Wednesda y . [OE.

Wodnes daeg ‘day of

(the god) Woden’ tr. Late
L. Mercurii dies ‘day of
Mercury’. N.E.D], The
fourth day of the week. Also
attrib. b. In the names of
certain days of the
ecclesiastical calendar, as
ASH WEDNESDAY. Also
Good W., Holy W., spy W.
(Anglo-Ir.), the W. before
Easter.

a …z
 (3rd edition)

7/9/94 ( Port Germein (no 58)). Got up at dawn – a very still morning. The car was
feeling a bit unsteady on the way to Burra. Didn’t realize I was driving on a flat tyre – thought it was
the gravel – till I got on the sealed road just out of Burra. The tyre was completely shredded; lucky I
hadn’t ruined the rim. So long since the last time I had to change a wheel that at first I couldn’t find
where the tools were – took ages. Cost of new tyre - $110. Drove to Telowie Gorge near Port
Germein and walked through the gorge and back – took 4½ hours. Am writing this in Port Germein.
Came here to phone home again but will spend the night as this is a town with character – old, very
quiet, very flat. There is a pier here that’s over a kilometer long. The sun sets on the opposite side of
the gulf to the town so everything is bathed in light till nighfall. Will park next to the pier for the night. ¶
The place reminds me of Port Albert. There is nothing glitzy or touristy about it. On one side is the
gulf, and the backdrop to it on the east are the Flinders Ranges. It has an ‘outback’ feel but I suspect
is very comfortable to live in. Port Pirie is not very far away. Tonight I will walk to the end of ‘the
longest pier in the Southern Hemisphere’ – which I have discovered is 1560 meters long. Over 3
kilometers to the end and back.
2/10/96. Another thing I forgot about here – the roosters (6/2/08. Tuesday 23/5/08
(no 68)). They have a session in the middle of the night and then another long before dawn. I wont
try to describe the beauty of their song as I could never match Thoreau on the topic. The odd one
can still be heard now, soon after sunrise (7am). They are going good and proper again now. If
you’ve grown up in the city without the music of roosters this is the place to come to find out what its
all about. Every morning should be announced like this. Last night H & I saw what looked like a truck
drive into the sea and head out west; we were on our nightime walk on the pier. H really thought it
was a truck and found it surreal. There is a vehicle here on stilt legs with wheels at the bottom which
takes boats out to sea on a trailer till there is enough depth to launch them. It has a two-way radio so
it can communicate with boats already out to pick them up. The other way of launching a boat is to
tow it out on a trailer by tractor. The tractor is then left in the water which becomes dry land when the
tide goes out. If a boat is towed out at low tide presumably the tractor has to go back to shore. There
is a crab season here and a yearly crab festival. After breakfast we were engaged in conversation by
an elderly local redneck who believed in whites being banned from breeding with blacks. Then off to
see Alligator Gorge in the Mt. Remarkable Nat. Park where we went via Melrose, a particularly
picturesque small ‘boutique’ town nestling at the foot of the ranges. We did a slow walk through the
gorge for about 4½ hours, slow because the stream was running pretty hard because of the recent
rains. Back at Port G. (23/5/05. LfOrVaEnCkE (25/5/05 a noljbl frnchmn @ th CAFÉ PATISSERIE in
Errol st North Melb told me this mornn th@ th rue Saint Germain de prés in th quartier ST.GERMAIN
iz a sntr 4 lettres et arts & th chrch St Germain de prés iz th ldst in Paris) woz teln me 2day th@ rue
St. Germeine in a sberb of th same name iz of spshl sgnfkns 2 th riterz & rtsts of Paris) we find that
several aboriginal women have settled in near ‘our’ sleeping spot. They’ve got a ghetto blaster with
em, a small dog and a kid. The redneck had told us this morning that they are no different to dogs
anyway. I hope they are gone by bedtime or at least that they are not too noisy. Meantime I must be
careful of our gear because if anything goes missing they are sure to get the blame. The police
station is only a couple of hundred yards away and our spot out of earshot of the half-castes (these
ones are properly black) is in view of the cop shop. I don’t want to be told by the police we should be
in the caravan park especially as if the half-castes try to sleep in the spot they are in theyd probably
get kicked out (13/2/08. 2da Kevin Rudd rpljzd x2 &  sorry x3 2 thndjnez vOZ). Our intention
tonight is to repeat our routine of last night: walk on the pier, read the paper in the pub, another walk.
Just before tea we found some mussel shells (5/2/08. razr ) on the beach that are over a foot long.
There is a bloke with the half-castes – I can hear him sounding off, maybe about the policewoman
whom we saw yacking to them for about ½ an hour when we came back.
23/9 /98. Morgan → Burra (coffee & to read the paper) → Spalding → Gulnare →
Georgetown → Gladstone → Laura (where we talked to a shoemaker who makes coloured, alladin,
and other fancy ones) → Wirrabara (where a bakery makes fabulous pies & pasties (8/7/08. n10d 2
 r π thr (ntz nu prmsz nStone Hut 7kzS ( Tuesday 27/5/08)) 4 Hz rthd l8r nth y)) →
Port Germein. These are terrific towns unlike anything in Victoria and you can buy a great house in
any of them for $50,000. Inspecting towns is something both of us enjoy, and with a selection like this
2
I think its fair to say we had a great day. On arrival in Port Germein we discovered that the spot
behind the old rail shed at the top of the pier is closed off as public works are using it while they are
mending the pier, however we have found a beaut spot a couple of kilometres to the north past the no
camping sign and through the racing track. Helen is making some soup and we are right on the
beach with a view of the pier to the south. After a stop at the pub later we are coming back here for
the night. During the day we decided we are heading for the Gawler Range, north of Port Augusta
instead of the Flinders Ranges. I’ve never been there – its exciting.
17/2 /99 ( The Hat (alt. title: jehovah) (no 27). ( Monday 3/12/01 (no 67))).
Warren Willman & Adam Cadd are two guys Ive bumped into 3 times today. I am late with this entry as they
have only just left after not getting even a bite off Pulpit Rock near where Im parked for the night once again.
The first occasion was when they arrived before 7 am for some early morning fishing. I never saw them in
person then but noted the bible on the dashboard of their 4x4 half-truck when I got up later. It was Ross & his
mate (3/12/01. two fishermen I had been meeting & chatting with over previous days) that gave me the wake up
call when they came in at 7.30. I left for my walk along the coast to the lighthouse at 8.30. Found a great felt
hat that fits me excellently & used to belong to Lee Kernaghan (3/2/08. “The boy from the bush is back in town, with
country music star Lee Kernaghan named Australian of the Year for 2008. A proud Kernaghan, 43, admitted he was surprised at the
honour but said he would use his new role to help farmers battling the drought. Naming him Australian of the Year, Prime Minister
Kevin Rudd said: "Lee Kernaghan's music resonates with every Australian by connecting us all to the spirit of the bush, but more
importantly he gives hope and pride to those on the land when they need inspiration most. He has rolled up his sleeves to make a real
difference for those in need in rural Australia." … Mr Kernaghan was chosen from more than 3,000 people nominated by the public.”
- helenz) who is an official member of The Outback Club. Its in perfect condition & definitely wasnt washed
up by the sea. Got to the lighthouse at 12.30 & commiserated with the keeper about how nature is getting
stuffed by technology. Apparently there are plans to add new car parking areas besides the ones at Pulpit & City
Rocks. On the way back I noted that Disaster Bay was looking very still & seeing as the tide wasnt out till
about 4 pm had time for one more diving effort. As it turned out the conditions were just perfect, absolutely
amazing. On the way down my special track I found the 4x4 with the bible & later met the two guys. Talked
them into joining me in the snorkelling & showed them the Port Jackson sharks. They were whooping with
excitement at finding abalone but only took 3 each & measured them for legal size. They were jehovahs
witnesses from Ensay. The only other jehovahs witness there is Cathy Smith who with Bruce & 11 year old
daughter Caitlin are back there again permanently. Small world! We were all excited about that & the fact I also
knew Geoff Bigmore who is a legend with them. They are passing on my regards & promise of a visit to the
Smiths. They insisted on leaving their own addresses & asked me over to their camp at Betangabee for a beer. I
declined fearing religious zealots but, after more diving by myself further along the coast where I plucked up
enough courage to touch & then tweak the dorsal fin of a Port Jackson shark which refused to move anyway,
when I got back here their car was in my spot while they were fishing off Pulpit Rock again. They caught up
with me over my tea & we yacked on like old friends. They insisted on giving me a packet of corn thins
(3/12/01. thats the start of my practice of carrying corn thins on trips) when I told them about my bread
(3/12/01. which had got mould spots on it). Now its getting dark, the mozzies are suddenly out in droves & I
havent put up the nets yet. The reason I was keen on them diving with me was because I figured it would
decrease my chances of being taken by a shark by 66%. In fact it would have been by more as they werent
wearing rubber suits & one was quite fat.
24/5 /00 ( DANYO RESERVE (no 53)). Heading home; from one trusty camping spot
(Port Germein, in which area Ive found a whole new set of great spots to stop) to Danyo roadside
reserve where I am now with two stubbies of Southwark Old Stout (7.4% alc/vol). Ive been driving
through a lot of locusts, mor than ever before, and have to stop more frequently at petrol stations for
a clean down. Am listening to Saulius’s tapes (5/2/08. Tuesday 18/12/07) at last and they are up
to the usual extremely high standard that Im used to from him. Have stopped listening to the drinking
(5/2/08. & thhabt!) songs that Gyras gave me as Ive got them fully under control. This trip has been
heavily musical. Had a coffee and read the paper at Morgan where I talked to two guys (standing at
the bowser, cleaning off locusts) who had left Perth on Monday and had been driving continuously.
One was unlicensed and the driver was stary eyed and evidently liked to drive barefooted. The water
pump on the car wasn’t working so they were having troubles with overheating as the locusts were
clogging up the radiator. I wont have to attend to mine till I’m home. They were using a clothesline for
an aerial. They are heading to Ballarat and I reckon it wont be long before they are there – maybe
already are. Am listening to Lauren Newton right now and about to start reading Gargoyles by
Thomas Bernhard (5/2/08. ystrda got ♂z 1st Frost d ← Amazon). Its 3.55 pm.

3
 9/8/00 ( Port Germein (no 58)). (21/5/05. from trip notes titled 14/8/41) Today must be
very special, the Saint Companion lists four of them. St Cyriacus (martyr, ?-304) ministered to the 10,000
Christians condemned to slave labour in building the baths of Diocletian in Rome. He was himself arrested,
whipped and beheaded together with Largus and Smaragdus, two of the other four listed for today. St Cyriacus
is invoked against diabolical possession on account of having delivered Diocletian’s daughter who was
possessed of a devil. He also protects against diseases of the eyes. And the fourth is St Altmann (Bishop
Confessor, ?-1091) who was a court-chaplain to Henry II at Goslar, Westphalia and led 7000 Christians on a
pilgrimage to the Holy Land where the infidels succeeded in murdering a third of their number.
I skipped breakfast because I wanted to drive straight to Wirrabara to the bakery which Helen and me
agree makes the best pies in australia. There in between eating two steak and kidney pies and sipping plunger
coffee and eating the chocolate lolly that came with it I wrote the letter to Gabba and put in with it some
feathers from the rosella. Then came on to Port Germein where I am writing now. Earlier here I wrote a letter to
Adriana Cozzolini in the Arte-Postale mode (though she may not consider it such). Walked to the end of the
pier. I have bad news to report – they are installing metal railings along the sides of it. The job is only half done
but I can already tell that the very special atmosphere of this unique structure is gone. With the risk of falling
over the side removed it feels much like any other. Apparently its owned by the roads department who want to
give it away to the council who wont take it unless the railing is in place in case they get sued by someone who
falls over the edge. Money rules!
But why pretend, the fact is I’ve spent most of the day thinking about the implications of the events
beginning in the 3rd week of august in 1941 in lithuania, in particular the secret word of mouth order that must
have accompanied the written Secret Order No. 3 issued by Colonel Vytautas Reivytis head of the Lithuanian
Police Department under the germans. Who gave the word of mouth order? Did it go from Stahlecker to Jaeger
to Joachim Hamman to Vytautas Reivytis or did it go to Reivytis first and then to Hamman who after all was
only a lieutenant. Perhaps given the realities of occupation it was understood that in matters relating to the jews
the lowly lieutenant took command over the colonel. There is some support for that possibility in the existence
of correspondence from the colonel to the lieutenant asking for clarification regarding procedures for carrying
out the written Secret Order No. 3 that had been sent to district police chiefs.
Its getting dark over the Spencer Gulf as I look out from the beach side shelter where I’m writing past
the pier in the direction the sun is setting obscured by cloud. Its very still and the temperature is dropping fast.
A couple of aboriginal kids have just cycled past. Its 6.45 pm. Am heading off to pick up a couple of stubbies in
the pub then will go on to my normal spot a few kilometres along the coast northwards. Its well hidden in scrub
right on the beach sand. Will continue writing in the car using my hikers head torch.
Would that word of mouth order have been given in a whisper? How do you order the murder of
innocents? In the village of Butrimonys near the town of Alytus where the executions took place on the 9 th of
September there were only old men, women and children left as the bulk of the men had been taken away
earlier and were already dead without the remainder knowing what had happened to them. Before the 9 th the
pits for them had already been dug and were waiting. Perhaps the order was inaudible and all that was needed
was a ‘watch my mouth’ gesture by Jaeger to Hamman. In that way responsibility could be denied, or shared
between several. That is the essence of the nod-and-wink conspiracy method which could have led right back to
Hitler (23/5/05. 2day I sor Downfall @ th Nova – vri Wagnerian) himself without him ever having to
give a written or spoken secret directive of any kind. Was even that necessary? Could it be that the written
Secret Order No. 3 by using the word “transport” when no transport was available or referred to already implied
to the district police chiefs that this order was different, that this time everyone was to be killed. There is a
correspondence to Reivytis from at least one of the district chiefs naively asking for further information about
the availability of rolling stock and what provisions were to be made for food. Is this request the exception that
proves the rule? If together with an order to “transport” a separate order is given to dig pits (when the men had
already been executed) would that have in effect been interpreted by the district chiefs as meaning that
everyone was to be killed? In that case it is possible that no specific order to murder need have been given, not
even in a whisper. Perhaps a cooperation to do the unimaginable also involves a cooperation or a complicity to
misuse the language so as to communicate by implication or by what is not said. Is it possible that when we
embark on the unimaginable, on an action that involves the violation of the foundations underpinning human
practice, we also at the same time embark on new practices in the use of language, changes not to the meanings
of words, but to the core rules underlying their use? What comes first – the changes to the use of language or
the new practices? Or does intention precede them both? It occurs to me that the fate of the jews of europe may
have already been sealed before the war when Hitler was threatening that if jewish bankers once again financed
a war against germany that they had no future in europe. In issuing those threats he may have been drawing on
4
subterranean wells in the psyche of germans and others which only he was able to penetrate sufficiently to
articulate but which had long been there (21/3/09. “I cannot avoid the impression of a general
atmosphere of uncontrolled madness that seems to me to be unique in his . This
collective madness, this ‘ ing off the rails’, is usually exd by postul8ng the
combination of many diverse factors, insuffici if considered singly, & the gr8est of
these factors is Hitler’s personality itself & its profound interaction with the German . It
is certain that his personal obsessions, his capacity for h8red, his preaching of viol ,
found unbridled echoes in the frust ion of the German , & for this reason came back
to him multiplied, confirming his delirious conviction that he himself was the Hero
prophesied by Nietzsche, the Superman redeemer of Germany. …. Everybody must
know, or remember, that when Hitler and Mussolini spoke in public, they were believed,
applauded, admired, adored like gods. They were “charisma leaders”; they possessed
a secret power of se tion that did not proceed from the credibility or the soundness of
things they  but from the suggestive way in which they  them, from their eloqu ,
from their his onic art, perhaps instinctive, perhaps pati ly learned and practiced. The
ideas they proclaimed were not always the same and were, in general, aberr or silly or
cruel. And yet they were acclaimed with hosannahs and followed to the  by millions of
the faithful.” – Primo Levi). Is it possible that once all the pieces were in place the murder of the
innocents was inevitable? That murder was in the air – that no order needed to be given – that every whisper
meant: kill.
16/8 /00 ( 14/8/41 (no 8)). St Joachim (1st century). Joachim is the name under which the
father of the Blessed Virgin is most commonly known, but unfortunately, Holy Scripture tells us nothing about
this holy man’s life. His name means “Yahweh prepares”. A very ancient tradition, which is based on the
apocryphal Gospels, and no doubt contains some historical data along with later fanciful additions, states that
the Virgin’s parents were from Galilee and that they came to Jerusalem and died there. On the site of their home
St Helena had a church built in honour of Joachim and Anne, and until late in the ninth century, their tombs
were venerated there. The building was later turned into a Moslem school. In 1889 the ancient crypt of the
tombs was rediscovered. The feast of St Joachim is very ancient in the Eastern Church, but does not appear in
the West until the 15th century. Reflection: “In all thy works remember thy last end, and thou shalt never sin.
(Eccl. 7, 40)”.
The survivors and relatives grieve and mourn; I do not enter their space. Instead I am tangled by
appalling abstractions. The dead cry out to be remembered and it is clear to me now that the purpose of this trip
and this writing is to discharge the obligation . I feel that my offering is accepted by the calmness I’ve been
allowed over the last few nights. It is not what I’ve said that matters but the effort to say it and the effort I make
to bring a memory of them to those who have wished to expunge it. I pay my respect to the dead but hope I will
be able to lay the remembering aside so the balance between them and the living is not disturbed. The
requirement to heed their cry has made me examine myself and acknowledge the limits of my intelligence.
Certain things (most of the things that matter to me) are not meant to be understood. It would be an affront to
the memory of the dead to try to. To honour them is enough. I am grateful that I have been challenged to further
my awareness of the limitations of language and the scientific method. Perhaps its their gift to me.
Woke up this morning to a really cold day with a steady easterly which in this country can mean rain.
Didn’t want to go out onto the lakebed with that possibility. I haven’t gone far; am parked right by the road next
to Lake Macfarlane, also a dry lake, only about 10ks east of Mahanewo. Don’t expect any passersby as Paul
Manning is there by himself. Conny Manning is teaching in Port Augusta till the end of the year to help out.
Last year their best income came from selling wild goats but this year wool prices are up and they are doing
alright. Meantime Conny Manning is only here on weekends and the kids are going to normal school. I talked
to Paul for over and hour over tea and chocolate coated biscuits. Told him his life is about as opposite to mine
as it could possibly be. I feel we parted as friends and I know I’m welcome to visit again. Lake Macfarlane
(just did a walk for a couple of hours; started reading Bernhard’s Old Masters) is as bleak as Lake
Gairdner but not as overwhelming. I thought it was the right moment to leave because I feel I’ve resolved
something or at least turned a corner and I wanted to couple it with a change in location. The lake has a power
to heal. I will come here again.
13/9 /00 ( 7/9/00 – 16/9/00 (no 10)). Was going to the demo but met Brian Maclure going
the other way. So we went to an ‘irish’ pub and he explained to me the significance that can be given to the
word Hamman. The answer is in The Book of Esther in the bible. Each year orthodox jews observe the

5
Purim where they stamp their feet remembering Haman who was prevented from exterminating them by Esther.
So Joachim Hamman can be read to mean “Yahweh prepares Haman”. The Purim is observed on the 14 th and
15th of the month Adar.
4/10/00 ( 4/10/00 – 5/10/00 (no 13)). Yesterday was the ‘poets’ meet and I asked Frank
and Leonie for permission to use their short article from the last issue of Axle in my journal. Its on my topic:

Shakespeare’s computer
by
FnL Osowski
This text examines the relevance of postcolonialism to art.
Colonialism rests on the concept of the”other”, also labelled the subaltern (etymology – sub: under,
inferior; alterity: other). By definition, the coloniser is more powerful than the colonized, the subaltern.
The powerful define and label, the less powerful wear labels. Postcolonial thought posits that, if you
want a label at all, you can create your own.
Some labels of geographic colonialism: Belgian Congo; Anglo-Egyptian Sudan; French West Africa;
and, of course, Terra Nullis. Since, these labels have been modified in keeping with postcolonial geography.
Being subaltern and having to wear a label has consequences: if Nazis make you wear a pink triangle,
or a yellow star, you end up holidaying in Auschwitz.
Getting a job could be difficult if the label you wear reads ex-convict or ex-mental patient. You can lie
about your past but its more difficult to mask your Aboriginal label – or the label that is the wheel chair
holding your subaltern body.
“Passing” is a transsexual and transgender concept: you want to “pass” – to be accepted – as the sex
or gender in which you choose to present yourself.
If your name is hard to pronounce, to write, and you’re applying for work, you try to “pass” – to mask
your subalterity, your otherness – by anglicising as required: in Terra Nullis, “real” jobs are held by white,
English speaking males – or those who “ pass” as such.
The powerful define and label. The colonizers who have labelled themselves Art Galleries, Museums,
Art Schools, and Art Critics, discern the label ARTIST as they choose. Wearing the colonizers’ label you’re in
the art “industry”; you’ve got a “real” job, you make “good” money.
In these postcolonial times, overt colonizing by the sword has dropped out of favour. Rather, colonialism
is implemented by stimulating a voracious need for obsolescent, complex, and costly toys.
You can create works of art using simple and cheap equipment and, if you like, apply the label artist to
yourself. Not only did Shakespeare and Bach not have computers, they even managed to get by without artistic
copyright laws.
You need neither get a “real” job, nor make “good” money, nor play with the toys being touted by the
colonizers.
Defy the colonizers! Subvert their art industry!

The comment I make on this excellent manifesto is that those who issue the labels are themselves labelled by
other powerful players. We all label each other in a play of infinite reflections as Foucault would put it. Perhaps
the powers that determine the labels are their own main victims, prisoners of their habit of trying to gain power
by defining things. In this way the most powerful become the most blinkered while the lost and bewildered
ones are the free – stumbling like somnambulists through strange kingdoms of unnamed things.
In all it was a good evening at the ‘poets’. Leonie has promised to send me her latest philosophy essay
which I look forward to reading as she has a habit of not going beyond what she can clearly state. I was
explaining to her how in the judeo/christian/orthodox tradition the strategy of the priestly caste was to scare the
shit out of people at a subliminal level by dressing in black which reminds of night, crows and death but at an
ostensible level to offer (or claim that they are brokers of) right of passage to the kingdom of heaven, or
enlightenment or the path (“stairway to heaven”). The men in black tell us that they have made vows of chastity
and poverty (though some dont even pretend that anymore) but they dont tell us that its only a ploy to gain
power – power over the mind, over thoughts, especially of children that fall into their grip. The lever of
subliminally reminding of death while preaching eternal life is almost irresistible to women and children.
Afterwards rode on to the Bocadillo club where I heard the big news that the Bad Joke man has been sighted
again in the street, back from the chess tournament in Amsterdam. Hope to catch up with him on friday to find
out what happened to the two letters he was supposed to send for me. I had left them open so he could inspect
the contents for drugs and I reckon he did a switch. A chess master is allowed to make a sideways move and the

6
consequences of this one are hard to predict. Alternatively he may have lost them (though I dont think so) in
spite of me having given him $10 to keep his memory intact. He’ll be interested to find the two beautiful girls
singing operatic arias in his usual spot. Barbara tells me they have been into the Bocadillo and are now singing
on several nights. If they are there on friday I’ll give them the next instalment of the story. Back to domestic
matters: Helen is allowing herself to be influenced by me and is about to transfer some of her personal funds
into a teachers credit union on the grounds of smallness. We are still leaving a working fund with the
commonwealth bank because of the chequebook facility and because some of our bills are automatically
deducted from it and payments made into it. Overall though we are downsizing. Even Joe’s wife (6/2/08. 4mr),
Sandra is affected – she’s getting rid of her mobile. I’m carrying small amounts of money on me in a plastic
envelope like I saw Andrew Saniga do in imitation of his father. I’m meeting the world of new age man half
way so I’ve resumed taking the Somac for my oesophagus but cut down on coffee, enjoying eating chips with
plenty of salt but not often, eggs and bacon for breakfast but only on sunday. But I draw the line at watching
telly or driving cars unless I absolutely have to and I’m inclined to stop reading newspapers except that I give
my stuff to the girl at the newsagents so I need an excuse to go there. Meantime Vi is making an excellent
recovery with the help of Helen spending a good fraction of her life ensuring it. Dan is visiting her now; there
are more photos of him in the current issue of Cream magazine. I’ve just run off story 2/10/00 in record
short duration and have started mailing it off (thanks honey!). Its about paranoia and it will allow people who
want to dismiss me as a looney to do so. All the better – I dont want their company. I’m not writing for the
decision makers, or those who determine and attach the labels, or the dosages for the injections. I’m writing for
the ones who have to wear the labels, who cop the injections. Oh yes, just as I was leaving on my wild 4-day
escapade I noticed a giant crane in the car park at the back of Seddon st. in Ivanhoe. The crane is gone and a
brand new cross has been erected on the tower of the church there except that its really a microwave receiver. I
suppose the church is paid rental. The christians are selling their most sacred symbol to Mammon (who is
Haman perhaps?). But why? We already have good mobile reception here. What is this new more powerful
receiver supposed to track? I think I already know the answer. The new $100 bills have low level radiation
incorporated into the transparent section of the note so that even the serial number of a particular note can be
traced at a distance in the interests of market research – but it also means everyone who withdraws money from
the bank in $100 bills (as I did for the tune of $9000) can be tracked by being connected to the transaction info
at the bank. All in the future you might say but the technology is already in place for those who can afford to
use it (U.S. intelligence) and soon will be commonplace enough to be used by any large corporation. Also I
have become sensitive to the sound of aircraft flying overhead (because of my fear of being tracked, see story
2/10/00) and am hearing them all the time. Maybe in my absence a Tullamarine flightpath has been routed
over Ivanhoe without local consultation to avoid the kind of controversy that took place in Sydney when new
flight paths from Sydney airport were routed over the suburbs of the affluent. My joust with Paranoia has made
me sensitive to such issues – perhaps thats her purpose. Finally I’d like to comment on the microwave towers
situated on hills that I was dodging on my jaunt through the western district of victoria. In the past the upward
gaze for me was an expression of my sense of reverence or awe but for those crazy 4 days I was skulking
behind low ridges or under trees trying to avoid them. My gaze was free of them only when it was directed
downwards at the earth for the steel towers of microwave dishes (operated by solar power and therefore free of
dependence on the electricity grid; only to be made inoperable by being knocked down by bulldozers; so get to
it, folks) rule the heights. The upward gaze which Simone Weil considered so essential to her inspiration
cannot exist in this environment. I found myself on several occasions becoming like a muslim, bowing my
forehead to the ground because no matter if the microwaves rule the mountains, the earth is always going to
accept me as its own. Just remembered another thing. On my way home on friday 22 nd sept. I saw about half a
dozen barn owls and boobook owls killed by the roadside just in the section between Charlton and Melbourne. I
have always been saying that they are being killed by car headlights but that may be only part of the problem.
Why have I only been seeing them over the last two years? And more and more all the time? It coincides
exactly with the proliferation of the microwave towers that are being erected everywhere exactly over this
period. Are the microwaves contributing to problems for the owls sonar navigation? All the new freeways like
the one from Woodend to Keilor have multiple microwave poles in anticipation of cars being made that would
have low level radiation emissions that would allow them to be automatically guided along the freeway or to
read tags that could be attached to the cars to ensure they paid fees. What are we doing by surrounding
ourselves with all these sources of low level radiation? Some people now carry a dozen strip cards in their
wallet, hundred dollar notes, and a mobile next to their earhole. Why does my blood pressure (6/2/08. Tz lwaz
↑ now. Doig rknz th@ft staz @ 155/100 l hv2 pop plz) jump 20 points when I go into the endoscopy
ward at the Royal Melbourne Hospital even when I am perfectly relaxed? Is it because hospitals are full of
machinery that emits radiations? Yes, yes, yes, - I’m suspicious, paranoid. One thing for sure – dont accept the
7
advice of paid experts. When I was being treated for schizophrenia by the best doctors in Melbourne, one of
whom was a prof. and another who became a prof. they all behaved as if they knew nothing of tardive
dyskenesia and were massively overdosing their patients and casting them into a hell of fog and depression
even though the dangers of that condition had been fully documented overseas for years to an extent that I (with
a shattered mind knew of) was spotting people in the street with obvious symptoms of the condition. So much
for medical experts.
Its a depressing topic. I think I’ll resume learning the old litho Christmas songs for advent. Or maybe
I’ll start reading Jaroslav Hasek’s The Good Soldier Svejk which is the latest recommendation by
Bas Salt.
10/1 /01 ( 10/1/01 (no 16) (2/2/08. rsetv pomz  owt n2000 dspt thttl)).

writing an obituary
requires some talent
not everyone
has sufficient rapport with the dead

to be a professional
obituary writer
requires talent indeed
to be really good
you must be practically dead yourself

the only one

who can write an adequate obituary
for a dead obituary writer
is the owner of the funeral parlour
who having previously employed
the writer in a professional capacity
also sold him a life-insurance policy
which though it kept him poor
just covered the cost of his burial

they say
Hitlers scientists discovered a cheap method
of making paper out of jews

on that paper
some good books were written
but they were anti-establishment
so Hitler had them burnt

it was
a-round-about way
of burning jews

however
the ashes were scattered in a fertile valley
and from them grew a great forest
which Hitler ordered to be chopped down
and made into paper-backs

the paper-backs
consisted of progaganda

8
so Hitler forced all the german libraries
to keep it on their shelves

the americans
bombed the libraries
turning them into heaps
of smoking rubble

and if there is a moral to this story

dont ask me what it is

my uncle
who lives in a little
almost unknown country
has acquired over fifty years
the best private collection of old manuscripts
in the whole place

when he dies
he would like to be processed if possible
into parchment
we his relatives
would file past sombre faced
and with old fashioned ink plumes in our hands
put our signatures
on his dried out form then one of us
would take that parchment and put it among
the old scrolls and books in the library
lock the door
and throw away the key
forever

when I die
I want to be burned
so that once more I return
to the ashes from which I was made
but then I also want
those ashes to be put in a hole in the ground
and over them a tree planted
as the tree grows
its roots will draw nourishment
from the cinders
I will see and hear the world
through the eyes and ears of a tree

so it is
some have the peace to seek death
others seek to be reborn

I tell my dentist
that he is wasting his time
drilling holes in teeth
9
all he finds is corruption and decay

how much better it would be

to drill neat round holes in peoples heads
lift out the grey matter
from the cranial cavity
and into each one insert
a queen bee and her mates

soon people would be walking around

with beehives in their heads
they would always go
to where the lovely flowers grow
and all their thoughts would be
sweeter than a honey bees

oh death
where is your sting?
in my head I hold a thousand bees
each with a mightier sting than thee

*
my wife said
unless you take a good dose of sleeping pills tonight
you will kill yourself through
lack of sleep

I complained
that if I had taken my pills
on the previous night
I would not have written the four poems on death
which I did write

well she said youve got to

work our your priorities
is it so important to write poetry
that you run the risk of
killing yourself

I pointed out pedantically

that such a clear distinction
between poetry and death
could not be made

I said poetry is my life

or perhaps it is my form of dying
I write a lot of poetry about death

and with a note of drama in my voice:

after all
we are all dying in our different ways
I havent decided yet
which way to go

*
10
I told my neighbour
who is a doctor
that I had just written
four poems about death

I suggested
that even if they lacked interest for him
from a literary point of view
he may find their subject
of professional interest

he said doctors
were more interested in life
than death

but isnt it true I smiled

that they know much more of death
than lets say the man in the street

for some obscure reason

I then rambled on
about traditional chinese medicine
where while a doctor kept a man healthy
he was paid for his services
but if the man sickened or died
then he or his relatives
were paid by the doctor

anyway while I was rambling on like this

with my neighbour
the man in the street
was run over by a car
and really did get to know a lot about death

I wrote six poems

about death
ranging from the facetious
to the dead serious

for awhile I behaved

as if I was an expert
on death

as if in my arms
I had long carried a dead child
through swamp and desert
forest and valley

till finally
after many years
following a winding river
and by now tired out with the burden
I reached a village by the sea
11
 or perhaps more accurately
a tourist resort

there I laid the dead child

at his mothers feet
and as I looked at it
I realized that it was no longer a child
but had grown into an old old man

(2/2/08. Completion of Wednesdays from folder 1. (nos 1-16 of anthology))

29/11 /00 ( 27/11/00 – 7/12/00 (no 17)). There was a thunderstorm last night & flashes
of lightning close by & some huge claps of thunder. It reminded me that the ridge wouldnt have been a great
place to be on in those conditions. Yesterday I had noticed how many large single trees along the spine of it
have been burned out presumably after being hit by lightning. Now the heights are obscured by low cloud, there
is an occasional drizzle here. Ive had breakfast, its 9.30 & its time to return to the expression of my confusions
about the word – god.
The extraordinary thing is that the same word can be used (people have no trouble with the translation
from one language to another) to group together such diverse items as an emperor in japan, a voice from a
cloud, an intuition about nature, a principle of evolution (Teilhard de Chardin), a sociological
abstraction (principle of love). With the meanings so varied it seems useless to try to get a grip on it by listing
its varieties especially as theologians will undoubtedly supply us with increasing (& contradictory) numbers of
them as they write more books. I propose however that we tackle the problem not by studying attributes &
meanings but who assigns the meanings & to what purposes god is put by them. It becomes apparent that in all
cases god is used to justify a status quo, a way of behaving or an assertion of power over others, especially
arbitrary power. Even in a democracy where we say the laws come from the people the justification for the rule
of law itself is said to come from god. The exercise of power is always there, it always comes first, & the
appeal to god comes later when also his attributes are assigned to him (or it) according to the requirements of
rulers. If theologians are employed by universities which are funded by the christian churches you can bet that
the one, eternal, indivisible (except into 3) god will be divided into so many parts & considerations that it will
take huge tomes to write them all down. (I read half a dozen by Teilhard de Chardin, tried to read Kung, more
recently read a book called Theology after Wittgenstein by Fergus Kerr which I actually found
useful). Apart from the idea of god becoming totally confusing it is often also likely to sound like a scientific or
sociological principle for we live in the age of science & the perspective of theologians is coloured by scientific
& mathematical models. It goes without saying that obscurantism & jargon is absolutely essential for power to
function because the users of power have to disguise that there is no justification for its exercise. Power is
always exercised. Things only fit together in certain ways. 2000 years of christian pomp with its regal
vestments in red & gold & purple, its ornate chairs that look like thrones, its preoccupation with the detail of the
sexual lives & thoughts of the congregation (caused no doubt by the decision some hundreds of years after the
death of jesus of nazareth to make the hierarchy of the church the exclusive domain of celibate men whose
habit was to dress in black drag), its huge cathedrals that could shelter congregations of thousands, its wealth
(the parson of the Wesley Mission in Melbourne is on $160,000/year!!!) has to hide by these theological
obscurities that its entire structure has to source itself to a single sentence that jesus made to peter about a rock
& a church. It has to throw enough sand in peoples eyes to make sure they are not able to read for themselves
that according to him it is enough for 2 or 3 to meet in his name for him to be present. & that all that prayer &
those ceremonies in the huge cathedrals dont sit well with the statement attributed to jesus that you should pray
in secret & that its enough to say the lords prayer & then only if you must. It needs a lot of scatter to disguise
the disparity between the lives of the popes & the life of peter whom they claim as the first one. Peter didnt
spend years learning theological jargon, didnt drive round in popemobiles, didnt kiss tarmacs, didnt dress in
spectacular costumes or wear tall hats with a cleft in the middle, or die of old age. I would think he dressed
down, maybe wore sandals, & probably died by being crucified, perhaps upside down. It needs a lot of scatter
to make people forget that the constituency of the preacher from nazareth consisted of the poor, the
dispossessed, those who mourned, those who were searching, those who were carrying heavy burdens – in
short, the underclass. That he himself was a vagrant. Above all I would think the purpose of the theological
obscurantisms (which were put firmly in place in the Church Council held at Chalcedon in AD 451 with the
Chalcedonian Definition & its 4 famous adjectives claiming that in jesus god & man were united: unconfusedly,
12
unchangeably, indivisibly, & inseparately) is to invent a god who though one with the nazarene is also separate
& hugely confusing so that an army of intermediaries consisting of the church hierarchies, theologians & others
are needed to broker the relationship. For nothing is more at odds with the institutions & hierarchies of the
churches than the example of the life of the man whose teachings they claim to be perpetuating. The nazarene
said that he didnt belong anywhere. He spoke in language that was best understood by fishermen. I am not
aware that he ever made a single claim to be god. The first occasion (other than john the baptists words) on
which a special role was assigned to him was by peter when in answer to the question by jesus “who do you
say I am?” peter replied you are the messiah (christ in greek). Nowhere in the gospels does jesus refer to
himself as god. He neither confirms nor denies peters assertion but instead goes on to moot the possibility of his
execution by the authorities much to peters consternation who does not see this as the role of the messiah. He
was referred to by others as teacher, rabbi, healer or master. The voice from heaven when the pigeon descended
on him after johns baptism called him – son. (St. Fabian, a member of the roman nobility, was crowned pope in
236 AD after a pigeon settled on him too & it was taken as an indication of the holy spirits preference. It was
the first instance of a layman being elected pope). Elsewhere jesus preached that the relationship of god to man
was as father to son. The implication here, if words mean anything, is that jesus saw himself as a man &
definitely not as god. Albeit with a special mission. Time & again when he is asked who he is he refuses to
make that claim. His dying words were “Oh god, oh god, why hast thou forsaken me?” Once again,
if words mean anything, this is a crystal clear statement by the teacher that he was not god. &, remember, it was
said by a man renowned for the clarity of his language which was easily understood (best understood) by the
uneducated (but others, eg the priests, heard without understanding). It was pointed out to me last saturday
(when I was at litho house to sing traditional songs to mark the beginning of advent) by Andrius Vaitekunas that
jesus called himself a king in answer to pontius pilates question. Later he had a crown of thorns put on his head
to mock him for having said it. I pointed out to Andrius that I’ve called myself a king in a poem I wrote many
years ago & that the use of the word by the nazarene would make him a poet to add to the many other titles by
which he was known. He didnt have to say he was a king, he could have said he was a god, but instead he
lamented later that same day that god had forsaken him.

an accident divided his brain

into four parts

top left
a coast pounded by the sea
next
the forest of birds
bottom right
a desert
next again
a precipice and a vast expanse of air

they talked to him about their politics and plans

his ears were deafened
by the singing of a thousand birds
they said come here and look
his eyes were blinded
by the blue expanse of air
they took him to a house of rest
his mind was shaken
with the thunder of the waves
they introduced him to their friends
he felt the chill wind of a desert waste

he said

I am a king:
if you will be my slave
you can walk in my forest

13
 swim in my ocean
sleep in my desert
and then
I will lead you to the edge of my precipice

& a poem about the prophet:

because
in their cities of steel
and their factories, the people were
lost
and bewildered
they cried out for a leader

the king came

wearing a scarlet robe
a crown of thorns on his head
in his right hand he held
a reed

he walked among them

from city to city
telling them that he had been sent
to bring light
to make the blind see
the deaf hear
he said they were blind
led by the blind

on his back
they put a wooden cross
and when they had led him
to the top of the mountain called
the place of the skull
they gave him vinegar to drink and
crucified him

I’m only a few kilometres further along the road which, by the way, is sealed as is the road to Licola. There are
campsites all along the river but I havent seen anyone in any of them. Some have toilets. They are all picture-
postcard beautiful & the river is a classic example of the burbling mountain stream. I am back from a brief look
at the immediate surroundings as I’m anxious to resume writing. Midges, mosquitoes & march flies are drawing
blood from my legs & hands. It has begun to rain.
It seems to me enough to be jesus of nazareth without the title of god being bestowed on him. If I saw a
pigeon hovering above a mans head & a voice from the heavens announced that the man was a beloved son that
would be enough to convince me to pay attention. The voice is enough. Nor can I see what is added to the voice
by calling it god & attributing qualities to it to suit our purposes. & if a voice spoke to moses from a cloud &
gave him the tablets that by itself would convince me to pay attention to what was written on them. I cannot see
what is added by saying that the voice which said “I am that I am” belonged to god. I would suspect that it
was the same voice that spoke to jesus since voices from the sky are not a common occurrence but I would have
no way of knowing. In the case of moses there were no witnesses & I have a sneaking suspicion that he might
have made it up but I suppose the israelites could tell the source of the tablets from the quality of the
workmanship. For mine I am sufficiently impressed by what is said on them. In the same way the words of the
preacher from nazareth are sufficient by themselves. I find them so dense with meaning that my mind boggles. I
find truths revealed in single phrases that have taken me a lifetime to arrive at & then I find my understanding of
them changes again with time. I dont see how an abstract principle that claims god is love (among heaps of
14
other things but is also inscrutable) adds anything to the parable of the good samaritan. The parable is clear & I
am regularly faced with situations where I should heed its example. But the vague sociological principle that
god is love though validated by being called a quality of the incomprehensible almighty is used everywhichway
to suit the purposes of institutions & may well have been invoked by the inquisitors when they roasted people
alive for having told lies about him.
I would like to digress into an irrelevancy at this point. The statement “I am that I am” leads me into
it. Its impressive enough even though I dont understand it (though I have an intuition) but as I said I am more
impressed by the fact that it was made by a cloud. I want to comment on the less inscrutable, & better known
one made by Descartes: “I think therefore I am”. If this statement has any meaning at all it postulates
a dual nature in man in which thinking precedes or causes or is prior to being. At the time it was stated it
conveniently reflected the belief in the division between body & soul, the soul probably sharing the part of mans
nature that the rational mind did. Plato’s ideals probably sat in there too. The body, the other part of the
duality, which housed these qualities was secondary & perhaps gross by comparison & able to be represented by
the thinking mind & hence studied. It must have been a convenient way of putting it for someone who devoted
much of his time to mathematics. In saying that the I am is secondary to the I think it adequately reflects the
aspirations of science which has progressed by its capacity to represent material objects with symbols & to
rearrange them by thought (or maybe more accurately by writing, mathematics etc.; see Wittgenstein).
God is aligned with the rational part of this order of things & can be considered as the mind from which
everything else generates. The problem with the cartesian dualism for me is that you get into awful trouble when
you are not thinking. What happens when you are asleep – do you cease to exist? Or when you have been
knocked unconscious? Or when you are under anaesthetic on a life support system? Or when you are a foetus?
Or when you are singing or chanting or swimming or doing all the things you do thoughtlessly? Or when youre
dead & gone but still mourned by your friends? For mine it seems far more intuitive (or natural) (though
perhaps equally useless) to say “I am therefore I think”. That would give a subsidiary role to thinking & by
allowing for it to be only one of the attributes of the I am put it in its proper place. I would still exist if I was
comatose, asleep, drunk, anaesthetised, or in other peoples memories. It would allow for many other attributes
to being besides those given it by thought & science. It would not have to cope with the new problem that
cartesian dualism finds itself in where with the development of computers which operate in ways we see as
being analogous or imitative of thinking we are forced to wonder if they have an I am in the way that we are
said to have. Besides, the “I am that I am” of moses doesnt sound like an exercise in thinking!
6/12/00 . 9.00 am. Again went to sleep to the patter of large drops on the roof of the van from
condensing fog on gum leaves as on last thursday at Wellington Horse Yards. I am in the Alpine Park again too.
The sky is clear & soon I’ll drive back a few ks to walk a section of the McMillans long range alpine walking
track. I was going to write this morning about the notion of ‘the other’ & how every society needs to point to its
converse in order to more clearly define itself. To the classical greeks it was the barbarians who represented
what was beyond the pale, chaotic, irrational, beyond law, sub-human – in short the opposite to the enlightened
lives led by themselves in their city states. We use the idea of mental illness to reinforce our confidence in what
is rational, sensible, scientific. It serves our self esteem. As I say I had intended to expand on this but Foucault
has adequately covered the base. I wanted to explain my suspicion that the class of people we call
schizophrenics use the language & relate to metaphor more like the nazarene did than the representational way
that it is used by modern scientific man. I refer you to Foucault for those linguistic issues too. I wanted to
outline my reasons for a premonition that the mind set that has led to science will destroy our environment &
that we run the risk of turning ourselves into a mockery of what human beings have been or could be. But I
can’t be bothered its too big a topic. I’ll go for a walk instead. … 2.05. For those who think that a major change
in climate might be slow enough for us to have time to do something about it may be worth getting acquainted
with the concept of phase transition of the complexity theorists… Both the books have the same saint for today:
St. Nicholas of Bari (Bishop Confessor ?-352). Although Nicholas is doubtless one of the most beloved Saints,
hardly anything is historically known about his life and death, except that he was Bishop of Myra in Asia Minor
during the first half of the fourth century. His legend recounts how, on returning from a pilgimage to the Holy
Land, he came to Myra, and early the next morning went to church. The local bishop having recently died, the
clergy had secretly agreed that the first person to enter the church on that morning should become the new
Bishop; and so Nicholas was consecrated. He suffered imprisonment during the Diocletian persecution, but was
freed by the Edict of Constantine, and is known to have attended the great Council of Nicaea in 325, which
condemned the Arian heresy. God worked numerous miracles through him, and his love for children and his
charity to the poor became proverbial. Whenever possible he tried to perform his charitable acts anonymously,
as in the famous case of the three daughters of the impoverished nobleman for whom St. Nicholas provided
15
dowries by throwing gold-filled purses in through the windows during the night on three separate occasions to
save them from prostitution. The Myra Christians kept the memory of their beloved Bishop alive after his death
by leaving surprise gifts for their children during the night before his anniversary. This custom has gradually
become transferred to our Christmas, and St. Nicholas has in popular parlance become contracted to Santa
Clause. But in certain parts of Europe, as in Catholic Austria for instance, the custom still prevails of giving to
well behaved children a small present on December 6th , while naughty ones receive a piece of black coal and a
switch. The relics of St. Nicholas were brought to Bari in southern Italy by some merchants and there they are
venerated to this day for their power of healing. On the day of his feast his image is taken out to sea in a boat
and returned in the evening with a torchlight procession. Being regarded as the Patron of mariners and
travellers, he is honoured specially in seaport towns. He is also the Protector of the innocent and the wronged,
and of all children in general. Merchants, coopers, brewers and bakers appeal to him as their Patron; so do also
the pawnbrokers, their symbol of the three golden balls being in memory of the three bags of gold which
Nicholas gave the three maidens for dowries. Finally, he is also the Patron Saint of Russia, Greece, Sicily,
Lorraine, Limerick and Naples. Reflection: “I am come that they may have life , and may have it
more abundantly” (John 10,10). …8.20 pm. I’m about 30ks west of Myrtleford perhaps not too far from
Bobinawarrah. I’m driving without consulting maps in the general direction of Mansfield. The foothills of the
main range are nearby to the south. I’m at the end of a lane off a minor road. There is a shed & a cattle yard
across the fence & the cattle in the paddock are slowly getting nearer. Cattle are curious & sooner or later the
whole mob will be a couple of hundred yards from me on the other side of the fence. One of the bullocks has a
demented call: he’ll probably let go full blast in the middle of the night. I dont mind, I like company. Earlier I
drove out of the high country after a detour to inspect Hotham ski resort which I found unattractive only
stopping to walk on a patch of snow. I had been seeing these snow patches on my walk in the morning & wanted
to look back at the ridge the McMillans track followed. In Bright I rang Helen. Dan answered the phone. He’s
leaving on friday morning so I’ll miss him. I wished him the best. He’s got a return air fare that cost $240 & was
no doubt taken out of the monies owing him by his management. Helen has been out every night of the week &
tomorrow is meeting up with Kate for an auction of the stuff that was shown at the gallery to finish off her year.
She says she’s managed to make another seven cards over the last couple of days so she’s been flat out. I had a
beer at Bright & bought a couple of stubbies at Myrtleford. Some of the bullocks are within 10 yards of the
fence pretending they havent noticed me. Its cooling down, very still, bird calls, time for bed.
14/2 /01 ( 13/2/01 – 26/2/01 (no 18)). 7.07 am. During the night the mozzies buzzed me
on occasions & I was wondering how they were finding their way in. This morning I’ve discovered that the
drivers side window has been open all night & the front window had scores of mozzies inside waiting to get
out. In the circumstances I got off lightly or slept through. The accident however has been with me most of the
night in some way other than thought. At around 10 last night I rang Helen on the mobile (the replacement to
the one I had thrown away - see story 5/10/00). She has a way of connecting things she hears on the news
with family members & I told her I wanted to make sure she knew I was ok but my real reason for ringing was
that I wanted to tell her about it (she had just got home from taking Vi to a film as she does every tuesday).
Shes talked to Dan who had arrived in Melbourne in the morning for a fitting . He has two shows to do on the
weekend, one at the casino, before returning to Sydney on monday. Shes also talked to Ben on the phone who is
pretty chuffed because he thinks he might be able to get a bottle or two (or more) of 10 year old krupnikas
(herbed litho alcoholic drink) for me. The domestic normalities were not able to shift my mood. I think that the
driver of the truck might also be dead by now. When I first came up to him his eyes were staring in a bulging
way as if they might pop out & I thought he was dead or almost then. It was a shock but also a relief when later
he came out with the first of his agonising groans. The strength of his pain made you think there might be
enough life in him to pull him through. Later he was able to indicate to the medic that his pains were internal,
all down the front of him (he was lying on his side doubled over). The way he was staring may have been his
astonishment that he was dying. The other man, who was lying on his back, was able to lift his head up a bit &
to close his eyes when he put it down again. If his back is broken he might be the worse off. I can’t get out of
my mind how peaceful the scene was when I first got there. Why didnt the guy casually kicking the rubbish off
the road say to me that there were two people in their death throes lying in the grass nearby? There was a wisp
of smoke rising from what I now know was the crushed cabin of the utility truck. Later when I told one of the
people who had assembled a couple of hundred yards away about the body in it he kept asking me if the man
was dead. I said to him what do you think he’s all in pieces. But he kept wanting to hear me say the word, that
he was dead. Finally I gave in & said yes mate he’s dead alright. I suppose that made it comprehensible –
another road statistic of the kind that is reported on the news on telly.

16
 Its 8.55 am, I’ve finished the Kellogs Komplete Muesli so while the coffee is cooling I continue the
entry. I’ve brought 4 books this time: Field Guide to the Birds of Australia which I always have; Sea
Fishes of Southern Australia coz this is meant to be a snorkelling trip; Arthur Schopenhauers
The World as Will and Idea where I’m up to p.83; & the Mausolff & Mausolff Saint
Companions which is becoming a habit. I forgot to bring the bible I keep on the dashboard as I had taken it
out of the van last week while it was getting the front ball joints, shockers & tail pipe replaced, & serviced at a
cost of $1500. Here are the saints. Yesterdays is St. Catherine De Ricci (Virgin 1522-1590). Alexandra Romola
was a Florentine, the daughter of an old patrician family of bankers & merchants. Her tendency to solitary
prayer was already observed in early childhood and at 13 she was received into the strict Dominican convent of
the neighbouring city of Prato where she took the name Catherine. After five years, during which she was much
misunderstood and calumniated, her holiness was recognized and she was advanced to novice mistress, then
sub-prioress and finally, in 1560, to prioress, in which office she remained until her death 30 years later. Her
famous “Ecstasy of the Passion”, which would last from Thursday noon until four o’clock on Friday afternoon,
began in 1542 and continued each week for twelve years, when it finally ceased at her own urgent prayers; for
the confluence of great numbers of visitors, among whom were three future Popes, was seriously disrupting the
religious life of the convent. During these ecstasies, which have been fully authenticated, St. Catherine would
witness all the stages of our Lord’s Passion and would sense and vividly describe our Lord’s sufferings. The
wounds which our Saviour suffered during the flagellation, the crowning with thorns, the carrying of the Cross
and finally the Crucifixion became visible in her body. St. Catherine also had the gift of miracles and is known
to have held what might be termed telepathic converse with such contemporary Saints as St. Philip Neri in
Rome and St. Mary Magdalene de Pazzi in Florence, without leaving her own convent in Prato. Reflection:
“God forbid that I should glory save in the Cross of our Lord Jesus Christ, through whom the world is crucified
to me, and I to the world” (Gal. 6,14). Todays saint is St. Valentine (Priest Martyr ?-269). Valentine, a Roman
Priest and physician, distinguished himself during the persecution of Emperor Claudius the Goth by helping
numerous Christians to escape and by ministering to those in prison. In his work he was ably assisted by St.
Maris and his family, the Persian pilgrims to Rome, whose martyrdom is commemorated on January 19 th. St.
Valentine was at length apprehended, severely beaten with clubs, and beheaded. The Christians buried him in a
catacomb about half a mile outside the city gate, and there Pope St. Julius I constructed an underground basilica
in the 4th century, which Honorius I restored in the 7th. From this latter period dates an ancient fresco painting of
the Crucifixion, which is remarkable for being the only representation of our Lord’s death to have ever been
discovered in any of the catacombs. St. Valentine is the Patron Saint of young couples who are engaged to be
married, and on his feast day the popular Valentine greetings are sent out, a custom which seems to have
originated in the Middle Ages in connection with the then current belief that the birds began to mate on
February 14th of each year. During the 12th century the Puys d’Amour, a kind of song festival and competition
for troubadours and romantic minstrels, used to be held on this date. (happy valentines day honey guess what
I’m getting a typing job ready for ya.)
2.30. Death alerts to more death. Yesterday as I was leaving the crash scene I saw a tiger snake that had
been run over. Today a bit out of Orbost a barn owl was squashed as flat as a sheet of paper onto the highway.
Near Cann River I got out to examine a lyre bird (female) carcass. I’m writing in the wharf café at Tathra over a
latte & after eating one of the very good fish burgers I got into the habit of buying when I was here with Helen
last year. I wanted to put a distance between myself & that scene. From Orbost you start seeing beautiful
Formosa lilies by the roadside (some of which I’ve transplanted to the Ivanhoe garden & will probably get more
of on the way back) but I kept noticing the increasing number of crosses & other informal memorials that mark
the sites of road accident victims. I suppose it would make sense if you could believe in a soul that lived on in
another, happier world, waiting to greet the arrival of relatives temporarily left behind. I’ve used the word soul
in poetry but I think for me its a shorthand way of summarising the transactions & decisions that a person
makes in his dealings with neighbours (& god?). The traditional idea of a kind of spirit whose contours coincide
with the skin & which at death can leave the body as a diaphanous ghost to wander homelessly or go to heaven,
hell or purgatory seems the stuff of comic books. I find no evidence for it & those who say it is so also dont
pretend to have anything more than hearsay. Or dubious written accounts. What makes it easier for some
modern men to cling to the notion uncritically is that Cartesian dualism (or forms of it dating back to Plato)
has been the main tool philosophers have used to sort their ideas into two groups, the first division if you like.
The dualism is so pervasive in many different philosophic discourses that it forms a mutually supportive whole.
For plato it was object / idea; for Descartes “I think therefore I am” ( though I can’t imagine a less
consequential ‘therefore’; & even if so what would be added to the I think by the I am); in the book I’m reading
Schopenhauer is already getting himself into contortions with ‘the idea of the thing’ as separate from ‘the
thing in itself’ & I’m only up to page 83. Why always have two of when there is only one you can see? At the
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last ‘poets’ meeting Peter Murphy reckoned that the notion that a thing (another thing?) exists outside a
perception of it is intuitive. I pointed out that Wittgensteins main contribution to me has been to make
such an ‘intuition’ impossible. Peter reads Wittgenstein too but he says he reads it like poetry. It may help to
disentangle yourself from Cartesian dualisms if you view words as bundles of instructions (see explanation in
story 14/8/41) – the ‘thingness’ of words, ie when they become nouns, is because after practice the
instructions get wired in the brain. (12/3/01. people who learn musical instruments & singers should be able to
understand this process.) I’ve gone into this airy discussion not just because there are some students of
philosophy (& even of theology) on my mailing list but in an effort to explain why I dont understand what
Chogyam Trungpa means by the word “spiritual” on the card. Is it used in eastern religions with the same
meaning as christians have used it in the west? My knowledge of buddhism is negligible – do buddhists use the
notion at all?
4.50 Wittgenstein says he is like an elderly widow rearranging the items on her mantelpieces. Perhaps
its as important as that. You get absorbed in the task – I forgot my flanno at the wharf café & drove back to get
it. It fills in the time on rainy days. I havent seen the sun in the last two days of the trip & its raining now as I sit
writing in the car between swigs of Sheaf Stout (in a ‘Crows’ stubby holder) on a narrow spit jutting into the
lake on the northern exit from Tathra. & hey, it feels good here. I hope these jottings reach some other
rearrangers; we’ll compare notes. Soon I’ll have to start looking for a spot to park for the night at the end of one
of the many beach accesses in the Mimosa Rocks National Park to the north. Meantime a bit of portuguese fado
guitar should set a suitably mellow note.
21/2 /01 . I’m checking the saint book & I’ve still got the dates ballsed up. St. Eloy and St. Leo
are both on the 20th and St. Margaret of Cortona is todays. I was ahead of myself, it saves me putting one in
now. Taking up from where I left off yesterday. Can you imagine all over europe for a thousand years healthy
young men listening to women in the confessional giving accounts of who had & who might almost have
ploughed their patch & to what temptations of thought they had succumbed for which they sought forgiveness.
Its not a healthy situation. They were the same men who had an input into the churches pronouncements on
what constituted sound sexual morality. It may appear that I am flogging a dead horse as most young people
today wouldnt give two figs for the churches and are barely aware of their existence but christian attitudes are
embedded in our culture. They are our main legacy from the past. Nothing is ever lost, it only gets overlain or
changed. In the world of doubles, the soul/body distinction was the main frame through which people viewed
themselves & at the base of all moral discourse. The discourse was primarily owned by churchmen . The soul
represented what was important about us & the body was the seat of evil. Make no mistake – the church
despised & hated the body & its influence was to make people think of the body & of sex in particular as dirty. I
can think of some very cynical explanations of how these attitudes are a direct consequence of church structures
& the need of sexually deprived men to compensate by encouraging their flock to view physical intimacy
between men & women as grubby, abhorrent, dangerous, to be engaged in only as a last resort if you can’t get
kids any other more savoury way, on no account to be engaged in for pleasure alone, a certain way to eternal
perdition if done incorrectly. (I’ve just swatted a march fly that had a good drink – theres blood spattered over
my foot & hand & fingers.) Why make such a to do about the virginity of female saints? (I know the theory).
There must have been countless peasant girls married to abusive husbands who spent their lives in virtual
slavery in total devotion to the welfare of their children. Many died in childbirth. Were they any less holy by
not being virgins? What kind of subliminal message was being preached to them & to honest fathers who spent
their lives in toil bringing up families by coupling saintliness with celibacy & virginity? I suppose the
insensitivity was not intentional. The people the church accredited as saints had to be from its own hierarchy in
order to promote its image & all the hierarchy were supposed to be celibate men (from the 4 th century onwards)
and the female members were mostly virgins (have there been female saints of lay orders?). I wonder if the self-
consciousness & awkwardness that so many of us have over sexual contact, to the extent that there are people in
the community whose sexual lives are blighted or who are unable to engage in sexual intimacy is not partly the
result of the christian legacy. Can the fact that in most european languages swear words have a sexual
connotation be traced back to the obsessions & distorted imaginations of a celibate priesthood? Incidentally
lithuania was the last country in europe (14th century) to become christian & there are no sexual swear words in
its vocab.; when a litho wants to swear sexually he has to use russian or polish words. The everyday language
about sexual intimacy, especially among men, is often derogatory of women, especially of their sexual parts.
Can this too be traced back to the clerics & the soul / body world view? There are several people who regularly
ask me why I persist in writing. One does it with an accusatory note in his voice. I think he is implying that I’m
grandstanding. I ask the question myself (6/2/08. rlredi thn !). The most honest answer I can give is that I dont
know, its as if I am meant to, I feel a sense of job satisfaction when I finish a piece. (the biggest bull-ant I’ve
18
ever seen, over 3 cm, has just walked past the saint book). But here is another reason. If we hand over discourse
on important areas of our lives to people who represent institutional interests (priests, experts, educators,
journos, scientists, (Bettina Arndt owns male sexuality) medicos, social workers, theologians, politician etc.
etc.) they will forge the language of that discourse & ultimately own it. They view things through their
particular perspectives which are often determined by who pays them. Ordinary people benefit from sharing
with each other directly on difficult topics such as the ones I write about. We may discover that our knowledge
differs from the paid experts. At source words are forged by being acted out together (practiced, Wittgenstein
would say, even in a case like that 10 x10 = 100). If the experts control the language they also end up owning
the meanings. They charge rental. They can make you pay through the nose. As the world gets more populated
& people buzz about faster the pressure on us to leave difficult issues to the experts who work for the
institutions is increasing. The institutions are getting larger & more interdependent & more dependent on huge
financial structures & more anonymous & less accountable. The laws that govern the growth of institutions (&
they always want to grow) may not coincide with the interests of individuals. It may be in the interests of
institutions that we change or suppress certain of our habits, beliefs, knowledge. Life might be easier for
financial institutions if we are precisely measured & regulated so they can reward with exact quantities of
money those parts of our behaviour they wish to encourage, and since they are hand in glove with states, punish
us precisely (with fines or jail) for those habits they wish to eradicate. The voice of individuals is getting harder
to hear – I take my hat off to Ralph Nader and Noam Chomsky. If the meanings of words in areas such as
religion, god, sanity, sex are owned by others we will stop talking sensibly about them to each other because the
language will sound foreign to us or as if it doesnt quite apply. Couples will stop being able to tell each other
what gives them pleasure in bed. Then we will stop our individual private conversations that we have in our
head for the same reason. There is a danger that in this way we will lose access to large areas of our behaviour
& our ability to explore new capacities. The habits & knowledge that we lose may not be recoverable. The
potential habits & capacities that we fail to explore may also be lost. The areas of self knowledge that we lose
become gaps that separate us from each other still further. These gaps are then exploited & widened by middle-
men, brokers, servants of institutions. It could happen that we lose the knowledge to have the pleasure of each
others intimate company in exchange for being able to buy virtual reality sex beamed to us in packaged doses
according to capacity to pay from satellites owned by supranational banks. Thats why I’m writing.
6.40. A few snapshots. Yesterday evening after I finished writing I went to the beach for a stroll. There
was a half full bottle of Jim Beam Black Bourbon Whiskey standing in the sand. A fisherman must have left it
during the previous night as it hadnt been there the day before & there were no fresh footprints about. I walked
along the empty beach taking swigs from the bottle thinking – yair, it feels good. On the bottle it said 43%
proof but what I was drinking was very weak: must have been cut down with coke or cola. … Early arvo today
I was sitting at a table on the veranda of Horseshoe Bay Hotel looking at a school of porpoises crossing the bay,
then like a hardened yuppy I pulled my mobile out of the pack & rang Helen at school. … Late in the afternoon
I did another of those philosopher type things. After exploring a crevasse which was so deep I couldnt see the
bottom I climbed back up the cliff in my wetsuit carrying the goggles & flippers in me hand. When I got to the
top I realised I had left the backpack behind so I put down the goggles & flippers & went down to the bottom
again only to discover the pack was gone. Had it been washed into the sea? Then I noticed I had it on my back
– it had been there all along. … Tonight I’m back in the same spot for the third night. This patch of bush is part
of Biamanga National Park (6/2/08. th Mumbulla Creek Falls w vztd rlv wksrgo zrko x
C&ArSeTaRdiO) about 5ks south of Bermagui.
11/4 /01 ( 7/4/01 – 18/4/01 (no 19)). I had intended to cut back on the saints ( I
left out St. Fulbert of Chartres yesterday) but I must put in todays, St. Leo 1, The Great, for its political &
historical significance. At a critical time in the Church’s history, when the Western Empire was disintegrating
and the Eastern Church was profoundly disturbed by dogmatic controversies and speculations, God raised to the
throne of St. Peter in 440 a far-sighted and wise Pontiff, St. Leo I; he was to become one of the three Popes
whom we honour with the title of “The Great”. (St. Gregory I in the 6th century and St. Nicholas I in the 9th are
the only other two.) In order to maintain the purity of the Church’s doctrine, he took sharp measures against the
subtle infiltration of heresies into Italy and Spain, and in the East condemned Monophysitism or Eutychianism.
In his famous dogmatic letter (tomos) to St. Flavian, Archbishop of Constantinople, he clearly set forth the
Church’s doctrine that Christ is one person but possesses two distinct natures, the divine and the human: an
early example of an infallible Papal pronouncement (6/2/08. thv t bn nflrbl !!). At the Fourth Oecumenical
Council of Chalcedon in 451, some 600 Eastern Bishops, assembled under the presidency of the Papal legates,
officially acclaimed this great document as the Church’s true teaching: “Peter has spoken by Leo.” St. Leo also
reformed Church discipline and maintained the primacy of Rome in connection with the organization of the
19
Church in Gaul, where the Archbishop of Arles held a privileged position as Papal vicar for that country. Here
St. Hilary of Arles had gradually exceeded his powers and had to be restrained. The Emperor issued an edict in
this connection in 445, in which he seconded the Pope’s procedure and solemnly recognized his primacy. Into
St. Leo’s reign also fell the calamitous barbarian incursions of Attila, “the Scourge of God”, from the north in
452, and of Genseric from Africa in 455. The Pope, by his great moral authority, was able to dissuade the
former from marching upon Rome in consideration of an annual tribute, but the latter plundered the city for two
weeks and carried off many inhabitants into slavery before heeding St. Leo’s intercessions. Still, a general
massacre and the complete destruction of the city were averted. St. Leo died in 461. The profound writings of
this great Pope have furnished numerous lessons for the Breviary. Reflection: “Thy Cross, O Lord, is the source
of all blessings, the cause of all graces: by it the faithful find strength in weakness, glory in shame, life in
death.” (St. Leo). Its 9.00am & I’m putting a few pieces of fruit in the pack, glasses, sunglasses, compass,
patches for blisters etc. & heading out onto the glittering salt surface of Island Lagoon in the direction of the
‘island’… 5.10pm. I walked in a straight line on a bearing of 340º for what I estimate to be 17ks to be at the
island at 12.30. Took slightly longer on the way back as I took the 140º bearing instead of the 160º. That was
because I wanted to make sure to reach the eastern shore north of the short bit of derelict fence that juts into the
lake as it was the only way I had of recognising the spot where my car was parked opposite over the shore
dune. Thats how you navigate on an ocean, always aiming to be on one side of the spot you want to get to so
you know in which direction to follow a shoreline. Now as I write I notice my compass has stopped working.
The axle of the needle has come out of its housing. I should be delighted as Ive been in a lot of situations where
I would have been a goner if it had happened then. There is always some new way of getting into strife. I have
another much older compass which I’ll check tonight against the southern cross for accuracy. Anyway as the
island loomed up ahead, looking very close but still 40 minutes walking away (it is a feature of the islands on
the salt lakes to look much closer than they are) I was getting arthritic pains in the lower back which happens if
I walk on a very even surface (footpaths, sea-shore) & on checking in the pack I discovered I hadnt brought the
Naprosin. On the way back my dicky right knee was complaining. But by the time I was nearing home base
everything had cleared up – I was getting into a rhythm. When I got to the island I climbed to the top where you
can see two other islands, one to the north & the other to the east which is the very high conical shaped one you
see from the Port Augusta/Woomera road I think. You can see the shoreline right around the lagoon which is a
surprise as when youre at surface level it looks endless in some directions. Also on the top there was a small
mound or cairn holding up a shiny aluminium post with a plastic sign with these words engraved on it by
machine: “We Frank & Marj Warr of Woomera first climbed this island on the 27th October 1984 and we last
climbed it on 27th April 1997.” Fuck that! Here I am doing a round walk of 7 hours to see an island that 9
months ago in the setting sun on an evening of crimson cloud looked like a staging post for the next world only
to find that Frank & Marj have been buzzing in & out on their trail bikes putting up a personal sign as if they
own the place. So I broke off the ugly plastic & then pulled out the post itself which I hid in some stumpy scrub
under a disused wedge tail eagles nest. In the Flinders Ranges there are cairns topping just about every hill of
any size so you wouldnt make the mistake of thinking youre the first one there but at least their builders had the
decency not to put their own names on them. I suppose its the technology thats new. Signs are proliferating &
you even get huge ones with pictures on them of what youre going to see when you get there. Frank & Marj
have tipped me over – next trip I’ll be carrying a spraycan.
18/4 /01 . Had a restless night. A sense of suffering filled the confined space of the van like a fog.
Took a Somac pill for the oesophagitis when I got up. When I’m on the road I only take one in the evening but
I’m preparing for Melbourne. Read the daily saint: Bl. Mary of the Incarnation (Widow 1566-1618). It read like
a collection of clichés (6/2/08. ssnsv rljn?). Maybe its the mood I’m in. Nevertheless there are bird calls all
round & a variety of parrots & honeyeaters are flying in to drink at the dam. I am coming home renewed, a tea-
totaller (6/2/08.  woz @t thn2 - m gon OnOO!), & the pain in my side (6/2/08. rtbl bowl sndrom) is
almost gone. I have a job of typing for H. Its 7.55, time for the road. … saw a dead barn owl near Birchip. …
read the Age over a mug of coffee at Lou’s in Charlton (is that your diary? Maria asked) …. home.

I told you about the man

who gave all kinds of charming reasons
for carrying a caged bird slung round his neck

actually when I last saw him

20
 he was prancing and leaping about
like a madman doing a rain-dance

the bird (and it wasn’t a song bird)

seemed used to the buffeting
half its feathers were missing
the rest ruffled
and it had a wicked glint in its eye

we were glad to see the last

of both of them

(1/7/08. tokkerz 2mi th@ thsz th ql 2 rpom v nvr ‘pu lsht’ 

one subject for conjecture

was an ageless man
who regularly passed through our town

against his chest

in a wire cage
suspended by a leather belt from his neck
was a small grey songbird

each time we asked about the caged bird

he would tell us
with a note of polite amusement in his voice
a different story:

that it was a travelling companion

and though it appeared to lack freedom
and he seemed to have it
there was an understanding between them

or that it was in memory

of a beautiful girl
to whom he swore to be true
but she left him

then again it was a treasured possession

of an old widow who took ill
she asked him to look after it
and it remained with him ever since

he said the bird reminded him of us

the cage was life,
however far he travelled
he knew to return

once he told us how in a huge city

he stopped under a bridge where two rivers met
a river of oil shone like the rainbow
the other was red with blood

he was the only one in that city

to wake to the mornining song of a bird )

21
 15/8 /01 ( 13/8/01 – 25/8/01 (no 23) (3/2/08. *….* ← Port Germein (no 58)). 7.50
am. Caught a cockroach in the back of the car. Hardly a trip goes by that I dont but this was a beauty, a
whopper. Turfed him out, lets see how he makes do in the outback. I’m retracing paths, repeating the same
sequence of stops I’ve done many times & described in my handouts at least twice. In the piece titled 14/8/41
I also bought a hamburger at Lou’s, oranges in Waikerie; later today I’ll be eating pies in Wirrabara (& writing
a letter to Kate (c/o) as I did on a trip earlier this year); tonight I’ll be in Port Germein, tomorrow I’ll probably
be shopping up in Port Augusta. We retrace paths & think that everything is the same as before but things
change by degrees. We reassure each other that we are still who we are, that the essentials are the same, but we
havent noticed that we have all changed together. The van has had its third set of rust holes filled with
fibreglass (by Joe Sayon of Ivanhoe panelbeaters; he did the first set for free). He had to put fibreglass on top of
other fibreglass, soon whole chunks of the body will be falling off. It feels good to drive & has a gutsy, sporty
sound: thats because there is a hole in the muffler that would take $200 to fix up. The demented magpie that
used to repeat a single repetitive phrase on the other nights I’ve been here was not in evidence last night. More
surprising is the change in the crows. This spot at Worlds End has always been characterized by a large & vocal
population of them (they can be heard in the background of a piece of improvised music I did using an
instrument put together for me by Graeme Leak that consisted of alto sax mouthpiece, garden hose, & a plastic
funnel.) but theyve been replaced by others that look identical but are a different species. The ones I am used to
& recorded on the tape (an audio account of a trip I did a couple of years back, titled ‘Impossible Spaces’) were
Australian Raven (Corvus coronoides), the ones with the dying call on the last note, but the ones here now are
the Little Crow (Corvus mellori). These are the birds with the very short nasal note that sounds like a frog
croaking & that I’m more used to seeing round the rubbish tips of inland towns. As I said I’m making changes
too. I’m not reading any more philosophers (but never say never as the politicians say) with the possible
exception of Wittgenstein. A few weeks ago I told someone that the purpose of this trip was to explain in simple
language why I’ve made the decision, why I reckon I’m better off at the end of a pier drinking a stubby or in the
outback walking the bush. I may still have a go at a fuller explanation but if I dont here it is in a nutshell: I
suppose philosophers have their purpose seeing as everything does. Probably its to provide languages for
institutions to be able to converse with each other. Institutions, being incorporeal, cannot communicate by
holding hands or looking into each others eyes, or having sex: language is all they have. Hospitals have to have
ethicists to give reasons why they give operating theatre priority to paying patients; boards of prisons have
charters to justify the practices of incarceration; governments have to have constitutions & bills of rights to
safeguard into the future the interests of those who wrote them. It is the job of the philosophers to provide the
jargon & the obscuranticisms to fool ordinary people into believing that the practices of their institutions are
meant to benefit them rather than that they are governed by systemic necessity. In the increasingly verbal age
that we are in they also have a role as social commentators to fill space in newspapers & on telly. As we
become less physical, dominated by our technologies & increasingly subjected to the procedural requirements
of the state that houses them we will babble more & the need for them to justify the status quo will increase.
Thats what they get paid for. & maybe it has to be like that but because I’m not interested in exercising power I
leave them behind. My interest is in who it is that is the subject of the exercise. & why? You dont get paid for it
if youre serious …. 3.50. Had to bypass Wirrabara & give the pies a miss & I had really organized my stomach
for a steak & kidney & had promised Helen to have one for her too, a steak & pepper. I know the pastrycook is
overweight & I thought I overheard mention of a heart condition last time. I’ll keep my fingers crossed for him.
What happened was that as I pulled off the road just past Jamestown to read the map I stalled the engine & it
wouldnt start again. The RAA got me going & suggested the bushes on the starter motor were worn. The van
has done 250,000 ks so anything could be wrong. Right now I’m in Port Pirie at Coe’s Automotive Electrics
while the motor, which has been taken out, is being inspected. I’ve been here since about 1.30 while other
possible causes were eliminated. Spent part of the time writing the letter to Kate (c/o): wanted to make clear
why she shouldnt take what I say more seriously than it merits. I’ve been in Port Pirie before & since then I
always avoid it. Walking about round here confirms my prejudice. The change predicted by the Morgan
publican hasnt arrived but there is a strong northerly blowing & clouds are building up *…. Got to Port
Germein at 6.00. The foreshore street was lit up by the sunset while the southern sky is dark with clouds. Faced
the back of the van into the setting sun for dinner. In the end I’m glad the electrical work got done. I was very
impressed with the guy doing it. It cost $145 & he gives a years warranty. He said he couldnt find what was
wrong so he checked & renewed everything he could. He says he doesnt get his jobs come back. He suggested I
might have tried to start it while it was still rolling after I stalled it. Something can jam & to unjam it you put it
into 4th gear & rock the car. I like to think that it happened so he got the opportunity to thoroughly check the
22
electrics before I got into station country. Had a pot of beer in the pub so as to watch the weather on the news.
Its not a good outlook at all. I might be forced to drive along the Eyre Peninsula so as to stick to a sealed road
which would take me into bigger rain in the south. Picked up a couple of stubbies before ringing H. Ben
answered the phone. Hes liking the driving lessons. Helen got her pay increment that she thought she wouldnt.
Dan was in a fashion spread in the weekend issue of the Herald Sun. He hadnt told her & if she hadnt come
across it by chance she would have missed it. Time to turn out the lights & crack a stubby of Coopers. Not
looking to bed tonight as its pretty warm & my new sleeping bag is much too hot. I will have to get another
lightweight one when I get back before we go off on H’s holidays.*
22/8 /01 . I read a story by Borges of a story told about the buddha. This is it from memory (or
lying) so I may be inventing it. During his stay in the 7th heaven of enlightenment the buddha sent a disciple to
the world of men to find out what lesson was to be learnt from the 4 attributes: birth, illness & suffering, old
age, & death. When on his return the disciple reported that though he did indeed find these attributes in
abundance he was unable to discern their lesson he was sentenced to be burnt alive for the rest of eternity. I
dont know if the story can be put simpler. As with the commandment thou shalt not kill any comment may be
already to undermine it with qualification. Perhaps I am allowed to make some parallel remarks or which refer
to it obliquely. All opposites demand each other. You cannot conceive of good without evil or evil without good.
Not even the words would exist without each other. Before you sort the apples into the two piles there is only
one. Before you learn the action to separate (the first division) you are part of the one. You cannot know the joy
of good health if you have no knowledge also of illness, in your past or in others or potentially. You do not
know what it is to feel safe if you havent faced danger or felt fear. We celebrate only because we remember
when we grieved. The sweetness of honey is the bodys memory of hunger. Life is not imaginable without death
anymore than death without life. Ecstasy is close to agony – they touch each other. Money would be worthless
if everyone was wealthy. To wield power would be meaningless if we were all kings. We will always have the
poor so that others can be rich. There will always be those that suffer for others to enjoy. We must die to be
born. Perhaps it is for such reasons that the nazarene said those who suffer will be rewarded but the rich already
are. I wish that it were true. There is a buddhist saying that we should not pity the poor as they already have
more than we do. I agree. They do not deserve our pity only that we give them what we owe. People do not
choose to suffer. No credit accrues to us when we discharge a debt. Those that receive charity know the
indignity of it – they should know not to be grateful. A welfare society is not a benign society as we like to
imagine. It is a failed society. It is an institutionalisation of indignity. It hurts to discover that we can only get
assistance from someone who has to be paid to give it. When we give we should take no pride in it nor should
we let anyone know, especially not the recipient. If it were possible we shouldnt know ourselves … 3.20. In the
final analyses there are no reasons why we help. People cry out; if they cry loud enough we hear them. If we
need reasons its probably already too late for those who require them can also make excuses. In my experience
people are always crying out, very close by, clamouring to be heard. If we practice at not hearing we become
the sort of people with gaps in their hearing & seeing, almost deaf & blind sometimes. If enough of us have the
habit we become a society where people dont hear each other. It may suit those who are busy, or preoccupied
with enterprise or themselves, or those who are rich enough to surround their houses with high walls ….
Strolled about for 3½ hours in the middle of the day getting a bit depressed. The weather is never good. There
are a few showers about, enough to get the gear wet but not enough to be of any use to the countryside. Its been
like that for days. Mainly though its the topic thats getting me down. Tomorrow I’m heading for Wirrulla about
70ks to the west on the Eyre Highway & from there to the coast another 28ks away at Haslam. On the walk
found a good pool of water so I washed my hands to get rid of the orange juice that has dried on them over
several days. But then I ate another orange. The habit of not using the water I carry for washing when I’m in the
inland is too deeply ingrained to break. Stupid really as I havent used up even the first of my three containers &
have a lot of milk too. In fact I’ve got heaps of food that I’ll be taking back as I can tell that the writing is
coming to a conclusion & I’ll be anxious for H to type it….6.10 . Climbed up a mountain for a huge 360 view.
The mountain was bare red rock as the spinifex had been burnt down, probably last summer. Crept up on a
wombat; they have poor eyesight so its easy. Found a rams head for Frank Osowski. He asked me to keep an
eye out for that kind of thing. This has a magnificent set of horns, perfect really. I’ll have trouble parting with it.
26/9 /01 ( 22/9/01 – 1/10/01 (light type by helenz; heavy type by a … z @ (no
24)). After a short walk (early start this morning as we both woke up about 6 a.m.) we headed back to
Beechworth for coffee & paper & a second go at the Nepalese hand-made books, too good to miss at $3 for a
large & $1 for a small. The bakery where we had the coffee was trying hard to establish a trendy, city-style
atmosphere but missed out a bit because they didn’t have mugs & were short of spoons! However the town is
quite charming & has been the biggest one weve been into since leaving Ivanhoe. Then onto Yackandandah
23
again for a sausage roll & a pie & some rolls for John’s evening meal. Our attempt to move on was foiled when
we accidentally took a side road that took us straight back to town. Gave in & went on the highway to Tongala
& then to Walwa on the Murray where we sat in the sun for a while for John to continue his interpretation of
recent events. I hope it helps to sort out his reactions. I am keeping my equilibrium simply by doing the head in
the sand trick – I find I can’t make sense of any of it & have no internal indicators of what might happen, so
I’m concentrating on the minutiae. We are camped tonight in a pine-forested area abutting some cleared land,
near where a marked walking track (Hume & Hovell) crosses the area from the slopes of Mt. Jergyle east
towards the road connecting Towong with Tumbarumba & on into the Bago Range & then north to who knows
where. We plan to walk a little bit of it tomorrow. It’s very still here & will be a cold night.
I dont normally write when I’m travelling with Helen but over the last few days before leaving the
implications of the war were beginning to sink in. I was not able to sleep & was subject to a peculiar kind
of agitation & paranoia that I recognise as an indicator that things are out of kilter for me. Writing helps
me to achieve some stability. After putting it down on paper I’m able to better assess what it is that is
disturbing me. Its as if I am an intersection of domains of discourse (by which I mean both the practices
represented by language & that develop from it) & that my peculiar task is to resolve the instability of it
however slightly by putting it into words. Unlike most Melbournians I didnt find out about the toppling
of the towers till mid morning of wednesday when I went to Errol st., as is my habit, to read the paper
over a cup of coffee (7/2/08. dunt2da). Tuesday evening I had been at the Make It Up Club & didnt get
home till about 1 a.m. Later when I was walking into town for lunch I stopped in a lane to listen to a
tradesmans radio & got into a heated discussion with him which consisted mainly of him shouting
repeatedly at me that we should nuke them all. He wasnt particular about whom other than that they
should be in large cities like Baghdad. I found him very disturbing as I fear mass insanity (perhaps
because I’m an eccentric & my instinct for self preservation tells me that there is no room for them in
times of mass hysteria). When I dropped in on Danius on sunday I had not yet talked to anyone about the
events. I suggested he might go to the Astra concert I was going to later in the day & we could discuss
what had happened on the walk back but Jane who had been sitting in the background quietly broke out
into a nervous giggle & said she’d had enough of the topic. Danius (who is inclined to resolve the domains
that intersect in him more visually than I do) pointed me to a picture on the front page of the Herald
Sun of the explosion of one of the towers. The fact is that at the time I had still seen only a single TV
news version of the events as I dont normally watch telly. In todays Age there is a Leunig cartoon titled
infinite replay but I’ve still only seen the one. So I suppose I’m going through a delayed reaction when
everyone else has digested the events & appear to be going about their tasks as if nothing has happened.
The fact is I am full of dread. Whichever way I analyse possible outcomes I sense catastrophe.
lamb of god take away the sins of the world
24/10 /01 ( 22/10/01 – 2/11/01 (no 26)). 2.30. Im in beautiful farmland north of the
highway that goes through Stawell & Horsham on the way to Adelaide. Ive stopped because its raining. This
morning I went from Streatham to Ararat along very minor roads meandering about in a haphazard way but
being able to keep a general direction because I could see the Grampians in the west & Mt. Buangor (I think
thats the name) to the north. Went through Mininipa which is a railway town of half a doz houses, a one room
box like shop/post office that sells newspapers & a petrol bowser. I have a habit of checking out the recreation
reserves in small towns because I sometimes stop at them & this one is a beauty, the finest thing there. Its called
– M.C.G. By the time I went through Ararat last year I was well & truly out of touch with normality & at the
mercy of the gods that govern our destinies. I went through it solely because of its symbolic associations. The
town itself is of no interest to me. I had decided before I started this trip that Id visit it again in order to
emphasize to myself (ritual?) that I do not reject the experiences of that journey. So this morning I walked up &
down the main street, bought buns for tonight & tomorrow, read the paper in a bakery/café over a mug of latte
that had no coffee taste in it. I notice in an article consisting of journal entries by a writer called Grossman
that he also is overcome by a sense of impending catastrophe. I read the same sense of foreboding less
explicitly stated in many of the articles over the last two weeks. Last saturday in town me & H were handed a
leaflet with a big ? on the front titled Where Will You Spend Eternity from the International Bible
Society. Then another which had a picture of a clock face & said Do You Know The Time – Is At Hand?
from the New Covenant Pentecostal Church. Near Southbank a smart looking young man gave us a quarto sheet
of instructions on how to test a true prophet. It consists of 7 spiritual (predictions of the prophet come to pass,
encourage obedience to 10 commandments, prepare to meet the Lord, etc…) & 7 physical tests (have their eyes
open, speaks without breathing, tongue controlled by the Lord, unconscious of natural surroundings, etc. …).
This has something to do with the ministry of Ellen G. White (1827-1915) & the SDA church. Ive never heard
24
of either but she is said to have had 2000 dreams & visions & to be one of the most translated writers in the
entire history of literature. To top it off I was given a free book The Great Controversy described as The
Compelling Account of Unseen Powers, Struggling for Supremacy. I have brought it with me but its written in a
quaint sort of language & is nearly 400 pages long. I think its about the imminent return of christ. Its
copyrighted in 1990 by Better Living Publications, a trademark of ASI Missions Inc., 12501 Columbia Pike,
Silver Springs, Ud 20904. Original text by E.G. White. The Happiness Series of books are developed & funded
by ASI Missions, Inc. in cooperation with Review & Herald and Pacific Press. Printed in U.S.A. On the cover is
a very kitchy picture of a young blonde blue eyed couple exuding wholesomeness. I dont want to read it but I
wonder if I am not being unfair if I dismiss it out of hand. From Ararat I went on to Mt. Zero which is the
northernmost tip of the Grampians range. I had intended to go to Mt. Zero last year too but was freaked out by
the microwave dish I knew would be there. History shows that catastrophic events are preceded by signs:
unexpected comets, plagues (according to Artaud), sexual depravity etc. I experienced one today. Still on the
road to Adelaide, a little before turning off for Mt. Zero, an emu with 8 chicks crossed the highway. Cars
stopped both sides while the father bird led the chicks across then stood defiantly in the middle of the road
waiting to see if there were any more to come. Emus do that because they cant count past about 4. As we waited
this one went back to check that there were none left behind then walked past us across the highway again, to
where the chicks were nervously waiting. This is one of the main highways in australia – whats the world
coming to!
Last year the symbolic power of the zero for me came from its connection to machine code (the 01 of
computer language), the binary occurrences in the dates which are still with us this year, & the notion of
finality. This time (I climbed to the top for a look out over the plains I am in now) I was reminded that it is an
arab word. Not only the word but the number itself came from the arabs & played a crucial role in the
development of mathematics. They were the most civilized people in the world then & if they had thought of it
they could have made us pay an exorbitant rental for the right to use the symbol: one perhaps that we couldnt
have afforded to pay. But the bizarre notion of exclusive rights of intellectual property didnt exist then &
couldnt have been enforced anyway. It is only now that the club of ‘civilized’ nations is powerful enough to do
what it likes have they invented the idea (australia is playing a leading role of supporting the U.S. in opposing
relaxation of restrictions so as to prevent poor countries from making simple medicines themselves instead of
buying them from the large pharmaceutical firms at prices they cant (& probably never will) afford). The word
‘evil’ is much in use today (especially by bin Laden, George Bush, Arial Sharon, Tony Blair & John Howard) &
though I would not presume to have such knowledge if I was to nominate a candidate the deprivation of cheap
essential medicines from the third world poor in order to maintain returns for shareholders of pharmaceutical
giants is it. It leads to protracted painful deaths & we know it when we do it though we pretend not to.
(13/11/01. Or maybe the man-in-the-street doesnt know how the process works.)
31/10 /01 (3/2/08. *….* ← Port Germein (no 58)) . *8.15am. Port Germein. To assign
meaning to something is to put it into a context. If someone then asks us what does it mean we dont talk about it
but about the things around it, what usually is there, what comes before & after, the order of things. Assigning
meaning is a fundamental human attribute. Its a gathering together of a set of events that we are going to treat
as a group – thats the action of the word. Lets suppose I went to Paris to write my next piece & booked into a
seedy hotel on the left bank for the duration then when I got back to Melbourne, after posting a copy to my
mum in Sydney, I got an excited phone call from her saying do you realize that the room you were in was the
very same room I was in when I was studying at the Sorbonne before the 2 nd world war. Extraordinary. What
could it mean? In The Book of Memory Paul Auster gives a whole series of similar examples that
happened to him. & he tries to answer the question, unsuccessfully I would say. The Book of Memory can
be read as a meditation on it. But perhaps the answer cannot be given as an exercise in assigning meanings but
only by the way you lead your life afterwards. Maybe Paul Austers answer is his life as a writer preoccupied
with depicting, if The Music of Chance is an example, the vagaries of destiny or blind chance. Maybe there
are events in our lives to which meaning cannot be assigned (or conversely, to assign meaning would be to deny
them), which if they are to be read as signs can only be answered by the conduct of our lives. I have had my
share of the extraordinary & Ive given an account of some of it in the pieces that I distribute. I hope that my
discerning readers see my writing for what it is intended to be – a tribute to that which cannot be explained….*
12.30. Hawker. To be always amazed is probably just as unhealthy as never to be. But in a more dramatic way.
For a start you cant sleep & that makes your hands shake. Judgement is impaired & errors of perception
proliferate. You see a road sign or a number & there seems to be a message embedded there of frightful
importance but later someone points out that you misread a u for a v & a 6 for a 9. It is one thing to find
connections between things but another to have them multiply till they swarm all over you. & its frightening.
25
Personalities of people from whom weve been used to maintaining comfortable distances through the practice
of conventions designed to do that suddenly loom enormous in the imagination & can invade your most private
refuges. It seems that we are not equipped for easy survival in a world of unexpected events & fluid
connections. Some manage to contain them (structure? destroy? transpose? shun? channel?) by the practices &
observances of formal religion. Others write about them. Some douse themselves (or are doused by others) with
chemicals so that they dont see or hear. In the enormous swirl of the unknowable we are helpless …. 3.55.
Aroona Ruins camping area. Im in tourist country & have stopped here only long enough to write the final part
of the entry for today. Then Im shifting back to the previous camping area because its empty. This is the
Flinders Ranges Southern Park. Its years since Ive been here but once I used to know it extremely well.
Probably walked every major ridge & most of the bigger creekbeds. Theres a $6 day pass to get in now & thats
the price for spending the night also. Ive got the relevant envelopes for putting in the money but dont intend to
unless Im sprung. I dont accept that the earth or any part of it belongs to someone to charge rent. What used to
be unofficial camp areas are now formal ones with toilets & they are all maintained with lots of posts that keep
you from driving where you shouldnt. There are some people here who have enclosed their heads in nets,
presumably to prevent flies from landing on their faces. I saw a pair of cyclists between Port Augusta &
Hawker doing the same. They look bloody ridiculous. There arent even many flies here. I feel a bit morose but
am looking forward to a couple of days walking before meeting up with Saulius & his mate on saturday. The
creeks are actually running which is quite unusual & Im anticipating some sweaty climbs followed by recovery
periods in cool pools.
(3/2/08. Completion of Wednesdays from folder 2. (nos 17 – 26 of anthology))

13/2 /02 ( 7/2/02 – 22/2/02 (no 28)). I cant remember the last time I spent a summer in
Melbourne. Prior to the trip, except for a few days in Sydney for christmas, Ive been in the city the whole time
since coming back from the Flinders Ranges early in november. January has been spent waiting for Vi to die.
The burden of it has been shared by her & Helen. Helen has been leaving in time for the start of the first session
of visiting hours then going in again in the evening to help her with her tea as the stroke has left her partially
paralysed on the right side. Just when everyone, including the doctor (who had listed the possible procedures all
of which she had rejected & who later told Helen that Vi was one of the most rational patients shed talked to)
had prepared themselves for her death her condition stabilized, the internal bleeding has slowed , the blood
pressure is under control. But she is unable to get out of bed, dress or wash, or do hardly anything else unaided
so she cant go back to the hostel. The last chapter of her life is to be spent in a nursing home. The white nightie
in the cabinet by the bed which she explained to Charlie Chan (to Vi all asians are chinese and all male chinese
are called Charlie Chan), to his consternation (“you mustnt talk like that”) to leave for the special occasion will
follow her to a bedside drawer in the nursing home. Its not the first trick fate has played on her. About 1½
years ago it seemed she was dying from loss of blood & she was looking forward with curiousity to meeting up
with old Noel (who died from emphysema long ago after being tortured in his final days by having his life
artificially prolonged in an intensive care unit; prior to that he was pestered by ‘sky-pilots’ & ‘god-botherers’ as
he called them) again on the other side, seeing what he was up to, when her life was saved by the miracle of
medicine. An operation to remove a cancer which it seems may have been 10 years old but as good luck would
have it came out neatly & a blood transfusion (or a couple) combined to save the day. I have no doubt that the
event will have been recorded in a hospital register or data bank as a success. Some future statistician will draw
positive conclusions about the benefits of medicine from a comparison of the years gained against the number
of procedures performed. These things are measurable. But soon afterwards Vi lost most of her mobility which
together with her deafness meant that she was barely able to participate in the social life, such as it is, of the
hostel. No small loss to someone as mentally alert as she still is. How do statisticians incorporate into their
conclusions, or measure, the loss of quality of life? I am sure that if she was asked now whether the operation
had been worth it, she would say no. Nevertheless she consented to a transfusion this time round because the
doctor asked her to have it for her (the doctors) sake. I think that was probably to allow her the opportunity to
have a longer conversation with Vi to present the options Ive listed. When in doubt the doctor chooses to
prolong life. The pharmaceutical industry counts on it. The bulk of its products (Vi takes 13 pills a day) are
consumed by the aged. Medical technology depends (shareholders know) on the body falling apart. In the same
ward as Vi there was on old codger of 89 who had been given only months to live five years ago. A young
doctor said “Monty, you could do with a pacemaker. It could make you feel better. Consider it.” “Orright
doctor, if you say so”. Later his wife Beryl, who looks considerably younger & also minds a backward nephew,
says to him (Beryl told H) “What do you need a pacemaker for Monty? Dont be silly. All you do is sit in a
chair”. “Yes Beryl, I suppose so”. (26/2/02. By contrast, the very decrepit, barely alive old man in the corner
bed of Monty’s ward even older and sicker than him, when prompted by the specialist that he didnt really
26
want more operations to keep him alive, replied loudly and crossly “Of course I bloody do! What the friggin
hell am I in the hospital for!” – helenz) Ive visited Vi in hospital once. That was before her condition
stabilized, when she still thought she was dying. She seemed bemused, the edge to her humour was still there.
She cant wash herself properly & has to be helped with the toilet. She showed a black (like the colour of dried
blood) mark ½ by 2 inches on her shin caused by her slightly hitting it on a chair leg. I was unable to more than
glance at it because Im squeamish. In a voice between sobbing & laughing she said “I have no dignity. I have
lost my dignity.” (11.45)
… (5.40) This spot has proved busier than I expected. Yesterday evening there was a procession of
people coming in to give their dogs a run. After I was in bed another set of people came prawning. Then a tray
truck pulled in right near by into one of the 3 spots among the casuarinas where I am. The two guys (& a dog)
in the truck stayed overnight. They left this morning. They came from Canberra just for the one nights
prawning. This morning I had a long conversation with an old dude who is selling his house in the caravan park
(asking price $60,000) as he has shifted into Narooma. He had an accent, perhaps german. He said all the
people going for prawns here last night were from Canberra but that they didnt know what they were doing &
were mainly grogging on. He reckons he got 19 kilos of prawns here in one effort. It took him longer to shell
them than to catch them. He was using a net across the mouth of the river (which is tidal I now realize) which is
illegal without a licence. He was very informative about the behaviour of prawns & about the fish that spawn in
the lake. He travels north most years with his partner & has been to Normanton & Kuramba as well as other
places I know. He says people have been known to park here for a month without being hassled by rangers.
Him & his partner also never pay on their travels & they sneak into camping parks for showers & to use the
laundries. We agreed that the regulations I am in the habit of complaining (there is a blue wren at my feet)
about are probably necessary to keep these places from getting trashed & that avoiding the fees is part of the
fun of travelling. That conversation was in the middle of me writing this mornings entry. As a result I wasnt
ready for a walk till midday, not that it mattered as I am sunburnt from yesterday. As I was passing the car park
I exchanged a few words with a large guy of about my age who was sitting on the boundary railing. There was
something familiar about him & then I recognized that it was Rein Tender whom I went to uni with & we
travelled on a trip to the inland together (Tony Kesminas, Audrones sister Jurate, & Reins wife Jura were on
that trip) & with whom when he was with his first wife we regularly socialized. He didnt recognize me till after
I introduced myself. He was here staying at his current wifes brothers place in Narooma & showing a young
couple from estonia around the area. We hadnt seen each other for 20 years & compared notes about the kids. In
fact the only member of the family I have met in the meantime is his daughter Daina who came to Eddies place
on a few occasions to sing litho village songs. She has spent a year in litholand & another in mexico with
husband & daughter teaching english. Shes pregnant again. I asked him to give her my regards. He sends his
regards to you & invites us to visit. Hes in the phone book. They go north for winter too & like the person I had
just talked to they have been to Normanton & Kuramba. (I am watching a rat). Hes been retired since he was
retrenched 5 years ago & also has a seniors card. Charlie Kazlauskas came from Brisbane for his 60 th birthday.
Apparently their house had burnt down & things got too much for them for a while (the Kazlauskas’). We
talked about nursing homes. His mother is in a good one he says. Shes 95. He visits weekly but she can only
cope for about 10 minutes at a time then asks him to leave. When they go away in winter he makes a point of
sending cards to break up the week for her. The mother of a friend of his also about 95 has alzheimers & has
been in a home for 15 years. She is scarcely more than a corpse, doesnt recognize anyone, just sits in a chair. I
think that when we try to evaluate the contribution made by medical science we should balance against it the
nursing home phenomenon which is its by-product. It may be that the way we die, especially if we take a long
time about it, is important but easy to overlook because a lot of these geriatrics are hidden away. It may not be
worth it at that price. The problem has to be faced. You cant ignore it simply because it cant be quantified. Ive
digressed. Rein & me talked for over half an hour, till the rest of them came back from the beach. He talks in
exactly the same slow, measured manner as he always did. When they left I was at last able to go for the walk. I
was away only 3 hours. Walked north till I got to the beach were the Narooma Life Savers clubhouse is. There
is a very impressive headland just before you get there on top of which is a cemetery where they were burying
someone as I walked through. I was able to walk back along the shore at low tide again. Its very quiet this
evening so far. I dont think there is anyone about.
20/2 /02. Over the last couple of years Ive been subject to an increasing intensity or agitation. Its
difficult to nail down: its as if a pressure builds up, the kind of thing that you might feel before you decide to
change direction, or the restlessness before embarking on a major journey. I wonder whether its part of the
ageing process but when I observe contemporaries of mine I notice the opposite. They seem to have come to
conclusions, settled into sedate habits, plateaud out. What is this uneasiness? Why the foreboding? A few weeks
ago I was talking to an english kid (touring here; just finished a fruit picking job) at the Young & Jackson hotel
27
in the city & he was saying that he sensed that western civilisation was on the skids & that the survivors would
be the sort of people who live in afghanistan & africa. He was saying it was those who are now on the margins
that would ensure the survival of the human species. It was just a feeling he was saying & I was saying “I hear
you, I hear you mate, I could have said all that.” I wonder how many others feel the same without speaking out.
But perhaps its not that at all. I look for explanations, metaphors. Imagine a beetle that has been sucking sap
attached to the same root deep underground for years, its entire life in pitch black, immured in clay. Then
something stirs inside it, something it has never felt before. & then in an extraordinary spasm, it wrenches its
mouth parts from the root & blindly, without knowing why, starts digging furiously upwards. A new
incomprehensibly violent life has begun leaving no space for memory. But thats only the start. Later, after a
herculean effort, it will break through into another world & immediately be blinded by an unimaginable sun so
that it has to scramble backwards into its hole to save its life. That night it emerges & guided by the light of the
moon starts climbing up the rough bark of a tree trunk, fanned by breezes. It splits in half along its back & loses
consciousness. Next day on a leaf nearby there is a cicada. It is a vivid green. Its eyes stare into a brilliant sun
without being blinded. I wonder about those first stirrings (& they must have been preceded by signs: slight
uneasiness, disorientation). Are they what I am feeling? & its strange to consider how thousands of individuals,
separated by night & clay, felt the same stirrings at the same time. Here is another example. When the low
pressure trough that will bring the change is arriving a few of the ants in the colony become edgy, start running
around agitated but aimless. Very soon others are on the move & before long the entire ant city is in upheaval.
The turmoil increases all day & by nightfall it has risen to a frenzy. Then in a final crescendo of disorder the
winged queens emerge for their nuptial flight. Their wings glitter as they take off into a starry sky. A day later
the clouds roll in. It starts raining. Here is another. There is a palm in the tropics that doesnt flower every year
like normal palms do. Each year it adds a new ring of leaves only & by the time its about 70 years old it has
grown to be one of the large palms. Then a flower stalk emerges from the crown. But its not an ordinary flower
stalk. Its a huge spike that divides and subdivides till it overtops the entire palm. The spikes are covered with
buds which will soon burst into thousands of crimson flowers. Already the palm which still looks the same is
barely more than a husk, depleted of nutrients, almost exhausted. A final effort ensures that the seeds ripen, &
the palm dies. The question I ask is: did the palm after 69 identical years in its final 70 th year, but still before the
emergence of the enormous spike already forming inside it, have any inkling of what was about to happen?
… I am at Mallacoota (6.00) at the Betka River picnic area. Later Ill find a quieter spot for the night. Its
warm, there is a change due tonight. I had intended to stop at a spot 5 ks out of Wonboyne but right at the beach
end of a bad track it was covered by over 0.4 metres of water. That detour took up over an hour. On the way out
of Potato Point I gave a koori a lift into Bodalla. He said he had seen me on the beach yesterday when he was
fishing on the lake. I reckon he had been staying in the caravan home at the end of the track Id discovered. Read
the Age at Narooma in the same boathouse I had gone for a coffee ($2.80) the previous times. Bought 6 bottles
of fruit wine at the Fruit Ballad place south of Cobargo. 3 are lavender & apple & 3 are rose petal & honey.
That was $100. Stopped for a snack near Wolumla. Im sure this is no interest to anyone but the wine reminded
me that the litho word for honey ‘medus’ is the same as the singhalese word ‘medhu’. I found that out from
Malika who used to do typing for me. Gathering honey is a very ancient activity. No doubt both words are
related to the sanskrit word for honey. The fermented drink made from it is called ‘midas’ in litho which is
obviously connected to the english ‘mead’ which is also fermented honey. How come the connection? The
answer is that the old english word for honey is ‘meodu’ (old teutonic: meduz) but has not been in use since the
middle ages. …Im at Quarry beach by myself. Its good here coz youre close to the water so the waves are loud.
This is the place we left once, honey, when a bunch of druggies came in during the night to shoot up … Found
another tick in the hair of me head at the back but it was only the pinhead stage.
17/4 /02 ( 15/4/02 – 26/4/02 (no 29) *….* ← Port Germein (no 58)). I woke before
the first bird calls into a brief moment of ecstatic thoughtlessness. Then I thought that I am almost never free of
thought & that one day, when all these strings of chatter are completed, I will achieve a more permanent
stillness. I heard the first truck go by on the highway 2 ks away. I felt grateful to be in mallee scrub away from
the city. The first birds to call are magpies & the very numerous crows. You overlook a vast plain eastwards
from here so they see the pre-dawn glow long before sunrise. As the large orb of a red sun made its appearance
the galahs, which are the dominant bird in the area, joined in. Its 8.10 & Ive had breakfast (just had a crap). It
was quite brisk early & looks like a good day coming up. As usual Ive brought a few books in case of rainy
weather which on the Eyre Peninsula is not very likely. Im about a quarter into the Pensees of Blaise
Pascal. Ive also started The Battle for God – Fundamentalism in Judaism, Christianity and
Islam by Karen Armstrong. Ive just finished her A History of God & brought it in case I want to
refer to it. The other books Ive read by her in the last couple of weeks are the ones on muhammad & buddah.
28
The History of God is described as a world wide best seller & has been translated into 30 languages. Her
qualifications are that she was a nun for 7 years an experience she has described in another best seller called
Through the Narrow Gate. In 1999 she received the Muslim Public Affairs Council Media Award. She is
a teacher at the Leo Baeck College for the Study of Judaism. Her sister is a buddhist. (20/5/02. Yesterday I saw
the Dalai Lama lecturing on a giant screen outside the tennis centre. There was no room inside as it was
packed.) I find her books very informative (did you know that in lithuania there were processions in honour of
Sabbatai Sevi (Shabbetai Zevi)? & Im going to find out more about Jacob Frank (1726 – 95) if only because she
describes him as “the most frightening figure in the entire history of Judaism”. (I had heard of Frankism only in
connection with the polish/lithuanian/and according to Simon Schama maybe somewhat jewish poet
Adomas Mickevicius). (20/5/02. Before going to the tennis centre I read the Encyclopaedia Judaica
entry on Frankism at the state library where I also caught up with Frank Lovece, Brian Maclure, Walter Struve
& others.) The fact is Ive been told Im a religious writer myself so Im interested to find out what it is that Im
being accused of. Much as Ive enjoyed the historical detail I find her interpretation of the place of the ‘mystical’
experience in our lives to be banal & at the service of orthodoxy as you would expect from someone who is
paid to teach at a religious institute. Her point of view is couched in cartesian dualisms. She makes a facile
distinction between ‘mythos’ & ‘logos’ placing religious meanings in the first & the world of practical affairs in
the second. Underpinning the initial structure is an uncritical acceptance of the inside/outside paradigm of the
personality. She locates the experiences of the mystics deep in interiority where they are safe from doing harm
& where they reside in similar territory to the creatures of psychoanalysis. She uses words such as unconscious,
subconscious, psyche as if it is obvious what they mean without showing any awareness of how they serve their
owners in the real world. The main practical effect of her theology is to endorse the roles of the church
hierarchies who have to filter & structure the insights of the mystics much as shrinks guide their patients to self
awareness by helping them confront the denizens of their subconscious. The end result, & I dont think she
intends it, is to trivialize religious experience. The problem with cartesian dualisms is not that they are being
undermined by people like Derrida & Wittgenstein but that they are already dead in the water. The
philosophers come after the event trying to find a language for what has already happened. People in the street
still use the language of doubles for want of replacement terms but their actions show they know its
meaningless. For the record I do not consider myself to be a religious writer. I write about language. If someone
said I was a truthsayer – that would be something ! *…6.00pm. I am at Port Germein at a table overlooking the
beach & pier. The pier is 1½ ks long & was once the longest in australia according to the info board. When you
walk out to the end you can hear the crowing of roosters back in the town. Sound carries well over water. Ive
spent the bulk of a hot day mucking about in Port Pirie which has little to recommend it except youve got to go
there for services. I walked up & down the main st enough times for people to be saying hullo to me. First I
went to the Nissan dealer who suggested I get a new key cut to see if the sharper edge fixed the problem. That
cost $5 & didnt work. The locksmith sent me back to the dealer. To order a barrel in from Melbourne would
have taken till next week if one was available. It would have cost hundreds of dollars. Then I went to the
R.A.A. garage & after much toing & froing we located two second hand ones at a wreckers. One had a key but
would have been hard to attach to the van as it was a different model, the other was OK but had no key. Thats
the one we got & took it back to the same locksmith to disassemble so as to cut a key for it. All this took over 5
hours & cost $105. Later I realized that all I had needed to get done was to get the R.A.A. people to break the
locking mechanism as Im getting rid of the van after the trip. No-one had thought to suggest it. Anyway I am
here at what I consider to be home territory. Its a still evening. Im drinking a stubby of Coopers Sparkling. An
Italian family are returning from fishing on the pier. One of them is pulling a special trolley designed for fishing
gear & they are talking very loudly. Dogs are barking. Pigeons cooing. Later Ill ring H. Tonight Ill be sleeping
by the waters of Spencer Gulf (about 2ks to the north).

they watch the white birds stoop through mist and spray
beautiful as a dream

it makes them think that

they are near the sea

they wait
to soak their withered hands
in salty water
once again *

29
 24/4 /02.

the boy listened

to the whorls of the shell
whispering
the secrets of the sea

all life comes from the sea

come back to me
come back to me

so he went to the beach

and made a castle
of sand
born from the shells of the sea

*
The mouse was particularly active during the night & I was extremely alert before falling asleep for a
short time from exhaustion. The paper bag strategy didnt work as he gnawed his way in through the bottom &
because I was hearing mainly various pitches of gnawing instead of rustling I had assumed he wasnt in there. I
kept worrying that he was working on a water container. It seemed to me that his determination was capable of
anything. When I checked the contents of the bag this morning before burning it I found that he had gnawed
through the empty milk cartons, in which he would have found some moisture, & the mackerel fillet container
into which I had put the emptied can. There would have been a bit of briny moisture there too. He did a few
sprints around the inside of the car which made me disinclined to lie naked on the sleeping bag though it was
uncomfortably hot inside. A desperate thought came to me: that when I get into Streaky Bay 50 or so ks to the
north, as I will have to do for petrol, maybe I should get a mousetrap.
*
Before leaving Melbourne I had told H that I would write less on this trip as I wanted to tip the balance
of my days towards walking. I wanted to be more carefree & recover some of the health that I lose in the city. A
few alcohol-free days have already benefitted but the writing has got out of hand so I want to finish off the
piece for ‘publication’. As usual I have left the subject that I find most difficult to get my head around till the
end. In the last piece I put out I said that all killing is murder & that religions that supply pastors for the army
stink. I meant to set out my basis for saying it as much for my own clarification as for others. Blaise Pascal
would have it that in the final analysis, when we examine the reasons for our reasons, we have only two sources
of primary knowledge: intuition & revelation. Wittgenstein claims that the bedrock is consensus of a
fundamental kind where we have agreed on, by jointly practicing, the basic moves of the “language game”. I
suggest that Wittgensteins bedrock is underlaid by other strata: the cooperation between the organs of the body
which itself is a development of the regularities & synchronicities that govern atoms, molecules etc. But this is
airy-fairy stuff. All I want to do in todays entry is to explain that I do not hold these kind of positions for what I
say about killing. I gain no support from the commandments of moses as it is quite clear that “Thou Shalt Not
Kill” only applied to the tribes of israel amongst themselves. Its purpose was undoubtedly to cement them into
a nation. The way the law was interpreted is shown by their subsequent murder of the Canaanites. Besides there
were all kinds of exceptions even among themselves: sorcerers were to be killed out of hand etc. The biblical
commandment has more holes in it than a sieve & thats how it has been correctly interpreted ever since. But I
say, categorically, that you are never allowed to kill others except when they request to be released from pain
(torturers will interpret this in the way that suits them). It is obvious (I hope) that, unlike moses, I do not base
my ban on a revelation. But suppose that on one of my walks a sandhill suddenly became enveloped in a smoky
cloud & a voice from inside the cloud said: “Youre wrong, mate, youre not allowed to help people kill
themselves for release from pain. Youre never allowed to kill anyone including yourself except for self-
protection, or if theyre sorcerers or demons, or evil threatening to overcome the world, or to protect civilization
as we know it, or for the sake of women & children & freedom & justice or if they are infidels”. (19/5/02.
Sounds like a burning Bush to me - helenz)

Gods, like men, revere the boys who die for them in battle.
30
 Heraclitus

In that case my answer is “I do not recognize the authority of sky gods.” I would of course be mightily
impressed especially if to demonstrate that he meant it he zapped the ground next to me with a bolt of lightning
(7/2/08. & th@s wot ♂ dun rfu y l8r ( Saturday 24/6/06 (no 72)). I would be forced to run for
cover, to hide from his wrath, but if he found me so be it. I disagree utterly with Soren Kierkegaards meditation
on the abraham isaac story. I suspect it was invented by priests with claims to gods word to con people into
blindly following their ridiculous instructions. The fact is people do hear voices (I have heard my name called)
that can tell them to kill themselves or others because they are demons etc. etc. & if they obey they are acting
no differently to moses & the churchmen ( the inquisitors burnt so many witches). Nor do I lay claim to an
intuition not to kill. I suspect the opposite: that the urge to kill those who we believe threaten our lives is wired
into us almost as compellingly as the life urge itself. My problem with Pascals distinction is that when I look
hard at those two words they merge into each other. The most extensively documented account we have of
revelation is that of the verses of muhammad (koran) which were dictated to scribes over many years (he was
illiterate) & where we have many accounts of how he looked, whether he trembled, or fainted etc. at those
times. If he had claimed that they were the poetic expressions of a heated imagination or intuition people would
have found it just as acceptable though they wouldnt have supported him in his political activities. The greeks
attributed poetry to the muses. Nor do I gain any help from Wittgenstein. In his scheme language has nothing to
say on why we should or shouldnt kill but it enables science & the nuclear bomb. Hardly anyone agrees with
me. So I say again without invoking any authority, nor claiming it myself: Thou Shalt Not Kill.
*
Did a 4 hour walk north along the coast that had a bleak aspect. One section looks just like parts of
Victorias west coast that is also limestone cliff. It must be the knowledge of the sea lion colony that kept
making me think of coasts Ive seen on telly of islands near antarctica. As you walk you know the ocean
stretches all the way south to there. About ½ of it was beach with rather yielding sand that sloped steeply into
the water so that it was hard to walk on. The plants along the edge of the beach are varied & there is no marram
grass here yet. There is a 4x4 track along the cliff top & evidence that the beaches get visited.

*
in the womb of the wave
dead men float
waiting
to be born into sand
Helen
13/8 /02 ( 11/8/02 – 21/8/02 (no 30) *….* ← Port Germein (no 58)). 8.10 AM
Worlds End. In the riverland between Loxton & Morgan the orange trees, which are irrigated by Murray water,
are sagging under a load that promises an exceptional harvest but the pasture & croplands Ive traversed over the
last two days are heading for disaster. There is barely a tinge of green in the paddock next to me: I dont like the
prospects for the sheep I can see there. There was no growth in the grass anywhere along the way & the colour
was more like what Im used to seeing in autumn. The crops in the paddocks that have been sown are only a few
inches high & you can see the brown of the earth between the skimpy rows. Maria of Lous at Charlton who
made me a meal of fish & chips with salad & a coffee for $7.00 on monday asked me if I thought it was going
to rain. …. 11.25 Wirrabara. Got here via Hallet, Jamestown, Caltowie & Stone Hut for my usual jug of
plunger coffee (about 4 cups) with choc mint & a steak & kidney & also a steak & pepper pie which I havent
eaten yet. Skipped breakfast to leave room for it. The country in between (northern end of Lofty Ranges to
Southern end of Flinders Ranges) is green & in patches looks normal. Im sitting on the step of the van with my
fold up table in front round the corner from the shop because its too cold under the verandah. Just had the
pepper pie brought out. Read the Australian *…. 12.35 Port Germein. Breezy & when the sun goes behind a
cloud cold so Im in the van writing on the table that is designed to double as Hs bed which is about 8 inches
higher than my bed. The sliding door is open on the side of the van facing into the sun & out of the wind.
Anyone whos read my pieces knows that this is a favourite spot because of its calm so I wont describe it again. I
dont have a subject that has taken hold of me so I have an opportunity to try & avoid an underlying polemic that
seems to impose itself on my writing. It may be that the polemic is myself & Id like to break free. Like the
unlearned jew, who because he knows no better sings the alphabet instead of the devotional songs, Id like to
offer my observations without imposing an order for a reader to make of them what he will. Its my way of being
social. The fact is I do not wish to recruit anyone to a point of view (& I wonder if anyone understands what I
say about language? or do I fail to express myself? ) – my pleasure comes from sharing.
31
 *
“Though I speak with tongues of men and of angels, and have not charity, I am become as
sounding brass, or a tinkling cymbal. And though I have the gift of prophecy, and understand all
mysteries, and all knowledge; and though I have all faith, so that I could remove mountains, and have not
charity, I am nothing …. Charity never faileth: but whether there be prophecies, they shall fail; whether
there be tongues, they shall cease; whether there be knowledge, it shall vanish away.”
Paul (I Cor : 13)
*
The heart has its reasons of which reason knows nothing.
Pascal
*
Apart from the usual bundles & books of maps, the bible which has been transferred from the Nissan
dashboard to the Hiace one, the bird book, scraps of paper with poems & jottings on them Ive brought The
Rubaiyat of Omar Khayyam (to justify my drinking; when I told Frank I might quote from it he gave me a
strange look: he is no populist) & a large tome containing the complete essays of Montaigne. (Peter Murphy
who should know because he is a schoolie tells me that the word ‘essay’, of the dreaded variety feared by
schoolkids, to describe a short written effort originates with him.) Montaigne is a great read; I recommend him.
He tackles philosophic problems not by abstract waffle but by giving examples of the practices & sayings of
great men from his own time & antiquity. He is not so shy that he doesnt offer his own views but it is obvious
that he gives no particular weight to them. The views he examples are often contradictory so the reader has no
option but to make up his own mind. Here is a quote from the essay Of the Education of Children: “For
likewise these are my humours and opinions; I offer them as what I believe. I aim here
only at revealing myself, who will perhaps be different tomorrow, if I learn something
new which changes me. I have no authority to be believed, nor do I want it, feeling
myself too ill-instructed to instruct others.” & from We Should Meddle Soberly With
Judging Divine Ordinances: “Thence it happens that nothing is so firmly believed as what
is least known, nor are any people so confident as those who tell us fables, such as
alchemists, prognosticators, astrologers, palmists, doctors – that whole breed (Horace).” I
came to him through reading a book in defence of moderate humanism titled Forbidden Garden by
Tsvetan Todorov. Todorov quotes a variety of reasons Montaigne gives for writing & in every case I could
have or already have said the same about my own. Other than introducing me to a great personality ‘Forbidden
Garden’ was a bore. Todorov goes on & on about the ‘I’, the ‘you’, the ‘they’ & the ‘other’ as if he wants to
translate his views into a code with which you might program a computer. He writes those key words in italics
& his insistent repetition of them indicates that he wants to get his way by wearing you down instead of by the
clarity of his exposition. (Karen Armstrong does the same with her ‘mythos’ & ‘logos’ in her books on
religion). In the end what he says is said less well in the length of a book than the parable of the good samaritan
says in a paragraph. So much for professional philosophers! But it was worth it for bringing me to Montaigne.
Sometimes you have to suffer to get to a good spot. (just spent ½ an hour talking to a guy about country music,
guitars, voice control, camping vehicles, whether you can camp at the end of this pier where I am now (but will
leave) in spite of the sign that says no camping on foreshore & the cop shop being only a few hundred yards
away & he is about to bring round his huge campmobile to join the other 3 huge campmobiles nearby belonging
to people hes made friends with in another town & he has just brought his bus around & he is towing a trailer
which is carrying a 4x4 vehicle & above that vehicle is a kind of frame with a motorboat perched on top of it &
he is from NSW & for the last year & ½ hes been ill.) Back to Montaigne. An example of his method is the
essay That To Philosophize Is To Learn To Die. He starts by saying in the first sentence that Cicero
says that to philosophize is nothing else but to prepare for death. (I reckon Cicero got it from Platos Phaedo
(64A) where Plato says: “…for the non-initiate this is a secret, but philosophy is a preparation
for death and a gradual dying.”) Then he tackles the problem by simply giving heaps of examples of
how various people have died or what they said just prior to it. Included in the examples is a list of notables that
have died between a womans legs. The list includes a pope but doesnt include Billy Snedden because the essay
was written in the 1570s. Thats the kind of thing that makes him readable. I myself (when Im in Melbourne) am
doing my best to maximise the chances of that kind of ending. Sometimes I think I want to return to a dark,
controlled, warm liquid environment right now where I could curl up in a foetal position & forget all this. I try
everywhichway to get in but never make it back in entirety. Incidentally Montaignes essays have many
interpolations that he has included in subsequent years after the initial writing but before publication & they

32
were written as continuous pieces. I think its a pity that Donald Frame, the translator, has seen fit to break them
up into paragraphs.

*
Strolled about for a little looking at the front yards. You can buy a 4 bedroom house on a large block for
$60,000. There is a bowling green that looks like a lawn from a distance but is synthetic. They have planted a
row of Norfolk pine along the main part of the esplanade but most have died or are dying. I suspect the
summers here may be too fierce for them. As I was eating tea (lousy buns from the same Wirrabara bake house
(they claim to be the only bakery in the mid-north) I got the great pies at) all 4 of the huge campers at the pier
left. One was as high as the roof of a house & had several levels in it. My van which is so upmarket by my
standards is nothing compared to what Im seeing. Rang H on the mobile but she was on duty so arranged to ring
her at 7.30 which is soon. Rang her: shes got a cold & so has Kate, she hasnt seen Joe, & Ben is OK. Ive still
got a stubby of Coopers stout before I hit the sack.

Oh Thou who with Pitfall and with Booze

Beset the Road I was to wander in,
Thou wilt not with Predestination round
Enmesh me, and impute my Fall to Sin?
Omar Khayyam *

20/8 /02.

Hashem

in your mighty arm

my hand is firm

by itself it shakes
like a reed

I am a mouthpiece

*
Ernesto Grassi repeats the story of Cassandra (daughter of the king of Troy according to Homer)
whom the god Apollo wanted for sex. Desiring to resist him she promised to yield provided, in exchange, he
first gave her the gift of prophecy. But when he gave it she broke the promise by denying herself to him. So as
punishment he also provided that no one in future would understand her utterances.
Frank Lovece has another story about Apollo. The flute player Marsyas, a mortal & the greatest of
earthly musicians, was being praised as equal to Apollo so the god challenged him to a contest (lyre vs flute)
which Marsyas lost. As punishment he was sentenced to be chained to a stake & flayed alive. For Frank this is a
story about the artists punishment. A more traditional interpretation would see in it the consequences of hubris.
My view is that it is not about punishment at all but an account of how Marsyas was introduced into the
company of the immortals. For when the skin that had insulated him had been removed, exposing raw nerves,
he became as sensitive & aware as they are. I hear your objection: but what about the stake, he is chained &
they are free? No, my friends, the gods are not free. They are also chained, just as securely, by the rules of the
language we have fashioned. Even the almighty, eternal god of the christians is bound by grammar – he cannot
commit the tiniest sin, let alone suicide.
*
Left at 10 & was back at 4.30. It was the best walk so far. Walked to the large dune I had thought to
reach a couple of days ago. Every part of the walk was attractive & the weather was perfect: mild & breezy. It
took 3 hours going due north along the top of the dune behind the shore to get to a classic lunette of very fine
reddish sand with clay sculpted stacks at the base of the kind you get at the Lake Mungo park in NSW. The
direction of the steep sides shows that the predominant winds are from the south west as along the coast. Saw
only a couple of rabbits where no doubt there used to be thousands. It seems they are being replaced by an
explosion in wombat numbers whose huge excavations are everywhere & the dunes are crisscrossed by their
footprints as is the area around where the car is parked. I couldnt see any evidence of old rabbit warrens so I

33
deduce that the wombats use them to dig their own warrens into. About 2/3rds of the way along there is an
interesting narrow salt depression running along the landward side of the dune which has quite a thick layer of
salt, unlike the main lake, & I walked down the middle of it on the way back. Saw a couple of emus on the main
lake. Its interesting to see such large birds look so tiny & gives an idea of the perspective which makes judging
distances by eye so difficult here. You cant go wrong walking on the red dunes as the very varied vegetation
makes the surroundings always attractive. There is a disused track that goes some of the way north before
petering out in wind blown sand. Saw quite a lot of scrapers & arrow heads. Took a tin of kippers in tomato
sauce for lunch & they tasted delicious. The little oranges I got at Port Augusta are impossible to peel without
breaking apart & covering my hands with juice so I have accumulated 4 days worth of dried orange juice on
my palms. When I put me hand under me cheek at night as is my habit when I sleep on the right side it gets hot
& sticky on my face. But there is not a hint of water in the area & I am not breaking the habit of using the water
I carry only for drinking or brushing me teeth which I havent done yet here. (24/8/02. Lake Gairdner. Found
some small pools in a fold in a hill & have finally had a wash & got back in time to hear Collingwood beat St
Kilda to secure a spot in the top 4.) Ive been seeing only one variety of parrot (I hear some nearby) but its
plentiful everywhere Ive been since leaving Kimba. Its the very attractive largish dark emerald with jet black
head Port Lincoln Ringneck (Barnardius zonarius). Todays walk was just the right way to round off a short stay.
Tomorrow Im heading back to the homestead.
25/9 /02 ( 21/9/02 – 3/10/02 (Cursive by helenZ; plain by a…z@) (no 32)). A fresh
morning after a cool night – the weather has been great – sunny & mild during the day, although windy at
times. After breakfast we investigated the lane till it met a large irrigation channel & then walked along
the levee bank for a while before heading off to Horsham for some shopping (tomatoes, onions, cheese,
matches, milk & packet soup) & newspaper/coffee at Café Chickpea where there seemed to be lots of staff
and not much service. Noticed another “Bull and Mouth” pub in Horsham – is it a 19th century equivalent of
“The Elephant and Wheelbarrow”? This morning we decided that since we’d got to the Grampians without
maps, we could use them for the western side, so hauled out the Country Roads Victoria book. There is a
beautiful state park, where we are now stopped, some of which is the Grampians State Park & the rest of
which is the Black Ranges State Park - very attractive with lots of trees that look like young River Red
Gums (but probably not, the resident tree-identifier says. (26/9/02. I reckon the tree that looks like a
river red gum might be a yellow gum (Eu. melliodora) an isolated stand of which can be seen in
Fairfield in Melbourne at Yarra Bend up the hill from the pipeline bridge; & it is interspersed with
numerous yellow box (Eu. leucoxylon) which is renowned as the very best fuel wood.) Stopped briefly
for a snack at the Cherrypool Roadside Park next to the Glenelg River which looked very birdy & reedy &
excellent for swimming. The weather has been intermittently rainy (some heavy showers) so we’ve driven
a fair bit. Now we are in the State Park off the Cherrypool-Balmoral road, which is unsurfaced & a bit
dubious in wet weather for us, as the van is not 4x4. We’ve read a bit & now will have a soup for tea,
having eaten earlier. The Grampians look mysterious & rather like a huge fortress sticking up from the
plain (or a ship – see how Bloody Bush & his war talk is affecting me?)
I realized last night that the creek we were next to had to drain into the Wimmera river or even
be its headwater. The map shows that it is Mount William creek. Earlier in the day we had crossed
the choked up bed of the Wimmera & earlier still the very deep, narrow but completely dry bed of the
Avoca. Both rivers drain the northern & western slopes of the Grampians & the Pyrenees ranges
respectively. I think the Avoca flows to the Murray via the Campaspe. The Wimmera goes more or
less due north to fill Victorias largest freshwater lake, Lake Hindmarsh, & when that overflows it fills
Lake Albacutya & that overflows into Lake Brambruck in the Wyperfeld National Park & once upon a
time it flowed further north into other lakes before finally petering out in mallee scrub. These 2 rivers
must be the most degraded major streams in Victoria but lack the publicity value of the Snowy as no
poems have been written about them, nor have they been the subject of movies. Lake Hindmarsh is
shrinking (8/2/08. kmpltle dr 4 ynow) & Lake Albacutya has been dry for 20 years. Ive walked
along Outlet Creek when it was like a river with water pouring through it out of Albacutya into
Brambruck. I remember sampling the water & it tasted of eucalyptus. It will probably never happen
again. Nearly all the water originating in the Grampians is dammed & diverted for use by irrigators &
for towns far north into the Mallee. The Wimmera river is doomed to remain a string of stagnant pools
increasingly choked by reeds. This morning as I lay in bed facing the window I was looking at the
branches of a large gum whose canopy was being visited by a variety of small birds & over which
flew several different kinds of parrots. I could have had a relaxed time identifying them but my
binoculars were out of reach. The only bird I picked by sight was the New Holland Honeyeater
(Phylidonyris melanops). Later when we were walking along the canal I saw some Little Lorikeets
(Glossopsitta pusilla). After a while H woke up & climbed down from her high bed to mine for our
flexibility exercises. Regular morning & evening exercises are important for older people & especially
34
for H who has a bad hip, crook back, & an occasional dicky knee. “If you dont use it, you lose it” a
famous doctor once told me.
2/10/02. We really gave the Western District a going-over today. After leaving our spot
looking at the flanks of the Grampians we went to Dunkeld, a very tidy, well-kept town where we
discovered a long (1.3k) 6’ wall made of irregular sandstone blocks, reputedly with fern fossils in many,
with several artistically made wrought iron gates , each featuring a different representation of the history
& wealth of the area, within which was a huge compound with parklike gardens, a gazebo, a stable block,
a huge glass house, a couple of small cottages & a main house which we only glimpsed, but seemed to be
an old-fashioned squatters residence. All very impressive and exclusive. A local told us that it belonged to
Alan Myers Q.C., one of Alan Bond’s legal team, who is the son of a local family whose father had been a
butcher in the town, & still lives in a modest home in a back street. Mr. Myers has the road he lives on
named after him, & has contributed to the development of the town by providing money for the swanky
Royal Mail Hotel (lots of glass, interior timber, large open spaces) which wouldn’t look out of place in any
of the more comfortable Melbourne suburbs. More of him to come. The town also boasts a smartly painted
restaurant (Izzys) & a coffee lounge as well as a modern take-away food place, and a very upmarket
doctor’s surgery (I thought it was another restaurant at first glance). The store & newsagency look original
by comparison. A supermarket was labelled in a side street, but didn’t seem to be operating. In all it was a
pretty town, but lacked a genuine country feel. On the way to Coleraine we stopped along the Old Adelaide
Road /Noskes Subdivision Road to let a farmer get her flock into a paddock, with the aid of a young dog to
whom she was giving directions (not as savvy as the dog of the previous cocky we saw working a flock), &
her son, about 12, who was driving the ute slowly after the mob. She had a chat after the job was done, &
told us a bit more about Mr. Myers – there are a lot of them in the R.C. family, & he is buying up all the
land he can which is part of the original Mt. Sturgeon Run, a lot of which was divided into soldier
settlement blocks. Now that the soldier settlers are either dying or packing it in, he is putting the blocks
back together as part of one big property where he has another house, an old place he has restored. She
reckons he got an Austrian brewery in return for services rendered to Bondy. Another local identity is a
Frenchman who has a big property running merinos, who flies out every now & then to inspect the place,
the home on which is filled with art works. Ah, the life of the extremely rich & entrepreneurial (8/2/08.
now H zkpinsnt @ 1st nr 1½ wk vzt → ♀r ½ bruthr WdIeLaLnS nSydney) . We stopped for a bite to
eat at the Bulart Bridge in a picnic area & left our very expensive & much travelled knife on the table
there, which we only discovered when we set up for dinner tonight. At Coleraine we checked our mobiles &
John had an annoying & spell-breaking message about the roller door at Miller St., which got blown out in
the freaky high winds of late. He must have spent about $20 making various calls to get things on track,
so its been an expensive day.
Coleraine is a genuine country town in a valley & boasts 2 pubs & a very large supermarket. From
Coleraine we proceeded to Dartmoor via Merino (where the Hentys established the first permanent inland
settlement in Victoria, according to the bloke who offered to give us directions as he thought we looked
lost) & Digby. From Dartmoor we headed off on the Casterton-Dartmoor road between cattle grazing
properties & pine & blue gum plantations. We are now off that road in a spot surrounded by forest on one
side & pasture on the other which is very tucked away. A group of about 10 young bulls have just trundled
up to see what we are doing. They are very curious, & seem to want something interesting to happen &
are waiting patiently. Sorry guys.
The roller door at Miller st. for which I am jointly responsible with my neighbours the
Woodlocks (absentee owners) has been a pain in the arse. Up to date Ive made about 20 fone calls
trying to get the fucken thing fixed, mostly to my insurance company CGU where Ive talked to a
different person saying different things every time Ive rung. On each occasion Ive been stuffed
around by an automated system telling me to press different numbers for different services & then
making me wait while I listen to lousy music. Melba Doors who are supposed to fix it havent been
much better & just as I thought I got a guy called Jason worded up on what had to be done he left on
holidays & on the day he was due back we left. Now Ive got messages from someone called Shane
(left a week ago but I havent checked the message bank in the meantime) saying they have to make
a new quote because the posts holding the thing are wobbly & need bracing. All this will later have to
be explained to CGU (& a way found of splitting the costs evenly between me & the Woodlocks so
our respective insurances pay up) later. So I sat in the lounge of the Coleraine Hotel ringing everyone
(including Mark Maughan who has the keys to the house & is the only person I trust to be competent)
giving them each others fone numbers & telling Shane to stop stuffing around (its been 3½ weeks) &
just get the job done & send the new quote in. All this makes me realize that we are on our way back
to Melbourne where I could spend the rest of my life filling out forms, ticking boxes, & attending to
financial & domestic trivia. Is this what a few million years of evolution (not to speak of billions of
years of earlier work) been preparing me for? At the age of 61 I dont have enough time left to be
wasting it. I could have done better remaining in the jungle swinging about in the trees eating
bananas. Anyway after leaving Coleraine, on the road between Merino & Dartmouth, I looked up at
35
the sky & was amazed to see a brolga flying overhead. It did a semi-circle & landed in the paddock
we were driving along among some sheep. I had read that there are a few brolgas (Grus rubicundus)
still in Victoria but have never seen one further south than Hat Head in N.S.W. Seeing this
magnificent bird, which stands 5’ tall, so unexpectedly has somewhat revived my mood. (Oh, come on,
stop whinging about the incredibly minor hiccups that interrupt your astonishingly privileged, even
indulgent life! There are people not very far north of here who have worked their arses off all their lives
only to find that drought, flood, the banks & the pollies have all conspired to leave them pretty well on the
breadline in their later years, with perhaps a trip to Melbourne or Adelaide once a year for a week to
lighten their life. Get real!) (I can handle a bit of criticism honey, Ill just go to the pub & get drunk.)
13/11 /02 ( 11/11/02 – 20/11/02 (no 33)). Back at the Mountainview Hotel at 1pm.
Drinking a Fransesco 01 cab. Its OK. I intend to be brief with the entries for a few days to make up for
going way overboard yesterday. Its a beautiful, mild clear day & it would be easy to settle in here,
except I wont. As I drove in a platoon of army guys in a variety of vehicles including a couple of trucks
with huge clearance drove out of the car park. They eat well, evidently. Got up at 6.30 this morning
after a good sleep & after buying an Age at the general store drove up the beautiful King valley past
vineyards to Lake William Hovell at the head of the valley where the King river is dammed. Along the
way found some excellent spots where I could park for the night. Ive added them to the huge file of
such places in my memory. At the dam read the paper on a trestle table in a picnic area by the water.
It was very peaceful. I was the only one there. I shouldnt read the paper as it makes it more difficult
for me to disconnect myself from my life in the city but Ive developed a ghoulish interest in observing
the unfolding events between the US, the UN, iraq, & us of course. They are scary enough but Im
mainly interested in how they are being presented by the various parties, the lies that are being told,
the delusions. I am interested in the way labels are used to disguise intentions & solidify paranoias.
(23/11/02. Here is an example of how paranoias take hold. On the day I got home from the trip H told
me how a kid at her school had told one of the mums who help in the library that his mum had picked
up a purse that had been left behind by a muslim woman & when she returned it to her the owner
wanted to give her a reward but she kept refusing so then the muslim woman said that since she
wouldnt take a reward she was giving her some advice – not to go into the city on the 14th december.
This was still before the govt came out with the warning that we should be “alert but not alarmed” & to
watch out for anything unusual. The 14th is a saturday & me & H usually are wandering about in the
city then but on that day H has decided (& I havent disagreed) to avoid it. Well probably go to St Kilda
bypassing the city by walking through the docklands. (I intend to find out more details from the library helper
on tuesday when she comes in & if necessary ring the parent to find out if its true or her kid’s way of being a
smartarse. If its true Ill ring the police – helenz) ). There was no mention today however of the development
that has concerned me most over the last few weeks which is north koreas admission that it has an
active nuclear program. (22/11/02. Read a good article in the Age today called Nukes the Weapon
of Yesterday by Paul Keating.) It has made the admission, I suspect, because enriching uranium
up to weapons grade standard emits radiations that cannot be disguised (thats why we know iraq isnt
doing it). But what I find most intriguing is the claim that is being made that north koreas nuclear
program is the result of a previous cooperation between pakistan which has had a nuclear capacity
for some time & north korea which has been the more advanced in its rocket technology (saw a
snippet in the paper the other day, attributed to US intelligence, that they may have over 100 rockets
with a range past Tokyo.) The more I think about it the more likely it seems to me that such a
cooperation would have taken place given that both countries see themselves as being under
imminent threat, one from india the other from the US. But what has not been discussed at all in the
papers is that if such a deal took place it would have made obvious sense not only to swap
technologies but also for the koreans to supply the pakistanis with some viable rockets in exchange
for some completed nuclear bombs to fill the time gap while the newly acquired capabilities were
being developed. In fact it seems to me that this is certainly the way it would have been done. If this
is so then there are already nuclear primed rockets aimed at New Delhi, Bombay, Seoul & Tokyo. It
would explain why the US is so gung ho about attacking iraq (knowing it doesnt have but could
acquire them in the future) but has been so muted about north korea (knowing it is too late.) (an
ordinary pot of beer here costs $2.60) If certain states have nuclear weapons civilization is doomed
but it doesnt matter I suppose as it is anyway. I must get off the topic. After reading the paper I drove
back to Cheshunt & up another beautiful valley to Paradise Falls. There is almost no water now but
they must be very impressive at other times as there is a huge wall & cave caused by the overhang
so you can be behind the falling water. Met a group of Carey Grammar kids hiking with overnight
36
packs. The teacher said they have a very big adventure program at the school & that there are seven
such groups hiking in the area (Wabonga Plateau) right now. Im about to head off back towards
Cheshunt & along the Rose River Road which in 60 or so ks ends up at Myrtleford …. 6.40 pm. Im
about 30ks south along the Upper Rose River Road which branches off the main road ½ way to
Dandongadale. Ive just walked up a steep 2k stretch of it to see if the van would be able to get up but
I dont think Ill try. A grader operator 10ks back thought I mightnt make it as a bulldozer was working
on it last week. Pity, as I would have liked to be able to park at Lake Cobbler from where its only a 5k
walk to the summit of Mt Cobbler (1628). I might still have a go at it from here. Its cool & shady & Im
just next to a little bridge that crosses the Rose River. The whole area is dominated by Mt Cobbler of
which you get impressive glimpses as you get closer. There is a beaut camping area about 12ks back
where the road fords the river called Bennies Camping Area. It has many sites, a couple of toilets, but
there is no one there. From there on youre in the Alpine National Park on a winding narrow dirt road
which often has a steep drop on one side. There are mozzies here too.
20/11 /02. This access is called Gunnai Beach. In the past Ive found it to be a problem
with mosquitoes as there is a tea-tree swamp along the other side of the road but there are none this
time. The swamp must be dry. Later Ill head back towards Melbourne along the foothills over three
days. Might call in at Walhalla where I havent been before. Continuing on from yesterday. No one has
ever complimented me or even suggested that what I have been mainly doing (at least most
consistently) is writing about language, examining how it works. The reverse is the case. Ive been
told I burble on too much about it or that what I say is not understood. Yet the only thing I lay claim to
is an interest & perhaps some aptitude in unearthing, however slightly, some of the foundational
structures (a kind of grammar underlying the grammar) that are hidden from view by familiarity of use.
Not wishing to curry favour I press on. I think that what we do when we make the comparisons that
we call time is an important component of human awareness (which I use synonymously with
consciousness & which, if it is to be deconstructed should, just as with time, be examined by asking
the question what is it that we are doing when we use the word). But not necessarily the most
important as some might believe. Borges ends off a couple of the essays he has written on the
subject with an account of an experience of timelessness (a suspension of comparisons) he once
had in a suburb of Buenos Aires & it too is an aspect of awareness. He makes a comment on it in a
different way in the story The Immortals. What we do in making (knowing) time is a uniquely human
attribute. We look at a watch & can say in Greenwich it is such & such mean time but in Los Angeles
it is evening & a particular newsreader is on telly & in a small village in Siberia its night time & an owl
is hooting & I am sitting here writing. These things are not connected to each other except through
us, when we look at our watch. So it can be said that by making time we are able to make
connections in a new way of everything in 3 dimensional space. & since we also connect things from
the past to that space (hence history) its as if we add another axis to it, a 4th dimension, which we use
to predict & manipulate the future. It seems to me to be extraordinary that in giving birth to us the
earth should have spawned such a capacity & I marvel at the possibilities - & the dangers. (The black
cockatoos are back.) … Back to Orbost (where I bought the paper) & then towards Buchan along a
road that mostly wound through forested mountain. Saw a koala asleep in the fork of a branch. 3ks
short of Buchan a sign pointed to the Snowy River 11 ks away. This road takes you to a magnificent
picnic spot (& camping & theres a toilet) by a beautiful stretch of the river but the last 6ks of it is not
for everyone. It is well graded & gravelled but only a single narrow lane that looks easy to slide off
either into the gutter on the mountain side or over the edge on the other. I was gripping the steering
wheel the whole way. It is seriously steep in parts with the steepest bits right towards the bottom at
the end where its too late to turn around. This spot is used as an embarking (for Orbost) spot by
canoeists but most of the time thered be no one there,as there wasnt today. It would not be a great
place to be in if there were fires about & on the radio as I was driving in I heard that lightning had
started one in the Coopracambra national park overnight. Just as I got there the spots of rain Id been
driving through turned into a steady drizzle & I already wasnt sure of making it back up the steep bits
so I ran down to the river bank for a quick look & ran back & headed back up the hill before the road
had time to get properly wet. I made it but had to go down to 1 st gear on 2 occasions which on gravel
would have tested my traction to the limit. Read the paper in the pub at Buchan. When I came out it
was raining steadily so I abandoned my idea of driving along the foothills & have parked for the night
at Marlay Point (via Bruthen, Bairnsdale, Stratford). Its still & the rain has stopped.

37
 Last night I had the feeling that this might be the last set of trip notes that I put out (8/2/08. !!!).
I cant be sure but in case it is I take the opportunity to thank my typist, my honest critic & occasional
collaborator – H. Writing is a marginal activity not deserving the same respect as farming, labouring,
trading, nursing & other lines of honest work (11/2/08. butz Claudio Magris  2 Vila-Matas (
Montano’s Malady) (1 evnn nBarcelona): “Literature may also be part of the world in the
same way as leaves are, for example.”). None the less, for a while, its where I was meant to be
& I hope I have done credit to the task for words can be strangely powerful.
(3/2/08. Completion of Wednesdays from folder 3. (nos 27 – 33 of anthology))

26/2 /03 ( February 24 (no 34)). Dan didnt ring during the night (I slept surprisingly
well by drinking an xtra stubby instead of taking the valium (which had been a 10mg tab (17/2/08. 
nt gtm nOZ nmor but kn gtm ← india vr th (wthowt prskrpshn)) that was about 30 years old)) so
we think he got on the plane. Earlier in the evening Egle rang & reassured us that he would get
paged if he was dozing & that if he missed it hed get on the next one with the same ticket. Theres
nothing 2 do now xcept wait. H will meet him @ the airport 2night where he is due @ 10.20 pm. Had
lunch @ the local pub. Returning to my sketch of the previous month, a major event was the
suggestion made by Andrew Saniga that I spend a few months in an apartment in the very centre of
Vilnius (capital of litholand & lately dubbed by the tourist trade as the Paris of the north) which had
recently been inherited by his mum. I had always resisted going back to the country of my birth, not
being prepared 2 go 4 a short tourist trip & not wishing 2 leave H on a longer one. Besides I enjoy
what I do here. But 4 my xmas present last year H had given me a card titled ‘IT’S TIME…’ with an
enclosed cheque 4 $750 (16/2/08.  rdskvrd thchk nth d rfta m 1st ltho trip n2004 &v nvr drwn nt)
which read inside: “... as someone famous once said. Time to do the “roots” thing & discover your rellies
in Litho Land. Its time because (a) you’ve waited long enough (b) you’re restless by nature & need
challenges (c) I won’t be able to afford this contribution when I retire (d) I’m not retiring till 2004 (e) I’m
older & wiser & not so insecure as I was once (f) I love you. ¶ To John, with all my love & best wishes ¶
Helen ¶ Christmas 2002”. I had rejected her offer 4 my usual reasons though everyone I asked swore
by the ‘roots’ xperience with the exception of Frank L who says when he was in calabria it occurred 2
him that he should visit the land his father had worked & b4 he had the chance 2 xpress the thought
his uncle said I suppose you want 2 see your fathers place. Frank says that as he was kneeling down
crumbling a clod of earth in his fist, observed from a respectful distance by his uncle, he heard a
voice bhind him call out THIS LAND NO LONGER BELONGS TO YOU. It had been said in good
humoured jest by a neighbour & then Frank, having ground the dirt into powder, flung it down (I think
it would make a good subject 4 a painting in the classical tradition) 4 he had realised that it meant
nothing 2 him. I suppose my interest would b the language which I xpect would return in full as even
now if I spend a few hours talking in it (eg 2 Vaidas) later in the evening Im liable 2 break into litho in
answer 2 a question from H. Also Id go 2 see the tree (17/2/08. Sunday 30/5/04 (no 73)) that
was planted on the day of my birth in the garden of the house on the bank of the Nemunas river in
the suburb of Panemune where I spent the 1st 3 years of my life. The 2nd offer coming on top of the
1st convinced me that 2 refuse would b 2 ignore the ‘signs’. Bsides I didnt want 2 look a gift horse in
the mouth. When I told Frank that I was worried that it would distract me from my main task he
assured me that in similar circumstances he had been @ his most productive. Tom Fryer (Make It Up
Club) claims that going 2 sweden had made him appreciate aussie culture. After all that the offer fell
through. Mayb just as well. I am pasting in some documentation of the events of the day including the
original police note (16/2/08. omtd h).
*
I am quoting from the beginning of the 1st essay from Lev Shestovs In Job’s Balances:
““Who knows,” says Euripedes, “if life is not death and death life?” Plato in one of his
dialogues puts these words into the mouth of Socrates, the wisest of men, the very
man who created the theory of general ideas and first considered the clarity and
distinctness of our judgements to be an index of their truth. According to Plato, Socrates
almost always when death is discussed says the same, or much the same as Euripedes
----- No one knows whether life is not death and death life. Since the earliest days the
wisest of men have lived in this state of mystified ignorance; only common men have
known quite distinctly what life is, and what death. How has it happened, how could it
happen, that the wisest is in doubt where the ordinary man can see no difficulty
whatsoever, and why are the most painful and terrible difficulties always reserved for
38
the wisest? For what can be more terrible than not to know whether one is alive or dead?
……. Where is the Oedipus who can resolve this question and penetrate to the depths of
this supreme mystery?””
Here I Am

*
@ 10.40 pm I heard a car pull up. It was Ben. ½ an hour later H & Dan turned up. Dan is fine; loving
& beautiful. Talk about style – he looks like a parisian – you dont get style like that here. Hes OK. He
had a story. Ill tell it 2morrow. 4 most of the trip hes been asleep xcept 4 the time it took 2 eat the 5
meals hes had. Now hes gone with Ben 2 catch up with Joe & Tony. He will b back 2morrow. Its
midnight.
12/3 /03 ( March 11 (no 35) (16/2/08. * …. * ← DANYO RESERVE (no 53))). *The sun
has risen ( 7.55 ). Last night Id b woken by voices nearby or by the sound of a car engine & as Id
strain 2 hear Id wake up again & look out the window in2 a starry night. Its a kind of agitation: u wake
from 1 dream in2 another & maybe another again. On the first couple of occasions I could see the
moon setting in the west bhind the callitris pines. Consequently I dont know if I slept a lot or very little.
I woz tossing & turning in the grip of introspections or confusion. Frank Osowski (@ the ‘poets’)
suggested I give xpression 2 my confusions rather than always seeking clarity but language doesnt
lend itself 2 such an effort. It tries 2 nail down, hold up 2 the gaze, forge agreement. (just had a visit
from a hooded robin: Melanodryas cucullata).Take my word 4 it though I am confused. When I woz a
kid (bcoz I was rgumentative) my lders had a habit of telling me that Id know better when I got 2 their
age but all I learnt woz that they hadnt known what they were talking about. The main thing they
sought woz financial security & the deities they worshipped (never wavering in their loyalty) were the
gods of achieverism. They r not mine. Late in2 the night & long b4 dawn Ive been listening 2 the
trucks roaring on the highway in the distance & am reminded of a passage in Austerlitz (27/1/05. a
kupl of munths ago I told DRUaMlMeOcMD I wood take hiz rkmmd8n 2 read it havn kmpletly 4gottn I
(2/2/05. not az bad az LfOrVaEnCkE hoo on 26/1/05 (c DANYO RESERVE p 5) woz quotin @ us
“Time is simply a yardstick of our separation …” @rbutin it 2 Faulkner havn 4gotn hed got it
from my piece 30/11/04 – 9/12/04 p 2 whch hed rceivd nly a kupl of dayz rlier) lready had)
(Sebald) where the narrator listens 2 the ebb & flow of the traffic in a large city from his hotel room
& wonders if he is hearing the life form that is about 2 replace him or already has. I dont think its quite
like that. What we r hearing is what we r changing in2 - our new heartbeat ……* Perhaps confusion
can b xpressed by a more scattered way of writing 2 reflect the absence of connection btween
different aspects of xperience (but as I write I know Im giving shape). I feel free (its a relief) 2 do as I
please as I have already given full voice in the past 2 what had been important for me 2 say ….
(under the shade of a river red gum on the bank of the Murray in Loxton) Recently I read the curator
of an xhibition commemorating the Warsaw ghetto uprising use the same language 2 justify
resistance as Ive heard used by Hamas 2 justify suicide bombers. I am sure she woz innocent of the
comparison. Jean Amery has used a like rgument. He woz tortured (it is said that US interrogators
at Bagram base in afghanistan r so sensitive 2 inflicting pain that they send suspects 2 b interrogated
2 the egyptian, israeli, moroccan (etc.) intelligence services who r more used 2 brutality. If it is true it
should b pointed out that by distancing themselves (drawing the curtain) from the view (or knowledge
of responsibility) of the tortures they r more dspicable than those who do the deed) by being hoisted
up off the ground by the wrists with his arms tied bhind his back so that they remained straight. Even
the strongest can maintain the position only for a very short time b4 the arms give way at the
shoulder joints & u hang straight & limp with torn ligaments in twisted, dislocated shoulders (some
speculate (eg. Sebald) that pain can be so intense that it bcomes self limiting by leaving no room 4
awareness of anything else). From the intent xpressions on the faces of his tormentors Jean Amery
realized that there woz no purpose in what they were doing other than the xercise of pure power –
the sustenance (growth) that is gained from the dminishing of the victim (for a better understanding
read Crowds & Power by Elias Canetti). Montaigne notes the large numbers of torturers (&
he marvels @ their creativity) spawned by the religious wars of his time (late 1500s). Their ingenuity
woz increased by the knowledge of both sides that it woz in the service of the 1 true god (in this
respect it is also worth acquainting oneself with the e4ts of the christian missionaries in the early days
of the spanish conquest of south america. Montaigne gives some graffic xamples) …. (Burra) I
suppose they r always among us waiting in the wings 4 their cue 2 emerge…. (Wirraburra) Got a
39
steak & kidney pie 4 $3.50 (16/2/08. * ….* ← Port Germein (no 58)) *…. (Port Germein, hot & still,
6.00) @ the ‘poets’ last tuesday Peter Murphy woz saying that apparently a lot of people were
sending the letter with the fridge magnet back 2 Mr. HoWARd having added white powder 2 it.
Sounds like 1 of those stories that circulates but is unlikely 2 b true. If I remember rightly these letters
r titled To the Householder & addressed 2 specific houses. What would b the point of that kind of
gesture if u had 2 get rid of the addressed sheet so no one knew who u were? Anyway, if I had sent
that letter out I would have inserted an invisible barcode of the address in2 each booklet so that when
the letters came back with the white powders Id know where theyd come from. Then Id put the
names on a list (in Stalins days regional bosses were often issued with quotas of how many had 2 b
xecuted & they were so large that the only way they could b filled was by victims names being taken
from lists. The surest way 2 get the chop (“when you chop wood chips fly” said Stalin) woz 2 b
on a list, any list, & there were informers who were known (they had hot lines too though not on fridge
magnets) 2 have sent 100s of innocents 2 their deaths. They were not all looking 4 financial reward,
patriotism woz the big motive. No doubt they watched (27/5/05. I send my rtklz drkt → Canberra 2
save em th trubl) out 4 suspicious bhaviour, anything unusual, like @ the place next door 2 us in
Miller st. where there r strange comings & goings @ all hours of heaps of dubious looking guys with
weird accents. Lately theyve taken 2 climbing up on the roof pretending 2 b just having fun drinking
beer. They claim 2 b irishmen but I dont blieve them. Im not ringing the hotline but coz Stalins
informers were also put on lists (that was the other way of getting on2 them & their turn came later)
bcoz u have got 2 have something 2 show 2 justify how taxpayers money is spent. These
organizations r doing their work (probably fielding a 1000 calls a day from dmented geriatrics whose
picture of the world comes almost ntirely from a TV tube & from the emotionally disturbed & other
isolated people who dont have 2 go further than their fridge 2 bcome players on a world stage) in a
country which has not had a terrorist incident since the Hilton bombing a generation ago. There
probably isnt a single terrorist out there & if there is he wont get caught coz hell check out 4 what not
2 do by reading up the Lets Look out for Australia book first. So all these snoopers have 2 look 4
are would-b terrorists & potential would-b terrorists. Which means making lots of lists & more lists.
Sooner or later they will have 2 show some results. Thats why the legislation mooted by Steve
Bracks where houses of suspects can b searched without their knowledge is so worrying. Whatever
rational (I suppose agencies might rgue that it would allow them 2 plant listening & recording dvices)
is given 4 this suggestion (houses of supects can b searched now as thoroughly as is needed) its
main effect would b that it would allow people 2 b set up by making it dead easy 2 plant incriminating
evidence on them. Once upon a time ASIO (25/5/05. I kwote th folown kkount givn → me x
DRUaMlMeOcND: “16/5/05.   Several   years   ago,   I   applied   for   access   to   my 
mother’s   and   maternal   grandparent’s   ASIO   files.  ¶  ASIO   is   exempt   from 
Freedom of Information laws, but a separate arrangement exists whereby one 
can apply throught the National Archives in Canberra, for files 30 years 
old or older to be released to the Archives, who then (for a fee) can post 
photocopies. ¶ ASIO  staff  first vet the files, deleting parts that could, 
for   example,   be   used   to   identify   an   ASIO   agent.  ¶  Some   months   after   I 
applied I got a letter from the Archives listing the files they’d received 
from ASIO. Photocopying and postage was about 50c a page, and the costs per 
file indicate the quantity – “Alexander Anders – Volume 2 – A6119/90,2848” -
$71.  “Rachela Anders aka Rachela Morrison  –  Volume 1  –  A6119/90,2846” -  $67 
and so on. My sister Sue and I sent off cheques for about half of the files 
to be copied and sent to us. ¶ These files covered parts of the 1950s and 
1960s, well before mass computerization. The days of filing cards, carbon 
paper   and   manual   cross­referencing.   From   what   we   got,   ASIO   must   have 
employed legions of typists and filing clerks just to manage the system. ¶
Both my maternal grandparents were active in the Australia-USSR Friendship 
Society, and in various peace groups. My grandfather was in Moscow at the 
time of the Gary Powers U2 spy flight trial (a note in one file shows that 
ASIO noticed him in the public gallery at the trial on the TV coverage).(I 
also have his diary of this trip – mostly in English curiously [he was born 
and grew up till 16 in Moscow]) ¶  The highlight for me personally of this 
40
voluminous amount of observation and recording was the first ever reference 
to   me   in   an   ASIO   file.   The   occasion   was   the   1969   Australia­Soviet 
Friendship   Society   Xmas   Party   when   I   was   4½.   Attendees   are   listed, 
including “Rachel Morrison with two grandchildren” [me & my then 6½ sister 
Sue.]   Best   of   all   in   this   file   is   the   final   attendee   listed  –  “Irene 
(f.n.u)   [=  “full   name   unknown”]  –  tiresomely   voluble   Russian   woman” ¶
Obviously Irene (f.n.u) had cornered ASIO’s spy at the party and wouldn’t 
shut up. Did she know who the spy was and attempted to stop him hearing 
others?   Or   was   she   just   naturally,   and   relatively   innocently,  “tiresomely 
voluble”?   We   may   never   know.  ¶  Its   easy   to   laugh   at   a   lot   of   this  –
especially a particularly Keystone Cop­ish record of my grandfather being 
lost,   then   found,   then   lost   again   by   some   spies   on   a   trip   he   made   to 
Canberra – but the effort and sheer detail involved in spying on what to us 
seems  innocent  (my   20   year   old  mum  organizing  her  weekend  social  life  –
recorded by a telephone tap and all names mentioned cross­referenced) shows 
serious paranoia in the secret service of the time. And their ability to 
get   resources   from   the   government   of   the   day   to   indulge   this.  ¶  How 
different   are   things   in   our   current   New  New  War?   Only   Allah   and   perhaps 
Lenin   know.   If   our   society   survives,   we   may   find   out   in   thirty   years 
…”)woz busy keeping files (dstroyed under the Cain government?) on union leaders & labor party
members & now I imagine the list is headed by muslim clerics (28/5/05. I amend: knvrts → muslm rljn
ajd btween 18-35 hoov had mltri trainn & bn 2 th mdl eest or th subkntnt). It all seems so stupid
(1/6/05. how ronik 2 find th doneezian mbasi 2 b a targt (2/6/05. Interesting that in all the newspaper
and TV coverage of the event no one has said the phrase “terrorist attack”. Is it because the perps are
likely to be Aussie supporters of Chapelle Corby? – Helh&z) (2/6/05. just powdr pprntli) & no1 thort 2
make lists of th p10shl terrrsts koz thr not muzlmz (Richardson (thankt x HoWARd 4 hiz good werk)
sed they wer ASIOs nchrl trgts)). & why r we told 2 keep a torch handy? Woz there a scoutmaster
involved in drawing up the advice? & whats the idea of having an out of town contact for family
members? Either the government knows something that its not letting on about eg. that there is the
possibility of a nuclear bomb going off in Melbourne or Sydney or its more paranoid than I am. Or it
purposely wants 2 foster fear & paranoia so that people would b prepared 2 hand over even more of
their rights 2 an all powerful state (20/3/03. I recognize now that it woz dsigned 2 shape public
opinion in preparation for attacking iraq regardless of UN outcomes) which we are told in the book the
Prime Minister (oh no John HoWARd the shameless liar) will take strategic control of in a national
emergency. If all this crap doesnt bcome a self fulfilling prophecy (2/6/05. thei korzd th hoaxz) Ill go
hee. Sorry, readers (esp. liberal party supporters), Im just trying 2 get it out of me system. Washin it
out of me hair. 9.05 pm. Im sitting in the heritage railway shed at the head of the jetty under a
fluorescent light. On the wall in front of me is a sign that says NO FIRES PERMITTED IN THIS
SHED. Next 2 me on the bench someone has printed DRINK PISS & SMOKE WEED. (the mozzies r
out in droves). But the koorie family I saw here a while ago were drinking bourbon & cola. Their mpty
cans r on the table. Also I notice among more recent writings on the table that “fingers chicken blows
pigs” & “w gay fucks cows”. Its a balmy night. Earlier I rang H. Shes OK considering how low she woz
over the weekend. She says Bill Woodlock (25/5/05. just nokt on th dor 2 sai th@ werk on th x10shn
2 hiz haus haz strtd (I kan heer it) & 1/3 of th new fens whch had rplaist th old 1 iz 2 b puld ↓) is
removing the ivy off the fence @ Miller st. tomorrow & that Dan volunteered 2 give him a hand. Joe &
Ben dropped in 2 do their washing. After sunset I walked out on the jetty 4 a dip by way of a wash.
Had 2 go out about ½ k b4 the water woz deep enough bcoz the tide was ½ out. The water woz skin
temperature. Then walked 2 the end of the jetty & watched the 7 or 8 people who were going after
blue swimmer crabs with nets (there is a Festival of the Crab here each year on 26th january). The
water on the southeast side of the jetty woz dark but the north-west woz shimmering silver with a faint
rose in it, perfectly still. Some dolphins came by & 1 kept going round & round the pylon directly
under where I woz watching. I think it woz per4ming. U cant get much closer 2 1 than that. U could
tell how heavy it woz bcoz when it bumped the pylon u felt the vibration. Im drinking a very cold
stubby of Coopers Sparkling. Later Ill probably walk out on the pier again 2 see how the crab
fishermen r doing. It takes 5 or 6 crabs 2 make a meal Im told. Later again Ill go 2 my usual spot in
the scrub along the shore a couple of ks 2 the north. ( 21/3/03. On the way back through Port
41
Germein I learnt that the guy with the little dog who had talked 2 me about the VW van he had just
bought ( see 15/4/02 – 26/4/02 p 6) 2 fit out & travel in woz buried 3 weeks ago. He had no
connexions but the lady in the pub said theyd “sent him off “ with a good funeral. His name woz John
(about 67) & he had an agreement with a friend in Adelaide that if 1 died the other would look after
his dog. So the little fox terrier has gone 2 the big city now. (16/2/08. 2/10/96 )*
16/4 /03 ( 12/4/03 – 24/4/03 (cursive by helenZ & block by a … z…) (no 36)). The spot
for the night is Victoria Falls Reserve between Dinner Plain and Omeo. This morning we drove through
Myrtleford and Bright with a short detour to Wandiligong, which is a very pretty little village 5ks from
Bright, through Harrietville (paper reading, wine, coffee) to Mt. Hotham and Dinner Plain. At Harrietville we
found a line of walnut trees growing on the nature strip along a lane, so succumbed to the urge to glean.
Discovered that the walnuts from these trees can be cracked easily by hand, so gathered a bagful for easy
eating in the van (the harder ones we gathered yesterday will do for home consumption). At Hotham the
clock on the visitors centre said 13.38 and 1º - it was cold!. Stopped briefly to investigate a snow hut,
which was occupied by 2 young guys enjoying a roaring fire and whiskey and coke. There was a trace of
snow on the ground near the hut. They’d arrived last night in pouring rain to find the access gate (about
50 yards from the hut itself) locked, but they managed to get the jeep they were driving in behind the
building and spent an uneasy night they said, waiting for someone official to discover it, so they got up
early and shifted it back to the designated parking area. They, like us, bemoaned the ever-creeping spread
of regulations and “Do not…” notices in country they have travelled in all their lives. Dinner Plain was an
eye opener for me - a whole development of wooden houses which looked a bit like something from
Middle Earth (some even had round front doors) and ritzy restaurants and a great pub (empty except for a
family at the restaurant and us at the pub). The place has a permanent population of 80 and they are
hoping for a good Easter and snow season after the fires. John had a whiskey and coke and I had a
cappucino and a choc-chip cookie - $10. You have to be a polo player to live here obviously, or the CEO of
something. Now at Victoria Falls Reserve (in the Cobungra district) the temperature is dropping so we’re
having a fire in the specially provided fireplace, though with all the burnt trees around it seems a bit
disrespectful somehow, like adding insult to injury.
23/4 /03. Knowing blongs 2 the individual. I know what I see, hear,
touch; I can know pain, joy, love, pleasure, I know a woman; I know anger & hate,
remorse, guilt, pity, gentleness; I know pride & humility; etc. etc. Meaning blongs
2 the group. We agree what something might mean. They r not mutually xclusive
as we r separate & social simultaneously (30/4/03. In view of the dscussion @ p 10
of March 11 if ‘separate’ & ‘2gether’ r 2 retain their meanings while simultaneous
they have 2 b referring 2 different parts of us (1/5/03. i.e. it only makes sense 2
say it from the vantage of a greater nclusive domain).) (the hermit praying in the
desert is less alone than the ndividual who has rjected (or bn ab&oned by)
agreed meanings bcoz the words of his prayer had 2 b learnt by practice with
others & their meaning ncoded in2 his nervous system/brain). Though it blongs 2
the ndividual knowledge can only b passed on by a language of agreed meanings
blonging 2 his social group. It may b that its source precedes (or is subsequent 2)
words. I dont know if it is better “never to be born than to be someone who
investigates into the four things … what is above; what is below; what is first;
what is after …” but it is clear 2 me that some questions r unintelligble.
Sometimes the best answer is silence. Last night we watched the headlights of cars toing and
froing down the steep descent on the other side of the valley, and into and out of the various roads on the
valley floor, and counted 8 lights of farmhouses scattered up and down the valley. It was a beautiful balmy
evening and a very warm night. As a result I slept badly and have felt out of sorts all day – you pay for
your pleasures one way or another. We drove much of the day in pursuit of those damned elusive walnut
trees with the soft shells which we both remembered as being along a side road from the main road in
Harrietville. Could we find them? No – so off to Wandiligong as a possible alternative site and still no trees.
I’m beginning to think we must have been in a parallel universe there for a while, or that my memory is
even more unreliable and erratic than I thought it was (which proves John’s theory about memory). Read
the paper at the Tawonga pub, looking out to Mt Bogong, in the Kiewa Valley (another vista of valley floor
flanked by high hills) and stopped at the Harrietville pub where John did his entry. The hunt for the trees
threw our timing out, so we are hurrying to find a spot for the night and have had to settle for really
ordinary compared to last night’s outstanding. (Missed Tintaldra by the way – took a wrong turn
somewhere).

42
 4/6/03 ( 3/6/03 – 12/6/03 (no 37)) . 8.43am. Last night I woz seething with words so I
barely slept. (14/6/03:

the
tranquil
night moon mocks
the eye of day
&
i am like
a leaden weight
suspended by a
human
hair
im
spinning
like a disk in
space

) I hope 2 settle them by writing, the purpose of the trip. I woz awake when the 1st birds started b4
dawn. Large trees mean large birds: magpies, sulphur crested cock@oos, kookaburras, crows
(australian raven – Corvus coronoides) … Just bn talking again 2 Tom & bn ntroduced 2 Bob who is
on a trail bike. They brought c@le up the road 2 put in the paddock with the others. 1 woz a large
bull. Then Bob (who might b a brother) brought a mob past me from the other direction. I wont need 2
shift the van again as there is only a lone bull left 2 come in from the other side. The property carries
mainly sheep 4 shearing & most of it is much hillier than the paddock with the c@le. Theyv had good
rain this autumn 4 the 1st time in 6 years. I woz telling Tom th@ when he rturnd past me a 2nd time
ystrdy evening I had guessed that he would have taken down my rego & I had prdicted there would b
a lock on the gate by the time I sent him the writing @ the nd of the month. After all Im by an
unlocked gate 2 a paddock of btiful bullocks on a road which only gets a car or 2 a week th@ have
had 2 b h& fed by him over summer. But Tom, who is a Richmond supporter, says there is no histry of
stock rustling here, nor of burglary. Until his father died 4 years ago the farmhouse used 2 b left open
though now his mother is alone she locks up. In many parts of the country however gates 2 paddox r
routinely chained & padlocked. My xperience is that farmers r bcoming more suspicious of travllers as
the underlying level of fear in the community rises. Ystrdy over lunch @ Flowerdale I read an rticle I
had cut out of the Age in the morning. Its about new law-n4cement powrs that r being signed in2 ffect
or proposed since the passage of the USA PATRIOT (Uniting & Strenthening America by Providing
Appropri@ Tools Required 2 Intercept & Obstruct Terrorism) Act of 2001 (14/6/03. There must be a
whole government department somewhere in Washington where the articulate and switched on yanks
with literary degrees from shonky universities in California or the Carolinas sit around and make up those
amazing acronyms. I’d love to get a job there, as I really enjoy doing stuff like that – what about
BULLSHITS (Bush University of Lame and Lacklustre Spies Hyping Interminable Terrorist Stories)? - helenz)
which woz the greatest roll back of civil liberties ever in the US of A. Last year the Bush admnstration
proposed an initi@ive called Operation TIPS (Terrorist N4mation & Prevention System) which would
have rcruited a million volnteers 2 rport ‘suspicious’ activities 2 law n4cement agencies. It aimed 2
rcruit postal workers, utility workers, dlivery people, cable technicians & any other citizens who might
have axess 2 peoples homes & back yards 2 spy on them without the need 4 warrants. The public
outcry woz such the proposal woz dropped but on April 18 a new citizen-snoop program called Eagle
Eyes has bn ndorsed. The program creates a network of local, 24 hour telefone numbers 4
voyeuristic citizens 2 call whenever they observe “suspicious activities”. Eagle Eyes regards the use
of still or video cameras, note taking, drawing diagrams, using binoculars or annotating maps as
suspicious activities th@ should b rported. How suss does it make me look!? – I do all those things. &
Ive just had a number 2 haircut . The huge US program 2 store personal info on every1 that woz titled
Total Information Awareness (TIA) has been renamed Terrorist Information Awareness (still TIA) so
ordnary people wouldnt think they r targetted by the project. Whats in a name! They hope 2 b able 2
idntfy potential terrorists by their p@erns of bhaviour. As in all things australia is following in americas
ftsteps. As the underlying level of fear in the community ncreases people strt bhaving strangely.
43
Some get over dfensive others overggrssive. Ive noticed that there r people who r shocked if u ask
them a question unxpectedly in the street. (14/6/03. That’s because you insist on that convict haircut,
darling – helenz). The ncidence of roadrage is ncreasing. I wont go on about it as its dealt with in the
film Bowling For Columbine much better than I could but I prdict (Tom just drove by with the dog on
the ute tray) the level of fear will keep ncreasing so th@ rdiculously minor ncidents (often caused by
people who r unwell) will lead 2 major dslocations (eg. mptying of large buildings bcoz a letter with
white powder is found) & even major systems (eg. financial) will run the rsk of collapse. People will
want 2 wall themslves off from each other & other countries & will only vote 4 govrmnts that assist
them 2 isolate themslves from perceived threats. All these powers the state is gathering makes me
more frightened of it than of terrorism & they wont help prvent it. The proof ther r no would-b terrorists
here is th@ most bushfires r still strted by lightning & the 1s th@ rnt r usually strtd by kids & volunteer
firemen even though both Malcolm Fraser & ATSIC chairman Geoff Clark have hinted th@ if ther is a
failure @ reconciliation with ndigenous people they might strt a few. The ncreasing complxity, size,
globalization, & interlocking of systems make opprtunities 4 sabotage so numrous th@ maintaining
good will & trying 2 undrst& other views bcomes more mportant than policing & nforcement. But we
have chosen 2 go in the oppsite drection. Ncidentally Ive brought the Good News Bible with me
bcoz it woz being h&ed out free @ a stall outside the Young & Jackson pub on the corner of
Swanston & Flinders st. Its a version that uses ozzie spellin, weights & measures, & nglish as spoken
here. & it really is very easy 2 read. It woz being h&ed out by a little guy almost as old as me dressed
in full rmy gear. I think he woz a dfender of the faith. (14/6/03. “I promise the chastity of my
body, and poverty, and obedience to God, Holy Mary, and You, to the master of the
teutonic order, and your successors, according to the rules and practices of the order,
obedience unto death” – Oath sworn upon admission into the Teutonic Order (Knights of the
Cross))… 2.50. I left @ 11 & drove through Merton & Strathbogie 2 Violet Town where I ate a
hambrgr & read the paper (they r hasslin iranian people now, probably 2 please the yanks) over a
beer in 1 of the 2 pubs. It struck me as a pretty town. Its on the rail (Sydney/Melbourne), has a bit of a
main strip, is tidy & is about 20ks from a lrge town (Benalla). & guess what, honey, they have a
muncipal library. It has about 600 people & a bit of a park. A good 3 bedroom brick vneer with ductd
heating sells 4 under $150,000. This could b the sort of town 2 buy a house in as security 4 the kids
whn we sell Ivanhoe. Ive pulled in2 a swamp rserve off the road from Violet Town 2 Shepparton 2
write this. Bsides Im buggered from lack of sleep so I may take a nap. The plan is 2 head 4 Echuca &
northwards 4 sunnier weather. Sorry about the bit of journalese this morning. Its boring & Ive said it
all b4 & I shouldnt have added 2 the typing. An event which finished well a few weeks ago in
Melbourne woz the 1 I titled ‘An anatomy of a public disturbance’ (see March 11 p 1) where I
dscribed an altercation with Maz Salt over a guy dstrbuting peace litrature 2 the patrons of the café
(Time Out) that he manages. A few weeks later when I wnt 2 pay 4 our drnks the waitress n4md us
they had bn on the house courtesy of the manager. Cing as I had nstgated the rgument I thought it
woz a generous & elegant gesture by Maz; a fine way of putting it bhind us & I thank him. A week
later I had another 1 of those days which Ive bn dscribing which probly have nothing 2 do with
coincidence but more with a sense of familiarity or of the connectdness of evrything (yet people say
life can b lonesome & anonmous in the big city). I woz already in the mood on friday evening after
Paul Brickhill told us it woz his uncle who woz the writer. Saturday morning I spotted the peace
activist in the Vic Market who had bn h&ing out the litrature @ Time Out so I got his name, which is
James, & his address (a unit in Elizabeth st) & promsd 2 send him a copy of March 11 even though I
had rferred 2 him in it as the ineffectual peacenik. I have a policy of trying 2 give copies of my stuff 2
people mentioned. Id send him this piece 2 xept Ive lost the address. H caught up with me in the rvo
& we wnt 4 a walk through the dockl&s 2wards Southbank. As we were passing Jeffs Shed (I
nglected 2 mntion in March 11 that Dan crossed paths in europe with Jeffs son whom he knows
from the catwalk & whos still in the ndustry & having a good time) we noticed that ther woz an
xhibition of fotos on so we wnt in 4 a look. 1 of the pics woz of Dan. It woz the 1 st occasion Id come
on a picture of him by chance. We walked through Southbank 2 Time Out café in Federation Square
& there woz Maz Salt st&ing out front (usually hes out back) lookin pleased with himself. Earlier th@
day (or the prvious, I cant rmember) he had jumped out of an aeroplane 4 the 1st time @ 14000 feet
& he says hes going 2 do it again. In the evening as we wer going back 2 Miller st I spotted James
again looking 4lorn in a doorway @ the top nd of Swanston st. A few days later Frank Lovece told me
he had a poem 2 give me which woz written by Fran Malone in rsponse 2 my poem about st&ing on
the edge of a cliff (see March 11 p 10). It woz writtn about the time Maz did the jump as if 4 the
44
occasion. Fran dsagrees with H that my urge 2 jump off a cliff or swim out 2 c is a death wish. She
claims every1 has those urges & pradoxcally they r an urge 4 more living & it seems 2 me th@ @
their xtremities opposites sometimes come very close. Its as if they reach out 2 the other side of a
circle. Agony & ecstasy almost touch. Fran (a libarian) woz 39 when she took her 1st jmp & she wnt
on 2 do 34 more. She says she was terrified every time.

Into the Abyss/15 Second Freefall.

We balanced precariously
Gripping the wing strut
The edge of the abyss
The icy wind whipped & tore
Then we leapt …
Down – down – we fell
Into the whirling maelstrom
And we fell like stones
Counting the seconds
Our speed increasing rapidly
Till we reached terminal velocity
Only then did we open our ‘chutes
The – wild – screaming – air
Turned to peace & silent blue
The ‘chutes creaked gently above us
The friendly earth – green & golden
Smiled in the sunshine
Far below – the tiny orange cross.

Fran Malone – May ‘03

(terminal velocity = 120mph/175ks)

11/6 /03. 8.50am. My fngers r frozen. I m keeping me left h& in my right rmpit as Im
writing & blowing on the fingers of me writing h& btween words. There r a pair of whistling kite (Milvus
sphenurus) in a dead gum across the rvr. U can tell when theyr in the vicinity b4 u c them by their
call. Some pelicans flew by using the rvr bed as a highway. A bit past the kites a pair of white-bellied
c eagles (Haliaeetus leucogaster) r perchd on a low branch over the rver bed. U dont xpect them in
the inl&. Their white breasts r brilliantly highlighted by the morning sun. The big news here is that ther
is barely a trickle of water in the rvr bed bcoz it has bn held back @ the prvious weir while they rplace
or rpair the gates on this 1. Th@ xplains why all the water brds r so xited & active. Its dsturbing 2
come back after being away only a few days 2 find a deep & wide rvr mpty. It makes u realize the 1ce
mighty Murrumbidgee has bcome little more than a drain @ the service of the rrigators. The same is
true of most of the streams running through the riverina. Bcoz the plains r so fl@ paddox can b made
prfctly lvl with the aid of lazer technology so they can b workd by hugh machinery. It makes this
marginal country where topsoil is easily blown away during windstorms more @ractive 4 agribusiness
than more suitble country 2 the east & south. The dmand 4 water is nsatiable. U wonder wher the
btiful & xtremely large (& tasty they say) freshwater crays hide when the river is drained like this. 2
th@ ddnt get away r mounted on boards on the wall in the pub. Thes r known as the Murray Crayfish
& r the 2nd lrgest of the 90 or so freshwater crays in australia xeeded in size only by the huge Marron
of WA. If there r any lrge old river cod left they must b trying 2 hide in holes in the river bed (whch
ncidntlly is rmarkbly free of snags) which r few & far btween. There is 1 whch Norm pointd out 2 me
wher I woz parked last time 4 awhile whch is nearly 40 ft deep. The locals know thes refuges & dangl
hooks in2 thm. (Ive drivn 2 the Maude Weir Park 2 b in the sun; later Ill brush me teeth 4 the 2 nd time
on the trip & wash me face & h&s in the washbasin in the toilet; I can hear pied butcher-birds).
Though technologies r xtntions of ourselves their rlative ugliness (straight lines, angularities, smooth
& unnaturally shiny surfaces, hardness, sharp edges) stems from the fact they r outgrowths of only
the smplest components of whch we r 4med bcoz thes r the easiest 4 us 2 brng in2 view. Now th@
our molecular sciences have progressed 2 the point wher we can tamper wth, manpulate, & duplicate
45
our cells we have dvelopd a capacity 4 a new set of technologies wher we can 4m xtensions of
oursleves @ the nxt (though still xtremely subsidiary lvl in complxty) lvl of the components th@
constitute us. I m not mpressd. Our knowledge of the elements has nabled us 2 prduce the nuclear
bomb; now our capacity 4 catstrphic error is about 2 b xponentially ncreased. The powrs th@ we r
gathering r mainly powrs 2 elminate & dstroy. We learn 2 free ourslvs from dsease (& relatively easy
ways of dying such as from nternal bleeding) & we rplace thm with a slower death from old age,
dcrepitude, cancers, altzheimers, dmentia & various other forms of stupor. I note th@ our ever
ncreasing knowledge of molcular biology & genetic ngineering has not givn us the capacity 2 make
even the smplst life 4m – not even a virus! We can only copy & dlete from what is already ther. Which
is 2 b xpected as the eye is ncapable of viewing itself. The new technologies will b ugly in a more
ntimate way (like cancers) than the technologies which dveloped from our harnessing of motion and
@oms …. 1.35. The road 2 Oxley which is 40ks north of Maude is a sngle lane sealed strip. I turned
on the radio & they wer talking about the opning of the state libary dome room in Melbourne. Nxt yr
ther will b another set of celebrations 4 the 150 yr annvrsry. Prior 2 Oxley ther r a couple of real good
spots 2 stop on the Lachlan river. @ Maude they keep saying ther is nothing @ Oxley but I found a
weatherboard anglican church whch may never b opn but it has a brass bell held up by 2 beams out
the front. Ther r about 10 houses ½ of whch look occupied. U can tell it woz 1ce much bigger bcoz
ther is a small cemtry nearby & shattered glass glittrs in the paddox in the town & around the
outskirts. Ther is a big fancy sign saying: Oxley Lodge. Family Restaurant. Good Food. Lovely
Garden. 9 Hole Golf Course. Airstrip. Join the Crowd that has Discovered Oxley is the Place 2 Be. 2
of the houses r 4 sale & I reckon theyd give u a good idea of how cheap a house in australia can go
4. I m in a sparse black box forest a k or so off the good gravel road which goes 90ks from Oxley 2
Balranald. I m going 4 a walk 2 c wher the faint wheel marks I took in2 here nd up. Ive hardly done
any walking this trip as from the outset my purpose has bn the writing. Ive come this way bcoz the
map shows the road as going along the northern edge of the Great Cumbungi Swamp 1 of the worlds
most xtensive wetlands fed by water from the Lachlan & the Murrumbidgee. Sooner or later Ive got 2
get 2 know it a bit. I used 2 have an intro 2 1 of the bordering stations but never activated it. I can c
on the map there is a turnoff ahead 2 a station 8ks off the road called Chillchil which mayb the 1 but I
wont hav time 2 call in. I m not vsible from the road but a vigilant prson from the local station would
spot my tyre marks wher they come off it. … The track petered out a couple of 00 yrds futher among
a st& of lrge trees whch cast xellent shade. The ground underneath many of them is littered with
skeletons of bullocks & sheep. It bcame apparent 2 me th@ the trees marked the shoreline of a
shallow dry lake. It took an hour 2 walk around. People came here in better yrs as I found broken
glass & small stacks of mpties @ ntervals along the shore. Mpty shotgun cartridges litter the lakebed.
I picked up a rams head & 2 tortoise skeltons 2 take home. Its worth rmembring a spot like this as
ther is no ndication of it from the road. Evdently its public l&. The people whod come here would b
mainly from Balranald Id reckon. Ther r kangaroos about. Might as well spnd the night here.
2/7/03 ( June 28/29 (no 38)). Ther woznt much rain last nght & its sunny – well b able 2
drive out. Some final commnts from ystrday. Those who liv by slogans cannot accept th@ truth mght hav many
aspects. This is not what we mean by truths 2 liv by they say. We mean simpl thngs like love thy neighbour,
thou shalt not kill, all is love, ther is only 1 god etc. etc. Yet in practice they amend their truths with as many
qualfcations as ther r circmstnces (17/7/03. some say chrst is god prviding us with an xmpl of how 2 liv) in
whch they apply thm. So good chrstians vote 4 gvrmnts whch lock up childrn, some of the best anglicans hate
gays, & we pin medals on the misty eyed boys bishops sent off 2 dstnt parts rmd 2 the teeth with the latest
technlogies 2 blow up almost dfenceless foreignrs with the least possbl coll@ral damage. & some mght object 2
the nazarene being listd by me bside other men but if comparisons r not 2 b made his life cannot b an xample.
…. @ Dingly Dell. Im putting in 1 of the letters the park puts out 4 collectng fees. The way 2 go with these is 2
hav 1 on the dashboard ndated & if queried u say u dont know how long u r stayng & since uv only got so much
change in cash u cant make the paymnt till the last day. The day u r pingd by the ranger (it hardly ever happns)
is the day u ntr as your 1st day so @ worst u r up 4 $10.50. Puttng it anothr way: I assume these thngs r aimd @
foreignrs or honest folks. We began the day (after breakfast) with John’s writing session so I went for a few
small walks to get the kinks out – into a grove of callitris pines and then in the creek bed where there are
magnificent red gums. On the way back I was feeling very peaceful and dreamy, so you can imagine my
horror and shock, dear reader, when I spotted my better half hunkered down right next to the van with an
expanse of bare bum waving in the breeze. “Don’t look!” he shouted (I was still a fair distance away) so I
obediently turned my back and studied the scenery for a while. When I turned around, thinking the coast
must be clear by now, he was still deshabille, only standing up. “Don’t keep looking at me!!” he roared, so

46
once again I turned, my modest cheeks aflame (his were turning blue) to study the ground cover at close
quarters, which I think were young pre-bloom Salvation Jane (Paterson’s Curse outside S.A.) At my final
approach he was fully dressed and ready to explain that, suddenly, in the midst of deep thought and
careful writing, nature called so loudly and urgently that he could do no other than he’d done. About 15
minutes later a ranger swooped down on us to warn that we were in a restricted area and that camping
there was verboten. Probably someone in a passing car (there was an almost continuous stream of them
on the main road to Wilpena , only 3 or 400 metres away, with hardly any trees in between) had seen the
flag flying and raised the alarm that someone was mooning the kangaroos. After a quick getaway, we
travelled slowly, stopping at 2 lookouts, one of which gave a 360˚view of imposing peaks as far as you
could see, and at Dingly Dell (a twee name for a lovely spot) near which we did a short walk along an
iconic Flinders gorge which had a running stream in it. Turned off on the road to Brachina Gorge and then
again onto the road to Koolaman and Aroona camping areas. We are at Koolaman now having had our meal
and a short walk, sharing a bottle of Fruit Ballad rose petal and honey wine. The weather has been kind –
mainly sunny, no rain, a few cloudy patches. The ngrdients 4 the close call this mornng r a daily diet of 250
grams of muesli wth mlk 4 breakfast followed by a large naml cup of coffee with mlk & thn more mlk 2 fnsh
off whats lft in the cartn. What really tips the balance thgh is havng a couple of stubbies of stout the previous
evnng. U wouldnt thnk th@ ther is anythng worse than gettng your car boggd but ther could hav bn. The Fruit
Ballad Rose Petal Country Wine should be OK but. I m keepng the bottl coz its clear & I want 2 collect some 2
send off a few of my writtn pieces as bottld messges in2 the ocean. The idea came from Rod Cooper who told
me last week @ The Make It Up Club how whn he woz a kid he snt off ½ doz bottl messges & 1 woz pickd up
by a kid in Noumea. Hes still got the nwsppr rtcl. Mayb we could turn it in2 a ceremony: 1 st the grog on, then
the boat (hes got 1) trip out 2 wher the currnt is, the launchng of the messge (just turf it out), Rod could play a
tune on 1 of his own nvntd nstrmnts, then the fshng session (mght as well once your out ther & wed hav takn an
esky & Vaidas mght come along coz hes in2 fshng 2), thn the trip back, & finally the nding of the cermny would
b the cooking & the eating of the fsh washed down by whats lft of the stubbies (16/2/08. md rgood  @th
but ddnt doot).
9/7/03 (16/2/08. * ….* ← DANYO RESERVE (no 53)). *We’ve retraced our journey into
Victoria (Burra →Morgan → Waikerie → Moorook → Loxton → Pinnaroo) to Danyo Bushland Reserve, a
stretch of mallee and callitris pine off the Mallee Highway just past Murrayville. It is familiar territory to
John as it’s one of his usual spots on trips into S.A. It’s green, in much better shape than he last saw it. We
spoilt our record of domestic harmony today with a blue over what I consider to be the mangling of
perfectly useful and easy words by careless handlers of the language and John considers to be natural and
charming verbal evolution a la Shakespeare, when we heard an Aussie ASIO troglodyte use the word
“nucular” instead of “nuclear” on the radio. One thing led to another and we spent the next half hour in
respective sulks. Goes to show that some people will argue over 2 flies crawling up a wall. God help the
Arabs and Israelis. At Waikerie there was a big placard outside a church with the message: “You are bound
to stumble if you are not humble”, so I’ve taken it to heart and have nuffink more to say on the whole
(U had the last word but (until now)). Some may lamnt th@ in a world of
sorry matter.
no measures or st&rds (ltim@e truths) from outside the human condition ther is
confusion about how we shld liv. I dont find it a problem bcoz ther is always the
spectcle of xmplary lives, contempry & hstorical. They cannot be calibrated or
condnsd in2 rules (eg. the 10 (plus heaps of minor 1s) of moses) bcoz they r not
quantt@ive but particular & wheras the fortunes of the rch can b countd the
qualties & acts of xmplary lives can only b ndicated or dscribed. Those who
complain th@ the role models chosen by the ‘masses’ r trite or nadequate (or
prsentd & controlld by fnancial ntrests, the media etc.) hav the option of offrng
thmslvs as more suitable 1s. I hav chosen 2 rtain the life of the prpht from
nazareth as my pre-emnnt xmpl of how life shld b livd. My loyalty is not backd by
deeds. I hardly evr read the accounts of what he has tght & lately whn I do his
words seem strangely opaque as if meaning itself has changed. Or mayb I stare @
thm 2 ntensly & ask “but what does it mean?” & thn they dsintegrate like bubbles
bursting in spray. Evn his words may b finally dsppearing! But I rtain the picture
of a life: of a manger, of a lamb, of a heart, of a teacher & healer, of the sharing
of the bread & wine, of a king riding sidesaddl on a donkey in2 Jerusale. Perhaps
they r pictures from illustrated bibles 4 childrn. *

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 20/8 /03 ( August 18 (no 39) (16/2/08. * …. * ← Port Germein (no 58))). 8.20am.
Last night I was wearing my woolly socks, t-shirt, flanno, a polyester cap over the no. 2 haircut I had
on sunday, & an xtra blanket over the sleeping bag. Iv got the fingerless gloves on now which makes
writing awkward. When I was snug in bed I remembered I had left out the most important thing in the
story of the family name – no one who doesnt speak litho pronounces it correctly. In the original the z
is written with a little v over it 2 indicate it is pronounced differently 2 a normal z as in zero. U say a
regular z with the tip of your tongue @ the back of your teeth (Max, the final part of whos sons bar
mitzvah I was @ on sunday 1/8/03 calls me zeezee; Brian, Zorca (16/2/08. rtrn ← thSt8 Lbre
soon) (a czech poet) & Johnny were also there). The zs in my name r pronounced like the g in the
name of the french writer Andre Gide or the french name Gigi. When the sound (made with the tip
of the tongue curled up 2 touch the roof of your mouth) occurs in a russian name the english usually
indicate it in translation with an h after the z as eg in Marshal Zhukov or Doctor Zhivago. I am making
these xplanations 4 the benefit of posterity should I ever have any grandkids (17/2/08. Elliot – 7
munths) (the composer Johann Sebastian Bach had 18 kids & his line died out in a couple of
generations ie there is no one who can claim 2 b a legitimate descendant. What r the odds against
th@ ?) who want 2 pronounce it in the original as none of my kids do or even know what it is. 2 say it
right say Gigi with the 2nd syllable accented (ie stressed, prolonged) & add s. If your only language is
english you cant do it with comfort or not at all. Thats what we discovered when we arrived here in
the 1st major post-war migration in 1949. No amount of coaching could get a linguistically challenged
ozzie anywhere near it. (This from a man who pronounces ‘thongs’ as ‘tongs’ – helenz 30/8/03 (17/2/08.
uvgot prolbmz)). So we changed the pronuciation 2 the very ugly sounding Zeeshus which I give in
response 2 the most frequently asked questions which I have had 2 face in life which r “how do you
pronounce that?” & “is th@ how you say it?” My nicknames @ 1 school were zigzag & zed @
another. If I were 2 change me name by deed poll Id change 2 the single letter z. *…. Camping spot
(where the vegetation down the centre of the access track is growing fast & was brushing hard
against the bottom of the van. Might not b able 2 get in next time) → Burra (where I checked the
message bank on the mobile on which H had left a happy birthday song; bought a litre of metho 4 the
trangia) → Hallet (the camels r still in the paddock next 2 the highway) → Jamestown (where a shop
front on the main st displays the words in 2 ft high signwriting on the inside of the window: COME,
HOLY GHOST, COME) → Wirrabara (read the paper while drinking a jug of plunger coffee (3 cups) &
eating a steak & kidney pie) → Port Germein (where its gloomy, cold & windy; the outlook is 4 more
of it & rain 4 days ahead which may 4ce me 2 change my plans). I owe Lance Morton an xplanation
as I had told him when I bought the sandals (12/8/03) th@ Id probably b spending my birthday @ the
spot he had recommended in the Strathbogie ranges off the Merton-Ancona rd about 15ks north east
of Merton. Apparently its a pearler & the minor track u use 2 get there is not shown in my VicRoads
Country Directory but Lance had provided me with a fotocopy of the area from a more detailed map &
even attached a couple of fotos he had scanned on his computer which he had taken of it. Th@ was
on top of having given the $50 cut on the shoes. What happened, mate, was th@ when I saw the
weather map I changed me plans thinking Id get north of the weather & now Im worse off than if Id
remained in Vic. I feel guilty coz I noticed th@ Lance had spotted I was wearing a new pair of shoes
which I had bought from his competition. These r Naot brand shoes with a cork insole which I find
particularly comfy & the only other shop I know th@ stocks them is a small shop in Acland st in St
Kilda. Lance is often away from his Ivanhoe shop (he has another 1 in Kew) & I was in St Kilda
anyway when I needed the replacement pair so I rode past the Sheherazade café (used as a title for
a book currently on the shelves by a writer with the same initials as me (Arnold Zable)) which was
boarded up as the front plate glass was smashed (28/7/03) 2 the shoe shop nearby which was in a
state of disorder sorting out a new delivery of stock. The 3 rd pair of shoes I tried felt pretty good &
when Id given them a thorough test & had decided 2 buy them the lady in the shop said well what do
you think & I said these r good & she said Ill give u a reduction on them. I knew they were being sold
4 $200/pair 4 a couple of years now & I said how much & she said u can have them 4 $150. I wasnt
going 2 argue with a 25% reduction & took them. Then as she was putting them back in the box she
said where do u originate from & I said I was born in lithuania & she said so was she. Th@ xplained
why she had given me the cut it seemed except it was happening in the wrong order: 1st I indicate Ill
take the shoes, then she gives me a reduction, then she tells me why. (& I have since mused th@
mayb everything is in reverse: we started out as nothing, a single dot which xploded, & now we r
being scattered ever more widely. & mayb evolution isnt a growing but a process of entropy, a
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winding down, always approaching towards a final cold stillness in a static universe. & mayb
awareness, the holding 2gether of different, discordant pieces (sensations), is an attempt 2 retain a
long lost & ever diminishing cohesion) (Are you related to Woody Allen, by any chance? helenz 30/8/03)
As I said matters of identity have been an issue 4 me recently bcoz of my decision 2 get the litho
passports 4 the kids & over the weeks since the trip with H Ive been in one of those domains
(moods?) where things tend 2 get connected (George Luis Borges describes the phenomenon
excellently in his story The Zahir & a few weeks ago I read a humdinger of a story by Paul Auster
in Granta (the Magazine of New Writing) no. 71 titled It Don’t Mean A Thing about
‘coincidences’ of the kind I often write about. & Id like 2 say 2 Paul that if u really mean it (which I
dont think is the case) u r being just as assertive & presumptuous as those who say it means
something. I hold a 3rd position 2 the polarized opinions above & say I dont know what it means
(though I have my suspicions) & I cant xplain it & Im inclined 2 accept the not knowing) so it didnt
surprise me when she said she was born in a small town near Vilnius whose name Ive forgotten. She
said she was born when Vilnius was still part of poland so she has 2 b @ least a year older than me.
As it happens a few days earlier (23/7/03) I had visited Frank Lovece 2 drink his dads delicious home
made wine (“must be from shiraz grapes”) & eat his home made savoury snags & 2 pick up 82 pages
of writing titled Conversations with Lev Shestov by Benjamin Fondane th@ Marcus, a good
friend of Frank, had pulled off the internet http://www.angelfire.com/nb/shestov/fon/fondane-full.html
07/7/03 & I also picked up a couple of tapes of music th@ Alec Drummond (19/2/08. thanks4 th
IMPOSSIBLE SPACES 1 CD – gott ← Andrea ystrda) had given Frank 2 pass on 2 me. Most of the
music consisted of songs sung in yiddish by a contemporary group in New York & a group called the
Vilna choir that was singing in the 60s in israel. 3 of the songs were different versions of the same
beautiful song about Vilnius (Alec says Vilna, the lady in the shop says Vilno) called Vilne Vilne.
Because I had been very moved (21/8/03. Bcoz its all gone. Ive read an account of the last day of an
xecution squad which moved west as the russian front approached. With the front only hours away
the 300 or so men of the unit changed in2 civilian clothes & scattered, most going west some
returning east crossing the soviet lines back in2 lithuania. Of those th@ went back some 25 or so
were later identified & sentenced 2 various terms in siberia by the new soviet authority.) (You are
unhealthily obsessed by all that stuff - it wasn’t your fault or responsibility and you should let it go. I dont
know a lot, but I do know there is absolutely no such thing as inherited guilt or genetic blame or some sort
of ethnic culpability – helenz 30/8/03 (17/2/08. but now th@  nolngrm (19/2/08. you always say that)
vbn  th@ 1vth ledrz vn  unit d nMelb n1968 & hdbn non 2 sum nth Melb ltho kmunt)) by the
songs over the previous days I heard her story with a sense of the particular familiarity th@ I get
when I xperience the ‘small world’ domain. She told me how her family had been so dislocated by
large events during the war th@ she knew hardly anything about her relatives. She had ended up in
Gdansk (where Solidarity was born) & from there came 2 australia in the 60s because she knew she
had a relative in Melbourne. Only after she got here she discovered from her Melbourne relative th@
she had @ least 2 relatives in poland of whom 1 was a radio announcer. She told me the family
names of relatives about which she knew little & would have liked 2 find out whether they were jewish
or polish but I didnt know except th@ they didnt sound polish. When her face quivered as if she was
going 2 cry I distracted her bcoz I feel inadequate in those situations by suggesting she access the
family tree program on the computers @ the Immigration Museum in Flinders st which u can do 4
free. But she didnt know how 2 use a computer & she hadnt heard of the museum. She said
everything is gone (her family had been rich) & things go in circles & u keep coming 2 a dead end.
On th@ note I left suggesting she get someone 2 check out the names @ the museum as H had
found even our name there despite its rarity (of an immigrant in2 New York). Thats the story of my
new shoes, Lance, & what contributes 2 my feelings of guilt is that I knew when I told u of the
reduction I was being strategic bcoz how could u not give me a good cut having just heard of the 1
she gave. I did it on automatic (that proves youre related to Woody Allen – helenz 30/8/03) & I know very
well th@ u insist on me taking a reduction anyway. (Its been raining the whole time Ive been writing &
everything in northern SA thats off the bitumen is turning in2 mud.) … 6.35. Its still raining. Rang
home. Dan answered as H was visiting Vi. Hes got his interview @ the US consulate tomorrow.
Hoping 2 get some work during fashion week. Ben was over last night avoiding a Joe & Tony party.
Hes fine Dan reckons. I am hoping I dont have 2 get out of the van 4 a crap 2night. Bit concerned
about the wind: hope the pop-top can handle it. Will continue the story 2morrow.*

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 27/8 /03. Im back @ me spot out of Burra. Im drinking an enamel cup of Country Cup
(gourmet flavour) Asian Prawn Laksa (98% FAT free) soup becoz Im too scared 2 drink beer after the
experience the other night. Last night was freezing but I was ready 4 it becoz it was already getting
cold in the evening. I love it when the temperature drops a long way. Slept like a rugged up baby till
just b4 dawn. Left about 8.30 & didnt stop till Hawker where I got petrol, read the paper, & rang H.
Shes fine but Dan has been crook with a pain in his side. X rays show nothing. Kates had a ball in
Sydney & is returning 2morrow & she may b COMING TO LIVE WITH US IN IVANHOE. Incidentally
there is an exhibition of Flinders Ranges painters on in the town. Tourists love art. Signs on the way
in say UNAUTHORIZED CAMPING NOT PERMITTED. U gotta b careful with these – theyre easy 2
miss. They have similar ones outside Port Fairy in Vic where me & H were fined $100 4 sleeping in
the van by the Moyne river. There is a new sealed road starting 10ks out of town 2 Orroroo which is
the shortest way 2 Burra but I did a detour through Quorn so as 2 go through Wirrabara. A bit out of
Quorn stopped 2 fotograph a large rainwater tank lying on its side with an ad painted on the base
facing the road 4 the Quorn Cricket club Reunion which will feature a match between the HAS
BEENS & THE NEVER WASES. Had my regulation pie & coffee @ Wirrabara. Theyve caught on
with the tourists: the steak & kidney pie cost $5.50 & $3.00 for the coffee. Theres been plenty of rain
since I was here a week ago. Hawker had an inch after I drove through on the way north 4 a total of 2
inches over the last 4tnight. The streams @ the foothills of the ranges btween Wilmington &
Wirrabara r running. I can tell theyve had good rain around Burra too but not much here on the edge
of the plain. Its green but & there is a flock of a doz emus wandering about in the distance the other
side of the fence. When I rang H on the mobile @ Hawker she ddnt recognize me voice – thats how
good a few walks have been 4 me. Should any1 wish 2 follow in my footsteps here is an item x item
inventory, in the order in which I take them out, of what I carry in my day pack. Im interested 2 check
meself :1. In the small pocket on the top there is a pair of reading glasses (in a hard case) on a string
so they can hang around the neck. I have 2 have them otherwise I can barely read the compass &
cant read the topo sheet at all. A guy was lost 4 five days in the Vic alps once bcoz he smashed his
glasses when he fell over. 2. In 1 side pocket (the 1 with a still smaller zip pocket on it 4 change) is
the wallet which I never leave in the van bcoz I am terrified of losing it. I also put the van keys in
there. 3. In the badly designed front outside pocket with the curved zip I carry the 7 x 20, 7.1º Nikon
binoculars, in a cloth bag as Ive lost the proper case. 4. There r 6 items in the other side pocket: a) a
pair of sunglasses in a soft carrier as lately I cant tolerate the glare on a salt lake or even on the very
white sand of some beaches eg @ Jervis Bay in NSW b) compass with string 2 hang round the neck
c) a container of 250mg Naprosyn tablets which I havent used 4 years & which were bought on
26/6/96 & on which Ive written in biro EXP 99 d) a little round container of sunscreen wax 2 smear
on me lips otherwise a day in full sun triggers cold sores on the lower one. It says store below 30º c.
(when the van is left closed it can b much hotter than that) & the expiry date is 8/2003 e) in a very
grubby plastic HANDY STORAGE PACK which is kept shut by a rubber band as the hinged edge is
broken r a pair of ear plugs which I always use 4 protection against getting pseudomonas fungal
infections (same 1 women get). I paid a couple 000 $s 2 get the exostosis drilled out of 1 of me ears
but I reckon I might have wasted me money coz since Ive been keeping the water out (including in
the bath) I havent had an infection in either ear (the other also has exostosis) f) a very smooth stone
which is perfect 2 hold. Captain Queeg rolls the ball bearings while I caress, throw up and down &
from hand 2 hand a shiny stone as smooth as soap. Cant remember where I got it. 5. The main
compartment: a) a plastic bag th@ has held Walnut & Mango Natural Muesli (high dietary fibre) but
Ive been using 4 the last few days 2 carry a spoon & a 200gr tin of John West Mackerel Fillets in
Tomato Sauce or Kippers in Brine or vice versa & theyve been delicious. The tins r rip top. b)
Wirrealpa 1:50000 topographic map c) a plastic bag inside which r 3 toilet rolls with only a little paper
left on them (two have rubber bands around them, 1 is squashed flat); 6 band aids & a very rusty tin
dispenser with a bit of Leukoplast in it – 4 foot repairs; 3 rubber bands; a razor edged, folding, snub
nosed knife made by SEKICITY of Japan 2 cut a vein (when Seneca was ordered 2 commit suicide
@ short notice by the emperor Nero (whose tutor he had been) his doctors cut his wrist veins but
becoz of his age (pushing 80 I think ) the blood flow was too meagre 2 b effective so he went 2 his
bedroom (his young wife also cut her wrists) & cut the veins in his thighs) in case I bust a knee or
something in a spot where I cant b found. I usually walk off track & I dont want 2 risk a slow painful
death from thirst or cold. Some time ago I enquired @ a chemist if I could get some local anaesthetic
(4 my 1st aid kit I said) but all I got was a funny look & an evasive answer. d) a very crumpled folded

50
black floppy hat with a starched rim & salt encrusted. It has the word AUSTRALIA & a kangaroo logo
printed 6 times around the band e) a green cotton long sleeve shirt, originally of good quality,
extremely grubby on the inside of the collar, 4 protection from the sun. The brand is FLETCHER
JONES & I got it when it was uniform issue 4 library attendants @ the STATE LIBRARY OF
VICTORIA when I worked there years ago. f) a small zip up plastic pencil case 2 put shells in2 or little
things I want 2 collect but I dont remember ever having used it….Thats all that was in there & it
shows how slack Ive bcome. I should carry a larger plastic bag 2 keep stuff dry in rain as the pack
isnt waterproof. I used 2 carry waterproof matches & a small note book & pencil 2 write myself
reminders about times & locations. U will have noticed I didnt have a water container or rain shell. I
agree with the authorities they r essential items u should never go on a walk without but I dont feel
the need 4 a drink on an easy days walk in cool weather & I neglect 2 take a rain shell if I think it wont
rain. In hot weather I usually take 3 pieces of fruit & rely on finding water if necessary. Just
remembered: on sunday the 31st they r serving naliesnikai (meat wraps) (4/9/03. made x Dana
Linikas) @ litho house 4 lunch & theyre delicious. Ill b back 4 th@. Sleep well.
24/9 /03 ( September 20/21 (cursive by helenZ; block by a … z… ) (no 40)). Had a
windy night. John had a nightmare, then he got up to put the pop-top down, then he got up to put it up
again over the course of the night. In the morning we had a fight so the day was spoilt and we even went
to Booligal, as in “Hell, Hay and Booligal” (A.B. Paterson). Now we are on the road between Booligal and
Oxley, across the way from a deserted shearers quarters made entirely of corrugated iron, endeavouring
to mend our fences (to use a rural metaphor). The orchid I mentioned (21/9) turns out to be a prolific pea
flower, one of quite a few varieties growing thickly in patches along the road.(30/9/03. Those of you who
are thinking of impressing me with an expensive floral arrangement can safely put a cap of $5 on it – tell
me its orchids from Asia and I’ll believe you.) A cerise coloured one has a marvellous perfume, though
we’ve seen fewer of them – botany and map-folding are not my strongest subjects, nor is keeping my
mouth shut. We r @ a spot Ive described recently in a previous piece (c 3/6/03-
12/6/03 p 11). The bird chorus I had eagerly anticipated 4 this morning ddnt
eventuate. There was 1 single eerie note call repeated ½ doz times which I
couldnt identify besides the usual magpies & the occassional crow caw.
Somewhere in the distance I made out a few flutey notes of the pied butcherbird
(Cracticus nigrogularis). Incidentally this morning I saw a couple of orange chats
(Epphthianura aurifrons) when we got up & later along the way 2 Booligal. We
spent about 1½ hours walking in2 the plain & back westwards along the dry
irrigation channel. Saw nothing of note apart from the regulation kangaroos & 1
largish flock of emus. Weve been miserable all day. Dont know why. Probably we
were just due 4 it. I suspect H doesnt want 2 b in the fl@ country but neither is
she prepared 2 accept responsibility 4 changing our plans & counterm&ing my
preference. But Im not sure as Im not a mind reader. After the walk we drove
15ks 2 the Lachlan river then the 80ks along the track 2 the north of it whch
comes out @ Booligal. From Booligal its 45ks north along the Cobb highway 2
Daisy Plains Road then 27ks west 2 here. We filled up with petrol @ Booligal &
intend driving west along minor roads 2 Pooncarie whch is about another 240ks
further where we can get petrol. The sun is about 2 set. There have been no cars
along the road since we got here about 2.30. Im not sure it was a nightmare I had
last night though H woke me up bcoz I was calling out. @ least I ddnt kick the
frame of her bed, nearly bust me big toe (c 21/9/02 – 3/10/02 p 7-8) as I did this
time last year. I ndd up losing me toenail out of th@ & the new 1 was impacted till
a couple of months ago. In the dream last night I found myself looking in2 a large
old fashioned shadowy room cluttered with furniture, corners & alcoves. Then I
realized th@ by an act of concentration I could illuminate parts of it. But even as I
made 1 part brighter & brighter the rest would sink in2 deeper obscurity. Then I
saw what might have been a large box (pandoras?), trunk or perhaps coffin &

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started 2 slowly lift the lid by the same method of concentration (I dont know if I
was in the room myself or seeing it from somewhere else as in a film). It seemed
all my effort was taken up with lifting the lid & I was only dimly aware of the
sinister darkness being revealed inside. But the distraction was enough 2 break
my concentration 4 a moment, the lid dropped shut, & I must have been yelling
out as the next thing I knew was Hs voice saying “John John wake up youre
having a nightmare.” (30/9/03. Sorry folks, I spoilt the ending but I couldn’t let him start kicking . By
the way you are welcome to write your interpretation of this dream and provide a suitable ending, and
mail it to us. The winning entry gets a trip to Booligal. No, Sigmund, you are not eligible to enter.)
29/10 /03 ( October 27 (no 41)). I told H b4 I left my only obligatory writing agenda
on the trip was 2 include a record of Vis funeral. H (being a librarian) has filed it & associated
documentation neatly in a folder whch if it doesnt get lost will b available 2 future generations on this
side of Vis family should there b any (17/2/08. Elliot) or any1 who is interested (16/2/08. A family tree
is currently being developed. See Tuesday 18/12/07). Apparently H & Kate r also preparing a more
comprehensive tribute in the 4m of a h&made book. But a single copy can easily b lost or mislaid
whereas I put out 100-150 copies (but intend 2 get it down 2 100 (17/2/08. ↓2 r full now)) of my
pieces some of which r kept by people (they tell me) & my own master copies (with illustrations in
colour) r filed in yearly folders whch 4m a bulky collection more difficult 2 mislay than a single folder.
The modern method is 2 store this kind of info on a personal internet site (my ribs have just been
pummelled by 3 sudden sneezes & I still havnt reached the stage where Im able 2 blow my nose
properly) but I am not computer literate & I dislike it though my writing depends on it (16/2/08. But he
has bitten the bullet and is now progressing with IT (though he’s not a nerd yet)). But 1st Im putting in a
copy (17/2/08. omtd h) of the funeral service of Georgi Joost because it was given 2 me by Dennis
on monday. We both knew George (originally trained as a lawyer in estonia; a conscript in2 the soviet
army; though not a tradesman built an xcellent house himself in Melbourne working from architectural
plans from a newspaper) when he worked as an @endant in the State Library of Victoria where he
had the respect of all who worked next 2 him. He seemed @ peace with himself, cheerful, never
angry or critical of others, & always balanced & calculated in his opinions which he rarely offered
unless asked 4. His lifespan coincided with Vis & he died only a few weeks earlier. By including the
brochure (miniaturised) of his funeral service I hope 2 highlight the account of Vis service (prepared
by H who uncharacteristically dipped in2 the bible 4 material) & 2 illustrate the departure from
traditional practices they represent. Also though its a long time since George retired from the library
there may still b a few people there who remember him & may b interested in my account should they
come across a copy of it. …. (1.18) Im @ the spot 34ks or so out of Hay described on pp 7-9 in
September 20/21. I have addd it 2 my list of private camping spots. I like the way it is made
invisible in country whch appears fl@ 2 the horizon by a subtle dip in the plain from the road a k away
whch itself probably goes 4 days without traffic. I like knowledge whch is particular depending on
personal xperience rather than on the application of principle. U wont find this spot in a lifetime unless
u come here from the information Ive provided. The entry in2 it is not visible @ the verge of the main
road but some1 has been in here in the intervening period on a wet day as I recognized from a new
tyre mark. I suppose it was a government vehicle as a thin round plastic stake, about 2 feet high has
been driven in2 the ground next 2 the track a couple of hundred yards away. It has a white plastic tag
attached with the letters W19 written on it in black marker. The channel unlike the others Ive been
driving past between here & Hay, is still dry. There r now 2 pairs of black kites in the area. I did all the
usual things I do in slow motion when leaving Hay. Bought tomatoes & a spanish onion @ the
supermarket. Topped up with water @ the picnic area off the main road where the dripping tap where
we fotographed the butcher bird drinking from it has been repaired. Rang H on the mobile 2 tell her
me ribs were OK. She says yesterday they had the coldest october day ever recordd – it only got 2
9°C. No 1der I felt I had gone from winter 2 summer. Filled up with petrol & cleaned off the spl@ered
insect remains from the windscreen whch r more numerous than they were a few weeks back. Read
the paper (a suspected terrorist cell in Sydney none of whose members have been arrested or even
charged with a past misdemeanor or of planning 1 4 the future) in the bread shop where I also bought
½ doz buns. On the way out of town got 2 stubbies from the last pub along the road. Im sitting @ the
back of the van out of the wind under the tailgate feeling a bit soporific (the beer?) so Im turning in 4
a doze b4 continuing with the entry.… I find it interesting th@ Dennis whom I remember as having
52
been the most ntensely & ntolerantly ntireligious person I had known took part in what was clearly a
religious service conducted by a parson in a church. Moreover he did 1 of the readings: the
Beatitudes from Matthew 5: 1-12 . (just had a crap). Coincidentally Matthew 5: 3-9 was 1 of the
passages picked out by H (read by Joe) 4 Vis funeral. Dennis tells me as he was reading it he kept
thinking of the part in the film Life of Brian where the main character mishears lines 5-9 as “blessed
are the cheesemakers” & muses on their mysterious importance in the larger scheme of things. Its
worth noting th@ Dennis has a clause in his will xpressing his objection 2 a religious funeral & he
tells me th@ as far as he knows George Joost was irreligious, the service being jointly designed by
the parson & Georges children. Compare this 2 the action of Leo Tolstoy @ a time when he was a
vehement critic of the russian orthodox church of sending 4 a parish priest 2 have his brother (a
believer) interred according 2 the orthodox rite. Wittgenstein told Drury (a convert 2 roman
catholicism) th@ Tolstoys action was xactly what he would have done in the same circumstance.
Wittgenstein died of prostate cancer @ the age of 62 (as I am (17/2/08. nuthr fngr ↑th rs tst x Doig &
nultrsownd rsntle - m OK)) with a h&ful of his most devoted admirers (most of his ‘disciples’ had
been persuaded by him 2 pursue other careers rather than bcome academic logicians in Cambridge
or Oxford 4 though acclaimed by his peers (Russell, Frege etc.) as the greatest logician (in
mathem@ical theory) of his time & perhaps ever he was of the opinion th@ almost any other
occupation including ditch digging was of more benefit 2 the individual & humanity) in @endance. As
they had arrived after he was already unconscious they had 2 choose the 4m@ of the funeral which
they did @ a brief meeting where Drurys opinion was probbly the most influential. Wittgenstein who
had claimed his thinking was of a religious style nonetheless was on record 4 having stated he was
unable 2 believe in the kinds of things catholics believed in or 2 “bend his knee” or say “lord”.
However he had once xpressed the desire his catholic friends pray 4 him @ his death & in the final
days asked 2 c a priest provided he was of the ‘non philosophical’ variety. The priest he talked 2 was
the 1 who had converted Drury 2 catholicism but we dont know if the meeting gave him any
satisfaction. In the end while he was unconscious the usual catholic office for the dying was
administered with conditional absolution. He was given a catholic burial @ St Giles Church,
Cambridge & the normal roman catholic prayers were said by a priest @ the graveside …. 6.00.
Have just had an unpleasant surprise. As I was walking back 2 the van along the track on which we
had walked west along the channel until we saw a homestead in the distance on our last trip & was
examining another 1 of the numbered (W18) plastic posts I saw a vehicle approaching going in the
same direction as me. It turns out it was coming from the homestead which is called Norwood (main
access track is from the Maude road) & has recently been acquired 2gether with a neighbouring
property by the govt & become a new 30,000 hectare national park. Ive been sprung & Im illegal 2 I
was told though the ranger doesnt mind if I spend the night here as long as its understood “you
havent seen me”. It takes the gloss off it as the feeling of privacy in a beautiful spot was its main
@raction. Bsides he reckons storms r predicted 4 2night. I doubt his judgement as hes only been
here a month but I might as well return 2 my spot in Hay. The numbered posts r fox bait markers &
the GPS location of each is noted on a map. He looked uncomfortable when I told him how rabbit
numbers xplode in places where fox hunters have been based. I suppose theyll have a rabbit
eradication program later coz they r certainly on the comeback as I noted & he agreed. They also
have plans 2 get stuck in2 the salvation jane (also known as patersons curse or riverina bluebells)
though their methods r not very effective according 2 him. On saturday they have a rose show in the
homestead 2 whch 200 visitors r xpected. The lady who had owned it had been famous 4 her
gardening. I told him th@ in my opinion their chances of returning this country 2 anywhere remotely
resembling its original condition was buckleys & he ddnt disagree. He says once there were 3 timber
mills between Hay & Deniliquin (or maybe he said between One Tree & Hay) just cutting callitris pine.
Now the most outst&ing feature of the plain is th@ its treeless. Things pass away & cant be returned.
5/11/03 (* …. * ← DANYO RESERVE (no 53)). When Kate came over having been
given the 3rd (17/2/08. krkshn – twozth 1st ) epistle (known as letter in the ozzie version) of Paul 2
(17/2/08. m mstak – twoz Paul 1) the Corinthians (ch.13) by H a couple of days earlier she
remarked “who is this? what he says is the opposite 2 me”. I dont know if she thinks about religion @
all. I think she used 2 b a feminist, mayb is now.

The Third (17/2/08. 1st) Epistle of Paul the Apostle to the Corinthians

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 Chapter 13

Though I speak with the tongues of men and angels, and have not love, I am become as
sounding brass, or a tinkling cymbal. And though I have the gift of prophecy, and understand
all mysteries, and all knowledge; and though I have all faith, so that I could remove mountains,
and have not love, I am nothing. And though I bestow all my goods to feed the poor, and
though I give my body to be burned, and have not love, it profit me nothing. Love suffers long,
and is kind; love envies not; love vaunts not itself, is not puffed up, does not behave itself
unseemly, seeks not her own, is not easily provoked, thinks no evil; rejoices not in iniquity,
but rejoices in the truth; bears all things, believes all things, hopes all things, endures all
things. Love never fails: but whether there be prophecies, they shall fail; whether there be
tongues, they shall cease; whether there be knowledge, it shall vanish away. For we know in
part, and we prophesy in part. But when that which is perfect is come, then that which is in
part shall be done away. For now we see through a glass, darkly; but then face to face: now I
know in part, but then I shall know even as also I am known. And now abideth faith, hope,
love, these three: but the greatest of these is love.

Lev Shestov has quoted from the passage; I have, repeating Shestov (19/2/08. I suppose he didn’t
read the New Testament much); I think Wittgenstein brought it 2 the @ention of Drury. The
meaning of most of it might b indicated by a line from Goethes Faust admired by Wittgenstein: ‘in
the beginning is the deed’. Wittgenstein disliked the gospel by John claiming he couldnt underst&
the language. I also have been inclined 2 take Wittgensteins view & have enjoyed unearthing the
strategies (actions) obscured by words. I have wanted 2 reveal the infants cry preceding the childs
language & the adults literature (17/2/08. Monday 22/10/07 (no 67)). But the cry isnt the same
as the language otherwise there would b no need 4 words. In language where the meaning of every
word is learnt through practice we r joined with others in a new & extraordinarily intricate way. We
cannot know where the process is taking us or where it will end. It may b th@ in the way a tree
already existed in the seed, or a man in his DNA, the end is already present in the beginning as ‘in
the beginning was the word’. I am mindful th@ John was reputed 2 b the nazarenes favourite.
But it is the last part of the passage I want 2 comment on because consistent with what came earlier
Paul demonstrates a disrespect 4 language by the way he uses it. He makes the claim th@ we know
in part but will know in whole even as we r known. If Paul is 1 of us (he calls his congregation
‘friends’) then like us by his own admission he can only know in part. 2 make the added assertion he
would need 2 b speaking from a region (perspective, larger domain, distance) from which he can
pass comment on how he sees god seeing in whole how we r seeing only in part. The hubris implied
in the comment is breathtaking, typical of Paul, & inherited by the church hierarchy. If we know only in
part we do not know what it even means 2 talk about knowing in whole. Meaning is hard earnt so if I
were 2 accept Pauls statement I would b doing nothing. I reject it bcoz it is meaningless & out of h&
bcoz it disguises a preposterous impertinence. Pauls views & claims (very legalistic in style I note
elsewhere) were 4med by his xperience on the road to Damascus. We should b careful of the claims
of visionaries. It is in the nature of xceptional xperience th@ its rarity makes it difficult 4 meaningful
language 2 b practiced. Without shared meaning we do not know how 2 describe it or 2 interpret it 4
ourselves. The temptation is 2 retrospectively mbroider & overreach .…Its not 2 say th@ u r lying.
Interpretation is of necessity reductionist always mired in a past @ the mercy of a revisionist
present… drove back 2 the reception centre in the feral free 4tress bhind the electrified fence & the
automatic doors. I wanted 2 thank Michelle 4 having put me up 4 free & 2 donate $10 in xchange 4 a
hot shower whch she would have provided if I asked 4 free anyway. I suspect everything is by
donation @ Scotia. I made it bcoz reverse psychology works on me: if u dont ask I pay, if u do I try
not 2. Then out through the other automatic gate past the sign with the picture of the numbat & bilby
& into free australia with the goats & the other introduced pests. Should the venture fail the facility
could b sold 2 the correctional services as its isolated location & secure perimeters would make it an
excellent detention centre 4 illegal immigrants & potential terrorists. There is an anomaly in it: u
reintroduce in2 the nvironment little animals which r almost impossible 2 spot @ the price of
establishing a major infrastructure which is a visually stark intrusion in2 the natural surroundings &
depends on the kind of economy responsible 4 their destruction. What else would u expect from the
introduced europeans that we r. @ the same time as we r destroying the world with our technologies

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we will be congratulating ourselves 4 saving bits of it. It seems hopeless. Michelle told me the
manager (there is @ least 1 other woman on the staff 2) said the road 2 Lock Lilly is 4x4 though he
has no problems driving it in an ordinary car. Th@ settled it 4 me as a big blow 1½ weeks ago has
put new s& on all the tracks in the area so I headed back the way I had come 2 the crossroad
(“corner” she called it) 25ks back where the signs r in miles, the 1 2 Renmark reading 80. Thats the
road Ive taken & pulled in 4 a nap 68ks short of Renmark where it meets the inland road whch
connects it 2 Wentworth … 4.45. Im only 10ks further about a k off the main road stopped 4 a snack
*…. Changed me mind & drove on 2 Renmark where I checked the message bank. 1 was from
Mykolas, left last Friday, telling me (as per agreement) there was a meal of kugelis on @ litho house
on the sunday. The other was a surprise message from Andrew S (31/1/05 wth hoom I had lunch in
Lygon st 2day) saying no 3 baby hasnt arrived yet & wishing me well out in the backblocks (he knew
from H). Rang H @ home & caught her b4 she was leaving 2 go out with Kate. She had expected me
2 b away 4 up 2 a month but I told her the writing was as good as finished so I would b back on friday
& would b riding me bike 2 the Bocadillo as usual. Me ribs r better all the time. Im sitting on the back
bumper under the tail gate on a warm night @ 8.35 pm & there r no mozzies. Im gunna get drunk. I
had 2 stubbies after Loxton & bought another 2 @ Murrayville 5ks back. Between Renmark & Loxton
the air was redolent with perfumes of flowering trees, especially orange. I can hear an owlet nightjar
(Aegotheles cristatus). Its still. The smell of the grass crushed where I drove in over it is a contrast 2
the perfumes of the riverl&.*
(16/2/08. Completion of Wednesdays from folder 4. (nos. 34 – 41 of anthology))

18/2 /04 ( 16/2/04 – 27/2/04 (no 42)). I bought The Authentic Gospel of JESUS
@ Readings in Lygon st Carlton last week on wnesday b4 meeting up again with Andrew S (who said
Dave Tolley whom I think Iv mntiond in my writing was ailing) 4 lunch. The other book I got then was
Oracle Night x Paul Auster though Iv lready broken my vow not 2 read another Auster book (c
The Hat p 5) on sevral ccasions 2 my regret. Oracle Night whch I read straight away was equally
dsppointing. So why did I buy it? Sometimes I try 2 analyse my way of choosing a path or making a
dcision, so here goes. The word ORACLE had some nfluence. It was probbly the reason I pickd the
book up in the 1st place from the new rleases shelf. The commndations on the back cover wer over
the top & though they appeard 2 ndic8 his themes tersected with mine I knew 2 b wary of beatup &
as it turnd out I was rght. I had heard Auster was popular in france & Im clined 2 b fluenced x frnch
culture (NB Adriana Cozzolini). I dont think I rmmbered @ the time th@ Freuds ssay Das
Unheimliche (its 1 of the most famous, every1s read it says Frank L & heaps of people (eg
Foucault) hav rferred 2 it but I hav bn ntroubld x Freud havng read less x him than x Jung x whom
Iv read nothing) whch was in my possssion becoz I 1ted 2 take it on this trip was acquired x me as a
result of a chain of events whch startd with me reading The Book of Solitude x Paul Auster after it
was recommndd 2 me x Frank L after our lunchtime dscussion on COINCIDENCES (c 22/10/01 –
2/11/01 pp 2-3). It was the 1st Paul Auster book I had read & still the only 1 I recommnd. As I was
about 2 rturn Oracle Night 2 the shelf a beggar ntered the shop & askd me 4 $2 saying th@ he was
hungry as he hadnt eatn 4 2 days. Still holding the book I rummaged round 4 ages rmoving numrous
items from the pocket of my panier 2 get @ the small change @ the bottom whch came almost 2 $2.
I cant xplain why or how but it was the event wth the beggar whch tipped the balance & nstead of
putting it back I went & bought the book. Now heres what Im getting @. I m not in the habit of †ing
paths with my neighbours from either Miller st or Locksley rd whn Im buying books though I get books
oftn. In fact I can only rmmber 2 ccasions whn its happnd. The 2nd was last week as I was walking out
of Readings with Oracle Night & I spottd Robbie Egan in the middl of Lygon st waiting 2 † the road
in2 the stor wher it transpires he works (with Dave Brown who though he doesnt practice nough (he
says) is 1 of my favourite guitarists) selling books. I hadnt met Robbie 4 ages since he left the house
(whch was sold 2 the Lalors whom Iv mntioned in 25/1/00) † the road a few doors north from us in
Ivanhoe wher my 2 ldest kids used 2 spnd much of their spare time. The only other ccasion I can
rmmber meeting a neighbour whn I was buying a book was whn I bought my 1st Paul Auster book
The Book of Solitude. On th@ ccasion I met Suzie Wall (19/2/08. mt ♀r rgan ystrda rftr nt n ♀r 4 y
. ♀z prgnnt - kspk10 naprl.) coming up the scalator from Readers Feast as I was about 2 go
down. She advised me not 2 buy Leviathan so I got the other book Frank had mntioned whch was
The Book of Solitude. Suzie grew up drectly oppsit from Robbie on our side of the street in the
house (101) of the friendly doctor who looks after my oesophgus (19/2/08. vztd ♂m ystrda). Apart
55
from these 2 ccasions I havnt cn either of thm 4 years & its worth noting th@ Ivanhoe is about 10ks
from the city. Flukey or not? I spnt a good part of wdnsday night trying 2 answer the question. Is it
“blind chance” as Paul Auster would hav us blieve (ccording 2 critics)? It feels as if it should hav a
meanng but I was nable 2 place it in a contxt I knew of (2 assign meanng is 2 put in contxt). Is it
worth noticing? Is it worth writing about? Who cares? Mayb Das Unheimliche will throw some lght
on it but I dont xpect it 2. → Omeo (wher I bought what turnd out 2 b 1 of the most tasteless hmbrgrs
Iv eatn so I could read the paper under roof as it was breezy outside) → Swifts Creek (wher u can get
belly dancing lessons 4 $2 a go; in the window of the community centr ther was a notice saying r u
stressed & anxious? Suffering trauma? Experiencing panic attacks? Have fears, phobias (etc) – if so
I am currently studying me Masters Degree in Mental Health Science which requires me to ex10d my
practical experience through offering COGNITIVE BEHAVIOURAL THERAPY (CBT) to anyone who
would like to benefit themselves x reducing stress in their lives etc.etc. The notice turnd out 2 b put
up x Cathy (Ward) Smith who I was on my way 2 visit @ their place 17ks further south in Ensay; 2
doors further I spected a book shop bcoz I was so surprised 2 c 1 in such a littl town & found it blongs
2 Peter Gardner whom Iv mntioned in 11/11/02 – 20/11/02 whch I had snt 2 him) → Ensay (Cathy
was home wth a broken nose & no less thusiastic about life than Dennis had bn whn I talked 2 him on
monday; she is going 2 set up a practice in Lakes Entrance; she runs a creative writing group & is
working on a novl; she fl@red me x telling me th@ I had made a major contrbution 2 her slf dscovery
whn I taught her nglish ksprshn in HSC & was the 1st person 2 tell her she was talnted in writing.
Phew! Bruce got home around 2 & they had 2 race off 2 Melbourne wher she had bn nvitd 2 listn 2 a
talk x a famous german shrink. As we wer yarning the fone rang & I nswerd it 2 save Cathy having 2
walk over & it was Julie (wife of Adam Cadd (c The Hat p 2)) who snds her rgards 2 u Don & who
passd a message 2 me from Adam asking th@ whn I get 2 Pulpit Rock (southern coast of NSW in
Ben Boyd park) wher they had just bn I was 2 look out 4 the sunglasses hed left bhind) → Tambo
Crossing (had a meal nxt 2 the water x the bridge) → Metung (I m writing in the same pub overlookin
the water wher we had a beer on the 2nd last day of our summer trip along the coast; its 5.15 on a
bright but mild day & the yachts r out on the water) → Tambo River (about 6ks back 2wards Swan
Reach (2nd night of our honeymoon, rmmber?) rght on the edge of the bank over the water about 10 ft
below. Ther r small black bream feeding off the growth on the rocks along the bank undrwater. Ill
spnd the night here. Contnuing from Ernest Gellners The Origins of Society: “The sheer
diversity possible in a species of this kind, also makes change possible, change based
not on any genetic transformation, but rather on cumulative development in a certain
direction, consisting of a modification of the semantic rather than genetic system of
constraints … But this possibility of progress, which in our culture we think of as
somehow glorious, presents a problem. Initially, the main difficulty facing societies was
to restrain this excessive flexibility. The preservation of order is far more important for
societies than the achievement of beneficial change, which only comes later, when
conservation can be taken for granted, and when openings for genuinely beneficial
change are available. Progress is possible because change is possible, because the
internal constructs of men allows such a wide range of conduct. But most change is not
at all beneficial; most of it would disrupt a social order without any corresponding
advantage. Before we can explain how beneficial change is possible, we must first show
how too much change, with all kinds of chaotic effects, is avoided. This is not a
Conservative Party political broadcast but the point needs to be made. Conservation is
the initial problem for a labile population, and it appears to be solved through deeply
internalized concepts.”)
25/2 /04. I must press on wth quoting frm the Origins of Society x Ernest Gellner
othrwise I will hav fnshd ths piece wthout being fair 2 the rtcle & Frank (who wth Alec Drummond & a
lady (who is a serbian engneer workng as a libary @10dnt) r doing a sound per4mance prsntation @
the libary. Frank told me a nice littl story: Alec, who likes 2 use blue language wth ccompanying
gestures said 2 the lady he was concernd she mght find some of his act ffensiv & she said well thn
dont do it so he said hed leav th@ bit out.) & Andrea di Castro mght feel I havnt done justice 2 their
nthusiasm. Cntnuing from Origins…: “The shift from ritual to doctrine, as the central agency
of sanctioning the restraint which keeps society together … is supremely important. The
orderly behaviour of concepts and of men is really attained by one and the same
revolution … In one sense, any concept is a ritual: it is a named cluster of expectations
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and obligations, triggered off by socially prescribed conditions and contexts … reverence
attaches to the fact that they form part of a unified and orderly system … A society
makes the first shift from a religion centred on ritual and magic and committed primarily
to confirming stable status groups, when it acquires a class of literate scribes whose
speciality is the codification of doctrine. In their competition with freelance shamans and
possibly with other rival social groups, the scribes will stress the authority and primacy
of doctrine, over which their literacy gives them a kind of monopoly … the high culture,
transmitted by writing and formal education comes to constitute the pervasive culture of
the entire society, defines it, and becomes the object of loyalty …What I have in effect
done, as anyone familiar with this topic will have realized, is to give a very potted
version of Durkheim and Weber, fused so as to form one continuous story.” → Brushd me
teeth, shavd, cleand the goggls wth tartar cntrol toothpaste & rinsd thm in the frsh watr of Thurra rvr,
& left @ 10 walkng east 2wrds Petrel Point. 1st dversion was 2 find the pool on Camp Creek whch u
get 2 x †ng the dune backng the beach abt a k past the Mueller rvr but wth all the new growth I ddnt
find the rght spot 2 † ovr. Ths is a great pool a few 00 yrds long whch the kids used 2 lov swmmng in.
1 yr me, Joe, Ben & Dan (walkng neck deep) follwd it out walkng down the middl of it 2 the Mueller
rvr. A few ks furthr I 1td 2 chck on a spring whch I had nvr known dry & whch in some yrs flowd a
coupl of feet wide out of the dune & 4 a 00 or so yds b4 dsppearing in2 the s& again. 1ce again I
found evrything chnged wth dense scrub & full size banksia (integrafolia) wth closd canopy wher 1nc
ther had bn only a covr of low shrub. My NIX For Men ndrpants & thongs wernt ideal 4 pushng thrgh
dense grwth but I 1td a drnk as I like the idea of drnkng from a hiddn spring. Bsides I had countd on it
as I hadnt brght eithr watr or fruit whch I havnt stockd up wth ths trip. In the 1 st place I lookd I found a
hole dug x anmals wth abt 6” of drty lookng watr whch I wsnt prpared 2 risk drnkng. I managd 2 † the
scrub again a coupl 00 yrds furthr west & dscovrd the ntire area of the spring & wht had bn red clay
littrd wth abrignal tools undr a covr of scrub & banksia. No sign of watr @ all. So I 1drd abt the dunes
sprised @ how feebl I felt & how littl territry I was covring cmpared 2 my rambls in thm 20 yrs ago.
Back on the beach I walkd on 2wrds a pool abt a k ths side of Petrel Point th@ hikers used 2 rely on
wher u could take a track inl& whch brght u out 2 Wingan Inlet. I had eatn a tin of kipprs in brine & 4
the sake of me kidneys I ddnt 1t 2 head back wthout a drnk 1 st but whn I got ther I found it cmpletely
dry & the stream th@ feeds it was also dry as a bone. Seeing it mpty I was mazed @ how deep the
pool used 2 b. Whn its full its the size of a swmmng pool & 1 night I had lain nxt 2 it thnkng I was
dying. Th@ was aftr I had thrown up all the oysters I had prisd off the rocks & eatn & the c urchns I
had got x divng. I had rlied on the pool 4 rehydration but 2day I had 2 turn abt & head back dry. As I
was gettng 2 the spot from whch I was going 2 hav a nothr go @ findng Camp Creek I saw wht I
thght was a lone persn on the beach in the distnce 2wrds Mueller rvr. Closr up it ddnt look like a
persn so I checkd thrgh the bnoclars & it was a swan (Cygnus atratus) all x its lonesom abt 15 yds up
frm the high watr mark. Ths time I did find the ntry 2 the pool & swam up the tidl section 2 wher it is
fed x frsh watr runnng in2 it from a rocky stream & had the drnk I was fixatd on thgh I wasnt feeln
thirsty. Was back in camp @ 5 pm. The swan ncdntlly wasnt sick as I had smised & flew off 2 c whn I
got closr. Anyway Iv had t & drunk a cup of Continental Gourmet Chicken & Sweet Corn & m heatng
up watr 4 a cup of coffee (my neighbours r drnkng wine frm propr wine glasss. They r Anton Gibson &
Phoebe @ 2 Bath st, S&ringham 3191 & the wine is a Penfolds Rawsons Retreat Merlo 2002. Iv just
givn thm my last 3 pieces of wrtng & promisd 2 send ths 1 but they ddnt offr me a drnk of the wine). A
couple of cmmnts on Gellners summry of how it all is. Frm some othr notes th@ Andrea gave me I
know th@ Gellner bcoms confusing & confuses himslf whn he tries 2 xplain his use of the word
‘concept’. 4 a mor usefl way of dfining the word c my commnts on specific gravity in 14/8/41. Also I
think its a pity he ddnt use the xampl of ntellectual proprty rights 2 llustr8 how systms of concepts
nterlock. 4 ths notion 2 b ffective legal, commrcial & govt structures hav 2 join in2 a singl mutually
comp@bl whole. In 1996 the US bombd & oblitratd (undr the prtxt of limnating WMDs) ½ the
farmceutcal ndustry of sudan aftr complaints from its own ndustry th@ the sudanese wer
manfacturing drugs outside licensing laws (drawn up x the west). In sudan people die like flies 4 1t of
simp antibiotics whch r easy 2 prduce if u know how but the ntellectual rghts 2 whch r ownd x larg
cmpanies in the west whch r oftn only prpared 2 sell medcines 2 the 3 rd world @ prices a4dabl only 2
the very richst in thm. X way of furthr cmmnt relvent 2 all of us theorizrs here is a nother quote from
Henri Michaux: “Every person has observed wrong ideas held by others: ideas that stay
wrong. How can these ideas with all their flaws not appear wrong to these people? That
ought to be troubling. Why wouldn’t the same thing apply to oneself, to you? Ideas
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untouched by any objection. Futile, experience proves, to try correcting them. All their
roots would have to come out. And these wrong ideas – from nearby, or one’s own
surroundings – what if you were to “catch” them or others like them? No, don’t worry. As
long as you hold to your own ground you have no chance of picking up their bad ideas.
For this same reason you have only a slight chance of picking up some of their excellent
ideas of the same sort. They wouldn’t live on your land. And what substitute could you
find for the missing mother-roots? Still, you need to stir your compost around from time
to time. Otherwise, a withering, even a falling away.” Its gettng dark so I mght as well wind up
but I shld mntion Iv workd out the meanng of the dream I had a few nights back (23/2/04). The
crustacean symbolized the foundational structures of language & brain. It may b cartesian dualsms
hav bn in place 4 so long & r @ the base of so much els in our language th@ histry alone (28/2/04.
Why ‘alone’? Mayb histry is the most mportnt.) nsures it is no longr possibl 2 dscard thm but only 2
rplace (trans4m) 1 set & its high priests wth a nothr set & its xperts. Freudian theory is a kind of
‘modrn’ rligion. The way language systms ntegr8 is not limitd x the complexity of our brain & nervous
systm but the ncreasing complexities made availabl x the way peopl can nteract wht each othr &
groups wth groups. We cannot know wher those possbilties r taking us & it may b th@ if the
foundashnl structures r undrmind & collaps so will the whole illusion.
7/4/04 ( 3/4/04 – 12/4/04 (no 43)). → (24ks back2 Dargo/Str@4d rd took 50mins) →
Briagolong (crap) → Boisdale → Maffra (petrl, Age, coffee, ATM, suprmrkt, mobile messagebank) →
Heyfield → Licola (@ Map 82 B5 x 3.5; crap; can of beer as no stubbies @ genrl stor) → camping 4
the night 15ks up seald rd along Macalister rivr; Iv bn in the area b4 (c 27/11/00–7/12/00). In the
evening yesterday 4 large cattle came down to the Crooked (Wonnongatta) River to drink, splashing in
among the stones to stand knee deep in the water- very picturesque. There were cattle on the Dargo High
Plains too, obviously not all of them have been banned from the National Park, as they were grazing not
far from the Macmillan Walking Track. In Licola there is an information board (“reclaimed from the National
Parks”) with copies of letters written by the head of the CFA there, L. R. Baraclough, to various government
departments before and after the recent fires, pointing out the disastrous effects (financial: $11million
spent on fighting it as well as losses in property and stock; ecological: destruction of watercourse
vegetation in gullies, which causes later erosion and creation of rock and detritus “fans” which will not go
away soon, as well as losses of native animals and the large single trunked snow gums which had escaped
many previous “cool” fires; pollution of the Macalister River) of not cool burning and clearing out fallen
forest litter which the Aborigines had practiced, and trying to create a mid-storey of forest which the Parks
ecologists, botanists & environmentalists claim is the “natural” forest condition. One comment on this Park
personnel was scrawled across the bottom of one of the reproduced letters: “Why are universities turning
out slow lerners?”. I thought (though my ignorance of the issues is profound) that Mr. B. has a lot of good
points. It is impossible to return an environment to its natural state once it has been tampered with
(mining, forestry, cattle grazing and before them, no doubt Aboriginal methods of improving hunting and
gathering), so theorizing about what the forests should look like seems a bit naïve. On the other hand, it is
hard to feel sympathy for the 4x4 clubs who want to use it for their playground, or the cattlemen who want
it for theirs. Surely some moderate middle ground could be found if only all interested parties would shut
up and listen to each other. While people live cheek by jowl with national parks there cant be rigid stances
taken by either side. Here’s one for the environmentalists to ponder – as we were driving to Maffra
between 2 pine plantations an adult, healthy looking emu knicked out of one, crossed the road, and
disappeared into the other. And here’s one for the tribesmen among you – on the same road, closer back
to the mountains, an aussie flag was flying at the side of the road, virtually in the middle of nowhere. The
house it belonged to was partially hidden by a rise on the roadside. What was the point they were making
– to prove they were true-blue aussies (but there are only aussies in that area – nary a muslim or a black
man to be seen) or to prove to the passersby that they might not be? No doubt the owner was inside
watching CNN or Days of Our Lives or Oprah or any one of those aussie shows on TV. Flags are bits of
material wrapping up neuroses, psychoses, paranoias and destructive tribalism, and should never be flown
except at half-mast to signal the death of compassion and humanity, or upside down as the international
signal of distress to show how we feel about what we have lately become. Pictur the follwing: I m
watchin the film Nostalgia x Tarkovsky (lready cn x the TREASURER OF PASMINCO elswher)
abov Birds Gallery (bcoz ŽVIRBLIS means sparrow in litho) @ 236 High St. Kew 3101. Australia
Ph/Fax: 0398550327 Mobile: 0402 8781506. The film is about a russian writr who goes 2 italia 2
rtrace the steps of a russian paintr 100s of years ago in the days of serfdm who had bn snt ther x his
ownr bcoz of his outst&ing talnt. The paintr had bcom successful, married & livd as a free man in
italia but yearnd 2 rturn 2 russia though it would mean he would 1nce again rvert 2 his st@us as serf.
No mount of persuasion was abl 2 prvent him from rturning but a coupl of weeks aftr he was back he
hangd himslf. The film, shot in italia, was the 1st of Tarkovskys films produced ovrseas & as he was
doing it he realized he had a particlarly initm8 connexion with its theme as it was during this time th@
58
he was dciding not 2 rturn 2 the soviet union & his famly. It is wrth noting here th@ the most vvid
chractr (in2 whos mouth Tarkovsky puts his own thghts) in the film, the madman who immol8s hmslf
yearns 4 a past whch is being dstroyd x modrnty. Th@s 4 layrs of commntry on the theme of the title
lready. Now cop this. The film is spokn in italian & russian but the video of it in Vaidas possssion has
no subtitles – it has a voiceover in russian. So as I m watchin it & Vaidas is workin on a beautful
object he is making out of cweed he is transl8ing 4 me from the russian in2 litho bcoz lthough my
language of choice is nglish ther is an ndrst&ing btween me him & Brigita th@ my litho is bettr than
their nglish so they r the only peopl I know wth whm I convers in litho. Brigita brings out some green t
& Vaidas pulls a chair ovr so w can use it as a tabl 4 a pl8 full of sliced dark rye bread, sections of
smokd eel (ungurys) & squares of heavily saltd & smokd bacon (lašiniai). Vaidas & Brigita couldnt
GIVE A STUFF about balanced diet, vegies, nutrtionists, dietitians, cholsterol etc. They eat
ncompromising litho & I LOVE IT. @ the very nd of the film whch Tarkovsky ddic8d 2 his mothr u can
hear a beautful russian folk song (not 1 of thos crappy kalinka type songs of the russian army choirs
& visting nsmbls) sung in a crackd womans voice whch could just as easily hav bn sung in the eastrn
part of litho (O Vilnius (Vilna, Vilno) adjoining villages of diffrnt language groups of10 sung the same
melodies 2 words in bielorus (gudai) or polish (lenkai) or litho (lietuvei). But I notice from the songs in
yiddish (sung x a NY group) th@ u lent me, Alec, the jews (žydai) drew mor widely 4 the source of
their meldies as a couple of the songs r very famous Schubert meldies & sevral r riginally meldies of
russian rvolutionry songs) of the kind me & Brigita used 2 practice singin 2gethr on a tuesdy arvo b4 I
gave it away bcoz I hav lost my voice (PRAGĖRIAU BALSA). I had noted Brigita had a leaning
2wards songs from th@ part of litho & sh tells me th@s wher her mum origin8s. Aftr the film has ndd I
m tellng Vaidas my theory th@ the dog whch appeard in Stalker & the 1 whch coms 2 the bedside in
Nostalgia r really spirit dogs but not spirits of othr dogs but spirits of a village no longr in xis10ce or
the woodn house of some1s childhood. Vaidas tells me th@ whn he has built a house (TROBA) on
his rurl rtreat (SODYBA) in litho he is going 2 get a big dog (19/2/08. gotth  but ntth ) like 1 of
thos & I can tell from the conviction in his voice he will. I ask u – how many layrs of NOSTALGIA is
th@!
26/5 /04 ( Melbourne → Kaunas (no 45)). (2.25 pm MOSCOW time (19/2/08. jst b4
l&n @ Moscow prt n Aeroflot )).
2/6/04. Got bak ystrdy evnn. Alvinga (dghtr of Jurgis (brothr of Juozas) hoo livs in Minsk
(bielorus)) hoo livs wth her mothr (teachr of nglsh) & alhocolic ((2/8/04. but mayb not) hoo had opnd
th door 4 me but I ddnt c any mor of him (24/3/09.  njanuri ths y levn th♂ vth ZIZYSz VOZ
zthonli rmann rprznt@vz a 2 proprg8 thnam vths b ch vth . Ys d jZoIsZeYpSh rpld 4 & EU
stzn )) brothr (his wife & child r in bielorus) Ernestas had left th fotos sh took of me & Juozas (he
had takn me → Panemune cemetry (th dead r mor prsnt here than in oz; gravesites r well 10dd & oftn
vsitd; mmorials (esp 2 partisans (calld bandits x th soviets & not 2 b konfused wth their use of th term
partisans whch refrs 2 th men hoo fought 2 disrupt th german rtreat bhind th lines 2wards th nd of th
2nd O war as th front movd wst)) dot th countryside in th most nxpectd places; workshops 4 making
gravestones (PAMINKLAS (PAMINKLAI in plural)) r a major business) then past th field O th size of a
basktball  not far from th house in Biliuno st (whr he had livd in th care of a dranged rl@iv (aftr w
had fled wstwrd in 44 bcoz my fathr hoo was tekniklly a dsertr from the soviet rmy would hav bn jaild
& lmost certnly shot (peopl wer 4 much less)) bcoz both his parents had bn rrsted & in siberia (as 1 of
th “childrn of th nmy of th peopl” up 2 th last days of soviet russia whn travl ovrcs had bn made easier
he still wasnt llowd 2 † th bordr evn in2 pol& or th othr east ropean commnst st8s)) wher the
MUTILATED bodies of PARTISANS used 2 b thrown out of trucks & left in rows 4 days guar x 2
NKVD men wth submachine guns. A 3rd NKVD man in civvies would mingl wth th nlookrs w@chng 4
sgns of rkognition from grieving MOTHERS or relos hoo had 2 train thmslvs 2 hide all emotion so th
SPY wldnt spot thm & hav thm → SIBERIA.Ther wer many such  in th suburbs & in centrl Kaunas
Juozas said) then w went ↑ hill (my mum has a foto of me held on my unkls shldrs as a kid on it) calld
Napoleono Kalnas overlookn th Nemunas (Niemen) from whch Napoleon had w@chd as his rmy †d
th rivr ovr 3 pontoon bridges his ngineers had built. I think I mght b gettn things out of ordr as w
probbly vsitd th gOs of th offcer trainn school earlier whr my fathr had spnt 4 or 5 years b4 bcomn an
air4ce pilot & offcer (he had wantd 2 b a doktor but couldnt a4d th schooln bein th son of villagrs & th
only way 2 get a free duc8n 4 him was @ miltry school or a smnry) & so earnn nough money 2 help
his 2 oldr brothrs complet their duc8n & evn saving nough wth whch 2 x his parnts a propty whch
59
wasnt mainly birch swamp but his savings wer made valueless x a dvalu8n) & whr th riginl barracks r
still st&n thgh pparntly not in use though th place is 1ce gain a miltary base whch w had sneakd in2
thrgh a rusty g8 @ th bottm of an ovrgrown cemnt staircase left ajar in th rear wall sOng th base. W
had cn a soldier on guard wth a rifle in th field whch w skirtd thrgh th scrub out of view. W → strght
down th middl of th base long n vnue lined x trees as bold as brass & left thrgh th main g8 nchallnged
coz th guards wer checkn only traffik GOING→ TH BASE. Ncidntlly now th@ Im a citzn of europ & so
hav dual citznship Im in th COALITION OF THE WILLING x 2 (how p@riotik is th@!) as lithol& is 1 of
th mmbrs & has sent a couple of 00 soliders xept readn th pprs here u wldnt know iraq xistd coz they
is only ntrstd in lokal news & dont realize th@ whatvr moneys th yanks bribed thm wth 2 join doesnt
slghtly compns8 4 th ncreas in petrl prices whch r huge here & r sendng peopl (specially farmrs hoo
try 2 b modrn x usin traktors (old soviet gas guzzlrs) broke). Aftr partng kumpny wth Alvinga (hoo h8s
it here & is pining 2 get back 2 th US whr her partnr is & whr sh had bn 5 years but ← bcoz her
teenage dghtr hoo was bein brought up x gr&mothr was playn up & bein away a week @ a time. Now
Alvinga cant ← & has 2 hav only short meetns wth her partnr in europ coz sh has no pprs (like many
lithos in europ & oz & all ovr th O but specially in New York from wher Juozases dghtr, Egle, (@ hoos
fl@ (on th edge of th old town just x th rivr & th jesuit school I had vistd) w finshd off th day wth wine
& dlicious food (like all th food here) b4 Juozas walkd me back 2 th Metropolis (whr u can reach me x
On 0011 (ntrn@tionl) 370 (litho) 37 (Kaunas) 205992 (rception desk) & ask 2 b put thrgh 2 me in
room 206 as I will xplain 2 H l8r 2day (same day in Melb. but 7 hours l8r)) hoo also has spent th last 8
years in NEW YORK (lookn aftr a disabld man) & also has a teenage dghtr hoo was bein brought up
x her gr&mothr & hoo also cant get back bcoz sh has no paprs (bcoz of th TERRORISTS & here they
dont giv a shit O terrorists coz they r mor worried O th MUGGINGS) but sh wantd ← yankiel& bcoz of
th awfl food & othr stuff) & is konsdrn tryin 2 get in thrgh MEXICO) w ↑ top of th hill ovrlookn Aleksoto
bridge (4/8/04. c covr map) whr th view was bettr than from Napoleons hill & whr ccordn 2 Juozas
som 20 or so of th litho snipers hoo wer pickn off th soviet soldiers as they wer scrambln in panik 2
get → from th germns th day aftr opr8n BARBAROSSA was launchd in 41 wer killd whn they wer
flushd out x th despr8 ruskies. This is th day whch is rmmbrd x th lithos as th day of the uprising (101
coffins wer cermoniously buried) but th jews rmmbr as th day of th KAUNAS POGROM wher probbly
O 1200 (2/8/04. 4 mor ccur8 dtails c Vilnius 1 & Jews, Lithuanians and the Holocaust x
Alfonsas Eidintas.) jews wer murdrd (but I read 8000 in a pprback calld The Holocaust) but
som lithos claim NONE or hardly any wer. But rght now Kaunas is beautfully green & verywher u go
chsnuts (kaštonai) & lilacs (alivos) r in flowr. Th numrous bars & cafes as good as any Iv cn r playn
nglsh muzak (Vaidas has just walkd in) … Had a coffee; he bought som books 4 his m8 Hilas in zrael;
I → a card 2 my mum in Sydney 4 hr brthdy on 4 june; met & drank 3 beers wth ReUgDiIdNiSjKuAsS
hoo is 1 of th mor succssful rtists here (headn off 2 work in italia 4 a few mnths) hoo is currntly ntrstd
in old maps & rtracing th → mappd out x a medieval travlr. He is a grafik rtist & w vistd his new studio
in ‘old town’ a littl off Vilniaus g. He nvited us 4 t 2 his place 2morrow & I said Id giv him a sampl of
my stuff & said I mght use 1 of his Kaunas maps if he givs me a copy; tried 2 O H 2 tell her th numbr
2 O back on th card I bought her 4 th purpose coz its cheapr th@ way but her no. is NGAGED so m
O 2 try gain – got thrgh 2 Dan hoo says shs @ a libary dinnr so Ill try in an hour @ 11.30 pm
Melbourne time) I told ReUgDiIdNiSjKuAsS O AEROFLOT & how nlike on th QANTAS plane whr ther
was a telly on th back of each seat th AEROFLOT plane had 1 telly abov th centr aisl 4 evry1 & strght
aftr th safety nstructions fnishd they nno-uncd th@ th video playr had brokn ↓ so th TV was rtractd ↑
th ceiling 2 evry1s musemnt & my rlief. But I prferd th AEROFLOT hostesss hoo lookd like ordnary
broads whras th 2 jap womn on th QANTAS flght lookd like mannequin klones of each othr. Durin th
flght th AEROFLOT hostess spoke in nglish 2 me probbly knowin I was ozzie from th passngr list &
whn I said SPACIBA as w ↓ @ MOSCOW sh was tickld pink. Then w talkd O why Kaunas peopl dont
say hullo whn u pass thm in th street. I passd a fishrmn on th bank of th Neris & whn I said how r u he
turnd his back on me as if I was prying in2 his ffairs. My 1st learnn xrcize was 2 say xcuse me
(atsiprašau) but th@ also oftn doesnt work. Near SOBORAS (th big church @ th westrn nd of
LAISVĖS ALĖJA) I askd a guy whr th toilt was & he nswrd as if he was nconvniencd & wldnt rpeat his
drektions whch wer unklear. Same whn I askd 4 th trolley bus 2 PANEMUNE. Egidijus rckns its bcoz
peopl learnt 2 trust no1 & evn nghbours pass x prtndn not 2 c each othr. Undr th soviets th idea was 2
mind your own business & 2 b nkonspikuous (19/2/08.  rkd The Whisperers x Orlando
Figes). But I said th@ in Muitinės g. in old town I passd a klassic jew (as in a llustr8n 4 Shylock) wth
a long black coat & long grey beard & black h@ & hunchd shldrs wth rms †d bhind him lookn worried
& I said GEROS SVEIKATOS (good health) & quick as a flash & wth a pleasd look he shot back IR
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PAČIAM (& 2 u) & in Vilnius (…a, …o,…e) I askd a guy in litho whethr th time on me w@ch was rght
(bcoz th clock on th towr said diffrnt) & he noddd yes & said PROSHE coz he was polsh. An old lady
on th bus said not 2 say I was ← oz coz I mght get muggd & Egidijus said som1 got killd 4 50 Lt th
othr day. Ther is a sens of threat in th air & young men mit8 macho fashn x dressn in jeans pants &
jackts etc. I saw 4 guys walkn ½ th lnth of LAISVĖS ALĖJA 1 evnn jumpn O & swearn as if 2 test th
lmits of peopls reaktion & evry1 prtendd they nevr saw thm. As a middl aged womn in a leathr jackt
†d in front of thm on her way ← work 1 sp@ on her back whch sh may not hav noticed but sh
certainly would hav heard th loud rmark O f@ arses made x 1 of th othrs but sh nevr turnd O. Egidijus
reckns it will take a genr8n 4 it 2 change. Kaunas lacks nfluences from outside bein thniclly uni4m &
is also th bastion of litho jingoism. He hmslf would nevr go thrgh russia or on AEROFLOT as I had.
But I found Ukmergė (2/8/04. But c my commnts in Vilnius → Melbourne. It is not th same
place havn bn a jewsh (70%?) town b4 th war (but I ddnt know!) & most of th peopl r new. A
signifkant fraktion of th jews were herdd → synagog & burnt live. It bkame 1 of th main centrs
in lithol& 4 th xtermn8n of jews hoo wer transprtd ← th sOng towns & villges eg: TAUJĖNAI,
KAVARSKAS, KURKLIAI, VIDIŠKIAI, SIESIKAI (whr my fathr was born), BALNINKAI, ŽELVA (a
pretty place now), ŠEŠUOLIAI (whr I vistd th chrch), PABAISKAS, DUBINGIAI (on a beautful
lake rsort (c → (no 2)), ŠIRVINTOS, MUSNINKAI, GELVONAI, BAGASLAVIŠKIS etc.) kompletly
dffrnt & peopl lookd rlaxd as they mght in a medium size oz town. How can u xplain it? I m havn nothr
go @ On H. Shes not home. I had my times mixd up. 11.30 in Melb. is 4.30 here – Ill try then. Dan &
th othrs r OK & th new fence is in (5/8/04. & intrudes → our propty x up 2 4 nchs @ 1 nd (thes r th
things I fnd havn wokn from jetlag)). Im off 4 a coupl of cepelinai followd x a beer as Iv only had som
fried rye bread sticks wth garlik (whch is st&rd here wth beer) 4 th day. Just 2 fnsh off th commnts on
Kaunas mannrs: Vaidas reckns th komparison with Vilnius is th 2 nd most commn topik of convrs8n
mong his friends most of hoom bein rtists vntually leav 4 Vilnius (…a,…o,…e) th 1 st bein th dffculties
of an rtists life (& how 2 get out & make it in th west) since th dmise of th soviet st8 now peopl rspect
only $s) wth th rceptionst & sh gave thm → me whn I xtndd my stay 4 nothr coupl of days. 1 of thm is
of me & Juozas st&n in front of MY OAK & its big. Just realized Id bettr make my bookn in Vilnius
wher I hope 2 get a room rght in th ‘old town’ @ th rt cadmy wher they r rntng 4 th fantastik cheap r8
of 40 Lt/nght. Couldnt get thrgh. Off 4 a meal, 3pm. …Got → H & told hr 2 considr th possblty of us →
here 2gethr @ ths time nxt year. Couldnt prtend I was missn her as its 2 hektik 4 me 2 b missn
anythn.(19/6/04. Sigh… haven’t you ever heard the saying “If you can’t say something nice, don’t say
nuthin’ at all”? or “Honey attracts more flies than vinegar”? Or even “Its wise not to be tactless to the
typist”?- helh&z) (3/8/04 ystrdy H (hoo is typin) h&d me a poem sh wrote then: “he doesn’t miss me he
says / busy as he is with birds / and bridges / and bars. / a small sin of omission / would not have gone
amiss. / at least, by implication, / he may miss me / in the few dull moments / when there is nothing /
better to do.”) Im not managin 2 keep up wth th writin & as I was walkn back from me meal I met
Romas hoo had pickd us up @ Riga wth wife & baby strolln long Laisvės Alėja & he was pushn 4 me
2 meet up wth him gain. He knew all O my last 2 days & evn cn th foto wth th stork bcoz hed cn
Brigita earlier in th day. Aftr On H I got my bookn in Vilnius 4 2 weeks from wdnsdy nxt week. He took
th bookn in my 1st name sayin he ddnt need th srname as ther arnt th@ many Arunases (4 /8/04. but
thr r a helluva lot I found). Im going 2 hav 2 write th rest in a kind of shorth& as ther is 2 much dtail & I
want to com home wth somthn of mangeabl lenth. As I was → long Zikaras g. a lady hoo volnteerd 2
giv m som drektions was telln me he had taught in th rt school in th park near x & pointd out th hous
he had livd in. I ddnt realize @ 1st, honey, it was his son hoo had bn th oz (taught @ RMIT) sculptr
hoos son u had taught @ Heidelberg High & usd 2 com home complainn what a pest he was.
Certainly 1 4 my future book on COINCIDENCES. In Vilnius w wer listnn 2 a group of singrs pr4mn in
1 of th s u get bhind th houses in evry block of th old town & me & Algis Karazija from →← spottd
each othr @ th same time. Wer both from Melbourn & Iv mntiond in 1 of my pieces he scord th job as
1 of th 2 drektors of th Vilnius jazz festvl (5/8/04. but c Vilnius (no 2)) so I gave him th 3 pieces Iv
put out this year in whch I happn 2 mntion ½ th peopl he is bringn ← Melbourn 4 th festvl in sept.
(Danius K, Neil Kelly, Rohan Drape, Craig Fermanis (hoom I talkd 2 a few weeks ago whn he said he
was giggn in the US & knew 0 O comn here)). I had put th pieces → my day pack @ th last momnt as
w wer leavn th Metropolis. But he lready knew I was in litho coz Dana Levickis hoo had lobbd in on th
jesuit school in Kaunas a coupl of days aftr my vsit had told him. In Vilnius I saw th most beautful
nterior of a buildn I had evr cn in th Pranciskaus church of th Bernardinu monstry whr th damage don
in th soviet years had only servd 2 hghlght th beauty of what was left. It was 1 of th only 2 ccasions I
wasnt abl 2 rtain my komposur. Bob Hawke (& Malcolm Fraser & Peter Moore) would hav cried
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bucktfuls in my position. I could find reazns 4 my fragilty but they r nvntions aftr th evnt & only
dsguise th fact th@ th emotions com 1st & r likely 2 b nrl8d 2 th xplan8ns. (“If you do not want certain
people to get into a room, put a lock on it for which they do not have the key. But it is senseless to talk with
them about it, unless you want them all the same to admire the room from outside. // The decent thing to do is:
put a lock on the door that attracts only those who are able to open it & is not noticed by the rest “ – Culture
& Value x Ludwig Wittgenstein) Thn w → country cottage (SODYBA, VIENKIEMIS) 11ks out of
Ukmergė on th edg of Rimeisiu kaimas (village) wher Vaidas gr&fathr had 1ce kept 40 hives (each x
4 th volume of an oz 1 & not dsignd 2 b shiftd O x truck). All xept 1 of thm wer killd whn an aerial
sprayn on th kolhoz in soviet times nadvertntly sprayd thm. Nxt 2 th SODYBA is a tall brick chimny
wth a nestn gandras (stork) (Ciconia ciconia) on a normous stick nest. I saw @ least ½ doz of thes
nests in th distrkt lways in th most promnnt position & always wth a parent on th nest. Vaidas took a
pretty good shot of me walkn past 1 on a lowsh lamp post. Th rezdnt cuckoo (ther r 2 pposing kinds
of folk lor O thm: 1) If whn u hear th 1st 1 of th czon u hav money in your pockt youll b rich 4 th@ year
& 2) in songs its call is konnktd 2 notions of mpndng death) (Cuculus canoris) was in full voice. Th
O place was sOd x large trees & scrub & was live wth chirpn & warbln. I met th nghbours Antanas,
Milda & son Egidius GRYBAS (mushroom) hoo r such archtypal xampls of simpl, drekt & vaišyngi
(hosptbl) country peopl th@ I mmedi8ly doptd thm as th sampl on whch 2 try 2 base a rkonstruktion
of my gr&parnts hoo wer in a village 6 ks th othr side of Ukmergė. It helpd th@ Antanas Mushroom
lookd like my gr&fathr in th few fotos of him in my possssion. I hav a copy of a dockt dclarin th
konfisk8n of his last cow 4 failur 2 dclare it 2 th authrities. Th village he had livd in (Žeimiu kaimas)
was bulldozd 2 make way 4 peat minin. As I was thinkn O thes things I xperiencd my 2nd loss of kontrl
but was abl 2 dsguise it x walkn out in2 a lush field hoppn wth frogs. I slept partclarly well 4 th 2 nghts
w wer ther whch is proof th@ somethn is rght in th vienkiemis & sOds. W 2rd th neighbourn villages
whch on th vrage r 3 or 4 ks part. Just outside a village 3 ks away is a monmnt in th 4m of a stone
oblisk fenced x a foot hgh solid cast iron fence commmr8n th death of Vladas Žvirblis (1920-1946),
Vaidases unkl, as a soviet hero (4 havn bn shot x partisans (miškiniai)/bandits as he was ← school
wher he was a teachr. @ a simlar time my fathrs brothr Jonas hoo had bn a commnst (3/8/04. But c
Vilnius (no 2)) from th prwar days whn th party was bannd was also teachn in th dstrikt & they may
hav known each othr. Vladas Žvirblis was killd aftr testfyin in a court case unrl8d 2 poltiks (says
Vaidas). Aftr th break up of th soviet union Vaidas fathr rectd an ntric8ly carvd woodn † in th same
nclosure in front of th stone oblisk. Th 2 mmmorials side x side provide a poignant llustr8n of th
dffring magin8ns of 2 ncompatbl systems. 3ks furthr in a yard of an ordnary hous ther is a large †
made from CEMENT in mmry of th partisans. Now how O this 4 a COINCIDENCE. Th hous blonging
2 th Mushrooms burnt ↓ last year & was rbuilt wth th help of nghbours but th wndow s wer nstalld x
a Darius ŽIŽYS from furthr away. I hav cn (3/8/04. false mmry) a foto sent 2 us of a Darius ŽIŽYS &
his brothr (mayb th sons of 1 of th sons of Jonas ŽIŽYS) & whats th bettn they r 1 & th same person?
I should find out on friday whn I meet up wth Juozas ŽIŽIS hoo has promsd 2 show me th riginl site of
Žeimiu kaimas & th township of Siesikai wher my fathr was aktually born. Oh yes, @ th Birds I saw a
deer 2ce & w found th dam wher th beavrs liv whch @ack th trees on their proprty.
9/6/04 ( Vilnius 1 (no 47)). 8.30 am @ th st8n waitn 4 th train 2 Vilnius. I think Im
gettn kklim@ized. I talk 2 peopl just as I would in oz & buggr all th ATSIPRAŠAU (xkuse) stuff I was
+vized 2 do in Kaunas. Mayb th peopl here r eazier 2 talk 2 or mayb my norml, brupt (ill-mannrd?)
way of +rssn strangers would hav workd ther 2. Tried out me methd (Iv got a pretty good line O kumn
back ftr 60 years not only 2 lithol& but 2 europ & th@ Iv kum 2 c th oak tree whch was plantd on th
day I was born) on a girl @ th st8n & it works but sh says peopl here r MIELESNI NEGU KAUNE
(mor warm ♥d than in Kaunas). Wer rolln – due in Vilnius @ 12.00. Tickt kost 24.10 Lt (ie $12.05). Iv
workd out why I was askd 2 pay in kash (300 Lt) @ th hotl last nght nstead of x VISA. Its so ther
would b no vdence of th last 2 days of my stay so th ladies @ rception kould pockt th 120 Lt. Good on
thm; they work huge hours 4 only O 400 Lt/month same as most ordnry workrs & pnsionrs get & Im
told check-out girls @ th suprmrkt get evn less & work longr. Th@s only nough 2 feed yourslf so its
no 1dr most young peopl try 2 get work lswhr in europ. Honst workrs dont make a livn here. Just
bought a koffee & a packt of nut bikkies 4 3 Lt. Im chwn coz som chwy kame wth it. Readn
‘LIETUVOS RYTAS’. Peopl knock up askn me why I speak such good litho as pparntly othrs rturnn
hav an akcent. I say I dont know why but th@ Im short of words. A greek guy @ Stalactytes on greek
kornr in Melb 1ce told me u only need 2 know 10 words in 4gn 2 prtnd 2 b a lokal (but they hav 2 b th
10 most kommnly used 1s). Got a lend of a pair of scissors kurtsy of litho rail 2 kut out th follwn rtkl
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(19/2/07. omtd h. Twoz O nrljd sm sprd x Effraim Zuroff. EeWaErRlS ( Tuesday 18/12/07) hd
mad nkwrez O th m@r (O n ‘nfrmus’ bskt m@ch) n1v ♂z vzts 2 ltho ♣ nErrol st Nth Melb) from
p.4 of Lietuvos Rytas. Had a nip of trauktine (ftr askn th koupl in front if its legal) 2 get rid of th
chewy taste & mpress th rest of th karriage with my authnicity. Though no1 els has dun it it makes it
bvious Im not a 4gnr (nless russkie). X th x w r travlln thrgh beautful kuntry of 4sts, villges, & of
pastures in bloom….Its 1.30 pm & Im brlliantly nstalld (wth showr) in room 203 of th Vilnius Art
Kadmy 4 600 Lt (ie $300 4 2 weeks) @ th very centr of SENAMIESTIS (old town). Kan u blieve it?
Evn in Kaunas & Šiauliai peopl hav askd me how kum I got it so cheap & th answr is it was a totl fluke
& I nevr dservd it as is th kase wth vrythn els Iv got. M I owng? WHO do I thank? Im itchn 2 start
xplorn as I reckn it will take @ least a week 4 me 2 walk out th streets & alleyways & Im not n4mn
relos till Iv don it as I dont want 2 start off wth a brokerd xperience. Im off 2 find a dtaild map of
SENAMIESTIS. I hope I dont get drunk as I hav 2 use a swipe kard twice & 2 keys 2 → th room.
16/6 /04 ( Vilnius (no. 2) (no 48)). Got thrgh 2 JOrNiAmIaTsIS (on my dead stepfthrs
side of famly) & → his beautful unit drektly † th road from th cerkvė † th Neris upė @ th nd of
Gedimino pr. It woz mmdi8ly bvious 2 me he woz a persn of rdrly, ffcient, & orthrtiv habts, prhaps of th
kind hoo in th west hav bn most rsponsbl 4 makin it funktion well. Probbly a senior publik servnt I
thght. He has bn ovrcs many times. He fficiently put in place my kontakt wth his sstr
JOvNiUtŠaIlEiNaĖ in Neringa, (Nida. Kopu g. 31-1) whch evry litho youll evr talk 2 will tell u is an
bslute must on th 2rst tinery. In th list of kontakt +rsss givn 2 me x my mum sh writes “Jonušienė
Vitalija (Izidorius’ niece, sister of Rimas and Saulius Jonaitis. Vitalija’s husband Eduardas
(15/9/04. just finshd readn his book: Likimo Spastuose: sapnu ir tikrovės variacijos’) is an
internationally reknowned painter and sculptor, grew up as an orphan in Siberia. An
eccentric full of ideas. Beside his paintings and wood sculptures, he built a ‘kuršiu’ boat,
worked to preserve ancient ‘kuršiu’ gravestones. Unfortunately, last year he had a
severe stroke and is now severely handicapped and very depressed. Vitalija has to cope
with a lot of hardships. I think she (or perhaps their daughter) lets rooms in their house
to summer guests. Neringa itself is a place of little wonders. Do try to get there. The Hill
of Witches is not far.’’ It so happns I had lready greed wth th Birds 2 go wth thm 2 Kaunas O th
28th or 29th from their SODYBA in Rimeisiu KAIMAS & then on 2 Nida. Now I hav lodgins thr @ a time
whn they r xpnsiv & hard 2 get. Rimas said its worth vzitn Klaipeda (4mly Memel) 2. Then he (last
nght) droppd me off @ th Kabaila haus O 10pm whr Rasa (th persn I had really kum 2 c here as I had
shown her O 4 a day or 2 in Melb. years ago), her mum Meilutė (prof of geolgy), & Rasas sun & her
bruthr Algises sun (hoo is leavn in a munth 2 work as a paintr in swedn) rceivd me graciously 1ce I
got past th xtrmly fiercely yappy dog guardn th ntry. I felt guilty havn kum nnounced & I kould c Rasa
woz very tired but it woz Rimases (hoo is a koupl of years yngr than me) idea. Wev rranged 2 meet in
a kafé 4 t on s@dy 6pm. I woz not prprd 2 make xtra rrangemnts bkoz I dont know what taŽuIrŽiYuSs
has in mind 4 me. Rasa droppd me off here @ mdnght whch was kind of her az sh leavs 4 work @
6am & duznt get home till 7pm. (sum1s startd up bop muzak in th  (& th plumn in th nxt room is
gurgln), probbly a workmn (hoo work slow here I note). 1 thing Im learnn 2 h8 iz nglsh pop & th
slavish mt8n of all things nglsh). I m off 2 x nuthr fone kard az publik fones r hugely xpnsiv, then a ppr
& brunch …. 4pm. Th doormn sez th aziatik lookn guys hoo spoke a stangely akcntd litho I saw in th
foyr a koupl of days ago wer from peru. They r buskrs & hav gon 2 Kaunas koz they dont like th
weathr here (kold & wet). Read in 2days Lietuvos Rytas th@ 2 PROSTITUTES rrestd in Šiauliai
wer fined 300 Lt & 500 Lt rspktvly & their norml skn price from klients (4 lytines paslaugas) is 100 Lt.
Thgh very1 greed wth me O th hgh kost of publik fones I dskovrd ths mornn th@ what I had thght
woz a 50 Lt kard whch I had used up so fast was only a 50 kredits kard worth 9 Lt. I had probbly paid
50 Lt 4 it & → wthout waitn 4 th change like th 2rst DICKHEAD th@ I m. If I had bn in th place of th
girl in th kiosk I would hav dun th same.(nip). Now I hav a 100 kredit kard. Ftr bookn th same room 4
liepa (july) 23-29 I headd → Olandu g. in search of th old jwsh cemtry. (nip). I wantd 2 pay my rspekt
& homage (howvr nadq8 it iz). On th kornr of T Kosciuskos (named aftr Mt Kosciusko in NSW,
australias hghst mountn @ 7000 metrs) g. & Olandu g. I → nside th Šv. Petro ir Povilo bažnyčia whch
is bein rstord. 1drfl though they r th chrchs r wearn off 4 me a bit but I stayd longr in this 1 bkoz I
noticed th main feature of th hgh dome buv th altr woz th st@ue of S.AUGUSTINUS (nip – of
Čepkeliu). Then I went in search of th rmains of th JEWISH CEMETRY. I took a left turn → a small st
→ what lookd like a rural/4st l&skape of windin lanes, stairways ↑ woodd hills & narrow tracks. I skd a
koupl of ladies 4 drektions & they nswerd in what I rkognized az litho uzed x poles th@ it woz → road
63
I had kum from. A koupl → x & sh had a large lump nder her eye from what I reckn woz a punch. A
large guy → past & I knew he was polsh (Im gettn good @ this) wthout him sayn a word. I kame 2
nuthr jail (how many hav I cn?) & then I saw th cemtry xpt it woz a krstian 1. (ncidntly whn Rimas woz
drivin me 2 th Kabailas place (in Varšuvos g. (Warsaw st) near whr th ♥ of PILZUTSKI is przervd) w
passd nuthr jail.) Near th ntry → cemtry opp th ntry → jail I saw a guy hoo I thght mght b a cemtry
workr bhind a large metl kontainr or storage  & askd him if he knew whr th SENOS ŽYDU kapinės
wer. He sed sumthn O th graves of th war dead in brokn litho then lapsd in2 polsh sayn sumthn O a
telefon. I realized he woz a VALKATA & whn he pulld out a mobile & motiond 4 me → thrgh th g8 2
whr he woz x th metl door of what I now sor woz an iron waste dsposl skip bhind whch w would hav
bn out of view of th road & th ntry → prizn (not th@ ther woz ny1 in sght) I knew he woz goin 2 skon
me & mayb push me ↓ th skip & mayb evn shut th iron door on me so I sed DĖKUI & left makin sure
he woznt follown. (nip). Az I woz ← in th drektion of th chrch I woz thinkn it mght b a sgn (dvice from
my daemon (in th way Socrates uzez th word (7/9/04. Last sundy @ litho haus North Melbourne an
old guy told me his life has bn saved a duzn times by his persnl 1(so he woz told x him)))) not 2
search 4 th jwsh STONES az mayb my motiv woz not az I thght (mpure) & I woz motv8d x mere
kuriousty az 2rsts r & nless I kum on th STONES x chance I shldnt want 2 find thm az I mght b aktn
mpiously. Then I ↑ a narrow muddy track (it woz rainn soldly now) & a guy turnd → it follwn me
karryin 1 of thos 2 ltr plastik bottls of beer they get here & I turnd O koz I thght th track ↑ steeply mght
take us out of view → 4st (sum very large old pines on th skyline) & he said in litho its OK it ↑ 2 such
& such st. So I ↑ & then ↓ gain & finally (aftr askn nuthr lady whr th jwsh cmtry woz) → Olandu g. 2
look 4 th funral parlour (on th site of th old jwsh 1) near whr I woz told th cemtry woz. Takin th 1 st turn
2 th left I woz srprized 2 c a kar pull up wth 2 guys & th drivr got out, put his stubby on th bonnt of th
kar, & had a PISS in full view of th peopl → x only 150 yrds from th main rd whn he kould eazly hav
gon → bushs near x. @ th funral parlr they seemd bmuzed x my ? but 1 lady sed its gon & whn I sed
I had bn told sum stones still kould b found sh (16/9/04. az I woz leavn I thght I vrheard 1 say “they
lways kum lookn 4 th cemtry”) sed 2 look → th road. So I walkd → road & thn → track thrgh what
ppeard like 4st kareful 2 keep checkn a guy I had cn walkn bhind me (koz I m kautious) hadnt taken
th same track koz I woz out of shoutn dstance & thn nxpektdly kame out past a row of dlapd8d metl
‫ٱ‬s or garages → a street & finally → Olandu rd gain havn Od th funral parlr.(nip). Ftr askn 4 th rght
→ koz I woz dsorientd I woz walkn ← Olandu g. (a major thrghfare) → chrch whn I saw a stone rght x
th footpath in a grassy verge (7/9/04. lookn @ th 1941 map of Vilnius (c rght h& side of kuvr map of
Vilnius → Melbourne) its near th kornr of Olandu g. & Vasaros g.) only 150 yds from whr th guy had
had a PISS whch ftr nspektion I realized woz a STONE. I walkd ↑ past whr th PISSER had PISSED &
lookn ↑ hillside saw STONES & I knew they wer stones from a DESEKR8D jwsh cemtry. 1 st I checkd
out a small side road → 3 millionairs hauses (I would b 2 shamed 2 build such hauses in this kuntry)
1 of whch woz in olde worlde litho kuntry x bavarian style whch mayb STAvNaKiAdUaSsKAS had
dzgnd 4 mayb th@s whn he found th cemtry. I ↑ side of th hill in heavy rain thrgh wet grass past
many stones most barely vzibl koz they had bn knockd down & wer lost in thick growth. Then I woz
on a foot trail in a pine 4st & big snails (15/9/04. they xport thm 2 france) (x 2 th size of 1s in oz) wth
pale bodies wer on th track & I kould just follow th rmains of what must hav 1ce bn th cemtry wall.
Thn I ← & from a hghr spot noticed th@ th ye olde style haus had a swimmn pool & a fancy PIRTI
(sauna) & all 3 hauses had sevrl rch peopls kars in th yards (koz now its great real st8 backn on2 4st
& sol8d from poor peopl x hgh fencin & lektroniks). I woz st&n in a spot (wth wet feet & jackt & soakd
pants though I had an mbrella koz it woz rainn & windy all th time) from whr on 1 side I woz lookn
down @ th millionrs hauses & nxt 2 me on th uthr @ STONES lyin in th grass & I thght of th
DESOL8N 2 kum. Then I klambrd down aftr nspektn th STONES (th rmains of a row is barely
dscrnbl) & I knew DESOL8N, DESOL8N, DESOL8N. I went → path long th Neris rvr 2 → from things
& n up in a shoppn mall like Doncaster or Box Hill wth 3 lvls kalld EUROPA. This iz whr th newst
part of Vilnius iz rizin. I had a very good lunch @ a self serv place 4 10 Lt. Lookn O me I kould c what
kind of shoppn mall th peopl of Vilnius r dreamn of livn & eatn in & I woz dsgustd. Evn in th toilt piped
anglo pop woz kumn thrgh th speakr systm. In th mall I bought a flask of Čepkeliu (nip). Then I went
back 2 Vilniaus g. 4 a glass of kvietinio alaus (beer) & 2 read th ppr I had bought in th mornn. (nip).
Whr th guy had had a PISS had bn nside (7/9/04. not quite sure of this now) th of what had 1ce bn
th JWSH STONES.
23/6 /04. Az I woz lstnn 2 th pruvian wth DUENDE ystrdy I woz sharin th tabl wth a man
hoo woz O → but stayd on & w got talkn O th pruvian hoo pparntly has bn here on & off 4 a koupl of
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years (& 4 th last 3 munths iz 1 of a group) & hoo sumtimes pulls out his guitr nywhr & plays wthout
kollktn money, but lwayz very quietly, az he woz then in bizzy Pilies g. so u kouldnt hear him @ all. Th
man I woz talkn 2 hoo turnd out 2 b a jazz fan woz sayn he should b playn loudr & I woz sayn it
ppeard he knew what he woz doin & th jazz fan sed yes it seems he iz dliber8 & it woz a PARADOX.
I greed. A jazz muzikian th jazz fan (knew all th jazz fstvls in Vilnius & hadnt heard of KAaRlAgZiIsJA)
knew walkd up & startd ch@n & I marvlld @ th way his features (esp face) & mannr gave him away
az a muzikian – so I knew he woz 4 real (but I still kant put my fingr on th dffrnce xaktly). Then Algis &
Jurgita joind us & I had in ffect put Algis, th fan, & th muzikian 2gthr & strght way they wer ngoti8n O
sum group or uthr. It turns out ther r lready various jazz festvls in Vilnius & I korrkt my bsrv8n a year
or so ago th@ Algis had bkom a drektor of “The Vilnius Jazz Festival”. This 1 iz an naurgurl fstvl &
here r th full partklars on th kard Algis h&s out: “JUMBO // Jumbo Jazz, Blues & World Music
Festival // September 3-5, 2004, Vilnius, Lithuania // Gedimino pr. 24 Vilnius, Lithuania // Algis
Karazija // Co-ordinator // mob ph. +370 615 99449 // P.D. 187, LT-01003, Vilnius, Lithuania //
Email: karazija@hotmail.com”. I heard Algis (az I woz talkn 2 Jurgita) say th mjorty of th muzikians r
kumn from Melbourn & I happn 2 know most of thm but specially of kours KEdSaMnIiNuAsS (c
16/2/04 – 27/2/04 p 6) hoom Iv mntiond many times, iz a nghbr & hoos parnts I lso know & so duz
EVrAoNdS 2 hoom I had bn talkn in th mornn mung uthr things O th book x EaIlDfIoNnTsAaSs whch I
bght 4 th littl litho libery @ litho haus in Errol st. North Melb. It woz then OlLeSIOfN had turnd up & ftr
goin off 4 a meal † th road kame back 4 ngoti8ns wth Algis. So in ffect it seemd az if I had put 2gethr
a JAZZ (DŽIAZO) fan + JAZZ (DŽIAZO) muzikian + theatr drectr + KAaRlAgZiIsJA az if it woz me
th@ woz th KO-ORDINATOR whn th kard sez klearly he iz. Prhaps th@s what its all O. It woz ftr th@
w walkd back in th gathrn dark & tippd th muzikian wth DUENDE hoo had st8nd himslf @ a spot
furthr up th street in th drektion of Latako g. hoo is a PARADOX … Woz nvolvd in a kurious ncidnt @
th PO whr I had gon 2 send my Vilnius (no. 2) rtkl of O 10000 words (sorry honey) 2 Melbourne. I
woz in a Q whch woz goin 2 take ½ hour + 2 wait in whn I noticed a smartly drssd guy kum in & st&
near th front of it ntndn 2 jump it. Then I rlized thr wer 3 wndows servn th publk & he woz 3rd in line @
th middl 1 while I woz O 15th in th longst BEKOZ THR WOZ NO SYSTM. So I sed 2 th lady bhind me
hold my place 4 me & I went 2 th shortst line of what had ppeard 2 b Q jumprs & gestkl8n wth large
motions of my rms said loudly this Q starts here & th@ 1 → thr & I took my place in th shortst & kalld
out 2 th back of th longst Q 4 th lady not 2 hold my place nymor. I wrote a quick note 2 H az I stood in
th short line koz I woznt goin 2 looz my place. I nsistd on writin th +rss on th nvelope sh gave me on
th spot 4 th same reazn. Th kurious thing iz no1 kame from th long Q 2 st& bhind me in th short 1.
Thr is a LESSON IN THER sumwhr. Earlier I gave 3/4/04 – 12/4/04 & 24/4/04 – 1/5/04 2 th guy
in th frnch ltr@ure bookshop bkoz Leif Olson had sed th frnch lady hoo owns it iz xllntly kquaintd wth
th frnch AVANT GARDE (I h8 th term only slghtly ‹ POST MODERNISM but m nabl 2 void (OuLiPo)
uzin it) tradtions of wriitn 2 pass on 2 her. Leif iz himslf far bettr read in thes (he transl8s mainly from
frnch) than I hoo m in th PARADOXkal position of dstributin my stuff in ozziel& & now in lithol& whr
such 4ms of writn r az good az nknown & r not ppreci8d. What I m doin in writin iz not dssmilar 2
what th pruvian iz doin wth his guitar MUZIK. W r friends but lone. W r out of place & space. Earlier I
read th ppr @ what iz now my rglar eatn spot. It sez th mnimum wage is ffcially 450 Lt & th@ 13% of
workrs get undr 600 Lt. Most hosptalty ndustry workrs get undr 600 Lt. 10% of salries r btween 900 &
1300 Lt. Th middl range of govt workrs get 1200 -1500.… Only a few 100 yds down th road, @ th
kornr of Pilies & ŠV Jono (St Johns) g., I → Leif Olson gain kumn th uthr way & w s@ down @ th
nearst streetside tabl whr he had t & bskits & I drank dark (red) beer wth fried bread sticks (rye) wth
garlk. I xplaind 2 him what KEdSaMnIiNuAsS does & how th HISTRIONICS & SLAVE PIANOS r
kumn 4 th Jumbo Džiazo evnt on Sept 3-5 bein rgnized (ko-ordn8d) x Algis. Then Algis himslf (sez
very1 lready knows O Jurgita (hoo has nevr bn on an roplane & has only cn th c 1ce @ Klaipeda (whr
KRISTINA IŠ VILNIAUS (c Vilnius 1 p 10) has gon)) on th FLG (th fucken lithuanian grape-
vine)) joind us @ th tabl. Ftr Leif was gon sum MORMONS walkd x. Th MORMONS INVADE
LITHUANIA (24/8/04. & so hav th Hare Krishnas) Algis sed. He sez (told x Veronika Povilionienės (c
Vilnius 1 p 11) hoo will lso b pr4mn in th OPERA (11/9/04 O th korrspndnce btween Mačiunas &
L&sbergis hoo had bn friends @ skool & both of hoos fathrs had bn rkitekts (20/2/08. Tuesday
18/7/06). Jane hoom I met 2day in Errol st whn me & H went thr 4 our mornn koffee & ppr, sed
Danius sed (ovr th mobile) he woz very happy wth how it went) writtn x SLAVE (11/9/04. Neil Kelly &
Rohan Drape rote th muzik) PIANOS (& th libretto x KEdSaMnIiNuAsS (possbly a rl@v of
KEoSlMeIgNaAsS (grew up in SIBIRAS & traind in Moscow x hoom Leif had cn a play he drektd last
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nght th@ woz th most movn theatr evnt he had cn in 20 yrs (Leif iz here now & has just xplaind th@
he met him gain last nght but saw th play a month ago))))) husb&) they offr 2 check out your famly
tree then rtrospktvly konvrt your ncestrs 2 MORMONS so az 2 b abl 2 klaim how very numrous they r
(on ppr). A bit l8r Algis pointd 2 th buildn nxt door (SIGNATORU NAMAI whr th dklar8n of lithos 1st
ndepndnce (1919 I think) woz signd) & sed th@s whr his fathr (now in Melbourne), Gediminas, had
livd as a child & sum of th furnture nside rginally blongd 2 Povilas Karazija, Algises gr&fathr, & talkn
of tabls & Karazijai th writin tabl I got 4 my 21 st brthdy whch iz still in use in our Ivanhoe haus in
Melbourne AUSTRALIA woz built x Gediminas Karazija from a dzign x Povilas his gr&fathr (so sez
Algis). But I reckn he got th dzign from a furnture magzine koz its of th swdish or sk&navian style
whch was poplar in th 60s …. Met th x ballrina gain (c Vilnius 1 p 1) & her sun & her husb& hoom
sh had wantd me 2 meet & hoo works in staind glass. His name iz rBoUlLaAnVdAaSs. He has ‘new
age’ notions & iz knowldgabl O rtsts like Mačiunas & Mekas. I gave him th last 2 pieces of me writin. I
woz telln thm I had left 3 (gave th 3rd l8r) of my pieces wth th shop ssstnt of th frnch ltr@ure bookshop
2 giv 2 th ownr & th ballrina sed th@s Karolina & → 2 her kumn → us wth her dghtr 20 yrds way.
Karolina Masiulytė-Paliulienė of J. Masiulio Knygynas @ Didžioji 1, 01128 Vilnius iz not frnch but
dspite her litho srname speaks litho wth dffkulty. Sh haznt got my pieces yet & I told her Id send this 1
bkoz sh iz in it. Sh sed th KOINCIDENCE of th meetn iz made mor signfkant bkoz 2day iz JONINĖS
(20/2/08. Saturday 24/6/06 & Monday 14/8/06). Th time iz 1 mnute → mdnght.
30/6 /04 ( → (no 1) (no 49)). 7.30 am. I cght meslf thinkn in litho this mornn. Ystrdy
evnn w 8 th quivlnt of what in oz would b a fsh n chip meal @ a seaside rzort. Th fsh iz KARŠIS & u x
it eithr karšto rūkimo (hot smoked whch iz dun ovr a short time & iz tastier but haz 2 b eatn on th day)
or šalto rūkimo (smoked kold & hence 4 longr & mor salt uzed but kan b eatn ovr a week) @ any of O
20 outlts (Vaidas sez) & it iz best washd down wth beer. I m writn @ a rottd out (so I will b karryin my
passprts & wallt wth me @ all times) wndow whch swvls opn so I kan step out → grass & th 4shor O
15 yards way. I kan c a fshn boat/trawlr whch is probbly fshn 4 KARŠIS, many cgulls of rdnry white
hedd varieties not nlike th 1s u c in Melbourn, & a Pilkasis Garnys (Ardea cinerea) whch is a large
heron. Earlier w had kalld in on JOvNiUtŠaIlEiNaĖ 2 tell her I had found a place 2 stay & rranged 4
me 2 kum O @ 6 pm thursdy. I xplaind it haz bn my prktice whr possbl not 2 stay wth rl@vs. Went
↑stairs of their very beautful haus full of rt work dun x her husb& Eduardas hoo woz lyin in bed
watchn telly (probbly th sokkr az th championshps r on) & bviously prfoundly dprssd. W hardly
xchanged a word. Durin th rvo w had drivn 2 NERINGA (th s&spit ; all thes rzort towns wer germn
b4 th war; russian bordr iz nly a few ks south of NIDA) via VILKYŠKIAI on the Nemunas whr w 8 a
meal on th vr&ah of a pub @ rdiklously low prices 4 great food. I 8 blyneliai su mėsa AKA lietiniai su
mėsa AKA naliesnikai su mėsa (but this term iz no longr uzed az its of RUSSIAN rigin) AKA meat filld
flour pankakes (4/10/04. 8 them @ litho haus in Errol st Nth Melb ystrdy & they wer just az good but
kost $7). Th weathr woz kold & wet but th kuntryside woz lush & beautful & I sor no sgns from th
wndow of th kar of srious povty or any of th uthr problms I hav writtn O. Prhaps from a dstance they
dsppear. Vaidas woz 2 tired 2 try 2 xplain what PIŽONAS & PIŽONIŠKAI means & Brigita ddnt do a
very good job of xplainn MIESČIONIS & MIESČIONIŠKAI. Both r pjor@vs dskribin nkool peopl &
krass bhaviour. I m goin 2 hav a look O. (8.30 am). 4got 2 mntion th@ 2 get →  w had 2 take a
ferry ← KLAIPĖDA (probbly lithos 3rd largest town & nly port; 4mly MEMEL) @ a kost of 35 Lt & then
pay a furthr 15 Lt 2 get → th spit  whch knssts of 4 main towns: Juodkrantė, Pervalka, Preila, &
Nida spread ovr a dstance of O 40 ks long a spit I must → start xplorn …. It took ovr 2 hours 2 →
nearst part of Nida & I ddnt meet ny1 long th way thgh I kan tell many do th →. I felt az if I woz bhavn
natrlly lmost az if I woz in oz. Th basik struktures: s&, rozion, layrn of vegt8n r th same. Evn th pine
thckts rmindd me of st&s of calitris pine in th Flinders Ranges. Sor a swan (Gulbė Nebylė (Cygnus
olor)) (th ozzie black swan (Cygnus atratus) whch haz gon ferl in sevrl kuntries in urop haz bn sghtd
in lithol&) wth 5 cygnets. Nida iz full of germn 2rsts & they look just like ozzies 2 me. I praktisd @
pickn lithos from germns & m bkumn pretty good @ it. X kmparisn th lithos (esp th guys) look like
BALVONAI (I heard Vaidas uze it th uthr day & realized Iv had it stord in my mmry bank since
chldhood). Basiklly it means wkward or what ozzies mean whn they say DRONGO (a good word
probbly rarely uzed now havn bn rplaced x such merikan words az DICKHEAD). Kame † th haus
Thomas Mann ownd & spnt a few summrs writn in whch is now RAŠYTOJO THOMO MANNO
MEMORIALINIS MUZIEJUS. I made n xeption 2 my norml rule of voidn mzeums & went in but ddnt
pay. It woz pparnt 2 me th litho girl takin ntry fees would not sk me 2 nless I ffrd. Gave my last 2
pieces of writin 2 1 of th mzeum staff I got talkn 2 ↑stairs. Sh had mountd an xhibition titld
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Sugrižimas iš egsodo – Thomo Manno amžininkai AKA Heinskehr aus dem Exil – Zeit-
gefahrten Thomas Manns AKA Return from Exile - Thomas Mann’s Contemporaries. I giv
th names (wch wer wth fotos & outlines of their lives) whch featurd 4 th bneft of wSaTlRtUeVrE hoo
may wish 2 dlete sum or + uthrs 2 th list: Alfred Kantorowicz (1899-1979), Bertold Brecht
(1998-1956), Erwin Piscator (1893-1966), Egon Erwin Kisch (1885-1948), Johannes R.
Becher (1891-1958), Berthold Viertel (1885-1953), Anna Seghers (1900-1983),
Wolfgang Langhoff (1901-1966), Hanns Eisler (1898-1962), Alfred Doblin (1878-1957),
Arnold Zweig (1887-1968), Theodor W(iesengrund) Adorno (1903-1969). (nip) I notice
th@ th Čepkeliu really keeps u goin. I bght a meal of fried fsh wth mushrm (real 1s not the stuff they
kall mushrm sauce in oz) sauce & vgies @ a govt VALGYKLA (left ovrs from th soviet system) & it
woz dlicious @ 6 Lt. Bght a beer @ th pub x th shor & az I left th waitr sed GERA DIENA (goodday)
very quietly ndr hiz breath az if 2 kknowledge a tribal soldarity. Did a set walk → dunes. Az I
pproachd th hghst 1 it kkurd 2 me (I had bn dstraktd x tryin 2 c if thr wer any markrs in th dstance 4 th
russian bordr) I woz O 2 c th BALTIK (its why w wer kalld BALTS whn w kame 2 oz in 49 & why th
beer I hav bn drnkn here iz kalld BALTIKA) C 4 th 1st time (nevr cn th ATLANTIK) in me life. I got a bit
xited O th@ & whn I got 2 it a few ks furthr on I drew me h&s thrgh th watr & nnointd me eylids & lips.
Back @ th watrside pub in Nida I s@ nxt 2 a tabl (I woz writn sum notes, lookn out @ th watrs of th
Kuršiu Marios (8/10/04. c middl left of kuvr map), drinkn a maža (& then nuthr) of BALTIJOS ) whr a
litho pro (LYTINĖS PASLAUGOS) woz pickn up what woz probbly (I m guessn) a swedsh 2rst. He
woz glown in a sk&navian sort of way & makn rdiklous small talk while sh smiled etc. but her eyes
wer nxious 4 hm 2 hurry up & make a mov. Sh touchd hiz h& sevrl times but he kept burbbln on in a
shy/nice sort of way 4 such a big guy. Sh woz small & had a kold sor on her lip. They wer talkn in
labourd nglsh but sh talkd 2 th waitrss in litho & sh lso talkd in litho on her mobile & I heard her say sh
woz havn a good day. Sh soundd az if sh woz talkn 2 a girlfriend but whn th gallnt (whn they wer
leavn he got up 1st & held her leathr jackt 4 her 2 put on) sk&navian hoo had just kum back from th
toilette skd hoo woz On sh sed sh woz talkn 2 her doktor. He lookd a bit sprized. It woz bvious 2 me
sh ddnt realize I ndrstood litho pickn me 4 a 4gn 2rst but whn they wer leavn & I glanced @ her sh
smiled broadly & muttrd GERA DIENA az sh passd me. How did sh know? Mayb pros r good @
pickn phyzkl types or mayb sh had heard me talkn 2 th waitrss. I 1drd O Nida bkoz I had a kupl of
hours spare b4 th bus 4 Klaipėda (MEMEL) (8/10/04. sum weeks l8r I read in th ppr th@ a madam
had bn rrestd thr 4 supplyin hgh klass, multilingual pros all of hoom wer kollej students 2 4gn bizness
men & dlg8s @ 500 + Lt / go) whch would drop me off @ Preila left @ 7.00. Found a cemtry (u would
luv it ,honey) whr thr wer many xmpls of th ncient woodn karvns th@ th lokl lithos used 2 put @ th
foot of a gravesite. Thes r beautful symbolik dzigns of horses, birds etc karvd out of wood. Th earliest
dzign iz ovr 730 yrs old. A notice sez th cemtry woz rstord in 1975 & th persn rsponsbl 4 th work iz
eJdOuNaUrŠdAaSs hoom I had found in bed in a st8 of prfound dprssion ystrdy evnn & hoom Ill b
viztn gain 2morrow. Th chrch near x is dkor8d wth wood karvns I rkognized 2 b hiz. Then I 8 a t of
šaltibarsčiai (2.50 Lt) & l8r bght a kupl of small smoked fsh 2 eat in th h& b4 c@chn th bus. Th 2
broads (they r a pair of BRICKS!) hoo look ftr th place just → past th wndow. I think they liv on th
prmises. They spend their time watchn telly. 1 of thm lent me a needl & thread whch Brigita uzed 2
sew on a buttn (8/10/04. That’s pathetic! Why can’t a man sew on his own button? Is it so complicated
that only a woman can do it?- Helh&z) whch woz kumn loose on me shirt. Its bn freezn all day. (nip) ….
7/7/04 ( → (no 2) (no 50)). 7.50. Anothr nght of littl sleep so I heard th crows (Varna
(Corvus corone)) calln @ dawn. Thes r th black & grey (th black 1s u c in th kuntryside r th Kovas
(Corvus frugilegus) & th Kranklys (Corvus corax)) birds th@ liv in close ssocia8n wth peopl. They
hav a croaky voice (13/10. a gr8 vriety of very xpressiv notes th@ Iv bn listnn 2 gain on th CD of litho
bird kalls givn 2 m x KABArIaLsAaITĖ rsponsibl 4 th kuvr of Vilnius (no. 2) & (& c Vilnius (no. 2)
p 10)) & call very early. (Vaidas foned (7.55) 2 say th wheel th@ was wobbln & was spposedly fixd in
Ukmergė (c → (no 1) p 2) is wobbln really badly again & he has 2 get it fixd so if I get 2 th
VIENKIEMIS ahead of him Id hav 2 let myslf in so hell giv me th key @ 8.30 @ th main ntrance 2 Šv.
Petro ir Pauliaus arkikatedra-bazilika). Last nght aftr t wth Egle (hoo offrd 2 find cheap rentl 4 nxt year
shld we need it) I went 2 th opretta @ th PILIS. Ctually it konsistd of slektd arias from a variety of
oprettas & was very njoybl. A lady offrd th nd of her sheet of plastk 4 me 2 sit on so I ddnt hav 2 sit on
th wet grass. Sh was an opra & opretta fan (from Mariampolė) & her dream is 2 go 2 th 1ce a year
produktn whch is staged in th  of the Trakū pilis (c Vilnius (no. 2) p 5) wher th tckt costs 00s of
Lts & u hav 2 ordr thm a year ahead & thn cant get thm. Bsides, her husb& dosnt like opra so th@s
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th@. I m goin off 2 wait 4 Vaidas …. I m @ th VIENKIEMIS again O 1k away along a soggy track
from Rimeisiu KAIMAS (village) whch is O 12ks from Ukmergė. W dcided it made bettr sens 2 com
2gthr so 1st w had 2 get th car fixd whch turnd out easier than xpektd as all th@ was needd was
(rainn again) 2 rplace th dud tyre Vaidas had bght last week. W did it @ th Kaunas car mrkt whch is a
huge xpans wher 2nd h& cars & parts r bght drektly off th doubl deckr semis th@ bring thm from
germany dirt cheap. Peopl com from as far as kazakstan etc. 2 x & I skrutnized th asian faces (its not
easy 4 thm now lithol& is in th EU as they hav 2 get visas) as I nherit som such genes myslf. But b4 I
4get I want 2 rturn 2 th lady hoo offrd me th use of her plastk sheet @ th opretta bcoz sh aktd xaktly
oppsit 2 th way Kaunas peopl normly bhave wth strangers – praps sh is th xeption whch proves th
rule or mayb ther r no rules only th ppearnces of thm. I no longr say ATSIPRAŠAU (xcuse me) whn I
+rss a stranger but I say PONAS (mr) or PONIA (mrs) or PANELE (miss) or if its a young guy I just
ask th ? Th suspicion of strangers probbly d8s from th rprssns of th soviet era & is rein4ced x th prsnt
crime wave as a rsult of konomik changes & th dsntegr8n of value systms. 1ce peopl know u they r
xssivly genrous in my xperience (specially wth food (VAIŠINGUMAS)). Rturnn 2 reality, durin th
sleeplss nght I was thinkn O Vaido friend DŽeElŽiUgLiSuKsIS hoom w met @ Preila (c → (no 1) p
11) & hoom I had mntiond in my writn early in th year (c 16/2/04 – 27/2/04 p 8). He is nvolvd in
city poltiks in Kaunas & lektures in filsofy. He said he has publshd a book titld KAS YRA TIKROVĖ
(What is Reality) or som such. I sggstd 2 him th@ in doin so he has raisd his h& very hgh (& I raisd
mine like so) & he countrd th@ w all take part in dtrminn what reality is. But I say katgorkly I xklude
myslf from th@ prvlged kumpny. I bserv & I write down – u make of it what u wish (suit yourslf) or 0
@ all. 2 mor mundane (& tangibl) m@rs. On th way here w stoppd @ a PIŽONIŠKA eatry (Vaidas
rckns MIESČIONIŠKA is mor apt (c → (no 1) p 8)) whch bcame famous 4 makin th largst
DIDŽKUKULIAI (cepelinai (22/10. rEaIiMmOuNnTdAaSs (c p14) rekns th bielorus rekn they nvntd
thm)) in lithol& so u only manage 2 eat 1 each (ther is a bug walkn ovr th page) thgh I hav totally
DIDŽKUKUL8D myslf lready. Rturnn 2 Egle wth hoom I 8 t last nght. Evn aftr 8½ years sh ddnt like
merika & is rapt 2 b ← & says sh wont hav any troubl gettn a job thgh th nmploymnt r8 is 18%. Sh
has swappd her dghtrs → your old school, mum, (AUŠROS GIMNAZIA (13/10 drektly † th road from
th Kaunas PO (c pik on p 14 of → (no 1)))) wthout runnin th risk of havn 2 pay a bribe x goin strght 2
th mnstry (sh said). I wish her well (20/2/08. & ♀z doon kstrmle wl bn ksklusv ownr vr frnch vr hetn
sstm wch drorz het ← gO → ) coz ther is a drektnss O her karktr whch I like. Shes just bn 2 Tallin
in stonia wher sh said sh had language prolbms coz they dont speak nglsh (not evn on th menus),
wont speak russki, & cant speak litho. I think it is lmost mpossbl 2 void bein a 2rst wthout knowin th
lokl language well so I probbly wont go 2 Tallin. Ncdntly I caught myslf thinkn in litho again this
mornn. Its 4.25 pm & Vaidas has a LAUŽAS (outside fire) goin & w r xllntly stockd wth beer (3 kinds),
meat (5 kinds: sausage; tongue wrappd in pigs ears & cookd & smokd; livr paste; bits of cookd &
smokd chickn giblts; smokd bacon); bread (3 kinds of rye); tomatoes (5); spring onion (bunch);
cucumbrs (2 small). Im feeln bettr lready….Just bustd th LITOVKA (c → (no 1) p 4). Th blade
broke near th base. So much 4 my good ntntns of doin a few days JUODO DARBO (black work) (th
1st time I heard th phrase used was x Mykolas K @ litho haus in Errol st Nth Melb. but its used here a
lot) 2 make amnds 4 th beer Iv drunk. Rturnn 2 THE TOPIK. Any peasnt O Ukmergė knows reality as
well as any flosfr wthout readn a page of DŽeElŽiUgLiSuKsIS book. Th realty is hes gettn skrewd.
Realty is not nothr kind of nml but whats bn don 2 u x th peopl hoo hav th key 2 it – coz they charge
rntl.
14/7 /04. Nothr good (thgh short) nghts sleep. Only got up 1ce 2 check th nght sky & m
pleasd 2 hav missd th dawn. Th last of my st8d (c Melbourne → Kaunas p ?) aims in cumin 2
lithol& has bn chievd – I dreamt in litho 4 th 1st time on th trip. I was in a room on a boat (whch woz
wkwrd 2 moor) or mayb th room woz on th pier I had had toubl moorn th boat 2 & a young womn (ther
wer othrs comn & goin) was ccusin me of bein –ve in my Vilnius 1 rtcl & I woz very sprized coz I
kouldnt work out how sh kould hav known of it othr than havn sneakd a read of my journl whn I had
left it on a tabl somwher. Wthout any pparnt guilt sh dmittd sh had read it wthout prmssion. Som
peopl kame lookn 4 kkomod8n & I realizd it woz in konnectn wth th biannual litho days evnt they r
havn in Melbourn @ th nd of th year. Kant rmmbr any mor sntnces or evn singl words from th
konvers8n but m sure it woz konduktd in litho. Othrwise ther seems no signfknce to th dream. Prhaps
it means ther is no longr anythn 2 hold me here & I m turnn my gaze back → Melbourne. Part from th
dream I got up in th nusual stu8n of not havn 2 c@ch up wth m@rial I had faild 2 note down from th
prvious day xept 2 giv th name of th swallow (1 of only 3 species here) Iv bn seein: its th Langinė
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Kregždė (Delichon urbica). Wer → Ukmergė 2 drop Rita off @ th bus 2 Kaunas …. On th way back
bght a large punnt of black currnts 4 2.50 Lt from a womn hoo pickd me as a 4ner from my habt of
sayn OK @ th nd of a sntnce & then did her best not 2 giv me my 50c change from 3 Lt. Sh tried 2
get me 2 x a 2nd punnt & 1 of th 2 large cheeses (wth dill seeds) sh had. Th moles hav dug a new set
of holes ovrnght & Vaidas woz 1drn how 2 xtermn8 (23/10. whn him & me wer @ Wanganella last
week w found whr th karp wer spawnn in th swamp near whr th road †s th ‘8 Mile Outlet’. Th watr (1 ft
deep) woz live wth huge (6 kilo) fsh & I waded in & skoopt 2 out in a singl go wth th net & left thm 2
die in th sun on th shor. Now @ nghts Im 1drn why I woz th cauz of a needlss & kruel KATASTROF in
their lives (25/10. in th nxt life I dzrv 2 rtrn az a karp & b gaffd x a fshrmn)) thm. Its a beautful sunny
(thrgh brokn cloud) & breezy day whch shld help dry th pasture out whch I notd as w wer drivn back
was a metr hgh in places. @ th mrkt whr I bght th punnt of JUODU SERBENTU I rang up th
Metropolis hotl 2 make a bookn as w r rturnn 2 Kaunas 2night. @ th bus st8n I made a point of usin
th toilt gain (c → (no 1) p 1) 2 fix it mor firmly in my mmry 4 th bnft of my gr&chldrn (20/2/08. 
woz jokn but thrz 1 now). Since my 1st vist (c Melbourne → Kaunas p 7) a prfusion of new flowrs
is rplacin th 1s whch wer then in flowr but white ntrsprsd wth blues & mauves rmains th domnnt
theme …. (a h&ful of RAUDONU (red) SERBENTU takes time 2 kollct bkoz theyr small; Vaidas found
a huge BARAVYKAS th@ w had missd but it was wormy; w r kookn up sum KALDŪNAI (pelmeni in
rus; dumplings with meat in em); 4 all I know it may b my last day in th my fathr grew up in (15/10. c
→ (no1) p 3 & 5))…. In th evnn w mowd a good part of th yard @ th back of th TROBA. Th BOBA
had a 2nd coat of sealr put on & is ready 4 th paint job. Now Im back @ th Metropolis (rm 310 @ 55 Lt
/ nght (wthout brekky)) in Kaunas. Its gettn 2 b a habt (11.35pm). (nip) (28/8/04. No, the nipping is
getting to be the habit – helh&z (19/2/08. 8th munth nth wagn now)). Had a meal of vėderai @ Berneliu
Užeiga washd down wth Baltijos. Im dvlpn reglr p@rns like a lokal – walkn down Laisvės Alėja (used
2 b th premier st in lithol& kkordn 2 Vaidas & he nearly kried 2 c how it had changed ftr he had bn
way 3 years (ther used 2 b ‘milk’ bars wher u got various milk produkts & buns etc) bcoz since
ndpndnce all $$s → Vilnius) & Vilnaus g-ve & back like evry1 hoo is any1 does @ least 2ce / day. Th
change here is th@ th street vendrs hav bn bannd (I think its a pity) & th pruvians r gon 2.(nip): Im
hookd on Čepkeliu. Goodnght.
21/7 /04. Last nght w burnt up most of th pile of rubbsh wood & branchs I had bn stackn
up from my f4ts 2 clean up th yard hoos upkeep had bn so badly nglktd x Vaido friends. Th set of
ownrs rules on th kitchn door rquest th@ those hoo bnefit from th use of th place in his bsnce
kntribute 2 its maintnnce. He was up long b4 me this mornn puttin stones in th wheel ruts of th worst
ffectd part of th track, mown, & clearn an  2put th BOBA (komplet xept 4 earOs) 2 best dvntage.
2gthr thes should giv th rght message. Hell know this time nxt year. W r off 2 Ukmergė …. Verywhr th
mown goes on, ½ of it x h& x scyth. Womn (bobas) st& in th centr on top of normous mountns of hay
piled on krakrstik V (or boat) shaped karts as men throw it ↑ 2 thm wth pitch4ks. Men urge their
horses long th hghway from a position perchd (how do they ↑ & ↓?) abov. Th 1st hay harvstd in th
dstrkt rottd due 2 th wet seasn so ther is som rgency 2 put in new spplies 4 th wintr whn cattl & horss
r hausd in sheds. W bght 5 Lt VOVERUŠKU ( … U = of (plural)) so w kan make mor soup. On th way
back w kllektd a load of stones 2 put on th boggy part of th track. A minmum of nothr 10 or so loads is
needd. L8r well try 2 walk th BOBA 2 her finl lok8n & Im in mind of a story x Gogol wher a man is
crushd 2 death x a † he woz carryin. Last nght x th fire V told me th@ Brigita had gon 2 india wth
Miglė 4 a month a coupl of years back 2 vsit a holy man kalld Sai Baba (16/10. DIaCnAdSrTeRaO
reckns he is a kon bekoz it sez so on telly) hoom evry1 xpt me has heard O (says V). This man
(“demi-god” – V) sounds th quivlnt of Fra Pio of italy hoo has bn dklard a saint. Brigita mnaged 2 h&
him a lettr whch made her trip a success as huge crowds choke th streets he is likely 2 → & u r lucky
just 2 get a glimps of him. He givs peopl small mmntos whch m@erialize in his h&s from thin air. A
litho friend of hers vistd him years ago & he turnd a crappy O he woz wearn → a beautful jewl whch
he cherishs. He is lso a healr (but does he prtekt vsitors from Delhi belly?). Vaidas askd me how a
doubtn thomas like me would b ffectd if I wtnssd proof of thes things wth my own very eyes, & its got
me thinkn…. (oh yes, last nght I dreamt I saw a vry colrful littl bird I had nevr cn b4 & I made a point
durin th dream of mmorizn it 4 dntfik8n & checkn in th bird book ftr I got up this mornn & I find its a
Mėlyngurklė (Luscinia svecica))…. V, hoo spent 3 months (in searn heat) in india (on a UNESCO
skolrshp) wthout ndrst&n a thng bkoz verythn woz bein don x dffrnt rules 2 th 1s he had known, says
he dosnt dsmss th possblty of holy men havn special powrs but he ddnt sound 2 xcited whch is O my
position. I kannot prdikt what my reaktion would b while retainn an opn mind but I suspkt Id b less
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mazed than most. Th xtrordnry aspkt of th doubtn thomas story is th bad press he gets bkoz he
koudnt possbly hav doubtd if he had cn th mirakls @ributed 2 jesus of nazareth & what th
story sggests (th hiddn meann) is th@ they ddnt take place @ all but wer nvntd x dluded
skribes. It is not clear 2 me why those hoo blieve in mirakls should 1t 2 evade th rules whch hav led
2 th 4m8n of us in th O. Bettr 2 change th rules (whch would nvolv changn ourslvs)! Nvrthlss whn I
get back 2 Melbourn Im gunna hav a read of what Sai Baba says …. Shiftd th BOBA 2 its position
lookn out → dstnce ovr th fields. A lot of work was don & it was hot like a summr day in Melbourne.
Last nght I was missn home & H. 2mrrow Im → Vilnius whr Ill spend th last week of the trip. It kould b
Ill nevr ← here or 2 lithol& but I felt least like a 2rst here & woz @ peace. It is possbl I got a slght
ntion of how it mght hav bn whn my fathr woz a boy in th but his O is gon & th last vestiges r O 2 b
swept way. Finis.
28/7 /04 ( Vilnius → Melbourne (no 51)). 2 komplet th meta4 of th haus whr sum1
haz bn mrdrd u would hav 2 b talkn O viktms hoo had bn th ownrs of th haus & hooz srvivin rl@vs (if
they hav any) kkuse your rl@vs (howvr dstant (2/11. but prhaps klose (5/11. th Zuroff/Wiezenthal
rgniz8n sends lists (6/11. az th passn of years make it mpssbl 2 proov guilt or dfend gainst fals
kkuz8n or smear they get longr) of names 4 oz guvt → nvstg8))) of havn takn part in th mrdrs. Would
u want 2 liv in such a haus? Last nght woz nuthr bad 1 & @ 4.40 a kar larm went off gain outside my
wndow, thn stoppd, thn startd up gain, so I got up xpektn 2 c th ownrs kum out but nstead sor th kar
thief (4th break in I know of in th mdi8 vcinity of Latako 2 while Iv bn here) headn off klutchn sumthn 2
hiz chest. Th ownrs, 3 yng peopl, ddnt kum out 4 nuthr 20 mins while th larm whined, stoppd briefly,
then startd gain. I think my nghbr (th kraut) mght hav finshd hiz toiltries (he takes 4eva) so Ill go & do
mine…. Hez gon wth his toothpaste & soap & littl bottls of stuff & left verythn vry tidy. Mayb he had it
wth th kar larms goin off. Im sorry 2 c him gon az he went 2 bed early & woz quiet & I dont know hoo
Ill get 4 2nght whch iz a portnt 1 4 me az I ntnd 2 uze drugs. Outside th wndow they r dskussn how th
thief got → yard so az I go out 4 a salad breakfst Ill tell Bronius whch way he went…. Strolld O in a
medt@iv mood. Here r sum poems from th beautfully prduced lt givn 2 me (3/11. whch I gave 2 K8)
x Rasa. It iz titld Carnets de Vilnius x Anelė Keršytė-Josadė – textes/tekstai // Arūnas Baltėnas
– photographie/nuotraukos // Izaokas Zibucas – mise en page/maketas. © 2002 R. Paknio leidykla.
ISBN 9986-830-74-5. Vilniaus užrašai. Both th frnch & litho vrzions of th poems r x th authr. “Il
s’est passé quelque chose. Quelque chose a changé. / Et tout est si pareil … (Kažkas
atsitiko, kažkas pasikeitė. Ir viskas taip panašu ..)” & “Des mots que tu ai tant cherchés, les
plus beaux, les plus justes, / des mots qui changeraient le monde / qui le réinventeraient
…/ Tu les trouves par hazard, au tournant d’une rue. / … Et à nouveau tu les oblies.
(Patys svarbiausi žodžiai, galintys viska pkeisti, / apversti pasauli, sukurti ji iš naujo … / Juos
atrandi netikėtai, eidamas gatve. / … Ir vėl užmiršti.) ” & “La pluie, le vent, le froid. Et ce n’est
pas parce qu’on est triste. / L’automne est là, par l’obstination de novembre / nous
rappelant à la réalité. // L’irreal m’attire en propageant ses promesses. / J’écris –
l’automne – pour me rep-érer dans l’espace / et dans le temps. (Prasidėjo lietus, šalta,
vėjas. Ruduo, / kurio jau nebereikia sugalvoti, / jis taip smelkiasi, stingdo. / Man patinka rudens
migloje skendintis miestas - / atitoles, pusiau nerealus. Bet aš sakau – ruduo, / kad galėčiau save
kažkur padėti, apibrežti laike ir erdvėj.)” (Vaidas turnd up but I ddnt hav th nergy (rain haz set in) 2
spnd 5 hours goin 2 Ukmergė & ← etc so w went 2 th Užupio kavine x th Vilnia whr I had a beer wth
a smoked herrn snak whch woz dlcious) Her poems xprss well how words nail down sk@rd
mprssions (but its takn me 50-60,000 (2/11. mor like 80-90,000) of thm & peopl ask az if u kan (pissn
down) turn it → 4 or 5 brief st8mnts or they ask how did u like it? or will u kum back? whch I kant
nswr ( 5/11. I say if I woz th sort of persn hoo kan giv an nswr in a few sntnces I wldnt b th persn hoo
duz all this writin) @ all) @ th kost of smplfyin thm. Sor a plaque (u get lots of thez) sayn Gabrielis
Landsbergis Žemkalnis (a relo of KAaRlAgZiIsJA (2/11. c Vilnius (no. 2) p 12)) Lietuvos
Dramaturgas Gyveno (livd) Šiame (in this) Name (haus) 1905-1966 MM. I know relos of hiz in
Melbourne. @ no 25 Vilniaus g. whr Labdariu g. ntrs it thr iz a buildn whch haz bn kopied xaktly xpt ⅓
smallr in Chapel st St Kilda in Melbourne. Now Iv fotografd both. It woz a grey day & I nly had a 200
ASA film in th kamra so time & gain found I kouldnt take th piks I wantd on th autm@k settn whch iz
th nly 1 I know how 2 uze. Th kinds of drelikt rcesss & krumbln walls I 1td 2 foto r dark on a grey day.
8 a vry tasty meal 4 5 Lt ($2.50) @ an rdnry eatry near th Chapel st buildn. Bought a CD of Danielius

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Dolskis (sum1 rfrrd 2 him as th ŽYDUKAS (2/11 Eidintas dskusss th term in hiz )) 1929-31 rkordns
(c → (no 2) p 3). 1 of th post kards Rasa gave me kould make a gr8 kuvr 4 Vilnius → Melbourne
(2/11. uzed it 4 Vilnius (no. 2) nsted). Its a fotografd scene of th  I m near @ th nd of th 19th cent.
titld Vilna – Place du Théâtre …. Woz thinkn of Meilutės dfnition of a SIELA (soul): th@ it iz what iz
left ovr ftr th body iz gon & I thght here it iz sually a PAMINKLAS, or if not it iz food 4 worms, or if u
burn it up it iz th ASHS (& smoke), or it iz your mmry (bkoz a mmry kanot but b a part of th thing
w rmmbr since uthrwize it kouldnt hav bn 4md) or sens (Rasa sed Meilutė sed 4 sum years sh
felt th przence of Vytenis @ times) of or a dream (same az 4 mmry) of th persn hoo iz gon (& so w
r joind (a huge flok of krows (mix of Kovas (Corvus frugilegus) & of Kuosa (Corvus monedula)),
000s (8/11. mayb 10s of 000s. Iv nvr cn so many) of thm, haz flown ovr old town th last 3 evnns & iz
vrhead now (6.20 pm)) wth thm & they r thrgh us wth very1 els w r joind wth) in body. I would
hav liked 2 dskuss it wth th Great Gaon of Vilnius, Elijah ben Shlomo Zalman (& mayb nvited
Wittgenstein long 2 b a silent wtness) 4 I sspekt w may hav found a kommn lnguage & az yet I
havnt met ny1 els here (5/11. or nywhr) hoo I think mght ndrst&.
(19/2/08. Completion of Wednesdays from folder 5 (nos. 42 – 51 of anthology))

1/12/04 ( Port Germein (no 58)). (21/5/05. from 30/11/04 – 9/11/04 (no 52)) Port
Germein, SA (5.35 pm Melbourn time). Just kum bak from th nd of the pier – it lwayz duz me good.
Drove 200 metrs → pub 2 x a stubby of Coopers Sparkling & m bak @ th 4shor rzrv 2 drink it & write
th ntry. Danyo rzrv (8.30am) → ( Blue Bonnet prrot (Northiella haematogaster) on road) →
Pinnaroo (ptrl) → (pair of  Red-rumped prrots (Psephotus haematonotus); got out 2 xamn a kestrl
karkss (Falco cenchroides) whch ddnt hav a feathr out of place) → Loxton (strong (dubl shot) latté
@ $3 & read th ppr; mssge from K8 2 say sh found sum1 hoo kan send piks of ozzie trees →
COaZdZrOiLaInNaI in Menton in la belle france az rquestd but haznt found ny1 wth a thentk
BOOMRANG (25/12 since then H haz passd Adrianas rquest → gallry spcializn in koori (still pltkly
krrkt?) rt) 4 her) → Waikerie (bght 2 mngoz, 4 tm@oes, vkado, red unyn, 3 kookd chikn wngs; ferry †
th Murray) → Wirrabara (steak & pppr pie wth koffee) → Port Germein …. Lay in th van & read Cons
ssay O Michael Moores film Fahrenheit 9/11. No1 haz takn th film mor sriously or watchd it mor
@10tvly. Con h8s Moore (“yellow by nature person”; “Moore is the ‘maggot that eats off the
dead’”), luvs Andrew Bolts “bold and probing pen”, h8s “ugly-faced Feminism” &
“necrophilous Pacifism”, & blievs Bush iz a truthsayr. I sppose if Michael wer 2 meet Con (“Former
Director of SBS TV”) he mghtnt like him eithr. & yet they share th same  - they hav George in
kommn. W knstrukt dwellngs out of words then w uze thm az 4trsss from whch 2 @ak each
uthr. Xcpt th@ since th words r learnt x praktis & nkoded in our neurlgy & hence in our ntire
body & thrgh our senses in our sOns w r thoz dwellngs & w r all joind so whn 1 iz set alight w
burn 2gthr. I like th most basik words like ‘YES’ & ‘NO’ (28/5/05. GOOD & EVIL r th x10shnz)
(poltitians rarely uze em) O hooz meann w kanot dsgree (25/12. though Bill Clinton 1ce klaimd: “It
depends on what you mean by ‘yes’” (28/12. or woz it ‘sex’?)) & hooz shared wnrshp nsures
th@ az w DSTROY each uthr w DSTROY ourslvz …. Rang H on th mobile. Sh sez th twittrn whstln
soundz wv bn hearn thrgh th bdrm wndow (Ivanhoe) r flyin foxs (25/12. Grey-headed (Pteropus
poliocephalus)). Danz cn thm. They must b feedn on th blossms of th lemn scntd gum (Eucalyptus
citriodora). Dans O 2 start plastrn hiz bdrm b4 paintn it. Very1 iz fine. Im goin 2 get nuthr 2 stubbies
& on 2 me spot 4 th nght. Glanced @ Cons uthr ssay whr he sez th nmy r lready mung us & note he
haz takn 2 boldn certain phrazes & sntnces. Rekon hez got th@ from me az he gets me writin….
Nglktd 2 mntion thr r 3 solr powrd lektrk lghts @ ntrvls → th pier. It means th pleasure of walkn → ovr
th ocean → a dark mystrious nght haz bn takn way. 8.55pm. …………
8/12/04. Rang H. Therz 32mls in th rain gage. Dans lmost fnishd paintn th room. He took
a break 2day az he woz doin a karstn. Pparntly hez goin 2 Milan in janry (28/12. put off till aprl
(25/5/05. put off til june)) 4 a fashn show & hez wantd 4 a TV kmrcial @ th same time here. K8 sez
shz shiftn out on th weeknd. I sed Id b home on fridy 4 our sual nght out. I m in Port Germein havn
dcided → home ftr hearn on th radio this rvo th@ th low whch haz bn th korz of th lmost gale4ce
winds iz prdktd 2 b ovr th Eyre pnnsla x th weeknd & then nuthr low iz kummn in ← th west. 4 me th
pnnsla iz O beachz & theez rnt th wthr kndtions 4 thm. I heard th 4kast @ O 1.00 whn I woz lyin down
4 a siesta ftr a snak. In th mornn I →d sth from Fishermans Point. In Port Lincoln I bght a piece of
frsh fl@head from th shop on th main wtrfrunt strip & it woz dlcious. Then I read th ppr in a kafé whr a
dubl shot mug of latté kost $3.20. Then I drove → Tumby Bay whr I bght a smokd snook & 2 stubbies
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of Coopers 4 wht I now think of az th klassk meal litho style. I 8 it sittn in th van wth th slidin door opn
facin out of th wind on th splanade ndr a norfolk pine. O 20 cgulls & 1 pcifk (2/1. whn I woz jung they
uzed 2 b komn on Melbourne beechz) gull kleand up wht woz left ovr. Ktually th pcifk gull took mor
than th kmbined cgulls az it woz much mor grssv, iz O x3 bigr, & haz a wikd hook on th nd of its beak
whch th uthr gulls make sure not 2 get 2 near 2. Its a beautful bird but. I had ntndd 2 spend th nght in
th Tumby Bay  but since Im neithr readn nor writin sriously thr wuz 0 els 4 me 2 do thr in th wthr
kndtions so I dcided → here. Thgh I rekn my writin daze r ovr (25/5/05. hmmm!)I want 2 komnt on th
buddhist klaim th@ th tangibl O iz an llusion. Th word llusion prsppozes a tangibl O az th reazn w
4ge th word iz 2 make a dstnktion btween solid bjekts & mit8ns whch mght b knfuzed wth em
eg. mrages, rflktions etc etc. 2 say th@ th tangibl O iz an llusion iz 2 deny th O of bjekts wth a
word hooz 4m8ion prsppozez their xistance. Its a nonsens 2 do it yet th klaim iz 1 of th main
found8ions of all buddhst metafyzkl systms. Its this kind of msuse of lnguage whch makes rlgion
(29/12. esp th@ of th thlogians), krstian or uthrwize, nkomprhnsbl 2 me. Wittgenstein sez rlgious
lnguage iz uzed dffrntly & its poplar 4 thlogians 2 make a mythos/logos dstnktion. But th ppl hoo bl-
iev rlgious lnguage kcept it prcisely koz they think it iz of this tangibl O. But 4 many of us (2/1.
az 4 me I do not kcept kontrdktionl nonsens evn from mrakl workrs (3/1. 4 what wood then b th value
of lnguage?) & nlike abraham or Kierkegaard wood rfuze an rdr 2 murdr thgh givn x god hmslf (&
wood rjekt hiz thority)) its hard 2 kcept nonsens nless thoz hoo say it kan lso do MIRAKLS like
nstntly healn th sik or levit8ion or raizn th . Such events kood b part of our tangibl daily life
& if u kan bliev in thm u kan bliev in nythn. Th gr8 rlgious teachrs needd lso 2 b MIRAKL
workrs if what they sed woz 2 b mor blievbl (authort@v) than what u or I say. Goodnght.
16/2 /05 ( 10/2/05 – 18/2/05 (no 54)). I hav s@ @ this pknk tabl ritin a ntry b4 (c
16/2/04 – 27/2/04 p 3). Itz a small park nxt 2 th Victoria rvr in th Cobungra  O 20 milez sth of
Dinner Plain & Mt Hotham a k or so off th Alpine Highway. This mornn I left @ O 9.00 folown th eestrn
bank of th Tambo rvr. @ th 1st • u kan pull off → rvr bank nrth of Swan Reach I pikt h&flz of blakbreez
(my h&z r staind) rmmbrn how w uzed 2 pik em wth kups @ th bak of Whiters Park (Lakes Entrance)
in th rly 50s till w fild up a bukt & thn w wood eet em @ very pportunty, day in & out (wth milk like a
brekee srial) so az not 2 waste ny. Az new mgrnts w wer mazed u kood get such dlcious food free. →
Bruthen (whr I bort 2 bunz & red th Age) → Ensay (ScMaItThHy woz home wth dghtr & a girl of
l@vian bakgO hoo haz spent a yeer in l@l& (c 11/11/02 – 20/11/02 p 11). Cathy haz ritn 4 chptrz
of her dtktv novl & dmits 2 ritin poetry but woodnt show me a sampl) → Swifts Creek (I had 1td 2 ask
GApReDtNeErR if he new of ny fotos of th koori stlmnt bhind Whiters Park (c DANYO RESERVE p 18)
but hiz shop woz shut. Howvr SbMrIuTcHe woz in hiz ffice @ th kommnity • so w had a bit of a yarn.
He woz werin a flamboynt shirt. I think hez in chrge thr. Both Bruce & Cathy ndpndntly & 4 dffrnt
reeznz rkmmndd I vzit RhEoDwDaIrSdH @ th Mt Markey Winery (1/3. postd 1 of th fotos → Howard
2day) in th Cassilis Historic Goldfields .) → Cassilis (az I woz teln Howard O th fotos
GApReDtNeErR → in. Neethr of thm hav cn or knew of ny fotos of the koori kamp. I told thm I had
sent kopeez 2 HAbNrCiOaCnK hoom they know. Mt Markey make a lot of dffrnt prdukts (jamz,
vinegrz, beerz, fruit winez) & I bort a stubee kalld ‘Lone Hand’ stout. They r opn daily 10 – 5, fone:
(03) 5159 13-28; email: mtmarkey@tpg.com.au; web address: www.omeoregion.com.au) → Cobungra (x
goin thrgh Cassilis u x-pas Omeo; I had ntndd 2 park @ me • neer th top of th range 5ks off th
Hotham/Bright road long th road → Dargo but I rekn it mght b 2 kold thr 2nght - it iznt warm here). Itz
5.15. Here iz nuthr trbute 2 Konstancija Bražėnienė from ir dar valandėlė ….. Th riter Sarah
Capelovitch iz a Neurodevelopmental Therapist in zrael & iz lso a prfsor. Sh iz th persn most
rsponsbl 4 Konstancija bein wardd th titl of ‘Righteous Gentile’ x th zrael guvt: “Dear Nijole, ¶ A
book should be written how a 5 year old (not quite 5) little girl is saved by a Lithuanian
family while her family and whole community of Jews were being massacred around.
Dates I know not, and a book I have not written yet, it is difficult to reach into that hell-
hole, which is memory! A few things shine bright – the loving care of your dear mother is
one, the other a bit blurred by a dark cold night, fear, tears, shivers – is a man. The man
wore a uniform, he had black tall boots. The man picked me up, he covered me, because
when I looked back to see the bridge and the river that I crossed – I could not see it
anymore … He brought me to your mother’s house and left. Sometime later, he came
again, he brought my mother out of the ghetto to see me for a few minutes at dawn,
before she was shipped off to Schtuthoff – a death camp for Jewish women. Your mother

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called him Mindaugas, I am pretty sure it was the same young man that picked me up at
the foot of the ‘funiculaire’ – at the foot of the hill. I know now, that the children of the
ghetto Kaunas were gathered and exterminated just after that. ¶ I am here, I have two
lovely daughters, two beautiful grandchildren, a loving husband. ¶ The family of
Konstancija Brazeniene (I apologize if I misspelled the name of that dear woman) –
provided a life line of love and care amidst a world of hate and annihilation. ¶ All my love
to you and yours, ¶ Sarah – or as named by your family – Katrinėle.” Itz worth mntionn here
th@ Konstancija lso gave shltr 2 sevrl adults from the ghetto just prior 2 itz finl lquid8n 4 th 3 weeks
till th dprture of th germnz. An ntrstn sidelght iz prvided x Eva Birkmann (iš Sonenbergo, Tiūringija)
hoom K.Br. lookt ftr 4 sum munths (6?) ftr th war had ndd. She had got hold of th +rss of Nijolė in
New York & rote letrz (1953-55) solcitn munee & parcelz klaimn sh new K. Brs whrOs & sh wood
send thm → her. In fakt Eva Birkmann new Konstancija had bn dportd → sberia in 1949 but ddnt let
on 2 her chldrn. They found out thrgh dffrnt channlz in 1956. Pparntly l8r in th book Konstancija rites
O Eva but Im nly up 2 p101 & hvnt kum 2 thoz letrz yet. Im goin 2 heet up watr 4 a Country Cup Pea
& Ham soop wth CROUTONS tho I kant rmmbr if Iv popt me ntacid (Somac) pil. Then I mght get 2
reed a bit mor of th book.
23/3 /05 ( 21/3/05 – 25/3/05 (no 55)). I m ritin sitn on th bak bumpr parkt nxt 2 th
Tambo rivr a few kz out of Metung. Its 5.50 pm. Iv ritn a ntry here b4 ((20/2/08. 18/2/04 ) “→ Tambo
River (about 6ks (26/3. ktualy itz O 3) back 2wards Swan Reach (2nd night of our
honeymoon, rmmber?) rght on the edge of the bank over the water about 10 ft below.
Ther r small black bream feeding off the growth on the rocks along the bank undrwater.
Ill spnd the night here. Contnuing from Ernest Gellners The Origins of Society: “The sheer
diversity possible in a species of this kind, also makes change possible, change based not on any genetic
transformation, but rather on cumulative development in a certain direction, consisting of a modification of
the semantic rather than genetic system of constraints … But this possibility of progress, which in our
culture we think of as somehow glorious, presents a problem. Initially, the main difficulty facing societies
was to restrain this excessive flexibility. The preservation of order is far more important for societies than
the achievement of beneficial change, which only comes later, when conservation can be taken for
granted, and when openings for genuinely beneficial change are available. Progress is possible because
change is possible, because the internal constructs of men allows such a wide range of conduct. But most
change is not at all beneficial; most of it would disrupt a social order without any corresponding
advantage. Before we can explain how beneficial change is possible, we must first show how too much
change, with all kinds of chaotic effects, is avoided. This is not a Conservative Party political broadcast but
the point needs to be made. Conservation is the initial problem for a labile population, and it appears to be
solved through deeply internalized concepts.” Thursday 19/2/04. 9.00. Ther r blackberries †
the road with some ripe fruit (2 + 2 the mango I had 4 breakfast); a boat went past
heading 4 the mouth of the river (in2 Lake King. C map 84 of Vic Roads Country
Directory). I learnt a new word from the Vermes book day b4 ystrdy: ESCH@OLOGY &
my writing is ESCH@ALOGICAL ie. it pertains 2 the “final period of the present era and all other
m@ers pertaining to it”. On a smaller scale I rturn 2 the m@er of knowing I hav finishd
saying the things whch wer mportant 4 me 2 say. A couple of weeks ago I rread my last
8 or so ‘pieces’ & spnt another 1 of those sleepless nights rviewing what I had said & it
confirmd my knowledg th@ I hav givn as clear a ccount as I m capabl of. I should considr
myslf 4tun@ as ther r many who would hav liked 2 giv fuller xpression 2 thmslvs but hav
bn prvnted x circumstances or lack of language. I m not 1 of thm. It would b fair 4 some1
2 ask me how do I ‘know’ in case I dont know the meanng of the word. 2 answer I
suggest u considr what is the dffrence (the str@egy of) in saying ‘I m in pain’ 2 saying ‘I
know I m in pain’ & compare it 2 the dffrence in saying ‘I M SANE’ 2 ‘I KNOW I M SANE’ &
compare it 2 saying ‘I M NSANE’ 2 ‘I KNOW I M NSANE’. A clue: it concerns the balance
btween ‘knowing’ & ‘meaning’ (c 12/4/03 – 24/4/03 pp 16,17). Czeslaw Milosz
(27/2/04. from slavic root ‘milo’/love so th@ (Slobodan) Milosevic means lover. In litho:
‘miliu’/I love, & ‘meilė’/noun 4 love) (Česlovas Milašius in litho) who claims he is a
polish speaking lithuanian (he has a supposedly close rel@iv in the litho communty in
Sydney who spells his name MILAŠAS) whos long life covers the period of both wars (1st
& 2nd) says th@ prior 2 the 2nd u could hav filld a libary wth books prdicting the evnts 2
follow. Did the literry fr@rnty ‘KNOW’ or sens what was 2 come? I rather fancy an evn
bigger libary could hav bn filld wth prdictions (esp in germany) of a triumphant future &
the immnnt rrival of the goldn age. Robert Musil says th@ b4 the 1st war & the dmise of
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the civilzation of the Hapsburgs all points of view had their rprsent@ives & their loud
PROPHETS. I c (feel it in my bones, apprhnd, fear? sens) the nd (28/3. On a hazy
summer day a boy sees a thread no thicker than a cobweb hanging from thin
air in front of his face. Perhaps he has seen it before without paying attention
or perhaps it has always been there unnoticed. As thoughtlessly as brushing
away a fly he reaches out and tugs at the thread. He is not to know that it is
hanging loose from the fabric which goes to form the universe and that he has
set off a run which will unravel it.) & prdict the dstruction of MPIRES & of
CIVILZATION as we know it. Others c it dffrently & they may wish 2 in4m me th@ my
VISION is faulty. But it has never bn my ntrest (or n10tion or politic) 2 speak 4 (rprsnt)
others. I only speak 4 myself. I SAY IT AS I C IT. 4 it may b th@ every moment contains in
it ALL POSSIBLE FUTURES.”). Just rang home & Ben nsrwd. He sez Dan had taken th fotografr &
th mgzeen edtor (Rachel (26/3. met up wth her (27/3. grew up neer JERUSALEM (iz 2day th day th
stone woz rold way?) & rmmbrz Baxter) & a ftogrfr (27/3. from Warsaw (Varšuva (home town of Dr.
Zamenhofas (nvntr of ESPERANTO) b4 he set up prktice in Kaunas (c Melbourne → Kaunas p
10)) in lthol&) via canada, Flemington, & Mt Baw Baw) in Errol st 2day & Dan & me wer ftogrfd (29/3.
he woz uzin a Rollei kamra whch woz much oldr than him as it woz made in th erly 50s but iz stil his
most rliabl kamra he sed) in th lane bhind th old town hall & then w had a drink in ltho haus)) from
kiwil& hoom hez showin O → KEdSaMnIiNuAsS studio. H woznt home so Ill O l8r. I partd wth V @
Kalimna pub. Hez → Melbourne. Erlier w 8 sordfsh gain @ Lakes Entrance ← Orbost (whr w wer
brethlized) ← Snowy rivr (eest bank neer Marlo whr he ddnt get a singl bite; I woz reedn Borges x
Edwin Williamson (hoo haz had 0 of th xpriences whch wood llow him nsight in2 Borgesz ritin)
Viking © 2004) ← Snowy rivr (Corringle or wst bank whr ftr I rote th ntry ystrdee V puld out a sizebl
conger eel (●d) whch he saltd & iz takin home. W ddnt drink 2 much last nght & only a kupl of glasz
(just heetd up sum soop) @ mdday 2day so wen w went w left th shapelss kask on th pknk tabl wth O
a litr of soft dry red stil in it 4 th nxt fshrmn. Az I sed I had n10dd 2 nklood all kindz of rumin8nz in this
piece of ritin but I m stil lackin nergy & may leev thm out or I may kntnue wen I rtern → Melbourne. It
wood giv me th xuse 2 ntrojuice (20/2/08. & tdd) u 2 th 3rd main prtagnist from IN TRANSIT. I m rfern
2 th ‘I’ persona, klose relo of Jim Brown & Mallacoota Man (u kan work out 4 yorslf whch iz th ID, GO,
& SPRGO) hooz xploits r knfined 2 th inr sity s of Melbourne & Sydney. (“Let’s progress to some
real sex. My defacto, and its about time I started calling her my wife, tells me that her cunt is getting
old. But as my cock has only one eye it hasn’t noticed the difference. I havent told you yet that she is
pregnant. If we have a son I want him to be called Jonas rather than Jonah. Jonah (according to the
Women’s Weekly) means, peace, but Jonas means a dove. And though my wife looks like a whale,
when she lies joined to me in bed I can feel inside her belly the fluttering of a dove. I could at last be
associated with a relatively normal birth but not if the local women’s support group have their way. At
her last meeting they advised her to get an abortion because of our non-existant financial situation
and because it would be a negative input into the current stage of her personal growth. Besides Im a
rapist. They are right too, but really it has nothing to do with me, its her body to do with as she
wishes.¶ Getting back to my guided tour of Balmain, I have to say in my own defence that I wasn’t
your typical tourist. My guide was a yuppy cousin of mine and we ‘did’ Balmain on foot. At least
where wheels are concerned I did not score any demerits. I realize now too that some of the Balmain
experiences I earlier ascribed to Jim may have been mine rather than his. As I explained, there is a
blurring of the line between author and character in our case because of the common bond we share
in that we both had abnormal births. There is also a possibility that Jim is attempting to appropriate
some of my experiences in an effort to gain a separate existence. Could it be that even a character in
a book aspires to live in his own right? ¶ These events happened long ago when my sperm count
was two or three times greater than it is now and I was still a teenager. Up until then I had lived at
home with my parents in Coburg. My relationship with my father, which had always been lousy, had
finally culminated in a confrontation which was even more awful than the normal ones I was used to.
It was the first time that he actually made a full frontal physical attack on me throwing punches like a
windmill. If it hadnt been for my mother screaming out the name of the Holy Virgin Mary at the top of
her voice and then falling down on the kitchen floor and banging her head on it till it looked as if she
might knock it off I could have got killed. The shock of seeing her thrashing about like that brought us
to our senses but only temporarily. The argument continued on in the TV room and though no more
punches were thrown the emotional violence we did to each other reached a new and intolerable

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intensity. In the end, goaded on by the old man, I left home in the middle of the night intending never
to return. My parents did not budge from their positions in front of the TV set while I went into their
bedroom and took out $150 from a drawer where I knew the old man kept his money. I would have
taken more but that was all that was there. I had been in the habit of knocking off small amounts from
there before because the old boy was too stingy to give me a decent allowance. Then without so
much as a goodbye I left the home of my birth closing the door quietly behind me. There is no point
recounting the argument blow by blow. The fuse as always was some trivial domestic practice which
according to my father I had failed to observe. The real causes of our conflict ran much deeper. They
can best be described by terms such as generation gap, culture-gap, communication breakdown or
better still by the fact that he was a plain bastard. He was a Greek living in Australia and he wanted
me to behave in the way that Greeks believe their sons should behave. For instance he expected me
and my brothers to do hours of homework every night so that we could become lawyers and
embezzle huge amounts of money or brain surgeons and do frontal lobotomies. He could not
understand that I was a product of a pro-active-problem-solving style of education where we did not
do homework or waste our time learning facts. My teachers did not try to teach us the truth, no one
knew what it was anyway, but instead they tried to instil in us positive attitudes to learning. What
those attitudes were precisely I have since forgotten but they were not the sort of thing that I could
explain to the old man. Anyway by then I had reached a level of sophistication where I desired to
communicate with people while he was still at the primitive stage where he talked to them. He used
to shout at me in Greek as I pleaded for caring communication. My pleas fell on deaf ears as he was
incapable of listening to anyone in an open tolerant way. His lack of listening skills reinforced my
negative self-concept and heightened my feelings of rejection. That is probably the origin for the
prolonged dependency needs which my defacto finds so burdensome. I used to try to explain to my
father how knowledge can be gained through other mediums than school; how the bottom line of any
learning experience was whether it succeeded as a preparation for the real world. I argued that only
real world activities could endow me with genuine life skills. I might as well have argued with a brick
wall. His face would turn grey with anger and he would still kick me out of the TV room. My three
brothers meanwhile would be in their rooms studying. They sided with the old man, a state of affairs
which I felt bordered on the unnatural. If it had been them who were in conflict with him they certainly
would have got my moral support. As it was I felt an outcast in my own home, psychologically
disoriented by the bad male and female role models provided by my parents. I’ve often wondered
why my brothers did not get into the same strife that I did. I think its probably because at heart they
were more Greek than my parents even though they were born here. They all had scholarships to a
Greek-Australian school which according to its year book has, and I quote, “a worthwhile curriculum
committed to the teaching of our best validated knowledge in a coherent and systematic form, and
also in a form which illumines experience and provides resources for human purposes and
necessities!” Every Greek parent knew that this meant a lot of memorizing, plenty of homework and a
likelihood that their kids would one day make a bundle in professional careers. Which is in fact what
happened to my brothers. I was made to sit for a scholarship too. My father’s occupation as a
sanitary engineer was not a highly paid one and he could not afford to send us to a private school
without scholarships. I failed mine on purpose because I knew I could never fit into a school full of
such conscientious do-gooders as my brothers. I had already by then worked out the unusual nature
of my birth and knew that I was not a Greek like the rest of my family. I was a post-multicultural
Australian, a new man at the dawn of a new age. It was important to me that the educational process
be one which empowered me not in society as they perceived it but in the future society which was to
be transformed by a devolution of authority structures into a spiritual haven for mankind’s search for
greater self-awareness. I was fortunate that at least at school I had people I could relate to. Once I
had outlined the nature of the emotional violence I was subjected to at home to the school counsellor
the teachers became very supportive and sympathetic. That’s another reason I did not want to go to
the Greek school – I liked it where I was. In particular my teacher in Interdisciplinary Studies, which
was my favourite subject, was very helpful to me and prepared to act as a surrogate role model.
When we were exploring as part of our social consciousness raising, the role of fantasy and imagery
in the sexual molestation of children, he encouraged me to act out my own fantasies. One night when
he was giving me a lift home after a school play we called in at his flat. It was there that I had my first
experience with marijuana. From then on at school I hung around exclusively with the pot-heads. It
was the beginning, for me, of a new path to personal discovery and the actualization in my
personality development of those aspects of my nature which had previously been suppressed by my
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authoritarian upbringing. ¶ Exultation is the going / Of an inland soul to sea, / Past the houses,
past the headlands, / Into deep eternity! // Bred as we, among the mountains, / Can the sailor
understand / The divine intoxication / Of the first league out from land? (Emily Dickinson) ¶
That was also the beginning of my interest in body language for it was in body language rather than
the spoken word that we communicated with each other when we were spaced out. Can you
appreciate now that there was just no way I could explain any of the things that were going on inside
me to my parents. They and my brothers could talk about money and the practicalities of life till I felt
like spewing but I was forced to make my spiritual journey alone. ¶ My education was a major source
of conflict with my father almost as long as I can remember. This had been a particularly bad year.
Right from the start he took exception to my choice of subjects and even threatened not to pay for
the books. It was only after my Legal teacher wrote a note explaining that he was obligated by law to
pay for my education unitl I was 18 and that I could, if he didn’t do so, get legal aid to sue him, did he
agree to pay. He was shit scared of the law. For a guy who had almost no schooling himself though,
he held very firm opinions on educational matters. He disapproved of every subject I chose except
for Society and the Law, which he reluctantly, as a result of the aforesaid correspondence with my
Legal teacher, had to admit would be useful. Besides Society and the Law my other subjects that
year at Moreland High School were: Peace Studies, Environmental Issues, Media Studies,
Comparative Religion, Human Relations, Real Life Skills and my favourite subject, Interdisciplinary
Studies. You may wonder what happened to English which in most schools is a compulsory subject.
At Moreland High English was included in Real Life Skills. Even my mother who usually kept out of
our arguments wondered about what kind of job these subjects would qualify me for. The old man
never stopped criticizing and praised my brothers at every conceivable opportunity. They were doing
subjects like Mathematics, Accountancy and Greek of course. And they were getting very good
marks. My school never gave marks. The report at Moreland High consisted of a bunch of written
statements outlining verbally my achievements in every skill a human being could possibly possess.
On the surface it looked good but my parents found out from a relative that the teachers were not
allowed to say anything negative about even the worst kid in the school. They didn’t understand what
was written there anyway. Dick O’Tool (we were encouraged to be on first name terms at Moreland),
my teacher in Interdisciplinary Studies, wrote that I had achieved major milestones in my journey of
personal discovery. The truth of the matter is that by Moreland High standards I was a gifted student;
but try convincing my parents of that. They could not or would not accept that I was a child of the
future for as Teilhard de Chardin once put it: “Only he who has fought bravely and been victorious in
the struggle against the spurious security and strength and attraction of the past can attain to the firm
and blissful experiential certainty that the more we lose all foothold in the darkness and instability of
the future, the more deeply we penetrate into God.” ¶ There were other problems too. Coming home
one night after 1am from a form party at Dick O’Tool’s flat I noticed that the light was on in the old
man’s workshop, which was attached to the back of the garage. I did not think at the time to pay any
attention to it and I let myself into the house quietly, so as not to wake anyone, by the back door as
was my custom. I made a special effort to be very quiet so as not to alert the old fellow, who never
stopped complaining about the hours I kept. He claimed that he was almost an insomniac and
couldn’t fall asleep till everyone else was in the house and in bed. As I later learnt it was true too. The
old bastard slept with one ear open and always made a note of when I got home; sometimes he’d
even write it down. I didn’t want to wake up my mum either otherwise she’d come out in her
nightgown looking old and frail and as if she was carrying the world’s worries on her back and
interrogate me about where I’d been and who else was there and was everything alright and did I
have a good time and was there anyone there messing with drugs and so on. The plain fact is that
that night I was concerned that the smell of pot could be detected on my clothes so I actually took off
my shoes on the porch before entering, turned the key very gently in the lock and crept into my room
like a thief. I swapped the globe in my reading lamp for a dark purple one and went to sleep. ¶ I had
a strange and extraordinary vivid dream that the party was continuing on in my room. In the dim glow
of my purple globe I could see that the room was crammed with people all talking incomprehensibly
at the same time. Through the babble I could clearly hear the faint sound of party music coming, it
seemed, straight out of the wall. My room was only small but there must have been a whole crowd
inside. Through the gloom I could tell by the chuckling and giggling more than by anything else that
there were several people on top of the wardrobe. I also became aware of activity under my bed.
Someone was thumping about under there and now and then I could hear a girl or perhaps more
than one squealing. There was a couple sitting on the edge of my bed and even someone right in
76
with me. They were smoking pot. Peering more closely into the face of the bloke in the bed I
recognized Dick O’Tool. He was offering me a joint. Frankly I was already feeling a bit spaced out
and I just lay back on the pillow again and went back to sleep. But I slept only fitfully. I woke up again
briefly but this time the room was bathed in bright light. The music was still playing but the revellers
and pot-heads had gone. Instead I was surrounded by a dozen or so doctors and nurses in white
coats peering intently at me through various instruments. I heard one of them say that they had
better put me to sleep now as I was waking up. Later again, probably still in my sleep, I remembered
the light in the workshop. My room faced the garage and was only a few yards from the workshop. I
became aware that the music which had appeared to be coming from the wall was actually coming
from outside, almost certainly from the workshop. Obviously whoever had left the light on must also
have left a transistor going. Suddenly the music was switched off. I sat up in bed wide awake. There
were people in the garage talking quietly; every now and then I could hear over the voices the sound
of something being dragged about as if the furniture was being rearranged. I almost got out of bed
with the intention of going out to find out what was happening but a sense of foreboding warned me
to be careful. I was frightened now. I switched off my purple light and lay on my back staring into the
darkness. Later I heard the sound of doors opening and closing, someone laughed, and the sound of
cars being driven off. Although I cannot remember falling asleep after that I must have, for the next
thing I heard was the usual morning noises of my parents getting up and going to the bathroom. I
looked at the window and saw that it was already getting light. My desk lamp was switched off. When
my mother came to the door to wake me up she was surprised to find me already out of bed and
dressed. ¶ After breakfast when my father and brothers had already left I pretended to my mum that
my bike chain was playing up and went out the back to the workshop ostensibly to get some tools.
Everything in the shed was in place. The light was not on. It was perfectly tidy for the old man was
obsessed with tidiness. There was no transistor on the table and the room had been swept. I was just
about to go back to the house when I noticed what were clearly drag marks on the floor. They weren’t
obvious but they were definitely there. A closer inspection revealed more of them. The rest of the
room was exactly as normal. Something was very wrong! Back in the house I got my bag, called out
goodbye to my mum and left hurriedly for I didn’t want her to see me. I got on my bike and slowly
cycled off to school. I felt like swooning. ¶ Lord // hold me in your mighty arm / like a tiny ship / in
the eye of the storm / take me in your gentle hand // to the stillness of your heart ¶ Over the
ensuing weeks I became very watchful. I did not tell anyone about the activity in the shed, not even
Dick O’Tool because I did not want my friends to think that I had a screw loose. Because of the
earlier events of that night I began to wonder if the pot and the occasional pills I popped hadnt
affected my mind. The marks on the floor, however, were clearly visible for weeks. ¶ I now became
aware of a series of small events and circumstances which previously in a less vigilant frame of mind
I would have most likely dismissed. I would sometimes look up and catch my mother staring at me
intently as if she was seeing me for the first time. She would turn her head away guiltily as if she had
just been caught spying on me. On several occasions I noticed my three brothers with their heads
together conspiratorially, in earnest discussion. This struck me as very odd because they were not
particularly close to each other and their usual form was for two of them to gang up on the third. Me
they had always ignored. As I walked up to them they would fall silent or one of them would suddenly
raise his voice with a comment which would start off an obviously fake conversation for my benefit.
The old man became much less abrupt and less volatile with me. He seemed to choose his words
carefully and even managed not to criticize me for a week at a time. This put me more on edge than
ever because it was so unlike him. I could tell that he was watching me like a hawk though. One night
when I was going to the bathroom I noticed under the door of my parents’ bedroom that the light was
on and when I made a few careful steps closer to their room I could hear a number of voices
discussing something. I crept back down the passage to the bathroom then cluttered about noisily,
flushed the toilet and stomped back to bed. Next morning was exactly like every other; no signs that
anything had happened over night, nor for that matter any signs of fatigue on my parents’ faces. A
similar event happened in the daytime once. It was a Saturday morning and the rest of the family had
all gone to the market. As I was walking past the lounge room door which was unaccountably shut, I
heard the sound of talking and even my name, followed by laughter. I was so surprised that I threw
open the door before I had a chance to be overcome with fear. All three brothers were inside fiddling
with some electronic equipment. ¶ “Just messing with some tapes”, one of them blurted out. ¶ They
were too, I could see that. There was nothing extraordinary about that as one of them was an
electronics freak. But it still did not explain why they had stayed home that day or why my name
77
should be on the tape. I became convinced too that I was being spied on in the evenings from
outside my window. I would have liked to draw the blind but by doing that I would have given away
that I was onto whatever was going on. ¶ As you can see I was becoming very tense and frightened.
Which may explain why I became more involved in my Comparative Religion course than any other
kid in class. We had a very progressive teacher for this subject who encouraged us to assume
responsibility for the content of the course while she stayed very much in the background. She
wouldn’t have had much time for teaching anyway as she was always writing articles and answering
phone calls in connection with her other job as editor of a Man-Boy magazine called ‘Rear Passage’.
I have heard that she has since been promoted to a more senior job in the Education Department
where she has fewer distractions to her work. Most ot the kids concentrated on making costumes of
Inca priests, bishops, the pope, Mandrake capes and angel wings, and so on. This was good fun as
the suits had to be made back-stage in the hall where we could muck around without any
supervision. I decided that I would make a Jesus Christ suit. The amazing thing is that when I put on
my suit which was a kind of loose fitting, floor length, white smock with very baggy sleeves, I felt a
tremendous sense of relief as if all my troubles had melted away. ¶ Lord // when you hold me / in
your mighty arm // my hand is firm // by itself / it shakes like a reed. ¶ I also made myself a staff
and a crown of thorns out of barbed wire. I had started out intending to make a total statement with
my outfit but I ended up realizing that I was a special being in the eyes of God. Dear reader, I ask you
for understanding. I still don’t know if God created children or children invented God, but I was only a
youth then, not much more than a child. How was I different to any other born-again Christian? It isnt
even a rare experience. Jimmy Carter is a born again Christian and so is Ron Barassi. The enormity
of my discovery was so shattering that I couldn’t sleep at nights and even forgot for a while to monitor
the odd events going on around me. ¶ Lord // my strength is yours // but tonight // I pray / you
give me rest. ¶ My parents viewed these developments with consternation. My old man was really
shaken up when I started hammering together a life-size cross in the back yard! He had never seen
me work so hard at anything connected with school before. First I made a twelve foot long ladder
which was to be the upright and onto it I hammered a one by two inch cross beam. I also hammered
in two nine inch nails at the exact distance where my wrists were to be. Unfortunately it turned out to
be too heavy for me to carry on my back as I had hoped to make a pilgrimage with it to a local church
to demonstrate my devotion. So I attached it instead to a gum tree in the back yard. It was an
impressive sight. I was able to climb up it like a ladder and stand on a rung so that my wrists rested
on the nails. My parents and even my brothers, meanwhile, were behaving as if I was out of my
mind. They were terrified of what the neighbours were thinking; and I must say that I had noticed
them examining from the adjoining yards what I was doing with curiousity. When I told my family that
on Good Friday I intended to put on my thorn crown and a loin cloth and stand on my cross from
midday till sundown, they nearly flipped. But they were not to know that I was chosen to do this. That
part is my secret. ¶ Lord / I am unworthy // in the music / of your wounded hand / I tremble //
like a bird ¶ Nevertheless, soon afterwards my mother started trying to talk me into seeing a doctor.
She said I was over-stressed but I could tell she thought I was out of my mind. Dick O’Tool informed
me that both my parents had secretly visited the school and were in correspondence with the
headmaster. ¶ In the days prior to Easter the whole family seemed obsessed with talking me out of
my plan. ¶ “Why?” I kept on asking. “Why is it wrong to stand on a cross in the afternoon but alright
to go to church at a crazy hour like midnight?” ¶ “Because you arent Jesus Christ”, the old man
muttered. ¶ “But we are all made in the image of God”, I said. “He was the son of man you know.” ¶
“He didn’t smoke marijuana.” ¶ That did it! It had come like a thunderbolt from the blue: there was no
way he could have known I was a smoker. That night my head was in a spin. The same thoughts
kept going round and round in my mind: they were spying on me. I knew now that the clicks and
whirring sounds I had recently been hearing on the phone meant it was bugged. I spent the whole
night listening to the sounds in the house. I could hear what I knew to be the fridge and a dripping tap
but also a host of sounds that had no explanation at all. It was amazing that I hadnt heard them
before. It showed just how self absorbed I had become in the religious experience. The house was
wired, there were bugs everywhere. The music I had heard in my room on the night my suspicions
were first aroused really had come from a transmitter in the wall. ¶ I now completely forgot about my
plans for observing Good Friday. Easter came and went while I was desperately trying to find out
how my family was spying on me. I knew that one of my brothers was a whiz with electronics and
that any system he devised would be sophisticated and hard to detect. The house was rarely empty
so I could not get enough time to examine it exhaustively. I had, of course, gone through my own
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room with a fine toothed comb. I even broke open the ventilation grill to see what was behind it and I
dismantled my clock radio and my tape recorder niether of which I was able to put together again.
Although I couldn’t expend the same care on the rest of the house I still got into the roof through a
man-hole in the bathroom ceiling and I also checked out carefully underneath the house. I found
nothing. ¶ Though I was never able to precisely locate the listening devices and other monitoring
equipment that I could hear I kept finding new clues of various kinds all about me. By themselves
some of these clues were small but taken together they were overwhelming, mind-boggling and
enigmatic. ¶ One day I came across a Rolls Royce parked in Gilbert Road. Now Coburg is not
exactly Rolls Royce country but what stopped me in my tracks was the personalized number plate:
JZ 666. It was the first time I had come across my initials on a number plate. I knew that sooner or
later it had to happen. But why now and on a Rolls Royce? What really floored me though was the
number for I recognized immediately that it was the number of the beast who was a man from
Revelation, which was the only bit of the bible I had read in full. I raced home to search for the
relevant passage to make sure that my imagination wasn’t playing tricks on me. Sure enough, there it
was in Chapter 13: “Here is wisdom. Let him that hath understanding count the number of the beast:
for it is the number of a man; and his number is six hundred three score and six.” ¶ It began to dawn
on me that I was the centre of not only my family’s attention but the fulcrum for a much wider scheme
of things the exact nature of which was hidden from me. The discovery of a hidden agenda in the
apparent normality of the world around me shook me to the core. As I stood on the doorstep of the
greatest discoveries of my life, perhaps to the greatest insights of all time, I knew that I would have to
call upon all the resources from the deepest wells of my character if I was to retain my sanity. I
wondered if I had the courage to open the door. ¶ as we stood on the edge of the precipice / a
companion remarked how glorious it would be / to take a deep breath and dive into the abyss
// my friend / even as you straighten out into the dive proper / already you are travelling at
fantastic speed / because of the special nature of the abyss / your acceleration increases so
rapidly / that in an instant the speed of your dive / has choked the minds scream / into silence
/ far behind // the abyss goes on // believe me my friend / unless a greater hand than mine
pluck you out / you will never come out of that dive ¶ Soon afterwards I was riding my bicycle
back from school only a couple of hundred yards from home when a Channel 10 News van passed
me going the other way. In the instant that we crossed I saw out of the corner of my eye someone
behind the tinted window in the passenger seat gesticulating to another person or persons out of
sight in the back of the van as if to draw attention to me. By the time I stopped and turned to have a
better look the van was disappearing around the corner ahead of me. It had no markings but I could
tell it was a TV van because it had tinted windows and was the same make as a Channel 10 van. It
did not really surprise me. My role in the events unfolding about me was still a mystery but it was
obvious that there were powerful people who knew what was happening and everything in time
would be revealed on TV. I got an inkling of the future when I was watching a documentary one
evening on natural disasters in the third world. They were showing footage of avalanche victims
being pulled out of the snow in the Andes and carried on stretchers to waiting ambulances. As one of
the bodies was being placed in the back of an ambulance I saw that the face of the victim was my
face. How it could have been arranged so that I would be sure to see this program I didn’t know. But
unless similar inserts were being made in many programs, and I had no evidence that this was the
case, it was clear my movements could be manipulated by hidden watchers. ¶ Minor incidents such
as the time I spotted my father’s back as he disappeared into the local police station no longer
amazed me. I knew that he was terrified of the police but it didn’t surprise me when he came home
that evening as if he’d done a normal day’s work pretending nothing had happened. I waited till
Saturday and when they had all gone to the market searched through a chest of drawers in the
parents’ bedroom where they kept their personal documents. Sure enough I found a card originating
from the Coburg Police Station with the name of a Sergeant Wood on it and the names and phone
numbers of two of my friends at school written on the back. They had managed to infiltrate even the
pot-heads in order to spy on me. Nobody, but nobody, could be trusted. I would lay in bed at nights
endlessly reviewing the most minor events of the day and the expressions on people’s faces, even of
shopkeepers and people I did not personally know, in a futile effort to solve the mystery. ¶ The
human mind works in perverse ways. Often we fail to see the forest for the trees yet at other times
we use the most obscure clues to make monumental discoveries. Thus, for a thousand years,
thinkers failed to discover gravity in spite of the evidence of falling apples all about them, yet Newton
deduced its existence by contemplating the elliptical paths of planets which Kepler had discovered
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through a second rate telescope. ¶ I had overlooked such tell-tale clues as the crumpled sheet of
paper I picked up under the lounge and when I smoothed it out found it to be a notice advertising a
seminar for neuro-surgeons. After reading it I scrunched it up into a ball again and without a second
thought threw it into the waste basket. I drew no inferences from the habit one of my brothers
acquired of always using a scalpel at dinner to cut up his sausages; nor did I think to ask him where
he had got it. I attached no significance to the fact that the work-smock another of my brothers wore
as he endlessly tinkered with his electronic equipment was really a surgical gown. It suited him, too;
he was the one who later became a brain surgeon. So, surrounded though I was by all these obvious
pointers to my condition, the crucial evidence which caused the sudden insight, the flash of
inspiration that made me stop dead on a crowded footpath with my mouth agape and my eyes
bulging, oblivious to the curious glances of the people walking past, was enigmatic and superficially
mundane. That evidence was my increasing punctuality; not your ordinary punctuality but an
effortless kind of punctuality, and sometimes, even in spite of efforts to the contrary. I would arrive at
a station just as a train was pulling in without even having looked at my watch. Or I would get to the
barbers for a haircut an hour after my appointment and be called straight into the chair because
someone else had cancelled theirs. No matter how often I slept in I was never late for classes. I
would arrive in schoool to discover that the classes prior to recess had been cancelled due to a
teachers’ meeting called without notice, or that everyone had been busy doing a fire drill, or that my
teacher for the period I missed was ill or away. I stopped wearing a watch but it made no difference.
At first I found it curious and even exhilarating but after a while I became uneasy and later my
punctuality became oppressive. It was as if I was a robot programmed to do certain tasks without any
input from my own free will. I was, I realized, a prisoner of the forces that govern time. Not time by
the clock as you know it, but a more subtle real time which made allowances for human error and
chance. ¶ It is possible, I suppose, that in my subconscious I had been putting the pieces of the
jigsaw together all along otherwise how can you explain that at the moment of enlightenment, as I
stood like a statue on the footpath one foot in front of the other frozen mid-stride, all the pieces fell
into place instantaneously: I had been given a brain transplant. ¶ Now I kwew why I felt like a robot.
Together with the new brain they had implanted a miniature receiver-transmitter which allowed them
to control my movements by radio. I knew now why the rest ot the family looked at me in that
particular way and why I felt no kinship with my brothers. The music I had heard did not come from
the wall of my room but from inside my own head. The clicks and whirrings did not come from
equipment hidden about the house but was the sound made by the machinery hidden in my head in
response to various radio signals beamed at it. I also knew that the operation had been done on the
night that I imagined I had been dreaming about a party in my room but had in fact gained
consciousness long enough to have seen, however briefly, the doctors who did the operation before
they put me out again. In that one instant I understoood how my old man was able to find out about
the drugs I was fooling with; I understood why I had so little memory of my childhood; above all I
understood why I was different to them. ¶ I also understood why I no longer had any sex drive. For
the time being my libido had been reduced to zero. There is a very intimate connection between the
brain and the dick. You cant tamper with one without affecting the other. It is well known in the
medical fraternity that people who’ve sustained massive head injuries often lose their sexual drive, as
do people who have had a frontal lobotomy. I had attributed my own loss of sexual interest however
to my religious conversion. I knew better now. ¶ I must focus for a while on the horny topic of my
sexuality prior to the brain transplant. I realize what you’re thinking: you think that I’m pandering to
the modern reader’s need for vicarious sex; maybe you think that I’m doing this because I have
nothing of substance to write about. On both counts you’re wrong. I am doing this in the interest of
truth and science. Nor have I forgotten that I previously said I would keep sex out of it; but this is not
one of those cheap exercises in titillation. This is a gentle and sensitive examination of a youth’s
sexual awakening; of a young man’s fumbling efforts to achieve a sexual identity in the face of
enormous odds and surgical intervention. Besides it would be impossible for you to have any insight
into my relationship with my defacto without some acknowledgement of my sexual past. Even in this
sexually liberated age when it is considered smart to use words like bum and dick in sophisticated
company and when the most refined feminists use four letter expletives like builders labourers I give
you these autobiographical details with trepidation because I am afraid you will think less of me as a
result. Please remember that as a consequence of being a virgin birth I was sexually confused from
the start. ¶ I had already become a poon by the time I was nine or ten years old. In fact among the
few vivid memories that I still retained after the transplant were the memories of the countless times I
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put up my hand in class asking the teacher if I could go to the toilet and then instead of going to the
toilet the mad dash round the back of the school to the bicycle sheds. The sheds could more easily
be approached across the asphalted yard but I had to go around the long way so I wouldn’t be
spotted. There is some controversy about the current meaning of the word – poon. A deluded friend
of mine sincerely believes that he and his mates invented the word on a trip through coastal
Queensland when they bared their behinds at mindnight in the main street of Yeppoon and stirred the
locals with derisive cries of “You Poons.” This purportedly took place when Yeppoon was still a
sleepy coastal paradise before Jo Bjelke sold it to the Japs. I use the term with the meaning that was
in use still earlier when I was in primary school; that is, to describe a kid who went round sniffing girls’
bicycle seats (1/9/08. Thursday 1/5/08). That’s it! I’ve told it now! This is not one of your
sanitized biographies like Mother Theresa’s or Albert Schweiter’s. I stand before you with my past
exposed to the full glare of daylight to be judged for what I am. I make no excuses and I don’t ask for
your sympathy. I can just imagine the smirks of self-satisfaction on your smug faces out there in
videoland or pulpland or listenerland or wherever you are. But people in glass houses should not
throw stones. If I had been a queer you would by now have promoted me to a weather man on the
ABC by using provisions for positive discrimination. If a had diddled the common purse out of millions
of dollars by my expertise in company tax laws I would have become a tycoon and been the object of
admiration to the whole country. Your sons may yet grow up to be male models (21/3/08. how profe
zth@!? - Tuesday 25/2/03 ( Og 68)), sperm donors and urinologists and your daughters female
wrestlers and social workers. If I had been a young drug pusher or prostitute or an aborigine you
would have hired batteries of psychologists and counsellors to explain to the world how I was the
victim of incest and environment and brutal alcoholic parents and you would have written countless
sob stories in your Sunday papers on how I wasn’t responsible for my own actions. But I am just a
Greek boy with a brain transplant and I’m no longer young and I don’t fit into any of the cliches or
categories on which you are in the habit of expending your worthless sympathies. And I admit it, I
have been – a poon. ¶ But enough of this self-indulgent indignation. Like a cat to its vomit or a fly to a
turd, I return to the topic in hand: my developing sexuality. Right from my early adolescence I was
perfecting methods of looking up women’s dresses with a small mirror (20/2/08. now nonz skr10)
which I initially held in the palm of my hand but later as I refined my techniques attached to the end of
a handle about a foot long. The idea of the handle was to save me from having to keep stooping all
the time or pretend that I was picking something up off the ground. By my mid-teens the passion for
mirrors had completely displaced my earlier interest in bicycle seats. It was a hobby which contained
a prediction about my future: there I was holding little mirrors to little bits of the world and here I am
now, a writer, holding up a much larger mirror to the world. As with the interest in bicycles this hobby
also had its origins in school. I was thirteen years old and in second form at Moreland High when I
took an optional subject called ‘Knowing Your Body’. It was taught by the same teacher who later, at
the time of my religious conversion, was taking me for Comparative Religion. I used to sit in the first
row in front of the teacher’s table which was on a platform about a foot above the level of the rest of
the classroom. The topic we were studying remains fixed in my memory in spite of later traumas. It
was called ‘When To Say No’. The general idea was that if propositioned by boys or men and
especially by defactos and uncles girls were always to say no, and conversely, if propositioned by
girls, boys were always to say no. Our teacher explained how she, like the majority of young girls,
was the victim of childhood incest which had resulted in making all subsequent relationships with
members of the opposite sex repugnant to her. Her faith in the entire human race had been shaken
and only partially restored by the loving relationship she found with the policewoman responsible for
prosecuting her uncle. Later, when the policewoman shifted to Rozelle in Sydney where she is now a
councillor, our teacher moved in with a social worker and her two pit-bull terriers. I was finding all this
rambling on about her personal life typical of teachers and pretty tedious stuff and would have been
inclined to doze off if it had not been that as I stared vacantly at her knee-caps, about three feet in
front of my nose under the table, they parted slightly and I was instantly galvanized into alert
attention by the discovery that she wasn’t wearing any panties. I glanced up at her face and knew
that I was blushing all over. When she saw that my interest was gained she parted her legs further so
that I was able to see right up to where her pussy was so snugly curled up. She played this game
with me for the duration of the course, which lasted six months, and I must say I have never been the
same since. ¶ Now I am not going to go into sordid accounts of how step by step this experience led
to a full blown interest in mirrors. It is not that kind of book. Suffice to say that I spent so much time
going up and down the escalators at Parliament Station, which by the way are the longest in the
81
Southern Hemisphere, that I am still on good terms with some of the Vic Rail staff there. Nor am I
inclined to recount my various adventures in the main reading room of the State Library except to say
that girls, and especially girls in short dresses, make their privacy fabulously vulnerable when they go
up those ladders (20/2/08. nt thr nemor) to get books off the top shelves. ¶ A practical consequence
of my hobby was that at the age of fifteen, in the company of a school counsellor and a legal studies
teacher, I had to face up to a case in the children’s court on a charge of invasion of privacy. My case
was number 27 and took about 1½ minutes of which over a minute was taken up with a speech by
the magistrate on what a social pest I was. I was let off with a twelve month good behaviour bond.
The school, consistent with its multi-dimensional approach to education, encouraged me to get as
much knowledge of legal processes from this experience as I could. I have retained an interest in
practical law to this day and since that first time have made use of legal aid on thirteen separate
occasions. Another consequence was that Dick O’Tool’s extra-curricular interest in my education
began to wane. I greatly admired Dick for the way he was prepared to spend so much of his own
time on our education even to the extent of ferrying students to and from his flat late at night. No
teacher, apart from the Comparative Religion teacher, was so devoted to the students. Dick had
taken it on himself to turn me into a cultured person rather than just the son of a Greek geek. He
spent countless nights sitting next to me on his little sofa reading out in a beautifully modulated voice
excerpts from such great European authors as Gide and Genet. We poured over the pencil drawings
of the male form by the immortal artists Michaelangelo and Da Vinci. You can imagine his profound
disappointment to discover that I had been wagging school to spend my days wandering about the
city with little mirrors. I felt deep guilt at my failure to live up to his expectations. ¶ The reaction of my
parents was nothing short of monstrous but perhaps not too surprising given their lack of schooling or
knowledge of the role of the modern parent. Sensitive participatory parenting was beyond them. As
soon as I was dropped off at the front gate by Dick that night I knew something was wrong by the
wailing coming from the house. I stepped inside to be greeted by the sight of my mother wandering
around in circles holding her head by pressing on her ears with the palms of her hands with her
elbows sticking out at right angles as if she had every intention of squeezing her head into the shape
of a sandwich. Her eyes were staring up at the ceiling and the gurgling and wailing was coming from
her mouth. I could discern a lament something along the following lines: ¶ ‘Ai, ya-yai! Yezu, Maria,
Kristu! Ai, ya-yai, ya-yai …’ ¶ The old man was at the other end of the room waving a rifle about while
my brothers George, Jim and Arthur appeared to be trying to pacify him. I never did find out what he
had intended to do with the rifle on this occasion: perhaps he had meant to shoot himself or perhaps
put my mother out of her misery, or maybe he had been waiting up for me. ¶ That rifle needs some
explanation. I had never seen it before though I knew the old prick had one. Apparently Jim and the
old boy had once gone shooting and actually managed to pot a couple of bunnies. That single
occasion had often been mentioned as if it made them a pair of great white hunters. That’s how they
liked to think of themselves anyway. For my part I have no recollection of the event or for that matter
of eating rabbit. Now while it may be true that Greeks are embezzlers, make lousy lovers and that
they’re humourless, I have to say in their defence that they don’t go in for shooting everything that
moves as some people imagine. It’s the Italians that do that. Carlo Chinchotta, next door, had
enough shotguns and twenty twos to start a small revolution. He shot anything that moved but
especially if it was feathered. When you had Rosella soup at the Chinchotta’s you knew it was made
with real rosellas. His kids even shot sparrows and blackbirds in their backyard with a slug gun to
feed the cat. Carlo would come back from his expeditions to Kinglake National Park with magpies,
kookaburras, bronze-wing pigeons, galahs, cockatoos and assorted parrots, but his favourite game
birds were black swans and lyre-birds. He did not observe bag limits nor, as I say, did he restrict
himself entirely to birds. One day Maria his wife, beaming broadly, asked me to try a piece of special
pie she had just baked and waited for a verdict. I had to admit it tasted delicious. It was koala pie
without even a trace of gum-leaf taste. Maria could cook anything. But lets not stray too far from the
story. The point is my old man had a rifle. He kept it in the wardrobe in his bedroom and as I was to
discover later, though the magazine was hidden in another part of the house, he always had the rifle
loaded with a single bullet in the breech. It was a point 22 Winchester. ¶ I cant give you more details
about that night because they are lost either in my subconscious or have been permanently erased
by the transplant. The mind’s capacity to subsume traumatic experience in the subconscious is one
of the wonders of nature. We take it for granted now and it has found its way into popular culture but
actually the idea was discovered relatively recently by that shrink without peer, Sigmund Freud. While
casting doubt on his sexual theories based as they are overwhelmingly on his experience of wealthy,
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bored and neurotic Viennese matrons let’s put our hands together in due recognition for the great
contribution he made to popular literature and the film industry by publicizing the subconscious mind.
¶ The main application of the idea is in psychoanalysis. The theory goes that if the ghosts, buried in
the labyrinths of our subconscious are raised from the grave and dragged out into the full glare of
daylight, they lose their magical powers. Sounds good, doesn’t it? The classic example in medical
texts is of the young lady who developed paralysis of the legs on her wedding night for which no
physiological basis could be found. With the help of psychoanalysis she was able to remember that
her Hungarian stepfather had violated her with a dill-cucumber when she was eight years old. As
soon as she realized she had more to fear from cucumbers than men her paralysis disappeared.
Now she only gets paralysed when someone opens a jar of dill-cucumbers. Unfortunately, beautiful
clear-cut cases like this are as rare as hens’ teeth. So rare in fact that they can more easily be used
as evidence that the subconscious, in a medically useful sense, hardly ever exists. A more typical
example is that of Mahler who after years of prompting by the aforementioned Sigmund,
remembered that as a child he had seen his father rape a servant girl in a wine cellar. The childhood
experience was so traumatic that it made him virtually impotent as an adult. His two daughters were
born by artificial insemination. Needless to say, there is not a shred of evidence to corroborate
Mahler’s account nor did he by dredging it up from his subconscious solve Elma’s (his wife) problem.
Our hospitals, prisons and drug rehabilitation clinics are full of prostitutes, addicts, liars and sleeze-
bags who are prepared to remember umpteen traumatic experiences, incapable of being either
proved or disproved, rather than accept any responsibility themselves for their inadequacies. Most
drug addicts and prostitutes would much rather think of themselves as victims of incest than as the
plain nerds and dags that they are. The role of victim is easier to live with than the role of dickhead.
Which may account for the skyrocketing number of incest victims in our community; incest, and in
particular incest long ago, being almost impossible to prove. The subconscious as well as providing
us with a convenient mechanism to avoid ever blaming ourselves keeps piles of gullible therapists
and shrinks in employment. Mind you, if placebos can cure physical ailments, imagined traumas may
be able to cure psychiatric ones if only by the contribution they make to our self-esteem once we
realize that the fault lies not with us but events beyond our control buried in a dim past. The important
thing, apparently, is not what you are and what you do but what you perceive yourself to be. The
subconscious is the biggest cop-out of the age. ¶ Which brings me to that other sacred cow of
shrinks, social workers and educators: self-esteem. Now, dear readers, even the dullest among you
will have worked out that self-esteem is a commodity in short supply with me. I once took a twelve
month course of injections from a Ceylonese doctor operating from his garage to increase the size of
my dick. At least I admit my shortcomings to others and am, albeit with an occasional outburst of
resentment, able to live with them. I can tell you its not easy writing all day cooped up in a one room
flat and then at the end of the day when she comes home from work have your wife tell you you’re a
shithead and laugh at the size of your dick. But I can take it. Even when I was at Moreland I would
rather my reports had told of my weaknesses as well as my strengths, so my parents might at least
have believed them. To this day I myself don’t know if I was quite as good a student as indicated by
the fact that I never got less than 10 out of 10 for any writing I did from form one to form four as no
one got less than 10 out of 10 for anything at my school. All in the interest of preserving a kid’s self-
esteem. My self-esteem works differently: I’d rather live with the knowledge of my abject inadequacy
than have to pretend to myself that I’m a different kind of person. Such pretence would lose me more
self-esteem than admitting I have a tiny prick. I would like to say my life is a rich tapestry and its
threads contribute to the beauty of the overall design, but I will be satisfied with the lesser
achievement of having outgrown a youthful interest in mirrors and bicycle seats. I was confused then
and totally out of touch with my own feelings. I admit that my tricks with mirrors were the actions of a
self-indulgent compensator; what do you expect from a kid who hasn’t even seen his parents’ knees.
Mea culpa. ¶ I write on these matters with the experience of someone who’s undergone every kind
of counselling there is, who’s been in half a dozen institutions, who’s been subjected to group
therapy, family therapy, assertiveness training, sex therapy, hypnotherapy, play therapy, hydro
therapy and even bibliotherapy. When I first began suffering from angophora, that is the fear of open
spaces, I also underwent a course of psychoanalysis. I did it really more from a desire to discover
my past than in the hope of curing the angophora. And I wasn’t cured. That’s why I never leave the
flat. All our shopping is done by my wife, and that includes my underwear and condoms. I can’t blame
the shrink as I never told him about the transplant; I didn’t want him to think I was crazy. To give him
his due though I did dredge up quite a bit from my sub-conscious: a lot of what I’ve told you about my
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life at home I learnt in these sessions. Huge gaps will never be filled. My shrink had never had a
patient with so little memory of his past. His conclusion was that as well as suffering from angophora
I had a severe case of Waldheimer’s Disease, that is, a selective loss of memory. But, of course, he
was not to know. ¶ I cant remember much about the night my parents learnt about my court case
and I’m very sketchy about that other fateful night, the night of the argument, when I left home.
Perhaps they were one and the same night although logic tells me that the first took place before the
transplant and the second after. It has all receded into the mists of my past. Did he throw a punch at
me or did I punch him? Did he punch my mum? Did I punch myself? Did he shoot himself through the
foot or did I shoot him through the head? Gaps and enigmas in the mists of time. Time. Who knows
what it is? Does it flow like a river or does it move in little jumps like a ticking clock? Can it be
dissected? Can it be turned back? ¶ The time when I left the house of my birth was late, close to
midnight, my midnight hour. I had nowhere to go, so soon after midnight I was knocking on the door
of Dick O’Tool’s flat. He opened the door dressed in his frilly pink pajamas with the little fur collar,
looking displeased. Stephen, a physical education teacher from Heidelberg High whom I had met
there before, came out of the bedroom. He was wearing what appeared to be an imitation sailor suit
but was really a pair of pajamas. He looked sick. Dick explained that the previous day Stephen had
found out he was AIDS positive and had come here for consolation. Which, when you come to think
of it, didn’t explain what they were doing here in the middle of the night in their pajamas. Over a cup
of coffee, a glass of port and finally, a few long drags on a bong, I explained what had happened but
didn’t tell them about the $150 I had in my pocket. I told them I wanted to go to Sydney where I had a
cousin; if I could get there. Dick rang train information and found that I would have no trouble getting
a seat the next morning. He would drive me to the station and buy me a ticket himself. I spent the
rest of the night slumped on Dick’s couch in a state somewhere between stupor and nightmare. In
the morning Dick and Stephen together drove me to the station and put me on a train. I think they
were glad to get rid of me. A new chapter in my life had begun.”). I think u will like him (20/2/08.
ddu?). 2 sgn off 4 2day here r a few werdz x Georges Luis Borges (28/3. ncidntly I may hav bn
mstkn wen I rote in 7/2/02 – 22/2/02 p 23 that havn bn a agnostk all hiz life he kceptd th last rites
in th kathlk tradtion. All w no 4 sure iz th@ shortly b4 hiz deth he spent sum time prv@ly wth a prtstnt
minstr & spr8ly wtha kathlk 1. Hiz funral on June 18, 1986 in Geneva took place @ th Protestant
Cathédral de Saint Pierre & woz knduktd x both. “Pastor Monmollin read the opening verses of
St. John’s Gospel – “In the beginning was the Word …” – and gave an address in which he observed
that “Borges was a man who had unceasingly searched for the right word, the term that would sum up the whole, the final
meaning of things,” (28/3. That seems a bit arrogant – if he found the word, he would be God – Helh&z (28/3.
@ least th term if not th werd may hav lredy bn found - E = MC²)) but man can never reach that
word by his own efforts; he is lost in a labyrinth. As St. John taught, “it is not man who discovers
the word, it is the word that comes to him.” For his part, the Catholic priest, Father Pierre Jacquet,
revealed to the congregation that when he saw Borges before he died, he had found “a
man full of love, who received from the Church the forgiveness of his sins.”” (29/3. On heern he had died Susan
Sontag rote a mpashnd ssay az a trbute in whch sh +rsd him az if ritin a letr 2 a 4mr luvr.)): “ “I
have already identified, among thousands, the nine or ten words that go well with my soul; I have already
written more than one book in order to write, who knows, just one page perhaps – the page that will justify
me, the page that only the assessing angels will maybe listen to on the day of Last Judgement.” ” &
Williamson rites kwotin him ferthr: “His “greatest literary ambition” however, was “to write a book, a
chapter, a page, a paragraph, that would be all things to all men … that would dispense with my
aversions, my preferences, my habits.” This transcendental work should also be “unfathomable
and eternal.”: it should “preserve (for me as for everyone else) a changing angle of shadow; it should
correspond in some way to the past and even to the secret future; it should not be exhausted by analysis,
it should be the rose without purpose, the Platonic, intemporal rose.” ¶ We may see in the mystical
Aleph (29/3. 1 of th •s in  th@ kntainz all •s) vision Borges was proposing to compose ….”
etc, etc. It seemz th vizion woz lso cn all th way O th uthr side of th O in Japan (29/3. Borgesz last
wife Maria Kodama woz ½ nip & he had vzitd nipn x 2 wth her & dmired th tolrnce of shinto.) whr th
rmainn mmbrz of th Shoko Asahara (mastrmind of th SARIN GAS @k & like Borges - blind; leedr iz
Fumihiro Joyu) kult (Aum Supreme Truth (pokalptk vzion of mmnnt hlkorst (Age sez Kurt
Vonnegut sed Susan Sontag sed what sh had lernt from th hlkorst woz “that 10 per cent of any
population is cruel, no matter what, and that 10 per cent is merciful, no matter w
hat, and the remaining 80 per cent could be moved in either direction” (H reknz they may b
dffrnt 10%s kkordn 2 Ostancez (it sjests a role 4 riterz (26/3. but not 4 1z like me. Mgine lngauge az a
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tree whr th lrge limbz r dskorsz & dscplinz 1 of whch iz ltr@ure (hooz smallr brnchz r genrz) & th
leevz r green wth meenn. I take the meenn out of thm & they turn brown & shrivl & fall ↓ gO whr they
swrl O in edeez in ded pokts in th sity & durin sleeplss nghts in my hed. But it haz 2 b so if new budz r
2 sprout. Lso th brnchz hav 2 b pruned.) & Im rmindd th@ Borges sed: “Dictatorships breed
oppression, dictatorships breed servility, dictatorships breed cruelty; more loathesome
still is the fact that they breed idiocy. Bellboys babbling orders, portraits of leaders,
prearranged cheers or insults, walls covered with names, unanimous ceremonies, mere
discipline usurping the place of clear thinking (25/3/05. He forgot to include flag waving, flag
holding, flag flying. In fact anything that involves flags (26/3. & all sorts of evnts kommr8n th  (27/3.
esp of soljrz)) should terrify us all . Helh&z) …. Fighting these sad monotonies is one of the
many duties of a writer.” But Im nklined 2 think th@ all ·s of vew hav their riterz @ th redy & th@
1 majr terrrst evnt in oz will swing th 80% → krulety & dikt8rshp (25/3. of th norm (26/3. Mammon & th
norm hav komn ntrsts)) (25/3. They’ve already had a practice with the Tampa, the SIEV X & the detention
(concentration) camps. Helh&z))) korzd x NUKLULR ramagedn from a @k x th US of A) since the year
2000 hav gon ndr th name - ALEPH. I m knfuzed: iz 2day th day th@ jzuz of nzarth woz in Bethany
@ th haus of Simon & a womn kame in & pord xpensv (wrth 300 silvr koins) prfume of pure nard ovr
hiz hed?
6/4/05 ( 2/4/05 – 8/4/05 (no 56)). Th • I ment 2 make but ddnt get aO 2 ystrdy wth
th diagrm: @MZ → MLKULEZ → SELZ →ORGNZ → HUMENZ → ? iz th@ if u r nklined 2 uze th
werd god (whch I m not) 2 dskribe th possblty th@ w r part (or in th prcess of bkumn part) of
sumptn gr8r than spr8 ndvdualz then it makes mor sens 2 think of him az havn @rbutes whch
r x10shnz of th HUMEN prsnalty (ie 1 hoo heerz & mite nswr like th 1 jzuz of nzarth, th pope &
th nshnt prfets mplord) than az a prncipl, or a rool, or a lor of naychr as a kemst or a fizzst
(18/4. Einstein (‘There’s a wonderful family Stein, / There’s Ep, there’s Gert, and there’s Ein. / Ep’s statues are junk, /
Gert’s poems are bunk, / And nobody understands Ein.’): “I cannot conceive of a God who rewards and
punishes his creatures, or has a will of the kind that we experience in ourselves. Neither
can I nor would I want to conceive of an individual that survives his physical death: let
feeble souls, from fear or absurd egoism, cherish such thoughts.”) mite wen thinkn O
mlkulez or sub tomik partklz tho in th ayj of 1drful teknljkl cheevmnts meny of us favor th mor
rdukshnst dfnshn …. From our possie between the Glen Roy Conservation Area and a local sand mine
(operating through the night under arc lights, with trucks coming and going) we went to Penola, past acres
of vineyards (Coonawarra), one stretch of which was flanked by about ½ k of rose bushes smothered in
bright red roses. Penola was the spot where Mother Mary McKillop (made a saint by the late pope, who
(20/4. he made so meny now they hav 2 make him 1) is already reckoned for sainthood himself) set up
her first school for the poor. In Petticoat Lane, the historic district of the town, stand the two cottages of
Christopher and Ellen Sharam, parents of 15 children and grandparents of 56. Ellen married her 30 year
old husband (21/2/08. pdfl?) at 15 and produced 4 sons by 21, at which age she was pregnant again
with her first daughter. Her last child was born when she was 41. The original cottage was built in 1850 &
the second one added next door to cope with the continuous stream of children, some or all of whom
probably attended Mother Mary’s school, built in 1857. The town was founded as a private venture by
Alexander Cameron in 1850, “the King of Penola”, and his entrepreneurship was carried forward by John
Riddoch, “the Squire of Penola” who planted the first vines in the area. By 1863 Penola boasted the second
largest library outside Adelaide. Christopher Sharam, by the way, was a bootmaker whose wares were of
such quality and workmanship that they attracted buyers as far away as Portland. His nickname was “Long
Christie”. Another resident was the Reverend Moses Gabb, who literally built the methodist church in 1908.
From Penola (coffee & paper) we headed for Robe, another historic town, this time on the limestone coast
with lovely old stone buildings. Its very quiet, as SA school holidays don’t start till Vic. ones finish. Tonight
we are at the jetty on Guichen Bay, having done a small walk around the town & Cape Dombey, where
colonies of pigeons live in the pitted limestone cliffs. We also saw a big flock of yellow tailed black
cockatoos on the drive here, as there are plenty of pine plantations in the area. Both Penola and Robe are
particularly well kept towns and Penola could well set the standard for historical preservation and
interpretation – the local information centre has a rich and extensive display. Robe has a good one, too,
which mentions (18/4. it lso sez th@ Adam Lindsay Gordon hoo had bn a plice troopr, rufrider on
pastrl st8nz, dairdvl, had 1 hors racez & woz up til then australiaz most faimus poet & hoo kmitd
suiside in Melbourne @ th ayj of 37 in 1870 had livd in th  4 9 yrz & sed th@ Robe woz “the little
town where I learned to live again”. Here iz a sampl of hiz vers (from Whisperings in the
Wattleboughs): “Oh, gaily sings the bird, and the wattleboughs are stirr’d / And rustled
by the scented breath of spring: / Oh, the dreary, wistful longing! wistful longing! / Oh,
the faces that are thronging! / Oh, the voices that are vaguely whispering!” Nuther thing it
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mnshnz iz th@ thr woz a cannery in Robe which spshlized in canned mutton, canned black swan
(Cygnus atratus) (th sOn  woz swampy) & canned parrot (Psittaci)) that some 20,000 Chinese
disembarked here and walked to the Victorian goldfields to avoid the Victorian government’s poll tax.
(16/4/05. Lucky for them there was no equivalent of Phillip Ruddock or Amanda Vanstone or they’d all be
still sitting in the holding pens on Nauru). Speaking of Chinese, John had a fillet of Red Emperor for lunch.
6/7/05 ( Melbourne → Sydney (no 60)). Ystrdi @ t H dskuvrd th ☼t had bn pord →
shoogr bowl so thr iz no shoogr in th haus. I drank most of a botl of red (Poet’s Corner). Mum sez
Matty haz brokn hiz rm & hiz grlfrnd haz panik @ks. Louis duz n dspeern akt wenvr he duznt like
sum1 whch iz ftn. I rang Egle & sh sed thei r havn a tuf time. Wr xpktd 4 dinr on frdai 6.30 (just dskvrd
th kastr shoogr lso has ☼t n it). Then rang Rasa & wr @ thr place 4 lunch @ 12 on ☼di. H rang Ben n
Ivanhoe hoo woz ← vztn Joe (30/9/05. haz n nfktd pndx) & K8i. He (25/9/05. had 13 stchz n hiz thum
n kupl of daez go ftr n ksdnt wth n bush sor wile ktn up n tree) wl giv Joe n drvn lesn on s@rdi. Larst
nite n owl hootd x3 klose 2 th haus. I ddnt rkgnize th species – srtainli not a boobook. L8r I dremt I
woz bein cheetd x a paki tradezmn – wont go in2 th dtailz of wot woz a long dreem wch I rmmbr in
nonsnskl dtail. W r → Balmain whr w wil find a vztrz parkn prmt hidn on th Garricks vranda & thn w r
→ 2 town x feri …. Epping → Balmain (pik up parkn prmt) → Darling St worf → ($10 1 wai) → Or 
(x The Age (8 pm bak @ Epping. Thr iz a ful paij rtlk O n xbshn of Diane Arbusz fotoze @ th jwsh
muzium in Melb. I red Susan Sontagz ssai on Arbus (I woz n fan) n few daze go: sh kkuzez Diane
of bein voyrstk (7/2/05 & itz ntruzif & it steelz a part of th sbjkt) but znt orl fotogrfi?)) → Sydney Dance
Co Café (red Age (Rivkin (21/9/05. c 13/9/05 p 1) got jail 4 = az Vizard got 0 & I rmmbr th@
Herscu got jail 4 = az Hinze got 0) ovr kofi) → Palisade Hotel (H drank n lmn skwsh & I had n skoonr
of James Squire Amber (grl nxt door @ Miller st in Melb iz korld Amber) Ale then it took O ½ nowr 2
get thru $1 on a pokie) → Sydney Observatory → † Sydney Harbour Bridge (8/7/05 1st time I noetst
skuriti gardz (both sidez)) → O Lavender Bay → McMahon’s Point worf 4 feri → (saved $10 x not x-in
tkt) → Thames st worf → van (chkt wth Louis th@ Egle ddnt want parkn prmt ←) → Epping (@ 5.30
mum iz bizee prpairn t (botl of red iz waitn on th tabl 4 mi 2 ↑ kork)).
13/7 /05 ( ↑North (no 61)). Toobeah (7.45) ←W → (rlong th rod nuthr Aprosmictus
erythropterus; droverz n horsbk, dogz, katl †d th rode) → St George (“inland Queensland fishing
capital”) ↑N (long Carnavon Hwy whch iz bein prmoted az th GREAT INLAND WAY goin mor or les
↑N orl th wai ← Dubbo → Cairns & Cooktown & iz th kwikst wai ← Melb → th far north tropk koast
wth n side trip 2 Carnavon Gorge throne in) → Roma (not th 1 w r → nxt yeer (c Vilnius (no. 2) p
8); had th werst hmbrgr, shopt, red ppr (Australian) wer th ditorial woz vtuper@v (but not 2 th x10t of
Beazley (30/10. hoo ksplaend ystrdae n n speech → Australian Christian (1/11 (Melbourne Cup).
““According to senior Palestinian official Nabib Shaath, George W. Bush explained the US
foreign policy in these terms when meeting Shaath and Palestinian leader Mahmoud
Abbas in 2003: “God would tell me, ‘George, go and fight those terrorists in Afghanistan.’
And I (1/11. Phillip Adams reckons that we generally lock up people who say that they did it because God
told them to) did. And then God would tell me, ‘George, go and end tyranny in Iraq! And I
did. And now, again, I feel God’s words coming to me: ‘Go get the Palestinians their state
and get the Israelis their security and get peace in the Middle East.’ And by God (2/11.
Prof. Harper (“I don’t meet many low-paid people in my line of work.”) th hed f th prpoezd nue
Fair Pay Commission lsoe haz n drkt lien judjn x hiz: “My God is a God of love. My God is a God
of fairness and justice and honesty.” – The Age (30/10. p 1,4)) I’m gonna do it.” ”” – The
Big Issue. (No 240. p7)) Lobby how “faith guided his life” – The Age (p 1, 4) hoo (1s rfrd 2
our sljrz az “b♥d mmbrz of our dfns 4sz”) korld th terrrsts “subhuman filth” (2/11. but thei (6/11.
HOMO SAPIENS (1st uezd x LcIaNrNoAlEuUsS n hiz Systema naturae). Kkordn 2
AgGiAoMrBgEiNo: ““ In a letter to a critic, Johann Georg Gmelin, who objected that in
the Systema man seemed to have been created in the image of the ape, Linnaeus
responds by offering the sense of his maxim: “And nevertheless man recognizes himself.
Perhaps I should remove those words. Yet I ask you and the entire world to show me a
generic difference between ape and man which is consistent with the principles of
natural history. I most certainly do not know of any.” The notes for a reply to another
critic, Theodor Klein, show how far Linnaeus was willing to push the irony implicit in the
formula Homo sapiens. Those who, like Klein, do not recognize themselves in the
position that the Systema has assigned to man should apply the nosce te ipsum to
themselves; in not knowing how to recognize themselves as man, they have placed
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themselves among the apes. ¶ Homo sapiens, then, is neither a clearly defined species
nor a substance; it is, rather, a machine for producing the recognition of the human. ….
It is an optical machine constructed of a series of mirrors in which man, looking at
himself, sees his own image already deformed in the features of an ape. Homo is a
constitutively “anthropomorphous” animal (that is, “resembling man”, according to the
term that Linnaeus constantly uses until the tenth edition of the Systema), who must
recognize himself in a non-man in order to be human. ¶ …. This is why at the end of the
introduction to the Systema, Linnaeus, who defined Homo as the animal that is only if it
recognizes that it is not, must put up with apes disguised as critics climbing on his
shoulders to mock him: ideoque ringentium Satyrorum cachinnos, meisque humeris
insilientium cercopithecorum exsultationes sustinui {that is why I endured the derisive
laughter of snarling satyrs and the exultation of monkeys leaping onto my shoulders}.””)
wer not prtraed like soe n Paradise Now (8/11. n wch th moest powrfl werdz wer put →2 th mowth f
th 1 hoo choez 2 b n SUISIED BOMBR (…8/11. loekl lejd wood beez rrstd 2dae (10/11. trnspairnt
leegl proessz r th nli wae f +rsn feerz n th muzlm kmnti f b-in d. Mntiem th HOTLINE z shorli runn
HOT – w need huemn skrfshl vktmz 2 feed PARANOIA))) wch I sor @ the NOVA ths rvo. C it wiel u
kan az n th neer fuechr such filmz wil b b& (3/11. Robert Burns was threatened with a charge of
sedition in 1794. He is rumoured to have “tempered his writing”, and written under assumed names as
a result of the threat. William Blake was charged with sedition in 1803 for exclaiming “damn the
King and damn his soldiers” in a heated moment (7/11. n th Tablelands Advertiser. (17/5/05) ndr n
mug shot f mi n p 5 ie sed: “…. I am against all soldiers. I don’t think people should kill
under any circumstances because war does not solve problems.” (8/11. but ie woz kort off
gard (drinkn n kerbsied latté wth H) x th rportr z iem gaenst kiln evn f wor did solv prolbmz (…8/11. tz
n startn ● (fowndaeshnl). c 30/11/04 – 9/12/04 p 1))). Daniel Defoe (Robinson Crusoe) was
imprisoned for his satire of church and state, The Shortest Way with Dissenters (170-2). Ben
Jonson was imprisoned in 1597 for sedition for writing The Isle of Dogs. In th 1660s, Moliere’s
satirical play Tartuffe was banned for sedition by Louis XIV, although the ban was later lifted.
Honore Daumier’s Gargantua, a lithograph depicting the French King as a corpulent giant
feeding upon the riches of his people, landed him in jail for six months in 1831. Robert Goldstein,
the maker of The Spirit of ’76, which depicted British atrocities in the American Revolution, was
charged under the US Sedition Act 1917 during World War I. The judge was concerned that the film
might cause Americans “to question the good faith of our ally, Great Britain.” The filmmaker
served three years in jail. (Source: Chris Connolly, law faculty, University of NSW (5/11. + Mahatma
Gandhi hoo spent yeerz n jael 4 sdshn; Joe McCarthy ternd sdshn lorz gaenst th mrikn left; it
woz 1 f th chrjz gaenst Nelson Mandela; Peter Lalor & hiz folowrz wer charjd wth sdshn & ditr f
th Ballarat Times woz fownd gilti f it 4 praezn th rvolt & spent 3 munths n przn; sdshn charjz wer
laed gaenst anti-Vietnam War dmonstraetrz n th 1960s n QLD; jeezs f Nzarth woz †d n n charj of
klaemn ♂ woz ‘King of th Juez’.)) (4/11. ‘Are we starting to censor ourselves?’ Freedom
of speech is a fundamental right which we tend not to notice until we’ve lost it. A healthy
democracy needs people who feel free to investigate, critique, satirize and mock our
politicians and their policies. A healthy democracy needs alternative opinions and films,
plays, novels and artworks that take risks and challenge the status quo. ¶ Censorship
takes many forms and self-censorship (11/11. merikn muzikian, EsAtReLvEe, rknz: “They don’t
have to censor artists nowadays, …. Artists censor themselves because they’re scared.”
F mor knsrn 4 mi z wn th lngwj f rdnri ppl n vrdae dskors → mor & mor → PL@ITUDES,
BANALITIES, INANITIES, & SIMPLFK8SHNZ ntrsprst wth th kkazional SLOGAN. (14/11 & howz ths
4 kleerli put x mienr oz ktor jeSrIeMmSy (← The Age (13/11. Sunday Life p 19): “My
professional career has taught me that everyone has the potential to be bad, cruel and
selfish. Society is the restraining paradigm. Without a good moral framework to hold us
together, mankind is a bad animal. Similarly, our capacity for good is always present.
That struggle, between angels and demons, is quite real. It is not some abstract
metaphor.”) is perhaps the most pernicious. Over the past few years both the media and
funding bodies have become more cautious; stories abound of pressure put on artform
boards and production houses not to bite the hand that feeds them, and on individuals in
the media to tone down comment or reject certain cartoons. ¶ The new measures in the
anti-terrorism laws relating to sedition as they now stand will curb artists, writers,
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filmmakers, producers, publishers and journalists. Without fair comment provisions as
safeguards (7/11. 4 ‘arts’ grueps 2 arsk 4 prvljd prvzionz wch uthrz r ksluedd from z n btrael f th riet
2 ‘free speech’ az w hav stablsht t n westrn dmokrsi (ie rkmnd Foucaultz ssae What is an
Author? 4 n dskushn f th traed-offs nvolvd). Not th@ rtsts dserv 2 b r r taekn sriusli eni mor (c
13/8/01 - 25/8/01 p 14, & 27/11/00 - 7/12/00 Tuesday 28/11/00). Kkseptans f r kmpliens wth
“fair comment provisions as safeguards” wood maek rtsts kmplsit wth fshstk lorz. What kan
b sed nli with th permshn f th st8 z not werth saein. & ie gree wth Islamic kmnti spoeksmn Keyser
Trad (The Age (6/11. p 2)) th@ famli mmbrz (& frndz etc) (8/11. & newzpprz) f eni1
‘disappeared’ (8/11. Habib?) ndr th nue ntiterrzm lorz hav n jewti (8/11. rflktn n th werd ie rialiez t
kareez mor bagj than iem prpaird 2 ksept & t rkwierz kwalfkaeshn eg. hoo m ie (9/11. c-in z ie doent
tork 2 god & m not n hed f st8) 2 pontfk8 n jewti!) 2 shout loud n long 2 eni1 & vri1 n eni & vri
street kornr O wot haz taekn plaes 4 th saek of thr ♥d 1z & 4 th saek f OZ ssieti & dmokrsi.
Freedmz r eezli lost but rtaind nli wth kurj (8/11. wch ie doent klaem 2 hav (10/11. larst niet ie
dremt thr woz n nok n th dor & wn ie oepntt ie woz rrstd x n kop n ueni4m wth n drorn pistl)).),
sedition can be made to mean whatever the government wants it to mean. ¶ The Prime
Minister declares that he doesn’t wish to silence legitimate criticism or catch writers and
artists in the net. He asks us to trust him. We need rather more than that. – Hilary
McPhee, Fitzroy n The Age (3/11. p 14)))); Roma iz korld “capital of the Western Downs”;
stubi 4 th rode) → Injune (topt ↑ wth ptrl; stubi; H took foto of pub) → Here (x th side of th rode mung
s&stone skarpmnts stil O 70kz short of th gorj; 5.45). W r bein reel 2rsts ie. travln huje dstnsz 2 a set
dstn8shn →2 whch w had 2 book ahed (← Roma) bkoz thr iz nli th kmrshl kampn  az th Parks hav
shut theirz bkoz ppl wer bringn in dogz & leevn litr etc. – kost iz $20/nite. H just red out th@ th fsh u
k@ch @ St George r Murray Cod (Maccullachella peelii) & Yellowbelly (2/11. c Melbourne →
Sydney p 10) (aka Golden perch (Macquaria ambigua)). 4got 2 mnshn w kame † our 1st botl treez
(boababz?) south of Roma whr tiz th prdmnt street tree.
20/7 /05. Mi jujmnt woz mpaird x mi 3rd (I kan heer a pokie klikn ovr bhind mi – wr@ th
Forrest Beach (8/11. ie think twoz sumwhr O heer n 97 ie met mie x2. ← GULF TRIP: “Andrew, ¶
I’ll probably beat this letter back to Melbourne but I still cant bury the encounter with my
doppelganger. I am still trying to understand why its had such an effect on me. ¶ The
romantics were infatuated with the idea and Schubert has a song in his last and most
famous lieder cycle which he wrote when he knew he was dying (at the age of 31) in
which he encounters his doppelganger who doesn’t answer him but presses on ahead of
him into the distance. The song is very dark, the idea being that you meet your ‘double’
(that’s what the word translates into) when you are in the grey, indefinable area that
separates the world of the living from the world on the ‘other side’. Pity the idea lost
popularity before the sci-fi writers came on the scene as it would have made a lot of
sense in a world of parallel universes. Every now and again due to some warp in the
fabric of time (or an excess of alcohol) the universes might get less parallel and meet for
a bit and that’s when the sci-fi hero would meet his double. ¶ What gets me about Frank
Roberts is not so much the similarity of his ideas to mine but his way of expressing them.
His gestures, his emphatic way of speaking, his tendency to search for the poetic phrase,
his readiness to acknowledge that many layers of understanding could co-exist at the
same time were uncannily familiar. There was a knowingness in the way we sized each
other up that remains unnerving. I suppose it means that by pure chance our brains
have been similarly wired because our experiences of life are not similar. He seems to
feel he has been unlucky in love, while the women in my life, particularly the women
who know me well, eg. wife, mother, daughter, (21/2/08. sstrz), have treated and continue
to treat me better than I feel I deserve. ¶ It’s a humbling experience because it suggests
that we get to where we are not by exertion but by the play of chance. I’ve suggested
anyway that most of what we perceive as struggles within ourselves about making
decisions and choices about life styles don’t really affect the outcomes (which are
determined, perhaps, by far more obscure sources too deep within ourselves to ever be
grasped) but are only about the rationalizations we intend to use to justify what we will
do anyway. (Sorry for that long sentence). And I’m old enough to have no claims to
originality in anything, either trivial or basic, having met plenty of people who’ve taken
everything further than I ever would. To meet somebody whose gestures and style mirror
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yourself is something again; but you tell me that you’ve had comparable experiences
when you visited the village your father came from in Slovakia. When alls said and done
the above considerations still don’t provide a satisfactory explanation for the eerie
feeling I’m left with. Perhaps I’ve been affected by Schubert’s song and a gothic
imagination. But I’m not normally subject to preternatural intuitions! I’m not looking
forward to the next meeting with my double because we wouldn’t have much to tell each
other. ¶ See Ya! ¶ a … z ”) Hotel 17kz out of Ingham whch I woz tort az a kid @ St Patz (24/10. c
22/11/00 – 7/12/00) iz th wetst town (12/11. maeb twoz Innisfail) in oz but th titl iz dsputed x Tully &
Babinda a bit ↑ N) stubi whch I had bort @ Clermont & ftr w setld ↓ larst nite wen it bgan 2 rain liteli
on kkazshnz I startd woriin O th rodeside kulvrt (dich) I had †d → our ● off th rode. I woz on th nside
of a slite kerv & I reelizd th@ if it raind & th dprshn fild up propr w kood b stuk 4 weeks. Wen I told H
& got out of bed & th van 2 nspkt th lie of th l& ♀ sed not 2 worri & sumwot techli “do u wont mi 2 get
out of bed?” (its pisn ↓ outside az it haz bn th ntire time sins w left Charters Towers). Wen I fnali fel
sleep I woz dreemn O orl kindz of snarioze of ngosi8n wth varius ppl in varius setnz wethr I kood b
towd out & H woz veri much in theez evnts & orl our pathlojeez wer bein plaid out in gzadjr8d 4m
ptkoriali (I wont giv n kkount) til fnali (nsidntli I herd a sharp hevi showr erlier in th nite & it trgrd
ORGASMk spazmz in mi (in mi dreem?)) I showtd out in ngr in a xmpl of sum rdkulus moshnl poschr
I m kapbl of doptn & I woke mislf up 2 th sownd of rain 4ln stedli on th roof. Th@ & th dreem knvinsd
mi wi had 2 → out of thr b4 it woz 2 l8. H woz in greemnt so @ 5.15 w ↑N (300kz) → Charters Towers
(where I rang Kate (no connection), Joe (fired from his phone job with the National Bank (last on, first off)
but OK (21/2/08. OK wth thlrst job ♂ lft 2!) with it and spending his time reading Freud and Jung (9/11. &
medt8n 45 mns/dae)), then Dan (who Joe said was back from his modelling expedition to Milan (24/10. c
10/2/05 – 18/2/05 p 4; dae b4 ystrdi got ← NZ)) who sounded chirpy and had a good time though it
was 35º every day with a couple over 40 º - he sweated profusely but got a tan. He’d seen Kate on the
weekend and she’d sold one of her pieces to someone in the LaTrobe Valley for $100 and is on antibiotics
for a further month as a result of her whooping cough/pneumonia bout. He’d also seen Ben who is OK, and
a strict teacher in the driving lesson he gave Joe (3/11. ystrdae faeld th tst @ hiz 1st @mt). Since I had
rung Michael from Emerald yesterday, that meant contact with all 5 kids has been made and there are no
dramas (cross eyes, fingers, toes while clutching wood). Charters Towers has some fine, grand old
buildings, including an impressive clock tower and a stock-exchange building (now an arcade with tea-
room and National Trust shop). Unfortunately it has awful coffee, ersatz hamburgers and lousy bread,
despite charging top dollar. As we left it started really pissing down, which forced us in the Townsville
direction as the longer journey we intended through Greenvale, The Lynd junction , Mount Garnet to
Atherton & the Tablelands was on a road with a flood warning, parts of which are single-lane, to be shared
with on-coming road trains which have right of way. That means pulling off the road to let them pass and
the rain makes that manouvre dubious, and a camping spot for the night off the road almost certainly
impossible. It pissed down all the way to here (Forrest Beach) with occasional flashes of lightning and even
heavier falls. “Sunny Queensland – beautiful one day, perfect the next”. The lady in the pub made me a
free hot coffee cos she was cold and needed one to get warm. Everyone here is talking about the rain – its
sugar cane harvesting time and it is not appreciated. Everyone we’ve met so far (rangers, information
centre staff, people on the street and in shops we’ve asked for directions/info) have been very friendly and
obliging. A young man in the pub here has bought John a 1½ nip of rum, which the coffee lady said was
“to warm your TOSSLE” (3/11. toss n. 1 an act of masturbation.-phr. 2. argue the toss , to go on arguing after a
dispute has been settled. 3. to not give a toss, to be unconcerned; not care. 4. toss of f, a (of a male) to ejaculate sperm;
have an orgasm. b. (of a male) to masturbate. c. to produce casually: to toss off a poem (5/11. H just tost 1 off: Crafty
little Johnny and spineless big Kim / Tweedledee and Tweedledim / Conspired to mug democracy and push
her off the hill / So if IR laws don’t get you ASIO surely will. // Tweedledee and Tweedledim / Dangerous
little Johnny and ineffectual big Kim / Have worked hard together to make us understand / That fear, lies
and evasions can ruin the wide brown land. (7/11. 2 mor poemz tost off n 2daez The Age p 12: “Ole
man Howard, / Dat ole man Howard, / He must know something, / He don’t say nothing, / But ole
man Howard, / He just keeps rolling along …” - Ivar Dorum, Hawthorn. & howz ths 4 n bueti:
“Jabberwocky ¶ ‘Twas chillig, / And the slimey coves conspired and swindled o’er our wage, / All
mimsy were the Beazley boys, / While Andrews-spin soiled page by page. // Beware the Jabber-John
my son! / With jaws that lie and laws that lash. / Beware the gargoyle Ruddock-hawk, / His sedition
claws your tongue will slash.”- Peter McCarthy, Mentone.)). 5. toss up , to weigh up in order to make a
decision. ¶ tosser n. a stupid or annoying person; a jerk; a wanker. ¶ tossle n. the penis. Also, tossil. [variant of
tassel]). As if it needs any more warming!) I told her I had betr waiz of getn it wormd. I hav 2 kmmnt on
th hmbrgrz I had in ROMA (c Vilnius (no. 2) p 8) & in Charters Towers az theez townz r in prize
beef kuntri (31/10. From GULF TRIP: “25.08.97 Jundah QLD. ¶ Andrew, ¶ don’t consider the
lilies of the field and the birds of the air, instead consider the bullocks of the scrub.
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That’s what I was doing last night camped a kilometer or two off the single strip of
bitumen that connects Quilpie to Windorah. The ‘three-trailer’ road trains roar east, one
after the other, late into the night. They are chock a block full of bullocks heading for the
abattoirs on the coast in Ingham, Rockhampton (etc) …. They will take a couple of days
to get there. There is no other traffic on the road as there is too much danger of hitting
animals at night, especially kangaroos, emus, pigs and free running cattle which
constitute a significant portion of the road kill here. ¶ The road journey is the middle part
of the most intense period in the bullocks lives. It starts when they are in the prime of
condition and only several years old when they are mustered in the scrub by men on
trail bikes and helicopters. Then the TERROR really begins when they are coralled in
tightly packed herds with the help of vicious cattle dogs bred for the task prior to being
loaded for their first and final journey starting on the properties scattered along the
Coopers Creek north and south of Windorah. ¶ From the first days of muster to the final
bullet or electric shock in the slaughter house takes only a few weeks yet the bullocks
live more intensely in this short time than in the entire years of their previous existence
in the scrub plains. Their lives are so full of what is new, tumultuous, and
incomprehensible that they have forgotten, by the time they are packed tight in the
trailers, that they ever had a previous life. If some faint, dreamlike memory of the scrub
surfaces at all they must believe, or we would in similar circumstances, that these
images have no connection with their lives but are an intuition (vision?) of the paradise
that awaits them. If they could communicate with each other they would tell each other
that it will be alright finally and those of them who have a clearer vision cheer the others
with descriptions of those halcyon plains. They are wrong of course for the picture they
draw is not of the future but of the past which is their own, and irretrievable. They will
not know the moment of their death as when bullocks are slaughtered it is essential that
they have no inkling of what is about to happen as otherwise they tense their muscles
and the resulting beef becomes tough permanently. ¶ The road trains cannot stop
quickly even in an emergency because sudden braking makes the trailers jack-knife,
hence the road kill. If the bullocks on the train are capable of being aware of the
occasional thud or of the others of their own species lying twisted by the roadside then
they must know, or at any rate we would, that they are in the grip of an inexorable
process. ¶ a …z”). In ROMA th ‘beef’ rsole had NO MEAT IN IT!! – it woz a bubln-skweek p@i of th
kind u x in pakts @ SUPERMARKTS. In Chartrz Towrz it kost $7.50 kkordn 2 th bord but thei took
$8.70 off mi & then I notist in smorl ritin on th bord th@ BACON woz $1.20 xtra. Wel th@s 2rst l& 4 u
but 2 top it off th so korld ‘beef’ rsole woz – maid from th veri fineli gO mins th@ iz mor like paist, iz
pale pink in kulr & probli knsists mostli of bred & taists lowzi. Top prices 4 krap kwalti iz th norm here
– xept in pubz (ovr th larst weeks I hav kwired a permnt DISPEPTK NOZE (3/11. ftr chekn n The
Shorter Oxford Dictionary tz kleer 2 mi ie nvntd th fraez zt maeks noe sens. Ie ment n prmnt
redns (21/2/08. dmnshn rftr 7 munths offth BOOZ) n & O th noez – ie ‘strorbri noez’ (12/11. H sjstd th
term but ie think ‘strorbri’ znt rfrn 2 th kulr but 2 th pitd txchr like her dad had – but ie havnt gott
yet.))). Speaking of rip-offs, there is a National Park here called “Undara Volcanic National Park, Savannah
Way, via Mt Surprise, Queensland 4871” where entrance to the park is “by guided tour only. Booking
essential.” The prices are as follows for a single adult: 2 hour lava tube tour: $37; ½ day tour: $65; full day
tour: $97; wildlife sunset tour: $39; helicopter scenic flight: $99. Accomodation (called “The Undara
Experience”) ranges from restored railway carriages: $75 per night; tent village: $18 (linen $7extra);
Wilderness Lodge: $25 (firewood $7/bundle); caravan park and camp ground: $7(firewood $7/bundle);
Safari Shelter: $9 (firewood $7/bundle). The place has been “leased” to the Collins family: “Our f am i l y
were the f i r s t wh i te se t t l e r s i n th i s p lace , back i n the 1860s . S ince then
genera t i ons have exp lo red these s t range f o rmat ions beneath the l and , now acc la im
one o f the l onges t l ava tube sys tems i n the How’s wor ldthat
. ” for a rip off/sell out combined.
Imagine Tower Hill or the Grampians or any other National Park being “privatized” like that. We pay taxes
to have National Parks in the first place and then we have to pay exorbitant prices to use them – it’s the
first such instance I’m aware of and it made me froth at the mouth! The old lady in the info centre (name
badge “Gladys”) reckons its to prevent vandalism! Wel here w r n tropkl ↑N QLD, & it haznt stopt porn
sins w startd drivin @ 5.15am. W karnt eevn eet from th bak of th van az w r lredi a bit soggi so w r O
2 → th shop 4 FISH & CHIPS & then kum bak here → pub 2 get a site 4 th van az thei own th ttacht
kravn park. (wile H woz ritin I red WrAoLbSeErRtz The Little Berliner; th newz itm n

90
shCaOpReBlYle on th big TV skreen kort th @10shn of th bar paitrnz; H iz reedn Angels and
Demons x BdRaOnWN.) In a wai th rain mai b a blessn az H kan nli hobl az ♀ kant put w8 on th 2
litl toze of her rite foot. On th wai ← Ingham → here w parst th bigst shoogr mil in th S hemiO. In QLD
thei r →2 ‘th bigst’ & ‘th longst’ & ‘th moestst’. (1/11. soe ie + n letr ie roet ← QLD stil n mie arte-
postale daez az its O – ‘th moest mportnt’. Ie kwoett n full zt ppeerd n GULF TRIP (c 13/9/05 p 1):
“24.09.97. Lil Chile ¶ What I am doing, Chile, is racking my brains and observations to work out
filosofik questions of what are THE IMPORTANT THINGS. Then I am goin all about the country
comparin the importint things in each class to themselves to find the very best. There arnt many
important things in life and if I tell you the best ones you wont need to travel as far as I have had to
find quality. Of course your dad could get them from a book or find even better ones in New York.
However here are the tentative results of my invesigashins. ¶ PUBS. Yes, little fella, the Toompine
Hotel with its contradictory juxtapsishin of small intimate bar and wide open country outside is hard to
beat. But then all the 3 Normanton ones have fabbo lounge/beer garden areas. And then I was in a
beauty at Mossman and how can you compare anifink to the one at Croydon QLD or that absolute
pearler at Babinda. These are the jewels in the crown that I is giving you. By comparison the one at
Cardwell is a bit ordinary but instead of payin $3 for a stubby of VB (Yes, chile, it far outranks 4X in
QLD) to drink at the bar you win two ways by payin $2 to take away and drinkin it on the public jetty.
And that brings me to the other of the IMPORTINT FINGS in life what I am investigatin by trapesin all
over the country: ¶ JETTIES. The one at Cardwell is good and the company at the end of it is always
stimulatin late into the night. It is a sensitive crowd there. In the windows of shops, like the one from
which I got this paper I am writin on there are signs, and in the front yards of houses too, chile, which
all say: ‘PORT HINCHINBROOK YES YES YES’. They mean the resort they is building down the
road. But the sensitive types on the jetty have a consensus of ‘NO NO NO’. They is so sensitive to
the true values of the heart in this crowd that no one catches any fish because they don’t want to be
cutting em up and, even worse, eating them dead. The germin kid who comes here every nite from 7
to 10.30 has been fishing even in Morocco and New Zealand and India and the world over and he
never catches anyfink coz he doesn’t want to hurt them . At 10.30 he picks up his rods and nets and
leaves with his bucket empty as usual. He is very talkative and like all of us probably comes here for
the company but he only gets going if you start him off. If you want to drink your stubby by yourself in
a dreamy mood he wont bother you. Ah, the lights reflektin off the water, the lovely sound of waves
lappin against the pylons, the bump of boats against each other …. And all this in a tropic nite that
gits warmer as it gets later; for, yes chile, here in Cardwell, just after sunset a little cool breeze
springs up and you is thinkin of putting on a shirt when it drops away again as it gets darker and by
the time you is back from the pub with your stubby it is warmin up again. There are jetties and jetties.
How about the one at Peach Tree in Victoria, or the little ones at Corringle, peaceful hey! Or what
about the old wharf at Normanton where the croc cruises by, or the beaut one at Port Fairy or Port
Albert! Your dad will probably burble on about the one at Palanga or the Kuršiu Marės in Lifuania but
who gives a shit about that. There are hundreds and hundreds all over down here. What about the
one at Port Germein SA. Last night at about 10 at night only the germin and me was left on the pier
and we woz not talking cause he could tell I wanted to be wid my thoughts and I was eating a
hamburger which is very juicy here so that the juice was runnin down my wrist to my elbow and from
my elbow onto my knee coz you must understand, chile, I wasn’t exercizin very good control of it coz
I was holdin a stubby in my other hand and I was thinkin, I was thinkin: ‘the world can be so beautiful
sometimes that it is too beautiful for our minds to apprehend. Too, too beautiful.’ You see I had
survived my encounter with the DECIBEL BOYS from the other night. But to tell the truth the
hamburgers at Cardwell are by no means perfect. ¶ HAMBURGERS. And I don’t mean the good folk
deutche of HAMBURG in uber alles. I travel the length and breadth of the land seeking the perfect
one. The ones at Cardwell are higher than they are in diameter. They think they impress you with that
but from me they get demerits. The perfect hamburger must have a SUBSTANTIALLY greater
diameter, lil Rudi, than it is high. Otherwise you practically dislokate your jaw as you try to get a bite
on it and the filling squeezes out of the sides unevenly and dribbles down your wrist to your elbow
and then your knee and people look at you strangely when they see you lickin your knee. I know,
chile. The perfect hamburger is made from buns that have a bit of texture, not the soft, sugary, cakey
type of thing you get in McDonalds or in packets of 6 in supermarkets sold as ‘hamburger buns’. They
must be toasted on the insides. Some places these days are cheetin to save time by just warmin
them in a microwave. And chile, never never put cheese or beetroot (3/11/05. or pienapl) in one but
put a lot of fried onion; and the salad of course. Ya don’t want heaps of juice that runs onto the plate
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like soup and you hav ta drink it up. But you do want enough juice to make your fingers greezy – the
good kind of juice what comes off the fried onion and slightly crisped bacon. And I mean bacon, not
that crappy manufactured stuff that is often substituted and they is lieingly callin ‘ham’. If the diameter
is very wide all the better, the one at Babinda was as wide as a plate but still not too high to wrap
your jaws over it. It cost $3.70 and was bigger than two ordinary ones in Melbourne which sets a
benchmark for price, a critical factor. No perfikt hamburger should cost more; the one at Quilpie was
$3.50. I know that your dad will say that he can get one at the Clide or the Prince of Wales or
whatever that pub is called, for 1½ c with a pot of beer thrown in and save enough money, if he eats
enough of em, to buy more real estate (22/2/08. bort rv l& @Wonboyn Lake lrst y), but that’s
crap. He has soled his sole to the devil. The cheap jobs are wafer thin and they have nothin inside
except insipid shit, and they have no texture neither and above all they is eatin in the wrong spirit. For
to have a really great one it is not just the thing itself but the subtil newancy things around it that
make the difference between perfikt and also ran. … Chile, I can imagine us one day eatin a perfikt
hamburger (maybe at Quilpie) after a few stubbies that we drank all arvo at the perfikt pub (maybe at
Toompine) sittin on the perfikt pier (probably at Port Germein) and we is havin an conversation
(maybe about THE IMPORTANT FINGS): ¶ “You forgot to mention the meat but I already know you
will be sayin it must be good quality juicy real beef mince not them round disks from packets”. “Pass
me another stubby and screw the lid off, them stars look great when youse is lying flat on your back
like this. Like they is dancing to the musik of the water lappin against the boats and they is shimmerin
and wiggling and then all you see is sort of blurry becoz the musik is all over”. “That’s because your
eyes are shut”. “ Oh, yair, better pour it in to me mouth as I’m talkin, otherwise its hard to handle in
this posishin”. “So you reckon it’s the newancy things around the edges.” “Yair, like the way at
Quilpie the woman smiles at you when she gives ya the burger. Just because she can see that you is
not like her hubby and you wouldn’t break her jaw again becoz she was feelin too tired to screw on
cue”. “That’s almost like sayin it’s the journey and not the destination.” “Be careful when you pour, I
don’t want ya to get me in the eye again like ya did the last time.” “That wasn’t me, that was Danny,
and he didn’t get ya in the eye, ya got it in the nostrils.” “Ah yair I remember now. He’s always doin
things like that he’s so agitatid.” “Or its like sayin its not the peak of the mountain that counts but gittin
there.” “Or not gettin there, but how you don’t. When I shut it at the end of the word stop pourin will
ya, your gettin it all over me face.” “Not the four points, not the getting into the grand final, but the way
ya bomb out. Talk slower and open your mouth more.” “It’s the style that counts. Bow out with style.
Ya reckon Pete polishes it or it shines like that naturally?” “It’s the operashin, hes been like that ever
since. Having to keep it secret from the parints is what broke his spirit.” “They know he’s bald, mate.”
“No, no, I mean Danny. His parints wouldn’t be able to handle it. They is littleaneans. “ “And they go
on visits to Lifuania”. “Tough double.” “Or do ya reckon Vamzdys shines it up for him when they go
surfin. With that stuff they youse on the boards. Missed again.” “Dubbin.” “In the end its not what but
how.” “Yair, but what if ya bomb out without style. Disgracefully?” “That’s a tough one.” “Fits most of
us, but what if ya bomb out, without style, and ya got no money?” “We talkin about the same
person?” “Maybe it gets shiny from rubbin against the wall or the top of his bed when hes asleep.
Vamzdys and him aint talkin ya know.” “Don’t have to just to give his nut the occasional buff and
polish." “Hardly anyone in the littleanian kommunity talks to each other.” “Theyre not missin nuffin.”
“Faustas talks in littleanean”. “Same thing.” “He frew away his mind in lifuania.” “Sounds like the title
of a song, what is it, yair: Don’t cry for me Argentina.” “Frew it a long way. Coz theres no evidence of
it left.” “Listen Prof. Im gunna solve your problem. Don’t pour on the konsonints, just on the vowels,
you got me in the ear that time.” “Do ya reckon Ruke would sign a cheque for us not to catch fish on
jetties? He’s the treasurer.” “And he’s kind, he wouldn’t hurt a fish.” “Ive seen him eatin them, with us
in Tassie.” “He doesn’t have to while he’s signin the cheque though. Then we could go all over the
country testin out jetties to see which is the most perfikt for not catchin fish.” “Or maybe its vitamins
that get him that way.” “Not enough of em.” “What do ya mean?” “Make him so agitatid. Cause he
was like that already before the op.” “I mean vitamins that make Pete’s head so shiny.” “Or not
enough of them that makes you know who so dum.” “Probly the combination.” “They never made you
a prof for nuffink.” “You earn all ya get, mate, fillin out forms, applikashins.” “Suppose ya even worked
out how to make this a tax deduktion.” “They don’t pay me fer nuffin.” “Why ya stopt pourin?” “Ya
finished yours.” “Give me one of yours. Pay ya back tomorrow.” “Which pier?” “Cardwell.” “Im out
anyway.” “That finishes the lesson then.” “What was the topik?” “HOW NOT TO POUR BEER.” “No,
no, no, no it wasn’t I remember it was all bout: DA IMPORTINT FIN(G)S IN LIFE.” “Same fin(g).” ¶
a…z”)
92
 (21/2/08. Completion of Wednesdays from folder 6 (nos 52 – 61 of anthology))

27/7 /05 ( Tropika - 1 (no 62)). (9.05am) Ystrdi H torkt 2 K8 (n mbilez) n West Melb
(Miller st) hoo sez ♀ haz nuthr 3 weeks n ntibiotks. Larst nite w wer maizd 2 find our 1 st ● kkupide x n
old VW hipitipe van so w → 2 th 2nd ● w had sust out. T shoze thr r thrz hoo prowl O dtrmnd 2 do thr
own thing & rtain prvasi & n 6 life. Iv thortv sum mor ntrprt8shnzv mi dreem O getn mroond out n th
oepn oeshn wth H. I gnor th bvius freudian H2O nlsis z my nli noljv mthd kumz ← Foucaultz
kkountv klaskl Greek kmntri. Praps th dreem z n rfrns 2 mine & Hz ‘folie-à-deux’. (Distinctly unhealthy
– are you saying that for the last 40 years we have been mutually mad (14/12. Fkors, & owtv tutch wth
rialti!)? Sounds about right – otherwise how have we put up with each other?) Mor n KOKONUTZ: th 1 w
opnd ystrdi wch stil had 2 smorl green p@chz @ th ndz woz th taistiest so far (& thei r orl taisti) wth
th thikst flesh. Mi 1st drink 4 th dai z th milk ← nut. Twoz nli th 2 nd 1 so far wch ddnt hav th pingpong
(betr dskrpshn thn ‘golf O’ koz tz so lite) O bit n th midl wch wv lernt z korld UTO n th iel&z & z fed 2
nfnts x th naitvz z tz so nuetrrshuz. I like em 2 bkozv th kraktrstk sweetns & txchr. Thr absns prbli
ndk8s ths NUT woz NFERTILE. I stil havnt fownd out f thr wer eni KOKONUTZ heer wen th 1 st setlrz
kame - no1 seemz 2 no. Ritn n ‘early birds coffee shop’ gain …. 2dai w fownd th jwl n th krownv th
beechzv th Mission Beach : tz Garner’s Beach n kupl kz ↑Nv Bingil Bay. W wont getn betr xmplvn
tropkl beech vrhung x huje calophyllum treez etc. Teevn hadn stark naekd ♀ sunbaithr & n naikd old
♂ hoom H sed ♀ ddnt c but hoo woz a horbl site ♀ sed. H lso sor n Ulysses butrfli wch z larj & safire
blu. Bestv orl w foundn perlrvn ● neer-x 2 park 4 th nite ftr mie x2 RUMNKOKES & Hz 1 KAFE & 1
RUMNKOKE wch ♀ dskvrd ystrdi z priti nise. Th Bicton Hill → haz sum sperb lookouts & Iv gotn good
sietnv n Emerald Ground-Dove (Chalcophaps indica). N th wai 2 th Lacey Creek → O 3kz b4
reechnt w pulld ↑ nxt2n Cassowary (Casuarius casuarius) hoo ddnt ppeer 2b much knsernd x us
but → 4st wr twoz 2 dark 4 mi 2 getn good foto. N th Lacey Creek → I gotn xlnt vuev n Noisy Pitta
(Pitta versicolor). Twoz our 1st klowdls dai n th TROPKL KOAST.
3/8/05. Ella Bay → The Locality of the Coconuts (wash etc @ th beechside toilt blok) →
Innisfail (x2 shot l@é, kpootcheeno, red ppr, spansh makarl 4 mi & chikn wingz 4 H) → Josephine
Falls (ndr Mt Bartle Frere (1622m) QLDz hghst (Mt Bartle Frere experiences 250 days of rain out of 365;
the average rainfall is between 5 & 8 metres; the creeks and rivers in the area have extremely high water
quality)) → Babinda Boulders (5kz westv Babinda (“Town of Umbrellas”)) → Murdering Point (so
called because in the 1870s small vessels used to put in at King Reef, where an aborigine called Dungaree
killed and partially ate 4 crewmen off various boats over a period of a few years. Apparently the coastal
tribes here were quite hostile and aggressive to what appeared to them to be invaders. Dungaree was
eventually speared fatally by a member of the Burdekin tribe.) Tropical Fruit Wines (wer w bort n lgnt
LYCHEE wine 4 $20) → Paradise Wines @ Mission Beach (wer H bort mi n botlv ‘Tropical Red
(Christmas)’ 4 $28 4 mi berthdi (w r drinknt hedv shjewl) wchz dskribedz: “Combining the rich red colour
and aromatic plummy melon tones of the Dragon Fruit with Red Mango and Banana captures the essences of an Australian
Tropical Christmas. The delicate indulgence of vanilla oak in this velvety-smooth dessert styled wine will give the drinker the
fantasies of a rich Tropical Christmas all year round”; bhind th wineri thrzn larj tri loded ↓ wth kmuenl nstsv th
Metallic Starling (Aplonis metallica) 2 wch th berdz kame bak nfue daze go) → El Arish (ndr
suspshn) → Silkwood (hazn kasl) → Japoonvale (thrzn bute FREE kownsl karvn park n th
Livingstone Creek) → Mena Creek (maijr 2rst @rakshn (so w ddnt go) ‘Paronella Park’ zneer x) →
South Johnstone (shoogr train trak down midlv main rode) → Innisfail → The Coconuts (wer w had t)
→ here. N4tuen@li jewrn th vri butefl drive ← Silkwood → South Johnstone t raind th ntire wai so w
wer not aibl 2 taik full dvantjvt wch I found dprsn. Th rainz getn 2 mi & w wer 1drn how much longr b4
w r 4st off th TROPK KOAST. Normli th wintr wthr heerz just rite but 2dai n kuplv loekls sjstd ths yeer
kood kntnue 2b n xpshn. Wots th usev bn n th TROPKS f u kant drink yor DRAGON FRUIT wine n n
mpti beech n th MOONLITE?
10/8 /05 ( Tropika - 2 (no 63)). A quiet night. After ablutions (total immersion for him, a
wash for me, and teeth cleaning for both) we set off for the Atherton Tablelands. First stop was Kuranda
“the village in the rainforest”, filled to the brim with tourists (lots of Japanese) meandering through the
extensive retail centre where everything from local honey to coin purses made of cane toads or kangaroo
scrotums were being flogged. (6/12/08. the following poem was written on 11/8/05 (see Thursday) but
has been included here because it refers to our visit to Kuranda.)

At Kuranda
buses from Cairns
spill out germans, japanese,
93
 dutch and english
to invade
the town’s markets and eating houses
haggling over cane toad skin purses
kangaroo scrotum coin pouches
crocodile hide wallets
eating MacDonalds and Kentucky Fried
walking the rainforest
cameras at the ready.
They don’t notice the sunbird
flashing gold onto the tables
for the crumbs;
they have gone back to high rise hotels
in the evening
when the aborigines drift like smoke
onto the grass
to claim the night

It was fun in a ‘buzzy’, trashy way and we spent the whole day there, doing a walk which took us through a
conservation park, along the Barron River above the falls and through a much degraded ‘jungle’ full of
lawyer vine with fewer large trees and much less variety than we experienced in the Daintree. Tonight we
are at the Speewah NP ($8) in a great camp-site (only about 8 spaces in total) which is quiet and private.
We had considered going on the Skyrail, a cable car which runs above the forest down the side of the
plateau for a 2½ hour return trip, but it cost $52 p.p. so we thought better of it. We have seen magnificent
tropical forest of all kinds on the trip already and think that the best experiences come unplanned in some
quiet spot where people are generally in short supply – that’s when the local fauna tend to pop up
unexpectedly. The tourist beat took us to the Barron Falls lookout – an impressive drop and magnificent
exposed rock walls, but a tiny trickle of water was a little surprising seeing as all the postcards we’ve seen
on the way show a mighty curtain covering the width of the valley. Dunno when they took that. It feels
better here on the plateau because there seem to be more choices of roads. The whole Wet Tropical Coast
felt like a huge funnel channelling everyone into its narrow strip by the complete absence of any
subsidiary roads going away from the coast. It felt a bit like a drag strip and it certainly made finding spots
for the night difficult. Victoria may be cold but it does have a terrific minor road network. H 4got 2 mnshn
tz K8s brthdae 2dae. Mie bigst xietmnt @Kuranda (19/1. c kuvr map ↓) wozth sietv npairv Yellow-
bellied Sunbirds (Nectarina jugularis) flien ndrth eevzvn kafé not nliek sparoez doo nMelbourne. Lso
sevrl sietnzv Ulysses (azuer) & Cairns Birdwing (mrald) butrfliez kntrbewtd2th xotk feelvth plaes. Th
nue berdz ie sornth →s wr n ♀ Victoria’s Riflebird (Ptiloris victoriae) &n Grey-headed Robin
(Paecilodryas albispecularis) wch hav simlr habts 2th Yellow Robins ue get ↓S. Thrr mor shops
seln junk → 2rsts nKuranda than nth Rocks v Sydney but w ddnt perchz 1 ietm. Hwvr thrz 1 plaes
wch givz wae FREE m@rial – litrchr nth BAHAI rljn. Thei bleev The Báb (d. 1844) & Bahá’u’lláh (d
1863) wr th l8st nth lienv dvien MSNJRZ r ♂FSTAESHNZ (20/1. Manifest , a. late ME. [ad. L. manifestus,
earlier manufestus, ? f. manus hand + *festus struck, f. root found in offendere, defendere. Thus primarily ‘palpable’.] 1.
Evident to the eye, mind, or judgement; obvious. †2. Having evident signs of; evidently possessed of or guilty of. [Consist.
after L.] –1725 1. That the works of God should be made m. in him John ix. 3. 2. Calisto there stood m. of shame DRYDEN. Hence
Ma •nifest•ly adv., •ness. ¶ Ma nifest , v. late ME. [ad. F. manifester, or L. manifestare, f. manifestus (see prec.).] 1. trans. To
make evident to the eye or the mind; to show plainly. b. Of things: To be evidence of, prove 1508. †2. To clear up (a matter)
–1669. 3. a. To display (a quality, condition, feeling, etc.); to reveal the presence of, evince 1567. b. refl. Of a thing: To
reveal itself as existing or operative 1808. 4. To record in a ship’s manifest 1541. 5. Intr. To make a public expression of
opinion 1898. 6 . Spiritualism. Of a ghost (refl. or intr.): To reveal its presence, appear 1858. 7. Hist. In Spanish law, to
protect by a MANIFESTATION (sense 4) 1818. 1. [He] manifested forth his glory John ii. 11. b. Thy Life did m,. thou lou’dst me not
SHAKS. 3.b . No tendency, in general to dysentery, manifested itself at this time 1808. ) startn wth: Krishna (Hindu), Moses
(Jewish), Zoroaster (Zoroastrian), Gautama Buddha (Buddhist), Jesus Christ (Christian) &
Muhammad (Islamic). Ie havn leeflt tietld The Rumor of Christ’s Return sjstn th@ twoz
Bahá’u’lláh. Th jntl♂ hoo gaevusth ritn m@rial gaev suprt2th iedia x kwoetnn boodist pasj whr ♂
sedth nxt reenkrnaeshn wood taek plais b4 1st August 1943 (trnzl8d ← hindu kalndr). Thr teechnz (:
=tiv th 6z; harmniv siens & rljn; noe preests r rchual; th klaem thr r noe reel dffrnsz btween th maejr
rljnz etc) seemd mnntli kseptbl zowtliendn What is th Bahá’í Faith? (Bahá’í Publishing Trust.
Johannesburg. At one time published in Zimbabwe. First edition published by the
National Spiritual Assembly of Bahá’ís of South Africa (Incorporated Association not for
Gain) in 1978. Gwynne Plaka Press. 5 Hopkins St. Salt River, Cape Town ISBN
1919864253) ntil ie got2 p13 whrt sez: “The use of beer, wine and other alcoholic beverages
and intoxicating drinks is strictly forbidden by Bahá’u’lláh, for, the Bahá’í teachings
94
explain alcohol ‘is the cause of chronic diseases, weakeneth the nerves and consumeth
the mind’”. Wch puts paed2 mi hoepsv findnn spritchl hoem nth faethvth Bahá’í. But kum2 thinkvt,
ie hav nevr lookt4 strnthn numbrz (kmuentiv wershp) thrwiez ie woodntb rietn (1/2. abc suep? werd
stue? (4/2. but miemum hooz 85 sez ♀ werktowt orlv Tropika – 1) nkiendv klrdj? (4/2. “The job of a
citizen is to keep his mouth open.” – Gunther Grass)) zie doo. Correction - Kate’s birthday is
Friday 12/8.
Wn zdae (25/2. Wednesday [OE. Wódnes daeg ‘day of (the god) Woden’, tr. late L. Mercurii dies ‘day of
Mercury’. N.E.D.] The fourth day of the week. Also attrib. b. In names of certain days of the ecclesiastical calendar, as ASH
WEDNESDAY. Also Good W., Holy W., Spy W. (Anglo-Ir.), the W. before Easter.) 17/8/05 ( Savannah (no
64)).
Normanton (vrj daeli sumr max - 35º C & thrzn shortjv shaed treez; doo not drink nth PURPLE PUB
ztzn IKON 4 th GREY NOMADZ owt 2 find kloezure x drievn riet O OZ & maenli 2rsts drink thr
bignoetn thmslvz (18/2. let’s make a pact not to bash the buggers (25/2. Bugg er . ME. [a. F. bougre:- L.
Bulgarus Bulgarian, heretic, usurer.] 1. A heretic: used esp of the Albigenses. (Hist.) 2. One who commits buggery; a
sodomite. In decent use only as a legal term. 1555 b. A coarse term of abuse; also, in Eng dial and in U.S., = ‘chap’,
‘customer’, etc. Hence Bu •gger v. to commit buggery with. Also absol. ¶ Bu ggery . ME. [f as prec.] †a. Abominable
heresy. b. Sodomy. Now only as a technical term in criminal law.) any more – we are all tourists once we step
outside our own suburb (19/2. mea culpa, mea culpa, mea maxima culpa!)); doo not ▲ nth karvn 
(xpt wen wet) z thrz nlimtd ●s → thNorman rvr nth Karumba siedvth brj; thr wozn Black-necked Stork
AKA Jabiru AKA Ephippiorhynchus asiaticus neer whr w wer & n wild Brolga AKA Grus
rubicundus & tz maet wer vztn th nfo ◘ ← faemus ‘Gulflander’ traen taeks 2rsts n n 50k O trip 4 $40
eech paedn $$$) … → 70kz NW → Karumba & Karumba Beach (th 3 THINGZ u must doo wen u
kum heer r: 1) eet prornz (w duntn n Karumba Kafé wch lso maeksn gr8 x2 shot l@é (18/2.The young
waiter (German tourist doing a long working holiday) was wearing a T-shirt which at first glance looked like
one advertising Alitalia (20/2. best wishz2 &drea & Barbara proud pairntsvn nue Leonardo) ai-rlines,
whose motto is “You’re safe in our hands”. On closer inspection, the brand had been changed to Genitalia
with the accompanying motto underneath.) 2) eet npeesv BARRAMUNDI wch ie wil soon do ← th
saem shop (@ Karumba Beach (17/2. ← GULF TRIP ( nthljin 13/9/05): “30.08.97. QLD ¶ IN
KARUMBA there is a tropical beach with jabiru, brolgas, and pelicans that you can watch from the
beer garden of the pub but you cant swim in because there are many nasty things in it besides
krokodills. ¶ IN KARUMBA I saw two men with plastic legs but I didn’t ask them what happened as I
knew what they would say. ¶ IN KARUMBA there is a shop which claims to sell the best fish and
chips in all of Australia. I said they were pitting themselves against the Greeks of Melbourne so they
gave me a very big serve with a huge fillet of barramundi and it was very nice. ¶ IN KARUMBA I
walked to the end of the beach where the mangroves start and there was an old man there sitting on
a cane chair starkers with his knees spread wide apart. I looked between his legs because past
experience has taught me that it makes naked people cross their legs (girls faster) but he won. He
was a hard core nudist. He was doing a cryptic crossword. He was good at it. ¶ IN KARUMBA I
walked back along the beach to where the steps take you up into the beer garden overlooking the
sea and watched the sunset with the jabiru, the brolgas and the pelicans. Then I had a couple more
stubbies. ¶ a …z”) ie bort npees 6 (11/2. 8) yrz goe); & 3) havn beer @ ☼↓ @th ☼↓Hotel (but iev lredi
td & tz nli mdrvoe) vrlookn THE GULF OF CARPENTARIA; roetn kard 2 SA&NrIeGwA (18/2. 1
‘The Teacher’ priez nth fakuelti 4 2005 (25/2. iel pootn mie 2bobzwrth wth ♂z postgrad klars (MA
vrktkchrn l&zkaepn) nn fue weeks & wil dstrbuet nkopiv Savannah → eech)); H hazn mesj ← K8
wshn mi nHAPPY BIRTHDAY; nth wae heer w sor 00zv Brolgas & sum Sarus kraenz n poolz (&
padks) nxt2th roed; Hz reedn th ♀’z Day.) … Th ☼z ↓n oevr th GULF. Radjah Shelduck (Tadorna
radjah race: rufitergum) r siftn thrue thtiedl mud; tzth 1st tiem iev n th speesz. H washt her h&z nth
H2Ovth GULF (26/2. →(no 1) p 9). Wr O 2 → pub 2 pae homj 2 th ☼↓.
24/8 /05 ( Outback (no 65)). Ftr brkfst w → kreekbed & rj 4 nkuplv owrz. H dspuetd m
 klaem th@ th rabz & uthr muzlmz (how thei must dspz us (12/3. ← The Age (Extra Letters)
p 16: “The PM’s little helper ¶ If taking Terry Lane at face value, one would have to
assume he wets himself when confronted by a hirstute bloke wearing sunnies (‘Hidden
unease staring us in the face’, 5/3); though it may be that , for Lane’s fusiform gyrus,
only women should be plain to see. ¶ It is a bit rich for him to tell reclusive Muhammadan
chicks what’s normal. Their men may be sexist but is Lane’s female utopia the answer to
95
their woes? ¶ After all, he comes from a culture in which: ▪ Adult women shave
themselves raw (to avoid being ostracized) in a vain attempt to make themselves look
nubile (12/3. Tropika – 1 p 14). ▪ Medical science has come up with ways in which
women can inject into their faces, as a “beauty therapy”, the agent that causes
botulism. ▪ Prostitutes routinely dress up as schoolgirls to turn on the punters. ▪ Typing
“teen sluts” into Google gets you 19.8 million hits. ▪ And pensioners are knocked from
their wheelchairs and raped. ¶ I don’t think Western capitalists are holy enough to
lecture Muslims on women’s rights. ¶ Maybe its time Lane admitted how much he has in
common with the Man of Steel. Like race, gender and class. One wonders if either of
these characters cross the cerebral Rubicon. ¶ A.E.O’BRIEN ¶ No fixed address, no
phone”)) woodv 4gvn us fowr moetvz 2 nvaed rark (23/3. ← The Age (21/3) (Extra Letters) p 9:
“J’accuse ¶ With its mealy-mouthed mea culpa of sorts (Editorial, 20/3), The Age still
fails to face up to the fundamental flaw of the arguments for the invasion of Iraq. That
they were all bull is only the beginning of the story. The real story is that The Age – and
most of the media – didn’t bloody ask anyone, didn’t probe, didn’t ask for proof of all
these “weapons of mass destruction”. ¶ The Age should come clean and apologise on
bended knee not only to the Iraqi people for all the unnecessary death, destruction and
misery they have suffered, but to the Australian people for supporting the re-election of
the lying bastard who got us into this mess. ¶ Marilyn Shepherd, Kensington, SA.”
(but ← The Age (dtorial 22/3) p 12: “American poet Robert Frost said that if society fitted
you comfortably enough, you called it freedom. Perhaps then this is the evolution of the
political and social cycle. We, the voters, in our economic comfort zones, believe we
have freedom enough. To speak out now is often mislabelled dissent, and dissent has
come to be a perjorative term. Democracy, and society, needs a plurality of opinion. It
starts with an individual voice.”) had bn jnuen (ie 2 free thm ← Saddam). ♀rknz thei woodntv
bkoz th chn west had nvae Oi muzlm sts. ♀maeb rt but wr not jnuenli chn eethr wch mudeez
th H2Oz. W hadn vri good stnvn Mistletoe (Dicaeum hirundinaceum) buttwoz thd Bowerz
(Chlamydera maculata) wch ntrstd mi moest. Ystrdae w had dstrbd nowletntjar (Aegotheles
cristatus) nn kreekbed. W wer nth roed nbit ftr 11. NBoulia w rplnsht suplz &  (nth pub) & d z.
Nth  → MAX (c/o cheef lbairian, n dsp@ch @th St8Lbrv Vic)  xd th@ thvlue ue plaesnn
oethvloilti (muzlm klrks wr dishnm owt ystrdi) zmzuerd x wot ue swairon. But  ddnt x th@ wot ue
swairon bkumz subsjri2 wotvr ue plj yor loilti 2. Wchz y  kood nvr swair loilti 2n st8 rkuntri
nn lk th bbl rtorah rkoran f wozn rljs persn.  sjstd2 H  mt swair x m prm mnstr
John Winston HoWARd (coWARd) but ♂ zn lr ♀ sed wchz wot  t. Lso  koodnt swair
loilti x r 2 australia rAyerz Rok etc z doent pae homj 2 nanm8 bjkts.  feel mor rspkt & loilti 4n
GOOD ARAB rn GOOD MUZLM than4n BAD KARMON OZZI KARMON. &  fnd eevn nvri good
ozzi hoo SKRUEZ RABTS nSydney (23/3. r 90 yold ♀z wth ltzmrz nnersn z n Melbourne) hli
SUSS.  rspkt & hnr good pplv orl naeshnz & kreedz soe m naebl2 plj loilti 2n prtklr gruep.
Thmuzlm mullahz maedn mstaek nmaeknth pljz, x doont thei kseptd thmpld kuezaeshn th@
thei needd 2 & spsshliaz twoz nli thoez hoo wer lrdi noen 2b loil th@ hadbn nvtd 2th meetn.
Thr wozn far gr8r need4 HoWARd 2b maekn such pljz ztz heehoo haz maed us n 4 thxtrmsts &
trrrsts x hchn us (wthowt db8 thoe l8r ndorst x thvoetrz) 2 US geopoltkl aemz wthowt UN ndorst.
Ftr n thz w →↓S 100kz & r t nkupl 00yrdz offthroed wch → sville but w ntnd2  @
Bedourie →W → Windorah. Orl longthwae wv bn in Brolgaz, Bustardz, & kaezionl eemuez nkluedn
O hwhr wv t 4 thnt nth oepn . Thr wr lso swormzv flz & now mozzeez. Threeznz th@ thoe
tznotz lushz O Winton theiv had  h2 thzr tinjd green &th H2O Ozr full. n 2 thsubjktv loilti
oeths.  spoezt orl td wth thROEZ hoo uezd2 maek juez & chnz plj lleejns  THMPIER & 
ZR (KAISER, TSAR). Tzn nkronzm wch cheevz noe uesfl perpz. Tnkurjz lin & punshzth onst dsntr.
Tz perpus z2 dvd 2  grueps soe thmjorti haz sum1 2 vktmz (thrzn yernn 4 lv skrfsz
(23/3. Sacrifice , sb. ME. [a. F., ad. L. sacrificium, f. sacrificus SACRIFIC a.] 1. Primarily, the slaughter of an animal as
an offering to God or a deity. Hence, the surrender to God or a deity, for the purpose of propitiation or homage, of some
object of possession. Also fig. the offering of prayer, thanks-giving, penitence, submission, etc. 2. That which is offered in
sacrifice; a victim immolated on the altar; anything offered to God or a deity as an act of propitiation or homage ME. 3.
Theol. The offering of Christ of himself to the Father as a propitiatory victim in his voluntary immolation upon the cross; the
Crucifixion in its sacrificial character. late ME. b. Applied to the Eucharistic celebration regarded as a propitiatory offering
96
of the body and blood of Christ in perpetual memory of the sacrifice offered by him in his crucifixion 1504. 4. The
destruction or surrender of something valued or desired for the sake of something having a higher or more pressing claim;
the loss entailed by devotion to some other interest; also, the thing so devoted or surrendered 1592. b. A victim; one
sacrificed to the will of another; also, a person or thing that falls into the power of an enemy or destructive agency. Now
rare. 1697. 5. A loss incurred in selling something below its value for the sake of getting rid of it 1844. ¶ 1. Divines divide
Sacrifices into bloody, such as those of the old law; and bloodless, such as those of the new law 1727. 2. Make of your
Prayers one sweet S. SHAKS. 3. b. He exhorteth the people to flee from the accustomed sacrifices of the masse 1560.
4. As rich shall Romeo by his Lady ly, Poore sacrifices to our enmity SHAKS. Phr. The great, last, or supreme, s., death for
one’s country in war.)). Twl  thowtraejv onst muzlmz & maekt eezier 2fnd rkroots 4 xtrmst korzz
(13/3. tz zfth powrz2b krtli yern4n trrrst n). Twil  thlklhoodvn TERRORST EVNT nOz. 
gree w shood giv2 kzr wotz kzrz but doent 4gt th@ hee klaemz oenrv th O O & wenn st8 
FASHST twl notb s@sfd tlt oenz yor  & thortz. Butthrz 0 hoep (13/3. but maeb thrz sum jjn x
thgzampl ← The Age p 7: “A British SAS soldier has refused to fight in Iraq and has left
the army over the “illegal” tactics of US troops and the policies of coalition forces. ¶ He
said he had witnessed “dozens of illegal acts” by US troops, claiming they viewed all
Iraqis as “untermenchen” – the Nazi term for races regarded as sub-human. ¶ The
decision sets a remarkable precedent, marking the first time a Special Air Service soldier
has refused to go into combat and quit on moral grounds. ¶ It immediately brought an
end to Mr Griffin’s exemplary, eight-year career, in which he also served with the
Parachute Regiment in Northern Ireland, Macedonia and Afghanistan. But it will also
embarrass the British Government and have a potentially profound impact on the cases
of other soldiers who have refused to fight. On Wednesday, the pre-trial hearing will
begin into the court martial of Flight-Lieutenant Malcolm Kendall-Smith, a Royal Air Force
doctor who has refused to return to Iraq for a third tour of duty on the grounds that the
war is illegal. ¶ Mr Griffin’s allegations came as British Foreign Office Minister Kim
Howells, visiting Basra on Saturday, admitted that Iraq was now “a mess”. ¶ Mr Griffin,
28, who spent two years with the SAS, said the American military’s “gung-ho and trigger-
happy mentality” and tactics had completely undermined any chance of winning the
hearts and minds of the Iraqi population. He said many innocent civilians were arrested
in night raids and interrogated by American soldiers, imprisoned in the notorious Abu
Ghraib prison or handed over to Iraqi authorities and probably tortured. ¶ Mr Griffin told
SAS commanders at the regiment’s base in Hereford, England, that he could not take
part in a war that he regarded as illegal. He now believed that Prime Minister Tony Blair
and the British Government had repeatedly lied over the war’s conduct. ¶ “I did not join
the British Army to conduct American foreign policy”, he said. He expected to be labelled
a coward and to face a court martial and imprisonment. ¶ Instead, he was discharged
with a testimonial describing him as a “balanced, honest, loyal and determined
individual” who has “the courage of his convictions.” TELEGRAPH.”). Thrzn SIMBIOSIS
btween thoez mzrbl mijts (Stalin, Hitler, Napoleon wr nli nsmijn buv 5foot) hoo kraev powr & th frtnd
chldrn nkshus 2givt2 em. KRAEVN 4 POWR x F = ASTROF (22/3. “Prophesying
catastrophe (23/3. Catastroph e. 1579. [a. Gr. καταστροφή, f. καταστρέφειν.] 1. The change which produces the
final event of a dramatic piece; the dénouement. 2. ‘A final event; a conclusion generally unhappy’ (J.); overthrow, ruin
1601. 3. An event producing a subversion of the order or system of things 1696. esp. in Geol. A sudden and violent
physical change, such as an upheaval, depression, etc. (See CATACLYSM, CATASTROPHISM.) 1832. 4. A sudden
disaster. (Used very loosely.) 1748. 2. The late war, and its horrid c. MARVELL. Used joc. in 2 Hen.IV, II.i.66. Hence
Catastro •phic , -a l a. of the nature of, belonging to, a c.; -ly adv.) (24/3. nakhba) is incredibly banal. The
more original move is to assume that it has already occurred.” – Jean Baudrillard).
Tknot b voi.
31/8 /05 ( Wingdings (no 66)). m nn bitvn ↓r. Just wn w had wrkt owtn good tinri 4
thlrst 2 wksvth trp thpoptopz gon bung. Twont ↑ bkoz thskruez hinjn thmknzm hv popt owt. Wr ½
nowrz drv E ← Moree nxt 2 n w4kz off thhwae. W wr → Iluka nth N koestv NSW. Theez
poptops rnli nstorld nth big  & rkwr spshlst nlj. Propr funkshnnvth poptop &th taelg8 r2 ssnshl rkw
rtsv owr kndv ▲n. Soe hz nsumrv wotz bkum thlrst daevth holdae propr. Thsmornn owr
♀/♂ woz ♪♪♫♪d x nPd Butcher (Cracticus nigrogularis) 4 th2nd (1/4. ↑N p 3) nthtrp (& 
kn hsvrl now @ 5.15 pm h). Thn w → 4n rli mornn soek nth hot H2O (41.5° C) vthrtzian bor wch
97
splz Rj. W wr thr @ 7.30 & shairdth H2O (ftr thkmpulsri shwr) wth O 8 uthr  sumvhoom 
talian, sum chk, but w  nglsh. Thrr 7000  @ Rj thchk  us. Wmaev staedn nbit 2long zwn H
→ 4 ♀ showr ftrwdz ♀ nli faentd & koodnt st& ↑ 4 th1st 10 mnuets thn ♀ woz soe dsornt8d ♀ 4got 2
taekoff ♀r lthr s&lz nth showr. ♀ ← lookn nbit won but OK (31/3/06. I’ve never felt so awful – I think my
core temperature was way too high). Thn w → O thoepl deelrz n @ thr wairz not n10dn 2 x nthn but w
kaem † sum cheep kntaenrzv oepl chips wch wood maek deel prznts (lauktuvės) 4 rloez shood 
→ lthol& (1/4. Melbourne → Kaunas; ŠIAULIAI; Vilnius 1; Vilnius (no. 2); → (no 1); → (no
2); Vilnius → Melbourne) @ thndv fbueri (1/4. nstd m goen 20 mae → 16 rgst).  bort 10 tmz
4 $140. L8r w  2nuthr deelr hoo dd ♀r bst 2  mi owtv →. ♀  twoodb 2kold & thfood 2greezi & 
woz 2old & thei woodnt lk m oepl (1/4. no 4 nthnthlji ( 13/9/05 p 1): “ OP AL ¶ A long time
ago, up north, where its always dry and they mine opal a bloke passing through stopped in at a pub.
The pub was quiet as he entered. There were a few dusty drinkers sitting at the bar and the only
noise was the dull thud of a soft break at the pool table and the slow beat of the rusty fan which cut
the air into chunks. The bloke walked up to the bar but there was no barman behind it. He glanced
around and although the old Aboriginal fella was sitting perfectly still on his stool he seemed to
explode into the man’s field of vision. The old fella wasn’t drinking. There was a cigarette burning
between his fingers but he wasn’t smoking either. ‘G’day’, said the man in an easy drawl. ‘How ya
doing mate’, replied the old Aboriginal fella. ‘You look to me like a fella whose looking for some work’.
The man stopped and thought. He noticed that as the fan beat it whistled softly. He felt sweat on the
back of his neck. ‘Maybe I am mate. Maybe I am.’ He hadnt been but he thought what the hell I
need something to fill my days. The old Aboriginal fella spoke confidently. ‘Ah well, just so happens
that I’m looking to pass on a little stake I got, a little piece of land that I reckons got opal in it. You
know I’m getting too old to be digging holes.’ Although the man’s face remained calm inside his chest
his heart was beating faster and his mind was racing with the possibilities. Opal. Opal. He could get
rich, these Aboriginal fellas they know what they’re talking about. ‘How much?’ he said in a shrewd,
business like manner which belied his excitement for his decision was already made. ‘Hundred dollars
mate’, said the old Aboriginal fella with the burning cigarette which he never smoked. ‘You’re on
mate. You are bloody on’, shouted the man and threw a hundred dollar note onto the bar. His life
savings. All the money he owned in the world. ‘You got a deed?’ The old Aboriginal fella looked at
him, ‘Na, I’ll tell you where to go’. The man was taken aback somewhat. He noticed that there was
no buzzing of flies in this pub. He felt the sweat running down his ribcage. ‘Where is it then?’ The old
Aboriginal fella shifted his body ever so slightly. ‘Right, ya know that ridge that seems to jump up
from the land like it shouldn’t about twenty ks that way.’ He spat his finger out in the direction he
meant. ‘I know where you mean mate, that hill was mined years ago’ said the man sharply with a
hint of suspicion in his voice. ‘Yeah, you go up to the top of that ridge and you look beyond it.’ The
man’s face was drenched in disbelief. ‘All that’s over that hill is the bloody desert mate.’ The old
Aboriginal fella leaned a bit closer to him. The man felt the air move. Whoever was playing pool had
now stopped playing pool. ‘When you’re on top of that ridge look real hard and in the distance you’ll
see a little bit of green. That little bit of green is a great, big, strong peppercorn tree that’s always
full of life. Then you look beyond the tree and a bit further ahead there’s an old, dried up creek bed.
That old creek bed has never had water in it and it never will. That old creek bed it was even dry in
the dreamtime. Between the big, strong, green peppercorn tree that’s always full of life and the old
creek bed which will never flow with water, that’s my land, that’s where I staked my claim.’ The man
looked into the old Aboriginal fella’s eyes, they were the haze of the ancient and they laughed softly,
softly yet ecstatically. The man turned and walked quickly out of the pub. He stode across to his
banged up old car. He grabbed his short handled shovel from the back and threw it in the front with
him. The sky was a lucid, pale blue. The sun shone so hard it could not be seen and was an
iridescent light. He drove along a dusty road to the foot of the ridge, swung on a back pack with a
few necessities in it and with shovel in hand set off for the ridge. He saw a big snake which slithered
away when it spotted him. A shingleback lizard shuffled backwards out of his path. He climbed the
hill avoiding the old shafts that littered the area and sweat ran down his face as he looked out over
the ridge and saw an immense, flat, arid land. Far away a speck of green sharpened his focus and he
took a bearing with his compass and set off down the other side of the hill. He spotted a mouse
which was so quick that it vanished as soon as he saw it and could only ever have been a memory.
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High above he noticed an eagle, a black speck circling miles up until it went so high that he lost it in
the blue. He walked for hours, shovel in hand, until he spotted the peppercorn tree which grew
bigger and bigger as he came closer and closer. Finally, aching, he stood under its huge drooping
branches in the shade of the thick green foliage which hung down to the ground. He pushed through
to the other side. Back in the sun now he saw the dry creek bed. All that was in the creek bed was
dust. He stood between the tree and the creek bed and he looked out across the huge dry land. He
slipped his back pack off his shoulders and it fell to the ground. He pushed the shovel into the earth
and felt the sun hot upon his back as he began to dig. It was not long until he had dug out a rock
which he rolled out of the hole before sitting himself down on the parched soil. With the flat of the
shovel he belted the rock and it split into two pieces which fell away like the shell of an egg revealing
a dirty black sphere. The man picked the sphere up and it fitted well in his cupped hands. As he spat
on it and started rubbing it he thought that yes, it is perfectly round, like a crystal ball. As he rubbed
the sphere and old dirt began to shift he detected some colour. He rubbed the sphere harder and it
seemed to him as if he was rubbing colour into it. Or was he rubbing dirt off to reveal what was
already there? Either way his hands were turning black. He continued mesmerised as if in meditation
until he realised that all the dirt was gone. His hands were black like the hands of the old Aboriginal
fella at the bar and what he held in them was a ball of pure swirling colour into which he gazed. He
was gazing at the essence of life as it spun so many beautiful shades upon each other. He saw the
sun, he saw the blue sky, he saw the green tree, he saw the brown earth, he saw the pink sunset, he
saw all colour at its point of birth. He saw it all. The sphere rolled out of his hands back into the hole.
He sighed wearily, stood up and pushed the earth back, burying the sphere. He threw on his back
pack. He picked up his shovel. He began the walk back to his car. ¶ Ben Zizys”. (2/4. ♂ ntrdt →2n
shrtstri komp nThe Age nth y2000) ( 21/3/05 – 25/3/05 p 14 re Borgesz ALEPH (“1 of th ●s
in th  th@ kntainz all ●s” (but kkordn 2 umbEeCrOto ← on literature (Vintage 2006) p 21:
“The first Aleph appears in the final canto of the Paradiso, where Dante sees (and, as far
as he can, makes us see) “bound with love in a single volume whatever is spread
throughout the universe, substances and accidents and their behaviour, almost fused
together …” (Par. 33. 88-89). In describing “the universal form of this bond”, with “mind
suspended and inadequate language,” in “that clear subsistence,” Dante sees three
circles of three colours …”)))) prznts z♀ had fowndowt wn ♀ had → yugoslavia wn ♀r pairnts wr 
n. ♀ wozv serb bakgO  rkn & thrzn serb rthdox  nth . ♀ hadsum sperb spsmnzv m@rx oepl 1v
wch  woz tmptd2 x eevn @ $50/@. Fnli w → & hw r & 2moroe w hav O ½ owr ← Moree b4
↓S → Dubbo & → Melbourne. Oyair, v kopt 2chips nth wnskreen soefr, 1v thm 2dae. Vrthn hzn ↑s
d but – thsl saev H O 2wks wrthv jrnl nzv tpn.
7/9/05. From Perch Hole to Laurieton. Walked along the breakwater where we saw a Darter
with a fish it had speared dragging it across a flat stone repeatedly as if removing scales or spines before
he swallowed it whole. To Forster-Tuncurry where we had fish from a coop on the Tuncurry side (flathead for
him: large, fresh and well cooked, mullet and two potato cakes for me, likewise – probably our final fish
meal this trip) and then wandered along the water side watching some quite large blackfish in the marina.
Garlic bread and a drink overlooking a branch of the Manning river in the sun, quietly relaxed. Now at
Smith’s Lake in our usual spot (nth Frothy Coffee Shop).
(21/2/08. Completion of Wednesdays from folder 7 (nos. 62 – 66 of anthology))

24/5 /06 ( Litho Trip 2 (on CD ttld: ALL THAT WAS ALL THAT WILL BE)). 6.50am. M rt
knee woz aekn whn  woek↑ wchz nndkaeshn  shood walk less & spnd mor sitnn kaféz. v
orlsoe dvlptd 2 nue worts (23/2/08. nth lrst wkv 2007 orl me worts shrvld↑ nd) wch rub chuthr
nneighborn big toezv mi rt foot. Hadn showr, washt mi ndrpants & soks & hung thm on th hot wortr
pps 2 dr nth bthroom. Tz luxuri not2 b shairn toilt & bthroom.  hav no dowt  gotit bkoz m
nthnk litho. Th ♀♀ @ rspshn orl speek rus, polski & litho but th 1 thr ystrdae woz n ‘reel’ litho.  told
♀r  woz bornn Kaunas & th@ m old  rjinaets ← Ukmergė rjion (♀ had rkst) & had bn nofsr nth
lithol& 4s. Trblzm z4 reel heer. 1v th bloeks ie torkt 2 ystrdae had trd2 tern th knvrsaeshn → ‘
ishue’ but  sed it woznt sumptn  felt noljbl O. Th ?v kmpnsaeshn klaemz zr sleepr. Ray sed no1 z
prpaird 2 dvlp prm reelst8 O th stv th 4mr gr& SINAGOG nkaesv subskwnt klaemz.  think th
litho guvt shood rbldt 2 its 4mr glori zn rmndrv wot haz bn lost. Z4 th broadr ishuev kmpnsaeshn
thei shood look @ uthr rlvrnt gzampls (taekn n2 kkount fnanshl st8sv orl parteez) eg. US/red
99
indianz; germny/; OZ/borjneez (John woent say SORRY (23/2/08. Kevin dt but  no $$) nkaest
kosts); zrael/plastinianz; terki/rmeenianz. Whr on th skael wood th lithoez lk2 plaes thmslvz mung
th@ lot?  hav had m sae & n10d 2 void th issue zmuchz posbl …. Red th maen rtklzn issue no 9.
Twood hav bn betrf theez 2 ISSUEZ hadnt been nxt 2 chuthr so thr wood not b nhint (evn nspoekn)
vkwivalens.  lwaez fnd akowntsvth Siberian xpeerians partklarly ntrsting & thrtkl x Ray v♂z
‘gr&muthrz’ xpeeriansz woz speshli good. What thei r achieving wth ths magazine on what is no
doubt a shoestring budjet is extreemly impressiv. Cant t getn nuff Oaeshn 2 servve but ….
31/5 /06. Hrz nuthr samplv Pessoa: “48 [103] Knowing how easily even th
smallest things torture me, I deliberately avoid contact with them. A cloud passing in
front of the sun is enough to make me suffer, how then should I not suffer in the
darkness of the endlessly overcast sky of my own life? ¶ My isolation is not a search for
happiness, which I do not have the heart to win, nor for peace, which one finds only
when it will never more be lost; what I seek is sleep, extinction, a small surrender. ¶ To
me the four walls of my miserable room are both prison cell and far horizon, both bed
and coffin. My happiest hours are those in which I think nothing, want nothing, when I do
not even dream, but lose myself in some spurious vegetable torpor, moss growing on
the surface of life. Without a trace of bitterness I savour my absurd awareness of being
nothing, a mere foretaste of death and extinction. ¶ I never had anyone I could call
‘Master’. No Christ died for me. No Buddha showed me the right path. In the depths of
my dreams no Apollo or Athena appeared to me to enlighten my soul.” (8/7/06. Poor Pessoa,
poor you.) …. Spnt moestv thdae →n & mtrd & footsor. (7.55pm). Nth mornn 1drd O nth  † thbrj
nrthwrdz. Sum z th4st looks soe butefl  feelzf m drinkntn. Thwild strorbreez rbgnn 2flowr.
Thbluebreez kuvr th4st flor wth vvd green. Sum lupins rlrdi 4mn flowrbudz. How  wsh  kood →
thru r4st wn theirn bloom. Herd kookooz boeth nth mornn & rvo. Hadn huej servv Žemaitiško bulvinio
blyno wchz npotaetoe pankaek thsiezvn medium pizza wth n laeyrv meetnth midl. Nreel rtri klogr. Nxt
l getr ½ porshn. N ♂ s@↓ nxt2 mi hoo wozn zraeli. ♂z langwjz wr heebrw & rus & mn nglsh &
litho soe w had2 tork nnglsh. ♂ lft rusia 25 yz goe but uezd 2kum h nholdaez vri y wn ♂ wozn
kid. ♂ sed zrael woz4 juez & whr thrr arbz tz daenjrus. ♂ wozn nroom @ 20Lt/nt found x nfrndv ♂z
hoo lso put ♂m n2th BEBENČIUKAS. ♂ lkd vrithn O Druskininkai. Vri dae ♂ hadn msarj @ 29Lt.
♂z louzi nglsh ddnt stop us getn nwel & w partd x shaekn h&z zfrndz. Nth rvoe  →d ↓S long thbO
trak → Švendubre wchz nklaskl smorl vilj wth naroe streets oevrhung wth branchs, dogz, chooks, &
flowrgardns, & frm shedz maed from intrlokt split logz.  torkt 2 nman hooz wf had dd 3
weeksgoe & hoo koodnt 4giv th guvrmnt 4 maekn ♂m povrti strkn. ♂z jor kwvrd z♂ spoek &  thort
♂ mt strt2 kr. (8/7/06. Over his lost wife or his lost money? I guess it’s a fortunate man that has a rich
wife.) Thrr plnti mor lk ♂m nth viljz. Nth wae bak  met thzraeli gain. ♂ wozn nbO ♂ hd hrd.
Thr woz nhuej man wth ♂m bilt lkn bair hoo  think maehvbn ♂z mndr z♂ woz srprzd  woz
→n nm own. W torkt 4 kwt nwl hardli ndrst&n nithn w sed 2chuthr. N Švendubrė thr wr nstn
Baltasis gandras (Ciconia ciconia) & nth Nemunas ie sor wt swonz (Gulbės) &n Pilkoji Gervė
(Grus grus) flue x. Twozth 1st iev nGerve wchz thtorlst bird nlithoel& & nrltvv th Brolga (Grus
rubicundus) & th Sarus Crane (Grus antigne) nOZ.  kaem bak nlongr wae than  needd2 soe
norl twoz O 13kz. Sorn d †n throed. 4 t 8 kabj roelz nth tni kavine nth staeshn & 500v b 4
7.50Lt.
7/6/06. Mslaenia: →2 Labanoras 2 th♪♫; stood torkn2 PzEeLnUoRnKaIsS nth ejvth vilj.
♂ sez DEbVaElIyKsIS znbtvn lad & ndrnkr & haz nwf n Utena, thoe ♂ livz wthn ♀ h. ♂ d 2n wl
looktftr  & sed nlithoe ← OZ had owndt b4 ♂  & leftn good nhritns 2th reloez. ♂z naem woz
kVaAjSaItUoLnIaSs. ♂  maenli old ♀♀ liv hnow & whn thei  spklaetrz x↑ thr ; ftr n th & x-
n ntorch  hdn bwth silke 4 9Lt @th hoetl/rstront; chktowt Labanoras laek 2th eestvth vilj; →d nOr
wae x kumpus → Seriediškis tmnt soez 2b bak b4 Rasa hoo sed ♀ mt vzt @ 6pm n♀r wae 2fch
Rokas ← th;  woz wairn nlthoe rmi jakt  fownd nth  bkoz  wontd 2looklk nloekl (but
Rasa sez ♀r frndz @ th lredi wr saen thei had n mi b4 nVilnius) & z woz →n thrue th 4st  flt l
kn PARTIZANAS (PzEeLnUoRnKaIsS sed mniov thyung ♂♂ vth vilj d juern thprtzn wor); sor hoof
prntsv dfrnt sz d & gO wch woz dug↑ x wld bor; sor npairv Kranklys (Corvus corax) from
kloes↑ & rd thr korlz; th4st offtrak woz maeznli buetfl; Rasa brort kaek & nchkn kasroel rapt nn rug
2keept warm but  hd lrdi eetn.  told ♀r ♀ woz aktn lk ♀r mum z doent need 2b pamprd lk
soe zm kaepblv looknftr mslf (15/7/06. But you lap it up). W rraenjd 4♀r & Rokas 2maeb kum
100
n☼di whn  kan uez ♀r moebl 2 O th .  gaev ♀r nlauktuve voeplchipz nn vlv H2O
(23/2/08. 31/8/05 ); thstoevz heetn↑ & throomz 1drfli warm; larst nt  lft thdor oepn soez not2
run shortv O2; Rasa sez thold ♀ hoouezt 2liv h sed sum z noe1 kaem x 4 munthz nnd & nth larst
3 daez Rasaz thnli1 hooz kumlong throed; drnkn nbotlv BALTIJOS (švyturys) & norn nnPLEKŠNE;
Rasa brort npairv thk sox nkaes  koodnt gt npair nth stor nLabanoras soe  kood → ngumboots ftz
wt; tz 9.50pm, stil plntiov lt owtsd & m snnoff.
14/6 /06. Lae nbed 4 nlong ½ sleep nrflktv moed kspt  woz freevthort. Uezueli @ sum
• nnrflks akshn  throeff thblankt & get owtv bed nn sngl nvoluentri moov: nsted  s@ nthj vth 
wth mi hed nmi . Thn  chkt th●s whr  had puldoff 2mor  larst nt wch  had dskuvrd ftr
getn →2 . 1 woz buvth bakv thnee whr  koodnt t prpli & hd trubl pulntoff wth blunt fngrnaelz. 
lak thflxblti 2 ternO & eevn m fngrz rgetn klumzi. Thuthr woz nth fruntvth th & vri smorl, n1 vth rli
staejz ( think thOZ 1z hv 5 molts) vn  lf.  n10d 2void beevrz hns4th (8.45) … Lft @ 10am
woz ← @ 5.30: woz thnkn O thklaem n☼dae O how th vUkmergė (komnst prti thr woz lmoest
ksluezvli sh (mn & Vaidasz nklz mae hvbn thkspshnz wch proovd thruel) kkordn2 Eidintas) hd
cheerd thMoltov/Rbntrop treeti. Th litvaks probli hd noe nklnvth merdrus aejold f & lowthn thnlookn
lthoez hld 4 thr nue kom/rus leedrz & thlthoez 2ths dae doent seem 2noe th@th litvaks wr cheern4
thrlvz zthei lredi nue wot woz hapnn 2th  ndr Hitler fromth rfuejeez fludn →2 Vilnius & Kaunas;
→d 2th tipvth Šmykštakulys pnnshuelr 2th • from whr Vytenis mustv d owt †th froezn laek (Aesetas)
from whr  kood thsmorl s&i swimn ● ♂ woz he4. F♂ hd bn wairn ♂z skeez ♂ probli woodntv ↓
but 4 sum stranj nnoen reezn ♂ woz kariin m; sorn Uldukas (Columba oenas), Didysis genys
(Dendrocopos major), Juodoji meleta (Dryocopos martius); hd nswim nth nudi n1vth mni buetfl
kkssz 2th laek wch  nspktd & wn  woz drien off dskuvrd nuthr vri tni  (ie 5 norl) nmi leg; →2
Labanoras whr  paed x2 4n meelv ptaetoe pankaeks wthn 500ml b (toetl: 10.50Lt (ie $A5.25)) &
red thppr (Lietuvos Rytas) wch sez th ☼i wthr zkntnuen; bort 2 500ml botlzv b & nuthr paktv
SMOEKT PIGZ ; → h marvln @ how frst th luepnz rberstn →2 bloom; berst nhumdngrvn blstrr
wthth spshl litl   bort 4thprpos nDruskininkai; 4got 2 mnshn ystrdi  bort npaktv SMOEKT CHKN
NKS wch rlsoe mnt4 norn wn ue drink b; eechvtheez sumr eevnnz v s@ @ thtaebl owtsd
thbak dor wotchn th☼ setn oevr lush feeldz (no kowz r horsz 2graezm) & nglktd grdn.  drnk nleetrv
b wth th & neks etc mids thbuznv flz, beez, bumblbeez, dragnflz, mozzeez, wosps. 2nt
 ♪s th d&dilnz hv stopt bloomn & th grdn zfulv puff borlz (23/2/08. Monday 19/6/06).
21/6 /06. m trd ftr nful dae nthroed nVaido r@sht  nn hot sumr daev O 29º. Hz
nbair owtln: Rimeisiai → Lyduokiai from whr  took nshortkut † feeldz (via Butkiškiai) → Nuotekai
(mnuemnt 2 th1945-1950 prtzn wor) → Ukmerge (500vb& nmeelv cepelinai) → vljv Žeimiai (whr 
met URBjOaNrAoVnIiČmIaENE hoo livz nth prprti nkst dor 2 whr m gr&prnts (frthrz pairnts) livd &
hoo rmmbrz th b4t bernd↓ n1957; ♀r mum ŽmIoŽnYiTkĖa (b.1920) nue Juorzas & Felicia ŽIŽIAI
wl; Monika took mi 2 thst nli 150 yrdzwae, vth  &  stood nth rmaenz vth fowndaeshnz; ♀ dowt
sumvth rjnl treez nkluedn nlrj oak wch woz plantd x m frthrz bruthr Juozas & wch znow nthr prprti;
♀ sed m frthr hd nrpuetaeshn 4 b-n sum & ♀ sed ♂ uezt2 oevr ♂z pairnts  & drop paktsv
sigrets @cht 2waets 4 ♂z dad Juozas; ♀ gaev mi thmoebl no & +rs v♀r bruthr KArSoEmLaIsS
nKaunas hoohz aksst thplees flz wch giv thdtaelz vw thei wr dklaird LIAUDĖS PRIEŠAI (nmeez
vth ) & lsoe vth chrjz gaenst m frthrz bruthr Juozas & ♂z wf 4 wch thei wr → SIBERIA, howvr
m kuzn Juozas nŠiauliai hzbn nkontkt wth ♂m soe m shor ♂ lredi hz thnfoe (23/2/08. Juozaz 
me l8r th@ ♂ hdnt d v♂m); uthr mmbrz vth ŽIŽYS klan wr hasld x thNKVD 2; th hoo DOBD m
gr&pairnts →2 thNKVD (♀ uezd thwerd STRIBAI (23/2/08. Friday 18/6/04) soe thei kood
taekoevr th wr thSADZEVIČIAI hoo thn livd nth tilt bernt↓; thn ♀ took mi 2th v ŽmIoŽnIiEkNaE
(b. 1925) hoo not nli rmbrz m frthr & ♂z bruthrz & dptd sstr Jadze but livd nthr  4 4yz; Monika
(muthrv aŽlIbŽeYrStas hoom  met 2 yzgoe (23/2/08. Monday 28/6/04)) knfrmd th@ m fthr
woz noen4 ♂z looks wch ♀ sed ♂ got from ♂z mum (Felicija) hoo woz knsdrd ngr8 bueti n♀r yooth;
♀ lsoe told thstori O ♂m dropn thsigrets ↓ & sed Felicija uezt2 hd nth nkaes ♀ got hit; thprprti
woz fnli divdd btween m 4 kuznz hoo hv nvr fltt nssri 2tl mi & m sstrs (Rasa & Egle) Ot prhps
bkoz whd = klaems 2t (fthei hd tolds w woodnt hv maed klaemz bkoz owr pairnts wrnt ntrstd nmaekn
thlvz vowr poorr rl@vz hardr); ŽmIoŽnIiEkNaĖ hd lsoe vztd m gr&mthr Felicija nKaunas (23/2/08.
Sunday 30/5/04) ftr Juozas (livd →2 ♂z 80s long ftr ♂ hd lost kntrlv ♂z bladr) hd d; ♀ gaev mi
nfotoev m kuzn Juozas (hoom l meet l8r nth trip) & ♂z bruthr zyoothz; ♀ sed thrjnl vilj hd 14 z
not 4r5 zm muthr rmmbrz; thn  wnt & hd nb @ th br @cht2 thvilj shop (thrz lwaez nbr nkst 2
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thvilj shops) whr thvilj drunks 1td 2show mi O & taek mi 2 mor rl@vz & rkst mi f woznt skaird vb-n
roeld → Ukmerge (whr 1vth brz zkorld KARČIAMA (thold lthoe werd) nstedvth uezuel BARAS; whr
grfeeti nn worl sjsts 2 mi th@ ŠERNYS zth ppsitv GAIDYS (23/2/08. Tuesday 23/5/06); whr 
got sltli boosht) → † Pivonijos Šilas (whr thbaes m fthr woz@ juern th1st dportaeshn woz; w hv
3 fotoez nowr lbum taekn nth 4st; whr thrzn mnmnt korld ‘Hitlerizmo AUKU KAPINĖS’ 4wch  ddnt
thsn & wch prbli mrks th● whr th vUkmergė wr taekn 2b shot) → Antankalnis III (whr  hd
nuthr b& torkt 2 nloekl 4 ½ nhowrrsoe: ♂ hz nrl@v hoo kaem ← Canberra ngoodoel OZ 2 liv
nPanevežys but duznt lkt koz tz 2kold nwntr & tmaeks ♂m sik; 3 famleez vjp z moovdn nygoe
→2 drlkt soviet a bildnz wth thprmshnv thloekl guvmnt thorti; thr loekl lthoe jp z & kn tork lthoe but
mung thmslvz thei speek nli jpoe;  sor sumvm & thr kidz look vri cheeki & kuet & wn  gaev m
mti botl 2th bloek  woz torkn2 1vthm sn@chtt from ♂m 2 taektn 2 kash) → Mėgučiai (thrue nmnr
4st trak; bort strorbreez (lredi eetnm) x throedsd) → Rimeisiai @ 6pm (hd lft @ 9am)). Hd nwosh
nth vri kold Šešuola. Tz 9.45pm. Drinkn Švyturys BALTIJOS Tamsusis alus. Alk 6.0 Proc..
28/6 /06. Hd m 1st lowzi nt vthtrip (31/7/06. You were having withdrawal symptoms – no
warm harmonious family bosom to bask in). Ftr b-n droptoff x thz (goen → Preila (nth Couronian
(NERINGA) spit))  → long LAISVĖS ALĖJA → ROTUŠĖS AIKŠTE & thr woz hrdli ni1 nth streets
thoeth kafez wr fulv ♀/♂z.  dtktd noe snz vproegrs nth lrst 2 yz. Bort nsmorl b 4 6Lt – nrkord.
Thbildnz wch wr derlkt 2 yzgo stilr. Windoez rbor↑. SOnz look shabi & trd. M room @th hoetl
faesz nkort & laenz wr lrj rubsh skips get dumt & pikt↑ juern thnt.  hadn kool showr but soon
woz swetn niwae. Rlier  had wosht m shortsleev shert (thhoetl chrjz 15Lt 2 woshn shert & 8Lt
fthei rnt) & hd 2 wr thlongsleev shert nth →. Thr wr orl kndzv noisz nth pasjwae nkluedn wot 
thort woz n brkn but  spoez th@ woz from owtsd. Nsdntli  koodnt wosh thshert propli koz
thplug duznt fit thplug O nth baesn. Wn thH2O runz ↓th baesn plugO tgerglz↑ from thshowr baesn
plugO @ gO lvl butt seemz drtier.  koodnt hang thshert nth GIVATUKAS (23/2/08. htd S-shapd p
pz nth bath worl) 2drie bkozt woz soe hot  thortt mt get bernt. Wn  hungt nth showr roezet tfl↓
n2 thdrti H2O nth showr baesn soe  hd2 wosht gaen. Thnoizz juern thnt wr soe lowd  hd
2kloez thwndoe. Th m@rs nth  sloeps sdwaez whr ppl hv s@ nt &t nt b ternd oevr bkoz tz
t@cht 2th baesvth. Sum1 d m room x mstaek @ 7am & wn  nsrd hloe sed ksuexmi nnglsh &
hung↑.  hv tn & paed↑ (70Lt/nt zkumpaird2 55Lt/nt 2yz goe) 4 x2 nts z wontt 2b shorvn
 2 O H hooz bak ← Cairnz 2nt (30/6/06. Ah, Cairns – the mountains framing Trinity estuary , the
Tablelands looming and green, ibis roosting in the coconut palms, the walk along the esplanade in the
balmy evening air, beautiful young men playing soccer in the park – a feast for the eye and spirit. How I
wish I was there.)).  need 2hv n vaelbl 4 ♀r 2 O bak2. Ystrdai  rkst @ nns lookn hoetl nx
how much thei chrjd & thyung ♀ @ rspshn lookt@mi skornfli & sed 360Lt/nt! (23/2/08. 2y l8r
me & H wr pan €55 (165Lt)/nt 4 rdubl nVenezia)  hv bagz ndr m  & m2trd2  … Vztd
RUeDgZiLdNiSjKuAsS n♂z stuedio nZamenhofo g. (23/2/08. Friday 4/6/04). ♂z → nkonfrns 4
nweek 2 wot uezt2b nnoeblmnz sst8 @ Žemaitkiemis (not 2b knfuezd wth thvlj  roed th thrue n
Rimeisiai) & sjstd  goe thr but  rfuezd koz  hd rraenjd 2meet VALEeVgIlČeIENE & ♀r frthr, m
kuzn, jŽuIoŽzYaSs @ ♀r plaes nAleksoto brj nth SENAMIESTIS (old town) @ 6pm. ←2 m swet
 @ thMETROPOLIS x 2pm 2 O H nMelbourne (@ 9pm). ♀z hdn gr8 holdae nCairnz & from wot ♀
sed  rkn dv ♥dt2. Vri1 zOK thoe Ben hz straend nankl doon ♂z YOGA ksrszz. Joe hz srvvd
♂z 3munth prbaeshnri peeriod & gotn salri↑ (23/2/08. got thsak & z studin kmpartv rljnz). Thbig nuezz
Elytė zprgnnt wch meenz mum wilbkum ngr8gr&muthr. Dan gaev mi thfooti nuez but wthowt dtael z♂
mist thMelbourne m@ch koz ♂ hd njob nBankok & ♂ mist thSydney gaem koz ♂ woz nnjob
nShanghai. Thbair ssnshlz r thDEMONs beet thPIES & thPIES beet thSWANS. Thladr: 1. EAGLS 2.
CROWS 3. PIES 4.DOGS 5. DEMONS. Mi & H torkt 4 O nhowr &  told ♀r Oth  strk zv bn
teln vri1. F♀ woz hwth mi now d stae nKaunas (31/7/06. What an enormous spoke I’d be in your
wheel – you’d be reduced to being a tourist (23/2/08. see Tuesday 20/6/00). You couldn’t nestle in the
bosom of the Birds family or enjoy the flattering company of young women while I was around . The die
was cast on your first trip and the second has reinforced the first in making it impossible for us to travel
there together except in the most superficial way.) but v dsdd 2 hitthroed 2moroe. Wn  kort↑ wth
Egle & Juozas twoz bvius twoznt thrt 4m. Juozas znth prosess vshiftn ← Šiauliai → Kaunas &
Egle hd2 taek ndortr v♀rz → thport 2 → 2 ngl& 2spnd 2munths werkn nn foodpakn faktri. Lithoe
skool kidz maek $$$ x spndn thr holdaez wrkn nth EU &t hlps thm prkts thlangwj thei rlernn @ skool.
m lookn 4wrd 2 fndnowt wot tz lk travln lt town → town wthowt prraenjd nz rkontkts ztz wot
mi & H maeb doon ntali ftr wleev ROMA. (the gorjz  nth ppsit wndoe just lnt owt lookn →2 thkortyrd
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z♀ woz torkn nth, ♀z naekd & hz lotsv t@s; thei tork rus nth@ room). Tz nli 10pm but m jue
4nerli nt. 1 mor Pessoa 1st but: 154 [237] “I think what creates in me the deep sense of
living out of step with others is the fact that most people think with their feelings
whereas I feel with my thoughts. ¶ For the average man, to feel is to live, and to think is
to know that one lives. For me, to think is to live, and to feel just provides food for
thought.”
5/7/06. Th famli rport woz muchz uezuel …. K8 hdn trip → Mungo wth ngruepv frndz, Joez
OK but K8i seemz loe bkoz ♀z stil werkn 4 th saem louzi bos, Dan ppeerz 2b getn mor werk thnn
thprst soe thpaentn vth frunt room zgoen vri sloeli. Nth footi frunt Collingwood got thrasht x
Richmond. But orl paelz →2 nsgnfkns 2th oevrdn fakt th@ H sowndd vri dprst, trd & dslueznd.
(8/8/06. to mangle T.S. Eliot: “Let me disclose the gifts reserved for age / To set a crown upon my lifetime’s effort. / First, the
cold friction of expiring sense / Without enchantment, offering no promise / But bitter tastelessness of shadow fruit / As body and soul
begin to fall asunder. / Second, the conscious impotence of rage / At human folly, and the laceration / Of laughter at what ceases to
amuse. / And last, the rending pain of re-enactment / Of all that I have done, and been; the shame / Of things ill done and done to
others’ harm / Which once I took for exercise of virtue.”) ♀z ↑set x wot ♀z redv thn v snt ←. Wot ♀ z zn
bsshnl rtern 2th ishuev thmrdrv th vlthl& ppz 2ndkaet 2♀r v lost m kwlbrium. Soe thn  wz
dprst & x th  got → K. Vančienė’s farmstead JURODIS nJurbarkas (26/2/08. Monday 3/7/06
&
Tuesday 4/7/06)  woz soe sk@rd  hd lostn 2nd tm 4 thtrip - m trusti kap wchz ssnshl ndr
thkndshnz - soe 2dae l hv2 tr & fnd whr  kn x 1.  woz met hx Rimas, th☼, hoo wairz hz
hair long nlk lmoest eni uthr lthoe ksept Vaidas, spndz nlotv nitalia wch ♂ ♥z whr ♂z talian ♀frnd
livz, & werks nTV jernlzm.  gaev ♂m thlrst owt nm pzeshn Wingdings. Nfakt wgotn vri wl soe
wn ♂ nvtd mi 2wotch thtalia vs thkrauts  chmpnshp sokr m@ch  woz pleezd 2kspt thnvtaeshn
not rialzn twoznt goen 2 fnsh til 1.30am kozt wnt →2 kstra . X thn nli Rimas, nfrndv ♂z, & mi wr lft
st&n. Nsdntli  hittoff wthth pairnts juern thdae 2 & nfrndv VkArNiČsItEiNnEa nvtd mi 2uez ♀r
plaes 4 FREE n nvlj nr 4st 6kz thuthr sdv Jurbarkas whch from 1st npkshn zprtkrli rpeeln. Krnt
rmmbr thnaem vth ♀ but ♀z nchrjv nprmri skool & livz nJurbarkas & thvilj  zhrdli evr nues ♀ sez.
♀ rlsoe hz rloez nSmalininkai 6kz ferthrn gaen hoo ♀ sez woodb hapi 2 putmi↑ shood  wsh. Howvr
 think d prfr thfarm toorzm plaes thr wch pparntli shood hv plaesz vaelbl.  mbugrd z ddnt
sleep lrst nt zm n1vth cheepst roomz @ 35Lt wchz nth roofspaes zmni roomz nlthl& r soet
heets↑ 2 th•v sufkaeshn but wn ue oepn thwndoe TH MOZZIES KUMN. Thei doent seem 2noeov fl
wr skreenz nlthl&. B4 rrvn nJurbarkas  vztd thPanemune sl ½ wae btweent & Raudone. H
z thblerb ← thpamflet: “Panemune Castle ¶ Gelgaudiškis Castle, a family name given to
the castle in western Lithuania, on the right bank of the river Nemunas, between
Raudone (10km) and Skirsnemune (6km). The castle stands on the top of a steep river
bank on the former Panemune estate. It was built for the estate owner Eperias (Eperiess)
by the Dutch architect Peter Nonhaardt, who served at the royal palace in Vilnius.
Construction was completed in 1609-1610. The building had two stories, was square in
plan and had thick masonry walls with cruciform openings, high round towers at the
corners and a cobbled courtyard. It was surrounded by dams, defensive ditches and
park. In 1753 the somewhat decrepit building was acquired by Baron Leo Ingelstrom,
who sold the premises to the Gelgaudas (Gielgud) noble family. The castle came to bear
this family’s name, although locally it was often referred to as the Zomkus (Pol. Zamek –
castle). In the course of refurbishing the building the Gelgaudas family gave it some
classical features and remodelled the interior very lavishly and ornately. The castle
ceased to be inhabited after the 1831 revolt (led by General Anthony Gielgud, q.v.) …”
Ftr rrvn h  lft m g nth vri hot room & wnt 4 n→ nth town & ys l tr 2voidt zmuchz posbl
but l hv2 goe n 2 x thkap. Z sed  woz dprst niwae. H sez  keep rternn 2th topkv th lkn
rkord stuk nth saem groov. ♀ sez tzzf  woz blaemn mslf aksptn rsponsblti 4 wotznt m knsrn.
But tznt lk soe @orl. m notwair vni trbl knsdraeshnz nm prekpaeshn wthth mrdrz. M
jtaeshn stmz (thoe m ntshor) from m dntfkaeshn wth ROEPIAN svlzaeshn r mor jnrli wthth
huemn raes.  think ue hv trubl ndrst&n th@ kndv dntti. (23/2/08. you are far more tribalizied than
you admit. Also are you implying that I am neither European nor human? – I must fit into one category or
the other, or perhaps because Im an Australian I must be aboriginal!)  hd thort 2 maekn maejr f4t 2
mrshl m thorts nth m@r nJurbarkas sins thr znt nsingl rfrns 2 th4mr prezns vth LITVAKS nniov
thpmflets v red yet v n nmap wch showz twoz prmrli nLitvak town @th tvth 19th sntchri & 
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noe thr woz nmaejr getoe & kstrmnaeshn juern th2nd wor. Ue nt travl thrue lithl& & rportn wotue
wthowt ths topk 4sntslf nue nls uer blnd. Howvr  doent wont ue 2think m nbalnst rlueznm
mrblz soe ue t worin & getn dprst soe l taek yor dvs & wilnt tr 2pul ththredz 2gthr (probli
mposblnwae) & rstrikt mslf 2 mnshnn nli wot bsluetli hz2b sed fn fols pkchr znot 2b givn. Xthwae
Rimasz frthr zn nior guvt sktrst & thr zn servnt nth  & ngardnr …. → town wchz nli 10mnzwae.
Bort nkap & npadv nadkwet ppr & nbaknbord zths ksrsz  zrunnowt. Bort nkopiov Lietuvos
Rytas & redt vri sloeli oevr 2 ‘smorlz’ vb wl ch@n 2n gr&muthr & ♀r spoilt litl gr&drtr staenoevr
← Klaipeda. →d long thrvr ndrth brj 2th nue dok & ← long thrvr 2 h. Lae nth lorn nmi bak nth
shaedv nsmorl tree. M nakrd. Thppr sez tz getn hotr stil & thrz nprdkshnv 33º nndaersoe soe l
bglad 2b outv ths room x thn. 2nt porchuegl rplaen vive la france & noe dowt lb nvtd 2wotch
but  nt mslf lrstnthdstns. Oyair – 2moroe zMINDAUGAS dae & nfrdae thrz nreenaktmnt x
nwlnoen drrmr gruep vth btrael & kapchrv JONAS ŽEMAITIS thfaemus leedrvth prtzn rzstnsv 1945-
53 hoo woz kapchrd x thNKVD nths . Thmaen fotoe v♂m nth ltho genosido nth old NKVD hd¼z
nVilnius zn nlrjmnt vn fotoe ← owr famli lbum ← ♂z daez nth rtlriofsr kadmi nParis … 2moroe zlsoe
nspshl dae 4Jurbarkas bkoz tzth 395th nniversriov thsiti b-n grantd th “Magdenburgo Teisui Miesto
Teisiu Sutekima” ie thMagdenburg Rights ie ful leegl staets znsiti & nkoetrvrmz. → town & s@ nth
brj drnkn nworm b & eetn orfl bsnaks bkoz  ddnt wont nful t koz v got DIARROEHA (23/2/08.
speln?). Twoz nmistaek  rialzd 2 laet zth bsnaks wr probli thwerst posbl kmbnaeshnv f@i food
& ndjstblti ue knhv 4 nkaesv DIARROEHA. Twoz mloe sitn nn smorl nook vthold town whr wth nbitv
f4t ue kood majn n x-gon a. Thn  shopt ↑ nn Maxima stor 4 food 4 thnxt lvdaez. Thrz bsluetli 0
th@ kood njues mi 2goe →2 thsovieta style vsubrbn wildrns vn town lk Jurbarkas. Thbeek klapn
 herd @ thkrakv dorn woz x nstork & nowzlookowt thwndoe  kn thnst kloes x (200 yrdz?).
12/7 /06.  woz stil n @ 8.30am zthr woz nwlkum  soe thr woz noe• ngetn↑. Thr
woz nns smlv kookn ← ↓stairz & thn nnoknthdor &  sed ‘yairs’ ( woz ln naekdn zpruezuel)
& thdor oepnd nbit & Emilija sed kum↓4 kofi. Wn  got↓ brkfst, knsstnv omlet, salad, bred wth hoem
maed butr, woz w8n.  8 wth ♀r/♂m & fnshtof wth nlv svkofi. Bviusli v ernd m strps &
wraz @th t ♀ woznt keenn feedn mi wn  rkst, now m nvtd 4 nmeel eevn wn  doent. ♀r hubi
sez th vri taesti BELIAŠAI zn Klaipeda spshlti &  woent gett nKaunas. W torkt 4 kwt nwl. ♀ hd
nstroek 6yzgoe & 1 sdv ♀r woz parlzd. ♀ sed ue nt majn wottz lk. ♀r rhab thrpst got ♀r
werkn straewae & booleed ♀r 4 wch ♀z thankfl. Threezn  nt lwaez ndrrst& wot ♀z saen znt bkoz
vn rjnl ksnt but bkozvth ffktsvth stroek n♀r speech. ♀z vri luki  told ♀r znot mni ppl kn kum← from
nmaejr stroek &  lk ♀ duz. ♀ told mi O thdfrnt ppl hoov staed nth: thr wozn rus nueaej ♂
nnfansi  hoo kaem 4 n. ♂hd npersnl skuerti grd & wn ♀ mad nmeel 4 ♂, ♂ woodnt eatt. ♀ hd2
givt 1st 2th grd & thgrd hd2 givt 2 ♂m; thr wr th6 poelsh♂♂ hoo wontd nmeelv CEPELINAI wch ♀ ddnt
wont2 maek soe thei paed ♀r 100Lt & ♀ maedm; thr wr th8 vanjlkl baptsts ← thmti USvA hoo staed
4n munth. Thei hd 1td n maedv wood & wth thrt vbz (AURA – lthoez rlwaez torkn Ot) & ths
wozth1. Thei knduktd servsz nth  & nvtd yungppl & kidz plaen nth yrd 2joinn. Thei dun baptzmz
nth NEMUNAS rvr 4 sum nue rkruets. Thr preest drst orl nwt, wnt →2thrvr ↑2 hzwaest. Mung
thmslvz thei spoekn nglsh but thei knduktd thr servsz & sang hmnz nlithoe ← nspshl lthoelangwj misl
theid brort. 1vthm kood speek sum lthoe porli. Emilija showdmi ththankue  thei gaev ♀r. H
rsumvth thingz thei : (Emilija hzjust brortn sum pankaeks (su varške) wth jam & sum t 4n snak)
“Thank you so much for opening your house to us. You constantly amazed me in the ways you
were willing to serve us. May the Lord bless you for this. The food was excellent. ¶ In Christ, ¶
Joe Woodring” & “Thank you for letting us use your house for the time we were in Lithuania.
You are a great cook and we had a great time! God loves you! ¶ Love, Megan Perrault” & “Thank
You Very Much for your wonderful hospitality you are an awesome cook! May you find Christ
during your life! God Bless You! Jesus Loves You! ¶ Natasha ♥” & “Aiču, Ačiu, Ačiu !!! ¶ Man
labai patinka Mano gyvena čia po tavo namo, ir man labai patinka tavo labai skanu maistas!! Tu
buvo labai gera šeimininke! (viskas gerai!!) ¶ Labai Ačiu dar karta! ¶ Jezus miele tave, ir mums
mylim tave taip pat! Aš meldžiuosi už tave! Su meile Kristuje, Debbie” & “Thank you so much for
taking such good care of us. You are a wonderful hostess and a great cook. I enjoyed spending
time in your home! ¶ In Jesus, ¶ Rod” etc.etc.  must owt th@ ths woz 3yzgoe wn Emilija woz
stl suffrn ←thffkts vth stroek. Nsdntli th rus $$$♂ sed th hdn spshl AURA bkoz ♂ woz aebl 2sleep l
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k noewhrels. Ftr thknvrsaeshnz  → 2 thl8st setv → H. Thn  wnt4n  → Uostadvaris wr
thrzn rplkr vnold saelnshp wchwz bilt 4n jrmn .  hdn  fromn s&i beech nthNemunas. Nnuthr
plaes fromn hide  kood sevrl 00sv wt swonz & nth dstns Ventės Raga thpromntri  woz
taekn2 x eLgŪiPdŠiAjSus nm 1st dae h. Th zvri mprtnt 4 rair  & thrzn proegrm fundd xth 
2 knsrv vrnmntl vluez & 2 subsdz frmrz fthei swch2 beef k@l (here4dz) bkoz beef frmn zth leest
damjn. Vrthn zlush thr & thrr chanlz 2 draenwae thH2O. Twoz dzrtd & peesfl …. Hd nkslnt  wthn
glrsv fruetjoos @th VALGYKLA 4 4.6Lt (nn fansi br xth Teatro  nKlaipeda ystrdae  paed 4Lt 4n 
v kofi (twoz good)). Theez lftoevrz ←thsoviet a mustb luesn n4chuen &  bet th♀♀ hoo werk nm
bringnuf food hoem 2 feed orlthr rl@vz. Hd mi lrst  nth kanl. Hd nshowr &m soekn m
shortsleevshert ndtrjnt gaen. Nkwt daen Rusne zngr8 waev fnshnoff nuthr faezvth trip. 2moroe m
←nKaunas & m notlookn 4wrd 2t.  paed Emilija 160Lt (ie 30Lt/nt & 10Lt 4th  knkshn → OZ)
& ♀ woodnt ksept paemnt4 z ♀ servd! ….  gaev ♀r thpad  hdbort nJurbarkas & ddnt wont2
kari nm g& ♀ gotmi 2  sumtn nt soe  : “ue wont fnd nbetr hoest thn Emilija
Pužnienė. Wn  get ←2 Orstraelir l tr 2tork mi wf →2 kumn 4nuthr trip 2lthoe & fw
doo wl sertaenli stae h.¶ aŽrIūŽnYaSs ¶ Orstraelir ¶ 12/7/06.” Kspt  t nlithoe. … 
think  mustb bkumn nKON;  getnwth vri1 & m nteevntrn! …. Sor wot woz thr nSvilikėlis
(Serinus serinus) rn Alksninukas (Carduelis spinus) & st@s knferm mown mprshn th@ thrr mor
Ciconia ciconia O h thn niwr nlthl&.
19/7 /06. Pozishn, pozishn, pozishn thei sae & m nth bsluet bst1 nKaunas looknowt
nRotušės  z . & thkmdaeshn z ●ls & cheep. Got↑ rli & showrd etc & wnt4n erli mornn → 2th
uthr ndv Laisvės Alėja & bak 4 thknsttueshnl. Got $$$z (700) ← th. t th50Lt/nt room ←2moroe
→ ☼di nt.  Juozasz nmbr @th door sevrl z juern thdae but thrwoz noe nswr. Ternzowt their
rwae @ thr SODAS nŠiauliai. Ths eevnn gotthrue2 ♂z dortr Egle & rraenjd 2 meet @ ♀r plaes @
5pm ☼dae (tz 6pm & thchrch zOn).  Brigita 2giv ♀r thnmbrv ths plaes soe Vaidas kood leev mi
nmsj shoodtb needd. Viztd thstuediov RUeDgZiIdNiSjKuAsS & ♂ ksplaend ue kn  oevr z cheepli
← srtaen kmpuetr/ntrnt shops soe  wnt ←2 thuthr ndv Laisvės g. & hd nuthr long tork 2 H. ♀ feelz l
k nsfr ♀ sed (31/8/06. Cipher – a person of no importance, from the Arabic cifr = 0 or nought, from
carafa – to be empty) & kant koep wthm long bsnsz (not the absence itself, but what it means). 
promst not2 trvl loen gaen ft maeks ♀r mzrbl.  feel mzrbl mslf n♂r kkownt. M blti 2travl
hzbn nprvlj  hvnt ernt. 3 r 4 ppl nths trip hv rkst mi howtz H givz mi thfreedm 2 travl x mslf
soe  gthr tz not thdunthing (The issue is not the solo travelling, but the time spent away). 
thankue  4 wot vhd but doent klaem nrt 2hvt.  hoep ← nkst y wkn lwaez travl 2gthr.
Kaem ←long Laisvės Alėja & Vilniaus g. sloeli eetn nkuplv smorl meelz (orl greezi) & drinkn nkuplv b
z. Z woz drinkn noevrprst  b (maed nth prmsz) 2 street ppl got torkn2 mi & twoz bvius thei
wr @ leestz smrt zmi &  koodv justz eezli bn nthr shuez. Thei klaem th@ 2moro @ 11 their b-n
taekn 2 ngl& 2do laborn wrk x nhoo rraenjz vrithn nkluedn kkomdaeshn (@ £40/munth) & 2hoom
thei giv 20% vthr ernnz. Theez gz rdropowts & thorgnzr zMAFIA (lthoe) but wn 1vthm rkst mi
4sum food koz thei woz hungri  koodnt rfuez z woz drnkn nb@ 7Lt/500mlz.  tookm 2n
cheepr eetri & bortm n 4.50Lt meelv kaldūnai (plmni) eech. lftm thr & wnt2 Berneliu Užeiga nbort n
v FILOSOFO KAVA (wth alhokol) wch  drank vri sloeli. Thn nnuthr plaes off ROTUŠĖS AIKŠTE
(ie )  drank nsloe b. Tz nbuetfl eevn owt thr soe m fnshn↑ & goen owtsd. m← @
noepnair br wr m lookn † Rotušės  →2 thndv Vilniaus g. Wot mor kood  wont nKaunas kspt 2b
doont wth ue ♥? …
26/7 /06. Juern thnt  herd @ 4, 5, 6, & 8 (tz 8.25 & v hd nshowr (noe woshr zt
dsprd ystrdi ← wr  hd lftt nth GIVATUKAS 2dr (thkleenn ♀ mustv thortt hdbn lft x 1vth gzmplri
POELZ)) &  kood feel Hz mzri ← thuthr sdv th.  wsh  woz ←n Melbourne. m not lookn
4wrd2 thweekn Vienna (wch wl rraenj m fnnsz) r2 thweekn Vilnius wnn & dnn wth rloez (wth
thksptshnv KABArIaLsAaITE hooz lwaez good kumpni). Thtrubl wth nrtrn tikt zuer kmitd 2n fuechr
wchz nprdktbl (zwoz mfszd 4mi x ththundr (PERKUNAS (thmoest mportntvth lithoe paegn GODz))
) ……. Th nKaunas zngood plaes 2spnd : plentiov kshn, cheep food, duebius krktrz, rli mornn
drunks, thskuerti grdz looklk thei just gotowtv jael. Rd th Lietuvos Rytas oevr nblak kofi (2 Lt):
n☼di npoelsh flm/pop swloed nwosp (ŠIRŠE) & woz  nfue howrz l8r ← sfkaeshn (m keepn
thbotltop nm Baltijos); nbloek nlthl& got bitn nth th & d nn kuplv howrz (♂ hdbn stung x ndifrnt
kndv wosp thpreevius dae nth fngr wch hd swoeln↑) -  knsidr mslf luki: naechr hz maed 2

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@mts nmi lf nth spaesv nmunth (26/2/08. Tuesday 18/7/06 (no 68) & Friday 23/6/06
(no 71)) & mist boeth z. @ th nUkmergė ♀♀ bilt lk waelz, old ♂♂ lk tubz & nfue yung gerlz
pldn dsrgrdn ni posbl maksmum loed lmtaeshn til w wr paktn lk  n2 thold rkti sovietstl ½ s
z  rdi 2 prsowt ← thheet.  woz wondrn wot wood hapn nn roed ksdnt. m mor skairdv thoez litl
z than mv aktsv naechr rv GOD.  srvvd but & gotowt @ Janušiskis 2gthr wth GmRiYlBdAaS
& w →d 2gthr prtvthwae long thgravl roed.  told ♀r  hd pland 2 vzt thm soe  spoez now 
doent hav2. Thdor vth  kntb d & Vaidas hdleft th owt 4mi soe  got mslf rgnzd &  →2
Lyduokiai 2 thlrst setv but  woz 2l8 zn wnzdaez th fs shuts@ 2pm. Soe  shopt↑ & kum ← 2
ths ntri. Now m gunr hvn SIESTA & thn l t n thlitl Raimundas Eimontas gaevmi zn
mmntoe nwch ♂  “Kolegai Arūnui nuo ‘laiškininko’ ¶ RE 06.07.24”. Th lt zttld Laiškas
Lotai (novelė) publsht x Pasvires Pasaulis VILNIUS (nnglsh tz rskue ) UDK 888 2-3 ¶ Ei 99 ¶
© Raimundas Eimontas, 2005 © Pasvires Pasaulis, 2005 ¶ ISBN 9955-435-59-3. Thedtr,
Redaktorius KrUoNbDeRrOtTaAsS, dskrzt soe: “Laiškas Lotai – tai nusivylusio, dvasiškai
palūžusio ir vidiniusiuose labirintuose susipainiojusio dailininko Rono, nusprendusio
pasitraukti iš gyvenimo, laiškas mylimajai, likusiai abejingai menininko širdies šauksmui.”
“2005 02 03 Išleido ir padaugino Pasvires Pasaulis, Erfurto 48-18, LT – 04102 Vilnius; el.
paštas: tango@takas.lt ; www.km.projektas.lt ; 80- oji leidyklos knyga.” ….
2/8/06. … (kont) z woz leevn DOMUS MARIA thr woz nmsj ← Rita 2  b4 11am. Meen
 wnt srchn 4 ncheep plaes 2  H nMelbourne but wn  fnli fowndt thei sed thr sstm hd broekn↓
tmprli & th@ thei wr thoenli 1z nVilnius hoo dd thcheep oevr z korlz.  Rita & rraenjd 2meet ♀r &
Meksys & 4got m kard (50 pts ie 9Lt ie $4.50). Rd ppr nth uezual plaes but n♂  noe ←
Adelaide (POČIUS) →d x & t 2drink nkofi. ♂z ngoe 8n 2 bild nfaktri 2 maek ltr ← rd ppr. ♂z ♀
zth soekorld ( rd nth lthoe prs) OZ poet ŠIMKUTĖ. Fownd nntrnt plaes nPilies g. (st) ← wch  woz
aebl 2  H cheepli wthowt goen thrueth rigmroel vhvn 2get ♀r 2 ←. Thngz hv stld↓ wth ♀r
nMelbourne. (15/9/06. Little did you know!) Ben spnt nkuplv daez nth Barmah 4st & sed ♂ mt
bgoengaen. Danz got ntrstd nplaen kmpttv (4 chips) poekr @th loekl pub. Rachel d 2sae ♂z
rvuez hvbn wl r vd x sum1 nNY nth USvA. Th Mgpz beet th Horks. Ftrwrdz  bortn KIBINAS
←nsmorl sueprmrkt nPilies g. & wnt & hdn bnth maen  (rrkatėdra). Met wth Rita @th ŠMC kavine
but MI&KrSeYwS (26/2/08. Tuesday 1/8/06) koodnt maekt soe w  Gintas hoom  hd wontd
2sae goodb2 b4 ♂ leevz (24/2/08. Tuesday 2/10/07) 4 thUS (Richmond, Virginia) &  →
Vienna. ♂ woz soe hpt↑ (♂ hz th@ 10dn ) ♂ hd mi worrd. ♂ bort nb& nkofi & thn ddnt drink thb
. ♂ nsstd npaen 4 th3vus & lft n4Lt tip. ♂ let ♂mslf btorktn2 xn nCD ← n♂ hoo woz slnm
taebl2taebl. ♂z jschrz wr vri kspansv & ksprsv. Hoep ♂z OK. Ftrwrdz  wnt 2chkowt th ← whr th
z & th mkroz → prt (no2 & mkro no20). Bort nnue ( On 10) d & rraenjd 2b @
thKABAILAsz 2dae @ 5.30, 2b pikt↑ owtsd Aušros Vartai x taŽuIrŽiYuSs @ 11am 2moroe, & 2b
pikt↑ h x JOrNiAmIaTsIS @ 7pm 2moroe. Th@ nli leevz Laima (&sstr) vth blgtri vzts b4  →
Vienna. Dd nlongsh → nth evnn & fnsht wth ndrink vKVIETINIS (wt) b nth oepn br nth. 2
thppr oevr kofi ….
9/8/06. Thr wr brneez l8 →2 thnt mung thkraut 2r gruep nth pasj &  got↑ @ 6
nntspaeshn vth trip → Vienna thoe th znt tl 3pm.  ♪ ← m jrnl ntreez th@ now  hv02sae vrthn
taeks prsdns oevr th.  mae evn braek th habt suen. Hz thbreefst skch vth ndv mundae &v
ystrdae: zmi & Albina wr →n long Pilies g. wwr korld oevr 2 nstreetsd kavine taebl x ngruep wch
nkluedd 2 ppl w nue ←Melbourne. Thei wr yung lthoez hoo hddun grad studeez thr oevr thlarst lv
yz & havn kmpleetd thm r ← prmntli nlthl&. 1z n♂ hooz naem v 4gotn hoo kspkts 2b nmlionair
wthn 5 yz koz lthl& znl& vpprtuenti ♂ sed. Thuthrz Gintarė hoo hdbn th♀frndv VšAaIrTūKnUaSs
(24/2/08. putnowt soon 2b publsht nLT llustr8d x Vaidas wth blurb n ←kuvr x me) & hoo nue thz.
 gaev ♀r Brigitaz no.  ♪d wwr sitn nth ‘Duble Kofi’ kavine wr ue pae 7Lt 4n v bad korfi & wr
 hdpromst mslf larst  woz nVilnius  woodnt goe2 gaen.  hd 1dd (7 ) wot kndv ppl
drink @ thz plaesz. Now  noe – lthoez fuechr mlionairz. W joind thtaebl 4 nwl &  toldm O th 
strk & how  hdswoloed nŠIRŠE & Albina toldm O how th5 ngrz wth nvz hdtaekn orlv
PEpTaRuAlIiTuIsSz g n sowthfrka. Th ‘mlionair’ sed ♂ hdbnthr ½duzn z & twoz prfktli saef. Ftr nw
l w lft 4n kwtr (& cheepr) kavine 2 kmpair ♪♪ O thvnts vth lrst 2munths b4 Albina hd2 leev 2 let
Paulius hoo woz n♂ wae ←←Panevžys →2 ♀r fl@. 2 daez ftr ♀ got2 Vilnius ← Druskininkai ♀ woz
lrdi gdn n2r gruepvlthoez thru ngl& & skotl&. Wn ♀ got ← ftr n2dae braek ♀ woz gdn nuthr 
106
gruep. ♀ sez thkaptlz vueropr look thsaem 2♀ now but ♀ fownd thfeeordzv norwae vri buetfl.
Nnorwae n♀ slipt & broek ♀r leg soe thboen woz stiknowt & Albina hd2taek chrjvth mrjnsi 4 wch ♀
gotn boenus n♀ pae. ♀ hzbn told thjobz prmnnt & ♀ kn hvt & ♀ thinks ♀ wl keept nstdv goen
←Melbourne. ♀ woent b← 4 ms z♀ hd thort ♀ woodb z♀ hz ntripn thn. ♀ rlsoe duz nz & rgnzn
vtrips & grueps & zstl doon sum trnzlaeshn wrk & nbitv teechnv nglsh. ♀r pae 4 thgdwerkz
1200Lt+/munth soe ♀ kn4d 2rnt ngood fl@ nthsiti 4 700Lt/munth. (nsortmntv rnounsn nchrch
srvs)  promst 2 prsn ♀r rgrdz & 2giv nrport 2 ♀r bruthr Rimas & 2 Rūta (24/2/08. gts m ) bh
nd thbr nlthoe♣ nErrol st ngoodoel Melbourne town. Ftr ♀ lft  hdn vwn & dd sum tranzl8n 4 thbr
♀ hoo woz trn 2tork jrmn 2ngruepv talian 2rsts. Ths woz nn smorl br nLatako g. wr  hd bn nfue
z 2 yzgoe. Ystrdae  spnt thO rvoe nn kavine (mor nnownsn 8.00) x thVilnia wth Rasa
Kabailaite. Thsz thsaem kspnsv stablshmnt w hd s@ torknn 2yzgoe. Twoz thbst posbl wae vfnshn
m stae nlthl& zthr znoe rloe  getn betrwth thn Rasa. X tuchn  wth Rasa & Albina  hv kmpletd
nO &m redi 2 leev …. 12.30 (drinkn n500ml vb@ 7Lt; got 30Lt & €130 nmi wolt) m hwae2rli z
←Aušros Vartai → staeshn → OROUOSTAS (prt) took oenli 30mnz (kost 2Lt x mkro) & 
nt get→2 thdprchr lownj tl ftr 1.30 (Austrian Airlines Flight 0S 834 leevz @ 15.10). Sum mslaenir
2 finsh m ♪♫ nLIETUVA (lthl&): thgd  torkt wth @ Trakai (m bn buzd x nŠIRŠE) sed talianz
rvri oepn O ben h4 th♀♀. Thei lern fraezz lk “ua buetfl” & “ ♥ ue” nlthoe ← fraez s b4 thei r
v; (just t nŠIRŠE owtv m glrsv b)  d nth Dov Katz Oth Karaim th@ ntl 200 ygoe b4
tsrst daez thei wr nntgrl prtvth sh kmuenti but thn thtsrz (spshli Katrina - mn) gaevm kspshnl
prvljz & l8r thr rljus leedr  2proov thei wrnt ; Albina told mi th@ th♀ hoo drsz lk njp & bgz
4 Lt, Lt, Lt zkorld ROŽĖ. ♀ uezt 2studi skolji but hdn nrvus braek↓.  sed ♀z mor saen thn mi &
Albina greed, moest ppl think ♀z kraezi;  told Rasa th@  woz 1drn wot th3 ppl hooz kumpni 
hd njoid thmoest (ie Rasa, Albina, Vaidas) hd nkomn &  think tz th@ thei rnt m@k; m aem nth
dskushn wth thjrmn doktrz (26/2/08. Tuesday 8/6/06) woz 2 ‘prblm@z’ (uezn thtrm thwae
Foucault duz) thwrd – RIALTI; Albina rkst mi wthr  woz meetn mor ntrstn ppl nm travlz nlthl& rn
orstraelir &  hd2dmt twoz nlthl&. Maeb tz bkoz wn ue travl frthr ur mor snstv 2 yor sOnz rmaeb
thkulchr h prjuesz mor kstreem . (17/9/06. Or maybe you are just bored with the people you know in
‘good old Melbourne’ and the lack of freedom that goes with marriage). GOODB LIETUVA (LTHL&)
…
16/8/06. €6 ( → prt) + €2.40 (Herald Tribune) = €8.40 (O A$14). Wnue +↑ thsumz
@thndv eech daen Vienna (wnzdae: €69 (A$117) + thrzdae: €78 (A$133) + frdae: €87 (A$147) &
s@dae: €83 (A$141) + ☼dae: €75 (A$128) + mundae: €107 (A$182) + chuezdae: €102 (A$173) +
wnzdae (2dae): €8 (A$13)) thO = €609 (A$1034). ie Vienna kostmi A$1000/week r A$150/dae (nt
kowntn  fair →← europr) …. (nth) …. Th week nostrir mfrszd how orfli & gr@ooitusli rued
lithoezr. Ppl nostrir rkertius & outst&nli hlpfl (shout @ue ←z fue drop sumthn; nsstn wrkn thtkt
masheenz; prsnli taek ue 2th plaes uer lookn4 etc). Twoz thbigst singl dfrns 4mi btween th2 kuntreez.
But vrthn hzn waev evnn owt: nlthl&  hd rltvz, nue thlangwj, & kpt meetn↑ wth ppl  nue
←Melbourne wl nostrir  woz orlwaez loen; & LTHOE RUEDNS KUMZ CHEEP WL ORSTRIN
KERTSI ZKSPNSV … (rproechn Singapore (stm8d rrvl : 4.47am, lokl @ S: 3.03am) nAustrian
Airlines Flight OS7 dprchr ← Vienna 10.40 (butt woz 1howr l8)) …. M ½wae thrue In Lithuanian
Wood. Bortt koz th♀ nth shop  “let th fnd ue” &  wont2 fnd owt wt fownd mi. Howd rkrap
lk ths (weMnAdYeOll “directs the Creative Writing program at Bowling Green State
University, where he teaches fiction writing, form and theory of fiction, and modern and
contemporary literature.” & ♂ s lk sum1 hoo teechz n) get → nfaemus shop lk
Shakespear Co nVienna? Zthr nmsj thr 4mi? … (@ Singapore, 9713kz ←Vienna)…..
(24/2/08. Completion of Wednesdays from Litho Trip 2 (1st draft on CD ttld: ALL THAT WAS ALL THAT WILL BE))

11/4 /07 (Journal ♪♫ Italy). (6.45am DUBAI port) W hvoenli owr ion lugj (2x5kgz) 4
ntripov 11 weks. Nb@th rshpub nth port kosts €9 soe wr not xn 0. → ROMA (AMOR) dprts
@ Gate 21 @ 7.55am. @th port lownj w torkt2 thoenli libian  v evrmet. → ROMA port @
12.30pm. €22 (biglietti 4 treno ordinario (thLeonardo da Vinci) (ie €11 x 2 paed ← m krdtd)
Fiumicino Aeroporto → Roma Termini rrvn @ 1.35pm) → Basilica di S. Maria Maggiore
(18/7/07. “The building was erected between 432 and 440 by Pope Sixtus III … the
Basilica … is the first basilica in Rome built not by an emperor but by a pope, who had it
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splendidly decorated. … It is said that during the night of 4 August 358, the Virgin
appeared simultaneously in a dream to Pope Liberius and to the rich and devoted John,
to ask them for the dedication of a basilica on the site in Rome where snow would have
fallen that night. The next morning John went to the pope to tell him of the apparition of
the Virgin and together they went to the Cispian Hill, where the pope traced out, in the
fresh snow, the outline of the new church. The miracle of the snow is still remembered in
the basilica every year on 5 August: during the celebration of Mass, white jasmine and
rose petals are made to flutter down over the high altar.” (Passeggiate Romane ( blow))
→ thkonvntv Suore di Santa Elisabetta @ 9 Via d’Olmata 100 yrdz ← Piazza Maria Maggiore @
€80 (B&B). €5 4 rpzza nx + €5.50 4 rb& kafe latte 4 H nrbr nowt nth COLOSSEO. Thbwch
kost €4.50 2b drunk st&n↑ kosts €11 fdrunk sitn↓ @ rtaebl. (th rchmn 4 9.00pm.). Toetl spnt
2dae: €112.50 [A$191]. Some impressions: Dubai – constant movement of a seemingly endless variety
of people. Muslim women spectacular in traditional dress. One couple caught the eye – him in flowing Arab
white, her in full burqua with only beautiful dark eyes showing – v. romantic! DUBAI = RICH – huge airport
(terminal splendidly decorated with marble, gold chandeliers etc) – bus took about 5 minutes to get us
from plane to terminal! EMIRATES AIRLINE = EXCELLENT (food very good, served (too) often) with a wide
variety of backgrounds among the flight personnel (on Dubai/Rome leg there were 15 languages spoken
among the cabin crew). Fiumicino to Roma: lots of green undeveloped spaces, big run-down apartment
blocks decorated with about equal parts of pot–plants, washing and TV antennas/satellite dishes; passed
under an ancient Roman AQUEDUCT; ROMA: traffic (horns, sirens, motorscooters); dirty (lots of dog poop,
litter, grafitti); amazing (courtyards glimpsed through street doorways, iron door handles, heavy timber
doors from Renaissance, facades from every artistic period, churches & more churches, the old Roman city
wall curving its way among the buildings; visible nuns, lots of tourists, but not too many for comfort, sense
of overwhelming detail everywhere – too much to take in on the first day, especially after a virtually sleep-
free 21 hours to get here. We saw, briefly, these churches: Santo Giovanni in Laterano (huge stark façade;
huge tumultuous interior where every decoration is BIG. Outside is the tallest and oldest Egyptian obelisk
in the world – 32.18 metres tall, dating from the 15 th century BC, and placed there during the reign of
Constantius II in 352AD); (12/4/07. tharkikatedra nVILNIUS wch  dslkd fromtht zklerli rvri nfrer
mtaeshn vt); right next to it a small basilica for Gregory XIII (?) in early medieval style; Santa Pressede
(amazing mosaics. ‘Passeggiate Romane’, a booklet from the Azienda di Promozione Turistica di Roma,
which we picked up at the airport information counter says: “Among the numerous and valuable works of art
contained in the church, the Chapel of St. Zeno and the mosaics of the apse and triumphal arch created for Pope Paschal I in
the 9th century are stand-outs. They are the expression of the rebirth of a Roman mosaic school which ended up playing a
fundamental role in the resumption of religious art in the Christian West. ¶ But it is the second chapel of the right-hand aisle
that holds the most significant example of Byzantine artistic culture still visible in Rome.¶ The chapel, dedicated to St. Zeno,
was built as a mausoleum for Theodora, the mother of Paschal I, and was called the “Garden of Paradise” because of the
richness of its decorations. The mosaics have no equal in medieval Roman art for their complexity, creative fantasy, richness
of symbols, density of colour, and profusion of gold.”); Saints Marcellinus and Peter in Lateran (where the local
priest in sneakers was having a deep and meaningful with 3-4 late teenage boys at the top of the steps
(concerning calcio?); each one was littered with paintings by famous artists but it was all too much to take
in & then we stumbled onto the Colosseum and Forum (2 churches along the Via Sacra, whose names I
have lost), which we will revisit tomorrow as the main area was closed when we got there in the early
evening. I reckon you would need 20years to get to know Rome in depth. The convent room we have is
great – 3 single beds, an ensuite (including a bidet!). The beds are comfy, linen is spotless, nuns are
friendly, we have a small balcony, & there’s a tiny lift (we are on the 3rd floor). Curfew at 10.30, breakfast
7.15-8.30am. ROMA E BELLA!
18/4 /07. € 6,00 (← ystrdae: nlv Heineken &  chrjz. ♂ trd2 chrj me €2,50 4 nstube &
wn  rmndd ♂m  hd bort nlrj1 4 thsaem prs ystrdae ♂  thei boeth kost thsaem. Wn   
paed €2,00 thdae b4 ♂ ksptd €2,00) + €21 (wvbn paen €83/day 4 thkkmdaeshn not €80,00 zv bn
 soe m +n thkstrr now.  paed €581 ← m krdtd) + €6,40 (ts (3,20 x 2) Napoli Garibaldi →
SORRENTO) + €4,80 ((2,40 x 2) ts SORRENTO → AMALFI) + €1,00 ((0,50 x2) uesv toiltn
AMALFI) + €2 ((€1,00 x 2) ts AMALFI → MAIORI) + €8,37 (goodz ← smorl sueprmrkt nMAIORI:
birra, pane, porchetta, formaggio, vino, limone aqua minerale) = €50 + €80 (B&B) = €130 [A$221].
What a day! We negotiated the train to Napoli well – it turned out to be a Eurostar train (the 2 nd most
expensive) but we were fortunate to be sitting with Michela Cerimele, a charming & vivacious young
woman in her twenties (in student days she visited Kazakstan) who was excellent company as well as very
helpful with suggestions for good places to go – she said Procida (island) was beautiful & off the beaten
track & will send us an email about a place in Abruzzi whose name she will get from a friend. We parted
with kisses on both cheeks all round and it was lovely to interact with a local so easily (she spoke excellent
English). Roma – Napoli: 9.45 – 11.38am & on time! At Napoli Garibaldi station we discovered that we had
to get tickets to Sorrento using the Circumvesuviano line, on which we met another helpful person, a
young man in his thirties who warned us to put our backpacks between our feet to stymie pickpockets. We
chatted to him about the train (too slow he reckoned – it stopped at many stations – the trip took
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approximately 2 hours), the difficulty of getting a business started in the south (kick-backs to every
authority) and places to visit. He was very keen on Sorrento, being a native son. At Sorrento we had to get
a SITA line bus to Amalfi so asked directions to the tourist office from various people, including other
tourists, only to find it closing for lunch & window-washing 2-4pm. Back to the station. Saw a bus with
destination Amalfi, so got on & had an amazing trip – the Great Ocean Road x10! But with houses,
churches & the remains of castles clinging to the steep slopes above & below the road. The bus was
packed with tourists (Italians, Americans & an Australian couple with 2 young kids from St. Kilda) & locals
got on & off as well. The buses prepare for corners by blaring their horns & oncoming traffic hugs the
interior wall & sometimes everything comes to a halt as negotiations about who goes where are made – v.
exciting & quite safe really despite appearances. (21/7/07. Italian bus drivers were very impressive in
every place we used the buses, but the guys on the Amalfi coast could judge available space to the
centimetre while dealing with other packed buses, tentative hire-car drivers, cheeky motor scooters &
sauntering pedestrians). In Amalfi we had to change to the bus to Salerno which stops at Minori & Maiori –
the first bus was chockers so we had a short stroll & then got first in line for the next one which then
proceeded to fill up rapidly & finally with a school group on an excursion. Arrived in Maiori about 5.30pm &
followed the map we got from the internet to Palazzo Coco, high up in the town overlooking the sea. It is a
sumptuous room – tiled floors, double bed, ensuite with space-capsule shower, toilet & bidet, desk, mini-
fridge, TV, air-conditioning and a balcony for meals – a true Palazzo! It is reached by a series of steps
which will improve our fitness and help get us shapely calf muscles! Already John is limbering up for walks
to the top of the mountains behind. The old people here must be extremely fit & healthy with years of
practice of climbing up & down. The town itself looks very attractive and there are walks galore. When we
booked first we were going to stay for 5 nights, leaving on Sunday, but then added Monday because the
Lonely Planet guide said travelling on Sundays was difficult. John thought it would be too long – now we
think it wont be long enough. Luckily we have no commitments till June (Venice) so we may stay longer &
even have some time in Napoli. Impressions: Napoli: grimier, more grafitti, darker, shorter people. On the
Circumvesuviana a large group of young men got on at one station, fairly rowdy, big, dark glasses, 5-
0’clock shadows, like the local chapter of the Mafiosi in training, but our informative travelling companion
said they were school kids on their way home. I’d hate to have to teach them maths. By contrast the
ragazzi on the bus from Amalfi were quieter, more “refined” but there were 2 teachers with them. Gypsies
on the Circumvesuviana beg by playing the accordion (well, too). All in all an exciting but exhausting day.
I’m for bed. Buona notte.
25/4 /07. €22,00 ((11 x2) SALERNO → NAPOLI (Mergellina)) + €4 (● + penna 4 €2,60) +
€4 ((€1 x4) biglietti 4 NAPOLI ) + €210 (3 nts B&B) - €140 (oevrstm8d Palazzo Coco B&B
zAntonio woz chrjn €70/nt (not €80 zd bn rkrdn) & ♂ dskowntd 1 dae bkoz whd t rntr week) +
€3,50 (b(33cl), kafe l@e nrltl br nus nVia Possillipo) = €104 [A$175]. An exhausting day. I slept
badly, wondering if I’d misunderstood the quote of €70/night for Palazzo Coco – perhaps it meant €70
each!! The place was so good & Antonio so obliging that by 4.15am (I counted all the bells from 2.15am
onwards) I’d convinced myself that our 7 night stay would set us back 7x €140 = €980 or over A$1500!! I
was also thinking about the difficulties entailed in meeting with Micele in Napoli, which we’d suggested by
email – huge city, we dunno where anything is etc. etc. so when the alarm went off at 7am I think I’d had
about 3 hours sleep. Antonio provided another torta made by his good self to accompany the regular 4 hot
cornetti & the mountain of packaged biscotte & assorted jams & the enormous cup of café e latte which
has been our normal breakfast here. He seemed genuinely sad to see us go & we felt affectionately sorry
to wish him goodbye. If any of you ever go to Italia & visit the Amalfi coast, you wont get a better deal
from a genuinely nice person (www.palazzococo.it, email palazzococo@libero.it for “camere matrimoniali
con bagno, frigobar, tv, aria condizionata, arredamento mediterraneo e vista panoramica”) & an excellent
host. He asked me to contribute a comment to www.tripadvisor.com (26/7/07. now done). We left on time
to walk down the 317 steps for the last time to catch the 8.25am SITA bus to Salerno (an elderly American
couple clogged up the aisle with a big suitcase until an Asian nun hoisted it into an empty seat) where we
arrived to find a ceremony in full swing in the piazza outside the station. It was Italia’s national day, a
holiday, & there were caribinieri in full dress uniform (black frockcoats with splashes of red, trousers
striped in red, Napoleon style hats), ½ dozen soldiers in khaki with white gloves & snazzy berets, & ½
dozen military in green (fidanza?) as well as 2 adolescent boys in pale blue uniforms & nifty hats who had
some ceremonial role. The police & military all had semi-automatic weapons. The non-military group
consisted of assorted civic dignitaries (of which one gave an address wearing sunglasses (it was a cloudy
day)) including a representative of the clergy in black & purple, 2 nuns in cream & 2 nurses in navy blue
dresses & capes with the old style matrons’ veil. The brass band was dressed in black & struck up a
rousing tune. One of the soldiers played a variation of the Last Post. The whole thing lasted abut 25-30
minutes during which time we got our ticket to Napoli & came out of the station to continue watching.
There seemed to be no obvious conclusion to the proceedings – everyone just wandered off, including the
cops & the military. We went to find an internet point, sent an email to Kate & Micele & returned to find a
procession of the Communes of the town preceded by the band & followed by some political party
supporters (Communists? Socialists? Anti-Fascists?). A great experience & so much more colourful than
anything Melbourne provides (John So, eat your heart out). There were lots of police cars – Polizia
Municipale, Polizia Nationale, Polizia Penitenzia, Caribinieri, Polizia di Fidanza – more than Roma!. All with
different, dashing uniforms, all with guns. Discovered we’d missed the early train (9.22) so had to wait till
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11.21 (the same train we’d taken to Pompeii) for the Eurostar to Roma which stopped at Napoli Mergellina,
the closest station to our new accomodation at Via Possilipo 56 (B&B Rivalta). Walked about 2.5ks to the
address (house numbers here run consecutively along one side of the road & down the other, unlike
Melbourne). Along Via Possilipo the houses are in gated compounds with a security guard (vigilante) in a
car in the driveway behind electronically controlled high wrought iron gates. He also totes a side-arm &
wears a blue uniform like a policeman. You only get in if you have a key or drive a car & are recognized.
The guy who let us in didn’t speak English but we showed him the details Antonio’s neighbour had written
for us & after unsuccessfully trying to communicate with Senora Colucci-Feis (Rivalta’s proprietor) through
the intercom, sent us off with directions in Italian which I misinterpreted so that we ended up at a house
where no-one was home. A helpful young woman who could speak a little English in the garden of a house
nearby offered to ring the senora for us, which she did, & the senora came down in her car & picked us up.
We had walked to 56 instead of 20. She speaks even less English than Antonio, so called on her daughter
to help out. After much animated talking all round we were settled in to a nice large plain room with a big
window overlooking a fenced lawn area with 3 leafy trees (one an orange in fruit). We have a bathroom
close by (with bidet!) & the kitchen for breakfast is down the hall. We are quite separate from the signora,
except perhaps for the kitchen (don’t know if its her personal use one or not yet). The bed is comfy, the
window can be opened & its very quiet as its at the middle level of the compound, down a cul-de-sac.
Higher up there are a couple of hungry looking alsatians behind the fence of one house. The houses are all
individual compounds within the larger one it seems. It’s a new experience & one that I bet the Almafini
would find downright perverted. It suggests a high crime rate, social disintegration & mutual suspicion. Yet
interestingly enough as we walked from Mergellina station we saw a woman leave a cake on a street stand
while she popped into a shop, & there was washing left to dry in the street from a window within easy
reach of passersby. The houses in this compound seem modest, ordinary places, though other compounds
along the Via contain obviously rich ones. We set off about 3pm to check the surrounds but were forced
back by rain by 5pm. We hadnt taken our warm items (flanno for him – the only one in Italy I reckon - & a
cardigan for me) & our umbrellas. Its been an eventful day too in that John’s bankcard was rejected at a
bancomat. We got a bit worried & asked for possible reasons at the Tabacchi where we bought some bus
tickets. It seems Italian bancomats only accept 4 or 5 figure PINs (I’m OK as I only have 4 in mine) & John
has 7. We began to think that tomorrow would have to be dedicated to a bank visit (the very thought
sends shivers up the spine) but tried one more machine (a bit more modern looking) in a nearby square &
it worked. Relief all round. We ate sparingly today – a Neapolitan style calzone (folded pizza) with
prosciutto & big lumps of cheese in a very thick dough from a street stall & a beer (for him) & café latte for
me in the closest bar which operates a la Roma: cheaper when you stand at the bar, really expensive if
you sit at a table. Neapolian traffic is even more frenzied than Roma’s. There is no mercy for pedestrians –
drivers don’t even slow down when eye-balled. We sat at the bus-stop for a while as it rained, waiting for
the bus, & the gladatorial combat on the road was exciting to see. The road safety rules here are either
ignored completely or non-existent. Many young scooter drivers don’t wear helmets (as it was raining a
few we saw put towels over their heads) & most drivers & passengers don’t wear seatbelts. Cars full of
untethered little kids hanging out windows drove past. Young men drive with one hand with the other arm
around their girlfriends. All this in stop-start traffic on narrow roads where ideas like giving way to the
right, slowing down at intersections & not passing on the wrong side would be laughed at. Speaking of
laughter our Croc shoes continue to be a source of hilarity/amazement/curiousity/disapproval to all &
sundry. At the ceremony in Salerno a man asked out of the blue if we were Dutch & a couple in a car broke
into laughter when they spotted our feet. I’m a female & even I don’t notice shoes like every Italian does,
male and female. My attempts at Italian have resulted in catastrophe number 2: at the Salerno station the
nice man selling tickets got very confused when I asked what bagno (bathroom) the train left from, instead
of what binario (platform). The Italians are very forebearing. We have just realized that we have the house
to ourselves as there is no sign of the signora or if she is in residence she is very quiet – can’t even hear a
TV. Forgot to mention that while in Maiori we found a blue rose lying on the grass on the beachfront corso –
I thought it was fabric or plastic till I picked it up. It was real & a strong blue, the first Ive ever seen.
2/5/07. €11,20 (x4 biglietti →← SCANNO) + €0,60 (ltl pomodori bort@ mrkt) + €1,50 (BBQ
wngz vth szv chkn wngz but vri taesti drksh meet bort@ mrkt & eetn nkst2 rplrk kwoetn thwerdzv
Ovidius (OVID) (nloekl slebrti) ← Tristia iv, 10 “SULMONA MIHI PATRIA EST GELIDIS
UBERRIMUS UNDIS.” Pprntli loeklz stil bleev Ovid kood wth ♂z feet koz ♂z st@ue (bilt n1474)
showz ♂m st&n wth rthik ndr) + €3,40 (pere, fragole, mor BBQ wngz) + €3,20 (crema freddo,
birra (Nostro Azzurro 33cl)) + €1,00 (tolini x2 (“Salute da Sulmona”) + €1,00 (francoballo 4 
tolini → Tony Petrilli vEaglemont Motorz hoos rjnli ← ABRUZZO) + €6,59 (supermercato) = €29
[A$49]. Explored the old town. It is beautiful with a distinct medieval feel. The Palazzo SS. Ma Annunziata,
originally a church-palace complex has a magnificent façade described as being “the best example of civic
architecture in transition from Gothic to Renaissance” in Italy. It now houses a church, a tourist information centre
(very helpful & English is spoken) & the civic museum. During WWII it was used as a hospital. The church
dates from 1320. The major piazza (Garibaldi) is very large with a central ‘Vecchia Fontane’ & is bordered
on one side by the remains of a 13 th Century aqueduct (completed in 1256) – originally it comprised 21
arches but only about 10 remain. It makes a striking impression as your eye looks through the arches
across the magnificent square, over the roofs of the town & up to the mountains, some with snow,
110
towering behind. The piazza is the location of an annual Easter Sunday tradition: “The Virgin Mary dashing
through the Square” which dates back to medieval liturgical drama. (1/8/07. Here is a report of the festival
I found on the internet by a reporter from the New York Times in 1985: “in all of southern Italy there may be
nothing quite as popular, elaborate and dramatic as Sulmona's feast of La Madonna che Scappa in Piazza - the Madonna who
races through the square - which takes place annually in this market town of some 20,000 inhabitants, about a two-hour
drive from Rome. Four days of events culminate in an Easter Sunday procession in which life-size polychrome wooden
statues representing the characters in the Resurrection are paraded through the Piazza Garibaldi, one of the largest
marketplaces in Italy…The celebration begins on Holy Thursday. Small models depicting the preparation of the tomb of Christ
- allestimento del sepolcro - could be seen in nearly a dozen churches, some of which date back to the Middle Ages. On the
night of Good Friday there is the procession symbolizing the deposition and burial of Christ in which statues of the crucified
Jesus and the mourning Madonna are paraded through the town. ¶ This procession is organized by the Confraternita della
Trinita, a lay brotherhood that dates from the Middle Ages when such associations were formed throughout Italy to assist in
the work of the Lord. The Confraternita della Trinita began in the 13th century as an association of noblemen whose purpose
was to help the needy and bring the dead to the cemetery. In the country's industrial north, such brotherhoods have shrunk
to folkloric remnants. But in the more traditional south, they still represent the main divisions of social life… ¶ standing in the
dark, medieval streets, one could see the pathos painted on the faces of the statues reflected in the faces of the Sulmonesi…
¶ On Saturday evening, there was another procession. Though I was only a visitor, I was invited to join the townswomen
who were carrying candles and accompanying the statue of the Madonna to the Church of San Filippo Neri, where she would
wait until Sunday…¶ Ferdinando D'Eramo [is] an 83-year-old carpenter who has inherited the task of dressing the Madonna
for the Easter procession. He must do so in such a way that her black robes of mourning fall away with the first gust of wind,
revealing a green dress that signifies the arrival of spring. The secret of how he manages this is shared only by his nephew,
Ennio, 50, who will ultimately take over the task, as will Ennio's 17-year-old son, Gaetano. ¶ The statue bearers are chosen
in a sorteggio, or lottery, of the young and athletic members of the Confraternita di Santa Maria di Loreto, Sulmona's
working-class brotherhood. Just as the rival and more aristocratic Confraternita della Trinita is responsible for the events
related to the death and deposition of Christ on Good Friday, so the laboring brothers of Santa Maria di Loreto, including
Ferdinando D'Eramo, are responsible for those related to the Resurrection. ¶ Easter Sunday dawned bright and sunny, and
we made our way through the narrow, gray streets to the Piazza Garibaldi. Had I not actually seen the spectacle before me I
never could have imagined it. Thousands of excited Abruzzesi had filled the piazza and were packed shoulder to shoulder -
on the ground, on the rooftops, in every window and even on the large, medieval aqueduct that borders part of the square.
¶ Shortly after 10 o'clock, there appeared the brothers of the Confraternita di Santa Maria di Loreto, robed in green and
white, bearing the statues of St. Peter, St. John and a triumphant Risen Lord, a crown atop his head. First, St. Peter was
paraded from one end of the piazza to the other, symbolically bringing the news of the Resurrection to the Madonna
mourning in the church. Then came St. John, to confirm the message. ¶ When the black-robed statue of the Madonna finally
bobbed through the portal of the church to face the statue of Christ at the opposite end of the piazza, an audible wave of
emotion swept through the crowd. The brothers holding the statue of the Madonna, who had been pacing carefully in front of
the church, broke into a run. As their shoulder- borne Madonna was raced across the piazza, her black robes of mourning fell
cleanly away to reveal a bright green dress, symbolic of fertility and spring. With the ascent of 12 doves, symbolic of the 12
apostles of peace, the crowd burst into applause, hugs, tears and kisses. ¶ … If the black veils of mourning had remained
stuck to the Madonna, it is said, crop failures and general bad luck would have been in store for Sulmona. In 1913 and 1930,
when some of the black fabric stayed fixed, there were earthquakes. ¶ On Easter Monday, the Sulmonesi traditionally pack a
picnic and head for the countryside for an alfresco celebration of spring. Ideally, the picnic takes place near the ruins of the
massive Roman Temple of Hercules or in the Campo di Giove - the Field of Jupiter, father of all the gods.”) There is a
market every Wednesday & Saturday till about 12.30pm with fresh fruit & veg., delicatessen stalls, chicken
& pork rotisseries, plants, flowers, clothes, shoes etc. John discovered that the wings of Abruzzo chickens
are far tastier than those of Oz ones. At first he couldn’t work out what poultry it actually was – the meat
was dark so it could have been duck but the wings were too small. When he went back for seconds the
stall holder confirmed it was indeed chicken – that must be what it tastes like before its factory-farmed &
pumped full of hormones & antibiotics. He followed up with some big ripe strawberries. Since we have
eaten strawberries before with no ill effects the nausea he came down with this evening is probably just a
bug. He’s decided to self-medicate with limoncello – it should pickle the bug nicely. Ran into some English
speakers: an Ozzie woman who’s lived here for 28 years whose son was born in Naples, & a Kiwi research
librarian with an English woman whose fathers were both interred by the Germans in a prison camp not far
away during WWII who were hidden & helped by the local population when they escaped. The librarian is
researching the addresses where the escapees were sheltered & is in the fourth year of her endeavours to
document the people & places involved. We bumped into these 2 twice & the Kiwi a third time – its not a
huge old town. I noticed the initials S.M.P.E. stamped onto some walls & thought of Rome with its S.P.Q.R.
everywhere. It stands for “Sulmo, mihi patria est” (Sulmona is my country). A charming local art form is the
confetti – sugared almonds done up as flowers, in many colours and shapes. At first I thought they were
artificial flowers. They are striking to look at as the colours are intense (purples, yellows, oranges) & they
have an enamelled look. John spent quite a bit of time sussing out bus timetables for our journey to
Scanno tomorrow & working out if the return bus from Scanno next morning arrives in time for us to catch
the 10.44am train to Terni, from where we get another bus to Spello, Spoleto, Assissi or Todi (wherever the
accomodation is economica). An Italian lady stopped us to congratulate us on our shoes!! She indicated
that she would get some if they were available as she suffers from hip/knee problems & was wearing a
version of Birkenstocks. Its amazing that people continue to hold animated conversations with us despite
being told ‘non parlo italiano’ & somehow we get the drift, as we did with the senora yesterday who told
us ‘Sulmona e bella’. We saw the Polizie Municipale in action twice, first attending a minor car accident
(looked like the driver had nearly run over someone on a pedestrian crossing) & later moving a gypsy
family off the park bench where they were having a snooze. We’ve noticed that these municipal police are
not intimidating to the locals – in Rome we saw a man driving a horse & carriage for tourists give a heated
& loud expression of opinion when a cop stopped him continuing on his usual route because the road was

111
closed for a demonstration, & the cop dealing with the car incident seemed more like a teacher trying to
find out who started it – listening to all sides, looking concerned, being patient. In Naples I saw a driver
abuse 2 caribinieri because their car was blocking his & they just shrugged & drove on. However they all
pack a gun so I suppose appearances can be deceptive. By the way there were 23 stations between Napoli
& Sulmona & we’d only paid €12.90 each. The 60k return trip to Scanno is costing €3,00 each. Travel is
cheap here as long as you use buses & regional trains. Outside our window there is a vacant lot full of
scarlet poppies.
9/5/07. €4,90 (x2 Limoncello & fe l@e ← ystrdae eevnn nth piazza garibaldi (thpiazza wr
nkst 2 nSPOLETO nth  albergo wr tn2 4 2nt zorlsoe korld: piazza garibaldi) wthth fontana
vecchia nkst2th mdeevl kwrdukt) + €37 (B&B (paed x m krdt d) wchwoz zgoodz ni wvhd) + €0,80
(smorl pomodori ← SULMONA wnzdi mrkt) + €1,60 (fiori di zucca x2 (♥ thtaest)) + €4,10 (biglietti
TERNI → SPOLETO) + €5,00 (10 tolini bort@th spoleto duomo (Cattedrale di santa maria assunta)
vfrskoez wsor nsd: Annunciazione x Filippo Lippi (1406ca. – 1469); Madonna col Bambino
della Cappella Eroli x Pinturicchio (1454 – 1513); Crucifisso x Alberto Sotio (Secolo XII);
Incoronazione della Vergine (particolare) x3 x Filippo Lippi; Nativita x Filippo Lippi;
Affreschi della Cappella Eroli x2 x Pinturicchio; La Santissima ICONE della Gran Madre di
Dio donata da Federico Barbarossa nel 1185 in segno di Pacificazione) + €2,50 (birra
(Heineken 33cl)) + €9,03 (supermercato: vino, birra, chinotto, peccorino, prosciutto, pstzrpane,
panini, pere x2, cerotti) = €61 [A$104]. Said ‘Arrivederci’ to the 2 suore of the Franciscan Missionary
Sisters of the Infant Jesus, one of whom kissed me on both cheeks & patted John’s arm, & the other of
whom (the very friendly old one) wished us happiness, & set off to pay a final visit to the market in Piazza
Garibaldi before walking to the station to catch the 10.44 to Terni. It was a comfortable trip through great
scenery. We discovered that we had not validated our tickets as required when the ticket inspector told us
there was a €25,00 fine each for not doing so. We thought that the usual validation was the punching of
the ticket by the inspector & the writing of his name on it, as happened on our trip to Sulmona. What
dummies we are. The ticket inspector was very nice , but warned us for next time. The scenery consisted
of mountains, ravines, snowy ridges, thick forest, rushing streams & then as we descended, green hills
with many towns nestled on summits or in valleys & cultivated small fields. Then in Terni we were able to
profit from the ticket inspector’s knowledge of the train timetable when he told us the next train to Spoleto
was due to leave in about 10 minutes. A quick dash to the biglietti counter & we were on the train to
Spoleto. Arrived about 2.30pm & spent the rest of the day getting our bearings – it’s a complicated old
town, established sometime around 1500BC, becoming a Roman colony in 241BC & a municipium in 90BC.
After the barbarian invasions it became the capital (576AD) of the Longobard Duchy. In 1155 it was
destroyed by Frederick Barbarossa (26/2/08. Tuesday 18/12/07) & became a part of the Church
State in the 14th century. The French ruled it 1809-1815 & it became the chief town of the Department of
Trasimeno. After the unification of Italy it lost precedence to Perugia & only began to recover its cultural &
political influence after WWII. It is not a town to be trifled with so we’ve decided to stay for 4 nights,
tonight at a hotel but the next 3 at the Monastero di San Ponziano where Spoleto’s martyr & patron saint
Ponziano was buried in 175AD. The quick tour of the town was a bit overwhelming because everywhere
there are fantastic streetscapes: town walls, little cobbled lanes all higgledy piggledy with no apparent
logic. Even John’s excellent sense of direction has been challenged. We went into the Duomo (Cattedrale di
S. Maria Annunziata) to find it decorated with frescoes by Fra Filippo Lippi & Pinturicchio & housing an
actual letter from Saint Frances of Assisi to an acolyte: “O Brother Leo, thy Brother Francis with health and peace.
And so I tell thee, my son, as a mother, that all the words we spoke by the way, I briefly resume here, advising thee as
follows – that in all the means you take to make yourself dear to our Lord God and follow His example and poverty, you act
under the blessing of Lord God and my authority. But if thou shouldst want, for the salvation of thy soul or for other
consolation and desirest, brother Leo, to come to me, come if thou wilt.” There is also a magnificent Byzantine
crucifixion done in 1187 & the tablet of a Madonna given in 1185 by Barbarossa as a peace offering.
Tomorrow we passegiate in earnest. Forgot to mention that on our journey today we saw ½ dozen small
wild boars tear off into the undergrowth as the train sped past. The scarlet poppies were also a treat today
– masses of them all along the railway line & in the bright green fields of grain, & hows this? – a stand of
Salvation Jane in the railway yards at Sulmona. Wn wwr nROMA wkaem † rstorl prmoetn umbria @ wch
ryung ♂ hoo spoek kslnt nglsh  twoz th vth “mystk saents”. ♂ sjstd fwwnt  mt dskuvr 
woz 1.  spoez th@ 2moest  ‘mystk’ d♪s sum1 hoo hz vzions, torks 2 ♂mslf r2  rnmlz &
bhaevz straenjli nuthr waez. 2dae fue strptof soe th@ ue wr krz nth piazza, livd nkaevz & preecht
serz 2 theid  ue wr rsktsoefrnk, lok ue ↑ & pump ue fulv kmklz. Sumsuch hz hapnd 2mi
soe  rekn  kwalf 4 th1st prtv thttl – but dfntli not th2nd. Nvrthls thfrskoez x Pinturicchio nth
capella eroli & thlrj frskoe x Filippo Lippi oevrth oltr nthDuomo moovdmi lk noe chrchrt v n ntli
2d8 & nwae  koodnt ksplaen. Thvri buetfl tolini vth dtael vth frskoe x Pinturicchio
vmadonr&chl l snd →m mum 4 ♀r brthdae njuen 4th - ♀z →2 mrdonr&chl .
16/5 /07. Thpoverello (san francesco d’assisi), uthrwz noenz Francis vAssisi woz born n2
rwlthi mrchnt (kloth) famli (boldd x mi) n 1182. N 19/8/1228 nth BULLv knonzaeshn poep
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Gregory th9th : “Francis imitated the example of our father Abraham when he spiritually
left his land, his parents and the house of his father to move towards the land the Lord
had shown him with His divine inspiration. ¶ In order to run promptly toward the award
of the heavenly vocation and to be able to enter easily through the straight gate, he got
rid of the bag of earthly riches – following the steps of He who rich from eternity
embraced poverty for us – dispersed them by sharing with the poor, so that His justice
might remain forever.” ( kwoet ← thpamflt w pikt↑ wnw vztd oratory of san francesco piccolino
(nshrn ddk8d 2th berthv thsan)). Rfta vztn ASSISI @th bgnnvth 14th snchri dante  nth Divine
Comedy: “A sun was there born to the world”. Nth 1469 Statutes of the City of Assisi thshr
n zdntfdz “The Church where Blessed Francis was born.” Nr rch nth shrn zrl@n vers
n nth 14th snchri nvri lgnt gothk letrz (1s giltjd rports Ludovico da Pietralunga n1570): This oratory
was the stable of the ox and donkey where St Francis, mirror of the world, was born.”
Thkapshn hd bn +d nth midlv th14th snchri wn th epsoedzvth lfv Francis bgan 2b striktli macht wth
1zv jzzvNazrth. R 1599 mapv ASSISI (x Giacomo Lauro) rfrz 2th shrnz: “San Francesco
Piccolino, formerly the stable where he was born.” (thoe listd zoenli 25th nmportns vth 28 shr
nz 2th SAN shoen nth map). ↑2 1615 noe uthr monut nASSISI maeks rfrns 2th  vrch kloth
mrchnts Pietro Bernadone & Giovanna Pica (thpairnts) wr ♂ woz born. Nresnt z thshrn hz bgun
2b noenz La stalletta (the tiny stable). HISTORY!! ….Yesterday in Santa Chiara we saw the relics of St
Clare: clothing, bible, shoes, her hair (grey curls). What struck me was the size of her camisole – it was of
fine white material (linen? Cotton? Wool?) cut like a T-shirt but with long sleeves. At about hip level on both
sides it billowed out in small pleats & there seemed to be enough fabric to make 4 or 5 dresses there. It
must have been because it was behind glass & on a raised stand but it looked enormous – she must have
been a substantial woman, big enough to play full-forward for Collingwood in Rocca’s place. Her tomb is
also in the crypt of the church & I got tangled up with a fervent group of very small Italians (about 4'10" -
5' – I was Gulliver among the Lilliputians) who were putting their hands through the outer grille of the tomb
to touch the inner grille closest to her coffin & then crossing themselves devoutly. It was all done mostly at
a trot as they seemed to be in a hurry). In the Cathedral of San Rufino there is another kind of relic – the
pavement of a Roman street, perhaps the Forum, under the floor, protected by a glass panel. The façade
of this church is magnificent – it was started in 1140 & has allegorical figures, beasts, birds & gryphons
decorating it, including a couple of lions/leopards chomping on the heads of sinners(?). In another church
(S.M.Maggiore (I’ve lost track)) there is an early Christian chiesa below the existing building & a Roman
house below that with its own mosaic floors & wall paintings. Layers upon layers. Today we re-visited San
Francesco’s basilica, particularly the lower one where every square inch is covered in divine frescoes. Here
is the true miracle I reckon. In the afternoon we walked outside the walls into the forest up a steep incline
for about an hour. On the way back we went into an olive grove & John spotted 2 snakes entwined, either
fighting or copulating, one biting the back of the other’s neck. They were olive coloured with
yellowish/whitish stripes about 3 feet long & about as thick round as a brown snake (John says they were
thinner). As soon as they spotted us they swiftly disengaged & disappeared into the undergrowth. This
morning we rang the Hotel Alma Domus, a religious guest house in Siena & booked a room for Thursday &
Friday. Yesterday we saw a group of Chinese pilgims with their priest, one of whom had discovered a free
toilet – he was keen to let us know, pointing at it & saying excitedly “No charge, no charge!” I was out of
luck as I’d already paid €0,50 to pee in the toilet near the Basilica but John used it on the grounds that you
don’t pass up good fortune when it presents itself. By the way, John must be the only person in Italy
(possibly Europe) wearing a flanno shirt. Not even the guys working on the roads here wear them. It
doesn’t draw as many stares as the Crocs however. A discovery today was the Pilgrim’s Oratory, a small
square chapel built in 1457 & decorated by 3 artists of the 15 th century – Matteo da Gualdo, Pierantonio da
Foligno known as Mezzastris & Andrea di Assisi known as The Talented – with wonderful frescoes. We were
the first ones at the time to spot it & it was closed off behind inner glass sliding doors leaving a small
space just big enough for 2-4 people to stand between the inner glass door & the outer door. When people
passing spotted us about a dozen all tried to shove in behind us. John got cranky & told them to rack off &
that they were behaving like lemmings. So much for PAX & BONUM. Just as well we’re leaving for Siena
tomorrow. €1,50 (H bortr niknak 4 Joe (PAX ET BONUM)) + €0,40 (rtoliniov ASSISI (thkownsl sn
owtsd thg8s: assisi – cittÀ gemellata con bethlehem)) + €7,90 (pprkrrft maedn ASSISI bort x H
npiazza commune) + €9,44 (alimentari 4 t) + €3,30 (2 slszv ptzr) + €6,30 (4r v limonce & r
cioccolato nthpiazza commune) + €1,00 (5 tolini) + €1,40 (vino rosso da tavola) = €25 [A$43]. 
hvjst kalkuel8d th@ owr orl nkuesv kosts (ksluedn thfair →← EUROPA) oevr thlrst 5 weks hzbn
A$533 each/week.
23/5 /07. (kont. ←ystrdae) Nr ∞ nwch wr bairli sov dust ← owr limtd prspktvz ech1 vus
zt thrue ♂/♀  zf ← . ( Sunday 28/9/03 (no 73)). Soetz nachrl th@ t felz zf lngwj zn
ks10shn vus & th@tz us wch givzt meenn. Th@ nmaekn thdvzion (dstknshn) bodi/lngwj zbtwen 2
orgnz vn singl ntiti w rsn thmor nyr roel 2th bodi. Tsemz wr spr8 & th@ lngwj zowr srvnt. Howvr
113
thpoe10shl 4 lngwj hzgzistd nth sins bgan (“in the beginning was the Word.”?) just zth
poe10shl 4 th4maeshnov owrslvz woz orlrdi thr nth prmevl  wch, wr , ksploedd 2setus nowr →.
&t maeb wr 2ndri (subsjri) 2th rkwrtsov lngwj, mpowrd x thpoe10shlz hooz posbltez r nnoen
2us & rstrktd x thlimtaeshnzv tz 4maeshn. But tz uesls 2 spkl8 nwot kumz 1st & wot zlrst (hoo mrsta
hoo slaev) (25/5/07. & ue mt getr swoeln ) orwotz bloe rbuvt orl ( Thursday 16/8/01). W hv
noe noljov wrwr → oenli thpowr 2 dstroi owrslvz…. Another hot day, threatening but not delivering
rain in the afternoon. Started with a coffee in the Piazza della Erbe, inspected the Chiesa di S. Agostino
(1280-1298) which has frescoes by Gozzoli done in 1464-5, the remains of the 13 th century frescoes, &
paintings by Pollaiolo, Pier Francesco Fiorentino, Tamagni & Mainardi. It is a lovely church, much more
impressive than the interior of the Duomo (Basilica of S. Maria Assunta). In the afternoon we continued our
cultural education in the Town Hall or New Podesta’s Palace, the home of the Civic Museum & Picture
Gallery & the site of the Torre Grossa built in 1311 & reaching 54 metres. Lippi, Pinturicchio, Gozzoli,
Taddeo de Bartolo, Sodoma & Mainardi are all represented. The 360° view from the tower was impressive
though a build up of cloud interfered with clarity – while we were atop we could hear thunder & given
John’s experience with lightning last year (which he recounted to a couple from Philadelphia sharing the
view with us) we decided to descend (14/8/07. There was a doco. on lightning survivors when we came
back in July in which one of them advised: “If you hear it, fear it; if you see it, flee it.”) & return to our room
to get our umbrellas. But it didn’t rain so after tea we did a small part of the Passegiate della Mura which
we completed yesterday evening in the pleasantly cooler temperature before sunset. It follows the 2nd
circle of walls dating from the 13th century – 2176 metres long – with bastions from the Medici period (15th
& 16th century). Yesterday we also saw the very beautiful medieval fountains (12 th - 14th century) just
outside the wall – clear, cold water in large rectangular basins against a rock backdrop covered & fronted
by a set of arches, a mixture of Gothic, Lombard & Romanesque. Fish swim in them. John sent a set of
postcards to the library people today – scenes from Taddeo di Bartolo’s fresco of the punishments of hell –
with his questionnaires on them which if answered correctly will allow the avoidance of the devil’s tortures.
Yesterday we also visited the Rocca di Montestaffoli, a fortress dating from 1353 which now serves as a
secluded, shady park. When we re-visited today the long grass surrounding it was being cut. I rather like
the Italian idea of letting the grass grow long – it allows any flowers to come to fruition & nice seed heads
to develop. Its also nice to lay down in. There are flowers & grasses growing in the crevices of the towers &
a lovely vine covered in white flowers with purple stamens & a delicate fragrance has established itself in
clumps all along the exterior face of the city walls. John got gypped today when he bought a beer to go
with his slice of pizza & was charged about 3 times the price it’s sold in the supermercato. The rule is “ask
how much before you buy”. €1,80 (Birra Moretti 66cl (← ystrdae)) + €2,50 ( ← ystrdae)) + €7,00 (2
krfe lrtez & 1 kwr frznte npiazza @thsdv thduomo) + €1,60 (prslaen owl 4H) + €10,00 (francoballi
x10 4 thtolini) + €2,60 (2 slszv ptzr) + €4,60 (birr 33cl (2,70) & ptzrslsz (2,90) (ie ♀ chetdmi nth
birr prs bkoz  maed thmstaekv nt rskn b4 )) + €0,50 (tolini 2 → Dean Wills) + €8,00 (biglietti
x2 → palazzo comunale pinacoteca (sumv thrtsts wr bkumn rkwaentdwth: duccio di
buoninsegna, simone martini, ambrogio lorenzetti, spinelo arentino, taddeo di
bartolo, domenico beccafumi, filippo lippi, mainardi (lk ♂m), filippucio, lippo
memmi, benozzo gozzoli, pinturicchio (m faevrt) & e uthrz) – torre (ridotto)) + €5,00
(gelato x2 bort nth piazza della cisterna) + €5,00 (pootchenoez x 2 nth piazza erbe) + €2,00 (Birr
Moretti 66cl) = €51 [A$87].
30/5 /07. Breakfast was far more opulent than the frugal fare (biscotette & prepackaged
cornetti) served up in the Hope Hotel in Purgatory Street – bread rolls with butter & jam, a jug of orange
juice (refilled) & as much coffee as you wished – though the interesting conversation was missing. It was a
pretty quiet night, too – no orgies or mayhem that we could hear. First stop was the Chiesa di San
Salvatore a Ognissanti where Giotto, Botticelli & Ghirlandaio were represented. Then on to the Basilica di
San Lorenzo & the Medici Library, both the result of the Medici devotion to the arts with the church
enlarged & remodelled by Brunelleschi who also designed the Old Sacristy and the library designed by
Michelangelo (16/8/07. the collection is fully described at http://www.bml.firenze.sbn.it/collections.htm.)
Donatello & Bronzino provided sculpture & art works. The library is a rectangular room with a spectacular
wooden ceiling & rows of wooden seats, like pews in a church, each with a built in wooden shelf on which
the books were placed. Stained/painted windows let in the light. On display were marvellous illustrated
manuscripts & books with illustrations of imaginery creatures. Debated whether to go to the Medici
Chapels, got into the queue prepared to fork out the €6,00 each entry fee only to find that the exact
money was required as they didn’t give change, so gave it a miss. Might go tomorrow. Did our
supermarket shopping & changed clothes as it’s starting to warm up again & then sallied forth to the
Brancacci Chapel of S. Maria del Carmine frescoed by Masaccio & Lippi 1424-80. Wandered in the pleasant
sunshine in the Santo Spirito district where a lot of green is locked away behind high walls, saw the Porta
Romana with its immense wooden door, walked past the sternly huge & imposing Palazzo Pitti, crossed the
Ponte Vecchio & continued to wander till we reached Piazza della S.S. Annunziata which John really likes,
then wandered back to Hotel Patrizia via a circuitous route. Sights seen today: 1. in Piazza Santo Spirito a
group of about 5 men were treated to an impromptu fruit lunch when a street vendor packed up his fruit
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van & gave them bananas, a canteloupe & some tomatoes – I think they were vagrants/homeless/drunks
though 2 of them were very artily dressed: an African in a flashy shirt knotted at the waist, & a long-haired
greying Italian wearing a leather jacket & leather shoulderbag. One of them was already drunk but they
really enjoyed the meal using paper plates & knives & forks to eat with & the rim of the fountain as a
table, & cleaning up carefully afterwards. The African nipped off & came back with some wine which they
drank from plastic cups. It was nice to see. 2. John spotted 2 vivid green parrots flying into one of the
cypress trees growing in the garden of the cloister in S. Maria Carmine. He couldn’t get a clear look but
they were definitely parrots. 3. a sparrow with a genetic mutation(?) – white tail & white wings – flew
around Piazza S. Spirito. It looked really beautiful. 4. Lots of lovely courtyards with greenery on display
inside opened street doors – there is elegant living being done in some areas of the old town. €10,00 (blyti
x2 →2 basilica di san lorenzo & biblioteca medicea lorenziana) + €0,20 (tolini bortn piazza di san
lorenzo) + €12,22 (sueprmrto: t stuf) + €1,15 () + €6,80 (blyti x2 (3,00 x2) →2 capella brancacci
nthsanta maria dell carmine (rljn & rt, thoe kuznz, doent ned chuthr but theil uez ni suport ← rl@vz
(orth DIAVOLO ♂slf) thei knget; tz rlsoe wrth ♪n wwr orlwaez goen2doo thez thngz – thlngwj ovt kumz
l8r); & 0,80 4tolini) + €4,50 (stuf ← thCapella shop 4H) + €3,80 (2 ptzrslsz & panini) + €4,00 (
fe lrte x2 nkst2 Przzr dellr SS.annuNziata) = €43 [A$73]. Just went for a stroll to the bridge to check out
the “costoro”. An Italian woman said they are not costoro (beaver) or rats, but nutrie, a member of the
rodent family. To emphasize their non-ratness, a rat was foraging at the same time as a nutria & the rat is
20 times smaller. We still don’t know its English name though. There are bats flying outside our bedroom
window & a marmelaide cat is sitting on the window ledge 6 storeys above the ground in the building
opposite.
6/6/07. €3,60 (felrte & poocheno @ trvolr) + €4,00 (ntri x2 →2 tresoro nbasilica di s.
marco) + €1,20 (tolini x3 bort@ thbasilica) + €10,50 (brunch) + €0,80 (→ erzr san francesco
(doenaeshn)) + €6,00 (biglietti x2 →2 scuola dalmata dell santi giorgio e triffon dkr8d x Carpaccio
(1465-1526) dun n1502-07) + €3,00 (sprtzbtr & felrte n campiello bruno crovato giÀ s. canzian) +
€2,00 (jlrti x2 @ fondamenta nove ()) †← isola di san michele (cimitero)) = €42 [A$71]. A quiet day
again, this time walking about closer to home – to the Chiesa di San Francesco della Vigna where paintings
by Tintoretto, Bellini & Veronese & sculpture by Palladio graced the walls. The Franciscan frate saw our
interest & turned on the lights to 2 chapels so we could see properly. It usually costs 20c to turn them on.
There were lovely cloisters there too complete with a vegie garden. Saw the Duomo in the morning – an
explosion of mosaics on walls & ceilings & a treasure trove of icons, book covers, reliquaries &
ecclesiastical objects. We also took in the Scuola Dalmata with its fresco cycle by Carpaccio featuring St
George. It was interesting that the Franciscans never ask you to pay to see their churches even though
they are often full of beautiful paintings, as with Assisi. Tonight John has gone to Callum Morton’s opening
at the Palazzo Zenobia near Campo di Santa Margherita, one of 3 artists (with Susan Norrie & Daniel von
Sturmer) who are representing Australia at the 52nd Venice Biennale under the banner: “Au3: 3 artists, 3
projects, 3 sites” sponsored by the Arts Council of Australia. Callum Morton’s work is called Valhalla &
Danius Kesminas’ group Histrionics (Danius, Stepas Levikas, Tom Zdanavicius) are performing at the after
party. I am not a sophisticated person in any area, least of all art, but somehow I feel that compared to the
art we’ve been seeing Callum’s effort will leave a bit to be desired. Much of what is now ‘art’ seems to me
to be simply shock tactics & ephemeral. I wonder what will remain in 500 years time that will move &
astonish the viewer like those serene byzantine madonnas move & astonish me today. Started reading
“Animals in Translation” by Temple Grandin & Catherine Johnson – very interesting subject matter & a
direct, simple writing style make it a great read.
13/6 /07 (Journal ♪♫ Austria). Had a special early breakfast (7.45am) so we wouldn’t miss
the train but we needn’t have hurried cos it was 10 minutes late! As a result we missed our Salzburg
connection & had to wait 1½ hours for the next one. Compare that to all the time we were in Italy where
all the public transport we took was on time, precisely. However it didn’t matter as we caught the train to
Salzburg & then a bus to St. Gilgen in the Salzkammergut in plenty of time to find accomodation at
Sonnhof, Raintal 8, A-5340 St. Gilgen; tel. 06227/2283, fax 0627/228; email: stoellinger-sonnhof@aon.at
where we have an appartment with breakfast for €52,00 per night. It is close to the village centre & like
the accomodation in Seefeld is spotless & comfortable. There are many walks here, both Alpine & around
the lake; the village is picturesque & the birthplace of Mozart’s mother & his sister Nannerl. A cable car
goes to the top of the Zwolferhorn (1522m) overlooking the village; the lake, the Wolfgang See, looks
beautiful – clear water with a temperature of 20° our landlady told us, so swimming is available. It also has
large, edible looking fish. John saw a deer from the Innsbruck-Salzburg train & there were white swans with
5 cygnets on the Wolfgang See. The view from our bedroom window looks like the illustration from some
fairytale about mountain trolls or gingerbread houses. The bits of Austria we have seen so far really are
like picture postcards. John stopped his Naprosyn last night & his ankle was fine today. The walking test
comes tomorrow. There was a thunderstorm with lightning & rain as we had our post-dinner drink at a
hotel in the village but its warm & the sun is hot when its out. There is a guesthouse here built in 1415
with a frescoe on the façade from 1618. The patron saint is Saint Agydius (Egidius is a common litho.
name according to John). €250,00 (B&B @ Haslwanter nSEEFELD 4 5daez) + €11,90 (♪ 4Joe) +

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€0,50 (toilt @ SALZBURG staeshn) + €10,40 (ts x2 SALZBURG → ST GILGEN) + €14,40
(sprmrkt stuf (nkluedn 2 botlzv Franziskaner Weissbier 2 poot →2 frj) 4 t) + €5,40 (fe &
Maissel’s weisse (‘Aus Bayreuth’) 0,5lt ← Hotel Christebaur nMozart Platz) = €293 [A$497].
20/6 /07. Luxurious breakfast (3 kinds of bread, 3 varieties of buns, about 10 choices of
homemade jams, a platter of various kinds of goats cheese, another platter of other cheeses, 3 juices,
honey wine, a jug of water (over stones), muesli, poppyseed cake as well as a side plate of salami & ham,
coffee, cream, butter in a pot). The owner likes arty stuff, so there are works in glass (lizards, animals,
hands), little towers of stones, & painted stones decorating the front steps & interior spaces – very
attractive I think. After the feast (actually we didn’t eat much more than usual, but the choice was
impressive) we walked to the top of the 1000 Eimerberg for a view of the town & then to the Ruine
Hinterhaus, a 12th century castle with additions from the 15th century which was very impressive as I
havent seen any small castle ruins where you can wander about and see where the dungeon was. Then we
walked from the castle to Schwallenbach along part of the Rundwanderung (“the romantic hiking trail
around Spitz” according to the tourist brochure) which in parts was quite steep & very narrow & seemed
not to be maintained well compared to the walks round Seefeld & St. Gilgen. We came across 2 harassed &
rather flustered teachers with about 6 mid-primary kids coming from the direction we were heading in
which turned out to be the narrowest, steepest section. So much for romantic hiking. Caught the bus at
Schwallenbach back to Spitz as we were both in need of a drink & it was really hot (a young man at the
bus stop told us it was 34°). Downed long drinks at the pub & went back to our room for a snooze about
3pm. At 5pm we went for a swim in the Danube. Now I have got wet in 2 iconic bodies of water (I dipped
my sore heels in the Meditteranean near Maiori). Had tea at the pub still wet from the river, checked out
the train timetable to Krems as we’ll probably go tomorrow (another hot day predicted – too hot for
walking more of the romantic walking trail), walked along the river in the cooler evening air. Our room has
only one window, which though large, doesn’t help in cooling us as there’s no cross-draught. We have to
leave the curtains wide open to let the air in but were woken at sunrise this morning by bright sun pouring
in. The hottest day ever recorded here according to the boy at the bus stop was 36° last summer. €5,10
(Weissbier & t ← ystrdae) + €1,00 (rkrdd n4maeshn @ sl ruenz oevr n thDonau) + €4,40 (ts
x2 SCHWALLENBACH → SPITZ (rfta →n2 SCHWALLENBACH rlong Panoramaweg no. 7 (yloe )
nth ☼st (34°) dae sofr (x3°) ths y)) + €12,30 (Weissbier x2 & lkholfreb & Traubensaft (taests l
k apljues butz maed ← graeps & drunk mit wortr) + €5,44 (drinks ← sprmrkt 2poot →2 frj) + €21,00
( @ Spitzerl x thDonau) = €50,00 [A$85].
27/6 /07. (SINGAPORE 1450 (dprchr tm 1520)). Jue nMELBOURNE @ 0030. Thei took
thnael  ofmi wch wr rlowd thrue nVIEN & DUBAI. Long trip nkrampt kndshnz. Taxi home 4 $41.50
(thrzdae 1.45am)
19/9 /07 (River ♪♫). Pknk  (Lake Tyers) (15 hrz ovrnt n) → Orbost (korfe & pprz
(The Age, Herald-Sun)) → Cann River (toilt; 8 sum frut) → Bermagui (flak  4 ♂&♀ & pt8okak 4
♀) → Narooma (bort r lmn & rbun) → Meringo (bhnd dunz mung flowrn, prfumd swet-ptosporm;
soundv oshn, plnteov mozez).
26/9 /07. Lrst nt wmad ♥ 2 thhootnv Ninox novaeseelandiae wch kntnud orltrn8n
btwen thfalsetto x2 hoot & long preodzv kntnuus sngl ♪ hootn prktkle orl nt. Thsmornn sum kdz rr
vd 2pla nkst2 th @ 6am. d spnt rgood prtv thnt rkn m branz ovr numbr there koz m O th
Gödel number n I am a Strange Loop x Douglas Hofstadter … → FORSTER (4 kofe & pprz
nr  ovr thH2O; lv bitsv  (mullet) 4me † thbrj nTUNCURRY) → URUNGA (ptrl; lmnlm&btrz
(x2) @ thpub; nap nth bankvth Bellinger River; l8 ) →  nth Bellinger River 13kz ←
URUNGA nth South Arm Road (4 thnt; hepsv mozez; flnfksz chrrpn nth tops; frflz
glitrn nth ndrgroth).
3/10/07. BROADWATER BRIDGE  → (28kz ↑N; 3 dingo/wld  † pups run † throd)
→ wr Grahams Road †† thUpper Clarence River (d n thwstrn ndov thbrj). We were up by about
7am & on the road by 8 for the picturesque drive through the hills to the concrete bridge that crosses the
Clarence on its way to join the Mann. The river here is fragmented into multiple streams separated by
lumpy islands. There are plenty of reeds & little cataracts & on one stretch on the eastern side the
callistemons are host to the yellow flowering vine (2/11/07. see Friday 28/9/07) we saw by the Mann, but in
a denser canopy. It is some variety of jasmine I reckon & an interloper by the way it behaves. Still it is
spectacularly beautiful & unlike lantana (2/11/07. “Lantana camara: Hybrid of garden origin; parents from tropical
America. A variable sprawling thicket-forming perennial shrub to 5 m high and many metres wide or climbing to 15 m high.
Introduced to Australia before 1850. Hardy, showy plant. Invasive from tropics to warm temperate zones. Plants smother vegetation to
15 m tall. Leaves and seeds of some varieties are toxic to stock, causing photosensitisation and damage to liver, kidneys and gut.
Lantana infests over 4 million hectares of pasture and many millions of hectares of open woodland and open forest in Australia.

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Programs aimed at biocontrol of Lantana began in 1914 but without a lot of success. THIS PLANT HAS BEEN DECLARED A WEED OF
NATIONAL SIGNIFICANCE” (www.weeds.org.au))(of which there was plenty on the Mann) does not impede
walking as it hugs the tops of its hosts to get maximum sun, although its possible to hook your foot
through a loop of vine & send yourself sprawling as its thick on the ground. The lantana here is very pale
pink, not the red & orange of the Mann. The river banks are kept well tended by those excellent
groundspeople the cattle whose trails make great walking paths too. They are a mixed lot – some
completely black, some hereford colours (though not the right shape), some completely white & some a
mix of all. There is a strong Brahman gene however, as they all have the floppy ears & many have the
dewlap under the throat. They are mostly cows but there are a few young steers/bulls with horns intact,
who look distinctly willing to stand their ground when we come across them doing the lawn maintenance
as we walk. However so far they have decided discretion is the better part of valour & have moved off
huffily as we pass by. Being the West Heidelberg girl I originally was I am easily intimidated by large
quadrupeds (even sheep) so it is John who shows them which is the superior species by continuing
purposefully & uncompromisingly while I bring up the distinctly nervous rear. I really don’t know what I’d
do if one of them chased me – my agility is zero, my decision-making likewise & I cant run for nuts. I guess
loud screaming & waving about of arms would have to do. Since they seem to be well fed & thus heavy
but quite zippy on their feet it would be an unequal contest. I’ll never run with the bulls in Pamplona so
don’t want to do any practicing here. Wild dogs must be a problem in the area – there are signs about
warning that 1080 poison has been laid for them. Perhaps the absence of adult dogs with the pups we saw
is an example of its effects. I must say I’m glad, as wild dogs popping up unexpectedly is even worse than
the angry cow scenario – at least the cows don’t bite. By the time I watch out for cows, dogs and snakes
on these walks I have virtually no time to see the scenery. Now that John has a digital camera & is taking
shots of great spots at least I can look at them on the LCD when we get back to the van. Thankfully the
waters are free of leeches and crocodiles so I’m most relaxed when I’m in the water, though, since I’m not
even an average swimmer, dog-paddle being my best stroke, the threat of drowning sits in the back-room
of my brain & is activated if my feet cant touch bottom. Also getting in, out & across the water is a matter
of extremely careful navigation as I am losing my balance (badly deaf in my left ear) & a simple slip which
those better endowed (ie John whose reflexes are excellent) could rectify with some quick fancy footwork
means I end up crashing to earth like a stone, as I did today, barking my shin on a rock, bruising the palm
of my hand, & feeling stupid & shaky for a good ½ hour afterwards. It also slows me down to the pace of a
sedated snail if we are walking in the water as my confidence is shot & I seem not to be able to move my
feet for fear of the consequences. Sigh – to think that in my youth I was a rock-hopper extraordinaire. All
that aside, I’m having a great time as the quiet, the warm wind & the beautiful surroundings do tend to
cancel out the cowardly effects of aging. Perhaps the rather cranky old cocky who drove past us last night
in the ute with the 2 lean & mean yellow dogs chained in the back had had a bad day being chased by
cows, dogs & snakes while slip-sliding in the river & hadn’t had time to notice how amazing the
surroundings he was driving through were. (27/10/07. John just suggested he might have been returning
from inspecting his fencing and found Neil the concreter had been at work with his wire cutters.) I’m
writing this on the side step of the van in the shade & have just noticed the tag hanging on the swag that
is my mattress for our trips. It says: “Bluegum Single Swag. Camping in the outback is made easy with
BURKE & WILLS Canvas Swags. Our swags are tough and built to last the distance! The Canvas Swags are
strong and light, breatheable and designed to withstand the harsh Australian climate. Ideal for 4-wheel-
driver enthusiasts, bikers, truck drivers and campers.” Makes me feel like a fraud!  uv ds 2 takovr
throlov !
10/10 /07. Lemon Tree Flat (nKWIAMBAL NATIONAL PARK) → (84kz) →
WARIALDA (“1 settlement in the area”) → (40kz) →BINGARA (“The Gem of New England” (h
st

 th2rst blrb ← thmap ← th2rst nfo ofs nGLEN INNES: “ Warialda – ‘place of wild honey’ is
the oldest settlement in the region. Find its local heritage through the historic Town Walk
or witness its beauty at Cranky Rock Nature Reserve, perfect for picnicking, bird
watching and bushwalking. Take a nature walk to view the rare tree species. Bingara is
situated on the Gwydir River, which meanders to the mighty Copeton Dam. Copeton
Dam, an inland water playground, offers a fascinating day trip or holiday experience.
Visit the Glacial area, great lookouts, historic buildings, mine sites and geological drives.
Go fishing, horse riding or canoeing. The Orange Trees in town are the living memorial to
Bingara’s fallen in war. Every August the town hosts a festival to harvest the fruit. The
magnificent Roxy Theatre is a striking building, built in 1936 by three Greek gentlemen.
The Roxy is currently used as a venue for weddings, meetings, live performances and
cinema.”) Did a figure-of-eight walk (8ks) from Lemon Tree Flat, kept mown by kangaroos, 2 of whom did
the duty last night as we ate tea, to the junction of the Macintyre (really a creek) and the Severn (a
magnificent river, bigger than the Mann) where we spotted 2 goats & swam in the boulder-strewn valley in
deep pools of dark brown water. It’s a spectacular place. Got back about 12.30 & decided to move on to
protect my knee from further rock-hopping & thus forestall the possibility of preventing any trips in the
future. At Warialda we had a truly awful pie (soggy pale pastry, unrecognizable mince in watery gravy) & a

117
soft drink each for $13!!! We could have had a feast in Venice for that much. Consoled ourselves with the
thought that we contributed to the rural economy. On the way into Bingara there was a chookyard close to
the road where about a dozen hens were cosying up to a turkey in full display. Just goes to show how the
groupies gather around the rock-star. As John commented: “All that pomp won’t count for anything at
Christmas”. We are in a great spot on the Gwydir River in an area called the Gwydir Scenic Drive, a large
expanse on both sides of the river, about 1k downstream from the town bridge. There are lots of horses
wandering about. Thunderstorms threaten. The day before yesterday Lismore copped a storm that
produced softball-sized hailstones & about $5million damage to cars & buildings – the extreme weather is
beginning!. On the walk today we discovered that our Crocs are no match for prickly-pear spines – John
had lots of stops to remove them from the soles and I had a long thorn so far imbedded in the skin below
my ankle I had trouble pulling it out using full force. The spines must lie on the ground because though we
saw the plants we were careful not to walk near them but somehow got attacked anyway. Now we know a
2nd limitation to our otherwise terrific footwear.
17/10 /07. Manning River st (@ H2Oz nWoko NP) → (37kz) → GLOUCESTER
(pad $8.50 4 mugzv kfe x2, rrkord?; ptrl, shopn, mps ← nfo ) → (41kz; †t 8 4dnz vth Gloucester
River) → st (nth Gloucester River 4 th Gloucester Tops  20kz frthr ↑throd). Some info on
Captain Thunderbolt from the Cartoscope map we picked up in the InfoCentre in Gloucester: “Frederick
Ward was born in about 1836 near Windsor NSW to convict Michael Ward and free settler Sarah Ward
although no record of his birth exists. Frederick was one of ten children … [he] began his bushranging
career in 1863. Of all the bushrangers in the first 100 years of European settlement Thunderbolt was at
large for probably the longest period – almost six years and six months … Following is a list of crimes said
to have been enacted by Captain Thunderbolt and his gang: 25 mail coach robberies, 16 hotels and stores,
16 stations and residences, 6 hawkers, 1 tollbar gate, 80 thefts of horses, 1 escape from lawful custody,
numerous firing on police in their line of duty … Frederick’s sister Sarah Edwards supposedly concealed
Thunderbolt on frequent occasions at her home near ‘Guy Fawkes’, now known as Ebor (1/11/04
Tuesday 12/7/05 (no 68)). Taken from a board in Woko NP giving info re the Aboriginal history of the
area: “The local Aboriginal people, in retaliation of wrongdoings by European settlers, speared to death
five convict shepherds. This Aboriginal clan then divided, with one group moving towards the Gloucester
River, the other towards Upper Arundel. ¶ The local residents, assisted by settlers from Port Stephens, set
off to find the Aboriginal people responsible. They found a group camped on the edge of a cliff near the
Gloucester River. The sleeping camp included men, women and children. It was reported that the
Aboriginal people leapt to their deaths after being surrounded by the settlers. However oral evidence
suggests they were shot and thrown over the cliff edge by the settlers.” (1/11/07. Monday 22/8/05
(no 67))
24/10 /07. NUNGURNER (1/11/07 16/2/04 – 27/2/04 (no 42) 20/2/04) (4shor rzrv
off Loop Rd; lrst nt  drmt H woz  rrvzd listv sjschns 4 me vhow2 br btr ♥r (2/11/07 rgr8 pom x
H ( Monday 14/6/04): “I could be a post / modern pro / & specialize in / avant garde sex / with
intellectuals // For foreplay / I could tit / illate your Aristotle / & play with your Plato / Socra / Tes you / I
would Machiavelli / happy fella. // Then for the main event / When your Heidegger was / Quivering / You
could explore my / Nietzche / Lick my / Kant / Foucault me / To the rhythm : // Derrid, Derrid, Derrid / Ah …
…..!! (with apologies to the phlosphers. helenz 2/8/04.)” (25/8/04. u left out Wittgenstein (28/8/04. The
last line could have been: That’ll be 100 Wittgensteins (cash, no cheques thanks) – helh&z) )). ♀ woz 
nowr foldowt tabl &  kort st vth wrd LICK nth 1st krumplt list b4 ♀ SNATCH TIT rwa.) → (105kz)
→ SALE (pprz nth kafe vth Gippsland Art Gallery; thgzbshn) → (236kz vr CityLink @ rproks $6.00)
→ MELBOURNE (West, Miller St.). So n owr 1st trip (River ♪♫) ← ← EUROP nOZ.
19/12 /07 (X-mas 07). (6.60am @ Tatong (15/6/08.  2daz ☼day Herald ☼ – Sport
7: “One of Victoria’s oldest and proudest ball ♣♣ is facing extinction in what should
be a year of celebration. ¶ Tatong ball ♣ is celeb ing 100 years of proud
black and white tradition. ¶ But the lifeblood of the northeastern Victorian town –
population 300 – is set to cease ope ion at the end of the year  to a funding crisis
…“we’ve been the most successful ♣ in the league with 15 premier , and we’ve
survived a depression and two  wars …” ¶ But despite the one-time success of the
team, the now struggle to field a full senior team. ¶ … in a morale boost for the
club, Collingwood president Eddie McGuire has d his support for the ♣. ¶ “We hope
they can do everything they can to keep wearing the mighty black and white colours
and keep the ing, and we support them as much as we can”, he said.”) –
thKakatua galeritaz hvbn skrechn 4 nowr) Yor rt but: ystrda  woz so mrd nth prst (15/6/08.
Saturday 10/4/04)  4got 2 shn  dropt nn Dennisz & Margarets plas nth HIGHLANDS
118
(26/2/08. hzr sho @ thglre 10 nkst wknd) rlir nth da. ♂ woz @ werk but ♂z nabr Bernard  ♂ hz
rknn (nt korzd x rstrok) wr ♂ hz lost kntrl ovr th muslz nth rt sdv ♂z  so th@t sagz & ♂ nt
kloz ♂z rt  wch makst get nfktd & panfl & ntrfz wth ♂z slepn (2/1/08. Bell’s Palsy: see
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bell's_palsy). Thz dmorlzd ♂m & ♂ hz 2 wair np@ch. Wot madt wrs z ♂
got thknn just b4 ♂ woz levn 4 thStockhausen (7/1/08. SwTaRlUtVeEr 2da hoo  twz
Shöenberg) smpozium nCanada 2 wch ♂ hdbn nvtd rftr thei dskvrd nth  Dennis woz nsprd x
(& ttld r rezv pantnz) Stockhausenz – The Planets (1/1/08. Something wrong here – according
to Dennis’ site ( http://www.dennis-spiteri.com/) Stockhausen doesn’t rate a mention as a source of
inspiration (28/2/08. but ♂ shood 4 me z ♂z MAGNUS OPUS (kmpozd 1977 – 2003; 29 howrz
longnorl) z “a cycle of seven operas called “Licht: Die sieben Tage der Woche ("Light: The Seven
Days of the Week"). The Licht cycle deals with the traits associated in various historical
traditions with each weekday (Monday = birth and fertility, Tuesday = conflict and war,
Wednesday = reconciliation and cooperation, Thursday = travelling and learning, etc.)”
(←) & DRUaMlMeOcND  2da th@ m Days (Days of the Week ? 7 Days ? (hvnt ds yt))
rmn ♂mv thLicht…)) …. Molyullah → Moyhu → Whorouly → Myrtleford (ptrl) → Bright (kfe,
The Age, ∏ ; bort koldsor krem) → Mt Hotham (sprng flowrz, sno gumz flowrn) → (rst  nr
bushtrak @ 11.45am) …. → Omeo → Swifts Creek → Ensay (Bruce & Kathy wrnt @ ) →
Bruthen → Petmans Beach (3.30pm) …. lay on me back on the bunk immobilized by a huge
weariness the result of my inability to sleep properly over recent nights. Every muscle to my fingertips
was frozen & perhaps only the apnea kept me awake which is just as well as Id like to get some
proper sleep overnight. Havent bothered to go the other side of the dune where I can hear the waves.
Im here by meself since a bloke and his kid packed up their rods and left …. Rftr t strold → bch nt
2get ← @ ☼↓. Thrwr no uthr prnts nth s&.
26/12 /07 (26/2/08. ← th: “Wodensdaeg, an Anglo-Saxon name for Wednesday.
In Teutonic mythology, Odin, Woden, Woutan, and Votan [plus hundreds of other names],
was the one-eyed patriarch and chief of the gods; god of wisdom and war …. , inventor
of the arts ….. connotations of Odin lie with "poetry, inspiration" as well as with "fury,
madness and the wanderer." …. He was also considered a powerful magician, sorcerer
and healer. Some sought his aid in trade and sailors called on him for a fair wind and he
was the patron saint of travellers.…and in English and Continental folklore the leader of
the Wild Hunt…. Although he was called “All-father”, he wasn’t regarded as a creator.
Like his Greek counterpart Zeus, he was limited in power and they were both helpless in
the hands of the Fates who were Norns in Scandinavia and Moirai (Moerae) in Greece. He
carried his spear, Gungnir, as a sceptre or staff. …. On his shoulders perched his two
ravens, Hugin (Thought) and Munin (Memory), who whispered in his ears about the
events they saw in their daily flights over the earth. Even when he sat at the feasts of
the gods in Glasdheim, his golden palace, or with the heroes in Valhalla, he ate nothing.
Whenever food was put in front of him he gave it to his two wolves or watchdogs, Geri
and Freki who were by his feet. Although he was … supreme among gods and men, still
he continually desired and sought for more wisdom. He went to the Well of Wisdom that
was guarded by Mimir (“he who thinks”) to beg for a drink from it … in [which] was
hidden all wisdom and knowledge. Mimir said Woden could drink from the well if he paid
for it with one of his eyes…..It was Woden who ordained the laws which ruled human
society….. As he sat on his throne Hlidskialf in the palace of Valhalla he looked out over
all the world and watched the doings of the gods, giants, dwarfs and men.”). Spnt
thmornn nn n10s dskshnv hs (31/12/07. Tuesday 18/7/06) & thdfrnszv prspktv btwen jnrashnz.
Thrz no dskshn wrth tz ☼t btwen me & mum wch duznt ttr nth ejv opn worfair. Mumz stil tle wtht
nuff 2 ndrst& th@ th rius prtvth rgut z 4t @ thlvlv mplkashnz, nnundo, & thrdopshnv strtjk pzshnz
– wotz opnle st8d zt onle 2 prvd prtuntez 4 ntrapt. (27/12/07. r OO wa vn hs zpltkl).
♀r man ● z2klam m jnrashn nt mjn thprst:  rgre – ech nu jnrashn rest. Thn off 2nuthr pgowt
ths @ thGarricks nBalmain wth svrl ♀/♂ hoom v met b4 but hrdle rmmbrd. ←n Epping @ t th
 rpd mt &   → Beecroft 2 gtr  ← Rasa but thBlansjaarz  woz rlso mt. ←@ Epping 
woz nstorln mslf nth room 2 r wn  rrlzd th ↑stairz wozn so   & & bangd nth wndo
& fnle mum : ♀d bn  orlrlong. Frthr dskushn re  hs – vre ntrstn & tkontnuz → (27/12/07. l
119
k nvstg8n hoo 4jd th sgnchrz nth ttlz 2 th). But 2moro m ↓S (so r thGarricks) 10 rlong m
ltlbtsv hs nm  4 thrd.
5/3/08 (YORKE PENINSULA). ROBE ( 6/4/05 & Thursday 7/4/05): “Best Medium Town
2007”. 7.40pm. “One has to be responsible as I have always said. One has a moral
obligation to take responsibility for one’s actions, and that includes one’s words and
silences, yes, one’s silences, because silences rise to heaven too, and God hears them,
and only God understands and judges them, so one must be very careful with one’s
silences.” - the words of a Chilean priest (12/4/08. JESUIT & dvzr 2 Pinochet), member of OPUS
DEI, as reported in By Night in Chile x Roberto Bolaño (5/8/08. “In The Gulag Archipelago
Solzhenitsyn wrote that to keep silent about evil “in burying it so deep within us that no
sign of it appears on the surface, we are implanting it, and it will rise up a thousandfold
in the future.” ” – 2daz dtorel  The Age). Even without the direct line of a member of god’s own
Ive been mindful of the sentiments expressed since a discovery a week or two ago has thrown me off
balance again and subjected me to an agitation which I know from experience can only be resolved
by giving an account. I intend to do it over the following days (3/4/08. Thursday 6/3/08 -
Monday 10/3/08, & 17/3/08 (15/4/08. but4 ths1  kdnt hlp rvr10 2m stl)) in plain
english, for a change, not as I write now but as I used to when I wrote the story 20/6/00 (no 7)
almost 8 years ago which unbeknownst to me contained a prediction or prepared the stage for a
sequel which I am finding unsettling and uncanny ( Sunday 22/3/04 (no 73)). Ill explain
tomorrow but for now (the sun is low & its time to check out the fishermen at the end of the jetty) to
end off the en here is a quote from the original ( Tuesday 20/6/00 (no 68)): “I am in Litho
House, Errol St. North Melbourne by myself and everything is silent. Except now and
then I hear people talking as they walk by on the footpath outside the foyer doors. I look
over to see if its some of the other singers come late but its just passers by. I go upstairs
to the toilet and grope in the pitch black to switch on the light. Later down in the foyer
again I do a tour of inspection of the wall decorations. They consist of a mix of carved
sculptures, some geometric, some fantastically contorted depicting suffering, linen
hangings with patriotic poems and songs woven into them, pictures of medieval grand
dukes representing the heroic antiquity of the lithuanian tribes. The overall effect is
clean, rather bare, almost clinical, certainly kitsch. I wonder what is the cause of this
barrenness of the imagination. Am I seeing an example of how constrictions on the
personalities of individuals, perhaps self-imposed, are being translated into the cultural
aesthetic values of a whole group? Is the way a community expresses itself in the choice
of its symbols and decorations a reflection of the hidden lives of its members? I stand in
front of one of the linen hangings, a long one. It has the words of a song in block letters
woven down its length. The song is Lietuva Brangi Mano Tėvynė (Lithuania Cherished
Soil My Homeland). I am reading the words as I sing them sotto voce but I know them off
by heart. Then I sing louder, every verse to the end of the song. There is no one to hear.
¶ The foyer is L shaped so that the half of it around the corner is not visible from the
main door. It is dark here as the single light is in the front section. Up against the wall
completely invisible in the gloom is a comfortable armchair. I unscrew the stubby of
Abbots Invalid Stout I’ve been holding all this time and sit back in the armchair. I am
looking at one of the traditional symbols carved in wood on the opposite wall which
catches some of the light from the front part of the foyer. The symbol is shaped rather
like the letter E laying on its back with the points facing upwards (4/3/08. htz - ). It is
called Gedimino Stulpai (The Columns of Gediminas). Gediminas was one of the grand-
dukes. This decoration is solidly constructed out of timber beams some 15cms wide by 4
cms thick and covers an area of wall about 8 ft. wide by 5 ft. high. It is polished or
lacquered a glossy light brown. It is ugly. Its uncompromising geometric prongs make me
think of the arms of the swastika. I can’t take my eyes off it. I am in a meditative mood,
sitting in the dark, drinking my stubby very slowly. About half the face of the Stulpai is
incongruously covered by shiny brass plaques each of about 3 x 4 inches inscribed with
the name of a dead lithuanian, always male. I wonder who these men are. Are they
community notables? Are they people whose families have given donations? Are they
members of some organization of lithuanian patriots? Is my father’s name there? I think
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its probably not there as he was not one for organizations. But I can’t see from where I
am as the light is not good and I dont get up to check (23/2/08.  ♪st 2da m frthrz nam zth
3rd↓ thlst nth lft. 5 ●s lor  ♪ thnam(15/4/08. rwek l8r nth dvsv r♣ ldr  gugldt & fownd th@th d8 &
plas v♂z  z♪d wch menz thnfo mstv kum  MELBOURNE – stranj 2gt nfo re m sOnz wch  ddnt
no h  nLT st; gugld m frthrz nam 2 but ♂ ddnt )v rmajr hooz shnd nth DVD dokoz
 don8d → th♣ l re rfu wks rgo zth ♂ nchrj vr ltho TDA (15/4/08. Tautinio Darbo Apsaugos -
National Tasks Guard) unit rspnsbl 4 e kskushnz v (m told)). Then I notice that on the
middle prong, the tallest, near the top is another symbol. Symbols on symbols! Marriage
of symbols. This one is the cross, I mean the christian, the Jesus Christ cross. Its a plain,
unadorned (Christ has risen!), solid looking white cross and it occurs to me that if you
bent the arms it would look even more like the swastika than the duke’s columns.
Flanking either side are the letters A, A also solid in white. Can’t be Alcoholics
Anonymous, I muse, but I can’t think of anything else they could mean (1/3/08. 2da 
rgan. A  A = AMŽINA  ATILSI = ETERNAL  REST). I peer about the shadowy foyer and sure
enough against the wall in the corner is another cross but life size and massive as if it
might be made from railway sleepers. It too is polished a glossy light brown. Salve for
the conscience? How they must need to keep reminding themselves of their piety, I
think.”
12/3 /08. ARDROSSAN ( ort r otlv redwn 4 & hd @ mRiYcAkNz plas 4 pullns
owtv ths& ystrda; dontno wot2do – wr nth mdlv x fr thlongst ☼ spl evr rkor nSA; tz 1.40pm ndr
thshad vr πn nth 4shor; m pas10n thtmp chrz rkor nADELAIDE & prjktd tmp chrz 4 thwek r
: “THE SWELTER ¶ MONDAY March 3: 35.4C § TUESDAY March 4: 35.7C § WEDNESDAY
March 5: 37.9C § THURSDAY March 6: 38.5C § FRIDAY March 7: 39.0C § SATURDAY
March 8: 39.8C § SUNDAY March 9: 40.2C § MONDAY March 10: 40.0C § TUESDAY March
11: 38.4C ¶ FORECAST ¶ WEDNESDAY March 12: 38C § THURSDAY March 13: 39C §
FRIDAY March 14: 39C § SATURDAY March 15: 38C § SUNDAY March 16: 38C § MONDAY
March 17: 39C § TUESDAY March 18: 39C.”; 4 rkrap, & 2 x r prz wnn prst (wonn 2002) &
ma r off thp…; rlong klf as; Peregrine Falcon (Falco peregrinus) wth pjn nklorz; huj
stngra;  K8, Joe, & lft msj 4 Ben & Dan; nuthr nth p - nth vnn tz thsoshl ) ← 2 owr  @
TIDDY WIDDY BEACH (nth skru x th (GULF ST. VINCENT))
19/3 /08. Ovrnt  (@Surfers Campground @ INNES NATIONAL PARK @ th v
YORKE PENINSULA nS.A.) (vr WAROOKA) YORKETOWN (sprmrkt shopn; The Advertiser &
The Australian ovr (4/7/08. A family tree on the My Heritage website, provided by someone called
Babin, mentions my maternal great great grandparents, Timothy and Mary Feehan. Timothy was reputed to
have died while carrying stones to build the Catholic church in Yorketown in 1918. Since his date of birth is
given as 1834 I think there has been some confusion, as he would have been 84!) STANSBURY (where
my maternal grandmother Rebecca Olive Mason probably started school in the old one-room schoolroom
combined with teacher’s residence which is now the Stansbury Museum. We took photos there (under the
eye of the Pole who was on duty, our age and with a thick accent, but who was delighted to offer
suggestions about spots for the night) and in the Info Centre (formerly the old post office) bought some
pictorial cards & a booklet on the old buildings of the town – in this a Thomas Mason, carpenter, is
mentioned. Is he a brother or cousin or other relative of George Golland Mason who was Rebecca’s father
(my great grandfather)? There are still Mason’s descendants living here. One of the ladies at the Info
Centre lives at Koolywurtie (on Rebecca Olive’s birth certificate) & is engaged to the son of a farming
family which has lived in the area for over 100 years. She said she’d ask if anyone in his family knew of the
Mason family & will email me if so (29/3/08. She did – there is a Mrs Mason who cleans the caravan park in
Port Rickaby (near Koolywurtie) and she has included her contact number). Stansbury is a peaceful town
on a quiet bay (Oyster Bay, named after the oyster beds which featured there in the early days, now gone)
& has some lovely old houses. A photo of the pupils taken outside the school in 1892 is too early to include
my grandmother (she would have been 4) but could include her oldest sister, Mary Hannah, born in 1886
v ♪st H hz n dprst sns ♀r knvrsashn wth Michael ystrda wn
and therefore a 6 year old at the time.
♂z r ln & th singsong♫ v♂z  ndd ♂z ntwl.  nt us W wl ♀z nths st8 z1s wr prst
PORT AUGUSTA thdstns 2 MELBOURNE prvnts r kwk E shood ♂z kndshn worsn. Joe & K8 wl
a l 2rprt n♂m rfta thwknd so til thn wl rman ths sdv thSPENCER GULF & mak owr mnd nwthr 2 W
 r2 E 2 MELB rfta hn wot tha hv2 . 4 r  th4shor).

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 26/3 /08. Ovrnt   12kz W vPENOLA (4.10am. nt gt2 slep rfta drnkn r2nd lrj v kofe w
l  thfrnch(Pascal). Th hv lnd thmslvz V us. Owr pland 2mnth trip ttld W (Going
West) hz n rst2 r 3wek 1 rttld YORKE PENINSULA. Th 1st o woz th@ thtrip gan @ tht
vth longst ☼wav x fr evr rkor nths prtv th cuntre ( nADELAIDE) wcht w koodnt N (frn pan
 ) 2 O th SPENCER GULF 2get  Eyre Peninsula 2 thW. Wn th ☼wav fnle n rfta 15 daz (prvius
rkord n ADELAIDE woz 8, & nne OZ kaptl 10 daz nPERTH) H  Michael & twoz rpair ♂z ntwl. Th@
woz n18/3 & n20/3 K8 lft r  msj 2  ♂ woz n hsptl rfta r majr skopsod. So wr nowr wa 2
MELBOURNE. Tz hrdle srprzn thn th@ thpoptop got lown owt 2da 2 th folt nstlashn vth kanvas
slev nle r lv munths rgo & thvan kn no longr funkshn zr rvan. v lso gotr  wchz prgrsn 2 me
lungs &  thprspktv rlong 2moro.) CASTERTON (ptrl @ 149c/ltr) DUNKELD (lowze ; The
Age, The Herald Sun; 3 msjz  K8 nHz mo l re Michael: ♀z  ♀r undl) ALLA (ptrl;
π 4 H & vre dr chkn drumstk 4me) (spdn 2 lm; ) MELBOURNE (thO strof).
16/4 /08 ( ). MELBOURNE (lft O 10.30am rfta wth H @ Fraus nVic. St. zpruzul) 
 (vr City Link; p l)   (Calder wa:  uz2  vt zm  svlzashn, rspns lt,
etc.(21/6/08. Monday 13/8/01))   Charlton (t nth prk rfta th rij th Avoca rvr 4 )
  Wycheproof (p l)   Sea Lake (stu vjnjr !!)   Ouyen (1/2owr zzz) 
 DANYO RESERVE (( 24/5/00 ); @ ☼; ; v rort 4r ida: Granta (sshu 100) mag,
Cosmos x Witold (19/6/08. Vytautas nlitho - m frthrz (& th namv lithoz gr8st G d Duk) nam)
Gombrowicz & Pornographia x Witold Gombrowicz (18/6/08. hv sns rqrd A Kind of
Testament (19/6/08. wr ♂ : “I come from a noble family which, for some four hundred
years, owned estates in Lithuania, not far from Wilno and Kovno (20/6/08. wr  woz born
19/8/41 (25/6/08. Monday 14/8/00))…. In 1863 the Czar of Russia confiscated the
property of my grandfather, Onufry Gombrowicz, falsely accused of having participated
in the Polish uprising.” (20/6/08.   m m@rnl fammli nam Kabaila woz +opptd thTrtr ♀ s
dvth fammli 4 reznzv sekkurit rftr thsam rzn)), Ferdydurke, & Trans-Atlantyk); … 0 2doo so 
td n Cosmos; … nth dst ror  nth Mallee wa).
23/4 /08. O 22kz nr da v O 30°c nr letr vH2O & 3 o jz & woz nakkrd. Lft @ 9 woz 
@ 4. Wil s♀/♂ u th♪♫. Nstedd let me ndulj nr itvr rvre (rflkshn, orwank fu so) naj, & 2makt r
itmor mordln  mt even lapse, a little, 2  nglsh. Ys m d io n, going accele d ajn,
dkrpitud, &  suppose tz takn4 g td - b d. m ku r dtherer & r worrier. Afu nts ago 
woz havn tru getn 2 slep worryn  mt skru thnjn koz  had2   50kz 2 thnxt town without
oil ( Monday 21/4/08).  nt dsd f2 ttl thez p♪♫  or  - what do u prefer? U dsd,
. (1/6/08. Since the heart symbol encompasses both the word heart and me, I’d feel less likely to be
tempting fate, and one of your famous coincidences, if you called it  !) There is a shop in Alice
dvotd ntirely 2 O OZ wars, galipole, memoirz vgenerals, Cosgrove etc. They have na jt vthez
O nOZ nth frunt dspla . Wr ls wood u get th@? (1/6/08. In every major capital in the Western world I
would think, with the appropriate substitutions).  dce th@ Alice Springs zr place of pilgrimage 4 th
PATRIOTS OF OZZIE OZZIE OZZIE. But as  aj cultural & relice clichés & almost everything else
that sustains us in language (26/4/08. spshle wotr populrle nonz storez/na vz 2 wch , rtsts, &
mor sgnfk le thmedr/TV nds mak such nmport kntrbushn; tz koz thav lost thrz (27/4/08.
songz/po vth ldrz nolongr ev /rlv ) th@th orjnez v Alice Springs so vak ) hav almost lost
meaning for me. &  nt claim 2 happy or 2 dzrt. Twood n wl 2v my kidz r
condemned 2 lvz vmzre, & r trayl vorl thos th@ suffr nth . The altar of happiness has more
than enough high priests already – I commend u 2 their capable (1/6/08. I bought “Handbook for
happiness: exploding the depression myth” by Lorraine West, described on the blurb as “RN, RPN, B.A.,
Soc Sci (Mental Health), M.A.” who “has worked in the field of mental health for the last 25 years …. with
people and families who have mood disorders. Her work and current research focuses on depression and
developing resilience.” Clutching at straws is one of my regular exercises) - let them teach u 2 ENJOY &
2 JUMP 4 JOY. Which isnt 2 say th@ Im unhappy: the words just dont apply; or others of the sort. I
think Im merely a mirror which reflects my sOnz. Its why tz import 2 n utfl places.  hv no inner
glow 2 r10 r mundane , only reflect @ u. &  hv 0v valu 2 report (20/6/08. “You know, it is
122
not without pleasure that I can tell my majes colleagues who  for humanity, and in
the name of humanity, that I have never n a single word other than for a sel
purpose; but, each time, the  trayed me and escaped from me.” – Gombrowicz, A
Kind of Testament (21/6/08. & Monday 22/10/07)). Wot  ne nswrd 4 mslf  nswrd long
rgo. So   nkod wch no1 z (24/6/08. “Who knows? This may be why these are so resist
to criticism. They are so boring that they are unreada , so one can’t criticize them. …..
¶ His  will bore others to t, but that doesn’t matter, let’s . According to the
theory, it is we who have to adapt ourselves to the , not the  to us! …. ¶ From such
an asceticism, incapa of enjoying life and una to have fun, never king one’s own or
anybody else’s pleasure, and still less a personal profit, from such high-minness, always
ready for self-sacrifice, come the of martyrs. This is matyrdom. ¶ You have what you
deserve: you have persecuted this wretched ‘self’ so often that you have reached an
impersonal lite ure and hence an abstract, unreal, arti ial, cerebral, ardly, fee lite
ure, deprived of strength, vigour, freshness, originality, determined only to bore.
Where are the good old days, when Rabelais  as a child might pee against a , to
relieve himself? The old days when lite ure took a deep breath and created itself freely,
among people, for people!” - A Kind of Testament) Tz kum r habit. So there!
30/4 /08. @ Serpentine Gorge da vztrz . Wot  hd  woz thman pool wr thj
SPIRIT SERPENT lerks zonli thpool wch s thn  thgorj & 2th man pool O 1k ferthr 2 thgorj.
Th2rsts dont no th@ &  onli suspktd th uth koz  kood wot t lk r tas klft nth nkst j
 th owt. No1 goz 2th owt koz thsn  tz rs nuws klm, thot onli taks 15mins. So 2da 
ds 2nvstg8 thgorj propr. Lft @ 8.30 & woz  @ 3.30.  woznt a 2 klammbr rlong thworl  thpool
so  wnt2 th owt & ovr thj @ thvt &  rkrek nthuthr sd 2 thmdlv thgorj.  hd stm8d
twood tak 1½ owrz tt took 2½. 1st  wnt2 nvstg8 thklft & tz reli tas t th ig srprz woz
2dskuvr thmagnfs pool wch loks thn 2th klft & wndz tzwa 2 thsnakn, naro kervz vth ur
wch splits thj. Twoz vys 2me th@ ths zth v thj SPIRIT SERPENT &  woz nklnd 2pa m
 rspkts 4 @ ths plas tz r ettr mtr4 4 th ntanj wch rul owr ds10ez (& 2 wch/hoom ( Thursday
11/8/05) w mak sakrfs ( 24/8/05 )) thnth BOODA rth Oe GOST.  wosht m soks, shert, & hdr
 thn setld 2 th floksv Painted Firetail (Emblema pictum) wch kam 1 rfta thuthr 2 drnk @th pool.
 hd onli evr n 1 ♀/♂ vthm 4, 1000kz owtv thr nachrl  nth Flinders Ranges. Tha r vre showe &
thndv thgorj woz fild wth thr ♪♫♪. Thuthr ko thr woz thGrey-headed Honeyeater (Lichenostomus
heartlandi). Thn  2th pool @th n vth gorj wch  th2rsts 2 f kood klm  thsd vt z
ddnt lk thdr vr 2½ owr  thwa  hd kum nthwch woz prdktd 2rech 31°c n Alice.  hv lost
knfdns nm r tz @ evri lvl. Sins Doig  me  hv  luddprshr &  klstrl  fel mortl.  sspkt m
susept 2 ☼ s s & ddrashn zndid x thdzzns & wekns  fel n hil. So  woz plezd 2fnd th
holdz & holdz wch  nu wood rlow me 2klm  thpool @th n .  koodv lwaz   t  ne
 2kep m dapak dr z hd r (21/6/08. 2da  ort rnu Panasonic Lumix TZ15 wth 10x
mgnfiion + s♀/♂ rchrj + 4GB d 4 r g d totlv $615) &nt. Havn sta lsht  kood
getowtv thgorj ezli  wnt 2 th ig pool wr thj SPIRIT SERPENT SLEEPS/BROODS (rwa 
thuthr 2rsts) & loitrd thr wthth tal fnchz.
7/5/08. @ Parks n  Ormiston Gorge (Macdonnell Ranges O 145kz Wv Alice
Springs ( v OZ)). 4got 2shn ystrda th@ @ Bowmans Gap  flusht nAustralian Owlet-
nightjar (Aegotheles cristatus). Nth  thrr Grey-crowned Babbler (Pomatostomus temporalis,
race: rubeculus) & thWestern Bowerbird (Chlamydera guttata) zr skavnjr. Lrst nt   nuthr brf
skuffl mung thoz uthr skavnjrz – r lv DINGO . Nth mornn ♪d thr prnts nkst 2th . Thrz r
sn nth toilt  nt2fedm ztha r t 2 thin & fu fedm nth 2rst zn (n – orgust) tha v 2
nsummr. 2da  d nrrij & rlong rkrek ntil  dskuvrd @ 2.00pm th☼☼v m Naot d shuz
rkrakkn. Hop tha lrst 1morda z2moro  want2 nth s m wch d th Ormiston Gorge
Pound. l tak thCrocs nrzrv zr prkorshn. v rlso n takn nxtrr ltrv H2O nr plas otl (Mount
Franklin: Buy Me register to Plant a Tree. DRINK POSITIVE – THINK POSITIVE)  fownd nth toilt. Nfrda m
  Alice 4 splz & ma l hv2  r♀/♂v shuz. Thrz rwekv utfl wthr r zvri da zprdktd 2
123
 24°c & mornnz 2 O 7°c.  woz n 2da th hz kum 2 cht m usv sm z 2mak th prtir.
DIC&ArSeTaRO woz n 10 me 2 prvd r ljnd givn th mnnz vth sm z so ♂ kn m . (5/6/08. If
you think its hard to read Andrea, imagine what its like to type!) SORRY M8! nt doot: twood outr d8
orlmost mmedrtle – thrulz kep chanjn; 0 z st@k, orlz flux;  kep chanjn; th zchanjn; tz r moovn .
LfOrVaEnCkE  m  znt t zl8r 2 uthr lngwjz. M8 -  th m thru wtht twont t zl8r 2
nglsh! 4 trz  ned mor fm  z2 rflkt r wchz fullvm. So hns4th st&z 4 R-A-T nwotvr
werdt okkerz eg: dmok , g fl, adm ion, hr. &  ned mor  2ch th so st&z 4 C-
A-T/K-A-T norl werdz eg: rcom, nd, eion, & vkors Ok. & zu mtv ♪st nrsnt daz rprznts
thsownd v thwerd t rlso kn rprznt th  B-L eg: a ushn, sta sht etc. & 1da l t pl 10 m
 l&skap vwerdz fullv utfl .
14/5 /08. For your benefit, Gintai ( Tuesday 2/10/07), Ill endevour 2  the following
account in  english (2th x th@ m a 2 res mslf). I  out through the gorge & s m
along the dry  vth Trephina Creek (joins the Ross River which gives its name to the Ross River
Highway off which you come 2 this reserve ) outside the boundary of the Trephina Gorge reserve
wearing only my Croc s&lz as I was in10ding 2 restrict myself to the sandy bed of the river 2 allow
another day for the  on my heel to heal. I was surprised & a little disappointed 2♪ there were other
human prints (though old) leading in the same direction besides the usual ones I accompany
such as dingo, , goanna etc. “The answer my friend” was round the first bend in the hill only half
an hours away in the 4mv an irregularity in the side of the hill like a small amphitheatre but which
on entering I discovered was the exit of a small stream which wound its way back  the mountain
along a tas ure through rock walls every twist in which was only hiding the next more amazing
chasm or dry waterfall. I had to climb  the mountain to get around the 1st l of sheer drops which
would have tested even Spiderman (but not perhaps Mandrake (6/6/08. Who? Oh, you mean the guy
with the moustache and the Nubian side-kick.) with th@ las arm of his(I don’t think he has an elastic
arm, though; that was Plastic Man)) but from then on I was able 2 follow the bed though frequently
clambering up smaller waterfalls all of which were dry. How wonderful it must here when the pools
are full but then you would have to   them or climb out of the chasm and out over the mountain to
get a them if you were to get to the top as I was a 2. I must warn you, Gintai, 2 very careful when
climbing  a rocky creek. What looks easy going  can seem impossi going  because you can
no longer see the obvious (& ma the only one) hold or grip which looking wards is hidden
by the edge of the . Also when you were going  you may not have bothered in your haste and
excitement to look over your shoulder @th  hind you whereas going  you are looking straight 
into it & it looks (& is) fatally deep. Don’t try to memorize the & holds – experi has taught
me it cant done. But it was worth it because right @th top after about 45 minutes of climbing I
found the cave! The cave is deep (perhaps endless) & once you get past the large portal into
the interior proper it suddenly is much warmer and the occasional flits by into a deeper
recess. I didn’t have a torch to explore inside so was very excited when one of the
flew out and then back onto a wall of the main arch where I could have fotographed it in natural light
ut by the I got out me and adjusted it to the macro setting (I wanted a shot from a couple of
feet so I could blow it up on the computer for microscopic examination) & just as I was O2 press the
button it flew 2 the interior. But, my friend, it was only the t of it. Because now I noticed my eyes
had adjusted surprisingly well to the gloam (its an old-fashioned spelling 4 gloom) so I resumed my
explo ion of the interior ♪ing the ceiling rose again as you got deeper inside. wings ed
my cheeks as they (they are O twice as big as the little ones which I can ing O the  - thbody a
bit bigger than a fat mouse) flitted back & forth. Two darker shadows in the wall turned out to be
openings 2 further caves one of which opens up inside 2 a height which should allow further explo
ion when I get back there tomorrow with my torch. Then I made an amazing discovery when I
went to take a flash shot into the side cave from which most of the were coming on
the off chance of getting them on picture ‘blind’ so to speak – my cheap little Canon 550 (17/6/08.
Now I’ve upgraded to 590) not only tells you the d8 & but throws out a beam of light like a weak
torch with which I could scan the walls. I suppose its how the determines how strong to set the
flash. So with the occasional aid of this fee beam I was a to peer 2 the recessz.
were brushing past my shoulders & 1 cannoned into the back of my  (I was wearing a hat) but Ive
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managed to get some good close up fotoes & also a utv glowing eyes (reflecting the flash)
in the recessz (6/6/08. tha r thr Common Sheathtail Bat (Taphozous georgianus) (kkrdn 2 th
thlrjst kollne evr fownd woz 17 ndvlz) or Hill’s Sheathtail Bat (Taphozous hilli) wch livz jointli & hz
n rkgnzd zr spr8 sp z sns th1980z (checking on the web revealed that they are Taphozous hilli
which are classified as vulnerable. South Australia Museum is requesting a specimen of one for its
collection)). On one of the shots I can a mysterious circular mineralization which I hope to find and
examine (20/6/08. woznt a 2 fndt rthuthrz  kood nl8r fotoz – tha must r fos4snt O glo ggrd
 flash t nt  m torch) tomorrow (Im taking reserve lithium 4 torch & ).
Can you imagine how thrilling it was to have those ing my face with their wings &
brushing my back? I left the cave because I didn’t want 2 dsturb them for too long (spshli zl )
& td  wn    a  2 some scru which  suspekted might one of an ex mely
elusive group of small desert  known as Grasswrens (Amytornis). There are 8 (19/6/08. 10 now
rkordn2 Michael Morcombez Field Guide to Australian Birds: Complete Compact Edition
2004 wch  bort 2da @ thBotanic Gardens shop) species in the group & there are ornithological
entrepreneurs who criss th cunt providing oz (twitchers) with the briefest glimpses of them.
Their habit is to straight 4 cover when surprised where they disappear. They like to along the
ground fast so when you get 2 the  thrz 0 2 fnd. They live mainly in stoney deserts & remote
spinifex cunt where most people never go. Needless to say I havnt n r single member of the
group ut only a little further  the creek  d what   mt nuthr 1 or ma th sam1 rgan.
Dear friends (spshle Gintas (17/6/08. hz nzl8d r  Chopper Read  litho. 2moro m n
nrtkl  The Herald ☼  th@ Chopper zn)), tz thrward of following the less travelld road – yes!!
 woz a onli r litl l8r 2 0 in wth th binoculars & make a careful identifiion of a  which  twoz
owtv vu – twoz r Dusky Grasswren (Amytornis purnelli) (19/6/08. th lest sh vth Amytornis
rkordn2 m nu  ). My  neth (old wav  z) over. To those who have, even more will given
(&  thoz wothv rlmost 0, evn th litl tha hv wl takn rwa)! As I was scram ing down the creek
hoping my plas Croc s&lz would hold out (both side straps had come loose, once each) I noticed
my knee was grazed in several places and I was remin of how when I woz a kid in Sale
(Gippsland) they were always like that, & sca . Now, Gintai, Ive n  uv + r psychology masters
2 yor uthr kwalfiions (filosofy? computerz?) so u pro e know all kindzv cy long words 4 the
developtl stages of man. I use simplr gories 2 dskrb matu ion – th main differ twn
the boy & the grown ♂ zth@ th adult haz no sca z on his knees.
21/5 /08. King(1/8/08. 29/11/00 )s Canyon ( t @th ☼ pknk  ignorn the  n s
n). Th2rst hordz t rrvn wl 4 ☼ & th Canyon rim  (3½ hours, 6 kilometres) zn nn us 4
thntr da. Tha dont no th@th most tas chr vth zth mlz vla rnthn domz. Fu want
2no how tha fnd sum fotoz vth Bungle Bungles nWA nth wd  zth uzul fotoz u vths 
ronli vth worlz vth kanyn. Majjn wot wood happn fth 2rsts dprtd  th lk  doo – thad dskuvr
thmajjkl  vthdomz & thr krvasz & soon  wood sworrovrm lk . So perhaps an equally
import function of th clearly signposted path (continuing with yesterdays reflection) is 2 guide the
hords (herd/flock/sheep) away & around those areas of beautiful but dangerously crevassed domes
which they would certainly trash and where some might come to grief. In this particular case it
includes the  vth main creek where I found more hidden pools, including large 1z, 2da. It may be
some of us are given a job of signposting paths whose aim (like a mother bird fluttering on the ground
pr10ding ♀ hz rbrokn wing 2 lure thfox awa  thnest) is to preserve what should remain hidden. 
spnt thOda rgan ram n thru ths mjkl kngdm nth nolj  woodnt meet nuthr ☼ or evn sum1 nth dst
.  td @ 8.15 & woz  @ 4.45. Onle last week @ Trephina Gorge   th@ thache (or
tightness)  woz xpri n @th ndv r6 owr nth  woz an ndion vm limt t h m no
longr subjkt2 thsymptom rfta an 8 hour skram . Nstead  suspkt th@ th limi10 faktr, m Achilles
heel, is m ankle (sorry). The last lv daz v n takn NAPROSIN 1000 nth hopv prlongn th p
t 2da nvthls  hd thsam kndv dskum4t nth lft nkl  got lrst y in castrovalva (18/6/08.
Tuesday 8/5/07). Remember th@,  - 2r3 daz l8r nspoleto (18/6/08. Saturday 12/5/07) m
rt nkl lu &  kood hrdli 4 weks. So @1 vth utfl pools  s@ wth m nth kold

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H2O zrekk  Sebastien Kneipp ( Monday 16/6/07). Z s@ sokn me
sworrmzv Zebras (Taeniopygia guttata) wr rrvn nr nth  sd n 2 pluk kurrj 2 go 4
rdrnk, & sum dd. Hop twerks z kood h4 weks.  rmm r  uz2 fel lk ths @ Mootwingie &
ft wernt4 thnklz m rlmost 2 thsam n 4m. Evrthn zso utfl th@ wn  hv2  nth midl vth da 
w 2kep  2thnxt n gn l&4m r skulptd rok  nth dist .  woz n how strong u r & how lt
thstep & how lt thpak wn yr xtd wn tokkerd 2me m pak woz ndd vri lt & so  dskuvrd  hdnt
put10 m 1l vH2O. Orl  hd woz r 95grm tinv srdnz & 2 smorl o jz. t nt2 worre 4  mad r v r
prtkulrli long drink  thsam pool  sokt me n wr fth H2O woz goodnuff 4 thZebras twoz
goodnuff 4 me. Thsn @th tv th kanyn rim  u shood drink 1l vH2O/owr, so  hd savd m
slf th w8v karin 8 loz! Yes! m rlmost 2 Mootwingie n 4m li m hold. Mdrvo 
hd rpropr skair wn    woz lost & 2 n pro mz. M rdrnrln goz sk nthoz Ost z&
td n & klmn fr & fr & felng no ftg. Thdomz wr g10 igr& igr & thdrkshn  wontd 2 woz
t  mor&mor krvasz & wch wr g10 dpr&dpr.  wont l -  woz pankn. t thn 
thl&mrk  wontd &  stl hd 3owrz v☼ &  woz gon2 makt n .  evn hdnuff 2hv rwosh & sok m
rgan a là Sebastien Kneipp. A curious incident woz thdiscovery vr singl print (shoe) in
some s& nth ejv r gorj leading  thmain creek. It made me think never to assume you are alone.
Anything you do haz n done 4  i uthrz. Though we may never meet each other those of
us hoo travel the minor roadz recognz each other  the prints we leave.  hd onli just
earlier t thgorj  mslf had used yestrda 2  th main creek so why not sum1 ls using this bigger
gorj, though +mitedli  hdnt n any1 ls in my 1drnz? Then a  struck me & I went  4nuthr koz
th edd marks vth shoe wr familir. & twoz m own shu prnt  ystrda.  hdbn mstakn wn  hd 
 hd  thprevious gorj, this igr1 hd n th1 d  ystrda. Its happened 2me 4 ( Monday
25/8/03) …. 2nt v got th  2mslf. Tz n rlong da & v got2 get erli wn  hth 1st
2 thkanyn  4 th jr gets h.
28/5 /08. Red Bank Conservation Park (O 16kz  Burra)   (vr Roseworthy: p l:
37 l z @ 157c/l 4 $58.00)   Gawler (xl 2 shotv & The Age)   KINGSTON
S.E. (Best Medium Size Town Award 2007 (17/6/08.  ♪ nm n 5/3/08  nkorktli @r utd
th ttl 2 ROBE); m re asn gzaktli thrut H & me took  Gawler nowr lrst p ( Tuesday
25/3/08) xpt th shop hzopn ths kozm erlir nthda so v ort r v snappr wchz normli
$7.00 t  pad $8.50 4nx r lrj ; p l: 35 l z @ 158c/l 4 $55.27 4 325kz = 11 l z/100kz)
  Penola Conservation Park 4 thnt (eternl , lrst (8/8/08. “Ordinary facts are
arranged within time, strung along its length as on a thread. There they have their
antecedents and their consequences, which crowd tightly together and press hard one
upon the other without any pause. This has its importance for any narrative, of which
continuity and successiveness are the soul. ¶ Yet what is to be done with events that
have no place of their own in time; events that have occurred too late, after the whole of
time has been distributed, divided, and allotted; events that have been left in the cold,
unregistered, hanging in the air, homeless and errant? ¶ Could it be that time is too
narrow for all events? Could it happen that all the seats within time might have been
sold? Worried, we run along the train of events, preparing ourselves for the journey. ¶ For
heaven’s sake, is there perhaps some kind of bidding for time? Conductor, where are
you?” – Bruno Schulz  The Age of Genius) H, me & Pascal t h l8  thnt ( Tuesday
25/3/08); 2moro l  nMELBOURNE; …. 1v m n10shnz @th tv th p woz 2  m lvl
vfi10s &  m w8. Thgood Dr Doig hd lrst yd hv2doo sum10 O m bludd prshr nxt 
♂m ztwoz 2 @ 155 wr tz n 4 sum y(18/6/08. bludd prshr takn 2/6/08 woz stil nth 150z (152?)
t r wek l8r much2 mn & Doigz srprz ttstd @: 135/85! (26/6/08. ys d  perchst r IA2 Omron
Automatic Blood Pressure Monitor with IntelliSense TM 4 $119 wch: “… uses fuzzy logic
intelligence to sense both your systolic and diastolic blood pressure values, and the
result is personalized inflation for every reading.” – wow! @ 1.08pm  woz 156/88 & m 
woz 62; now @ 6.33pm tz 166/104,  63. Avrj vlrst 3 mzurz 168/98,  62). v owtv
(26/6/08. givn th nz  ma  hvnt t (27/6/08. 2da, rkordn2 Omron m 2 th “VERY HIGH”
rsk gre – ie 20-25% ch (1/7/08. rkord  sofr: 124/81 @ 11.38am 2da (8/7/08. 117/69 @ 4.10pm
126
(19/8/08. 113/68 @ 3.44pm (29/8/08. 107/65 @ 4.05pm (13/10/08. & m 1st n onren 2da  owr
6wek p (ttld dr cunt ) woz 99/69 @r  v 68 @ 4.37pm (17/10/08. t m  zof10
irglr sns wv n  & n2 mornnz v nt n a 2get r n wthr rglr  @orl - m rwairv thoz
wthowt th moni  r slt fln vfullns nth chst (21/10/08.  kn sum flt wn mi  skips r t; & v
rlso hdnrsorttv mnr chst panz rn thwk) &  chkn mi puls) (18/10/08. 103/60 @ 3.52pm @
 v 67 - ♪ rekord stolk (11/11/08. 93/59 @ 1.44pm @  v 81 (13/11/08. 89/60 @ 4.06pm @
 v 71 (15/11/08. 84/56 @  v 70 (18/2/09. 84/54 @  v 68))))))))); rkord : 210/105 @
11.08pm 29/6/08 (9/7/08. m kumn r pokondriakk (12/7/08. korzd b thmedkl proffshn  u kn
sik wthowt nont - lk Donald Rumsfeldz “things we don’t know we don’t know” (5/8/08. t
rkordn2 owr vriown Dick Pratt (xprzdntv Carlton FC): “You don’t know what you don’t know, till
you know it.”) (3/2/09. t Mark Twain : “ careful about reading health - you may 
of a misprint.”)) – thuthr da  hdr prshr nth  ( & ) &  ♪d twoz nr da  rekor 200+ bludd
prshr t  koodnt rmm r fthuthr daz v flt prshr nth  (29/8/08. aks orlmost gon sns
thPERINDOPRIL  4mgz/da) rsntli wrn dazv 200+ bludd prshr (19/10/08. thonli v mezhrd suchr
 prshr sns thn woz 200/102 @r  v 58 @ 11.05pm n15/10 &  hd rak rgan). M f zth pos t
vr strok wch 12t  mi t levz mi nkappast8d & r erdnn H.)))) th 1/5 ch gre 4 get10 r vaskulr
evnt ovr thnxt 5 y2r 1/10 ch , wchz ttr thn most 4 m aj - m now nth 43%l vlklihood).
♂ menz pilz. M kols l lvl z2 @ 7.5 (18/6/08.  sp  klktd 4/12/07 – Triglyceride: 1.4; HDL
(good) kls l: 1.3; LDL (bad) kls l: 5.6; kls l/HDL rsk io (wn plottd ganst bludd prshr & aj uzd2
dter st@stkl lklihood vr vaskulr evnt): 5.8. Z , wth thoz noz  hd O r 20% ch vr nvnt
ovr thnxt 5 y. M nu kls l lvl  sp  klktd 2/6/08 z 5.6 – Triglyceride: 1.7; HDL: 1.3; LDL:
3.5; rsk io: 4.3). ♂ mad no rkdashnz O lfstl chanjz zm nt f@ &m fairle aktv. Tz pro i
jne ♂  wn ♂ fowndowt both m mum & si wr npilz. Rfta wv prst owr bredn aj evolushn hz
nomor ned 4 us & duznt protkt us  d io ion ♂ . t 4  kspt ♂z pilz  want 2 4mslf
wthr rr lvl vfi10s kn mpruv thbludd prshr wthowt me rzor10 2 ♂z mdionz (19/6/08. no longr ♂z rko
dashn (22/7/08. ths a m Doig & ♂ prskr 1 t t (2mg)/da vPERINDOPRIL (13/8/08. yda, rf
 reportd m vrj rednz v170z/c105z 160z/c95z, ♂  thdos  5mgz/da (15/8/08. t  ♪ 2da
th t ts v n takn ( Errol St frmr ) wr 2mgz & thnu 1z r4mgz; nsdntle @ 8.20am  rkor m
rkord (17/8/08. “He had been dying a number of times, always with some reservations
that forced us to revise our attitude towards the fact of his death. This had its
advantages. By dividing his death into installments, Father had familiarized us with his
demise. We became gradually indifferent to his returns – each one shorter, each one
more pitiful.” – Bruno Schulz  Father’s Last Escape (21/8/08. orz Robert Murphy (vthAFL
)  (kwo10 Albert Einstein) n2daz The Age Sport p5: “The tragedy of life is what dies
inside a man while he still lives.”))stolk v107 (19/8/08. m da - ys d @ 9.19am rkor r (“I
know one day death will take me into her open arms, as she does all life, bountiful and
benign. I will lie, entirely sated, among the green undergrowth of the beautifully
manicured local cemetery. My wife – how beautiful she’ll look in her widow’s veil – will
bring me flowers on those bright, calm midmornings we enjoy here. Out of the depth of
this boundless plenitude a ponderous, full-throated music, the solemn, mournful,
resonant bars of a majestic overture, seems to rise. I sense the powerful pulsing of its
rhythms as it thrusts upwards from the deep.” – Bruno Schultz  Fatherland)stolk v109
(29/8/08. rr stolk thn 2daz sstolk v107 (18/10/08. & tak ♪v th99 sstolk v 13/10/08) (11/11/08. Doig
ths am & ♂  PERINDOPRIL 2 10mg/da; took rblud sampl 4r kdni pthlg tst (21/11/08. tst OK t Doig
dru m @10shn 2 th przns vr sst ♂ ♪d  prvys pro jr – pr4thkors @ m aj); m 10 4 n Exercise
Stress Test @ Melbourne  Services n S@rd 15th (15/11/08. noworee – prst wth f kolrr); & 4r
Spine Lumbar CT (re lossv snshn nth lft & f (21/11/08. lji rvld d o ion nr spnl dsk
korzn rbulj th@ prsz nth rspons nerv wchz thpro korz – no woree nls tgets wors)) @th Repat.
Hosp. nWnzd 19th))))))) (10/2/09. Doig ths a m &  ♂m  nolongr hv th aks & m avrj bludprshr
zO 140/85 nth a m a m (wn tz st 4 thda) wch ♂  zgoodnuf (11/3/09. t td  rgn @ ndv f uri –
190/96 @  v 62 @ 9.02am v4/3/09 &  orlso hd th krk s ak (13/3/09. so 2da ♂ prd
rdosjv 4/1.25mg/da vPERINDOPRIL/INDAPAMIDE (15/3/09. t gon2werk t -  woz pn orl nt)
127
(10/4/09. pn  t t12nt werk niwa: bludprshr ths am 182/100 @  v 63 & akak . nt r10d2t
now zwr  roma nmund so wlhv2 chanj thmdion wn   norgust))). & ♂ kn mz th@th lump nth
hip zdfntli r LIPOMA, ntr ). So u kn majn how xtd v n 2gt2 rlvl wr  kn rom ovr th cunt s
d 4 n8owr da & nt trd nth evnn. 2 a 2doot v nodowt shd rfu loz 2 & mpro i @ m bst
w8 now tho  wont a 2 mantant @ rmor sdn MELBOURNE pas (18/6/08.  hd lost O 5 loz
 77  72 & sofr hv jd 2sta @ th@ w8 (13/10/08. now rfta owr dr cunt p m rO 68 &
n10d2 regan rfu kloz). 2da H ort rnu ♀/♂v (22/6/08.  shood rlso shn thrz n no vd
vm apner ( stl nt slep nm akk t koz m owtv th ha t (15/8/08. korkshn: tz stl thr t
ls sv)) & no n d v ( kep takn SOMAC t) sns prtwa thru th p; &  ♪d ys d w mad
 am&pm wth xl snshn pm)). t  nt fool mslf – 4 how ronik tz th@ @th vri sam nths
p tz kum r♀/♂ 2mi th@ m vrlt (♂ns) hz vansht, qtli d ( Saturday 10/5/08)! (18/6/08. not
kompletli t mz. Wthth adv Hz rli li komp  stlj svrl /wk & w mak , t m lvlv snsashn
z much ret). Tz r m@r v1dr 2me th@ nWrn lt ure, tho tz n do8d  ♂♂ , no
n v hz n evolvd 2morn thlossv maskulnt – zf ♂♂ hv valud thr vrlt so litl thav airle ♪st thloss
(rma uthr  dont luzt? rma tha luzt t  thn thar 2old 2 n nmor?).  grev thlossv 6ult
– tz n 1vth vm lf. Tmaks me  vuthr ENDnz, vFINAL ☼ushnz; v  - which is like a
mountain th@ u were a 2 clearly from a dist & has kum nviz now youv approached it
ut whose looming prz is evid from your increasing shortness of breath as u t
climbing the early slopes.
3/9/08 (dr cunt ). Ovrnt (O 5kz Wv Amherst; wok 2th ♪♫ vCrested 
(Oreoica gutturalis); ls sk)   (vr Talbot, Majorca)   Carisbrook (town where my
great-grandmother Honora Skelly married James Robinson, lime-burner, at the Roman Catholic presbytery
where Father Francis Richard Xavier Fennelly (“…. regarded as one of the great pioneer priests of the
Ballarat, Castlemaine and Carisbrook goldfields. In the days of his youth and vigour he was known as the
‘Apostle of the Goldfields’. He was born at Ballantaggart, County Tipperary, Ireland …. In 1855 …. he set
sail for Melbourne …. In January 1860 he was appointed Parish Priest at Carisbrook. …. The first work
undertaken by Father Fennelly at Carisbrook was the erection of a brick presbytery which was commenced
in 1860 and completed towards the end of 1861.” (from information in the former Catholic Church in
Carisbrook, now a very expensive B&B) signed his name on the wedding certificate in 1862. The
Presbytery pre-dated the church, St Francis, built 2 years later, and was demolished in 1871. Its site is now
occupied by a group of units, one of which houses a local historian, Judy Healy, who kindly gave us info
about the location of the grave of Honora’s parents, Thomas and Ellen Skelly, and the whereabouts of the
Lower Wareek school which Thomas had petitioned to be built.)   Maryborough (wr  lotz @
th stashn kaffé (imposing, ornate, enormous building, better than the Melb. Town Hall . “When Mark Twain
visited Maryborough in the 1890s he described it as 'a railway station with a town attached'. The Maryborough Railway Station
is a wonder to behold. It is huge and gracious: a vast 25-room edifice which is surely Maryborough's finest building. Erected in
1890, it is a red-brick structure with plenty of stucco trimming for contrast. Highlights include the ornate clock tower, Flemish
gables, massive portico, marble dressing tables in the women's toilets, some attractive wrought-iron work on the verandah, oak
wall panels and the longest platform in Country Victoria” – Google); vzt  & l ri (4 Timor sm );  )
 Timor (8kz N; where we visited the grave (no. 177) of Ellen (nee Mulcreavy) & Thomas Skelly,
immigrants from Ireland (she from Cork in “The Duchess of Northumberland” (…. Sailed from Cork on the
26th of May 1836 and arrived in Port Jackson, Sydney on 3rd October 1836. The ship carried about 300
immigrants, and according to the Sydney Gazette of Tuesday October 11 “It is now known beyond even a doubt
that [of] 319 Irish girls …. Only 150 were selected with the necessary precaution, and because this took up an unusual length of
time, and because, forsooth, the vessel was chartered to sail on a particular day, under a penalty, the remaining 169 were
actually, indiscriminately selected from the different workhouses, and numbers, we blush to add, from the very streets! …. We
must, however, only confine our censurable remarks to the 169 …. For the rest we are informed are just the kind of girls we
require as good and useful servants, but to find that they should have been cooped up in a vessel for six months with the most
abandoned of their sex is indeed lamentable.”), he from Dublin in the “Red Rover” date unknown) who married in
Sydney 27/6/1838 and then travelled to Victoria on the coastal ship “Essington” sometime between late
1845 and mid 1847 with 4 daughters in tow possibly to become tenant farmers in the Tower Hill area
where “In 1843 Irishman William Rutledge obtained a parcel of Crown land, known as the Farnham Special Survey, which
stretched from Killarney, south of Tower Hill, to the Merri River, near Warrnambool. Rutledge encouraged Irish immigrants to
become tenant farmers and in the years after Ireland`s Great Potato Famine the lure of the rich volcanic soil and a landscape
similar to the one they left behind prompted many Irish families to settle in the district.” 3 more daughters were born in
this area, then a son in Castlemaine, and finally they bought 32 acres at Timor West on the Bet Bet Creek
in 1858 and had a final son in 1860. It’s interesting that a minor road in the Timor West area is called
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Killarney Road. As a result of an accident (a runaway horse & overturned spring cart (see Tuesday
9/10/07) Ellen was buried here in 1888, followed by her husband in 1891. They share their grave with
their granddaughter, Annie Theresa Skelly, who died in 1905. Other Skellys in the Timor cemetery are
James, their last child who died in 1930 aged 70, and 2 infant girls, both called Julia, who died in 1874 and
1891; fownd rg  4 thnt @ The G d Duke Mine runz @ thv town      The G
d Duke Mine (the circle we did was to find Timor West, situated on a plain between the Bet Bet and Lime
Kiln Creeks, where Thomas took up his 38 acres (Lot 3, Section 2) on the south side of the Bet Bet Creek
and engaged variously in farming, lime burning and carting, and the Lower Wareek school (No. 949). In
January 1868 a meeting had been held proposing a school which was completed about April 1869. Thomas
was one of the parents involved in this proposal (at the time he had 2 school aged sons, Thomas William
14, and James, 9, as well as 3 eligible grandchildren) and contributing financially to its establishment, as
the Education Department promised that for every £1 raised locally it would contribute a like amount. “The
structure consisted of four bare walls with iron roof, floor, fireplace, doors and windows. Since then inside plastering, porch,
veranda, tanks and spouting have been added.” This is essentially the building we saw now being used as a storage
place for hay by the farmer across the road. We only found it by chance, having dismissed it as unlikely
when we first drove past because its red brick exterior looked too recent, but on the way back we noticed
a blackboard on one wall through a broken section of brickwork. It sits on the corner of the Wareek and
Timor-Dunluce Road, and had an attendance of about 50, increasing to 120 in the 1870s. The school fees
were 9 pence per week for each child (the Free, Secular and Compulsory Education Act was only
established in 1873). Thomas himself was at first illiterate, signing his marriage certificate with an X, but
by 1858 he was using a signature. His involvement in the establishment of a school indicates a belief in
the value of an education. It is hard to imagine that in nearby Timor(originally Coxtown) there were 38
hotels, 3 butchers, 2 banks, 3 bakeries, a police station & several lock-ups, & a population of 27,000. An
initial 16,000 miners were in the area in 1854 after gold was discovered at Chinaman’s Flat. Thomas
wasn’t bitten by the gold bug, unlike my father’s forbear Robert Dryburgh, miner at Woolshed Creek near
Beechworth in 1855. We are camped on the Bet Bet Creek on the eastern side of Timor, where the giant
mullock heaps of the Grand Duke mine are a reminder of the glory days. There’s nothing here now, not
even a functioning general store or pub. Only Maryborough’s grand buildings 8ks away are a reminder of
what used to be.
10/9 /08. Yesterday rfter ☼ as we lay naked on my bunk clinched tightly together in an
embrace as is our custom b4 H climbs 2 ♀rz 4 the rest of the night ♀ : what rw doing 2morro? I
: I dont know Ill decide 2morro. I thought wwr going 2th Flinders Ranges ♀ rekonz. How could w
going 2th Flinders Ranges when were on throad 2 Alice Springs?  rkst. Flinders Ranges r N
E  Port Augusta & wr going NW. U probly meant 2  4 Alice Springs all along ♀ accused
but ♀ had 4go10 th@ earlier in the day  had drawn ♀r @10shn 2 th fact th@ thtmprchr nAlice was
prdkted 2 30°c 4 thnxt 2 days & even @ Coober Pedy they woz prdik10 28°c, much hotter than
we njoi. Earlier  hd dowt 2 ♀r how people along this highway as  hd done on my last p(
Sunday 20/4/08 – Tuesday 22/4/08) over 2 days ing 4 thfamoos TOURIST TRAPS N such
as Uluru, Kings Canyon, Alice Springs and the Macdonnell jz bpassn & barely ♪ n, as they
along, what lay n twen. And its u ful cunt wth rvarietv flowering shru z & u 1dr what
kindv small  feed offm (2da  m 1st Pied Honeyeater (Certhionyx variegatus) & woz a 2
dterth@ thahv ♪♫ rlmost 2pcht 4me 2 ). When  hd rkst th♀ @th Port Augusta  4
advice about driving off the road 2 thskru 2 4thnt ♀ hd yor not allowd 2 & hd 2 nth
dezign8d  vri fu100kz rlong thwa (Sturt Highway) koz rlotv thstation properties wch were
unfenced wr still privately owned & some owners rezntd u proppn 4 thnt in competition with their
& (  ♀r  nevr  @ H2O ). Anywa here w are, entirely b ourselves in th
beautiful skru surroun b an assortmentv flowering dezert shru z wth threa10n dark 
rprochn NW. ….It seems H  I had or should hav a PURPOSE or PLAN FOR THE FUTURE
over & above our agreed in10tion of driving far enough north to get2 thwarmer weather so if the
necessit arose we would be driven south by the heat rather than freezing owr rszoff nth Mt Bryant  -
& wev already achieved it. I admit th@ ♀ hd tioned it mt interesting 2 if w could klimb 2
St Mary’s Peak again but since rfter klimbing a small hill near Mt Bryant ♀ hd klamd 2 hv n
kompletely buggerd  hd rsumd ♀ hd put thoz aspi ions aside. Since it is ♀r practice 2 leave all
decision making re itinerary on ps 2me m 4st2 2nd guess ♀r n10shnz. Perhaps she wants me 2
guess ♀r dzires, assimilate them 2th x  4get they were orijnly ♀rz, & propose thm as my own.
May it of10 works like so twen ♀/♂ ♀/♂ & in fact  hv brort m Flinders Ranges maps t th
better time 4 thm would @th ndv th p. Wnw S  hr ( 7/5/08) cy 1st vz10 Kingoonya &f
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throad permits   S 2th Gawler jz & Lake Gairdner  - t m opn2 sujschn, v no
hrd&frst PLANS 4 either thnordst FUCHR. m amls, pre♀/♂d 2dordl b throadsdz lookn4
smorl (only O 2kz furthr N nr pearler of r pozshn having found a track which allowed us 2† th
wa & thman10 track wch z rlongt & th NS ko l ka , H2O ( Woomera) pp ,
& man10 track twn thm so wr wlrwa throd & evn th rfr enuff nt2 r othr) ….Larst
nite as  woz ls10n 2th konst s m v roarn down thwa & havn th undr me shakn b
 1 rfta nuthr ( ADELAIDE, PERTH, DARWIN)  woz  how people rorlwayz
somewhere else – how unsatisfied wr wth wrwr. We AIM 4 r dst place or a nth FUTURE. W make
ourselves in2 arrows with pointy headz so w can AIM HIGH & awa. W DREAM th DREAM. W
FOCUS.  suppose wr orn with r snsv PURPOSE. Our ♀/♂ r ankshuz 2 nstil morvt in their
unsuspekting kiddies. Th  itself, according 2 some hazr PURPOSE (whatever th@ might mean!). I
had   should serve GOD insteadv @10dn 2m mmed8 needs. School has a lot 2 ansr4
(24/3/09. r story   ovr 25 yrgo: “Times of Change ¶ Lately my son, Luke, has been telling
me about the problem his friend, Robbie, has been having at school. This is worth re-telling to a
wider public not only because of its value as a human interest story but also because of the way it
throws light on the changing nature of society and in particular of catholic education, of which
process I myself am an imperfect product. ¶ A short resume of Robbies history is in order. He has
been attending Marcellin College only this last year. Prior to joining the catholics he used to go to
Banyule High School where he was making a respectable name for himself as ‘one of the boys’, an
energetic upholder of student rights in the face of insensitive authority. The french teacher went so
far as to partially attribute her nervous breakdown to the efforts of Robbie and his mates. His parents
(25/3/09. now long dvorst) however were not completely satisfied with these successes feeling that
his political achievements were gained at the expense of the academic side of his education. So it
was he was sent to Marcellin where, it was thought, the sterner discipline of the brothers would
further his education and might even be good for his soul. It is worth mentioning at this point that
neither Robbie (25/3/09. sum y rgo met ♂m werkn@ READINGS nLygon st.) nor his parents
nor any of his relatives are catholics. ¶ For a while all went well. Robbie is now occasionally seen to
do some homework and his reports vary from moderate to favourable. The brothers appear to be
having the desired effect. The problem resides not in the teachers but in the students, more exactly:
some of the students. ¶ In short – Robbie keeps getting belted up by the wogs. Here I must pass a
few comments on the socio-economic background of the boys at Marcellin College. It is by no means
the cheapest of catholic schools. Besides catering for the sons of your normal garden variety of
middle class parents of Irish catholic ancestry it is also favoured by the successful Italian. Now these
Italians are tough and heady people who having come here with nothing but their determination,
muscle and sharp minds have in a single generation carved out influential and often leading postions
in our society. And they breed a super confident and aggressive type of wog; a little shorter than the
local breed of young manhood – but chunky. ¶ A typical incident goes something like this: Robbie and
his mates are quietly minding their own business, in the corner of the yard furthest away from the
school, playing dice and wanking themselves, when up stroll the Marcellin Mafia. Tough. They look
down at the guilty group and the Boss says: “We’re going to belt one of you Aussies up.” ¶ They
survey the abject gathering, looking for a victim. Only Robbie stands out as a worthy contender: he is
a fine example of adolescent masculinity, beautifully muscled, and already the subject of interested
enquiries by Collingwood talent scouts; he is also an excellent cricketer and the only one in the group
presenting even a remote possibility of ever leading a resistance to the Mafia. But, they are not
impressed by his cricketing prowess – they consider cricket to be a poofters game. Nor are they
overly awed by his football credentials – the Boss happens to be the captain of the school first
eighteen and an all Victorian schoolboy representative. He knows that Robbie plays for his suburban
competition rather than for the school. Besides, Robbie is an atheist – the Mafia, of course, are all
catholics. ¶ “Get up off your arse, Egan” (that’s Robbie’s surname). ¶ Robbie’s father is a P.R. man
who has talked himself into a $50,000 a year job and is improving on that fast; so every instinct in
Robbie’s body tells him to shoot with his mouth. Though physically strong, in mental toughness he is
no match for the Mafia . ¶ “What d’ya want with me? Get out. Leave me alone! Go and pick on …..” ¶
He is cut off mid-stream by a knee to the groin. Words mean nothing to the brotherhood. A sharp
elbow in the ribs and they move on; leaving their victim clutching his balls. There is no serious
damage but Robbie’s ego is badly bruised. ¶ Later that day Robbie is playing table tennis with a

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weedy looking freckled kid who has the nervous habit of continually glancing over his right shoulder.
The standard of the game is low. The freckled kid cant hold the bat properly because of all the hair
growing in the palm of his hand. Robbie’s form has been falling away too. Ever since he started
attending Marcellin his eyesight has been deteriorating. So its not surprising that he does not notice
the Godfather himself sauntering up to the table. Built like a dunny! With one deft movement
Godfather sticks out his arm and catches the ball, crushes it slowly and drops it on the table, then
without even glancing at the players continues on towards the door of the hall. ¶ It was their last ball.
¶ * ¶ That evening I can hear Luke (25/3/09. chozn 2 nonz mSiMcIhTaHel. +mtd2 hosptl rgn ys d)
and Robbie playing video games on their computer as usual. But there is no zest in their game and
the scores are low. Robbie’s loss of prestige weighs heavily on their minds. I hear them planning to
get a set of weights and work out over the summer holidays till Robbie is bigger than even “that
bastard Sergio”. ¶ I go away from the door immersed in thoughts of my own boyhood. ¶ There is an
ironic sequel to this story: a week later Robbie’s grandfather rings brother superior to complain about
the general standard of discipline and lack of supervision at the school and in particular about his
grandson’s treatment at the hands of the Italians. Now it so happens that Robbie’s grandfather
(25/3/09. long sns ) is himself an Italian having divorced his former wife, a successful feminist
author, and married Robbie’s grandmother who had recently divorced her husband on account of his
damaged liver. Furthermore, Robbie’s grandfather is a leading communist in both the Italian and
Australian communities. He defends his grandson with a full blooded righteousness that only a man
of his credentials could possibly do. ¶ Life is strange.”) when it comes 2 nstiln such noshnz & 
supoz tz y ♀/♂ snd u 2m - 2 ndok n8d. koz  dspzd thm so much  dlu mslf wth
th th@  hd sucessfully eva th machinations of my JESUIT mr (tha woz korld ‘fatherz’).
As I sat in class so often day dreaming with eyes glazed, chin resting in th palmv my , elbows on the
desk (& quite often an erection underneath) I couldnt help even as a callow youth but feel
embarrassed @th stunted, infantile personalities of all bar1 vm teachrz. The possibility of role
models from among this pitiful (though some were vindictive & 1 r sadist) collection never remotely †t
m . But  woz mstakn in n tha hd failed in their @mts. It didnt m@r who tha wr or wot
they tort 4 once you were partvt your @10d alone nsurd the successv th system in achieving its
AIMS. No1 couldv @10 such a stultifying nvrt 4ni lnthv without suppressing th preznt 4
iluzory FUTURE GRATIFIIONS tha called eduional AIMS, getting on, or wotevr. Now th@ 
m old, & wth th bnftv reflection, th hv finally falln rwa & m left sans AIMS & wthowt PURPOSE,
wthowt PLANS, or KNOWLJ vwr m or should .  hv 0 2tch & tz dfkult 2 krtsz (or rage). So
HERE I AM, caught in te – dordln  th wth H.
17/9 /08. Gotvri kold lrst nt nth shorzv Lake Torrens.  hd rrug ontopv th2 slepn
agz. U nt poot 2much gon zthn yor 2hot @th t. 4 ☼  woz werkn @ plugn gaps 2
fingrzv skoldair ge10 nsd th ankts. t  hv2hv @lest 3 PSZ/nt 2 thplasskrutop kntanr 
kep nth 4 thperpuss.  len  ovr thejv th holdn th kts wth thlbov mi lft rm wl holdn thkntanr
wth thrt - & thFREEZN KOLD AIR  thslepn ag. H wats tl rfta ☼ 4rlek 4 hoppn 2 m
. Rfta  w nth krek & got BOGGED wn w rok thru thser. l lt H dskr wot th@ ntalz.
M rwrd 4 persv woz  got2 thltl   ys d & kn knferm dfntli thr Rufous Fieldwren
(Calamanthus campestris) rkordn2 Michael Morcombez Field Guide to Australian Birds
(pub. 2004) t dskr zRufous Calamanthus (Sericornis campestris) nm Field Guide to the
Birds of Australia  Simpson & Day (pub. 1993).  hd2 storkm rlong ztha kept r vmi
fli10 1 ush2thnxt1 ovr thGIBBER  tl fnrli g10 klosnuff 2 1 (v4) 4 rpropr . Tz rnu  4mi &
makst orl werthwl.  n zlk n – u doot 4 uthr thnth os10s reznz: n 2 lnthn yor lfspan
(Thoreau) & 2 boozon (H);  n 2tak u 2 thopprst tpv cunt & l&skap thn 2rsts go2 - lk h
2 NEVER NEVER L& wrwv n  owrslvz sns w got hys d evnn. In every trip there is at least
one “Helen moment” when my genuine lack of physicality (co-ordination, strength, balance) combines to
“drop me in it”. In this case the “it” was a stretch of innocuous looking creek bed which John negotiated
without too much trouble, stepping smartly and lightly to make the opposite bank, but which I trudged into
in my usual clod-hopper style & promptly sank into the tarry black mud lurking just below the fragile crust
up to the tops of my shoes. Stuck fast & slowly sinking even more, I stood helplessly dithering. By this
time I was up to my knees in the stuff and John had to haul me out, leaving my shoes behind. That meant
his shoes and feet also got covered in the goo while he was rescuing me & my shoes. Luckily the mud
wasn’t too deep or we both could have sunk without a trace like the dinosaurs of the La Brea Tarpits. After
131
we reached firm ground we scraped off as much as we could with sticks & dusted ourselves & our shoes
with the fine dust crumbled from the crust of red soil on the creek bank which helped to dry the sticky
stuff. Back at the van we used the brush & toothbrush John keeps for maintenance to rasp off as much as
possible & then used Woolworths Home Brand Baby Wipes (80 Thick Wipes in a Scented Refill Pack) to
clean off the worst of the remainder. I heartily recommend them for bogs of all kinds. The clean-up at the
van took almost an hour and has left us respectable enough to re-enter civilization …. Wr onli rfu kz 
rlong th4x4 ak ½ wa  Andamooka rfta  rlv krek & rt n2wrwr  4 thnt (owtv
vu hnd ooshz  rkrek: 1 hz   nth man ak O 200yrdzwa) v d r b d nu ()
- Cinnamon Quail-thrush (Cinclosoma cinnamomeum) (hopn 2htz ♪♫ nth am)!!
24/9 /08. Gawler Ranges National Park. From Stone Dam we took the Old Paney Scenic Route
to Old Paney Homestead, a solid stone 4 roomed (3 bedrooms, 1 kitchen) building which housed 13 people
at one stage. The plaque outside reads: “ WILLIAM MILROY CRAWFORD – ‘THE OLD SCOT’ – PIONEER
PASTORALIST ¶ Between 1877 and 1898 William Milroy Crawford (1823- 1899) and his wife Margaret, nee Harkness, (1825-
1904) held a total of 1,400 sq. miles in the Western Gawler Ranges, (Paney, Pondanna, Yartoo and the Scrubby Peak Leases), and
also Karcultaby Station. During this time, their son-in-law William Murdoch McKenzie (1844-1930) managed Paney Station and
lived in Old Paney Homestead with his wife Jessie (1848-1932) and their eleven children. ¶ “A Dream of the Past” ¶ “…We
travelled down past Scrubby Peak, along the sand hill track, ¶ We mustered all the twelve mile plains and brought the shorn
sheep back ¶ The sight of Paney Bluff recalled those hardy days of yore, ¶ Brought back familiar faces and the scenes I knew,
once more….” ¶ William Crawford McKenzie (1869-1966) ¶ Remembered by their descendants, September 2002”. There is a
grave a little way away where Sarah Humphreys (1853-1856) and Joseph Humphreys (1860-1867) were
buried before the Old Scot came on the scene. Walked up various creekbeds where John photographed
flowers & I photographed him doing it & where a pool of water deep enough for an all over wash satisfied
his need to be clean. ( wosht mi p 2; sns ♀r dskuvri nths p vwps H fndz ♀ no longr
nedz 2 wosh/showr) Came across a pile of goat remains, probably shot at the Park’s instigation. Walked
along a track across the Old Paney Homestead’s home paddock (a semicircular flat with a creekbed
framed by hills) to a terrific spot which we’ll suss out tomorrow – have to listen to the weather report first,
as it’s a 4x4 track & obviously gets muddy in parts as the Salvation Jane grows thickly across it in those
bits. There are native hibiscus (Alogyne) in flower in the creekbed, a magnificent flush of purple, and
stands of amyllaris. Last night before our evening drink we walked to the Stone Dam and got quite close to
a pair of 28 Parrots (black caps, bright yellow collars, blue-green coats, yellow vests) preoccupied with
stripping seed heads from grasses growing in the slightly damper ground behind the dam wall.  Emu
(Dromaius novaehollandiae) wth sum tni chiks – tz m kon10shn th@t wood mak rfn m m 4
th♀♀z li shn moovt sns tz th♂  th@  thchiks wthowt ni hlp  th♀. Tz ♪werthi th@ 2da w
hvnt †t prthz wth or evn nth dst r sngl hu n or . Wr h  owr lonsum rgan wchzhow w l
kt – dont won2 sp g nth am makn 6.
1/10/08. Port Germein (tz Hz ( Helen Margaret Dryburgh, 1942) da 2da! Wv n h
4 ♀r da 4 ( Tuesday 1/10/96 & Thursday 1/10/98).

HAP DA 2U
HAP DA 2U
HAP DA DHLN
HAP DA 2U

HIP HIP HOO ! (x3)

Thanks 4 thy(& thtpn tvkors). v givn ♀r r n1 sd vwch whd nrdvr li off sum dom
prnt  m Days 2 foto papr (“yor so ro” H  - & ys w dd 6 nth am); thrwoz rhowln gal n98
justz thrz 2da & w owt nth p thn2; th 10dnz n oth m nklz r n d ( Friday 11/5/07) so 
took r NAPROSIN 1000 pl)   Stone Hut ( 2nd korsv “Best Pie in the Universe” 2 sl e Hz
da ( Monday 8/9/08): wnwwr h 4 w ddnt no wd nth kchul da)   (vr Jamestown 4 p
l; 9kz)   Bundaleer Forest Picnic Ground (dd rlv fairli ordnri : Maple & Scenic )
  wrn 4thnt (O 6kz Sv thpknk nCurnow’s Cottage; thMawson al  prst
ths ; w hvnt nuff H2O 4 2moro am zw 4got 2fil @ Port Germein).
8/10/08. Sitella st (nBirds Australia Gluepot Reserve (65kz Nv Waikerie nS.A)).
Chktowt W13 –The Old Gluepot Heritage Walk & thrso 8d hd t ddnt fnd nithn vn st thr xpt4th 3

132
lrj li gots 1drn O – wv O 10 sofr. So   (lft owr tabl & sum gowt 2 klam owr vrigood nth
st) 2 W3 – Bluebush Walk –v10.3kz wch goz thru n wch hznt n rfktd  4 thlongst & woz
thprtst wv nn sofr knsdrn th@ n1902 The Bulletin  “Nobody knows who made the
mallee, but the Devil is strongly suspected!” Nth w r♀/♂v Striated Pardalote (Pardalotus
striatus) ns10 nr O onli h. Thtni Pardalotes & evn tnir Weebill (Smicrornis brevirostris)
(@ 8.5-9.5 cm knsdrd 2 thsmorlst OZ ) rvri konth rzrv. Nth wa d rWhistlerz ♪♫  1td 2
nvstg8 so w   2 wr thjt ak levz thKelly Dam ak (no. 2) wrw r now.  th t
ddnt getr vri good : tz ethr rrair ♀ Gilberts Whistler (Pachycephalus inornata) rth vrimuch rairr ♀
Red-lored Whistler (Pachycephalus rufogularis) wch  hvnt 4. (Jst t rgain – tz r♀ Gilberts)….
Its interesting that the bird hides here have been erected by the Riverland 4WD club – we don’t usually
associate 4x4 drivers with conservation efforts, & have bagged them in the past, but here they have
shown their more altruistic side. The park is a great place to camp – quiet, well-spaced camp sites and
well-marked & organized tracks. There are only 3 spots set up for camping with a couple of toilets in each,
where a container of lime is provided with the instruction to put a spoonful down the pit after use. It works
too – there is very little odour & very few flies. All the dams on the place (bar 2) have been filled in, in
order to limit the feral animals’ survival. It was worth the long & sometimes badly corrugated drive in
(60ks) to be basically private (the other sites are sparsely occupied – 4 out of the 17 possible here at
Sitella and 3 out of 19 at Bellbird on the first night, including us) unlike the cheek-by-jowl experience at
Rapid Bay where we had to shift from our first spot when 2 cars playing “doof-doof” music parked
alongside, to a slightly quieter spot where John was entertained into the wee small hours by a couple of
loudly laughing women. Birdos may be odd, but they do camp quietly and at a distance. If the $A keeps
plummeting we might have to come back in April-June instead of going to Europe. Its only
$10/night/vehicle here.(8/11/08. m lenn2 UROPA t zlong zth anks dont  &  owr $$$.
(9/11/08. rstlsns 4 FINALE? (stil rigln (dar biški kruta (12/11/08. mor  Gombrowiczz ri: “Will
 a e 2  lke others & then what will m f8 ? Among a  fleeing from
themselves,  remain fixed on mself.  magnif mself 2 what ex ? Is this
unhealthy? 2 what ex & in what way is it unhealthy? Some  suspect th@ the act of
self-agg zet, 2 which  submit, is not an indiffer m@ter 2 nature & th@ it is a
provoion. Haven’t  touched on something basic in m very relation 2 supern@ural
4ces & will not m f8 differ “l8r” as a result of the fact th@  did not t mself as
others?”))))).(10/11/08. nt rzst nuthr Gombrowicz   Diary Vol 1: “Language. Not th@ a
person should not make grammaal mistakes, but the mistake should not degrade.
Any1 can make a mistake in , even a grammaal or spelling mistake, but some 
dress themselves in classic togas and these folks are devast8d by a mistake, even a m
nor 1 (12/11/08.  2daz The Age p26: “Victor Huerta … is a lingual nit-picker, a grammatical pedant,
… alert to … atrocities perpetrated on the mother tongue. ¶ Two months ago Huerta felt obliged to point
out to the librarian at the Melbourne Athenaeum Library that the blackboard outside contained a
misspelling. There was a missing ‘p’: the library was announcing a talk on ‘12 Setember’. ¶ Huerta went on
to point out that the library’s quarterly list of new books had been headlined ‘quaterely’ and there were 54
errors, including bad grammar, changes in the gender of writers, truncation of titles, misplaced
apostrophes, misspellings, etc. ¶ This provoked a letter from the library’s executive officer, Sophie Arnold,
accusing Huerta of nine incidents of misbehaviour. But pedant Huerta could not help himself: he found a
mistake in the letter, too. “It said, ‘It is up to we, the staff’” says Huerta in disgust, “when it should have
been ‘us, the staff’”. ¶ Huerta then asked to inspect the library register, but was refused. Not to be
daunted, he then sent the library president a parcel containing eight folders of mistakes in booklets from
May to October. “So far, after a perfunctory examination, I have found upwards of 200 mistakes”. ¶ But
now Huerta says he has been “expelled from the library”. ¶ Says librarian Arnold: “It is the first expulsion
in my time here. Mr. Huerta was harassing staff. One almost went on stress leave. He was coming in every
day to com.”). The , on the other , who does not want 2 2 impecca in arulation
can allow ♂mself frequent stum ings and no 1 will hold ♂m responsi 4 those. There4, a
 must care not only 4 language, but, above all, 4 fnding the rght @titude 2
language, which is 2 say an @titude th@ is least inhi ting. It is a lousy stlist who
allows ♂s words 2 used against ♂m. & lousy is ♂ who, like some ♀♀, makes a
reputation for ♂mself of ing without sin. The least little sin then comes a scandal. ¶
 who de 2 much in an alleged precision of stle, who try 2 shock with some sort of
nonexist mathema of language, who coquet (the school of Anatole France) with
their “mastery”: these  are no longer in ♪♫ with our . Especially since sybaritism
has come unfashiona . A contemporary stlist must have a feeling 4 language as
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something ∞ & dynamic th@ does not allow itself 2 mastered. ♂ will emphas ♂s s
uggle with 4m rather than 4m itself. ♂s @titude 2ward the word, as something th@
eludes ♂m, is 1 of dis ust. This loosening of the bond tween the  & the word
ensures a gr8er boldness in using words.”)
15/4 /09 ( lir09ri p♪♫). €11.27 (supermero: mela fuji marlene – 1.01;
pane speciale – 1.36, pane con noci sfarinando – 1.54, pane speciale – 0.72; salamino
romagnolo – 6.64) + €6 (biglietti x 6 (autobus)) + €3.60 (gelati x 2) + €6.72 (supermero:
formaggio – 1.76; pane speciale – 2.21; frut  (mela & kiwi) – 1.60; t – 1.15) + €1.92 (chino
0.48 x 4) = €29.51. The room here at Independence Square Inn (www.independencesquareinn.com) is
very clean, comfortable (double bed, small table, TV (don’t use it), corner wash-basin & wardrobe) & with a
window overlooking apartments at a lower level. Its on the 2 nd floor, up marble steps, & entered from Via
Castelfidardo through an imposing wooden door with lion-headed doorhandles. Breakfast (a bit
disappointing: 2 small, mass-produced cornetti, a small orange juice and one coffee con latte each – no
refills) is served on the floor below in a very small kitchen where the seating is on bar stools at a bench. It
only fits 4 at a time. This morning we were first in at 8am (our watches were badly out – I must have
misheard the Emirates hostie when she announced local time as we landed) so the other party in
residence (2 couples & a child) were told to wait by the cook, an Italian-American from Massachusetts
who’s been here 9 years after marrying his Ukrainian-born wife here. He is distinctly unimpressed with
Italy, describing it as just a fraction above a third-world country, and confessing to prefering the States
because of the “modernity” there – too much old stuff here obviously. He mentioned that there was a big
heroin problem in Rome, with lots of methadone clinics & told us to watch out for pickpockets. We spent
the day walking to & in the Parco Regionale dell’Appia Antica which covers 3,400 hectares (“Within this area
are 16km of the via Appia Antica and its adjacent features, the valle della Caffarella (200 hectares), the via Latina archaeological area,
the Aqueducts archaeological area (240 hectares), the Tormarancia estate (220 hectares) and the Farnesiana area (180 hectares). ”
(Google)) and on the map provided by the Rome Tourist Authority looks to be a huge green area dotted
with tombs, churches & catacombs. The Via Appia Antica runs straight along its middle – “the main ancient
road … leading from the town centre to the rest of the world”, according to the map. In my long-ago school
days when I first fell under the spell of the Roman Empire, I remember it as the road across the Campania,
where wealthy Romans erected family tombs & where villas were built as self-sufficient rural farms. I
should have known it wouldn’t be like that now & it wasn’t. The Via Appia itself seems to be one of the
busiest roads in Rome with its narrow pavement supporting 2 lanes of fast moving traffic & any foolhardy
pedestrians who decide to ignore the costly bus-tour & go “a pede” (guess who?). At intervals there are
unmade tracks/paths/trails (sentieri) branching off to right & left which criss-cross the surrounding Parco, a
considerable amount of which seems privately owned & inaccessible. The public bits are open green
spaces with plentiful trees (some gums!) and are used by the locals for jogging & dog-walking & general
exercise & outdoor activity (the uomini favour lycra bike shorts). It is an area of undulating small hills &
not the flat plain I had imagined it to be. We walked most of the day along the Via della Caffarella which
traverses the Valle di Caffarella, the home of Fiume Almone whose waters appear to be fairly clean &
flowing – there were ducks on it. There is a private Azienza di agricoltura there which runs a flock of sheep
and a number of chooks out of a medieval walled building. From the high points the suburbs of Rome
spread out to the Appian Hills in the distance. There were birds singing loudly & no traffic noise &
occasionally the ruins of an ancient building. Though it wasn’t what I had expected I was glad to have seen
a bit of it, though it’s not crying out for a further visit. The more interesting bits are further out and need
wheels to get to. We had originally intended to go to the Terme di Caracalla but John forgot to take his EU
passport which allows him to get in gratis, so we’ll do that tomorrow perhaps, so the Parco was the default
option. On the way to the Terme we took a detour up a set of steps that looked intriguing & found
ourselves in the Chiesa di San Pietro in Vincoli where Michelangelo’s sculpture of Moses (1515) the
centrepiece of the tomb of Pope Julius II, has pride of place behind a low iron fence. On the way back
another impetuous stop took us into the Basilica di San Clemente, which like Santa Pressede, has beautiful
mosaics & “is a three-tiered complex of buildings on the site, the lowermost notable as being an archaeological record of a first
century insula(apartment or tenement) belonging to T. Flavius Clemens, with remains under it of foundations from the
republican era; superposed on it is a second century Roman pagan temple dedicated to Mithras. On the foundations of the 4th century
Christian church is the current one built just before the year 1100 during the height of the Middle Ages.”(Wikipedia). We might
check that out again to see if John’s EU passport can get him in for free, which even with the entry fee for
me still means a considerable reduction in cost to our mutual funds. The cost of investigating all these
antiquities and art treasures can mount sky-high, so we tend to favour “freebies” (like Moses) over official
sites. We are both pretty tired – John is still recovering from the flight & my hips are begging for mercy via
Naprosin.
22/4 /09. €3.00 ((x 6). W ne 2 se td 1z 4 pane & carne) + €3.63 ( etta 
alimentari npiazza  museo) + €7.15 (supermero owtsd the mura: pomodoro ciliegino
1.25; pere 1.19; panino 0.26; banane 0.63, vino rosso 500ml 0.71; succo (x2) 3.11) + €25.10
(biglietti x2  PISA (treno regionale, 2° classe)) = Totale = €38.88. It was market day this AM –
lots of clothes, shoes, bedding & drapery. Italians have gorgeous curtains, rugs, towels, sheets, doonas
134
etc. – far better than the stuff you get in Myers. After a stroll looking through the wares (we bought a pack
of 6 serrated knives for €3.00 to cut bread & meat as we couldn’t find single ones) we went to the Tabacci
to get our tickets for Pisa because the signora at the info office said they were sold there. But no, the
Tabacci man said, go to the Etrusca Viaggi (travel agent) in the piazza with the fontana, so we did. The girl
there spoke excellent English & said they did normally sell them, but the computer connected to the treni
biglietti was down (for the past month!) & no-one from Trenitalia had come to fix it, so she suggested
another Viaggi further down the Corso. We trotted off there to find the only attendant dealing with a
woman who was trying to decide which tropical country she might visit (Maldives? Madagascar?) & where
she might stay etc. etc. We waited awhile, but John decided to write a note (in the interests of efficiency)
which went like this: “Per favore: 2 biglietti per Pisa, domani, ritorno 13.00” & passed it to the attendant as
she dealt with the customer. He had to go back to clarify they were one-way tickets, but it worked very
well & the ticket (for 2) was ready when we returned about 12.30. Filled in the middle of the day with a
walk into the countryside immediately below the Wall, which is the only place solitude is assured, & an
excursion to the big COOP supermarket ½ way to the stazione where the ordinary Italians shop, followed
by a re-run of the Museo. We followed that with a stroll to find a couple of churches we hadnt yet seen, one
open & functioning, the other being used as an exhibition space for a local artist with whom we had a long
chat – a Brit who’s lived here for 50 years & paints scenes of nature & wildlife (his card: “ARTLAB – Brian
Mobbs, pittore-scultore; Alexandra Pelko, pittrice – ritrattista. Studio: Via di Porta Castello, 19; Abitaz: Via Giordano Bruno, 18.
Tel.0766 840032, 01016 Tarquinia (VT). www.tarquinia.on-web.it/studiomobbs). He too finds the level of Italian
(dis)organization to be frustrating (the British description is “couldn’t organize a piss-up in a brewery”) and
the intrusion of cars into the Centro Storico annoying & detrimental. The same lack of organization clearly
doesn’t extend to Italian accounting though – on a board outside a vicolo being restored there was a sign
saying the job was costing exactly €484,195.42. Our room has been spotless during our stay & we’ve been
careful not to drop stuff on the floor or spill anything, but tonight I had a shower & managed to flood the
place! The shower is tiny (19/9/09. zwr th onrr vth ), the shower-curtain ill-fitting & the water-pressure
very high: a combination disastrous for anyone as clumsy as me. W s@ owtsd Chiesa di S.
Francesco z  2  d 10 6 n n 2 DRUaMlMeOcND & SwTaRlUtVeEr (19/9/09.  r onth l
f& v“Herr O” ( Tuesday 30/11/04)  n10d2 f♂ gvvmi rkop 4 0) @ thST8 LBRIOV VIC.
Th n n r  pan10pan10 nth worlv nTOMBE ETRUSCANI. Nsd thchiesa thrz r st@uov padre
Pio hangn  r  lk r l@rda gzrz of Nazreth xspt ♂z td 2t wth thik roprop nstedv n nald 2t.  f
ndt dsterbn nz ♂   old aj - t th f ssknf sskn d 2  thPOVERELLO ( 16/5/07 ) 2 r
l@rda gzrz 2. Tha oth hd thSTIGMATA nko. Tma t th@ wnvr w i owrslvowrslv 2 sum1
nth prst w kum ren nashnren nashn vthm (nr snn). Th prst kn onli liv nth prz thru us.
STIGMATA r  2 dsrp@  menz u nt chk4m onth korpkorp – pret suss, huh! H  s
KOsom@ t thsz r werd dzgn88 r klrsv fnor hooz mkrnzm z non (fsuch zst zst!?). Th
LA sKOsom@ zdznd 2 mak us kum4t wth owr lakv nolj. & th STIGMATA zsuchr d @
♂fstashn (ft zst zst) th@t 12t ezli fit2 thgrup w normli dzgn8 wth thLA – tz nths wa th@ langwj
zorlwaorlwa RE SHIONIST! N d li th vDon Bosco 2 TARQUINIA nth 27th Aprile.
29/4 /09. €4.14 (mero: banane, soprassata, vino 0.25l x3, yoghurt) + €1.00 (
tolini x2) + €3.80 ( - por un ora!) + €5.00 (biglietti  Torre del Ora) = €14. We went to a suburb
outside the wall today, to the Fiume Serchio where geese & ducks & pigeons had gathered next to the
strongly flowing river. The excursion along the bank & over the bridge was terminated by heavy rain &
strong winds which belted the umbrellas about (mine blew inside out). John thinks a front must have come
through. On the way back into the Centro Storico we passed the Sanctuario di Santa Gemma – Vergine, of
course – a local lass made good. (27/7/09. “Maria Gemma Umberta Pia Galgani (or Gemma Galgani as she became
commonly known) was born on March 12, 1878 in the hamlet of Borgo Nuovo in the provincial town of Capannori. Gemma was the
fifth of eight children; her father, Enrico Galgani, was a prosperous pharmacist. Soon after Gemma's birth, the family relocated north
from Borgo Nuovo to a large new home in the Tuscan city of Lucca in a move which was undertaken to facilitate an improvement in
the children's education…Gemma went on to study at Saint Zita School. Gemma was not accepted by the Passionists to become a nun
because of her poor health and visions. At age 20, Gemma developed spinal meningitis, but was miraculously healed, attributing her
extraordinary cure to the Sacred Heart of Jesus through the intercession of Venerable Gabriel of Our Lady of Sorrows (later canonized
a saint), and Saint Marguerite Marie Alacoque….Gemma began to display signs of the stigmata on June 8, 1899 at the age of twenty-
one. She stated that she had spoken with her guardian angel, Jesus, the Virgin Mary, and other saints (especially Gabriel of Our Lady
of Sorrows). According to her testimonies, she sometimes received special messages from them about current or upcoming events….
Gemma was well-known in the vicinity of Lucca before her death, especially to those in poverty. Opinions of her were divided: some
people admired her extraordinary virtues and referred to her as The Virgin of Lucca out of pious respect and admiration; others
mocked her (including her younger sister, Angelina, who apparently used to make fun of Gemma during such experiences, and during
Gemma's canonization process was deemed as 'unfit' to testify due to accusations of attempting profit from Gemma's reputation), and
in light of the extraordinary events surrounding her life, some skeptics thought that she had a mental illness. ….In early 1903, Gemma
was diagnosed with tuberculosis, and thus began a long and often painful death. There were numerous extraordinary mystical
phenomena that occurred during her final illness. One of the religious nursing sisters who attended to her stated, "We have cared for a
good many sick people, but we have never seen anything like this." At the beginning of Holy Week 1903, her health quickly

135
deteriorated, and by Good Friday she was suffering tremendously. Gemma died in a small room across from the Giannini house on
Holy Saturday – April 11, 1903. After a thorough Church examination into her life, she was beatified in 1933 and canonized in 1940.
Her relics are housed at the Passionist monastery in Lucca, Italy. As one of the most popular saints of the Passionist Order, the
devotion to Gemma Galgani is particularly strong both in Italy and Latin America. She is a patron saint of students (said to be top of
her class before having to leave school) and of pharmacists.” Wikipedia). The weather continued erratic (rain, sunshine,
rain, wind, sun etc.) so we gave up & returned to our room for a rest & a read before dinner. Strolled out
into a nice calm evening to go to Piazza Napoleone which we crossed the day we arrived but didn’t really
notice, and discovered an unexplored area, including the tree-lined Corso Garibaldi & the Duomo, which
we thought we’d seen, but hadnt, which has a lovely façade like S. Michele, though not as large. We’ve
enjoyed Lucca a lot & it’s a beautiful place. Barga will be quieter, smaller & hopefully have access to some
walks in the countryside. A  feature of this kind of avel is the further in10sifiion of the ntmacy
tween us. We are very exclusive & we like it like so. When Irina d 2 @@ch ♀rslf to us yes d
♀r need & loneliness were palpa . rn th ip v n d ing with myself whether we should
always respond to pleaplea 4 hlp as thbuddhists prech. In the biggest   beggars are putting out
their hands everywhere and there is no way of knowing what proportion of them are scammers
though in the case of the plump gypsy @ S. Michele thda 4 ys d some tz obvious. Conseq ly
v dsi not2 gv2 gr gr @orl. In my experi there is no shortage in our normal livelive of
opportunities 2 reject pleas 4 hlp which we well know are undoubtedly genuine (& often within your
own family). Also our generosity is stretched with a multitude of worthy causes as if we are ing
tested. Irina provi such a test 4 me. When we got out @ Barga   2 ♀r th@ we had 2 owr sepa
wayway as  woz r & it was import 4 me 2 a 2 consent & consult with H rn thda
koz w ne 2 rkord thdada evnts rftr g10  nth evnn. ♀ flinched when   ♀r. ♀r dsr t woz ptfl.
 FAILED THE TEST. (17/47/09. We both did. On the other hand you probably did her a good turn, as
she would have had trouble keeping up the pace – you sure can race up those narrow streets & endless
steps – and she might have pegged out (I was lucky I didn’t). Also you can’t save everyone – there’s an
endless supply of poor, needy, unhappy, disadvantaged people in the world. From my point of view I
couldn’t have been in the company of 2 intense personalities all day without becoming exhausted. All we
can do is be honest with ourselves and admit we are both heartless, selfish bastards.)
6/5/09. €22 ( ghetto biglietti (x2) lerici  corniglia) + €2.60 ( biglietti
riomaggiore  corniglia (wv r &nd th ghetto) - €1.00 (H fowndt nth  rd nth rntl camera @
corniglia) + €18 (pr @r tni minimero – thonli1 nth vlj (k d wth 2risti)) = €41.60. We didn’t do
our homework thoroughly enough about the Cinque Terre – we didn’t realize that the way to get into it
most economically was by train – the ferry was expensive & would only have taken us to Manorola, from
where we thought we could walk along the coastal track to Corniglia. The big discovery at Riomaggiore
was that the coastal track costs €5 each! The other tracks (many & varied – 21 marked sentieri) are free.
It’s a National Park – Parco Nazionale Delle Cinque Terre – & a UNESCO World Heritage Area. We forsook
the ferry (which we’d taken at Lerici) & got a much cheaper train instead which delivered us to Corniglia
stazione in 6 minutes. We then walked up the 382 steps to the Centro (welcoming sign says: “Comune di
Vernazza. CORNIGLIA. ¶ Il centro storico di Corniglia ti aspetta, sali e non rimarrai deluso: The historical center of Corniglia
awaits, come up & be amazed. Das Zentrum von Corniglia erwartet sie – Sie werden begeistert sein!”– much easier than the
314 up to Palazzo Cocco in Maiore in 2007 (see 18/4/07 ) as they were shallower & zig-zagged up the hill.
Our accomodation is great – a double room on the 1st floor with a window looking out to Manarola, &
access to a 2nd storey terrace with great views where we had tea. The bathroom/toilet is on the ground
floor. There is a minimercato close by & plenty of bars/cafes for breakfast. The town is very small – we
explored after tea & covered it pretty much in about an hour (19/9/09. t dd ♪s thstep stairwa ledn
thport  drktli o th).The terraces (some used, many abandoned) go up the steep hillsides held back
by dry stone walls, built over many hundreds of years, an estimated 8 million cubic metres of them
throughout the park. Tomorrow we start exploring them. We spent time in Porto Venere & Riomaggiore on
our way here, both spectacular towns. There were plenty of Australians in Riomaggiore – a group of 4 from
Kiama, a young couple from the Latrobe Valley (near Churchill), and a few we heard passing by at Corniglia
scala. We are really appreciating our lack of luggage – it makes getting around so much easier & allows us
to change our plans without too much effort – had we had lots of suitcases we would have had difficulty
exploring Porto Venere & Riomaggiore while we mucked around deciding whether to keep on with the ferry
or go with the train, & lugging suitcases up the scala wouldn’t have been much fun (it costs €1 each to
catch the bus that meets the train). Also most of our accomodation has had limited space (except Pisa &
Barga) so storing suitcases would have been a problem. So far we have nearly lost 2 items – yesterday in
Lerici John left his notebook (with vital contact numbers in it) at the public telephone booth & had to run
back to get it. Today I left my hat in the info centre in Riomaggiore & luckily they’d kept it for me. By the
way the inquiry office had an excellent signorina who gave accurate info in good English.
13/5 /09. €4.20 (a.m. vcapuccino (x2), rioche (H), onyn focaccia (me) nth Via XX
Settembre nowr affita camera) + €3.30 (acciughe ripiene (srdn ) + €0.94 (chino (x2)) +
136
€2.65 (banane x2, pere x2) + €4.76 (supermero pr : yoghurt, succo, fragole, vino rosso) +
€10.66 ( (x4) vpizze - thprz tookus  surpr) = €23.51. Just when I thought it was safe
to come out of the affitacamera & walk along relatively flat lanes/vias/stadas we came across the Salita
Superiore San Simone which climbs 300 metres above the town to Righi in the Casteletto area, right after
we’d walked up to Spianata Casteletto for the view of the town from the Belvedere Montaldo – we saved
ourselves the fares for the lift to Spianata Casteletto & the funicular to Righi. At the top of Salita s. San
Simone we tried to see the view across the old city wall to the hinterland but it was mostly obscured by
trees. We met 2 Australian women who were looking for the way to the forts/castles along the wall. One
was a graduate of Ivanhoe Girls Grammar! They were leaving for Milan & home this afternoon after a 6
week whirlwind tour taking in Athens, the Greek Islands, Spain, Paris, Provence & the Cinque Terre – talk
about around the world in 80 days. They were obviously well-heeled having paid €30 for a taxi from the
station to their hotel about 1k away. However, tourists are not much in evidence in Genoa, which makes it
more attractive to us. The walk down was along Salita Porta delle Chiappe back into the old town near the
start of Via Cairoli. These salitas must have once been mule or handcart tracks from the port into the
upper city & were hemmed in by walled buildings. Each was paved in 3 sections – a shallow-stepped brick
on one side, a middle section of paved brick without steps & a side section of black & white round pebbles
(marble?) Much work has gone into their surfacing – I can hardly imagine how long it must have taken to
complete. The bricks are laid in the Roman/Medieval fashion, vertically into the ground, so that the narrow
edge is uppermost. We wandered into the Via della Madellena in the centro storico on the way back &
discovered the red light district – there were many buxom working girls (scantily or tightly clad, with plenty
of flesh on display) & plenty of male onlookers (pimps? customers?) as well as ordinary citizens doing their
shopping or passing through, who were completely unfazed. It was only about 3pm & we’d seen 3 or 4
girls already on our way in the morning about 10am. Most of the girls were darker-skinned, but there were
some Italians too, I think. They didn’t look sickly or drugged-up like their St. Kilda counterparts, & were
chatting happily to each other. No wonder there are long afternoon breaks (1.30 – 4) here! Seriously, the
division of the day into 2 sections – 8.30/9 – 1.30 & 3.30/4 – 7/7.30 – is a great idea which should be taken
up in Melbourne. It makes the day seem shorter, it allows for a relaxed social lunch (or recreation), & the
morning’s disasters can be forgotten by the time work resumes in the arvo. There are plenty of police here
- local, state, military, with different uniforms, but they all wear guns. The local police (white belts, white
hats) seem to be glorified traffic wardens. Whatever their status however they all seem to spend a lot of
time standing about in groups chatting, having a fag, & flashing their jewellery (the women too). Christine
Nixon would be appalled. Nevertheless the senora in the info booth said the old town was quite safe as
long as you used your common sense.
20/5 /09. 2moro w n so tz rpropr8   r short rport vth kndv thngthng H zlkli
2hv lftowt: v 4 nth p sofr, 3 vO 2½ long & th1  t 2da woz O 1 -
1td 2hv rgood @tz i 2chek ft woz r orr legls lizrd; km♀/♂d2 t lir v litl wldlf n
lir: th 1 2♪♫ @ ☼ hnstresa zth ak/g
st
(thsam1 uget noldtownv KAUNAS); ngenova twoz
th i kr (lk r♀ havn r nt ) vth lokl gul gul; wn w pm nowr tni koni wr serna  smorl
swrloo wth x mli long nedltal tak  2 perch nth lk k wr nx2 us; thrz r si10
on  thlaksd proad & sevrl sp v & nth lak; thsalami w t 2da 2mrk owr
dprchr   lir ( @r prv €32/kg zmuch chepr thnth salami paesi (vlj) @ €90/kg w nth
supermero) zmad  (cavallo) met (tak♪ KsAuBzAeItLtAe); th vri ko h& d d
tslf zth sam CHUSAN  pl d nowr grdn nIvanhoe  dln dln  dug O wrtz orlso
dn tslf; 2da H t mi r Limoncello 4 m da n3 munthmunth & koz wr levn  lir 2moro - n
d li th  p 2 Locarno kostkost €21 t tha stl chrj u €18.50 ech 4 th1wa p; fnrli  shood
report th@ owr hlth zfn: HH pro mpro m wth ne & ♂p jointjoint owt m pro mpro m
wthth 10dn10dn nm & nklnkl – wr just servvn wthowt takn 2much NAPROSIN 1000 (0 4
mi) - & thkrakkrak & dr skn nowr getget fixt  ♂l rm; & ys,  dd rmm r 2 r tolino
2da 2m MUM hoo  88 on n 4 ( Elena’s Journey  Elena Jonaitis) & hoo m m no2
th

r vn owr ee! Despite the practice I had in the Cinque Terre at hill-climbing I seem not to have put
on any muscle, or developed any tolerance for steep grades, so we are a bit restricted in the walks we can
do (John is gracious enough to say that he, too, has to mind that his tendonitis doesn’t flair up, but I know
he could easily tackle the slopes here) so we strolled slowly towards the NE end of town along moderate
rises, inspecting the houses. We wrote postcards in the tiny park attached to a little church in one of the
villages that are now part of the Stresa suburbs, and came back to our albergo for limoncello & café latte
around 2pm. We had an unpleasant encounter with an African selling trinkets who pretended to give us a
carved elephant because we had come from so far away & then suggested we give him €5 as a
contribution towards feeding his newly born baby. Like a muggins (I’ve got “soft touch” written on my
forehead it seems) I fell for the first bit of what sounded like sincere patter & was only rescued by John’s
quick response. The African then loudly abused us & all Australians before we made our getaway – he was

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the first really aggressive & manipulative “hard” seller we’ve encountered. I’ll watch my step better in
future, though there’s probably not many Africans in Switzerland, which is our next stop. I forgot to
mention that there are lots of rhododendrons here, some of which have grown into large trees. We saw lots
of big fish (several kilos each) in the Lago today, possibly carp. €1.50 (cia ta panini (x4)) + €4.60
(capucci & rioche (x2) 4 a.m) + €5.96 (supermero supl 4 p.m) + €1.10 ( tolini (x3)) +
€6.08 (salami di cavallo ( ) (dd  thsalami paesi (pz )  thsupermero @ €90/kg) &
4maggio  alimentari) + €0.90 (mele (x2)  vlj minimero) = €20.
27/5 /09 ( 09ri p♪♫). (3.55am) N lir wwr nr u4ik u v2gethrns. Twoz
1derfl. Thrz 0  or H kndoo 2 re chr thmajk. Erlir nth nt   2go  domodossola & S 
milano thn W r  lir ttz gon2 2 hot ther  nowon. Wn  kotd 2♀r ths evnn th@ th 
lin voisvois w hnIntragna rmuch lowdr thnth jer11 ♀  “@ lest u no thr rlv”. Tz u4H
hoo slepslep muchmor dpli thndoo & 4 hoom slnsslns hold ls lf thn tha doo 4mi.  hv r
&dnd th  v onli 2 smorl  nHelvetia zthrthr 0 2doo nthm xpt th  & thpr H
papa 4 spndn ntl ntl owrowr nf tv th doon mi t zth@ ♀ fitnuff 4 . Nstedv 
Savognin or Davos r  nth  m hopn wkn fnd mor2doo nBad Ragaz
r spr  (wotvr th@ menmen!). @ lst tsowndsownd hlthir & thrma mor 2doo nth  tslf. 2da
H md klos2 danjrus orschn. sd sd Bad Ragaz zon th rekt  owtv Helvetia (2 mor
!?). t ys – thmajk spl hz n rokn – wr 2 r dfr faz vth jerni. H nsstnsst on thee
♪♫ now zuthrw ♀ 1t a 2slep ♀  …. SF6.20 (€4.13) ( biglietti (x2) Intragna  Locarno
t  H  ortom@ t mashn ( t lrst ☼dada tt  Locarno  Intragna kost SF10.33!
( Sunday 24/5/09))) + SF16.40 (€10.93) ( tt (x2) Locarno  Bellinzona) + SF96 (€64) (
tt Bellinzona  Chur/Coira) + SF0.50 (€0.33) (4 H 2hvr SHIT nth stashn WC ( kept m
n 4 th & ♪d 2m spr th@t  on2 th ak ak); 2hvr PISS nth ♂♂ WC zfre t ♀♀ dont
hvth privlj) + SF0 (€0) (4r drnkv H2O  thfown10) + SF64 (€42.66) ( tt (x2) Chur  St.
Gallen: w ds 2tak th+v vth ♀/♂ w2 n☼d @ Intragna ( Sunday 24/5/09) & Bad
Ragaz sown xv) + SF9.20 (€6.13) (capuccino & rivella nSt. Gallen old ) + SF320 (€213)
(4 2 ntnt @th Hotel am Spisertor nSt. Gallen  HH VISA hoowoz onmi €153 so now  o ♀r
€60 + €6 4 th & rivella ♀ t nold  ♀r on  = €66) + SF23.40 (€15.20) (sprmrkt supl
( COOP & MIGROS) – w nt r4d 2  owt @ th nomkl prpr h) = €364.58. We are
both dead tired after our “loss of magic” – John was up at 4am writing his thoughts & so I read them, & I
didn’t get back to sleep until about 7 & then the bells started properly. I don’t think John got back to sleep
at all. We are too old for these dramas as our ability to bounce back is going the way of our eyes, ears,
knees, hips & ankles. The train journey to Chur started off with a bit of drama, as a woman buying tickets
at the office in Locarno was taking ages. A railway official came up to the substantial queue (we were at its
head) & made an announcement in rapid Italian & German which started a procession elsewhere. When
John said to no-one in particular “What was that all about?” others in the queue motioned us to go with
him. He took 4 of us (2 women & us) to the automatic ticket machine because the Chur train was due to
leave in less than 5 minutes. One of the ladies translated for us & told us what platform to go to. She was
on her way to Lugano & spoke good English so we chatted until she left the train. At Chur we had a picnic
style lunch sitting on the stone surround of a tree in a street just near the Bahnhof (station). The journey
from Chur to St. Gallen (which we decided on after consulting the Info office at the station) was by bus &
very spectacular – great jagged mountains (the highest we’ve seen) topped with snow, forests of fir trees,
waterfalls, rushing rivers – as we wound up to the San Bernadino Pass (1000m. asl). On the downward leg
the valley opened up into rich farmland with enormous barns where the livestock (mainly dairy cows, but
some sheep & goats) are housed over winter. The towns looked smallish & pretty. St. Gallen is a very
attractive place – we’ll explore tomorrow. I’m hoping John can get some sleep tonight – he is so tired he
chopped some skin off his finger as he was cutting up the salami for our lunchtime picnic. The lady at the
info office was very helpful & charming & pointed out a nice walk into “countryside” which we’ll do before
we leave, so we booked for 3 nights here. I’m amazed at how expensive everything is e.g. a Bratwurst
sausage (the local delicacy (from 1438 the Butchers Guild described how they were to be produced))
grilled from a roadside stall costs SF6.50 (€4.30) = $A8.60! (compare Vic Market $5 where you get a bun &
sauerkraut & mustard thrown in). A small pizza is SF11.00 (€7.33) = $A14.60 (portion about enough for ½
meal). Supermarket shopping is the cheapest option but is still pricey – the bread was SF3.50 (€2.33) =
$A4.60 & it lasts us one meal. We got Appenzeller cheese because its locally produced (in an area about
20ks away). The Swiss experience is no doubt terrific if you can afford to stay here long enough to have it,
but we are being pushed into Germany & Austria where hopefully the Euro will stretch a bit further. John
reckons St. Gallen is similar in atmosphere & people to Siena but Siena was much more affordable & had
far more in the way of cultural values & that intangible Italian pizzaz.

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 3/6/09. SF50 (€33.33) ( tt (x2) Herisau  vr St. Gallen  Lindau 4 2moro) +
SF7.00 (€4.60) (sprmrkt supl) + SF4.80 (€3.20) ( 10 10 (x4)) + SF17.00 (€14.66) (Rivella
& bier & pas (4 ) @ wasdn) + SF6 (€3) (tt Waldstatt  Herisau bahn( )hof) +
SF7.20 (€4.30) ( 2 10 10  t lir) = €64. We have been wanderwegging at high altitudes
– Herisau: 771m/asl; Hundwil: 788m/asl; Waldstaff: 20m/asl; Schwellbrünn 966m/asl; Säntis, the mountain
which has dominated the skyline of most of our walks is 2501m/asl & the highest in the area called
Appenzellerland (vom Bodensee bis zum Säntis) whose main cities are St. Gallen, Appenzell & Bruggen.
The wild flowers here are beautiful, though small & include: Wiesen-Hornklee, Alpen-Wundklee,
Habermark, Trollblume, Grossblutiger Fingerhut, Gelber Enzian, Zottinger Klappertopf, Buchsblattrige
Kreuzblume (all yellow), Gemeines Leimkraut (white), Schlangenknoterich, Wald-Witwenblume, Wald-
Storchschnabel, Alpen-Aster, Feld-Thymian, Grauer Alpendost, Rote Waldnelke, Pracht-Nelke, Berg-
Flockenblume (pale pink to deep pink), Clusius-Enzian & Niedliche Glockenblume (purple). As well there
are purple clover, white daisies, yellow dandelions, buttercups & a white flowering weed which is very
attractive. Scarlet, orange & pink opium poppies are flowering in gardens, along with peonies & a dinner-
plate sized clematis in deep blue, bordering on purple. Where the pastures are uncut & on verges there
are many grasses with lovely seed heads. Houses are decorated with items retrieved from the
surroundings (river stones, gnarled pieces of wood) as well as with metal or ceramic birds & cats, & in
some places wood sculptures of bears, eagles, frogs, etc. Barn doors often have a painted frieze of farmers
in lederhosen leading columns of cows & goats. Today we came across Buechberg, a collection of about 6
farmlets, one of which was also the local inn selling honey, jams, syrups, hard & soft drinks, cookies, bread
& pastries. We also saw a Hobbit – a cheery farmer who was walking barefoot on a gravelly path & who
was impressed that we were walking from Herisau to Waldstatt. His feet were very large & grass-stained &
I reckon they had some fur on ‘em too. There were some steep climbs & descents today, so by 4.45pm
when we were in Waldstatt & spotted a bus-stop, we cheated & caught the yellow Post-bus for the 4-5ks
back to Herisau, where we were able to post some postcards home before the Post Office closed. We have
been very comfortable in the somewhat dusty, run-down & unfashionable Loewen Hotel (Portuguese: Lion)
which also functions as a boarding house, finding it quiet, central & unpretentious as well as affordable in
this rich & expensive country. z n hrd2 przrv nl valuvalu v vk rspons t & ndpnd fmli
ast fr t th jugr0 vprogrs (fuld  , , TV/medr, & /) wl rol ovrt & chanjt irevok i ztwl
evrithn ll st&st& nitnit prth. Nth utfl  vSchwellbrünn wr  d k dunkel bier th ev vr  pro
udn ovr thman s t woz noktof tw nr wek  v dskuvrd th rod thru th
givgiv m rshortkut. Sotgoo. 2da woz owr lrst da n & 2moro wl nLindau (or prapprap evnn
Oberstdorf –  rmm r  m chlhood) njeri.
10/6 /09 (jeri09ri p♪♫). €30 (tt (x2) 22r oth schlößschlöß (Neu
stein & Hohen gau) + €12.40 (König Ludwig dunkel , drnk, s s & spud
sal@ @r pu undr Hohen gau) + €7.00 (4 nu 4 m : H woz onmi 94 so now ♀ oo
mi €87) + €18.15 (pm: hefeweizen (0.51), apfelsaft (0.21), haxe, ) + €1.80 (krm
krm (x2)) + €1.97 (t, Franziskaner Hefe - Weiß , apfelsaft  sprmrkt) = €71.32. After a
hearty breakfast we walked to Schloss Hohenschwangau (“High Country of the Swan”) Ludwig II of
Bavaria’s childhood home & then to Schloss Neuschwanstein (“The New Swan Castle”) which he had built
between 1869 & 1886, his fantasy “medieval” castle celebrating the legends of German mythology which
Wagner had put to music, with throne room, singers’ hall, private rooms & his very own grotto & waterfall
constructed next to his bedroom (20/8/09. Think Graceland & Neverland). He died before it was completed
& had spent so much of the Bavarian treasury on his various castles it took his family 40 years to pay off
his debts. The tour of each castle lasted about 35 minutes, so it was really a whirlwind fly-through with
little hope of taking in any detail. I would have liked to stop & admire the wall paintings in each room &
have a closer look at the wood-carving (the canopy over his bed at Neuschwanstein was carved to be a
forest of mini-church spires & reminded me of the roof of the Milan cathedral) but there are so many
tourists that unleashing them at will would no doubt cause huge traffic jams & danger to the artifacts &
art. (30/8/09. Wikipedia reports that 1.3million people visit it annually, with an average of 6000 per day in
the summer. That’s bringing in €90,000 each day! It is also the most photographed (from the outside)
castle in Germany, and the State of Bavaria, which owns it, has spent about $14.5 million on it since
1991). Here is the description of the castle from the info board outside: “In 1868 King Ludwig II of Bavaria wrote
to Richard Wagner that he intended to erect a genuine castle of the German Middle Ages. This in fact is a remarkable statement as it
reveals how far the 19th century had moved away from the authentic Middle Ages, and how profoundly it misunderstood the Medieval
castle. For we must know that Ludwig, in order to realize his powerful vision of the castle of the grail, completely demolished one of
the most important castles of Bavaria. Quite obviously the bulky, grey ruin of the old castle of Schwangau didn’t meet his idea of a
‘genuine’ medieval castle. ¶ The old castle of Schwangau …. [was] mentioned indirectly for the first time in 1146/7.” We met a
nice English couple in the pub where we stopped for a drink & a bite to eat (ah_zeitgeist@hotmail.com) &
promised to send them “Monday”. We had arrived at the castle complex by walking the 3ks from Füssen
(we kept saying “Gut Morgen” to many young soldiers coming from the opposite direction – must have

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been the morning exercise) & came back along a 7k path through beautiful deciduous forest, onto the
Kalvarienberg hill where the stations of the cross are displayed in a series of chapels, culminating in a very
large modernist crucifix at the summit (953m). After the press of people in & around the castles the walk
was wonderfully peaceful with only birdsong & the occasional far off cow-bell (Kuhglocke) to break the
silence. We arrived to find the locals enjoying the festivities associated with the Füssener Volksfest which
started today & runs till 21/6 – there were 2 local brass bands, lots of lederhosen & dirndls & a quartet of
beautifully attired draught-horses pulling a wagon loaded with beer barrels. We were too late back to get
our schweinhaxe at the fast food place so shared one in a pub, with a potato dumpling & the inevitable
sauerkraut. The weather was kind to us – we are missing the sunny days we had in Herisau & Lindau – but
the Alps are a bit unpredictable (like Melbourne used to be in spring, before the drought set in).
17/6 /09 ( r09ri p♪♫). €3.40 ( tt Innsbruck  Hungerburg aka 
Innsbruck) + €7.50 (weiß & & knödel suppe @ Bodenstein Alm (1661m)) + €12.50 (
& k ri  & knödl suppe (x2) @ Höttinger Alm (1487m)) + €15.60 (pm @ Café-Pension
Alpina nHungerburg) = €39.
A big day of walking (for me, anyway) on the North side of the Inn Valley, all of it up! From Hungerburg
(868m) to Arzler Alm (1067m) to Bodenstein Alm (1661m) to Höttinger Alm (1487m) & down again –
started about 10.30am & finished about 8.30pm, with 3 stops for sustenance. At Bodenstein Alm we
walked along a narrow track through stunted fir trees where buttercups & gentians were flowering before
heading down to Höttinger Alm where an old donkey replaces the usual dog-in-residence, & we ate broth
with a dumpling with speck in it. We started down a short, precipitous way back to Hungerburg in company
with a German back-packer from Munich who is travelling one holiday at a time over the Alps to Venice
(John walked the Victorian coast in a similar manner), but were stopped when the track across a valley was
hidden under a recent avalanche of snow-turned-ice. The backpacker, in boots & with 2 sticks, forged on,
but I reneged despite John’s protests that we could find a way across (during his exploration of the ice
surface he fell over twice, and then tried it without his Crocs, but it looked decidedly dicey to me, whose
balance on firm, flat ground can be problematic). So we trudged back up to Höttinger Alm & just under the
gate to the restaurant, passed a man in his 50s going down, who appeared to be very drunk. I was leading
the way & saw him have a fall as I was coming up to pass him. John told him it was too steep & dangerous
with ice to cross, but as the warning was in English it fell on deaf ears, as he continued slowly & erratically
down as we moved up into the cyclist track (a broad gravelled road) & began the longer, slower descent
the way we had come originally. As I looked back I could see the man had come off the track completely,
was on his hands & knees & looked in serious trouble. John ran (speedily for someone who had just done a
stiff climb) back to the restaurant & told the waitress there (who spoke excellent English) & suggested she
phone for assistance for him. In the meantime I watched as a young man who had successfully negotiated
the ice made his way up the steep track to the Alm, passing the man in trouble on the way. By this time he
had fallen again, but managed to get into a sitting position & was stationary. John had returned by now &
we saw a few people at the Alm looking down the track at him, & then a van drove past us with a driver in
a khaki shirt, up toward the alm. We assumed it was the cavalry arriving, though we didn’t see an actual
rescue. By now it was 5.30pm & we weren’t even halfway down, so we had to move on. It was really
disturbing for me as I felt that I had mad a huge error of judgement in assuming he was drunk – he may
have been having a stroke or a brain haemmorage or a diabetic attack. Even if he wasn’t sick, & was
drunk, I should have tried to prevent him from continuing, as he wasn’t in a fit state to be walking on a
mountain. Tests like these come along every now & then & I always fail them, nor do I seem capable of
learning from the failure, so that I repeat the mistakes. It shows something lacking in my character –
timidity, selfishness, lack of empathy or just plain thoughtlessness. Whatever it is it makes me a
bystander, the one who lets bad things happen, which is the same really as doing the bad things yourself.
Back in Hungerburg there was an aviary in a park housing 4 African Grey Parrots (like Alex in “Alex and
Me” (see Thursday 23/4/09)) a couple of sulphur-crested cockatoos (one with blue eyes!) & a galah – a
small touch of Australia in Austria. Once again there were heaps of Austrians of all ages & sizes walking &
cycling up & down the steep slopes, keeping fit. The cyclists in particular seem intent on punishing
themselves, riding up slopes so steep they are travelling barely faster than walking pace. I can’t
understand the motivation – it’s not to look at the scenery as they are bent over the handlebars going up,
& going down they are travelling so fast everything must be a blur – no gentians or buttercups for them. It
reminds me of the flagellants, or the people who crawl on their knees up the Scala Sacra in Roma (see
Thursday 16/4/09) or the fakirs who lie on beds of nails, without the religious or spiritual content. But
perhaps there is something spiritual about speeding down a mountain at 30ks/hr after you’ve slogged up it
at 5ks/hr. who am I, who have had not spiritual experiences at all, to judge. I feel knackered & miserable &
guilty & I’m going to bed.
24/6 /09. €3 (The Guardian nuuppr 4 th shop – koz  zkon10urr) + €1.75
(smorl ak cheree  stor  thrvr (flu) weg) + €15 (tz pisn rgn so w spnt slo nr kafé: weiß
, l t, apfelstrudel (x2), machiatti (x2)) + €1.08 (hefe weiß (Franziskaner) 4 2nt) +
€11.60 (takrwa pm  sprmrkt) = €32.43. The rain continues to fall, though less solidly, but we
managed to fill in the day nicely – first at the Hofbahn where we scanned the free town newspaper & found
a weather map showing unseasonable weather over most of Austria but particularly over Salzkammergut

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where the top temperature for today was predicted to be 14° with rain. In a lull we walked up the
Siriuskogel (599m/asl), topped with a lookout tower & a mini-farm with goats, rabbits, pigs. We were the
only visitors. We walked along the river, still high & flowing strongly, & along some small wegs that were
cut off by water. The soil is oozing moisture & mini-lakes are forming in low-lying areas. We also attended a
Chamber Music concert (1 hour) in the Info centre Trinkhalle (6 attendees only) which was very enjoyable
– the musos (pianist, 2 violinists & a cellist) were excellent & played music from Strauss, Lehar & others of
the Imperial period – marches, waltzes & operetta pieces which were popular when Bad Ischl was the
Emperor’s summer retreat. We repeated our Café Ramsauer experience from yesterday, this time taking
“The Guardian” with us to while away the time while we drank & ate apple strudel in its relaxed &
comfortably warm surroundings. We spent time looking for somewhere to have our evening meal but
couldn’t find anything that really appealed (no nice pub like the one in Oberstdorf) so settled for a hot pork
bun & salad bowl each from the Billa supermarket in the town centre, eaten in our lodgings. For a holiday
town there seems to be a dearth of medium-priced pubs. The big hotels have expensive dishes & the
cheaper places provide only snacks. The pork buns are the Austrian equivalent of Italy’s porchetta, & are
very tasty but we’ve only seen them in the Billa supermarket chain. These small Salzkammergut towns are
really centres for walking & when bad weather sets in the tourists have little to do. Tomorrow we take the
train/bus to Hallstatt as an excursion – its about 30 minutes away & was recommended by a couple we
met on a walk from Oberstdorf as a beautiful town, so we’ve added a night at Haus Reisenauer. It’s an
excellent room – spacious, well-lit & with a wash-basin. Bath & toilet are just across the corridor & it’s very
cheap at €40/night. Breakfast is 2 buns each with butter & home-made apricot jam & coffee – plenty to
start the day &more like an Italian prima colazione than the hearty buffet served up in Pension Jahn in
Salzburg.
1/7/09.   &  O GOD & tz m jo 2 kot on thr ch@tr spshli ztha sum mi
mennfuli nth  & mi how  shood hav. @ ♣ Rod (v romarod@hotmail.com) 11 rkstmi f
n GOD &  rpld  dd no wot ♂ t  thwerd z uut ndfr wawa & ♂  ♂ t ‘GOD
th krea vth ’ lk vri1ll drr. t  stl kood giv♂m nansr z♂d xchanjd 1 hrd2ndrst& werd wth
nuthr evn hrdr2ndrst& 1 (ko uuj givgiv usth fln w ndrst&) n zv nvr hd evid ovnithn n
mad owtv 0. F wr 2uu thwerd  wood uut 2d th fln  hv th@ m prtv r lrjr O &  no tmakmak
no snsn 2  no wot m rprtv. THE PART CANNOT KNOW THE WHOLE OF IT IS A PART.
YOU CAN KNOW WHAT IS GOOD FOR YOU BUT YOU CANNOT KNOW WHAT YOU ARE GOOD
FOR. Ukn  u fl lk r kog nbr mshn ( Wittgenstein 4y tmakmak no snsn 2 u no wot u fl) t u
dont no wo kog flfl & u dont no fwot urn zr mshn.  no m joind 2u & 2r lrjr O (  th@ n z
n tt wood u onlif st woz yor onli snsn) t  no 0 O thO:  fl vri smorl,  ow 4 th
unown,  p .  nt u nth  wth konfd lk thotho werthi  hoo 2 th fulv thr
slfmport koz  no m 0 nth v thO &  wl = us tho u rekrut thorlmt lord 2 pled yor
kas. So  giv kum4t 2 thotho hoo  2mi -  wlnot   2u. We strolled along the eastern side of the
Traunsee on the Traunsteinstrasse, described on the map as a “Touristische Strassen” which I wrongly assumed
was a tourist walk but turned out to be a busy road. We got as far as the Gasthof Ramsau where a fussweg
(footpath) into the mountains was marked but were told at the gasthof that it was unusable due to water
damage. It was suggested we take the next weg further along the road, but roadworks with heavy
machinery were in progress, so we gave up & walked back to Gasthaus Grunberg where a proper weg took
us onto a higher path along a level which was pleasant walking (we found some wild strawberries &
raspberries along the way). We then discovered a path along a minor railway line which looked promising,
but the map indicated it only went a short distance so our plan to come back & follow it tomorrow was
aborted in favour of moving on to Enns. Checked the internet – Joe reports that Michael is improving fast &
has plenty of smokes, that Elliot is recovered from a bad cold & is developing in leaps & bounds, that Kate
& Gary are well & that he’s contacted Dan & all is well at Ivanhoe. Dan confirmed this in a separate email –
its stormy & raining in Melbourne & he’s offered to come to the airport to help with my luggage. John’s
litho plans are all in order as Aiste is a superb organizer & is monitoring his movements & co-ordinating
with Andrus Kaspariunas, with whom the Great Bike Ride will take place. We had the Salzkammergut
version of a porchetta roll for tea from a travelling market doing a Salzkammergut promotional tour over
the next 2 months – it was pleasant enough but lacked the crackling & the rosemary which makes Italian
porchetta so delicious (29/8/09. John & I have often wondered why it is not available in Melbourne,
considering the number of Italian immigrants who settled here. I think I’ve seen it in Cardamone’s deli/fruit
& veg shop in Station Street, Fairfield, but it was cold & exorbitantly expensive). I bought a book of recipes
for knodl (dumplings) to take home to try out, as John has developed a taste for them & they seem simple
enough to make (famous last words, no doubt). In the info centre this morning where we went to get train
info an elderly British woman & her husband were giving the young man behind the desk their
specifications for a walk they wanted to do – 5ks, no rain, no slippery sections, no washouts across the
track like the walk they’d done at Traunkirchen which wasn’t up to scratch, & not like the ones they’d been
told about by people at their hotel who’d slipped over in the mud & so on & on & on. John finally snapped
& butted in to tell her that she should just stay in the office & he’d do the walk for her! The

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Salzkammergut Wandern Markt has a 4 piece band – 3 accordians & a tuba – playing traditional musik
tonight. Schubert Platz is in full swing & there is lots of Tracht & Trachtenmode (see Friday 20/6/09) on
display. €8.60 (am @ kafé  thTraunsee: (x2) & rioche (x2) – km♀/♂ kost wth Genova (
13/5/09 )) + €5.72 (sprmrkt spl 4 t) + €7.80 (drnkdrnk & suppe nr @ gast 
thTraunsee) + €54 (4 2nt @ Hotel Austria am See) + €2 ( 4 ½ owr @ slfsrv plas: got Vaido
mobno n – 865079795; Aistė zntuch wth Andrius K.; Rimas J snt kntakt nono) + €6 ( un
un (x2)  avln mrkt) + €6.30 (t, kak, wtwn  thTraunsee @ ☼) = €90.42 …. Wthdror
€300 ech  anKOm@ owtsd Spar sprmrkt nGmunden hnd Hotel Austria am See.
8/7/09 ( p3). Thsl shn nxt dor t sudnli @ mdnt & thyung  wn2  nthr
vairiys roomroom.  took rlong 2go 2slep & wok erli zper uzhul t slept OK. Ths mornn rmm rd
d 4go10 2tak mi plpl ys d (20/9/09. PERINDOPRIL/INDAPAMIDE 4/1.25 & SOMAC 40mg).
Throom &  rkumfi & nuli rnv8d tt took 2werkowt thshowr ths mornn zth hot/kold hv n nstorld  -
thngthng werk nrfashn n ! F woz2  m eptf rlr Vergil ( d 7/8/09): “ woz 
nKAUNAS;  n? non 0;   O mslf & wot  .” m  4  @ 8am, thn met wth Aistė @ 8.45
Oth ∟ 2getth  (7.40am) …. Oys, ys d  4got2 pop mi plpl (20/9/09. d 4go10 d rmm rd d
4go10). (8.15pm).  hvr flrskv Čepkeliu Trauktine nf tvmi. Worktowt how 2uu th. : Rimas
Jonaitis (♂l mi @ 6pm 2moro nth ∟ owtsd); Andrius Kaspariunas (2 go ovr mapmap 4 th
& w met Algis Karazija ( orlwaorlwa doo h) so Andrius K. got sum1 2tak rfoto vrr ♂l e  H
(Aistė  e H 2 &  rkst ♀r 2  H th@ th an d (HH) werkwerk hn )); t spnt mostv thda
& n4 th8th volumv Lietuvos Kariuomenės Karininkai 1918-1953 kam rval rfu wkwk
rgo t klamklam 2hv n pu sht n2008. Mummum ankshanksh 2get holdvt 4 ♀  zt hzn n nt vm
 frthr Vytautas ŽIŽYS. Eglė erjd mi 2sndt 2♀r st trwa. N thrthr nndus ov pu kshnpu kshn on
wor♂roo, prtznprtzn, wnrwnr vth Vytauto † (lk thperpl  orth rn †), 44  etc etc. Fnli, l8
nth rf noon  fowndt nth muzm shop. Tkost 70lt & nuthr 50lt 2  mum (jrst 4 klosn ). 4 
dt  thn onm frthr & n♂♂ ruthr Juozas hoo  dd evn no hd r konkshn wthth rmd 4s4s.
 thn onm frthr wth rmazt kozt md 2 O rnuthr ♂. M wr m n z t t 
thfolon n2 th♪  kari: “Sovietu sajungai okupuojant Lietuva tarnavo Karo aviacijos 3
grupės Šiauliauose fotosekcijos vedeju. Likviduojant Lietuvos kariuomene 1940 10 04
paskirtas RA29 ŠTK 29 atsk. aviacijos eskadriles fotolaboratorijos skyriaus v-kn. Kilus
Vokietijos – SSRS karui iš Pabradės atskrido prie Siesiku, pateko i vokiečiu nelaisve, per
Kedainius, Raseinius išvežtas I Rytprūsius, vėliau I belaisviu stovykla Hammelburge.
1941 pab. atvežtas I Kauna ir paleistas.”  wlnot x @lnth w m wr shakn xptwth
thfolon rfr : th r nt gvnn Elena’s Journey x Elena Jonaitis. Text Pub Co. 1997. M
wr shakn somch koz vth n4mashn t koz v orlwaorlwa prdktd th@  wood fndt, or mor
aku tli – IT WOULD FIND ME. Kairfl vm  (onli m mum tsmtsm) wl no wot  men. Doo u
ami 4 ge10 d k?
15/7 /09. t thmost n s10 n4mashn w got  Bror Tryggve woz th@ 1v thkon
nn vjoinn th zth@ mm cunt prvd fre mdkl nshur 2 znn vthoo cunt wn thr
nuthr cunt . t th st vth European Health Insurance Card zkept a verchul krt hn
 thorthortt. Tz ishud onli on aplkashn n o skur ofs nVILNIUS – 4 fre (20/9/09. l8r  fowndowt
tt no krt & kn got  ni ). Thpro jr takk rl vdada &th d zvald 4 3y. Ttakk u 2thv thmedkl
Q nuthr cunt korr thdok noo th l wl pad drktli th ishun cunt . 2 get fre medkl t
t u kn smpli go thna rn cunt (20/9/09. not u 4 kronik lnss). No 1dr th d zkpt rverchul
st8 krt n wrthr r so i il  & thsam z u n rkordn2 Bror. So owr planplan rchanjd. 1st thng
mi & Andrius doo ths mornn z22 th 2 fnd owt how 2gt th d 2 mak shur wkn gtt 4 wlev -
koz, vkorr 4n t lin zn hoo rlso hz zn tmnn fre hlth nshur wl avln nUROPA
(xkludn ). M BUM zmpruvn &  hdr good ntt slep wth &drius slepn @thuthr ndvth  onth sofr.
Wv 10 4nuthr nt & 2moro w  RIMEISIAI. Wr @ “BED & BREAKFAST by Shirvintos sea
– 50km from VILNIUS. ELEONORA and JUOZAS GRUODIS. Pakrantės g. 3 LT – 19115
Širvintos Lietuva. Mob: +37069969732. e: grudisnamai@gmail.com”. …. Tz 9.30 &

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&drius hz f td yt. ♂ shur kn slep 4rr long . Ys da f hd wokn ♂m ♂♂ rvo nap ♂dv
slept 2 thevnn. m gon stairr 2 wak♂m now….♂♂ gon – mustv   (fre nth l ri  8am –
6pm): l & fnd ♂m …. Nfakt  met ♂m nthwa th. ♂ hd n  snn thkrakv☼ rf rgood
ntt slep. Wwnt 2 th tt mm zf th d mant rval 2 hoo r pan thlokl kompulsri nshur
(20/9/09. tt howt dowt 2 ). Thn  vri xl  @ thVALGYKLA. Thn 4r 2 thnst
woz rmung th st v n h. Rf O 3howrr wr  & oth hvhd showrr. &drius ztakn rnap 4
nowr orso zit woz rhot da. v  Vaidas 2 l nRIMEISIAI 2moro & rkst 2sta 4 rfu dada tl mi
BUM ♂ll prprli &  rezum th wth &drius. N d li throom nxtdor woz OKupd  Bror
Tryggve hz kum vak zBror hz gon2 Plungė 22 rprst hoohd wtnst thPlungė v rn WW2
(22/9/09. thrrr ♀ @ ♣ nN Melb hoo thLIETUKIS GARAGE ). So now &driuss nxt dor – thworl
sepr 10 throomm zvri flmzi & ♂ snorr vri lowdli: wo m ch vr good ntt slep? v
just spnt 1½ howrr  2Juozas. 2go & wak &drius n 4  4 thkafé shutt …. Soporfk evnn nth
GAZEBO  thlak drnkn wth &rius & Juozas.
22/7 /09.  kon10u on ☼d 26/7/09 …. Vaido ruthr ☼ius ( 50 nxt wek) & 
hv ; Giedis (r revi8d Gediminas) &  hv  - ♂ uu2  rnrmd kom champn & noww
thdok 4 th ♀♀ tm…. T n (mororls)  m ♪♫ vth p (20/9/09. ie 22/7/09 p ♪♫ r
re ospktvli): Thprevys da sum1 hd kolktd ČIABRELIS wnw hd t  th ŠVENTOJI (Oi rvr
( Monday 26/7/04)) &t woz uud nth t w d k. ČIABRELIAI (Thyme: ( rigi r Encyclopedia
of Herbal Medicine) “(Thymus vulgaris (Lamiaceae)) … is an excellent antiseptic and
tonic, and today is still used as a respiratory remedy, as well as being important for a
variety of other ailments … tonic … relieves muscle spasms … expectorant … expels
worms … antioxidant … may help maintain higher levels of essential fatty acids within
the brain … strong antibacterial activity against H. pylori a bacterium often associated
with stomach ulcers … useful tonic for the immune system in chronic, especially fungal,
infections, as well as an effective remedy for throat and chest infections, such as
bronchitis, whooping cough, and pleurisy … Its invigorating qualities balance the
sedative effect of many herbs used for asthma … The herb is also helpful in hay fever …
often used to treat worms in children … relieves bites and stings, helps sciatica and
rhumatic pains. It helps ringworm, athlete’s ,thrush and other fungal infections, as
well as scabies and lice…”) woz rlso nth VODKA wd k 2gvt flavor;  woz trd  5 owrr vrown
so perhapp twoz no surpr th@  PISSED MYSELF rn thnt. Prapp m +jr810 r t - ma
 tpt sum PISS ovr mslf  thPISS BOTTLE  uu so  dontkep hvn2 owtsd 2 5 /nt. 
thr wa tspoilt wot woodv n rprfkt ntv dp slep z Tadas hd lntmi rs♀/♂ llo 2 +2 thuuls rolm@ d
rort &  woz drst nvri v klothn nm pozshn 2sta wrm n. Tadas orlso mad rdrorn vhow 2fnd
♂♂  nKAUNAS wr m nvtd 2sta (: 861832820 (mob), 390384 (home); +rs: Planetu gve 15)
xpt n th p lrstd thO wk  1thv 2 thr.  woz 2 vzt Vaido ruthr Gintas hoom  +mr & hoo
zr r vm t ♂♂  hnsted & rf wrdd m  VILNIUS  h (v prtd kumprne 
&drius hoo  VILNIUS 2da nth (20/9/09. ♂♂ n goodolOZ! Hd  wth ♂m @ ♣ 2da). W roo 
2 rwnd 2 thuthr sdv thlak (ASAVAS) & thn thru thrjoinn lak (ASAVĖLIS) & thnxt lak (ŪPARTAS) wr
wpcht 4 thnt. rn thda Stasys hd rkst mi wot  v th vuu t   ♂m  woz mor mprst 
thlojs rqrd 2staj th p & th@ g d♀/♂ wr avln 2gethr wth g dchldrn nwot ys d d
owt2 r rys x n. N d li Tado ♀ z Jurga & Arvido ♀ z Zita (l8r ♀ puldowt 24mi). Nth evnn
w 8 rdlshuz  vmakroni wth wd fownd nth . Thsgrup hzr ha t vuun produktt
wr rval . Zita (& thuthr ♀♀ 2) zr mrs (rtst?) @ pr♀/♂n food 4 lrj grupp wth onth mprvashnn. W
onli spnt 3 owrr vakchl ron t twoz r g da niwa zit woz 2 thwnd onth lak. Onth ŠVENTOJI wwr r
uud  r♀ 4 rs10 onwot ♀  woz rprvt jt ( t thr woz no sn!) … &rius  - ♂♂ n VILNIUS
(O 80kk) … r vz rusht prst th vthBOBA ( Thursday 22/7/04) &t rokof: fulv termtt …
Vaidas gludt  … l8 @ nt  th Vaidas  zstl prmitv – t1t kulchrle (KULTŪRA) machur ntl
thz gon thru thsam lsnn zth rstv UROPR.
29/7 /09. 2i(ŽVIRBLIAI: Passer domesticus) nth nst lrst nt so 
hd2 slep nr . 12t m@r: onli hd 26 or so kk 2  ŠIRVINTOS. Rf rigi r 4ml    good
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 2th rstv th (Vaidas, Gintas, ☼ius, old♂ Vytautas, Miglė, Rūta etc) & off @ 9.50am. R t 
throd r nml nth rod rlotlk owr Tasmanian :  rskt r♂ prsn  nr  & ♂  “KAJOTAS”
(coyote) & thn ♂  “USURINIS ŠUO” (). Nuthr nam m  z “JANOTAS”. Tha wr rort h
30 yrgo 4 thr & hvgon ferl vriwr. (1/8/09. oys – 4go2 shn m srpr nth 
MEGUČIAI th@ thmonut ( & ) 2 Vladas Žvirblis  hd fownd 2 so poign hz n
rmoovd!?! SO MUCH 4 HIS !). 10kk thr S rlong th ld rod rsmorl doms takld mi &b
kn sudnli  fl ARSE  . Took sum tt owtv th vmi lft t no rys dmj. @ ŠIRVINTOS (11am)
chkt mi e @ lrst & H wnt krook @mi 4 misn ♀r owt nmi lrst (& onli) e. Dontno howt hap&.
Michaell n . Elliot zn ‘no!’ H rekt ♀r  nth . Th gzanirr r bloo. Lrst nt hd  Gintas d
prs on ♂♂ kt 2 Vaidas th@ ♂ njoid HH kn ushn 2th  2 H koz ♀ ♀rslf dd valut (20/9/09.
t m Oi dd ont & kep  ♀r so). Gintas woz vyt nkla th@  must rspons 4 HH
lakv slf  sumhow itln ♀r.   d rekord ♂♂ rnlss. (6/9/09. Thank you for your compliment,
but you are quite wrong about the cause of my lack of self belief – that is down to my experience as the
only child of a bad marriage in which alcohol, bitterness & anxiety eroded the confidence & self-esteem
children in happy families automatically develop. It has blighted my life. Arunas has always generously
encouraged and praised my writing (and me) but feelings bedded in so early are hard to uproot, &, like
weeds, sap the strength from more desirable blooms.) SO IT GOGO.  ed Monday  Stasys
Žebrauskas; Tuesday  Tadas Žebrauskas; Monday  Arvydas Virbalis (rjktd  srvr). Lrst nt
 hdr vre n1010 dskushn wth Gintas 2 therli mornn owrr. ♂ o jktd 2m uuv rlijrr langwj (eg: “
OF GOD TAKE AWAY THE SINSIN VTH ” ( 26/9/01 )) – mor nth@ nuthr ma .
5/8/09. Z  tt r mlo nVILNIUS & m taknt vre rstfli - t w shood 
rlowd 2get rwa wtht? HzK88 rsponn nth 4mv rpom 2 m e nth p (20/9/09. Friday
31/7/09): “Poem for Papa ¶ I was born into learning: / Up from the cradle I saw a slur
across a face / Recognisable as Papa, plus another, / A demon there, red behind the
eyes // As a youngster, together with my brother: / We hollered ‘wake up – wake up’ /
Too many k’s per hour – open highway – dodging trucks / 5th stubbie down / One more
to go before home // I was a young woman with a procession of boyfriends, / All of them
loved drinking more than me - / Are there any men who don’t drink / And piss in their
pants? // Lessons in beer, wine and spirits / Stumble about in laneways at night. / Can’t
walk, have to crawl / Vomit down my jumper, scream abuse / Get fucked at parties //
Now I’m sprouting grey hairs / Years of drinking weigh heavy: / Indiscretions, betrayals,
misjudgements / Lies / Misuse of people / Powerlessness and poor nerves // Balanced
against loss: / Relationships with my family fraught, taut like wires / Friendships lacking,
don’t even know how / Love turned to mistrust and rages // The drink Demon in Mexico
known as ‘El Borracho” / Drinks fire, eats fat, fills the world with noise - obliterating
shouts. / Not the bell note or the bird song // Folklore from the Slavic places / Tells it that
drunkards are Vampires,/ Sacks of skin full of hot blood, / Red faces bulging / Perched on
rooftops beating thatch /Until stones fell them / Or fires burn them. // The succession of
moments / Spent acting out destruction / Is not the existential fantasy that makes the
rounds in emails./ A generation of confusion follows / Feels deep shame / Not for the
others’ action / But for suffering born from shared blood and strong tides of pain.” Such
zth lotv ♀/♂ . Thsmornn  ed Monday  Vydas Geidrichis (uv go2 rspkt rnam kontann
1vth 4 le & n : Q, X, W, H) & ♂l e rfoto ♂ fownd vm g frthr Pranas Kabaila wn ♂ gett th
opr♪♫t 2sk . Tt 2.30 & m takn nrvo nap 4  hv2 off @ 4.30 th Kabailass plas …. Twoz
nxspshnli plz evnn: thrwoz konvvilt & fmlil wrmth twn orlvus.  Aistė hooz stl 2  l&. ♀
 2 @ ♀r plaa @ 2pm 2moro wr Juozas & Jane ŽIŽYS & r g dor (20/9/09. dowt2 thr dor
Eglė) wl vz10  KAUNAS 2 good . (11.15pm).

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