Saturday 25th April is Anzac Day here in New Zealand, and also celebrated by our friends in Australia. The word Anzac is part of the culture of New Zealanders and Australians. ANZAC is an acronym for Australian and New Zealand Army Corps, a grouping of several divisions created early in the Great War of 1914–18. The Anzacs first saw action at Gallipoli on 25 April 1915. The small cove where the Australian and New Zealand troops landed was quickly dubbed Anzac Cove. Soon the word was being used to describe all the Australian and New Zealand soldiers fighting on the Gallipoli Peninsula. Later it came to mean any Australian or New Zealand soldier.
This year, because of Covid 19 Lockdown, the first time in more than a century, there'll be no dawn services to commemorate ANZAC Day. People are encouraged to mark it in their own way, perhaps placing poppies in their letter boxes, or in windows. We have our hand crafted ceramic poppy outside our kitchen window. This was purchased three years ago when we visited the Great War Exhibition at the historic Dominion Museum in Wellington - read about our visit here
Our ceramic Anzac poppy
And of course Robin had the New Zealand flag flying.
In Flanders fields the poppies blow
Between the crosses, row on row
That mark our place, and in the sky
The larks, still bravely singing fly
Scarcely heard amid the guns below.
Between the crosses, row on row
That mark our place, and in the sky
The larks, still bravely singing fly
Scarcely heard amid the guns below.
Giving thanks to all our Anzac heroes, past and present.
1 comment:
It was an Anzac Day we will all remember.
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