I'm holed up in the Slow Death that is Broome on account of the fact I decided that if I got a job before Staircase To The Moon I'd stay in Broome and save up for the Kimberleys tour I wanted to do. If not, I'd be off to Darwin the day after the Staircase.

Anyway, I landed me a job with a gardener, I mow lawns, rake leaves and trim hedges and by "trim" I mean butcher in a style made famous by Jack The Ripper in the 1800's. My boss is nice enough, he's an English bloke, he's been away from home since 1973 and solidly proves the theory that you can take the Pom out of England but you can't take the whinge out of the Pom. It's a job anyway, it's cash in hand so I should be able to save enough for this overpriced 4WD adventure then get out of here.

I also work on the markets on Saturday mornings making fruit smoothies and juices so I'm getting something resembling a health food intake (take note, mum) although there's something about working on a market stall that makes you talk like a southerner with a dodgy cock-er-ney accent.

Bitch, Moan, Whinge
In case you haven't guessed I'm not Broome's biggest fan, it was never part of my plan to stay here until I found this tour, I was going to head straight to Darwin and spend a few months there. It doesn't help that I never wanted to leave Perth in the first place, I guess that any town I spent any time in after the West Coast road trip was doomed from the start for simply not being Perth. For the first time in Australia it doesn't feel right, I feel a bit lost and confused, like I'm treading water or wasting time, I feel like I'm in some sort of limbo, waiting for something to fall into place.

I miss Perth and the people I left there so much it actually hurts, I think about going back every day, even if its just for a weekend but I think it would be the wrong thing to do, I think I want to go back for the wrong reasons and it would be too different.

Party At The MCG

Gypsy Camp

I'm staying at Roebuck Caravan Park in an unpowered section called the MCG (Mango Camping Ground), known to every one else in the park as the Festival Site on account of the fact it looks like a scaled down Glastonbury (minus the mud and medieval diseases people contract from being soaked in water for three days), the dope smoking and the loud music.
I like living here, its like an outdoor hostel but I'm over camping now. I love it when I'm travelling but when I'm settled somewhere I want a proper bed and a powerpoint for my laptop and a light switch but I'm paying $69 pw here. A hostel would be over $150 pw so my choice is live here and leave sooner or live in a hostel and probably miss out on Darwin.

Some Of The Broome Crew

Killing time in Broome invariably involves alcohol, it has to, there's not much else to do but it's hindered by one painful fact; Goon is illegal here. Oh you can get 2 litre casks but you're looking at $11 and when you've been paying that price for 4 litres it's gutting. This also means that games like Goon Rugby and Goon Volleyball and other games involving an inflated 4 litre goon pillow are out of the question so we've had to resort to Intelligent Conversation and Making New Friends.

Just Chillin'

MCG Golf Hockey Team (Yeah, We Were Bored)

The thing is, I'm surrounded by friends, old and new. The weather is amazing considering it's winter, it touches the late 20s every day. My tour is booked, I know when I'm leaving, I'm earning money and saving enough to get to Darwin comfortably.

So what the fuck is wrong with me?!

written by  Koala Bear on June 1, 2007 from Broome, Australia
from the travel blog: Sod Off Great Big Mission Round Oz
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Bog Frogs

I do feel a bit guilty about pissing on the frogs but hey, when you gotta go you gotta go and they don't seem too perturbed by it. I'm more worried about the use of cleaning chemicals, what if they have an adverse effect on the frogs? What if they mutate resulting in the Kimberleys being ruled by the iron albeit webbed fist of the evil Lord Ribbit and his minion, Captain Croak?

I digress.

I will now see out my time in Broome fixing panels with cable ties, what with me being the expert that I am after me and Sarah lashed the grandstand at Burswood Dome together with cable ties and gaffa tape.

The yard is run entirely on Broome time. Work starts when the supervisor finally shows up to let us in and the kettle's boiled. A 10 minute break takes 20 minutes and we get three breaks a day.

People To Talk To

Cybo The Puppy

They keep trying to get me out on the pearl boats though which totally doesn't appeal to me for two reasons. The first being, I currently sacrifice 8.5 hours of my day and they give me $130 minus tax in return for essentially drinking tea and chatting shit. The other day they asked me to go out on the day trips, sacrifice 11.5 hours a day of my precious time during which they will expect me to actually earn my wages and all for a mere $20 a day extra.

Get. Fucked.

The main reason though is that everyone that comes back off the boats after a 12 day trip come back covered in scabs and with bits of shell embedded in their extremities. The sea water in Broome carries a bacteria and you're constantly covered in the shit on the boats so any sores you get will get infected.

I really don't need any more scabs, I've been eaten alive since I got to Broome, I've practically skinned my legs and feet. I can't help it, I scratch the bites in my sleep and there's nothing I can do about it. I wear long trousers to bed and I wrap myself so tightly in my sleeping bag that I shouldn't be able to move, let alone contort myself into insane positions that I do so I can reach my legs with my claws. I wake up hacking at myself and I can't stop because I'm still half asleep and it feels so goooood! The only other option would be sellotaping mittens to my hands but I swear if I did that I'd wake up gnawing on my limbs to satisfy the itching.

And lets face it, scabs aren't gonna help my pulling potential now are they. Come and get me girls.

Don't mind the pus.

written by  Koala Bear on July 6, 2007 from Broome, Australia
from the travel blog: Sod Off Great Big Mission Round Oz
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Anyways, as from Tuesday I'm off through the Kimberleys on a 12 day 4WD drive tour. I won't have Mobile phone signal until I get back to Broome and no internet until probably Kununurra which means no Hotmail, no blogging and certainly none of that new found addiction, Facebook.

The horror!

I'm sure the withdrawal symptoms will wear off soon.

And damn you all for getting me into this Facebook thing! Damn you all to cyber hell! I resisted for so long but you all know I'm weak and easily swayed by peer pressure so you kept on pestering and pestering until finally I set one up and before you know it I'm uploading photos and leaving messages and generally Keeping In Touch.

Well there goes hours of my life I can't get back. Just you wait. I'll get my own back.

Just as soon as I work out if there's a Beat Your Friends With A Big Facebook Stick application I can add...

written by  Koala Bear on July 13, 2007 from Broome, Australia
from the travel blog: Sod Off Great Big Mission Round Oz
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Yeah. Because they're really going to want to employ me after I drip sweat on the application form.

written by  Koala Bear on August 7, 2007 from Darwin, Australia
from the travel blog: Sod Off Great Big Mission Round Oz
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I've got no job, no money and I live in a car park. Meh. If I was any higher up in the world I'd smack my head on the chandelier. All I need now is a job in a sex shop and a date with a stripper.

Can you imagine the letter home to Gran?

written by  Koala Bear on August 16, 2007 from Darwin, Australia
from the travel blog: Sod Off Great Big Mission Round Oz
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This means no phone signal or internet until what will seem like the very end of time.

Well, an off-greyish lining anyway.

written by  Koala Bear on August 17, 2007 from Batchelor, Australia
from the travel blog: Sod Off Great Big Mission Round Oz
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The following has been brought to you by abject laziness, a touch of boredom and no small amount of confusion as to why my usually fantastically reliable luck appears to have taken a holiday.

See I Did Have A Life Before Australia
So I was mincing through Darwin pretending like I was employable or something when I saw a man in a sarong and I thought, "Hmm. Man in a sarong" because lets face it, men in sarongs walking through Darwin are about as common as lesbians with 31 piercings walking through Darwin. Then I recognised him, it was Tristan, the stoner hippy Aussie I lived with at Stockmore Street in Oxford for a year about 4 or 5 years ago during one of the vaguer, messier periods of my life. There were some fun nights and days at Stockmore Street with our digital TV, PS2, mixing decks and an abundance of people who came round our place to party. The UV Wall was the centre of attention, I was a perverse mix of cybergoth, punk and crusty, kittens made great toys for fucked people and the Smily Army started to grow.

Tristan In The Old Days Of Stockmore Street

But still, good times and I do miss them but they weren't good for me. Tristan now works and lives at The Rock, an indoor rock climbing gym based in a WWII water tank, its fucking cool and means I get to go and play on fibreglass rock face 9 metres higher than normal. Regular readers will be aware of my fascination with putting myself in High Up places then wondering why because I generally like it better when incapacitation or death isn't imminent. Chilling with Tris is like we were never apart and the other guys at the gym are cool an all.

One Of The Lads

NOT My Most Flattering Angle

Anyway, so that's the main Darwin story. These days I stay in touch with everyone whether they mean anything to me or not. I'm in touch with random people I met only once and with people who didn't touch me in ways others did and I don't mean that in a filthy way. Well, not everybody anyway.

But the point is I've been reunited with someone I should never have lost touch with in the first place and hopefully, where ever I am or where ever he is we'll manage to stay mates from here on in.

The Top End City
The first thing you need to know about Darwin is that it's hot. Its winter in Australia but Darwin doesn't do winter. It does the Wet (50C and close to 100% humidity, monsoonal rains, cyclones and flash floods) and the Dry (around 30C in the day, never drops below 20C even at night, still quite humid, chance of rain is minimal). The Dry is when every backpacker and his Ford Falcon is in Darwin, I made the mistake of rocking up at the height of the Dry when there's more people than jobs.

Random Overheard Comment Whilst Watching The Sunset @ Mindil Beach Sunset Markets: "Wow, its like a big ball of fire init!"

Mindil Beach Sunset

Really? Ya reckon??

Apart from the odd retard, Mindil Beach on a Thursday and Sunday evening is the place to be. Live music (usually involves didge) and loads of food plus the usual home made jewellery and tie-dye which is compulsory at every market. And and and! Unless you have a severe addiction to buying stuff you don't want or need its free.

I had a couple of good nights out in Darwin, one thanks to the misguided notion that I might get work soon and one thanks to the Vic and their penchant for cheap or free food, party games and giving away beer. I think they work on the theory the drunker we are the larier we'll be and the more fun the night'll be.

Good Times

Nice Jugs, Krystal

Oh how right they are.

Twisting My Melon, Man
Ever tried to imagine Hell On Earth?

Take a mate and go down Coles or Tescos or whatever supermarket happens to own the country you live in. Feeling a bit posh? Try Waitrose. Students and backpackers, stick to the Co-Op.

Find a decent sized watermelon and play catch with it. Now imagine doing this for a minimum of four hours a day seven days a week.

In an oven.

On account of the fact I have tits and therefore can't be trusted to pick enough melons I get to do other things such as Drive The Tractor or Put Things In Boxes. It's definitely easier but this still has to be the worst job I've ever had surpassed only by that time I decided that cleaning in the slaughter room in an abattoir was a viable career option, instead of sheep heads hitting me in the noggin its melons hitting me in the tits but its still almost as unpleasant.

Melon The Flea Bitten Mutt

Backpacker House

The backpacker house is cool, its like a hostel without the rules and the omnipotent "Don't Do This, Don't Do That" signs everywhere. The other people are wicked, you get four dogs to play with and if you don't mind the fleas its all good. The only other thing you have to deal with is being patronised by the sons although after receiving detailed and comprehensive instructions on how to use a rubber stamp I did manage not to slap Sam. Do I get a medal?

But yeah. Fuck it. Fuck melons. I'm off to the Lesbian Metropolis that is Alice Springs, not that I saw any dykes last time I was there but to be honest its difficult to notice much when you constantly have your face buried in a pint of beer.

Curly And Krystal's Goodbye Message At The End Of The Loooong Dirt Road To The Melon Farm

Kindred Spirits
I have discovered that the Taiwanese have the same appalling taste in cheesy music as I have.

Always good to know you're not alone as a minority.

written by  Koala Bear on August 21, 2007 from Batchelor, Australia
from the travel blog: Sod Off Great Big Mission Round Oz
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Me and Irma At The Big Snake

The Big Snake

Crikey mate, you wouldn't wanna get tagged by this little beauty in Ayr, Queensland.

written by  Koala Bear on November 5, 2007 from Ayr, Australia
from the travel blog: Sod Off Great Big Mission Round Oz
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Gainful Employment
I landed me a job in one of Brisbane's two gay pubs, the Sportsman Hotel, where I get to sell beer to puffs whilst attempting Responsible Service Of Alcohol. It's actually illegal to get too drunk in Australian pubs, it's the job of the bar staff to keep an eye on everyone and get them to drink water if we think they're starting to have too much fun. This is all thanks to the Lawsuit Culture, if they get pissed in our pub then they fall under the bus on the way home then we get massive fines for letting them get Unduly Intoxicated. I don't like fines so I've become fascist water dyke which can't be doing anything to help the so called drought they're meant to be having here.
Other duties include delivering food to patrons at their table after sneakily relieving them of a few chips and washing up in the back in between zipping drag queens into tight frocks and offering useless advice on what wig they should wear that night. I'm also responsible for perving at the few girls we get in who range from A Bit Of Alright to Excuse Me, I Think You Dropped Your Paper Bag.

Andy, Mouse, Paul, Ella, Merlin, Chris, Anna Mae, Brettski And Me

I also had a Monday to Friday job in a warehouse taking locks out of boxes and putting them into different boxes. I lasted 8 days before they said they didn't need me anymore. I think they wanted someone to actually Do Stuff as opposed to staring mournfully at boxes and trying to put off opening them by colouring everything in in marker pen. This is fine though because I get enough hours at the pub now on account of them being desperate for staff. They'd have to be in order to employ a pierced lesbian who hadn't pulled a pint for about 5 years in the first place.

Drought? What Fucking Drought?
Call me old fashioned but droughts conjure up images of brown foliage and arid wastelands, not torrential rainfall and flash flooding. I can't remember how I dealt with rain, it's been so long since I've had to function in it and I'm still refusing to buy an umbrella dammit all because I'm in Australia and it's not meant to rain in Australia! Yes, I'm aware the dams were at less than 20% and yes, I know they needed the water but its done nothing but rain since we got here and quite frankly I'm over it not least because it relieves me of my right to be a Smug Cunt to those back home.

Jingle Bells Etc Etc
So Christmas happened again. This is my second Christmas in Australia and I still can't get my head round the Xmas In Summer thing. Despite the rain it's still been warm and humid and walking into a shopping centre wearing shorts and flip flops and seeing Christmas trees and decorations still freaks me out. It's weird. It's just not right. I had the urge to sit in a freezer with a piece of tinsel until it went away.

Anyway, me and Irma spent it with John and his fella, Brendan, Dom, Jess and a couple of others where I proceeded to eat and drink too much and pass out.

Ah, nothing like a traditional Christmas with the Queen... Uh, I mean queens.

Pretty

Today's Top Tip
If you have a passport photo taken after you've spent all day running round Brisbane in the summer during one of the worst hair days in history you'll end up with something that looks like a mugshot from Prisoner: Cell Block H stuck in your travel document for the next 10 years. Prepare to be pulled over at customs.

written by  Koala Bear on January 22, 2008 from Brisbane, Australia
from the travel blog: Sod Off Great Big Mission Round Oz
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I have vague recollections of being dragged onto stage on my birthday, sipping an Ella Va'Lay Surprise (surprise, you've lost the use of your basic motor functions) but again, being pissed helped and everything else was drowned out by the sound of liver caving in on itself.

Then there's the Sportsman Hotel Annual Drag show which this year happened to fall on my last night on the bar. This meant I would still be staff and with it being a staff drag show an all that I'd be expected to perform. On stage. In front of people that were actually looking at me!

Me As Anthony Canlicker

I toyed with the idea of deportation or sustaining some sort of crippling injury during a freak accident but I kinda need a good track record in order to get into other countries and I generally don't move around enough to cause myself a mischief so I resigned myself to the fact and me and Chris decided we were going to do Kids by Kylie and Robbie and anyway, how hard could girl-to-boy drag be?

Anthony Canlicker And Alana Speed

Finally, Sasha drew a beard on me and darkened my eyebrows to complete the look and I spent the night trying to resist the urge to scratch my imaginary bollocks in front of a room full of people and wondering who I should start a fight with at the kebab van later on coz he looked at my bird funny ok?

Olivia Kuntz

Alana Speed

Y'know I've never been so scared in my whole life, ever. I can't recall a time I felt that sick because I had to do something I was reluctant to do. I don't actually remember much of being on stage, I don't know if I remembered to mime or not, I remember bits and bobs and just wanting to get off stage at the end and Chris not letting me by the time I did get off I was a sweating, shaking wreck. Despite the date on the bottom of this post I was in Fiji by the time I got the bottle up to watch the video back.

Drag

Drag

More Drag

Yet More Drag

Drag Overload

Shy... Guy?!

It seems I have an abject inability to shimmy, one or both shoulders forget what they're meant to be doing resulting in something resembling a minor fit and there wasn't much dancing so much as wandering aimlessly round the stage waving my arms about occasionally but hey, I did remember to mime. Bella Chimes (Chris) was brilliant though, no way on this earth could I have gotten up there on my own and while she was dragging me back on stage against my will she said some awesome things that I wasn't expecting so thanks again :)

I had a top time working at the Sporties, everyone has been brilliant, both the staff and patrons. The boys (and some of the girls...) that drink there are some of the warmest, funniest people I've ever met and they made me welcome right from my first day. I love the atmosphere there, the look on the faces of the people who haven't worked out where they are when a 7' drag queen sashays past, watching the pool comps and whiling the day shifts away chatting to the regulars.

The Good Ol' Sporties

Yep, I'm gonna miss working at a place where at the mention of a boys vs girls pool comp where everyone has to wear a dress the girls groan in horror and the boys start picking out their outfit.

written by  Koala Bear on May 6, 2008 from Brisbane, Australia
from the travel blog: Sod Off Great Big Mission Round Oz
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