With or without the adjective "whinging", the Ten Pound Pom is a colloquial term used to describe British citizens who migrated to Australia after the Second World War for a mere £10 (as a "Hun" I paid £50).
It's been made into a TV series which follows a group of "Poms" who left post-war Britain in 1956 for Australia, having been promised a better house, better job prospects and a better quality of life for just £10.
The first episode shows how a woman wipes the vomit from her drunken husband's mouth with a piece of newspaper that shows an advert which reads, "Build a new life in Sunny Australia". And the rest is history!
I discovered the German equivalent of this advertisement in the German Bild Zeitung , which was like television in print: plenty of pictures (BILD means 'image') and sensationalised commentary. Sold for 10 Pfennig, or the eqivalent of a box of matches, everyone could afford it and, with just four pages, read it all in one sitting - literally!
Because, being just four pages, it could easily be folded - lengthwise to be slipped down one's trouser leg, or twice across to fit into one's back pocket - and taken to the office loo which in those days was the only place where one was allowed to take some time off from work.
Speed reading hadn't been invented yet and so, in an office with over twenty people and just one windowless loo, slow readers could be a bit on the nose, made worse on a Monday morning when the reporting of the weekend's footie results in the "Kicker Fussball-Illustrierte" slowed down some football-mad readers' bowel movements even further.
Such were the conditions in my office when I was an articled clerk in Germany in the early 60s, so is it any wonder I emigrated to Australia? - see here. But it wouldn't have happened without the Bild Zeitung which at the time carried advertisements by the Australian Embassy showing a smiley face in the shape of the Australian continent with rays of sunshine around the edges under the header "Come to sunny Australia!" - in German, of course, or I wouldn't have understood it.
Information about Australia, a young and aspiring nation, and the opportunities awaiting you there, are available from the Australian Information and Immigration Agency
2 Hamburg 1, Mönckebergstrasse 11, Phone 33 49 82.
For more information complete this coupon (in block letters) and mail it to us."
Of the TV series "Ten Pound Pom", some kindly soul has uploaded all the six episodes, from Episode 1 above to Episode 2,
Episode 3,
Episode 4,
Episode 5, and
Episode 6. Before YouTube takes them down again!
(Well, that didn't take long: they've been taken down again already!)
As for the 10 Pfennig Bild Zeitung , it's still around today, albeit a lot dearer. And I am still in Australia, too, a lot older but still grateful for having read that life-changing ad while things were a bit "on the nose".
