SYDNEY -- Goodbye to the traditional Australian summer, surfing Pacific waves or lazing on golden beaches. Meet this summer's new beach sport, dodging gangs of racists trying to kill one another.
Race riots hit Australia, scream newspaper headlines. And television newscasts confirm the once unimaginable, the horrific sight of police battling to restrain screaming mobs of bloodied youths. For the first time, laid-back Australia is facing the possible validity of what some Asian critics have long claimed -- we are a nation of incipient racism.
The usually glorious weekends of sunny Christmas-New Year holidays are effectively canceled, at least in the worst trouble spots along the miles of beaches fronting Sydney. Happy days are being postponed for holidaying families to avoid outbreaks of wild, hit-and-run violence.