Beaconsfield
Mining is perhaps the most manly occupation out there; miners are men at their Aussiest, brothers in bulky arms and dust-built beards toiling away underground for the rest of us. They’re such classic blokes that they even threaten to kiss one another as punishment and yet it takes a near-tragic event such as Beaconsfield for us to actually recognize them with a telling of their story; which is made much worse by the fact that it is killers, addicts and incestuous idiots who get the attention instead. Even here though the fact that they are miners seems besides the point, it’s only the plural status of the word that matters, that there are two of them under there that makes this a story worth savoring. Unlike 127 Hours or the like this isn’t a story of survival – physically their achievements were not amazing – or the strength of the human spirit – I’m not sure that they actually triumphed over adversity – it’s one of mateship and according to scripture nothing is more Aussie than that.
