My, hasn’t the political arena been interesting lately? From an outsiders perspective it seems like our very own version of government Bold and the Beautiful. First there was the surprise election in WA, followed by the so called “bloodbath” in NSW resulting in a new premier and his mostly under-experienced cabinet been handed the difficult task of cleaning up the mess left by Morris Iemma.

Now, not only do we have a new WA premier and a sparkling new Liberal-National partnership, but we also have a new leader of the opposition. News straight from Liberal headquarters says that Malcolm Turnbull defeated Dr Nelson 45-41 in a surprise ballot called by the former opposition leader just after his jet-lagged rival returned from Italy.

Despite speculation early this morning that Dr Nelson might just scrape by, in hind-sight it’s easy to say that this change is probably for the better. Since before the last federal election, Mr Turnbull has been slowly coming more and more into the public eye and the Liberal party obviously hopes this will put an end to the never-ending leadership question. That is, until Peter Costello comes into the spotlight again.

Now we must all wait to see whether the new Opposition Leader will be able to turn around the last poll showing Dr Nelson trailing far behind Kevin Rudd 16 per cent to 62 per cent as preferred Prime Minister. The PM reckons he can, saying that, with the easing of all that tension that has been building over the last few months, a surge in the opinion polls is “a normal thing”.

From a voters point of view I really don’t think the PM should be worried. Putting aside the fact that he has been described as one of our most popular Prime Ministers (with his time in office still in its infancy); consistent opinion polls show that the Liberals have some catching up to do.

Putting weight behind that argument is the wonderfully lazy way in which Australians seam to choose their leaders. It seems that we elect one major party into power and leave them there for a good 7, 10 or even for 26 years. The other major political party more or less holds all the state governments and then once a decade or so, we switch!

One interesting point the change of leadership does bring up is the question of an Australian republic. Rudd says that Turnbull has long been an advocate of the change and bipartisan support is needed to get it happening. If true that means we could all be in for a bigger change than your average switch-the-state-governments-over swap, although the wonderful thing about democracy is that the public gets to shelve that plan if we don’t want to say goodbye to the mother country just yet.

One certainty is that we are all in for an action-packed show over the next few months.

Canberra-based website RoomRates.com.au is gaining on its competitors in the cyber world by providing extra incentives to its customers when they book their accommodation online. 

RoomRates.com.au is the latest brainchild of successful Canberra entrepreneur Robert Leticq, whose ACT Tourism Award-winning Privileges Card launched in 1991 is used by tens of thousands of Australians to access fantastic deals at leading leisure and entertainment venues.

“RoomRates.com.au is the only known web site to provide a dining incentive with every booking (hotel deal with a free meal) and it is the only known web site that donates part of its profits to leading charities that find shelter for people in need (donate a bed when you book ahead)”, says Leticq.

Users say the site is clean and clutter free, simple to use and easy to navigate.

With a range of 45,000 hotels in 120 countries to choose from, and the ability to take advantage of a ‘lowest rate guarantee’ for last minute bookings, plus the free main meal deal at quality restaurants in a growing number of cities, RoomRates.com.au is fast becoming the popular online booking site.

Access the site via www.RoomRates.com.au

The Australian War Memorial offers the opportunity for all Australians to experience a significant part of history and nationhood.

It is open daily. Entry is free, although donations are encouraged to assist in maintaining the collection.

Must sees:

Colonial Conflicts
First World War 1914-1918
Second World War 1939-1945
Conflicts 1945 to today
The dioramas
The Hall of Valour
Aircraft Hall
ANZAC Hall
The Discovery Zone
 

Special places:

The entrance and commemorative courtyard
The Hall of Memory
The Tomb of the Unknown Australian Soldier
The Sculpture Garden
 

Four millennia before the Californian Supreme Court overturned its ban on same-sex marriage and Ellen DeGeneres wed her girlfriend Portia de Rossi, two manicurists of Ancient Egypt won social acceptance for their homosexual relationship.

Since the Tomb of Niankhkhnum and Khnumhotep was discovered in 1964 in the Necropolis of Saqqara at Memphis on the West bank of the Nile, debate has raged as to what relationship they shared as it is extremely rare to find two men of equal status buried together.

The key to this mystery lies in the Wall paintings covering the inside of the tomb,
which show the two men repeatedly pictured together, sometimes holding hands, sometimes with their arms around each other. In two of these murals they are shown with noses touching, the most intimate embrace permitted in Egyptian art at the time.

Although the tomb has been studied, very little has been written about it. A fact Egyptologist Greg Reeder, a contributing editor to the Egyptology Journal KMT, is planning on changing.

Speaking to The Sunday Times, Mr Reeder said Niankhkhnum and Khnumhotep adopt poses which are strikingly similar to male-female married couples on other tombs of that era. “Same-sex desire must be considered as a probable explanation,” he said, though he admits it is impossible to be sure. “We can only say for certain that the carvings show a profound intimacy between the two men, and the people who built the tomb were possibly unsure how to portray this.”
Opponents say that Niankhkhnum and Khnumhotep could have been twins, conjoined twins or blood relatives, such as brothers, because of the similarities between the two names.

“The danger is that people want to find positive (homosexual) images in the past and it is very hard for modern European eyes to resist seeing the images as homoerotic,” Richard Parkinson, assistant keeper in the department of Ancient Egypt and Sudan at the British Museum, said to The Sunday Times. “I doubt myself that this is one of them, simply because we have no other evidence of male-male relationships being commemorated.”

Niankhkhnum means “joined in life” and Khnumhotep means “joined to the blessed state of the dead”. Together the names can be translated as “joined in life and joined in death” and although it was not unheard of for Egyptians to change their names later in life, the two men also share the same title, “Overseer of Manuscripts to the Pharaoh”. As such they were responsible for the Pharaoh’s hands and among the privileged few allowed to touch the ruler.

Even though Niankhkhnum was known to be married, the hieroglyphs that tell their stories still fail to mention their relationship. In a scene where the two men share a final banquet before their journey into the afterlife, Niankhkhnum’s wife has been plastered over and Khnumhotep’s spouse fails to make an appearance at all.

Mr Reeder said that in this banquet scene, Khnumhotep occupies the place normally associated with wives and that hints of homosexual relationships, commonplace in ancient Greece and Rome, have been found in Egyptian Papyruses.

“Same-sex desire existed just behind the ideal façade constructed by the ancients” he stated at a speech in Dallas in 1998, noting that it is often difficult to find the right words to talk about sexuality in ancient times “…Gay’ is too loaded. ‘Homosexual is too modern, so you have to speak in terms of their relationship to one another” He said.

Although their ancient ancestors were known for their sexual customs, which included incest to keep the royal blood pure, current Egyptian laws that ban any homosexual activity, have made it impossible for gay tourist operators to target the site.

Thomas Dowson, an independent scholar formerly at Manchester University, told The Sunday Times: “I have absolutely no problem if we have evidence of same-sex unions in the past that is used to challenge the homophobia of our society today, though that doesn’t mean we play fast and loose with the data.”

The tomb was restored by German Archeologists in the late 1970’s, opened to the public in 1990 and ever since has attracted a lot of gay tourists.

“I think it is beautiful, but if it became too big, I wouldn’t be surprised if the Egyptian authorities closed it down,” Dowson said.