Stumpy Joe in Tennant Creek

The following is an incomplete entry I began a few days ago. We have since journeyed to the east coast and upward via the beautiful Townsville, and are making out way to Cairns.

Anyway, excerpt begins;

I am trapped in Tennant Creek.

Three days ago I set off in a '91 Toyota van with a Canadian guy called Brett heading south. The road has been kind, but the van has a few oddities to it.

Firstly, it overheats in the mid day sun, so we have to drive through the morning and pause between 12 and 2:30.

Secondly, the regulator on the alternator borked so the battery is cooking under the 18volts (inatead of 14) and the whole place smells like sulphur. The acid burned through some of the wires and I had to patch 'em back up.

Excerpt ends.

What happened in the end, was we hung out with an auto electrician and camped in his yard while he fixed up Stumpy Joe. Drinks were taken, banter was had. Then we rode east over bushland with the Lord of the Rings theme music blaring.

Dogs 2

You always miss your dog most. Taffy, you were a fine stand in, but you're no Sola.

Leaving Darwin

The hardest part of travelling is leaving people all the time. In the backpacking world, everyone has a plan and the plan is to keep moving. That's the only inflexible part. You can do anything you want as long as it's new. Every day is a new day, every day is a new goodbye, and every new beginning comes from some other beginning's end.

Day 135 - My Precarious Financial State

The Story So Far

I’ve never had any concept of the value of money. It’s something that has always floated around, but never been necessary. If I wanted to eat out, I ate out; if I wanted to go to the cinema, I went to the cinema; if I wanted to go drinking, I went drinking. I always had something to eat. I always had somewhere to live. Part of this whole “Australia” lark was to get some sense that it meant something. This has taken a while, but I think I’m finally there.

The Prediction

I left Ireland with something in the region of €8,000. I cautiously budgeted that I’d spend €70 a day, which is reasonable if you’re buying petrol, eating in restaurants, and buying anything digital that takes your fancy. Which of course I did. Anyway, factor in €600 overdraft, another €300 cash, and $800 that I earned re-wiring a boat, and the math tells you that I should last almost exactly 135 days, which means that my guess was about right, and that I now have no money.

The Predicament

And so, to the present, where I sit on the balcony of a quiet hostel outside of town, with an empty petrol tank, and all the money I possess; $10.80 made up from loose change I found in the car. I’m planning tomorrow night’s busking, which I need to do to pay for petrol to drive to work the day after. “How did this happen?“, you might ask. Good question.

The Experience

It was probably all the dinners. And breakfasts, lunches and brunches. The ones I bought myself while no one was looking; the ones I bought other people because I like to dine. It might have been the drinks, or all the sunglasses I’ve gone through. Or it might have been the digital camera, the phone, the three sim cards, or the car. Either way, most of it I blew on fun things I simply wanted, and the rest I squandered.

The Situation

So I’m working out in the university to earn some beer tokens before heading east toward surfers’ paradise and the rising sun. The guys with the money have seemingly had some difficulty in organizing a clever way of getting it from their account into mine, and since I haven’t cashed in my pocket full of mumbles yet, it makes sense that now I have nothing but considerable unpaid wages and minor (yet maximum) debts to various financial institutions.

The Solution

Turns out if I want some money I’m going to have to sing for it. Which is ironic, because I think that’s what my dad used to say in a figurative sense. I think I’ve learned something though. Something important. Something about money and how when it really comes down to it, in a situation like this, with all things taken into account and factored in, and taking a broad yet pinpointed view, when all else is… is… I’ve quite lost my train of thought. But I’ve definitely learned something.

Awkward

So I'm walking along the waterfront, past the wave pool, and I start thinking the inside of my lower front teeth feel a little weird. I'm checking this out and looking absent mindedly about when suddenly I notice I'm looking at a girl and she's looking back. She sees me notice, and smiles. But I'm not thinking of that. I'm thinking of my teeth, and feel suddenly compelled to stick my hand in my mouth and find out why the hell they feel so weird.

The girl looked horrified. I laughed but I had my hand in my mouth so it came out as "hahghrjlarfgh".

Crying Women and Why I Have a Beard

This post is long overdue, as it relates to something that happened five times over a period of about two weeks in early July. It was one of the strangest experiences of my life, so I can't leave Darwin without writing about it somewhere. What happened is that women started crying around me.

It's been a long, sunny, enjoyable day. I've been swimming and hanging out with the gang down by the water front; I've played some guitar and had a laugh. We've all gone for drinks. I've gotten hungry and nipped out for a bite. I've grabbed some food at a kebab place and sat down outside. A girl has sat down beside me. She's pretty, but tired. I already know what's going to happen.

She starts making small talk. I'm short with her and ignore most of what she says. She starts telling me about her travels. I barely say a word. She starts talking about her friends back home. I stare at my food. Then something flicks. The tone of the conversation changes. It's like she was a sunday diver in a village of conversation before, and she's just found the slip road onto the motorway.

She talks more quickly. It's hard for her to fit a breath into her sentences. She starts getting agitated. The words make less sense. Her eyes redden. The first drop of water appears. She stops talking. Here we go.

I drop my fork into the food and look at her; I say something meaningless and comforting, but the barrier has come down and it has to run its course. It peaks with angry words, sad words, twisted words. Water flows down her face and after a while subsides into sniffs, and eventually apologies. "I never do this." The words of an emotional petite mort. They're the same every time.

There has been a connection, somewhere along the line. She has opened up to me and feels a bond. I just want to finish my kebab. She'll talk to me again in a few days and expect another transformational heart-to-heart, but I'll probably wrap up the conversation quickly and go to the TONR. You have to be firm and polite with these people; there are just too many of them.

After talking about it with a few of the greatest minds in Darwin, I eventually decided that if I grew a beard I'd be a little less accessible, and it's seems to have worked so far. I'm a little worried about shaving so I'm going to keep it until I head east side.

You can't be too careful.

The Guy Who Recommends You Music

**Rant Warning**

I get a lot of different reactions to carrying a guitar everywhere. Some people go totally crazy for it, some think it's an every day thing. Most just look a little brightly and don't say a word. There's only one type that really bothers me. It's The Guy Who Recommends You Music.

A standard thing for The Guy Who Recommends You Music to say is "Hey you have a guitar! You'd love this obscure piece of crap music because I girl I liked years ago said she liked it once and I've listened to it a million times since." (They don't punctuate.) This is usually followed by them fumbling with phones, mp3 players, and websites, trying to communicate to you the brilliance and emotional weight of the life changing experience that is this music. Usually it's just one guy with a poorly mic'd guitar whining clichéd lyrics in a post Elliott Smith lament over a lost love.

Don't get me wrong, I have my own strange music I listen to, and I like a bit of Elliott Smith now and again, but I don't stop strangers on the street and make them listen to it. The main problem is that The Guy Who Recommends You Music is usually enthusiastic and clueless, so you can't be outright rude to him; it's a social trap of politeness.

One day someone will recommend me a band and I'll punch them without a word of warning.

Just you wait.


References:
http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0137523/quotes?qt=qt0479121
http://xkcd.com/920/