How bizarre

State elections in Tasmania and South Australia this weekend should have sent a clear message to Labour Prime Minister Kevin Rudd that his government is in deep trouble as the Federal elections loom later in the year. In both states there has been a double digit swing against Labour, even though the party may just hang on to power in each state. Although the results should sound serious alarm bells, it may already be too late. Rudd has the electoral appeal of New Zealand’s Phil Goff and Annette King combined and is sliding in the polls in a manner reminiscent of the last New Zealand Labour Government. It seems that once the momentum starts, it is difficult and often impossible to arrest.

The worst part is that Rudd is being blitzed by Liberal leader Tony Abbott who, quite frankly, is ghastly beyond description. Something like a Lockwood Smith on speed, Abbott has specialised in appearing as an ordinary Australian bloke; that is if the ordinary Australian bloke spends most of his life in Speedos.

Last weekend, in a soft, magazine-style television profile, Abbott was filmed, unnervingly creepily so, in the family swimming pool in his Speedos, one daughter piggybacking on his shoulders combing his hair rooster-style with her hands. Most often Abbott is in red and blue life-saver Speedos and on Sunday night, he was in a sort of mottle-patterned pair coming out of the water from a fund raising fun-swim somewhere to have another crack at Rudd.

This man has a winning formula; the pit-bull charm of the late Sir Robert Muldoon combined with a what appears a hapless but calculated honest-John approach, akin to that employed by Kiwi Prime Minister John Key who masks an ideological agenda with a plausible pretence that his policies are driven by common-sense and pragmatism.

There is a complacency among many who believe that Labour has an unassailable lead at the federal level and there seems little comprehension that a turning tide is hard to stem.

Almost as horrible as the prospect of Tony Abbott becoming Prime Minister is the thought that Australian cricketer Doug Bollinger may almost singlehandedly bowl out the New Zealand team twice in the first test at Wellington. It is one thing that Michael Clarke has overcome the Lara Bingle melodrama to score more than one hundred and sixty runs, but Bollinger epitomises everything that Kiwis find dislikeable about Australian sports’ stars. The only saving grace here is that the test series against New Zealand is not being shown on free to air television.

On what may be a lighter note, and this is true, is that there was an attempted carjacking just up the road from our home this week. While that may not be funny in itself, what provided the amusement was that three women concerned have been charged with attempting to steal a motor vehicle, their attempt being thwarted as none could drive a car with manual transmission. Local police have released a Neighbourhood Watch bulletin advising locals to drive with their windows up and doors locked.

Meanwhile, while the tree man of Thornlie, Richard Pennicuik, who has had more than his fair share of publicity already has drawn some unlikely support. British entrepreneur Richard Branson has been in town this week for some sort of fundraising effort and somehow the plight of Mr Pennicuik’s attempt to save the gum tree outside his house from being chopped down was drawn to Branson’s attention. To television cameras, Branson has wished Penniciuk the very best of luck, adding that he is a “bit of a tree hugger himself”. As for Pennicuik, he has been summoned to appear in the Armadale Magistrates’ Court in a fortnight and given that he now believes the local authority has no constitutional legitimacy, we will watch with interest.

Perhaps the last words should be about the hapless Lara Bingle, former fiancée of cricketer Michael Clarke and subject of the unauthorised release of a nude photo, allegedly by former boyfriend and Aussie Rules bad-boy Brendan Fevola. Bingle, it is reported, is poised to dump her newly appointed agent, Max Markson, after advice from her family that Markson had ruined her career and cheapened her image in the debacle. Fancy that, some might suggest that dumping Markson would be a little like closing the stable door after the horse has well and truly bolted.

What happened this arvo?
Cricketer Michael Clarke may have learned something this week, and that would be to be careful about whose initials to adorn with tattoos to the body. As the media circus surrounding the split between Clarke and his former fiancé, the unfortunate model Lara Bingle (should that be Bungle?), becomes more obsessed by the day, The Sunday Times revealed in an intellectual exclusive that the cricketer had the initials LB indelibly emblazoned on his shoulder after becoming engaged. One can only hope that Clarke will be sufficiently distracted by events of the past fortnight and perhaps an imminent tattoo removal that his concentration will suitably lapse during the forthcoming cricket tests against New Zealand. Especially so given that he has taken relationship advice from Shane Warne.
Away from the Clarke-Bingle drama, what is hot here is at the moment is the University of Western Australia is running a course on mastering Australian slang, although it hasn’t been stated whether this is for the benefit of locals or confused immigrants. As if we hadn’t been able to work it out, we are told that Australians run vowels together, shorten every possible word and give nicknames by adding an “a” or “o” onto the end of almost everything. Thus we get Bazza and Muzza and have our local port town of Freo, or Fremantle for the uninitiated. In Melbourne we head to the tan in the arvo to look at things botanical, that’s on the way to the “g” in to watch a bit of cricket or football, AFL or Aussie rules that is. A work colleague took the abbreviation business to the extreme, completely unable to master a word as complex as Kaelene he shortened it to a simple “K” and since then all has been well. “How’s K”, he regularly asks, with a look of smug, self-satisfaction.
The UWA’s “Studysmarter” people give their students a rundown on Australian history and then concentrate on the real business of deciphering words and phrases such as see ya later, chrissie present, knackered, freebie, aggro, servo and yobbo. It is as well that thong is on the list, possiblly convincing these impressionable young students that they should wear their thongs on their feet and not under their jeans. Now that would be uncomfortable.
If there was any doubt that some Australians have lost their sense of reality, The Sunday Times also reports that a runaway psychiatric patient is suing the Minister for Health for becoming pregnant while on the run, and has claimed additional damages for what has been described as the assault to herself that the pregnancy and birth of the child has caused. This woman apparently had sex with an unknown male after absconding from the hospital where she had been detained and is now blaming the authorities for not preventing the escape and subsequent impregnation.
Elsewhere, residents living near the local Subiaco Oval and ME Bank stadium have complained that they are being “ripped off” by not being given free tickets to events at their neighbouring grounds as compensation for having to put up with the noise and crowds from occasional concerts and sports matches. Prompted by this fine sense of logic Marty is requesting a new car from the local authorities as compensation for living near a busy road and free drinks from the local pub past which he has to walk past twice daily. It is hard to understand though what would possess anyone living near the ME Bank stadium to want a ticket to see the hapless Western Force rugby team. That is, unless it is the night they play the Crusaders.
Finally, it is good to be able to report that the Tree man of Thornlie, Richard Pennicuik, has refused to come down from his gum-tree protest following a threat by the local council of a $5,000 fine and a further $500 a day penalty for staying aloft. Pennicuik now approaches 100 days up his tree and, either intoxicated or buoyed on by a renewed flurry of media attention, has declared he now intends to run for mayor. Against his own legal advice, he has apparently discovered that the local authority has no constitutional basis and is therefore unable to impose penalties upon him. Mysteriously, a tree-top platform, previously taken down after council threats of prosecution, has mysteriously reappeared and Pennicuik has predicted he will still be sky high after another 100 days.
There is no doubt this is a wonderful country.

Daughters for the return home
Australia is agog. The question exercising the minds of every television and radio channel reporter and it seems every viewer or listener across this entire continent is apparently whether the two-year engagement between underwear model Lara Bingle and Australian cricketer Michael Clarke is on the rocks. The lesser question is whether Clarke can ever be captain the green and gold’s as a result of his return from the New Zealand cricket tour to be with his fiancé following the release of a nude cell phone photo of Bingle taken by then married AFL bad-boy footballer, Brendon Fevola while having an affair with her some two years earlier. It seems almost unfathomable, but the hapless Bingle, rather than the naughty Favola, seems to have become public enemy number one, and it hasn’t helped that she has reacted by giving the finger and swearing like the proverbial trooper at paparazzi and reporters that have stalked her out over the past week. Fevola, meanwhile, appears to be almost off the hook.
During what has turned into a media frenzy, in one television interview alone this evening, Bingle’s celebrity manager, Max Markson, when asked about the relationship between Bingle and Clarke, gave the no-comment response on no less than twelve occasions. Now that is consistency and to divert attention further, Max then began to sing in response to questions.
It has been a bad year for Bingle, over the New Year break a $200,000 Aston Martin brought for her by Clarke was stolen and it may just be a reflection of the macho nature of Australian society that she is the one vilified during this current drama. It’s not all bad though, if Clarke and she split, Bingle gets to keep their two Pomeranians while he gets the Staffy.
There has been no such media speculation or even the slightest frenzy about two former world travellers after recent confirmed sightings of Kaelene in New Zealand’s Christchurch and Rotorua while husband Marty remains in Australia. After slipping quietly back in to her country of birth Kaelene has resumed work, like a recidivist, at the National Distribution Workers Union and is likely to remain there awaiting a major lottery win. Coupled with Marty suffering the indignity of working in Australia, the return home signifies that, unfortunately, this leg of the world adventure may be over and a brutal and unpleasant form of reality is setting in. If asked, their agent will reply to questions on the state of the marriage, explaining that the trans-Tasman separation is no more than a geographical accident of fate.
That said, the New Zealand news is every bit as entertaining as Australia with reports that Whanganui Mayor and shock talkback jock, Michael Laws, has been regularly calling police to his home to referee matrimonial discussions, while former National member of parliament and children’s commissioner Roger McClay is in a spot of bother for allegedly double dipping on expenses claims for charities with which he is involved. These things really couldn’t happen to a more deserving couple.
Back in Australia, there is a brutal reality for one of our old favourite characters, Richard Pennicuik, the tree man of Thornlie. After more than ninety days perched up the gum tree outside his house in an attempt to stop the Council chopping it down, Pennicuik’s days aloft are clearly numbered. The Council has served him with a notice threatening a $5,000 fine if he remains up the tree when the loppers come calling and a further $500 for each and every day he defies the earthwards order.
It may be as well, for Pennicuik has become something of a target for local hoons who have entertained themselves at weekends by shooting pellet guns and throwing eggs at him and, most recently, setting fire to the Australian flag draped around the tree trunk. Now that is unpatriotic.

Spent Force
Something quite odd happened today. During evening rush hour, our train stopped at Claisebrook station, two stops out of Perth Central, and remained put. Normally a one minute stop, it remained motionless as trains on other lines came and went while trains behind us on the same line banked up. Then, sometime later, came an announcement: “Ladies and gentlemen, we would like to apologise for this delay in service, but our driver has gone missing.”
Incredible, how can it be that at a suburban railway station a driver simply goes missing? There was no toilet for a driver to take an unscheduled but perhaps desperately needed pit stop, there was no sign of a railway driver high-tailing out of the station and, unlike the London Underground, there was no announcement that a passenger had gone under a train and the driver in was immobilized by shock. This was simply a case of one train, no driver.
There was one more apology, we were informed that a relief driver was on the way and some fifteen minutes later, the doors closed and we were off. We presumed it was the relief driver, but if it was just a helpful passenger we were none the wiser.
It may be an easy thing to become obsessed or preoccupied with weather, especially when the mercury tops 39 degrees centigrade on the first day of autumn. We are apparently experiencing a heat wave which is defined in meteorological terms as ten days in a row where the temperature reaches more than 35 degrees. We have had, according to the television news, two of these heat waves in what has become the hottest and driest summer recorded in the 110 year history of recordings in Western Australia.
This may be the only place in the world where, when the forecasters predict improving weather, they actually mean it is going to get cooler.
If ten days of 35 degree-plus temperatures constitute a heat wave, spare a thought for the residents of Paraburdoo in the northern Pilbura region of the state. There it has been over 40 degrees every day for forty days straight, so hot that the town’s liquor store is reported to be almost out of booze. Wines, spirits and pre-mixes have all run dry, but there is still some beer because they buy in bulk. Bulk must be quite a large order.
Perth Now reports that Paraburdoo Burger Bus owner Sonia Peters shut her mobile burger van one day because the heat topped 50 degrees inside the vehicle. “Luckily I’m Asian so I don’t sweat,” the extraordinarily fortunate Ms Peters told the paper.
While the weather may be hot, the same cannot be said for the Western Force, the local Super 14 rugby team, who were uncharitably described in the local newspaper as the Spent Force. It may be coincidence but a recent email from an acquaintance, no less than a board member of the Canterbury Rugby Football Union, suggested that, with his coaching experience with the Sydenham Rugby Club in Christchurch, Marty might be just the man to help this team out of the doldrums. There may have been something in that, or alternatively it may be a clue as to just how desperate the team is, that a local competition is running, the first prize to be John Mitchell’s assistant coach for a day. The consolation prize is quite possibly to be the assistant coach for the entire season.

Kiwi gold
This was one not to be missed, the twenty-fifth and, as it transpired, final Swanbourne Olympics. Beachside, under the hot Perth sun, this was competition as its most fierce; an international field contesting such unlikely events as pass the bucket, fill’er up mate, the four legged race which was actually what Kiwi’s know as the three legged race but with an extra person, the hot-rod race, ocean swimming and a variety of others culminating in an all-in tug o’war. This left the concurrently running Vancouver Winter Olympics for dead, and proudly taking the gold and silver medals from the Aussies in the ocean swimming in the second event of the day were a couple of young New Zealand women. We were just so proud; it almost brought tears to our eyes when they belted out a couple of refrains of God Defend New Zealand as they stepped onto the podium to collect their medals. They were to take more medals later, fortunate as their only other compatriot competitor, an unidentified male formerly of Christchurch, was beaten into second-to-last place in the egg and spoon race, which was actually golf ball and spoon, after some unruly interference from an Australian rival. Typical.
Team uniform for the day’s events was described as immaterial and that was as well; judging the best bum competition would have been difficult had costumes been mandatory or even allowed. It may be that some think a best bum competition culturally inappropriate in an age where substance is intended to be more admired than form, but we thought the whole event somewhat ageist. What chance does a middle-aged, sagging backside have against a nubile, taut young thing, and this proved the case. The winners were all young, but we applauded as our country fellows again picked up the gold and silver medals in the female section.
Uniforms too would have been quite a problem for the eggs in space competition. It comprised one competitor throwing eggs to another who attempted to catch them without breakage. The distance between the players was increased after every successful throw until a point was reached where containment could no longer occur, the catcher generally becoming splattered in yolk. No good for clothes we were told.
We refrained from the lunchtime body painting feeling no particular need to have a blue Australian flag torso with one nipple the fifth Australian star and the other the centre of the Union Jack, or to have an elephant whose trunk extended to a phallic finish, but others did. Instead, we had a barbequed sausage from the stall of one of the local nudist clubs.
Clearly these sports are not everyone’s cup of tea. The local free beach association reports that there is entrenched opposition to their very existence from some local residents and council representatives and elements within the surf club despite North Swanbourne having been a nude beach since before the Second World War. There was even, their newsletter says, opposition to the new beachside café calling itself the Naked Fig, the word naked apparently not considered to be family friendly.
If it was considered that people who inhabit nude beaches might be odd, they are nothing by comparison to some who use public transport. Just the other day, a young man sat next to Marty on his way home from work. Not long into the journey he began shadow-boxing, sparring, it seemed, with an invisible Mohammed Ali and he was sidetracked only by a need to repeatedly call out to a non-existent person who may or may not have been on the bus.
Next, he jumped out of his seat, stood underneath the ceiling mirror designed to let the driver see passengers wanting to alight from the rear doors, pulled off his cap, spat on his hands and spent the best part of five stops sculpting his hair in one of those rooster comb styles. Brilliant, he then sat down in another seat and told a complete stranger loud enough for the whole bus to hear how he was off to meet his partner, the previous night being the first time they had been together in four years. “It was a bit strange”, he said, “but we have an open relationship. I told her she could sleep around as much as she wanted as long as she didn’t tell me about it”, he said to all who probably didn’t need that level of information. And then he proceeded to then tell us all about permaculture.
How very odd this country can be.

Post Mao
It was the place to be, Chinatown, Melbourne for the Chinese New Year and it was quite by accident that we found ourselves making our way through hundreds of spectators, mostly Chinese, watching costumed dragons weaving their way through the crowds accompanied by drummers and lines of followers. Strings of Double-Happy firecrackers sounded like random machine-gun fire going off completed the raucous atmosphere as we made our way to the Post Mao Restaurant for dinner with Seath and Nicole.
We can’t be sure if this was coincidence or fate, but they had brought tickets to see the rock band AC/DC in Melbourne and were booked for a week in Australia’s cultural capital while on break from work. Subsequently, when he started work, Marty learned was to be dispatched to Melbourne at the very same time. But it didn’t end there, quite independently we had been booked into the same hotel, The Rendezvous, opposite the Flinders St railway station and, as would be expected, we couldn’t help but all bump in to each other once there.
For us, it was a return visit to Post Mao, a restaurant themed on the iconic leader of the Cultural Revolution, complete with Mao statues and posters and a maitre‘d who seemed like a Chinese version of Basil Faulty. With tie tucked firmly into shirt, he challenged intending patrons about whether they had a booking and, if not, it seemed, he made random or arbitrary decisions on whether he would let them in. We must have passed the test, so secured a table and subsequently tucked in to a fabulous meal of Peking duck, honeyed chicken, sizzling beef and other delicacies washed down by New Zealand Sauvignon Blanc.
Melbourne itself is just as we remember, but for the number of AC/DC fans in town for the band’s three concerts planned for the city. The place was crawling with people adorned in tour T-shirts, although there was clearly some competition to be wearing clothing from scenes of the band’s past glories. Among the current tour shirts were those from previous eras, dating back as far as their concerts of the 1970s.
The National Gallery of Victoria even got in on the act, with an AC/DC exhibition including concert posters, tickets, magazines, videos, photos and even a series of handwritten letters and cards from the former, now dead, singer, Bon Scott, to family and friends. One letter, loaned to the exhibition by his girlfriend, accused her of being unfaithful to him while he was away on tour and telling her how cross he was as a result. How very generous of her to loan such a personal letter and how very possessive for such accusations to come from a wild man of rock’n’roll.
Four Australian cities have made into the world’s top ten most liveable cities in the world according to an annual survey conducted by The Economist magazine. The survey considers five factors; stability, health-care, culture and environment, education and infrastructure. Melbourne comes in as Australia’s highest ranked city, beaten into third place by Vancouver and Vienna. Sydney, Perth and Adelaide are also included in the list ahead of Auckland in tenth place. Not surprisingly, Zimbabwe’s capital Harare was considered least liveable of the 140 places compared.
While these Australian cities are easily liveable, one difference between New Zealand and Australia is the level and visibility of organized crime and how the seemingly responsible rich and famous appear to be have such interesting connections. Incidents linking industrialists, business people and lawyers with underworld characters are commonly reported, the latest the firebombing of a car belonging to the boss of a company currently in charge of Perth’s largest construction project. The West Australian reports that underworld characters had been seen around the construction site and that bikies and other gang members employed by sub-contractors had proved impossible to control before the bombing. Soon after, the developer announced a halt to the $550 million project.
Among the frontrunners to take over the project is a company whose board members include former “Sword Boys” gang member, cage fighter, nightclub bouncer and “enforcer” Edmoind “Monty” Margini, who has denied any connection with the incident. He claims as his alibi the fact that he was dining with ‘larger-than-life construction union boss, Kevin Reynolds”, at the time. It turns out they are good mates, Reynolds having employed Margini at one stage as an industrial relations officer.
This all seems quite normal in the lucky country.

Jesus, the kangaroo
This may be taking things too far, but we spent the weekend with the other Churtons, Kaelene's first husband and his second wife, but then we are all mature and sensible people. With Seath and Nicole, we headed down the Kwinana highway past Bunbury and inland to Bridgetown in the South West, to what is an essentially old-fashioned rural Australian town. They exist, these places with old, verandahed pubs and tree-lined streets, but to get there we had to pass the “ups”; Burekup, Boyanup, Kirup, Balingup, Manjimup, Dwellingup, Gnowangerup, Kojonup, Nannup, Kulikup, Beerelup, Dardanup, Mullalyup, Yowungup, Maranup, Naimup, Kakatherup, Winnejup, Mandalup but to name but a few. Up, we are told, is the indigenous term for water, but there seemed little around.
This is outback Australia where legend has it there are such things as Kangaroos and Emu in the wild; we’ve not seem any and we are not convinced they exist outside of wildlife parks and zoos; all we found were wineries, olive groves, orchards and market gardens, and traffic police hunting down wayward drivers. This is a place where, when forecasters’ talk about improving weather, they mean it will get colder and, better still, it may even rain. It is big, dry country but it does have quite an appeal if you can appreciate the beauty of straggly gum trees and red soil. Undeniably it is big country, the tourist brochures tell us in graphic form that this state is bigger than New Zealand, Japan, the British Isles and half of Europe put together. We believe it.
The first Mr Churton, Victor, and his second wife, Victoria, have a five acre block just out of Bridgeton and it is quite heavenly. In the mornings, vivid, almost iridescent, blue wrens fossick in the garden while, later, white Cockatoos and bright green parrots call by. Ravens and crows squeal, sounding for the world like new-born lambs and the flies, huge things, bite everything that gets in their way. We don’t like those one bit, but breakfast of garden fresh tomatoes, free-range eggs and local bacon make it all seem okay.
As if to prove that Kangaroos really do exist in the wild, the president of one of the University union branches provides a weekly update into his latest charge, a young Joey. As part of a rescue group, he and others pluck survivors from the pouches of road-killed kangaroos and hand rear them until ready for release back into to the wild. In this case, Jesus, as this Joey is known, lives in an eskie, the Australian equivalent of a chilly bin, until big and strong enough for release. What happens is that, once independent, they are put into a paddock with other similarly hand-reared joeys, the gates are left open and, eventually, they drift back off into their wild state.
Down at the beach, dressed in nothing more than red and gold surf lifesavers’ budgie smugglers, Australian Liberal Party leader, the ghastly Tony Abbott, has told women that their virginity is a gift that shouldn’t be given away lightly. Those he says who are tempted by sex before marriage should at least use contraceptives. This might seem obvious to some, but Tony Abbott for more than two decades was hoodwinked into believing he was the father of a love child conceived during his teenage years. “I have gone through twenty-seven years of life convinced that I was Daniel’s dad, but it appears that is not the case,” said Mr Abbott after DNA testing proved that an unidentified man was actually the father. Clearly Mr Abbott did not mean that young males need to give away their virginity so easily.