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Published: August 6th 2010
What a strange, even downright bizarre, few days. I’ve become practically a native of Brisbane. After three days here, I know my way around like a local. The city has a huge river weaving and meandering through its heart like a thick, brown snake, and there are fantastic catamaran and other river taxis plowing their way up and down this river. I spent yesterday riding these ferries as the weather slowly deteriorated and the day deepened, thickening clouds adding a layer of gloom to my speculations about the rest of the trip.
I was due to leave for South East Asia’s sweaty climes, but a number of factors were interfering with the normal enthusiasm that would normally greet such a plan for me. I asked Antony what he thought I should do since he is not only my brother, but also currently the best informed about the factors disease-clogging my mind. I thought he would just say, ‘Oh f**k it, just go for it’. Too my surprise, he didn’t. He recommended changing the ticket, going home early to concentrate on getting ducks into proverbial rows.
At the same time as I get his advice, a new curve ball appears in my
inbox: I get a message from Suze about the work being done in my apartment to repair the ceiling and walls. Her assessment is that, while the extensive repair work might well be fine in the end, there is a colossal clean up going to be needed because there is plaster dust in every nook and cranny of the apartment, including rooms where no activity even took place. I was worried that the people doing this work were going to be cowboys before I left. Looks like I wasn’t too far off with that fear!
My original plan and plane ticket, bought in those heady days before the insane clowns ruined my job, called for me to return in my usual fashion: inches before the next school begins - I was due to arrive back on Sunday after a thirty hour sequence of flights, have Sunday to get my house together, Monday for the Classroom, Tuesday, back to School, Wednesday: Hello nippers! This plan would have been great had I not since fallen through a bloody great rabbit hole into an alternate Universe.
Now look at the situation: apartment covered in plaster dust and shite, a whole new and utterly
horrific school scenario requiring me to come up with a whole new survival strategy, my dental apparatus threatening to crack, splinter, and collapse with the next crunchy surprise (- while Antony and I were in the Blue Mountains I chomped into a piece of crispy bacon and a sinister cracking sound reverberated ominously around the interior of my skull.) both my websites needing a whole new revamp. On top of that, the general stress of contemplating the future didn’t lend itself to the claustrophobic heat and hassle of South East Asia.
Nevertheless, as all this is bubbling around, I proceed as if I’m leaving: I post a care package by ship back to America filled with Oz-specific stuff, I start taking the malaria meds, make Hotel reservations for my first two nights in Phnom Penh, pack everything, check out, and eat. Eventually, after a day of touristing I make my way to Brisbane airport. It is here that I decide to find out if it is possible to change the V Australia flight back to America, and, if so, at what cost.
There’s the rabbit hole. Or is it the looking glass? Everything turns weird and slightly strange: suddenly I
am back on the bus going back into Brisbane, My flight back to America is changed to August 18th (with a penalty of $145 for doing it being the major cost), my entire sequence of flights to South-East Asia and back to Oz are just gone (I haven’t even contacted the airlines at this point to see about any sort of refund - I’ll give it a go tomorrow, if I get the chance), and, slightly stunned and confused (that I actually did it), I end up in a boxy, windowless room back in Brisbane wondering if perhaps I had lost my mind.
This head spinning continued pretty much unabated until 2:00am, by which time I had Skyped the whole affair to Antony and had hatched and executed a new even more slightly insane plan. I really was a little worried by this time. I’d fallen down a rabbit hole and while down there had found another rabbit hole to fall into: on the other side of the looking glass was a looking glass that I fell into.
I’m reading Paul Auster’s excellent ‘Invisible’. I am worried that I am starting to resemble the slightly crazed and impetuous lead character,
although the person I appear to be seeking revenge on seems to be me rather than anybody else. I am chucking around money as if I grew it. We’ll see where I am by the time I get back. Broke as usual, no doubt! And whose fault will that be?
As well as reading Auster, I’ve found another way to counteract the insanity. I’ve been playing chess a lot on the computer and really enjoying playing almost like I used to years ago. I feel slightly guilty about it, but I keep sneaking games in between bouts of insanity. It calms me. Distracts me from the financial hari-kari!
So this is what I’ve done: I fly to New Zealand tomorrow for a ten day tour, returning to Brisbane for one night before flying back to the States on the 18th August. I am currently only as far as LAX when I get back to the States, since I still haven’t changed the flight from LAX to Boston. Hopefully I’ll get back into Boston either the 18th or 19th of August.
This will give me time to do the following:
time to recover from the awful jetlag I’m anticipating - even
though I’ve cut it way down by nixing the South East Asia leg,
time to visit my dentist and concoct the latest insane and devilish master plan with him,
time to thoroughly clean and prepare my apartment for a new soccer season of undoubted decadence and debauchery (Liverpool’s new season kicks off a week on Sunday!),
time to migrate and sort out the website problem that landed on my doorstep during the trip that is going to make both of my websites problematic to run,
time to strategize and plan for the upcoming school year,
hell, even time to get away and spend a few days with friends down on the Vineyard, if I’m lucky.
So I’m sitting here back in my fabulous Brisbane Hotel - this time on the fourteenth floor overlooking the skyscrapers from a different angle through my giant glass doors and, over my balcony, the lights of the City at night are gorgeous and magnificent - and my fit of insanity from last night no longer seems so insane.
Fiscally it was and is undoubtedly mentally deranged from every possible angle. I might as well just grab a handful of cash and set fire to it
and chuck it off the balcony while dancing butt-naked and screeching and howling the can-can into the night. But I’m more excited about going to New Zealand, even though it’s going to be ass-freezing cold, than I am about going to sweltering, monsoon, malarial, beggar, hassle, humid Asia. Truth is, I’ve been to that part of the World on a number of occasions, and I know what to expect. I’ve never been to New Zealand.
Also, I’m enjoying having the relative ease of travel that Australia and New Zealand afford. I’ve got a lot of stuff on my mind and having to deal with the cockroaches and weasels that infest the tourist traps of South East Asia is about as appealing as the humid, thick, sultry air on my bloody, bursting hemorrhoids (I don’t actually have steaming bloody hemorrhoids, but I think you know what mean).
So if you take away the complete financial lunacy of what I’m doing, the utter stupidity of it all, I think I’ve actually stumbled onto the best plan to deal with my sketchy future circumstances.
I’m adjusting to changing circumstances, demonstrating flexibility you might say, if you wanted to be positive,
Anyway, whatever you
or I think, it’s too late now.
The dye is recast. Whatever.
The next update will be from Auckland New Zealand in about fifty degrees Fahrenheit and in the pissing rain!
See you on the flypaper…
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Muz
non-member comment
Stunning photo!
This is a great perspective with wonderful tone :-)