HONK! Oz was a blast: what they thought of it

Morning temperatures of 35 degrees didn’t stop the HONK! Oz Grand Street Parade for Peace going ahead last Saturday, when hundreds gathered at Crown Street mall in colourful costumes, instruments in hand and ready to dance their way to the city's arts precinct. 

This year’s HONK! Oz festival brought performers from all around Australia to enjoy Wollongong’s vibrant music, art and activism. Local group the Femme Fatales celebrated 10 years of HONK! Oz with a femmbrella-making workshop on Friday, delivering much-needed shade for the parade. 

The Femme Fatales and other colourful groups shared their thoughts with the Flame on the day.

Mel and Christine - The Femme Fatales

Mel: "Today is all about hanging out with my friends and playing music, dressing up and having fun."

Christine: “With the community coming together, everyone can participate in some way, musically or with art. You don't have to be a professional musician. It's about having fun and joy on the streets, taking up public space. Fun, creativity. “

“Delilah has something on her umbrella, which I think is totally true, which says 'music mends'. I think that is so true for all of us. Music helps us cope with stress, you know, the frightening things happening in the world; music gives us the motivation to keep going."

Jess - Ballan Community Street Band, VIC

“We've come all the way from regional Victoria - we travelled like 900km in a minibus to get here. It's our first ever interstate tour, so we're just super-excited to be here and to be sharing music with so many awesome people who are just here to have fun and share the joy of playing music."

Jack - Junkadelic Brass Band, Perth

"We are doing a parade around this mall with a bunch of the other artists for Honk Oz. We've travelled all the way from Perth for this. Yesterday we did a performance at the Servo down in Port Kembla - really fun vibe, a really big community presence. People got into it. It was really fun."

Mum Brodie and Daughter Saffron - Tribal Jewels

Brodie: "We’re a local dance group who just celebrate dancing together and the sisterhood of dancing. We have cultural influences from across the world and we love taking part in Honk. We come and dance with a few of the different bands and just enjoy the celebration of music."

"Side note: my husband and I got married and we had the Con Artists as our band many, many years ago. And since then we've had two kids and this year both our kids are in Con bands. So it feels a little bit full circle, which is really, really nice. I’ve always been a part of Honk as a dancer, but now both my kids are musicians here so that’s really special for me this year."

Wollongong Friends of Palestine

Jett:  "A bunch of us came down as part of Wollongong Friends of Palestine - it's a beautiful community street atmosphere and the music is super-fun, but it's also a great opportunity for us to kind of show that we're still here, we're still showing up for Palestine. And especially in the Illawarra, where steel that's manufactured here goes and to be used against Palestinians, it's really important for us to show that every time something happens, we're here and we're flying that banner."

Casey: “Community, music, activism - what's not to love? We’ve seen a lot of that today, despite the heat, everyone came out still, and we’ve got people running around with spray bottles.”

Elena from Illawarra Bicycle Users Group (iBug)

"It’s a really lovely thing to do to get the community out playing music, isn't it? It's good because we're networking here, we're talking about cycling and how to improve cycling. 

“A lot of bicycle users groups get together with the idea of just organising rides for themselves, but we've decided there's enough of that and we really want a little bit more of an activist group. So we organise a few rides, but we're trying to get submissions in to improve the cycling infrastructure and so we're campaigning a little bit more, talking to different people here.”