VANZ News Issue 3
GallIpolI 2010
Turkey isn’t always on people’s dream
destination list; it’s that country somewhere in
Europe, somewhere near Asia, somewhere
in Eurasia … has anyone got a map?
I’ve always won obscure competitions – a set of knives, a food whiz, tickets to a Garfield movie. But never anything that I’d actually worked for, nothing that had me planning conversation starters to use on John Key, or pinning Granddad’s medals to my blazer for the Dawn Service. “That’s fantastic!” said Mrs Drummond when I shared the news, “Haven’t you heard? Alana Stretton won a place too!” I was ecstatic when, at Trentham Military Camp our chaperone assigned Alana and I as roomies. I’ve known Alana since I was four and as she’d seen me in significantly embarrassing dance costumes, there was mutual comfort of standards in our hotel rooms which stretched from Darwin to Turkey.
When we touched down in Turkey after 11
hours flying there was an overwhelming sense
of arriving home. Already the contingent felt
united on a mission to pay respects to the
fallen soldiers, and the friendships forged
between veterans and students were like that
of grandparents and grandchildren.
For six days in Turkey we were lodged in
a hotel in Canakkale, almost seven hours
from Istanbul by bus, and a half hour ferry
ride (full of bubbly Turkish locals) to Gallipoli
Peninsula. We first traversed Anzac Cove
and its undulant, scrubby surroundings on
22 April. Empty stadium seating fenced what
would become the internationally televised
Dawn Service, whereas only a five minute
walk down the dust road rested the real
Anzac Cove, waves lapping the shore beside
a graveyard. But it was one of those sights
that are spoiled by knowledge. You can’t help
but imagine the tainted blood red sea and the
footprints of the fallen and the noise and the
rubble. People think poppies only grow in
Flanders Fields. They don’t. We saw them
everywhere.
The next day was one of the greatest of my life; visiting ancient Greek ruins, eating waffles cooked by a man with a flamethrower, and meeting John Key and Judith Collins. Zigzagging my way through JK’s bodyguards was fun, and a group of us sat on the sunny deck listening to veterans tell stories.
It was 24 April that the highlighted events of
the trip began. Overnight we had somehow
become ‘VIPs’ accustomed to police
escorts, red carpets, and prime seats at
commemorative services for the Turks,
French and Commonwealth nations. At the
Turkish Ceremony we heard speeches by
various Prime Ministers, saw wreaths laid
and soldiers marching, then were treated
to a traditional Turkish performance and a
military flyover where troops dangled from
ropes attached to helicopters. My favorite
ceremony was the French service because
their Navy passed out flowers for people to
lay on a cross of their choice - I gave mine to
an Emile Barthalomy.
Every year my parents have hauled me out of
bed at five o’clock for the Anzac Parade. But
this year Alana’s alarm woke us at 2.15am.
Yet the moods of the officials on our bus
were odd. Something was amiss. As our bus
struggled through the crowds of pilgrims at
Anzac Cove, an NZDF officer boarded and
announced that three men from Ohakea Air
Base had died in a helicopter accident just
hours before. It didn’t take us long to realise
we’d met and taken photos with those men
the previous week – we’d even sat inside that
fatal helicopter. The tragedy of Anzac Day
had truly hit New Zealand.
Anzac Day at Gallipoli was a smoothie of services. At the Dawn Service, Australians and New Zealanders draped their arms around each other as brothers. The Turkish Ceremony was a bombardment of red flags, bodyguards, beating drums and foreign languages.
The New Zealand Ceremony at Chunuk Bair
was the most heart-wrenching. John Key was
cheered like a hero and The Maori Cultural
Group sang beautifully in remembrance of
the men who had died that morning - and the
men who had died 95 years before. Minister
of Veterans Affairs, Judith Collins read a
letter written on the eve of battle from William
Malone to his wife at home, and brought
almost everybody, including herself, to tears.
As we left the ceremony via the red carpet,
Defence Force members lined the path
saluting us, and it felt back to front, like we
should have saluted them.
The journey home was broken up with bursts
of sightseeing, and as we flew across Israel,
Egypt, India, and Indonesia, contact details
and goodbyes were exchanged, along with
promises to meet up in a few months. As we
touched down in Wellington and applause
erupted from the aisles, the warmth of being
home didn’t quite ease the breaking of a
spell which had held us together in some of
the greatest and most altering weeks of our
lives.