It's funny how some people come into your life. Take for instance one of my closest friends Kym. Kym was only meant to be in my life briefly and then vanish like a lot of people do. She was renting a room in our warehouse for a couple of weeks while my housemate was away on holiday. During this time I spilt up with my long term boyfriend who I lived with as he was cheating on me with a girl who lived down the corridor from us. With all the tears, shouting and drama, Kym must of thought she had moved into some sort of Jerry Springer episode. I chucked my boyfriend out as it was the only thing to do. The only problem with this was that between us, we rented a bedroom and an office. I could not afford both on my own. As I had been a complete nutter on the verge of a breakdown (or drunk!) most days since she had lived there, it was a complete surprise when Kym said she would move into the office and make it into a bedroom to cover the rent. She stayed for 8 months and over that time we became good friends, and when she left we continued our friendship and over the years she has become a really good, loyal friend to me. So looking back on it now, I'm really glad my boyfriend cheated on me, because I would of probably never of become friends with Kym and gained a person who was far more important to me in my life. I'm also glad he cheated on me as he was German and listened to bad German rap music, so it meant I didn't have to listen to that anymore as well!
"Because if I don't, I would cry and it's much better to laugh" was her response.
I didn't get to say goodbye to her properly as I was lay up in bed with a chest and throat infection from Hell. Maybe it was a good thing as I would of cried my eyes out in front of her, so instead I cried my eyes out on my own, while high on Day Nurse and antibiotics for my infection!
I was determined to keep in contact when she left. I sent her emails to ask how her new life in Australia was going, but got no response. I felt gutted. "Was this the way it was going to be now she back in Australia. Would she forget about me now" I thought to myself. A couple of weeks later I received an response email. Kym told me that she was sorry for not replying sooner but she had been in hospital for the last couple of weeks with Pancreatitis and a collapsed lung. She calmly said that it had been quite serious and she had nearly died. Not the start to a new life in Australia she had hoped for. Kym was one of my main reasons for visiting Australia. I missed her and I wanted to check my friend was OK.
"You have Australian visa?"
I'm panting, out of breath at the check in desk of Narita, Tokyo airport after sprinting across the terminal, scared I was going to miss final check in after missing my train and having to wait another hour for the next one. I make it just in time but then I'm presented with this question.
"No" I reply "British passports don't need a visa for Australia!"
"I think they do" replies the woman politely, behind the desk.
"I've been to Australia before and I didn't need a visa!" As this was seven years ago I really can't remember if this is true or not but I'm sticking to the story.
"I have to check with immigration" she says I picks up the phone and starts to dial. I'm starting to feel nervous. I spy an Australia couple at the desk next to me.
"I don't need a visa for Australia with a British passport do I?" I turn to ask them.
"Na!" they respond "You will be fine."
A tall, thin, camp Japanese man waltzes over.
"I believe you don't have a visa for Australia?" He asks.
"No. I don't need one!" I say defiantly.
"Well then I can't let you board this flight then!"
"What!" I go white and my mouth drops open. "You mean I can't get on the flight!"
"That's what I just said."
"But I have a British passport. I've been before!" I say in shock.
"I have worked here many years and you have always needed a visa" he responds. I hate this guy! He's smug and has a face I want to punch! I stand for a minute defeated.
"You pay 3000 yen and I can do visa online now for you" he says.
"Really?" My face lights up. This guy is not so bad after all. I wait anxiously as he types away at the computer as time ebbs away. This is cutting it down to the wire. After what felt like forever, he turns to me:
"It's done you can check in. Oh and next time you go to a country I suggest you check the visa situation!"
No! I take it back! I hate him and his smug face, which I still want to punch! I make it to the gate as they announce the final call, with my nerves shot at.
I wasn't go to stay with Kym first up as she was moving into a new house. I had rented an Air B&B with my friend Biskey who had come to see me from Sydney. As I said it's funny how people come into your life, well read how I meant Biskey and rest of the Pussy Fags (I did not give them this name before you all start telling me off for the use of this term!) in Colombia click here
Actually you should read it as then you will understand the chaos of what is about to follow as they seem to bring chaos with them. The plan was simple. I had the address of the apartment. I would buzz and he would let me in. Hey presto! That simple! Well you would think but as I have learnt, nothing is that simple with the Pussyfags, especially Biskey. After going through immigration and getting my luggage I arrive at the address at 2am. I buzz. Nothing. I buzz again! Nothing! I keep buzzing. Nothing! Nothing, NOTHING! I decide to ring him but I realise I only have Biskeys English mobile number from when he was in London. I have to turn on my 3G. I leave a message to say I'm outside. Nothing! So it's the early hours of the morning and I'm sat on the street with my bags looking like a homeless person in the middle of Melbourne. It's not even warm! I want to kill Biskey! I've been sat there at least half an hour, when a guy walks over:
"Are you OK there?" he asks.
I explain the situation to him. Luckily he lives in the building and takes pity on me and let's me in. Result. I find the apartment and knock on the door a couple of times. Nothing. I try the handle. The door opens. Amazing! I walk into a dark and silent and apartment. I call Biskeys name. Nothing. I walk from room to room with no signs of life until I finally I reach the bedroom where I can see a figure asleep in the dark. I call Biskeys name again. I walk closer to the bed and then I have a heart attack. You see Biskey is of Indian origin and is dark. This guy in the bed is definitely white! "SHIT! I've walked into the wrong persons apartment! I'm going to get arrested for trespassing in some one else's place!" I think.
I'm still having a heart attack when the person turns around and looks at me.
"Hello slag! Surprise!"
It's Reuben! One of the Pussyfags, but he's not meant to be here! I throw myself on the bed and give him a huge hug.
"Where the Hell is Biskey?" I ask
"He got drunk and didn't want to wait, so went out!" replies Reuben.
"What! He's such an idiot! Why didn't you wait up and let me in?" I ask Reuben.
"I'm not even meant to be here remember? I'm a surprise! None of my responsibility!" is his response and turns over and goes back to sleep. A typical Pussyfag response: I'm not taking responsibility! I decide to go to sleep and not get angry. Why would I expect anything different from these guys? They are total nightmares. Isn't why I get on with them? Life is never boring with them?
I've been asleep over an hour when I get woken by a phone call.
"Where are you?" Says the person down the line.
"Biskey! Is that you?" I ask.
"Of course it is! Where are you? I've been waiting for you!" He replies
"No you haven't! Where the Hell have you been?" I'm angry and tired after being woken from sleep.
"Yes I have! I've been waiting for you at the casino!"
"Why the Hell are you waiting for me at a casino?"
"Because that's where I am!" He retorts
"Your an idiot and I'm going to sleep!" And I hang up.
An hour later I'm woken from sleep again. This time it's Biskey in person shaking me! He smells of alcohol.
"Hey how are you? I was waiting for you?" He says drunkenly
"No you weren't! You were at a casino?"
"I know! I was waiting for you in the casino!"
"Your drunk!"
"No I'm not!"
"I can smell it on your breath!"
"I won $10,000 at the casino!"
"Yeah right! I'm going back to sleep! Nite!" And turn over.
I hear Biskey stumble to the kitchen to fix himself another drink and try to fall asleep while he plays music too loud in the living room. "Well a least they weren't a disappointment on the chaos element" I think to myself as I fall to sleep.
"Will you stop talking about women as if they are objects! We are not objects! We are people!" I berate them.
"We know you have tits and a vagina, but you should be happy that we treat you like one of the boys. Number 2 is nice but I don't really like the underwear she is wearing" Reuben continues to Biskey totally ignoring me.
Assholes!
I arrange to meet Kym later that evening. I'm so excited to see her. I tell the boys they can't come. The reasons for this is are:
1. Reuben has already asked if Kym is fit. He can hit on the whole of Australia but he ain't going anywhere near my friends.
2. I don't want to be having a deep and meaningful conversation with Kym while in the background all I can hear is them two going on about the merits of the waitresses underwear.
3. I need to get away from the walking bags of testerone for a bit. I tell them they can meet us for dinner later.
On the way to meet Kym at Flinders street station I realise I'm quite drunk. I have been drinking since midday though and trying to be one of "The Boys!" Kym is already there waiting for me at station. She looks really well. Radiant in fact. Not like someone who has nearly died. I'm so happy to see her well. We walk and talk. It feels like I just saw her yesterday. It doesn't feel like we are the other side of the world. We go to a bar down the lanes and catch up. Kym tells me she has been asked to do a PHD. Back in London Kym was a lawyer for Hackney council. She decided she want to do something different. So she decided to study for a masters in Human Rights and journalism, while still working full time. Kym is extremely intelligent, probably one of the most intelligent people I know, but what I like about her is she can be as ditzy as Hell sometimes too. She passed her masters with a distinction and her dissertation picked up the highest mark in her year. It's this dissertation that an Australian university has picked up on and want her to write a PHD on for 3 years. She tells me that she is waiting to hear if she has been successful in her application for the funding it will take, for the 3 years of research and writing she has to do. I can tell she has pinned all her hopes on this and doesn't quite know what she will do if the application fails. I tell her it will be fine.
After meeting the boys later on an over crowded roof top bar we decide to go for dumplings in China town. It's cheap and cheerful as you have to bring your own booze. We get sat down in a massive room full of drunken people at a long table crammed with others. It's like some bad medieval banqueting hall. We are sat next to a group of girls when Biskey spies one and does his usual trick and turns to us all and says:
"I'm in love!"
"Your not in love!" I hiss at him "You have only just seen her and you have never spoken to her!"
Biskey ignores me.
By the time the food arrives I realise I'm completely wasted. I look around. Biskey is still staring at the girl like some love sick puppy or stalker (it depends on which way you look at it) and Rueben is looking at some girl in a short skirt that has just walked in.
"Are they always like this?" Kym asks.
"Yes!" I reply drunkenly
Kym makes the wise decision to depart after dinner (I really don't know why as we are such pleasant company?). It would of been a wise decision for me too by then, but I'm not very good at wise decisions, so instead I down what is left of my bottle of processco in the street and start talking crap to some fellow Brits I find outside a bar. After that things become a little hazy. I remember the boys dragging me to some bar and then them arguing with the bouncer to let me in as he's refused me entry as I'm too drunk. He relents and I'm whisked in and sat down in a corner, while Biskey plonks down a pint glass of water in front of me and tells me to drink it. It's going to take more than a pint of water to sober me up and Biskey realises this
"I'm taking you home" he says. I know I'm in a real bad way as Biskey is the most irresponsible person I know and even he's looking after me! He drags me back to the apartment and dumps me on the bed and goes back out partying (as I said: not responsible)!
I awake the next morning to the hangover from Hell! I wander to the living room to find Biskey passed out on the sofa and Reuben on the floor with some blonde spooning him. They are surrounded by empty bottles and cigarette ends. I decide to have a shower and freshen myself up, while trying my hardest not to throw up on myself in the shower. "I'm getting too old for all of this!" I think to myself in the process.
When I return to the living room the boys are back in the land of the living, the blonde has gone and there raring to go again! "Right lets get back on it!" They beam. I just want to die.
Melbourne is known for its food and the boys take me to one of the best where we eat like kings. They order wine and I'm looking at the glass like its the enemy.
"Come on. Hair of the dog Carly! It will make you feel much better!"
Funnily enough it does and a bottle later I'm feeling brilliant, and by the time Kym comes to meet later in a bar I'm well....... Drunk again!
I decide to head to a BBQ of one of Kyms friends and have some time out from the boys. It was perfect weather for it. Melbourne has very changeable weather: worst than Britain if that's possible? One minute it can raining with gales the next it can be 33 degrees and so hot you can't think. It must of been that hot, as I wasn't thinking properly (or was it the fact I was drunk again?) as I rang the boys and decided to join them again instead of going home after the BBQ. They were at one of their friends houses in the suburbs, having a party so I drunkenly got a taxi to the address. The taxi dumps me at the end of a cul-de-sac and I look blurry eyed for the house numbers. I decide the house at the end is the one I want and stagger up the drive and to the porch. "It's very quiet for a party" I think to yourself. The door is open so I just drunkenly stroll in to find an old couple sat watching TV. They turn around in shock when they see me!
"Arnold? Reuben?" I blurt out in panic
They stare back at me blankly.
"This isn't number 34 is it? I'm in the wrong house aren't I?" I say pleadingly
"Yes Doll! It's next door!" Says the old man.
Shit! I run out the house as quick as possible. "Why the Hell does this keep happening to me?" I think to myself. I don't tell the boys about this incident or I'd never hear the end of it.
After too many drinks again I find myself collapsed in bed again before midnight (I really am getting too old for it!) and once again awake, to find the boys heaped on the sofas in some drunken state. Luckily they have to catch a flight back to Sydney (which in their state I'm not sure how they managed?), which means my liver and sanity can have a rest, until I see them in Sydney. I clear the carnage and the odour of stale booze left by them and collapse on the sofa. I don't drink that day. The boys have left me broken once again!
The next day I go to stay with Kym at her place in the suburb of Northcote. She'd only moved in the day before as being ill and in hospital has set her back a bit (nearly dying can do that)! She has moved in with an old childhood friend Bryony who is an artist and her boyfriend Gregory who a scientist. There are two other housemates as well: one who is a teacher who plays the guitar and doesn't shave her arm pits and the other is a lesbian writer who also doesn't shave her armpits either. The house is big, but saying that there isn't much room due to the fact that ever square inch seems to be cluttered with anything and everything. No one seems too keen on cleaning either, but everyone is very big on communal living and sharing, so when dinner time arrives everyone chips in with cooking the food which usually consists of something vegan with kale in it. This is followed by after meal discussions about science, politics and green issues which leave me feeling kind of stupid and not well read enough. Its how I'd envisage a 1970s commune in San Francisco to be, only that we are not wearing flares or flowers in our hair; though I wished we were as that would be cool. I also wished I was wearing a crochet waistcoat as well because that would be even cooler.
The days in Melbourne pass a lot calmer than how they started. Me and Kym go to museums, I eat well (lots of kale) and my liver becomes normal again.
Before I leave I go to see Ann. Ann is one of my mums friends who she use to work with back in England. Ann has been over the years one of the most encouraging people to me about my travels and my writing. There is a reason for this. Years ago Ann lost her daughter in car accident in Australia when she was back packing. It was all very sad and tragic. I think Ann likes to see my travels as I guess it's probably what her daughter might of done if she was still alive. Ann ended up marrying an Australian and moving over here a couple of years later.
I meet her at the train station and we go for dinner. Ann is all smiles, with a soft nature. She still has a strong northern accent without a hint of a Aussie twang. She tells me about her life here. She has been helping as a volunteer for road trauma victims and their families. She tells me she finds it hard here sometimes. Even though we speak the same language and Australia is quite similar in some ways to England, you have to remember it is still completely the other side of the world from us. I understand why it would be hard. That said you cannot focus on the negatives of situations in life and I tell her this. She must focus on what she has got here: a good partner; a beautiful city and the blue sunny skies. I would love to live in a country where the sky was blue most days. For me alone that would be worth it. We go and sit by the river and I make Ann have a glass of wine, because as I tell her "everything is better with a glass of wine!" We sit and talk as the sun smiles down on us and while I'm sat there with Ann talking about my travels, with my glass of wine, blue skies and not a care in the world it occurred to me that I should practice what I preach and think about all the good things in my life and not the negative. I realised at that moment I was a very lucky person indeed.
Next stop Sydney!
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