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"we are being made aware that the organisation of society on the principle of private profit, as well as public destruction, is leading both to the deformation of humanity by unregulated industrialism, and to the exhaustion of natural resources, and that a great deal of our material progress is progress for which succeeding generations may have to pay dearly. i need only mention... the exploitation of the earth, on a vast scale for two generations, for commercial profit: immediate benefits leading to dearth and desert. i would not have it thought that i condemn a society because of its material ruin, for that would be to make its material success a sufficient test of its excellence; i mean only that a wrong attitude towards nature implies, somewhere, a wrong attitude towards god, and that the consequence is an inevitable doom. for a long enough time we have believed in nothing but the values arising in a mechanised, commercialised, urbanised way of life: it would be as well for us to face the permanent conditions upon which god allows us to live upon this planet. and without sentimentalising the life of the savage, we might practise the humility to observe, in some of the societies upon which we look down as primitive or backward, the operation of a social-religious-artistic complex which we should emulate upon a higher plane. we have been accustomed to regard 'progress' as always integral; and have yet to learn that it is only by an effort and a discipline, greater than society has yet seen the need of imposing upon itself, that material knowledge and power is gained without the loss of spiritual knowledge and power."

- ts eliot (1939)

decent flick. but not the greatest in the whole history of the world ever. the chick is pretty hot tho. if you dig big chicks. with man hands. and four fingers.

so leaving the farm tomo. it sure has been a rough last week. mower broke. so had to get out the hoe. man oh man. nearly killed me. proper physical labour. brutal. at one point my hands started bleeding. and then one of the trees whipped me in the face. and then i fell on the hoe and it stabbed my spine off. i swore. and then kicked the tree. i shed a tear. and wished i was back home. with my garden boy. australia sure is an undeveloped country. they desperately need a slave class. cheap labour. white folks shouldn't be doing this shit. we weren't born for it. its genetics.

so heading back to sydney for a few days. and then onto bangkok for the wend. hopefully the reds and yellows have sorted out their issues. goddamn the third world. these people shouldn't have power; shouldn't have a voice. its dangerous. this is the sort of thing that fucked australia up. they should tazer the fuckers. or mow them down with that high-pressured water gun. drown one of the bastards. make an example. really do some damage. and then put them in their place. send them back to their huts. to tend the rice paddies. and sell their teenage daughters to the sex trade.

get. the. fuck. in. harry redknapp's blue and white army.

grapes of wrath

"i aint gonna baptise. im gonna work in the fiel's, in the green fiel's, an' im gonna be near to folks. i aint gonna try to teach em nothin'. im gonna try to learn. gonna learn why the folks walks in the grass, gonna hear em talk, gonna hear em sing. gonna listen to kids eatin' mush. gonna hear husban' and wife a-poundin' the matress in the night. gonna eat with em an' learn." his eyes were wet and shining. "gonna lay in the grass, open an' honest with anybody that'll have me. gonna cuss an' swear an' hear the poetry of folks talkin'. all that's holy, all thats what i didn' understan'. all them things is the good things."

- grapes of wrath, steinbeck

jussis. so the last two weeks have been about work. manual work. down and dirty. like christina aguilera. hand-to-mouth. like jemma jameson. mixing with the proletariat in the fields. on the building sights. in the pub. talking their language. eating their food. drinking their beer. breathing their goddamn filthy air. life experience.

eish. so it started off in townsville. north of brisbane. south of cairns. a backward town. laying insulation in roofs. shweaty job. gets friggin hot up there. stuffy. and toight. like a toiger. not conducive to claustrophobia. or wet beer farts. we started each day at 2am. kitted out in dirty singlets. and short rugby shorts. and bundy trucker caps. unshaven and mean. hard ripped bodies. charging around in a construction bakkie. flashing orange light on top. swigging xxxx gold. charfing the abo chicks with inappropriately bad language. we owned that building site. was peasant heaven. but after a week i had to move on. no pay. one big fuck in the ass. such is life below the poverty line. god hates poor people.

so i moved onto a farm. a few hours west of sydney. just over the blue mountains. hazel nut crop. the email invitation sounded perfect:

"I hear you might be interested in some hard labour on the farm.
We can offer you $10/hour and board for two weeks.
Most of the work to be done is hand mowing and cleaning weeds from the nursery."

sounds all rainbows and butterflies. but its not. friggin hell. i feel like ive hand-mowed the whole entire fuckin world. that nursery... eish... its not small. seven rows of hazel nut bushes. each row is half a kilometer long. and 2m wide. with knee high grass (shoulder high if you're wiggy). on a steep rocky incline. full of extremely dangerous animals. spiders and snakes. all to be negotiated with a small petrol-powered handheld lawn-mower. i was clumsy at first. ploughing down nut bushes. ripping up irrigation piping. now i am lawn mower master jedi.

on the plus side my hands are all hard and shiny. dirty finger nails. no more soft manicured office hands. labourer's hands. value-adding hands. hands that hot chicks love. hands that gays hate. a metrosexual's worst nightmare.

one unrelated point: the nude girls are one of the top 10 greatest bands in the whole world ever. just for the song genie alone.

hey now with the fist of a man
now with the fist of a god
now with the fist of my oh my
i heard my daddy said
no more, no more, no more, no more
uh oh now a little bit of money
yeah yeah from a little bit of hurry
genie genie genie GENIE

fruit donkey

"thus the hero of the odyssey is a great fighter, a wily schemer, a ready speaker, a man of stout heart and broad wisdom who knows that he must endure without too much complaining what the gods send; and he can both build and sail a boat, drive a furrow as straight as anyone, beat a young braggart at throwing the discus, challenge the phaecian youth at boxing, wrestling or running; flay, skin, cut up and cook an ox, and be moved to tears by a song. he is in fact an excellent all-rounder; he has surpassing arete.

arete implies a respect for the wholeness or oneness of life, and a consequent dislike of specialisation. it implies a contempt for efficiency - or rather a much higher level of efficiency, an efficiency which exists not in one department of life but in life itself."

- zen

hold the phone. jeepers creepers. and you thought queenstown was a lekker town. freak me out. two words. byron. fuckin. bay. pure quality. hippy heaven. on the beach. with awesome swells. and hot young chicks. with pert boobs. and vintage stores. and real live hippies. left over from the 60's. still living the dream. and smoking the weed. god bless them. eish. the whole place is so vibey. (aussies like to do this. i have noticed. take nouns and make them adjectives by adding a "y". hence the sea becomes sharky. and err... cant think of any other examples at the mo. dammit.)

lets back the truck up a bit. i've raced ahead. i left kiwi for aus sometime in early march. the first thing the bastards did was confiscate my love beads. fuckers. as if my mojo wasnt low enough already. apparently my love beads were seeds. of course they're seeds!!! they're fuckin love beads. fertile. virile. full of life. the goddamn border-nazi burned them. still... the aussie chicks must be relieved.

anyway. so... sydney. its ok. i guess. would have been better if simple guy little hadnt got us kicked out of the first pub. a hole on george street where the locals generally end the evening. we started there. so it was all downhill after that. dont remember much. sorry. selective memory. but it got real messy.

then headed off to canberra for the weekend. okes in sydney were shaking their heads. and muttering under their breath. canberra is seen as backward. but i had a mate there. a bogan. named jon. lekker oke. so... canberra!!! super surprised. very progressive. only really had one day there in between the hangovers and the sharks brumbies game. but in that time got to an awesome vintage market. joined in a gay rights protest. breezed thru an awesome arts gallery. and sipped wino to live music in the park. hundreds.

straight, gay, black, white
marriage is a civil right

eish i then had a week back in sydney. stayed with some of my folks mates kids (tedious link) in manly. people are so welcoming. i have no idea why people would choose to spend their time accomodating me. after all. time is all we have. very philosophical.

alrighty. enough of the bullshit. managed to catch up with george in bondi. what a night. what a place. what a chick. swedish. tongue ring. pity she was all over george. the oke is one good looking bastard. and he has a friggin awesome apartment. defo a step up from the burra.

headed up to the farm near mudgee to hook up with some long lost family. was hoping for a detox. no chance. goddamn dutchmen. and branderwijn. but the bonfire was kiff. if a little dangerous. being two stories high. and tended by two brandy-retarded sweaty-palmed gung-hos. (see that? i reversed aussie convetion. i converted an adjective into a noun. fuckin aussies. fuck em.)

they say the nile used to run
from east to west

then headed down to forster to catch up with another long lost cuz named dave. always puzzled me as to why i was named dave when my only other male cousin was already named dave. makes for a lot of confusion. such are the mysteries of the universe. like why german couples always look like brother and sister. and the name dave. the experience of which cannot be explained rationally any more than a piece of music. or a poem. but it was awesome to catch up after so long. spent a lot of time on the beach.

and then it was on to byron. the beast. and now brisbane. brisbane freaks me out a bit. there's a discomforting peacefulness here. like the quiet you expect to find in a peado's house. unsettling. and just last night (saturday 11pm) i was walking around the main pedestrian area in town looking for a place to watch the football when there, in the middle of the street, was a bible club. arguing loudly. "in 88AD the followers of christ...". eish. i shook my head. when i got back to the dorm (12.30pm) a fat chinese bastard was evidently having great trouble breathing in his sleep. the fucker sounded like he was violently choking. when things went quiet for 30 secs i hoped that he had finally been asphyxiated and slipped into unconscieniousness. but he then started neighing like a horse. at regular 3 minute intervals. i slept in the fire exit stairwell.

so heaps of folks have been asking me how aus is. and i hate to say it. but its friggin awesome (except brisbane - fuckin freaky). like a first world saffa. everything home should be. but... and here's the thing... its not africa. the people are nice. and the chicks are hot. and logically you cant argue saffa over aus. but aus doesnt make your chest puff up with pride. your eyes well up with tears. the hairs stand up on the back of your neck. it doesnt have that african spirit. you know? the waaahhhh. fuck. fuck. fuck. fuck. passion. hold on your heart. TIA. no words can describe it. so im still confused. oh for a place to call my own. a home.

theres a highway of stars across the heavens
theres a whispering song of the wind in the grass
theres a rolling thunder across the savannah
a hope of the dream at the edge of the sky
and your life is a story like the wind

so whats been happening in a personal capacity? well... in the interests of becoming a more well-rounded individual and in the persuit of possessing a general life excellence, and because i have no money and i cant eat, i have decided that i want to pick fruit. or work in a factory packing shit. be value adding. tangible results rock!!! fuck yeah. oh... and i keep meeting the right girl at the wrong time.

wherefore art thou derick
in this fit of spilt maths
and keg of fruit donkeys?

- frederick von beanstein