This essay was originally delivered as a speech at the OzAsia Festival in Adelaide on 7 November 2025.

It was written in response to the prompt ‘And then the world went loud’.


I hear it first and I tell myself      it always sounds worse under a tin roof.

But even before I see the curtain of water beyond which nothing is visible

I know it’s the kind of rain that cracks gutters

                     sinks bitumen

                                           dislodges long-buried roots so that when the next violent wind comes

another tree is gone      before its time.
I try to ignore the building anxiety that rain like this always brings on, try to tether the thoughts that

wander to a terrifying future in which small island states have ceased to exist
and there are no more polar bears in the Arctic. 
I fix my mind on the present and think, Why today of all days?

I had high hopes for a big turnout but this weather is sure to keep people away.

Not everyone will be disappointed of course.

Some will be rubbing their hands in glee.

Like the guy who said, We cannot allow Sydney to descend into chaos

And the other one, who agreed: 
Absolutely they should not be taking over the Harbour Bridge.
The words on one of my favourite placards come to mind.

WE’LL BE LESS PROTESTY IF YOU BE LESS SHIT.
The metro’s not running either.

I can’t help but think that this isn’t a coincidence.

I imagine the plotting that happens behind the scenes:
If we stop one of the main lines of transport into the city, it’ll be harder for the bastards to get there.
But then I’ve always been prone to thoughts like this. Was told once by a psychotherapist at a dinner

party that things aren’t always as I perceive them to be.

I expect she was right, but there was something about the way she said it, and I resent her to this day.
I leave home early, allowing enough time for the possibility that there may be      obstacles.

I get on the bus.

Apart from the guy wearing the * FUCK MURDOCH *

                                                                                                t-shirt

(who’s also carrying a Socialist Alliance flag), I can’t be sure that anyone else is going where I am. 
It’s more promising at the station though. Busy. Bodies scurrying from all directions. With purpose.

Carrying signs and bearing familiar markers. Slogans on shirts. Flags. Scarves. 
There’s an excited buzz in the carriage, the harmony of camaraderie momentarily disturbed by the

discordant voice of one man who announces just a little too loudly that he and his

family. are going into the city. to see. The. Book. of. Mormon.
When I reach my destination, I go in search of the toilets and join the queue, which is already absurdly

long.

I think about the state they’ll be in by the end of the day.

Ugh.

I see a woman pushing a pram. One hand steering, the other clutching her toddler’s arm, just above the

elbow.

Her eyes are fixed on the middle distance.

She walks the length of the line realising only once she’s reached the front that THIS. IS. IT.

This      is the line      for the toilets. 
I’m closer to the front than the back, so I let her in.

Remembering what it was like when mine were that age. And how the kindness of strangers could change

the tenor of my day.

And then images flood my brain one after the other and also all at once and I can’t stop them all I can see

is children.

But not as they should be.

Not safe and warm in their mothers’ embrace.

Not smiling and free from care.

But bloody.

In pieces.

In plastic bags.
I’ve come early, but in the time I’ve spent standing in line for the toilets the station has EXPLODED with

protestors.

I mount the escalator, there’s no fast lane, just two rows of people standing still, eager to reach the exit. 
Everyone please make your way out of the station immediately, do not gather at the top of the escalator, I hear the

announcer say.

I look back, and down.

It’s PACKED.

And then it comes, not from someone in the crowd but over the loudspeaker. 
IN OUR THOUSANDS      IN OUR MILLIONS      WE ARE ALL PALESTINIANS! 
The crowd cheers.
Outside, the rain is heavy.

Torrential.

Some people huddle under shallow shelter, but most are out in the open.

The weird thing is, no one seems to mind.

Maybe they’re thinking, as I am, that it’s only rain.

And not 2,000-pound bombs or sniper fire from drones that lure people from their homes with

the      sound      of      babies      crying.

Weaponry so sophisticated it disappears bodies and robs people of the hope that they will be able to bury

their loved ones      whole.
Volunteers are handing out disposable raincoats.

A television helicopter whirrs overhead.

The rain eases enough for the umbrellas to come down but then with no warning it starts again and UP

they go.

Bunnings is making a killing today, I hear someone say.

And not just in umbrella sales and free advertising, I respond, silently.
The crowd is at a standstill, and my claustrophobia taps me on my shoulder and whispers,

How long do you think we’ll have to wait here?

My hips begin their protest.

I try to distract myself from the discomfort that ensues by taking in the scene around me.

At my left foot, there’s an Italian greyhound in a black, red, white and green raincoat. Shivering.

To my right is a man with a little baby strapped to his chest, five tiny toes peeking out from beneath the

wrap that covers the rest of her.                                      
I think of the weapons again.      
In front of me there’s a man whose hearing aid has been dislodged. Tentatively, I tap him on the shoulder

and let him know. He is grateful for my care.

Up ahead there’s a sign that says: 
THERE ARE NO TWO SIDES TO GENOCIDE
I turn to my brother and say, Do you remember how it used to be? In the eighties? And he

says, Yeah, the chants have come a long way. What was that one again? PLO YES YES. REAGAN

BEGUM NO NO. 
We laugh. 
But the truth is, if someone had told us back then, that on the third of August 2025,

300,000 people – maybe more, because they didn’t all make it out of the stations and onto the streets –

would      march      across      the      Sydney     Harbour      Bridge      for      Palestine      in      the

pouring      rain

well

we would not have believed them. 
I get out my phone.

There are messages.

Texts flit back and forth.

Are you here?

Yeah, just arrived.

Where are you?

The reception is appalling but I check the news.

There’s word of a counter-protest      of four.

That’s right, not 400. Not 4,000.

Four.
Finally the crowd shifts. And roars. Makes its way to the end of George Street, slow but strong.

Loops around and up and eventually onto the Bridge itself where police line the route.

Standing idle.

Nothing to do.

As usual.

At one stage, somewhere near the middle, I climb onto the railing, hoping to see more.

There’s no beginning and no end to the mass of people.

And then I’m back on the road and I look up and I see the Aboriginal flag flying in solidarity with those

on the ground.

Your struggle is ours, I hear it say. 
Now there’s a police helicopter, and as though we’ve been transported to the set of a dodgy disaster movie,

it issues garbled instructions through a tinny loudspeaker.

I ignore it. And so does everyone else around me.

I make it past the last pylons when the first text comes through on my phone.

It’s the police.

Telling me that it’s not safe to go on.

I ignore it. And so does everyone else around me.

Some minutes later a second text comes through.

It’s the police. Telling me that it’s not safe to go on.

I ignore it. And so does everyone else around me.
The Bridge is thick with bodies now and when word from the organisers finally reaches us
telling us that everyone who came from the south must turn around because there is simply not enough space to hold us

all at the other end
I think of that footage from the Hillsborough riots and I pray to a god I’m pretty sure I don’t believe in

that everyone will stay calm.

And they do.
I turn back because there is no other option.

Now people are moving in both directions like traffic on a two-way street.

A man cuts a path through the crowd for two elderly women on mobility scooters.

Walking beside me is a guy with a cane.

I look at his legs. They’re twisted at the knees.

I look at his face. It’s determined and strong.
The crowd thins as I trace my path back to where I began.

The underground station is teeming with people who’ve been on the Bridge and for once

no one’s looking at them like they don’t belong

no one’s refusing them entry

or telling them to stay quiet. 
No one’s denying them their right to exist.
For a brief moment, I’m gifted a glimpse into a future in which wrongs have been set right.
And then I’m back on the train. Heading home.

I look out the window but it’s dark. All I can see is reflected.
I think of that Darwish poem, ‘The War Will End’: 
       The war will end / The leaders will shake hands / The old woman will keep waiting for her martyred son

       The girl will wait for her beloved husband / And those children will wait for their hero father

       I don’t know who sold our homeland / But I saw who paid the price
I think about how L O U D everything was today.

The rain.

The colours of the umbrellas.

The solidarity.

The love.
I think about how L O U D the people were and what it took for them to find their voice.

What it will take for them to keep it.
And then I think about 
the price.