The first time I was turned on to percussion was seeing Strike Percussion from New Zealand perform at a Creative Arts NZ showcase in Wellington. I thought they were fabulous and I was entranced. Through my efforts they got to perform the following year at 2000 Melbourne Festival where I was Program Manager. I met up with the group again in 2004 at the Australian Performing Arts Market in Adelaide. By then I had left Melbourne Festival and was running my own business, based in Melbourne, as an event producer and an artist agent (Australian and international artists and companies). Strike asked me if I would consider being their international manager/producer/agent. After some to-ing and fro-ing by email I submitted a proposal. We subsequently signed an agreement and the door opened in my business to promoting this pretty amazing percussion group – and a lovely bunch of guys and a gal to boot! Over the next few years I secured some exciting engagements for them in Australia and overseas. One of the overseas gigs was with the Hong Kong Leisure Centre. This was a government organization and they weren’t very flexible but having read the ‘Art of War’ – and spending my early childhood in Singapore and Kuala Lumpur – I have a reasonable Asian mindset and found a way to stand firm on several of Strike requirements. The HKLC folk weren’t keen on paying per diems. It was suggested Hong Kong $10 was enough per day but I insisted it wasn’t and eventually got them to agree to the equivalent of the Aussie union rate of $56 dollars per day. And then we finalised the contract, flights were booked and paid for, freight packed and shipped and the day of departure drew nearer. Funny isn’t that when you plan these things you try to dot every ‘i‘ and cross every ‘t’. But occasionally gremlins – or is that goblins? – get into it the mix and things go awry.

When Strike arrived in Hong Kong their luggage was taken to the hotel but the group went straight to the venue as they wanted to check out the instruments that were being provided locally. When they got there and saw the drum kit Muz, the leader, said, “it’s the wrong one! It hasn’t got a snare drum or timps with it”. So the Hong Kong minders scurried around to arrange an exchange before Strike came back for the rehearsal and sound checks. All during the show the audience sat there very quietly and didn’t appear to respond to the music/percussion at all. Strike played the last note of the finale and came forward to take a bow. Next minute the place erupted with applause and cheers and whistles. They were a hit!

Back at the hotel later the musos were having a drink and telling stories and jokes. Muz told the one about the woman who was standing at a bus stop looking at a dog and asked a man standing nearby, “Does your dog bite?” The man replied, “No.” So she reached down to pat the dog which immediately lunged and snapped at her. She leapt back and shouted at the man, “You said your dog doesn’t bite”. Unperturbed the man replied, “He doesn’t. This is not my dog.”

The writers class was similar to attending an antenatal class.

It doesn’t really matter if you attend or not, because you’re still going to have a baby. In the same way, if you’re going to write a book, you’ll do it whether you go to class or not.

But by coming to class, you get to know that everyone’s in the same sort of sea vessel. There’s no particular right way to have a baby (with the exception perhaps of giving birth in a fire pit or off the edge of a cliff); and it’s a bit the same with writing. Everyone comes to the party pregnant, and there’s just particular things you can try not to do if you want to avoid fucking the whole show up. It’s normally good to wear a life jacket of some description if you board a sea vessel, and it’s probably smart to ask someone who’s been on the boat before where you might locate your floaties.

Listening to Feedback and allowing a big feedback crap on your work to determine your birth plan is like letting an arrow drawn the wrong way in wet cement point you in the direction of imminent doom until the council decides it’s time for a new foothpath. It’s throwing your life jacket to the fish; which is both stupid and environmentally unfriendly. And who the fuck wants to leave anything up to local government? They wont fix the pavement till at least three senior citizens have stacked it.

So board the boat, have your baby, and don’t let those council bastards anywhere near it. Unless they have publishing grants (but that’s for the post-natal class).

He wants to whistle. He practices on the train and in the car. He practices in bed and in the bath and even on the toilet. He practices while we ride our bikes. Sometimes he is so intent on pursuing his goal that he falls off of his bike and gets up still trying to whistle. Questions and conversations about whistling dominate our days.

“Why do you want to whistle”, I ask. “What is so special about whistling? How do you think it will make you feel? What does it mean to you? What will you do when you can whistle? And once you can whistle what will you do next?”

He gives my questions a lot of thought.

“Well Grandma” he says, “I will be able to take music wherever I go. I will be able to entertain people and make music in my head and I could be the first whistler in an orchestra.”

“And then what will you do if you achieve that and become the first ever official orchestral whistler?” I ask.

“After that Grandma” he says, “I will make the first music for whistlers and I will choose all the people to whistle the sounds of all the different instruments in the orchestra. And there will be new sounds of instruments no one has ever heard before.”

“And when you have done all of that” I ask, “what then?”

His little face lights up. “Then we will have a concert for all the world and we will whistle my music and everyone will learn that if they can whistle they will always have their own music.”

“And after you have done all of these things and shown all of the people that they can carry their music with them all the time” I ask, “what then?””

“Well then Grandma” he says “it will make people feel happy and I will think about what I need to learn next.”

The first time I was turned on was during a family holiday in Hong Kong. I was 13 at the time.

I remember it was the final night of our stay at the resort and my parents left me, along with the other teenagers, alone at the Teenage Retreat. There were children, mainly English-speaking, from all over the world; American, English, Swedish, Australian, and Dutch and, of course, a few locals were thrown into the mix. I, who was always shy, sat down in an armchair alone whilst the others played ping pong, watched Anime, or danced on the disco floor.

There was this one boy on the dance floor who was so mesmerising; I couldn’t pull my eyes away and he made me feel tingly between my legs. He was a tall young man with rugged elf-like features and blond hair. He danced like an angel. I found myself fantasising about kissing him when, suddenly, the door opened beside me and a short stocky Asian man walked into the space. I remember thinking ‘why the hell is that old man in here’. He walked in a very determined and direct fashion over to the dance floor, past the dancers and towards a metal box on the wall. Within moments it was pitch black in the room and he yelled maniacally, ‘unless someone gives me ten Hong Kong dollars no one will ever see the light of day again!’

A din filled the room as children panicked; screaming and running towards the exit, bashing into other people and obstacles along the way. I could hear them trampling over other children who had fallen over in the rush to get out. Someone reached the door but it was locked. More panic ensued. I couldn’t see a thing; petrified by the situation I remained where I sat, frozen.

Until I sensed a person alongside me. I felt his hand gently reach towards mine and a young voice whisper for me to follow. The sound of his voice made me imagine the blond angel on the dance floor and strangely, given the traumatic situation, as his fingers clasped mine he made me feel safe and excited. So I stood up, and let him lead me.

‘Stay close’, he said. And then, as I clasped his hand tightly with my right hand and used my left to feel for any obstructions, he led me away from the chaos.

Suddenly there was a flash of green light in my eyes and I found myself in a different world. Greeted by a rainforest, a waterfall beckoned me to proceed whilst my hand continued to clasp the hand of my golden prince. Birds chirped, water gurgled through the reeds, and fish leapt upstream as we journeyed towards the waterfall. A rainbow framed it and wanderer butterflies fluttered by. It was surreal.

Finally it hit me. In confusion and anxiety I fell to my knees weeping ‘where am I’?

In my desperation I looked up asking ‘where have you taken me?’

It was the wrong one! The face looking down at me was not the face of my god-like elven king. He had blond hair but had an ugly face, filled with anger and a mischievous stare. He laughed menacingly, almost crying in his own mania.

‘Where do you think you are my princess’, he said. ‘Do you think that you have been rescued by your knight in shining-armor. That he will take you to another world where you can live in love and safety forever more?’

‘That is not how the world works’, he said between fits of laughter. ‘. I saw you sitting alone in the corner of the room and knew that you would be an easy target. So when my master turned out the lights I had to take you. I have stolen you so that I can torment you.’

In fright I screamed, and the next minute there was a red flash of light. The rainbow, fish, babbling brook, waterfall and scary boy had transformed into a desert. I was alone in the sweltering heat. Shocked by the sudden displacement I froze once again; this time scanning the horizon. It was almost dusk and the rust-orange sky was merging into the grey-blue night sky. It would soon be night and this meant it would be freezing.

I then felt a rough tongue probing between my toes. I looked down yelling ‘this is not my dog! Why the fucken hell am I am a desert with a strange dog? Will someone get me out of here?’ I felt as if I was going mad. I fell into a ball and wept.

The veil was lifted. I was in the teenage retreat sitting in the armchair. The disco ball was spinning, the ping-pong game was still going, and the elven angel was still dancing in the centre of the dance floor surrounded by his friends.

I stood up and removed myself from the room convinced that I was, indeed, mad. Leaning against the wall outside the room, I broke down once more. Would I ever be normal again?

The door squeaked as it opened to revel the blond angel exiting. He looked hot and exhausted. Embarrassed by my tears, I hastily wiped them. He saw me, his face softened as his arm reached out for me and he said, ‘are you okay?’

The end.

When he was 7 I did a phone call to child abuse report line. Apparently the police or some type of investigator was sent to investigate. Later after some pressure, I told my sister it was me. This went down real bad, I haven’t seen my sister or nephews since.
The weird vicious emotional scapegoating abuse of my nephew had been going on since he was 6 months old. His father was the leader of this, sadistic, emotionally abusive, tormenting, teasing and mocking his own son for fun.
My brother in laws behaviour was shocking and scary. But I like the rest of the family ignored it. Except for some cowardly wingeing behind his back, I too enabled the Abuse of my nephew.
It took me a long time to work out and wake up from a dream, a stockholme like syndrome, that my family outwardly well off, successful people, seemingly high functioning had a dark weird secret. My mum was some type of personality disorder, secretly she had scapegoated me, bullied me, violently hit me and like my brother in law a horrible bully to one child, but a better more loving parent to the other child/children.
Why was I allocated the family scapegoat role?

My dad breaks like fragile fine bone china under the weight of mums personality disorder, he has sacrificed me and my nephew.
Yes he chose peace at any price, fuck you all, I’m going to write the book I wished was there for me, and for my nephew, and work to set all the little Scapegoats free.

Anonymous

Fuck you. Fuck you for looking at me in my blue school uniform shorts and my too tight ponytail and thinking “There’s something fucking wrong with her”.

I was walking with my best friend, the Arkansan tomboy, on our school oval. Each conversational twist marked with “I have a theory “ followed by a profound observation about life . She was a little older than me and she knew what it was to be grown up. I was desperate to know everything but she doled out her knowledge in slow agonising drips.  I was in awe of her and being in her presence felt like being in the sun for the first time.

You were a year above me. You were with a friend and I hoped you’d ignore us and head over the low school fence.

“Look at the lezzos.” you said to us catching my eye “Are you a boy or a girl?” you said to my friend between laughs. I was outraged because you were in my sports faction. So much for fucking solidarity.

For years afterward whenever I would walk past your house I would wonder what happened in there to make you cruel.  I would speculate about just how big of a loser you grew up to be.

Thank you. Thank you for telling me my weirdness was wafting out of my pores. Thank you for giving me my clue on how to describe it.

The first time Jonathan visited Japan, he thought he would stay a bit longer than his friends.

Stay and find something – a soulmate, or just himself.

He loved the city – the people – the absence of litter.

The order and tidiness opened up something in his heart that hadn’t been there before travel.

He only felt ugly now whenever he’d run into other Aussies on the Metro, so he started avoiding places where those sleek, loud Hipsters would hang out.

This new philosophy took him to lost laneways and hidden paths that only locals knew about.

Jonathan began dying his faded, blonde hair black. Now, he wouldn’t immediately stand out as a visitor.

This night he lay on his hotel bed reaching for his Metro Pass, long neglected on the bedside table. Maybe this hadn’t been the best investment of his Yen.

“I can’t find it…” he moaned to himself. “I can’t find the right path.”

“Hang on, Mate!” His little brother would have said, “Can’t you just go with the flow?”

And so, with his brother’s words in his head, Jonathan edged off the bed and out of his slowed-down tourist brain and headed for the neon wisdom of Tokyo.

The black of his hair gave him a solemness and weighed down his skull and his thoughts.

He didn’t feel Japanese and yet his Australian thoughts were slipping from him each day.

Jonathan navigated towards his favourite restaurant where he felt welcome and safe.

He slipped off his shoes at the entrance and waited to be seated.

The staff remembered him even with his new black roots.

The food came fast and its aroma smelled of future hope, but its colours reminded him of something he’d lost years ago.

A love.   A life. A youth.

He was surprized when tears sprung from underneath his eyelids as he ran for the door.

“Where are my shoes?” he asked no one as he fumbled onto the stairwell without them.

Next minute, a pink girl straddling a pink motor scooter crashed around the laneway, missing Jonathan’s bare toes by just this much.

Above the beep of her scooter horn, the pink girl screamed, “Watch out!”

She slammed on the brakes, “What do you think you’re doing?”

“You tell me – I don’t know” Jonathan answered into the air between them.

She took off her helmet and softened her face, “Are you okay?”

“It’s music. Life is like music” Jonathan almost sobbed. “It can strengthen you but it can also take your heartbeat away with its grief!”

He didn’t really know what he was saying.

The pink girl kicked down the stand on her scooter. “Maybe stand over here?”

She led him off the lane to the curb. “You seem to be having some kind of Tokyo, touristy crisis.”

A small gasp squeezed from Jonathan’s mouth as he looked into the pink girl’s eyes.

Her eyes took in his dyed black hair and foreign sadness and she was surprized that she wanted to know more about this stranger who she’d nearly run over.

“Why don’t you tell me all about the music in your life over a drink?”

.