The Great Victorian Bike Ride: Day Three

Tallangatta to Mount Beauty 49 miles (116 miles total).

We awoke at 5:30 in order to start the day before the heat hammered us. Today we are meeting our friend Darlene at her sister's house in the town of Mt. Beauty and then going to her folks' house for dinner. She warned us before our ride about her father, Jock, who is apparently rough as guts. Should be interesting. We were on our way quickly and told our fast boys again to score us a good spot at the next camp. The ride to the first rest stop was easy so we didn't stay long and Ed and I rode together to lunch. The planners did a great job of planning the spot as it was right next to the Kiewa River, so we had our sandwiches at the river's edge with a hundred other bikers, and then had a stroll through the cold water.



After lunch the ride was a tough uphill slog and Ed moved ahead while I chugged along at my usual pace. The ride is actually not terribly difficult once one gets into a cadence, then it's just a matter of shifting gears to keep it. As a rule I cruise along at about 25k/hr when the rode is an uphill grade.



(As a note, Ed normally doesn't have a mustache but we were part of a fundraiser called Movember, where we raised money for prostate cancer research. I shaved mine for the ride. Ed looks like a bike cop.)

Near the end of the ride there was one bastard of a hill that I had to stop on just to give my nether regions a rest. I had passed Ed earlier as he stopped to give his brother a hand fixing a tire. Ed pulled up a few minutes after me and was about as happy as I was to give it a rest. A few minutes later we were back on for the last push into Mt. Beauty. We rolled into the outskirts town and Darlene shouted out to us from her sister's front porch. It was great to see her and she told us she had been watching our boys roll into town since around 10. We stopped for about a half hour and figured out our plans.

We rode to camp where our boys had claimed a stake at home plate of a softball diamond. (This is increasingly becoming a challenge for our boys as no one is permitted to set up camp until noon, due to safety reasons with the semi rigs negotiating the grounds. Our boys snuck in through a neighboring backyard and staked our claim, right under some nice shady trees. They are becoming our Special Forces team, negotiating themselves through enemy territory).

Once there, we were soon in the back seat of Darlene's car as she and her son, Tom, drove us to the local swimming hole. Man, it was awesome. A cold river with kids swinging in from a rope and crayfish scuttling about...just like home. A perfect antidote to the blazing sun and heat.

Eventually we made it to her parents' house for the most memorable night of the entire ride. We arrived, laden with dirty clothes to wash and a taste for barbecue.

What we got was Jock. Jock was sitting at the kitchen table with Darlene's mom, rolling cigarettes between fingers the size of bratwursts. The house was an old weatherboard throwback to the 60s, with furniture and add-ons comfortably thirty years out of date. Jock is in his 60s, a retired cop still wearing a brush cut of white hair, and he immediately offered us a couple of beers. We were aware that tomorrow morning we were straight up Mt. Beauty itself, which is a daunting task sober, let alone feeling a bit filthy from a night of drinking. Jock regailed us with stories of how he got Darlene's boyfriend drunk and had him throwing up all night when he was 15, of how the bathtubs he turned into water features out the front of the house will add thousands to the value of his house, of how there is no place better in the world to live than Mt. Beauty, and of how Americans are dicks. This is a man who instilled a healthy sense of fear in us as he gave us beer after beer after beer. He goes through a case himself nightly.

After our laundry was finished I hung them on the line to dry at the house next door. Jock's daughter and son-in-law Marty lived there. Marty had survived a three story fall off a house where he broke his back, a chainsaw to the face, and had lost three of his fingers in an industrial accident. Marty wasn't to be fucked with. I was told how Marty was a truck driver "who fucking hates bikers" before I slipped over to hang up all our nice little lycra pants and shirts. As I was doing so I heard a shout from inside the house and then a bear of a man opened the back door and just stared at me.

"Who are you?"
"I'm Nick, I'm with Jock. We're having a barbecue." (please don't destroy me).
"Oh."

We shook hands and I went back to Jock's where I was fed another beer and Marty came over as well.

As the night wore on I grabbed a Coke to pace myself and Jock looked at me like I was The Biggest Pussy The World Has Ever Seen, and proceeded to start getting hooked into me before his wife stopped him. We sat around the table on the back porch of the house, discussing all things simple, and Marty provided his first-hand accounts of his hatred of bike riders, and then left. He didn't want to be around Ed and I.

As it grew dark more of the family came over and Jock became increasingly surreal in his ramblings, mentioning with utter passion how eating gnats out of the hair of a woman was the finest meal he has ever had. Ed and I just sat back, eating as much as possible, winding Jock up, and drinking more beer. Ed got his second wind eventually, raised his empty beer bottle, and looked at Jock with disbelief on his face and shouted out, "Jesus, Jock. A man is not a camel! Can I get some beer around here!" I had a good laugh about this but was unfortunately obliged to have yet another beer lest I become He Who Must Be Ridiculed.

At one point a little later a foul smell wafted by us and we were told that it was the sewage plant across the road.

"Yeah, when the surface isn't dry you can smell it." Jock said.
"So this is the best place on earth, eh?" I thought.

At one point Ed brought up "Chop Chop". This is an illegal crop of tobacco grown out here that is hush hush. People have been killed more than once due to its ties with the mafia. Jock got stuck into Ed dropping more than one, "What the fuck do you know about it?" before Ed let it go.

When we got to the point where it was too dark to see, Jock had verbally abused most of the people sitting with him, the other men had run out of sexist jokes, and we were afraid to drink any more, we decided we needed to go. We were saying our thank-yous, and as I shook Jock's hand, he raised a machete above his head and leered maniacally at me in the darkness.

"Holy Shit!" was the last thing Jock heard, or will ever here, from me.

Me, Ed, Darlene and Tom walked back to the campground and Darlene looked at me.

"So. Do you understand why I hate my father? Do you see why I ran from here when I was seventeen...screaming?"
"Yes. Yes I do."

I have no idea how such a lovely, kind, gentle person like Darlene could have sprung from the loins of such an absolute bigoted lunatic.

Ed and I crawled into the tent, relieved that we only had to bike up the side of a mountain tomorrow. I only hoped I wasn't hung over while doing it. Even if I was, it seemed less intimidating now.

After all, I survived Jock.

The Great Victorian Bike Ride: Day Two

Beechworth to Tallangatta 42 miles (67 miles total).

On the second day of the ride we were up at 5:30 in order to get some miles behind us before the blistering heat arrived. We had a big bowl of musli with fruit, packed up our camp, saw the last kids off, and were on the road by 7:45. Our fst kids were on the road by 7:15.

We have a system: the fast kids arrive at camp around 10-10:30. They get our bags off the truck and find a spot to camp at the next site under a nice piece of shade. If there's no shade at least keep us upwind of the shit truck. The toilets, like the showers, are housed in huge semi-trailer rigs, and when they change the "resevoirs" it can be mighty painful to be anywhere near them.

Our first 50 minutes of the ride were cool and downhill and the flies were kept at bay. It was such a welcome change. We arrived fresh and happy at a little town and grabbed a coffee.



Our next stop miles down the road was lunch. A town park was the site and it was covered by bikers. We had our official badges around our necks and lined up under a little tent for our sausage sandwiches, fruit and cheese, and then filled up our water bottles. I am still amazed at the organization of this whole thing. everywhere we stop everything is ready for us, and when we leave it all follows.

We had a challenging up and down ride and arrived at camp at 12:15 in the full sun and the 90+ degree heat. Our camp was setup by the boys at a lovely spot next to some hills. It was too hot to be out so we went to the local town pool for a few hours. The pool was an oasis. It was like the pool scene from Caddyshack-a bunch of goofs land on a pool for hours. I doubt it saw this many people in it all of last year. Within a couple hours the water was murky from all the sunscreen that had been on all the bikers.

Ed and I strolled into town for a beer and watched a little of the Ashes Test.
(The Ashes is the cricket test series played between England and Australia every other year for the past 120 years. It is the most important match for both countries as it is effectively a game between the Brits who proudly created cricket hundreds of years ago and Australia, the former penal colony who have become the best team in the world. There is a good explanation of the Ashes here.) A Test Match in cricket last five days. There are five matches in a series. Yep-a cricket test can last for 25 days, with each day about 10 hours long.

Ed was patient in his explanation of the series and cricket in general. As a Yank who loves baseball (a combination of Rounders and Cricket) I actually enjoy watching the game. There's a hell of a lot more going on than one would think and there is a lot of strategy. There should be with all the time they have. I witnessed a batsman at bat FOR EIGHT HOURS in this test. Most baseball players are already on the plane to their next city by then. This guy had to focus on hitting the ball for EIGHT HOURS!

At about 9pm we were back in our tents. The boys were most likely roaming the grounds scouting out the thousand girls here as well. I fell asleep listening to a quitarist playing a brilliant version of Bad Moon Rising in the main tent. A good day.



Tomorrow we will be in Mount Beauty where we will be catching up with a friend from work whose family still live in the area.

The Great Victorian Bike Ride: Day One

The Great Victorian Bike Ride is an annual event held throughout the state where riders of every skill and ability come together to become a part of a giant moving carnival of gears, sweat, and a good time. It is an exercise in logistics and insanity as thousands of riders pay for the thrill of biking in 110 degree heat up the side of mountains...over nine days. I couldn't help but think that Aussies do these kinds of things out of a sense of guilt that the country was established by convicts dragged in ships from the UK, forced to do painfully tough labor, in a land designed in almost every way to kill off those who want to settle here. Australia is now such a clean and lovely place that, at least in my humble opinion, those with a conscious tend to put themselves through a healthy dose of physical strife just to balance the books.

This year my school took eleven boys on the nine day ride through the alpine region of northern Victoria. We had kids who had bikes that weighed as much as shadows and who themselves were nothing more than bone and muscle, and we had kids who, by my estimation at the beginning, wouldn't make it through the first lunch stop.

Day One: Wangaratta to Beechworth 40k (25 miles).
We arrived at the leaving point in Wangaratta at 1:30 and were the last group out of the 3,740 people to get on the road. By the time we got off the bus to hit the road the temp was already in the 90s. The ride started with a slight uphill grade and then, after about 12 miles, pitched itself on its hind legs and drove us at a ridiculously steep grade for our first day. I was one of the last on the ride. In the baking heat my pace was just slow enough that my face became a landing site for countless flies. After a few hours I was wondering how in the name of god I will be able to finish nine days of this grinding riding. The steepest hill of the day loomed ahead of me and I slowly, with persistent pedalling, managed to reach the top just in time for one of the escort motorcycle cops to puul up next to me. Mouth agape, sweat pouring down, flies darting in and out of my mouth and nose, I turned to hear...

"You from Southwood?"
"Yeah"
"You've got a boy back there about a k who doesn't look too well."
"Oh. Really. Well. I can stop." huff huff "He'll be here soon."
"No mate, you need to go back there and check him out."
"Oh. Okay."

He sped off and I looked at the top of the hill and then, with concern for the boy somewhere driving my back, I sped back down the hill. At least the wind kept the flies off for a few minutes.

There he was sitting on the side of the road telling me he was fine. He draped his lanky frame over the bike and started again to pedal. He stopped about 100 meters up the road.

We did this for almost 45 minutes. This increased the heat and flies.

When I realised there was a chance that he might actually expire, either from heat stroke, or from me pushing him off the cliff for keeping me stuck on this goddamn frying pan of a road, I signaled the SAG Wagon, which carries riders and their bikes to camp when they can't go any further. He pulled up next to me.

"There's a tall kid back there from Southwood. He might tell you he's fine, but he's not. Get him and take him to camp please."
"Right-o"

A few minutes later the SAG pulled up next to me and the driver rolled down his window, student in the rear, and yelled out with a big grin.

"You should hear him in here mate, he's paying out on you for being slow. C'mon. Pedal faster!"

I had a good laugh as sweat, or a tear, rolled down my face as they pulled out ahead over the next hill.

I rolled into town and then up one last ridiculous hill to get to the camp. I flopped off my bike and walked the length of the grounds to our camp, surrounded by a thousand other tents. It was shady, clean, and there was a water station greeting me at the gate.

My fellow teacher, (and leader of this excursion) Ed, had our tent set up and he directed me to the semi-rig that was our showers. An hour later I was clean and we lined up for a surprisingly fantastic dinner under the huge main tent. We finished it off with a beer and had a chat about how the boys did then headed back to our camp. I sat on a small camp chair watching the sun go down behind the beautiful mountains.



They were playing the movie Kenny tonight under the big tent and Kenny himself was going to open it (Kenny will most likely open in the US as it is actually a great Aussie comedy about a septic guy that made a fair bit of money.).

I was too tired to go and fell asleep at about 8:30, to the lovely sounds of a farting contest transpiring in the girls school's tents next to ours. Go St. Lukes!

1929-2006

“Football is the American game that typifies the old American spirit,” he said. “It’s physical. It’s hard work. It’s aggressive. It’s kind of a swashbuckling American sport. Football is not going to die. It is our American heritage.”

Another Perspective...

Article from The Australian

You've Got to be Shitting Me

I read this article today on the CNN website and I had a hard time understanding just how the hell we've gotten to this point.

Read it Here

I was at work and asked a few people if they thought that Australia was going in this direction and some thought that it may to a certain degree, while others thought that there was just no way.

Kids here play footy from a really young age and one of the games the boys at my school play on the oval (used for footy and cricket) is British Bulldogs. This is essentially every kid running from one end of the oval to the other, trying not to get tackled by the one kid picked to start. Those who do get tackled are then in the middle as well, trying to tackle those left. It is the perfect game for boys as it is essentially a loosly organised excuse to thump the shit out of each other with no sense of animosity or malice. It's just boys learning to be physical, venting any aggressions, without taking it personally. How is a parent protecting their child if they never allow him to learn how to come back from a setback, physical or otherwise.

We don't have the sport issue at my school, but what we do have are parents who are so determined that their child does well academically that they will do the work for them, or demand a ridiculous degree of mollycoddling, and effectively never allow the kid to fall on his ass academically.

It's a shame when kids aren't allowed to go out and learn how to define and follow rules for themselves, to blow off school and pay the price they deserve, to get physical for the sheer joy of being able to do it, and get bruised, battered, and beaten. What kind of adults are these kids going to be is they never learn how to negotiate a hard knock.

Aren't most of the proud moments in our lives those where we persevered through the greatest challenges to find what we were made of?

Aussie Beer Commercial

Carlton Draught just released a new commercial. It's a fairly good local beer and they usually have some pretty good ads. Click HERE to experience a truly sexy reason to drink their beer.

An Interview with Mike: Aussie Bloke

So Mike, what's shakin?
I've had a few beers and I'm feeling nice and I'm about to have a really good dinner.

So, Mike, what are your impressions of the good ol' US of A?
Stereotypical: Arrogant, money-driven, fat, wash myself with a rag on a stick. Jerry Springer types. Loud and brash as well. This is before I visited there and the impression TV gave me.

After going there: Amazingly friendly, not as money-driven as I thought and just generally cool, relaxed people (except New York because everyone I met there and had a conversation with was generally nuts. There was the coke addict, George Costanza's mother times four, and the Woody Allen guy at the airport who freaked out when his plane was delayed and was muttering out loud how his mother was right and he shouldn't fly.)

The country was beautiful, Vegas was nutty, San Francisco is cool and New York is the best city in the world. Chicago is beautiful and home of the Black Hawks.

What are the differences between Americans and Australians?
Not much, really. Americans seem to have this sense of outer national pride, wheras we have this sort of inner national pride, until we're drunk, and then we're much more like you guys. There is more choice of everything at supermarkets in the US. Stuff is cheaper. Smokes and books, cds, junk food. American junk food is the best in the world. I have never had such awesome junk food before in my life. You really do it well. Chicago pizza is the best I've ever had and the hot dogs there were great. Buffalo wings in Chicago were fucking awesome.

How do you mean?
Fuck off. They were spicy and really nice and served with that bleu cheese dressing that balanced it out nicely.

See, that wasn't so hard. So what were your least favorite things about the States. Or, more specifically, what did you think was shit?
Your homeless. It seems like Americans have gotten used to the homeless as a novelty as opposed to a group of people who should be helped. Everywhere I went I noticed the amount of homeless.

But you get homeless people here?
But there not as prevalent. In Melbourne you can go to a street corner and there's a possibility you won't see a homeless person. In the big cities in America I could be guaranteed to see them about on every corner.

I just remembered something else. You pay way too much for sporting events. I paid US$80 for good seats at a hockey game for a shit team, whereas here I wouldn't pay more than twenty.

What do you think Americans would find most surprising about Australia and Australians?
That we speak English. That we don't own Kangaroos as domestic animals.

I see you're holding a cricket bat in my face and looking rather menacing. Could you describe the game of cricket to an American with no experience in the sport?
Okay. It's like baseball but better. Played by people who do it for the love of the game and not money and we play it on an international level. Our world champions are actually world champions because they play teams from other countries and not just teams from our own country. Apart from that, it's actually terribly boring and you watch it to get drunk.

And for a last question, why are Australians such a bunch of lazy drunken fuckwits?
Because our nation's birth was through diplomacy and we didn't have to fight a war.

Just couldn't be bothered, eh?
Fuck yeah.

Thanks, Mike. You are truly an all-aussie bloke.

The Footy Visa

A few days ago I received the batch of paperwork for getting my Permanent Visa, and while this is one step closer to becoming a citizen, I find that having a footy team might be the better test.

I have been asked time and again who my footy team is. This is asked in Melbourne more often than what one does for a living. To clarify, footy is Australian Rules Football. I've been to a few games and there are couple of things that have impressed me. One is that the game seems to have just about one rule, which would be to kick the ball through the goal by any means short of manslaughter. The second is that people here absolutely love the game, and more specifically, their teams. Unlike the US where your team affiliation is almost always based on your state, here the affiliations seem to be more emotional. Most rabid fans have their affiliation due to a father or grandfather who went for the team. Footy is also primarilly a Victorian sport, located around Melbourne for the most part. The teams represent the inner neighborhoods in the area so it is not uncommon to have neighbors who all go for different teams, thus causing potential strife or long-lasting bonds.

Another thing that I think is really quite cool about the game is that the entire sport seems to be from another era. There is no padding to speak of, the players don't make gazilions of dollars, and the local stadium, the MCG, fills and empties with people who walk with their families through the surrounding gardens and parks. There is something quaint about it. After one game I attended the fans were actually allowed onto the field to throw or kick their footies around. Thousands of people threw as many balls through the air and it was as fun and playful as a family picnic. I thought fleetingly that if this was in the US, the balls would be sharing air space with the lawsuits that would be flying around with every kid who got beaned with a ball or accidently kicked.

And so, because I love baseball and have always been a fan of the Tigers, I have decided to be a Richmond Tigers supporter. It's also a cool part of the city. AND it has a club song that is right out of the 30s:

Richmond Tigers Club Song

Now I can cop all kinds of shit from friends about choosing such a mob of ferals and likewise find others who will be thrilled that I have been so wise and thoughtful in choosing such a proud and noble franchise.

I now have a footy club. I am now a little closer to being home.

RFC Homepage

I am a Geek

Another Good Perspective

Not that I'm a huge fan of Charles Krauthammer, but this article he wrote about Australia sums up the national psyche quite well. Politics here is reflective of the culture. Very much no bullshit.
Here's the fantastic article.

Of Hillbillies and Corporate Licorice

I like to think that my wife and I live in the perfect part of Melbourne. The photos above were taken one morning on my way to work. I drive along a back road that winds its way through borderline bush country, through vineyards and olive orchards, to deposit me in the typically dull suburb where I teach. We live about five minutes from rolling hills and wine country and are about 30 minutes from the heart of the city.

The people are nice where we live yet there are the odd moments when I feel like I moved to Shitkicker, Alabama instead of an island nation 14,000 away from any Good Ol' Boy I may have ever known or avoided. One of those moments came when I was doing some grocery shopping at the local Bi-Lo supermarket. Bi-Lo is supposedly a discount supermarket but I have found that the only reduction that goes on in one of these stores is on how much food they carry. They were out of eggs for three days once and couldn't say when they'd be getting more in. The food costs the same, there is just less of it. But what they lack in food quantity they more than make up for in incidental entertainment. I was at the deli counter one day and one of the gentlemen in line was standing with his basket without shoes or a shirt. My eyes darted from him to the meat and fish that were behind the counter and I couldn't help but think that some of his back hair would undoubtedly find its way to rest on a nice fillet. Half-naked people and food should be resigned to the beach. I felt mildly snobbish looking at him with undoubtedly disgust and disbelief vying for dominance on my face, yet how does one get to the point where they dress in public just enough to cover their genitals? It's as if he has decided to compromise with society's rules just enough to keep from being arrested. Needless to say I left without purchasing anything from the deli.

On another occasion a girl-creature was shopping with her mom and I was utterly incapable of taking my eyes off her. All of perhaps thirteen, she had six-inch heels on her shoes, a skirt little more than an ambitious belt, and makeup applied aggressively enough to offend not only prostitutes but also any god-fearing circus folk that may have been within eyeshot. While not obese, her fast-food-fueled physique, wrapped in too-tight-tart-wear, gave her the look of a kransky sausage stuffed to the point of jeopardizing a hull breach. I can say all this because she snapped at her mom and acted thoroughly embarrasses to be with her.

Nina and I tend to avoid the Bi-Lo and drive the five minutes to the nearest Safeway. People there are fully-dressed.

I guess in a way, hillbillies are a part of life here just as much as they are in the US. They even call them hillbillies here, which I think is fantastic.

What I like about where we live is that we can be at the local pub or farmer's market and see people of every walk of life. At St. Andrew's Market on Saturday mornings farmers, potters, jewelers, bakers and knitters set up their stalls, along with rune readers, psychic healers, flame twirlers, and other purveyers of the not-so-legitimate. I bought some homemade licorice from a hippie who had to first educate me on how consuming mass-produced licorice was akin to tipping a bucket of dioxins down my throat. It was good, though.

The market is smack in the middle of a tiny country town woven through by towering gum trees, and once all the produce has been bought, we mosey on over to the little pub that hugs the edge of the market and listen to a live blues band with all the assorted locals, tipping back a few beers before we head back home.

It's quaint and country when we want it to be, and if the desire hits us, we can drop in to the lovely and vibrant downtown cafes, museums, pubs and restaurants of Melbourne for our cosmopolitan fix.

We've got it good.

Fair Dinkum Factoid #1

Quick Fact About the Wide Brown Land:

The National Anthem of Australia is "Advance Australia Fair" and the national crest has a Kangaroo and Emu on it as they are indigenous and also share the quality of not being able to walk backwards, carrying on the idea of always moving forward as a country.

The anthem is not universally liked and a number of Aussies don't know all the words. One of the songs mentioned as a possible alternative is I Am Australian.

This song, especially as sung here by The Seekers, reflects the pride Aussies have in their country. The pride of overcoming hardship and the pride of being a part of a free and unique part of the world. It's the paradox of such an ancient land, almost primeval in places, being so young as a country.

It Ain't About Geography

"Homesickness is. . . absolutely nothing. Fifty percent of the people in the world are homesick all the time. . . You don't really long for another country. You long for something in yourself that you don't have, or haven't been able to find."
John Cheever, The Stories of John Cheever (1978)

"Mid pleasures and palaces though we may roam,
Be it ever so humble, there's no place like home."
John Howard Payne

How Not To Be A Twit

Read the Article Here

Saw this story and thought it captured the reality of where the stereotype of the "Ugly American" comes from. Obviously not every American who travels abroad does these things, but it does have some basis in fact. I think the biggest thing we tend to do when we travel is focus more on where we're from as opposed to where we are. I can still spot US tourists in Melbourne easy as pie.

The nice thing, though, is that nearly all of the people I work with have had very positive dealings with Americans and think that we are the friendliest, most amiable people they've met. It's always good to hear when so much of the talk is about how we can be a bit hard to deal with as tourists.

A survey conducted a few years back by a major tour operator polled people in the service industries from all over the world and found that the least-liked tourists were British, while the most liked were Americans and Germans.

Stupid Monkeys

And now, some doom and gloom...

And so it is and so it goes. Kind of scary thinking about the way the world is heading. People have evolved to deal with problems in the immediate, the things staring us in the face in the foreground. It goes without saying that our ancestors who could resolve and overcome the immediate issue of a tiger reading the menu where the ones who’ve passed on their genes. Those who couldn’t resolve such issues became a meal, having their DNA naturally selected to end up fattening up our four-legged foes. Unfortunately we seem to have a dramatic incapacity to be aware of the events unfolding in the background. Perhaps we didn’t evolve with an aim to minding what was going on behind the scenes, but then again, why would we? How would primitive man make a difference to his environment on such a large scale so that it would outweigh his need for surviving day to day?

Unfortunately it looks like that propensity towards myopia has led us down a track where we have been affecting tremendous and cataclysmic change in our world, and yet, even with this knowledge, we can’t get our shit together enough to take action and prevent what we all know to be happening.

Eric Pianka, a professor at the University of Texas, recently gave a lecture about how humanity is heading for an inevitable collapse due to the earth being incapable of sustaining the overpopulation.
(http://story.seguingazette.com/drudge.html). His is just one of the many learned voices speaking out about overpopulation as well as global warming, pollution, deforestation, etc.

So long as we look out the window and see blue skies. As long as we have warm summer nights and beautiful winter snowfalls, we will be hard-pressed to wrap our heads around what is happening on a much more subtle scale. What we see is what we believe. It’s not until the freak blizzards, hurricanes, tsunamis and droughts become the norm will we snap out of our contentment.

I heard someone speak about the misconception people have that we are killing the planet. What we are doing is reducing the planet’s ability to keep us alive. Once we push the planet past the tipping point, it will find its own equilibrium and we are either going to be gone or back to swinging clubs.

Weekend at the Prom

Spent the weekend at Wilson’s Promontory (http://www.parkweb.vic.gov.au/1park_display.cfm) and was absolutely blown away by the almost prehistoric beauty of the land. It looked like part of another world yet it was only a three hours’ drive from Melbourne. We spent the night in a cabin with our brother and sister-in-law and Nina’s parents. The entire wall of the cabin was made of glass door walls and we slid them wide open, eating, drinking, playing cards, watching the kookaburras swoop in for a peak and relaxing under the stars.



We went for a bushwalk up around a mountain that ended up overlooking a sheer cliff face that dropped to the ocean below. Strong winds blew us about and I was thrilled not only with the breathtaking view, but also with not a single safety railing or warning in sight. If you were willing to be stupid and hang out over the edge, you would fall to your death.

How refreshing not being protected from ourselves every minute of the day.

Heading out to the bush/campground/beach for the weekend is quintissentially Australian. It's not about being entertained every second of the day and it ain't about spending a lot of money. It's all about relaxing with family and enjoying this gorgeous country.

Bullshit.

Below is an email my mom received from a coworker that is supposedly written by a cop in Oz. I was pissed off enough not only by the inaccuracy of it, but by the suspicion that it was written by some fool in the US trying to make his own personal views appear substantiated by an authority. I also can't figure out what cop in Oz would give a toss and warn the Yanks about anything. Anyhoo...

Here’s the wank:

From: Ed ____, A police officer in Australia
Hi Yanks, I thought you all would like to see the real figures from Down Under. It has now been 12 months since gun owners in Australia were forced by a new law to surrender 640,381 personal firearms to be destroyed by our own government, a program costing Australia taxpayers more than $500 million dollars. The first year results are now in:
Australia-wide, homicides are up 6.2 percent,
Australia-wide, assaults are up 9.6 percent ;
Australia-wide, armed robberies are up 44 percent (yes, 44 percent)!

In the state of Victoria alone, homicides with firearms are now up 300 percent. (Note that while the law-abiding citizens turned them in, the criminals did not and criminals still possess their guns!) While figures over the previous 25 years showed a steady decrease in armed robbery with firearms, this has changed drastically upward in the past 12 months, since the criminals now are guaranteed that their prey is unarmed. There has also been a dramatic increase in break-ins and assaults of the elderly, while the resident is at home. Australian politicians are at a loss to explain how public safety has decreased, after such monumental effort and expense was expended in "successfully ridding Australian society of guns." You won't see this on the American evening news or hear your governor or members of the State Assembly disseminating this information. The Australian experience speaks for itself. Guns in the hands of honest citizens save lives and property and, yes, gun-control laws affect only the law-abiding citizens. Take note Americans, before it's too late!

FORWARD TO EVERYONE ON YOUR EMAIL LIST. [I DID ] DON'T BE A MEMBER OF THE SILENT MAJORITY. BE ONE OF THE VOCAL MINORITY WHO WON'T LET THIS HAPPEN IN THE U.S.A.

Here's what I wrote back in rebuttal:

Well, Australia has banned firearms for well over ten years now (not 12 months) as a result of the Port Arthur Massacre, when a nut went on a shooting spree and murdered a dozen people at a national park. Taxpayers were compensated for their firearms as well. IT IS STILL POSSIBLE TO OWN A RIFLE OR SHOTGUN. You must take a safety course. You must show a need. There is still hunting and farmers still own them for culling feral pests. There are even shooting clubs. The info in that email is utterly bogus.

The fact is, the reason you never hear about this in the US media is because Australia is small enough to slide under the radar, and is a hell of a lot safer than the US. Walking through the streets at night in the major cities is a given. I think in the US when there were over 10,000 firearm related deaths in 2000, there were something like 8 in Australia. I love how the nut who spread this bullshit says, "Take note Americans, before it's too late!" Too late for what? For not worrying about being shot? For not living with a sense of fear?

Some right-wing gun nut most likely found some information he liked, omitted any context to reality, and then decided to start spreading this as fact. It took me five minutes online to find these facts:

Bullshit: Australia-wide, homicides are up 6.2 percent, (Never is it stated through what period of time.)
Fact: See chart below...


Bullshit: Australia-wide, assaults are up 9.6 percent ; Again, Never is it stated through what period of time.
Fact: See chart below...


Bullshit: Australia-wide, armed robberies are up 44 percent (yes, 44 percent)!
Fact: In Australia they classify anything used in a harmful manner a weapon. Consequently, if you rob someone with a sharp stick it is classified as armed robbery. They actually use this as an example. "Armed" doesn't mean guns.

Bullshit: In the state of Victoria alone, homicides with firearms are now up 300 percent.
Fact: In the seven years from when the firearms ban took place, the whopping 300 percent this statistic he cites is wrong. Per 100,000 people there were a whopping 2 homicides annually through this period in Victoria. This includes homicide committed WITH OR WITHOUT a gun. Of course, even is one person is killed with a gun, then the next year three are killed, that's 300 percent. Statistics are used without their context for a reason...to manipulate perceptions.

This info can be found at: http://www.aic.gov.au/publications/rpp/38/RPP38.pdf

At the end of the day, Australia is a hell of a lot more sensible with firearms and it only took one massacre for the government to determine that people shouldn't own handguns. In the five years I've been here I've never heard a single Aussie complain about there not being more guns.

Not one.

The Great Mad Max Road Trip

If you are in your 30s, and a guy, you will undoubtedly have seen Mad Max a number of times when you were a teenager. I remember seeing the film and not having any idea where it was set, as it not only had landscapes that were foreign, but the accents of all the actors were dubbed into American, as the producers thought the audience wouldn't understand what was being said. Consequently, it just seemed like another world.

As part of my birthday present, Nina took us on a tour of some of the locations from the movie. I took photos and placed them on top of stills from the corresponding scenes from the movie.

This first image is from the police headquarters in the film. The building is a renovated pump house that is now part of the Scienceworks Museum in Melbourne. The scene is when the lawyers are driving up to spring Johnny the Boy from custody.



The second image is from a stip of resort houses built in the 40s in a city called Avalon, an hour west of Melbourne. It is a run-down looking place and is now little more than a shanty town. This is where the Biker gang hung out in the film and where Jesse went to get an ice cream cone, ending the scene with kick to the Toe Cutters clackers.




The last image is from Edgars road, just north of Avalon, and east of the You Yangs mountains. The road was used for all the chase scenes and you can see the mountains throughout. It is farm country and feels very remote, even though it is only an hour west of the city.



Needless to say, this was seriously cool.

It was also a reflective experience walking around these sites, thinking about how they seemed like such an alien world to me when I was sixteen, and how I live near them now.

I guess I've learned to roll with it.

Christmas at the Beach

Nina in Tasmania on our Honeymoon

One thing that most ex-pats that I’ve met here have in common is the occasional nagging of homesickness. What it’s for and when it hits is different for each person, but it is a common experience.

My wife and I just spent five weeks in the US over the Christmas holidays, and the thing that struck me the most, was that I didn’t think about where I was in a novel way. Living in Australia, I am constantly reminded of the differences between here and the US; the trees, seasons, sports, television, etc., whereas when I was back in the States, there was almost no novelty to it at all-I just fit.

Those of us who move to another country, even one as similar and comfortable as Australia, are aware of how much where one is raised becomes a part of his genes. The seasons, the colors, the smells and sights out our windows, become part of our internal calendar. No matter how long I live overseas, there will an untouchable part of me that will be of where I am from. The woods in Michigan, especially during Autumn, will make me feel something I feel nowhere else.

It is, I think, about the time in life that seems the most honest and free, when playing with friends and staring up at the night sky in the summer was all that it took to have a good day.

Of course this is all a bit romanticised.

After about three weeks in Michigan during late December and early January, I was ready to see the sun again and a weekend at the beach seemed damn good.

Regardless, there are times when the homesickness is completely gone and the newness of a different country provides a daily dose of something new to see, other times, the pangs for a walk through downtown Rochester, capped off by a cone at the Dairy Queen seem quite overwhelming, while at other times, there is a low-grade homesickness that usually hangs about undetected, just under the radar.

I think most people long for something just past their reach, whether it be some sort of lifestyle or level of comfort or item able to be purchased. I consider myself pretty damn lucky that the only thing that I occasionally long for is already a part of who I am and not something unknown, beyond my capacity to achieve.

Just Another Main Street

I used to live off Brunswick Street in Fitzroy. Fitzroy was my introduction to Oz. It’s a funky bohemian area just north of the downtown central business district of Melbourne, and Brunswick street is where all the locals come out in all their glory to shop, eat, listen to music, and drink.

A store called Polyester (http://www.polyester.com.au) has its slogan plastered across the front window: "Seriously Weird Shit."

Here’s why this street, for me, speaks for the culture as a whole: Anglos, Asians, Greeks, Italians, Middle Eastern, and any other combination are out in full glory, sipping coffee or over-priced drinks, having dinner in the open-air confines of the buildings or out on the street under lights and heaters. Hippies, teenagers, gangs of men on the prowl, gaggles of women doing the same; the old, the wealthy, the homeless and the dull; tattoos and piercings rub up against the cashmere of professional couples; and there is rarely a word of strife or contention. All these varied ethnic, cultural and economic groups somehow manage to get along and respect one another.

A young gay couple was sitting outside Joe’s Garage (killer breakfasts) a couple of weeks ago, dressed in hippy rags and looking at each other with that sappy, smitten affection familiar to new couples. They shared a kiss and held hands. Not a person took notice. This street works because of the tolerance of the people. Not every soul is appreciated and enjoyed, but more often than not, they are tolerated.

When my dad came out the first time to visit he was initially taken aback by the seemingly grungy look of Brunswick Street. A street that looks like this may give the typical American pause to walk down. It looks unsafe (even though it isn't). There might be junkies lurking about. There might be a shooting or a fight. Drunks could start trouble if you forget to look away and make eye contact.

This all might be going on (but there won’t be any shootings at least). Even the homeless are friendly and go their own way if you don’t throw them change.

The difference is that while the people don’t seem individually friendlier than Americans, the culture somehow manages to be. Australia is made up of people, it feels, that don’t quite jive from where they’re originally from.

In America there is a strong sense of being an American, and I kind of miss that pride of place. Here, it is rare to experience the same form of pride, yet there is something else…a sense of being open to other cultures on their terms. Aussies travel the world as a matter of course, being an island nation, and they have brought a larger sense of the world community home with them.

Sitting in an overstuffed couch in one of the local pubs, listening to a respectable jazz trio, my dad said, “This place just sort of swallows you up."

Only if you let it.

Detroit to Downunder

Using Australia as a vantage point on what it means to be an American and what America means to those living and working beyond the borders. Yep..sort of sums this blog all up in that first sentence.

We are at a unique point in history where much appears to be on the horizon; fundamental change in world order, mother nature asserting her natural dominance and apparent displeasure; technological changes that will, in the coming decades, make possible a potential leap in evolution for humanity, and the growing sense that the world is growing smaller and smaller.

We as Americans, living in America, take for granted our position in the world. We are the most ambitious nation; indispensible and pivotal in the workings of the world, yet we live our lives only marginally aware of the world beyond our borders. I speak from experience, as my sense of place for myself and home country changed dramatically as a result of my personal geography.

Moving from America to Australia brings perspective. I now am part of a culture that knows full well that its relevance on the world stage is limited; a nation that imports far more culture than it exports; a country whose influence across the globe is primarily its sense of a good life. Aussies love their country and their lifestyle, yet they don't have a genetic predisposition in thinking it would benefit the world to spead them to those unfortunate enough to live elsewhere.

Some Aussies believe their culture embraces mediocrity, and the truly ambitious move overseas to England or the US, where the opportunities are greater. Perhaps. I believe that here there is a bell curve that clips the extreme ends off the American model. Sure, there were never any Aussies on the moon (but they did play an integral part with their Dish to communicate to the astronauts), but every resident is guaranteed not to go broke paying for health services.

To those who've never experienced it first-hand, it's kind of nice taking for granted socialized medicine.