May 19: Gallipoli

Gallipoli turned out to be quite an emotive experience for two people who knew very little about the whole affair. Learning about the pointlessness of the nine-month bloodbath and the lack of planning and common sense exhibited by the instigating British war council, made the hundreds of thousands of deaths on both sides seem so futile.

It’s sometimes referred to as the last gentleman’s war, or something like that, because of the great respect the Turks paid to the Aussies and vice versa, which developed as a consequence of being within earshot of each other in the trenches. That gives some idea of how ridiculously close the battle lines were, creating a situation where to leave the trenches was to die. Except in some situations, like when a Turk entered no-man’s-land to come to the aid of a fallen, suffering Brit. There are several stories of unusual camaraderie like this, which are hard to over-sentimentalise. Enemies trading cigarettes, meat tins. We were impressed by the empathy that each side had for all the combatants, pawns in an international game of “Risk” (mixing metaphors, sorry).

On the touristic side, we did manage to see Peter Weir’s Gallipoli twice (springs, steel springs!) as well as a documentary on the conflict, staying at Anzac House. The lowlight of the day was the clearly audible vomiting of a fellow tour member from across the hall during the night.