Written in the stars
As a child, I spent countless hours not only watching and playing sport, but also reading books about past players, teams and iconic moments, drafting fantasy teams in the back of the classroom and drawing pictures of my favourite players winning premierships. The latter in which resulted in an artwork of mine featuring on the cover of the Little League magazine a few days before my twelfth birthday. This love for sport was not something I discovered on my own, it was my birthright.
My father is a middle child like me; however, he is the fourth child in a family of eight. He is also the son of Lebanese immigrants who left the small village of Hardine, nestled in the northern mountains of Lebanon for a new life in Sydney, Australia. My grandparents arrived in Australia in the 1950s with very little money and a large amount of hope, the same hope many immigrants carry with them, hope for a better life. Over a decade passed before they eventually settled in a small house on Quigg Street in the south-west Sydney suburb of Lakemba. Growing up in this quiet suburb, my father and his siblings would often make the twenty-minute walk down to Belmore Sports Ground, the home of the Canterbury-Bankstown Bulldogs rugby league team. Overtime, this place, this team and this sport became a sense of identity for the Elias family. The glory, the heartbreak, the cheers and the tears, rugby league was running, kicking and tackling its way into the DNA of my family.
Fast forward to the 1980s and a new generation of Elias kids were coming into the world. The time had come for my father and his siblings to move out of Lakemba and start families of their own. In 1994, I came into this world to an older sister and three years later I was sandwiched in the middle when my parents brought me home a younger brother. By 2005, 23 grandkids were sitting on the branches of the Elias family tree that towered over that sacred house in Quigg Street, Lakemba. Every Sunday afternoon the backyard of this house would wind back the sands of time through the kick of a footy, swing of a cricket bat or throw of a tennis ball. We could only be stopped by the smell of the traditional Lebanese feast coming from inside. After filling our bellies with kousa (stuffed zucchin), kibbeh nayyeh (raw meat), tabbouleh, and everything else my grandma had prepared for us, we would head back out to continue our game under the dim light of a torch tied unremarkably to a pole. Those Sunday nights shaped us, moulded us and created who we are, a family bonded by love, compassion, heritage and sports.
In 2017, the world watched as one of these Elias kids took to the global stage. With Australia and New Zealand hosting the Rugby League World Cup that year, we were all as eager as ever to watch the Aussies take home another World Cup. But this time it was different. On November 11th, 2017, the Elias family came together once again to witness the power of rugby league, the importance of sport and the deep connection we have with our past. We scanned our tickets, made our way through the crowd of green and gold jerseys and took our seats in the stadium. The sound of the drums made the stars above dance and the flashing lights of the stadium flirted with the field below. Both teams took the field, and we stood for the national anthems. The Elias family was in full attendance, all except for one. The one who was in the arena. Out there, standing opposite the Australian team, with a cedar tree on his heart and the hope of Lebanon on his back, stood the grandson of Lebanese immigrants who had found the better life they hoped for many decades ago.
Lebanon had their best performance in a World Cup that year, narrowly losing to Tonga in the knockout stage. When my grandparents left Lebanon to find a better life, Australia became their new home. I have never visited Lebanon, neither has my father nor most of his siblings, but the connection remains. It is a part of who we are, it is in our blood, it is our past. It is also our present and our future. My grandmother can no longer cook, I will never taste her food again. My siblings, cousins and I have all grown up and the Next generation of Elias kids are coming into this world. We no longer see each other every Sunday, only at weddings, birthdays, Christmas time and in more difficult times, to say goodbye. As the sands trickle down, those memories of playing in the backyard of that house in Quigg Street, Lakemba fade a little. But on a cold winter night, as we rug up on couches far and wide from each other, surrounded by our new families, something special happens. The past, present and future collide. The world may have changed since my grandparents arrived in this country over seven decades ago, but one thing has remained, one thing will always remain, our love for each other, our love for Lebanon, our love for Australia and our love for sport.