People jeer at Melbourne for being the only city on the planet that marks a horse race with a civic holiday. Nevertheless, they may post a notice like this on a store: "Dear customers: Since gambling on horse racing is a tradition that we can hardly resist, our employees have gone to the race course to waste away their monthly salaries. If we don't win, the store will open again tomorrow, but if we win enough money for our retirement, the store won't be open again!"

In 1890, Mark Twain experienced the colorful insanity in the city on this day. "Nowhere in the world have I encountered a festival of people that has such a magnificent appeal to the whole nation. The Cup astonishes me." Since 1861, the race has been held 146 times, but the people of Melbourne are still as passionate about it as ever.

On this day, my colleague and I each entered the race course separately with the cheapest tickets (AU$50 or US$39). However, faced with thousands of people, we were unable to locate each other no matter how we tried with our cell phones. There were simply too many people! We elbowed our way through the crowd, looked at our map, stretched our necks, and looked from side to side, and after maybe 30 minutes we finally saw the horses.

People who couldn't see the horses or weren't watching the race were frenetically involved in a variety of activities. They were either betting, or they were in queues waiting to buy food. Excluding all the lottery centers throughout the country, over $35 million (US$27 million) was bet at the race course on this day. Meanwhile, 190,000 people took turns buying breakfast, lunch and afternoon tea, while others had picnics on the lawns with their complete picnic sets (including, of course, fresh flowers, umbrellas and checkered tablecloths).

It was a typical spring day, partly cloudy with occasional showers. The temperature was 14 degrees Celsius (57 Fahrenheit). Despite my winter garments, I was still shivering. However, women on the race course were exposing their shoulders, backs, legs and cleavages. They wore high heels, their skirts flapped in the wind, and the feathers on their hats waved proudly. Once in a while, they would bump into friends or relatives and they would stop and chat, thus blocking the traffic. Gentlemen in fancy suits and neckties sipped on champagne and wine and chatted with their ladies in the chilly wind.

Some things from the colonial period became popular without any reason, just like this day when the Melburnians are more British than the British themselves.

A fancy world built with gold

The year when horse racing was first introduced in Melbourne was quite memorable. After 1851, when the news of the discovery of gold near Melbourne became widespread, nouveau riche quickly transformed Melbourne into a metropolis as bustling and flourishing as any European city. In 1870, it was regarded as the Paris of the Southern Hemisphere. In 1880, George Augustus Henry Sala, a famous British reporter, described Melbourne as "Marvellous Melbourne." Since then, the term has stuck.

The newly rich city folks demanded a higher quality of life, and they pursued more "civilized" social activities. Horseback riding, horse racing and gambling, which were the pastimes of British upper-class society, became status symbols and elegant ways for Melburnians to waste their money.

The gold strikes at inland Bendigo and Ballarat transformed Melbourne from an unknown little town into a haven for gold prospectors from around the world. The city's population increased to 140,000 from 30,000 in less than ten years. The city saw the rise of the University of Melbourne, a provincial library, and a number of museums. Streets were widened and railways were built. The Flinders Street Train Station and Station Pier were opened.

Station Pier was once where thousands of dreams and worries docked, but now it is only a spot for tourists and memories compared to the Port of Melbourne, the biggest and busiest port in Australia.

In the past, immigrants came to Australia by ship. Some came alone and some with their families; some rode in luxury, and some were crowded into the lower decks; some remember the trip as long and tiresome with people always arguing and fighting on the decks; some people remember that they vomited throughout the voyage.... David Johnson from Britain recalled that when his family arrived, Melbourne was extremely hot, but his mother, who strictly observed public decorum, demanded that he put on a complete British winter uniform, ignoring the fact that the thick clothing could cause him to have heatstroke. Maria Attadi from Italy said that her mother hid Italian spice seeds in her bra, her waist belt, and inside her daughter's doll to smuggle them into Australia.

The gold rush, two world wars, family reunions, work, education, and other reasons have brought millions of immigrants who crossed the sea in waves to form today's Melbourne.

"I don't know where I belong--half of me is from Venice and the other half Melbourne," smiled 65-year-old Leana Cavedon, speaking to us in fluent English with a slight Italian accent. She has lived for half a century in the northern part of Melbourne, where 95 percent of the residents have Italian blood. She now feels at ease owning both cultures.

Leana and her family left Italy in 1957, like many other families who moved to other countries to escape the poverty in the aftermath of World War II. They believed that they would return to Italy after a few years of making money overseas. However, she didn't go back until 1996. "There was no particular reason why we didn't go back sooner. Marriage, childbirth, and taking care of my parents simply took up my time."

A city with millions of stories

She and her family didn't realize that Italy would improve so quickly. Seeing their native country making such a stunning recovery after the war, Italians who have worked hard and lived good lives in Melbourne have mixed feelings of relief, agony, happiness, and regret. Suppositions like "If I had done this back then, what would have happened?" flicker through their minds.

"We can't forget what we threw away, nor can we throw away what we later picked up," she said. It was a rainy evening, and the aroma of Italian coffee pervaded her warm cottage. She took out a family album and a collection of poems with photographs of Italian immigrants. She read one verse to me which expressed that perhaps there would always be some unknowable scenes on the path of her life that she didn't choose.

This is a very ordinary immigrant story, and in Melbourne there might be over 1.3 million stories like this one. Today over one third of the city's 3.7 million people were born in over a hundred different countries and speak over 140 languages and 300 dialects. In a broader sense, Melbourne is indeed an immigrant city.

Disregarding the aborigines who immigrated from Asia and Pacific islands tens of thousands of years ago, it was the Europeans who discovered the land, named the place, and developed it. The Portuguese, Dutch and British all sailed past Australia, encountered the aborigines, and mapped parts of the continent, but the honor of charting most of the land mass and claiming British dominion over it fell to Captain James Cook. However, it wasn't until more than a decade later that the continent was seen as useful: It would solve the problem of overcrowded jails in the United Kingdom.

The first shipload of prisoners arrived near modern Sydney, New South Wales, in January 1788, and the land officially became part of the British Empire, but it was not until 47 years later, in 1835, that the Europeans started a settlement in the southeastern part of Australia.

In 1837, the city was named after William Lamb Melbourne, the then British prime minister. In July 1851, the province of Victoria, where Melbourne is located, became the fifth independent colony in Australia, after New South Wales, Tasmania, Western Australia, and Southern Australia.

One month later, gold was discovered in Buninyong, 120 kilometers (74 miles) west of Melbourne, and later also in Ballarat and Bendigo. Melbourne began the most brilliant era of its history as a key transportation center, exporting gold and importing miners. From that moment forward, the Europeans replaced the aborigines and became the major residents of the area. Shortly afterwards, those new arrivals rejected immigrants from other countries, especially the largest group, the Chinese.

"The history of early Chinese settlement was not recorded because most of them were illiterate," said 83-year-old Liu Xin-yao (劉新耀), whose father and grandfather were businessmen in Melbourne at that time. He remembers that they were quiet and hard-working, and they did not talk about their past much.

As early as 1851, hundreds of Chinese had already left China for job opportunities in Australia. After gold was discovered, more Chinese moved near the gold mines in Victoria, their population peaking at 40,000. When the gold started to peter out, the Chinese gradually moved to the cities to start businesses or trades. Liu knew that his forefathers began to import goods from China then.

In 1952, Liu left his wife and children in Hong Kong and came to help his father's business in Australia. "At first, I had difficulty adjusting to the new life here, especially since I couldn't speak English. I worked most of the time, but I often thought about going back." However, his older brother, father, his grandfather's brothers, and great-grandfather all left their families behind in Hong Kong and worked in Australia.

White Australia

Back then, long-distance communication was expensive and transportation inconvenient. Liu and his family didn't see or hear from each other for a decade or even longer. The family bond was secured by writing letters and wiring money. This was typical for Chinese society in Australia. One of the reasons for this lifestyle was that the older generation back in China felt that their young men wouldn't send any money home if their wives and children went with them. The other main reason for the insularity of the Chinese was the White Australia Policy, which was introduced in 1901 to restrict the increase of Chinese and later expanded to restrict immigrants from Asia, the Middle East and Africa.

Before this took place, colonies like Victoria, New South Wales and Southern Australia had already passed laws capping the number of Chinese in their territories and imposing high taxes on immigrants. Later, the government proclaimed an outright ban on any more Chinese entering Australia. On January 1, 1901, the six colonies in Australia became the Federation of Australia, and the immigration policy became tougher, making things even more difficult, especially for non-white immigrants. It wasn't until years later that the policy was loosened.

"Australia's immigration policy changes as time goes on," said Zhang Qi-qing (張齊清), a senior reporter with the Australian Chinese Daily who immigrated from Malaysia 19 years ago. The loosening of the immigration policy coincided with major historical events. For instance, after the 1989 Tiananmen Square Massacre, Chinese immigrants were granted Australian citizenship, which also changed the cultural condition of the Chinese in Melbourne.

Actually, the White Australia Policy started to weaken in the 1940s and 50s when horrible racist wars were rampant in other parts of the world. After the Second World War, accepting refugees became an international responsibility that Australia could not refuse, and many Australians also felt it was the right and natural thing to do.

Located in a place far from those wars, Australia was free from their destruction, but the wars also taught Australians many things. Australian soldiers fought against the Turks at Gallipoli during World War I and against the Italians in North Africa in World War II. Australia was the only country besides the United States that sent armed forces to the Vietnam War.

Australia finally saw clearly its position through these wars. The country understood that instead of going to war in far-off lands, it should not have participated in any of those unnecessary military confrontations. Furthermore, it should pay more attention to neighboring countries in Asia instead of culturally related but distant countries like the United States and Britain.

Neighboring Asia

Nowadays, Australia is very closely tied to Asian countries. Its biggest trade partners are Japan, China, and South Korea. Its Ministry of Education promotes Chinese, Japanese and Indonesian as the major foreign languages to be studied in school, and the five million tourists that bring in billions of dollars every year come mostly from Japan, China, Singapore, and other Asian countries.

It's hard for modern tourists to realize that the exhibition of racial harmony in Melbourne didn't appear until 1970, when the White Australia Policy was abolished. Also, they don't realize that the same Melbourne that once rejected Chinese has now elected a Chinese as its mayor.

John So (蘇震西), born in Guangdong Province, China, came to Australia when he was 17 years old and graduated from the University of Melbourne. During his university days, he was actively involved with a movement opposing the White Australia Policy. After graduation he taught high school physics, and then he went into business running a number of restaurants. In 2001 he became the first publicly-elected Lord Mayor of Melbourne (mayors were previously appointed by the city council), and he won a second term in 2004. So is the longest serving Melbourne mayor.

Even though his opponents criticize him from time to time because he speaks with a strong Cantonese accent, public polls show that he is highly welcomed for his friendly and humorous style. We interviewed many Melburnians, people of all ages and races, and no one had any complaint about his service to the public. In 2005 he was chosen as one of the top ten mayors around the world, and in 2006 he was the only Australian mayor to make the list.

The base of his popularity is not only the local Chinese community; in fact, there are far fewer Chinese in Melbourne than in Sydney or Brisbane. Instead, Melbourne has a high percentage of immigrants from the Mediterranean. The city has the highest number of Italians in Australia, and also the most Jewish people in the Pacific region. Half of the Jewish people in Australia live in Melbourne. The city also has the largest population of Greeks outside Greece and Cyprus.

Melbourne is dotted with areas representing a variety of ethnic groups and cultures from many parts of the world: the Italian section of Lygon Street, the Greek area on Lonsdale Street, the relaxed Mediterranean atmosphere of Brunswick Street, the Middle Eastern flavor of the suburb of Coburg, Melbourne's Chinatown on Little Bourke Street, and the Vietnamese area in Footscray.

If you go to McDonald's for breakfast, you'll hear people around you talking in Chinese, Japanese, Arabian or Tamil about what they want to eat. At lunch, you can consider Chinese fried noodles, Punjabi aloo naan (with flour and potato as the main ingredients), Mexican tortillas, or Ethiopian injera (pancake-like bread). Spices from Thailand, Korea and Sichuan assault your sense of smell. Sweets such as baklava from Lebanon, rasagolla from Bangladesh, or tiramisu from Italy entice you.

For supper, you may want to have normal, traditional Melbourne food, but when you find it, you may ask if such typically British fare as fish and chips count. Or how about having some tasteless meat pies? Considering the cruelty, could you really eat kangaroo meat?

A tale of two cities: Sydney and Melbourne

Traditionally dull British food has had an effect on Melburnians' culinary tastes. Most people cook simple, bland meals without many ingredients or spices. Breakfast is usually cornflakes or oatmeal (bacon and eggs may be added on the weekends); they enjoy sandwiches for lunch like the British, and supper is the time when they like to try all kinds of exotic food.

"Generally speaking, Melburnians are willing to try all kinds of food," said Megan Fraser, who has worked at the headquarters of the Lonely Planet Publishing Company for 12 years and is now the company's international copyright manager. She has her own definitions of Melbourne: the weather changes constantly, so people tend to meet indoors; and compared to Sydney, Melbourne has more unique restaurants, coffee shops, delicious food, and live music.

Just like between Tokyo and Osaka, Zurich and Geneva, Toronto and Vancouver, there is also a kind of competition between Sydney and Melbourne. "The beauty of Sydney is that it is magnanimous, open, and allows one to see all, but Melbourne is controlled, hidden, and takes more time to discover," said Fraser, who was born in Sydney and raised in Melbourne.

In 1865, the gold rush allowed Melbourne to surpass Sydney and become the most populous and richest city of Australia. The feud between Sydney and Melbourne thus started.

The good times for Melbourne lasted until 1890, when the world sank into depression and the unemployment rate skyrocketed. In 1900, the population and wealth of the two cities were on a par. In 1901, when the Federation of Australia was established, Melbourne temporarily became the nation's capital. However, the rivalry between Melbourne and Sydney prompted the parliament to choose a new capital, and in 1927 it was moved to Canberra.

Nowadays, the competition is more of a joke among the residents of the two cities, but sometimes the joke can become serious. Melburnians laugh at Sydney because it used to be a place for prisoners, it has no culture, and the housing is expensive. Sydneysiders call Melbourne "Bleak City" or detest the Yarra River for being so filthy; they pretend that there is no war between the two, or ridicule Melburnians for treating Sydney as their imaginary enemy (meaning that Melbourne is no match for Sydney).

Regardless of the jokes, Melbourne is as beautiful as ever. Sydney is the most populous city of Australia, but Melbourne is always ranked ahead of Sydney as one of the most habitable cities on earth, and twice it was ranked first. The major plus is the fact that the city is safer than Sydney.

Other reasons include: good (if unpredictable) weather; an ethical and efficient government; a good ratio between working hours and wages, with the average income supporting a good quality of life; a clean environment; convenient transportation; excellent education (the University of Melbourne is the only Australian university ranked among the top 20 in the world); an abundant cultural scene (ballets, symphonies, art festivals, and film festivals run all year round); and nearly perfect sports facilities. Referred to as the world's capital of sports, Melbourne has the best cricket fields, tennis courts, racetracks, and other sports facilities. The city hosted the Olympic Games in 1956, half a century earlier than Sydney.

Being a good place to live in doesn't mean that it is a good place for investment, however. "The mode of business in Melbourne is different from that in Taiwan, where the population density is higher. The main business opportunities have been taken over by major corporations, so medium-sized companies can't expand much," said Yan Ke-ming (嚴克明), director of the Taipei Economic and Cultural Office in Melbourne.

This kind of business environment, with its lack of nimble maneuverability, is especially visible in Melbourne. The headquarters of three major Australian companies--Telstra (a telecommunication company), BHP Billiton (a mining company), and the National Australia Bank--are all in Melbourne. Many big old corporations in Melbourne like to hire college or university graduates who share the same upbringing and background. Therefore, not just foreigners, but even people from Sydney find it difficult to break into the Melbourne business circle with its tightly woven personal connections.

"Many Taiwanese people immigrate to Australia under the Business Skills Migration category, but most of them still keep their business activities in Taiwan," said Yan. Many Taiwanese people immigrate to Australia because they seek a better educational environment for their children. Those who really stay put in Australia are mostly small business owners or professionals.

"I owned a construction business in Taiwan, and what I lacked the most back then was land to build on. The land is abundant here in Australia, but I didn't realize that there are far fewer people, so my business is not as good as my friends' back in Taiwan," confessed Wu Tian-zuo (吳天佐), who has just left his post as the commissioner of the Overseas Compatriot Affairs Commission in the Taiwanese government, and who has lived in Australia for 20 years. He claimed that he could only do small business in Australia, but he lives in a mansion that not even his major business in Taiwan could ever help him acquire in Taiwan. His children have all grown up and have excelled in their careers. One can say that he has gained a good quality of life and family happiness in Australia.

Compared to other ethnic groups, Taiwanese people are new to Australia, having arrived only since the 1980s. Over 20,000 Taiwanese live in Brisbane, 15,000 in Sydney, around 6,000 in Melbourne, and 4,000 Taiwanese study in Australia.

Taiwanese immigrants are different from those who came before. The Taiwanese are the only immigrants who have come with a lot of money, and their purchases of mansions with lump sum payments were unthinkable to the vast majority of Australians.

The basic model for this trend comes from the Australian dream, which originated with the baby boom generation after the Second World War: owning a house on a quarter acre in the countryside, with a backyard for a barbecue, a swimming pool, and room for children to run around and play. The dream involved activities such as mowing the lawn, washing the car on weekends, and maybe taking an overseas trip once a year.

After the Second World War, Melbourne's expansion was based on this Australian dream, and people flocked to the suburban areas. With a lower population density, the area of Greater Melbourne grew to an amazing 8,806 square kilometers (3,522 square miles), while Sydney covers 4,000 square kilometers (1,600 square miles).

But in the past few years, people have been flowing back into the city. As the birthrate declines, young couples with only one or two children no longer dream of owning large houses; they prefer smaller houses or condos instead. Terrace houses built in the 1920s and 1930s have suddenly become expensive as these immigrants started moving in. The terrace houses serve as a witness to the cycle of changes and dreams of a city.

The so-called "dream" and "reality" are not absolutely opposite, nor are the "new immigrants" and "old immigrants." Perhaps it is that most residents were once immigrants, so they are able to respect and tolerate the new immigrants.

With this understanding and gratitude for having been thus accepted, a group of Taiwanese immigrants have started to care for other new immigrants with different skin colors and cultures. Every other Wednesday, Tzu Chi volunteers prepare and deliver packages of goods according to the needs of each new immigrant family. New volunteers may ask what the volunteers can actually accomplish in a country with a perfectly good social welfare system, but the fact is that there are still problems that the government cannot help.

In addition to aiding unemployed Australian white people, aborigines and poor Vietnamese, Tzu Chi people mostly help African refugees from Sudan, Libya, and Liberia. The volunteers help these people get through the difficult time while they look for jobs and adjust to their new lives. The volunteers believe that goodness will form a cycle and that in the future these refugees will also treat other new immigrants with similar understanding, so that all may experience the goodness in the most habitable city on the planet.

The beauty of Melbourne did not occur by accident, nor was it an inevitable destiny. From a city that rejected other races and cultures to one that treats and accepts everyone equally in a multicultural society, Melbourne's transformation is a model that other chaotic cities could certainly learn from.