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I have finally started my exploration of the European mainland. “Why has it taken so long?” I hear some of you mumble to yourself. “What’s the big hurry?” I retort hotly, before quietly slipping out of quotation marks. I’ve never been a big subscriber to the’live every day as if it were your last school of life living’. If I did that I’d be broke and suffering from physical exhaustion. No, I plan on being around for a while, and a life is quite a lot of time to fill if you break it down. But no matter how you look at it, I’ve been dilly dallying around London longer than I intended. This is no bad thing, but with my energy levels restored to something of a normal level I found those old feet itching again, so I decided to join the rest of Britain in seeking cultural solace abroad.
The list of places that I want to visit has been steadily growing for years but my first choice was never in doubt. Barcelona is deeply embedded within my mind for a few reasons. The first reason is that my parents met there and imbue its streets with a mythical charm. Secondly, I have been there before on a childhood trip around Europe. When you’re seven years old the Sagrada Familia and Gothic Cathedral make an even bigger impression than on a fully formed mind, and they remain some of the strongest memory of that trip. Lastly, I feel an affinity with Spanish people. They’re not as stuck up as the French, more relaxed than Italians and the less said about Germans the better. So with destination firmly planted I risked the terrorist filled skies and flew to the Catalunyan capital.
When I arrived my first mission was to find a place to stay for a few days. Being new to this travelling malarky I just went to a cheap hotel. The old woman who ran it was used to idiot travellers talking in a language she didn’t understand and slowly guided me through the process. By the end of the transaction I had a room that most solitary confinement prisoners would have been pleased with, but I was only planning to spend a minimum amount of time there, so I really wasn’t worried about it. Unpacking consisted of throwing my bag on the floor as I could feel the pull of the street dragging me outside. I tripped down the 20 flights of stairs and burst out into the fresh Spanish air.
I may have been in London for too long but my first impressions were of the pleasant aroma. Everything was clean and there was room to move around in. It was a novel feeling after being hemmed in by London’s small streets and bad smells for so long. I was staying right on the Placa Catalunya, which is a large square and focal point north of the port. It is also the start of La Rambla, Barcelona’s main drag. La Rambla extends like a beacon of light from Placa Catalunya to the port. It is a wide street filled with people walking, stalls of flowers and birds, outdoor cafes and high stretching trees that provide a canopy of safety. It feels friendly, exciting, vibrant and was outside my front door.
With nothing in particular on my mind I ventured forth in the approaching dusk to get a feel for the place. As I sauntered downhill past the beautifully bright Spanish buildings I noticed something peculiar. The newsagent stalls were selling hardcore pornography. I don’t know why this stood out. I wasn’t looking for it and was aware of the continent’s looser attitudes to adult publications, but it still comes as a bit of a shock to see a double fisting video prominently displayed on the street.
The shock didn’t detract from my enjoyment of the walk. It’s a truly spectacular looking city and even though night had fallen I could see why so many people had fallen in love with it over the years. Delicate alleys led to squares dotted with palms and cafes. There was a sexy, lively feel, that no attempt to standardise or modernise could subdue. I was suffering the effects of a head cold but still managed to make my way down to the marina, which has become a massive entertainment complex. I’d just left a massive entertainment complex (London), so was content to go back the way I came. I aborted an attempt to go back through the Gothic quarter mapless, tired and at night. The stray cats were giving me funny looks and I know when to take advice from a cat. I was groggy and stuffed up from my cold so I retreated to my room/cell and listened to Spanish ads on the loud TV, and the even louder sporadic arguments from the elderly owners of the hotel.
When I regained consciousness the next day I revisited the coastal area. In my walk along the beach I was amazed at the Spanish man’s fascination with small dogs. I’m not sure if this is to make them feel more powerful but the number of them was beyond a joke. The water looked a bit brown and the smell whipping in off the sea breeze doubled my respect for the surfers braving it’s waters. You have to really love surfing to take it up in Barcelona. On the way back into the city I wandered into the Gothic quarter. Fate brought me to the Santa Maria church, which jumped out at me from around a corner while I was innocently walking along. It wasn’t open at the time but when I returned later the stained glass left me weak at the knees, which I’m sure is the desired effect. I also stumbled across the Picasso Museum. The man had a superb sense of humour. Barcelona feels like you’re walking along in one of his paintings – a beautiful jumble with objects jutting out where they don’t belong. It’s hard to tell whether they influenced Picasso or the modern structures have sprung up under his long-gone spirit.
My next jaunt took me inside the Gothic cathedral. It does it’s job of being an awe-inspiring spectacle. I havent seen many cathedrals, but this one rates highly on my list. I just feel sorry for the cleaners – stout little Spanish women with rubber gloves. They’re really doing god’s work. One of the female tourists near me fainted, but whether it was from lack of food or a vision, I couldn’t tell. One of the priests looked very excited at the prospect of a religious event but the woman’s friends were holding her legs up and splashing water on her face, so he wasn’t really much use. In the end she had to be stretchered away, so she was obviously one of the sinners. The old people in the area looked worried but I think it was because they knew it was their turn next and no amount of praying could prevent it. It made me feel good to be in a place with so many virtuous worshippers. Say what you will about them, they give off good vibes. Unfortunately my cold didn’t get any better. God must know I’m an atheist.
Everywhere you go in Barcelona you get a faint whiff of sewerage. It smells like the sea, which goes to show how much seafood the natives eat. It’s not a bad smell – it sums the city up. Even its shit doesn’t stink.
I made the obligatory trip to the Sagrada Familia Cathedral. For those who don’t know it, it’s that massive eight spired beast that has come to represent the city. I don’t know how the fuck they managed to put it together. The details are incredible. Huge stone angels are completely dwarfed by the enormity of it all and there’s an amazing amount of detail in the carving. I just had to lie on the ground and stare up at it for a while.
My first overseas jaunt has filled me with a renewed enthusiasm for travelling. I think Rome is next on the list, or maybe Edinburgh, and then there’s Germany …
Stay tuned for more in the ever expanding travelogue that is my life. Call me a Euro-slut and spank me hard Mary.
Hello my very good friends,
It was pointed out to me recently that my entertaining stories of a young Australian living out his dreams in the Motherland had come to a rather abrupt halt. My apologies to all those scarred by the deafening silence from this end. Nothing was further from my mind than insult or implied stagnation. I’ve just been rocking along in my own little world as I usually do, and without the added stimulus of things like new countries I tend to get a little self-absorbed.
Enough of that! The purpose of this email is to fill you in on my latest wheeling and dealing without having to customise too much for each person. It’s true, these emails started as a time-saving device and grew out of my control. I’ll assume that you’ve all read my email regarding moving house. You can probably understand my need for a bit of a rest and a chance to settle down before I felt a sufficient excess of energy to devote to tasks like this.
The last you heard I had just moved into a new flat in South London. I was working a three month contract in Hammersmith and barely keeping my head above water. Since then the flat has become one of the nicest places I’ll ever live in. While not as big and sentient as Archer Street in Dicko, it’s rooms glow with warmth and the wooden floors are a much needed grounding with nature in a city obsessed with growth, change and fun. My room is on the third floor with a pretentious view of Canary Wharf, the biggest skyscraper in London. It’s as big as the lounge room, so I’ve stashed a couch and stereo up here, making it the ultimate chill-out room.
So that’s the house sorted. The other priority and source of irritation over here is a job. To be honest I’ve been fucking lucky. The number of positions in front-end web development has completely dried up and I think I snagged a permanent job just in time. I’m doubly lucky in that it’s quite a good job. There aren’t any Hitler-type power freaks, I’m not asked to stay till 8 at night yet and the work is enough to keep me going insane from boredom. It’s not much of a life though. It was suggested to me recently that I should take up a position in a light-house, and I must admit that it holds a certain attraction. Living in London is fun, don’t get me wrong, but there must be more to life than this?
As you can probably tell, I think far too much. But when I’m not thinking, I like to get horrendously drunk. Take the other Friday for example. The usual Friday drinks were on the cards at the local pub, the Beehive. The Beehive is a dark and dingy pit of despair but they stay open after closing time so it’s pretty popular. It was a doubly festive Friday drinks as it was Juan’s birthday. The plan for the night was to get very drunk at the Beehive before going to the local strip joint. I should point out here that I was raised under a strict feminist ideology. I’m probably more of a feminist than all those women who say “I’m not a feminist but …”. Suffice it to say that strip clubs aren’t high on my list of a good time. In fact, I find the thought of a bunch of old drunk men leering at a woman being paid to spread her legs distinctly depressing. From the looks of the outside of the Queen Anne you could tell what it was like inside. It was the size of a small house. All the windows had been boarded up, I assume to stop people getting a free perve. In preparation for the night a few of us decided to climb some trees in the park across the street. It wasn’t a well formulated plan, probably brought on by some absinthe consumption and copious amounts of beer. It was a relaxing way to unwind after a week at work and I’d recommend a sit in a tree to anyone.
The night started to dissolve after one of my colleagues broke the branch he was hanging from and tumbled with it about 10 feet to the ground accompanied by peals of laughter from above. He’s a tough Swedish lad though, so no harm was done, apart from to the tree of course. By this stage most people had gone into the strip pub leaving a few dissenting patrons in the park to enjoy the late evening sun and fine lager. The group of us eventually settled into some firm drinking at a neighbouring waterhole, nodding in sympathy at the ashen-faced compatriots as they left the den of inequity.
I was intending just to go home but my team leader Ian asked me to come in. Apparently some guy had seemed a bit dodgy and he wanted to check that everyone in there was OK. Bear in mind that I’d had seven pints and some absinthe at this stage, so I was far beyond caring or understanding. The strip joint was exactly what I’d been expecting. It was about twice the size of your average lounge, with’a ‘stage’ in the centre. Judging by the pattern of the carpet, not to mention the stains, this place had been going strong since the seventies. I’ll spare you the excruciating details. Let’s just say that dodgy strip pubs in Vauxhall don’t get very good talent. With my head reeling and half a stiffy (a bodily reflex, I assure you) I ran from the horrible women paraded before me. Once back in the smoggy summer air I paused for a second before heading back to the other pub for more beer. I think I’ll stick to clubbing in the future.
Dave out.
As you may have heard on the grapevine, or maybe I told you myself, I recently moved house. It was one of the strangest and most horrendous experiences of my life and left me emotionally shattered.
Let me begin this tale of suffering and woe by describing the character of my friend Adam. He’s the kind of guy who would have revelled in the 60’s hippy scene in San Francisco. He loves smoking dope, free love and avoiding pain at all costs. You can imagine that he’s not a very angry person. I’ve only seem him really angry on a couple of occasions under extreme provocation but he’s normally a very relaxed character.
Adam and I had been frantically looking for a place to live for six weeks. We had made the decision to move out of our old house in Kilburn before Christmas and had been casually looking since then. If any of you know the London rental market you’ll realise that casually looking is about as likely to get you a house as knocking on random doors and asking if you can live there for a while.
We began to be under some pressure to move out. People had moved into Kilburn on the proviso that we would be leaving shortly and vacating one of the large rooms. We had already begged a one month extension to look harder but only two weeks of that was left. Adding even more pressure was the fact that I hadn’t been able to find a job since coming back from Australia at the start of January. As we headed into the middle of February we were discovering that landlords weren’t very understanding about my temporary lack on employment. Even my explaining that I was just between contracts was falling on deaf ears. If we wanted a place to live we would have to lie on a grand scale.
On the second last weekend before we would have to leave Kilburn we rang about a place in East Dulwich in South London. The best we could do was arrange for an appointment to see the flat on Monday. As I wasn’t working at the time I was elected to go and look at the place. I decided to set the scam in motion by going down there in my suit with the story that I was working for Freeserve, the biggest Internet Service Provider in the country. On the way down to East Dulwich, due to my inexperience on the overland rail system, I ended up on a line taking me within 30 minutes walking distance of my destination. Normally this wouldn’t be a big cause for concern but I was on a tight schedule and wearing my new leather shoes that had left my heels horribly disfigured the week before. As I hobbled up the rain soaked streets I congratulated myself on buying an umbrella that morning. The weather had turned against me and was almost blowing me back down the street. I soon discovered that umbrellas bought in very cheap local shops don’t cope very well with gale conditions. I was being pelted with rain from every direction while my umbrella insisted on turning inside out. I was soon soaked to the skin in a suit that was smelling remarkably like a wet carpet, pain shooting through my feet with every step, cold fingers madly fumbling at the now soaked map, and starting to lose my temper. As I navigated the confusing streets between Herne Hill and East Dulwich I passed the local school which had been attractively decorated with a burnt out car. At least the kids round here were normal.
My attempts at map reading aren’t usually too bad. I’ve successfully navigated my way around many parts of London. This day was a different story. I put it down to having cold hands, a wet map, and being very, very angry. After various wrong map readings I’d ended up walking up and down the same stretch of street four times. I began cursing the driving rain, venting my fury at the nature that so cruelly hampered my efforts at finding a house. All the weeks of job and house hunting had ended up in this moment of frustration and pain. Despite wanting to go home several times I eventually found the real estate agents. Impressively I was only 45 minutes late. I imagine I didn’t quite look the successful young professional that I was hoping to portray but my excuse of being late for the appointment due to heavy work commitments went down well. On the way over to the flat, as I secreted my wet suit smell onto the leather upholstery of the estate agent’s Audi, I gave my work story when prompted. It all seemed to be going well with this comfortable and self-satisfied character. As we bitched about looking for places to live while working full time I could feel my fortunes changing. Sure enough, when we arrived at the two-bedroom flat it turned out to be a corker. It was probably the nicest flat that I had seen in London. The price was right, it was clean and as a bonus it was nicely decked out. In short it was an absolute godsend. The hard part was going to be getting it.
On the drive back to the station I asked the estate agent how one would go about obtaining said property to live in if one was interested. He seemed quite taken with my conservative young man impression and very helpfully ducked into the office to get a couple of applications. There were the usual costs. One months rent in advance, a months deposit and a hundred pound holding deposit while references were checked. What I was banking on was making enough of a good impression to get the wheels moving without giving them a hundred pounds. If they discovered that our story was false it would mean losing money for nothing. Money wasn’t in such abundance that we could afford to do that. Adam and I duly filled out our applications and faxed them off the next day. My follow-up call proved discouraging. I was told that while they could start to get ready to look at our application they couldn’t actually process it until they had one hundred pounds. “Well that’s that!” I thought. With the amount of false information on the application they could sink our bid at any time.
I was all set to have a last ditch attempt at looking for another place that weekend when Adam received an interesting phone call. One of the real estate agent’s had rung up to ask us to supply the necessary references with no mention of a hundred pounds. While still not being very hopeful of getting the place we set further lies in motion. Jemima very kindly agreed to ring up and pretend to be my human resources manager at Freeserve which I then followed up with a fake fax. Luckily they had spotted my good character and by London standards were virtually begging us to live there. By Friday it had all been sorted and on Saturday morning we went to pick up the keys. When we left the real estate agent’s with the keys in hand we were in good spirits. All we had to do now was the relatively simple task of moving all our stuff from Kilburn to East Dulwich. Had we known what was to follow we might just have left the country as a simpler alternative.
Adam’s parents had offered to come down and help us move in a hired van. We got back to Kilburn before they arrived and started to pack some stuff up. When they got there at about midday it was like a whirlwind of efficiency. The van was soon loaded with the first half of our stuff and Adam left with his parents to unpack. What followed I can only relate to you in the garbled version I got when Adam returned at four. Apparently his parents found the flat unsuitable for him to live in. His mother took a brief look at it before fleeing to the van in horror and bursting into tears. Adam managed to unpack all our stuff and they proceeded to drive back. All the way home his parents told him he was a failure, that he’d never amount to anything, the flat wasn’t fit to live in and that he should give up his musical career, leave London and start a teaching job. As I mentioned before Adam is usually a calm and friendly person and is used to his mother being a bit critical, but this time with a dual verbal lashing from both his parent’s he finally snapped. There was a massive argument which resulted in Adam telling his parent’s to piss off back home. When he arrived back at the house he was the angriest I’ve ever seen him. He was literally foaming at the mouth and acting like a deranged wildebeest bellowing in pain.
I fully supported him in his decision to tell his parents to go away, but now we had a slight problem. Half our stuff was at the new place and half lying rather messily around our current rooms. Other people were moving in the next day, so we absolutely had to be out by that night. It being around 4:30 pm on a Saturday hiring another truck was out of the question. The only person we knew with a car was Adam’s girlfriend Jemima. In hindsight I probably should have called her given Adam’s mood. She was in Wales at a harp competition and when he asked to borrow the car she said “That’s a bit cheeky.” Adam’s response was to bellow very loudly “WELL FUCK OFF THEN!” and hang up. Before you start getting the wrong impression of Adam I should point out once again that this was very unusual behaviour prompted by the fact that his parents had just ripped his guts out and virtually disowned him. Now that Adam had managed to get offside with his parents and his girlfriend only his brother remained.
Jonny is Adam’s younger brother. He studies Astro Physics in Canterbury and is a really top geezer. He likes clubbing and staring at Jupiter, but most of all he loves his maroon bug. Strictly speaking it’s not his car as he and Adam co-own it, but it’s Jonny’s if the amount of time you work on it and love it count for anything. Jonny was in the last stages of his degree and doing his best impression of a hermit as he stayed in his room staring at formulas. We couldn’t ask him to jeopardise his studying schedule so we now had no option but to take the bus to Canterbury and pick the car up. As we waited outside the Kilburn house for the mini cab we started to analyse the situation. We would get up to Canterbury by about 10:30 pm, make it back to Kilburn just past midnight and move the rest of our stuff in a couple of hours. We were emotionally shell-shocked and not experiencing the smoothest move in history but we could still do it. We were standing around in the cold for about 15 minutes before we gave up on the cab and legged it down to the tube. Three quarters of an hour later we were at the Victoria bus station being told that the 8:30 pm bus to Canterbury had just left. Compared to the rest of the day waiting an hour for the next bus didn’t seem like the worst fate.
Thankfully we made it to our destination without further incident. Jonny picked us up and we went back to his place for a quick cup of tea. We eventually got on the road back to London at midnight. “No worries”, we laughed to ourselves. After all that’s gone wrong what does staying up all night matter. It was in this frame of mind that we greeted the first snow flakes of the night. Being an Australian I’ve only seen snow falling a couple of times so I quite enjoyed seeing the cute little flakes tumble down. It’s only with hindsight that I realise blizzards usually start small and get big. In about ten minutes visibility had been cut to ten metres and the windscreen wipers were chugging under the weight of snow. It was almost too much to take. After all the events of the day we’d ended up with the possibility of being stuck on the north circular in snow for the rest of the night. As Adam furiously tried to remember the way back to Kilburn, claiming he couldn’t see the signs because of the snow, I thanked my lucky stars that the last misfortune to befall us had been a blizzard and not the car breaking down.
You’ll be surprised to learn that the car didn’t break down. It was the next logical step and I’d being mentally preparing myself for the eventuality for some time. Instead something happened that was totally out of the blue. We hit a traffic jam. It was about 1:30 am on Saturday morning and we were on a three lane motorway that was inching forward. Adam and I had quit moaning. We had turned to switching between stunned silence and incredulous, hysterical laughter as a means of temporarily maintaining our sanity. Eventually we crawled past a sign that informed us that road works were being carried out between 12:30 am and 6:30 am of just that night. I think they did it especially for us. It was certainly starting to feel like nothing would ever go our way. At our darkest moment we received a phone call from Jemima. She was on her way back from the competition and offered to come with her mother to help us move house. We were way beyond being proud and gleefully accepted her offer. All we had to do now was find our way back home.
We finally made it back to Kilburn at 3 am. There was a fresh blanket of snow on the ground which we silently crunched over as we carried our stuff between the house and the bug. Jemima arrived soon after and we filled her car up as well. We set off with Jemima close behind us to navigate the streets of London.
Now as much as I like Adam he does have one major fault; he’s a terrible navigator. However much he tells you otherwise he has a talent for getting lost. Every time I’ve driven with him further than the local shops he starts to get this slightly confused, slightly scared look in his eyes and before you know it we’re driving round and round in circles. I hoped that it would be different this time as he had already traversed this route earlier in the day but the emotions of the move must have caught up with him. He took on the aspect of a hunted rabbit in the oncoming traffic’s headlights and started glancing about him in an over-tired frenzy. We were soon horribly lost in South London. Adam had managed to find the right area but we couldn’t pinpoint the street. We were frantically looking for a London map in the car when we got an abusive phone call from Jemima. She was understandably unhappy about driving around in circles at 3:30 am on a Saturday morning. Adam found an old map behind the driver’s seat and we hastily did a 180° turn to get back on the right path. We had finally arrived at our destination 20 hours after starting the move.
We managed to unload the cars and dump all our shit around the house. Jemima and her mother were impressed by the flat and we were suitably grovelling and thankful for their assistance. 5 am saw Adam and I finally sit down in our new house and christen it with a Star Trek film. We only got 30 minutes into it before we had to stagger up to our beds and fall into a hard-earned sleep.
You would expect that to be all from a moving story. The heroes finally get all their stuff over there and start to enjoy their new pad but not us. Not by a long shot. The nightmare week had only just begun. We woke up on Sunday morning and started to clean the place up and organise our stuff. Adam got some more demoralising calls from his parents but they had already said the worst they could. We wandered up the road to get some breakfast and returned to the flat feeling better, if not quite normal. Adam still had a few things to pick up from his house so he went over in the bug Sunday evening to get them. In the meantime Jemima had come over and we were talking about how nice the new place was when we got a call from Adam. Once again he’d lost his mind and descended into raving loony land. His car had broken down on the way back from Kilburn. In the middle of traffic the accelerator cable came out and left him drifting to an agonising halt. To make it even worse the driver’s side door was stuck and the passenger side was blocked by a wall of Adam’s belongings. In the end he had to crawl out of the driver’s side window.
When Jemima and I arrived at the scene he wasn’t acting very rationally. He abused Jemima for not bringing a tow rope and very nearly yelled at me when I told him to stop yelling at her. We couldn’t leave him stranded there though, so we got a tow rope and took him back to the flat. When we got there we helped him unload the car, and Adam and Jemima went to get some food. Soon after I got a call from Adam asking me to stop Jemima leaving. I looked out the window and saw a sobbing Jemima get into her car and drive off. To summarise the situation Adam had been abused by his parents, pissed his brother off by being in the car when it broke down, virtually broken up with Jemima for the fifth time and he owed me a large amount of money.
That’s right, the mother of all evil had reared it’s head. On the Friday before the move I’d lost my wallet. It was the first time in my life I’d done this and it occurred at the worst possible moment. I was relying on getting money out of my Australian account to finance the deposit and first month’s rent. With the keycard gone I had no way to get the money we needed. In order to get the keys on Saturday Adam had written a cheque but we now had to cancel this cheque and promise to get the whole £1823 to the real estate agent’s in cash on Wednesday. I was relying on a combination of an emergency mastercard, paying money by cheque from the Australian account to my Eng’ish one and my first week’s pay cheque. Adam had been counting on some money from his parents, which now looked unlikely.
The hell that our lives had turned into continued on Monday. The computers at Adams bank went down for the day which meant that he couldn’t cancel the cheque but would still get fined £25 for not cancelling it in time. I found out that it would take too long to get money from my Australian account by cheque. We were now relying on a combination of my pay and emergency mastercard, which Adam had picked up from Kilburn that night. The next day our run of bad luck extended into the kind of period that sees most people hide under the covers for a while. I found that the emergency mastercard draws from the same account that you usually have. I’d transferred all this to my normal account, which I couldn’t access, and I couldn’t transfer it back because my normal mastercard had been cancelled. I also discovered that because I’d been payed by cheque for my first weeks work and that it wouldn’t clear till the end of the week. It was then that I started to shit myself. We were about £600 short and looking at being chucked out by a very irate estate agent. The only solution we could come up with was asking various people for short-term loans. While I sat at my desk at work, head in hands and rocking very slightly, Adam called our old upstairs neighbour Tony “Mr T” Peck. He was our last and only hope, and to our tremendous relief he had £600 stuffed under his mattress, which we very gratefully borrowed from him.
Tuesday night saw £1800 neatly counted out on my bedroom floor. They were just going to have to wait for the extra £23. Adam took this is in on Wednesday and since then things have slowly started to improve. The incidence of bad luck has slackened and we feel sure that the balance of the world should see to it that some pretty fucking good things happen this summer. The flat is looking awesome, it’s a great area, everyone’s talking again, and once Adam pays me back everyone will be happy.
Dave out.
I thought that my three week silence would have provoked an avalanche of lamentations and pleading for more, but no! Instead you’ve all been as quiet as shy church mice. I guess I just have to come to terms with the fact that you’ve all found your replacement Daves and are getting on with your lives.
Casting all this psychobabble aside, let me tell you what I’ve been up to recently. These last few weeks have been like a black hole of time – insanely busy pockets of work interspersed with weekends of getting drunk and stoned. I’ve got newfound respect for all you 9-5’ers out there. I realise I’ve only got my training wheels on as far as a’normal’ working week is concerned, but I can’t imagine how you can do it for extended periods without becoming incredibly hardened or totally insane.
At the moment I’m keeping my head above water during the working week but occasionally find myself swamped by waves of depression. These are usually brought on by the sickly smell of stress that fills the subway on a busy morning. Work itself is incredibly busy. They gave me about two hours to settle in before ambushing me with a shit-rain of work This entails me taking new page designs from the graphic designers and doing a mock-up in HTML before using the Content Management System to change all the relevant pages, or add new ones. So far I’ve finished about four of these kind of projects with another two waiting to be done. It’s not the most interesting work but a job’s a job and at the moment I’m not very concerned about my future career path. I just want to make a bit of money and have a good summer.
Speaking of summer, have I got a link for these paragraphs or what? This weekend was the first warm one I’ve experienced in England. It felt like 30 degrees, but I’m sure it was just in the low 20’s. This summery weather happily coincided with my plan to take in some cricket this weekend. Imagine my stupendously, mind-boggingly huge excitement and joy when I figured out that Lords is only four tube stops from my house – a 15-minute trip! The home of cricket, the mecca for cricket fans around the world, is my local ground.
So it was with appropriate respect and reverence (and lots of beer), that I entered this hallowed arena, and had my first, and possibly last, religious experience. It was a perfect day for a game of cricket. The sun was shining, clouds drifted lazily across the sky, and I had my good rockin’ buddy Adam to drink beer with, and share the finer arts of the game of cricket (like explaining who Shane Warne was). That’s right my very good friends, Shane Warne was playing with one of the county sides starting with H, against Middlesex in a fiery one-dayer. The lineup was complete with Justin Langer being the captain of Middlesex this year, as a relaxed break from his No.3 position with the Australian test team.
With Adam and me settled in on the boundary, in the shade, behind the bowlers arm, with a refreshing breeze and beer aplenty, the visiting side proceeded to stage a collapse. They are English after all. The rest of the innings consisted of me politely cheering Robin Smith on, and getting drunk. The only real excitement came when Warnie came out to bat, prompting the majority Australian crowd to start chanting “W-A-R-N-E-E-E-E”, and sing’True Blue’ – a little bit louder in those parts that involve standing by your mate in a fight. All this was just an appetiser for when Warne came on to bowl later in the afternoon, with the patriotic Australian crowd driving themselves into a drunken frenzy of laconic chanting and shouts. “I love you, Shane”, from one devout young man, prepared to put his ass on the line, to “You are a true god, Shane”, to which he responded with a wave of the hand in thanks. There was even a bit of “Aussie, Aussie, Aussie … OI, OI, OI”, which brought on a wave of homesickness and a tear to my eye.
I only emphasise these good Aussie lads as the match was fairly dull, with both sides only scoring 150. Middlesex won in the end, but not before Warnie almost snatched the game off them with three wickets. It was all those bloody English fielders who kept letting him down, as one Warne devotee noted when he shouted at the first slip fieldsman who had just dropped a catch off Warne: “Hang your head. Hang your head in shame. You’re going to have to do it yourself, Warnie.”
The biggest cheers of the day came not when the home team hit a four, but when Warne took one of their wickets. Warne’s like a walking home ground advantage in England because the Aussies are guaranteed to outnumber the locals at any sparsely filled cricket match.
With the cricket over for the day Adam and I did a passable impression of sober people, and headed for home. Unfortunately, Adam (I can only think disoriented by the exciting day) got us on the bus going in completely the wrong direction. Seeing he has lived in the area for four years, I figured he knew where we were going, but it wasn’t until we got to Oxford Circus in the city, that we both realised we weren’t at home. Putting it down as just an unfortunate accident, we headed back north, only to find that the Jubilee line train that we caught terminated one stop short of Kilburn. Not a problem, we thought. We just have to wait a couple of minutes for another train to come along – that is until we saw a team of men staring at the track and scratching their heads. In the end we had to phone Adam’s girlfriend for a lift home, which proved to be more exhilarating than the whole day at the cricket.
I hope you’re all well and enjoying the varying severity of an Australian winter. I think I could get used to going from summer to summer.
See you on the other side,
Dave.
‘Keeping you bastards entertained isn’t easy’
Now I know how George Negus felt for all those years – constantly striving for an interesting angle and trying to meet the strict deadlines and high expectations of the ABC viewing public. My task is no less demanding in trying to satisfy this media-savvy mob.
Seriously though, I am starting to miss you guys. The first hectic weeks of a new town and trying to find a new place to live pushed routine aside for a while, but after settling into a new house I find myself with time to miss what I’ve left behind. The funny thing is, the person I miss the most is {insert your own name}. I guess part of the point of travelling is to try and discover the inner-self by leaving behind part of the social structure that defines you. That’s harder to do in this modern age, but the effect is still there.
Of course, the other bonus in travelling is meeting new people, which is as good a time as any to introduce you to my new housemates.
(Picture an indoor basketball court. All the lights are out, but a huge crowd is busy taking pictures. Suddenly a roving spotlight starts roaming around the court, and a deep-voiced American announcer comes on. You have to read the announcer part very slowly, and with as much exaggeration as possible)
Announcer: And now, introducing the London All-Stars!
(The crowd erupt in cheers, and the spotlight focuses on a man running onto court}
Announcer: Your fearless leader … the number one spliff smoker and tuba player extraordinaire … Adam!
(Crowd screams as Adam does back flips)
Announcer: Next up is your favourite art student and chronic mumbler … Colin!
(The noise is deafening as Colin walks to the centre of the court, shading his eyes, and reluctantly high-fiving Adam)
Announcer: Next on court, the one … the only … your favourite skater and mine … Matt!
(Matt comes flying over the crowd, launching of a huge ramp, before colliding with Adam and Colin)
Apart from Matt’s skating talents, this is a fairly accurate portrayal of my new housemates. Colin’s moving out in a week, to be replaced by Adam’s girlfriend, and they are all-round good guys. The house is on the bottom floor of a two-storey house, with other occupants above us. There are four bedrooms and no living room. Two of the big rooms double as lounge rooms, which kind of forces everyone to be nice to each other.
I think I’m just about through with sightseeing. It’s possible that I’m clouding my judgment with the fact that I have a bad cold and a bruised heel, which sees me hobbling around London like a leper, but most of the famous sights leave me a bit cold. They are dripping with foreign tourists snapping away and yelling at the kids not to run on the flowers. I went to Buckingham Palace today and the only people speaking English were the hot dog vendors. The other aspect of this is that the sights of London aren’t exactly unknown. It’s pretty hard to be delightfully surprised by something that, thanks to all those holiday programs, is almost as recognisable as your own home. Travelling to me entails finding things that you didn’t know about, rather than confirming that landmarks are still there.
That’s probably why I want to live in London for a while and try to see it from a native perspective. I imagine that this is quite different from what the tourists see and it’s probably more fulfilling. I would like to branch out and see a bit more of the British Isles and Europe eventually, but a job is the number one priority at the moment. There seem to be a lot of IT jobs (I just applied for 17 today), so I’m confident of getting one at the moment. If I descend into raving lunatic land again please send me encouraging emails.
I was seriously thinking about asking you to send some vegemite over but you could have knocked me over with a gum leaf when I saw a jar in the local petrol station. It just goes to show how many Aussies are over here. Apparently Kilburn has a fairly large Australian population but I’ve managed to avoid them all so far. Kilburn is full of large double story houses. It’s a very expensive looking area by Canberra standards, but expensive in London means inner city apartments. There are quite a few Jamaican and Islamic shops in the area but they’re done in a British way. This means small and unadventurous.
I hope that when this cold clears up I get a post-illness energy boost. I’m feeling the pressure to do things, otherwise the next email will be a long one about the paint scheme in my room, and all the interesting things to look at on the way to the shops. Actually, that’s what I usually do in the peak of health. I think I’d better get well, otherwise St. Patrick’s day could be the end of me.
See you on the other side,
Dave.
‘But were too sensible to ask’
Being on the other side of the world hasn’t stopped me getting into a familiar routine, albeit starting four hours earlier. My new job at gameplay has been going for nine days now, and I can feel myself becoming ingrained into the structure of the place. My job is to sit with the web development team and fix JavaScript and Html problems they come across. It’s probably not my ideal job, but it’s a good start, with the opportunity to get into some more interesting areas. The gameplay corporation has offices in London, Leeds and Colchester, and is slowly expanding into France and Germany. I work near Farringdon and Chancery Lane stations, which is the only reference point I have. The building I work in is located in an innocuous looking alley, but has just been refurbished with the gameplay colours (yellow and purple), and infested with two foot plastic models of the gameplay logos. I work on the fourth floor, and unfortunately have to walk up it most of the time as the lift is a little unreliable.
Going from looking for a place to live, to looking for a job, to working very full-time hasn’t given me a lot of time to soak up the local culture. I did manage to get out to a club in Brixton called The Fridge. There’s a big main room with a mezzanine, which is infused with jugglers and stilt-walkers among the artificially frenzied throng.
I’m sorry not to have been writing a bit more regularly but I have to be in a certain mood to write letters (which I’m not in at the moment). I think it involves a lot of sleep and alcohol. People might call artists lazy, but I think they’re just working in their own way.
Goodbye for now. I’ll write more when I do more and feel the creative juices flowing in a torrent.
Dave out.
Greetings my good droogs,
Today I thought I’d start off with some London slang so that you will know what I’m talking about if it ever creeps into my vocabulary. The main exclamation used when something is good: ‘‘Wicked’. For example’‘that’s a wicked shirt, Dave’. If someone is good-looking, they are’‘fit’. As in, ‘‘you’re really fit, Dave’. If something is the best in it’s category, it’s’‘the bollocks’.’‘That stir-fry was the bollocks, Dave’. Chewing gum is known as’‘chuddy’ and women as’‘totty’, but that might be straying into vulgar territory.
Spring has finally sprung this Saturday. It feels like the high teens and the contrast with the cold, cloudy days makes it all the more remarkable. The sunny weather prompted a spurt of activity in me which saw me cross another landmark off the diminishing landmark list. I went down to London Bridge, which is conveniently on the Jubilee line, so I can just get on at Kilburn and daydream all the way down. London bridge wasn’t what I expected. I was looking for Tower bridge, as I discovered when I saw how flat London bridge is. Geography’s not my strong point, OK? I ended up walking five minutes up the river to get to the more famed attraction. What greeted me was the usual throng of German and American tourists, which put me off going inside the Tower of London. It made me think that tourists could be used as a war deterrent. Rather than sending the UN in to try and quell local disputes you could just set up a Disneyland and let the tourists drive the opposing forces apart with their natural repulsiveness. I did take a walk across Tower bridge and was impressed by its size and architecture.
After this little excursion I went back home to enjoy a few beers and joined the late rising Adam in a fry-up. Adam just had his final recital at the college of music so he is understandably celebrating hard after four years of work. I went along to see his recital at the main hall, located in South Kensington, on Wednesday afternoon. It was a great spectacle to hear him fill the room with that big tuba sound while the afternoon sunlight intermittently came through the window, sparkling off the brass.
I’ve arrived at a point where my life in England feels very similar to how I was living back home. England feels like home and I feel like I’m going to have a good time over the summer. Once work is humming along I’ll have more energy to spend exploring what a summer in London can involve.
Keep writing interesting messages. I always enjoy looking at my emails and out of the 20 spam messages seeing 3 or 4 that tell me people care about me.
Dave out.
Hey there happy campers,
I’m in a decent mood at the moment as I’ve just enjoyed a very nice bottle of Wolf Blass Shiraz Grenache with Adam. The British wine market has been completely dominated by Aussie wines, which is probably a good thing. Apparently Australian wines are among the best available and are certainly the best value.
I can’t say that I’ve got a great deal of news but I was reading my past emails and I enjoyed them so much that they motivated me to add to the collection. Being a little drunk and sick of reading about Internet technology probably nudged me in this direction as well but I’m at my most communicative when I’m drunk anyway.
This past week has seen me sniffing the ground in a hound-like fashion in search of a job. The first week was taken up by sending a massive number of applications out and being rebuffed by job agencies. It seems that people want graduates with 12 months commercial experience although how you go about working for a company full-time while studying full-time is a little beyond my simplistic thinking. I was told that I was after junior and trainee roles rather than graduate ones, so with this adjustment in thinking I once again flung myself headlong into the whirling maelstrom of the London job market.
It took a while for it to get around, but once the word was out that a keen young Aussie was looking for any work available some of the smarter agencies had me in for an interview. I’m waiting on a couple of job interviews but have one definite for Friday. The company is called gameplay.com (just type it into your browser), and they specialize in selling computer games over the Net. Apparently the company is very casual, young, and exciting. That remains to be seen, but I am a bit pissed off that they’ve got an informal dress code. I just bought a bloody suit, and now it’s going to be stuck in the cupboard until the next wedding.
I’ve been spending the majority of my free time bonding with my new housemates. Adam is a very friendly and outgoing guy. He’s at the Royal College of Music, and has his final Tuba exam is in a couple of weeks. His girlfriend, Jem, is also a musician at RCM. She plays the harp, and it’s certainly a nice touch to have it plucked in the next room while you make tea. You can close your eyes and imagine you’ve gone to heaven. Mat’s the skateboarder and he’s been working most of the time. He works long hours at a skate-park, buffered with lots of visits to pubs. Unfortunately for him he broke his little toe by accidentally kicking a chai, so he’s more of a walker at the moment.
It’s hard to compose a good letter, as I’ve been too busy looking for a job, brushing up on my old IT skills, and playing board games to actually do anything. Think of this more as a drunken outburst than a serious letter. Now that I’ve got some housemates to talk to the anonymous confessional of a group email isn’t quite as necessary. Not that I don’t love talking to you guys … more that I’m purging all my shit on those who don’t require a 12 hour turn around for a response.
‘Yay! Another share house’ (deadpan enthusiasm)
I found a place to live the day after my cold struck, which is just as well, because looking for houses and colds don’t mix. I’ve ended up in Kilburn. It’s south-east of Cricklewood, north of Chelsea, and northwest of the city. My future housemates seem like a harmless enough bunch of dope heads. I just hope they don’t go psychotic on me. The room is small but it matches the rent of 70 quid a week – please don’t convert that to AUS$.
Now that looking for a house is over my next assignment is to get back on the campaign trail and look for a job. I’d feel a lot more comfortable with some pounds coming in, but before I do that I think the time is ripe for some laidback sightseeing. I’m praying that tomorrow is sunny. I’d like to go up the Millennium Wheel and check out Hyde Park. Jobs can wait for a couple of days.
It’s currently 10 pm, so I’d better send this off and catch all you 9 to 5ivers.
Me Dave – Me sleepy
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Tempers fray; constitutions weaken; ‘I just want a room you bastards’
I’ve been nailed by my first cold. I went to bed feeling a little bit lurgy but got knocked down by the news that I didn’t get any houses I wanted and will have to raise myself from the infirmary/nursery to once again walk up and down the cold streets of London. I can’t express to you how much I hate looking for a place to live. First of all, you have to scan the newspaper ads, picking out the low-cost, suitable areas. Next up, you have to ring all the people, most of whom are not at home, or have already filled the room. If by some divine intervention you manage to get hold of someone and arrange a time to see the place you then have to get there, go through the charade of an interview, and wait for them to tell you the place has been filled. I think the next time I go, I just won’t leave the room I’m being shown.
SCENE
Dude (played by ‘Bill and Teds’ Keanu Reeves but with an English accent)
Me (played by Johnny Depp as in Fear and Loathing in Las Vegas, but taller)
Dude – And this is the room … um.
Me – Does the bed come with the room?
Dude – Ah … yeah the bed’s staying.
(Sounds of scuffling and muffled shouts before a door slams)
Dude – Hey! Come out of there. I’ve got other people coming to look at the place.
Me – Fuck you! If you want to get me out, you have to throw me out, you rat bastards.
As tempting as this strategy is, my physical state is too weakened to contemplate any violence. My approach will have to mirror a McDonalds ad, after they had contributed to Nixon’s first election victory: ‘There are lots of talented losers and broke geniuses, but it takes persistence to succeed.’
This is certainly true in politics, and in looking for a room as well. In both you have to try and satisfy different peoples’ needs, pretend you’re someone else, and spend an awful amount of time trying to do it. I think I’m going to have to develop an 80’s capitalistic approach to finding a house. Namely, fuck anyone over that gets in my way, and screw people before they screw me. Sounds a little extreme but you’re not here listening to these polite assholes. I’m slowly being turned into a snarling, twisted beast, not dissimilar to Nixon or John Howard. My only thoughts are of London suburbs and rent prices. I pray that I can find enough of a human being left inside myself to force a smile on my future housemate.
DISCLAIMER – The preceding notes were made under a cloud of medication and emotional suffering. The author does not accept any responsibility for the twisted nature of his subconscious, but blames a misspent youth in front of computers, TV and books.
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