tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-80829727462341878652024-03-20T02:28:47.382-07:00Area SevenProving ground for articles.LKhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11244232092173678321noreply@blogger.comBlogger23125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8082972746234187865.post-5672734360499549992014-07-02T22:49:00.000-07:002014-07-03T15:58:24.447-07:0012 Standard Interview Questions, And 12 Answers We Dare You To GiveHave you ever been in an interview situation and suddenly had the overwhelming urge to punch the person interviewing you on the nose?<br />
Ever been asked to tell the whole truth?<br />
With the help of Stokesy, we've decided to help you out in an interview.<br />
<br />
<br />
<br />
<h3>
I can't believe they didn't offer me the job.</h3>
<img alt="http://s3-ak.buzzfeed.com/static/2014-05/enhanced/webdr02/7/0/enhanced-13395-1399437140-6.jpg" class="decoded" src="http://s3-ak.buzzfeed.com/static/2014-05/enhanced/webdr02/7/0/enhanced-13395-1399437140-6.jpg" /><b> </b><br />
<br />
<br />
<b>1. "Tell me about yourself..."</b><br />
<br />
Chicks dig me. Oh, hang on, no, that was Bill Murray in Stripes.<br />
<br />
I like Pina Coladas and getting caught in the rain. I’m not much into yoga, I am into champagne.<br />
<br />
Well I’m the type of guy who never settles down. I’m never in one place, I roam from town to town. I guess I am some sort of wanderer or something.<br />
My hobbies include, but are not limited to, masturbating and screaming. <br />
<br />
<b>2. "Why are you leaving your current position?"</b><br />
A change is as good as a holiday and I am out of annual leave at my current job. <br />
<br />
I hate work. I never anticipated that I would fail to win Powerball and remain a wage slave for my entire life.<br />
<br />
I got sick of the restaurants that were open for lunch around my old workplace.<br />
<br />
<b>3. "What do you consider your most significant accomplishment?" </b><br />
<br />
I once met ‘The Rock’.<br />
<br />
I have never been arrested for anything I actually did.<br />
<br />
<b>4. "Why do you believe you are qualified for this position?" </b><br />
<br />
Why do <i>you</i> believe it?<br />
<br />
I’m not a slack jawed yokel like the people I saw on the way in here.<br />
<br />
I went to university champ, how hard is it to sell hamburgers?<br />
<br />
<b>5. "Have you ever accomplished something you didn't think you could?" </b><br />
<br />
I once managed to drag myself out of bed to attend a job interview for a job I didn’t even want. In fact it was just this morning.<br />
<br />
I once convinced a woman to…um… actually no.<br />
<br />
<b>6. "What do you like/dislike most about your current or last position?"</b><br />
<br />
My boss. He can be a real jerk-off.<br />
<br />
I have to go like every day. I mean every fucking day dude!<br />
<br />
When they called me at home and said that not only do I have to come in every day, but at nine a.m as well, I knew it was time to quit.<br />
<br />
<b>7 . "How do you handle pressure? Do you like or dislike these situations?"</b> <br />
<br />
I find booze usually works, although sometimes I need something stronger.<br />
<br />
I love high pressure situations at work – you can get away with the craziest shit while everyone is panicking.<br />
<br />
Once I completed my "at desk" masturbating session while talking to my boss on Skype.<br />
Now that was pressure! <br />
<br />
<b>8. "The sign of a good employee is the ability to take initiative. Can <br />you describe a situation where you did this?" </b><br />
<br />
A guy at my last interview asked me this question and I immediately punched him in the face. In retrospect that freed me up to apply for this job, so it worked out great.<br />
<br />
Where I last worked last year we were doing nothing for the Melbourne Cup. I brought a six-pack and drank it under my desk.<br />
<br />
Also, my previous work put a porn firewall on the company network.<br />
I waited till the System Admin went to lunch and then went down and disabled it.<br />
An initiative that my fellow employees really appreciated.<br />
<br />
<b>9. "What was the worst/most embarrassing situation of your career? How <br />would you have done things differently with 20/20 hindsight?" </b><br />
<br />
At the Christmas party one year I faxed a photocopy of my arse to everyone on the management team. On reflection I should have waxed beforehand.<br />
<br />
<b>10. "How have you grown or changed over the past few years?" </b><br />
<br />
I got one of those penis enlargers on the internet. My wife says it hasn’t made a difference but sometimes I think it has.<br />
<br />
No, I sprung from the womb perfectly formed.<br />
<br />
<b>11. "What do you consider your most significant strength?"</b><br />
<br />
100% self actualisation.<br />
<br />
If I grow my hair really long I am able to slay 300 people with the jawbone of an ass.<br />
<br />
My right hand.<br />
<br />
<b>12. "Do you have any weaknesses? If so, what are they?"</b><br />
<br />
Chocolate cake, whole cream milk and heroin.<br />
<br />
Lolcats.<br />
<br />
If you tickle me I will wet my pants.<br />
<br />
My left hand. LKhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11244232092173678321noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8082972746234187865.post-8102704140871630432014-05-23T21:58:00.003-07:002014-05-26T17:21:23.580-07:00"I've decided to become a woman" - interview with my transgender friend.<table cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="float: right; margin-left: 1em; text-align: right;"><tbody>
<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiWXC-uAw9Mdx-x5CtLbfB65otalkASqkIIJo6VlMNQQ5UbxEfWR8Ye2K2-Ez0ClgWn7HrZq7NLHdqKounT7FowaPnYLtlsHFt01Ebc5e4K8pTW-vjOsbgXDzOYNC8uIqswdsSSwhrV_peP/s1600/andi-mac.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiWXC-uAw9Mdx-x5CtLbfB65otalkASqkIIJo6VlMNQQ5UbxEfWR8Ye2K2-Ez0ClgWn7HrZq7NLHdqKounT7FowaPnYLtlsHFt01Ebc5e4K8pTW-vjOsbgXDzOYNC8uIqswdsSSwhrV_peP/s1600/andi-mac.jpg" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Andi Mac - my transgender friend.</td></tr>
</tbody></table>
Did you know that there are between 140 and 350 million transgender human beings on this <br />
planet?<br />
If the numbers surprise you, you're not alone.<br />
I likewise had no idea it such a large number.<br />
However I paper I found at the <a href="http://www.transgenderlaw.org/resources/transfactsheet.pdf">Transgender Law Society</a>, tells us this: "<span style="font-size: small;">An estimated 2 to 5% of the population is transgender".</span><br />
<span style="font-size: small;">There are seven billion of us crammed onto this world, and so 140-350 million are transgender.</span><br />
<span style="font-size: small;">I had a vague mental image of..., actually, I'm not sure what I thought, but I didn't think the number was so vast.</span><br />
<span style="font-size: small;">Anyway, this all started with a phone call in January this year from my old uni friend Andrew.</span><br />
<span style="font-size: small;">I had recently reconnected with him after a near thirty year absence, and we picked up again quickly, and began speaking on the phone most weekends as if the past thirty odd year absence didn't exist.</span><br />
<span style="font-size: small;">Then late last (2013) year I didn't hear from Andrew for a while.</span><br />
<span style="font-size: small;">I did send him some texts, but got no answer.</span><br />
<span style="font-size: small;">However I put it down to the run up to Christmas, and him being busy with family matters and didn't think too much more about it.</span><br />
<span style="font-size: small;">Then in Late January, my phone rang, and I saw Andrew's name on the Caller ID screen.</span><br />
<span style="font-size: small;">So I answered and we chatted somewhat desultorily for a little while.</span><br />
<span style="font-size: small;">Then he said, "I suppose we better talk about the elephant in the room."</span><br />
<span style="font-size: small;">I replied, "Er, you mean why I haven't heard from you for a while?"</span><br />
<span style="font-size: small;">He said "Yes", then went on to say, "well I've been busy, seeing some doctors."</span><br />
<span style="font-size: small;">My heart jumped into my throat, hoping I wasn't about to hear a cancer diagnosis, or something otherly sinister.</span><br />
<span style="font-size: small;">But then I was relieved mightily when Andrew said, "Er, well, strap yourself in Lachy, er, but I've decided to become a woman."</span><br />
<span style="font-size: small;">[Thus from here on in in this article I will refer to Andi, his new name, with female pronouns.] </span><br />
<span style="font-size: small;">I was shocked, but I don't really like that word, as it seems to have negative connotations. Surprised? </span><br />
<table cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="float: right; margin-left: 1em; text-align: right;"><tbody>
<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgN6pWOT7LKLGGbNc4hGLKD3Xudj5cORbQOpFzMb7fgpJbIxwGZ7aUr4-fR_yMLSP8aVIpl5uZt8_9Hz3cA8Jyw4zjys0uGZA4N_m3LqtsSSG4xLvLrfsVFBNBbiHlfjtVftV6M1wvlhgvd/s1600/renee-richards.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgN6pWOT7LKLGGbNc4hGLKD3Xudj5cORbQOpFzMb7fgpJbIxwGZ7aUr4-fR_yMLSP8aVIpl5uZt8_9Hz3cA8Jyw4zjys0uGZA4N_m3LqtsSSG4xLvLrfsVFBNBbiHlfjtVftV6M1wvlhgvd/s1600/renee-richards.jpg" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Renee Richards</td></tr>
</tbody></table>
<span style="font-size: small;">Well that doesn't work either, as it seems a bit trivial.</span><br />
<span style="font-size: small;">Whatever, we worked through it, and so I'd like to support my friend in this process, and so am writing this.</span><br />
<span style="font-size: small;">So first a bit of history.</span><br />
<span style="font-size: small;">This allowed me to do some research my favourite thing these days, and also to bring in The Simpsons, my even more favourite thing.</span><br />
<span style="font-size: small;">So.</span><br />
<span style="font-size: small;">The first and most controversial transgender case occurred in the United States and involved a man named Richard Raskind.</span><br />
<span style="font-size: small;">He had gender reassignment surgery in 1975, and was henceforth known as Renee Richards.</span><br />
<span style="font-size: small;">The controversy started when Renee began to enter professional tennis tournaments in the women's draw.</span><br />
<span style="font-size: small;">Opponents screamed stridently that this was unfair as she had the muscles of a man.</span><br />
<span style="font-size: small;">However, she hardly set the world alight, and the best she ever achieved was the doubles final in the US Open in 1977, defeated by Martina Navratilova and Betty Stove.</span><br />
<span style="font-size: small;">At her peak she was rated 20th.</span><br />
<span style="font-size: small;">Tennis is a game where strength is handy, but clearly not an overarching tool for winning.</span><br />
<span style="font-size: small;">However, the controversy, largely press-fuelled, had ongoing ramifications for transgender people from then on.</span><br />
<span style="font-size: small;">For it was deemed that people have the gender reassignment surgery for some hidden agenda, usually to do with money.</span><br />
<span style="font-size: small;">In the case of Renee, winning tournaments.</span><br />
<span style="font-size: small;">Other examples are men becoming women and then becoming six-feet-tall models.</span><br />
<span style="font-size: small;">But as Andi pointed out to me over the phone, these are hardly widely accurate examples, and anyone who makes the commitment to do this, is always doing it for deeply felt psychological reasons, not just to win a tennis match, or have some career, making a paltry sum of money.</span><br />
<span style="font-size: small;">This was best evidenced in Andi's case when she went out on the weekend last to a club.</span><br />
<span style="font-size: small;">After some time it was time to go to the bathroom.</span><br />
<span style="font-size: small;">She entered the women's facility, and immediately had trouble with a woman in there, who claimed she had no right to be there.</span><br />
<span style="font-size: small;">She (in Andi's opinion) thought she had "dressed up" as a woman, and had hormone shots leading to incipient breasts, all so she could go into the women's bathroom and perve on the women in there.</span><br />
<span style="font-size: small;">So Andi stood her ground and pointed out that she(Andi) was going to the bathroom in a closed cubicle, as where all the women in there, and so wouldn't be looking at anyone else's private parts.</span><br />
<span style="font-size: small;">Andi also mentioned that a guy tried to crack onto him that evening in the club.</span><br />
<span style="font-size: small;">She spent some time batting him away, and it was only when the guy in question got very personal, and began a bit of groping that the state of Andi's sexuality became clear, and he left with a somewhat surprised look on his face.</span><br />
<span style="font-size: small;">A compliment to Andi's new dress sense if ever there was one.</span><br />
<span style="font-size: small;">All of the above though, highlights the controversial nature of Andi's upcoming life.</span><br />
<table cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="float: right; margin-left: 1em; text-align: right;"><tbody>
<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjE7CQytPrK3vNEP0nKIKXT3vNfGuE5m_ODZA5U2sJV0BJZZKPxyjQAp0L4QHA1mdJkDnBFCTFEDm-GA2sxjk5sIqyiQywwCqGfIQu8gTNt8nP4mUPl5iG4xhGYxw13ulRfddg196YUENYO/s1600/krusty_breasts.png" imageanchor="1" style="clear: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjE7CQytPrK3vNEP0nKIKXT3vNfGuE5m_ODZA5U2sJV0BJZZKPxyjQAp0L4QHA1mdJkDnBFCTFEDm-GA2sxjk5sIqyiQywwCqGfIQu8gTNt8nP4mUPl5iG4xhGYxw13ulRfddg196YUENYO/s1600/krusty_breasts.png" height="240" width="320" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Krusty was happy with the boobs.</td></tr>
</tbody></table>
<span style="font-size: small;">There will be challenges to be met and overcome, but not greater than those faced by us all, simply different.</span><br />
<span style="font-size: small;">And so to The Simpsons.</span><br />
<span style="font-size: small;">In an episode where Krusty the clown owes money to the mob for gambling debts, he, in an attempt to hide, had plastic surgery to change his face, total non-recognitive surgery as it's called.</span><br />
<span style="font-size: small;">However there is a mix up with the paper work and Krusty instead of having his face changed, is given the boob job that Mayor Quimby paid for to enhance his secretary's chest area.</span><br />
<span style="font-size: small;">After the bandages are removed from his face, post-operation, Krusty yells at the doctor: "You moron, I look exactly the same!"</span><br />
<span style="font-size: small;">The surgeon answers, "Yes, but I did a lovely job on the boobs."</span><br />
<span style="font-size: small;">To which Krusty replies: "Do you hear me complaining about the breasts?"</span><br />
<span style="font-size: small;">This episode had curious humourous overtones with Andi's story.</span><br />
<span style="font-size: small;">He is 48 year's old as I write, has just begun developing female secondary sexual characteristics and was saying to me over the phone that by the time he is seventy, he will have the rack of a twenty-year-old woman.</span><br />
<span style="font-size: small;">Pictures to follow, if he acquiesces.</span><br />
<span style="font-size: small;">So it's a fascinating story.</span><br />
<span style="font-size: small;">I asked Andi some questions that I was curious about, and he added some, and answers, of his own.</span><br />
<div>
</div>
<div>
<span style="color: purple;">Andi, what is transgender?</span></div>
<div>
<br /></div>
<div>
<i>I don’t want to hold
myself out as an expert on the subject, but , from what I have gathered,
transgender is a sort of umbrella term that people use to describe a
less common gender type than the more common gender type where physical
and psychological characteristics of gender seem more aligned (FYI -
this more common gender type is often referred to as cis-gender). For
example, I am transgender because my physical and psychological gender
traits are less common than cis-males or cis-females. Under this broader
term are groupings. For example, I call myself a transgender woman
because I identify as a female whilst having a male body. Also, because I
am transitioning physically, through hormone replacement therapy (HRT),
I sometimes use the term male-to-female (MTF) transgender. </i></div>
<span style="color: #550055;"></span><br />
<div>
<span style="color: #550055;"><i><br /></i>Is transgender the same as gay?</span></div>
<span style="color: #550055;">
</span>
<div>
<span style="color: #550055;"><br /></span></div>
<span style="color: #550055;">
</span><br />
<div>
<i>I
suppose the answer to this question depends on what you mean by “same
as” but, if I am assuming you are asking whether being transgender
always means that you are gay, the answer is no. Some transgender people
are gay in the same way that some non-transgender people are gay. Gay,
like lesbian, straight, celibate, etc is a term that talks to a
person’s sexuality whereas transgender is a term that is meant
to describe a more holistic sense of identity that includes an
expression of sexuality as one of it’s key characteristics. You could
say the same thing about many of the other characteristics we share as
humans in that some trans* people are tall, some still have a record
player, some are good at maths, some hate the smell of petrol, some
always get caught telling little white lies, etc, etc.</i></div>
<span style="color: #550055;"></span><br />
<div>
<span style="color: #550055;"><br /></span>
<span style="color: #550055;">When did you have the first inklings you wanted to be a woman?</span></div>
<span style="color: #550055;">
</span>
<div>
<span style="color: #550055;"><br /></span></div>
<span style="color: #550055;">
</span><br />
<div>
<i>I
can’t really pinpoint an exact time and, because I was not aware of
any people living as transgender until maybe my early teens, I would say
mid to late teens was the time I started to “listen” more to my gender.
However, I was still quite young and I did not really start to get a
functioning understanding of any of this until the recent past. In
saying that though, my internal drive to be truer to myself gender-wise
has been there in one shape or form for a long time. </i></div>
<span style="color: #550055;"></span><br />
<div>
<span style="color: #550055;"><br /></span></div>
<span style="color: #550055;">
</span>
<div>
<span style="color: #550055;">Where are you at with relationships now? Attracted to women, men,</span><br />
<span style="color: #550055;">neither, both?</span></div>
<span style="color: #550055;">
<div>
<br /></div>
</span><br />
<div>
<i>Well,
I am attracted to intelligence and a sense of adventure so it doesn’t
really matter to me which container that package is delivered in. In the
meantime, I have a wonderful family and loving friends. That duo
combined with surfing is getting me by. Anything else that comes along
is gravy. </i></div>
<div>
</div>
<div>
[Editor's note: Quite frankly I think we would all do well to answer that question the same way.]</div>
<div>
</div>
<div>
So finally I would say that for me, this process that Andi is undergoing is confronting.</div>
<div>
However Andi is my friend and I certainly owe him for all the times he brought my wayward, alcohol-fuelled head back into the middle ground when we were at uni particularly. </div>
<div>
And there is no boofier, heterosexual bloke than me in this country, and if I can support Andi in this, then so can anyone.</div>
<div>
And finally finally, when all this started over the phone with Andi, I was almost immediately reminded of one of my favourite Discworld characters, Rincewind.</div>
<div>
Rincewind, via the author Terry Pratchett summed up nicely what I think about prejudice, which is what I'd like to think I'm not these days and hope the world is moving toward being not as well.</div>
<div>
Rincewind was a sorely put-upon Wizzard(sic) who was constantly being yanked by magical means to far distant corners of the planet and there hexed, shot at, cursed, trampled, had swords waved at him and all the rest.</div>
<div>
He was constantly required to save the Discworld though as he said, "I don't know why you're always asking me to do these things. I'm not dependable. <i>I</i> don't depend on me, and I'm me." </div>
<div>
Anyway, at one point after some perennial last ditch escape from horrendous death done down by the creatures of the dark dimension, Rincewind retires to a nearby stump and ruminates: "Rincewind could honestly say he was without prejudice. He didn't care what sex you were, what colour you were, what species you were.</div>
<div>
"He didn't care what organs you used for sexual or magical reproduction. He didn't care how much money you had, or how much you didn't.</div>
<div>
No, in the end the only thing Rincewind cared about was that you weren't shooting at him."</div>
<div>
</div>
<div>
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Read more at Andi's blog: <a href="http://andimac66.blogspot.com.au/">Andi Mac's MtF Transition</a><br />
<span style="font-size: small;"><br /></span>
<span style="font-size: small;"><br /></span>LKhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11244232092173678321noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8082972746234187865.post-63441911983639058312014-05-07T16:54:00.000-07:002014-05-07T16:55:13.166-07:00<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiclwxkiTHO9O2UZ_GyOVCwfZcbEdFFn3uX3NWvgG2z7KSKB9EUsfdPOS4UC88ttahaTzhc8Jexp79R7mZ-JZHNh0lsxif8-tJXJeMCOUcnPsgdV6qRztpftF5veuP2aPDe7ulSGTVekEKM/s1600/dislike.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: right; float: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: 1em;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiclwxkiTHO9O2UZ_GyOVCwfZcbEdFFn3uX3NWvgG2z7KSKB9EUsfdPOS4UC88ttahaTzhc8Jexp79R7mZ-JZHNh0lsxif8-tJXJeMCOUcnPsgdV6qRztpftF5veuP2aPDe7ulSGTVekEKM/s1600/dislike.jpg" /></a></div>
<h3 style="text-align: center;">
<span style="font-size: large;">I dislike this with extreme prejudice</span></h3>
LKhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11244232092173678321noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8082972746234187865.post-23697331264376079962014-04-27T23:45:00.003-07:002014-04-27T23:45:20.992-07:00The Noddy and Big Ears jokeAnd finally this weeks joke.<br />
This was told to me by my friend at Uni, Allan Willmore, during, what must have been a more than boring chemistry lecture.<br />
<br />
One day Noddy decides to get in his car and go and visit his good friend Big Ears.<br />
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhfRiCZN-wbQ5qf9OGbIa7UVM5OBLlbrgxi3Iosg-bpcOW2T9_sDwCGIMv1DBs_l0BShX3NG7RXUqW7BK_oCqhLKqz0LZX_d6W26GJ6yYUkttrKdVHTMmuF5wUQlRrOqV2A3daWkWTTIOrJ/s1600/noddy.jpg" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhfRiCZN-wbQ5qf9OGbIa7UVM5OBLlbrgxi3Iosg-bpcOW2T9_sDwCGIMv1DBs_l0BShX3NG7RXUqW7BK_oCqhLKqz0LZX_d6W26GJ6yYUkttrKdVHTMmuF5wUQlRrOqV2A3daWkWTTIOrJ/s1600/noddy.jpg" /></a></div>
He starts the car and drives off, and he is so happy as he is going to see his good friend Big Ears.<br />
He
passes over the babbling brook and as he looks at the crystal waters he
is filled with more happiness as he is going to see his good friend Big
Ears.<br />
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhHlfGv0d-a2zghwoBFdF0RSN1EolxjpHGP6cvMDqTMxy8GgGPJrLIQocEyxAg98sAiMKDRYeKDZvxWTcmbkWJkjS1_V_r6-QqiQgk5_80tqqg8iX9e3w2HNU-uLN-tNUI7Mr8Db_OFZuJy/s1600/noddy-dingley_dell.jpg" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhHlfGv0d-a2zghwoBFdF0RSN1EolxjpHGP6cvMDqTMxy8GgGPJrLIQocEyxAg98sAiMKDRYeKDZvxWTcmbkWJkjS1_V_r6-QqiQgk5_80tqqg8iX9e3w2HNU-uLN-tNUI7Mr8Db_OFZuJy/s1600/noddy-dingley_dell.jpg" /></a></div>
As he drives further he passes Mrs Rabbit and he waves to her.<br />
She waves back and his heart is filled with Jo0y as he is going to see his good friend Big Ears.<br />
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiDlDdGHhZoSr7SjbKV047PVP9pMb7CnUtI_1OMfF6188IG0wZAjhNmO3TEa2loBmsoOJkZtrGiyjjSxCFlJzFP8noKnDVYrgd-8lHtl3xheWJdZbdEo2g-NGDNXOd0lPbG0X1YAJhY1YE_/s1600/noddy_rabbit.jpg" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiDlDdGHhZoSr7SjbKV047PVP9pMb7CnUtI_1OMfF6188IG0wZAjhNmO3TEa2loBmsoOJkZtrGiyjjSxCFlJzFP8noKnDVYrgd-8lHtl3xheWJdZbdEo2g-NGDNXOd0lPbG0X1YAJhY1YE_/s1600/noddy_rabbit.jpg" /></a></div>
Then he comes to the final leg and turns down the beautiful green track that leads to Big Ears House.<br />
Soon he will be there seeing his good friend Big Ears.<br />
<br />
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhN4KNC1cAEa8RzBmoYh9n_9KOBf_2khD1XCb8X26jNF5H1FLUNJK-3_NMuWZcIUv7-BFIM7eFGWfAlSBmJzdEF9o0N7A7qst7FWzO9cexnugZf8LSwoYRfHTmurFmv8cg9dV7tTTAKDcmY/s1600/noddy-country_road.jpg" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhN4KNC1cAEa8RzBmoYh9n_9KOBf_2khD1XCb8X26jNF5H1FLUNJK-3_NMuWZcIUv7-BFIM7eFGWfAlSBmJzdEF9o0N7A7qst7FWzO9cexnugZf8LSwoYRfHTmurFmv8cg9dV7tTTAKDcmY/s1600/noddy-country_road.jpg" /></a></div>
<br />
So he arrives at Big Ears's house and goes up to the front door.<br />
<br />
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEizYWA_7WNpnHmnIzneFR-GKzCLnPpG4Dd2GNGR6pmbBMW_AYyO8W_45z0BhZ0-69XA9ylVpeaf4yw8dyWBB38EP68y46tpUWmN76yIgmhZ2pX5i5snWRBTJl9EhLuF29IDxEaeRGNInCB8/s1600/noddy_big_ears_house.jpg" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEizYWA_7WNpnHmnIzneFR-GKzCLnPpG4Dd2GNGR6pmbBMW_AYyO8W_45z0BhZ0-69XA9ylVpeaf4yw8dyWBB38EP68y46tpUWmN76yIgmhZ2pX5i5snWRBTJl9EhLuF29IDxEaeRGNInCB8/s1600/noddy_big_ears_house.jpg" /></a></div>
He knocks and he is so happy, soon he will be seeing his good friend Big Ears.<br />
Footsteps come down the hall, and then Big Ears opens the door.<br />
BIg Ears sees who it is and says "Fuck off Noddy, ya' shit me." LKhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11244232092173678321noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8082972746234187865.post-56214668808950739452014-04-17T18:16:00.001-07:002014-04-20T18:51:06.334-07:00Business as usual in NSW, one liar for another.<br />
<br />
The new Premier of NSW, Mike Baird, has not wasted any time.<br />
He wants to start making money as fast as possible.<br />
And the biggest fat paycheck of them all is selling the NSW power grid, netting him and his cronies a cool thirty billion.<br />
On Saturday, the 19th of April he said this to the Telegraph:<br />
<i>"I'd say look at the facts. The facts show very clearly that</i><br />
<i>electricity costs in Victoria since privatisation have been lower," he</i><br />
<i>said.</i><br />
<i><br /></i>
<i>"They have been lower, you can't dispute that and yes there would be a</i><br />
<i>big scare campaign about this."</i><br />
<br />
Well Mr Baird, I've got an issue with all three sentences you have uttered above.<br />
First: "I'd say look at the facts."<br />
I have, and you're gonna see the fruits of my researches in word and picture.<br />
Second: "The facts show very clearly that electricity costs in Victoria since privatisation have been lower."<br />
They aren't. <br />
Reiterively, third:<br />
<i>"They have been lower, you can't dispute that and yes there would be a</i><br />
<i>big scare campaign about this."</i><br />
<br />
Oh no they haven't.<br />
If anyone is running a scare campaign, it's you, Mike.<br />
A preemptive scare campaign.<br />
The Premier's thrust seems to be, 'I've got to create a massive fear in the voters mind that if the power industry in NSW remains regulated, then their bills are going to be sky high.'<br />
So, let us, as Mr Baird urges us to, look at the facts.<br />
I went to the website of the Australian Energy Market Operator (AEMO).<br />
This organisation was established in 2009 to manage the national energy and gas markets.<br />
In the data section I found a history of power prices by state.<br />
So I took the figures across to a spreadsheet and made this graph.<br />
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEghkZ3EKCYYLBiIqkqcwwaGHAz9o6MUOyGNkGASRpgYwdj6q_5h-simxD0Ezq6-CX378yxEPkvekh-KPcIZIyE2itfskFgai6j5_fEtkyTYi1Y12XQNX_LCAh6XE5XippzvwO6xqg-E10EN/s1600/vicpower_price_base.JPG" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEghkZ3EKCYYLBiIqkqcwwaGHAz9o6MUOyGNkGASRpgYwdj6q_5h-simxD0Ezq6-CX378yxEPkvekh-KPcIZIyE2itfskFgai6j5_fEtkyTYi1Y12XQNX_LCAh6XE5XippzvwO6xqg-E10EN/s1600/vicpower_price_base.JPG" height="440" width="640" /></a></div>
The yellow trendline on the graph represents the average price of electricity in Victoria.<br />
It's recorded on the website as RRP (Regional Reference Price).<br />
This is the standard used across the country to compare power prices. <br />
I didn't make the trendline up, I used the spreadsheet analysis tools to "show trend".<br />
So as we can see, power prices in Victoria have been steadily increasing since 1999.<br />
privatisation has not made the price lower, quite the reverse.<br />
So I contacted the Premier's office, attached my the graph to my email, and asked him this:<br />
<i>"Dear Premier,<br />
The attached graph shows that the statements you made on Saturday to<br />
the Daily Telegraph, printed on Saturday, April 19, are wrong.<br />
So do you admit you were wrong?<br />
Or are you a liar?"</i><br />
<br />
Needless to say I have had no reply.<br />
<br />
Sidebar: The conservatives will say, "it's the carbon tax that is making the trendline go up".<br />
Well, no actually, the carbon tax was brought in in 2012, the trendline shows a steady increase from 1999.<br />
<br />
So what is Mike Baird up to with the sale of NSW's power infrastructure.<br />
Well it's an obvious money grab.<br />
The sale will net $30 billion, and this will show NSW's finances in a healthier condition.<br />
If, as the Premier suggests, the power prices in NSW will go down, then how will this happen?<br />
<br />
It would seem that what the Premier is suggesting is that with a fully free-market power supply grid in NSW, the power companies will choose to put their prices down.<br />
Excuse me while I clean my binoculars, as I have to go out and watch for airborne pigs.<br />
Recently Origin Energy announced a <a href="http://www.originenergy.com.au/files/Origin_Energy_2013_Annual_Report_web-ready.pdf">profit of close on half a billion for 2013</a>.Transgrid, another big player, announced <a href="http://www.transgrid.com.au/aboutus/pr/Documents/Annual%20Report%202013.pdf">$349.9</a> million profit.<br />
These guys really like making making and most of that money, came from price rises.<br />
Power bills for NSW householders have gone up <a href="http://www.smh.com.au/nsw/nsw-energy-bosses-get-substantial-pay-rises-in-face-of-soaring-household-bills-20131128-2yecs.html">100% over the last six years</a>.<br />
At the same time, the price of coal fell from a peak of US$140 a tonne, down to around US$60 a tonne.<br />
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgKcjOHi63PpW4Z2jAwb7X0w-u41davgronwnFg14BRLriCi2XPb88-UTsSO5tUMmu2HpChCqlWNsLSg-HjWH1JlJPk9tPBl5Rn6GmPTeMja72DsA-2wjwfZDcQZaXxHghWLfsK1C7bTQoi/s1600/coal_price_spike_down.JPG" imageanchor="1" style="clear: right; float: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: 1em;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgKcjOHi63PpW4Z2jAwb7X0w-u41davgronwnFg14BRLriCi2XPb88-UTsSO5tUMmu2HpChCqlWNsLSg-HjWH1JlJPk9tPBl5Rn6GmPTeMja72DsA-2wjwfZDcQZaXxHghWLfsK1C7bTQoi/s1600/coal_price_spike_down.JPG" height="238" width="320" /></a></div>
More than a hundred percent decrease in price.<br />
Seventy five percent of all Australia's power comes from coal.<br />
So the power companies put their price up when their main raw material is getting cheaper.<br />
It therefore beggars belief that they are suddenly going to put their prices down when the market has been privatised.<br />
So life in NSW continues as usual, the Premier is a liar, or he can't add up: either way, it doesn't auger well for the future of our state.<br />
Finally, I hope that all those sinners have taken a woolly jacket,
because they'll be holding the Winter Olympics on the south slopes of
hell before power prices in NSW go down.<br />
<br />
<br />
<br /> <br />
<br />LKhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11244232092173678321noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8082972746234187865.post-66514136310440430512014-03-28T13:17:00.001-07:002014-03-28T13:17:14.512-07:00The Destruction of Lasseter's Road<h4 style="text-align: left;">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS",sans-serif;">By Lachlan Barker</span></h4>
<br />
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">It all started when Kellner at number 312 decided to
blow up the stump that was blocking his driveway.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">Kellner hated that stump.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">It didn’t stop him accessing his house, but merely
from parking next to the verandah of his house, which was a problem as he
repeatedly had to bring in his shopping in the pissing rain.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">He could have had it removed when the tree guys were
there, but Kellner was a cheapskate.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">He didn’t think he was, he thought he was merely
prudent, but anyone else when asked would make comments like “he knows the
value of a dollar”, and “he would make $20 worth of effort to get back $10
owed.”</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">When the tree guys charged him the exorbitant fee of
$350 to cut down the tree, he asked aggrievedly “do you use gold chainsaws?!”</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">Then they’d had the outrageous audacity to quote him
$2,000 to remove the stump.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">Over his dead body.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">So the tree company had cut down the tree, mulched
the logs and left with the stump in place.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">It was a big tree, and therefore now, a big stump.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">It sat in the exact middle of the cul-de-sac end of
his gravel driveway and was exactly in position to annoy him every time he came
home.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">He had tried his own hamfisted efforts with his
rusty, never starting, always breaking down and always blunt chainsaw to remove
bits of it from time to time, but he had never changed the bulk of the thing,
and now he’d had enough.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">Kellner couldn’t have exactly told you why now was
the time to do something about it, but it was almost certainly to do with his
neighbour, Wills.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">Kellner hated Wills, but then really, Kellner hated
everybody.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">Disliking the bulk of the human race seems to go
hand-in-hand with being a cheapskate, why? Who knows, but Kellner certainly
fitted the mold, maybe it was because it was only other humans who constantly
cheated him out of money that was certainly his by right.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">His work paid him less than he deserved.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">The supermarket charged him more than the products
were worth.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">The government took more than their fair share in
tax.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">But Wills his neighbour didn’t have any monetary
interaction with Kellner at all.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">No, Kellner hated Wills simply because of the noise.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">Lasseter’s road was a meandering suburban entity
that wound away from the town and got quieter with every passing bend till you
arrived at Kellner’s driveway, the last dwelling, in the full blown
countryside.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">Thus Wills’ constant habit of partying every weekend
with backpacker chicks he met in town annoyed Kellner to the point of making
his doctor think he was eating raw salt, nothing else could explain medically
Kellner’s blood pressure.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">To be fair to Wills, he constantly invited Kellner
to his parties, but Kellner never went, suspecting (quite rightly), that Wills
only invited him to reduce the number of neighbours at home in bed, who would
then complain about the noise.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">And this decision to remove the stump, by fair means
or foul, had been taken by Kellner in the week after a particularly noisy
party.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">Even then, Kellner probably could have handled the
noise, but the accompanying annoyances were beyond the pale.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">For instance: even if Wills had not invited him
over, Kellner knew there was a party on because of the number of drunk and
stoned backpackers who would get lost and turn up in Kellner’s driveway and ask
if “he knew where Wills lived?”</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">Whereupon Kellner would tell them “no”, and they not
understanding or simply full of drunken bonhomie would then say, “but you must
know him, he’s a great guy and there’s a party on tonight, it must be around
here somewhere?”</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">Kellner would then relent and whilst grinding his
teeth give them approximate directions and let them get on with it.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">He had for a while deliberately given them the wrong
directions, but that had just led to innumerable camper vans driving up and
down Lasseter’s Road all night seeking the party as mariners had once sought
the Flying Dutchmen.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">So he suffered on the whole in ground tooth silence.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">He had tried wearing his chainsaw earmuffs to bed,
but this had had the counteracting effect of not hearing cars pulling up onto
his forecourt and coming out on the morning to find he had been parked in by
these party goers who had thought his parked car was a sign that this was party
parking, they had then parked their van and wandered off through the trees to
Wills house to party all night.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">So all in all Kellner was not a happy, or even fully
sane man when he began the process of obtaining explosives to remove the stump.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">A saner person would have noticed for instance that
the very house he wished to park closer to, was ipso facto, close enough to
sustain damage.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">But the stump by now had become the repository of
all Kellner’s frustrations.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">Somehow it embodied everything that was wrong with
the world, or at least the part thereof that Kellner inhabited.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">And so he sat down at his computer to find out how
to turn that small volume of hated wood into a large amount of smithereens in
the shortest period of time.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">Milliseconds ideally.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;"><br /></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">Wills was drunk.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">Even he knew he shouldn’t be drunk at two in the
afternoon, but if he knew it internally, there was no way he would admit it
publicly.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">He had a job, sort of.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">The sign on the side of his car said “builder”, but
he wasn’t really, or perhaps more accurately, he was a builder who hardly
worked anymore.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">What he did do, when he could pull himself together to
do anything, was supervise people who really knew what they were doing.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">Even then the word supervise was a hopeless
over-estimate of Wills’ skills.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">If he got a job for a new client, it was usually
because an old client from the time when he did swing a hammer had passed his
name on.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">Then Wills would swing into action and beg other
tradesmen in town to do the job.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">Wills hated and loved those phone calls.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">In the short period after the phone had been
replaced in the cradle he would be filled with a joyous euphoria, he had work,
he could afford more alcohol.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">This feeling of well-being would last until the
first problem arose in the build.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">Then he would cross the divide into hating this job,
the client, the tradesmen he had dragged on site, the building supply house,
the labourers who worked for him, the architect, the council for placing
countless footling regulations in the way of doing things and all because they
kept him away from the bourbon bottle and the company of 18 year old backpacker
chicks (his word) which he preyed upon.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">He went to the fridge and poured himself another
drink.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">He was “not at work” this day, meaning he was
supposed to be supervising the laying of a concrete slab at a build outside
town, but had twisted the arm of the concretor to do it all without him and was
now sitting on his deck getting a full alcohol glow on before the weekend’s
partying started six hours or so hence.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">He had as usual invited his neighbours for the
night’s party, but as usual those miserable, police-calling gits would not
attend.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">He didn’t really want them there anyway, but even
Wills knew that he had to try to maintain some sort of political détente.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">He wasn’t sure if anyone could have him kicked out,
or indeed if even the coppers could do anything when they showed up once a
weekend to tell him to keep the noise down, but keeping some sort of peace
seemed to a good idea.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">Of course once 8pm rolled around Wills would be in
the midst of bourbon-induced revelry and didn’t care if the US Navy started
shelling the place in a vain attempt to keep the noise down, he was drunk and
was allowed to have a little fun wasn’t he?</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">But then neither Wills nor Kellner could have
foreseen that a single tree stump would not only see the end of Wills partying
but the end of life as the residents of Lasseter’s road knew it period.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">O’Driscoll knew he had been doing this job too long.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">He often tried to remember back to a time when he
was a young policeman and to discern if his attitude to the job had been
different.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">He knew the job wasn’t different, the things he’d
hated then, he still hated now, but back then he seemed to have more patience.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">O’Driscoll felt that this was ironic, and certainly
paradoxical, in that young men were supposed to have less patience, but he felt
that back then he had more time to take over things.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">Why then was his fuse shortening on a daily, if not
an hourly basis?</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">Like the slowly dispersing cracks in a concrete dam
wall, he could feel a parallel corruption of his restraint.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">The scenario he feared was if just one more drunk
started arguing with him, then abusing him, in the course of his work, he would
go off like the fourth of July.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">Just one more drunk, just one more loud mouthed,
habeas corpus quoting drunk could see him turn from a regular joe into
something so incandescant, so full of nitric rage that not even a straight
jacket could contain him.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">Probably the thing that most enraged him these days
was the “Why don’t you go and arrest some axe-murderer?” line that he got from
every single fucking drunk.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">The drunks seemed to think that what they were
doing, pissing on a shop front, fighting in the street, vandalising parked
cars, then pissing on said car, jumping on bikes left chained to parking
meters, and/or spitting on him, were somehow perfectly reasonable ways to
behave.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">His old cop buddies from the academy who worked in
different locales would say make similar complaints, but then they would admit
that at least in their towns the drunken crescendo occurred only Friday and
Saturday nights.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">O’Driscoll’s town was a coastal resort with nearly
two million visitors a year and the partying was 24-7, and thus there was no
let up for O’Driscoll and his colleagues.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">Even then, the tourists were in general the best
behaved of the people he dealt with.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">Handsome Aryan men from Germany, passionate French girls,
Danish travellers.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">There only offences were driving vehicles that were
as roadworthy as a rowing boat.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">When they partied at their accommodation they would
shut it all down meticulously at 11pm and go quietly to bed.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">No, the real troublemakers and regular abusers of
O’Driscoll, were the locals and their sense of entitlement to do whatever they
damn well liked and if someone complained that was too bad because they were
locals.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">With a sigh O’Driscoll realised it was time to go
out on duty.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">He got his car keys and drove out of the station.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">It was Saturday at 6pm, he just prayed that tonight
wouldn’t be the night he cracked.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">“Coastal Demolition, Brad speaking.”</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">“Yes, I wonder if you can help me, I want to remove
a stump from my driveway, can you guys help me with that?” Said Kellner.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">“Possible, how big is it?” returned Brad.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">“Well it’s about, 1 metre across, maybe a metre and
a half.”</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">“OK, um, normally you’d get an excavator to do that,
have you tried any of the tree companies?”</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">Kellner ground his teeth.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">“Yes, I have, but the guys who cut it down wanted to
charge me the earth to do it. Also, I don’t think you could get a big enough
machine down my driveway to dig it out. That’s why I’m calling you guys, as far
as I can see, the only way to get it out is to blow it up.”</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">Brad, the voice on the end of the phone sighed
internally.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">He wished they’d never advertised they did explosive
demolitions.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">From the day his company had, they had been fielding
a semi-regular series of calls from weirdoes who just wanted to blow something
up.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">He began the weeding out process, “Well ok, I’m
happy to come and have a look, but the minimum price for any explosive related
demolition is $5,000. Are you prepared for that?”</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">Kellner nearly dropped the phone, he cleaned out his
phone ear with his little finger, “did you say $5,000?!” he responded.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">Brad sighed internally once more, “Yes. Any
demolition using explosives requires local council permit approval, insurance,
the explosives and staff to execute. Plus nearby buildings, roads, pipes and
trees have to be checked and shielded. Do you still want me to come out and
check it out?”</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">“NO” yelled Kellner into the phone and slammed it
down.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">He paced about his kitchen fuming to himself.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">He had a mental picture of a couple of hundred.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">In his mind’s eye he saw a demolition guy come out,
place a stick or two of dynamite under the stump, open a beer, press the
plunger and the job would be done.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">Once again he had not counted on the local council
placing a thicket of regulations around him doing what he wanted on his own
property.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">He wandered out to the front verandah and stared at
the stump.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">As he did he noticed that his “always on its last
legs” car, was leaking again.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">He went over and knelt under the front fender.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">This time it was the radiator, a very small pool of
green fluid was dripping on the ground.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">The leak wasn’t enough to worry him, his car had
achieved an almost zen-like state of continuing to run despite the eternal lack
of care he bestowed on it, he would just have to remember to fill it before he
left.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">He stood up, he went automatically to dust the
gravel off his knees, and as he did so noticed that there were dark stains upon
his skin.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">Probably oil or diesel from leaks from other parts
of his engine.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">Then something clicked in his mind.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">Diesel.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">Where had he read something about that?</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">Something to do with diesel exploding, something to
do with home made bombs.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">“Home made” was an expression Kellner loved, it
implied less money spent.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">He went back inside and turned his computer on.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">The party was in full swing and Wills was, as always,
drunk.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">Like the Inuit of Northern Canada who had twenty-two
words for snow, correspondingly Wills had a range of words to describe his
drunken feeling.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">A mild glow described how he felt when drinking
alone on his stoep at two in the afternoon.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">Mildly jouyous described the period around five to
six pm when he was “allowed” to drink, and the pace of his bourbon consumption
would quicken.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">“Pretty Happy” was when he began to forget what had
happened.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">And the ultimate was “totally fucking legless”,
which was literal, and described his immoderate progress around the party,
groping women, saying things like “Do ya’ drop ‘em?” (Meaning the accosted
female’s underpants), and was a period of the night when his legs no longer
functioned as decent ambulatory devices and so legless was accurate.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">He also has the expressions “Shit faced”,
“Slaughtered”, “hammered” to allow composite adjectives.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">“Pretty happy, verging on shit-faced”, for instance,
allowed him finer gradations to his descriptions of the revelry.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">Now it was ten pm and Wills was completely happy.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">His younger workers who did the procuring for him
had done a good job and his house and lawn was covered with 18 year old women.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">The music blared, the lights resounded and his mood
soared.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">Clouds of marijuana smoke drifted on the breeze.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">“What”, thought Wills, “could be a finer lifestyle
than this?”</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">A song he thought he recognised came on and he
yelled, “TURN IT UP! I love this song.”</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">The music soared forth and he realised it wasn’t the
song he thought it was.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">No matter.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">He moved onto the dance floor and sort of tried
dancing with a couple of attractive young women.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">In his drunken state he didn’t notice them edging
away.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">They knew him too well.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">It would have surprised Wills to learn that almost
everyone at his house that night hate his guts.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">The others at the party, all younger than Wills,
only attended because he provided vast tubs of free alcohol.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">He thought they attended because he was a great guy
who despite the ongoing years still knew how to party.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">Oh the self-deception of the middle aged.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">He shimmied across to the ice tub and got himself
another can of bourbon mixed with coke.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">Kellner ground his teeth.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">Another Saturday, another party at Wills’s place.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">He had already told two van loads of revellers that
the party was next door and “couldn’t they bloody hear it?”</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">They had responded as usual with the “can we park
here?” question, as if everyone on Lasseter’s road would be falling over
themselves to provide convenience for those attending.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">He told them to go back to the road and park at
Wills, and they had backed lurchingly down his drive in the dark.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">He knew he was in for another night of little sleep
and ongoing, increasing frustration and hatred of his neighbour.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">Among the real crosses for Kellner to bear was the
issue of timing.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">His job was with a road crew for the roads authority
and was up at 5am each week day to join the crew.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">And like all those with a regular early start he
found it impossible these days to sleep in on the weekend.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">He had tried, saying to himself, “c’mon it’s the
weekend, have a relax.”</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">But he had always just ended up lying in bed with
his eyes closed, until eventually, with a sigh he would roll over and start his
day.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">And of course this had become vastly worse with the
advent of Wills next door.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">Now it was Saturday night again and he faced his
usual courses of action.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">Like most, Kellner found his heart racing as he
faced the confrontation of asking Wills to keep the noise down.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">It was a<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">
</span>paradoxical endeavour.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">If he went over early-ish, say 9pm, Wills, full of
bourbon-fuelled bonhomie would wrap his arm around Kellner’s shoulder and ask
if he wanted a drink.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">Kellner would say ’no’ and then ask him to turn the
music down.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">Wills would say ‘yes’, and drop the volume.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">Kellner would go home and then wait out the next
step.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">Which was, an hour after Kellner had gone home,
sometimes a minute, Wills would have completely forgotten the conversation and
when next a song he liked came on would once again yell ‘TURN IT UP’, and so it
would go for another Saturday night.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">If he waited till midnight when the local council
noise covenant came into force, Wills wouldn’t even remember the conversation.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">Then Kellner would ring the coppers and complain
about the noise.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">The police were very good and would do their best,
but in this partying town, particularly in the summer, they had so many calls
for noise abatement that they sometimes didn’t get to Lasseter’s road till
three in the morning, by which time Kellner was a red-eyed wreck, dozing
fitfully in his chair in the living room, knowing the futility of entering his
bed, since the moment he did he would have to be up to tell someone to get out
of his driveway, or know that simply the volume of the music would rattle his
walls and make his bed dance in time.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">So he continued his research into home made bombs on
the internet, and with each passing second an unconscious desire to make Wills
sorry burgeoned within him.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">“You there Barry?”, crackled the radio in
O’Driscoll’s car.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">“Yes, June”, he replied.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">The dispatcher this evening was Constable June
Holcroft, O’Driscoll got on well with her and they had a loose and definitely
unspoken agreement that she wouldn’t bother him if she could at all avoid it.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">“It’s that time, I’m afraid,” said Holcroft.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">O’Driscoll’s heart sank.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">Like most in this coastal party town he knew the
time to the minute without looking at his watch.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">When the pubs shut, when the nightclubs shut, when
the bakery opened, when the first coffee shop opened, all provided him with
time markers that helped him through his shift.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">However, again like everyone else, he had trouble
keeping track of the days.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">“That time”, from June meant that it was Saturday
midnight and now the noise complaints would start coming in.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">“It’s not is it?”, said O’Driscoll in a hopelessly
optimistic attempt to change the time and day of the week.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">“Sorry Barry, but it is. And first up is your
favourite address.”</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">“What again? Jesus does that guy ever stop.”</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">“Well not this weekend, you on your way?”</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">“Sure June. I’ll go now.”</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">‘Your favourite address meant Wills place on
Lasseter’s road.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">O’Driscoll couldn’t count the times he’d been there,
but each visit was a carbon copy.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">He cursed under his breath and started driving.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">Kellner had decided not to go over and put his heart
through the racing stress of trying to get Wills to turn his music down this
night.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">He wasn’t sure himself why it stressed him so, but
it was most likely to do with the fact that it never did any bloody good.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">Some Saturdays Wills would turn down the music, but
as ever Kellner wasn’t able to relax, sitting in his living room waiting to
hear if a song Wills liked came on and the music got sent up to heaven again,
whilst Kellner gritted his teeth in his private hell.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">Also, even when Wills did turn it down, usually only
after the police came, the roar of the drunken conversation would easily fill
the sound vacuum and once again Kellner would have to wait till the last
reveller had gone to sleep, before he too could find some rest.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">So this Saturday he had gone for the easier option
of calling in his complaint to the police as soon as the noise covenant came in
at midnight.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">The police were very good about it, in that they now
knew why Wills’ neighbours called in at 12:01am, and responded as rapidly as
the events in town would allow.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">Thus it was Kellner’s call, routed through Holcroft
on the switch, that had set O’Driscoll on his way.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">O’Driscoll parked his police car at the end of a
long line of cars parked haphazardly on both edges of the road, indeed the gap
in the middle was barely adequate for a single car to pass.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">He locked the vehicle and began walking.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">If he hadn’t been here every Saturday for the larger
part of his working life, he would have known where to go by the noise.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">It was scandalous, he had no difficulty
understanding the neighbours complaints.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">He turned into the driveway and approached the
house.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">As ever possibly a hundred, maybe more people were
thronging the joint.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">He entered the exo-rings of partiers and began to
shoulder his way through to the heart of the action.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">If the noise was scandalous, so was the condition of
Wills, O”Driscoll knew him well by now and was able to pick him out where he
stood leering down the tops of two young women.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">With a long practised skill he manoeuvred his way to
the music centre and turned it off.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">The onrushing silence, well comparative silence of
only the voices echoing around the place continued.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">Wills, vaguely sensing something was wrong, well
different, to what had been happening previously, turned and saw the upright
blue figure of O’Driscoll staring balefully at him.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">“All right Tony, it’s midnight and you know you’ve
got to turn down the music”, said O’Driscoll.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">He then waited for the next part of the routine.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">Wills walked, well lurched in an upright sort of
stagger, over to speak with the sergeant.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">He threw his arm around O’Driscoll’s shoulder and
said, “Aw, yeah, officer, real sorry about that, do you want a drink?”</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">O’Driscoll looked down at Wills’ hand dangling below
his shoulder.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">“Take your hand off me”, he said, in as calm a tone
as he could muster.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">Thoughts shambled around in the subterranean caverns
of Wills mind.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">He faced this regularly.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">He had to impress the young women at the party with
his mature(?) and strong dealing with the policeman.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">He faced a difficult decision.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">He wanted to get through the conversation without
looking like he was backing down.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">But also, he didn’t want to antagonise O’Driscoll
who had the power to write him a noise citation, and, he vaguely thought, the
power to confiscate his music centre.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">“Take your hand off me, “ repeated O’Driscoll with
about the same level of menace as a leopard stalking a gazelle.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">Wills equivocated.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">“Would you like a drink officer?”, he said, allowing
him to take his arm off the policeman’s shoulder and rummaging in the ice tub
and coming up with a beer.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">“No”, said O’Driscoll, “what I want is to not be
called back here tonight because of noise, or any other complaints, do I make
myself clear?”</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">Wills struggled to come up with an answer that gave
him some face saving wriggle room.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">“Oh, sure, there’s no problem with that, you sure
though you don’t want to take a beer along with you when you go?”, he said.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">O’Driscoll, fed to the back teeth with dealing with
this guy, just shook his head and turned and left.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">He made his way through the now (slightly) subdued
crowd and began the walk back to his car.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">Wills turned back to the young women he had been
‘talking’ with to discover they had taken the opportunity to flee his advances
and made for a part of the party that Wills wasn’t.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">Wills, waited till he heard a car start on the road
and drive away, prayed that it was O’Driscoll’s car and then yelled, “OK, PARTY
ON!” and turned the music up to about half it’s previous volume.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">‘That should impress everyone’, he thought and began
patrolling for more female company.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">Kellner groaned.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">He was able to follow the events of O’Driscoll’s
arrival at the party as if he had been listening in on a phone extension.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">Some nights Wills had co-operated, this was one
night when he didn’t.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">Even at half volume he would have described the
music as blaring, throw in the conversation and it was as if O’Driscoll had not
been there at all.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">He had a vaguely defined feeling that it was somehow
bad form to call the cops twice in one evening, his only hope now was that one
or more of the other neighbours would complain.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">He went into his bedroom and lay down and wondered
what his quota of sleep would be this night.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">As he lay there he heard a snippet of a Wills
sentence, “…. Yair, I wasn’t having that, I even offered him a beer, and he
…..”</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">‘Some day’, thought Kellner to himself, ‘Some day’.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">The noise continued and Kellner began his Saturday
nightly activity of staring at the ceiling and waiting for exhaustion to
overwhelm the sounds from Wills house.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">The stump was no longer recognisable as such.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">An ice sculpture now stood in Kellner’s driveway, or
perhaps a highly localised snowstorm had fluttered down in the night and formed
itself into peaks and scallops on the woody surface.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">It certainly looked quite beautiful to Kellner as he
stood and admired his handiwork in the dawn light.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">Like all cheapskates Kellner had kept everything he
had ever owned in his life in a ramshackle shed made of stringybark logs, rusty
gal and fencing wire.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">He had once bought a cow which he was planning to
milk, but quickly learned the lesson that so many diary producers have, that
having even one cow gave one a morning and night chore that couldn’t be ignored
and tied you to the house, making holidays out of the question.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">He likewise has had a brief enthusiasm for gardening
and had layed out a garden in which he would grow veges, and save himself the
exorbitant costs associated with purshace at the supermarket.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">But likewise, he had found the work hard and by the
time he brought in soil and fenced it off, the veges from the garden had
actually cost more than those bought in town.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">Thus his shed was full of the remnants of past
ideas.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">One such remnant was bags of fertiliser, and it was
this product that now covered the top of the stump and trickled down around the
sides onto the driveway.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">Kellner had finally shuffled into a restless sleep
around three am, but his body clock had snapped his eyes open with a click that
almost audible at 5am.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">A lifetime of rising for work at this hour had once
again denied him a desperately needed sleep in.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">He had tried.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">He rolled and lay with his eyes shut, but after a
mere ten minutes of this he had swung his legs out of bed and lumbered groggily
to the kitchen to make coffee.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">Once he had imbibed some mouthfuls he had decided
that since he was up he may as well get on with the stump removal.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">He wouldn’t have really thought he was out for
revenge, but he had to work Monday and this was the day he had set aside for
the stump to go.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">He finished his coffee and went out to the shed.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">He shifted things around till he had located the
fertiliser and began dragging the bags out to the stump, one by one he emptied
their contents out until he was he had emtied all the bags.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">His internet researches had not been clear about
what volume of fertiliser was needed to create what sized explosion, but like
the chinese inventors of gunpowder centuries before he decided to start big, as
it was a big stump.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">He had brought home a jerry can of diesel during the
week, and now he emptied this onto the fertiliser and it, in more liquid form,
splashed and trickled down and through the fertiliser, pooling around the seam
of stump and gravel.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">He once more stood back and admired his work.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">Looked good, but would it work?</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">Soon find out.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">The last piece of the apparatus was an electrical
circuit to create ignition.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">The diagrams he had looked at had all favoured a car
battery with wires leading to the charge, but Kellner’s only vcar battery was
in his car, and he had carefully backed it up the driveway away from the
ignition zone.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">SO how could he set this off?</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">He went back inside for a coffee refill and thought
about it.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">He jiggled the cord to his electric jug to boil some
water for a second round of coffee.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">As you expect, his cord looked like Isaac Newton had
used it for early physics experiments and it had to be jiggled into place
create a circuit.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">An idea formed in Kellner’s mind.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">He had had a problem with rats.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">His television wouldn’t turn on one night and he
eventually discovered that starving rats had chewed through the power cord to
the back of the TV.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">As one would expect, he had taken the chewed cord
and thrown it in the shed, he couldn’t have imagined what it could ever be used
for, but now his frugality would pay off.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">He went out to the shed and ferreted about.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">Under a rusted out ride on mower, but dangling over
some besser blocks was the cord.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">He wrestled it loose of it’s impediments and took it
back to the house.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">He got some pliers out of his work room and then
examined the cord.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">He found the parts chewed by the rats and cut the
cord off neatly there.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">Then with some scissors he separated the two wires
back about twenty centimetres from the cut, then stripping the plastic from the
copper core.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">Beautiful.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">He plugged the cord in and flicked the switch.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">Holding one wire with the rubber handled pliers he
brought in closer to the other.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">A spark crossed the circuit and every light in his
house went out.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">He had shorted the circuit.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">He went around to the fusebox to flicked the fuses
back on.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">The hum of the fridge and light in the kitchen came
on again.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">Kellner was satisfied, he had the power.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">He plugged the cord into a powerpoint in the front
hall and carried it out to the stump.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">He placed the two wire ends into the
diesel-fertiliser mix and went back inside.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">He bent down to the powerpoint, installed at ankle
level in the hall, and flicked the switch.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">Nothing happened.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">In the part of his mind where no one else can go, in
the inner mental sanctum where he could be honest with himself, he knew this
would happen.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">The reason, generally, that home made things are
cheaper is because they don’t work.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">Or, they work once and then fall apart.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">Or, they work, haphazardly, sometimes effectively,
most often not.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">Kellner sighed.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">He walked down the hall and stood on his front porch
looking at the mound of chemicals piled on and around his stump.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">As he stood there in the quiet of the Sunday morning
his befuddled mind slowly grappled with a seed of mystery deep inside.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">True the explosion hadn’t worked, but…</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">He turned and looked back down the hall toward his
kitchen.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">The light was on.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">That was different, last time he’d tripped the
fuses.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">He turned back to the pile.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">As he did so, he noticed that the morning wasn’t as
quiet as he’d previously thought.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">Down at the very lowest level of his hearing a sound
was seeping in.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">Where had he heard that before?</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">At breakfast.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">The faint noise was a snap, crackle, pop, as of a
famous breakfast cereal when the milk is added.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">He went out to the pile and looked at the point
where the cord entered the mix.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">The sound was clearer now, and there was a sizzling
component.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">Then Kellner noticed that at the epicentre of the
noise, bubbles were emerging.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">With an appalled fascination he watched as a bubble
grew and popped, and was then replaced by another slightly larger one.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">With a rush a terrifying realisation hit him.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">Against all the odds, he had succeeded.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">His home made reactor pile was approaching ignition
point.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">It was the last coherent thought he had, his
endocrine system took over.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">He turned and fled.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">Through the house, out the back door and into his
ramshackle shed.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">He dove through the air and landed behind some straw
bales bought to mulch his garden beds and crouched down and held his hands over
his ears.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">Less than a second later the air was rent by an
almighty ka-whuffing sound, felt as much as heard, and the whole thing went up.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">Kellner had hit the jackpot of home demolition.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">Inside his shed he watched with a preternatural fear
as the rusty gal walls at the back of the shed bulged outward and then sprang
back with a clank that rivalled the sound of the explosion.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">From the house he heard the tinkling of broken glass
as every window on the front of the house disintegrated in a welter of shards.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">The stump itself, lifted and tilted as if by a giant
hand, then resettled down the driveway from the newly formed crater showing its
previous lodgement.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">The natural eucalypt oil in the wood, combined with
the spark and latterly encrusted diesel caught and red flame began to lick
around the stump as it settled, mud encrusted roots exposed, on the gravel.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">Kellner was a not a religious man but prayed for the
first time since childhood that he would come through this alive.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">The percussive effects began to recede, replaced by
the sounds of falling debris.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">First the heavier chunks of wood, glass and gravel
settled over the environs of his house, clunking,, clanking and thunking over
gal roof and timber decking.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">Then the lighter material began to fall and Kellner could
hear the pitter-patter of a gentle eucalypt rain on the roof of his shed.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">Eventually even this died out, and the quiet of
Sunday morning returned to Lasseter’s Road and the only sound Kellner could
hear was a persistent ringing in his ears.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">However, unbeknownst to Kellner, the effects of his
explosion were really only just starting.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">His attempts over the years to reduce the size of
the stump with axe and chainsaw had made a series of cracks and fissures in the
body of the stump.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">Sometimes he cut down, sometimes he held the
chainsaw parallel to the ground and thus a series of geometric shapes had been
visible in the stump.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">One of these, about the size of an adult human leg,
had been separated from the stump and launched into the high atmosphere like an
organic rocket.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">Coated with diesel and dusted with fertiliser this
chunk of timber sailed aloft trailing smoke and glowing red.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">At the zenith of it parabola the chunk turned
lazily, gravity took over and it began its descent.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">As it speed increased the flames died down, but
driven by the increasing rush of highly oxygenated air over its surface anew
and demonic cherry red incandescence burgeoned.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">Wills’ septic tank was not in great condition.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">Installed by the previous owner some twenty years
ago, it had now succumbed to the heating and cooling cycles of the seasons and
was cracked on all surfaces.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">Wills had inspected it from time to time and often
thought he should do something about sealing the cracks.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">If the wind was strong in any direction it wasn’t a
great worry, but if the wind was light and drifting toward the house, then
Wills’s place was enveloped in a fairly foetid odour.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">But then like most builder’s jobs, paid or
otherwise, Wills found it far easier to just say, “she’ll be right” and go back
to sit on his deck and drink bourbon.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">And so when this most aerial piece of Kellner’s
stump arrived at terminal velocity from on high, the cover of the septic
offered little or no resistance.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">With a crack, then a groan, a section of the cover
gave way and the still flaming chunk of wood entered and became as one with 25
years of well matured sewerage.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">And there for a few seconds matters rested and the
peace of this Lasseter’s Rd <span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>dawn
returned.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">Wills, passed out drunk on the outdoor couch on his
deck had started visibly from the first explosion at Kellner’s place, but then
unable to see the cause of the noise returned to his drunken sleep.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">Which was a shame in its way as he would have been
the first human to see a septic tank exploding.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">At first the timber merged with the contents of the
tank and a chemical battle ensued, with the moisture within at first
threatening to douse the rocket red surface of the timber.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">But the thing about septic tanks is that they gas
off.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">The smell that Wills had noticed over his tenancy
was indeed a highly valuable commercial product, natural gas.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">A bubble of this ignited, spread its exothermic
message to other bubbles in the tank and the peace of Sunday was once again
split by an almighty explosion.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">The roof of the tank lifted with a lurch and the
contents erupted skywards carrying, then splitting the roof of the tank into
smaller pieces of concrete.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">The cracks in the side of the tank gave forth
geysers of raw sewage and the side walls likewise came down and the contents at
the base of the tank decamped sideways in all directions.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">The percussive wave of force travelled up the pipes
connecting his tank with the house and all three of his toilets, two upstairs,
one down, became a revolting mirror image of their function, spewing raw sewage
out instead of in.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">The toilets began to run and cascades of the muck
formed rivulets, then creeks and finally small streams of sewage, flowing along
the halls and down the stairs.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">At the base of the stairs the various courses merged
and an ankle deep pool of waste began to cover the living room carpet before
flowing over the step, onto the deck and down the garden.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">The flying sewage then began to retrace the path of
the burning timber progenitor of this cataclysm and returned to Earth, covering
the roof of Wills’ house, the driveway, the garden and Wills himself.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">Wills, insensible from twelve hours of bourbon
drinking slept on.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">Some time hence he would wake and know truly what
hell was.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">“Barry”, crackled Holcroft’s voice over the radio.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">O’Driscoll stared at the thing in disbelief.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">It was 7am Sunday morning, an hour after he should
have clocked off.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">There was no way, just no way, that Holcroft was
thinking of sending him on a call.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">Following the first call to Wills’ place he had then
dealt with the usual round of Saturday night calls to holiday makers and told
them, one after the other, at one house after another, to turn the music down.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">He had argued with drunks till his already
threadbare tolerance had approached a point similar to the pile of explosive in
Kellner’s driveway.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">With gritted teeth he tapped the ‘respond’ key on
his car’s mobile.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">“June”, said O’Driscoll, in ominously low tones, “I
know, I just know you are not calling me to go on another call.”</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">“I’m really sorry Barry”, said Holcroft without preamble,
“I really am, but you’re the only mobile unit left and this is a recall.”</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">O’Driscoll rolled his eyes.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">A recall would indeed tie Holcroft’s hands.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">In an attempt to “simplify’ dealing with late night
complaints, the supervising officer had decreed that if at all possible, the
same officer would return to a previously complained about address, as they
already knew the situation, and it was thought this would aid in sorting things
out.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">As if, O’Driscoll had thought to himself many times,
ANY administrative tweak would make dealing with irascible drunks any easier.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">“All right”, said O’Driscoll, “what is it.”</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">“OK”, said Holcroft, “I’ll read you the exact words
of the call that came in four minutes ago.”</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">Holcroft cleared her throat, “There was a big party
last night that went on till after 4am, then this morning there were two
explosions at the party, now there is a really bad smell and I have had to
close all my windows. Can you get someone to have a look up there.”</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">June continued, “the call came from a Mrs Trail who
lives at 264 Lasseter’s road.”</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">“Goddammit”, said O’Driscoll. “OK, June, I’ll go and
see.”</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">O’Driscoll pulled over, made a u-turn and headed out
of town.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">Driving the vehicle was less a policeman than a
blue-clad incendiary device getting ready to detonate.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">O’Driscoll noticed the smell some kilometres from
Wills’s place.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">On this summer morning he had the windows down in an
attempt to stay awake and in a far less successful attempt to provide some
serenity to his fusing mind with a gentle rush of morning breeze.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">With the first waft, he rolled up the window and
found that the toxic odour was unstoppable.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">He drove on attempting not to breathe.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">He pulled up much closer to Wills’s house than last
night, the young things at the party, as always seemingly able to operate
without sleep, had decamped for an early surf of just not to be there when the
clean up started, and so the line of cars along the road was much reduced.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">He pulled a t-shirt out of the boot of his car and
with this providing minimal at best odour reduction, walked down Wills’s
driveway.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">Within a few steps of doing<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>this he stopped and stared.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">A perfect circle of…, well, now that he attempted to
form a sentence, he wasn’t sure what the substance was, but continuing inside
his head, he saw a perfect brown circle covering the lawn, driveway, deck and
roof of Wills’s house.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">O’Driscoll had been on the force twenty years and
like all beat coppers had a plenty of stories, some tear-squirtingly funny,
others that still rankled.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">He had seen fires, vomit covered driveway, blood
strewn bar rooms, fights, accidents and wild parties, but even he had never
seen anything like this.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">Whatever THIS was.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">O’Driscoll continued to stare and as he did a
movement caught his eye.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">On the couch, on the deck, a figure was struggling
to stand.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">The encrusted figure slowly, shakingly gained his
feet and like O’Driscoll stared down the lawn.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">O’Driscoll, still uncertain, knew one thing with
clarity.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">He wanted to be a long way from this odour as
rapidly as possible.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">“HEY!”, he yelled.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">The figure on the deck started visibly, then turned
and saw O’Driscoll in the driveway.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">He began a shaky ascent and as he slipped and slid
his way till he stood before the sergeant.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">O’Driscoll saw now that it was Wills, and realised
from the flecks of toilet paper stuck to his surface among the brown goo what
the substance coating every surface was.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">O’Driscoll then said a line that would go down in
the annals of police folk lore.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">“So Mr Wills, how’d this happen?”</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">Wills stared.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">He stared the stare of a man who had woken up with a
chronic hangover covered in sewage.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">He began to speak, but then realised he had nothing
to say.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">He didn’t know how this had happened.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">O’Driscoll waited a few moments and then continued,
“Well, however it happened you better start cleaning it up.”</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">This broke the walls of the little restraint Wills
had.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">“Clean it up! What are you fucking talking about, I
didn’t do this, I’m not cleaning it up.”</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">“Oh, so you do know who did this?”, O’Driscoll took
out his notebook, “would you like to file a complaint against the
perpetrators?”</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">Wills stared wildly around him.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">He hadn’t done this, couldn’t this dumbass copper
see that?</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">But then large chunks of the night before were lost
to his memory.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">Whatever had happened, and whoever had done it, Wills
didn’t know.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">O’Driscoll waited once more.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">“So Mr Wills, can I have a name please?”<br />
Wills shook his head.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">O’Driscoll waited again then put his notebook away.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">“OK, then I’ll leave you to clean this up. Be aware
that following the neighbours complaints you can be cited under the
environmental health act if you do not abate the smell and leaking sewage. The
maximum fine can be as high as $20,000 per breach, do you understand?”</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">Wills stared dumbly with bulging eyes at the
policeman.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">Sometimes there are no words, or more accurately, no
language had developed adequate words to describe his immediate situation.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">O’Driscoll gave it a few more beats to see if Wills
would respond, and then turned on his heel and walked away.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">He drove back to the station turned in his car,
reported briefly that the explosions on Lasster’s road were fireworks and it
was simply a big clean up job up there.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">Then drove home and went to bed.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">Wills finally regained his deck, found the phone and
began calling anyone whose number he had in his phone that had been at the
party.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">But those he could reach didn’t answer the phone and
when he went to leave a message he realised that asking anyone to come and help
clean was unlikely to respond to a message saying “there’s shit all over place,
can you come and help clean it?”</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">So he then searched his house for some cleaning
materials.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">He began at the top of the house and began
frantically trying to remove the sewage from his carpet.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">Within thirty minutes he had cleared a space a metre
square.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">He estimated he had a week of cleaning to go.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">And so Sunday continued on Lasseter’s Road.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">Kellner sat contentedly on his porch and watch the
stump burn away, soon it would be small enough to hack up and remove completely
from his driveway.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">He would wheel barrow in some soil and stones from
the boundary of his property and fill the crater.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">Then he would be able to pull up to his house, then
turn full circle and leave his driveway front on and not face the anxious
reversing that had been his such a big part of his driving life before.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">He had swept up the broken glass and would replace
that as the weeks went by, costly it had to be said, but in general the
overarching glow of having removed the stump, quietened his mind.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">Additionally, having noticed the smell he had snuck
through the trees and watched, hidden from view, O’Driscoll’s interview with
Wills.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">His hearing was till imperfect, and he hadn’t been
able to audit their conversation, but the body language told him all he needed
to know.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">What’s more the near square acre of faeces spread
across Wills residence had provided him with a satisfaction he had never known
before.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">All Kellner’s frustrations over all those times
Wills had refused to turn the music down over all those Saturday nights was now
gone, washed away on a tide of sewage.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">He hadn’t consciously set out to get revenge, but he
had succeeded, all unlooked for, beyond his wildest dreams.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">O’Driscoll slept well during a Sunday for the first
time in as long as he could remember.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">Most Sundays he struggled, with his mind continually
churning over the arguments he had had with raving drunks through Saturday
night.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">But this day he drifted off to sleep with the image
of Wills, covered in shit, facing multi-thousand dollar fines and having to
clean the lot up on his own, with a raging hangover to boot.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">Like Kellner, O’Driscoll had not set out to revenge
himself on Wills, but he had been granted a privilege denied so many law
enforcers, of seeing one of their tormentors completely reduced to mental and
physical rubble.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">None of the three men would have said they believed
in karma before, but certainly Kellner and O'Driscoll did now.</span><br />
<br />
<br />
<a href="http://byronshortstories.blogspot.com.au/2013/12/the-destruction-of-lasseters-road-2.html"><span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">Next Chapter.</span></a><br />
<br />
<a href="http://byronshortstories.blogspot.com.au/2013/10/fiction_24.html"><span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">Back to Home Page. </span></a></div>
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LKhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11244232092173678321noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8082972746234187865.post-71565739890584060562014-03-02T20:16:00.001-08:002014-03-06T14:49:01.813-08:00<h1 style="text-align: center;">
Year of the Rant.</h1>
<h3 style="text-align: center;">
Part 1: Ignition Point, Autumn 2013.</h3>
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjiP0lRl2eYLOfvHpcQ7L-zHIv7kEjYiMfI8FOXNYeF_RjPhQ13B_Czq5_cnr1FRlnMEpZ-EZwzyRogFPWyehKqpJ2MRNnw1F051mLPblU11uLOhfX8XWhxEjT39grQWsOfPbJfttExe5FI/s1600/fight_cloud_long.PNG" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjiP0lRl2eYLOfvHpcQ7L-zHIv7kEjYiMfI8FOXNYeF_RjPhQ13B_Czq5_cnr1FRlnMEpZ-EZwzyRogFPWyehKqpJ2MRNnw1F051mLPblU11uLOhfX8XWhxEjT39grQWsOfPbJfttExe5FI/s1600/fight_cloud_long.PNG" height="320" width="212" /></a></div>
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<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
</div>
<div style="text-align: center;">
Lachlan Barker<br />
<h1 class="heading">
</h1>
</div>
LKhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11244232092173678321noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8082972746234187865.post-29408853134422314232014-02-19T11:14:00.001-08:002014-02-19T12:18:00.379-08:00Where does a year go, eh?<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS",sans-serif;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEggbKKadzT7bU27HgUUtVRz3l-P5GNpG_qgTnfc1rG7ZJU8dgqLnvKhfOhBL7KnQJGrh4uIeEtYzL1QOrLAZxvPFcQWmKgpTAWT3dyYwHSZlO8emnSwD0Zo9COODxSIV8IDfGTS6oPeQLMd/s1600/stats_screen_Feb_18.JPG" imageanchor="1" style="clear: right; float: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: 1em;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEggbKKadzT7bU27HgUUtVRz3l-P5GNpG_qgTnfc1rG7ZJU8dgqLnvKhfOhBL7KnQJGrh4uIeEtYzL1QOrLAZxvPFcQWmKgpTAWT3dyYwHSZlO8emnSwD0Zo9COODxSIV8IDfGTS6oPeQLMd/s1600/stats_screen_Feb_18.JPG" height="320" width="400" /></a>A year of blogging, I can already hear you saying 'it seems much, much longer than that!'</span><br />
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS",sans-serif;">As this my 52nd week I will finish with a celebratory joke that sums up the essential 'bah, humbug' of my weekly ranting.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS",sans-serif;">However, first, I would like to draw your attention to the screen grab (right).</span><br />
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS",sans-serif;">This is the stats page of my blog, and it shows that about a hundred people a week read my vitriolic prose.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS",sans-serif;">I thank each and every one of you for showing an interest.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS",sans-serif;">Down
at the bottom right you can see a rather nifty map showing where the
readers come from, and latterly, my north American readership has picked
up due to sharing it to some new sites, <a href="http://www.reddit.com/" target="_blank">Reddit</a>, <a href="http://www.pinterest.com/" target="_blank">Pinterest</a>, <a href="http://www.stumbleupon.com/" target="_blank">Stumbleupon</a> and <a href="https://delicious.com/" target="_blank">Delicious</a>.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS",sans-serif;">The
darker green of the US shows that there are more from there these days
than home, so I am going to change my writings slightly to accommodate
them.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS",sans-serif;">So
instead of just saying that Julie Bishop likes murdering children, I
will say "the Australian Foreign Minister, Julie Bishop, likes murdering
children".</span><br />
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS",sans-serif;">Instead
of saying simply "the Abbott government like destroying the
environment", I will instead say "the current Australian Federal
Government, headed by an ultra-conservative lackwit, Tony Abbott, like
destroying the environment", and so on.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS",sans-serif;">Hopefully
the accommodating of our overseas readers will not inconvenience those
at home or interfere with the free flow of invective that I spew.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS",sans-serif;">And
now, since we have some US readers I will take the opportunity to
tackle an issue that still bugs me, namely, the Imperial system(?!!)
of measurement.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS",sans-serif;">The
US of course still famously refuse to institute the Metric System, due
to, I guess, an unwillingness to change to something unfamiliar.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS",sans-serif;">This
I understand, there is nothing more frightening to humans than change,
indeed most of the xenophobia that the current Australian Federal
Government headed by an ultra-conservative lackwit, Tony Abbott,
display, is due to fear on something different, mostly Muslims, but
anyone who isn't white and traces there genetics back to the British
Isles, is right in the government sights.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS",sans-serif;">But (as usual) I digress.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS",sans-serif;">So, the Metric System.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS",sans-serif;">I think the world should use the metric system mainly due to my background as a scientist.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS",sans-serif;">We scientists use what's called the System Internationale (SI) for units of measurement.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS",sans-serif;">Under the SI, the unit of time is the second, the unit of weight is the kilogram and the unit of length is the metre.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS",sans-serif;">The US still uses the Imperial system and this has no basis in logic: "and why", I hear you ask, "is that?"</span><br />
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS",sans-serif;">Well, as expected, I'm going to tell you.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS",sans-serif;">The metric system has its basis in logical, worldwidely available standards.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS",sans-serif;">Thus,
1 kilogram, 1,000 grams, is derived from the weight of a cubic
centimetre of water.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: 'Trebuchet MS', sans-serif;">(Editor's note: You yanks can damn well spell centimetre the correct way an' all.)</span><br />
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS",sans-serif;">Water exists everywhere, and so we have a convenient standard for weight.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS",sans-serif;">A metre was originally recorded as "1/10,000,000th of the distance of from the equator to the north Pole".</span><br />
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS",sans-serif;">This had some problems as the North pole moves around a bit due to climactic, gravitational and magnetic reasons. </span><br />
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS",sans-serif;">So it was redefined as: "the length of the path travelled by light in a vacuum during
a
<a href="http://www.si-units-explained.info/time" style="text-decoration: none;">
time</a> interval of 1/299,792,458th of a second".</span><br />
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS",sans-serif;">Not handy on a household level, but for those that can measure it, it gives us a uniform standard for length.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS",sans-serif;">Temperature is recorded in units known as Kelvins, named for an early engineer working in the field, William Kelvin.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS",sans-serif;">0 on the Kelvin scale is absolute zero, -273.15C.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS",sans-serif;">At this point it is so cold that even sub-atomic particles stop moving.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS",sans-serif;">The two common scales in use today are of course Fahrenheit and Celsius.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS",sans-serif;">Celsius
is, by a cosmic margin, the more logical, with zero being the freezing
point of water, and a hundred being the boiling point.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS",sans-serif;">Fahrenheit, still used in the US, makes no sense with freezing point at 32 degrees and boiling at 212.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS",sans-serif;">It seems our US friends like to stick dogmatically to units that are counter intuitive at best.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS",sans-serif;">Time is thankfully universal and derives from segments of the day, with a second being 1/86400th of a day.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS",sans-serif;">The
day itself being worked out by the Greeks and Romans, painstakingly, as
they watched the seasons pass and the shadows move across the
Colosseum.</span><br />
<table cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="float: right; margin-left: 1em; text-align: right;"><tbody>
<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhYKNI9HsYGsypmrTj2R1lue1a9dph0G7iMEG_W4AUUDYcIR95-gCpZskDxXPdYlc1XHgVtYuilW7CDNNN3nZ0q0GrWwXR1I62FVWJvcdCJbLDqQTLK0ZZ921IjMW2L5-uZINQT6nPf37fk/s1600/alec-baldwin-as-jack-donaghy-in-30-rock--6.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhYKNI9HsYGsypmrTj2R1lue1a9dph0G7iMEG_W4AUUDYcIR95-gCpZskDxXPdYlc1XHgVtYuilW7CDNNN3nZ0q0GrWwXR1I62FVWJvcdCJbLDqQTLK0ZZ921IjMW2L5-uZINQT6nPf37fk/s1600/alec-baldwin-as-jack-donaghy-in-30-rock--6.jpg" height="200" width="149" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS",sans-serif;">Alec Baldwin as Jack Donaghy: "Arrgghhh! </span><br />
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS",sans-serif;">he told me in kilometres!"</span></td></tr>
</tbody></table>
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS",sans-serif;">OK? So everything to do with the metric system has a logical basis and has easily available standards to get your first measure.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS",sans-serif;">Compare this with the hopelessly misguided Imperial system.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS",sans-serif;">A
yard in the Imperial system is apparently the distance from King Henry
VIIIth's nose to his fingertip with arm outstretched, a foot was the
length of his foot, and in inch, the length of one of his toes.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS",sans-serif;">The
pound, the basis of the Imperial weight system, has an uncertain
provenance, but stems from Roman times and was some arcane standard now
lost to the mists of history.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS",sans-serif;">The abbreviation for pound, "lb", comes from the Roman for scales, libra.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS",sans-serif;">The point being that there is now no logical standard that a pound can be measured by if for some reason we lose it.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS",sans-serif;">(Another Editor's note: I'm not crazy about monarchies of any sort, so the Imperial system has two strikes with me.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS",sans-serif;">Further
to that: The yanks hate the British monarchy and had a revolution to
break away, you'd think they would have embraced the egalitarian Metric
system at the time, just goes to show there's not a lot of logic
involved with the Imperial system and its use.)</span><br />
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS",sans-serif;">The American attitude to the Metric system is best summed up (in my opinion) by Alec Baldwin in 30Rock.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS",sans-serif;">Alec plays arch-republican, Jack Donaghy.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS",sans-serif;">In one episode he attends a conference in Toronto, Canada with his heavily pregnant wife.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS",sans-serif;">Some
days before the due date, she begins contracting, and Jack and wife
start a major flap as they want their child to be born in the US, so
that the kid can be president some day.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS",sans-serif;">Frantically Jack tries to find a way to get back to the US, and his wife asks, "can you drive me back there? How far is it?"</span><br />
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS",sans-serif;">Jack replies: "I don't know, I asked a Canadian the distance, but he told me in kilometres!" </span><br />
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS",sans-serif;">For the record, it's 160k, or 100 miles from Toronto, Canada to the closest point of the US, Buffalo, New York. </span><br />
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS",sans-serif;">So to all my new US readers, glad to have you, but please start using the Metric system and catch up with the rest of the world.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS",sans-serif;">So
having raised the blood pressure of everyone States side I will close
this week's epoch marking rant with one of my favourite jokes that could
have been written for me.</span><br />
<br />
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS",sans-serif;">A guy joins a monastery in the Himalayas.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS",sans-serif;">It's
a vow of silence monastery, but every year on mid-summer day each
member of the order is allowed to say two words to the abbot.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS",sans-serif;">So the new guy goes about his devotions and then summer comes and it's time to say his first two words.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS",sans-serif;">He joins the line in front of the abbot, seated at his desk with quill poised ready over his parchment.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS",sans-serif;">His turn comes and the abbot says, "Yes, brother, what are your words for this year?"
</span><br />
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS",sans-serif;">The new guy says, "More food."</span><br />
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS",sans-serif;">The abbot writes it down, and the novitiate goes away and another year passes.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS",sans-serif;">The next year comes and once again the line forms in front of the abbot.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS",sans-serif;">The new guy comes up in turn and is asked for his words, he says, "More blankets."</span><br />
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS",sans-serif;">Once again it is written down with due ceremony and the members of the order pass another year.</span><br />
<table cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="clear: right; float: right; margin-bottom: 1em; text-align: right;"><tbody>
<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEj7As1M8EoQtJg4RyDoHipp-YhUjbdLLFHaY6AzlJ8UDS5ecySwILbybT5E1pTFfuJ2JEyyyokKlokeYXGVE7VFYTHiAyTYHlpvagyEYKwV-bqS36giGlNZ_wzvlxtSbmxDnkNvYDkCX9_c/s1600/abbot_monastery.JPG" imageanchor="1" style="clear: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEj7As1M8EoQtJg4RyDoHipp-YhUjbdLLFHaY6AzlJ8UDS5ecySwILbybT5E1pTFfuJ2JEyyyokKlokeYXGVE7VFYTHiAyTYHlpvagyEYKwV-bqS36giGlNZ_wzvlxtSbmxDnkNvYDkCX9_c/s1600/abbot_monastery.JPG" height="249" width="320" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Our joke's abbot in one of the first two years.</td></tr>
</tbody></table>
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS",sans-serif;">Mid-Summer comes again and the new guy comes up for his third utterance, his fifth and sixth words in three years.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS",sans-serif;">He shuffles up to the desk and the abbot looks up at him enquiringly, and the guy says, "More firewood".</span><br />
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS",sans-serif;">At
these word the abbot throws down his quill and says with considerable
exasperation, "For Buddha's sake mate, you've been here three years and
all you've done is bloody complain!" </span><br />
<br />
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS",sans-serif;"><br /></span>
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS",sans-serif;"></span><br />
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS",sans-serif;"></span>
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS",sans-serif;"> </span><br />
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
</div>
LKhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11244232092173678321noreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8082972746234187865.post-35286783858736521842014-01-06T14:53:00.002-08:002014-01-06T14:53:18.158-08:00<h2 style="text-align: center;">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS",sans-serif;">Non-Fiction.</span></h2>
<h2 style="text-align: center;">
<a href="http://byronshortstories.blogspot.com.au/2013/10/emotional-north.html"><span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS",sans-serif;"><span style="font-weight: normal;">Emotional North</span></span></a></h2>
<h4 style="text-align: center;">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS",sans-serif;"><span style="font-weight: normal;"><span style="font-size: small;"><a href="http://byronshortstories.blogspot.com.au/2013/10/sunset-in-south-java-then-it-all-went.html">1 - Sunset in Java.</a></span></span></span></h4>
<h4 style="text-align: center;">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS",sans-serif;"><span style="font-weight: normal;"><span style="font-size: small;"> </span></span></span></h4>
<h4 style="text-align: center;">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS",sans-serif;"><span style="font-weight: normal;"><span style="font-size: small;"><a href="http://byronshortstories.blogspot.com.au/2013/10/dawn-over-palembang.html">2 - Dawn over Palembang.</a> </span></span></span></h4>
<h4 style="text-align: center;">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS",sans-serif;"><span style="font-weight: normal;"><span style="font-size: small;"> </span></span></span></h4>
<h4 style="text-align: center;">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS",sans-serif;"><span style="font-weight: normal;"><span style="font-size: small;"><a href="http://byronshortstories.blogspot.com.au/2013/10/3-sumatra-sideways.html">3 - Sumatra Sideways</a><a href="http://www.blogger.com/null">.</a> </span></span></span></h4>
<h4 style="text-align: center;">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS",sans-serif;"><span style="font-weight: normal;"><span style="font-size: small;"> </span></span></span></h4>
<h4 style="text-align: center;">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS",sans-serif;"><span style="font-weight: normal;"><span style="font-size: small;"><a href="http://byronshortstories.blogspot.com.au/2013/11/4-stepping-into-europe.html">4 - Stepping Into Europe.</a> </span></span></span></h4>
<h4 style="text-align: center;">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS",sans-serif;"><span style="font-weight: normal;"><span style="font-size: small;"> </span></span></span></h4>
<h4 style="text-align: center;">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS",sans-serif;"><span style="font-weight: normal;"><span style="font-size: small;"><a href="http://byronshortstories.blogspot.com.au/2013/11/5-london-and-thereabouts.html">5 - London and Thereabouts.</a></span></span></span></h4>
<h4 style="text-align: center;">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS",sans-serif;"><span style="font-weight: normal;"><span style="font-size: small;"> </span></span></span><span style="font-weight: normal;"><span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS",sans-serif;"> </span></span></h4>
<h4 style="text-align: center;">
<span style="font-weight: normal;"><span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS",sans-serif;"><a href="http://byronshortstories.blogspot.com.au/2013/12/control-i-had-none-at-first-and-less-as.html">6 - Control?! I had none at first, and less as the term went on.</a></span></span></h4>
<h4 style="text-align: center;">
<span style="font-weight: normal;"><span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS",sans-serif;"> </span></span></h4>
<h4 class="post-title entry-title" itemprop="name" style="text-align: center;">
<span style="font-weight: normal;"><span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS",sans-serif;"><a href="http://byronshortstories.blogspot.com.au/2013/12/7-rolling-hell.html">7 - Rolling Hell.</a></span></span></h4>
<h4 class="post-title entry-title" itemprop="name" style="text-align: center;">
<span style="font-weight: normal;"><span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS",sans-serif;"> </span></span></h4>
<h4 class="post-title entry-title" itemprop="name" style="text-align: center;">
<span style="font-weight: normal;"><span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS",sans-serif;"><a href="http://byronshortstories.blogspot.com.au/2013/12/8-rolling-further.html">8 - Rolling Further.</a></span></span></h4>
<h4 class="post-title entry-title" itemprop="name" style="text-align: center;">
<span style="font-weight: normal;"><span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS",sans-serif;"> </span></span></h4>
<h4 class="post-title entry-title" itemprop="name" style="text-align: center;">
<span style="font-weight: normal;"><span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS",sans-serif;"><a href="http://byronshortstories.blogspot.com.au/2014/01/9-everythings-bright-then-everythings.html">9 – Everything’s Bright, Then Everything’s Grey</a></span></span>
</h4>
<h4 class="post-title entry-title" itemprop="name" style="text-align: center;">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS",sans-serif;">
<span style="font-weight: normal;"> </span></span></h4>
<h4 class="post-title entry-title" itemprop="name" style="text-align: center;">
<span style="font-weight: normal;"><span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS",sans-serif;"> </span></span></h4>
<h2 style="text-align: center;">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS",sans-serif;"><span style="font-weight: normal;"><span style="font-size: small;"> </span></span></span></h2>
<h2 style="text-align: center;">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS",sans-serif;">Fiction.</span></h2>
<h2 style="text-align: center;">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS",sans-serif;">The Destruction of Lasseter's Road. </span></h2>
<div style="text-align: center;">
<h2>
<span style="font-size: small;"><a href="http://byronshortstories.blogspot.com.au/2013_09_01_archive.html"><span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS",sans-serif;">Chapter 1.</span></a></span></h2>
<h2>
<a href="http://byronshortstories.blogspot.com.au/2013/12/the-destruction-of-lasseters-road-2.html"><span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS",sans-serif; font-size: small;">Chapter 2.</span></a></h2>
<h2>
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS",sans-serif; font-size: small;"><a href="http://byronshortstories.blogspot.com.au/2013/11/the-destruction-of-lasseters-road-3.html">Chapter 3.</a></span></h2>
<h2>
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS",sans-serif; font-size: small;"><a href="http://byronshortstories.blogspot.com.au/2013/12/the-destruction-of-lasseters-road-4_1.html">Chapter 4.</a> </span></h2>
<h2>
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS",sans-serif;"> </span></h2>
<h2>
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS",sans-serif;"> </span></h2>
</div>
<div style="text-align: center;">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS",sans-serif;"><br /></span></div>
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<h2 style="text-align: center;">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS",sans-serif;"><span style="font-weight: normal;"><span style="font-size: small;"> </span></span></span></h2>
<h2 style="text-align: center;">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS",sans-serif;"><span style="font-weight: normal;"><span style="font-size: small;"> </span></span></span></h2>
<h2 style="text-align: center;">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS",sans-serif;"><span style="font-weight: normal;"><span style="font-size: small;"> </span></span></span></h2>
<h2 style="text-align: center;">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS",sans-serif;"><span style="font-weight: normal;"><span style="font-size: small;"> </span></span></span></h2>
<h2 style="text-align: center;">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS",sans-serif;"><span style="font-weight: normal;"><span style="font-size: small;"><br /></span></span></span></h2>
LKhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11244232092173678321noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8082972746234187865.post-80291554415891652322014-01-06T14:45:00.002-08:002014-01-06T14:45:28.658-08:009 – Everything’s Bright, Then Everything’s Grey<!--[if gte mso 9]><xml>
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<br />
<div class="MsoNormal">
And I did enjoy Greece, and not solely because I
spent every morning waist deep in the Adriatic conversing with naked women.
</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
It was a lot to do with the people, they are chaotic,
anarchic, lovers of good food and drink, and this national character cemented
my love of the place.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Craig and I were staying at a small village on the western coast
of Corfu, called Pelakas.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
The man who had picked us up at the ferry port had a lovely
little hotel and our stay there was great.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Each day we would sleep till nine or ten, have breakfast on
the deck overlooking the ocean, then, with toast and coffee consumed, we would
head down to the sea for a swim.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
As stated at the end of the last chapter, the beaches across
the southern coasts of the the Med are clothing optional.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
So just going for a swim was something of an experience.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
I was still too prudish to go naked, which may come as a
surprise to those who knew me at uni.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Then, it only took three beers after soccer and my daks would
be off, and I would be displaying my massive rear end for all to see, those
unfortunates who did then racing to the bathrooms to vomit.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
However, here in Greece we went swimming at ten in
the morning, sober, and so our boardies stayed on.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
The water was as clear as glass, and of an even, invigorating
temperature.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Also, due to the enervating calmness of the Mediterranean in summer, many didn’t lie on the beach
sunbaking, but stood stomach deep in the water and had their conversations
there.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
There was a range of nationalities there, from Australian
through Zambian, with all the continents in between.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
So it was a genuine holiday.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
On looking back it really comes as no surprise that this was
where the holiday began as all we had done previously had been drive on crowded
roads and set up tents on stony, gravel-strewn ground, like we were drivers for
the army or something.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Anyway in Greece
I began to finally relax.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
All the tension of London
and schools like Eastlea, compounded by weeks on the road, finally began to
unknot and I was able to sleep smoothly and enjoy the sun.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
We didn’t drink a lot, perhaps surprisingly, my full-blown
alcoholism was still in the future (thankfully), and where we were staying
wasn’t the full-on party vibe of Benidorm, Mallorca
and the others.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Also, our hotel was a little way down the coast from the
real partying capital of our area, the Pink Palace.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
The Pink
Palace is basically a
frat house for American college students.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Every summer the place fills up with those who can afford
the trip and frat boys and sorority sisters pile in and party like there is no
tomorrow.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
So the bulk of those who just wish to get on the juice
heavily tend to go there, thankfully, so we were spared their intrusion.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Indeed, the second morning there I had an in-Ocean
conference with two nice young American guys, who had come over to stay at the
Pink Palace, but after a week, couldn’t take it anymore and so had come down
the coast a bit for a more relaxed holiday.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
When we weren’t in the ocean talking, we rode mopeds around
the island.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Mostly I went with a group that included Craig, an English
lad, whose name escapes me, a young Australian man, and a young
Greek-Australian woman, Anna.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
I was navigating and I can tell you getting around in Greece
is not as simple as reading the map.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
In fact, I’ll digress slightly further.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
As usual I had started studying Greek via comic books, and
the ones I had to peruse were Tintin comics in Greek.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
I had my Greek-English dictionary, but the problem with
Greek, unlike German, Spanish and French, is that Greek uses its own letters,
so before you can translate a word, you have to first translate any Greek
letters in the word.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
So the village were staying at Pelekas, is spelled in Greek,
πέλεκας, if you look closely you can glean the meaning, ‘P’ is ‘Π’ pronounced
‘pie’, as in the symbol used in your high school maths classes, next is ‘έ’,
epsilon, or ‘E’, and so on.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Thus, studying my Tintin comics had a double layer of
translation required, and similarly, riding along on our mopeds, we would come
to a junction with signposts pointing in various directions and I would have to
get out my dictionary, translate the letters, then find the town on the map,
then figure out if we wanted to go there.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
However, it wasn’t a major hurdle, and we enjoyed our
riding.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
It did have its hair-raising moments though.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
While we were on holidays the locals weren’t, and so tended
to get a little impatient with put-putting, two-wheeled tourists filling the
road.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Add to this the Greek love of not following rules and you have
a recipe for traffic chaos.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
I remember us coming around a corner in the highway and
finding a truck bearing down on us on our side of the road.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
We then all swerved with the precision of the Holden Hell
Driving team into the middle of the road to avoid the oncoming truck, when a
car that had been behind us chose this moment to overtake us and the oncoming
truck.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
It shot by, we threaded through between the two vehicles,
and then without a formal signal, all pulled over to the side of the road to
begin learning how to breathe again and check our shorts for involuntary bowel
movements.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Some nights when I dream I still see the sides of those two
vehicles passing us at speed in opposite directions.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Additionally, some of the villages of Corfu
predate the motor vehicle by a thousand years, and so the roads are less than
accommodating.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
One morning I was riding on my own and I came along the
‘highway’, a two-lane affair that was as somewhat pitted with potholes, when I
decided to pull into an upcoming village and get some food.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
The highway swung wide to avoid the town (I was about to
find out why), and I took a small slip road off to the left into the
settlement.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
At first my road was two lanes and there was a solid yellow
line marking the edge of the road, I followed this yellow line on my moped and
the road got steadily narrower.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
First it dropped down to one lane, then this lane became
less than a car width, then less than a motorcycle width, then less than a
donkey’s girth.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
However the yellow line continued solid on my right and so I
knew I was on the ‘main’ road, so kept going.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Then the ‘road’, with its indicating solid yellow line,
vanished into a solid wall.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
What was really going on was that thee road disappeared
through a gap between two houses.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
The corners of the houses were offset slightly and so the
gap shut out the light of the sun, and so it appeared the road just terminated
flat against the wall.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
I had an eye-widening moment, fearing a crash coming up, so I
frantically braked down to walking pace, saw with relief the gap with the
yellow line disappearing through it, and rode through.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
If I had extended my elbows a la a flamboyant chicken dancer
I would have touched a house on either side.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Then I was through and into the market place of the village,
the yellow line continued and I opened the throttle and moved off.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
I did want to find some local equivalent of the RTA and ask
if they had ever thought of a ‘Road Narrows in Lunatic Fashion’ sign for the entrance to
the village, but put it down to Greece
and the Greeks.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
I bought my food in the market place, got back on my moped
and rode on out of town, keeping, now, a careful eye on the yellow lane marking
line to see where it disappeared to next.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
I might add, I’ve read that many cities founded in antiquity
are the same, Rome
is a good example.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Romans park anywhere, on, or in anything.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
It is famously said that if you are sitting alone at a Roman
restaurant, you are well advised not to go to the bathroom, leaving your table
unattended, as upon your return you will find a car parked where you had
previously been dining.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
So Craig and I passed a week on the western shores of Corfu in very pleasant fashion.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Then it was time to move on to stay with Craig’s sister in
the southern peninsula region of Kalamata, of olive grove fame.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Craig’s sister had married a Greek man, and they had set up
home down there, and so off we went to see them.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
I should say, I can’t actually recall being invited, but
then I have never been particularly good at picking up social signals, but
Craig was leaving, and so I went too.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
We caught a bus back to Kerkyra, then the ferry to the
mainland, a bus to Athens
and then another to Kalamata.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
The bus put us off some distance from our destination and so
we walked the last few Ks.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Craig’s sister, Anne, had married a Greek man, Paniotti, and
he had built the house they lived in on the seashore outside the town of Kalamata.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
It was another incredibly beautiful place and we settled in
nicely.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Anne spoke fluent Greek, but she did enjoy having the two of
us there to converse with in her native language.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Paniotti spoke broken, heavily-accented English, but still joined
in.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
I showed him my Tintin comics in Greek and he gave me a look
of wonder and disbelief that I thought I could learn this way, but I soldiered
on.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
I should add that Greek, due to the letter difficulty, is a
language that is better learnt conversationally, and now I was getting some
practise in that area of language learning as well.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Mind you, it is well known that Melbourne is the second largest Grek city by
population, so if I had been serious I would have spent a few months down
there, but there you go.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
I got back into exercise in Kalamata and each morning I
would put my swimmers on and walk around the bay, three or four ks, and then
swim back in straight line, about 1500 metres.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
There is nothing like the Mediterranean
for feeling like you have the world’s largest swimming pool at your disposal.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
There were no, or very few boats in the bay, and precious
few people, no currents and so it was an enjoyable swim.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
We ate at home on the deck and conversed over red wine.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
I remember one conversation that nearly lead to divorce
though, and it stemmed from the ‘Man in the Moon’.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
When I was a boy growing up under the clear skies of the
Southern hemisphere, I read in my, mostly, Northern hemisphere books of the
‘Man in the Moon’.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Apparently, the crater pattern on the moon’s surface looks
different in each hemisphere.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
So I had never quite understood what the Man in the Moon was,
until that night on the deck in Kalamata.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
We ate our meal, and then Craig pushed his plate away,
leaned back and stretched.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
As he raised his head he stopped, fixed in place, then said,
“Hey, I just saw the man in the moon.”</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
The rest of us looked up, and I, likewise for the first
time, saw what he meant.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
The crater pattern does indeed lay out like there’s a face
on the moon.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
It really does look like a man hiding inside the moon, and
looking out through the surface at the Earth.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Anne, Craig and I marvelled for a moment, making, “Oh, I
see” type noises, but then Paniotti, said, “I can’t see it, what do you mean?”<br />
So Craig then tried to point out to him what we were looking at, but he just
couldn’t see it.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
It was something like those computer images, made up of many
cross-hatching lines and colours, and if you look through, into or past, you
get to see the hidden image.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Well, try as we might, Paniotti just couldn’t see it.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
We pointed, we drew diagrams, but it did no good.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
We then got up and went to wash up, leaving Paniotti outside
staring at the moon, but it seems to be one of those things that you only
notice, like Craig did, by accident.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Eventually it was time for bed, but Paniotti had trouble
sleeping, worrying about not being able to see the man in the moon.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Thankfully, the moon began to wane the next night and so we
were spared further friction-inducing searching for the damn thing, but I was
glad I saw it.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
And it just goes to show, friction in marriage can occur for
a multitude of reasons, but that was the first and only time I saw the Man in the
moon causing it.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
So a week passed on the dusty, sunlit shores of Kalamata.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
My skin was brown again (skin cancer was still ot really
taken seriously), I had regained some fitness due to daily swimming of 1500m,
and the knots of tension were finally eased.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Then one morning about a week after we had arrived, Craig
said “Let me show you the Venetian fort”.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
I nodded, though this was a little unusual, but twigged
immediately; I was about to get the tap on the shoulder, it was time for me to
go.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
In my arrogance, I had thought I would just be able to plonk
myself on Crag’s relatives and stay there till term began again back in England.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
But of course, Craig hadn’t extended such an invite.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
I of course, should have known this, and left under my own
cognizance in graceful fashion, but even at the age of 28, I still had a lot to
learn about behaving.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
So we walked along the shores of the bay to the fort.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
This was an enormous, stone edifice, from the days when the
mighty Venetian empire had ruled the Levant.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Once there and we had looked around a bit, Craig, in very
well modulated tones, made it clear that I couldn’t stay for the whole summer,
freeloading off his relatives.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
To my (minor) credit, I got the point without going off in a
huff, my normal practise, when confronted with something I didn’t think fair.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Back home I made much thanks to Anne and Paniotti and the
next day got my pack on and headed with Craig into the village to catch the bus
to Athens.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
We shook hands in the little square and then I boarded, and
took the trip up to the capital.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
It had been a wonderful stay, all across Greece, and I
was thankful for it.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
However, now I had to contend with Athens, and boy, is that place frenetic.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
I had a few days till my flight and so I checked into a
backpackers, fretted over the price, in my usual cheapskate way, and then went
out to see the main sights.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
It really was something to see, the Parthenon, and Peiraus,
names that came back to me from my lessons in Ancient History at high school.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Australia,
you see, has a mere two hundred years of white history, so a building that is a
hundred and fifty years old, gets us all gooey.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
But here in Europe, you
would regularly encounter a building that was over a thousand years old, and
often still occupied, and this was quite amazing to see.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
I might add, for those who are contemplating it, the
Parthenon is guarded by Doberman Pinchers, as I discovered when I tried to
sneak in at dawn one day, and I repeated my frantic backpedalling leap to
safety that I had had to employ at the campground in Barcelona.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
At least the Parthenon deserves guarding by attack dogs, I
still don’t know why the campground had security that wouldn’t have disgraced Fort Knox.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Eventually my flight day came around, and I left my
backpackers and headed to the main park in Ommonia Square to wait for the airport
bus.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
I had some hours to wait and so tossed my pack down and got
out my book.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
I was lying there reading in a genuine sylvan glade, when
world war three broke out around the corner.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Explosions went off, people were screaming, horns honked,
the end of the world was nigher than I had ever felt it.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
I sat bolt upright, wondering what on Earth was going on, so
I put my book on my pack and then went to have a look.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
I walked through the trees cautiously, then emerged from a
copse to discover it wasn’t a riot, but a political rally.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Gerald Durrell once wrote during his time in Cameroon in
west Africa that “three Africans together can make more noise than an
equivalent number of any other race on Earth”.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Well this may be true, but I would happily bet on the Greeks
giving the Africans a run for their money.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
The Greeks do like to make a bit noise, and here it was writ
large.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
At first I thought that they must be planning a march on
parliament to impeach the PM with extreme prejudice, when it dawned on me that they
hundred or so people assembled were SUPPORTING the politician on the podium.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
He spoke, the crowd yelled, more fireworks went off, more
horns of passing traffic honked.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
I breathed<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>sigh of
relief that there wasn’t going to be trouble, then went back to my pack, lay
down again, and wondered what would be the harvest if I happened across a political
rally where the locals were AGAINST the person in question.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Buildings would burn, I was sure.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Then time came and I caught my bus for the airport.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
I remember when younger watching some terrorist-hijacking-on-a-plane
movie, and it turned out that the terrorists on board had got their weapons on board
at Athens airport, and one of the captives on the aircraft said, “Oh, well, no
surprises there, you could carry a bazooka on at Athens.”</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Well, once I got there I saw what they meant.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Again I was early, having nothing better to do, and so once
I checked the flight board and saw that my plane to London wasn’t for some hours yet, I went out
the front to a grassy, pine-treed area, to read my book till check-in time.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
I was doing so when I looked up from my book and saw that Athens airport consisted
of a tin shed on a tarmac area.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
It looked for all the world like one of those crop dusting
places in outback Australia,
or indeed like the working base of Crocodile Dundee in the movie.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
From where I sat I could see what the movie character had meant
about security.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
I could have got up from where I sat, walked around the back
of the shed, put a weapon or bomb in the baggage on the little truck that was
sitting there waiting and then boarded through the metal detector no questions
asked.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
It’s all changed now of course, in the lee of the 9/11
attacks, but then, in 1992, Athens
airport was about as secure as a sieve.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Subsequently, I checked my watch and saw it was time to
check in.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
I entered the shed, got in the queue, checked my bags in,
then headed back out to the grassy area to wait the next two hours.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
That done, I boarded, and once again fell foul of the ludicrous
smoking section delineation of the aircraft cabin.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
The smoking section was rows one to five, then in a burst of
bad planning, sat unaccompanied children, in rows six to eight, and I was
behind them in row nine.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
So, the smokers lit up with pleasure, then the smoke began
to irritate the kiddies and they began to cry and bawl in unison.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
And so I sat in row nine for the three hours it took to get
to Heathrow with a look of crazed mania covering my face as the kids gave
frantic voice against the tobacco smoke.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
I eventually emerged from Heathrow, ears ringing, in the
September of 1993.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Quicker, rather than gradually, the relaxed demeanour I had gained
in Greece
faded to be replaced by the classic, tension-knotted face of a Londoner.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
I tubed across London
to my grim, rabbit-warren converted house in the northern suburbs, stepped
sideways into my tiny room, put my pack down and began removing clothing to
wash.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
As I went about my domestics, I began planning for the
upcoming school year, and made a realisation that it was time for somewhere
new.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
To background that, the previous year I had taught mostly at
beastly Eastlea, and lovely Sarah Bonnell, but in the final term leading up to
the summer holidays, I had criss-crossed London
doing a day here, a day there at various schools around the place.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
One of these was Holloway Boys in north London.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Those who know London,
know all about Holloway, it is the site of a notoriously grim women’s prison,
and the suburb surrounding it, seemed to take on the character of the place.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Thus, I was truly and utterly shocked to discover that there
was a school in London,
THAT WAS WORSE THAN EASTLEA!!!!!</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Holloway was a boys’ school, so I didn’t have even the minor
calming effect that girls can have on boys, and so my one day there lasted
longer than it had taken to build some of the buildings I had so recently
visited in Europe.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Every lesson was a constant, battle to keep a minor
semblance of control.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
I felt like a lonely lighthouse standing on a rock in the
ocean, fighting to keep my light above the raging seas of misbehaviour.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
So as I went to the laundrette, that day off the plane, I
made a decision.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Enough of London, I would go
teach in Birmingham.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
I didn’t really know what I expected, but I had heard that Birmingham was a much slower paced place than London, and so hoped that
the schools there would be less pressurised.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
So I got through to Timeplan, told them of my decision, and
got a contact for a teaching agency in Birmingham,
and off I went.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
And so to digress in my usual meandering way.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Later in life than these events I would finally attend
Alcoholic’s Anonymous and Narcotic’s Anonymous, to try and get some control
over my substance abuse issues.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Now anyone with a problem like this, particularly alcohol,
fights and scratches and claws not to go.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
The perversely convoluted logic is that ‘if I don’t go to
AA, then I’m not an alcoholic’.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
And a common tactic employed by alcoholics is to do a
‘geographic’, change town, go somewhere no one knows you, and where you don’t
know anyone else.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
This stems from the idea that ‘I can’t give up drinking
here, I’ve got all my drinking mates, and my favoured local pub. I’ll never
give up here, it would be too embarrassing, all too hard’.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
And so the geographic is done.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
The tactic rarely works, for now the alcoholic is in a new
town where they don’t know anyone, and now they are bone-crunchingly lonely, so
what do they do?</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
They go down to the pub to meet some people in their new
town.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
I mention this, because what I did therefore in the autumn
of my second year in Britain,
was the worst geographic one can do.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Holidays in beautiful, anarchic, sunlit Greece to Birmingham,
the worst city in western Europe.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Birmingham is not even a city
really, it is a large conurbation scattered around the midlands, and as such, doesn’t
have a genuine geographic centre, as London does
with Piccadilly, or Sydney
does with the harbour.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
So it is a characterless place.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
I think it is best described by an author I like, David
Lodge.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Lodge was an academic at Birmingham Uni, and wrote many
successful books, most centred on Birmingham.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
In one, one of his Birmingham
characters, Phillip Swallow, goes on sabbatical to California and while there is talking with a
Californian at a party.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
The Californian says, “I hear that Birmingham is really crap, is that right.”</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Stung to defend his home town, Swallow replies, “No, no, it
just a large city, with all the usual advantages and disadvantages.”<br />
”Oh”, says the Californian, “what are the advantages?”</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
And Swallow can’t think of any.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
He stumbles around for a moment or two, searching inside his
head, and eventually says, “Well, it easy to get to the New
forest to go hiking.”<br />
Then he stops and realises that if the biggest advantage of the town is that
it’s easy to get out of, then that’s not a saying much for the town itself.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
So you get the picture about Birmingham.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
So a week or so later I gathered my belongings and caught
the train up there and almost immediately found that it was the right decision,
despite what I have written above about the place.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Firstly, I found somewhere nice to live, and here my friendship
with Neil once again came to my aid.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
In my time in the UK I stayed with each and all of
his relatives, now it became clear that not even his out-laws were safe.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Neil’s cousin Jane lived in Birmingham, where also lived her on-again,
off-again boyfriend , Paul.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Jane saw me coming and subtly got across to me that I
couldn’t stay with her, but inferred I might stay with Paul.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
So I rang him and asked that classic backpacker question,
“do you mind if I doss with you till I find somewhere to live?”</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Paul, foolishly, said “yes”, and so I took my meagre
belongings around to his house in King’s Heath, Birmingham.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
As always, my question had been heard by Paul as ‘I will
only be there for a week or so’, but the meaning for me was, ‘once I am rusted
onto your couch, you will need dynamite to get me out.’ </div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
However, I’d like to think it wasn’t that bad, we were still
friends once I moved out (three months later), so it can’t have been all bad.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Paul is a wonderful guy, and was very patient with me.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
He was currently “off-again” with Jane, and so his front
room was free for me to sleep in on the fold out couch.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Paul had that dry sense of humour that I like, and was also
a big soccer fan, so most evenings we would convene on his couch and watch a
soccer match.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
And I’ll put this story in to demonstrate his wit, and just
hope, as so often an author has to do, that it comes across in print.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
We were watching a pre-season trial match one evening
between the, at the time, two biggest soccer teams on Earth, A.C Milan, of Italy, and Barcelona,
of Spain.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
The Italian team were very dominant pumped in four goals
before half time.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Just after the fourth goal was scored the TV showed the
assistant manager of Barcelona
whispering something in the ear of the manager.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Paul turned to me and said, “Do you think he just said ‘we
better tighten up at the back?’”</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
And I’ll add one further incident to show that though Birmingham may have been
known as a pretty rotten place, the people there couldn’t have been more
helpful.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
I lost my wallet one afternoon.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
It had fallen from my pocket as I walked down to Paul’s
place from the bus stop.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Later that night when I noticed it, I began a frantic search
through the house and my belongings, but couldn’t find it.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
I asked Paul for advice, and he said, “Try the cops.
Sometimes people hand wallets in.”</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
I looked at him sceptically, there was fifty quid in there,
so I didn’t think it likely, but I had nothing to lose.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
So I called up the local nick and asked, and to my surprise
the WPC who answered said, “Yes, we have had one wallet handed in, can you
describe it?”<br />
I did so, and it turned out it was indeed my wallet.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Additionally, the fifty was still in it.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
I had thought it a long shot, but even then Paul and I had
discussed that the best I could hope for was for someone to find it, take the
money out, then give it to the cops.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
But no, the whole lot was there.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
So I went around to the police station, got my wallet, with
enormous relief, and also got the name of the person who had handed it in.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Turned out it was a neighbour about ten doors up from Paul,
and he had gone out of his way to walk around to the police and hand it in.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Man, I was thankful.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
So I went around to thank him, he wasn’t home, but his wife
was there, she told me his favourite tipple, when asked, and I went around to
the bottlo and bought him some John Smith’s Bitter with the fifty I still owned
in thanks.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
However if the adults on Birmingham were helpfulness personified, the
kids at the school I was placed at were less so.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
With my lodgings sorted I had made contact with the teaching
agency and they sent me down to Ninestiles
School in south east Birmingham.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
I thought I was going in to start teaching, but up here things
were done differently.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
I went up to the desk and fished the scrap of paper from my
pocket with the details given me by the agency on it.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
“Hi”, I said to the woman at the counter, “I’d like to see
Allan Hollins, please.”</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Hollins was the deputy in charge of casual teachers and
recruitment genereally.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
She nodded and went to her phone, she spoke for a moment and
then turned back to me and said, “he can see you now”, and so then gave me
directions to his office.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
I went down there, trying to put aside uncomfortable
memories of my own childhood, when I was sent on the long march to the deputy’s
office.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
I knocked and the door was opened by the man himself.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
He asked me to take a seat, then sat himself down at his
desk and then said, “So Lachlan, tell me about your best and worst lesson.”</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
I was stunned.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
I was being interviewed!</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
In London
interviews didn’t exist, or if they did, they consisted of, “Are you prepared
to go in there and teach those monsters?”<br />
And if you misguidedly said “yes”, then you got the job.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Here in Birmingham
they had time to interview for jobs.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
I must have acquitted myself reasonably well during the
interview though, because later that afternoon the teaching agency called and
said Ninestiles wanted me to start on Monday.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Great, I even had the weekend to enjoy myself.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
And for the record, my best lesson was the spaghetti tower,
in which you give the students a pack of spaghetti and some non-toxic glue or
blue tack, and they make a building out of it.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
The winner is the model that uses the least spaghetti and
holds the most weight.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
My worst lesson was every single one I taught at Eastlea.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
My original premise that Birmingham
students were less of a problem than London,
was generally true, but there were certainly some fire crackers amongst them.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
But overarching all of that was that I was already finished
as a teacher.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
I had been teaching for less than two years and was already
unable to find the energy reserves that this most demanding of jobs requires.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
My personal energy, depleted by the trip across Asia, had
been reduced, drastically, tyrannically, by Eastlea School.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Those same energy levels had been increased minorly by teaching
at Sarah Bonnell with its well-behaved girls, and further, on a personal level,
by my two weeks in sunlit Greece,
but really, only ten years sitting in a wheelchair looking at the ducks on a
pond could hope to restore the damage done by teaching in east London.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
I no longer prepared good lessons, I simply found some
problems on a worksheet, photocopied them and handed them out and then stood at
the back of the room making sure no one misbehaved.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
It is a terrible attitude for a teacher to take and in its
way, not providing stimulating lessons creates the misbehaviour that I was
always complaining about.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
So I did the least worst teaching that I could get away with
and once again mainly was satisfied if the roof was still on the classroom when
I went home in the evening.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
So therefore The Note, when it came, caught me by surprise.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
My year nine science class at Ninestiles was as out of
control as every year nine in the history of education and I had a lot of
trouble with them.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
I was constantly fighting for control, a process not helped
by my less than enthusiastic teaching, and so had sent one kid, Kevin, to the
authorities on more than one occasion.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
I mention this because one morning I herded them into the
lab as usual and the only well-behaved kid in the class, possibly in all of
year nine, Brian, came up and gave me a note.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
It was from their home room teacher, Ms. Pounder.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
The note said, “Mr Barker, could I see you at recess,
please. EP” (Elizabeth Pounder)</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
“Fucking bollocks”, I said internally, “what have I done
now?”</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
You see I was sure I had done something wrong in my attempts
to get this class under control and so this note no doubt presaged some
carpeting from the aforementioned Ms Pounder.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
So I grumped my way through morning school, wondering what I
was in trouble for, and building myself up into a state of righteous
indignation.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
“Yeah, well”, I prepared in my head, “they were completely
out of control when I took them over, so don’t complain now when I have to ride
them like a rodeo bronc” I said to myself many times as the morning wore on.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
I wasn’t going to be told by this Ms Pounder, no way.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Then recess came (finally) and wanting to get it over with I
dismissed my class and headed around to Ms Pounder’s maths room.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
I stepped though the door and saw she was helping a student
with their work after class, something I should have done occasionally I might
add, and so walked up and rudely interrupted.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
I can’t remember what I said exactly, but it was along the
lines of “yeah, whadda want?” in a rude tone of voice.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
She looked up from her work, and said, “Oh, Mr Barker, um,
look, er, sorry, I’m held up a bit here, could we do this at lunch time?”</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
I sighed rudely, and said, “yeah, whatever”, and left.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Then I had to get through middle school with this still hanging
over my head, but did so with my customary bad grace and then returned to the
maths department for round two.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
This time she had been able to get rid of her students on
time and so I walked up to where she was sitting at her desk, marking some
work.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Once again with terrible rudeness, I got started without
preamble, “OK, I’m here, whaddaya want?”</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
I mention my rudeness because it added further to her
stress, she put down the book she was marking and then with a stammering tone,
haltingly said, “Oh, er, Mr Barker, er, um, I was wondering, um, I, er, that
is, er, I” and here she finished in a blurting rush, “I think you’re quite
attractive, and I wondered if you would like to go out to dinner tonight?”</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Poor Liz, she was asking me on a date and I had been the
epitomy of rudeness.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Now I have taken some hits in my time, on the rugby field I
have had entire opposing forward packs slam me down and ruck over me.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
On the soccer pitch I have broken both ankles, my right
foot, both wrists, the ring fingers of each hand and had my right ankle
telescoped out of its socket by a heavy tackle leading, ultimately to the need
for a reconstruction.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
In the surf I had been javelined into the sand bar by five
foot waves bearing hundreds of tonnes of water down upon me, but none of those
hit me as hard as Liz’s question that lunchtime.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Firstly, I couldn’t believe anyone could find me attractive,
a product of eternal low self-esteem, and secondly, Liz should really have been
on the runway at Milan, not teaching maths in Birmingham, and so this
was a double shock.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
However, one thing teaching does teach the teacher is to
think on your feet, and so I, as quickly as I could, backpedalled, remodulated
my tone, and then answered in as halting fashion as she had spoken before.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
“OH, er, uh”, I paused to finger my brow, “Uh, yeah, uh, er,
uh, sure, um, yeah, er, that would be good.”</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Then like all running backs, I handed off the ball and got
the hell out of there before I blew the whole deal.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
We made arrangements to meet in my local in King’s Heath
that evening, and I went on my way.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Darkness into light, I had not only escaped a telling off
for treating my year nine’s badly I had got a date as well.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Things were looking up.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
So I got though the afternoon’s school in a mentally
opposite fashion to how I had spent the morning and then headed home to Paul’s.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
I then went around to the local to meet Liz and discovered
that I had been unaware that I had nearly got involved in ticklishly difficult
romantic situation of a completely other nature.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
The science department at Ninestiles had two laboratory
attendants, Hazel and a young Indian woman, Indira.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Indira had asked me out once for lunch, and we had gone
across to a little restaurant near the school.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
As we ate, she told me that she was engaged to me married to
an Indian engineer who lived on the other side of Birmingham.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
It was mostly an arranged marriage, said Indira, and she
wasn’t overly happy about it, she was more or less seeing how it went.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
She then asked me about myself, and seemed to dwell on it
when I told her I was recently divorced.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Then lunch over we returned to school and I didn’t think too
much more about it.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
However, that night in the King’s Head, as my local was
called, Liz informed me what was really going on that day at lunch.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Turns out that Indira had told her family she wasn’t to
happy with the arranged marriage, and ‘was there a way out?’</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Her parents had said that if she found a suitable man, a
professional man, with a working visa for the UK, she could dump the engineer and
sign up with him.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
And hard on the heels of that conversation yours truly
dropped out of the travelsphere into her orbit.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
‘Just the job’, thought Indira.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Indira had been a shade too diffident to come out and ask
me, and I, in my usual obtuse manner, had been completely unable to read the
signals.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Had we had a single extra glass of red that day at lunch I
could be living in Birmingham
or Mumbai as part of an extended Indian family now.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
But we didn’t and I’m not, so instead I began a relationship
with Ms Pounder of the maths department.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
This was complex, as she was currently breaking up with her
de facto partner, also called Paul.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Their breakup was amicable, genuinely so, but it did complicate
things a little, as we couldn’t go round to Liz’s place, because she didn’t
want to rub Paul’s nose in it by bringing her new boyfriend around while he was
home, and I was still dossing on the couch at ‘my’ Paul’s place.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
How things may have gone who knows, but ‘my’ Paul then
solved the problem by telling me it was time to move on.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
I should have realised, but then, as now, was ill-equipped
to notice depression in others.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
I said earlier that Paul was ‘off again’ at the time with
Jane, and what I hadn’t known was that she had dumped him, (this time), and so
he had really wanted the house to himself to lick his wounds in private.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Thus, after three months in the place he finally lowered the
boom, and asked me in as gentle a fashion as possible, to find my own place.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
So I looked at the little posters on the rack in the corner
store and found a residence around the corner with a room going.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
I went and had a talk with the leasee, and was offered the
room.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
I went back to Paul’s, folded up his couch for the last time,
then he drove me and my increasingly threadbare belongings round to the new
place, and I moved in.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
The place I moved into would never be photographed in the
‘fine living’ section of Vogue, but for twenty quid a week it was a dry room,
and in Birmingham,
that’s as much as a share houser can ask for..</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
I moved in with a nice young woman from Newcastle
(Newcastle England that is), Kristi, and for
the first time in my life I watched soap operas.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
I mention this because it became our, Kristi and my’s,
thing.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
We would watch those ridiculous shows and take the piss out
of it unmercifully.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
For instance, Eastenders, is a soap set in the east of London where I had been
teaching, and details the lives of those who live there in grinding poverty.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Yet, and here Kristi and I would yell at the TV, the characters
in the show were always in the pub drinking Heineken.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
“Where do they get the money?” Kristi would say.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
“God only knows, but none of them have a job”, I would
rejoinder.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
And so our evenings were spent happily in the company of those
most appalling of shows.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
I might add, Birmingham
has an almost celestial ability to sink the mood and fortunes of those who live
there, and this was evidenced by the soap operas of the day.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Britain
at the time had four major soaps.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Eastenders from London, Coronation Street
from Manchester, Brookside Close from Liverpool
and Crossroads from Birmingham.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
They were all as bad as each other, but Crossroads was the
only one cancelled due to lack of interest.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
However, now with my own room, I could see Liz somewhere apart
from in the pub, and this allowed us to have a relatively normal time.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
And so for the rest of that winter I continued to teach
(badly) at Ninestiles and go out with the statuesque Ms Pounder.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
In retrospect I had once again found happiness in a most
unlooked for place, in this case, Birmingham.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
But as ever in my life, I had not been able to recognise
that I had everything I needed, and took to the road again.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
It was the writing bug that caused this upheaval.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Not satisfied with staying with each of Neil’s relatives,
and then his in-laws, I was now going to presume upon the friendship by using a
friend-of-a-friend, twice removed, to further my writing career.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
I had got wind of a possible contact with BBC radio in
Scotland, and as I already knew teaching wasn’t for me, or perhaps the idea of
still being a teacher in twenty years gave me the cold heaves, I headed north
to once again “Try To Be A Writer”.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
So I’ll close the Birmingham
chapter with this anecdote.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
I seem to exert an entropic force upon everything I use and
own.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
My clothes become dilapidated and are regularly refused by
the op shop when I try to donate, my car is invariably patched up with duct
tape and I am constantly redrilling bits of my residence to repair damage done.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Well my room in Kristi’s house was nice, upstairs, and
looked over the ‘view’, the alleys and backyards of King’s Heath.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
However, the door was less than robust.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
When I moved in only the lower hinge was still functional,
and after a mere week, it came away as well.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
So from then on I couldn’t close the door in a regulation
fashion, but had to pick it up by the handle and upper edge and kind of place
it in the jamb, leaning slightly outward at the base to stop it falling inward.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
One afternoon I was in my room marking some work from
school.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
I had “put” the door closed to keep the noise of the tele in
the living room out, when unbeknownst to me, Liz came around to surprise me.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
She said ‘hello’ to Kristi at the front door and Kristi
directed her upstairs to my room.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
She arrived at my door, knocked twice and upon the second
tap the door fell inward across my bed, knocked over my little bed side table
and smashed my little clock radio.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
For a few seconds Liz and I regarded each other, she at the
door, me at my little desk, with mirrored looks of astonishment, then I said
the only thing I could say, “Come in”.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
She entered and we fixed things up.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
I mention this because it is the first and only time that a
woman has smashed down a door to get into my bedroom, though I have hoped for
it far more often in my life.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<span style="font-family: "Times New Roman"; font-size: 12.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-AU; mso-bidi-language: AR-SA; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-language: EN-AU;"><br clear="all" style="mso-special-character: line-break; page-break-before: always;" />
</span>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
LKhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11244232092173678321noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8082972746234187865.post-28448014621843101292013-12-24T15:06:00.003-08:002014-01-06T14:55:03.268-08:008 – Rolling Further.<!--[if gte mso 9]><xml>
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<br />
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
So with Madrid
done, it was time for the coast.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
We headed south-east toward Valencia
on the Mediterranean coast, the van was moving well again, and so I put aside
my thoughts of mechanical failure that first appeared in the Madrid traffic and rolled on.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
The coast was really (I see now) what we had come for, and
the seabreezes, when we finally came within their sphere of influence, were
worth every kilometre we had driven to experience them.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Valencia
is famous for its oranges, and indeed the site of those beautiful dark green
swathes on the red Earth of the coast made everyone feel better.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
We had been in the van, and each others close proximity now
for two weeks, and even if you are travelling with St Francis of Assisi and the Dalai Llama,
arguments and bickering will still occur.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
St Francis would always be wanting to stop at every church
and have a pray, while you would no doubt get annoyed with the Llama for never
getting annoyed about anything.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
So the coast was a great change for us.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
We hit Valencia
and after a few nights there we headed back up the coast toward Barcelona.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
And here, in Barcelona,
we hit a campground that was run by Fascisti left over from General Franco’s
regime.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
It says something about this narrative that famous sights
don’t figure prominently, that is largely due to my lack of interest in them.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
In the end I am writing down what I remember, and if it is
still in my mind twenty years later, then I figure it’s worth reporting.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
So.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
The first thing I remember about Barcelona was that it was the first place I
had a long, complex, to me anyway, conversation in Spanish.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
We were in the van driving around with our less than
adequate guide book, trying to find the campground.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Eventually, we came across two young Spanish mothers out for
a stroll, each pushing a pram with baby on board.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
I pulled up next to them and leaned out the driver’s window.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
“Buenos Dias”, I said, in my flawed Castillian accent, “Hay
una camping por aqui?” (Is there a campground nearby?).</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
One of the young women replied, “Yes”, and she pointed to a
chainlink fence next to the road, “that is the campground, inside that fence,
but to enter it in your van, you have to go back up the road to the lights,
turn right, and it is about one kilometre down on your left.”</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
I was very pleased as I understood her response pretty well.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
I sought some clarification, and then we thanked the young
women and did a u-turn and went on our way.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
It was very satisfying to be able to make some small steps
in a foreign language.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
And I might add, I was already learning that learning a
foreign language has many tricky bits, but in any language, grammar is the
toughest.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Vocabulary is relatively easy, this word means ‘car’, this
word means ‘campground’ etc, but when those words come clothed in and around
with verb and adjective structure, it can hide the noun completely and you are
left all at sea.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
German for instance is like this, many say that it is the
easiest language to learn as it is logical, but this is a fallacy, German has
its hard bits, I can tell you, commonly, by its use of compound words.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
The noun in German is placed in the middle of the word, then
a whole series of ‘un-</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
, ‘ab-‘, ‘noch-‘, ‘ge-‘ and other bits are welded onto the
front and back of the word till the learner doesn’t know where they’re at.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Plus Spanish and French have the famous gender prelates, and
so in French, a chair is male and a table is female, figure that out.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
And, just before this turns into some ‘English is the best
language’ rant, from what I understand, one of the hardest things about English
is that so many words mean different things, throwing the learner off even at
the vocabulary level.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
‘Set’, for instance, can be ‘the glue has set’, a ‘set of
blocks’, ‘the sun had set’ and ‘I am going to set up my computer’.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
So all of the languages of Europe
have their issues, but the point is there is something very satisfying about
making progress in any skill.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
So we made our way back to the lights, turned left and
pulled up at the campground.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
We paid, went in and set up, then decided to have swim in
the campground pool.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
And here Craig and I discovered where the Nazis that had
escaped Germany
at the end of World War two had got to.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
The pool attendants, in their white terry-towelling
clothing, seemed to have a beef against the world and everyone in it.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
For a start, I walked up to the pool wearing my shorts and
t-shirt, and jumped in.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Lovely.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Then before I had finished shaking my head dog-like to get
the water out of my eyes, one of the attendants blew a whistle and said to me, “You
can’t wear clothing in the pool”, then he gestured to my t-shirt.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
I looked at him a little askance, wearing a t-shirt in the
pool is a common way to avoid sunburn.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
At first I thought he was kidding around, it seemed so
ridiculous, but he kept gesturing and so I paddled over to the side, got out
and put my t-shirt on the grass next to the pool.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
To be fair to him though, I had been planning to use the
chlorinated pool to give my travel stained t-shirt its first wash since I’d
left England,
and considering the state of the thing, the life guard’s actions were probably
justified.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
So shirtless, I went back to the pool and dived in.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
The whistle went again and the life guard pointed at me
again, and said, “No diving from the side of the pool.”</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
WTF? I said under my breath, then the life guard came over
closer to me and admonished me further, he repeated his injunction and made it
clear that if you wanted to dive, you had to do it off the diving board.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
So Craig and I nodded and then began to swim a few lengths.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Astoundingly, the whistle went again and I looked up to see the
life guard once more pointing at us, and this time he was indicating that if we
wanted to swim lengths we had to go over to the other side of the pool and do
it.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Turns out we were swimming in the shallower side and this
was supposed to be only for parents and young children.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Anyway, we continued our swimming and then, mischievously,
began to push the envelope in every direction to see exactly just what was and
wasn’t allowed.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Turns out pretty much anything except floating on your back
quietly is against the rules, and even then you have to do it in the right area
of the pool.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Crag went to the diving board and jumped in.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
AGAINST THE RULES!</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Diving only from the diving board please.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
I splashed Craig with a sweeping motion of my hand.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
AGAINST THE RULES!.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
No excess splashing please.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
And so it went.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Eventually we had had enough, we’d heard that whistle more
than a particularly transgressive soccer player during a tight match and so now
it was time to get out.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
So we dried off and went into Barcelona to look around, I saw the main
square of town which was interesting to me because of a story told to me by my
flat mate in Vancouver, Bob.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
He had gone Spain
for his vacation and had been in Barcelona
for John Baptiste day.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
John the Baptist is the patron saint of Barcelona, and so his birthday is widely
celebrated.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
The focus of this celebration is the main square and this
square is packed with locals who take champagne and fireworks.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Said Bob, “midnight came around everyone was fully loaded
with champagne and already things were getting out of hand. Then they all began
letting off their fireworks. You’ve no idea how bloody dangerous it is being
jammed into an outdoor area, shoulder-to-shoulder, when a sky rocket suddenly
goes off next to your ear. I was lucky to get out of there with all my limbs.”</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
So we went down to the main square and looked around.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
It was all too easy to picture the carnage of that night.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Apart from the fireworks damaging you when they go up, they’ve
also got to come down sometime, so there is a double jeopardy on this night.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
We returned from town on the bus and we got off on the main
road, not far from where we had had our conversation with the two young women
that morning.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Thus, we were driving distance from the entrance to the
park.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
I should add, this was the mother of all campgrounds,
certainly in terms of size, I would estimate that it was a square kilometre,
and so where Craig and I now stood was something like a two kilometre walk
around two sides of the park to get to the entrance.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
I looked at Craig, then at the walk ahead of us, and said,
“Sod that, let’s climb over the fence, and save some walking,.”</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Craig demurred, he was always more sensible than I, and
said, “Do you think we should, won’t that be against the rules?”</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
To which I replied, “almost certainly, considering the pool
this morning, but I’m doing it anyway.”</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
So I walked through the scrubby bushes up to the fence.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
I was standing there examining it, planning my assault, when
a rattling, scraping sound caught my ear.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
I turned my head, and there, twenty metres away,<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>but closing the distance rapidly was a
Rottweiler guard dog bearing down on me with its mouth agape with menace.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
The scraping sound was coming from the dog’s lead which was
attached to a metal pipe laid lengthwise down the fence, the dog moving up and
down to stop people like me doing exactly what I was planning.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
I gave a falsetto yelp and leapt backwards and then sprinted
the few metres it took to take me out f the dog’s bite zone and stood panting
in fear next to Craig.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
“I think we had better walk around to the entrance”, I said,
in another understatement of cosmic magnitude.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
So we set off and now that we knew to look, saw that there
was a dog tied to the ground pipe apparatus every hundred metres guarding the
entire perimeter of the campground.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
So I didn’t climb in, but did wonder why on Earth the
campground needed such ferocious security.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
In the end, it was no doubt just a throwback to the third Reich,
where the staff of the campground had learned their trade.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
We spent a few more days in the internment camp, and then it
was time to return to France.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
So we packed up and headed up the coast toward the French
border.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
And it was on this leg of the journey, that the gear changing
stickiness that I had noted in Madrid
hit home for real.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
We were moving along the highway of the Spanish coast this
morning, and already it was hot, very hot.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Then the highway veered inland to avoid some coastal hills,
and here, cut off from the cooling seabreezes, our clutch melted.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
I was driving and I changed up from first to second, then
into third, then finally into fourth, however our speed didn’t increase, the
needle stayed stuck on forty kilometres an hour.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
I stamped on the accelerator and this had no effect, so I
tried changing down again in case it was a power issue, but our speed did not
increase.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
The queue of cars behind us began to build up, and
eventually when there were nearly fifty vehicles, full of irascible Spanish and
French drivers behind us honking their horns and telling us in no uncertain
terms to get off the road, I pulled over.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
I explained to the gang, what was happening, then got out and
had a look under the vehicle.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
I couldn’t see anything obvious ( I had thought we may have
picked up a bit of metal or something that was interfering with the gear
shaft), but nothing was visible.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
However, stopping the engine had compounded our problem
because when I restarted and tried to get the van going, I discovered that now
we didn’t even have first gear.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Whatever had happened had happened because of the heat, and
stopping had allowed whatever had melted to set solid, jamming the clutch and
gear cogs into immobility.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
So we stood on the side of a highway in Spain and
contemplated our options.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Thankfully Peter and Sylvana had been given some invaluable
advice back in London
and had joined an organisation called National Breakdown.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
This was a Europe wide
towing service, wherever you broke down across the continent, National
Breakdown would organise a tow to the nearest repair point.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
However, good as this service was, you still had to phone
them, and this was the days before mobile phones were widespread.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
So we had another conference and it was decided that since I
had the best Spanish I would walk/hitch along the highway to a phone booth, and
organise a tow truck.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
So I set out and I have to say, quite enjoyed my walk.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
I was away from the crowded interior of the van for the
first time since we had left London
and it was refreshingly liberating.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
But then the heat began to take over and I realised I
couldn’t keep this up forever.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
So it was fortuitous that the universe sent help.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
I walked along and came to a paddock where a farmer was
ploughing the field with a tractor.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
I went up the fence around his field and when he came around
again, waved vigorously and caught the farmer’s eye.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
He noticed me, pulled his plough out of the ground and drove
over to where I stood.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
He was a quite amazing looking man.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
He was Spanish, as I was to learn from our conversation, but
he had blonde hair.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
I guessed he had a northern European parent, or grandparent,
either way, he jumped down off his tractor and asked me what I wanted, I said
in the best Spanish I could that our car had broken down and did he know where
I could find a phone to call a tow truck?</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
He nodded and then launched into a series of direction, I
couldn’t follow it precisely, but gleaned the gist.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
So I thanked him and then continued on down the highway in
the direction he had pointed.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
He had told me there was a petrol station about three k down
the road, and I could call from there.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
I didn’t particularly fancy three more ks, but when you know
your destination, it does make it easier.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
However, as it happens, I didn’t have to walk all the way, I
was meandering along when a change in the traffic noise caught my ear.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
The noise of the passing cars was replaced by the deeper
rumble of a diesel engine and I turned around to see my farmer friend in his
tractor.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
He pulled up next to me and waved to get on board.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
“Terrific”, I thought, “this’ll speed things up”.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
So with me perched on the wheelguard we drove along the
shoulder of the highway until we reached the petrol station.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
I jumped down and thanked my Spanish farmer friend volubly.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
He nodded and said ‘no problem’ or words to that effect,
then parked his tractor and went into the petrol station restaurant and bought
himself a coffee.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
What a marvellous gesture of help.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
So I went inside and went up to the counter, a young woman
came to serve me and I told her my story of auto failure and then she took
over.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
“Grua?”, she said questioningly.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
I dived into my Spanish-English dictionary and looked it up,
‘Grua’-‘Tow truck’.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
“SI, si”, I said with my head nodding.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
She picked up a phone next to her mounted on the wall, and
made a call.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
She spoke briefly with someone at the other end.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
She hung up and then turned back to me, nodded and said
something, which largely passed over my head, but I caught the word ‘grua’ in
it, she was indicating the tow truck was on its way.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
I then asked her how long it would take, and she said
‘ahora, ahora’, (Now, immediately).</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Talk about helpful service.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
I began to feel I could start to forgive these Spaniards for
the Spanish Armada.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
So I made my way back outside the coffee shop are and then a
thought struck me, was the truck coming here? Or was I in for another walk?</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
But then that was quickly solved because I realised I hadn’t
told her where we were broken down, and then the truck itself showed up.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
It pulled onto the forecourt of the petrol station and the driver
looked around saw me, gestured at the towing apparatus on the back of the truck
and looked questioningly at me.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
I nodded, jumped up and got in the cab with him.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
We roared off down the highway till we came to the van, then
he winched the vehicle on board, we all got in and headed down to the nearby town
of San Carlos De la Rapita.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
We sent the tow truck driver on the way with a National
breakdown payment number, then entered the mechinic’s workshop he had towed us
to.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Needless to say, because our van was German, the parts
needed had to come from somewhere else, Barcelona
probably, or maybe even Germany.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Either way, we were in for a few days stay.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
However, this was a godsend in its way, and further
reinforcement of the Buddhist ideal that ‘nothing is good or bad, it just is’.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Carlos, as we locals came to call it, was a resort town on
the Mediterranean, and so we found a hotel and stayed on the coast for, in
retrospect, exactly what we had come to Spain for.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
The first morning was spent with me in conversation with the
owner of the garage while they tried to explain what was wrong.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Despite my progress in Spanish, this was well over my head,
but with perseverance we communicated in the end.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Turns out that somewhere in the past some nameless cowboy
had replaced the clutch plate with a plastic one.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
No doubt parts were short, and this had worked fine in the
northern latitudes where it was cool, but once we began traversing the stinging
hot Spanish plain the plate had begun to deform in the heat, and that final morning
on the highway it had folded up completely.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
So with much nodding the owner, the mechanic and I talked
and they got through to me that they could fix it but we would have to wait for
a few parts.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
I nodded and went back to the hotel to report.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
That done we settled in and enjoyed a bit of real Spain.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
We slept in, went to the coffee shop and had breakfast.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
We lounged on the beach and by the hotel’s bathtub-sized
pool, at night we had dinner in the seafood restaurants of the town, and
generally got some real vacation time.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Eventually our parts arrived and the owner sent a message to
the hotel and we went down to the mechanic’s workshop.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
The owner told us the van was fixed, then pointed at me and
told me to get in.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
We set on for a test drive, and scurried about the
cobblestoned streets of the town with the owner at the wheel, changing gears
repeatedly and constantly talking to me, clearly indicating that the clutch was
fixed.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
We drove back to the workshop and got out.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
We paid up, handed over a six pack of beer as a tip and then
went on our way.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Sometimes it takes a melted clutch plate to make you stop on
life’s highway and smell the flowers.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
So we moved up along the coast and re-entered France.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
We were going roughly to Italy,
Sylvana had relatives there, and to get there we had to return along the Meditteranean
coast of France.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
The next major town was Cannes,
but we took a detour that many do and stopped in at the small fishing village of Saint-Tropez.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
St Tropez is famous of course as the winter hang of the mega-rich,
Bridget Bardot lives there apparently, or did, and this description, mega-rich,
was accurate to the extreme.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
I’ll never forget pulling up in our dusty, travel-battered
kombi and emerging like five people who had come to fix the drains.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
All around us the beautiful people flowed.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
The shops contained goods, clothing most prominently, that
you needed a second mortgage even to try on.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
I remember a stunningly beautiful French woman in designer
clothing, with designer makeup, sporting designer hair and leading a designer
dog on a designer lead.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
She walked along till she noticed us, then made a wide
detour around us so that none of the poverty of our clothing would brush
against hers.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
And it was crowded, boy was it crowded.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
St Tropez has a resident population of 5,000, but each year
attracts 5 million tourists.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
This makes it a difficult place to live if you’re a local,
additionally due to the morphology of the coast, the only entrance and exits
are a single two lane road.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
So traffic jams are not just common, but incessant.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
And to give you some idea of the scale of the crowding
consider these nerdly figures.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Cape Cod in Massachusetts,
US, has a population of 250,000, and attracts six million tourists a year.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Byron Bay in Australia, has a population of
10,000, and attracts 2 million tourists a year.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
So those comparisons show that there is nothing like St
Tropez for tourist crowding, with approximately 1,000 tourists for each
resident jampacking the place annually.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
That being the case, we didn’t stay long.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Peter bought a pair of shorts, not so much because he was
out of leg wear, but to say he had bought something in St Tropez.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
We didn’t eat there, but simply gawked for a moment and then
got back in the van and got the hell out.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
I had been hoping to see Bridget Bardot, preferably topless,
but even if she had appeared on the footpath in front of me I wouldn’t have
seen a square centimetre of her skin as the paparazzi would have got their
first and blocked the view.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
They inhabit that town like swarms of killer bees, and it is
a reasonable rule of travel planning to be anywhere the paparazzi are not.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
So we moved on.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
We stopped at Cannes
and had a swim and had our first encounter with the French police.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
However it wasn’t overly ploblematic as they simply asked us
to move our van from the red zone in which we had parked it.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
We did so and they with nodding and a merky bucket watched
as we went on our way.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
I mention this because these Cannes
police were the epitomy of politeness compared with one I was about to meet
just up the coast in Monte Carlo.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Like St Tropez, Monte Carlo is a famous proving ground of
the hyper-rich and the police there are more of a Praetorian guard than any
other.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Just quickly some more stats.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Monte Carlo has a population
of 15,000 and they inhabit an area of 0.61 k<sup>2</sup>,<sup> </sup>an area <sup><span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span></sup>smaller than our<sup> </sup>campground
in Barcelona.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
However, this town, city, country, protectorate, or whatever,
is stunningly beautiful, and there is more money per capita in this small
little pocket of France than
anywhere on Earth with the possible exception of Brunei.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
I mention this because I think the police there have been
given orders to give anyone poor a hard time.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
And so it was that while there I nearly got arrested, then
deported, for sitting on a wall.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Craig and I had gone out to sightsee and we had climbed the
stony paths up into the hills to look out over the town and to the shores of
the beautiful, blue Mediterranean.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
We got to a lookout point and found our view obscured
(slightly) by a chest high wall.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Now the sign on the wall said, quite clearly, “No Sitting on
Wall”, in five languages, but that was just a red rag to my bull.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
And in similar vein to my attempt on the north wall of the
campground in Barcelona,
I went over, hoisted myself up, and sat on the wall.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Lovely, the view was so much better, without the wall
obscuring the lower half of the view I looked down through my dangling legs at
the houses below and the ocean further afield.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
I was just congratulating myself on my cleverness when a
French voice barked behind me, I turned my head saw two policemen in the light
blue shirts of the Monte Carlo police.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
They spoke again and gestured, clearly, for me to get of the
wall.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>I did so, then they
spoke to me in French, I gestured that I didn’t understand, and they switched
to English.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Faultlessly, one of them said, “Can’t you read? The sign
says ‘no sitting on the wall’”.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
I really had no answer for that, and was about to make a
smartarse comment when the cop took over and began handling the smartarse part
of the conversation quite nicely.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
“You know what I hate about you English” he began.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
I was about to say ‘I’m Australian’, but quickly realised
that was unlikely to help.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
So remained silent, and he continued, “You come over here in
your filthy clothes, you sleep on the beach, you get drunk and vomit all over
the place and you get into fights with the other tourists and cause a lot of
trouble for me and the other police.”</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
This was obviously a practised rant, and most of my life I
have had pretty good relationships with the coppers, starting with the much
loved Sergeant Crick in my home town, but this was as close as I have ever come
to obstructing a policemen in the course of his duties, to wit, punching the
arrogant arsehole in the face.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
I was starting to lose my temper, I can tell you, I didn’t
like being called English (no Australian does), and the reason I was filthy was
because every damn spare cent I had went on paying astronomical Europe summer
prices, Monte Carlo being the pinnacle of those.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
And I was just going to launch into my little fiscal
discourse when he said, “Give me your passport, I am going to check you out.”</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
What may have happened next we’ll never know, because
thankfully at that point Craig brought his level head to the issue.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
“Just give him your passport, we don’t want any trouble with
these guys.”</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
He may have gone on to say, “And I’m not going to wait
around to bail you out of the clink”, but I could tell he was thinking it.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
However, I saw sense, got my passport out of my chest bag,
and handed it over.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
The copper took it with disdainful fingers, if he had had
some surgical rubber gloves he would have put them on I’m sure, then he went
over to an area of the viewing deck away from us and spoke into his radio.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
He was there for a few minutes, then he came back and grudgingly
returned my passport. </div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Then with a final admonition to ‘follow all the rules’ while
we were in Monte Carlo,
he waved us away.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
He was only doing his job, but I was still fuming that
evening at the perceived injustice of the world.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Of course, looking back I should think myself lucky, because
what this policeman was really watching out for was English football
supporters, who famously make infinite amounts of trouble for the hard working
police of Europe, and in the end it was probably only hen he saw my passport
and realised I was Australian and not English, that he didn’t arrest me on the
spot.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
That night we went down to the famous casino of Monte Carlo.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Sorry, let me put that more accurately, we went down and
stood <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">outside</i> the famous casino and
looked at the pretty lights and the pretty people walking in.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
I have never seen so many glittering people, and so many
glittering, shimmering performance vehicles parked in one spot before.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
A Mercedes would have been decidedly low rent here.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Lamborghinis sat next to Ferraris, Ferraris jostled with
Zondas, those Zondas made way for Bugattis, Bugattis were parked next to
Beamers and Roll-Royces stood aloofly nearby.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
I would estimate that the street outside the casino had ten
million dollars worth of cars in it.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
How much was being flung around inside doesn’t bear thinking
about.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Even the taxicabs in Monaco are BMW minimum.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Come to think of it, it was somewhat surprising that there
wasn’t a <span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>roadblock outside of town
monitoring the vehicles trying to get in and telling us point blank that our
battered Kombi was not welcome.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
So having seen the sights of the Principality of Monte
Carlo, and paid the prices therein, we moved on.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
But before I do, I would just point out, that what you have
read so far has kind of glossed over the mental strain of what we had put
ourselves through.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
We were all ‘over’ this constant road life in the van.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
If we’d had a particular destination it may have been
different, as we would have been able to sustain ourselves with the completion
of each kilometre toward said goal, but we didn’t, we were just travelling
around and it was wearing thin for all of us.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
I was the worst behaved I might add, impatient, tight with
money, unwilling to compromise, but there was no denying we all, already, needed
a break from our holiday.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
And hasn’t that line been written thousands of time
throughout human history?</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
So when we were in Avignon in the south of France, Craig and
I went to the shops to get some supplies and I told him I was over this, and he
agreed, he to had had enough as well, and so we decided to leave the van and
head for Greece.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
I had always wanted to go there ever since reading Gerald
Durrell’s enchanting books of his life on Corfu when he was young, and Craig’s
sister had married a Greek man and they now lived together in Kalamatta in
southern Greece,
so we would leave the van, and go there.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
So on our return from the shops, we told the others of our
plan, and they agreed, with some relief, that it was good idea, I know they
were happy to see the back of me at the very least, and we got out the maps and
made a plan.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Next stop, Milan.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Sylvana’s relatives lived not far from there and Craig and I
could get a train south from the central concourse at Milan station.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
So we moved on across the southern coastal fringe of France and entered Italy.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
And just because it has always amused me, let me tell you
something my brother told me once that sums Europe up pretty well.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
He heard this from German friend he worked with.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Heaven in Europe is when
the Swiss are the organizers, the Germans are the engineers, the French are the
cooks, the Italians are the entertainers and the English are the police.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
That’s heaven, right?</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Hell in Europe is when the
Germans are the police, the English are the cooks, the French are the Engineers,
the Italians are the organisers and the Swiss are the entertainers. </div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
All tied in with the stereotypical views of these various
races.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
However, I want to say that I actually found Italy far from
disorganised, and quite nice to drive around in.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
This was mainly because we didn’t go to any of the heavy
tourist areas, the Leaning Tower, the Vatican and so forth.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
All Craig and I did in Italy
was get driven to Milan
on the famous Autostrada (Expressway) and a smooth ride it was too.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
However, my cheapskatedness nearly denied us that in the
end.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
All the autostrada have tolls and due to difficulty of doing
the exchange rates from Francs to Lira, even with Renee’s nifty little machine,
we couldn’t work out what the tolls were with any certainty.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
The last thing we wanted was to come to a toll gate and be
advised we owed a Monte Carlo-level of money for using the road.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
So we took a B-road toward Milan.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
This was a lovely drive, but we were in the foothills of the
Alps here just north of Genoa, and every ten
metres we went toward Milan
was accompanied by a hundred metres of snaking turns.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Then we would encounter a speed limited village.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Out speed would drop from sixty to fifty and we would nudge
our way through the tiny mountain settlement back to the open road.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
After an hour of this, we reconferenced and decided that
lovely as it was, if we kept this up we would spend infinitely more on petrol
than tolls, so it was time to open her up on the autostrada.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
So we did so, we lurched down out of the hills and took the
on ramp for the Milan Expressway.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
We came to the toll booth and the little sign popped up showing
we owed 3,000 lira for our trip.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
The Italian lira is defunct now, replaced by the Euro, but
from my research I have been able to glean that this meant we owed three
Australian dollars for the toll.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Even we could afford that.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
So we paid up, floored the pedal and set off for Milan.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Milan is a wonderful place,
and is often considered the true capital of Italy,
but we didn’t see much of it, with our plan set, and the blue waters of Greece beckoning we just wanted out of the van,
out of the country and out into the world of Greece.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
We stayed our last night in the van nearby in Bergamo, then the next
day the others dropped us onto the staggeringly beautiful forecourt of Mila
station and we said our good byes.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
They headed off and we went inside.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Italians are justly famous for their style and flair, so it
the look the guy selling tickets gave me probably shouldn’t have surprised me.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
I was wearing shorts and t-shirt that hadn’t been washed in
three weeks, I was unshaven, and my backpack looked like it had recently been
pulled from some swamp and should have been studied by archaeologists, rather
than being in actual use.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
I walked up to the counter and asked him, actually now that
I think about it, showed him where I wanted to go.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Craig had a little Italian, but that was not really up to
the conversational exchange and so we took out our guide books and drew with a
finger our proposed route.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
From Milan, we wished to go <span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>down the spine of Italy
to Brindisi, then take the ferry across to Greece.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
He nodded, and then said something in Italian, I looked at
Craig, but he hadn’t been able to understand, and so we looked back at the
ticket guy and shrugged.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
The ticket guy looked me up and down again, and gave a world
weary sigh, then he pulled out a piece of paper and wrote down the fare,
L66,000, or A$33 each.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Lovely, we nodded our heads, held up two fingers and he
wrote out two tickets.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
We then went through the mill of trying to read the
timetable on the wall.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
We were lucky here because our train terminated in Brindisi, thus the word Brindisi was prominently displayed.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
If , for instance, you are going to a small town on a main
line, you will commonly find that it is not even referred to.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
So we found our train, got our platform number and went over
there.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Our train was waiting and we got on board.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
We found the most empty compartment (there were no seat assignments),
stowed our luggage and then waited for the train to leave.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Eventually it did and we had the novel experience of seeing
a bit of Europe without driving.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
As the train left the suburbs of Milan we were able to see the Italian
countryside in all its summer glory.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
It was joyously relaxing.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
But then dusk came down and with the view no longer
available we tried to get some sleep.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
I say tried, because as usual we had the cheapest seats, and
without seat assignments, people just got on and sat wherever they could wedge
themselves in.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
About an hour after dusk fell I had an interesting little language
moment.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
A woman got on and looked into our compartment and said “Et
tu occupado?”, meaning, “are you full up?”</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
We eventually answered “No”, so she came in and took the
last available seat next to me.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
I mention that because the first part of her utterance was in
Latin, the ‘ et tu’ bit.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
You may recall this being used by Shakespeare in Julius
Caesar, as in ‘Et tu brute?’, referring to the moment when Brutus dug in the
knife.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
It makes sense that Italian of all languages would be the
one to have Latin bits used in the modern day, but even so I found it minorly
interesting.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
What was less interesting, positively annoying in fact, was
the woman’s presence next to me.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
I had previously been able to slump over a bit and been
relatively comfortable, but with her here now, I now had to sit upright all the
way to Brindisi
(she was going to the end of the trip as well).</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
And so the night passed.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
It took twelve hours or thereabouts, but eventually we
pitched up at the ferry port
of Brindisi and bought
our last Italian transport tickets.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
We boarded the ferry and soon we were making our way across
the Adriatic.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
The Adriatic is a small part of the Med, between Greece and Italy, similar to the Tasman being
part of the Pacific.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
This was my first experience of the Mediterranean, and it is
such a different world to the seas that surround Australia.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
It is so calm it is hard to believe some times.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
It is nicknamed ‘the pond’, and you can see why.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
It is more like walking across your living room through blue
shag carpet than being at sea.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
It redefines flat.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
The only disturbance was the wake of the ship’s propeller.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
However, it was just what the doctor ordered after our month
or so of crowded roads and tourist soaked hot spots.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
The journey takes nine hours and we caught up on some of the
sleep we had missed during our crowded train ride of the night before.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Finally the coast of Corfu began to line the western horizon
and then we docked at Kerkyra, the capital of Corfu.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Gerald Durrell and his family are long gone of course, they
lived here in the nineteen thirties, and the ravages of tourism, Craig and I
included, have taken over, but even so, there is still enough of the natural
charm to be going on with.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Craig had been here before, and there was the same guy he
had stayed with standing on the dock looking for customers, Craig pointed him
out and said his stay with this guy had been Ok, so we didn’t quibble, paid up
and got in his minibus.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
He drove us across the island to his hotel and we checked
in.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Backpack down, we then went straight to the beach and took a
dip.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
While I was standing there chest deep in the still,
everclear water, thinking I have finally made it to the site of one of my
favourite books when I became aware that I was not alone.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
An attractive English woman came up and said, “Hey there, Where
are you from?”, I answered, “Australia,
but currently I’m teaching in London.”</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
I was about to ask her the same question when I saw through
the glass-like water that she was stark naked.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
I knew I was going to like it here.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<a href="http://byronshortstories.blogspot.com.au/2014/01/9-everythings-bright-then-everythings.html"><br /></a></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<a href="http://byronshortstories.blogspot.com.au/2014/01/9-everythings-bright-then-everythings.html"><br /></a></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<a href="http://byronshortstories.blogspot.com.au/2014/01/9-everythings-bright-then-everythings.html">Next chapter</a><br />
<br />
<a href="http://byronshortstories.blogspot.com.au/">Back to home page</a></div>
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LKhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11244232092173678321noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8082972746234187865.post-3713949322919349022013-12-19T15:37:00.004-08:002013-12-24T15:11:19.790-08:007 - Rolling Hell.<!--[if gte mso 9]><xml>
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<br />
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
However, before I go into more teaching stories, there is
the topic of my first summer holiday in Europe.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
I got this so wrong, but then I don’t know how many times I
am going to write this in my various writings, we would all do things differently
if we had a time machine.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
I had taught at Eastlea for three terms and then moved
across the universe to Sarah Bonnell, but even with my short term of relaxed
teaching at Sarah Bonnell, I was still suffering the after effects of Eastlea,
and desperately needed some down time.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
So what did I do?</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
I got in a Kombi van with four others and drove across Europe in the sweltering summer heat for two months and
nearly did my head in fully.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
But all that’s ahead.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
It all started with a phone call from my friend Peter Lewis.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Peter was a geography teacher with whom I had gone into the
trenches at Eastlea.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
I picked up the phone and Peter, with that oh-so-Eastlea
habit of not mucking around, said, “Hey Lock, do you want to go to Europe this summer in a van?”</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
I, like many of us, never think things through, and so said
“yes”, we made a further few arrangements to meet and get it organised, and
then rang off.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
‘Great’, I thought to myself, ‘Europe
in the summer, that’ll be relaxing’.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Boy, was I in for a shock.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
We then began scanning the classifieds in the Southern
Cross, a newspaper in London put out for visitors like us from the southern
hemisphere.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
We eventually tracked down a van which seemed suitable and
then I went with Peter and his girlfriend, Sylvana across London to have a look at it.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
It seemed OK, not that any of us had much mechanical nouse,
and so we made arrangements to have it looked at by a mechanic, then left.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
The nice young Dutch couple that were selling it needed it
in the intervening period to move into their new house and so we agreed that
once moved in they would call.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
We then faced the issue of which mechanic to get to appraise
the beast for us.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
I had grown up on the TV show Minder and the snaky wiles of
Terry’s boss, Athur Daley, the ultimate used car salesman, and so was
trepidatious to say the least.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
I can’t recall from this remove how we found this mechanic,
but we did, and, when a few days later the call came from them, went across to
the Dutch couple’s address, got the van and then did my first driving in London.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
IT was manic.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
My friend Sean from Canada once told me that “80% of
people think they are above average drivers”.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
And Ben Elton put it well when he wrote, “You never hear a
guy come into the pub and say that he caused an accident on the way here
because he’s not a very good driver and also he couldn’t get it up last night.”</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
And those two quotes are relevant because the driving that
was going on was helter-skelter at the minimum, with seemingly everyone behind
the wheel convinced they were the only driver on the road who knew how to do
it.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
I thought I was a good driver, and could handle anything
having driven tractors and four-wheel drives on the farm, and had driven in Sydney.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
But when I look back on it, I realise that I hadn’t driven a
car for a long time.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
While still in Sydney
I had been a student at teacher’s college, and so couldn’t afford a car.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Then I had been in Asia
where I had been driven, nearly mad, as well as around by the locals in their
rattling death machines.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
So this trip across London
to the mechanic’s was my first drive in nearly 18 months, and it showed.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
What’s more, of course this was my first time in a Kombi,
and this one in particular, so the trip was fraught with many hazards to start
with.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Then there was the traffic.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Oh, my god, does London
have traffic.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Previous to this my worst experience of traffic was in LA.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
LA has traffic jams at two in the morning, the morning peak
hour is in reality the morning peak four hours.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
And now I was finding that London was similar.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
To put in into context, England
and Scotland form an island
the size of Victoria, Australia,
but while the population of Victoria is a
decidedly well-spread six million, sixty million people stand, and drive in 34
million cars, in England and
Scotland.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
And like all ancient cities, built for foot traffic and at
most a coach and horses, the streets of London
were in no way built for modern traffic.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Recently a friend told me that modern Londoners who own a
car spend an average of seven days, 168 hours, a year looking for a parking
space.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Ben Elton in his book, Gridlock, and Michael Palin, in his
TV show, Carsick, have shown that Britain is overfull of cars, and I can assure
you, that trip across London, if I didn’t believe there were too many cars in
Britain, I certainly did after.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
I navigated onto a main road and began traversing the
southern edge of London.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
I got into the middle lane and was doing about 80k, with the
speed limit being 100.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
I decided to just stick to this plan till I got near the
mechanics workshop, when a truck driver pulled up on my left, the inner, slower
lane, and screeched at me for going too slowly in the middle lane.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
I was too shaken already by the nightmare traffic to do more
than look at him, and then, thankfully, he gave me a two-fingered salute and
then spurted off at a greater speed.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
I continued my nerve-jangling way and eventually got to the
suburb I required and thankfully left the main road, (The south circular for
those with knowledge of London),
and joined the local traffic.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
And for about three milliseconds I was able to relax.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
But then I encountered the problems of driving in the
suburbs of London.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
I had left a road where I had been yelled at for going to
slow, and now I was in traffic where I wanted to yell at someone because it was
not fast enough.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
There were cars parked on both sides of the road and to say
the local throughways were barely adequate to handle four cars wide was an
understatement.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
So nearly demolishing the wing mirrors of parked cars on my
left, and the oncoming traffic nearly doing the same to my van, on my right, I
inched my way through to the mechanic’s workshop.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
To say I got out of the car with relief was another
understatement, I felt like I had just completed some arduous polar trek and
had planted my flag at the pole.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
I went into the office and spoke to the coverall-wearing man
behind the desk, “Hi, er, My name’s Lachlan, I
spoke to Garry?” I paused, and the man nodded indicating he was Garry, so I went
on, “We called about getting our van checked?”</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
He nodded again, then came out from behind the desk and led
me out into the yard and we surveyed the van.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
He didn’t start laughing, which I judged a good sign, and
additionally didn’t add, “And you say this thing moved?”, which was mechanic’s
short-hand for this is gonna cost you a heap of money.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
He nodded again and asked me for the keys, then he got in,
wiggled up and down a bit in the driver’s seat, then started the engine.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
He then got out and came around to the back of the vehicle
and stared for a moment at the exhaust.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Then he crouched down, pulled a rag from his pocket, and put
his covered hand over the exhaust pipe.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
After a few seconds the engine began to heave, and he took
his hand off the exhaust.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Then he went back and turned off the engine and turned to
me.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
“Yeah, she’s fine, you could probably use new rear shocks
though.”</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
I was a little taken aback, I thought the checking would be
a bit more extensive than that, but then I wasn’t a mechanic, and so had to
take him for his word.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
“Oh, right”, I said, then asked a question that no Londoner
can do without, “How much will that cost?”</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
“Aw, I could do it for ya’ for fifty quid.”</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
I said “great” and we went into the office and made the
arrangements and then I left, thankfully carless, for the nearest tube station
to go home.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
A week or so later Garry called back to say that the van was
ready and I could come and pick it up.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
So I got Craig, the handsome music teacher from Sarah
Bonnell, he of the ten-love-notes-a-day fame, who was also coming on the trip
and we trained across London
to Garry’s workshop.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
We walked in and Garry was once again behind the desk, he
looked up and nodded, then said, “Come for your van, huh? OK, I’ll just print
out your bill.”</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
He went to his computer and hit a few keys and then an
invoice appeared from his printer.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
He tore it off and then gave it to us, and there in the
total column was ₤300.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
I stared at it in consternation.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
All of us going on the trip were teachers and so were
relatively well off by English earning standards, but I had previously told those
going on the trip that we would only be up for fifty quid for the shocks.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
I looked searchingly at Garry, “I thought you said it would
be fifty?”</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
He looked searchingly at me, “Oh, sorry, no, fifty for the
labour, parts cost two fifty.”</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
“Oh”, I said, “well, um, I’ve, er, we, only brought fifty
quid cash.”</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
“Oh”, he said in return.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
I was uncertain how to go on, but thankfully Craig took
over, “Can we go to a bank machine? Is there one nearby? I’ve got that much in
my account, so I can cover it.”</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
I looked at Craig gratefully, thank god here was there.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
I should say that this was in 1992, and EFTPOS wasn’t
widespread at the time, it certainly didn’t exist in mechanic’s workshops in
the suburbs where the Arthur-Daley-esque cry of “less VAT for cash” was heard
incessantly.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
VAT is the English version of GST in Australia, a
common scam was to pay cash to avoid it.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Most repairs were therefore paid in cash so the mechanic
didn’t have to declare the full, if any of the amount, on his tax.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
So Garry gave us directions to the high street and Craig and
I went down there, got the money out and then returned.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
We paid up and Garry added graciously, “Sorry about the
fright”, and then with Craig at the wheel we drove away in our van.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
We parked it at Craig’s place in the suburbs and then went
around to Peter and Sylvana’s place near Earl’s Court.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Yes, that’s where they lived, talk about Australian
stereotypes. </div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
It was a curious living place, but then not if you were a
Londoner, for they lived in a bay window.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
London
is a very crowded place.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
The roads, as stated, just sort of grew in an organic
octopus-like way across time and space, and the houses were much the same.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Peter and Sylvana lived at the front of a three story house
that over the years had been slowly compartmentalised into smaller and smaller
living places.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
I myself was living in a similar place in north London and my room was so
small that I had to walk sideways to get past my bed.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Peter and Sylvana had lucked into the plum spot, at the
front of the house.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
They lived in one room about the size of a car, with guests
sitting on the ledge of the bay window.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
There was a tiny, sorry, microscopic, kitchenette, and their
bed filled up the rest of the floor space.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
The fifth of us, Renee, was also there and so, in its way it
was good training for the months to come, with all five of us jammed into a
space about the size of our van.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
We had some curry and made our plans.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
We set a leaving date, sorted out where we were with money,
then went our separate ways to our various accommodations.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
And so finally the day came, we were out of the
claustrophobia of London and on our way south
the ferry at Dover.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
We bought our tickets and then drove on board.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
We stood on the rails and watched the channel flow by, until
the horn sounded and we all scurried below to our cars.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
We drove off the ferry and suddenly, schizophrenically, we
were in France.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Like most, we had some adjustment-nausea.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
First we had driven on to the ferry on the left, not we had
to leave the terminal on the right.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
That done, we joined the south flowing traffic for Paris.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Many have described French drivers, but I think it was best
put by Peter Wherret in his car show, Torque, said Wherret: “You only have to
look at traffic on the Champs-Elysees to know that not only did the French invent
motor racing, they’re still at it.”</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
We were the slowest vehicle on that motorway to Paris by a wide margin.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
The other drivers flew by us as blurs, the speed limit was
listed as 130kph, but this was seemingly only used by the other drivers as a
speed to enter petrol stations.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
However, it was big wide freeway and we were able to pootle
along quite happily in the slow lane.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
We entered Paris
and using our guide book found a campground.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
We then set up and it was time to explore a bit.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
But here already I began to come up against my “know why
your going, before you go there” philosophy.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
I didn’t like sight seeing, still don’t, I seem to more
prefer doing things than just looking at things.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Actually, as we are to see, if I had any real awareness, I
would have driven or flown straight to Benidorm and got drunk every day till my
money ran out, but that was all ahead as well.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
So we took ourselves to the place all visitors go first, the
Eiffel Tower.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Up we went, observed the view, and this was indeed fine.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Then we came down and went to the Louvre, and it was here
that I was to first observe that most recurrent part of European summer
holidays, queues.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
The line stretched out of the entrance and around the block,
possibly finally ending in the outer suburbs of Paris.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
I wanted no part of that, so while Sylvana, Renee and Peter,
joined the line, Craig and I went off on our own to see a different exhibition.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
I might add, I have never had any interest in art, due to a
horrendous, dragon of an arts-and-crafts teacher I had in primary school, Mrs
Ashelford.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
She did everything possible to destroy a young child’s love
of that subject.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
She played favourites, which no teacher should ever do, it’s
bad enough when it happens by accident, it’s deplorable when it’s done on
purpose and everyone in the class knows who the favourites are.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
She criticised everything I did, which I think is likewise
reprehensible for art, maths you have to criticise and show the student when
they have the wrong answer, otherwise they won’t learn.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
But art in primary school should be an expression of wonder
at the amazing world that the child is exploring.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Mrs Ashelford would abuse you forcibly if she couldn’t
recognise what you had drawn.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
So I became scared to do anything.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
I might add, when I was very young my brother showed me
something I thought quite amazing, how to draw a landscape.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
With a series of overlapping triangles he made mountains,
then in the middle he put overlapping semi-circles to make hills, and a few
sinuous wriggles in the nearground made streams creeping out of the hills.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Once coloured, green for the hills, blue streams and white
and grey for the mountains, it looked genuinely like a landscape painting done
by a real artist.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
So with this technique, I was now able to do art and not be
screamed at by Mrs Ashelford.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
However, talk about when you’re on a good thing stick to it,
I then did that every time I was asked to do art.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
While it kept me out of trouble with the dragon, I then
began to come adrift when the teacher would ask us to do something different,
like a portrait.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
In second class, me aged seven, a, thankfully, softer voiced
teacher, said, “Lachlan, whenever we do
drawing, you always do the same thing, mountains, hills and streams. Why not
put something different in? Like a cow eating the grass or something?”</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Well, I tried, I couldn’t of course tell this gentler
teacher that my always-the-same-drawings were yet another defence mechanism to
prevent the dreaded Mrs Ashelford screaming at me, but I put in a cow, and I’ll
never forget this teacher’s expression when I showed it to her, I know she
wanted to say, “I thought you were going to draw a cow? What the fuck is that!”</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
But to her credit, she recognised that I had tried, and the
odd four-legged object cropping the grass by one of my streams, was an attempt
at least.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
In the end my attitude to Art was best demonstrated by two
TV shows, Futurama and Absolutely Fabulous.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
In Futurama, one of the characters, Dr Zoidberg, gets $300
Earth dollars as part of a global stimulus package, and decided to spend it on
something classy, art.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
He goes into a gallery in New New York, walks in, pulls out
his money and says to the attendant, “One art, please”.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Jennifer Saunders in ‘Ab Fab’, plays the fabulously wealthy Edina.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
She is advised by her accountant to get some artworks for
her office and home, so she goes down to an exclusive art gallery in Bond St.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
The concierge comes to attend her, and says, “Good morning,
madam, may I be of assistance?”</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
To which Edina
replies: “I want some art.”</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
The concierge, replies, in a decidedly bemused fashion, “I’m
sorry?”<br />
And Edina says,
“I want art. I just want to buy some art.”</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
“Oh well, we have some stunning pieces on display at the
moment, would you care to browse?”</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Edina
nods and walks up to a collection of coat hangers on strings.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
She turns to the concierge and says, “Is this Art?”<br />
He says, “Yes, this is a stunning thought piece by radical German edge artist
Horsten Klanmp”.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
And Edina
says, “That’ll do.”</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
So she buys it and has it brought to her house and
installed.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Then her friend Patsy comes over to visit, sees the
installation and says, “Is this the art?”</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Edina
says, “Yes, what do you think of it?”</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Patsy stares for a moment and says, “I’m not sure, how much
did it cost?”<br />
”₤100,000”</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
To which Patsy replies, “Oh, well it’s fabulous then.”</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Anyway, back to Paris.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Craig and I left the other three and went across town to see
the Monet exhibition.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
At least I think it was Monet, it was whoever did the
painting with the lilies floating on the water.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
This was actually a good move, not because either of us had
much interest in art, but because there was no one else there.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
We walked the largely silent, and gloriously air-conditioned
halls, perused the art in a bemused fashion, then returned to the campground.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
The others had seen the Mona Lisa and thought it only “OK”,
mainly because it is quite a small picture and the room is always, always
crowded, so they looked for a little while over the bobbing heads, and then
left.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Now that I think about it, there must be other art works in
the Louvre, but only genuine art lovers would know what they were.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
We continued our sightseeing, we saw the palace of Versailles,
I remember that, we took out second mortgages to eat, I remember that for sure,
then after three days, we decided we had seen enough of Paris and began to go south.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
But before we leave the French capital I’ll just say the
thing I remember most is Jim Morrison’s grave, which Craig and I went to see
one afternoon in Pere Lachaise cemetery.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
A lot of famous people are buried there, Chopin, for one,
but no one knows where his grave is, the most “popular” grave, I can’t think of
a better way to put it, is that of Jim.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
The circumstances of Jim’s death are still clouded, with
those that were with him at the time, still under suspicion from hard core
fans, but in essence he died of a drug overdose, heroin combined with heavy
drinking.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Anyway, his grave was a tremendously moving experience for
me, and was worth the trip to Europe for that
alone.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
I do not wish to compare myself with Jim’s greatness in any
way, but at a very low level I have always felt myself a very Jim
Morrison-esque character.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Well read, intelligent, creative, but massively, massively,
self-destructive.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
On at least four nights of heavy drinking I can think of, I
nearly died.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Twice in near car accidents, once when I unforgiveably drove
drunk, I came out the next morning and saw that my passenger-side front whell
was flat and shredded, with white dust on the wall, and realised that I’d
driven into a gutter last night, and had no recollection of it.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Once I got in a car with someone as drunk as me, and we
nearly went over a cliff.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Once from alcohol poisoning, in which I luckily vomited for
twelve hours and survived (Keith Moon, the drummer of The Who, was not so
lucky, choking on his vomit after passing out), and once when I nearly drowned,
having gone surfing when nearly too drunk to stand.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
So I have a great affinity with Jim, and I guess I am lucky
in the end that I received competent mental health treatment and am alive
today.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
To see that small, square stone in the ground, with simply
‘James Morrison, 1943-1971’ and a small Greek inscription, the meaning of which
is still unclear, but most think it says something like: ‘by my own daemon’,
was, as I say, massively sad.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Anyway, time to hit the road, and head for Spain.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
It is hard to piece things together form this remove, it was
20 years ago, but most of the middle of France is a blank to me.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
The next concrete thing I remember in the timeline of the
journey is Bordeaux in the south, but somewhere
in the middle of France,
before we reached the capital of claret country, we had our first mechanical
trouble.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Peter was driving and we came around a corner, and I, in the
passenger seat, noticed him swing wide, he looked down with concern at the
wheel and he had just started to say “I think there’s something wrong with the
steering”, when we heard the telltale thump-thump-thump, of a shredded tyre.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
We pulled over on this small, and thankfully little
trafficked, road in the middle of rural France and surveyed the problem.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
We got out the spare tyre and went about putting it on, when
something Garry, the mechanic back in London
had said came back to me.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
As I’ve written quite extensively, I am, and always have
been a cheapskate, and when Garry had given us the bill for ₤300, I had said to
him, “could we have bought the parts and done it ourselves?” (A hopelessly,
wildly, lunatically optimistic opinion of my mechanical skills, I might add.)</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
He had shaken his head and replied, “Well, I don’t think so.
What’s more when we went to put the shocks on, there was something wrong with
the wheel nuts, and it took three of us an hour, and with the use of a
makeshift extended spanner to get the damn things off, you would never have
done that on your own.”</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
And as I looked at the vehicle on the side of the road, I
was glad to my cheapskate heart that we had had the shocks done In London,
because even with that pre-treatment, just getting the wheel nuts off took
every bit of combined strength Peter, Craig and I had.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
But then with the wheel off we rolled the spare around and
discovered our next problem, it was too big.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
If the three still inflated wheels were thirty centimetres
in diameter, the spare was forty.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
However, we were exceptionally lucky because the new larger
tyre had the same sized hub, so the stems fitted the holes, and after a bit of
monkeying around we got the enlarged tyre under the wheel arch and in place.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
We tightened the nuts and then set off, slanted off centre
like a ship with no rudder lurching drunkenly into the harbour mouth, and began
looking desperately for a village large enough to have petrol station and a
mechanic.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Fortunately we found one, and he came out of his workshop,
wiping his blackened hands on an even blacker rag.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
He surveyed the wheel and then nodded, Garry fashion, then
addressed us in French.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
This was a problem as none of us spoke it, I had passable
tourist Spanish, Craig had a bit of Italian, but the best French any of us had
was of the “pen of my aunt is in the garden” variety.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
In retrospect, the first person we should have booked for
our trip to Europe was a language teacher, but
there you go.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Anyway, we all stood there for a moment, and then our French
mechanic friend, I’m guessing used to this sort of thing in the summer, took
over.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
He got went over to the wheel we had changed, front
passenger side, and made a cutting motion with his hand, then he lead us around
to the matching tyre on the other side, and made the same motion.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Then he lead us to the rear of the vehicle, pointed at the
rear wheels and made a thumbs up motion, then he went back to the front and
help up two fingers.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
I suddenly grasped what he meant, I took a closer look at
the front tyres, compared them with those on the rear, and guessed his meaning.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
I turned to my friends and said in English, “I think, I’ve
figured it out, he’s saying that we need to replace both front tyres as they’re
shot, but the rear ones are Ok.”</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
I then showed my friends the treads on the rear tyres and
compared them with those on the front.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Once pointed out it was quite obvious, so we all nodded our
heads in agreement and I spoke to our mechanic friend, I held up two fingers
and pointed to the front tyres.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
He nodded and with sign language we all agreed we needed two
tyres, and then passed to the recurrent question of European travel, “How
Much?”, I said to the mechanic.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
He got my meaning, but unable to pass on the information, he
went back inside and got out his tyre catalogue.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
He brought it back out, thumbing through the pages, then
found the page for Volkswagen, ran his finger down the list and pointed at a
certain tyre, the price was in francs, but Renee had a personal organiser with
an exchange rate app on it, and we saw the price in pounds, it seemed
reasonable, so we agreed the price.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Our mechanic friend went back inside, got to new tyres,
brought them out, did the job and then we were ready to roll again. </div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
With much thanking in French, “merky buckets (Merci
Beaucoup)”, we drove away from his little workshop and headed south again.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Do you know what ‘circulation difficile’ means?</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
I do.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Now.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
We were heading south-west from Paris,
toward Spain, and thus the
next major town on our route was Bordeaux.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
We perfectly disorganised our arrival in Bordeaux for the afternoon peak hour, and as
we began to skirt the city’s western arm this phrase was written on the
electronic sign.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
It was novel for a couple of reasons, it was actually the
first time I had seen one of these traffic indicator signs, most famously
represented in the Steve Martin movie, LA Story, and secondly, it was my first
acquaintance with this French phrase.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Renee punched it into her little personal organiser’s
translation app, and the response came back, ‘movement difficult’.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Of course by the time she had done that, we could have all
told her what it meant.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
The traffic was moving like treacle, and I think the reason
it was so annoying for us was that we had already driven six hours that day.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
No one likes being in traffic, but there is something about
heavy traffic at the end of your driving day that makes it worse.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
These days I live in a coastal resort town on NSW’s north
coast, and we have the same issue here.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Before they put in the new super-duper roundabout and change
system on the highway out of town, tourists used to report taking six hours to
get from Ballina to Byron
Bay, since this is a
distance of 44k, that’s a long time.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
And if you have already driven from Sydney, ten hours or so,
then six hours in traffic when you have already done ten at the wheel is enough
to cause gunfire.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Additionally, we weren’t even going to Bordeaux, but all the
roads in the area were laid down by the Romans nearly two thousand years ago,
and so every road in the area lead, if not to Rome, certainly to Bordeaux, and
so we were stuck with it.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
We inched along on the commuter expressway in the evening
sun.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
We sweated in our shorts, Craig, who was driving, developed
RSI of the ankle from changing gear from first to second and back a hundred
times an hour.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
But eventually we got around the rim and were able to launch
off the road to the south-west and the Spanish border.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
However, the extra time we had spent in the traffic had
brought dusk upon us, and so we had to go through the already loathed process
of finding a campground in a strange city, in a foreign country, where none of
us spoke the language.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
‘Ou eh le camping?’ (Where is a campground?) was an
expression we were already becoming familiar with, as we said it leaning out of
the driving window.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
However we found one, set up camp, already becoming tedious,
bought some of the cheapest claret we could find, had dinner and few drinks,
then hit the ground for sleep.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
The next morning we were up early and made it to the Spanish
border.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
We were entering the north-eastern corner of <span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Spain,
known as ‘wet Spain’.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Most of us have a picture of Spain
being a vast brown, sun-baked plain, consisting largely of dirt, and that is
generally true, but up here, where the coast of Europe makes a sharp turn run
out of France for Spain and the bay of Biscay, the land is lush
and green, as of an Ireland
in the south.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
It was actually raining as we crossed the border and headed
for the county capital San Sebastian.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
San Sebastian
is a beautiful place, or perhaps, better put, I is a standard large city on a
beautiful coast.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
As we entered we passed two middle-aged people on a biking
tour of Europe (I guessed), they had all their
possessions in four panniers each on the front and backs of their bikes.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Anyway, they were riding into town in the rain, they were
covered in mud, dripping wet, and neither of them had a smile on their face.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
I mention them because tempers were starting to fray in the
van, but looking at them we realised we were well off.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
However, I then perpetrated a bit of cowardice that would
lead to some more shortened tempers.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
I had navigated this day from our campground of the night
before outside Bordeaux, through the Spanish
border, to our current location, the outskirts of San Sebastian.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
But at this point, I was feeling pretty tired, so I said, “I
need a bit of rest, can someone else take over the navigating?”</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
One of the others said “yes”, and so I handed over the map
and lay back on my seat and let my eyes close.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
It was cowardice because we were all tired, we’d been on the
road for a week or so now, and also I spoke the best Spanish, which of course
our map was written in, so in retrospect I should have kept navigating into the
campground.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Anyway, I was lying back and slowly dozing off, when I heard
the others trying to find out where we were on the map.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
We passed a sign which said ‘cambio de sentido’, and I heard
Peter say, “cambio de sentido, let’s see if we can find that on the map.”</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
In my dozing state, the phrase rang a bell, the arguments
went on among my companions, and so I came awake again and grabbed my
Spanish-English dictionary.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
I looked it up, and it meant, literally, ‘change of direction’,
or in this context, ‘detour’.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
With a sigh, realising that if we were looking for a road
called ‘cambio de sentido’ on the map we were going to be lost for a long time,
I woke fully and agreed to take over the navigating again.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
I got my dictionary, looked at the street names and got us
to a campground not far away.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
And since we’re on the topic of mixing up street names ina
foreign language, I’ll just tell you a story told to me by my German friend,
Martin the language expert.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Martin was asked to teach an English automotive engineer German,
as the engineer was being sent to work on placement at the car company’s main
plant outside Stuttgart.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
However, as Martin told me, this fellow was one of those who
just find Languages a closed book.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Marin studied with him intensively for six weeks, but at the
end of that period, said Martin, he was still struggling with the ‘ein bier,
bitte’ level of German.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Anyway, he sent him on his way to do the best he could, and
the Englishman caught his flight to Stuttgart
and booked into a hotel.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
He then went outside and read the name of the street his
hotel was on, then took a cab into town and had dinner.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Dinner over, he came outside and flagged a cab to take him
back to the hotel.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
When the cabbie asked him where to, the Englishman said his
street name, ‘Eingang Strasse’.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
The cabbie looked at him askance, as ‘eingang strasse’ means
‘one way street’.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
However the story became a testament to German efficiency
and helpfulness.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
With the passenger not knowing where his hotel was or even
what it was called, he drove him around to the police station.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Inside the cabbie told the desk sergeant his passenger’s
story, then the sergeant asked the Englishman how long approximately his cab
ride to the restaurant had been, conferred with the cabbie on where he had
picked him up, then looked at the map and conjectured approximately where his
hotel was, then the sergeant rang the hotels in the area until he found the
right one, and was able to send the engineer home safe.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Back in San
Sebastian we found our campground, set up the tent and
the interior of the van for sleeping, then went to get some Spanish money.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
This is a complicated enough procedure when dealing with a
human, but we tried to do it through a bank machine.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Thus, I put my English bank card in and then tapped in my
pin.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
That went fine, but then of course the menu commands came up
in Spanish.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
So I took out my dictionary again and began to frantically
look up the commands on the menu and then pressing the requisite buttons.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
A queue formed behind us.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
After some frantic shuttle finance, read machine, read
dictionary, press button, I got through to receiving my pesetas<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
I tucked them into my money pouch and then Craig wanted to
get some money.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
So we went through the same process.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
The people in the queue began to get restive, to put it
mildly, and I began to hear the phrase, ‘English bastards’ far too often for my
comfort.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
However, we got through that, but then with Peter, Renee and
Sylvana wanting money as well, we decided to take a break before we got
lynched.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
So we let the locals through and once the line had cleared,
then went through the process for the other three.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
I should add, Australians are unknown in Europe,
and so anyone of pale northern skin speaking English and causing a delay, is
invariably labelled English, usually with an expletive prefix.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>That done we spent a
nice three days in San Sebastian, relaxing after the rigours of crossing France
in two days, then once more lit out for the south.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Once we were not very far south of San
Sebastian, the green disappeared and we were in Spain proper.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
And man, it was hot.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Our van was dark coloured, and the drive down to Madrid had
the same feel I have read of people having who have driven the Nullabor.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
A flat, seemingly endless brown plain stretched out,
seemingly eternally in front of us, while behind the same view rescinded with
glacial pace.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
We stopped for meals in roadside villages that leant new
meaning to the term dusty.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
I remember one lunch where I ate something that might as
well have been advertised as ‘eggs with dust’, as that was all I could remember
tasting.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
However, eventually we made the outskirts of Madrid and joined the
next set of city bound slow-moving traffic in the unbearable summer heat.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
What’s more, our map of Madrid was less than adequate.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
For some reason we had a decent map of San
Sebastian and its environs, but our only guide to the streets of Madrid was one page of
our guide book, the species of which Bill Bryson, acerbically, and accurately,
said should be called ‘Let’s Go Get Another Guide Book’.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Also, if the heat of the central Spanish plain had been bad,
at least we had been moving at 80k an hour, and gaining some breeze from it,
but now in the traffic of central Madrid,
we were down to a crawl, and all of us inside the van were suffering.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
On top of that, Kombis are air-, rather than, water-cooled,
and so our van was beginning to show signs of strain.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
I was having trouble changing gears, and I was noticing a
distinct loss of power.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
However, I put it down to the heat and the traffic and tried
not to think about it.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
But we got there, using our inadequate guide book map and
our near expiring van.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
The campground was not the coolly, shaded, riverbank, idyll
that I had begun longing for in the traffic, but instead of piece of urban
ground, dry, windswept and dusty.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
But anything was better than moving another centimetre in
the vehicle.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
So we debussed, set up our camp, a task that was already
becoming onerous, and then went up to the kiosk and had a Cerveza (Beer, for
the uninitiated).</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
I’ve had a lot of beer in my time, as you all know well know,
but I can assure you that beer was one of the top ten.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
So at the top of page twelve we come neatly to the end of
the chapter, and since I can’t honestly remember what we did in Madrid, I have
no recollection of seeing any sights, so instead I’ll tell you the story of the
woman with the suitcase.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
The Madrid Cityrail station that those in the campground
used was across a fairly major suburban road, four lanes at least, and to get
to it, you had to use an overhead walkway.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
This walkway was about six or seven metres above the road,
and the steps up and down were quite the workout.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
The next morning when we went into town there was woman, an
attractive youngish, middle-aged type standing at the bottom of the stairs with
a large suitcase.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
She obviously needed help, and as the five of us approached,
Craig stopped and asked her if she wanted help carrying the case up the stairs
and down the other side.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
She appraised us for a moment or two, then said, “No, Thank
You”, in Spanish.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
We thought this a bit odd, so I added, “Are you sure, we are
going to the station.”</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
But she demurred again, and with a repeated “No, thank you”,
waved us on our way.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
So off we went and went into Madrid and looked about.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
When we came home that evening, she was gone, so we figured
naturally enough that she had got some help with her case, and caught the
train, though why our help was not required, we couldn’t begin to speculate on.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
The next morning came and we headed for the station, and she
was back, standing at the base of the stairs with her bag.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
This morning I was with only Craig, and we once again asked
her if she needed help, once again she said “no”.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
So we went off once more, that evening she was gone.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
But the next morning she was back, so with curiosity finally
getting the better of me, I asked at the campground kiosk about her.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
She was a prostitute.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Turns out prostitution is illegal, and heavily frowned upon
in catholic Spain, so this woman had come up with an ingenious solution, she
lurked at the base of the stairs with her bag, and then when a single male came
along, and offered to help, she accepted and used this to get some custom.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
As far as I could tell she didn’t want our help on either
morning, because we weren’t rich.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
I had been wearing the same shorts for a week now, and it
showed, while Craig, had looked cleaner, but was still clearly a penniless
backpacker.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
And as I came through on my second pass of editing, I
re-read that bit about the woman with the suitcase, and it reminded me of
something else I saw in Madrid,
that was even less wholesome.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
At Martin’s direction, I had begun reading comic books in tandem
with my language dictionaries, to learn, at least how to read the languages,
and in Madrid
I needed some fresh comic books.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
So I found a bookstore in the heart of town and went in and
asked about Garfield
comics.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
I was directed to the comic section I went browsing along
the section looking for the characteristic ginger and black stripes of Garfield, when I saw a
comic book with an oddly contorted human couple on the cover.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
I took a closer look and realised it was a hard core
pornographic comic.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
It was such an appalling thing to be on display in a
section, comic books, devoted mostly to children.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
I opened it and looked inside, and simply couldn’t believe
my eyes, inside women with breasts like nose cones of Polaris missiles and men
with muscles like Schwarzenegger engaged in the most explicit acts.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
I was frankly shaken.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
So I put it down, found some much more wholesome comic books
of Garfield, Tintin,
and some Calvin and Hobbes, made my purchases and left.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
But as I write I am once more driven to the remarkable lack
of logic that goes with a country heavily dominated by religion.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
The greatest woman in biblical history, Mary Magdalene, was
a prostitute, yet in Spain prostitution is illegal, so much so that a practitioner
had to lurk by a road overpass with a suitcase as an excuse, while just twenty
blocks away, hard core pornography is sold in the comic book section of
bookstores.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
So I guess that’s all for Madrid, a city of a thousand years of
culture, and all I remember are XXX comic books and the prostitute with a
suitcase that was big enough to hide in if the cops came along.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Perhaps that’s where she got the idea in the first place.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Next time we move onto the southern Spanish coast around Barcelona, then back across the south of France and onward for the Brindisi
ferry to Greece.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br />
<br />
<a href="http://byronshortstories.blogspot.com.au/2013/12/8-rolling-further.html">Next Chapter</a><br />
<br />
<br />
<a href="http://byronshortstories.blogspot.com.au/">Back to home page.</a></div>
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LKhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11244232092173678321noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8082972746234187865.post-59574613823689440392013-12-08T19:01:00.001-08:002013-12-19T15:45:37.292-08:006 - Control?! I had none at first, and less as the term went on.<!--[if gte mso 9]><xml>
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<br />
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
So I traversed London on the
next morning for my second day at Eastlea
Community School.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
To say I was trepidatious barely hints at the levels of fear
burgeoning in my breast.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
My first day had been anything but successful, five classes,
four of them out of control, with only year seven being considered vaguely human.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Also, I had checked my timetable for the day yesterday
evening before leaving and a large D&R had been stamped on my afternoon for
this, my second, day, and so tired had I been that the full realisation hadn’t
hit me until I went about my desk that morning.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
As a casual teacher, I was simply given the timetable of the
teacher that I had replaced, or shoehorned in to best fit the school’s requirements.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Thus, 0.8 of my teaching load was science and 0.2 was
D&R, what’s D&R?<br />
It’s a ‘Yes, Minister-esque’ renaming of woodwork and metal work, and it stands
for Design and Realisation.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
And, apart from the hopelessly optimistic name, this subject
was a problem for safety reasons.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
High school teaching is of course divided into subjects, and
each subject has its challenges for the teacher.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Maths for instance, is the hardest in one way, as it is the
subject that most students struggle with and so boredom is endemic and boredom
in class is invariably followed by misbehaviour.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
However, the easy part of maths is that it requires little
preparation for the teacher.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Back then, the maths teacher would simply show up to class
and assign a page out of the textbook for the class then assist as they got on
with it.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Of course things have changed now with the computer age, and
a friend who teaches maths currently, was telling me that most of his time now
is not spent on the intricacies of calculus of the vagaries of trigonometry,
but how to download and install bits of software required for maths teaching
packages from the internet.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
But then, as I say, maths prep was relatively easy.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Science is the opposite of this, as the only thing kids care
about is doing an experiment, and the amount of preparation a science teacher
has to do to do an experiment is massive, and if you want to do say three
experiments in one day then the work you and the laboratory assistant have to do
is large, intricate and a constant battle with your own anxieties if you have
forgotten anything.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Then, further to this, the only thing kids want to do is
light the Bunsen burners, so even if the experiment doesn’t call for the
burners, the kids will moan that they cannot use them.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
And of course, once lit, the kids, well boys mainly, then
take about four milliseconds to start burning each other’s books, clothing and
body parts.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
So a science class using the Bunsen burners takes teacher
anxiety out of the normal range into the stratosphere.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
But then even science with its gas lit danger is as nothing
compared to the most stressful and dangerous teaching of all, woodwork and
metalwork, D&R, Industrial Arts, whatever you want to call it.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
A room full of out of control kids with hammers, chisels,
nails, screws, and of course the power tools, like the drill press, the power
saw and the electric lathe, is a clear and present danger to give teachers
blood pressure that goes off the graph.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
And I had both these subjects on my timetable.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
What’s more, the classes I taught D&R to were two year
eight classes, including my own previously mentioned out of control science
lot.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
What’s even MORE, Thursday afternoon I had those year same
eights for D&R, then we all crossed the school together and I took them
into my lab for science.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
So I had a class that I would have been happy to not see for
one minute, for the entire afternoon.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
However that was all ahead, and so I went about my Tuesday
morning as best I could.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Then lunch came and as I have previously mentioned the first
lesson after lunch is the worst for any teacher in any subject, and so I
entered the industrial arts block to take my first D&R class.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
I checked with the head of Industrial Arts, as a casual
teacher it wasn’t up to me to set the lesson, and he gave me the plans for the
year eights to build a wooden money box shaped like an animal, amusingly designed
so that if you inserted a coin the ears of the animal wiggled.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
He showed me an elephant money box built to these plans.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
And I did enjoy seeing the large ears of the elephant gyrate
gently as he inserted a ten p piece.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
I then showed my massive naïveté and inexperience by saying,
“Is that enough work to keep them going for the term?” (I had been booked by
Timeplan for a ten week term.)</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
He then raised his eyebrows and looked at me with surprise, then
asked, “How long have been here?”</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
“This is my second day”, I replied.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
He nodded knowingly and responded, “OK, well if anyone
finishes this project, come back to me and I’ll give you something else for
them to make.”</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
I have to say, I got the point immediately, judging by their
output in the one science lesson I had taken them for, if any year 8 student
made an ear wiggling elephant it would be a first, possibly in the history of
the school.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
So I took the plans and went into the room and showed my
year eights what we would be doing.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
And just to digress to describe my naïveté again, which I might
add, all new teachers have to a varying degree, but mine was large.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
My first ever school was Bourke High School
in outback NSW.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
I went there for ten weeks to save up to fund my trip to
Asia and Europe.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Whilst there I became friends with the other, almost
uniformly young, teachers there, including a nice young industrial arts
teacher, Oatsy.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
One Saturday he was heading to Dubbo, the nearest large town
to do some general shopping and make one specific purchase.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
I had to get back to Sydney
for the weekend for a friend’s wedding and got a ride with him to the airport
in Dubbo.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
As we drove I asked him what he was going to buy, and he
said, “A computer table. One of those with the shelves above it, and the
sliding tray for the keyboard to go on.”</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
And, showing my ignorance, I said, “Oh, why don’t you get
the kids to make you one in class?”</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Oatsy gave me an exasperated, if-one-more-person-asks-me-that-look
and replied, “Well considering I asked my year ten class to make a stool, and
none of them have finished a year later, in fact Bugsy…, (This was a student
who was well known for misbehaviour and never doing any work), all Bugsy has
got is a piece of wood with his name on it, and that is still sitting on the
window ledge in the workshop. The only work he has done in three terms is write
his name on a piece of wood.”</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Oatsy continued, “So I’m only going to get a computer table
if I buy one.”</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
So this morning in London, I added the head of department’s
knowing look to Oatsy’s answer, and knew that I would not be overburdened by
students finishing their projects and beating their way to my door asking for
more work to be going on with.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
And so it proved, but if they weren’t planning to do much,
if any, work, they were planning to get their hands on every dangerous bloody
tool they could get their hands on.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
So most of my time in the industrial arts section was spent more
like a prison warder than anything, with counting of all the tools in the room
my most important task of the day, a single chisel missing for instance meant
that a corner store in the district would be held up with it later in the week.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Thankfully, the technical assistant for the industrial arts
block was a nice man and very switched on.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
He was a cockney in his fifties, by the name of Terry, and
he had presided over the various classrooms there for twenty odd years.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
He would assist me by always keeping an eye on the room when
I was teaching, and if he saw a student up to no good, would bring it to my
attention in subtle fashion, nodding in his head in the direction of the
misbehaviour for instance, and that meant I was able to nip most incipient
trouble in the bud.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
However, even with such help, I became fatigued to levels I
had never thought possible.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
As I mentioned in the previous chapter, I felt I needed six
months off after my first class, but as the weeks went by, teaching a full load
with both science and industrial arts, my energy levels down to a place I
wouldn’t have thought possible.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
And as mentioned previously in this narrative, a hellish
journey in Sumatra had so depleted my energy
levels that it began to change my character, stripping away my emotional
shields and, thankfully, my arrogance.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Well I can assure you, teaching at Eastlea continued, and
accelerated the process.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Everything about that job was designed to make a new teacher
feel small and incompetent.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
The kids had no other real position than teachers were the
enemy, to be attacked, belittled and laughed at.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
With my less than well adjusted childhood, I quickly began
to become depressed and anxious to levels that I could not believe.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
My journeys across London
in the mornings became overlaid with dread, and my reverse journeys in the
evening correspondingly full of joy.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
So it was no coincidence really that I started mental health
treatment for the first time in my life whilst teaching in that war zone.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
And that only happened by accident.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
I had hurt my ankle playing rugby and had gone to my local
GP’s surgery to have it looked at.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
While I was in the waiting room I saw a sign behind the receptionist’s
desk saying, ‘Stress Counselling – See Sandy through reception.’</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Sandy it turned out was the
practice manager, and I was stressed out, believe me, so I enquired and the receptionist
buzzed through to Sandy
and she came out to speak with me.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
She was an attractive middle-aged English woman, and she
came up and offered me her hand, I shook it and she said, “I believe you’re
interested in some stress counselling? Is that correct?”</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
“Yes”, I replied, “I am not sure if I need it, but thought I
would enquire.”</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
She nodded, then said, “what work do you do?”</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
“I’m a teacher”, I replied.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
And that was all it took.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
She booked me in then and there with not a further word.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
In fact, if I’d asked for rapid removal under sedative load
to Colney Hatch she would have organised that no questions asked.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
I have to say, the reason I only went by accident was due to
the repressive nature of my parents regime.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
As slave owners of old had carefully organised it so that
none of the slaves got an education, or could even read or write, thus stopping
anyone getting any ideas above their station, freedom for instance, likewise my
parents, my father in particular, had made it clear that only fools and
weaklings go to counselling.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
What’s more, my brothers and I had it “so much easier” than
my parents, as they never stopped reminding us, and so there was no reason ever
for us to complain since we had food, clothing and a house to live in.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
The odd beating to within an inch of dying was therefore
considered a just price to pay for these material comforts.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Indeed, it wasn’t till thirty years after I had left high
school that I learned through a girlfriend who had come up to visit me in my
coastal resort town home, that we had a school counsellor when I was at high
school.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
I didn’t know of this counsellor’s existence, and even if
had got wind of it, I would not have been allowed to go as my father would have
forbade it.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
So here was stress counselling and boy, as it turned out,
did I need it.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
I had no idea what form it was to take, I had a mental
picture of some sort of yogic deep breathing session and listening to gentle
music, but it was more than that.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Turned out it was full on one-to-one psycho-analysis, and
though I won’t go into it too deeply (‘cos it’s boring, rather than
confidential), it was the biggest and most effective step I took along the road
to understanding my arrogance and heavy drinking.<br />
In Sandy’s warm office, in the suburbs of South-East London, I finally came to understand that my
childhood wasn’t normal, and that my parents had a lot to answer for.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
I retrospect, if not for this lucky accident and Sandy’s
careful ministrations, my mental state, which was bad, would have continued
downhill, until I was in a padded cell claiming I was Jesus and telling people
to repent before the rapture came.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
And so the weeks went by I taught Monday through Friday at
Eastlea, then played rugby with Beckenham in the Kent league on Saturday.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
My first game with the ‘Becks was probably the most
memorable, not for my play, which was appalling, but for the idiosyncratic
nature of the field we played that game on.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Britain
is avery crowded place, every piece of land has something, either a house, or
more likely these days a road or a carpark on it.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
The first match I played was in a small town not far from
Tonbridge about an hour to the south of Beckenham in south London, and due to
the ‘thousand-year crowding’ of the area, the only place left to put a rugby
field was on the top of a hill outside town.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
And even then, about two thirds of the field was aon the
eastern side of the hill, with the quarter line being on the brow of the hill.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
I was playing full back, and as such was at the back of my
team, waiting for any kicks to come spiralling down, which I would catch and
punt back.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Well that’s how a normal full back does it, but on this
field, where I stood behind the quarter line was below the hill brow, and so
once play passed into the other half, I couldn’t see anyone else.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
I was standing, therefore, on a peaceful green hillside, all
alone, when one of our forwards, Mick, called to me from the other side of the
hill, “LOCK, COMING TO YOU!”</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
I perked up and then over the brow of the hill came the ball,
spiralling down from a kick, and then, a few seconds later, the opposition
forwards, intent on jumping all over me in cleated boots.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
I judged the trajectory of the ball, backpedalled till I
caught it, then hoofed it back over all the other players and down the other
side of the hill.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
And so that most irregular of first halves went, I would
patrol the brow of the hill and then race back to catch the ball, before
charging up to as close to the brow of the hill as I could before sending the
ball back down the other side.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
The second half I was on patrol on the downhill side, and so
got to see the ball coming and most of the game.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Saturday night I would go out with the rugby boys and we
would get loaded in typical rugby fashion.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
I would love to be able to report that things improved in my
classroom, but sadly it was not to be.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
The problems of that school were endemic and were completely
out of the control of a single teacher.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
The socio-economic issues of the suburb from which Eastlea
drew its pupils were of such magnitude, that me in my little classroom had as
much chance of holding back the waves of bad behaviour as a single bricklayer
would have had of damming up the mouth of the Amazon.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
The best I achieved, if that, was to maintain a sort of thin
blue line sort of control in which I at least made sure that the no room I was
teaching in burnt down.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
In retrospect I should have just rung up Timeplan and said
“enough, I want another placement”, but I still had some sort of protestant
work ethic thing, or perhaps, noble-young-idealistic-teacher-fighting-the-hordes-of-ignorance
thing going on and so I stuck it out.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
I stayed three terms as I recall and that was a near record
for that school, in hindsight I wouldn’t have been surprised to show up at the
start of third term to find the Timeplan boss on site ready to award me a gold
watch for long service.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
After I left I learned that a number of other supply
teachers, as they are labelled in Britain, casual teachers in Australia, had
shown either less stoicism, or greater shrewdness, than me and had left without
completing a single day, walking, if not running full tilt, for the next train
out of West Ham as soon as the lunch bell rang.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
I remember one day walking across the playground one day
when a school book landed nearby like a baked apple hitting the kitchen floor.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
‘What the fuck?,’ I said internally, then looked upward to
find out the source of the missile.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
As I did, another book took flight and came down and landed
not far from the first.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Then as my eyes and ears focussed in on the window that two
books had most likely come, I heard a riot going on and realised that Ms
Agbiaka was taking my year eights.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
“Poor Yethoudi”, I thought, then collected the two books and
went into the building, up the stairs and into her room.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
I didn’t need to knock as she wouldn’t have heard.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Yethoudi Agbiaka, was, I think, Nigerian, she was certainly
African, and heavily pregnant.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
She taught French and is a lovely woman, yet fate had played
her a rotten hand and sent her to Eastlea.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
It speaks volumes for the chaotic nature of that school that
Yethoudi came from Nigeria
with all it’s internal political, religious and terrorist strife, and yet
Eastlea was too tough for her.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
She was a good teacher of the subject, but had no classroom
control.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
I’m not being patronising in saying that, as I had none
either, and therefore was already an expert in gauging levels of discipline.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
I went up to Yethoudi and noticed that she was in tears,
“Graham, stop that!”, she was yelling at a student as I walked in, “ROSS, SIT
DOWN”, she yelled at another.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
I came and stood next to her and she gratefully took the
opportunity to talk to an adult, “Yes, Lachlan,
can I help you?”, she said over the roar as of an approaching Tsunami.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
“Hey Yethoudi”, I responded in a matching constrained yell,
“I found these books in the playground. So I thought I would bring them back.”</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
“Thank you”, she said, taking the books from me.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
She then looked as if she wanted to continue the
conversation with me, but already events were moving and she had to return to
getting her class into a vague semblance of control.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
I felt for her, I really did.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
English was her second language, I might add, and so trying
to control an Eastlea year eight class while grappling for the right words is
definitely in the ‘most difficult endeavour’ realm.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
So I left her to her tears and yelling and went back to my
lab to prepare for my own next onslaught.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Soon after Yethoudi was to give birth and she took the
opportunity to leave Eastlea forever.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
I am sure you would all join me in saying that this was the
right decision.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
I understand that heavy stress during pregnancy can have
terrible effects on an unborn child and even cause an abortion, and I was kind
of surprised she didn’t leave much earlier.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Imagine coping with morning sickness while having to teach
at Eastlea, it doesn’t bear thinking about.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Another incident I recall vividly would have had any race
relation board struggling to decide who was in the wrong.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Apart from teaching your own classes there are many other
calls on a teacher’s time.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Playground duty, staff meetings, lunch room duty and so
forth are all part of your duties.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
At Eastlea, one of these tasks, which was not actually that
unpleasant, was supervising the detention room.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
This was an unused classroom near the deputy principal’s
office.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
If you were the duty teacher you sat in there at the desk,
usually going on with some of your own work, and any child behaving badly in
their class would be sent down to the detention room with a note explaining why
they were there.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
You would log them in, then keep them there till the end of
the lesson, then report their presence to their head of year, then at the end
of the lesson, they would rejoin their class.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Additionally, any student late to school, had to first go to
the detention room and report their arrival to the teacher there.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
You, as duty teacher, would note their name and arrival time
in your report, and likewise report that to the head of year and relevant
deputy at the end of the hour.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
So one morning I was doing duty in that room when a female
student walked in and came up to my desk.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
“Toni Bennett”, she said.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Then went to turn away and sit down.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
I nodded, then was writing her name on the late roll when a
bell tinkled in my memory.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
I didn’t teach her myself, but my friend Samantha did.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Sam taught P.E/Health and Science, and this girl, Toni, was
in her year ten science class.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
She was a real hard case and had brought Sam to tears one at
least one occasion.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
However, this was the first time I had met her, and I began
to smell a rat about a false name.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
You see, as Toni was a contender for the worst student that
Sam taught, one student vying for the title in my class was her younger sister,
Treeza (sic) Bennett.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
But here’s the thing, Treeza was afro-carribean, whilst this
student, Toni, was Caucasian.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
It speaks volumes for my middle class white breadedness,
that I had never encountered a mixed race family before, but my first thought
was that this girl reporting her name as “Toni Bennett” was giving a false
name.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
So then began an argument twixt me and her over her real
name.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
It was completely ridiculous and I was in the wrong, and
what’s more I couldn’t come out and say what was causing my suspicion, which
would have been, “How can you be Toni Bennett, your younger sister is black and
you’re white.”</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Thankfully I didn’t say that, or the word would have got out
that I was a racist and been sacked on the spot.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
And just to clarify, if needed.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Among the socio-economic problems of that school, the
Bennett family was an iconic case.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
There were four Bennett girls at Eastlea, all half sisters.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
The mother had four children with three different fathers,
one Afro-carribbean, two caucasian.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
The mother apparently spent most of her time in the pub, or
drinking at home, and so the eldest, Toni, found herself in loco-parentis for
the other girls.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Since, as I have written above, Toni herself was a hard
case, and difficult to deal with, it boded badly for the future of the other
three, younger girls.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Treeza would be expelled while I was teaching there.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
She was never even approximately in control and directed at
me, and I’m sure other teachers, expletive laden cursing that was hard to
believe could come from a thirteen year old.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
It was also well spoken of at Eastlea, and it was the most
perfect irony you could imagine, that the most famous Bennett sisters of all
were in Jane Austen’s book Pride and Prejudice.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Those Bennetts, were of course the ultimate in gentility, whilst
the ones at Eastlea were at the other end of the evolutionary scale I can tell
you.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
It would have made for the ultimate, but very school
specific, exam question of all, ‘Compare and contrast the life aspirations of
the Bennett sisters in Pride and Prejudice with those at Eastlea School’.
</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Looking back from this remove, twenty years after I left
Eastlea, I now see that society failed the Bennett family very badly, an
adequately funded health service would have been able to assist the mother to
achieve a less alcoholic life-style, and be of some help to her daughters in
school.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
But I was teaching in Britain under the John Major Tory
government, which in itself was essentially the last echo of the Thatcher
government, and help for the unfortunate was the least thing on either
government’s agenda.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
The upshot of the Bennett sister’s appalling home life was
that inexperienced teachers like myself and Samantha suffered the verbal, and
sometimes physical, blows in the classroom, with the effect of Sam and Yethoudi
winding up in tears, while myself and the other male teachers began drinking
heavily.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
So enough of the sociology lesson, was there anything good
about Eastlea?</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Not really, certainly nothing in the classroom.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
The thing I most enjoyed was playing soccer with the other
male teachers on Friday afternoon.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Each week the PE teacher would organise a match and we would
play in the fading light of the autumn dusk.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Our strip was full West Ham United of claret and blue, and
once again it was great to be playing the round ball code in a country where it
was the main game.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
I was learning about the darkness of the English winter, and
this was best exemplified by a match we played one afternoon toward the end of
the Autumn term.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Very late in the game, with the full time whistle due any
second and the score tied at two-all, I happened across the ball near the half
way line, a quick glance told me the ‘keeper was off his line, and so I laid
into the ball with my left foot.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
The ball sailed away and disappeared into the gloom over the
‘keepers head.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
We had no nets, only the steel goal posts and no one could
see what had happened.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
I felt from the trajectory that it had gone in and we had
won, but the ‘ref called to the ‘keeper asking if it had gone in the goal, he,
sensibly enough, replied that “he couldn’t tell, but he didn’t think so.”</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
So then we all conferred on the half way line and realised
that if we were now in the position of people shooting at goal and no one
knowing of a goal had been scored, then it was too bloody dark and it was time
to go to the pub.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Elsewhere, I was learning another fact of teaching life,
which was, the worse the school, the better the friendship among teachers.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
At a much lower level, these bonds were very like those of
soldiers who went into combat together, and very similar to those formed by
police on the beat.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Although I first encountered it at Eastlea, the lesson would
coalesce into solid form after a term at my next school, so I’ll go into it
more then.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
How did I move on?</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Well like going to counselling, it was a happy accident.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
I began at Eastlea in the autumn term and taught through
the, both literal and metaphoric, enveloping darkness through to the end of the
winter term in December.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Then Timeplan held an Xmas party at their offices in north London, which Sam and I,
and all the other supply teachers attended.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Whilst at the party I was talking to a consultant who was
dealing with my area of east London.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
I hadn’t set out to complain, although those of you who have
read my witterings in various places, will probably find that hard to believe,
but in our conversation, I mentioned that I was now going to counselling.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Like all recent converts I was full of zeal about how great
counselling was, and how much I was benefiting from the process.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
The consultant took this to mean that I wanted out of
Eastlea, which was true, not just of me, but anyone who taught there, supply or
permanent, but I hadn’t really mean that at that time.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
So we partied on that evening and January came around and it
was time to get back to work.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
I did one more term at Eastlea, but then just had to pull
the pin, my exhaustion, both mental and physical was complete, and I had had
enough.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
So I told Timeplan and thanks to my conversation on the
night of the Christmas party, got some great news.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
“I’m glad you called”, said the consultant, “I’ve been
searching around and I’ve found a ‘nice’ school for you, it’s just up the road
from Eastlea, but it’s a school full of well-behaved girls”.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
I was more thankful than I could say.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Just the fact that there were no boys was enough for me.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
I recall reading some education research done at the time,
which showed that boys do better in a co-ed environment and girls do better in
an all female environment.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
That certainly fitted with my memory of Eastlea, though some
of the girls were dead set bitches spawned in the foundries of hell, by far and
away the biggest problems for me were the boys.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
The boys spent their time screaming and fighting, throwing
books, bunking off, and misbehaving in ways that rewrote the form book, and
all, I now see to impress the girls.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
I might add, since I mentioned it, teachers at Eastlea were
in an invidious position as regarding bunking off (leaving the school grounds
without permission), we were supposed to stop it if we saw it, but I, as far as
certain students were concerned, actively encouraged it.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
A year eight class without either Billy Moore or Billy
Williams was a consummation devoutly to be wished.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Anyway, I got the address and phone number of my new school,
spoke with the deputy in charge of supply teachers and timetabling, then headed
out to start on the Monday of the next week.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
The school was called Sarah
Bonnell Girls
School, and was situated in Deanery Road, Stratford,
east London.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
I mention its suburb because it was to become eternally
confusing when I told people where I taught, most thinking I was in the town of
Shakespeare, though
nothing could be further from the truth.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
The great bard was from Stratford-upon-Avon a beautiful
rural seat on the Avon river near Birmingham
in the midlands.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
What’s more, another confusion about this school was that I would
often say that I taught in a Muslim girl’s school, with some surprise on the
part of the listener that a young, single male teacher would be employed, so
I’ll just clarify.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Sarah Bonnell was not a Muslim girl’s school, but Stratford, at the time,
was a largely Muslim suburb.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Most ethnic groups in a new land tend to enclave, and Stratford had become home
to large number of emigrants from Gujerat.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Gujerat<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>is a region
of India
in the north-west of that vast country and borders Muslim Pakistan, thus a large
number of the girls that came to the school were from there, and thus, I would
estimate, 80% of the students of Sarah Bonnell school were Muslim.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
They came to school wearing the full outfit, with the
exception of the face covering, certainly their hair was covered.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
To say they looked alike is accurate, and so marking the
roll was a problematic exercise.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
What’s more the name Patel predominated and some classes had
multiples of the same name.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Poonam Patel was one name I remember, I had one class with
four of them in it.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
However, this was a minor thing, and Sarah Bonnell proved a
heavenly place for me after beastly Eastlea.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
There were issues though, the first being that my standards,
set at Eastlea, had to undergo some major readjustment for my new well behaved
school.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
This was first brought to my attention when I was teaching a
year nine class in the first week.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
I had forgotten something and seeing the girls were getting
on with my work, decided to nip back to the staffroom and get the extra
materials I needed.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
I dashed in and began ferreting through a file cabinet, when
another, permanent teacher, noticed me and said, “Aren’t you teaching 9.2E?”,
she said.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
I turned from the cabinet and nodded and the teacher said,
“I wouldn’t leave them alone if I were you, there was fight in that class last
week.”</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
I was a little surprised, but nodded and returned to the
class room as quickly as I could.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Upon my return I looked at the class full of girls all
writing in their books and conversing with each other and shook my head at the
warning I had received.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
To see the thirty blue-clad girls all going on with their
work was<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>a sight for my sore eyes, and I
wondered if the teacher who had warned me about the fight was losing it.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
The issue was of course that at Eastlea, even one student
doing some work was a major victory, but here thirty students doing their work
was the norm and so, smaller infractions received greater attention.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
I couldn’t help wondering if the ‘fight’ had been one girl
dropping her ruler on the floor and tripping over another student’s feet when
she went to pick it up.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
However, this warning did presage a problem that I was going
to have as the weeks went on, not with the students I might add, but with the
teachers in rooms nearby.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Most lessons I would put the work on the board, then assist
the girls when and where needed.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
The girls would then quite happily get on with their work,
and take the opportunity to carry on intense conversations as they did so.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
These conversations revolved around, as far as I could tell,
make up, musicians, TV shows and boys.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
At first I thought that meant they were not doing any work,
but as is famously known, girls, unlike boys, can walk and chew gum, and as I
checked each students work I found that they were all doing what was required,
whilst still devoting half of their mind to what Mumtaz said to Darren at the
train station on Saturday.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Coming as I did from Eastlea where the classroom not burning
down was considered a successful lesson, this work and talk I found perfectly
acceptable and so let the girls get on with it.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
The first friction point came later that week.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
I was teaching maths, the class were doing their work and
gabbing on as usual, and I was seated at the bench at the front of the class
helping a student with a calculus problem.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Then a shadow fell across us and I looked up to discover
that another teacher was standing over us, she said, “Is everything Ok, Mr
Barker?” (Teachers of course use surnames when students are present).</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
I looked up in surprise and said, “Yes, far as I know. Is
something wrong?”</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
To which she said, “Well, I could hear your class down at
the end of the hall, and I thought there was no teacher in the room.”</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
I looked across the room taking in the students.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
They were doing their work while talking with each other.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
The volume was loud, but still nothing like an Eastlea
class, but I understood what the other teacher meant.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
So I said, “Oh, Ok, I’ll get them to quiet down.”</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
So I said to the girls, “could everyone please talk a bit
quieter, please?”</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
The girls glanced at me, nodded briefly then went back to
discussing who should be kicked off the reality TV show next, more quietly.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
But this did highlight graphically to me the differences
between the two schools.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Here at Sarah Bonnell my class had been labelled out-of-control
noisy, at Eastlea I would have been awarded an MBE for getting thirty students
to do some work.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
So my time at Sarah Bonnell passed, I tried to keep the
volume down, but so thankful was I for any students to be doing some work, that
I mostly let it ride, and copped the occasional walk-in from another teacher
asking me if I could keep the volume of the girls down.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
In one class, the head of Science walked in and with a
simple, “Sorry, Lachlan”, shut the door of my
room so she could concentrate in the staffroom.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
But in general life at Sarah Bonnell was one sweet song, I
taught maths and science and the girls had not only heard of calculus and
photosynthesis, but even expressed some interest in these topics.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
So I was a little unprepared when I sat down at my desk
during my free period one day and saw there was a letter for me.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
It didn’t have a stamp, and simply said, “Mr Barker”, on the
front.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
‘That’s odd’, I thought to myself, ‘who would be writing to
me here?’</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
So I opened the envelope and discovered it was a love note
from one of the girls.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
It was not overtly sexual, more flowery than anything else,
but it neatly opened the Pandora’s box of being a young male teacher in an all
girl’s school.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
There were seven of us as I recall, Myself, Craig, Bryan, John,
Viv, Robyn and Gregor.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
John, Viv, Robyn and Gregor were married or in a
relationship, and so Bryan, from New Zealand, and Craig and I from Australia
copped the brunt.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Most of these girls were Muslim and many had quite a
repressed life, and so for many of them the only single men they met were
teachers at school and thus Bryan, Craig and I, copped the brunt of this
attention, and this lead to all sorts of weird and wild thoughts going on in
the girls’ heads, and found expression in these love notes.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Thankfully the head of science was in the staffroom when I
opened the envelope, and so was able to ask her advice, “June”, I said, turning
toward her, “could you have a look at this for me?”</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
She turned toward me and I got up and took the letter over
to her.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
She scanned it and said, “Looks like it has started, Lachlan. What you best do is every time you get one of
these, show it to me or another senior staff member.”</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
“Why’s that?”, I asked her.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
“It’s for your own protection, it’s best of you disclose all
these notes as you don’t want it to look like you have been keeping any secret,
with the obvious implication that you were in any way involved with a girl here
at school.”</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
I nodded, this was good advice, I was glad that she had been
present when I opened the letter, otherwise I think I would have just thrown it
in the bin, or tossed it in my in tray.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Either course could have had bad consequences for me if
there was any friction with the girl’s family, if they had discovered their
daughter was writing love notes to a teacher at school.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
June then went on, “Just the other week, Barb (a deputy
principal at the school) got<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>a note from
a girl saying the Viv had raped a girl in the toilets.”</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
I reared back, shocked, flowery love notes were one thing,
but this opened up a whole new line of consternation.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
“Really?” I said, with some vehemence, “What on Earth was
that about?”</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
June replied, “It’s an old trick, whenever a girl wants to
get back at a male teacher, they do something like that.”</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
I might add, June asked me about that first note and who it
was from, but the name meant nothing to me, I checked my rolls and discovered
that the name, Shamrana, didn’t appear on any of my class lists, so I had
apparently attracted the attention of some girl outside my sphere of influence.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
I nodded again, “Thanks June, I had no idea. Do you mind
keeping any of my letters?”<br />
She said “no”, and so as the weeks went by, I would hand over my weekly, or
thereabouts, missives from some girl or other.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
However if I was in for one letter a week, Craig nearly had
to get an internal post office branch in his staffroom to cope with the load.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
I taught science and maths, and so was not overly popular
with the girls due to the eternal unpopularity of these nerdly subjects.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
However, Craig taught music, and this much more desired
topic, in combination with Craig’s fresh-faced good looks, opened the doors of
postal love note hell.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
I don’t know the actual number, but ten a day, a DAY!, is
the figure that springs to mind.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
I do remember that one day he returned to his staffroom
after a longer than usual absence to find twenty or so of these things piled
haphazardly around his desk.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
However, with June’s assistance I dealt with my notes by
simply giving them to her, which she would peruse briefly then toss in the bin
for me, and in retrospect when you consider that my biggest problems were the
girls talking while they worked and writing notes expressing their attraction
for me, then it shows I had no real problems at Sarah Bonnell.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
So that is probably why the inter-staff friction therefore
stood out a bit more clearly for me.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
As stated briefly above, the worse a school is, the stronger
the bonds that seem to form between the teachers.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
This had been true at Bourke, and also, definitely, true at
Eastlea.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
But at Sarah Bonnell, with no real discipline issues from
the girls, the permanent staff would take the opportunity to get at each other.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
And this was highlighted in most ludicrous fashion by the
printing of Daphne’s schedule in the school’s daily info sheet.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
The daily info sheet was a single sheet of double sided
paper that was printed each day and handed out to the staff.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Any students who were away for any reason were noted on there,
school events, like concerts, or excursions were put on it, plus other
extraneous messages required for the running of the school.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Most teachers grabbed for this sheet like an actor did the
newspapers the morning after a show they were in began, mostly in the hope of
finding that the students they detested were away today.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
This practise was much more evident at Eastlea where the
absence of Billy Moore, for instance, for a day was like an early Christmas
present.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Anyway, toward the end of the term, Daphne, who was the head
of a year, nine, I think, was having trouble with teachers just coming to see
her whenever they had a problem with one of her charges.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
She had put out a request for teachers to make an
appointment, but this hadn’t been overly successful, and so she had prevailed
on the principal to allow her to print her schedule for the remaining weeks of
term in a daily sheet, so that the rest of us knew when they could go and see
her.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
I thought this was a perfectly reasonable way to handle
things, but I was in the minority.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
The other heads of year hit the roof, you would think world
war three had been declared.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
“Why is Daphne’s schedule more important than mine?”,
screamed one at a staff meeting.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
“Would you like your schedule printed as well?”, replied the
principal.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
“Yes I bloody would”, said that teacher.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
“Well then mine should go in as well”, remonstrated a third.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
“Well why don’t we print everybody’s then?”, said the
principal, desperately seeking to diffuse the situation.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
“You can’t do that, there won’t be room on the sheet for
anything else”, pointed out Shirley, the tremendously efficient Senior Admin
staffer.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
And so the argument raged, over, as another female supply
teacher pointed out with much sense, a single piece of paper.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
I’m sure you get the point, this ridiculous argument would
never have occurred at Eastlea, as everyone over there was simply happy to
escape the school each day with their person intact and no limbs broken.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
However, all good things come to an end, and after a couple
of terms at Sarah Bonnell, the teacher I had been filling in for was due to
return, so I had to leave this little haven of good behaviour and once more make
my way back and forth across London, finding, then teaching in schools that
rewrote the definition of out of control.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<a href="http://byronshortstories.blogspot.com.au/2013/12/7-rolling-hell.html">Next chapter - 7 - Rolling Hell.</a><br />
<br />
<a href="http://byronshortstories.blogspot.com.au/">Back to home page.</a></div>
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LKhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11244232092173678321noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8082972746234187865.post-55572202270507906362013-12-01T18:40:00.001-08:002013-12-01T18:40:39.620-08:00The Destruction of Lasseter's Road - 4<!--[if gte mso 9]><xml>
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<br />
<div class="MsoNormal">
Enid Traill was a marvel.
</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
At 71, she burned across the skies of Litmus Bay
each day trailing a parabola of ferocious energy as she dispensed her good
works about the town.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Married at 18 to hideously tongue-tied young farm hand,
Harry Traill, she had then lived the life of an Australian country woman for
the next forty years.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
She and Harry had scrimped and saved till together they had
been able to buy 5,000 hectares in the dusty hills outside the Bay.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Together they had set to work, and no one on this Earth can
know what work is until they had spent some time working setting up a farm on
not such great soil.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Enid
was up at four am to begin cooking, first for herself and Harry, then for the children
that came along at regular intervals throughout that first ten years.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Harry would then leave the kitchen at five and work throughout
the morning.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Unlike many Australian farmers he liked daylight saving as
it felt like he was granted an extra hour to work hard.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Enid
would maintain the home and confer with Harry when he returned for lunch at one
pm.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
He and Enid would listen to the Country Hour as they ate,
then at 2pm he would return to the fields and labour till dark, and even after
if the headlights of the tractor were up to the job.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Her dearly loved Harry and he had been a model husband, and
they had never shared a cross word in 45 years, however his one vice was
smoking roll-your-own cigarettes, and these had eventually carried him off with
a respiratory failure compounding a heart attack soon after his sixtieth
birthday, and Enid was alone for the first time since she was a teenager.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
But like all women who had indeed built this country, she
attacked the problem of loneliness the only way she knew how, by working even
harder.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
With the children’s departure for work and uni, Enid now had
a lot of time on her hands, and so had started a shop in the town, selling
clothing and other homemaker paraphernalia.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
With the arrival of Litmus
Bay as a tourist mecca, the big chain
clothing stores moved in and Enid’s
shop began to go downhill.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Not one to complain, she had seen the writing on the wall,
shut down and turned to other areas of endeavour.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
She followed a friend to one of the charity stores and began
volunteering behind the counter there.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Within, so it seemed to the other volunteers, minutes, she
had moved with assured grace into the role of manager, and soon was doing the
staff rosters, cashing out the till at night, doing the banking, talking with
the truck drivers and running the place with a ferocious efficiency.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Then a friend fell in the shower and broke her hip.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
After a stint in hospital, Enid then added a twice weekly task of
driving her friend to rehabilitation at the hospital.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
After a recuperative period, the physio had suggested
aquarobics at the local indoor pool would be a good thing to do, and so Enid had joined her friend
in the pool, swaying and moving waist deep as together they exercised to
improve her friend’s hip.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Enid
enjoyed this quite a lot.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
At first she was a little confused why she found this such a
pleasure, but eventually realised it was because in all her years working with
Harry, a pastime away from the farm was unknown, considered by the two of them
(unconsciously) a waste of time, time that would have been better spent
working.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
So Enid and her friend had splashed and swayed to the slow
tune in the waters of the local pool.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Once Enid
began attending, it was some sort of signal, much like a royal approval, and
many other friends, all female, began to join them.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Numbers grew and Enid and her friends looked forward to these
outings immensely.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
But then the young woman who led the class announced she
could no longer lead them as she was leaving for the city and a greater income.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
So Enid
stepped in and began to lead the class herself.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Whilst clearly not a qualified instructor, if aquarobics
required such a thing, Enid’s
natural authority held sway and the numbers for the aquarobics class grew.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Then her friend of the fractured hip was given further
instruction that while aquarobics was good, she now needed to begin some
exercise on dry land to increase the strength of her hip.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Walking was suggested, or perhaps dancing, so Enid and her
friends looked about and discovered the joys of line dancing.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
They added this to the list of weekly activities and joined
a club that sashayed across the wooden floor of the Senior’s centre in town.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Once again Enid and her friends were in seventh heaven.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Moving in unison at a gentle pace while the instructor gave
directions at the front, and moved in mirror image herself, was a terrific
pleasure.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
So much did they enjoy it that the quality of their dance
improved and with the instructor’s help, they put together a line dancing
display, and began touring the area doing shows at other senior centres, RSL
clubs and the like.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
So Enid’s time was very full, when not at the charity shop,
she was in the pool, when not there, she was line dancing, if not doing wither things
she was up early keeping her home in order, and her garden frutiful.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Then one of their friends became ill and was confined to her
bed.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Enid
naturally began adding meals for this sick friend to her daily tasks, and began
delivering them each day.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
One lunchtime as she drove up she began conversing with the
“at-home” nurse provided by the hospital.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
The nurse began by thanking her for the food she was
bringing around, that then led to Enid
asking about “Meals-on-Wheels”, which she seemed to recall used to operate in
the town.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
The nurse nodded and said that it had to be cut down, then
abandoned, due to lack of funds.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Enid
was frankly shocked that here was a service that she hadn’t noticed withering
on the vine, and in her customary direct fashion set out to do something about
it.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Next aquarobics session she marshalled her friends, then saw
the hospital and told them she was willing to restart “Meals-on-Wheels”.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Her assistance was gratefully received, and after some
necessary administration, police checks and so forth, Enid was again at the head of another
organisation doing good works around the town.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
She was asked if she wanted to apply for funding assistance
for her new endeavour, but with her natural distaste for asking the government
for help for anything, threw the Encyclopaedia Galactica-length sheaf of forms
in the bin and funded it largely herself.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
She wasn’t short of a quid.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Upon Harry’s death the winding up of the estate had led to
her having to decide what to do with the farm land.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
After some thought and consultation with her children, she
decided to sub-divide and sell off the land.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
This process had lead to 2 hectare lots being made available
on Lasseter’s Road, with Kellner and Wills being among those who took up the
offer.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
The subdividing had coincided with the coming of age of Litmus Bay
as a tourist mecca, with profligate city dwellers desirinf a holiday home in
the area, and the money had rolled in.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
So Enid’s
life was full, to say the least.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
She had been a little circumspect at first when the partying
at Wills’s house had begun, but in truth not overly inconvenienced.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Her place was a similar distance from Wills’s place as
Veletta’s, though on the other side of the road.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
There was a slight rise between her and Wills, and this
hilltop provided a sound barrier between her and the noise of<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Wills’s parties.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
What’s more, like all country folk she was an early riser.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
In bed at ten, then up at four, the noise zoomed largely
over the top of her house, deflected by the hillside, and in fact quite often
the noise of the party on Saturday night she used as a useful alarm call, and
when things got rowdy at three a.m at Wills’s house, Enid simply got out of bed
and got an early start.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
So how Wills came to cross Enid Traill is a story well worth
telling, and was due to raging insanity arcing across Wills’s frontal lobes.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Wills stabbed the crow bar into the soil and then leant on
it and stared in frustrated rage across the hillside, contemplating the months
of hard work in store.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
For the zumpteenth time he stared at the stony ground and
wondered how it had come to this.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Following the Sunday in which he had been sacked twice in
the same day events had followed the path he had dreaded.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
The few other bits of work he had been angling for, well,
angling to get paid for while someone else did it, had slipped away from him.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
There was a verandah roof here, a dampcoursing there, a new
fence through Chipwells at the other, but the word began to circulate about his
sackings and a had led to clients and other tradies not returning his calls.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
He had begun widening his circle of attempts at work, first
to get some high paid work, but then increasingly, any, work.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
After some time he was definitely in the desperate zone and
had called a landscape gardener he knew peripherally, and discovered he was in
an equally desperate zone trying to get someone, anyone, to do some real hard
labour on an acreage property outside town.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
“Yeah, Willsy, well, I do have this job at Temple
(Temple Hill outside Litmus
Bay, in the green hills
that sheltered the coast). </div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
But it’s pretty gnarly”, said the landscaper.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Wills responded positively as he always did over the phone,
when not immediately confronted with a job, and agreed to go out and have a
look.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
The job was indeed gnarly, and the landscaper had taken
Wills through the work.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
The garden plan called for a series of paths to be made
across the hillside, with steps to be put in wherever the path descended or
rose across the rolling landscape.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
As Wills had stared, he had said to the gardener, “Shouldn’t
you do this with a Dingo? (A mechanical digging device on wheels.)”</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
The gardener had nodded and said, “Yeah, anywhere else, but
this place has so many steep bits that in the end it can only be done step by
step, by hand.”</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Wills had looked across the hillside and the plans, and had
had to agree.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Normally of course he wouldn’t have touched a job like this
with a mile long pole, or if he took it on, he would have then employed some
penniless backpacker to do it, but now with the bills in, and any savings he
had gone, he had no choice.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
So he started building the paths across the property at
Temple Hill.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Every shovel stroke, every strike of the crow bar increased
his frustrated rage, that ‘HE’ the all important Wills, was reduced to this.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
However, he had to admit that it was good for him both
physically and mentally to be actually working.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
The gut that had been building ever since he mentally
declared work to be sitting on his deck drinking and fielding phone calls
stopped growing, and then began to reduce with incremental slowness.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
By not drinking from 11 in the morning his mental state had
at first begin to improve.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
But then both these benefits of his new work began to
recede, as he then began playing ‘catch-up’ with his drinking at night.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Having worked hard all day banging and jamming across temple
Hill, he therefore felt that it was his due to drink as much as he liked at
night, and so his consumption began to grow again.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
But then his drink driving case came up at court and he
prevailed on his lawyer to attend with him.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
His lawyer, still rankling over their pevious
less-than-polite phone call, had attended, but as far as Wills could tell did
nothing except say his name for the court record, then sit there and agree with
everything the magistrate said.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
The judgement was brought down and was as his lawyer had lead
him to expect, $1,000 fine and a year of driving without any alcohol in his
system.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
So they had left the court room and parted on the front
steps with the lawyer telling him he would send him his bill.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Wills had grumped his way home and with the sentence
rankling, and the thought of the next bill for a lawyer who had done nothing to
come, had got loaded in his living room.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
The next day he went out to work and shovelled his soil,
installed his steps and dreamed of the first glass of bourbon to come when he
finally got home.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
So with this reward, drinking at night, in his life, he was
approximately sane.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
However one evening as he took an empty bottle from the
fridge, preparatory to putting it in the garbage, his eye fell upon the
mandatory health information on the side of the bottle.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Apart from an abjuration to “enjoy in moderation” (“Ha!”,
thought Wills), he then read there were approx. twenty standard drinks in each
bottle.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Wills grappled with the maths.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
He had been downing (easily) a bottle of Bourbon a night,
drinking from five p.m onward.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
He remembered hearing somewhere that one standard drink
increases your alcohol level by 0.02, and your body removes one standard drink
per hour.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Thus he realised with genuine shock, he would still have
alcohol in his system when he set out to drive to work the next morning,
usually at 7.30a.m.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
He went to his computer and checked the figures against
various websites, then he opened the calculator on the screen and did the
maths, he drank from five p.m to ten, or thereabouts, and usually polished off
a bottle, thus he wasn’t alcohol free till 1 o’clock in the arvo.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
“Shit”, he swore desperately to himself.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
He did some more maths and worked out what anyone who knew
him, from his doctor, to the people he used to work with could have told him
for free.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
He had to drink less.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
And it was this that finally tipped Wills into a new realm
of madness that would lead to gunfire being heard on Lasseter’s road.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Wills just couldn’t believe it.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
After all he had been through, all he now asked of the world
was to be allowed to have a drink at night.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
And now even this ‘small’ pleasure was being denied him by
the unfair court system.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
In Wills’s mind any system that stopped him doing what he
wanted, when he wanted was unfair.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
And from this it was only a short mental step back to where
this had started, with the explosion of his septic tank</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
He tried and failed to keep a grip mentally, but as each day
of hard labour on the hillside went on, and then having to come home and
measure how much he drank, stopping well short of what he felt he had earned,
his determination to make someone pay grew.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
The first tongue of anger from the flamethrower of his
frustrated rage came sooner than he expected and was vented against Enid
Traill.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Enid and her fellow dancers were putting in some extra
practise with a show coming up at an Ex-Servicemen’s club in a nearby town.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
The club was a large one, and the vibe about their dancing
had been getting about, and so this was going to be a biggish event.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Thus Enid and her friends were happily dancing hard, and
doing extra practise sessions to boot.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Enid
had organised one of these sessions at her place on a Sunday afternoon, she had
plenty of space indoors, but as it turned out, that particular Sunday was a
beautiful day.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
A cloudless blue sky arched over Lasseter’s Road, and a
light breeze blew from the ocean up into the hills around Enid’s house.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
So nice was it that she and the girls, which is what they
thought of themselves, even though no dancer was younger than 50, decided to do
their practise on the front lawn.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
They moved outside and went to begin, however the music
system was inside and they weren’t technologically savvy enough to move it
outside, so instead Enid got them into their starting positions, then went back
inside, turned the volume up loud and brought the needle down on the record.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
She then skittered back outside briskly and took her place in
front of the troupe as the first bars of the music began.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
She and the girls began moving into their routine and the
dance passed on pleasantly.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
However, this simple activity, dancing to Frank Sinatra on a
Sunday afternoon had ramifications that none of them could ever have imagined.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Over at his place, Wills was grouchily watching a sports
show on his TV, drinking ever so grouchily from his Bourbon bottle with sips
that would have hardly sated a wood nymph.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
The show was something on cable, which, almost inevitably
for him these days, he was beginning to realise he couldn’t afford, when the
sound of Enid’s music came ever so faintly to him across the gentle hills.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
So quiet was it that at first he thought it was some faint
sound track to the sport he was watching, but then an ad came on and he hit the
mute button on his remote, and he realised that the music was coming from
somewhere else.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
He listened for a moment and then madness took over.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
The best he had ever been able to conjecture of who blew up
his septic was someone with a grudge against him.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Who had a grudge against him?</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Well the honest answer to that was almost everybody, from
Sergeant O’Driscoll, to anyone he (Wills) had worked with or for, through to
his neighbours.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
So Wills fixated on his neighbours, particularly whose who
had complained about the noise of his parties.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Enid
had never complained to him, as far as he knew, but that didn’t matter.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
‘Complain about the noise will you?’, thought Wills.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
‘Right, well I’ll complain about yours.’</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
So he had decided to throw his weight around and go have a
word with the producer of this faint music.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
He took a man-sized swig from his bourbon bottle and then
lurched, he was drunker than he would have credited from his ‘sipping’ of his
bourbon, out the door and across the lawn.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
He followed the noise through the trees and came over the
hillside to see Enid’s
club moving in unison on her front lawn.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
He watched for a moment and saw that it was group of old
ladies, and thus there was no one on the lawn in whose presence he felt
intimidated.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
So he swaggered up to the group and began his verbal
assault.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
“Listen ya’ old bag,” he began, addressing Enid, standing in front of the group, “turn
the fucken music down will ya.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
I can’t hear the damn TV in my own house.”</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Enid and her friends ground to a halt and began twittering
in confusion, well her friends did, but not Enid Traill.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
“Mr Wills, I’ll thank you not to swear in front of my
friends.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
And what’s more, I can see you’re drunk, I’d advise you to
go home and sleep it off.”</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Wills bridled at this, he wasn’t drunk, this was technically
true, drunk as far as it concerned Wills meant three bottles of bourbon, not a
mere half a bottle, but he had come over to bully some elderly women and he
wasn’t about to lose his moment.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
“I’m not drunk, and anyway it doesn’t fucken matter, just
turn the music down.”</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Enid
began to warm up to really let Wills have it, but then changed her mind.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
While she was as easy to intimidate as badger with a
toothache, she realised some of her friends were less than robust, some had
heart conditions, and she didn’t want to upset them.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
So she decided to change horses.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
“I see, well Mr Wills, I shall accede to your request for
the moment, as long as you leave and stop upsetting my friends.”</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Wills nodded and then with a shaken finger and “see that you
do”, turned and headed home.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
As he walked he thought to himself, ‘that went quite well,
stop the old bag complaining, that’s for sure.’</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Enid Traill watched him depart and then turned back to her
friends.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
“I’m sorry ladies, my neighbour doesn’t seem to be himself
today, why don’t we finish our practise inside.”</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
And so saying she shepherded her friends back inside.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
She checked that everyone was OK, and then they recommenced
their dancing on the parquet floor on her living room.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
At the requisite moment, some time later she called a halt
to their practise and they set about their afternoon tea, which was the last
and most pleasant phase of their practises.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
All the talk was of course about Wills and his drunken
interruption of their afternoon.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
“My goodness, Enid”,
said a friend, “that man seemed so angry, was the music really that loud?”</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
“No, Margory”, said Enid,
“I just don’t think he was himself today.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
But rest assured, I will see that next time we want to
practise outside we will be spared any interruption from Mr Wills.”</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Her friends had nodded and continued with their tea.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
If Enid
said something was going to happen, you could bet your life that it would.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Mind you if they had known exactly what was to come, they
may not have been so calm.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Then with tea over and the washing up done, the members of
the Litmus Bay Line Dancing club got in their shared cars (not many of them
could drive) and made their way back down Lasseter’s Road to their various
homes.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Wills back at his place had a celebratory glass of bourbon
and congratulated himself on how that had gone.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
So well indeed that his thoughts turned to Veletta and
Kellner, they had complained about the noise, how would he make his discontent
manifest to them?</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
But while he was more than happy to bully a group of old
ladies, Kellner was taller than him, and Veletta frankly scared him, so a more
‘subtle’ approach would be needed.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
He went out to his car port and took down his shotgun.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
He went back inside to the couch and while taking more
enragingly small sips of bourbon, began to clean it.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Meanwhile, Enid Traill laid plans of her own.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
She was unhappy that their lovely dance in the sun had been
curtailed by Wills, but she had seen his drunkenness and known that the best
time to deal with someone like that was when they were sober, better still
early in the morning when they were hungover..</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
So she had seen her friends off and after waving them away,
had gone back inside, she made a further cup of tea and pondered the issue.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
‘What a rat, what a horrible, drunken rat’, she thought to
herself.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
‘A rat’, she mused.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Forty years on the farm with Harry had given her much
experience with rats.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
So then in an unknown mirroring of events just up the road
in Wills’s living room, she went out to the shed and got her .410 shotgun.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
She couldn’t account for how many rats she had removed from
her farm’s ecology with this weapon, but it was a lot, and one more, albeit
larger than usual rat wouldn’t make much difference.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
She wasn’t actually planning to shoot Wills dead, but all
her adult life she had used this trusty piece to deal with rodents, so why stop
now?</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
She got out her sewing machine oil and while squirting in
minute amounts began to work the triggers.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
However despite this home armouring that was going on the
next skirmish of the range wars on Lasseter’s Road didn’t take place for a
week, and this was due to Wills thinking he was drinking less.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Wills had been taking smaller sips in a hopelessly misguided
attempt to convince himself he was imbibing less alcohol.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
He was doing this because of a couple of stories he had been
told.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
The first was a pub crony who, after a year of marriage, had
been delighted by the arrival of his first child.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
With a new baby in the house, he had gone down to the Seabreeze
Hotel and told those assembled that due to his new responsibilities on the
parenting front he was only going to come down the pub for two hours.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Since he was normally there for six, he had thought this
would mean going home with a greater degree of sobriety.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
As a practise to drink less this was staggeringly
unsuccessful, now, with a self-imposed time limit, Wills’s pub crony had begun drinking
faster, and having an inbetweener as well, until eventually his wife had called
an end to this insane experiment by saying, “he comes home after two hours in
worse condition than if he had been down there for ten!”</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Another technique was a friend who had decided to only drink
middies instead of schooners.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
So if this friend was in a shout he would have the smaller
glass at his elbow, and this was likewise hideously unsuccessful as the middy
drinking friend would regularly find himself finished first, and so getting
himself “one to be going on with” while the others finished their larger
glasses, and so likewise wound up drunker than ever on the strength of a “drink
less” technique.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
And it was likewise with Wills.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
He had been frantically trying to convince himself that he
was drinking less bourbon at night, because he was taking smaller sips.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
But the fact was that he had to blind himself to the rapidly
diminishing level in his bourbon bottle by not actually looking at it as he
refilled at the fridge.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Yet, each morning as he set off for work he knew that he was
at some risk of blowing positive if he encountered an early morning breath test
on his way out to Temple Hill, so he began to plan his life around days when he
didn’t have to drive anywhere.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
He was working six days to keep the maximum amount of money
coming in, so Sunday was his day off.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Saturday afternoon he finished work and headed to town, he
stocked up on bourbon, beer and food, enough to see him through Sunday without
having to drive, then headed joyously home to have, the laughably inaccurate,
‘A’ drink.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
He sailed into the bourbon bottle and already by seven p.m
was well away.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
As he got drunker his thoughts about making Kellner and
Veletta sorry they had ever complained about the noise began to grow on a tide
of alcoholic confidence.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
By nine p.m he was ready to act.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
With darkness already ensconced around Lasseter’s road, he
got his shotgun and lurched drunkenly up the road.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
He hove to outside Veletta’s place and checked that no one
was home, no light glowed, so he took this as read<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>and then walked unsteadily down Veletta’s
driveway.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
He stopped on the front lawn, then raised his gun and fired both
barrels into the weatherboard front of Veletta’s house.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
He then admired, briefly, his handiwork and then set off in
the other direction toward Kellner’s.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
He went back down his own driveway and then through the
trees that separated his place from Kellner’s, and pitched up on the now smooth
gravel forecourt, raised his gun and blew the two front windows out that
Kellner had not long since replaced after the initial stump removing explosion.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
That done, he nodded in a ‘well that’s now sorted’ sort of way
to himself and then headed home.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
He got another bottle of bourbon on the go and began
drinking to celebrate.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
At this point in the narrative, Wills is lucky to be alive.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
If either of his neighbours, Veletta particularly, had been
home, he would have been lucky to merely escape with a load of buck shot in the
behind.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
But Kellner was away down the coast on a fishing weekend,
and so missed the blast that destroyed his front windows, and Veletta was in
town at one of their children’s homes.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Franco had taken Delia into town to have dinner with their
children and grandkids at their eldest son’s place.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
After an enjoyable meal and even more enjoyable time spent
with the grandkids, he and Delia had got into his truck and driven home.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Arriving in the dark, and additionally, never parking his
truck at the front of the house, Veletta had not noticed the damage done by
Wills drunken ballistic experiment in neighbourly relations.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
They had driven in, veered off onto the track that led around
the side of the house, parked and entered via the back door.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Exactly what Wills had expected to happen, even he couldn’t
know, but as has been reported often he was barely sane sober these days, and drunk
was as irrational as it comes.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
So Saturday night passed in peace.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Enid Traill had been asleep at nine p.m, as was her
customary practise and had stirred in her sleep when the first gun shot went
off, but not woken.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Wills’s second shot, at Kellner’s place, had been further
away and so she had not even stirred.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
So it was coincidence only that Sunday morning was the time
previously chosen by Enid
to make her feelings known to Wills.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
She was up early and busied herself about her garden until
the dawn had fully taken and she could see what she was doing.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
At six a.m, she picked up her shotgun and with this over her
shoulder, marched up the hill, through the eucalypts and over to Wills’s place.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
She knew Sunday morning early was the time to start
asserting yourself with a heavy drinker.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
She broke her gun on the deck area and popped two shells
inside, then she placed the gun, butt first, on the ground behind her where it
was largely out of sight.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Then she knocked on the door, whilst saying, “MR WILLS”.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Inside, Wills, deep in an alcoholic stupor took some time to
some round.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
He was dreaming of work related things and Enid’s knocking at the door coincided with an
excavater and jackhammer starting to knock on the inside of his head.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Slowly he ascended toward wakefulness and tried to
disentangle the two knocking sounds from those inside and those external to his
head.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Eventually, he made the mental leap and realised that
someone was knocking on his door.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
He massaged his forehead, then rolled painfully off the bed,
he put on a pair of work shorts and then headed down to the front door.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
‘Whatever this is’, thought Wills in among the maelstrom of
his hangover, ‘it better be important’. </div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
It was, certainly to Enid Traill.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
He opened the door and tried with limited success to focus
on the figure at his front door.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Enid Traill upon regarding Wills, knew she had picked the
perfect time, and so without preamble, launched in.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
“Mr Wills, last Sunday you were very rude to my friends and
I. </div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
I’ve come for an apology, and a promise that it will never
happen again.”</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Now you would think that a man who had woken to an exploding
septic tank would have accrued some ability to think on his feet, but any such
ability had vanished in the mentally-fugueing tide of alcohol that had borne
Wills to bed.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
He gaped at this apparition and staggered around mentally
inside his head.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Enid Traill waited a few moments and then repeated her
injunction, “Did you not hear me MR Wills, I’ve come to ask you for an apology,
am I going to get it?”</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Wills eyes bulged.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Whatever he had expected of this Sunday morning, it was
firstly not to be had till he had fully woken, eleven a.m would have been his
preferred hour to receive visitors, and secondly not a gimlet-eyed old lady on
his doorstep demanding an apology for something that Wills felt was completely
justified, AKA, getting his own back on neighbours for asking him to keep the
noise down</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Either way, his mind finally clicked into gear and he
decided to deal with this and go back to bed.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
“Listen”, said Wills, “I told you to keep the noise down and
I meant it, and what’s more, if you want to discuss it further come back later,
I’m having a well-deserved sleep in”.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Now it is possible that if Wills had just left it at, what
followed could have been different.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
But he chose to go on.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Having established his dominance over one of his neighbours
he was not about to relinquish it.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
“So just go on home you old bat, and don’t disturb me
again.”</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
He then made to turn and go back inside to bed, when Enid’s voice held him in
place.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
“I see Mr Wills, so you aren’t prepared to apologise, first
to me now and then my friends, when they are here next?”</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Wills turned and then said, “No I’m not, are you fucken
deaf?”</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Which as it turned out was prophetic in a rather reverse
fashion, as Enid Traill pulled her small bore shotgun from behind her dress,
raised it to her shoulder, aimed briefly past Wills’s shoulder and then blew
Wills’s television to smithereens.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
To say Wills was surprised by this response barely comes
within hailing distance of his true emotions.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
For the third time in not many more weeks he was on the
wrong end of an explosion on Lasseter’s road.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Shying back like a startled horse he fell bodily over his
couch and come to rest, legs entangled, on and near his coffee table.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
He was deaf, possibly permanently, but certainly temporarily
in his right ear and if his hangover had been bad before, a shotgun blast
within touching distance of an already throbbing head is no way to improve
matters.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
He lay there staring at the ceiling and wondering if the
world was ending.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Enid Traill however, was not finished.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
She broke open her gun and then entered Wills’s living room
and stared down at him while she slowly, and with infinite menace, reloaded her
gun.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
“Right Mr Wills”, she said, “I am leaving now.” (Wills was
certainly happy to hear that)</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
“However, I have not received my apology, so I will allow
you some time to think about your behaviour.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Next Sunday my friends are coming back for another practise,
I would like to receive your apology then.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Do I make myself clear?”</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Wills suddenly realised he knew the face of hell, it was
carried on the front of the skull of a little old lady in a long cotton skirt,
a farmer’s work shirt and holding a .410 shotgun.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
For the most fleeting of moments he looked to Enid as if he was going to
argue, but she had placed two replacement shells in the barrels of her gun, and
now snapped it closed with a menacing flourish.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Wills saw the way the wind was blowing and nodded with
feeling.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
“OH, so does your nod indicate that my friends are going to
get their apology?”, said Enid.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Wills now wanted more than anything to get this woman out of
his house, so nodded again.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
“Very well, Mr Wills, I am not overly satisfied with your
behaviour, but if we are agreed that you will attend my house next Sunday at
2pm and deliver said apology, we will say no more about it this morning.”</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Wills nodded for a third time.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Enid
gave a satisfied nod, then turned about and left the house.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Wills heard the door shut, and then slowly began to emerge
from under and around his coffee table.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
He sat on his couch and held his head in his hands.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
He then began to bat his right ear gently with his hand in
the hope of restoring some semblance of hearing.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
As he did so his activities of the night before began to
come back to him and he began to wish, like many alcoholics of a Sunday
morning, he had thought things through a bit more the previous evening.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Not only had he now got Enid Traill’s back up, and he now
knew she wasn’t the pushover he thought she was, but Kellner and Veletta would
soon be hunting around to see who had fired upon their houses.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Wills sat on his couch, contemplating the innards of his
television, held his head in his hands and tried to think.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Enid Traill for her part went home through the eucalypts
content with her morning’s work.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Fleetingly she wondered if Wills would call the police, but
just as quickly banished the thought.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
If he did do that, first the police would be sceptical of
his tale of 71-year-old Enid blowing his television apart with a shotgun.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
And if they did believe it, they would then ask why, and
then Wills would be forced to say he had complained about her playing her
record player to loud on a Sunday afternoon.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Which, considering all the times the cops had been dragged
up to Wills’s place on a Saturday night/Sunday morning, because of noise, they
would consider that he got his just desserts.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
So Enid
wasn’t worried.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
She looked at her watch, 6.30 a.m on a Sunday, she quickened
her step, she had a lot to do to prepare for her busy week, so she scurried
home and began cooking.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
LKhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11244232092173678321noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8082972746234187865.post-52300590525075899772013-12-01T18:33:00.003-08:002013-12-01T18:33:48.258-08:00The Destruction of Lasseter's Road - 2
<br />
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">Wills was fully
demented, and worse, now he owned a gun.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">Ever since he had
woken, or lurched from his drunken stupor that infamous Sunday morning, he had
been going out of his mind.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">Perhaps though, it
wasn’t clinical madness, but a close relative to that, uncontrollable, raging,
furious anger.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">On the calamitous
morning when Wills’s septic tank had exploded he had begun cleaning but very
quickly tired of it.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">First, he had had to
find something to clean with, and since his housework was rudimentary at best,
the best thing he had found was an old mop, with a dry as a biscuit sponge.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">He took this and
began working on the carpet in his bedroom, but very quickly realised that it
was simply moving the dark matter around.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">So then he had
decided he better go to town and buy a load of new cleaning materials, but he
didn’t want to attend the supermarket covered in grunge, and stinking in a way
that would make people start looking at the soles of their shoes.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">So he went to have
a shower, but found that the catastrophic force of the ex…., actually, on this
Sunday he still had no idea what happened.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">But anyway,
whatever had happened, there was no water.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">Clearly some
percussive effect had tripped the water fuse, or something.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">Stymied.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">He then decided he
better call the water people and get someone to come out and fix it, but here
he already had problems.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">Firstly, who do you
call?</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">And secondly, it
was Sunday, so if he did get through, would they come out?</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">He sat on the couch
on the deck, on the most clear place he could find, where he had been lying
asleep, and scraped and wiped his phone as best he could, then called directory
enquiries.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">A computer
generated voice answered and requested the name he was looking for.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">Wills went to
speak, but was back in the previous position of not knowing who to call.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">With a furious
grinding of teeth, he pressed the red ‘disconnect’ button and thought again.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">While he was
grappling with the problem of who to call, one coherent thought emerged through
the mists, whatever had happened, whatever he had to do now to clean up and get
the water back on, all of that could wait.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">If he didn’t have a
drink now, he would expire.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">He went to the
fridge and looked, but apparently he had drunk all the bourbon the night before
and no doubt the freeloading attendees of the party had polished off any
remaining alcohol after he had passed out.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">He went back out
and raked around in the ice tubs and came across a glass surface.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">He pulled it out
and discovered it was a beer.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">Good enough, he
twisted the cap and look a long, long, swallow.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">Then he sat down
and thought again.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">He had had trouble
with water before, a neighbour had run over the irrigation pipe that ran to
Wills’s house when slashing a paddock, through which the pipe ran through.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">He cast his mind
back and thought about the day he and a young fella who worked for him at the
time had gone up and fixed it.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">Slowly his hungover
mind restored the pictures of that day to his head.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">He got up off the
couch, and carrying his beer, went up to the highest part of his property.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">There he discovered
a noise of trickling water which lead him to the cause of the problem.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">The water meter
which connected his piping to the town system sat on the ground near the corner
of the fence.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">But as he homed in
the ground became squelchier.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">The last five
metres or so of piping displayed the damage with stark intent.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">The irrigation
piping which carried his water had been blown out of the ground and water was
cascading out of the now gaping maw of the pipe.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">Fuck.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">Wills stared at the
thing and wondered what to do.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">But the trek up to
the meter had been worthwhile, as there was a phone number on the metal plate
riveted to it.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">Wills bent down and
read the number.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">He then typed it
onto his mobile and pressed call.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">An answering
machine told him to leave a number if he had a water emergency and a member of
the team would call back.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">So he left his
number, told them it was urgent, then stared for a while longer.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">The numbers on the
meter were whizzing around, reflecting all the water that was draining away
down the hill and would eventually come out of his rates.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">This was the first
of the long succession of drains on his finance that this unholy Sunday would
cause.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">He knelt down next
to the tap-meter assembly and saw a fly wheel, half submerged in the soil.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">With difficulty he
got his fingers under it and tried to turn it.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">No way.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">With further
grinding of the teeth, he realised he would have to remove the baked hard soil
from around the tap to turn it.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">He walked back down
the hill, ferreted about in his car port, found a rusty shovel and went back up
the hill.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">With difficulty, he
loosened the soil.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">Then with every
sinew straining he turned the fly wheel to the off position.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">The water slowed to
a trickle and then stopped and the numbers of the meter stopped whizzing
around.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">‘Great’, thought
Wills to himself, ‘at least that’s something.’</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">Then he returned to
his feculent couch and grappled with his problems.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">He still wanted a shower
before he went to town, so all he could do was wait till the water emergency
team called back and then arrived to fix it.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">Great.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">Waiting was
something Wills liked.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">Waiting meant he
could just drink and wait for someone else to do something.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">He finished his
beer and then searched around in the ice tub.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">He found a can of
bourbon-cola mix, and began drinking that.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">The phone rang, he
answered, and the voice identified himself as Ian from the Litmus Bay Council
water team and asked what the problem was.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">Wills told him as
best he could what was going on, the water escaping, the tap he had turned off,
and the meter now stationary.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">Ian replied, “OK,
that does sound like there’s something going on. I’ll come out as soon as I
can”.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">Wills replied with
a terse “thanks”, gave him the address and then went back to waiting.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">He had finished his
can and found another, the last if his longer search in the ice tub had been
anything to go by.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">And so he waited.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">Eventually he heard
the sound of a motor vehicle on the road, it turned into his driveway and he
went out to greet it.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">The vehicle bore
the council insignia and a man in work clothes emerged from the vehicle.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">“Mr Wills”, he said
questioningly.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">“Yes”, replied
Wills.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">“I’m Ian, from the
water team, would you like…,”</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">Ian stopped talking
and his nose wrinkled in distaste.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">He looked around at
the near perfect brownish-black circle of filth encompassing Wills’s world and
asked the question that already, upon only the second asking, he was growing to
hate.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">“What happened
here?”</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">Wills ground his
teeth.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">“I don’t know.”</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">“Oh”, said Ian, he
looked as if he was about to make a light remark, but something in Wills look
stopped him and he recovered conversational ground.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">“Er, would you like
to show me the meter?”</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">Wills nodded and
then gestured for Ian to follow him up the hill.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">With a greatly
relieved look of someone who was heading away from faecal ground zero, Ian
followed Wills up the hill.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">At the meter they
stopped and looked.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">The council man
bent down and felt in the trench the pipe had previously occupied, he moved
along, pulling up tattered pipe as he went, till he came to the point where the
pipe was intact and disappeared from view into the ground.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">He straightened up
and was about to ask Wills again what had happened, but reconsidered.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">However, what he
had to tell Wills, he knew wouldn’t go over well.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">Wills, sensing an
announcement was coming tried to get in first, “Can you fix it quickly? I need
to have a shower, and then go into town”.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">Ian stopped himself
from agreeing volubly that if anyone on this damn Earth needed a shower it was
certainly Wills, and arranged the words he had to speak in his head.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">“I’m sorry Mr
Wills, but it’s not up to me to fix it.”</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">“What?!”, said
Wills. </span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">This smacked of
Wills having to do something, and pay for it, himself.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">Ian sighed
inwardly, “Well, although we don’t know what happened here, the damage is on
your property, inside the fence line. If the break was on the other side of the
fence, it would indeed be a council issue, but as something happened to the
pipe <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">here</i>”, he pointed to the
offending area, “I’m afraid you have got to fix it yourself.”</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">Wills’s eyes
bulged.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">For the second time
that morning he felt hard-done-by, by someone, the interview with Sergeant
O’Driscoll was the first, but at this point could think of anything to say that
really express his feelings accurately.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">“Fuck”, he said.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">Ian did his best to
shore up the breach, “do you know how to fix it?”</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">Wills eyes bulged
again.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">This seemed to him
a dig at his manhood.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">He then made a
mistake that would dig himself ever deeper into the mire, he was rude to
someone who could help him.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">Ian had in fact
been going to offer to help, as long as it was kept quiet.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">He had often in the
past, particularly with elderly residents, made the offer to fix the damage,
even though it was on the resident’s side of the property line, if the resident
would pay for the materials.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">This offer was
always leapt upon with gratitude, and Ian had gone to town, bought what was
required and quickly fixed the water supply interruption, then gone on his way,
with his bosses none the wiser, and the residents happy.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">But Wills gave no
thought to anything but venting his feelings, he burst forth, “Yes, I bloody do
know how to fix it, now get the fuck off my property, since you’re as useless
as tits on a bull. I’ll be writing to the fucken council about you, you fucken
slackarse”, said Wills.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">Ian, hurt, at this
savagely voiced response, walked back down the hill, got in his car, and drove
away.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">“Fuck, Fuck, FUCK,”
said Wills.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">Now that he thought
about it, he actually wasn’t quite sure how to fix it.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">But part of his
persona, stemming partially from the sign “builder” on the side of his car and
partly from being simply a man, wouldn’t allow him to admit not knowing
anything.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">He trekked back
down the hill again.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">He fished in the
ice tubs, but it only confirmed that he was out of booze.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">Double fuck.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">No water and no
booze.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">He decided to go
into town anyway, buy whatever he needed to clean, buy whatever he needed to
fix the pipe, and mostly BUY A LOT OF BOURBON.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">But even here he
faced a hurdle.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">He opened his car
door and then realized that he was going to irreparably stain the interior of
the car.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">Fuck.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">He went back up to
his bedroom got some cleanish clothes out of the wardrobe, carried them
downstairs and outside.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">Then he made use of
the only water still available on his property and had a rudimentary, at best,
wash using the water in one of the ice tubs.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">He soaped himself
and for a brief moment enjoyed them feeling of being naked outside, but quickly
the issues of the day overcame him and anger consumed him once more.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">Wash</span><span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";"> done as best he could, he got a bucket,
tipped some water over his head.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">Then he dried
himself and put on his cleaner clothes.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">He grabbed his keys,
went out to the carport, got in and started the car.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">He reversed up to
the road and was just backing out when he heard a horrendous scraping and
realized that he had backed into the letter box, but with reflexes slowed by
alcohol, he continued his reverse curve and by the time he jabbed frantically
at the brakes, the mail box had scraped along the side of his car, denting the
panels deeply nearer the rear, and removing the paint closer to the driver’s
door.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">Wills erupted from
the seat and examined the damage.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">“Fucking, fuck,
fucking, fucking….”, he trailed off into a spluttering fury.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">Another hole in his
money opened up as he contemplated the repair bill from the panel beaters.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">He kicked savagely
at the letter box to remove it from the area and then with already
uncontainable rage flooding his system drove to town. </span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">Like a St Bernard
in the Alps he arrowed in on the bottle shop.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">Whatever happened
he was going to make sure that his booze supplies were secured first.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">He jumped out and
walked in.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">Again he was
conscious of the patrons and staff wrinkling their noses, his meagre wash
nowhere near removing the smell, but he didn’t care.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">He grabbed a
trolley and filled it with bourbon bottles and cans of spirits and mixer.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">With that
teeteringly full he went back to the checkout and got out his credit card.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">Studiously ignoring
the blanched look on the face of the checkout staffer, he handed over his card,
which the staff member took as if she wished she were wearing surgical scrubs,
ran it through the machine and handed the docket over for Wills to sign.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">He did so, then
trolleyed his load out and filled the car with booze.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">That done he went
to the supermarket.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">Now adept at
ignoring the noses of those he passed near, he found the aisle containing the cleaning
materials and got a selection that he hoped would do the job.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">That loaded he then
sat in the driver’s seat and wondered what to do about the pipe.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">It was a rural
irrigation system, but did that mean he had to go to the Rural supply co-op to
get the materials?</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">Or would the local
hardware shop provide? And if so, would they be open on Sunday?</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">Well, soon find
out.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">He started the
engine and drove to the large chain hardware supply house.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">It was open, so
Wills went inside and looked for someone to ask.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">Not surprisingly,
most of the staff members suddenly found jobs of absorbing interest to do down
any other aisle in which Wills wasn’t.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">However with perseverance
he cornered a junior with slow reflexes and asked him if they sold irrigation
piping.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">The junior, named
“Josh” if the embroidered name on the top pocket of his shirt was to be
believed, gave ‘thanks’ to an almighty god and replied, “Yes, we do, and it’s
outside, come with me.”</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">He led Wills rapidly
out a side door, then took what Wills thought an overly insulting, enormous
breath of fresh air, then said, “how much do you need?”</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">Wills didn’t now,
but replied, “About five metres, I think.”</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">He then described
the damage up near his meter and Josh began to scrabble in amongst some large
rolls, then a thought struck him, “what sort of pipe is broken?”, he said,
poking his head back out from the pipe supply area.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">Wills reared back.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">“There’s different
sorts?”, he replied.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">Josh sighed and
told him of the different categories.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">“High and low
pressure, above meter and below.”</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">For what seemed
like the hundredth time that morning Wills grappled with a real life problem
that couldn’t be delegated to someone else while he drank on his deck.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">“I don’t know,” he
said.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">Josh sighed
theatrically and then replied shortly, “OK, tell me fully what the problem is.”</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">So Wills gave him
chapter and verse, the meter, the pipe, where the break was and how long the
damage to the pipe stretched for.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">Josh turned it over
in his mind, eventually deciding that he just wanted Wills and his smell away
from him, far way from him.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">“OK, I think it’s
best that you get high-pressure, above meter pipe. That stuff handles the
highest pressure, and even if you install it in a low-pressure area, it can
contain any flow that is required.”</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">Wills nodded, he
didn’t care, he just wanted to be home with the water fixed, drinking on his
deck.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">They grabbed the
pipe and the connector rings that were part of the fix and went into the
checkout.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">Josh handed Wills
over to the staff member behind the till with, again, what Wills thought
unnecessary alacrity, then evaporated to another part of the store.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">Wills paid, ‘more
fucking money’, he thought, then manhandled his pipe and connectors out to the
car.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">He struggled with
the load, but eventually fitted in into the rear of the cab, among his bottles
of booze, and bulk cleaning materials, then started the engine and drove away.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">Now despite his
bizarre start to the day, Wills mood was swinging around to ‘good’.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">He had his booze.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">He would fix the
pipe, have a shower, clean his bedroom at least, then go back to doing what he
did most after-party Sundays, sitting on his deck drinking.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">So in the end it
was a shame for Wills’s fortunes that as he drove away from the hardware store,
he was pulled over by the police.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">Wills looked in the
rear view mirror as two policemen got out of their car, and began to walk
toward him, with looks of slight astonishment on their face.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">The policeman on
the passenger side, caught the whiff of drying sewage which still coated that entire
side of the vehicle and began to veer away as he worked toward the front end of
the car.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">The other officer,
stared at the dents and paint scrapes on the driver’s side as he slowly moved
up into Wills’s field of vision.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">Wills tried to be
casual, but already felt the sinking feeling of a man driving a vehicle that
shouldn’t really be on the road.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">He waited in his
seat until the officer blocked out the sun and spoke, “Excuse me sir, have you
been in an accident this morning?”</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">Wills replied, “Er,
well, not really, um, that is, I haven’t had a real accident, I hit my
letterbox as I was leaving my house, um, I was in a bit of a hurry.”</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">The policeman took
another long look down the side of the car at the dents and scratches. </span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">“A letterbox did
this?”, he asked, sceptically.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">Wills tried to
control his temper, “Yes, a letterbox, did this. As I said, I was in a hurry.”</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">The policeman took
a few slow nods.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">“So there’s no
chance we’ll get back to the station to find that a motorist has reported being
hit by a car, a twin cab ute, like this one, which then drove off without
stopping? There’s no chance of that?”</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">Wills ground his
teeth and tried to respond in a controlled fashion.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">“No”, he responded,
“I have a lot to do today and I just wasn’t watching closely enough when I
backed out of my driveway.”</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">The policeman
nodded again and then said, “do you realize your blinker and taillight were
smashed?”</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">Wills hadn’t
actually, he had simply kicked the offending letterbox in question and then
driven off.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">“Uh, yes, is that a
problem?”, asked Wills.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">“Well, maybe, but
leaving that aside for the moment, perhaps you can enlighten us as to what is
coating the entire other side of your car? I thought it was mud, but my partner
pointed out that it hadn’t rained around here for a while, so…. ?”, the
policeman trailed off leaving the question hanging in the air.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">Wills ground his
teeth again.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">“Uh, yeah, well,
I’m not too sure myself. I had a party last night at my place, and I think
someone may have done this for a laugh.”</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">The officer raised
his eyebrows.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">“You must have some
pretty peculiar friends. I wouldn’t be laughing if someone had done this to my
car. And you still haven’t answered the question, what is it, if it’s not mud?”</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">Wills felt the
pulse in his temple begin to pound.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">He had hoped to get
through this without having to explain, but there was no escape now.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">“I think it’s shit
from my septic tank”, he said.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">The officer raised
his eyebrows and reared back slightly, “Shit…., from your septic tank!, …., is
that what you said?”</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">So Wills gave the
shortest explanation he could of the events of the morning.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">The officer, and
his partner would had now joined him, listened saucer-eyed to his account.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">Once he’d finished,
the first officer looked like he was about to say something, Boy, did he want
to go into this a lot deeper, so he leaned in to ask Wills another question,
then seemed to catch a whiff of something and gave a small sniff.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">He narrowed his
eyes and sharply changed conversational tack, “Party last night, eh? Did you
have a lot to drink?”</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">Wills heart raced.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">He then lied, “Oh,
no, few bourbos and coke, not a lot.”</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">The policeman
nodded and then said, “Oh good, well, we’ll just give you a breath test, then
you can get on your way.”</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">He returned to his
car and leant in through the driver’s window, then returned with the kit.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">He held one end
down toward Wills and said, “Just count up to twenty into the tube at the end”.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">With racing heart
Wills did so, after about the count of seven the machine gave a small squeak
and the officer took it away, saying “thank you.”</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">Then there was a
longish pause whilst all three of them waited, then it gave four squeaks and
the officer turned back toward Wills with a lugubrious sigh.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">“I’m sorry sir,
you’ve registered a positive breath test, it’s 0.11. I’m guessing you must have
had more than a ‘few bourbos and coke.’”</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">Wills rage
intensified.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">He did not need
this.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">He got out his
licence and handed it over.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">The policeman wrote
out the ticket, including a court attendance notice and handed it back.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">Wills, threw the paperwork
on the passenger seat and then, and this was truly the sign of a man with no
cognitive function operating, went to turn the keys in the ignition.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">Quick as a flash
the policeman said, “What do you think you’re doing?”</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">Wills, much slower,
realized that he couldn’t drive away with the police watching so stopped his
turning of the keys and looked dumbfounded at the police.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">“Mr Wills”, said
the policeman, “you’re over the limit. You will have to find other means to move
away from the area.”</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">Wills dropped his
head, then replied, “but how am I going to get home?”</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">The policeman
looked at him again, and with a slight shaking of the head, replied, “That is
up to you. But you’ll have to make alternative plans.”</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">Wills swore inside
his head as violently as one can.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">With very bad grace
he got out and turned to lock the car.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">He tried to get
straight in his head what to do, how could he get the piping home, more important,
how could he get the vital booze home?</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">He was trying</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">“Also, you can’t
leave your car here. Well, you can, but I wouldn’t advise it, you’re close to
the edge of the road, and your car could be hit.”</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";"><span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>“Well, what am I supposed to do?”, yelled
Wills.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">“I don’t know”,
replied the policeman evenly, “normally, me or my partner would move your car
away to a safe place, but I’m not, and I’m strongly guessing he’s not, prepared
to get in that car.”</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">Wills stared around
wildly, looking for someone or something to blame.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">He was apoplectic
with fury, he wanted to smash the Earth and everything on it.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">Wills got home four
hours after that.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">The intervening
hours had done nothing to reduce his rage.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">His first thought following
the DUI ticketing had been to wait till the police drove away, then sneak out
of town at the wheel of his car, but that thought was quickly quashed by the
realization that if caught again he would lose his licence right there on the
side of the road, and those cops had given him the disturbing feeling that they
were going to wait around the next corner to see if he tried driving anywhere.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">He then thought he
would just get in a cab and go home, but this was quickly followed by the
realization that he had to get his pipe materials home, and more importantly, the
precious booze.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">While the booze
would fit in the cab, he was sure the pipe wouldn’t.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">He then momentarily
thought of waiting till he was under the limit, and driving on, but quickly
dismissed this thought as unworthy.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">God knows how long
it took to get from 0.11 down to 0.04, but he wasn’t spending it sitting by the
side of the road in his car.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">He wasn’t going to
wait anywhere if waiting meant not drinking.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">Eventually he hit
on the idea of a tow truck.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">That done, he
called the auto assist organisation of which he was a member, but they had been
unwilling to help as it wasn’t an emergency, his car was on the side of a main
road, but wasn’t blocking traffic.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">They did however give
him a number for one of the local tow companies and said “you can call them but
they will charge you full rate”.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">But Wills just
wanted to be home, so he rang the tow company and they heard his story and said
they would come out.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">An hour after that
they had arrived, but then a new problem arose.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">While the tow truck
driver was just, that is by the most microscopic margin, prepared to bring
himself to touch the front end of Wills’s car to attach the straps and bring it
up onto the tray of his truck, there was no way on this wide Earth that he was
having Wills sit in the cab with him for the ride home.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">Wills tried to
cajole him into doing it, with the promise of cleaning the seat when they got
home, he indicated the cleaning materials he had purchased in among the booze
and pipe in his car, but the tow truck driver wasn’t having it.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">He then tried to
get the driver to let him sit in the cab of his car for the trip, but the towie
had been even more adamant, “The cops see that and it’s my tow licence, pal.”</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">Eventually Wills
relented and figuring at least if the vehicle gets home, his booze would be
there, he better take what he could get.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">So he watched as
the towie rigged things up and then dwindled off in the direction of Wills’s
place.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">Then Wills went to
call a cab to take him home, a cabbie agreed, but as soon as he pulled up, his
nose began to wrinkle and he, like the tow truck driver flat out refused to
have Wills in his cab.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">Wills argued with
him, but there was no way, and eventually, with a “Sorry, mate”, the cabbie
drove away.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">Wills was going to
try again, but Litmus
Bay only had one cab
company, and he didn’t think he would get anywhere fast there.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">So he realized that
he would have to walk.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">It wasn’t
technically a long way, six kilometres or thereabouts, but he was hung over and
severely dehydrated already, so knew this walk wouldn’t be fun.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">It wasn’t.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">It was everything
he dreaded, made worse by having to walk past the police indeed breath testing just
around the corner, and by the tow truck driver waving to him on his return to
town.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">He limped onto his
property and went over to the car.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">First things first,
he filled the fridge with booze, then opening one container, began, rather
unwisely, drinking it and then got his various purchases out of the car.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">He had a drink of
water from one of the other ice tubs, but still felt like death.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">He then went
automatically toward the kitchen sink to get enough water to quench his thirst,
when he remembered the broken pipe.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">So contenting himself
with another scoop from the ice tub, he gathered his materials and headed up
the hill.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">Once there he dug
into the ground to unearth the intact end of the pipe.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">With that exposed
he realised the ragged end needed trimming and with a growl of frustration,
realized he didn’t have anything to cut it with.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">He walked back down
to the house, rooted about in the car port shelves and found a rusty hacksaw.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">He went back up the
hill and cut the pipe.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">He lined his new
piece of pipe up, and put the connectors in place and screwed them on.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">Now splicing in a
new piece of irro pipe is a fairly straightforward process, but there as a few
fine tunes that are crucial.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">If he hadn’t been
rude to Ian the water man, he would have known that you have to screw your
connectors on with absolute plumb precision, the slightest cross-threading,
even by just a few degrees, will stop the seal forming and water will squirt with
gay abandon from one, or both of your connectors.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">But Wills was in a hurry
and already near demented with the frustrations of the day, and so he screwed
the connectors on, then unwisely buried the pipe again with a few shovel
strokes, turned on the flow with the fly-wheel at the meter, then went back
down the hill.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">He walked into his
kitchen and turned on the tap.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">A small trickle
emerged, convulsed with periodic spitting bursts evidencing air pockets in the
line.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">“Turn on at least
one tap in your house, before you fix the pipe” would have been another thing
Ian would have told him.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">He watched for a
minute or two, realized there was a problem, then went out and back up the
hill.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">He saw as he
approached water oozing from the ground where his two connectors were bedded.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">He turned the water
off, grabbed his shovel, reunearthed the pipe and connectors, unscrewed everything,
and then repeated his previous repair process.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">Then turned the water
on and headed back down the hill.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">This time the flow
from the kitchen tap was better, but still he knew there was a leak in the
line.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">Back up the hill,
and once more through the motions of repair.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">It wasn’t till the
fifth cycle of unscrewing and rescrewing that he finally brought a measure of
furious patience to bear, and lined the threads up nicely.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">He went back down
the hill, turned on and was finally satisfied.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">The pressure was good
enough, and he certainly wasn’t going to walk back up the hill to do it again.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">There was still the
odd convulsive spit indicative of the odd air pocket, but these lessened as he
watched, so he declared the job done.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">Next Wills turned
his mind to the next part of the day’s unfun tasks and thought he better begin
cleaning.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">But then his mind
rebelled and he instead decided that he was going to have a proper shower and
get fully clean.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">Dusk was falling
now and his plan to clean up and then drink on the deck throughout the
afternoon was twelve hours delayed.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">He was buggered if
he was going to start cleaning now.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">So he went into his
bathroom and turned on the shower.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">He stood there with
his hand in the flow, but after a minute or so he realized that the water wasn’t
getting any hotter.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">It never took this
long.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">“Fuck”, said Wills
to himself.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">He turned off the
shower and went down to his laundry and put his hand on the hot water system.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">Stone cold.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">He looked down at
the metal grille at the bottom and was not surprised that the diffuse blue glow
that told him the pilot light was on, was absent.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">“Fuck”, he said
again.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">The explosion of
the morning, and its subsequent percussive wave damage to the water system had
blown out the pilot light.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">“Fuck”, he
repeated, and then went out to get his cigarette lighter.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">What happened next,
truth be told, wouldn’t have happened to someone even remotely circling sanity.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">But that day Wills
had woken, still drunk, covered in shit.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">He had then had his
interchange with Sergeant O’Driscoll which had begun the steady rise of his
fury.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">Then a few drinks,
followed by the run in with the letterbox, had continued the process.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">The drive to town
including a drink driving charge, followed by having to pay for the tow truck,
then walk home, had increased his anger load.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">Multiple trips up
the hill to fix the water pipe had done nothing to help.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">Now the hot water
system was out and Wills would have thought it the last straw, but there was
more yet.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">The pilot light was
out, but the gas was still on.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">Anyone with a
remotely useable sense of smell would have known that the laundry was full of
gas.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">They would have
turned the gas wheel to ‘off’, then opened a window to vent the room.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">But clearly, Wills
sense of smell was hardly useable, the blast of this morning was still ‘fresh’
in his nostrils, where some of the debris still lodged.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">Plus he was still
drunk, or at least hopelessly hungover.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">And finally, horrendously
impatient to get in the shower and wash the filth off his body.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">So, he removed the
metal grille, took out his cigarette lighter and clicked it into life next to
the small metal tube where the pilot light usually burned.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">The room went up in
a ball of blue flame.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">Wills was blown
backwards across the laundry and the back of his head collided at pace with the
jutting sill of the window that if he had opened would have avoided all this.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">The flame burned
his eyebrows off his face and also provided a service he needed, but could have
done without it being so painful, namely cauterising his nostrils of all hair
and faecal matter still lodged there.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">The flame caused a
secondary explosion of the incandescent bulb on the ceiling and this caused the
fuse to trip and the power ceased flowing into Wills’s house.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">Wills slid down the
laundry wall like a thrown wet sock and measured his length on the floor where
a gentle tinkling rain of glass from the bulb came down and settled on and
around his unconscious form in the now pitch black laundry.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">Literally and
metaphorically Wills’s lights had gone out.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">Franco Veletta was
a stereotype.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">He knew this
because his children and older grandchildren kept telling him so.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">However, it wasn’t
barbed, vicious stuff.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">All his descendants
admired and looked up to him, and this was evidenced by their regular
attendance to his home on Lasseter’s road most Sundays for long lunches, and
their willingness to help him whenever he asked.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">He had come, like
so many others from the poorer areas of the Mediterranean, to Australia to work on the Snowy
Mountains Scheme.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">Once the work on
that mighty project had been completed he and his wife Delia had followed the
harvest trail around the country, picking fruit and vegetables.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">One summer he had
happened upon a nut farm outside Litmus
Bay and worked
torrentially hard for the season.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">The owner of the
farm, impressed by his nuggetty strength and willingness to slog on through the
rain and the weekend if required, had offered him a permanent post as farm
labourer.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">In a short time he had
ascended to farm foreman and was organising many of his former colleagues from
the Snowy Mountains to visit for the harvest and
work the season with him.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">Then the other nut
and fruit farmers in the area heard of his abilities and began asking Franco if
he could organise teams of pickers for their farms.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">And so Franco Veletta
prospered.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">Delia had given
birth to two children, in less than permanent accommodations, and had another
on the way when Franco came home and announced they would be staying
permanently due to his work on the nut farm.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">Delia was happy,
and then made the tentative suggestion that they may start looking for a house
of their own.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">At first Franco had
been a little surprised, he had never considered that they would ever be
earning enough money to own a home in this great new land, but slowly the idea
bore fruit and few seasons, they had enough to put a deposit on a piece of land
on the newly subdivided Lasseter’s road.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">So now Franco
worked even harder.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">When not at work at
the nut farm or organising picking teams around the district, he was down on
his land, building a house for his family.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">The building was
largely concrete, another part of the stereotype, but there were reasons, it
was cheap and it was strong.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">Franco Veletta
valued a strong house.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">Partly because it
tolled an unconscious bell inside his head, clanging to tell Franco that a
strong house made for a strong family.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">And partly because life
as a boy on the island
of Malta had brought home
to him the need for walls stronger than dried mud.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">Gun feuds were
common there.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">Rarely did a year
pass without a feud building to the “pressure-release” stage and the olive
groves would resound with the crack of shotguns being fired into the wall of
someone’s house.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">But these feuds
rarely led to bloodshed and just as commonly a feud would fizzle out when a new,
greater, grievance against someone else, usually richer, would see the former
feuders huddled over a table in the local bar, discussing plans to make the new
target sorry.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">These plans almost
invariably lead to another night’s creep through the olives in a new direction
and more gunfire at night.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">So Franco built a
house with concrete walls 150mm (six inches) thick.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">As his children
grew to adolescence they worked with Franco, mixing cement and in time the house
was structurally complete.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">The skills learned
by the boys who helped led them into allied trades and he had two plasterers
and a bricklayer among his offspring.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">His children did
though point out to Franco that his house, while strong, was ugly, and so after
consultation with Delia, he attended the hardware store and got some advice on cladding
the walls with a more attractive finish.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">Weatherboard was
chosen, installed and then painted.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">Not only had Franco
built a strong house, but it had the “luxury” of cladding and paint.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">With the hours
spent building his house now available for him to disperse Franco added to his
immigrant stereotype by opening up the land behind his home to vegetable
gardens.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">By the time the
events on Lasseter’s road were starting to liven up with explosions becoming de
rigueur, his gardens extended for two hectares, and what Delia didn’t use to
feed the hoards of grandkids, Franco would load on his small truck and sell at
the farmer’s markets in Litmus Bay each Thursday.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">Franco was happy,
he had succeeded like so many immigrants to Australia had, by eternal hard
work.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">Now 65, he
considered ten hours a short day and still worked either for wages on the farms
about, or in his gardens, seven days a week.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">How he came to be
connected with the events at Wills’s house were largely due to the increasing
irrationality of Wills’s actions.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">He rarely
complained about the noise of Wills’s parties, simply lying down with Delia in
their bed behind their thick concrete walls was enough to damp the noise.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">But if he had a
beloved baby grandchild in the house on a Saturday night, and the child and its
parent were having trouble sleeping, then Franco would be out of the house and
clumping down the road.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">He exuded a natural
authority, and Wills was quite frankly a little scared of him, so the music
would be turned down.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">Although Wills
would bluster to the young women at the party after Franco had left, he ensured
on a “Franco visit night” that the music volume stayed down.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">But apart from that
the noise didn’t bother Franco all that much and on more than one night he had
got out of bed and gone down to the gardens and got on with some work,
squashing slugs and checking for snails.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">Sometimes he would
do some heavy work that was better performed in the cool of the night.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">He hadn’t heard the
explosion of the septic tank this Sunday morning, having been working his stall
at the monthly tourist market, but had arrived home in the late evening and had
definitely noticed the smell.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">Like all gardeners
he had a sensitive nose and so the stench wafting down the hill from the hill
occupied by Wills had hit him with the force of a hammer.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">He had parked his
truck round the back of his house and was unloading various bits of his stall
paraphernalia whilst running over in his mind what on Earth the smell could
presage, when he heard the faint pop of the gas explosion in Wills’s laundry
and he decided he better go and see what it was.</span><br />
<br />
<a href="http://byronshortstories.blogspot.com.au/2013/11/the-destruction-of-lasseters-road-3.html"><span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">Next chapter</span></a><br />
<br />
<br />
<a href="http://byronshortstories.blogspot.com.au/"><span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">Back to home page</span></a><br />
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<br />LKhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11244232092173678321noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8082972746234187865.post-16065981830398225202013-11-25T19:53:00.000-08:002013-12-08T19:12:41.613-08:005 - London and Thereabouts<!--[if gte mso 9]><xml>
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<br />
<div class="MsoNormal">
It was when I fell asleep standing up that I first
understood how hectic London
was.
</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
I was coming home from work one afternoon and as I waited
for the pedestrian light to change I lent against a handy wall.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Some minutes…, actually, I don’t know how long later, but
the roar of released traffic woke me.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
The scene had changed in millimetric detail, different cars,
other people, and I realised that so tired was I that I had dozed against the
wall.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
And if I was, then it was no surprise really.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Not only was I living in London, but I was teaching now at one of the
hardest schools I have ever experienced.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
But all that is ahead.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
When we left things I had moved into the terraced house of
my friend Don in Lewisham, south east London,
and was staring longingly at a Sydney Cityrail ticket I had found in my pocket,
which promised to take to Bondi for $2.50.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
With a sigh I put it away and went about my preparations for
getting a job as a teacher in the metropolis.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
To do this I had to sign up with a firm called Timeplan.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
This was an agency responsible for finding substitute
teachers to prop up the ailing English education system.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
You can imagine the sorts of schools that needed the
services of Timeplan, obviously any school that an UK teacher wouldn’t touch with a
four hundred foot pole.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Even the name, Timeplan, is redolent of a prison sentence,
and that is largely what they handed out.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
However, I had ended my Asian travels early, and so when I
contacted Timeplan they said that the new term doesn’t start for another three
weeks, and so to get back to them closer to the time, and they will set me up
with a placement.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
I was a bit anxious about this, as I was already learning
what it cost to live in London,
and I would have preferred to get going straight away.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
But it wasn’t to be, so I put down the phone and
contemplated other options.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
When Matt came home from work I asked him what he thought,
and he said “Why not try a pub? They always need more workers.”</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
What he didn’t add, and as I was about to find out, was that
Britain then, maybe still, has no minimum wage, and that’s why pubs always need
more people.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
However, since my preferred work as masseur to the Swedish
nude silicon implanted volleyball team was unlikely, at least in the near term,
I went out to try a few hostelries in the local area.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Over a long time in the country I came to understand that
there are only three things that the English do well.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
One is TV shows, the next is the post office, and finally
pubs.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
However, almost typically of me, the first pub I tried, had
to be about the worst in Britain.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
I can’t remember what it was called, or if it even had a
name above the door, but it was a few blocks from my digs, on the way into
Lewisham high street.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
It’s not surprising that I didn’t know its name, as my
recollection was that at first I wasn’t sure it was a pub at all.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
I opened the door timidly and thought I was in someone’s
living room.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
The carpet was filthy, barely visible in fact, and there was
a motley assortment of broken down furniture spread about with various
middle-aged men, lounging about, beer guts on tables, drinking pints out of
filthy glassware.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
One of these barely mobile wrecks turned toward me and said,
well, I can’t remember exactly, but it certainly wasn’t “How can I be of assistance,
sir?”</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
I think he said, “What do you want?”, which was something
else I was to learn later, that this passed for the very pinnacle of English
customer service.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
I responded, after some serious thought about whether I
wanted to work in such a place, “Do you have any work going?”</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
To which he gave a deep laugh, gestured at his customers and
said, “Nah, sorry, mate, most of this lot just help themselves.”</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
But he was a kindly soul, and was prepared to help me, he
continued on, “If you want some work, go down to the town and try The Plough,
they have lots of stuff going on.”</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
I thanked him for his help and then left with alacrity
before the hordes of insect life that I was sure infested the place transferred
their attention to me.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
I headed down to Lewisham and there on the corner of the
high street was The Plough, and it was vastly different establishment.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
The sign that announced its name was a vast neon thing, with
a “ye olde” horse and plough drawn floridly across it.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
It looked more like an alien spaceship that had chosen the
dark streets of Lewisham to land, than an olde world English pub, but I could
see it was a bright and glitzy place, for the young things to strut their stuff
in.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
So I entered with a bit more confidence than previously, walked
up to the bar and spoke with a large man who was serving behind the counter.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
G’day”, I said, “Would you guys have any work going?”</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Without missing a beat he replied, “Yeah, interviews
tomorrow at two o’clock.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Just come in then.”</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
I rocked back slightly, talk about good timing.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
I quizzed him a little further, turned out that they had run
an ad in the local paper that week, announcing interviews in person at the pub
on the morrow, and I had lucked in.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
So I thanked the barman, and left.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
I returned the next day at the appointed time and took my
seat at one of the tables in the bar.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Soon another large man, and as I was to learn, getting
larger with every meal, came in and sat down at another table.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
He took out a pad and pen, then looked about, his eye fell
on me, the only one there, and he said, “you here for the job?”.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
I nodded and he gestured me over.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
I’ll just digress here to discuss a movie with Steve
McQueen, Pappillion.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Steve plays a man convicted of murder in Paris
and is sentenced to life on Devil’s Island, the aptly named, horrendously
brutal prison camp off the coast of French Guinana.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
As the prisoners are marched into camp to begin their
servitude they are given a perfunctory medical test by the camp doctor.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
As Steve’s turn comes he steps up and says, “Is there any way
to fail this test?”</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
And somewhat like that, was my interview at the pub.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
I can’t recall in detail what was said, but it was along the
lines of “Do you know what that is?” (He pointed to a pint.)</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
I said “Yes”.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Then he asked, “Have you worked in a pub before?”</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
I replied “Yes” to that as well, and that was it, he
concluded the ‘interview’, and told me to give my name and phone number to the
large man I had spoken to the day before.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
He turned out to be the assistant manager, name of Simon.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
I did so, then Simon brought out a roster of sorts, and told
me to come in on the coming Saturday for my first shift.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
I left the pub well satisfied and had some unique thoughts,
viz: if everything was this easy, my life in Britain would be a breeze.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
So I spent the rest of the week doing some tourist things, Trafalgar Square,
the Cutty Sark, and savouring London,
the city that had stood at the heart of the empire that had ultimately spawned
me in a far flung corner of it.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
But then I did something that was to lead to one of the most
painful nights of my life.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Don, who had found me my digs in his house, had returned
from Shropshire, and with his return the football team that he (Don), Matt, up
until then my only flatmate, and Pete, our other roomie, still away, played for
(Kent University Old Boys) was reactivated for the coming season.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
With players still away, Don asked me to fill in and I
happily obliged.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
The game was due for Saturday afternoon, some hours before my
shift in the pub was to start, so I had plenty of time to play and get back.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
So I bought some boots and went out and had a kickabout with
the lads.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
It went Ok, but about an hour in there was in incident in
our penalty area.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Don was keeping goal, and a high ball came over, I was just
going to jump up and head it away, when Don called, “’Keeper!”</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
This means he wanted to catch the ball.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
I hunkered down slightly and left him to it, Don though,
with his eyes focussed on the ball didn’t see me in his path, and as he leapt
to catch it, his knee came up and collected me full force on the right side of
my rib cage.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Truth be told, it didn’t hurt at the time as I was running
hot from the game, so I rubbed it a few times and then went on with the match.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Afterward we showered and headed back to Lewisham and as
each minute from the game passed, the pain in my ribs increased.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
It was my first experience of rib damage, and I can assure
you it is acute.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
You can’t really understand unless you’ve had it yourself,
but the essential problem is one of movement.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
If you break a bone in your arm or leg, you go to the
hospital and it’s set in a cast.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Once that is done, the pains tops because the bone is immobilised.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
However, ribs cannot be immobilised, and each breath causes
you pain.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
And so by the time my shift at the pub was due to start I
was having to walk like a man with a crystal goblet balanced precariously on the
top of my head.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
I got to the pub and took my place behind the bar.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
I met, very briefly, some of the other staff, but then
quickly the Saturday night rush began and I had no more time to think.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
However, I strongly suspect I am even today minorly
remembered in that pub due to the strange way I was behaving on that first
night.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
The rush meant I had to move around the bar with as much
speed as I could muster, and the pain was a constant hot beat on my right side.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Thus, a customer would come up to the bar, I would go to
serve them, and they would shout their order through the roar.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Then the pain would hit and my face would become the
grimmest of skull-like death grimaces as I rode the pain.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
So the customers began to think I was angry at them, as if
they had deeply offended me by simply asking for ‘three pints of lager’.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
However, I got through my shift then wended my way back to
the house and tumbled into my long looked for bed.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
It goes without saying that the next morning I was in
considerable pain.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
That night’s sleep, being jerked awake whenever my ribs sang
out was another in the long line of nights of disturbed sleep I had been having
since Asia, and I really needed one of those
lifts they use at the hospital to save nurses’ backs to get out of bed.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
However I managed it and as the week went by the pain
receded.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Thursday came and I went back for my next stint, Thursday
through Saturday, at the pub.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
The most salient point of those three nights was when
Saturday came and Millwall was playing at home.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Millwall was the local professional team, and match over and
the fans poured into the Plough.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
So just a bit about soccer supporters in Britain, and, as I was to learn,
thankfully much later, Millwall supporters in particular.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Due mainly to the fact that Britain is a rotten place to live,
certainly in the cities.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
The only real social option is going to the pub.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
The other great outlet is watching your local soccer team,
and these two pastimes collide on Saturday evening after the game.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Often the rage and frustration of every day life spills over
into angry feelings at the game, particularly when, as ever, your team loses
because the referee was biased.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Various teams’ supporters claim that they are the toughest,
but in the end, the title goes to Millwall.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
And they, god help me, were my local team.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Anyway, the pub filled up with Millwall supporters, already
well-oiled from the game, and the testosterone level of the pub filled to
overflowing.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
One of the other barman was a Millwall supporter himself, a
nice lad, and as the White-shirted soccer fans began to arrive, he came over to
me and said, “If this kicks off while I’m out there collecting glasses, will
you come to help?”</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
I was a little taken aback, but while not ever welcoming a
fight, wasn’t prepared to see my barman friend set upon, so I said I would.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
However, things passed off peacefully enough, I think
Millwall had won, which always helps, and even these barely sentient dregs of
‘souff landin’ knew not to destroy their own pub.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
But later on, Mike, my friend from Shropshire,
was telling me a few stories, which I’m glad I didn’t know on that Saturday
night.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Millwall fans are known as ‘bushwackers’.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
The reason is because their home ground at the time was the
aptly named Cold Blow Lane ground in New Cross, just a few stations up the line
from Lewisham, and the ground is a long way, ten blocks or so, from New Cross
station.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
So supporters from the away team have to leave the station
and make their way, as of some intrepid African explorer of old, through the
back streets of New Cross to the ground.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
The Millwall supporters would therefore hide in the back
yards of the tenement houses and when they saw some opposition fans coming,
they would jump out and attack, or ‘buskwhack’ them.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Mike himself experienced this unnerving process.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
He was from Liverpool, but
due to uni in the south and moving around a bit as a boy, hadn’t a full scouse
accent.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
However some of his friends did and one day they went to see
Liverpool play Millwall at Cold Blow, and
after the game they were walking home when they chanced upon some Millwall
supporters.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
One of these said to Mike’s friend, “What’s the time mate?”</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
He didn’t have any requirement for same, he simply wanted
someone from Mike’s group to answer, then he would hear the Liverpool
accent and they would attack.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Mike, with his non-descript accent answered, but this didn’t
satisfy them, and eventually one of his mates said something, I can’t recall
what, but that was enough. The Millwall supporters attacked, and one of them
brought out a Stanley
knife and slashed Mike’s friend down his back from shoulder-blade to hip.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Blood gushed and Mike and his friends had to gather up their
injured pal and race him to the nearest hospital where he received nearly a
hundred stitches.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
So as you can see, I’m bloody glad I didn’t know that story
that night in the pub.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
A fist fight I could acquit myself reasonably well, but
clearly some of these soccer fans would have had weapons on them and if it had
kicked off, blood would have certainly flowed.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Anyway, the night passed peacefully and on Tuesday of the
next week, I went in to pick up my pay, and here things turned comical.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
I got my pay packet, in cash, inside an envelope with the
various tax and other deductions on the front.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
I opened it and there was 14 quid in there.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
I held the envelope upside down and checked it against the
light while shaking it to see where the rest had got to.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
But no, that was it.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
I kind of cringe here, but I went up to Simon the assistant
manager, and said, “ there’s been a mistake with my pay, I think?”</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Simon said, “Oh, sorry, what’s the problem?”</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
“Ah, there seems to be some missing.”</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Simon took my envelope and examined the arithmetic on the
front, then he turned to me and said, “No, this is right, I think the problem
is because you’re a foreigner, you have to pay a higher tax rate.”</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
He then showed me the form from the tax department which
they use to work out the pays, and sadly he was right.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
I thanked him for his time and then walked home.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
As I ambled my thoughts were a little tumultuous, but not
overly confused.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
I wasn’t going back there again.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
14 quid for four nights work, sod that for a game of
soldiers.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
To put it into context, my monthly rail pass cost ₤32, so if
I kept that up I’d have to work a month of weekends in the pub just to catch
the train.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
I can’t remember if I called back and said I was quitting,
or if I just never showed up again, but I think it was the latter.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Anyway, it didn’t really matter because the new school year
was finally upon us, and that meant I could finally start work as a teacher.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
As I was to learn, my pay as a teacher was to be ₤350, of
which I would get to keep ₤250, for five days work, or ₤9 an hour, the pub
barely registering above ₤3 an hour.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
So for financial reasons I was desperate for the school year
to start, and as I think back to that time, me and a few other penniless southern
hemisphere teachers must have been the only people the length and breadth of
the British Isles who actually wanted school to start.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Certainly, as ever, the kids didn’t.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
And I’ll just digress here to take in a Ginger Meggs cartoon
that sums things up nicely.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
For those who don’t remember, Ginger Meggs was an animated
strip that appeared in the Herald every Sunday.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
The main character was a red-headed scamp who hated school.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
The comic I was thinking of went like this.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Ginger comes running up to his boon companion, Benny, during
the school holidays, out of breath and with momentous news.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
“Benny, Benny!”, he shouts.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Benny replies, “What is it Ginge?”</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
And Ginger goes “I just went down to the school to break the
windows of the staff room, and I discovered that THE TEACHERS ARE ON HOLIDAYS
TOO!!!!”</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Ginger thought teachers only lived to persecute him, and the
idea that they had holidays was just out of his comprehension.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
And as I was about to discover, it was even money who out of
the students and teachers at my first school hated the end of the holidays
more.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
The school was called Eastlea
Community School
and was situated in West Ham, down the end of the central line in the very
heart of East London.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Few geograhic areas of <span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>London, or the
entire UK
for that matter, were as financially strapped.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
I was walking into the Lion’s den all right.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
But more of that in the future.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
My first task was to physically get there, and being London, where even moving
six blocks was a major logistic exercise, crossing the river and going down
east, was not easy.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
I got up at six, showered, shaved and got dressed in my
teaching clothes.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
I got my rain gear, which would not have disgraced Edmund
Hilary’s expedition to the top of Everest, clad myself in it, then walked out
the door.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
A light drizzle fell upon me on this grey (Is there any
other kind?) London
morn.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
I walked ten minutes down to the main road, Loampit Vale,
and began my first wait of the journey.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Eventually a bus came and I got on it.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Once on board, I went to take my outer layer of rain gear
off, so as not to wet the other passengers.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
However, so crowded was the bus, that I realised that taking
of my raincoat would shed droplets all over those near me, and so abandoned the
idea and stood dripping in the aisle.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Ten minutes later the bus had inched it’s way down to New
Cross station, so I disembarked and went down to the platform.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
New Cross was a terminus, and so I was able to get on the
empty train and wait for it to leave.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Eventually it did, and I travelled five stops north to Whitechapel
station.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
There I changed train for the Central line tube.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
I caught that down to the East end, twenty minutes or so,
and got off at West Ham.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Then I walked ten minutes to the school.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
The whole trip took an hour, but the constant changing,
meant there was no real time to relax.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
I mention this, because if there was no time to relax on the
journey, there was deffo not a shaved second to relax once I entered the school
grounds.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Eastlea was populated by students who just didn’t care, and
teachers who, while dedicated, had long ago run out of the energy needed to
keep a lid on the place.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Some of the households that fed students into the school had
three generations of unemployed living there.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Grandad had worked on the docks, but any maritime facility
on the Thames had long since closed down, and
he had finished his working life on the dole.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Then dad and mom had entered the work force, with no real
industry to sustain them, and had therefore in their turn, spent most of their
working life at home watching Oprah.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
And now the next generation was at Eastlea school, and none
of them valued education at all.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Many students views of being unemployed were distorted by
their parents’ activities, to the student, being unemployed simply meant that
you got up when you liked, watched TV all day, then went down the boozer on
dole day.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
What a great life!</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
So with this attitude from most of the students, from day
one life in the classroom was hard.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
And I might add, as logic dictates, what sort of school
needs a substitute teacher on opening day? A school that is so shitty that no
local teacher would go anywhere near it.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
The only thing the students, well, certainly the boys, cared
about was soccer, either playing it, or watching their local team, West Ham,
when they could afford a ticket.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Their only goal in life was to be a professional soccer
player, and thus education was seen as a complete waste of time, time they
could have spent more usefully on the soccer pitch.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Indeed once I’d settled in I learned that the only, ultimate
sanction on their behaviour was to see the P.E teacher, Grant, and ban them
from playing soccer for the school team.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
So on my first day started by attending a meeting of all the
staff, then we broke into groups and were given our home room classes, (I was
allocated a year 8 group), then we broke further into our subjects areas, and I
was given my classes for the term by the head of science.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
I had one class in each year, seven through eleven.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
And the battle of wills between me and my various groups
began.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
First up was home room and I entered my room to mark the roll,
and was confronted by all the students sitting on the desks, with their feet on
the chairs.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Stifling a muttered paraphrasing of Basil Fawlty, (“Don’t
you people even know how to use furniture?”), I told them all to sit in a
chair, they did so grudgingly, and I marked the roll.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
This request, “everyone in a chair, please” then became a
perpetual refrain with my home room group, they sat on the desks as a form of
protest, and were still doing it a term (ten weeks) later.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
That done, I then went across to my science lab, and began
sorting out my actual teaching for the term.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
My year eight science were first up, and as I watched them
cavort in the corridor outside my room, my heart sank.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Cavort is a ludicrously jocular term for the behaviour that
was going on.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
I might add, there were three classrooms in that corridor,
and each class had a year eight class outside it.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
So there were some 80-90 students all corralled in there,
and the behaviour was a cross between a Tyson fight, World Championship
Wrestling, one of those reality TV shows and Cirque de Soleil.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
I remember standing there looking at them all and thinking,
“How in god’s name am I gonna control this lot?”</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
So I got out my machete and hacked my way through the
thicket to the door of my lab, then told them to line up and stop talking.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Well I might as well have said “everybody give me ten quid”,
that would have been equally likely to have been successful.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
After a few moments I gave up on that idea, and decided to
just get them into the room, and where I would only have my class to deal with.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
So I unlocked the door and told them to go in.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
NB: Every door at Eastlea
Community School,
from the tuckshop to the little hutch where the garbage bins were stored were
locked with triple strength titanium locks, such was the need for security.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
NBB: While I was there, a very enterprising thief broke into
the computer room and stole all the RAM chips from the school computers.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
This was a brilliant crime as the thirty or so chips fitted
easily into the thief’s pockets, left no trace of ransacking as the plastic
coat of the computer was put back in place and were worth twenty quid each.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
So I unlocked the door, and felt as some dam building
engineer must have upon opening the sluice gates for the first time.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Like a pacific ocean tsunami, my class burst through the
door.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
They scattered immediately into the age old seating
patterns, tough boys up the back, with the prettiest girls near them, while the
nerds and well-behaved students found a place closer to the front.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Once they had done this they began to climb on the desks and
sit with their feet on the lab stools.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
So my first job (again) was to get everyone in a chair.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Once this was done, and I more or less got them to stop talking
(Talking? Forget that, they were yelling like they were trying to reach China without a
microphone).</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
I took the roll.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Never in the history of humanity, with the possible
exception of the forged Hitler diaries, has there been a document with less veracity
than that roll.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
To explain: I had already learned a few tricks in my short
teaching career, and most important of these was never to ask any student their
name unless you already knew it.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
A common way to do this was to look at the name on the
exercise book on their desk, then ask.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
If they gave a name at variance to that on the book you knew
if this student was a troublemaker, or at least a smartarse.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
But this morning in the East end of London, even this was denied me, because I
came across something new to me.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
None of these students carried bags, and none had books.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
This was a facer.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
So I did something that no teacher should ever do,
particularly on the first day of school.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
I left the classroom to confer with the head of science, a
nice young woman named Rebecca.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
And just another tip here for new teachers.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
One way you can tell if your school is badly behaved is if
the staff are generally young.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Young teachers indicate that anyone who has done a bit of
time has taken one look at the place and moved on to more peaceful pastures.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Rebecca was in her early thirties and had just had her first
child, so to be already the head of science at a relatively young age was a
pretty good indicator of a bad school. </div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
I raced up to her office, and in a somewhat panicky tone
said, “None of these students have books or pens, what do I do?”</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
She replied, “Oh, you have to give them to them each lesson,
then get them back at the end. Else they take them away and throw them out.”</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
My eyebrows went up, this was new.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
“Why do they throw them out?”, I asked her.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
“Well, if they throw them away, they can come in next time
and say that they have lost their book, so can’t do any work.”</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
‘OH, great’, I thought to myself.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
“So where do I get the books to give them?”</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
She turned to her desk and opened a draw, “They’re in the
supply room.”</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
She gave me the requisite key and then told me where this
room was.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
I raced down there, got thirty or so books, and a matching
amount of pens, then raced back to my classroom.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Somewhat to my surprise it wasn’t on fire, and so I gave out
the books and then asked the students to put their name on the front.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Even then, this (to me) seemingly innocuous instruction
raised problems.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Most of the class did so, but already some of the tougher
kids had learned a few tricks of their own.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Toward the back two boys sat, and even now, just writing
their names down here brings back storms of rushing hormones throughout my
endocrine system.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Billy Moore and Billy Williams were their names.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
They shouldn’t have been in a classroom, prison maybe, or
perhaps a zoo.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Both sat defiantly on their stools and when I got around to
them gave me the same line, “I can’t read or write.”</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
This was difficult, if this were genuinely the case, then I
couldn’t make a big deal of it.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
So I made an annotation next to their names on the roll and
moved on.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Later I was to discover that of course they could read and
write fine, but had already discovered, in one year, that if they said they
couldn’t, they could sit around the classroom and do nothing for their whole
school careers.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
My recollection is that for that first lesson all I achieved
was to get the students who orbited within good behaviour bounds to write their
names on their books.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Then came the noise that would soon signal blessed relief
for me, the bell announcing the end of the lesson.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
I grabbed their books and pens like a man doing a trolley
dash round Safeway, and they left with no semblance of order.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
I went and sat at my teacher’s bench with relief.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
What I needed, after only 50 minutes of teaching was a six
month stress leave of absence on a beach in Acapulco, but just as I was
wondering if I could get some sleep in the little storeroom adjoining the lab,
a riot started outside, and I checked my timetable and with a lurching, sinking
heart realised that my next class was here.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
It was 9.50am and already I was exhausted as if I hadn’t
slept for a year.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
This class was my year 11 group, there were only 15 of them
(there were thirty in the first class), but they came with a whole new set of
problems.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Before I go into that, a quick bit of housekeeping on school
structure.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
In Australia
students study in junior school till year ten when they do the School
Certificate, then they may leave if they choose.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Those students who choose to stay, go on to years 11 and 12,
and do the Higher School Certificate, or HSC.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
In England,
junior school goes up to year 11, the students then do the GCSE, General School
Certificate of Education.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Those who are uni bound go to a different institution, a
senior school or college and do their ‘A’ levels.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
So this year 11 group was ‘studying’ (Ha!) for the GCSE.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Well that’s what they were supposed to be doing but again,
the lack of care for education was writ large.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
They stampeded into the room, punching and kicking each
other and the furniture, ignored me, and then scattered themselves around the
room like they were lounging at roman feast.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
I stared open-mouthed in consternation, what was I going to
do here?</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
My year eight group had been riotous, but at least I was
bigger than them, this lot were every bit as rambunctious, and two, at least,
were taller than me, and I’m not small.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
I draw a veil over that fifty minutes, not because I ma
trying to keep anything hidden, but simply because I had no recollection of the
entire lesson.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
But it was chaotic I do know that.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
The reason I can say this with certainty is that as soon as
that lesson was over, it was time for morning recess, playlunch as it was
called ever-so-whimsically when I was at primary school.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Here that adjournment had nothing to do with ‘play’, it was
simply a chance to get the fighting done without any teachers stopping it.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
I left my room and went back to Rebecca.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
“Who’s head of year 11?”, I asked without preamble.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
“Nigel”, she replied.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
“Which department is he?”</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
“English”, she responded.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
I left without a word and hot-footed it across the play…,
sorry, the fightground, to another building, then up the stairs to the English
staffroom.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
I entered like an action hero, swinging through the door
like a more than agile monkey, one arm gripping the door post, my body airborne
in haste.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
The various staff members were at their desks, coffee on
desk, “Nigel?”, I asked.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
I black-bearded man of mid forties turned to me, “Yes?”.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
I skidded to a halt in front of his desk, and began, again,
without preamble.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
I’d been in the school less than two hours and already I
knew not to waste time with chit-chat, things had to be done urgently of
classrooms would burn.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
“I’ve just had year 11 science, and I can’t control them,
can you help me with that?”</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Nigel replied, “Who was in that group?”</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
I cast my mind back, “Um, a few of them, but Steve Garrad
and John Wellcombe, are the two that concern me.”</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
As soon as I said these names, the other staff members began
chuckling to themselves.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
I stared somewhat wildly about me, this was no laughing
matter, to me anyway.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
However Nigel knew what he was about, he nodded and said,
“Yes, those two can be difficult.”</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
He went on reassuringly, “What I can do if you like is get
them to come to me for your next four lessons, then if they behave they can
return on a sheet.”</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
I let out a sigh of relief.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Firstly, I was spared them for the rest of the week, they
would sit in Nigel’s room with work to go with instead of coming to science and
secondly, a ‘sheet’ meant that I would have Nigel monitoring their behaviour
remotely.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
A ‘sheet’ refers to a Behaviour Sheet.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Any troublesome student carried this with them to each
class, and the teacher of that class fills it in, grading their behaviour for
that lesson.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
At the end of the designated sheet-carrying period, usually
a week or a fortnight, the head of year, in this case Nigel, checks their marks
and if the student’s marks are say, seven out of ten for the period, or
whatever is previously agreed with the child’s parents, then the student is off
the sheet and goes back into class as a normal student.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
It sounds pretty pathetic when written here, but it actually
works quite well, with the student often becoming quite keen to get good marks.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
The trouble is that it doesn’t work for real hard cases, as
I was to discover, but Nigel seemed confident that it would work for these two
students.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
I might add, did you notice that second student’s name,
Wellcombe? It is pronounced as ‘welcome’, but I can assure his presence in my
classroom was anything but.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
With my time spent with Nigel during that recess, and of
immense value it was for sure, but I came out with no time to have a coffee
myself, I looked at my watch and saw it was already 11.15, end of recess, and
so I raced back across the Fightclub, as I was already starting to think of the
playground, just in time to welcome my third class of the morning, year seven.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
This was a blessed relief, all classes should be year
sevens.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
My oft repeated aphorism is that all school students should
be shipped off to forced labour camps for years 8 through 11, and I stick by
that.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
These years sevens were, firstly, all smaller than me, and
to my unholy surprise and relief, some in the class were intelligent students
who actually wanted to do some work.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Being late back from my unscheduled meeting with Nigel, I
hadn’t got their books out, so once again had to race off to get the supply
room key off Rebecca.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
I went down once more and got their books, handed them out,
and spent the only enjoyable thirty minutes of the day with them.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
They left and it was lunchtime.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
I went across to the little shop run by a motherly cockney
woman and had a meal.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
I wolfed it down quite quickly and then raced back to the
science block.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
I re-checked my timetable and saw, with a kind of unknowing
horror, that my next group was year ten.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
I was already learning that the lesson straight after lunch
was the worst for behaviour.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
The kids have spent lunch time eating shit food like crisps
and drinking coke and worse, energy drinks.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Then they play soccer and fight for the rest of the time.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Then when they are as high as kites, the bell rings and they
are sent back into the prison of school for the next lesson.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
At Eastlea, the school day was two lessons in the morning,
then recess, then third period, then lunch, then fourth period, finally fifth,
then it was time to go home.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Thus, at the end of any period which had a break following,
you could keep the kids in, and this was a sanction that worked, as they were
missing their break.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
But since first period and fourth were ‘only’ followed by
another lesson, you couldn’t keep kids in as they were only missing another
class, plus you usually had a class of your own, and thus couldn’t deal with
them at that time anyway.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
So fourth period, straight after lunch, became an unholy
triptych of stress for any teacher, new or otherwise, at Eastlea.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
If you were lucky, your best behaved classes would be
scheduled for this post-prandial lesson, but on this first day I was well out
of luck.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Year ten came in and a bloody rodeo it was an’ all.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Once again I paraphrase Basil Fawlty by saying at the end of
that lesson I was sorely tempted to go out and see if the roof was still on.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
They left and once more the shouting in the corridor grew to
a deafening level and year nine arrived.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Another shouting match came and went and finally, blessedly,
my first day at Eastlea came to a close.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
I checked my timetable for the next day, then packed up and
repeated my five step journey in reverse until I stepped across the door at
Lewisham near 5.30pm.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
I felt that I had lived a thousand life times in that day.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
To say I was exhausted barely hints at the total dissolution
of body and mind I was undergoing.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
My flatmates Don, Matt and Pete got home a little later,
usually about seven pm, so I had the house to myself.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
I went in and sat on the couch, I switched on the TV and
turned to the highlights show and began watching a soccer match.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
I thought about making a cup of tea but even that pick me up
would have been hopelessly underpowered, mainlining cocaine would have been
about the only thing that could have changed my energy depletion.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
The next thing I knew was Don’s facing leaning over me and
his hand gently shaking me by the shoulder.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
I had dozed off sitting upright on the couch into a
dreamless sleep that had lasted a solid hour and had not even been relieved by
the sounds of the lads coming home, opening the door and coming inside.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
They later told me that they saw the top of my head over the
back of the couch apparently watching the soccer highlights, and had spoken to
me for a minute or two, while they moved about the place, until noticing that I
wasn’t responding, had come round to the front of the couch and seen I was out
like a light.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
NB: Some time later they said that this silence was the most
sensible reply they ever got out of me.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
And so my first day at Eastlea Community
School ended, not with a
bang or a whimper, but with an exhausted sleep that couldn’t have been beaten
by general anaesthetic.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
I went about the evening, making dinner, eating it, watching
more soccer, then we all went off to bed around ten.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
As I fell asleep, the nightmares came to me like fast moving
storms boiling over the horizon.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
And the worst nightmare of all?</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
I had to go back there tomorrow.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<a href="http://byronshortstories.blogspot.com.au/"><br /></a></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<a href="http://byronshortstories.blogspot.com.au/2013/12/control-i-had-none-at-first-and-less-as.html">Next chapter: 6 - Control?! I had none at first, and less as the term went on.</a><br />
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LKhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11244232092173678321noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8082972746234187865.post-1902284738234500792013-11-17T20:32:00.000-08:002013-12-01T18:41:36.971-08:00The Destruction of Lasseter's Road - 3<!--[if gte mso 9]><xml>
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<br />
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">When Franco Veletta
hove to a stop at the top of Wills’s drive he at first thought that Wills
wasn’t home, the house was completely dark and silent.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">But then he saw the
car parked in the driveway, and became a little confused.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">Franco had not had
much interaction with Wills, mainly the three or four times he had come to
complain about the noise, so a dark silent house was a new one on him.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">In his experience
everyone within hearing distance of Wills’s house knew when he was home.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">The house would be
lit like it was guiding aircraft in to land, and the music would blare out like
Guns’n’Roses were playing live.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">So this silent mausoleum
threw Franco for a moment.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">When he had heard
the popping of the gas earlier he had made up his mind to go and investigate,
so he had grabbed his torch, walked down to the house and told Delia he was
going up to see what was up, and hopefully, to find out what the smell was.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">Delia had
responded, “I hear, I hear, dinner is ready, be back soon.”</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">And Franco had
clumped off up the road.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">It was half a
kilometre or so to Wills’s place and Franco had soon crested the rise upon
which Wills’s driveway lay, and then had stood and stared.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">The smell was
indeed worse here, and so whatever was causing it was centred on Wills’s house,
but then Veletta had expected that.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">Anything less than
pleasant for the other residents of Lasseter’s road usually emanated from Wills,
and in the case of this smell, the word was exact.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">But now all was
dark.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">Franco stood there irresolute.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">He was a good
neighbour and though he desperately wanted to find out what this smell was, and
fix it as soon as, it seemed clear to him that for the first time ever Wills
had decided to go to bed early, possibly exhausted from the excesses of the
night before.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">So he had just
turned away to walk back home with a mental note to come back in the morning,
when he heard, faintly through the stillness of the Lasseter’s Road night, a
groan, then a pause, then a loud swearing.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">He turned back,
switched on his torch and then began approaching the house.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">Wills had woken up
for the second time that day, suffering from the after effects of an explosion.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">It was pitch black
inside his laundry and he at first wasn’t sure he had opened his eyes.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">He tried to think
frantically what had happened, but the best he could do was recall trying to
have a shower, he followed the steps through the fragments of memory and
finally came to the blue flash that had enveloped him.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">One thing he did
already know was that he was in even worse pain than when he had woken that
morning.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">Then, he only had a
bad hangover, and a smell to match.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">But now he was
immediately conscious of a searing pain from the front of his face.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">But if he thought
things couldn’t get any worse this day, he was once again mistaken.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">He put his hands
down on the floor to sit up, and broken glass from the shattered bulb pierced
his palms, and he gave a shriek and then began swearing loudly.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">It was this volley
of expletives that Franco had heard at the top of the drive.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">Wills snatched his
hands back from the floor and dragged himself worm-like backwards, then using
the wall as a brace, clambered into a sitting position.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">He was just
wondering what to do next, when he heard a voice outside.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">“Are you there, Mr
Wills?,” said Franco from outside the laundry, waving his torch toward the wall
of the house.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">Wills grabbed the
lifeline gratefully, “Yeah, I’m in here, can you see the door?”<br />
Franco followed his torch beam around the corner of the car port and saw the
door to Wills’s laundry.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">He opened it and
shone his torch inside.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">The beam fell upon
Wills and even Franco Veletta, who had seen a few sites in his time, struggled
to bring to mind anything to compare with this.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">Wills lay slumped
against the wall, now hairless on the head, his lower half covered in…, well, Franco
wasn’t sure, but he was certainly dirty, his head was a severe and angry red
with burn blisters already surfacing, and from his hands blood dripped onto the
floor.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">Franco suddenly remembered
where he seen this before, in church, in pictures of Jesus after his
crucifixion, with blood dripping from the crown of thorns and his from his hands,
where the stigmata bled.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">But any resemblance
to the son of god was physical only, mentally, Veletta would have struggled to
name any other human on this planet who less reminded him of Jesus Christ.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">He stared in
surprise for a few moments, then said, “Are you all right?”</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">Wills struggled to
utter, the short answer was that he had never felt less all right in his life,
but it wasn’t time for that.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">“I’ve cut myself,
can you see what’s on the floor?”<br />
Franco played his light on the concrete floor of the laundry and the sprinkled
glass glinted in its passage.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">“It’s broken
glass.”</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">Wills saw the
glass, and using the beam of Veletta’s light, struggled to his feet.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">With Franco’s help
he navigated around the glass, and together they walked across the deck area, and
went inside.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">Wills flicked a
light switch, but no light appeared.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">“Fuck”, said Wills,
“is there a blackout?”, he asked Veletta.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">“Not when I left,
Delia was in the kitchen with the light on”, said Veletta.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">“Shit”, swore Wills
again.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">So together, with
Veletta leading the way with his torch, they went back outside and found the fuse
box.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">To Wills’s
considerable relief the main fuse switch was in the ‘off’ position, they switched
it on, and Wills saw the lights come on and heard the fridge begin humming.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">They went to go
back inside, but with the deck area now bathed in light, Franco got his first
view of the contents of Wills’s septic tank, spread evenly around.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">His first thought
was to ask Wills what had happened, but even that crucial desire was overlaid
by his concern for Wills now that he saw him whole.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">“Mr Wills”, said
Veletta, “you don’t look so good, maybe you should go down to the hospital.”</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">To say Wills didn’t
look good was certainly accurate, wildly understated in fact, Franco struggled
to think of anyone, or anything, that looked worse.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">But already Wills
had other motives in mind.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">He had had the
worst day a human could have, he was now in pain, and still stinking like a
septic tank.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">He still had no hot
water, so still couldn’t even have a shower, but he wasn’t going to hospital,
he was going to have a fucking drink, lots of fucking drinks, until the ravages
of the day were washed away on a warm tide of alcohol-fuelled ambrosia.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">So he replied,
“Nah, I’m OK, I’ll go down in the morning and see them then, but now I just
want to wash this off and then go to bed.”<br />
Veletta’s eyes saucered in surprise, “Are you sure, you really look like you
could do with some treatment.”</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">“No, I’ll be fine”,
said Wills.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">All he wanted now
was Veletta out of the house so he could launch into a bottle of bourbon.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">Veletta continued
to eye him with concern, but realizing there was something in the set of
Wills’s shoulders that screamed “fixture on the couch”, turned to go.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">“OK”, said Veletta,
“if you’re sure.”</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">Wills nodded and
Veletta made to leave.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">It was only when he
was about to cross the threshold that he recalled the reason for his visit and
turned back, “By the way, what is that smell?”</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">Wills jerked around
in his seat and said the lines he was already becoming practised in, “I don’t
really know, something happened to my septic tank, probably at the party.”</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">Veletta stared
again.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">Talk about the
blinding obvious, he couldn’t think what else apart from a large septic tank,
the town sewerage plant maybe, could make life so unbearable for kilometres
around.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">He waited for Wills
to go on, but he had said his piece.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">Veletta however
wasn’t satisfied, “are you going to do something about it?”</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">Wills didn’t need
this.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">“Yeah, yeah,
tomorrow I’m going to clean it all up.”</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">Veletta’s eyes
narrowed, “Really, what are you going to do?”</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">Wills, realizing
that Veletta wanted an answer, prevaricated hastily.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">“Um, I’m getting
some guys I work with to come out and we’re gonna shovel it into a truck to
take away.”</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">Veletta nodded,
“OK, well be sure you do, it’s making it hard to live, that smell.”</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">Wills nodded
ingratiatingly, “Yeah, yeah, no problem, tomorrow, I’ll get onto it.”</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">Veletta nodded
again, slowly, and with infinite menace, “OK, well, that would be great”, then
added, “would you like me to come up and help?”</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">Wills screamed
inside, he was having as much trouble dragging himself out of this conversation
as he had trying to talk the coppers out of breath testing him.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">“Er”, said Wills
slowly, hastily coming up with an answer so that Veletta wouldn’t be up here
supervising and making Wills actually do some work, “No, I’m not sure when they
are gonna get here, so I’ll look after it.”</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">Veletta’s stare now
began to resemble that of a cobra with a particularly tasty mouse in its
sights.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">“Well, I’m happy to
help, why don’t you call me when they get here and I’ll come up.”</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">Wills leapt on this
lifeline and said, “ah, sure, yeah, OK, yeah, that’ll be good, I’ll call up
when they arrive and you can come up.”</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">Wills tried to turn
away when Veletta went on, “do you have my number?”</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">Wills screamed
inside again, “Um, I’m…, er, hang on.”<br />
He got his phone out and punched the contacts menu, he observed the screen a
moment, “Ah, no, I don’t seem to have it, what is it?”</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">Veletta gave him
his number and Wills, while trying not to get any of the blood dripping from
his hands on his already filthy phone punched the number in.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">“OK”, he said, “all
good, I’ll give you a call when they get here tomorrow and we’ll clean it all
up.”</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">Veletta nodded for
the final time, “OK, Mr Wills, I look forward to it.”</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">And so finally, and
with internal rejoicing from Wills, Veletta left.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">He listened to his
footsteps clumping up the driveway and then dived into the fridge and poured
himself a large glass of neat bourbon.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">At last, nearly ten
hours after he had hoped, he could finally have a drink, a lot of drinks.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">But first things
first, he thought to himself, he better deal with this glass in his hands, and
the raging burning on his face.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">He took his glass
of bourbon and went to the bathroom cabinet.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">He opened it and
tried to find something to use.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">He scrabbled among
the various tubes but couldn’t find anything that said “Burn cream”.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">The best was some
suntan cream, so he got it out and smeared it across his head.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">The pain diminished
slightly and making a mental note to go to the chemist on the morrow to get
something better.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">He then began
searching for some tweezers to deal with the glass, but like all single men who
drink heavily, he never spent any money on anything much apart from immediate
food requirements, television and more alcohol.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">Eventually he
returned to the living room with a pair of nail scissors, and using the ends of
the blade, began the painstaking process of picking glass from his hands.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">A process that was
made harder to do well as the bourbon went down, but easier, as it made feeling
for more glass less painful as the night went on.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">Eventually he had
dealt with the glass, more or less, and four hours later staggered fully drunk
into his noisome bedroom and slept decidedly face up.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">It is nearly
impossible to believe a man who woke up Sunday covered in the blast contents of
a septic tank, could feel worse when he woke up the next day, but Wills did.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">He had drunk neat
bourbon till nearly midnight.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">Considering that he
regularly drank from 11 in the morning till late in the evening, he had a lot
of tolerance, but even so the rigours of the day had taken it out of him “short”
four hour session was needed to get him to passing out stage on the Sunday
night.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">But now he was rediscovering
the problem of burying your problems in a bottle, to wit: eventually you have
wake up and deal with said problems, and with a raging hangover to boot.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">His hands were
still painful, though most of the glass was gone, his face and scalp were re-aflame
with pain after the cream had worn off, he STILL hadn’t had a shower and the
filth of the septic blast still clung to his clothing.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">And now it was
Monday, and apart from the issues at home, he would soon be taking calls from
various clients and employees on the few jobs he was “supervising”.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">The lure of the
bourbon bottle was already there at 9am Monday and he was sorely tempted, but
then with rage and frustration he remembered that he now had a drink driving
charge to add to his woes, and couldn’t afford an eye-opener on this day when
he sorely, sorely, needed one.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">He made some coffee
and tried to think.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">However, it only
took a sip of coffee to send him to the toilet, he went in and sat down.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">Catharsis complete,
he hit the flush button automatically, and heard nothing.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">He looked down and
there was no water in the toilet.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">With the septic tank
out of commission there would be no water in the line to the toilet.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">He washed his
hands, carefully, to not jag any remaining fragments of glass with the soap
cake, and that reminded him he still hadn’t had a shower.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">He then turned to
the shower, turned it on, and remembered why he had been blown backwards in the
laundry, no hot water.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">He went down to the
laundry and opened a window.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">He took his lighter
and played it at the mouth of the pilot light tube.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">Nothing, he stopped
clicking his lighter and listened.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">Of course, the gas
had been leaking from the cylinder since the septic blast Sunday morning, now it
was 24 hours later and the cylinder was long since depleted.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">With further tooth
grinding he massaged his forehead and tried to think what to do.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">In the end he went
back upstairs and had a cold shower, which felt good on his head, but shivery
everywhere else.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">He scrubbed
frantically as his hands allowed at the muck and got out as quickly as
possible.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">He returned to his
kitchen and laid out his plans.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">Being Wills, this
meant seeing to his needs first, and so dealing with the smell definitely last.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">He had to:</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">Replace the gas
cylinder so he had hot water.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">Clean the inside of
the house.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">Replace the septic
tank so he could flush his toilets.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">Call a lawyer about
the drink driving charge.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">Get a quote to
panel beat his car: subsection, clean the filth off his car before he took it
to the panel beaters.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">He groaned at the work
in store for his immediate future.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">Well, first things
first, hot water.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">He was about to
dial when the phone rang in his hand.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">He saw from the
screen it was a concreter who worked for him, he wanted to ignore it, but the
ringing phone exerted its spell.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">He punched answer
and the concreter’s voice came through, “Hey WIllsy, I don’t like the look of
the formwork for this slab.”</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">The concreter,
Terry, was supervising the pour of a slab at a house in town Wills was the
supervising builder on.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">He groaned
internally, Terry was probably right, Wills had planned to do it himself, but
in the end had told one of his inexperienced labourers to do it, while he went
home and started early on his drinking.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">He could do without
this at this hour of a Monday, but he brought his mind to bear as best as
possible.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">“Well, Josh told me
it was fine when he left on Friday.”</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">Their was a
hesitation at the other end, then Terry spoke, “Oh, Ok, well the truck’s on
it’s way, do you want to come down and check it before he gets here to pour?”</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">No, Wills
definitely didn’t want to do that.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">“Nah, it’ll be
right. Just tell the guy to pour it in, I’m sure Josh would have said if there
was any problem.”</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">Actually, no. </span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">No worker on Earth will
tell the boss about a problem on Friday, that may lead to said worker having to
work late on said Friday.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">Josh, the labourer,
had slapped the formwork down and then driven off to be in the pub by 4.30.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">Terry then replied,
“Ok, well if you’re sure, I’ll tell him to pour.”</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">“Yeah, thanks
Terry” said Wills and disconnected.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">He then turned his
mind back to the more immediate shit, literally, he had to deal with at his
place. </span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">He called the gas
company to learn that his account was already considerably overdrawn, and they
would not deliver a new gas cylinder till the outstanding balance was paid.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">So Wills got out
his laptop and paid his bill.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">The gas company
then agreed to deliver, but he would have to wait till tomorrow.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">He then called a
company that installs septic tanks, that he had worked with on various builds,
and asked them the price of a new one.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">$5,000 was the
coast of the tank, $2000 or thereabouts for installation.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">“Shit”, said Wills
internally, and rather accurately.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">He tried wheedling
the price down a bit, “Mates rates”, as he hoped to float with them, but the
company was used to doing things with Wills and weren’t going to wait six
months for payment, so they flatly refused to budge on price.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">Wills agreed with
bad grace, and made a date for them to come out and size up the job, which was
next week at the earliest.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">Then a call from a
different build came through with another problem and Wills tried, but failed
abysmally, to bring his mind to bear on it.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">This time it was
fencing contractor, he had followed the plans Wills had given him, drawn up by
the landscape designer, but had discovered some pipes where he was supposed to
put in a concrete footing for the fence.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">What did Wills want
him to do? </span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">Wills failed
abysmally to cope with thinking about the issue and told him he would call
back.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">He did have one
good idea though, he called a cleaning company to come out and clean the house.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">They agreed over
the phone, and the supervisor said he’d come out and have a look, but that
wouldn’t be till later in the week at the earliest.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">Wills was just
putting the phone down and trying to think when it rang in his hand.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">He checked the
screen and recognising the number as another work call, made the decision to
ignore work for the rest of the day.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">So the day proceeded
with Wills ignoring work calls and watching his bank balance starting to drain
out.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">He didn’t even get
to thinking about cleaning up the outside of the house where the septic tank
debris still lay.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">But then Veletta
came up again on Monday night and asked why Wills hadn’t called him to clean
up.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">Wills lied that it
hadn’t been necessary as the mess would be cleaned up when the new septic tank
arrived.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">Veletta had once
again gone away with bad grace, but with the assurance that the new tank would
be here this week (another lie) and the smell would be gone.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">Wills had a lot of
vain hopes that week, mostly that he would wake up and discover he had dreamt
the lot, but his dwindling bank balance and the never changing smell kept it
all too real.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">He called his lawyer
and told him about the DUI charge, and when he read the police document his
lawyer gave it his opinion that $3,000 was the likely fine with a twelve month
driving restriction, in which he had to be 0.000 at any given breath test.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">Wills had lost it
badly and then had yelled, “Fucken forget that, you’re supposed to get me off,
not agree with the fucken cops.”</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">Wills’s lawyer had
responded with the simple fact that he could only get him off if there were
mitigating circumstances, “Was he driving someone to hospital, for instance?”</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">“No”, Wills had
mumbled, and his lawyer had said, “Well then I’m afraid there’s very little I
can do.”</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">So Wills had then
rung off with bad grace.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">The lawyer, stung
by Wills’s rudeness had put down the phone and sent him a $330 bill for the
phone call.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">At night he got
drunker than ever and by Thursday his trips to town were furtive in the extreme.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">He didn’t want
anyone from his various jobs seeing him, as they would want him to do
something, or at least make a decision, and he just wasn’t up to it.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">Also, he didn’t
really want anyone seeing him visually, due to his now bald, burnt head.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">He therefore only
went to town to the bottle shop to keep his supplies of bourbon up and he ate
mostly delivered pizza.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">The empty bottles
began piling up, in, and then just anywhere near, his recycling bin, at a
fearful rate, slightly hidden from view by the pizza boxes, that he likewise
threw in the general direction of the bins.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">So the week passed
and he flushed his toilet with a bucket of water, adding to the smell each day
as the waster gurgled down the pipe to the septic tank area.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">He ignored work
calls, but knew that each call ignored meant that problems were growing in size
out on the builds.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">Friday came and Wills’s
mind, believe or not, turned toward having a party, but the thought died as
quickly as it was born.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">He didn’t want to
call any of the young labourers and get them to round up the young women he
found so alluring, as they were all connected with various jobs he was meant to
be supervising, and he still didn’t feel like dealing with any work issues, and
anyway, no one in their right mind would want to party in that smell.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">So instead he
planned to drink all weekend on his own.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">But on the Friday
Veletta came back, and was unprepared to brook any further delay.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">“Mr Wills”, said
Veletta, “why have you not started cleaning up this mess?”</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">Wills, unable to
come up with anything convincing, had shifted on both feet, and so Veletta had
said, “OK, we start now, I get my sons to come out and we begin.”</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">So Wills had to spend
Friday afternoon, and the first part of the weekend assisting Veletta and his
sons raking up sewage debris and bits of concrete and depositing them in a skip
that Veletta had ordered, but made clear that Wills was paying for.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">Sunday at lunch
time the skip was full and so Veletta relented and walked home to a Sunday
lunch with his family.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">So Wills hit the
bottle Sunday at lunch and by Sunday night was sitting on his couch looking
like a human representation of the painting, “The Scream”.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">Monday came and the
skip company took the skip full of stinking concrete to the local tip, and gave
him a bill of $300 for the skip and $500 to dump the heavy load.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">The outside area
was cleaner, but the smell was still present.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">At lunchtime the
cleaning company supervisor came and inspected the house.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">He asked “what
happened here?” in an unknown echo of Sergeant O’Driscoll’s question on that
fateful Sunday and Wills gave his now-practised answer, about his septic tank
releasing it’s contents during the party.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">The supervisor had
looked with the usual saucer eyes, and then continued his inspection of the
house.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">Eventually he
quoted Wills 30 hours at $200 an hour.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">He really didn’t
want this job.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">Now it was Wills’s
turn to look saucer-eyed.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">“SIX GRAND?!”, he
screamed.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">The supervisor gave
a laconic nod and said, “Yes, Looks like it.”</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">He went on, “Of
course, if you want to get some other quotes…”, he trailed off.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">Wills bit down on
his tongue.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">Every cleaning
company that sized up this job would charge a lot.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">The alternative was
doing it himself, and he wasn’t, definitely wasn’t, doing it himself.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">So he agreed to
that as well, and the supervisor left with the promise that they would be here
tomorrow.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">Tuesday, the septic
tank boss arrived and surveyed the scene.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">Veletta and his
family, with Wills as an unwilling accomplice, had removed most of the concrete
lumps from the septic blast, but the sand bed where the tank had been was
hardly in pristine condition.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">So then the septic
tank company said they would have to add another $2,000 to bring in a bobcat
and re-lay the sandy bed to take a new tank.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">Wills, screamed
internally again, the quote was now up to $9,000.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">For the briefest of
moments Wills considered dropping the whole idea, but knew as a builder, used
to dealing with council by-laws that he couldn’t eternally go on sending the
flushes from his toilets down the pipes to the open air.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">Even if the council
didn’t know, his neighbours, Veletta for one, would be on to them quick-smart.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">So he agreed to the
price.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">The septic
supervisor then said, “can you pay the price of the tank now, please before we
bring it out here?”</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">His tone made it
clear that it wasn’t a request.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">So Wills had taken
him back inside and the supervisor had watched while Wills had paid $5,000 for
the tank online.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">Then with a “we’ll
come out with the bobcat as soon as the money clears”.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">He got in his car
and drove away.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">As he left the
cleaners arrived, “MORE MONEY”, screamed Wills inside his head.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">The cleaners,
obviously warned by the supervisor what to expect, were dressed in top-to-toe
biohazard suits.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">Although Wills was
glad to have them start, he now had to vacate to the deck outside while they
worked their various machines.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">He wanted to use
the time recreating his life, drinking on the deck while others did some work,
so he started checking in with his various jobs.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">He called the
concreter Terry and asked about the formwork-concrete pour, then strongly
wished he hadn’t.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">Terry answered it
on the first ring and launched in, “Where the fuck you been WIllsy? The
formwork collapsed and there’s set concrete all over the fucken place. You
better get down there and have a look”, Terry said with some vehemence.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">“Shit”, said Wills,
“Is it bad?”</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">“Oh, yeah”, said
Terry, with, to Wills’s ears, undisguised relish, the whole things’ fucked. If
you’d answered the phone on the day, you might have been able to do something,
but it’s set now. The owner’s not gonna be happy.”</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">Wills tried to
think, “Can you sort it out? Do something to get it back?”<br />
”Nah, sorry mate, I’m already on another job, tried to call ya, but now it’s up
to you.”</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">“Shit, Ok, thanks
anyway,” said Wills and put the phone down.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">He massaged his
head.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">This was a major
fucking disaster.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">A truckload of set
concrete spilled everywhere.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">He tried to call
Josh, the labourer who had done the shoddy formwork, to at least have someone
to yell at, but not surprisingly, he didn’t answer.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">He clicked
disconnect again and once more the phone rang in his hand.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">It was a tiler.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">“Hey Willsy,” said
the tiler, “did you put that fence in up on Saddler’s?”<br />
This was Saddler’s parade, the job where the fencing contractor had called from
earlier in the week.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">“Yeah”, replied
Wills with infinite caution, “well I got Chipwell to do it, why?”</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">“'cos there’s no
water in the house, I tried to make up a mix and got nothin’ from the tap, and
the backyard is spongy as hell, I’d say they broke a pipe when they were doin’
the fence.”</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">“Fuck”, said Wills.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">Another disaster.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">He grappled again
with hungover mind with a real time problem.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">“Can you switch the
water off? I’ll get down there as soon as I can.”</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">The tiler replied,
“yeah, I can do that, you call me when the water’s back on? Then I’ll come back
and do the tiles.”</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">“Yeah, yeah”, said
Wills, and rang off.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">He called a plumber
and told him what had happened, and got him to go round to the house and find
the broken pipe, or just to find out what had happened.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">The plumber agreed
to do it, but would have to charge an emergency call out fee.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">Wills tore his free
hand over his still tender scalp and once more screamed, ‘MORE MONEY’ in his
head.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">Wills desperately
wanted to switch off his phone, but now he had to wait for the plumber to call
back.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">Some hours later
the plumber called with the bad news.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">“Yeah, looks like
when the put in the fence footing they didn’t cushion the pipe with sand, so
the concrete set hard on top of it and then cracked the pipe.”</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">“Oh, jesus”, said
Wills, “can you fix it?”</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">“Well, I can” he
said, “but I can’t do it till next week, and I’ll have to dig up the footing
and remove part of the fence to get at the pipes. You want me to go ahead?”</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">Wills sighed
internally, “Yeah, I guess so, but can you do it any earlier?”</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">“Not really”, said
the plumber, “got jobs booked up the ying-yang, could do it now, but have to
charge extra.”</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">“No”, said Wills,
“Just have to put the guys who need water on hold.”</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">They made a plan
for the pipe fix and Wills put down the phone.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">As long as the
water was off at the house, things weren’t critical, just that the job would
now be delayed as the tiler, and any other tradie who wanted to use water in
their work wouldn’t be able to get things done till the plumber had fixed the
pipes.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">Wills then got in
his car and drove around to inspect the concrete disaster.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">And it was, the
corner of the formwork had given way and the wet cement had cascaded across the
lawn.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">Not only was the
lawn damaged, but the entire slab, sloping neatly down to the corner that had
given way, would now have to be dug up and re-laid.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">The owner would, to
put it mildly, not be happy.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">He drove home via
the bottle shop and drank heavily as usual.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">The cleaners worked
through Wednesday, while Wills tried to get hold of someone to jackhammer up
the concrete.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">Eventually he found
a friend of an acquaintance of a friend who worked demolition.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">He agreed to the
job, but told Wills he couldn’t do it till the Saturday, as he had his work to
do through the week.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">Wills agreed again,
and feeling he had “accomplished” something, waited till the cleaners left,
then drank heavily.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">Thursday the
cleaners arrived in tandem with the bobcat driver.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">They jockeyed for
position in the driveway, to get all their vehicles in, and then the ‘cat
driver rolled his machine down and began the smoothing process of the sand base
for the new septic.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">That done in an
efficient couple of hours, he drove away, calling his boss as he did so to say
they could bring in the tank.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">The truck with the
tank came on Friday and it backed down the drive and then the complex process
of laying the tank began.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">Wills watched,
while the cleaners worked inside and by Friday evening he was in the somewhat
relaxed position of having a new septic tank, all connected, and a relatively
clean house.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">So his drinking on
the Friday night had a joyful component to it for the first time since his
septic tank had blown.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">Additionally, it
was now two weeks since that fateful Sunday morning, and the weather had been
dry, so the remaining septic dank waste that had been scattered around his
garden and across the lawn, had dried out and the smell was finally
diminishing.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">So one would have
thought that Saturday was day of optimism for Wills, but he should have known.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">At six am the phone
rang, he answered it without thinking from the mists of sleep, and heard the
voice of the owner of the property where the disastrous concrete spill had
occurred.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">If Wills was half
asleep when he answered the phone, he was firing on all cylinders within a few
milliseconds as the owner screamed down the phone.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">Starting with
describing the scene that met his eyes when he had gone round to inspect the renovations,
he then touched on Wills not telling him about it, included his displeasure at
seeing no one at work there fixing it, and ended up by sacking Wills and
indicating in the strongest of terms that his solicitor would be in touch to
find out how Wills would be paying for the fix up.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">He then added some
expletive laden comments about Wills’s mode of life in which the words ‘drunk’,
‘arsehole’ and ‘bastard’ featured prominently, and then fired him and rang off
before Wills had uttered a word.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">Wills, ashen and
shaken, knew he wouldn’t get back to sleep, so went down to his living room for
an emergency bourbon.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">He drank it down
with shaking hand then had another.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">Having started this
Saturday as he had so many others, though a damn site earlier than usual, he
continued with the medicinal process.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">As the bourbon went
down he began to calm down a bit and say internally, “That’s not so bad, didn’t
want that fucking job anyway.”</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">Which was true
enough, really Wills didn’t want any job, but it was his money source.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">With all he had to
pay, combined with what had already gone out of his bank account, he needed to
get back to work and get some dollars rolling in.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">And now with the
house clean and the septic tank installed he had a bit of clear air to sort his
other jobs out and start to get back on track.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">At lunchtime he had
enough bourbon on board to brave looking at his bank account, and it wasn’t
pretty.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">The skip, and the
dumping fee, the cleaners, the new septic tank, the DUI fine, the lawyers bill,
the upcoming legal wrangle over the concrete spill, the were all factored by
Wills.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">Though low in money
he would be all right though, provided he kept things moving this week.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">“I’ll drink to
that”, he said to himself and had just poured a new glass to celebrate when the
phone rang and he got fired once more.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">This time it was
the owner of the property with the cracked piped under the fence.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">The call actually
started out not too badly.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">“Hey Willsy,
Anthony here, I just wanted to check with you, I thought the tiling was going
to be done at my place this week?”</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">Wills’s drunken
mind lurched into approximate gear, “Uh, yeah, we had a little problem, the
fencer cracked some pipes up the yard, so there was no water, so he couldn’t do
it.”</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">“Oh”, said Anthony,
“have you fixed the pipes?”</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">“Uh, no”, said
Wills, “um, I called the plumber, but he can’t do it till next week.”</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">Anthony replied,
“couldn’t you fix it?”</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">Wills replied,
“well yeah, but I’ve been busy.”</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">“I see”, he paused
for a moment, “so what exactly am I paying you for?” said Anthony.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">Now it was Wills’s
turn to hesitate, “um…,” he trailed off.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">It was a good question
now that he came to think about it.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">He sought for an
answer frantically, “well, I’m supervising the tradies who are doing the jobs
needed.”</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">“Oh”, said Anthony,
“these cracked pipes seem like something pretty urgent. Couldn’t you
‘supervise’ them to get on with it quicker.”</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">Wills replied,
“well I did try to get him to do it last week, but he was already booked up, he
said he would have to charge extra to do it then.”</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">Anthony went on
remorselessly, “So what you’re basically telling me is that I’m paying you to
supervise people to do jobs, and then they don’t do them and you do nothing and
still charge me? Am I reading that right?”</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">Wills could feel
this situation sliding, he battled for control of both his drunken mind and the
conversation, “Oh, no, um, I have good relationship with the various workers,
they would only work for me really.”</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">“I see”, said
Anthony, “though in this case it seems that they aren’t, or not when we need
the job done.”</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">“Well, there’s no
need to panic, he said he would do it this week, I’m sure it will be done on
time.”</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">“But you see
Willsy, I would consider cracked pipes and no water stopping everyone else on
the job doing their work, tantamount to, if not an actual emergency, and
therefore would consider that not only should the plumber have done the job
last week, but whoever cracked the pipes, should be paying for it. Would you
agree with that?”</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">Wills, tried to
prevaricate, “Well Chipwell’s did it, so they’re certainly responsible for the
damage.”</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">“Oh good”, said
Anthony, “so they’ve agreed to pay for it then?”</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">Wills once more
felt madness rushing in at him from all sides.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">“Ah, well, er, not
as such, they, well, I haven’t spoken with them yet.”</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">Anthony continued
his demolition, “You’re not suggesting ‘I’ am going to be paying for it are
you?”</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">“No, no, definitely
not, I’ll speak with them on Monday about it.”</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">“I see”, said
Anthony, “I would have thought you would have spoken with them first, before you
called the plumber. Then I would have thought you would have called me and told
me about the delay to my build.”</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">Wills pictured
Anthony in his mind, when they had been introduced by a former client of Wills,
his first impression was that he was a soft touch and he would be able to get
away with murder.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">He, Anthony, did
something in a glass tower in the nearest capital, PR, or was it MR, something
like that, either way, he didn’t expect him to be as hard as this.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">But he was being
led down a maze of logic that couldn’t, as far as Wills could see, end well.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">Anthony went on,
“What’s more, now that I think about it, why aren’t you out there now? The
weather’s fine you could fix it yourself, and earn some of the money I’m paying
you.”</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">Wills mentally
leapt on this ‘lifeline’, then said, “Um, sure, I’ll get right on it, I’ll do
it now, things have cleared a bit for me now.”</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">“OK”, said Anthony,
“I’m pleased to hear it. Call me when it’s done, won’t you?”</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">“Sure” said Wills,
then rang off.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">Fuck, what could he
do now?</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">Oh, well, he
couldn’t drive anywhere now due to the already heroic portions of alcohol he
had on board, and so he made a mental note to do it tomorrow, then opened
another bottle of bourbon.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">He thought he had
‘dealt’ with the situation and could again be said to be getting things back on
track but come five o’clock Saturday afternoon the phone rang again.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">With a terrified
lurch he saw it was Anthony again, he made a quick decision not to answer and
then sat on the couch waiting till the ringing had stopped.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">Some minutes later
the phone beeped and he saw that he had a voicemail, he knew he should ignore
it, but then some demon prodded him to get it over with.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">He punched it up
and put the phone to his ear, Anthony’s voice came through loud and clear, “Hey
Willsy, I went out to my place this afternoon (Wills swore to himself), and you
weren’t there, nor was there any sign of you being there. So I’ll save you the
trouble of ever going there again, consider yourself fired, I’m getting another
builder in to take over, and you’ll be hearing from my solicitor about fees you
have incurred.”</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">Wills put the phone
down stunned.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">Sacked twice in one
day.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">He was now broker
than he could remember, and with little or no work to get him through.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">Though a man who
had made an art form out of self-deception, he knew better than anyone that in
the small world of Litmus
Bay, once the word got
out that he had been fired from the supervising builder role on two jobs, his
chances of getting any future work were zero.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">He poured himself a
fresh glass and tried frantically to think.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br />
<a href="http://byronshortstories.blogspot.com.au/2013/12/the-destruction-of-lasseters-road-4_1.html"><span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">Next Chapter.</span></a><br />
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<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";"><span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span><span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
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LKhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11244232092173678321noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8082972746234187865.post-38555918579570925282013-11-11T16:50:00.003-08:002013-11-25T19:58:48.279-08:004 - Stepping Into Europe<!--[if gte mso 9]><xml>
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<br />
<div align="center" class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: center;">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";"></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">My final morning in
Asia came and it was time to say ‘good bye’.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">My eyes were opened
there certainly, and I was changing as a person, but I wasn’t unhappy to see
the back of it.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">I took myself
around to Changi airport in Singapore
and checked in.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">I was flying
Alitalia, and even this European organization seemed to be suffering from a form
of disorganization, acquired by osmosis from the Asian continent.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">Back then I was a
fervent anti-smoker, which would be another learning process for me, as later
in life I would be a just as staunchly pro-smoking.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">I took it up full
time in my thirties as a protest against my mother, who was dead against it, as
she was an asthmatic.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">But even this
protest lacked any logic as she had been dead ten years at that point in my
life.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">Which was another lesson,
looking back, in not being to fervent about anything, because we all grow and
change through our lives, and the feverish declamations of our youth, for and
against things, come back to haunt us in later life.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">Anyway, I mention
this because I checked in and asked for a non-smoking seat, but I think the
check-in clerk only heard the “smoking” part, because when I finally sat down I
was right in the middle of the smokers, so much so that I felt that I was back inside
an Indonesian transport vehicle.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">I might add, some younger
readers, if there are any, may not know that there was a time when you could
smoke on a plane.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">And just to digress
(as ever) on the topic, I remember watching a movie about life in Australia
during the second world war and one scene was set in a movie theatre, and as I
watched I was struck by something weird, it took me a few moments to get it,
but then I realized what it was.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">The whole theatre
was clouded in smoke, and as I watched a middle-aged man lit up his pipe where
he sat watching the screen.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">It was odd to see
it.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">Of course, some
fires and deaths later, smoking was banned in theatres and those of my
generation never attended a movie theatre in which smoking was allowed.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">And similarly smoking
on planes was allowed then, and the cabin was divided into smoking and the
laughably titled ‘non-smoking’ areas.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">I say laughably
because, of course, it’s all the same air and within a short space of time the
whole cabin was full of clouds of rapidly staling smoke.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">The situation was
highlighted best to me by the story of a friend from Melbourne.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">She was first
generation Australian of European ancestry, and one Christmas her family flew
home to spend the holiday season with their relatives in Macedonia.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">There were seven of
them, mum, dad and five kids, but only dad smoked.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">When they checked
in, the father decided to sit in non-smoking with his family, and if needed to
walk down to the smoking section during the flight.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">The plane took off,
and a short time after the aircraft had reached cruising altitude, the man
sitting across the aisle from the father lit up a fag and began smoking it.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">The father thought
that the check in had gone wrong, and they were in the smoking section, and so
thought ‘to hell with it’, and lit up a fag.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">To his
consternation, a flight attendant came down and told him he couldn’t smoke as
he was in the non-smoking section.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">He stared at the
man across the aisle, a mere half metre away, pointed at him and said, “but
he’s smoking.”</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">To which the flight
attendant replied: “Yes. He’s in the smoking section.”</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">Anyway, my aircraft
ascended out of Asia and everyone around me
began smoking.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">My throat was
better by now, but even so, it was annoying, as I’d asked the check-in clerk
not to be there.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">So I once again
gritted my teeth and stuck out another journey in less than salubrious
surroundings.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">We flew direct to Rome and there I had to transfer to my flight to Frankfurt.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">I had to cross Rome airport and I
remember seeing the security police standing around with sub-machine guns slung
over their shoulders.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">It was quite
threatening, and a reminder that I was travelling in the terrorist age.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">Of course, this was
pre-9/11, but even then Europe had enough
trouble with terrorism to be going on with.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">There was the Badder-Meinhof, the Black September movement, and in Italy, the Italian Red Brigade.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">I trekked across
the airport and made my way to my next flight, a short hop across Europe.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">The flight came and
went, and I was then standing next to the luggage carousel in Frankfurt
airport waiting for my backpack.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">The crowd around me
thinned out as each person picked up their bags, until I was the only one left.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">Eventually the
carousel stopped moving, without producing my backpack, and I realized that the
check-in clerk back in Singapore
had not only put me in the wrong seat assignment, but had mis-tagged my bag as
well.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">Well, I assumed
that’s what had happened, certainly my backpack wasn’t here.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">With a sigh I left
the carousel area and went in search of the Alitalia booth.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">I found it and
explained to the young woman seated there what had happened.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">She picked up the
phone and dialled and spoke in Italian to someone down the wire.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">She put the phone
down and said, “OK, Mr Barker, I’ve located your backpack, it’s in Rome.”</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">Then she halted.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">I waited for her to
continue, but she didn’t seemed inclined to go on, so I prompted her, “I see.
So how do we get it here?”</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">She replied, “it
will have to come on our next flight from Rome.
That will be in four hours, at 2pm.”</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">‘Oh fucking great’,
I said to myself.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">“OK, so I just come
back then and pick it up?”, I asked her.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">She nodded and I
said “thanks”, then turned away.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">Thankfully I had my
carry on luggage with me, including a book, so I found a lounge area, sat down
and began the long wait.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">I might add I was
pretty annoyed because I had planned well before I even left Australia to avoid
this eventuality, said planning stemming from something my friend Bob, whom I
lived with in Vancouver, had told me.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">Bob said that his
guidebook had given him a good tip which was, pack everything you need for a
trip, Bob was going to Spain for a couple of weeks vacation, then pick up what
you’ve packed and walk around the block.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">Then when you get
home with your arms now longer by four inches and your shoulders on fire, take
half of what you packed out and put more money in your wallet.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">An invaluable tip.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">I had followed this
and had taken a backpack about the size of a basketball for my travels across Asia.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">So small was it
that I had wanted to take it onto the plane in Singapore as carry-on luggage,
but the desk clerk had added to his sins by telling me that it was too big, and
so I had checked it into the luggage hold.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">Thus, I was now
sitting in Frankfurt airport waiting four
hours for a pack which I could have stowed neatly enough in the overhead
baggage compartment.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">Finally two o’clock
came around and I went back to check the luggage carousel.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">Since I had now
entered German territory, this involved some tortuous explaining to the German
official who was supervising the area, but he checked that I had my passport
and once I explained what had happened he let me through to wait for my bag.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">I might add, once
again, this was pre-9/11, I’m not sure how things would have worked out if it
had been afterward for this reason.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">One of the security
precepts put in place was that no bag can fly unless its owner is on the
aircraft.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">So no doubt I would
have had to fly back to Rome, pick up my bag and
then fly back to Germany,
but thankfully I was spared that.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">However!</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">The carousel began
moving and I joined the passengers from the two o’clock flight waiting for
bags.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">And the same thing
happened.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">Soon everyone had
picked up their bags and left, and I was once more alone staring at the
carousel.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">I went back to the
Alitalia booth and once again explained my predicament to the woman.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">She (again) picked
up the phone and rang through.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">Another brief
conversation, then: “Ok, I’ve checked with Rome and your bag wasn’t put on the
aircraft.”</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">Once again she
stopped speaking, this was one chick who really needed a refresher course on
customer service.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">So I prompted her
again, “So what happens now?”</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">“I’ve told them to
be certain to get it on the next flight.”</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">“Great”, I replied,
“When does that get here?”</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">I had a mental
picture of four more hours in the ‘port, but it was worse than that.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">“Tomorrow morning
at 10am.”</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">I stared at her in
consternation.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">“Tomorrow?! So what
do I do now?”</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">I might add that,
then as now, I looked like I’d slept in the street, I was till in my
travel-stained Asia overland clothes, and so she strongly suspected, and she
was right, that I didn’t know how to assert myself.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">A penniless, filthy
backpacker she could handle.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">So she said to me,
“Find yourself a backpackers for the night and check in, then come back
tomorrow with the receipt and we will reimburse you.”</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">I think she would
have put anyone else up in an airport hotel, but she had quickly sized up my
appallingly filthy state and didn’t want to put any of the hotel cleaners
through having to clean anywhere I sat down.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">I can’t remember
how I found my backpackers, but anyway, I located one about an hour away from
the airport and headed down there.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">Frankfurt is part
of a large twin city conurbation comprising Frankfurt and Mainz.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">My backpackers was
on the western skirt of Mainz
and it was quite pleasant and peaceful.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">The month was
September, which is shoulder holiday period in Europe,
August being peak, and the backpackers was half full at best.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">I checked in and
threw my book (my only luggage apart from my passport pouch, which hung round
my neck) on the bed, then went outside and sat at a picnic table on the lawn.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">I contemplated for
a while and then began wondering what was different, and it was this: there was
no one else there.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">I even looked
around to try to get some perspective, but I was indeed alone on the lawn of a
backpackers on the outer edge of Mainz.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">Gradually it dawned
on me why this was strange, and it was that all my time in Asia
whenever a tourist went anywhere in public, they would be immediately
surrounded by locals trying to sell them something.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">But here I looked
like everybody else, and decidedly poorer than most, and so as a commercial
opportunity I was null and void.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">And of course,
having just spent three months in Asia begging
to be left alone, now that I had achieved it, I was now lonely.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">So I decided to go
to the supermarket.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">I had taken out
travel insurance, and the woman at the Alitalia desk had said I could buy
essentials and submit that receipt to the insurance company to be reimbursed,
so I figured that even my cheapskatedness could handle a bit of shopping.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">I went down to the
supermarket and got out my German-English dictionary and spent a quite
enjoyable time translating product names and figuring out what to purchase.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">I got some shampoo,
razors, and soap, mainly for anyone who had to stand near me, than for myself,
then having made my first purchase in Deustch Marks, went back to the back
packers.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">I went to the
shower and scraped some of the filth from my person, then went back to my room.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">In there was a
young German who had just checked in, I said “hello” to him and we began
chatting.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">He was the first
example of how almost all Europeans spoke three languages minimum.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">He replied in fluent
English and I learned a bit about him as he readied his stuff on, and around,
his bed.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">His name was Heinz
and he was from Bremerhaven in the north of Germany, on the shores of the North
sea.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">He had come down to
Frankfurt to go to uni in the fall term, and
was in the backpackers until he found some permanent accommodation.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">As we talked, in
his excellent English, with my occasional German word thrown in, it dawned on
me that I was enjoying this conversation immensely, and from that it was short
leap to realizing that it was my first real conversation in nearly two days.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">The only other
thing that vaguely gestured toward human interaction had been the kinda tense
conversation with the woman at the Alitalia desk back at the airport.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">So we talked, then
Heinz said, “Would you like to get some dinner?”</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">I replied “Yes, but
do you know anywhere cheap?”</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">He nodded and so we
stepped out into the German evening and ate at a cheap restaurant and had one
beer.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">I remember this,
only having one, because Heinz was going to study Theology and so, apart from
his natural Germanic strictness, his ensuing holy orders wouldn’t consider it
appropriate to get fully tanked.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">However, one beer
in Germany
does mean a tankard of foaming ale that you could fit your whole head in, so
one beer was definitely enough.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">We headed back to
the backpackers and got an earlyish night on our bunks.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">The next morning I
was up early, said how nice it had been to meet him, and good luck at Uni to
Heinz, then checked out and headed back to the airport.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">I spoke to the new
official on duty near the luggage area, showed my passport and explained what I
was doing, he noted down my passport number, then let me through.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">And so for the
third time in 24-hours I stood by the luggage carousel and waited.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">To my considerable
delight my backpack finally appeared through the hanging strips and I was
reunited with my stuff.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">That wasn’t hard.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">Now time to move
on, my ultimate destination was England,
but I had flown to Germany
to see a friend from teachers college, Alvian, who was doing some post work to
his PhD at the university in Bonn.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">Alvian was a quite
a marvel.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">He had a doctorate
in Physics, and so was clearly a smart cookie, but what made him even smarter,
in my opinion, was that he had bothered to go to teachers college to learn how
to teach physics as well.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">I’m sure you all
can think of one, or many, teachers, that were brilliant in their subject area,
but had no classroom control, or ability to relay esoteric concepts.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">Alvian had
recognized this and had taken steps to make himself a good teacher, not just a
brilliant physicist.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">So I travelled to Bonn, a distance of about
two hours, by train, and got my first feel of the German train system.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">It was fast,
efficient, clean, sorry for the stereotyping, but there you go.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">I arrived in Bonn, and went around to
the uni and tracked Alvian down.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">Here was at the,
wait for it, <span class="pp-place-title">Helmholtz-Institut für Strahlen- und <b>Kernphysik</b>
der Universität Bonn,
in english, the Particle Physics department. </span></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span class="pp-place-title"><span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">And
I’ll just digress briefly to mention something I saw on one of those ‘bloop and
blunder’ shows on TV.</span></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span class="pp-place-title"><span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">It
was an English TV crew and the news of the holes in our ozone layer had just
broken, so they were walking around in a park during summer asking people about
it, they went up to a young man who was reading with his shirt off and said,
“Excuse me, would you be surprised to learn that you are sunbaking under a
large hole in the ozone layer?”</span></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span class="pp-place-title"><span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">And
he replied, “not really, I’m a particle physicist”, which stopped that crew in
their tracks.</span></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span class="pp-place-title"><span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">Anyway,
even for physics, particle physics is well known as being very complex and
difficult, only triple-A+ students can cope with it, and not only had Alvian
graduated in it, his marks were so good that he had been granted this study in
Germany.</span></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span class="pp-place-title"><span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">I
enquired at the desk at the front of the building and they sent me down to a
seminar room, I knocked and went inside and there was Alvian and some of the
other students and staff discussing the boundaries of the universe.</span></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span class="pp-place-title"><span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">And
here I was to once again marvel at the Germanic gift for languages and courtesy
to outsiders.</span></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span class="pp-place-title"><span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">They
were discussing things in German, but quickly Alvian put up his hand and said
he couldn’t understand, and so they all switched over to English and continued
with hardly a pause.</span></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span class="pp-place-title"><span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">I’m
sure you understand this, most of us reading and writing this couldn’t understand
HSC Physics, but these people not only were adept in this hardest of subjects,
but could understand it in their second language.</span></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span class="pp-place-title"><span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">I
listened for a while, but it all passed over my head, then eventually the
seminar broke up and Alvian took me over to his accommodations, where I was
allowed to stay for my time in Bonn.</span></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span class="pp-place-title"><span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">This
was a great score, I can’t actually remember how I achieved it, but not only
did I have somewhere to stay, but I was allowed to eat at the student
cafeteria, three square meals a day for 2 DM each.</span></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span class="pp-place-title"><span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">It
really called to my cheapskate soul, I can tell you.</span></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span class="pp-place-title"><span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">And
it was here at the University
of Bonn that I met
Alvian’s friend, a young German named Martin, who lived across the hall from Alvian.</span></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span class="pp-place-title"><span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">As
I’ve already alluded to above, most Europeans speak three languages, almost as
a birthright, but Martin was way ahead of the curve.</span></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span class="pp-place-title"><span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">He
was a graduate languages student, with honours at that, and spoke six languages
with assured fluency.</span></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span class="pp-place-title"><span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">They
were his native German, plus English, Spanish, French, Dutch and Russian.</span></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span class="pp-place-title"><span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">Some
time later when I called him up from London, he
told me he was heading to Helsinki
to learn Finnish, well known as one of the hardest of European languages.</span></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span class="pp-place-title"><span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">I
asked him during the call “How do you say ‘hello’ in Finnish?”, and his reply sounded
like a car horn honking.<br />
I might add, Martin also burned for good my stereotypical view that Germans had
no sense of humour.</span></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span class="pp-place-title"><span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">When
I met him he was reading Garfield
the Cat in German, and laughing at this laziest of cats lukewarm reception of
Mondays.</span></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span class="pp-place-title"><span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">He
became my German teacher and by the time I left Germany I could converse with
halting but reasonably effective speech.</span></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span class="pp-place-title"><span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">I
might add, he told me to read Garfield
as a great introduction to German, and this was good advice.</span></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span class="pp-place-title"><span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">The
pictures helped me translate, with the help of my dictionary, what was going on
and I really enjoyed learning with Martin and Garfield.</span></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span class="pp-place-title"><span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">However,
it did limit things a bit, and I was forever after ordering lasagne in German
restaurants.</span></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span class="pp-place-title"><span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">I
spent about a week with Alvian and Martin in Bonn,
and we had a generally good time, though Bonn
was limited in its distractions, as it had been the capital of West Germany for many years, and like our
capital, Canberra,
it was pretty boring really.</span></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span class="pp-place-title"><span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">However
we did spend one night drinking at a riverside bar.</span></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span class="pp-place-title"><span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">We,
or perhaps, just I, got slaughtered, but apart from that the river was the
Rhein, and it was great experience to be on the banks of this most iconic of
German watercourses.</span></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span class="pp-place-title"><span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">I
might add, that this evening I foolishly, or perhaps, just thoughtlessly,
broached the subject of Nazi Germany.</span></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span class="pp-place-title"><span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">Martin
and his friends did discuss it with me and I learned a couple of interesting
facts.</span></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span class="pp-place-title"><span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">One
was that there are more Nazis in France
than Germany,
and two, Germans of Martin’s generation are prepared to fight to the end to
“see that it never happens again”.</span></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span class="pp-place-title"><span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">All
too soon however it was time to hit the road, and begin the next pahse of my
journey to England,
and here I rode with the Mitfahr-Zentrale.</span></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span class="pp-place-title"><span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">This
is the hitchhiker’s network and typically of Germany, even “thumb riding” is
officially organized.</span></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span class="pp-place-title"><span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">You
go into the office in whichever town you are in and put your name down in the
‘passenger’ section, with your desired destination.</span></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span class="pp-place-title"><span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">The
drivers state where they are going and you then hook up, with the driver getting
company and fuel money, and the passenger getting a ride cheaply.</span></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span class="pp-place-title"><span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">I
put my name down for London
and a few days later I got a call from a German business man who was going
through to the West Coast of Ireland where he had a holiday home. </span></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span class="pp-place-title"><span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">We
arranged a departure time and place and I showed up backpack at the ready.</span></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span class="pp-place-title"><span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">He
was at first another stereotype, large, somewhat overweight, red-faced, and he
drove a black Mercedes 500SE, and my first thoughts were is he really going to Argentina to
hide out with the other Nazis?</span></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span class="pp-place-title"><span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">But
thankfully I was wrong, and got another good lesson in not believing
stereotypes.</span></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span class="pp-place-title"><span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">Peter
was his name and he was a charming man and a good driver, you have to be when
you go everywhere at 200+ k an hour.</span></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span class="pp-place-title"><span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">We
set off and on the way picked up another Mitfahr-Zentrale passenger, a Belgian
girl called Angelique, who was going to Dublin.</span></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span class="pp-place-title"><span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">I
had bought a newspaper to practise my German on the way, and I should say, this
was the only time in my life that I have read anything at the ‘National
Enquirer’ level of baseness.</span></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span class="pp-place-title"><span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">I
bought this tabloid because it was the only paper with child-like text that I
could understand.</span></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span class="pp-place-title"><span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">Peter
endeared himself to me by looking at the paper I had bought and raising his
eyebrows, “why are you buying that?”, he said.</span></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span class="pp-place-title"><span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">“It’s
the only one I could half-understand”, I replied, “I thought I would practise
as we drove.”</span></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span class="pp-place-title"><span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">He
nodded, then said, “OK, but promise me that once you can speak German you will
never buy that rag again.”</span></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span class="pp-place-title"><span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">I
nodded my agreement and once I’d deciphered the front page, I understood what
he meant.</span></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span class="pp-place-title"><span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">It
made the Daily Telegraph look like a learned organ for philosophy societies.</span></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span class="pp-place-title"><span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">So
we set off and I had my first experience of the Autobahn.</span></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span class="pp-place-title"><span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">Peter
put his foot down and we soared along at near 200k.</span></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span class="pp-place-title"><span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">This
was my first real experience of European travelling and it was an oddity for
me, used to the vast tracts of my homeland, to cross a country in an hour.</span></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span class="pp-place-title"><span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">In
fact we were in four countries in one day, Germany,
Belgium, Farance and
finally, England.</span></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span class="pp-place-title"><span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">I
remember distinctly that I had hardly deciphered the first few pages of my
newspaper when I looked out the window and the signs were saying Bruxelles
(Brussells) and I realized that we had left Germany
and were sailing across Belgium.</span></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span class="pp-place-title"><span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">Then
hardly with a blink, the signs were in French, and we were at the ferry
terminal in Calais.
</span></span><span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";"></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">I remember telling
Peter and the Belgian girl that you can drive for fourteen hours in Queensland for instance and
still be in the same state, let alone country, to which they both shook their
heads in wonder.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">To give you a
comparison.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">In Queensland, Brisbane to
Cooktown is 2,000k, or 22 hours driving, this is about the same distance from Calais, France’s
northernmost city to the very southern tip of Spain,
Gibraltar.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">We queued with the
other cars then drove on board and then I went out on the deck to catch my
first glimpse of the land of my ancestors.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">Well, that’s what I
planned to do, but when I got to the door to the outside area of the upper
forward deck, I encountered a problem that would dog me for the next two years,
it was raining.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">And I’ll just
digress to use the work of an author I like, David Lodge, who describes it
best.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">One of his
characters is an academic at Birmingham
University, and he gets offered a
year’s sabbatical at a uni in California.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">He goes over there
and has the time of his life, as indeed anyone who gets out of Birmingham for any reason would.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">The weather is
great, the pay is higher, the food plentiful and well-cooked.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">So much so that in
the end he doesn’t want to go home, but finally reality prevails and eventually
he and his wife stand on the deck of the QE2 as it docks at Southampton, and
Lodge writes: “Phillip looked at the approaching docks emerging from the grey
smudge of Southampton and realized he had caught a case of the sniffles, which
would last for the next ten years.”</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">And so it was that
my hoped for glimpse of the white cliffs of Dover was not to be as a low lying
bank of grey cloud, from which emerged a depressing mizzle, blocked my view.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">I stared for a
while, but knew I wouldn’t see anything, so went back into the cab and passed
the rest of journey in conversation with Angelique and Peter.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">Eventually we
arrived and went back down to the car deck and drove down the ramp on to
English soil.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">I had a few hiccups
at the Immigration post, as most Australians arriving in London come via air through Heathrow, and the
cockney who was staffing the station wasn’t used to one such as me arriving in
the back seat of a black Mercedes.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">But I sorted it out
and then we were away into the heartland of Britain.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">It was late evening
now and Peter said, “Where shall I drop you off?”</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">Well, I wasn’t
exactly sure, the capital is just too diffuse a place to simply be dropped off
in “London”. </span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">However I had
another contact given me by my teacher’s college lecturer Mike King, and so I
decided to head for her residence, which was at Epsom, in the commuter belt on
the South-West side of London.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">My plan was to ring
a woman who had never heard of me, tell her I had just arrived in Britain and ask
if I could come and stay the night.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">Clearly my
arrogance and willingness to ask other people to provide for me was still
resident in my psyche, but as it turned out, my plan was foiled, as she wasn’t
home.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">Peter wanted to
keep moving toward Ireland,
he still had a ten hours or so of driving to go, including another ferry
crossing, so didn’t want to hang about while I made up my leisurely mind.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">So we had an in car
conference and I decided that the simplest thing to do was to catch a train
into London and
find a place to stay the night.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">I am thankful that
I hadn’t read it at that stage of my life, but Bill Bryson in one of his travel
books was saying that when he arrived in England
for the first time he had to spend his first night sleeping on a bus bench not
far from the ferry terminal in Dover.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">I certainly didn’t
want to repeat that, so got Peter to drop me at the station at Epsom and I said
a sad goodbye to Peter and Angelique as they drove off in their warm, dry car.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">Then with a sigh, I
humped my pack on my back and walked onto the platform.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">To say I was
depressed barely hints at the scale of my desolation.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">It was dark now,
and raining.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">Although it was
September (first month of Autumn), the rain and dark made it quite chilly.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">I couldn’t find a
ticket office, so just sat and waited for a train to come along.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">Eventually one did,
and I got on board.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">I sat in the corner
and contemplating the dark depressing view, wondering where I would stay the
night.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">Finding somewhere
to stay is hard enough, but at night, in the rain, it takes on a whole new
dimension of difficulty.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">Eventually a train
staffer came down the corridor wearing a large machine on his front, like a
metal child in a front holder.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">He asked me where I
was going, I said London, and he replied, “Well,
this train is going to Waterloo,
so I’ll ticket you there.”</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">“OK”, I said.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">He clicked at his
machine and a ticket emerged.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">I took it and he
walked off.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">It wasn’t till
after he had left that it occurred to me to ask him if he knew somewhere cheap
I could stay, but I put that thought aside with the thought that he would
probably return ere long to check for new passengers.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">However, I then had
a piece of luck that all travellers dream of.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">We stopped at
another darkened station and the door to my carriage opened and a young woman
got on.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">She sat near me and
then eyeing my backpack, and my genuinely deplorable condition began a
conversation, “where are you from?”</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">“Australia”, I
replied.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">“You?”, I said, “local?”</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">“Yes, I live in
Surbiton with my sister and brother-in-law”.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">We got chatting and
slowly it emerged that she, her sister and brother-in law, had a goal in life.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">A goal that had emerged
to the exclusion of all others: they wanted to emigrate to Australia.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">So we talked about
this, not that I knew much about it, due to my insular life, but I told her
what I could.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">And as the
conversation flowed we got around to where I<i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">
</i>was going.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">Well that was still
a question, but I answered as best I could and we discussed a few options.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">Then, as we
approached her stop, she seemed to come to a decision and she asked if I would
like to spend the night at their house.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">Did I!</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">I accepted so fast
that she was still speaking the last words of her offer before my acceptance reached
her ears.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">Talk about darkness
to light in a split second.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">Surbiton loomed up
outside the window and I got off with her, and we walked the ten minutes or so
to her home.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">We then went
through the process of entering an English home, which I would become heartily
sick of as the year went by, involving removing all wet clothes in the garage
or laundry, then entering the house.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">I met her sister
and brother-in-law, he rose in my estimation immediately by hearing that I was
Australian, then going straight to the fridge, getting beer out, and handing me
one.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">We then had a
lovely meal, with more beers.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">We discussed
options for Australian emigration, I agreed to help where I could.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">They told me travel
trips for Britain (Take more money), and eventually I went to sleep on a
mattress in their spare room, listening happily to rain outside, rather than
scrunched up on a bus bench trying to keep my various limbs out of it.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">Morning came and I
said my goodbyes to this most hospitable group and made my way back to Surbiton
station.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">I bought my ticket
and eventually, many long kilometres through Asia with long-haul flights in
between, I stood on the Strand.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">I had made it to London.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">So, first things
first, how to get out of the place?</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">Later on this would
become an overriding obsession, but on this first morning I had more immediate
reasons.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">The most important
contact I had from home was a biochemistry student, Mike Balmer.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">Mike was English
and had spent a year studying at Sydney U, and I played with him at the soccer
club.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">He was now back
home and I had sent my large bag with my “England”
clothes in it, to his place in Church Stretton, in Shropshire.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">So my first task
was to get out there and pick up my bag.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">So I caught the
tube around to Paddington and then the train to Church Stretton.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">Church Stretton was
a lovely place and I was given accommodation with Mike’s girlfriend’s mother,
who ran a small sweet shop in the high street.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">I threw my gear
down in the spare room and not long after Mike came in from his place just
outside the village and we repaired to the local pub.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">It was a weekday,
and not long after noon, but my arrival gave us an excuse to drink early.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">We had a few pints,
then I took my suitcase, which Mike had brought in with him, back to the shop
and I took it upstairs to unload.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">I then spent a
couple of very happy days there.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">I washed my clothes,
I drank pints in the pub with Mike, we walked on the Longmynd, a large hill
outside Church Stretton, famous for ramblers, and then time came to return to London.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">Among the valuable
things Mike and his family did for me was a place to stay in London.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">Mike’s
brother-in-law, Don, had a share house in South East London, and Mike teed it
up for me to stay there.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">Looking back I
can’t believe how lucky I was in that early period, first the fortuitous girl
on the train, now Mike’s family had a place, seemingly ready made for me in the
capital.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">So I said my
goodbyes to Mike and his family and hefting my backpack and suitcase and headed
for London.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">I arrived at
Paddington, then tubed around the circle to Charing Cross.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">I emerged from the
tube stop and took the surface train to Don’s house in Lewisham.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">This was a minor
coincidence as that was the last place I had lived in Sydney.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">I got off at
Lewisham station and walked through the grey streets to the address I had been
given, opened the door and let myself in.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">Don was an
accountant and lived with two mates from work, Matt and Pete.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">He had warned me
that he (Don) wouldn’t be home for a while and the first person I would meet
would most likely be Matt, and so it was.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">It was a little
disturbing for Matt, as I don’t think Don had been able to get through to tell him
that I would be ensconced, and as it happened I was watching the TV in the
living room when I heard the sound of a key scraping in the lock.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">The door opened and
I yelled out from the living room, “Matt”.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">There was a
silence, then he answered, “Er, Yes?”</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">Obviously he had
heard my Australian accent and knew it wasn’t anyone he thought should be in
the house.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">So I got up and
went out into the hall to allay his fears.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">“UH, hi, My name’s
Lock, I just got here from Australia,
and Don said it would be Ok to stay for a few days.”</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">He replied, “Oh,
Ok, great, want some tea?”</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">Yet another English
person who had broken the mould of my stereotyping by being accommodating
within seconds.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">We repaired to the
kitchen and while Matt made some tea we talked and figured out how things were
going to work.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">We went back into
the living room and began watching the soccer highlights and checking the
scores of other weekend games.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">After a lifetime of
being considered effeminate in Australia
because I played soccer, it was great to be in a land where it was the main
game.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">We watched happily
together and eventually I went up to the room I had been allotted to unpack and
prepare for tomorrow when I would go out and sign up with a teaching agency to
get some work.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">I began pulling my
clothes out and got a set of teaching clothes ready to put in the washing
machine downstairs.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">I emptied the various
pockets and as I did I came across an object that I would soon wish was genuine, it was a train ticket from home and it said “Lewisham to
Bondi, one way, $2.50”.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS",sans-serif;"><br /></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
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<br />
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<a href="http://byronshortstories.blogspot.com.au/"><span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS",sans-serif;">Back to home page</span></a></div>
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LKhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11244232092173678321noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8082972746234187865.post-21519505113604496132013-10-30T21:56:00.001-07:002013-11-11T18:30:16.316-08:003 - Sumatra Sideways<!--[if gte mso 9]><xml>
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<br />
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: left;">
<b style="mso-bidi-font-weight: normal;"><span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS"; font-size: 16.0pt;"></span></b><b style="mso-bidi-font-weight: normal;"><span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS"; font-size: 16.0pt;"></span></b><span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">I don’t remember a
lot of the top of Sumatra, the things I do
remember come in patches, so I’ll relate them where relevant.</span>
</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">I think the reason
for this is that something I learned later in life during a Permaculture
gardening course of all things.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">To wit: we remember
things better if we are in pain when we learn them.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">Strange, but I
believe, true.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">The example given
by my teacher was that of the Maori body and face tattoos.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">These tattoos were
traditionally carved into them while telling them things they really needed to
know, when the salmon run, how to catch a moa etc.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">And I think this is
why my memory was kind of in and out for the next period.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">The previous two
chapters related to one nightmare trip, and I was able to put it all down on
paper twenty years later with hardly a pause, largely I think because I was in
some kind of pain for the whole of it.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">So our arrival in Padang did signal a change
in pressure, and therefore mental state, for me and Neil.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">We relaxed by the
beach and did the “we-are-now-off-the-road” things that backpackers have to do,
washing clothes, finding the bar, things like that.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">While there we met
some other travellers, an Irish woman called Win, and two Americans, Gunther
and John, both doctors who had studied at UCLA.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">Win was a lovely
person and filled a stereotype as she wasn’t the most attractive woman.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">However, I
immediately liked her and looking back, am pleased that I didn’t demonstrate
the shallowness, which I saw on that Asia
trail a lot, of only talking to attractive women.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">Gunther was always
being asked if he was German, and this was because he was the archetypal Teutonic
look, blonde hair cut in a crew, a handlebar moustache and pale blue eyes.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">However, he spoke
with a classic California
accent where he had lived since the age of two, when his Austrian parents had
emigrated there.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">John was likewise
from California, but looked like an Englishman,
for no reason I can lay down in words, but be assured that if he had pulled a
grey suit and bowler hat out of his backpack he would have fitted in on the
Bakerloo line as if he was born in Surrey.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">I think the main
reason I remember Win so well was that she was the first person I met, possibly
ever, who listened during an argument and admitted when she was wrong.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">Neil and I,
certainly me, with our degrees fresh about our shoulders, thought we knew it
all, and so this behaviour from Win was a revelation.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">My inability to
admit I was wrong stems largely from my childhood, were I would be beaten and
screamed at if I made a mistake, and so this was part of my persona, to always
be right, and if wrong, make sure that no one damn well knew it.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">The five of us were
discussing Asia in general and thus, almost
inevitably, the topic of overpopulation came up.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">Win was an Irish
catholic and though not overly devout, still had the spurs of that religion’s
barbarous mind control jabbing her consciousness.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">Gunther contended
that the problems of overpopulation would never really be tackled till the
catholic church was removed from influencing the world’s politics.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">Win countered that
you can’t just blame the catholic church, and Gunther agreed , but then added
that, “not only overpopulation, but HIV could be tackled effectively if condoms
were widely distributed without stigma throughout Asia and Africa”.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">Win said “Aren’t
they?”<br />
And Gunther, said “not really, because the catholic church has told everyone
they can’t use a condom.”</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">Win said “surely
that can’t be true?”<br />
Whereas Gunther went on to say, in a somewhat exasperated tone, “well the first
bloody thing the pope said when he got off the plane in Ghana was ‘Don’t use condoms’”.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">To which Win said,
“Oh, well, that’s pretty clear. I guess the [catholic] church does has a lot to
answer for”.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">A simple thing, I’m
sure you’d agree, but it was the first time I heard someone change their view
during an argument when someone else presented a fact.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">It was a lesson
that I would sadly take another twenty years to absorb.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">Having said that, I
think also it was part of the process I mentioned at the tail of the last
chapter where the trip was changing my mental state, to a less arrogant
arsehole.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">And the fact that I
even noted Win’s change of argumentative direction, shows part of the process.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">Mind you no one
likes to be wrong, and this was best demonstrated to me by an SBS show called
‘Life Support’.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">It was a simply
superb send-up of those ‘life style’ shows and one of the characters on it was
a well dodgy South African doctor called Rudy.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">“Have you ever been
embarrassed”, said Rudy, “at a dinner party because someone else is better
informed, and more articulate than you?</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">“Well here’s the
solution, sleep with his wife.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">“Then next time it
happens, you just wait till he’s finished putting you down, then say, ‘yeah,
well I’ve slept with your wife.’</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">“Of course, considering
the behaviour of most middle class couples on the dinner party circuit, there’s
some chance that he’s slept with your wife, if this happens, sleep with his
daughter as well, just to be sure.”</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">Anyway, enough of
that, none of us like to be wrong, and there are many reasons for that, but I
still admire Win for being able to admit it.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">We had a good time
in Padang, we
hung with John, Gunther and Win, recharged our batteries, and planned out next
move.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">My stomach and
throat recovered (slowly), probably due to the fresh ocean air and not having
to sleep next to an open sewer, and slowly the memory of the four days of hell
getting there receded.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">We, Neil, John,
Gunther and I, decided to head for Medan on the
East coast of Sumatra and catch a ferry to Malaysia.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">This was a journey
diagonally across the top of the island and somewhat to my surprise when I went
to the mapping software it gave me this message:</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
“We could not calculate directions between <b>Padang</b><b>,
West Sumatra, Indonesia</b>
and <b>Medan</b><b>, North Sumatra, Indonesia</b>.”</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">Why this should be
so, I really can’t say, but I strongly suspect that it’s because we were now about
to traverse the real backwoods of Indonesia and that’s saying
something.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">So we boarded a bus
and the headed for our first stop, Lake
Toba.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">This was one of the
most beautiful places we stayed in our whole time in Sumatra.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">Mt Toba is an (we
fervently hoped) extinct volcano, and our accommodation was on a large island
in the lake, which in itself formed a large puddle at the bottom of the caldera.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">There was a jetty
coming out from the deck below our room and we were able to watch the sun come
up over the volcano rim from our beds.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">It was everything
we had come to Indonesia
for.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">Also I remember it
was the cheapest place we stayed, something that called to my skinflint soul.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">Our rooms were 1000
(A$0.10) rupiah a night, compared with the most expensive, 19,000 in Kuta Beach, Bali.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">So I was happy
again.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">The next morning we
then had one of the most enjoyable adventures of our whole stay.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">We rented push
bikes and circled the island.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">The island we were
staying on was about twenty k long and this fits with my memory as we rode all
day around the circumference, approx 50 or 60 k.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">And the thing I
most remember is defying the laws of thermodynamics.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">As the ride went on
I got faster and faster.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">At 28 I was
reasonably fit, and with my illnesses receding I felt good for the first time
in a long time.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">Plus, I think it
was some sort of tension release from twelve long weeks of doing nothing but
being stressed over late or non-existent buses, which were overcrowded when
they came, not understanding the language well, being ill, all of it was
released in a day long ride of increasing euphoria.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">There was only one
road on the island and not a lot of traffic (another first for Indonesia) and
we just rode.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">With the green
waters of the lake on one side, the spike of a mini-mountain on the other, we
really felt we were flying over the surface of the lake.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">My legs flew on the
pedals and with each k that disappeared under my wheels I felt better and
better.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">But even then my
inability to care about anyone else caused a problem.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">John and Gunther
had set off with us on the bike ride, but within a short period of time only
Neil was within touching distance and it wasn’t till later that evening that we
found out what happened to Gunther and John.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">From the start
John’s bike had been playing up, and after a few Ks, one of the pedals began
rattling, then came off.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">So he and Gunther,
who had stayed with him, walked their bikes into a village and asked if there
was anyone there who could fix it.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">The villagers
pointed them toward a little mechanic’s workshop at the top of the village and
they went in, showed the grease-stained man inside the errant pedal and asked
if he could fix it.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">He nodded and then
began fiddling with the bike.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">After a period John
and Gunther realized that he didn’t have a replacement pedal and was trying to
fix the broken one back to the stem.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">Then a further time
later he began shaking his head and they realized he couldn’t fix it.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">So they went to
push the bike outside and try to find somewhere else that may have a solution,
but then the guy became somewhat agitated, grabbed the handlebars, and tried to
stop John taking the bike away.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">An argument ensued
and eventually John and Gunther understood that although he hadn’t been able to
fix the bike, he still wanted to be paid for the time he had spent working on
it.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">That then led to an
increasingly acrimonious exchange between the three of them and finally John
wrested the bike from their erstwhile mechanic and began to walk away.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">The mechanic then
went back inside, grabbed a large machete and returned waving it threateningly
at the two of them.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">John and Gunther
then did what they probably should have done in the first place, paid him some
rupiah, and walked away.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">Having said that it
is difficult to know when to negotiate in the third world over money.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">It is important not
to pay too much, as respect in two directions is on the line, but likewise,
don’t pay to little, as that equally shows a lack of respect toward the vendor.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">Anyway, with that
sorted out, they still had a non-functioning bike, and Neil and I were by this
time a long way away.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">They asked around
but couldn’t find an answer, so in the end poor John had to push his bike back
home the five or so Ks we had already ridden.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">That night we
caught up for dinner and heard their tale and were generally happy we were
leaving the little island tomorrow.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">Islands are by
their nature insular, and none of us wanted the machete waving mechanic’s
relatives visiting us and asking for more cash.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">So the next morning
we caught the bus onward toward Medan.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">Again my snapshot
like memory is unclear how far we travelled each step of the journey, but I do
remember Neil and I on mopeds, so I’ll just broach that topic a little.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">Whether we used
them to go forward in our trip, or if we rented them to make some sort of
circular day trip, I’m not sure, but I favour the latter, as by its very nature
renting a moped means that you have to return it, so I think it was some sort
of sidebar day trip.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">I mention this
because if life was dangerous enough on Indonesian roads when being driven
around by a local bus driver, then riding a moped is another league up in
nerve-wrack.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">We were riding
along and a group of local young men on their moped swooping over toward me.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">I say group,
because mopeds were a favoured method of travel across the archipelago, and
like all Indonesian transport, it was overcrowded.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">There were three
guys on this particular one, but I have heard of more, up to the record,
claimed to have been seen and photographed in Bang Kok Thailand, of 14
on one scooter.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">I can’t vouch
personally for this, but can clearly recall whole families of five on board,
sitting in relative comfort.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">So these three guys
moved in toward me and began gesticulating toward my plastic helmet, which I
had looped over my shoulder.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">I had done this
because when I examined it when renting the bike I saw that it would be no
Earthly use in an accident, and obscured my peripheral vision to boot, so was
actually decreasing my safety.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">So I hung it over
my shoulder and set off.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">But now these young
men were trying to tell me something.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">So I slowed down
and metaphorically cupped my ear with my hand to understand.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">The oldest, who was
driving, and spoke quite good English eventually got through to me that it was
illegal to ride a moped without a helmet.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">This I thought
pretty rich and wanted to yell back that I thought the authorities would be
better off making it illegal to have 45 people in an eight-seater minibus, but
riding along the trans-Sumatran highway at 50k, while yelling broken Bahasa at
three young men on a moped is not the time to join the debating society.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">So, I gave in and
pulled my helmet from my shoulder and put it on.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">The three young men
then gave the usual Sumatran mile-wide smile because they were able to help an
honoured guest in their country, accelerated to 90 and soon were lost in the
traffic up ahead.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">I rode up next to
Neil and repeated what my mobile friends had told me and he put his helmet on
as well and went kept moving.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">And just to digress
slightly.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">A friend of mine
Julian was a helicopter pilot who worked with various aid organisations
throughout the pacific and he was telling me that New Guinea has similar laws, and similar
plastic helmets.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">One day he saw a
guy riding along with an ice cream tub strapped over his head as a helmet.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">In Julian’s opinion
it would have provided the same amount of protection as the horrible plastic
helmets, and he was obeying the law.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">So with helmets now
firmly on, we did enjoy our ride that day, I think because once more because we
were in the back blocks of Indo, the traffic was relatively light, and so near
death experiences were limited to one an hour or so.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">This was of course
a severe stepdown in anxiety from being on the roads in the more crowded areas,
around Jakarta
particularly.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">Ride over, we
handed back our bikes and moved on in a bus.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">Eventually we
arrived in Medan
and the next thing I remember is getting totally slaughtered in a dockside bar
with an epileptic Dutchman and his German friend, whom we had met in our hotel.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">I say epileptic,
because he had the mannerisms of those taking Tegretol, the main epilepsy
medicine, of continually, moving his head up and down as if trying to swallow
something large, and opening and closing his eyes, particularly while deep in
thought.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">However, being deep
in thought, for any of the four of us, soon became a less frequent issue as the
Bintang went down.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">Indonesia</span><span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";"> was a Dutch colony in colonial days, Jakarta was originally known as Batavia,
and was the Asian headquarters of the first ever limited company, the Dutch
East India
company.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">Thus, many Dutch
things were taken to the colonies, and Heineken beer was one of them.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">Heineken was
rebadged to the local name ‘Bintang’.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">It means ‘Star
Beer’ in Bahasa and this is appropriate because if you drink enough of it, and
we did, you’ll be seeing stars all right.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">We had, to the best
of my recollection, 6 large bottles in that bar over some hours and eventually
staggered home to our bunks the worse for wear.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">I think this
equates to 18 middies of full strength beer, and it showed.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">I mention this
carousing because I think it lead to me sleep walking.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">Sleep walking is a
little understood thing and almost every example of it is worth relating for
the sheer strangeness of the thing.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">I remember a time
when my mother and brother went down to Sydney
to help our aunt move house.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">Typically of my
family, my brother was expected to work hard with no reward and criticized for
everything he did.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">They arrived at
about noon on Saturday and went straight to work.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">This labour of
packing, loading, driving, unloading and returning then proceeded virtually
non-stop over the next three days.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">On the Tuesday
night at about three am, my mother was in slumber when her bed lurched and she
awoke to find my brother trying to lift it.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">She said, “What are
you doing David?”</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">And he replied,
“You know I’ve got to move this bed.”</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">Then he went back
to trying to lift the bed, with my mother in it, bodily, on his own.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">My mother realized
he was sleep walking, so she got up and told him he could do it in the morning
and shepherded him back to bed.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">Another tale of the
night travels happened to my friend Dave Smedley.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">He was helping his
dad to tear down the old garage and build a new, larger building on the site.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">His friend who
lived across the street from them was helping and they worked away on it for
some weekends.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">Then one night Dave
was in bed when there a knock on the back door.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">With a muttered,
“what the hell?”, he got up and went down to the door.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">He opened it to
find his friend from across the road standing there.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">His friend said,
“Oh, is Dave there?”</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">Dave at first
thought he had smoked too much pot and had warped into the famous Cheech and
Chong sketch, “Dave’s not here, man”, but then when his friend (whose eyes were
open, but quite vacant) just stood there gaping, he twigged that his friend was
sleep walking.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">But the amazing
thing was how he had got there.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">Dave lived on a
very hilly street, the road was the floor of the valley as it were, with all
the houses set back from it, up extended and quite steep driveways.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">His friend had got
out of bed, walked down his driveway, across the road, up Dave’s driveway which
was a maze of reo, lumps of demolition debris, concrete mixers and god knows
what, then picked his way across Dave’s backyard, around the side of the house
to find the back door in the dark.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">He then knocked on
it, and when Dave himself answered, asked if Dave was there.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">Dave, like my
mother before, shepherded his friend back through the maze, marvelling as he
did so at his friend’s somnambulant ability to not break his leg, and home into
bed.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">The next day Dave’s
friend had no recollection of the incident.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">Now this night in Medan was the second time
I had walked in my sleep.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">The first, in my
share house in Leichhardt in the inner west of Sydney, involved me getting up,
walking down the hall, outside, scrabbling at the garage door, then coming back
inside, down the hall, turning right instead of left and going to sleep again
on the bed of my flatmate across the hall.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">Thankfully, my
flatmate, a nice gay woman, wasn’t home that night as she would have been
non-plussed, to say the least, at me coming in and getting in her bed without
so much as a by-your-leave at two a.m.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">I likewise had no
recollection of this incident, with the exception of waking up in Sanda’s bed,
the entire events of the night before were related to me the next morning, by
my other flatmate Sue, who slept at the front of the house near the garage
door.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">Again, very
mysterious.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">So back to Medan.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">My mummy-like
perambulations were related to me by Neil, who had stayed up to have a last
cigarette before retiring.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">I came out of our
room, said Neil, stood near him and began running my hand through my hair.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">Neil looked up at
me and said, “Do you want something?”</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">I didn’t reply.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">Then I seemed to
make a decision, reached down, grabbed Neil’s water bottle, turned on my heel
and went back inside.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">I put his bottle on
the floor next to my bunk, got in it and went back to sleep.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">Neil came in,
stared down at me for a moment, and then realized I must have been
sleepwalking.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">He got my bottle,
filled it, put it where I could reach it, picked his up and went to bed. </span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">The next morning he
told me about the incident and we docketed it away under the Bermuda
Triangle-like topic of sleepwalking and began to make preparations for our
ferry ride.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">I might add in
closing the topic, that for the manyeth time that trip I was thankful Neil was
there and I hadn’t slept walked my way out onto the streets of Medan looking
for a water bottle, god knows where I might have ended up, under a truck most
likely.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">So we packed up,
heaved our gear on our backs, a process that I was by now coming to loathe, and
made our way down to the ferry port.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">Needless to say it
was nothing like catching a ferry from Manly across to Circular Quay, with its,
Sydney’s,
clearly labelled embarkation pathways.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">The whole area was
a vast, rambling, train, bus, ferry interchange with elements of a Clydeside
shipyard thrown in.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">We bought our
tickets, finding the ticket office an achievement on its own, and then began a
genuine trek down to the water’s edge.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">We walked around
trains, some stationary, some moving gently.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">We went up onto
overhead gantry walks, looking for all the world like a giant’s mechano set, we
took off our packs and lurched under overhangs of various sorts, from
shopfronts to fettlers workshops.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">One would normally
think that finding a ferry is easy as you obviously just go down to the water’s
edge and there it is, but as described, even finding something as large as the
Malacca Straits wasn’t easy.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">Eventually we got
there and went into the waiting area till we were allowed to board.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">I do remember
thinking that an odd thing about the area was that this was an international
border, the entering and leaving point for Indonesia, and security was
non-existent.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">But further thought
on the topic reminded me that this kind of fitted as well, as no one wants to
get into Indonesia, secretly
or otherwise, they only want to leave it, and since the ferries out of Medan only go one place, Malaysia, I guessed that any border
security would be at the other end.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">Time came and we
got on board and settled into our first comfortable transport for some time.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">This was a modern,
catamaran ferry, based on a design that came out of Tasmania, of all places, and was becoming
the standard world wide.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">Additionally, we
were in first class, so sat indoors, upstairs and watched, alternatively, the
ocean flying by outside, and a Charlie Sheen movie on the big screen at the
front of the lounge.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">What’s more, I’m
guessing due to cost, there were no locals in our lounge, and so I was spared
clouds of clove cigarette smoke billowing about my head, racking my throat dry.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">So it was a
generally pleasant trip, but about half way across I was absently rubbing an
itch on my left forearm when I realised that I had been rubbing it a lot that
morning, I looked down and understood why, bed bugs.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">Obviously the
previous night in our Medan
fleapit they had emerged from the mattress and made whoopee with my soft
western skin.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">I have never been
bitten by bed bugs before (or since) so I don’t know the form, but these ones
were like every other bug in the third world, super bugs.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">The way they had
worked was to bite me, then move on a body length, approx 2mm, then bite again.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">The bite number
varied, I’m guessing in some places they were full, and in others I had moved
in my sleep, displacing them from their banquet.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">I examined my arm
and discovered that the bites I had been scratching ran around my forearm,
under my elbow and resurfaced trekking in orderly fashion across my bicep.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">Nuts.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">I got up and went
into the gloriously luxurious toilet, and took off my shirt.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">Under the harsh
glare of the fluoros I could see how comprehensively I had been bitten.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">The tracks ran
everywhere, even as I know saw, down from my hairline, across my nose, around
my cheek and down to my neck.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">I looked like a
zombie freshly sewn together by an Igor–like character in a Transylvanian
castle.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">I went back to our
seat and questioned Neil about two things, “did he know that my face looked
like a recently produced baseball?”, and “did we have any calamine-lotion-like
unguent in the medi stores?”</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">The answer was “no”
to both, though I did see him grinning slightly for the rest of the trip, so
knowing his sense of humour (warped), I strongly suspected that he was enjoying
my fall from any semblance of </span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">handsomeness.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">However, despite my
resemblance to a fright night character, the bites weren’t overly itchy and we
continued our waterborne passage across the Straits, until Malaysia, and
the Asian continent proper hove into view.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">We docked and got
our things together and made our way into a new country.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">The port was called
Sitiawan, and from the start we knew we were in a place where things were done
differently.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">To start with we
didn’t have to bribe our way in, as we had had to do when we touched down in Bali at the start of this trip.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">Malaysia</span><span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";"> is more developed, but a lot more boring
than Indonesia.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">The country as a
whole didn’t make much of an impression on me, for a few reasons.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">Firstly, we only
spent three days there, and secondly, as stated, I was already in London playing rugby in
my mind.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">So really Malaysia was just another place to get through
on our way to Singapore and
a flight to Europe.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">Even the capital Kuala Lumpur I have no
memory of, though we certainly passed through it.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">Indeed the best
memories of KL I have are some digital photos taken by my friend Russell when
he visited twenty years later, so that gives you some idea of the low key
nature of the place.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">Think of it as a
tropical Canberra,
boring and you only go there if you really have to.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">The things I do
remember though were worth it.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">Not far from
Sitiawan was a tropical insect zoo, it sounds flesh-crawlingly creepy, and it
is, but as Neil and I were both in that field of study we went for a look.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">It was really quite
amazing, butterflies the size of ham sandwiches in all colours of the rainbow
filled the avery, and leaf litter scuttlers like small off road vehicles
tickered-tickered about on the ground and we spent a morning there quite
fascinated.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">However the main
event in that place was the scorpion pit.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">Inside this were
many hundred large black scorpions going about their business.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">As we looked in at
them I was truly, truly thankful that it seemed the only thing the gods of
travel hadn’t visited upon us so far on this trip was one of these in the bed.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">Their stingers were
frightening just to look at from some metres away, and their claws made one
involuntarily cross your legs against the thought of a double grab at your
funzone in the night.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">But even that was
put in the shade by a truly amazing feat performed by a local Malaysian woman
some years after we were there.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">She lived in the
scorpion pit for a month.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">She did it to show
that they weren’t as bad as they were perceived.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">This is true, as
their bite, while gruesomely painful, is not lethal, and since they were part
of the eco-system, this brave woman went in their to show them in their better
light, and to try to stop the wholesale scorpion killing that went on any time
one of them was encountered in the wild.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">The footage of her time
in there was quite amazing.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">She has to shake
her sheets out before she went to bed, then hope not to roll over on top of one
of them after she went to sleep, as they moved back in as soon as the sheets had
settled.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">When it was time to
cook, she had to open the cupboard doors carefully, remove any scorpions that
were in her pots, or nesting in her bags of rice.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">Once that was done
she then had to be careful that a scorpion didn’t wander into her saucepan, or
she would be eating them as well.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">All in all it was
an amazing thing to do and she got to the end of the month without too many
bites.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">I, then and now,
admire her courage, I couldn’t have done it.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">The next morning we
left Sitiawan and headed south toward KL and then Singapore,
and on the way visited the only other place I remember from Malaysia, the Cameron Highlands.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">I think this region
sticks in my mind because it was a cooler, temperate, mountain region, that for
all the world resembled Hampstead Heath in London,
or perhaps the mountains of Yorkshire or Scotland.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">To find it nestled
within easy driving distance of the equator was quite a disjunct.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">The region is
famous for its tea, and most of the tea drunk in that part of the world comes
from there.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">I still retain in
my mind after all these years the rows of tea following the contours of the
rolling hills, in ruler-like fashion, like a vineyard in France.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">Also, I think the
chilly crisp breeze flowing over the highland was the first we had felt in
nearly three months, so this also aided in making the place stand out.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">And adding to the beauty
were the extensive roses.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">I’ll slip in a
quick horticulture lesson here.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">If you visit any
vineyard in France or California, you will
find at the end of each row of vines a rose bush.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">This is done so
that the farmer can see if any insects that may attack the vines are present,
as they go for the rose bush, with its coloured petals, first.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">And so it seemed
that the founders of the tea plantations of the Cameron Highlands
had followed the same plan, and there were rose bushes all over the place.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">Thus the crisp
mountain breeze came to you redolent with the scent of tea and roses.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">It was an
intoxicating experience.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">Finally, I think
that the process of mental change that had started on the road to Padang, then noticed
fully on the beach there, was continuing apace, and I was for the first time
starting to appreciate beautiful things, and not be embarrassed about saying
it.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">Just to put that
into context, later on in this trip I was walking with Neil and<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>another friend from Sydney, Misha, in the
hills of Scotland
in the Autumn.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">The trees were in
their full glory of colour change, with yellows, russets, auburns, reds and
browns filling the vision with true beauty.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">I was brought to speak,
and said: “You know guys, I’m not a poof or nuthin’, but these trees are really
beautiful.”</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">So apologies to any
gay readers of either sex.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">I put that in to
highlight that although on the way to higher mental things, I still retained
the vestiges of my Australian yobboness, and couldn’t even use the word
“beautiful” without a qualifier protecting my manliness.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">So we enjoyed our
day on the roof of Malaysia.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">At the end of the
day we boarded our bus and headed back to the backpackers, thence on the road
to Singapore.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">Many have travelled
that road throughout history, Singapore
holds the most strategic position in all of Asia,
at the oceanic cross roads of the exotic East, and so had over time developed
into a major entity.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">It was once part of
Malaysia, but soon became so
rich in its own right, that the burghers of the town began to resent paying tax
to the poorer Malaysia and
so succeeded and became an independent country, like Monte
Carlo, Moldova
or San Marino.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">Despite all this
economic muscle, it is a really boring place.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">It is infamous for
flogging, with a reinforced riding crop, anyone convicted, or even accused of,
graffitiing a wall.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">You cannot spit out
chewing gum on the street without incurring a heavy fine, and littering will
get you executed.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">However, despite
the heavy-handed crime control, there were obviously backhanders going toward
the inspectors of cheap accommodation, because whoever set up where we stayed
should have been prosecuted.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">Our accommodation
was in a three story terrace and the sleeping arrangements were a new one on
us.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">Each floor was
carpeted with mattresses, you checked in at the front desk and then went in
search of a mattress that didn’t have a backpack on it.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">Once you found one,
you put your backpack on it and that was your bed.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">There were
something like forty single mattresses per floor and no, or at best a
vanishingly narrow gap, between them.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">So walking in and
out involved tip-toeing along, trying not to walk on someone else’s bed as you
went.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">This was hard
enough in daylight, but at night it was a nightmare.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">Since usually a
third of those staying had some sort of dysentery, your sleep would be
interrupted by one of your floormates, sprinting for the toilet at three a.m
and to hell with who they trod on.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">However, we were
learning to take most things in our stride now, so we found a couple of
mattresses near each other, threw down our backpacks and then went out to see a
bit of Singapore.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">We visited the zoo
and saw the only Polar Bear on the equator, wondering then as now, at the
phenomenal cost in energy to keep the enclosure down at arctic temperatures.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">We then toured the
town a bit, but there wasn’t much to see, as Singapore is largely just a big
industrial port.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">We then went out
with a contact I had gained from my lecturer at teachers college, Mike.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">He told me to get
in touch with a Singaporean student, now a qualified teacher, who rejoiced
under the name Len.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">This was his real,
Asian, name, and was a happy coincidence for him when he went to study in an
English speaking country, as his name would transpose easily.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">I mention this,
because there have been some really unfortunate names.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">The medal winning
student in the Veterinary faculty one year was the unfortunately titled Coq Liq
Kew, which when announced at the award ceremony was done Anglo style as “Liq
Kew, Coq”.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">I also read in a
book about the same area, it was a novel, so I can’t attest to the
authenticity, but a chinese character in this book was called “Fuk Yu”.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">So Len did all
right compared to those.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">Now if you follow
this story through the upcoming chapters to the British Isles you will learn a
lot about hot curries, but I was about to get my first lesson there in
Singapore.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">Indonesia</span><span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";"> does have a lot of hot food, Rendang
curries are probably the best known, but I don’t recall eating anything that
was particularly noteworthy in the heat stakes.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">But all that was
about to change, Len took us to a large food court, presented us with a small
keychain that said “Singapore”
on it, and then helped us to order.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">Neil’s order as
usual involved a number of dishes, and the working of overtime by half the
kitchen staff, but I was not sure what to order, so Len got me a black bean and
curd laksa, which he was having himself.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">Well!</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">While he ate it
with enjoyment and talked about his new career as a respected professional
teacher, with frequent mentions of Mike’s great tutelage, I stuck my spoon in
the dish, and had my first mouthful.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">I turned purple and
small wisps of steam began to come from my ears and cheeks.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">Mother of fucking
god.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">I looked at Len,
but his lovely olive skin was largely unchanged.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">I looked doubtfully
at my bowl, whilst throwing every container of water on the table, including
the flower pot, down my throat.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">I quickly began
wondering if I had by some chance been given a bowl of nitric acid.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">So the meal
continued with Neil and Len talking easily, and me making the odd croaked
announcement between throwing liquid down my throat.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">I finished the bowl
(eventually), and then we said “good bye” to Len and headed back to our floor
dwelling accommodation, with me trailing a small cloud of steam behind me.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">On the way, partly
because of my newly installed internal combustion, and partly because it is an
iconic Singapore
thing to do, I asked Neil if he wanted to stop in at “The Raffles” for a beer.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">The Raffles is
short hand for The Sir Stamford Raffles Hotel, the priciest place in Singapore,
named for the Englishman who founded most if its modern day infrastructure.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">He agreed and we
stepped into the cheapest part of it we could find.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">I grabbed my beer
like a drowning seafarer grabbing a life jacket for two reasons.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">One, I was still
burning inside, and two, it was time to tell Neil that my trip was over and I
wanted to leave him and head for London.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">To reiterate
briefly, the original plan was to “do” Indonesia,
then Malaysia and Singapore, then travel back up the west coast
through Burma to India.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">But of course, now
I was in no mood, or condition, to face this, so I told Neil that it was time
for me to go to Europe.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">He nodded, then
said, “It nothing I’ve done, is it?”</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">“No”, I replied,
“really it comes back to those psych questions Marayka asked us in Java, you
remember them?”</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">He nodded, and I
went on, “Well my answers mostly concerned rugby, so I think I want to just
head off to London
and get settled, find a club and get on with it.”</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">He nodded again,
then said, “Yeah, I understand, parts of this trip have been hard haven’t
they?”.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">I nodded in turn,
with some vehemence, then we ordered another beer, drank it, then headed back
to our terrace. </span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">The next day Neil
began getting ready to move off on his own.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">He was going to
head up the East coast of Malaysia to a turtle sanctuary called Terrenganu, and
meet up with a scientist he had worked with on the Great Barrier Reef.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">He made his
arrangements for this, while I started making mine to fly to Europe.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">We met back at the
terrace that night, and he informed me that he was off on the morrow.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">The next day I
walked with him to the bus station and saw him off, with the upmost relief that
I wasn’t boarding another Asian bus, then walked back into town.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">I had three more
days till my flight would leave, and was kind of at a loose end.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">But even so I was
somewhat surprised when I sat on a bench overlooking a little park and burst
into tears.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">If I was a
commercial author I would end things here on a suitable dramatic point, and
leave the reader (hopefully) gagging for the next chapter to find out what was
going on, but I’m not, and probably never will be, an author at all, but a
chronic bullshit artist who saw fit to inflict his choleric moaning upon the
internet.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">So I’ll go into
now, what was happening?</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">Well, as far as I
can tell on looking back there were immediate and life long factors at play.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">In the immediate, I
had nothing to do, and nowhere to go, in fact the reason I sat on the bench in
the first place was to figure out what to do next.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">Neil’s bus had
pulled away at ten or thereabouts, now it was near eleven and I had, as stated
above, three more days to hang around Singapore, we had been to the zoo and
there were no real tourist activities to do in that city, so I was like Marvin
the Paranoid Android from the Hitchhikers Guide, “severely stuck for something
to do”.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">So I sat on my
bench and thought it through.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">My backpackers was
for sleeping only, and not much of that with the nocturnal comings and goings
of various toilet-bound others.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">There was no common
room with a table tennis table or even a TV to watch, so there was no point in
going there.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">If I had been an
alcoholic, as I would become later in life, I probably would have found the
cheapest bar in town and sat in there drinking for the next 72 hours, but I
wasn’t, so that was out.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">And as the minutes
passed on that bench, I became sadder and sadder, then the tears started, and
looking back I feel that the reason for this torrent was that it was the first
time in my life I was alone.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">Much later I would
read a tremendous book by Stephanie Dowrick called “Intimacy and Solitude” and
finally come to understand that there was a difference between being alone and
being lonely.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">But on that bench I
was both.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">And I’ll just fill
in the background to illustrate this.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">I lived with my
parents in the forced labour camp of the family home from birth to the age of
twenty.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">I finally escaped
and moved to Sydney
and went to Uni, this filling my life, both mentally and geographically, for
the next three years.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">From the hallowed
halls of academia, I then moved to Canada and was met there by my
friend from soccer days, Darin.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">He helped me settle
in, I quickly got a job with Greenpeace, then in short order a good friend,
Sean, and a girlfriend, Deb.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">Deb is a wonderful
woman, we became closer and then married.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">We came back and
lived in Sydney
together for the next 18 months, and my life was full with my work with
Greenpeace, my soccer with Sydney U, and home life with Deb.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">Then my terminal
immaturity and dysfunctionality brought our marriage to an end.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">Deb went back to Canada, and I moved into a share house in
Leicchardt, in Sydney’s
inner west, with Gav, Sue and Sanda, and enrolled again at Uni to do my
teaching diploma.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">This likewise
filled my time and I had no moments for reflection and then when that finished I
teamed up with Neil and we set off for adventure in Asia.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">Thus, with his
departure, I was alone for the first time in 27 years.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">And all those
feelings of loss and grief for the childhood brutally stole from me by my
parents, grief also for the way I treated Deb combined in that one moment on a
bench in Singapore.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">I was alone, I was
desolate, there was no one to come and help me.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">In a weird way this
was a trauma and a help, since there was no one around who knew me, I could cry
without being labelled a sissy, which is what had been beaten into me as a
child at both home and school.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">I cried for some
time, I’ve no idea how long, but eventually I must have come to an end, then I
got up and went back to the backpackers.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">Whilst there I met
two female travellers, a Swiss and a German, and they were, like me, waiting
for a flight, and so I began to do things with them.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">I sadly now can’t
even remember their names, which is a pity as they were saviours in my life in
that time.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">All unknowing, by
simply giving me someone to do things with, my sadness lifted and I began to
feel better.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">We went in a cable
car up somewhere.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">We went to the
“beach”, a hideous grey-yellow strip of greasy sand next to the main shipping
channel, and we talked.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">With their help I
got through the time till my flight was due.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">And so that’s where
my Asian experience ended, but the journey inside my head was just getting
moving, whatever was happening, I was shedding the carapace of arrogant
arsehole and that’s got to be a good thing.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS";">Next stop Frankfurt, Germany,
of all places, as greater change from Asia as
one could wish.</span></div>
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<a href="http://byronshortstories.blogspot.com.au/2013/11/4-stepping-into-europe.html"><span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS",sans-serif;"><br /></span></a>
<a href="http://byronshortstories.blogspot.com.au/2013/11/4-stepping-into-europe.html"><span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS",sans-serif;">Next chapter.</span></a><br />
<br />
<br />
<a href="http://byronshortstories.blogspot.com.au/"><span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS",sans-serif;">Back to home page</span></a></div>
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LKhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11244232092173678321noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8082972746234187865.post-31281984838877198792013-10-19T18:24:00.004-07:002013-11-11T18:33:16.989-08:002 - Dawn over Palembang<!--[if gte mso 9]><xml>
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<b style="mso-bidi-font-weight: normal;"><span style="font-family: Tahoma; font-size: 14.0pt; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">2 </span></b></div>
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<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">When
we left things in the first chapter Neil and I were sitting on our backpacks in
Bandur Lumpang station, on the southern tip of Sumatra,
considering our options.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">If
we’d been thinking clearly, we would have gone back into Bandur, stayed overnight
at a nice beachside hotel, breakfasted well and then gone to the station in
time to catch the lovely coastal train via Bengkulu to Padang, our shimmering,
glittering oceanside goal, halfway up the Indian ocean side of Sumatra,
Indonesia’s northern most island.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">But
as you already discerned, clear thinking is not something easily achieved when
travelling in Indonesia.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">If
it’s not the noise, if it’s not the horrendously crowded buses, if it’s not
nights spent squatting over a hole in the concrete floor adding your faecal
load to the rudimentary Indonesian sewage system, then it’s any one of a
thousand other impediments to tranquil thoughts.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">So
we discussed things and more because we were already there in the station we
made the bad decision to catch the night train to Palembang.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">This
was an inland train, with no coastal views, but I think we just wanted to be on
the move.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">So
we bought our tickets and retired to the corner of the station to wait.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">I
had thankfully bought a single volume set of all three “Lord of the Rings”
books, so got it out and began reading.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">Neil
had “A Passage to India”,
and likewise began perusing its contents.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">I
was still feeling pretty rocky from the night spent in the prison-like hotel of
the night before, and Neil wasn’t too hot either, but we had all day to wait,
and he had the toilet nearby, so time passed reasonably smoothly.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">Actually,
it was an unlooked for benefit of that all afternoon wait.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">I
couldn’t remember the last time I had simply sat and read for hours before.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">Bandur
was still in touch with, if not fully on, the tourist trail and so we did catch
the eye of the odd local.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">They
would come over to practise their English and ask the standard questions.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">“Where
are you going?”, Padang.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">“Where
have you come from?”, Jakarta.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">Where
are you from?”, Australia.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">And
so the afternoon passed.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">Around
four things began to happen.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">More
staff appeared and began to do various tasks.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">Passengers
appeared and began stacking their luggage around and about.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">Then
a train pulled into the station.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">With
the best Bahasa I could manage, I gleaned that this was out train, so we found
our carriage and boarded.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">Backpacks
up onto the overhead rack, books out.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">We
sat and waited.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">We
were looking forward to this, it was our first train.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">So
far most of our travel had been by road, crammed into the front seat of death-defying,
eight-seater minibuses, then a ferry ride across the Sunda Strait that had been
anything but relaxing, so a nice soothing train ride over the mountainous spine
of Sumatra would be just what the doctor ordered.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">Well
that idea lasted for about three seconds.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">Unlike
the minibuses, whose seat booking system could best be described as anarchic
and could really be simplified down to “can-another-square-millimetre-of-human-be-put-anywhere?”,
the train was more expensive and so to start with wasn’t as crowded.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">We
found our assigned seats and sat in them, another first as it was the only time
I could remember in Indonesia
where a seat was only occupied by one person.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">Eventually,
diesel smoke blew and the train lumbered out of the station.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">The
rhythm picked up and the clickety-clack we all know so well began to soothe our
ruptured souls.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">But
if the train wasn’t overcrowded, it had an anarchy of its own.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">Although
the passengers all had assigned seats they quickly began to bestrew themselves
about the cabin.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">On
the floor, on the luggage rack, you name it.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">I
was a little bit mystified, the most comfortable places on the train were the
padded seats, but the other passengers took the first opportunity to sit or lie
on something hard.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">Oh,
well, perhaps it was just the mind set of the country that had spent a
generation under the despotic rule of Soekhano, that they now couldn’t handle
comfort, deeming themselves unworthy.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">And
I’d like to add that if my tone so far has been patronising toward the
Indonesians, that is accurate, I was a very dysfunctional person with my
western superior mind, but as we are about to see, Sumatra was to change that,
and set me on a path to greater compassion.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">But
all that is ahead, for now, I watched as at least five separate card schools
started up on the floor of the train.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">It
is well known that Asians love to gamble, and here on the floor of the night
train to Palembang,
that was writ large.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">I
watched with patronised amusement, but then as ever with this trip, a problem
occurred.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">The
Indonesian in front of me got off his seat and sat on the floor with his legs
sticking out into the aisle.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">He
rested on his arms splayed back behind him and in the two first fingers of his
right hand was a clove cigarette.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">The
smoke from this was sucked, in beautifully efficient fashion, under the seat in
front of me, up past my face and out the window which I had partially open to
enjoy(?) the night air.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">My
throat was a little better and had improved from the rusty chainsaw stage, but
was still crackly and this acrid smoke, now set it off again.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">I
wanted to say to this guy, could you put your cigarette in your other hand, but
my Bahasa wasn’t up to it, and anyway, now that I looked around, as usual every
single person in that carriage, including Neil, was smoking.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">With
a sigh I resigned myself to my fate and opened the window a little further.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">This
however, had little or no effect, and soon after I closed it down to a small
aperture again.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">And
I’ll tell you why.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">One
of the best physics lessons I ever saw, was not at college, but occurred on the
school bus one afternoon on my way home from Kelso High.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">An
older tougher boy, and I can assure you, nearly everyone was tougher and cooler
than me, called John Markwick was sitting about halfway along the bus and
smoking a cigarette.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">He
finished his fag and threw the butt out the window.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">Due
to Bernoulli’s principle the butt travelled down the outside of the bus, level
with the smaller upper windows and re-entered via an open window near the rear
and hit another older boy, Greg Cole on the side of the neck.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">We
were all a little astonished, but there you go, physics rules.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">And
so on this train, everyone who finished a fag, threw the butt out the window, and
if it was bad enough taking in the smoke, I deffo didn’t want to take a full
butt down the windpipe at train velocity while craning my neck out to get some
fresh air.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">The
conductor began to circulate, and for about half a millisecond I thought he
would tell everyone to get up off the floor, stop smoking and possibly to stop
gambling as well, but far from that, he stopped and chatted with one group,
accepted a cigarette, then stopped and played a few hands.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">Neil
didn’t help by maintaining a perfectly serene and content demeanour, while I
was going out of my tiny mind.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">Including
our last night in sweaty, smog ridden Jakarta,
this had “third-night-without-sleep” written all over it.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">So
with throat scratching and eyes smarting I sat and tried to meditate in the
smoke filled carriage as the train rattled on threw the night.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">I’m
guessing I must have gotten some sleep, but that was like the night before in
the prison like hotel in Bandur, snatched here and there for five and ten
minutes, jerking awake as the weight of my head grabbed at my neck ligaments.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">The
train stopped occasionally and the population of the carriage revolved, the
only real sign of this was the numbers at the different card schools went up
and down.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">I’m
guessing that most were regular travellers on this line, as they merged
seamlessly with the game as if they had been playing since the train left
Bandur.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">But
eventually the train rumbled down out of the hills into Palembang.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">The
card games disbanded, people picked up their baggage, chickens included, and
disembarked.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">Station
staff scurried about doing end-of-journey tasks and the station at Palembang slowly emptied.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">The
passengers began to walk or ride buses into town, the staff completed their
duties and returned to their various nooks, probably, to judge from the
conductors behaviour on the train, to finish their card games and slowly quiet,
then silence fell.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">Neil
and I humped our backpacks down the train steps and stood on the concourse.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">Dawn
was breaking over the town and there is something indescribably beautiful in a
palm tree dawn.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">Additionally,
it was the quietest moment I could recall since we had got off the plane at Kuta Beach
in Bali, the start of our Indonesian jaunt.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">Despite
all my troubles and tribulations, I remember thinking that to see this dawn, in
the metallic quiet of the Victorian era station in the mountains of Sumatra, made it all worthwhile.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">So
captivated was I by this that I turned to Neil, stretching beside me, to say
words along these lines, when without warning liquid diahorrea burst forth, ran
down the inside of my leg and pooled in my left sock and boot.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">I
should have known that Indonesia
wouldn’t provide beauty without a complication.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">Too
say I was gob smacked is to entirely understate the effect of this faecal
visitation had on me.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">I
stared down at the last dribbles as they oozed over my sock top.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">Neil,
was rolling then, lighting a cigarette, and had no idea.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">Eventually,
I stopped staring down and began to think what to do about this.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">I
didn’t want o move in case that spread my affliction around, and the last thing
I wanted was to be standing on train platform in Sumatra with liquid dynamic
lifter pooling in ever increasing circles around my feet.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">So
I turned to Neil, instead of something lyrical about the tropical mountain
dawn, I instead had to say, “Neil, could you get some toilet paper please? I’ve
just had an accident.”</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">He
turned to me in surprise.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">As
I say, the whole event had caught me by surprise, so he obviously had no idea.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">Even
the smell, was no indicator, swallowed as all bad smells are by the background
E coli count of Indonesia.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">He
turned and was about to speak, but I just pointed at my stained sock.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">He
got the message, moved away with his back pack and then had a quick search,
found the paper, handed the roll to me, then stood back.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">But
having done that, I was now uncertain what to do next.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">Undressing
seemed the next step, and those who know me well will tell you that although
most of my time at uni was spent undressing in public and displaying the broad,
panoramic spectre of my arse to the world.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">It
was less well known that sober I was massively introverted and becoming
voluntarily naked in the middle of a, thankfully, deserted train station was not
overly desirable.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">I
asked Neil if he could see a toilet anywhere, he had a quick look, but none was
obvious, but a he did rouse a passer-by to my predicament and he, the
passer-by, came over and began trying to communicate something to me.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">Once
again my Bahasa wasn’t really up to it.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">And
quite frankly, I was hardly in the best physical or mental shape to bring my
mind to bear on translation at this point.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">But
I did my best to focus, “Mandi?”, he kept saying, pointing to me and repeating,
in a questioning fashion, “Mandi?”</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">He
said it a few more times, and slowly, a bell began tinkling at the back of my
mind, ‘where had I heard that expression before?’, I thought to myself.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">Then
I remembered, a Balinese man had said it, when we were on the beach there.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">He
had said it, then gone into the ocean, and began to…, what had he done?, THAT’S
RIGHT!, he had washed himself in the waters of the Bali
sea.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">I
realised what our friendly Palembangian, (if that’s the word) was trying to
tell/ask me, “did I want to wash?”</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">“Yes”,
I said.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">Now
I saw that he had been making rubbing motions to along his arms and legs and
realised he had been miming having a wash.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">“Yes,
yes”, I repeated, “Mandi”. </span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">“Where?”,
I asked him in Bahasa, motioning around about me, “Where can I Mandi?”</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">He
then led me to a horse trough.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">There
were still plenty of these about, whether they had been built for horses to
drink out of, or were purpose built for humans to wash in, I do not know, but
either way, it was my only option.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">But
as I looked into it, I began a desperate mental search for another, ANY, other
option.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">Foul
trolls had built that thing with the clearly stated goal to spread diphtheria
and cholera.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">There
was water in it, actually, I’m guessing once it had been water, pure, liquid,
silver drops that had fallen from the pristine heavens onto the mountain redoubt
of Palembang,
but now I wasn’t sure if it was water anymore.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">Black
it was, I could see my reflection clearly in it, oil looked like this.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">But
I really had no option.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">I
took off my foetid shorts, socks and boots.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">I
threw away my shorts and socks, but had to take my boots in and wash them as
best I could.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">I
took my t-shirt off as well, it wasn’t dirty from the accident, but since my
nether regions were exposed I decided I might as well go the entire pig, and
wash all of me.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">Neil
handed me some soap with extended fingers, if he had had surgical tongs he
would have used them, and I did my best.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">I
didn’t stay in there long, apart from the colour, the consistency was more like
goulage than soup, and I was starting to believe that every drop of whatever
lurked at the bottom of this horse trough was increasing my filth load, rather
than removing it.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">So
with a rudimentary clean at best, I declared my Mandi over and got out of the
horse trough.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">I
handed the soap to Neil, but he said “keep it” and so I stuck it in my
backpack, got out some clean clothes, put them on and declared myself ready for
the next hurdle.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">Moving
on from Palembang.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">We
were as ever uncertain and so cast about for some help and found it quickly.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">A
young boy, ten or twelve years old was passing by the station and we made
ourselves sort of clear that we wanted to go north from town.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">He
grinned the mile-wide smile of happiness that he could help and led us away
from the station.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">Neil
stayed conspicuously upwind of me, and I don’t blame him.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">The
boy took my hand and we walked like lovers into town.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">I
should say, this was quite a common site in Indonesia, often fully grown males
would walk like this, I was still quite homophobic and struggled whenever I saw
it, but since our small guide seemed to know what we wanted and where to get
it, I held on quite happily and we hiked into town.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">Life
was coming onto the streets in the traditional zero-to-a-hundred fashion of
Indonesian cities and we were soon encompassed by the full throated roar of Palembang.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">Eventually
we arrived at a sort of green square and our young guide gestured toward a shop
front.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">It
looked like all the others in the square, but we couldn’t make out from the
signs in Bahasa, what it traded in.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">Then
our young guide gestured that he had to go and left.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">And
so once again our travels came to a halt while we tried to figure out why he
had brought us there.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">While
we debated a crowd gathered.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">I
have mentioned previously that we were becoming minor celebrities, particularly
Neil with his blonde hair, and now we were well off the tourist trail we began
to stand out like certain parts of a male canine’s anatomy.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">All
the tourists with an ounce of sense and who had done the minorest bit of
planning, took the coast train to Bengkulu, then on to Padang, but here in the
mountainous heart of Sumatra, we were well away from all that, and in all probability
the first tourists that had come there for some time.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">So,
while we debated, a crowd gathered and when I eventually deigned to notice the
commoners, there were nearly a hundred Sumatrans sitting and standing around
just staring at us and giggling behind their hands.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">So
I decided to make use of our notoriety and began to ask if anyone spoke
English.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">Soon
an orderly queue had gathered, almost as if I had advertised a position as
guide and translator, fixer, journos call it, and they were all hoping for the
job.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">But
here again being off the tourist trail counted for us and against us.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">Although
there were many people here staring at us, not many spoke English better than
my halting Bahasa.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">I
didn’t help by saying “Padang?”
over and over.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">Palembang</span><span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";"> was nowhere
near that city and wasn’t connected to it by any transport link.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">But
we persevered and eventually we got someone who seemed to understand from my
woefully inadequate mumblings what we wanted.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">He
then gave a great grin and waved his hands and led me by the hand to the shop
that our young friend had earlier indicated.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">I
went in and realised what both friends had been trying to say.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">It
was a travel agent.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">Hale-fucking-lulagh.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">The
young man behind the desk again didn’t speak much English, but we got out our
guide book and pointed to Padang,
and he nodded and went into action.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">He
shuffled papers, looked up things and then began writing.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">I
didn’t really know what he was doing, but did what we were doing a lot of these
days, hoped for the best.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">Eventually,
he finished what he was doing and held out two slips of pinkish paper.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">Tickets.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">He
then held out his hand in a world renowned gesture, obviously asking for money,
and I said one of the few phrases of Bahasa that I was fluent at, “How much?”</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">But
even then I’d like to provide a travel tip for others.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">Learning
the local language is a good thing to do, but it’s no good knowing how to ask a
question if you cannot understand the answer.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">I’d
been caught before like this, commonly when asking “where is the nearest
backpackers?”, only to have my interlocutor rattle of a stream of Bahasa that
left me floundering after the third word.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">I
scratched my head, we did want the tickets, but was this a situation where we
had to haggle?</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">If
so we were in big trouble as my language skills, and Neil’s less so, weren’t up
to it.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">Or,
was this a standard price, as our train and ferry tickets had been?</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">Either
way, we needed a new, non-verbal solution.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">I
massaged my forehead and then did what I should have done in the first place,
looked at the ticket.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">I
checked closely, but if the price was on it, it wasn’t visible.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">Impasse.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">I
then did have a good idea, I made a gesture toward the travel agent guy like I
was asking for the bill in a restaurant, writing in the air with my left hand
on my right palm.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">He
understood, got out a pen and wrote the price down.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">Thankfully
we fell on it and got our rupiah out and paid.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">Then
with much bowing and thank yous (“Terimah Kasi”), we backed out of his store.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">Having
done that we were now faced with a new problem, what were these tickets for?</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">They
were almost certainly not for the train, as Palembang was the end of the mountain line,
and the only trains out of town went back to Bandur.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">We
guessed they were for the bus, but if so where did we get that?</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">Luckily
our crowd was still with us, so I showed the tickets to those in the front row
and made what was becoming an incredibly useful, “Where?”, sort of gesture.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">The
crowd members at the front read our tickets avidly and then made various, “come
with us” gestures and we, and about twenty of our followers moved off.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">As
we walked I remember thinking that we only needed a couple of tumbling acrobats
out front and some elephants in gold trim to mimic a procession as of some
colonial governor of old arriving to take up his position as ruler of the
savage land centred upon Palembang.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">Thankfully
the walk wasn’t a long one, although as usual within an hour of dawn in that
area, carrying a full backpack for three minutes led to the sort of sweating
that would task even ten litres of Gatorade to replenish.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">As
we processed, shopkeepers and stallholders would ask the Indonesian members of
our troupe what they were doing and they replied in the local tongue.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">What
they were actually saying of course we didn’t know, but assumably something
along the lines of “we are taking these lost giants where they want to go.”</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">Eventually
we arrived.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">The
bus station.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">Well,
that was a reasonable guess, but now we faced another hurdle.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">Presumably
our tickets were therefore for a bus, but which one?</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">Neil
and I re-examined them and there was no ‘Padang’
on them, but it did say ‘Jambi’.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">Our
followers gestured inside and then began to move off, we thanked them in Bahasa
and then went inside.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">I
might add that another of my reprehensible character traits at the time was
that I was a cheapskate.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">And
I should have handed out some rupiah to our jolly friends for their help.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">But
learning not to be tight with money was something else that I sadly wasn’t to
even begin learning for another twenty years.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">Anyway,
inside the bus station it was the usual anarchy, with the additional problem
that no one even spoke rudimentary English.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">We
solved the problem by showing our tickets to anyone who would take an interest
and were slowly gestured toward an empty part of the bus station.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">This
was a facer, why did they send us here?</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">We
put down our backpacks and considered the problem.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">Eventually
Neil hit on the answer.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">“Does
it say what time this bus goes?”</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">I
re-examined the ticket.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">It
didn’t, but then no Indonesian bus, and certainly not one out here off the
tourist trail, runs to a timed schedule, when it is crammed full, it goes.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">But
Neil had come up with the answer, our tickets were for a bus that didn’t leave
for some time, and presumably, when it did start to get organised, it would do
so from this section of the bus station.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">So
we sat on our backpacks and waited.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">Neil
ate some food, but I wasn’t hungry.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">After
my throat and now with incipient dysentery stalking my moves, food was the last
thing I felt like.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">A
shower, ten beers and a long rest would have top of my list, but since they
weren’t on the menu, I dozed while I waited.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">Not
too long though, which was nice.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">Eventually
the area around us began to exhibit a quickening of tempo.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">Locals
came and gathered then a bus arrived and parked nearby.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">There
was no name on the front that I recall, but when the driver and his offsider
got out and began animated conversations with the locals, I shouldered my way
through and showed our tickets.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">The
driver nodded and said something incomprehensible to me, but it was clearly our
bus.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">I
don’t remember that particular bus trip, it was 25 years ago, the next thing I
remember is being in Jambi, so I’ll move things along to there.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">I’ve
checked the mapping website and it lists the road journey from Palembang to Jambi as 4 ½ hours, which
tallies with my memory in this way.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">We
certainly got off the train at dawn, I remember that well, and the horse trough
aftermath (likewise, clearly, I’ll never forget that!).</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">I
remember the crowd around us in the square in the morning sunlight, so I’ll
conjecture we caught the bus at lunchtime or thereabouts, rode it for six hours
and arrived in Jambi near or just after dusk.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">This
would fit because we stayed the night there.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">I
might add, I was kind of concerned all day as from the moment we got off the
train, through the interaction with the travel agent, followed by the walk
through town with our friends, then in the bus station, we didn’t know where we
were going.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">We
certainly weren’t going to Padang.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">We
were basically hoping that wherever we were going, and however we did it, that
we were moving closer to Padang
in some form.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">Rather
like a bad pool player who moves their ball closer to the hole each shot, till
eventually they can pot it.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">So
dusk, and Jambi.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">I
remember without having to look up the guide book, the description of that town
as if I had read it yesterday.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">“There’s
not much to be said for this pleasant riverine town, it’s just there.”</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">We
had to take this as read as we couldn’t see much as night was falling and we
weren’t there to sightsee, it was merely a stopover.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">We
likewise weren’t in any mood to hotel hunt, and so allowed to most vigorous of
the touts at the bus station to guide us to a nearby hotel and checked in.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">So
since we didn’t do much in Jambi except stay overnight, I’ll report something I
read there.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">If
Jambi has any tourist activities at all it is mountain trekking.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">And
each trek company has a book that tourists can write down their thoughts about
what they experienced and the best (possibly in history) was written by a group
of Australians at the end of a five day hike.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">They
described “bad food, rain that knocked you flat, insects the size of tractors
in your tent and a guide who wore an enraging smile for the whole five days
having lunged his length into a blonde kraut trollop the night before we left.”</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">Our
hotel for the night was a nice rural domicile, not opulent, but clean and since
it ran to three floors, well aerated.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">I
actually got a good night’s sleep there, which was important because if you
include our last night in Jakarta, tossing and turing in the sweaty backpackers
there, it would have been my third night with little or no sleep, but even that
was obliterated in the end because as we slept war was declared.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">When
I awoke it was to the sound of artillery going off everywhere in the
traditional pre-skirmish barrage.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">I
arose from my bed as if one of those shells had landed under it and ran to the window.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">But
the vista wasn’t as I expected, hundreds of Indonesians marching to and fro
firing rifles and trying to overthrow the government.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">The
streets weren’t red with blood of hated oppressors and slogans of revolution
weren’t being daubed on walls to urge the populace to revolt.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">No.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">It
was raining.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">Many
before, and surely many after me, will try to describe rain in the tropics, but
nothing can really portray the all-encompassing aural assault.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">Our
hotel was roofed with gal iron and of course was not insulated with pink bats
for heat and noise suppression, and the rain in Jambi fell upon it and made a
noise like Satan had given a drum kit to each of his demons and they had all
come around to rehearse on the hotel roof.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">I
panicked.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">Why?</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">Well
again as I look back from a vantage of 20 years I realize now that I was
becoming seriously unhinged.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">If
you read the first chapter of this tale, you may recall that just two nights
ago I had a near death experience in which I nearly drowned off Java, I think
the shock went deeper than I realized.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">This
was followed by virtually no sleep and two ailments, throat and digestive
tract, destabilising what little equanimity I had left.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">And
I’ll tell you this for nuthin’.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">I
DID NOT WANT TO BE TRAPPED FOR AN INDETERMINATE PERIOD IN JAMBI.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">As
I’ve written, I had nothing against the town, but I didn’t want to be trapped
in the middle of nowhere, with my stomach loosening and not being able to
communicate with the doctor (if we could find one).</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">So
I leapt to my pack, packed it in record time, raced out to get Neil, then
stopped in my tracks.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">He
was sitting, smoking a fag, serenely looking out the window at the waterscape
that had enveloped the town.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">I,
in a panicked tone, said “C”MON, WE”VE GOT TO GO!”</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">And
I have to hand it to him, then and now, he has always been able to keep his
cool, he turned to me and said, “Why?”</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">Then
blew a slow stream of smoke out his nostrils.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">I’ll
stop writing in capitals now as it is annoying for the reader, but take it from
me, everything I said that morning was in a loud, racing, panicked tone.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">“It’s
obviously going to flood, we’ve got to get out of town before the river rises,
plus we don’t know where to go to next, and we have to find the bus station,
then we’ve got to buy our tickets…,” I railed on for some while.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">Neil,
to his credit, saw what I would take 25 years to see, that I was panicking and
becoming deranged, and so agreed to pack and we would head for the bus station
and move on.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">He
then gave me one of his Lomotil’s, a medicine for diahorrea, which was vital
for another day being bounced around in the back of a bus, and helped me calm
down by getting ready quickly.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">He
even forwent his breakfast as I recall, which only those who know him well,
will realize what a sacrifice this was.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">Neil,
had, possibly still has, the mightiest appetite that I’ve ever seen.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">He
has won two eating contests that I know of.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">One
was at a party late at night after it had began to die down.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">Much
pot had been smoked and Andrew, another friend from uni, who witnessed it, described
things for me.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">“What
they did”, said Andrew, “was sit down in front of the fridge and had a bet on
who could eat the most.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">The
rules were that they wouldn’t shut the fridge door until there was no food
left.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">It
was pathetic really, the young woman he was eating against was full after 20
minutes.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">But
Neil was still sitting there when I went to bed.”</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">So
forgoing his breakfast was something I appreciated.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">Also,
and literally, thanks be to the heavens above, the rain had stopped.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">And
as we made our way through the streets back to the point where our bus had
dropped us the night before, steam rose from the streets and soon the sky was
blue and we were sweating again.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">Life
in the tropics all right.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">We
then went through the usual rigmarole at the bus station but things were
starting to go our way slightly.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">From
Jambi, although there was no direct connection, the name Padang, was not unknown.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">So
we paid our rupiah, got our tickets and took our seats in another bus.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">And
now, get ready, because you are about to read something that I strongly suspect
has never been written before, and will possibly never be written again.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">We
boarded the bus, which we learned was taking us to the town of Solok,
a mere hour from Padang.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">The
driver started her up and headed out onto another mountain road and soon we
were switch backing our way over mountain passes along a narrow two lane
mountain road.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">This
was another 18-seater, mid-size tourist coach, and so Neil and I were put on
the back bench seat as the only place we would fit.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">I
was right in the middle and so had no seat back in front of me, and had to hold
on to the seat backs on either side of the aisle, one in each hand.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">And
here it is.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">The
problem I had was that the bus wasn’t crowded enough.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">Never
heard that before, huh?</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">I
had too much room, and longed for ten or so Indonesians to be wedged in next to
me to stop me sliding around on the slippery, sweat-soaked plastic seat.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">Each
time we began a climb I would be slid backward and each hillcrest saw the bus
pitch forward and I would have to grab the seat backs hard and brace myself to
stop me sliding down the aisle all the way to the front.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">Additionally,
I was already fully clenched in the buttock area as I couldn’t imagine the
embarrassment of having another “Palembang-station-incident” on the bus and
having…, well you can see what I mean, I won’t describe fully the outcome that
would have followed from that.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">And
so the day wore on, we climbed, then we descended, we climbed, we descended.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">This
went on for hours.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">Once
again I’ve checked the mapping software, and it lists Jambi to Solok as four
and a half hours.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">I
can assure you it seemed like forever we were traversing those hills.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">But
eventually we came to a flatter area and to the delight of my buttocks we began
a smoothish run into Solok.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">Then
things began to go our way at last.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">We
arrived in Solok and debussed into another diesel-fume-soaked bus station.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">We
found that we were in the shadows of the post, and not only was the name Padang part of the talk
here, but we had reconnected to the tourist trail and so many of the station
staff spoke good English.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">Not
only that, but there was a bus to Padang
every hour and the next one was leaving quite soon.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">With
a relief that I still list as among the greatest of my life we bought our tickets
and boarded our last bus.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">It
was till early afternoon and the next thing I recall was riding through the
streets of Padang
in the sunlight.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">Slowly
the bus emptied at various stops and eventually the conductor fellow came back
and said, “Dimana turun?” (Where do you want to get off?)</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">I
replied, “Youth Hostel” in a questioning tone, he nodded and went back to speak
to the bus driver.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">Slowly
the bus emptied and then we were the only ones on board.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">Finally
the bus pulled up outside a tourist hotel and the conductor gestured to us.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">We
thanked him and the driver, and got off.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">I
don’t know if the bus was scheduled to stop there, probably not, like having no
timetable, Indonesians buses have no set routes, and they had courteously
driven us to the nearest suitable hotel.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">The
bus pulled away, and we went inside.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">We
checked in and having thrown our packs on the bed, went back out and walked the
hundred or so metres to the ocean.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">So
Neil and I finally stood on the Indian Ocean coast of Sumatra
and stared out to sea.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">The
mapping software listed our journey, all going well, as 26 hours.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">It
had taken us nearly four days (96 hours) and nearly did for me, physically and
mentally.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">But
now new feelings were beginning to steal over me, like dimmest, reflected
starlight revealing a shape in the night.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">What
was happening?</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">Well
I’ll start with a rather bizarre digression, which I hope will help show what
was going on.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">I
have never watched a lot of Star Trek, indeed most of my interaction with the
show has been through secondary spoof sources, sending up the essential
ridiculous nature of the show.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">A
writer to Viz probably put it best when he wrote: “TOP TIP: Star trek captains.
Always do the last ditch, million-to-one shot idea to save the Enterprise first, as it is the only one that
ever works.”</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">But
enlightenment can be found in the most unlikely places, even in Star Trek, and
so here it is.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">Whenever
the crew of the Enterprise were in deep space
and came under attack from the Stillettan Armour Fiends of Stitterax, the
hostile aliens would begin to pound the Enterprise
with their laser cannons and they crew would put up the deflector shields to
reduce the damage of the bombardment.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">Sooner,
rather than later, the captain, Kirk, would radio down to Mr Scott in the
engine room and say, “Mr Scott, stop all non-essentials and divert power to the
deflector shields.”</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">Scotty
would then reply, “I’m giving you all I’ve got captain. If you want more you’ll
have to stop the engines, or shut down life support.”</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">Or
something of that nature, then they would go on to do the last ditch thing,
whatever it was, to reverse thrust fire or something, blow up the Armour
Fiends, and move on through space.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">Well,
like that scenario from science fiction, that four day journey from Jakarta to Padang,
threw up the same choice inside my head.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">So
taxing was the trip with sickness, tiredness and all the rest that eventually
my emotional engine room sent the same signal back to the bridge, “Lachlan, we don’t have enough energy to keep up your
emotional shields. You have to decide what you want to keep doing, either keep
your emotional shields in place, or stop travelling and get some rest, you
can’t do both.”</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">I
had come to Indoesia from a very privileged, white bread, comfortable existence
in Australia.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">I
don’t know what I expected from Indoesia, but in retrospect, I wanted to
maintain control, and mostly keep up my emotional deflector shields, so that I
could present the image I wanted the world to see.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">I
wanted buses on timetable with set routes.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">I
wanted taxis to come as the second hand was ticking up to twelve.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">I
wanted access to 24-hour health care.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">I
wanted brilliantly lit, sparkling clean bathrooms with crystal clear fresh
water taking my waste away to the latest high tech sewage treatment facilities.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">I
wanted people to speak English on demand.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">I
wanted everyone to put their cigarette out as courtesy to me because my throat
was sore.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">This
list of wants could go on interminably.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">So
the question you naturally want to ask is, “Well, why did you go there?”</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">And
that is a good question that I find it hard to answer even now, 20 years later.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">I
went to “go travelling”.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">But
what does that mean?</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">I
found the mechanics of travelling in the third world were nothing but painful,
so the actual “travelling” part was something I detested.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">I
don’t like sightseeing much, then as now, so I wasn’t there to see the
buildings or experience the culture.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">While
I was there I was to learn and come to understand the acronym that anyone more
self-reflective than I would have told me that it was time to stop travelling,
“NAFT”.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">Not.
Another.Fucking.Temple.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">I
didn’t surf then, and that is the major reason that most Australians go to Indonesia, so I
wasn’t doing that.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">Thus,
why was I there?</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">The
original plan I’d made with Neil was to go to Indo and then across to Malaysia and the Asian mainland, up through Burma to India,
across that and off to England,
where I was to take up my newly minted teaching career.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">But
now as I stood in the dusk on the shores of the Indian
ocean I realized more third world travelling was the last thing I
wanted to do.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">And
so to the questions asked me by the two dutch nurses at the beginning of this
story.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">Again,
looking back it was the first time I came to understand that psychology, while
not a hard science like chemistry and physics, was indeed real, and more real
than I could imagine.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">My
parents attitude to psychologists and psychiatrists was that they were all
madder than the people they saw, and that only fools and weaklings go to
counselling.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">So
I had come to a man’s estate thinking I was a strong powerfully-minded
individual who didn’t need any help and knew everything.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">So
it was with some surprise that I found my first encounter with the invisible
part of my own mind a disturbing experience.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">So
to recap, here are the questions and my answers, which even as I contemplate
writing down for you all to see, I can hardly help but cry out in anguish at
the pretentiousness and arrogance of my 27-year-old self.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left: 18.0pt;">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left: 18.0pt;">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">What is your favourite animal? Taipan.
This animal represents how you interact with other people.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left: 18.0pt;">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left: 18.0pt;">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">What is your second favourite animal?
Dolphin. This animal is how you would like to be seen by other people.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left: 18.0pt;">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left: 18.0pt;">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">What is your favourite drink? (Cringe)
I said the first cold beer you have after winning a rugby match. </span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left: 18.0pt;">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">This drink represents how you like sex.
Sadly, this shows I saw it as a prize, a conquest, something to be grabbed and
consumed in rioutous fashion.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left: 18.0pt;">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left: 18.0pt;">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">Picture a box, what it is made of and
what is inside it. (Double, triple cringe), I said a shoe box with a pair of
rugby boots in it. </span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left: 18.0pt;">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left: 18.0pt;">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">Describe the ocean in three words. I
said “Big, scary, waves.” This answer is how you see life. </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">Clearly, I saw life as pretty
frightening, which was directly contraindicated by my answer to the last
question, which was:</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">Describe how you would travel across
the ocean from one island to another. Money is no object, and the laws of
physics need not apply.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">I said, “I would like to windsurf in a
straight line on flat calm ocean.”</span></div>
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<div class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left: 18.0pt;">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">Indicating that I wanted to travel
through life with no hiccups or problems whatever.</span></div>
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<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">These
questions are unlikely to be found in any clinical psych text, I feel they
would be described as potted psychology at best, but I found them stunningly,
blisteringly, accurate.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">The
two questions related to rugby, embarrassing though it is for me to relate,
were perhaps the most.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">Before
Neil and I had left Australia I had changed from my standard winter sporting fare
of soccer to rugby, and had finally broken away from my mother’s stern
injunction that I wasn’t allowed to play rugby because only uncouth yobbos
played that and had taken up the game with a passion.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">And
indeed, I realized that I didn’t want to see another temple, I wanted to get to
London, open my
shoebox, pull on my boots and start flying into tackles and running with an egg
shaped ball under my arm on the green sward.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">I
think the only thing I can lay credit to on that dusk in Padang was recognizing my feelings and giving
weight to them.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">In
retrospect it was the first time in my life that I had understood that my
parents were wrong about something, psychology was important, and I did have
feelings and desires, and it was time to start looking at them.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">I
didn’t announce to Neil that our joint travelling was finished there on the
beach at Padang,
but it was coming.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">I
might add, Padang
was already notorious as one of the few, possibly the only, beach resort on
Earth, where swimming was banned.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">When
we went down to the ocean I had thought ‘how bad could it be?’.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">But
as soon as we got there I understood why, the shore break, just ten metres from
where Neil and I eventually came to a halt to watch, crashed down on the sand
from three metres.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">The
sound and vibration of that murderous shore break was genuinely frightening to
behold.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">Contemplating
that I had thought it would make the most perfect end to my story: “So after
four days of travelling hell, we stood on the sand by an ocean you couldn’t
swim in. Just fucking perfect.”</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">Beautiful.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">But
then I changed my mind, that ending continues with my patronising attitude toward
Indonesia
and the Indonesians.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">Now
my ending for this stanza is, I’d like to think even better for journalistic
irony and pivotal balance.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">In
the end, my journey was just beginning.</span><br />
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<a href="http://byronshortstories.blogspot.com.au/2013/10/3-sumatra-sideways.html"><span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">Next Chapter </span></a><br />
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<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";"><a href="http://byronshortstories.blogspot.com.au/2013/10/fiction_24.html">Back to home page</a> </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";"><span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span><span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span><span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span><span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span></span></div>
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LKhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11244232092173678321noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8082972746234187865.post-12777828473389031692013-10-19T18:21:00.001-07:002013-10-19T18:26:39.839-07:00Emotional North<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS",sans-serif;">by Lachlan Barker</span><br />
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<a href="http://byronshortstories.blogspot.com.au/2013/10/sunset-in-south-java-then-it-all-went.html"><span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS",sans-serif;">1 - Sunset in south Java.</span></a><br />
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<a href="http://byronshortstories.blogspot.com.au/2013/10/dawn-over-palembang.html"><span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS",sans-serif;">2 - Dawn over Palembang.</span></a><br />
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LKhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11244232092173678321noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8082972746234187865.post-2635913652508361112013-10-06T21:17:00.002-07:002013-11-11T18:33:37.399-08:001 - Sunset in south Java.<!--[if !mso]>
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<b style="mso-bidi-font-weight: normal;"><span style="font-family: Tahoma; font-size: 14.0pt; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">1</span></b></div>
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<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">In
the end it was the ultimate change from the sublime to the ridiculous that
destroyed what even emotional keel I had.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">Just
a week before these events take place I was camping on a beach at the southern
end of the island of Java in Indo, with my friend Neil, and two beautiful Dutch
nurses.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">These
nurses, Hanika and Marayka, seemed to have an aversion to clothing and spent
the daylight hours topless.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">We
had met these two in a backpackers in the south javan town of Banyuwangi and they had told us they were
heading down to the south-western coast to a turtle beach with the hope of
seeing baby turtles running.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">They
asked us if we would like to come and we said an emphatic ‘Yes.’</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">Fully
clothed they would have made a trappist monk start talking, so the idea of a
couple of days with them in swim suits, or as events were to show, mostly out
of them, was a no brainer.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">Additionally,
Neil and I were both biologists, he already worked with turtles in Australia, and
so there was even a quasi-professional reason to go.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">But
make no mistake, it was the lure of the bikini that was all important.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">We
rented a truck, well, a motor vehicle that very loosely answered the term, and
bounced our way down there.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">There
was no real accommodation in the area, but we were all fired up to sleep on the
beach.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">But
as ever with travel in the third world, planning anything is at best a fifty
per cent return on thought.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">Firstly,
none of us had tents.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">Brilliant,
eh?</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">But
Neil and I in an attempt to be hairy-chested Australian macho men who were
phased by nothing, said “We’ll just sleep on the sand, we’re in the tropics,
how bad can it be?”</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">So
we tied our boots to our packs, put the packs on and then, as Peter Mayle put
it best, headed out “like two-legged snails”.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">We
had no real destination in mind, so we headed up the beach looking for a)
turtles, b) a nice spot to sleep and c) Hanika and Marayka’s breasts to appear.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">At
one point we came across a small trickle of fresh water coming down the beach
from the green undergrowth fringing the sand.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">We
stepped over and through it and continued on.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">Eventually
we found a spot we thought serviceable, threw down our packs and generally
lazed about.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">For
the two women, lazing about meant divesting themselves of all but bikini
bottoms and rolling around in the black sand.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">For
Neil and I, lazing about meant staring as if hypnotized at the breastual feast
being paraded before us.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">Then
the sun began to set with its usual tropic speed and I just want to say this, a
piece of philosophy I have developed over the years is: “You haven’t lived till
you’ve been slapped in the face, had a drink thrown over you and someone has
said, ‘Who the fuck are you?!’”</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">All
of which has happened to me, of course from my drinking days, but I would like
to add this to it.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">You
haven’t lived till you have seen two beautiful, topless Dutch nurses, rolling
in black sand, on a beach in south Java, while the tropic sun sets over the
western headland and the shadows grow long.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">The
natural setting itself was enough to start rhapsodic descriptions, but the
beauty of these two girls even put that in the shade.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">Anyway,
just so you know, no romance developed.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">Neil
was ready to propose to Hanika, but they both had boyfriends and we had to
content(?) ourselves with walking around bent double with sexual frustration
and lying stomach down in the sand to keep the physical manifestations of our
ardour hidden.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">Night
fell and thankfully Neil smoked so we used his lighter to start a fire.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">From
this point, though we didn’t realise it at the time, it was all going downhill.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">Firstly
it was night and so the girls put their tops on, so that pleasure was now
denied us.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">Then
we began to learn something about the tropical night, viz: it’s cold, or it
certainly was where we were.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">Slowly
as the evening moved on we pulled more and more clothing from our packs and put
them on our increasingly chilly bodies.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">Then
we began to creep closer and closer to the fire.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">THEN,
we realised that we were running out of firewood, and this realisation was
closely shadowed by the realisation that apart from having no tents, none of us
had brought a flashlight.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">Another
stroke of brilliance.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">We
at first used Neil’s lighter to try to find more driftwood, but that proved
ineffectual, and further that lighter was now integral.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">We
had to conserve its fuel in case the little fire we did have went out and we
needed to relight it.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">FURTHER,
to our outdoor ineptitude was a lack of paper to use as a fire starter.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">All
of us had toilet paper, but in Indonesia
toilet paper is even more crucial to one’s well-being than a working lighter.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">What’s
more, using it as fire paper is very ineffective as it turned to ash in the
blink of an eye.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">So
the night wore on and eventually we decided to get some sleep.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">We
lay, as I recall, with the two girls next to either side of the fire, with Neil
on the windward side of Hanika, and myself on the leeward side of Marayka.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">We
huddled up as close as possible against the cold, and so cold was it that
thoughts of sex had long gone from my mind at least, I can’t speak for Neil,
but am guessing he likewise was now only trying to stay warm.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">But
our efforts were to nought.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">After
an hour or so, Neil with his back to the wind realised it wasn’t going to
happen.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">He
sighed and gave up and went to his pack to have a cigarette.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">This
created a knock on effect.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">Without
his shielding presence Hanika was now fully exposed to the stiffish night wind
and a short time later she gave up, stood up and went to her pack and began
ferreting around to see if there was any other clothing she had missed to put
on.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">Then,
without Hanika and Neil to shield it, the fire went out.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">Thus,
Marayka was now taking the brunt of the wind and so she lay there fitfully for
a small while then she gave up.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">I
think I had drifted into a lightish doze, because I recall waking with a start
due to the wind now full into my face.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">I
sat up and felt, rather than saw, the other three moving about in the pitch
black night, and so I got up and we began discussing our predicament.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">We
faced the choice of sitting there all night freezing, or going somewhere else.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">We
vaguely considered moving into the undergrowth behind the beach, but if it was
dark on the beach, clearly it was blacker than hell’s midnight in there and so
we scrubbed that idea.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">Eventually
we decided that the only sensible course of action was to walk back up the
beach to the road where our truck had dropped us, then at least we would be out
of the wind, and we might even be able to find a village on the road where we
could spend the rest of the night.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">So
we put our packs on once more and then began a truly perilous walk back.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">I
say perilous for a few reasons.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">The
only passible light was a glimmer from the sliver thin moon, and the only area
this lit was the ocean, and little enough of that.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">The
sand as I say was black, and so obviously no aid, and of course the undergrowth
even less.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">However,
the oceans on the south western side of Indonesia have been famous through
history for their ferocity, and this beach was no exception.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">So
we had to walk close enough to the water to be able to see, but not close
enough to get caught up in it.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">I
might add, if you think that sounds like a small danger, later in this tale we
will come to a beach resort in Sumatra that
famously doesn’t allow swimming.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">The
reason: you can’t even walk into the ocean there.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">So
ferocious is the shore break that six-foot waves crash down from above head
height while you stand watching.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">And
likewise this shore break was not to be trifled with.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">Actually,
now that I remember it, the sound of the ocean crash was more useful than the
moon to find our way with.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">So
staggering slightly under the weight of our packs we picked our way through the
Javan night toward the road and some semblance of safety.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">Then
we came to the little stream I mentioned on the outward journey.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">Thankfully
was saw its vague outline in the glimmer of the moon as we pitch up onto its
shore.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">We
all stopped, more from fatigue than caution and tried to discern a crossing
point.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">It
looked more or less the same as it had done in the day, though we all agreed it
looked a little broader.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">I
decided to cross first, and with pack on I put my left leg into the middle of
the stream and disappeared from view.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">I
have had some shocks in my life I can tell you, but that was one of the most
severe.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">The
tide had changed while we were up the beach and the ankle deep trickle had
changed too.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">The
retreating tide had combined with the little stream to scour out a two metre
deep trench in the sand and with the weight of my pack, combined with the
shocking, savage, unexpected cold of the water, put me a) underwater and b) into
a catatonic shock.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">Thankfully
for me the currents and the morphology of the beach came to my aid.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">Close
by the point I took my plunge the stream curved sharply and I was flung up
against the sand forming the outer wall of the bend.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">Never,
I mean, NEVER, have I been so thankful for my feet to register contact with
something solid.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">If
the stream had been a little deeper, or if it ran in a straight line out to
sea, you may not be reading this today.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">But
with desperate energy I scrabbled in the sand of the stream bank, found some
traction and went up the wall of the stream, wresting collapsing sand out in
big handfuls, until like a goanna going up a palm tree I shot over the lip of
the stream and re-entered the view of my friends staring horrified into the
dark.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">The
water glimmering of my shivering hide gave them a small glimpse of me.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">Neil
said, “Are you all right, man?”</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">I
then replied with the stupidest overstatement since Stanley met Livingstone, “Yeah, I’m Ok, but
the stream is really deep now.”</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">We
conferred across the metre wide stream and then in parallel headed back up
beach till we got to the sand dunes at the head of the beach, here we could
tell that the stream was once again shallow, and the other three crossed over
and we went on.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">At
this remove of 21 years I can’t recall the exact sequence of events, in
retrospect I was still in mild shock.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">What
I do remember next is being on the back of an open backed truck, riding through
the jungle in daylight.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">Neil,
Hanika, Marayka and I perched on our backpacks among the locals carrying
chickens, rice , vegetables and various goods, who were headed for the local
markets.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">I
was still damp and coated with sand and salt, but the day was as warm as the
night had been frigid, and as we are about to see, that was as pleasant a ride
as I had for some time.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">But
before we move on, I want to report something that was to change my life.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">Whilst
I was hung up on reporting Hanika and Marayka going about topless, I forgot to
mention that as evening fell and we sat around the dieing camp fire, Marayka
asked Neil and I some psychological questions.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">They
may not be found in any text book, but as events will show, I found them valuable
beyond belief.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">These
were the questions:</span></div>
<ol start="1" style="margin-top: 0cm;" type="1">
<li class="MsoNormal" style="mso-list: l1 level1 lfo1; tab-stops: list 36.0pt;"><span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">What is
your favourite animal?</span></li>
<li class="MsoNormal" style="mso-list: l1 level1 lfo1; tab-stops: list 36.0pt;"><span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">What is
your second favourite animal?</span></li>
<li class="MsoNormal" style="mso-list: l1 level1 lfo1; tab-stops: list 36.0pt;"><span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">What is
your favourite drink? Alcoholic or non, anything goes.)</span></li>
<li class="MsoNormal" style="mso-list: l1 level1 lfo1; tab-stops: list 36.0pt;"><span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">Picture
a box, made of anything with anything or nothing in it.</span></li>
<li class="MsoNormal" style="mso-list: l1 level1 lfo1; tab-stops: list 36.0pt;"><span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">Describe
the ocean in three words.</span></li>
<li class="MsoNormal" style="mso-list: l1 level1 lfo1; tab-stops: list 36.0pt;"><span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">Disregarding
the last answer, how would you travel across the ocean from one atoll to
another. Fantasy rules here, you can go on a truffle bike, or fly in a
gravity box, it doesn’t matter.</span></li>
</ol>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">Later
on I will say what these questions and answers represent, it is a tool for
finding out about yourself, and Boy, did I learn something.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">So
back to our open topped truck.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">We
headed from the isolated coast, back onto the central spine of Java, and
reconnected with the main north-south tourist trail of Indonesia.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">We
than travelled north to Jakarta, the capital of Indonesia,
and man, that place is a maelstrom.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">Smog
like LA, traffic like you cannot believe and 24-7 freneticism that would have
been hard to take if you had just come from another capital city.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">For
us, basically straight off the beach, it was like being thrown into a blender.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">Among
the things I remember of Jakarta
was the bicak.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">A
bicak is a three-wheeled motorcycle taxi and I’ve always felt the Jamar Islamia
never needed bombs, it only had to get all the hated western tourists in the
country into one of these devices and send it out into Jakarta’s perpetual peak hour traffic and
job done.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">Neil
and I got in one of these death bringers for the journey to our backpackers.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">They
were/are built for Indonesians and so Neil and I, and our backpacks, filled the
rear and left us with little or no room to manoeuvre.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">The
drive chain to the back wheels was exposed beneath us and ran perilously close
to our socks and we spent the journey in perpetual dread of a) our socks
getting caught in the chain and our legs ripped off, and b) the other vehicles
on the road ripping our head and shoulders off.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">I
have a picture, still burned in my brain twenty years later of a truck tyre
moving menacingly toward my face as I sat trapped, unable to move.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">In
the end it was so close that if I could have moved my arms I could have undone
the wheel nuts with ease from where I sat.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">The
exhaust fumes of our vehicle and the traffic in general made our heads light and
when we eventually pitched up at the backpackers, we got out and fell to the
ground and kissed it like the pope arriving in a new country, so thankful were
we to be alive.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">With
nerves jangling we checked in.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">That
backpackers was an interior analogue of the city itself.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">Overpriced,
overcrowded.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">Not
fun.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">After
a shower we went to have dinner with Hanika and Marayka.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">And
if there was any slight chance of dalliance, it was snuffed out then and there,
for Marayka’s boyfriend, Pieter, had flown out to join her.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">He
was currently doing his national service as a submariner in the Dutch navy, and
was on two weeks leave.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">He
was everything I wished to be, young, handsome, fit and in bed with Marayka
every night.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">However,
he was a lovely man, and we had a nice evening.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">Later
on we said good bye to the three dutch travellers, they were heading for a different
part of the island, and repaired to our stuffy dorm for what was becoming the
norm, not a very good night’s sleep.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">The
next morning we examined our guide book sand maps and figured out what to do.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">I
was very happy as there was an English language book store and so was the first
port of call.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">I
was then, maybe still am, a horrendous cheapskate, and so went there and
browsed every shelf of the place, examining stock and comparing prices, without
purchase, I was going to make that decision at my leisure.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">That
night we went to the movies, and the next morning we had a conference and made
a decision that would change my life.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">Over
coffee, Neil pointed out that so far in Jakarta
we had shopped in an English Language bookstore, had dinner at a nice
restaurant, gone to the movies and sat in rush hour traffic.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">“We
might as well be back in Sydney”,
he said.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">I
heartily agreed and so we decided to go to Padang, a coastal resort a long way from Jakarta.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">So
far the rhythm of our trip had been to stay in one place for three days, then
travel for a day.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">A
day’s travel in Indonesia
then, probably still, could be 50 kilometres, or 500, mostly the former.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">This
had been sustainable and we had had a generally good, if not overly, relaxing time.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">Why
we made this decision I cannot now recall, but I think it was largely due to
the unpleasantness of Jakarta.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">There
were plenty of nice beach resorts close by, but we somehow thought that the
further we got from Jakarta,
the nicer things would be.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">Anyway,
the internet maps give the laughably optimistic time for the journey to the
mid-west coast of Sumatra where Padang sat centrally as the capital of the
region as 26 hours.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">If
only.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">So
we made the decision and went to bed planning to check out and move on the next
day.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">Morning
came and we packed our gear for the trip.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">I
was ready earlier then Neil and was ready to go while he was still smoking his
first fag of the day.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">So
I said, “Ok, I’ll take my gear and walk around to the bookstore to buy
something for the trip. When you’re checked out, come and join me there. If I
buy something and am ready to leave I’ll walk back and meet you on the way,
then we’ll head to the bus station, how’s that sound?”</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">He
said, “Ok”, and I headed off.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">Like
everything else in Jakarta,
walking was not pleasant.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">I
had my whole pack on and within metres of leaving Neil’s table I had sweat rolling down my body.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">The
smog caught my throat, and my shoulders already felt the bite of my straps.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">The
book store was about a kilometre away and when I arrived I felt like I had beaten
Tenzing to the top of Everest.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">I
had pretty much made up my mind what I was going to buy.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">It
had to be a long book, as I wasn’t sure when I would next find a bookstore, and it had
to keep me engaged, or I knew I would throw it aside in boredom.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">So
I purchased Lord of the Rings.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">I
had already read it twice, but knew it could stand a third pass-through.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">I
carried my book and bag out to the footpath and looked down the road for Neil.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">No
sign.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">I
waited a few minutes, and then with a long-suffering sigh, hoisted my pack and
began the walk back to find him.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">I
got all the way back to discover him still at the desk of the backpackers
arguing over some sundry expenses.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">I
was exasperated, but he was doing the right thing, haggling is a way of life in
Indo, and you want to pay a fair price, but not be regularly ripped off.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">Not
that the money matters to us phenomenally rich westerners, but even the
Indonesians gave you greater respect if you haggled to a mutually acceptable middling
price.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">That
over we loaded up and headed for the bus station.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">Another
kilometre walk in the smog and heat.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">We
got there and tracked down a bus going to the ferry port
of Cilegon on the northern coast of Java.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">Our
vehicle was a standard Indonesian eight-seater mini bus.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">I
say eight seater, though I am not sure if these vehicles ever travelled with
eight people in them.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">30
was common, 40 not unknown.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">Additionally,
there are no timetables in Indonesia,
you simply get on the bus, and when there are so many people on board that the
driver can’t reach the gear stick without asking someone to move, you go.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">And
go we did.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">Another
characteristic of these trips is that any westerners sit up front, with, as it
happened, full nerve jangling view of the carnage to follow.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">I
should say, Neil and I aren’t giants, but best described as medium large
westerners.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">Both
being just under 180cm (just under six feet tall) and weighing in at 90k
(190lbs).</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">I
mention this because the only place we would fit in these mini-buses was on the
front bench seat next to the driver.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">20
odd Indonesians of smaller stature were crammed in the rear.</span></div>
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
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<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
</div>
<br />
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";"></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">The
journey to Cilegon took about three hours and the first hour of that was
through Jakarta.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">I
thought we were going to die a few times and already my eyebrows were becoming
permanently fixed to my hairline.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">In
my massive, massive naiveté, I thought once we get onto the highway through the
countryside, things will calm down, surely?</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">Wrong
again, Lachlan.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">We
eventually left the outskirts of the capital and my eyebrows began to return to
their more customary position above my eyelids when we passed our first fatal
accident of the morning.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">Glass
everywhere, two bent and savagely twisted vehicles.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">I
don’t know for sure if someone died, but there was blood on the roadway and
knowing the Indonesian predilection for overcrowding any vehicle, it was almost
certain.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">My
eyebrows once again took off like the space shuttle and we watched with the
standard appalled fascination as we inched through the traffic around the
accident.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">That
passed we returned to cruising speed and continued northwards.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">At
the time I was enjoying learning Bahasa, the official language of the
archipelago.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">I
had some “See-Spot-Run” level primers and it was something I genuinely enjoyed.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">I
was reading from one of these in a vain attempt not to watch the road, when
Neil, who likewise wished to learn a little bit, asked me, “How do you say,
‘What is your name?’”.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">I
replied, “Siapa nama anda”, and the bus driver, naturally thinking we were
addressing him, replied, “Rambo”.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">Like
absorbed spectators at a tennis match, our eyes swivelled in unison to look at
him.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">Rambo?</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">I
don’t know to this day if Rambo is a common name in Indonesia, or if he took it, or was
given it, for the Sylvester Stallone movies, but as we were to learn over the
next two hours, it was almost certainly the latter.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">If
he had been born in first world, he would have been dedicated driver of V-8
gruntmeister vehicles.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">I
guess we were lucky that his minibus was hopelessly underpowered, but then that
created problems of its own.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">I’ll
just digress to say that many have written about the traffic and driving in the
third world, but none better than P.J.O’Rourke in his book “Holidays In Hell”.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">His
story, “Third World Driving Tips” is best remembered for its description of
driving maniacally up hills, down mountains, through walls and over people.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">I’ll
just put in this little extract for those of you who wish to read it.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">“When
to honk your horn in the third world.</span></div>
<ol start="1" style="margin-top: 0cm;" type="1">
<li class="MsoNormal" style="mso-list: l0 level1 lfo2; tab-stops: list 36.0pt;"><span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">When
starting the car.</span></li>
<li class="MsoNormal" style="mso-list: l0 level1 lfo2; tab-stops: list 36.0pt;"><span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">When
stopping the car.</span></li>
<li class="MsoNormal" style="mso-list: l0 level1 lfo2; tab-stops: list 36.0pt;"><span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">When
someone is coming.</span></li>
<li class="MsoNormal" style="mso-list: l0 level1 lfo2; tab-stops: list 36.0pt;"><span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">When no
one is coming.</span></li>
<li class="MsoNormal" style="mso-list: l0 level1 lfo2; tab-stops: list 36.0pt;"><span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">And at
all other times.”</span></li>
</ol>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">So
with my eyebrows already starting to go over the top of my head and return under my chin we entered the mountains and we became unwilling close up
spectators to Rambo’s overtaking technique.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">What he did was this, you drove the accelerator venomously into the floor and
spurred the minibus up to its max speed of 90k.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">When
you came upon another vehicle and decided to overtake you pressed both feet onto
the speed pedal and moved out into the oncoming traffic lane.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">Then
you encouraged the passengers to throw anything not essential out of the window
to gain that extra few clicks.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">Then
you inched your way up to the overtaken vehicle and raced them for the next few
kilometres trying frantically to get ahead.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">If
another car came in the other direction, you either gave up and slipped back in
behind the vehicle you were trying to get beyond, if another vehicle had not
come up and was filling the space behind already, or you gritted your teeth and
continued to go for it.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">Rambo,
apparently living up to his name, almost never gave up.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">With
a full panoramic view of this Neil and I became suddenly religious and began
praying for the first time in years.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">We
went through three or four of these heart-stopping overtakes and were already
commending our souls to god when we rounded a corner and nearly added to the
carnage of the second fatal accident of the morning.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">Another
cluster of mangled vehicles, another swathe of broken glass.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">Rambo
in a split second moved both his feet from the accelerator to the brake and we
came to a shuddering halt within metres of the last car in the queue trying to
get around the accident.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">I
didn’t wear underpants at the time, but was beginning to heartily long for a
pair.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">Once
again we inched through and moved back up to travel speed.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">The
next hour was a copy of the first two with the requisite fatal accident to
buoy(?) our spirits.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">Eventually
we pulled into Cilegon and Rambo dropped us at the ferry port.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">Once
again we emerged from an Indonesian hired vehicle and fell to the Earth and
gave thanks for our deliverance from death.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">The
next step of the journey was a ferry ride across the Sunda Strait.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">We
were really, really looking forward to this as the first relaxing piece of
travel we had undertaken.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">However
I now had a new problem.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">It
might have been the dip into the stream on the beach in Java, combined with the
stress of the recent travel, compounded by the smog of Jakarta, but I was developing a really sore
throat.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">I
negotiated the tickets for the ferry, noticing I was already starting to sound
croaky, and feeling the flames beginning to lick around the back of my mouth.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">There
were three classes on the ferry, first, second and third.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">I
couldn’t quite understand the differences using my smattering of Bahasa.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">But
we eventually plumped for first, figuring after our ride with Rambo we needed
the most luxury possible, and so tickets in hand we boarded the ferry.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">If
I had been smart, I would have quickly found a pharmacy and bought some throat
lozenges, but I didn’t, and have rarely regretted a decision more.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">On
the ferry it turned out that first class differed from second only in that
first class was inside with an appalling Asian smash-up movie to watch, while
second was upstairs and outside.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">So
we decided to sit outside and enjoy the calming waters and lovely sea air of
Sunda while we unwound.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">However,
it was not to be.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">For
on this ferry ride we were to be afflicted, if that’s the word, by a new phenomena
that would become an increasing part of our lives as we moved further away from
the touristed areas.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">In
short, Neil and I were now (very) minor celebrities.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">In the more rural areas tourists were less known and the locals would stare
fascinated at us.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">Neil,
being blonde, particularly attracted attention.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">And
this first exhibited on the upstairs outside deck of the ferry.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">We
put our packs down and we enjoying the view when we became aware of an
increasing crowd of locals, mainly young men, gathering around us.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">They
weren’t rude, they were genuinely interested in us, and asked us the standard
questions of the travellers.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">“Where
are you from?”, “Australia”,
we would reply.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">“Where
are you going?”, “Padang”.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">“Where
have you come from?”, “Jakarta”.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">The
problem for me was, they all smoked.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">So
the beautiful night air was not sampled by me, only the vapours of twenty or so
clove cigarettes, heating my already chainsaw painful throat.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">At
first I tried to answer their polite questions but it quickly became clear that
my throat wasn’t up to it.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">Additionally,
the crowd was a revolving number and once someone had asked their questions they
would leave and another polite young man would come up and want to practise
their English with us.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">So
I gave up trying to answer and left it to Neil.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">However,
the smoke continued to fill my airways, and my relaxing ride across the strait
was not to be.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">Eventually
we arrived at the Sumatran side and pulled into the port of Bakauheni.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">We
disembarked and were wondering what to do.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">Night
had fallen and we needed somewhere to stay.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">We
couldn’t find anyone obvious to ask, but it was clear that Bakauheni was a
ferry port and nothing else.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">We
then noticed that everyone else from the ferry was marching in line toward a
large car park and boarding buses.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">We
decided to join them, figuring that the buses were going to the nearest town
and we did not want to be left hanging around the ferry terminal all night.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">Unlike
Rambo’s death machine, these were genuine tourist coaches, 36 seaters, or
thereabouts, and as I hauled my flaming throat on board I hoped for a safe
comfortable ride.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">However,
it was not to be.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">36
seats there may have been, but as ever on an Indonesian bus, this meant ninety
people would be crammed in there.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">When
I took my seat I then discovered that the original seats had been removed and
replaced with smaller seats and these were closer together.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">Their
were two nice young Indonesians between me and the window, seated so my left
buttock stuck out into the aisle.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">My
knees were not just touching the seat back in front, but were positioned as
though they were trying to scour out a hole in it.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">So
with my knees nearly touching my chin, my bum hanging out, my elbow regularly
stopping my travelling companion from breathing and my throat aflame we began
out journey.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">If
I wasn’t uncomfortable enough, I quickly realised that I had ANOTHER problem.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">As
a young man I was a keen cricketer and played for hours on Saturday afternoon
wearing cricket boots that were designed by someone who had never heard the term
“orthopaedic”.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">The
soles were sliver thin and eight spikes emerged to grip the turf as I ran
about.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">My
home town in country NSW was undergoing prolonged drought and the fields on
which I played were hard as concrete.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">Thus,
after some hours on my feet in these unsuitable shoes, my lower back would
start to complain.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">Not
a sharp pain, but a dull, uncomfortable throbbing feeling of unease.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">Of
course I had not been playing cricket before boarding this bus, but something,
possibly sitting awkwardly on the steel deck of the ferry had set off my lower
back discomfort.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">When
playing cricket, I could always stretch, hop or run on the spot, or do things
to ease this problem, but now, locked into my seat by the seat back in front
and the two travellers next to me, I couldn’t do anything.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">I
tried to shift my position, but that only aggravated my companions and didn’t
help my back at all.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">Within
twenty minutes I was gritting my teeth from the twin pains of my throat and
lower back.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">Within
an hour I was ready to convert to Islam if that would get rid of the pain.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">Adding
to my already unmanageable discomfort was we didn’t know where we were going,
and thus didn’t know how long it would be.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">I’ve
been able to use the internet mapping tools as I write this to figure that out,
which was: the journey took 90 minutes from the ferry port to the regional
capital of Bandur Lampung.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">I
can assure you that time dilation was in effect and if I had learned I was on
that bus in screaming discomfort for twelve hours, I would have believed it.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">Eventually,
thankfully, mercifully, lights began to appear through the windows of the bus
and we entered Bandur
Lampung.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">We
pulled into the bus station and quite frankly if we had rolled up at a
sulphurous pit with red flame emerging around a sign that said ‘Hell’, I would
still have got off that bus.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">The
above description of the christian netherworld is however almost prescient, as
we were about to discover.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">As
we stood in the bus terminal, with me going into a frenetic stretching routine
to ease my back, a young man came up to us and began talking in Bahasa, I
brought my mind to bear on him and eventually realised that he was offering to
lead us to some accommodation.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">We
were very thankful.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">We
still didn’t even know what town we were in, and the thought of getting out the
guide book and trying to find somewhere on our own was not to be borne, and so
we loaded up and followed our guide to the hotel.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">Well
I say hotel, but military barracks would be closer, a prison more accurate yet.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">We
were still, just marginally, on the tourist trail, but we quickly realised why
this hotel sent people to the bus station to get custom, if you saw it with
your own eyes, you wouldn’t stay there believe me.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">However
it was dark and we weren’t able to discern what awaited us inside, and as
stated we were in no position to argue.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">We
entered the lobby and began a dialogue with the young man behind the desk.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">This
tête-à-tête was another first, as he was the first hotel staff member we met
who spoke no English at all.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">Not
a word.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">My
fractured Bahasa wasn’t up to it, and though we both knew what we wanted, a
room, we didn’t have the spoken word tools to achieve it.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">We
both fell silent and then the young man had an idea, he waved his arms a bit in
a, “Wait-here-for-a-moment-gesture”, and left the room.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">He
returned ten minutes later with another man, and he spoke enough English to get
everyone sorted out.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">He
translated the check-in card for us, and Neil and I filled ours in.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">Then,
with much thanking and some tipping in rupiah, the English speaker left, and
our desk clerk led us to our room.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">As
soon as we opened the door, I realised I had ANOTHER problem.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">Heat.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">Another
digression, so bear with me.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">When
at primary school I went on an excursion of some of the historical points of
interest in our area, well, interesting to someone, but not any primary school
student.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">Anyway,
one was a jail at the historical village
of Hartley in the Blue
Mountains.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">It
wasn’t a full prison, more a pair of holding cells for the Hartley courthouse,
which at the time, the early nineteenth century, was the entire structure of the law in the
area.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">These
cells were concrete with the requisite steel bars on the windows and a plate
steel roof.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">We
visited in summer, and the heat inside these places was truly hell-like.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">Winter
was no better, Hartley, in the mountains regularly records winter temperatures
below zero and for any unfortunate spending a night there, winter or summer,
death was a real option.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">It
was as if they had been built to provide torture more than just containment.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">And
so when Neil and I stepped into our room that night, I was immediately
transported back to those cells behind the Hartley courthouse.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">If
I were to learn that our room had been designed by the same architect I would
not have batted an eyelid.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">The
floor was concrete, and the “beds” were raised biers of concrete with a single
sheet on them.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">The
walls and roof were corrugated iron.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">Bandur
was in on the coast, but we were far from any sea breeze here and we once more
began sweating great rivulets.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">With
sinking heart I threw my pack on my “bed” and then we had a conference.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">Neil
wanted some food, but with my throat, and the remnants of my back pain still in
force, I was not up for anything but being recumbent for the next ten hours.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">So
while he headed out to find some food, I laid out my things and began planning
for sleep.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">Even
I who claim to be a writer can’t hope to adequately describe the heat in that
room, suffice it to say that it the slightest movement, breathing for instance,
induced great waves of sweat to roll down my body.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">With
a sigh I got my rubber roll mat, laid it out on my “bed” then sat on it,
ferreting in my bag for this and that.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">Whilst
I was doing that, I became aware I had ANOTHER problem.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">Mosquitoes.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">I
slapped one on my arm and was aghast at the inch long swathe of blood it left.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">These
were tropical mosquitoes I might add, they were the size of house bricks and
had stingers that could go through the corrugated iron walls of the room, or so
it seemed to me.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">I
slapped the back of my hand, and realised I had killed two, covering my hand
with blood, but then to my horror, four or five moved in to take their place.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">Needless
to say a quick ferret in my pack told me I was out of mozzie repellent.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">But
I did have a mozzie net.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">So
I quickly unpacked it and found to my delight, the one “luxury” appointment of
my room.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">A
rusty nail stuck out of the tin above my head.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">I
was able to get my mozzie net fixed to this, and then lay it out around my
sleeping area.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">With
alacrity I got under it and was happier for about a millisecond, till I
realised I had ANOTHER problem.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">Airflow.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">This
may be hard to believe, and I understand, I really couldn’t believe it myself,
but the mozzie net, thin and diaphanous though it was stopped what little
cooling air there was moving about my body.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">I
crouched under it and considered my problem.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">Eventually
I lifted the tiniest, tiniest segment of the net and poked my nose out like a
polar bear cub emerging from its snow den for the first time.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">The
mosquitoes were ready and whined down to intercept.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">I
took as big a noseful of air as I my long-suffering throat could stand and
retreated back inside.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">And
so it went for the next little time, nose out, breathe, net down with a slam.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">I
readied my self for bed and then realised, of course, that I needed the toilet.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">With
a sigh of resignation and then a few deep breaths for courage, I lifted the
net, emerged like a racehorse when the gates fling back and stampeded down the
corridor.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">I
urinated into the hole in the floor that is the standard Indonesian toilet.
(The luxury ones have footprints painted next to them, showing you where to
squat.)</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">Then
as I made my way back to my room, I realised I had ANOTHER problem.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">Smell.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">I’ll
just regress here for a moment.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">Remember
I said that I had a few mental images of Jakarta
burned forever into my brain?</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">One
was the wheel nuts of a truck looming as I sat in the back of the bicak, well
the other was scatological.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">Not
far from our backpackers was a full-scale, five-star modern skyscraper, with
revolving doors, air-conditioning, bronze marble steps leading up to it, the
lot.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">It
was the head office of the Negara (Country, or Rural) Bank of Indonesia, and
was a centre of commerce and the hub for movements of millions of rupiah.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">That’s
fine, but what I most remember, and always will, was that these bronze marble steps
arched an open sewer and a young boy was defecating into the open drain beneath
from one of these steps.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">Bank
workers in their suits passed by without breaking stride, and the young boy
waved to passers by in the least self-conscious manner imaginable.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">To
me that will always stand as the image that best summed Indonesia at
the time.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">Horrendous
wealth, cheek-by-jowl with enormous poverty.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">Thus,
after a short time you became inured to the open sewers and public defecation,
and the smell dimmed to a dull background olfactory roar.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">However,
this toilet in my concrete hotel in Bandur was as fearful as they came, and as I
leapt, rather than walked out of there, I was longing for my room(!) and a diminution
of the smell.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">I
was to be sorely, sorely disappointed.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">Now
that I noticed it, the smell didn’t diminish one iota as I repaired to my cell.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">In
fact, if anything, it was worse, or at the least, just as bad.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">I,
with great reluctance, followed my nose around the room while beating off the
squadrons of mozzies and found, to my horror, that the sewer ran directly past
our room, I could see it through the gap between the bottom of the tin wall and
the concrete floor.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">I’m
guessing it had been dry in Bandur for a while, as the sewer contained raw,
randomly scattered pieces of shit, and feculent pools of raw sewage.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">Of
course if it was the rainy season, that would have been worse, I guess, the
sewer would have had liquid to move the stuff on, but that would have risen up
and entered our room under the tin walls.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">And
now that I was aware of it, the choking sewer smell was raking my throat and
sending that into new paroxysms of pain.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">So
I got under my mozzie net, got into the most comfortable position that my back
would allow, grabbed my mozzie net and made my nasal lunges for breathable air,
and waited for Neil to get back.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">As
I waited, I realised I had ANOTHER problem.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">Noise.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">I
had had a lot on my mind so far, so the noise hadn’t really impinged, but now
that I lay there taking my shallow breaths I heard the murmur of voices from
the room next door.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">It
wasn’t loud and I was just thinking that things were pretty quiet, all things
considered for an Indonesian town, when it all changed.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">The
door opened and suddenly the murmur became a full-scale party.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">Glasses
clinked, bottles were opened, cigarettes were lit and, from the sounds of it,
raucous jokes were being told.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">In
the recording industry it is a well known trick for accentuating a singer with a
weak voice to record them in a bathroom or some other hard walled room.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">Something
just like the room I was in.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">The
room next door was exactly the same and it worked a treat to accentuate the
voices.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">What’s
more, with the traditional Indonesian overcrowding, there seemed to be thirty
people next door.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">I
began doing what I would do for longish periods that night, staring at the
ceiling and begging for death.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">The
next morning we would see the denizens of the party next door and counted nine
people.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">Turned
out it was six oil rig workers, off the rig for their week long break onshore
and ready to party, and three prostitutes.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">The
three women were the voices I first heard quietly murmuring, but as the bottles
were drained there shrieks of laughter joined those of the rig workers to
create a real hubbub.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">Then
Neil returned and announced, “I could die in next few days.”</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">“Why
is that?”, I replied.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">“The
only food I could find was one of those street carts set up next to a sewer
with flies all over it and bats with their wings cut off, bleeding out.”</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">I
should say this was a common practise for food animals.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">Because
refrigeration was largely unknown, particularly in the poorer areas, a food
vendor would cut the throat of an animal and let it slowly die to allow the
bodies natural immune system to preserve it for some valued hours till it was
ready to be thrown in the pan.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">Well
that was all I really needed.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">So
far Neil had been a great strength to me, in my pained state, if he went down
with illness we would really be in trouble.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">And
so the long night began.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">I
don’t know how much I slept that night, but it was certainly not longer than a
half hour at a time.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">If
I drifted off and rolled onto my dorsal surface my back would hurt and wake me
up.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">If
I slept a half hour under the net, my lungs would cry out, and I would have to
wake and muzzily grab a few nosefuls of air.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">If
neither of these things occurred, the noise next door would reach a crescendo,
and we would jerk awake on our concrete beds.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">The
smell raged on and the mozzies massed at the fringes of our beds.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">Finally
dawn came and we emerged from our cell to face our NEXT problem.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">Geography.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">We
had by now at least learned what town we were in, Bandur Lampur, but weren’t
quite sure how to move onward to Padang.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">Padang</span><span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";"> was
sufficiently far away to have no direct connection, and so we had to come up
with a town midway, and hope to get a connection to that.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">We
consulted our maps and came up with the town of Bengkulu.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">On
the coast nicely midway, and just the job.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">We
lunged our gear onto our wracked bodies and went to the bus station.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">Now
we faced ANOTHER problem.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">Confusion.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">We
quartered about and found a bus that said “Bengkulu” on the front in the
destination window.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">Great.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">I
went up to the front of the bus and asked the driver of he was going to
Bengkulu, “Yes”, he replied.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">Double
great, we would soon be moving again.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">I
went to confer with Neil and said, “OK, this is the one, the driver says he is
going to Bengkulu”.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">Neil
raised his eyebrows and said, “well I just spoke with the ticket guy and he
says they’re not.”</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">Just
to clarify, most of the larger buses in Indonesia, and a few of the small
ones on popular routes, have two staffers.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">The
driver and a “conductor” who haggles with passengers over fares, takes the
money and runs things on board.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">Impasse.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">My
driver versus Neil’s conductor, who was telling the truth?</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">I
turned toward the bus, which already had twenty or so passengers on board and
said “Does this bus go to Bengkulu?”</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">“Yes”,
said some.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">“NO”,
said others.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">Nuts.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">We
repaired to the shade, sat on our packs and conferred.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">Neil,
who I should say was more phlegmatic than me and considerably more adventurous,
wanted to just get on there and see where we ended up.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">I,
increasingly strung out, somehow wanted things to go smoothly and mentally
demanded to know where we were going before we boarded.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">I
really, really, didn’t want to wind up in the middle of zarking nowhere in
another hotel like last night.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">So
we bickered in the shade and whilst doing so had our problem solved for us.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">The
bus driver started his engine and the bus pulled out of the station.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">We
then further conferred.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">There
was really no point staying here if even buses with the place we want to go
written on them can’t help us, so what are we going to do?</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">Neil
consulted his guide book and came up with an answer.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">Train.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">There
was a station in town and since trains ran on rails, there was no way we could
go wrong.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">We
grabbed a taxi across town to the train station and discovered, or course, that
the daily train for Bengkulu had just left.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">Our
options were therefore, return to our hotel and come back tomorrow.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">You
know what I thought of that plan.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">Or
catch a different line north.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">In
retrospect, one plan we didn’t consider was to go back to Bandur, find a nice
hotel on the coastal side of town, enjoy a night’s rest then catch the Bengkulu
train in the morning.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">Why?
I can only think we were sleep deprived and not thinking clearly, or, we were a
just a pair of idiots.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">I
think also somehow the goal of Padang had become like some trophy, some major
feat of third world travel to be achieved and then spoken about in tourist bars
to the boredom of all others.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">Anyway,
our choices were, the Bengkulu train which was well touristed as it ran along
the southern coast of Sumatra and was
considered beautifully relaxing.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">The
other option, to Palembang, ran across the
mountainous central spine of Sumatra, and
though picturesque in its own way, was well off the beaten track, and, I had no
doubt, contained more places to stay like the prison of the night before.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">At
least we had plenty of time to make up our minds, this Palembang train didn’t leave for some hours.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">We
once again retired to a quiet(?) corner of an Indonesian transport hub and
considered our options.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">And
there we will leave it for this chapter, with Neil and I sitting on our
backpacks in the corner of Bandur Lampung station.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">And
I can already hear you say, this is third world travel, why has there been no
mention of galloping diarrhea?</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">Well
it’s coming, believe me. </span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br />
<br />
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS",sans-serif;"><a href="http://byronshortstories.blogspot.com.au/2013/10/dawn-over-palembang.html">Next Chapter</a></span><br />
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<a href="http://byronshortstories.blogspot.com.au/2013/10/fiction_24.html"><span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS",sans-serif;">Back to home page</span></a><br />
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LKhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11244232092173678321noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8082972746234187865.post-56051904557129610902013-09-25T21:39:00.000-07:002013-12-01T18:37:28.979-08:00The Destruction of Lasseter's Road.<h4 style="text-align: left;">
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</xml><![endif]--><span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS",sans-serif;">By Lachlan Barker</span></h4>
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<br />
<div class="MsoNormal">
<b><span style="font-family: Tahoma; font-size: 20.0pt;"></span></b></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">It all started when Kellner at number 312 decided to
blow up the stump that was blocking his driveway.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">Kellner hated that stump.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">It didn’t stop him accessing his house, but merely
from parking next to the verandah of his house, which was a problem as he
repeatedly had to bring in his shopping in the pissing rain.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">He could have had it removed when the tree guys were
there, but Kellner was a cheapskate.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">He didn’t think he was, he thought he was merely
prudent, but anyone else when asked would make comments like “he knows the
value of a dollar”, and “he would make $20 worth of effort to get back $10
owed.”</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">When the tree guys charged him the exorbitant fee of
$350 to cut down the tree, he asked aggrievedly “do you use gold chainsaws?!”</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">Then they’d had the outrageous audacity to quote him
$2,000 to remove the stump.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">Over his dead body.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">So the tree company had cut down the tree, mulched
the logs and left with the stump in place.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">It was a big tree, and therefore now, a big stump.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">It sat in the exact middle of the cul-de-sac end of
his gravel driveway and was exactly in position to annoy him every time he came
home.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">He had tried his own hamfisted efforts with his
rusty, never starting, always breaking down and always blunt chainsaw to remove
bits of it from time to time, but he had never changed the bulk of the thing,
and now he’d had enough.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">Kellner couldn’t have exactly told you why now was
the time to do something about it, but it was almost certainly to do with his
neighbour, Wills.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">Kellner hated Wills, but then really, Kellner hated
everybody.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">Disliking the bulk of the human race seems to go
hand-in-hand with being a cheapskate, why? Who knows, but Kellner certainly
fitted the mold, maybe it was because it was only other humans who constantly
cheated him out of money that was certainly his by right.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">His work paid him less than he deserved.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">The supermarket charged him more than the products
were worth.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">The government took more than their fair share in
tax.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">But Wills his neighbour didn’t have any monetary
interaction with Kellner at all.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">No, Kellner hated Wills simply because of the noise.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">Lasseter’s road was a meandering suburban entity
that wound away from the town and got quieter with every passing bend till you
arrived at Kellner’s driveway, the last dwelling, in the full blown
countryside.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">Thus Wills’ constant habit of partying every weekend
with backpacker chicks he met in town annoyed Kellner to the point of making
his doctor think he was eating raw salt, nothing else could explain medically
Kellner’s blood pressure.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">To be fair to Wills, he constantly invited Kellner
to his parties, but Kellner never went, suspecting (quite rightly), that Wills
only invited him to reduce the number of neighbours at home in bed, who would
then complain about the noise.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">And this decision to remove the stump, by fair means
or foul, had been taken by Kellner in the week after a particularly noisy
party.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">Even then, Kellner probably could have handled the
noise, but the accompanying annoyances were beyond the pale.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">For instance: even if Wills had not invited him
over, Kellner knew there was a party on because of the number of drunk and
stoned backpackers who would get lost and turn up in Kellner’s driveway and ask
if “he knew where Wills lived?”</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">Whereupon Kellner would tell them “no”, and they not
understanding or simply full of drunken bonhomie would then say, “but you must
know him, he’s a great guy and there’s a party on tonight, it must be around
here somewhere?”</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">Kellner would then relent and whilst grinding his
teeth give them approximate directions and let them get on with it.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">He had for a while deliberately given them the wrong
directions, but that had just led to innumerable camper vans driving up and
down Lasseter’s Road all night seeking the party as mariners had once sought
the Flying Dutchmen.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">So he suffered on the whole in ground tooth silence.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">He had tried wearing his chainsaw earmuffs to bed,
but this had had the counteracting effect of not hearing cars pulling up onto
his forecourt and coming out on the morning to find he had been parked in by
these party goers who had thought his parked car was a sign that this was party
parking, they had then parked their van and wandered off through the trees to
Wills house to party all night.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">So all in all Kellner was not a happy, or even fully
sane man when he began the process of obtaining explosives to remove the stump.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">A saner person would have noticed for instance that
the very house he wished to park closer to, was ipso facto, close enough to
sustain damage.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">But the stump by now had become the repository of
all Kellner’s frustrations.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">Somehow it embodied everything that was wrong with
the world, or at least the part thereof that Kellner inhabited.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">And so he sat down at his computer to find out how
to turn that small volume of hated wood into a large amount of smithereens in
the shortest period of time.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">Milliseconds ideally.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;"><br /></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">Wills was drunk.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">Even he knew he shouldn’t be drunk at two in the
afternoon, but if he knew it internally, there was no way he would admit it
publicly.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">He had a job, sort of.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">The sign on the side of his car said “builder”, but
he wasn’t really, or perhaps more accurately, he was a builder who hardly
worked anymore.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">What he did do, when he could pull himself together to
do anything, was supervise people who really knew what they were doing.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">Even then the word supervise was a hopeless
over-estimate of Wills’ skills.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">If he got a job for a new client, it was usually
because an old client from the time when he did swing a hammer had passed his
name on.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">Then Wills would swing into action and beg other
tradesmen in town to do the job.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">Wills hated and loved those phone calls.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">In the short period after the phone had been
replaced in the cradle he would be filled with a joyous euphoria, he had work,
he could afford more alcohol.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">This feeling of well-being would last until the
first problem arose in the build.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">Then he would cross the divide into hating this job,
the client, the tradesmen he had dragged on site, the building supply house,
the labourers who worked for him, the architect, the council for placing
countless footling regulations in the way of doing things and all because they
kept him away from the bourbon bottle and the company of 18 year old backpacker
chicks (his word) which he preyed upon.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">He went to the fridge and poured himself another
drink.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">He was “not at work” this day, meaning he was
supposed to be supervising the laying of a concrete slab at a build outside
town, but had twisted the arm of the concretor to do it all without him and was
now sitting on his deck getting a full alcohol glow on before the weekend’s
partying started six hours or so hence.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">He had as usual invited his neighbours for the
night’s party, but as usual those miserable, police-calling gits would not
attend.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">He didn’t really want them there anyway, but even
Wills knew that he had to try to maintain some sort of political détente.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">He wasn’t sure if anyone could have him kicked out,
or indeed if even the coppers could do anything when they showed up once a
weekend to tell him to keep the noise down, but keeping some sort of peace
seemed to a good idea.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">Of course once 8pm rolled around Wills would be in
the midst of bourbon-induced revelry and didn’t care if the US Navy started
shelling the place in a vain attempt to keep the noise down, he was drunk and
was allowed to have a little fun wasn’t he?</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">But then neither Wills nor Kellner could have
foreseen that a single tree stump would not only see the end of Wills partying
but the end of life as the residents of Lasseter’s road knew it period.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">O’Driscoll knew he had been doing this job too long.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">He often tried to remember back to a time when he
was a young policeman and to discern if his attitude to the job had been
different.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">He knew the job wasn’t different, the things he’d
hated then, he still hated now, but back then he seemed to have more patience.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">O’Driscoll felt that this was ironic, and certainly
paradoxical, in that young men were supposed to have less patience, but he felt
that back then he had more time to take over things.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">Why then was his fuse shortening on a daily, if not
an hourly basis?</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">Like the slowly dispersing cracks in a concrete dam
wall, he could feel a parallel corruption of his restraint.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">The scenario he feared was if just one more drunk
started arguing with him, then abusing him, in the course of his work, he would
go off like the fourth of July.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">Just one more drunk, just one more loud mouthed,
habeas corpus quoting drunk could see him turn from a regular joe into
something so incandescant, so full of nitric rage that not even a straight
jacket could contain him.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">Probably the thing that most enraged him these days
was the “Why don’t you go and arrest some axe-murderer?” line that he got from
every single fucking drunk.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">The drunks seemed to think that what they were
doing, pissing on a shop front, fighting in the street, vandalising parked
cars, then pissing on said car, jumping on bikes left chained to parking
meters, and/or spitting on him, were somehow perfectly reasonable ways to
behave.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">His old cop buddies from the academy who worked in
different locales would say make similar complaints, but then they would admit
that at least in their towns the drunken crescendo occurred only Friday and
Saturday nights.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">O’Driscoll’s town was a coastal resort with nearly
two million visitors a year and the partying was 24-7, and thus there was no
let up for O’Driscoll and his colleagues.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">Even then, the tourists were in general the best
behaved of the people he dealt with.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">Handsome Aryan men from Germany, passionate French girls,
Danish travellers.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">There only offences were driving vehicles that were
as roadworthy as a rowing boat.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">When they partied at their accommodation they would
shut it all down meticulously at 11pm and go quietly to bed.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">No, the real troublemakers and regular abusers of
O’Driscoll, were the locals and their sense of entitlement to do whatever they
damn well liked and if someone complained that was too bad because they were
locals.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">With a sigh O’Driscoll realised it was time to go
out on duty.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">He got his car keys and drove out of the station.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">It was Saturday at 6pm, he just prayed that tonight
wouldn’t be the night he cracked.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">“Coastal Demolition, Brad speaking.”</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">“Yes, I wonder if you can help me, I want to remove
a stump from my driveway, can you guys help me with that?” Said Kellner.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">“Possible, how big is it?” returned Brad.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">“Well it’s about, 1 metre across, maybe a metre and
a half.”</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">“OK, um, normally you’d get an excavator to do that,
have you tried any of the tree companies?”</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">Kellner ground his teeth.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">“Yes, I have, but the guys who cut it down wanted to
charge me the earth to do it. Also, I don’t think you could get a big enough
machine down my driveway to dig it out. That’s why I’m calling you guys, as far
as I can see, the only way to get it out is to blow it up.”</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">Brad, the voice on the end of the phone sighed
internally.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">He wished they’d never advertised they did explosive
demolitions.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">From the day his company had, they had been fielding
a semi-regular series of calls from weirdoes who just wanted to blow something
up.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">He began the weeding out process, “Well ok, I’m
happy to come and have a look, but the minimum price for any explosive related
demolition is $5,000. Are you prepared for that?”</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">Kellner nearly dropped the phone, he cleaned out his
phone ear with his little finger, “did you say $5,000?!” he responded.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">Brad sighed internally once more, “Yes. Any
demolition using explosives requires local council permit approval, insurance,
the explosives and staff to execute. Plus nearby buildings, roads, pipes and
trees have to be checked and shielded. Do you still want me to come out and
check it out?”</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">“NO” yelled Kellner into the phone and slammed it
down.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">He paced about his kitchen fuming to himself.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">He had a mental picture of a couple of hundred.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">In his mind’s eye he saw a demolition guy come out,
place a stick or two of dynamite under the stump, open a beer, press the
plunger and the job would be done.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">Once again he had not counted on the local council
placing a thicket of regulations around him doing what he wanted on his own
property.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">He wandered out to the front verandah and stared at
the stump.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">As he did he noticed that his “always on its last
legs” car, was leaking again.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">He went over and knelt under the front fender.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">This time it was the radiator, a very small pool of
green fluid was dripping on the ground.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">The leak wasn’t enough to worry him, his car had
achieved an almost zen-like state of continuing to run despite the eternal lack
of care he bestowed on it, he would just have to remember to fill it before he
left.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">He stood up, he went automatically to dust the
gravel off his knees, and as he did so noticed that there were dark stains upon
his skin.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">Probably oil or diesel from leaks from other parts
of his engine.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">Then something clicked in his mind.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">Diesel.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">Where had he read something about that?</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">Something to do with diesel exploding, something to
do with home made bombs.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">“Home made” was an expression Kellner loved, it
implied less money spent.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">He went back inside and turned his computer on.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">The party was in full swing and Wills was, as always,
drunk.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">Like the Inuit of Northern Canada who had twenty-two
words for snow, correspondingly Wills had a range of words to describe his
drunken feeling.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">A mild glow described how he felt when drinking
alone on his stoep at two in the afternoon.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">Mildly jouyous described the period around five to
six pm when he was “allowed” to drink, and the pace of his bourbon consumption
would quicken.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">“Pretty Happy” was when he began to forget what had
happened.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">And the ultimate was “totally fucking legless”,
which was literal, and described his immoderate progress around the party,
groping women, saying things like “Do ya’ drop ‘em?” (Meaning the accosted
female’s underpants), and was a period of the night when his legs no longer
functioned as decent ambulatory devices and so legless was accurate.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">He also has the expressions “Shit faced”,
“Slaughtered”, “hammered” to allow composite adjectives.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">“Pretty happy, verging on shit-faced”, for instance,
allowed him finer gradations to his descriptions of the revelry.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">Now it was ten pm and Wills was completely happy.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">His younger workers who did the procuring for him
had done a good job and his house and lawn was covered with 18 year old women.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">The music blared, the lights resounded and his mood
soared.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">Clouds of marijuana smoke drifted on the breeze.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">“What”, thought Wills, “could be a finer lifestyle
than this?”</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">A song he thought he recognised came on and he
yelled, “TURN IT UP! I love this song.”</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">The music soared forth and he realised it wasn’t the
song he thought it was.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">No matter.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">He moved onto the dance floor and sort of tried
dancing with a couple of attractive young women.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">In his drunken state he didn’t notice them edging
away.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">They knew him too well.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">It would have surprised Wills to learn that almost
everyone at his house that night hate his guts.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">The others at the party, all younger than Wills,
only attended because he provided vast tubs of free alcohol.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">He thought they attended because he was a great guy
who despite the ongoing years still knew how to party.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">Oh the self-deception of the middle aged.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">He shimmied across to the ice tub and got himself
another can of bourbon mixed with coke.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">Kellner ground his teeth.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">Another Saturday, another party at Wills’s place.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">He had already told two van loads of revellers that
the party was next door and “couldn’t they bloody hear it?”</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">They had responded as usual with the “can we park
here?” question, as if everyone on Lasseter’s road would be falling over
themselves to provide convenience for those attending.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">He told them to go back to the road and park at
Wills, and they had backed lurchingly down his drive in the dark.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">He knew he was in for another night of little sleep
and ongoing, increasing frustration and hatred of his neighbour.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">Among the real crosses for Kellner to bear was the
issue of timing.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">His job was with a road crew for the roads authority
and was up at 5am each week day to join the crew.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">And like all those with a regular early start he
found it impossible these days to sleep in on the weekend.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">He had tried, saying to himself, “c’mon it’s the
weekend, have a relax.”</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">But he had always just ended up lying in bed with
his eyes closed, until eventually, with a sigh he would roll over and start his
day.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">And of course this had become vastly worse with the
advent of Wills next door.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">Now it was Saturday night again and he faced his
usual courses of action.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">Like most, Kellner found his heart racing as he
faced the confrontation of asking Wills to keep the noise down.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">It was a<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">
</span>paradoxical endeavour.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">If he went over early-ish, say 9pm, Wills, full of
bourbon-fuelled bonhomie would wrap his arm around Kellner’s shoulder and ask
if he wanted a drink.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">Kellner would say ’no’ and then ask him to turn the
music down.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">Wills would say ‘yes’, and drop the volume.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">Kellner would go home and then wait out the next
step.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">Which was, an hour after Kellner had gone home,
sometimes a minute, Wills would have completely forgotten the conversation and
when next a song he liked came on would once again yell ‘TURN IT UP’, and so it
would go for another Saturday night.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">If he waited till midnight when the local council
noise covenant came into force, Wills wouldn’t even remember the conversation.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">Then Kellner would ring the coppers and complain
about the noise.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">The police were very good and would do their best,
but in this partying town, particularly in the summer, they had so many calls
for noise abatement that they sometimes didn’t get to Lasseter’s road till
three in the morning, by which time Kellner was a red-eyed wreck, dozing
fitfully in his chair in the living room, knowing the futility of entering his
bed, since the moment he did he would have to be up to tell someone to get out
of his driveway, or know that simply the volume of the music would rattle his
walls and make his bed dance in time.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">So he continued his research into home made bombs on
the internet, and with each passing second an unconscious desire to make Wills
sorry burgeoned within him.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">“You there Barry?”, crackled the radio in
O’Driscoll’s car.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">“Yes, June”, he replied.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">The dispatcher this evening was Constable June
Holcroft, O’Driscoll got on well with her and they had a loose and definitely
unspoken agreement that she wouldn’t bother him if she could at all avoid it.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">“It’s that time, I’m afraid,” said Holcroft.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">O’Driscoll’s heart sank.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">Like most in this coastal party town he knew the
time to the minute without looking at his watch.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">When the pubs shut, when the nightclubs shut, when
the bakery opened, when the first coffee shop opened, all provided him with
time markers that helped him through his shift.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">However, again like everyone else, he had trouble
keeping track of the days.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">“That time”, from June meant that it was Saturday
midnight and now the noise complaints would start coming in.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">“It’s not is it?”, said O’Driscoll in a hopelessly
optimistic attempt to change the time and day of the week.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">“Sorry Barry, but it is. And first up is your
favourite address.”</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">“What again? Jesus does that guy ever stop.”</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">“Well not this weekend, you on your way?”</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">“Sure June. I’ll go now.”</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">‘Your favourite address meant Wills place on
Lasseter’s road.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">O’Driscoll couldn’t count the times he’d been there,
but each visit was a carbon copy.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">He cursed under his breath and started driving.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">Kellner had decided not to go over and put his heart
through the racing stress of trying to get Wills to turn his music down this
night.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">He wasn’t sure himself why it stressed him so, but
it was most likely to do with the fact that it never did any bloody good.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">Some Saturdays Wills would turn down the music, but
as ever Kellner wasn’t able to relax, sitting in his living room waiting to
hear if a song Wills liked came on and the music got sent up to heaven again,
whilst Kellner gritted his teeth in his private hell.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">Also, even when Wills did turn it down, usually only
after the police came, the roar of the drunken conversation would easily fill
the sound vacuum and once again Kellner would have to wait till the last
reveller had gone to sleep, before he too could find some rest.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">So this Saturday he had gone for the easier option
of calling in his complaint to the police as soon as the noise covenant came in
at midnight.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">The police were very good about it, in that they now
knew why Wills’ neighbours called in at 12:01am, and responded as rapidly as
the events in town would allow.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">Thus it was Kellner’s call, routed through Holcroft
on the switch, that had set O’Driscoll on his way.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">O’Driscoll parked his police car at the end of a
long line of cars parked haphazardly on both edges of the road, indeed the gap
in the middle was barely adequate for a single car to pass.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">He locked the vehicle and began walking.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">If he hadn’t been here every Saturday for the larger
part of his working life, he would have known where to go by the noise.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">It was scandalous, he had no difficulty
understanding the neighbours complaints.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">He turned into the driveway and approached the
house.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">As ever possibly a hundred, maybe more people were
thronging the joint.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">He entered the exo-rings of partiers and began to
shoulder his way through to the heart of the action.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">If the noise was scandalous, so was the condition of
Wills, O”Driscoll knew him well by now and was able to pick him out where he
stood leering down the tops of two young women.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">With a long practised skill he manoeuvred his way to
the music centre and turned it off.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">The onrushing silence, well comparative silence of
only the voices echoing around the place continued.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">Wills, vaguely sensing something was wrong, well
different, to what had been happening previously, turned and saw the upright
blue figure of O’Driscoll staring balefully at him.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">“All right Tony, it’s midnight and you know you’ve
got to turn down the music”, said O’Driscoll.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">He then waited for the next part of the routine.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">Wills walked, well lurched in an upright sort of
stagger, over to speak with the sergeant.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">He threw his arm around O’Driscoll’s shoulder and
said, “Aw, yeah, officer, real sorry about that, do you want a drink?”</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">O’Driscoll looked down at Wills’ hand dangling below
his shoulder.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">“Take your hand off me”, he said, in as calm a tone
as he could muster.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">Thoughts shambled around in the subterranean caverns
of Wills mind.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">He faced this regularly.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">He had to impress the young women at the party with
his mature(?) and strong dealing with the policeman.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">He faced a difficult decision.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">He wanted to get through the conversation without
looking like he was backing down.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">But also, he didn’t want to antagonise O’Driscoll
who had the power to write him a noise citation, and, he vaguely thought, the
power to confiscate his music centre.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">“Take your hand off me, “ repeated O’Driscoll with
about the same level of menace as a leopard stalking a gazelle.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">Wills equivocated.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">“Would you like a drink officer?”, he said, allowing
him to take his arm off the policeman’s shoulder and rummaging in the ice tub
and coming up with a beer.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">“No”, said O’Driscoll, “what I want is to not be
called back here tonight because of noise, or any other complaints, do I make
myself clear?”</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">Wills struggled to come up with an answer that gave
him some face saving wriggle room.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">“Oh, sure, there’s no problem with that, you sure
though you don’t want to take a beer along with you when you go?”, he said.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">O’Driscoll, fed to the back teeth with dealing with
this guy, just shook his head and turned and left.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">He made his way through the now (slightly) subdued
crowd and began the walk back to his car.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">Wills turned back to the young women he had been
‘talking’ with to discover they had taken the opportunity to flee his advances
and made for a part of the party that Wills wasn’t.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">Wills, waited till he heard a car start on the road
and drive away, prayed that it was O’Driscoll’s car and then yelled, “OK, PARTY
ON!” and turned the music up to about half it’s previous volume.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">‘That should impress everyone’, he thought and began
patrolling for more female company.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">Kellner groaned.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">He was able to follow the events of O’Driscoll’s
arrival at the party as if he had been listening in on a phone extension.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">Some nights Wills had co-operated, this was one
night when he didn’t.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">Even at half volume he would have described the
music as blaring, throw in the conversation and it was as if O’Driscoll had not
been there at all.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">He had a vaguely defined feeling that it was somehow
bad form to call the cops twice in one evening, his only hope now was that one
or more of the other neighbours would complain.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">He went into his bedroom and lay down and wondered
what his quota of sleep would be this night.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">As he lay there he heard a snippet of a Wills
sentence, “…. Yair, I wasn’t having that, I even offered him a beer, and he
…..”</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">‘Some day’, thought Kellner to himself, ‘Some day’.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">The noise continued and Kellner began his Saturday
nightly activity of staring at the ceiling and waiting for exhaustion to
overwhelm the sounds from Wills house.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">The stump was no longer recognisable as such.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">An ice sculpture now stood in Kellner’s driveway, or
perhaps a highly localised snowstorm had fluttered down in the night and formed
itself into peaks and scallops on the woody surface.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">It certainly looked quite beautiful to Kellner as he
stood and admired his handiwork in the dawn light.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">Like all cheapskates Kellner had kept everything he
had ever owned in his life in a ramshackle shed made of stringybark logs, rusty
gal and fencing wire.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">He had once bought a cow which he was planning to
milk, but quickly learned the lesson that so many diary producers have, that
having even one cow gave one a morning and night chore that couldn’t be ignored
and tied you to the house, making holidays out of the question.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">He likewise has had a brief enthusiasm for gardening
and had layed out a garden in which he would grow veges, and save himself the
exorbitant costs associated with purshace at the supermarket.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">But likewise, he had found the work hard and by the
time he brought in soil and fenced it off, the veges from the garden had
actually cost more than those bought in town.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">Thus his shed was full of the remnants of past
ideas.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">One such remnant was bags of fertiliser, and it was
this product that now covered the top of the stump and trickled down around the
sides onto the driveway.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">Kellner had finally shuffled into a restless sleep
around three am, but his body clock had snapped his eyes open with a click that
almost audible at 5am.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">A lifetime of rising for work at this hour had once
again denied him a desperately needed sleep in.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">He had tried.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">He rolled and lay with his eyes shut, but after a
mere ten minutes of this he had swung his legs out of bed and lumbered groggily
to the kitchen to make coffee.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">Once he had imbibed some mouthfuls he had decided
that since he was up he may as well get on with the stump removal.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">He wouldn’t have really thought he was out for
revenge, but he had to work Monday and this was the day he had set aside for
the stump to go.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">He finished his coffee and went out to the shed.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">He shifted things around till he had located the
fertiliser and began dragging the bags out to the stump, one by one he emptied
their contents out until he was he had emtied all the bags.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">His internet researches had not been clear about
what volume of fertiliser was needed to create what sized explosion, but like
the chinese inventors of gunpowder centuries before he decided to start big, as
it was a big stump.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">He had brought home a jerry can of diesel during the
week, and now he emptied this onto the fertiliser and it, in more liquid form,
splashed and trickled down and through the fertiliser, pooling around the seam
of stump and gravel.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">He once more stood back and admired his work.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">Looked good, but would it work?</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">Soon find out.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">The last piece of the apparatus was an electrical
circuit to create ignition.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">The diagrams he had looked at had all favoured a car
battery with wires leading to the charge, but Kellner’s only vcar battery was
in his car, and he had carefully backed it up the driveway away from the
ignition zone.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">SO how could he set this off?</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">He went back inside for a coffee refill and thought
about it.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">He jiggled the cord to his electric jug to boil some
water for a second round of coffee.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">As you expect, his cord looked like Isaac Newton had
used it for early physics experiments and it had to be jiggled into place
create a circuit.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">An idea formed in Kellner’s mind.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">He had had a problem with rats.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">His television wouldn’t turn on one night and he
eventually discovered that starving rats had chewed through the power cord to
the back of the TV.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">As one would expect, he had taken the chewed cord
and thrown it in the shed, he couldn’t have imagined what it could ever be used
for, but now his frugality would pay off.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">He went out to the shed and ferreted about.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">Under a rusted out ride on mower, but dangling over
some besser blocks was the cord.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">He wrestled it loose of it’s impediments and took it
back to the house.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">He got some pliers out of his work room and then
examined the cord.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">He found the parts chewed by the rats and cut the
cord off neatly there.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">Then with some scissors he separated the two wires
back about twenty centimetres from the cut, then stripping the plastic from the
copper core.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">Beautiful.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">He plugged the cord in and flicked the switch.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">Holding one wire with the rubber handled pliers he
brought in closer to the other.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">A spark crossed the circuit and every light in his
house went out.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">He had shorted the circuit.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">He went around to the fusebox to flicked the fuses
back on.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">The hum of the fridge and light in the kitchen came
on again.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">Kellner was satisfied, he had the power.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">He plugged the cord into a powerpoint in the front
hall and carried it out to the stump.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">He placed the two wire ends into the
diesel-fertiliser mix and went back inside.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">He bent down to the powerpoint, installed at ankle
level in the hall, and flicked the switch.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">Nothing happened.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">In the part of his mind where no one else can go, in
the inner mental sanctum where he could be honest with himself, he knew this
would happen.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">The reason, generally, that home made things are
cheaper is because they don’t work.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">Or, they work once and then fall apart.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">Or, they work, haphazardly, sometimes effectively,
most often not.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">Kellner sighed.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">He walked down the hall and stood on his front porch
looking at the mound of chemicals piled on and around his stump.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">As he stood there in the quiet of the Sunday morning
his befuddled mind slowly grappled with a seed of mystery deep inside.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">True the explosion hadn’t worked, but…</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">He turned and looked back down the hall toward his
kitchen.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">The light was on.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">That was different, last time he’d tripped the
fuses.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">He turned back to the pile.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">As he did so, he noticed that the morning wasn’t as
quiet as he’d previously thought.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">Down at the very lowest level of his hearing a sound
was seeping in.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">Where had he heard that before?</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">At breakfast.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">The faint noise was a snap, crackle, pop, as of a
famous breakfast cereal when the milk is added.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">He went out to the pile and looked at the point
where the cord entered the mix.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">The sound was clearer now, and there was a sizzling
component.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">Then Kellner noticed that at the epicentre of the
noise, bubbles were emerging.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">With an appalled fascination he watched as a bubble
grew and popped, and was then replaced by another slightly larger one.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">With a rush a terrifying realisation hit him.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">Against all the odds, he had succeeded.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">His home made reactor pile was approaching ignition
point.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">It was the last coherent thought he had, his
endocrine system took over.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">He turned and fled.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">Through the house, out the back door and into his
ramshackle shed.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">He dove through the air and landed behind some straw
bales bought to mulch his garden beds and crouched down and held his hands over
his ears.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">Less than a second later the air was rent by an
almighty ka-whuffing sound, felt as much as heard, and the whole thing went up.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">Kellner had hit the jackpot of home demolition.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">Inside his shed he watched with a preternatural fear
as the rusty gal walls at the back of the shed bulged outward and then sprang
back with a clank that rivalled the sound of the explosion.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">From the house he heard the tinkling of broken glass
as every window on the front of the house disintegrated in a welter of shards.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">The stump itself, lifted and tilted as if by a giant
hand, then resettled down the driveway from the newly formed crater showing its
previous lodgement.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">The natural eucalypt oil in the wood, combined with
the spark and latterly encrusted diesel caught and red flame began to lick
around the stump as it settled, mud encrusted roots exposed, on the gravel.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">Kellner was a not a religious man but prayed for the
first time since childhood that he would come through this alive.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">The percussive effects began to recede, replaced by
the sounds of falling debris.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">First the heavier chunks of wood, glass and gravel
settled over the environs of his house, clunking,, clanking and thunking over
gal roof and timber decking.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">Then the lighter material began to fall and Kellner could
hear the pitter-patter of a gentle eucalypt rain on the roof of his shed.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">Eventually even this died out, and the quiet of
Sunday morning returned to Lasseter’s Road and the only sound Kellner could
hear was a persistent ringing in his ears.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">However, unbeknownst to Kellner, the effects of his
explosion were really only just starting.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">His attempts over the years to reduce the size of
the stump with axe and chainsaw had made a series of cracks and fissures in the
body of the stump.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">Sometimes he cut down, sometimes he held the
chainsaw parallel to the ground and thus a series of geometric shapes had been
visible in the stump.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">One of these, about the size of an adult human leg,
had been separated from the stump and launched into the high atmosphere like an
organic rocket.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">Coated with diesel and dusted with fertiliser this
chunk of timber sailed aloft trailing smoke and glowing red.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">At the zenith of it parabola the chunk turned
lazily, gravity took over and it began its descent.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">As it speed increased the flames died down, but
driven by the increasing rush of highly oxygenated air over its surface anew
and demonic cherry red incandescence burgeoned.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">Wills’ septic tank was not in great condition.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">Installed by the previous owner some twenty years
ago, it had now succumbed to the heating and cooling cycles of the seasons and
was cracked on all surfaces.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">Wills had inspected it from time to time and often
thought he should do something about sealing the cracks.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">If the wind was strong in any direction it wasn’t a
great worry, but if the wind was light and drifting toward the house, then
Wills’s place was enveloped in a fairly foetid odour.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">But then like most builder’s jobs, paid or
otherwise, Wills found it far easier to just say, “she’ll be right” and go back
to sit on his deck and drink bourbon.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">And so when this most aerial piece of Kellner’s
stump arrived at terminal velocity from on high, the cover of the septic
offered little or no resistance.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">With a crack, then a groan, a section of the cover
gave way and the still flaming chunk of wood entered and became as one with 25
years of well matured sewerage.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">And there for a few seconds matters rested and the
peace of this Lasseter’s Rd <span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>dawn
returned.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">Wills, passed out drunk on the outdoor couch on his
deck had started visibly from the first explosion at Kellner’s place, but then
unable to see the cause of the noise returned to his drunken sleep.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">Which was a shame in its way as he would have been
the first human to see a septic tank exploding.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">At first the timber merged with the contents of the
tank and a chemical battle ensued, with the moisture within at first
threatening to douse the rocket red surface of the timber.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">But the thing about septic tanks is that they gas
off.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">The smell that Wills had noticed over his tenancy
was indeed a highly valuable commercial product, natural gas.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">A bubble of this ignited, spread its exothermic
message to other bubbles in the tank and the peace of Sunday was once again
split by an almighty explosion.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">The roof of the tank lifted with a lurch and the
contents erupted skywards carrying, then splitting the roof of the tank into
smaller pieces of concrete.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">The cracks in the side of the tank gave forth
geysers of raw sewage and the side walls likewise came down and the contents at
the base of the tank decamped sideways in all directions.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">The percussive wave of force travelled up the pipes
connecting his tank with the house and all three of his toilets, two upstairs,
one down, became a revolting mirror image of their function, spewing raw sewage
out instead of in.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">The toilets began to run and cascades of the muck
formed rivulets, then creeks and finally small streams of sewage, flowing along
the halls and down the stairs.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">At the base of the stairs the various courses merged
and an ankle deep pool of waste began to cover the living room carpet before
flowing over the step, onto the deck and down the garden.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">The flying sewage then began to retrace the path of
the burning timber progenitor of this cataclysm and returned to Earth, covering
the roof of Wills’ house, the driveway, the garden and Wills himself.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">Wills, insensible from twelve hours of bourbon
drinking slept on.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">Some time hence he would wake and know truly what
hell was.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">“Barry”, crackled Holcroft’s voice over the radio.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">O’Driscoll stared at the thing in disbelief.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">It was 7am Sunday morning, an hour after he should
have clocked off.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">There was no way, just no way, that Holcroft was
thinking of sending him on a call.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">Following the first call to Wills’ place he had then
dealt with the usual round of Saturday night calls to holiday makers and told
them, one after the other, at one house after another, to turn the music down.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">He had argued with drunks till his already
threadbare tolerance had approached a point similar to the pile of explosive in
Kellner’s driveway.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">With gritted teeth he tapped the ‘respond’ key on
his car’s mobile.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">“June”, said O’Driscoll, in ominously low tones, “I
know, I just know you are not calling me to go on another call.”</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">“I’m really sorry Barry”, said Holcroft without preamble,
“I really am, but you’re the only mobile unit left and this is a recall.”</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">O’Driscoll rolled his eyes.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">A recall would indeed tie Holcroft’s hands.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">In an attempt to “simplify’ dealing with late night
complaints, the supervising officer had decreed that if at all possible, the
same officer would return to a previously complained about address, as they
already knew the situation, and it was thought this would aid in sorting things
out.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">As if, O’Driscoll had thought to himself many times,
ANY administrative tweak would make dealing with irascible drunks any easier.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">“All right”, said O’Driscoll, “what is it.”</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">“OK”, said Holcroft, “I’ll read you the exact words
of the call that came in four minutes ago.”</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">Holcroft cleared her throat, “There was a big party
last night that went on till after 4am, then this morning there were two
explosions at the party, now there is a really bad smell and I have had to
close all my windows. Can you get someone to have a look up there.”</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">June continued, “the call came from a Mrs Trail who
lives at 264 Lasseter’s road.”</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">“Goddammit”, said O’Driscoll. “OK, June, I’ll go and
see.”</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">O’Driscoll pulled over, made a u-turn and headed out
of town.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">Driving the vehicle was less a policeman than a
blue-clad incendiary device getting ready to detonate.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">O’Driscoll noticed the smell some kilometres from
Wills’s place.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">On this summer morning he had the windows down in an
attempt to stay awake and in a far less successful attempt to provide some
serenity to his fusing mind with a gentle rush of morning breeze.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">With the first waft, he rolled up the window and
found that the toxic odour was unstoppable.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">He drove on attempting not to breathe.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">He pulled up much closer to Wills’s house than last
night, the young things at the party, as always seemingly able to operate
without sleep, had decamped for an early surf of just not to be there when the
clean up started, and so the line of cars along the road was much reduced.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">He pulled a t-shirt out of the boot of his car and
with this providing minimal at best odour reduction, walked down Wills’s
driveway.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">Within a few steps of doing<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>this he stopped and stared.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">A perfect circle of…, well, now that he attempted to
form a sentence, he wasn’t sure what the substance was, but continuing inside
his head, he saw a perfect brown circle covering the lawn, driveway, deck and
roof of Wills’s house.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">O’Driscoll had been on the force twenty years and
like all beat coppers had a plenty of stories, some tear-squirtingly funny,
others that still rankled.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">He had seen fires, vomit covered driveway, blood
strewn bar rooms, fights, accidents and wild parties, but even he had never
seen anything like this.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">Whatever THIS was.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">O’Driscoll continued to stare and as he did a
movement caught his eye.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">On the couch, on the deck, a figure was struggling
to stand.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">The encrusted figure slowly, shakingly gained his
feet and like O’Driscoll stared down the lawn.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">O’Driscoll, still uncertain, knew one thing with
clarity.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">He wanted to be a long way from this odour as
rapidly as possible.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">“HEY!”, he yelled.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">The figure on the deck started visibly, then turned
and saw O’Driscoll in the driveway.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">He began a shaky ascent and as he slipped and slid
his way till he stood before the sergeant.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">O’Driscoll saw now that it was Wills, and realised
from the flecks of toilet paper stuck to his surface among the brown goo what
the substance coating every surface was.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">O’Driscoll then said a line that would go down in
the annals of police folk lore.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">“So Mr Wills, how’d this happen?”</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">Wills stared.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">He stared the stare of a man who had woken up with a
chronic hangover covered in sewage.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">He began to speak, but then realised he had nothing
to say.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">He didn’t know how this had happened.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">O’Driscoll waited a few moments and then continued,
“Well, however it happened you better start cleaning it up.”</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">This broke the walls of the little restraint Wills
had.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">“Clean it up! What are you fucking talking about, I
didn’t do this, I’m not cleaning it up.”</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">“Oh, so you do know who did this?”, O’Driscoll took
out his notebook, “would you like to file a complaint against the
perpetrators?”</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">Wills stared wildly around him.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">He hadn’t done this, couldn’t this dumbass copper
see that?</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">But then large chunks of the night before were lost
to his memory.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">Whatever had happened, and whoever had done it, Wills
didn’t know.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">O’Driscoll waited once more.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">“So Mr Wills, can I have a name please?”<br />
Wills shook his head.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">O’Driscoll waited again then put his notebook away.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">“OK, then I’ll leave you to clean this up. Be aware
that following the neighbours complaints you can be cited under the
environmental health act if you do not abate the smell and leaking sewage. The
maximum fine can be as high as $20,000 per breach, do you understand?”</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">Wills stared dumbly with bulging eyes at the
policeman.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">Sometimes there are no words, or more accurately, no
language had developed adequate words to describe his immediate situation.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">O’Driscoll gave it a few more beats to see if Wills
would respond, and then turned on his heel and walked away.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">He drove back to the station turned in his car,
reported briefly that the explosions on Lasster’s road were fireworks and it
was simply a big clean up job up there.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">Then drove home and went to bed.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">Wills finally regained his deck, found the phone and
began calling anyone whose number he had in his phone that had been at the
party.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">But those he could reach didn’t answer the phone and
when he went to leave a message he realised that asking anyone to come and help
clean was unlikely to respond to a message saying “there’s shit all over place,
can you come and help clean it?”</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">So he then searched his house for some cleaning
materials.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">He began at the top of the house and began
frantically trying to remove the sewage from his carpet.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">Within thirty minutes he had cleared a space a metre
square.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">He estimated he had a week of cleaning to go.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">And so Sunday continued on Lasseter’s Road.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">Kellner sat contentedly on his porch and watch the
stump burn away, soon it would be small enough to hack up and remove completely
from his driveway.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">He would wheel barrow in some soil and stones from
the boundary of his property and fill the crater.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">Then he would be able to pull up to his house, then
turn full circle and leave his driveway front on and not face the anxious
reversing that had been his such a big part of his driving life before.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">He had swept up the broken glass and would replace
that as the weeks went by, costly it had to be said, but in general the
overarching glow of having removed the stump, quietened his mind.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">Additionally, having noticed the smell he had snuck
through the trees and watched, hidden from view, O’Driscoll’s interview with
Wills.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">His hearing was till imperfect, and he hadn’t been
able to audit their conversation, but the body language told him all he needed
to know.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">What’s more the near square acre of faeces spread
across Wills residence had provided him with a satisfaction he had never known
before.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">All Kellner’s frustrations over all those times
Wills had refused to turn the music down over all those Saturday nights was now
gone, washed away on a tide of sewage.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">He hadn’t consciously set out to get revenge, but he
had succeeded, all unlooked for, beyond his wildest dreams.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">O’Driscoll slept well during a Sunday for the first
time in as long as he could remember.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">Most Sundays he struggled, with his mind continually
churning over the arguments he had had with raving drunks through Saturday
night.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">But this day he drifted off to sleep with the image
of Wills, covered in shit, facing multi-thousand dollar fines and having to
clean the lot up on his own, with a raging hangover to boot.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">Like Kellner, O’Driscoll had not set out to revenge
himself on Wills, but he had been granted a privilege denied so many law
enforcers, of seeing one of their tormentors completely reduced to mental and
physical rubble.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">None of the three men would have said they believed
in karma before, but certainly Kellner and O'Driscoll did now.</span><br />
<br />
<br />
<a href="http://byronshortstories.blogspot.com.au/2013/12/the-destruction-of-lasseters-road-2.html"><span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">Next Chapter.</span></a><br />
<br />
<a href="http://byronshortstories.blogspot.com.au/2013/10/fiction_24.html"><span style="font-family: Tahoma; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">Back to Home Page. </span></a></div>
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LKhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11244232092173678321noreply@blogger.com0