Thursday 21/7/05. It was a dark and stormy night! But both wind and rain eased by morning. The girl at the hotel told John to ‘forget it’ when he offered payment for the night’s spot tucked next to the ablutions block (which helped shelter us from the full blast of the wind, allowing the pop-up roof to go up.) The locals in the van park were all talking about the weather (7/12. th gO woz litrd wth koekoenutz & frondz). Went to Taylor’s Beach, which has a local progress associ-ation which puts up lots of “Do Not …” signs. Saw our first “ACHTUNG – DANGER: crocodiles” sign which occur frequently where people are likely to launch boats, and near creeks etc. Sussed out Lucinda where we got advice from a worker at the ritzy resort on the water what coconuts are best for liquid and for meat. He even went and found a couple he reckoned were just right. John cracked one & we’ve almost eaten it all, as snacks during the day. Queenslanders are very fri-endly and helpful (7/12. but HOaLnLdIyS sez thr r 2 meni boen-hedz & red-neks thr). While we were cracking the nut we noticed beautiful beetles (30/11. harlequin) on a nati-ve hibiscus – mostly orange with metallic green patches, but one was a true je-wel : sapphire blue and deep crimson. The spot near the water (elevated by a rock wall) was where we had tea. Halifax (28/11. l8r dsiedd 2 nkluedtn mie listv prmyr sm-orl townzn OZ) is a small village with heritage listed mango trees in the central strip, and 2 old style 2 storey pubs, in one of which we read the paper. Then into Ingham for a look around after establishing the whereabouts of the Tyto Wet-lands Reserve, which we’ll visit tomorrow – a 3.3k walk which will test my toes as they are still sore & wont tolerate too much pressure. Ducked into the info cent-re to ask about crocodiles’ habits and got into a conversation with a volunteer info officer, Alice, who is a 5th generation Italian. The Italians first arrived in the early 1900s, some from Argentina or Brazil, and were augmented by immi-gration between the 2 world wars and after WWII, becoming the 2nd wave of cane farmer/cutters after Kanaka labour was stopped. Approximately 60%+ of the inhabitants of Hinchinbrook Shire (capital Ingham) are of Italian (28/11. eg. jmnst IdSaTmRiIaAn hoo kmpeetd n th O chmpnshps ystrdi n Melb) descent, representing 6 regioni and still speaking their original regional dialects. That explained the amazing cemetry at Halifax with its room-sized tombs and ceramic tiled gra-ves. The tombs are Sicilian (28/11. DIC&ArSeTaRO (14/12. maeb ntrstd 2 no th@n studi n 20-03 showd 18-22%v talianz thort juez wernt koshr & shoodntb trustd) rkns w shood goe thr nxt yeer), Alice claimed – not Italian! Ingham is a sister city to a north Italian town on the French border and has an Italian festival each May. “We are like a muse-um” said Alice, because the old traditions still flourish here while they have di-sappeared in Italy. Saw lots of new birds, but John can tell you about that. H dd-nt mnshn th@ w rlso drank O a kup eech of COCONUT milk from a yungr (green) nut than th kind u uze 4 meet. A pot (10oz) of beer @ th Halifax pub kosts $2.20 vs $2.90+ nMelbourne. Most kraktrstk tree n th ٱ z th buteful flowrn Afrikn Tulip tree wch, n@chrli, zntn naetv. Hz toze r korzn her big prolb-mz – w karnt →. Th berd Iv bn c-n n larjst numbrz n th kanefeeldz (wch r b-n harvstd now) z th Chest-nut-breasted Mannikin (Lonchura castaneothorax) nfloksv 50+. Sor a few Crimson Finch (Neoch-mia ruficauda) 2. A Jabiru (Ephippiorlynchus asiaticus) n th bankv th Herbert river (whr thr r meni CROCODILEZ). Feeldz full of Magpie Geese (Anseranas semipalmata). A kmon berd heer u dont c ↓S z Brahminy Kite (Milvus Indus). Th jeti @ Dungeness whr w 8 t z th same 1 I woz brort 2 ftr doin th Hinchinbrook Island → (7 daiz) wen I woz heer n sept/oct 1977 (19/11. heerzn rport n th 4mv nletr (kwoetd ← ‘GULF TRIP’ (c ‘30/4/05’ p1)) ie rote 2 Melbourn ftr th → (th dfrnt fonts 2wrdz th nd ndk8 dfrnt kulrz n th rietn, sumtn ie dun n kkaezionz n mie ARTE POSTALE (17/12. “La Mail Art è apparsa nel 1962 quando l’artista americano Ray Johnson creò la New York school of correspondence of art presentandosi co-me nuova corrente artistica Neo Dada e Neo Realista. Ma il supporto della corrispondenza artistica risale ai tempi di Mallarme, Picasso, Matisse, Calder che vi sono avvicinati senza pretese di farne una scuola a tutti gli effetti. Soli i dadaisti rivendicarono successivamente un ruolo nell’arte postale, ma non continuò. Si deve considerare che

1

diseg-ne, pitture, collage, grafica e timbrature “portano la busta al rango di opera d’arte.” Per la sua continua ascesa e pop-olarità tale arte ha assunto un ruolo di vedette internazionale. In tutto il mondo si organizzano continuamente prog-etti per gli artisti e numerosi musei espongono opere di Mail Art (ad esempio il Museo Van Gogh di Amsterdam o il Museo di Mosca)” – sent 2 mi ← “Florentina”, 8 avenue du Général de Gaulle, 06500 MENTON – FRA-NCE x COaZdZrOiLaInNaI) daze) :”Emergency Action Guide (Hinchinbrook) ¶ I was lucky I had packed a seven day pack (6 nights) because that meant I could spend 3 of them at Zoe Bay which comes closest to the tropical beach that I intend to go to in paradise. My imagination was formed by films such as Kidnapped and Treasure Island that I saw as a kid. It had a backdrop of magnificently dramatic mountains which produce sunsets straight out of Tolkien. Each end of the beach is proscr-ibed by a beautiful estuary in the northern one of which the two largest crocs on the eastern side of the island live. It goes without saying that the jungle (DŽIUNGLĖS in littlanian) goes right down to the high tide mark. I spent one day walking through the jungle, parallel to the beach, using the sound of the waves on the beach as my reference point so as not to get lost. Those DŽIUNGLĖS, ah, those D-ŽIUNGLĖS! As you walk south along the bay you have a full view of the Zoe Waterfall at the bottom of the mountain and you know that there is a magik pool at the bottom (and another at the top) in whi-ch you are going to perform your evening washing ritual. In the pools there are alert fish which instan-taneously snatch any march fly you throw into the water. There is no end of fast flowing mountain str-eams in the wet tropics and on Hinchinbrook Island. Their water is invariably a blue/green slightly mil-ky colour and is crystal clear so that what looks like 2 feet of water is usually over head high. The rea-son is that water is not stained by tannin here as it is in the south. I spent one day rock-hopping up one of the streams at Zoe Bay till I’d got 2/3 of the way up the mountain. Great pools, great waterfalls, great rock formations gouged out by fast flowing water is a feature of the island. Who cares that you cant swim in the estuaries which do look so inviting fringed by mangroves. The crocs can have them for their own as there is plenty of other water and its always warm. But tell Rudi he’ll be too late to co-me here as they are building a giant resort on the mainland just across the channel with facilities for 1,500 boats; and where else can these boats go to except to places like Zoe Bay? On my 3rd day th-ere I came across a twin-hulled craft parked in the northern estuary. I was visiting the spot for the 3rd time in the hope of spotting one of the crocs. I had seen it enter the estuary early morning and the guy told me he was staying the night. Then two ultra-lights landed on the beach; it was low tide and it’s a 3-4 metre one here. I took all particulars on IDs and conscripted witnesses and today handed the info to the parks people who said they’d pass it on to the relevant department (for prosecution); then I gave the same info to the guy co-ordinating the protests here against the resort development so he could monitor if anything is done by Parks. But if you saw the size and scope of the work alrea-dy done (the channel through the seagrass is being dredged through ‘world heritage seagrass beds’ under special temporary permit) you’d know that the cause is lost and Rudi will not want to do the wa-lk I did. A week before I left, in a demo at the site, Mrs Thorsborne was manhandled by the develop-er’s workmen in a peaceful rally they had here after the police got rid of the press so that they would-n’t observe them standing by as the assaults took place. She and her husband are responsible for de-veloping the trail (2/12. ie th ‘Thorsborne Trail’). They are locals from Cardwell. She is in her 70s. Just for the record, 5 or 6 years ago the same developer tried to start a resort in Zoe Bay itself but the pro-test movement managed to win that one. Not that Zoe Bay is the only spot worth stopping at, they’re all good. I observed green sea turtles at Banksia Bay and then heard a fishing boat sneak into that bay in the dead of night and not leave until the morning. Most of these things I am telling you and Ru-di are not noticed by the German Rudolphs who form a good fraction of the backpackers. They do it in the minimum 3 days spending most of their time tramping and setting up and pulling camp. In the evenings at Zoe Bay out come the cameras for the Tolkien sunset and ze krauts say “zat is zo wund-erfill”. They are great at the logistics of backpacking : they come and they conquer in minimum time and they camp close to the metal boxes where you’re supposed to put the food so the kokonit gnaw-ing rats wouldn’t gnaw through your pack and they obey all the rules and they is very good healthy campers. Bless dem! On

2

my last night I decided to camp on the beach instead of Mulligan Falls cau-se you couldn’t really be private at the falls (where I investigated the great pools above the falls where they say not to go) and there was a group of six kids from Brisbane who I thought might be ‘late night-ers’ and I wanted to outwit the mozzies of the DŽIUNGLĖS. Ah! Yes I forgot to mention them in my gl-owing report on Zoe Bay but there is a mozzie in every ointment as they say. There is clouds of them in some spots here and at Zoe you cook and eat on the beach and then run back and dive into your tent in the jungle where you zip up for the night. If you have to get out for a leak in the middle of the night its curtains for you but I have my special plastic screw top container which I snatch quickly from outside the fly screen by unzipping it only enough to shove me arm out. My problem was that I was rebelling against the slather-on-the-RID culture that prevails here and determined to see out the trip without using it once. And I won. What got me that way was that the ferry operator who took us to the island had everyone (cept me) lather up at his expense for a 50 metre boardwalk through mangrove to the beach to start the walk (see no.1 on enclosed brochure). It was a calculated decision of mine: next stop Ross River Fever or Encephalitis. Anyway I dodged Mulligan Falls and went to the beach below and faced the front of the tent into a stiff breeze right on the beach itself hopefully just above ze 4 metre tide and was getting heaps of sand blowing right into the inside of the tent (I wanted the bree-ze also because my tent is a bit hot for tropiks) and the mozzies were still there. CLOUDS OF THEM so that about 50 would be biting each hand while another hundred would be biting my face and ears and eyelinds and another 100,000 would be circling around me. And I couldn’t shake them without going right to the edge a couple of hundred yards away (it was low tide). Then two dudes arrived. Th-ey was locals: one was an army guy and he had his army pack with him and the other might have be-en part aboriginal and they were straight from DELIVERANCE. Remember the film? I never saw it but I read the book. They were already completely pissed and were doing flying jumps and landing on the ground on their backs, or heads or whatever, just for the fun of it. The part-abo who would turn 29 at midnight had a compulsive maniacal laugh which punctuated every sentence of his which they both uttered only in four letter words and always screamin at the top of their voices. Besides being crazy they were the DECIBEL BOYS (30/11. c ‘↑N’ p15). I drank a couple of tins of V.B. with them which th-ey had unlimited quantities of in a larger esky than I have ever known to be manufactured and which was brimful of ice too. It turned out I had inadvertently encroached on their ‘private’ spot where they also lit fires (against the strictest code here) and did as they pleased coz they woz lokills. In situations like this very basic instincts prevail and I woz on red-alert but they were two and so I was real glad when they went fishin cause the 29 year one woz getting aggro in a sneaky, crazy sort of way. I had to head for the tent to escape the mozzies that woz murderin me but first I watched them in the twili-ght but I neednt have cause I could hear them from a KILOMETER away cause they woz screamin at each other ALL THE TIME. I didn’t succeed gettin into me tent without bringin a couple of hundred mozzies with me then by and by I heard their screamin getting louder and louder and they woz back. They lit a fire and for a good while all went quiet. I surmised they was having their dope session to which I had also been invited. I was sweating it out in the tent with the mozzies getting NO SLEEP when they finished their quiet session and a huge argument ensued punctuated by the compulsive laughter of the crazier one. It went on for HOURS and they woz SCREAMIN the whole time. They woz screamin things like “DIE YOU FUCKEN CUNT, DIE RIGHT NOW!” etc. I didn’t like the sound of the little guy, and his mate (army dude) had told me that the little bloke had had a ‘head job’ done on him the previous night by a local lass and didn’t even know about it. “That’s the sort of guy he is” the army dude had said. I could hear them screaming about nightmares and knives and next mornin the little guy (before he passed out) told me he’d thrown a ‘darkie’ and started turfing everythin out of his boat. D.T.s I suppose. Anyway I woz considering my options coz I didn’t want to trigger anythin if they saw me getting out of the tent and I didn’t want to spend the night in the DŽIUNGLĖS and I didn’t wa-nt to lose my gear and I didn’t want to die. I got me knife out of me pack then kept checking that I kne-w exactly where it was in the dark (I don’t carry a torch) coz if I was going to go à la the film DELIVE-RANCE I was going to make sure it was gory and Id have an unexpected card up me sleeve. You see, Andrew, I shouldn’t have read the book. Anyway their screamin was interrupted by the boat star-

3

ting up again and off they went fishin a second time. I was real glad because I thought they had GO-NE HOME. And I had also thought I had heard the little guy scream to the other one earlier “YOU CU-T HIS THROAT”. And I actually finally got some shut eye as all the mozzies in the tent were no longer botherin me cause they were already full of my blood (you should see the bloodstains on the tent). But then, as any good scriptwriter would have known but I didn’t, I heard the engine coming. “Oh NO!” I said and then I heard the SCREAMIN. And we woz back to square one. And then the birds started chirpin and GOD was about to rise on the eastern horizon and the screamin subsided a bit and I got out of my tent and was rolling up my sleeping bag (etc) and I heard the army guy say “waky waky” an-d the crazy little nut said “he’s already up” and the army guy sort of sang “happy birthday” to the little crazy ‘head job’ guy and I sort of sang just the two words “happy birthday” separately, and the head case said “on your bike you cunt” AND GUESS WHAT! we sort of got friendly, even the little cunt before he passed out and rolled onto the open LARGE can of spaghetti and I had to share their breakfast of fish cooked in the aboriginal style in the sand and ash and I even accepted a piece of fish handed to me by the army dude with his bare hand even though I’d seen him earli-er go into the DŽIUNGLĖS for a crap. What could I do? I couldnt have them think I was an ing-rate and the fish was delicious. Several kinds of fish (1/12. 1 f thm woz Coral Trout), cause they had caught heaps, as you do here, but were taking the biggest ones back with them and the arm-y dude said he was keeping the very biggest one for a mate of his. They had a great method: bec-ause they only had one esky and it was chokka and they had to put the fish into it they had to drink the beer to make room. And they got heaps of fish so they had to drink real fast. They was so full that at brekky they was spilling their beer on the ground. But they had this ethical approach where they couldn’t take a single can back with them. That was their culture. So the last two cans which were ice cold they gave to me as they left. Yes! We parted the best of mates and I promised to clean up after them and bury the empties and cetera in a hole or the fire pit and so on and they offered to give me a lift to Lucinda which I declined cause I was still waiting for the sun to dry out my tent cau-se there’d been a dew and also if I hadnt turned up for the ferry with five others at 11am there woul-d be a search party sent out for me. And they became quite human in the end and I am alive to tell the tale and it was a great walk. And I don’t blame them coz these guys are at the bottom of the pile and the big tourist operators are screwing them even more than me. There’s no room for guys at the bottom of the pile in the shiny ‘coconut palms and golf course on the beach front’ world of the TOUR-IST RESORT. ¶ May Truth Prosper forever! ¶ a … z” ). Hav ritn ths in a pub @ Luncinda O 2kz ← Du-ngeness whr w r ← 4 th nite. 2 finsh off I must knolj how xtrordnri bliejn ppl havbn 2 us from th momnt w set footn th koast ystrdi evnn. Lso sum ppl ↓S mai not reelize th@ COCONUTS r found lyin O n th gO here like rubshn nlmtd kwantis so no1 need evr go hungri & th frsh taistz far betr than nythn yule evr x n Vic. U kan lso find th gO kuvrdn makadamia nuts but u hav 2 rowst em. Friday 22/7/05. About 9.45 pm, after we had settled into our spot for the night (a large, flat gr-assy area near the boat ramp at Dungeness, where another traveller in a large campervan was also parked) a man with a torch roused us with “Hey mate, di-dja know your van’s under water?” John jumped out of bed into his shoes, out the door and into water ankle-deep. There was a king-tide and the area whe-re we were was fringed on one side by a mangrove covered creek, which was ca-rrying water fast over the surrounding area. The bloke who warned us had dis-covered the situation when he’d taken his dog out of his campervan for its fin-al pee of the night. We migrated to a parking area around a local park in Lu-cinda for the rest of the night, just opposite a caravan park, one of whose users came to tell us in the morning that the shire was fining such as us $500 if app-rehended by the ranger who regularly does his rounds. By then we were up and dressed and ready to go and read the paper over coffee in Ingham, so we esca-ped our fate. A little corner of the caravan park was patriots’ (14/12. ftr th Cronulla riots (16/12. ntrstn 2 mi koz th 5000 wr n mjrti targtn n mnrti liek th anti-chieneez riotsv th 1800z r th pogrmzv rusia & soe far mor daenjrus thanth riotsv kooreezn

4

Redfern rv th frnch dspozst. Th NORM ssertn tslf oevr th xstrmteez z frietnn 2 ksntrks liek mi.) whr ozziozziozzioioioiz draept mslvzn flagz HOjWoAhRnD sed : “Look, I would never condemn people for being proud of the Australian flag.”) corner – every van (about 6) was flying the flag (28/11. c ‘Melbourne → Sydney’ p4). In Ingh-am we had coffee at the Olive Tree Trattoria, recommended previously by Alice. On the wall was a large painting of the late, sainted Jo Bjelke-Petersen (28/11. c ‘30/4/05’ p4). Some Queenslanders wear their hearts on their sleeves! Took in the Tyto Wetlands, and then moved on to Cardwell along the coast as inland excu-rsions to Wallaman Falls and Mt Fox seemed dubious because of the continui-ng cloudy weather with intermittent rain. Cardwell is like Lorne – its mainstr-eet runs parallel with the beach just across the bitumen. It has great trees (cal-ophyllums) with contorted trunks and roots growing over the beach, along wi-th coconut palms and other lush vegetation which is unknown to me. We colle-cted more coconuts, having eaten our way through another one today. On the foreshore we met a young couple heading south from Daintree in a “Wicked V-an” – we’ve seen a few of these (in fact we thought it was the same one from Ca-rnavon Gorge and Balgal Beach (28/11. nletr → Melbourne (← ‘GULF TRIP’) : “30.09.97 SELF-EVACUATE ¶ I am getting the hang of how to travel in Q.L.D. otherwise I wouldn’t be here in Balgal Beach (out of Rollingstone, 40ks north of Townsville). I am sitting in a kind of shop/pub called Fisherman’s Landing immediately over a boat ramp into an estuary that empties into the ocean a cou-ple of hundred yards away. This is the very opposite to the Mission Beach area where I spent the last week. I did all the standard things: did the set walks and saw the cassowaries, went out to the reef a-gain for coral viewing ($65), walked the beaches after dark, tested the hamburgers and spent a day on Dunk Island. Mission Beach is a pretty, comfy, bourgeois resort and it is not crass. The tourists manage not to look ugly there because they are in their natural environment. There are quiet cafes and candle-lit tables. The cafes use those bamboo poles with a taper burning at the top to attract as-ian tourists. Its all real nice and I enjoyed it but would not have wanted to spend one extra day there. This place however is not touristy – its just supremely relaxed. I think Fisherman’s Landing should be placed high on the list of places we should strive to get drunk at. Tell Danny Cash-Minus about it. Th-ere is a council camping spot right outside where it says you can camp free for 48 hours and that they check but I am sure they don’t. There is a mob of aboriginal women and kids camped in tents on the point between sea and estuary. I can tell you friend, aborigines are very discerning about the good-feel places to stop at. You’ll never get them at Mission Beach where I camped illegally for free right in the centre of, just for the record. I got up before sunrise each morning to greet the sunrise with the other devotees before driving off so as not to get nabbed by the council people. Isnt it a beaut reflec-tion on the spirituality of the middle classes that we should be doing that. Of course its easy in the tr-opics since its warm even in the morning. In Lifuania they wouldn’t be doing it – they’d be lying in bed grumbling how it was 70 years of Rusky rule that’s the real cause of their problems. I made a mistake today that could mean I am getting althiesers (not knowing how to spell it says sumptin). This morning south of Cardwell I went for a walk along a forestry track (10ks in one direction) which was not always clearly marked and became quite indistinct in the jungly sections. Anyway after a while I started see-ing the same things I had seen earlier on the walk but wasn’t quite sure that they were. Sure enough I had managed to turn myself around on the track without realizing it. Never done that before except in the outback once when I was drunk in the middle of the night (30/11. c ‘30/11/04 – 9/12/04’ p11). I ha-dnt even bothered to carry my glasses and could barely see the compass when I was trying to work out what was happenin and the compass was giving readings which were indecisive anyway. Not a problem as I knew that by sticking to the track I’d get out somewhere as it only went for 10ks in one direction. But it was an eye opener and once again showed that there is always a new way of getting into strife. Saw a very large feral pig on the walk that raised its hair along the spine in a show of aggr-ession. The other mistake I made today was to buy my vegies at Ingham not realising that the vegie checking station was just 40ks further south down the road before Rollingstone. They take everything off ya so you wouldn’t be bringing the papaya fly further south. Luckily I did read the sign (having ign-ored all previous ones as

5

is my custom) just in time to stop and hide all my tomatoes, paw paw (etc) in the depths of the car. They did a bit of a search too but found nuffin. The fruit that I am most keen on was called ‘cainito’ at Cape Trib but I managed to buy more of it at a Sunday market at Mission Beach where it is called a ‘star apple’. My other discovery yesterday is that there is a second kind of paw paw called a ‘red paw paw’ and its nicer than the regular one which is nice anyway. The super-markets in big places like Ingham don’t stock it. In fact in the tropical north the fruit and vegie section is exactly the same as down south and apples are real cheap. Look at it in a positive way as a unify-ing thing in this large country. For all I know they may be the same all over the world (2/12. th 1z n lit-hoe sel kokonits, brnarnaz, mngoez etc etc) bringing us together in a brotherhood of consumers. I am heading south with the general intention of being back in Melbourne in 2 weeks or so after a short st-op over in Sydney to say hullow to the relos. Here at Balgal Beach I feel that I have driven out of the ‘super wet coastal tropics’. I’ve loved em, especially the jungle but in the final analysis there is nothing I have done here that is better than taking Helen out to the Bocadillo Bar and talking about our kids as I get drunk on sangrias. Its just that I don’t wont to be doing the same thing all the time. What I really like about life on the road is that it allows me to keep a distance from the people I look at. I enjoy bei-ng able to observe people without my perceptions being distorted (7/12. notn good choisv werd – ‘ch-aenjd’ z betr) by too close proximity or involvement. Scrutinising what is out there is what I enjoy most as to tell you the truth, my friend, none of the big truths or even little ones, have ever been revealed to me by the almighty or anyone else for that matter. Sure, heaps of folks keep tellin me what matters (-Faustas, Eddy, and practically everyone else) but when I investigates what it is they is sayin (espec-ially priests etc) I always find that it is bulldust. By the way a bit of investigation has revealed that the-re will be 250 berths at the marina at Port Douglas not 1500 as someone told me and I then told you. Its still a very large number. That new resort will cover a larger area than Cardwell itself and its alrea-dy been cleared. I saw it again today, acres and acres of coconut palms with everything in between bulldozed away. ¶ Live well. ¶ a … z” ) which are provided by a van hire company like Britz or Maui, but are painted in grafitti style to look hippy-ish. Checked out Port Hinchinbrook, a new marina-cum-quays development just outside Card-well which had been the focus of protest some time ago because of fears it would destroy the local dugong habitat (sea-grass beds). Its typically quays-style : en-ormous houses, hundreds of Florida palms, tennis-courts, swimming pools and his ‘n hers boats tied up at the private jetties. The ranger at the Reef and Rain-forest Centre in Cardwell says there’s at least 4 crocodiles in the marina system, and that house prices in Cardwell have been driven up by the development. Th ♂ hoo told us O th $500 fine woznt bein helpfl – just a bizibodi. ♂ uzed th term ‘FREELODERZ’ & klaim-d thr wozn sine kumn →2 town 4bdn kampn n publk ٱz whch znt tru z I chkt l8r. But I woz n n 4gvn mood z I rializd ♂ probli woznt skorn n hour of 6shl ndljnsz vri mornn & sumtimez @ nite 2. ♂ livd pr-mntli n n krvan wch ♂ towd wth n 4x4 2 whrvr th fshn woz good ♂ sed. @ th Tyto Wetl&z Rzrv w nevr sor eni Eastern Grass Owlz (Tyto capensis) but w sor plenti of Crimson Finchz (Neochinia phaeto-ni), Spangled Drongo (Dicrurus bracteatus), n Cotton Pygmy Goose (Nettapus coromandelianus), ♀&♂ Green Pygmy Geese (Nettapus pulchellus), n Jacana (Irediparra gallinacea), Collared Kingfi-sherz (Todirhampus (Halcyon) chloris) (Aust. race sordida), & ssortd mor komn berdz. Thrz a kns-trukshn korld “grass owl viewing platform” wch ovrlooksn xpans of 2-3 ft torl trpkl grasz whr th chans-zv u evr c-n 1v thez gO nestn & roostn owlz z meni timez les than yor chansz of c-n a wail from n wail viewn pl@4m. Larst nite @ Dungeness w sor th vri goestli lookn Beach Curlew (Esacus magnirostr-is) & th mornfl korl H herd juerin th nite mai hav blongd 2 t. Z w wer leevn Tyto rzrv w ●d n mndrn tree n th park so w stokt ↑ wth xlnt frute. In th trpks tz nrml 2 c treez laidn wth npkt frute – th@s how good thei get t here. Pikt ↑ 3 mor larj KOKONUTS n th 4shr @ Cardwell & got th husks off z H woz rietn her partv th ntri : Im dvelpn a tekne (Heidegger (2/12. c ‘↑N’ p5 & ‘Port Germein’ pp10-13)). I hav lredi xp-laind th@ tz not posbl 2 pik ↑ & kari >5 nutzn yor rmz @ n time. U shood lso no th@ 4 drinkn th joos u go 4 th big green 1z wch r O x 2 or 3 hevier than th ripe brown 1z u take 4 th flesh. Theezr best taken wn thei stil hav sum joosn thmz then thei havn kernl O th size of a golf O r a bit bigr wch z z lite z poli-stiereen butvn ntrstn

6

txchr & taist. I hav fownd from past xperiens th@ tz mposbl 2 eet >1 KOKONU-T/dai 4 eni lnth of tiem. W hav drivn ↓S 5kz ← Cardwell 2 n ● n ½k off th hywai korld ‘Five Mile Swim-ming Hole’. Tz vri nise here & thrzn toilt. Thrz no1 here z n larj sine sez NO CAMPING. Saturday 23/7/05. A quiet night at the ol’ swimmin’ hole, followed by paper and coffee in Cardwell, a walk along their foreshore (coconut hunting – John found the big-gest one yet, but though it looked big, the nut itself was about the same size as the others.) We now have 8 in storage, de-husked. John has got the de-husking down to a T – a combination of axemanship and brawn. Indulged in fish from the local fishnchip shop – Spanish mackerel (dry and chewy) for me and a sm-all piece of barramundi for him (juicy but fairly tasteless). He fronted for ano-ther go at another shop and got nannygai (juicy but completely tasteless). Its hard to get good fish away from fishermen’s co-ops. Did a smallish walk (about 5ks) in the Edmund Kennedy National Park 8ks north of Cardwell in the arvo. Im building up my toes. Estuarine crocodiles inhabit the park in the 2 main creeks, but they were a no-show. Their presence does make you feel more wary near water, so I find myself looking out for likely trees to run up. Back into Ca-rdwell we found a road to a boatramp off which a track to the beach proved a good spot for the night. The bulk of Cardwell is nowhere near the shopping str-ip, but further north, tucked away between the highway and the beach – an ex-tensive suburb of well-kept, large houses. There is even a large modern-looking old folks’ home. Mislainia : 4got 2 mnshn ystrdi th@ @ th Tyto Wetl&z Rzrv w sor n buteful goldn (14/12. nstedv th norml ornj) Afrkn Tulip (nsdntli theez treez r seedn thmslvz whrvr th l& hz bn dsterb-d); Hz takin naprosn 4 hr toze (thei hav nevr givn a hint of trubl in th parst) & laxtvz 4 a kndshn korzd x eetn 2 much KOKONUT ♀ thinks;nSydney th pprz wer sayin th@ tz th nxt trrrst targt & I noetis Ho-WARd (7/12. duzn gree wth Winston Churchill hoo sedn 1943 (← 2daez The Age p18 ): “THE power of the executive to cast a man into prison without formulating any charge known to the law, and particularly to deny him the judgement of his peers, is in the highest degree odious, and the foundation of all totalitarian government.”) iz prktsn hiz speel of how w wer lredi n targt b4 hi alied us → US poltks & dklaird war on iraq prtndn it woz 2 free thm (Ha!Ha!) from dkt8rshp – thr woodnt b a arab or muslm in th O let lone in th midl eest hoo wood blievt & thr wil b sum hoo wil b outrajd evnf thei wernt xtrmsts b4; Iv dskvrd th@ not orl KOKONUTS hav th golf O sized ♥ n th ●; w r rite on th ej of th cshr & 2nite I mite hav 2 get ↑ & chek th@ w rnt swampt x nuthr KING TIDE; sor a treen Cardwell full of Figbirds (Sphe-ctheres viridis) (had cn sum in Carnavon gorj 2 (28/11. c ‘↑N’ p7)); ths mornn w wer woken @ 5 Mile Swimn O x a ssortmntv smorl hunieetrz mungst wch I ●d a Dusky Honeyeater (Myzomela obscura), Brown Honeyeater (Lichmera indistincta), a Melithreptus, a Graceful Honeyeater (Meliphaga gra-cilis) & lisnd 2 n ssortmnt of Philemon orlv wch (28/11. 4 vrieteez) r foundn th ٱ; thr wer lso a kupl of Rainbow Bee-Eaters (Merops ornatus) O; oyair, th tree I had thort 2 b n Makdamia (n few daiz ←) woz probli a Calophyllum, & I shood hav mnshnd th@n th main street of Ingham thr r larj Quondong of th vrieti wch hav sky blue bereez; lso wotch out 4 green tree antz wch make thr nsts x gluin leevz 2gthr. ☼di 24/7/03. @ O 10.30 larst nite th oeshn had dvanst → wthn a foot or so of the lip of th bee-ch bhind wch w wer parkt lowr ↓ so w rtrnd → ‘5 Mile Swimn O’ whr ths mornn (2 Brolgas (Grus rubi-cundus) hav just flown ovr) th van woz nvstg8d x 3 Yellow Honeyeaters (Lichenostomus unicolor) wch wood hovr @ tiemz rite in frunt of th netd wndow of th van zf thei wontd → nside. 1 reezn I left th ● n th beech woz bkoz I woz rmindd of a dreem I had told H O @ th start of the trip r n Sydney n wch w had →d out n n spit & wen w ternd O orl w kood c n th drkshn ← wch w had kum woz th c wch had kum n bhind us & sepr8d us ← dstnt linev hilz x meni milez. It seemd 2 mi th dreem mite hav bn a w-ornn (& sertnli n COINCIDENCE) & ntil sum1 givz mi a good reezn why I shood dsrgrd my dreemz (b-ut shood bliev wot Winston HoWARd (14/12. 1s sed th@ th Cronulla ٱ woz : “a part of Sydney which has always represented to me what middle Australia is all about”) or George Bush sai) iel pai heed 2 thm. In Car-dwell zpartv my nvstg8shnv thingz loekl I bort n piecev fsh @ nuthr shop (th fsh @ “try our famous fi-sh” had bn por) evn tho its bvius thrz no fshn fleet in Cardwell & tho th ♀ sedt woz Dory wch I new woz a suthrn fsh. Wen ♀ h&dt 2 mi I kood tel sumtn woz sus from th

7

size of the pakt zt woz x 2 th nr-ml serv & DORY ↓S zn xpnsv fsh wchz good evn ftr long freezn (orl fsh r frozn or childn ice 4 a wile evn wen thei r dskribedz frsh) & I woz rite zt taistd xktli like th fsh whch had bn korld NANNIGUY wch I had eetn ystrdi & wch meltd →2 a taistls paist th moemntt wozn thmowth. Then H rmindd mi O PA-CIFIC DORY wchz reali mportd VIETNAMESE K@FSH (c ‘Melbourne → Sydney’ p3) & I new I had bn had like a tipkl 2rst (28/11. ← ‘GULF TRIP’ : “[ 24.09.97 ] Emergency ¶ Sir, The tourist industry sucks ¶ Shopkeepers and caravan park owners will rule the world. ¶ Bureaucracy will triumph. ¶ The rich will shit on the poor for ever and the poor will eat shit forever. ¶ THIS IS THE GOSPEL ACCOR-DING TO Q.L.D. ¶ a …z”). Thn I had n dskshn O theez m@rz n stil nuthr fshshop & ♂ xplaind → mi th@ th nli fshn ports O heer r @ Cairns & Townsville & n fue botes opr8n outv Innisfail (1v th wetst townz – not Ingham z I rote n fue daiz go) & th fsh 2 go 4 r RED EMPEROR, CORAL TROUT (v xp-nsv), n kindv SALMON & BARRAMUNDI (but nli f t woz kort lokli z th stuf mportd ← AZIA z louzi). N-ow 4 n kmpleet chainjv topk – n kuplv kwoets H haz torn outv th ppr ovr th week : “Steve Irwin is so in-explicably popular with Americans (21/12. n lithol& 2) it surely made sense to create his own feature film. That doesn’t mean you should watch it. The plot (Steve tries to save a crocodile from potential poachers) is incidental as he pokes native animals and promises they could kill him at any moment” & “If a governnment can do it, sooner or later it will do it; if a law can be misused, it will be. As Benjamin Franklin said, people who can give up essential lib-erty for a little temporary safety deserve neither liberty nor safety.” Iv rit th ntri (3pm) @ n br& new pub ½ wai btween Hull Heads & Tully Heads. W mai spnd th nite @ 1v theez. W r O 14kz ← th hiwai; Tully & Mi-ssion Beach Resort etc r n litl ↑N n th uthr sidev nstuari. We have often discussed the distin-ction between being a tourist (7/12. ←’GULF TRIP’ : “ CENTRAL 12.09.97 ¶ Doc, Tourists wear white socks, especially if they are old (with gym shoes) but some groovier young ones wear th-ose new very expensive coloured sandshoes on bare feet. If they are superfashionable french types they wear leather slip-ons with khaki shorts and maybe a polo shirt that is navy blue with baby shit colour collar. Tourists hire bicycles and like to ride them on the beach even though the bikes are cal-led mountain bikes. Tourists often wear a sarong. I think they like being in RESORT towns like Port Douglas (great backdrop of mountains) because even the old couples are often walking hand in hand though it doesn’t prevent them looking a bit grim while they are doing it. Perhaps being in a RESORT makes them fall in love again in a tepid way. Tourists spend most of their waking hours eating heaps of gourmet food in waterfront ye olde style cafes or in waterfront very modern cafes but whichever ki-nd they have all been built in the last few years. Tourists are not sun smart, no, no, they insist on exp-osing even their nipples to the sun cause they want to show their friends back in germany that they have done the tropics. I don’t think Danny Cass-Minus would make a very good tourist. Give the tour-ists their due though, many of them got up before sunrise to gather on the famous 4-mile beach at Port Douglas this morning to witness, and with reverence, for I noticed that even the joggers and some of the power walkers stopped for the event, what turned out to be a truly metaphysical (proph-etic?) sunrise. There was hardly one among us that wasn’t frozen in his tracks by the magnificent sp-ectacle of sunbeams bursting through dramatic cloud formations. Claude Lorrain, or Pussin perhaps? Even the guys who like me, are forever dodging authority and with whom I have been connected by fate were sufficiently sobered up by then to lean on their old Holden in quiet reverence. All this seems a long way behind me now for I have driven through Cairns heading SOUTH and have parked in a FREE council park at BABINDA. Remember the name because this is a real town. What a relief after all the RESORTS. The WHOLE town is 1950s like the Hollywood Palace. All the old signwriting, the old cigarette vending machines, pin ball machines in the pub. And what a pub it is, you must join me for a drink here some day. This is the real thing. But in a time-warp. It is the 1st ‘real’ town I have co-me to since I left the inland. ¶ a …z”) and being a traveller, so here is my mathemat-ical formula for use as a test : TO = (-TI) + PTE + Mn + I + Kmsn + En while TR = (+TI) +ATE + M – I - Kms – En where TO = Tourist, TR = Traveller, TI = Time, TE = Temperament, M = Money, I = natio-nal icons (eg. Uluru, Kimberleys, Gold Coast or anywhere extensively advertised in the media), Kms = Kilom-etres travelled, E = Equipment, P = Passive, A = Active and n =

8

unlimited. John HoWARd (7/12. hiz midl naem reeli z Winston) is touring British hospital wards lately, dispensing official condolences to Aussies injured in the recent London bombings (the HYPOCR-ITE) and was tackled by one of them (a gutsy girl who had escaped the train wreck and got onto the bus the bomber was sitting on, on the top floor above her – she got severe neck injuries) who demanded to know if he saw any conn-ection between the incident and the Iraq invasion. Apparently he left ‘in a bad mood’ according to the waiting press corps. Unfortunately she didn’t get stuck into him properly – I would have shrieked at him like a fishwife. Perhaps her neck was hurting too much. I have started collecting seedpods of unusual sha-pes and sizes …. 6.30. W r n th kownsl kampn gO & tz kostn us $3.30 eech. Iv bn heer b4 praps n th vri ● w r n now, rietn (c ‘GULF TRIP’). Th wite&blak Torres Strait Pigeons (Ducula Spilorrhoa) kk-ordn 2 n kopr plark n th 4shr (but kkordn 2 mi berd book thei r korld Torresian Imperial-Pigeon (Duc-ula bicolor)) “have a special relationship with this area often flying in flocks between offshore islands where they nest and the mainland rainforests that are their feeding grounds”. Ths smorl kampsite z vri loe kmpaird 2 th Mission Beach ٱ (& Dunk Isl&) w r → 2moro but nvrthls mostv th vanzr far fansier than owrz. Thei ha-v naimz like ‘Shark Attack’, ‘Lost and Lovin It’, ‘Free Wind’ etc, etc. @ th bote ramp w met a ♂ ← So-uth West Rocks in NSW wer mi & H sor n th yeer 2000. ♂ sed heed nevr liv heer z u kant swim (KR-OKODILEZ) & orl thei do z drink. ♂ z heer now bkoz hiz farthr hooz 63 z dien from CIRRHOSISv th livr. Th komn pijn w r c-n heer z th ◊ Dove (Geopelia cuneata) wchz th smorlst pijn n OZ. Just herd n th nuze th@ th persn hoo woz xkuted in London x plain klothez skuriti ON SUSPSHN of b-n n terrrst woz n Brazlian wth no knkshn 2 th BOMNZ . Hmmm … wot kan u xpkt! M heern 4 th 2nd tiem ths evnn th rpeetd mornfl wailnv th Beach Curlew but wch n mi book z korld Beach Thick-Knee (Esacus mag-nirostris). Monday 25/7/05. Speaking of thick-knees, that thick-head Howard sa-id (14/12. ystrdai hi sed th Cronulla riot whr nli pplv midl eestrn ppeerns wer targtd woznt raesist (15-/12. how eezi 2 rlees this niml (16/12. v meni dsgiezs (17/12. ← ‘Tent Posts’ x MIhCeHnArUiX (c ‘16/-2/04 – 27/2/04’ p8) : “In a highly developed society, its essential for cruelty, hate, and domination, if they want to hold on, to camouflage themselves, taking on the aids of mimicry. Camouflage into opposites is the most common. That’s in fact how those full of hate, claiming to speak solely for others, can best demoralize, suppress, paralyze. Th-at’s the direction from which you’d better get ready to meet them.”)) from its kaej n th SUB KORTX eevn n th moest tolrnt sosieti) butn “quite unacceptable” “outbreak of domestic discord”) today that the incid-ent of the killing (5 bullets) of a Brazilian subsequently found to be uninvol-ved in the London bombings was “not central to the issue” – WRONG John!!. It is THE central issue : when, in a parliamentary democracy where the rule of law and the principle of due process are imbedded in the constitution (7/12. but thei r-ntn th OZ 1), a person can be EXECUTED by unidentified operatives of the state, and the authorities comment on it as “regrettable”, we have ALREADY LOST the war on terror. Still, you’ve got to expect stuff like that from economists and la-wyers. Another one, an associate Prof at a NSW uni was quoted a few days ago in the Courier Mail as saying that we don’t want too many African refugees here as they have low IQs and high testosterone! He is also openly connected with a White Supremacy movement. HoWARd must take full responsibility (7/12. ie dsgree. Th ppl hoo voetd 4 hm shair rsponsblti (8/12. ← 2daez The Age p14: “Tyranny ¶ NO LONG-ER “silent”, the majority in this country have forged for themselves a tyranny. John Stuart Mill, founding father of liberalism, had this to say : “The will of the people … practically means the will of the most numerous or the most active part of the people; the majority, or those who succeed in making themselves accepted as the majority. The people, consequently may desire to oppress a part of their number, and precautions are as much needed against this as against any other abuse of power.” ¶ With the passage of the Industrial Relations and Terrorism legislation, those precautions, to which we have become accustomed in Australia’s liberal society, have now been swept away. ¶ Ni-

9

cholas Low, Warrandyte”).) for unleashing this racist hate-mongering. It would plea-se him no end, I’m sure, to see all the Aussie flags flying in the caravan and mobile home parks we’ve driven past. Today we resumed our crawl north, to Tu-lly, the wettest town in Australia (over 4000 mm of rain/year) whose identifier is a giant gum-boot as you enter the town. Couldn’t find a decent coffee place, so moved on to Mission Beach, which strikes me as quite groovy with its small village and broad beach, fringed by jungle and plenty of coconut palms. John has developed a coconut fixation and finds it hard not to pick up ones that look ready to eat – we now have 9! Had a coffee and shared a Greek salad at a place called, appropriately, Café Coconutz. After a few walks, including one along the beach, we are here again to do the journal. On the way here we did a walk – very jungley, with tall palms of many types, but dominated by the huge leaved fan palms. There are Cassowary warnings here – apparently they can be aggressive. 2nite w ntnd 2 park @ th bote rampn Mission Beach nth hope th@ th sine z u ntr th to-wn wch sez u kant kamp nth 4shr duznt pply 2 bote ramps. Bsidez w r not kampn n n 10t but sleepn n n van. Tz 7.30 & Im O 2 x mi 2nd glars of RUMNKOKE b4 kntnuin reedn WrAoLbSeErRtZ ‘The Walk’ wch Im njoin vri much z I hav th uthr storeez x him. I think yoov put mi n2 a ritr, m8. Yair, drinkn RUM-NKOKE, reedn WrAoLbSeErRt n n jewlie evnn n th sidework, wth H bside mi reedn ‘WOMANS DAY’, mung th KOKONUTZ – wot mor kood u want? Chuzedai 26/7/05. 8.10am @ th ‘early birds coffee sh-op’ (wer u kan get n reel good (n rairiti 4 us so far n QLD) x2 (or x3 th prprietr sed) shot) in Mission B-each wch lredi had kustmrz nt @ 7am. Tz good 2 c H get th HoWARd stuff off her chest. Tz my bleef th@ if th ‘koalishn-of-th-wiln’ had bn jnuin n goin → iraq 2 ridtv Saddam & 2 nstorl dmokrasi (-500,000+ troops wood hav bn rkwired soze not 2 dpnd n th trdshnl klonialst mthdv prmotin 1 f-akshn V nuthr) w woodnt hav bn so dspized x th muslm & arb O. & wile greein th@ zraelz ntg-riti shood b grnteed x th west (7/12. not th@t woodr shoodb trustd x em)(…6.10pm. bkoz urope z owin. 2 werk out how much rl@vli th zraileez ow → plastinianz, th plastinianz ow → ainshnt juze, th y-anx ow → redndianz, karmon-ozeez-karmon ow → brjneez: dvide 4000 x th no v yeerz th 1st haz dsp-ozst th 2nd but 2 werk out how much th ropianz ow th juze 4 th HOLOKORST n dfrnt 4mula haz 2 b u-zed (nsdntli th lithoze hav kalkul8d th xkt no v 000,000,000zv rooblz th rus ow thm from th soviet daz-e)) x alinin ourslvz wth th US kmtmnt wthout n full db8 or n voet ont n oz w hav nvolvd ourslvz n th midl eestrn & muslm poltkl ajndazv th US & Britn (wth its lgasiov n klonial parst n th ٱ ) & n thr termz wen thr woz no need 4 us 2 b nvlvd @ orl. I c n ‘The Courier-Mail’ th@ Jean de Mene-zes woznt gund ↓ ftr b-n vrpowrd & held ↓ n th gO z rportd x n wtns but shot x5 (27/7/05. (9am) now thei sai x8 : 1 n th sholdr & 7 n th hed) n th “head at close range after he reportedly ignored a command to st-op.” Twood hav bn =i llgl if ♂ had bn n trrrst & kowntrprdktv z n pprtuniti 2 gathr vdens wood hav bn lost. If w kum 2 rvew our shift → FASCISM ths evnt wil b cn 2 hav bn n sgnfknt markr. Larst nite w left th bote ramp meedi8li ftr setn ↑ bkoz w dsiedd thr woz no wai w wood b abl 2 rgue our wai outv th no 10ts sine wch woz kleerli rlso aimd @ vanz z u woodnt b abl 2 ↑ n 10t n ashfelt niwai. So w drove th 8 or so kz 2 th karparkv th Licuala → wer rlier w had cn a larj van parkt wth kertnz drorn. Twoz stil thr & faint muzik & drumz wer kumn ← t z w doezd off. Thnt startd pisn ↓ & stil mindfulv MI DREEM & lsov our neiborz hoo wer kleerliv th vriati hoo sleep orl dai & plai drumz etc etc orl nite w left @ 12.30am ← bote ramp wer w nue th tied had peekt z w had kwierd n TIDE CHART durin th dai. 3+ meetr tiedz r sumptn 2 bhold & skairi but w nue w wer saif. I got ↑ @ dorn & woke H not wishn 2 bothr lokl thort-eez eevn tho th ramp z dminstrd x THE STATE not th kownsl. Tiem 4 n KRAP …. (7.15) mucked around finding possible spots to sleep for tonight (found 2), then went on the Kennedy Track (7.8ks return) which was very attractive, going through a vari-ety of habitats (jungle, mangrove, beach, rocks) south from South Mission boat ramp to Kennedy Bay, 2ks from the mouth of the Hull River. Though the day was overcast it was very pleasant. Discovered my toes arent arthritic, but infest-ed by 2 corns, one on each toe, rubbing together. Got corn plasters at South Mi-ssion Beach pharmacy – oh, the indignities of age! No sign of a crocodile or a cassowary yet. Are they mythical creatures thought up by Q’land Tourist Bur-eau for the benefit of giving tourists

10

a frisson of fear? John and I are weighing up the possibilities of going on a $50/head evening boat trip up a creek which is guaranteed, according to the brochure, to put crocs on display. We have to work out if that’s cheating. I m drinkn RUM & KOKE gain & kntnue reedn ‘The Walk’ wth ple-zure & wth n sensv th riterz frjlti, soldariti wth hz vewz, & soro 4 hz prdkmnt & failyr 2 find n ● n th O (& so I rkmnd WrAoLbSeErRt → KABArIaLsAaITĖ (c ‘Vilnius (no 2)’ p10 & ‘Vilnius → Melbourne’ p9-12) n lithol& (kcept ♂ probli haznt bn trnzl8d →2 litho) z shz ntrstd n helpn lesn th prolbmzv thoezn = situashnz (but praps 4 sum thrz no ● (14/12. c ‘11/8/02 – 21/8/02’ p11) & thei knot b helpt ksept x kin-dnss)). Meenwile Hz reedn ‘NEW IDEA’. He can’t get over the fact that I’m a lowbrow at heart. (2/12. He often asks me why I read mags like this – my only explanation is that it’s a girl-thing). Fnsht reedn ‘The Walk’. I kn c why u rkmmddt → mi, thanx. Wnzdai 27/7/05. (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 1st ● 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 thor-tv 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 rfr-ns 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 ab-out 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 2nd 1 so far wch ddnt hav th ping-pong (b-etr 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 nf-nts 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 1st 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 ٱ: tz Garner’s Beach n kupl kz ↑Nv Bingil Bay. W wont getn betr xmplvn tropkl bee-ch 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 Em-erald 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). Tw-oz our 1st klowdls dai n th TROPKL KOAST. Thrzdi 28/7/05. 9.50am @ ‘early berd…’ 4got 2 mnshn ystrdi th@ I woz told x n dutch ♀ @ th parks nkwiree th@ thr wer no KOKONUTZ n OZ wen th 1st se-tlrz rrived but th@ thei prbli floetd ovr x thmslvz. Thsz Oi mplorzbl – thei must hav bn brort x th KAN-AKA laibrrz th erli setlrz brort wthm. Lso neer wer w stopt 4 th nite w had found (n prv8 prprti markt 4 subdvzion → 5 lots) n frsh H2O spring fed lake wth xlnt mossi lake bed 4 ntri but w wer 2 frietnd → swimn n kasev KROKODILEZ (th ejv th mngroev woz nli n fue yardz ← 1 ndv th lake). Nkwiri @ n reelst8jnt rveelz th@ mmeed8 c-fruntj z $700,000+ +d 2 th nrml vluev th prprti just 4 th pzshn. Dspite knstnt rmindrz O th vluev th koastl rain4st (1v th main habt@s 4 Casuarius casuarius n hoom ovr 100 jungl treez dpnd 4 prpg8shn) ovr 60%v wch hazbn kleerd 4 shoogr kane farmn (hujeli sbsdized x th txpayr) wch rlize hevli n larj doeszv frtlizer (leecht soilz) wch dmj th reef, th rmaindr, muchv wchzn prv8 ownrshp, z b-n kleerd @n trmndus r8 4 subdvzion & seln → rzort opr8rz, nvstrz etc. W r spndn sum tiem @ GARNERS BEACH bkoz twontb th same n n fue yeerz tiem. Oyair. Jean Charles de Menezes woz mrdrd x b-n shot 1s n th mowth, x6 n th hed, & 1s n th sholdr z hi lai helpls n th gO x pleesmn. Wlkum → nue O ordr! (17/12. It is manifest in Oz with Revolting Rud-dock’s deportation of two mentally ill men to their countries of birth (Serbia and Turkey) despite the fact that they had both grown up here and have fam-ilies here. The Serb cant even speak Serbian. It shows how far the government and its so-called opposition has declined into inhumanity (n The Age A2 2dai Ray Cassin rvuewn ‘The Wreck of the Batavia ‘ x sLiEmYoSn sez “ …how fragile is the thing we call civilis-ation, …how easily it can unravel, …how

11

quickly fanatics, thugs and charlatans rush to fill the gaps when it does.”)) …. 12.15 @ Garners Beach ovrhung n klaskl TROPK stile x Calophyllum, hibiskus & uthr larj treez. Larst nite I woke 2th soundv waivz braekn neer x (soe I nuetwz hie tied) @ O 3am. Wen I lookt owt th wndo thr wer fos4snt •s glown n th 4st flor. W wer parkt n the ● w had fownd n th rmnnt stripv koastl jungl @ th bakv th beech. Thn I herdn xtrordnri korusv berd korlz wch I ddused wer b-n made x th bu-sh terkeez wch mi berd book sez r Orange-Footed Scrubfowl (Megapodius reinwardt) & wch make: “loud crows, gurgles; often many birds call at once.” Th naikd ♀ (yung) & th horbl naikd old ♂ w sor jewrn th dai ystrdi r not heer so w hav th beech 2 rslvz. Ths mornn @ Mission Beach I bort 3 BLACK SAPOTE 2 riepn n th van. Hav just ritn n kard 2 DI&CrAeSaTRO (14/12. hoo sez thr r 3 waezv leedn sheep kk-ordn 2 th booda : 1) liekn KING (ie. outn frunt); 2) liekn SHEPHERD (wotchn oevr from th sied 4 str-aez & lost 1z); 3) liekn FERRYMAN (ie. taekn m abord liekn soeshl werkr) & LfOrVaEnCkE c/o th St8 LiberiovVic & m O 2 rzume reedn WrAoLbSeErRt. Bkorzv th vri shalo grdientv th oshian & th KROK-ODILEZ hoo liv n th stuari just O th krnr U DONT GO SWIMN. Hz reedn ‘Dragon’s Lair’ x PsEhNaM-rAoNn wch ♀ bort ths mornn @ th newzjnsi. Just so you don’t get the impression I’m in-capable of reading anything but women’s magazines. Penman is described as “an historical novelist of the first rank”. So there! …. 6.20. RUM & KOKE @ KOKONUTZ. N TROPK beech znt TROPK wthout @ leest a hintv 6 (life bgan n th trpks). I woz → O serchn 4 NUTS 4 Hz klkshn wen I got torkn 2 n bloke mi own aij sitn mung sum shrubri @ th topv th beech but ♂ ddnt no wot kind thei wer z ♂ wznt n lokl. Fakt ♂ woz ← Colac n good ole Vic. Az w torkt he took off hiz t-shert & n bit l8r hiz togz & lai bak wth hiz hed on his h&z (see, I keep telling you you’re irrestistible). I siedld → rthr sheepshli but doent feel gilti z l8r I noetst ♂ → parst wth n frnd. Wen H shftd pzshn bkoz owrz wozn shdoe ♀ dsterbd n naikd kupl but ddnt look @m & maid shor I ddnt lo-ok (3/12/05. Ha! To stop him looking I would have had to throw a towel over his head!) @ th yung cuntri ♀ (hoo lookt arabl) whch I ddnt. I fnsht reedn th Walzer book & like him I 2 wood like 2 dvlop mi own lngwj xpt I no Wittgensteinz rite – lngwj z n joint prjkt (‘folie à group’) so Im werkn n sumptn H & n fue frendz mite ndrst& but probli not reed. So it goze. 2moro w r leevn th Miss-ion Beach ٱ & its 20kzv tropkl beechz 4 mor TROPKL beechz ↑N. W njoidt heer & I rkmndt. Th book Im startn, lso lent → mi x Frank, z ‘Fires’ x mYaOrUgRuCeErNiAtRe (hooz ‘Hadrians Memoirs’ I fnsh-dn litl b4 w leftn th trip). W r leevn KOKONUTZ wel b4 9.30 wen th BOOT SCOOTN wth COWBOY C-ARL z due 2 bgin. H sez tz n kind of LION DANSN. Friday 29/7/05. Had our last coffee/pa-per at the “Early Bird” and set off North for Kurrimine Beach where we did a slow walk collecting seeds in the high tide debris. The beach is a spit between the sea and an estuary. The council camping area looked good – nearly empty and only $10 a double /night, but we had a free spot at the far end of a devel-opment area picked out for the night. After a drink at the pub we went to Cow-ley Beach along a back road off which a number of tracks went into forest, opp-osite cane fields. We went to explore one and found it to be an almost contin-uous rubbish dump (old fridges, mattresses, wrecked cars, thousands of smash-ed bottles etc etc) on both sides. When we tried to turn around we got the rear passenger wheel bogged in soft sand. Walked back to the road where, luckily, a young man of islander descent driving a 4x4 stopped and came with us to help drag us out. Cruised round Cowley Beach but decided to go back to Kurrimine for the night. On the way found a nice secluded spot in a “park” where we had tea and did a short fruitless croc-spotting walk. It was sunny and warm all day. How u rmmbr n dai z mainli n m@rv wot u chuez 2 put n or leev out. @ Kurrimine pub H drank-n lemn skwsh & I had x2 glarszv beer wile w gambld wai $1 eechn th 2 msheenzn th bar. Thoze 2 gl-arsz wer posbli th korzv mi por jjmntn trien2 tern th van O n n knfind ٱ mung treez whr eni mstaik woz guna get mi →2 strife. 2 + 2 mi dsmai (I kan heer mstrius berd korlz kumn ← th KROKODILE nfstd ri-vr w r nxt 2) z I got outv th van wch woz bogd @ n diagnl † th trak so I kood c mslf wjnt mung treezn suchn wai twoodb mposbl2 xtrk8 shortv winchnt ↑ x hlkoptr I rialized I mite hav SH@ mslf or fartd or swetd nwairz z I woz knsntr8n (TOTAL FOCUS) n wot th weel woz doin z I woz trien2 rok-n-roelt outv th s& bog but nli getnt deepr ↓. I PUT mi FINGR ↑ mi KRAK not reeli xpktn th werst & pulldt out kuvr-dn SHIT & t smelt

12

ORFUL & I wodld off wth n ♠ & n rolev toilt ppr & vku8d th gut (4 nuthr dvnchrv th same gendre c ‘→ (no 1)’ p1, 13 & ‘→ (no 2)’ p8 (14/12. & vrius dvnchrzv M.M. Mallacoota Man n ‘IN TRANSIT’)) & rubd th soild partzv mi ndrpants & th ffektd partv mi shorts & I WOZ FEELN TERBL just how I rmmbr I uezd2 wen I woz O 5 yeerz old wen I uezd 2 SHIT (17/12. Shit, shite, sb. Not now in decent use. OE. [Teut. Root * skit-.] 1. Excrement from the bowels, dung 1585. b. a contemptuous epithet applied to a man 1508. †2. Diarrhoea, esp. in cattle –late ME. Also vb. trans. and intr.) mslf ftn or maib nli 1s or x2 but th mmri & gilt rm-ain → ths dai. I HAD DUN VRITHN RONG & I pongd evn wen I got →2 th frunt seetv th 4x4v th vri ni-se persn (v KANAKA dsnt I rekn) hoo ddnt terf mi out but drove ← & @@cht nchain 2 mi bak bumpr brakt & pulld us out (z I ←d) no bothr. ♂ had had n dvnchrus dai lredi z rlier 1v hiz dogz (thr wer 2 n th 4x4) had got xited x n KROK drag mark neer wer w r parkt 2nite & 4ln n th rivr & ♂ had jumpt ↓ ftr it →2 KROKODILE NFSTD H2O & got hmslf tangldn fshn line. Wen w → Cowley Beach I chainjd →2 nuthr pairv undeez & →2 mi swimn trunks & washt th DERTI ietmz n n h&baisn n th toilt. Then I wa-sht mi BUM (17/12. Bum sb. 1. ME. [?Cf. BUMP sb., etc. Perh. echoic. Not a contr. of ‘bottom’.] The posteriors. Also transf. 2. colloq. Short for BUMBAILIFF; (like F. cul for pousse-cul) 1691.) wth th faiswshr & thn th faiswshr wth sope z H had xplaind 2 mi 2 do (having had 5 children I knew what was necessary!). Piti, z I had strtd out reel kleen z @ Kurrimine I had hadn orlovr woshn th c n th NUDDI. Orlz wel th@ ndz wel but! X th wai th ● wer w r @ znot reeli n park butz korld so bkoz Mr Joseph Francis McCutch-eon don8dt “To the Residents of the Johnstone Shire for Recreational Purposes in 1947”. I hav givn u ths kkount n ful grfk dtail bkozt haz bn mi prakts 2 rkord COINCIDENCE & u karnt do betr than BOG yrslf justz u BOG yer kar. 7.50pm @ McCutcheon Park offn ded nd trak off th gravl bak rd ← Kurrimine → Cowley Beach. 2moro I startn nue jrnl. S@rdi 30/7/05. N th TROPKS th mornnz doe-nt start wth n xplozionv sound zthei doo ↓S wer u get ggrg8nzv th same speeseezv berds suchz mg-pize, kroze, kookburruz. U get th 10t@v korlv 1 thn nuthr kmpleetli dfrnt berd 0v wch I m aibl 2 dntfy xpt th Oriolez both vrieteezv wch I think (thei r hgh n th treez) r heer: Yellow Oriole (Oriolus flavo-cinctus) & Olive-backed Oriole (Oriolus sagittatus) bothv wch hav vntrlkwl mlodius voisz. Tho WrA-oLbSeErRt sez th serch 4 novl xpriens z n sinev shaloness I hadn nue 1 ths mornn (tz 7.55am): I 8 2-vth 4 BLAK SAPOTE I had bkoz thei wer perfktli ripe. U wait til th frutez so soft th@ tz hard not 2 po-ke yor fingr →2t. N ths kndshn th skinz n blochi yelowsh brown. U kut t n ½ & skupe ↑ th flesh wth n spoon. Tz dfkult not 2 get yr h&z & fase smeerd wth wot looks like SHIT (same kulr & taistsv przrvd d-8s) & wen wiept wth tshuze make thm look zif yoov bn2 th toilt. I rks mi reedrz (I doent rite 4 ntljnt pe-epl (21/12. Louis (c ‘Melbourne → Sydney’ p3) kaem 3rd n th NSW HSC rzults skorn 99.9) z ntljns z th kpasti 2 mit8 & folow drkshnz 4 wch thei r lredi prporshntli rwordd wth $$$z x sosieti but 4 thoze hoo r por @ foloewn xmpl & pai th prisev not findn n ● n th O) 2 xuze mi 4 mi lakv delikasi n mi serch 4 prs-izion. H ddnt want2 tais tit z ♀ duznt like TROPKL frute ♀ sed (had it once before and its way too rich and sicky sweet) …. Ovrnite ● ↑N → Mourilyan →E → Mourilyan Harbour ↑N → Etty Bay (sumv th best jungl bakdrop 2 a smorl kove Iv cn; huje calophyllums) →W & ↑N →Innisfail (-ppr, shopt (bortn sharpnnstoen), drank n beer) →NE → Flying Fish Point ↑N → Ella Bay (6 kampn si-tes spaist ovr ½ k or so (ie eech vri prv8) n dens jungl; w r here 4 th nite; rainjr kumz 1s / week; 5.20-pm). Mslainia : ther r 2 kindzv KROKS nOZ : Freshwater (Crocodilus johnstoni) & th dredd mneetr, Estuarine (Crocodilus porosus) wchz th reezn u nevr c niwan swimn n th koast wchz a big ▼ H sez. Nlike th +z n TV wer th c H2O z shownz kristl kleer & v n merld or zure kulr tz terbd & sumtiemz brow-n like Yarra H20. Thsz korzd x th hgh (3+ metrz) tiedz (@ Kurrimine I fotode n wornn sine xktli llustr8n mi H2O dreem wch n 3 krtoon stile piks showdn famli b-n kut off x rizin H2O on n →) chernn ↑ mud n th mngroev ٱ z. Thoez TV +z r FAKED x th H2O shots b-n taikn far out @ c n kral @olz but th NUBI-LE (17/12. Nubile, a. 1642 {ad. L. nubilis, f. nubere to marry, or a. F. nubile] 1. Of females : Marriageable. 2. Of age : Ad-mitting of, suitable for, marriage 1831. Hence Nubility 1813.) SORT u c runn →2 th H2O z no FAKE. Th ♀ w sor ystrdi @ Garners Beach had hr PUBIK (17/12. Pubes. 1570. [L. pubes, -is.] 1. The pubic hair. 2. The hypogastric region, which in the adult becomes covered with hair 1682. 3. Zool.and Bot. = next 2, (Bot. The soft down which grows on the leaves and stems of many plants; the character or condition of being pubescent 1760) 3.(Zool. The soft down which oc-curs on certain parts of various animals, esp. insects 1826) 1826) HAIR trimd →2 n ‘l&n strip’. Lso Iv reelized th-@ th ● O th kornrv th roks wer I met th ♂ ← Colac mustb nmeetn ٱ 4 gaiz (17/12. Gay. M.E. [a. F.gai; of

13

unkn. etym.] A. adj. 1. Full of or disposed to joy and mirth; light-hearted, exuberantly cheerful, sportive, merry. b. Airy, off-hand. JOHNSON †c. Applied to women, as a conventional epithet of praise – 1802. 2. Addicted to social pleasures and dis-sipations; often euphem. : Of immoral life 1637. 3. Bright or lively-looking, esp. in colour; brilliant, showy ME. 4. Showily dre-ssed. Now rare. ME. 5. Brilliant, attractive, †Formerly also of reasonings, etc. : Specious. 1529. †6. Excellent, fine – 1593. 7. dial. In good health 1855. ¶ 1. This Absolon. . jolif was and g. CHAUCER. b.G. indifference 1779. c. The learned man hath got the lady g. SHAKS. Phr. The gay science (= Pr. gai saber): the art of poetry. 2. Is this that Haughty, Gallant, G. Lothario ROWE. Euphem. Two sisters – both g. 1825. 3. Costumes g. with ribbons 1870. Dressed in his gayest 1842. 4. Women .. sell their soules and bodyes to go g. BARCLAY. 7. I don’t feel very g. (mod.)). Ths leedz mi drktli → tpkv mi ntestnl prolbm wch I now think woz korzd x th SALAMI Im eetn wch I bort @ Charters Towers & wchz ternn green from th air pokts n t. I like th taistvt th@ wai & mi theeri wil b testd 2nite z Iv eetn plenti morvt. Th 2 BLACK SAPOTE prvied n nprdktbl +shn 2 posbltee-z. Not 2 wurri but - shoodn ksidnt b mmnnt Il just run strait → th c wch I kan c (z w sit n th bak BUMp-rv th van) thrue th jungl n fue yardz ↓ us. N krikt haz startd chrupn & Im goin ↓ 2 th H2Oz ej. Hz reedn ‘Mammoth. Book One : Silverhair’ x Stephen Baxter (“a stunning talent”). Wen ♀ fnshz reedn n book ♀ leevzt n n publk ● wth th werdz “read me and pass me on” ritn n th flie-leef. ♀ duzt soze2 dscharj hr jewti z n lbrairian. Sleep wel. ☼di 31/7/05. Larst nite w wer wotchn n fierfli hooz litez blinkt n n off liken airplainz went flue. Ths mornn I puld n tieni tik ← Hz mdrf. 2dai O 9.15am w → th long tropkl beech wch lookt like sumptn outv ‘Treasure Island’ or ‘Kidnapped’ 2wordz th nxt hedl& ↑N. Thsz th wetst bitv koastlinen OZ wch meenz tz z TROPKL z u kan get. Rite @ th startvth → I got 2 c n pairv Yellow-bellied Sunbirdz (Nectarinia jugularis) wchr komn but Iv nvr cn em b4. N@chrli w ha-dn SWIM N TH NUDDI (17/12. Nude. 1531. [ad. L. nudus.] A. adj. 1. Law. a. Of statements, promises etc. : not for-mally attested or recorded. b. Of persons, esp. n. executor : An executor, etc., in trust 1590. 2. Naked, bare; without cover-ing; devoid of furniture or decorations 1866. b. Of the human figure, etc. : Naked, undraped 1873. 1. a. N. contract or pact : a bare contract or promise, without any consideration. 2. b. The medals .. bear .. on their obverse side th n. bust of that Empress 1879. B. sb. 1. A nude figure in painting or sculpture 1708. 2. With the. The undraped human figure; the representation of this in the arts 17-60. B. The condition of being undraped. 1856. 2. Modern chalk drawings, studies from the n. BROWNING.) Swimnn H2O th kulr of th Yarraz skairi z u thinkv sharks so u doent stain 4 long. Faktz I havnt cn ny1 n th H2O z longz Iv bn & Iv nli bn n x3. Th moodv th beech woz maid mor xotk x th fakt th@t haz not yet bn vrrun x KOK-ONUT PARMZ wch havn habtv skweezn out th casuarinaz & trashn up th hedv th beech. & yes!!! O 1½ hrz → beech lookn →2 n LAGOON bhined th beech I sor mi 1st CROCODILUS POROSUS sitn n n log n th midlv th LAGOON butz I moeshnd 2 H 2 kum ovr it ●d mi & slid →2 th H2O. Twoz n xmplv how lert thei r probli bkoz wen thei rnt thei get eetn x bigr KROKS. I woz vri xited havn n th parst (c ‘-GULF TRIP’: “02.09.97 FRAGILE DON’T DROP ¶ Dere + Rew, ¶ I don’t care being out of focus now that I know its caused by me being in a paralill universe and I admit I am unfocussed cauze Im lazy and lack consintrashin. And I can hack bein irresponsible and havin an infantile personality especially as I am having a great time anyway but I worry about bein a burden on society so when I get back to Melbourne I am goin to get councilling (how the fuck do you spell that) as long as its at the taxpayers expense and totally free + no strings attached. It’s the first step (+ necessary one). I take this step of putting meself in the hands of the caring profession as long as the councillar is between fifteen and twenty three (them being the legal age) and STARK NAKED for the duration of the sessions. She mu-st be good lookin too of course. In fact I DEMAND to be councilled. ¶ Give my regards to the Lil Chile, tell him that Cloncurry + district is a great area for him to start his hub cap collection. Tell him too that yesterday I sprung 3 krokodills of the freshwater variety and they woz all movin towards the water like greezed lightnin and were disconcertingly big – my size in fact. Id just had a dip for a wash in another pool in the Leichhart River. Power to the Prof. ¶ Burke and Wills roadhouse on the way to Normanton. a …z”) nli cn CROCODILI JOHNSTONI & I kood tel th dfrns strait wai. N4tun8li H nevr got 2 c t. Tz hard 4 mi 2b knfdnt O th lenthvt (wen u mzure th lenthvn snaik tz lwaiz shortr thant lookt ppl sai) but I rekn 5 ft z klose. N ← I had nuthr dipn th c & w wer bak just wen tlookt zift mite start rainn. But wev nli hadn bitv drizl. Th ROMANCE of th → woz dmnsht x th sprizin kwantiti v jagd peeszv BROKEN GLA-SS, mostli brokn stubeez, stikn ↑ outv th s& spshli @ th hgh H2O mark. Twoz ftn raizr sharp nlike ↓S wer th ej gets worn wai x th larj serf wch u doent get heer. 4get th rmantk nitetiem → x moonlite, & ev-n goin 4 n swim prznts n dainjr. So far the GLASS haz bn th most dainjrus thing wev kum † n th TRO-PKS. …. Im kumn 2 th knvkshn th@ mYaOrUgRuCeErNiAtRe znot th orthr hooz goin 2 rkndl mie ntr-

14

st n reedn wch I doent think I want rkndld niwai …. 7.25. Th rain haz setn. W r kooptn th van. Radio sez min. temp. 4 2nitez 19°. Hz reedn. Rlier n th evnn ♀ sed ♀ felt like n RUM & KOKE. ♀z n bit ↓. W greev 4 sumv our kidz hoo kant find n ● n th O wch sewtsm. ♀ 1drz wotzt orl O. (Pisn ↓). Sum thingz just doent make sens. N th SUPERMARKT nInnisfail thei r seln KOKONUTZ 4 $1.80 eech wen th O dstrktz litrd wthm & u kan pik ↑ z meni z u want 4 FREE. 2dai wv bn ON THE ROAD (Jack Kerouak – Iv red th book) 4 n O munth. Mundi 1/8/05. Raind n&off orl nite sumtiemz hevli. ← @ Innisfail w red th ppr vri slowli @ Il Fiorentino whr mie x2 shot mug of l@é kost $4.30. @ leest thei no how 2 maken deesnt kofi heer. If u want 2b shor u r torkn 2n loakl tork 2 sum1 hoo looks talian. Red n th ppr th@n th home cuntri thei r goin2 lok up muzlm ♀z if thei r kort warin n berka (tz so huemid Im swetn tho Im sitn heer NAIKID; th waivz r braikn 20mtrs wae (H haz chekt th tied chart); tz 7.50pm; w r n Russel National Prk O 10kz ↑Nv Bramston Beach (wer Iv bn b4 (c ‘GULF TRIP’) ftr dvise fromn lokl hoo told us 2 gnor th 4x4 sine (I waiddn fue pudlz 2 chek th fermns & dpth) n n veri kosi ● n jungl rite nxt 2 be-ech s&; I sor a fue Orange Footed Scrubfowl (Megapodius reinwardt) neer x.) L8r w bort n mbrla bk-ozt woz rainn kntnuousli. H rang th kidz n Melb: Michaelz OK; Joe kntnuze hiz drivin lesnz (21/12. got hiz liesns larst week) wth Ben; K8 & Dan r fine. Th ppr haz orlv QLD n n rain ٱ & w r n th epi• vt 4 th nxt 4 daiz @ leest & I rekn twil b n O week b4t kleerz this ٱ f @ orl (but tz not rainn now). W doent no wot 2 do n thoez kndshnz so w potrd O town – chekt out th op-shop; bort n peesv fsh fromn rkmndd fshop & tho twoz Spansh Makrl twoz good & not @ orl drie. Rlier H had sed I mite z wel giv up trien 4 good fsh n th tropkl koast. I woent bor u wth n kkountv th lnthi dskshnz Iv hadn th subjkt wth vrius fsh-mungrz nkludin th main splierv frsh fsh n Innisfail but f u r reeli ntrstd u kan arsk mi wen w r bakn Mel-b. Then w setldn @ th Imperial Tavern wer H dm&d n RUM & KOKE (1) & plaid th pokeez ($1). So di-d I. Th rain eezd mid rvo so w → Eubenangee Swamp (short →) & → Bramston Beach (wer w had t vrlookn th beech @ th bote ramp n bit ↓S) → here (vri groovi ●; neerst bigr townz Babinda. Wn w got heer w dskvrd w r just O outv H2O but f w run short w hav 6 leetrzv milk & 7 KOKONUTZ eech wth sum KOKONUT MILK. Now th@ w both hav mbrlaz w kan go 4 →s heer 2moro. Chuzedai 2/8/05. 5.-50pm & rainn stedli. Th soundv waivz braikn, ntrmitnt hevi rain, gustsv wind shaikn H2O off th vrhang-n branchz ↓ roofv th van rite thru th nite trigrd meni dreemz 0v wch I rmmbr n dtail. I woz wuriin O our shortjv drinkn H2O & 1drn O th 10kzv rode ←2 Bramston Beach. But t held up wel b-n s&i & ftr n → ths mornn w → Babinda. I 1td H 2 c t bkoz I had liektt so much wen I woz heer 8 yeerz goe (7/12. soe now ie kwoet 2 letrz ← ‘GULF TRIP’ : “DUGONG FACING EXTINCTION 13.09.97. ¶ Doktor, there is an argument going on the radio at the moment, I am told, whether Babinda or Tully is the wettest to-wn in Australia. Last year it was Innisfail which is between the two. Doesn’t matter : the footpaths on the main street of Babinda are wide and its all under verandah. I am writing this at a sidewalk table and should be able to report on the hamburger later. The sugar cane train cuts across the main street every 5 minutes only 50 yards away. It goes to the crushing factory which is the main employer here. The factory is huge, a ‘satanic mill’, or something transported or deposited here from east Germany or Slovakia. I checked it out this morning. It has a main stack belching out a continuous churning cl-oud of steam and various other vents in the building huff and puff smaller clouds at intervals. IT’S BE-AUTIFUL. It is responsible for this being a normal town. NOT A RESORT. Unlike Palm Cove, Trinity Beach, Port Douglas. I havent seen a single person wearing gym boots with white socks. And there are half-castes here. No town in QLD looks right to me now if it hasn’t got its aborigines. In bigger to-wns like Mareeba they occupy the public areas from early morning and boy have they got style! The sneers on their faces, their resentment of the white man’s dollar, their enslavement to alcohol marks their faces and their entire physiques with character. It ensures that their emotional lives are intense and contributes to their beauty. How insipid the TOURISTS of the RESORTS look by comparison. Coming into BABINDA after a string of pretentious coastal resorts restores my self-confidence. Pe-ople don’t stare at me as if I am from another planet just because I am not neat and clean. Municipal authorities don’t try to hound me into caravan parks that in Port Douglas are choked with tourists at $15/night (14/12. now tz $25 4n npowrd siet). In the resorts the owners of the parks are councillors and they spend their meetings nutting out strategies to force you into their parks whether you like it or not. There are only 5 of us in a spacious municipal park here and its FREE. It says you can stay for 2

15

nights but the guy who puts in the toilet rolls says you can prop indefinitely. The rolls arent under lock and key. And yes, there is a shower there although I prefer to use the beautiful stream that runs along one boundary which is running well as you would expect in the wettest part of Australia; and the water is crystal clear. There is a guy in the park with his wife and 2 kids and he has a huge gut and I think they might be roadies. A bloke Ive been talking to has a crippled leg and a cockatoo that talks in his caravan (I thought it was his wife at first) which is 30 years old and that will outlive him he says but he will pass it on to his granddaughter in Dubbo, he says, cause she likes it. He had an old navy blue fal-con and its UNREGISTERED and his caravan is held together only by the rust and the peeling paint-work. He cant move for the time being. He has a dog too. He knows all the free parks (including one not far away near Tully) and he NEVER pays. You got to respect a guy like that. Last night I was ya-cking to a german cyclist who had earlier asked me where you pay to be here. He has been cycling for 12 months around the country and taken about 3000 photos for his art work. Both of us have spe-nt the morning in the township checking it out separately but comparing notes when we meet. We ap-pear to share a common attitude to tourist resorts. I gave him a coconut for his tea last night as he cant carry them on his bike. (Ive got a weeks supply in the car). He spent a lot of time in ‘A.C. Mellick Draper and Mercer’ which is a kind of opportunity shop. He is riding back to Cairns this arvo because tomorrow night he is going to a ‘Midnight Oil’ concert. You should see the pub here; it has a cigarette vending machine covered in rust and which looks 100 years old. There are two pinball machines; po-ker machines where you can play 1c at a time by putting in $1 for 100 credits. Its walls are covered with film promo posters as old as the ones in the Hollywood Palace. It has a barmaid who is a bit of a hard tart but she’s still a looker. In the resorts they hire pretty people who are often foreign tourists themselves or who look as if they have a degree in the visual arts. There is a BARBER SHOP here, not a ‘hair dresser’ or a ‘hair stylist’. There is a picture theatre with old fashioned billboards that look just like the one I used to go to in Sale in Gippsland when I was a kid. ‘Con Air’ is showing with John Cage and Nicholas Cusack. Quite a few of the shopfronts are empty and have ‘To Let’ signboards in them but apparently the towns population is increasing. Problem is that its only 60ks from Cairns and 30 from Innisfail and people like to drive to a supermarket for their shopping even though every other kind of shop is here in the single main street, even a bicycle repair shop which also sells some fresh fruit and has a small lending library of paperbacks. Its run by a 91 year old woman who still does some of the repairs herself; shes had the shop since 1948. She has a kid come in for the harder rep-airs. I think she cant be bothered getting rid of her old papers and magazines as about ½ th cubic space of the shop is taken up by them and they are covered in half a century of dust and grime. The guy who runs the hardware shop next door (one of two in town) assures me she does do business with the cycling kids of the town. I went to the hardware shop because I had to buy some thin string to hang my pack off the ground on the Hinchinbrook walk as the very same rodents that gnaw holes thr-ough coconuts will also gnaw right through a tent or a backpack if they can smell food inside. Goan-nas are also a problem they say. I am a bit apprehensive as a 7-day pack is my limit and assumes I don’t have to carry water but a woman I met today tells me that the streams can be dry at this time forcing walkers to carry water on the way. Maybe I was too ambitious by making my arrangements for a week. They only let 40 campers on the island at any one time and the waiting time can be up to 6 months so I was lucky to get on at all. For $100 it’s a cheap walk ($20 to parks, $38 for Cardwell fer-ry, $35 for Lucinda ferry and back to car at Cardwell). Ive just had the hamburger, mate, and it was huge; $3.70 with the lot; the bun came from the baker 3 doors away (right next to the sugar cane trai-nline); I recognized it cause I bought ½ doz. buns there this morning to replenish my own supplies. I enclose the paper serviette which came with it as a present for lil chile. Ive underlined BABINDA in red on the map that is on it. I suggest he keep it for his geog assignment as little kids always have to learn the wettest towns in Australia. Now tell me, can you think of a better thing to do than eat a truly great hamburger in BABINDA, with the cane trains choofing by every 5 minutes on a sultry tropical day surrounded by mountains covered in lush tropical vegetation, and everyone who walks by nodd-ing and saying hullo? When I told the lady in the clothes shop she said “that’s a nice thing to say”. Or would you prefer to sun-bake at Palm Cove (tourism is full of ‘coves’) and then have a glass of wine

16

with your gourmet foccaccia at the beach front boutique restaurant; in the evening, dinner by candle-light overlooking the ‘plage’? This morning I walked right around the outskirts of BABINDA looking at the gardens. I have become infatuated by the aromas of the tropical jungle (Cape Trib.) and I kept sniffing the flowers that hang across the fences. If Lyn really does decide to grow an aromatic garden as she said I think she will be demonstrating that she is prepared to live with a substitute that is awf-ully inferior to the real thing. And I guess she knows what the real thing is because don’t they have a tropical jungle in Sychelles where you guys have been on holidays? Ive changed my attitude to gard-ens – better than waste time on an imitation, go to the real thing. Nevertheless I did walk past a gra-pefruit tree near the crushing mill and it smelt great as all citrus trees do; I suppose they grow better in Melbourne than here as its too wet here for them really. There was an elderly woman working in the garden of the parish church whom I judged to be a nun in civvies as there is a convent nearby and she had an irish accent. The church and the parish and the convent are called St Ritas. St Rita was an Italian mother of two sons. When their father was murdered the sons swore to spend their lives searching for the killer to avenge the father. Their mother prayed that they would not take a hu-man life in vengeance and they didn’t as both died in the next year or two anyway. So she joined a convent, Augustine I think, where she spent the rest of her life and where she “saw Jesus often” acc-ording to the nun. It seemed sad to me that the nun should live a cloistered life in the hope of “seeing Jesus” when, according to her own beliefs, she is going to ‘see him’ after she dies anyway. Or is she not so sure of the afterlife? The altar of the church is very plain, like a protestant church. I felt grateful to have the opportunity to pray for everyone but especially (as always) for my derelict and god-forsak-en son – Luke. It is the unfairness of Luke’s situation that has turned Helen into an atheist. God, relig-ion, does he exist or not, these are non-issues as far as Im concerned. Boring stuff. On the way out I crossed myself with the holy water from the font; I wanted to physically assert my membership of the community of worshippers, however oblique or distant it be. Tourist buses do drive down the main str-eet of Babinda on their way to the Babinda Boulders 5 kilometres away. Q.L.D. is full of tourist buses. They have sold their souls to that industry. But I guess that tomorrow (or later today) I’ll go and have a look at them myself. There is a beach to the east of here that tourists also go to. Why do they find those kind of ‘things’ more interesting than this kind of town? Strange and I don’t know the answer. Its lucky for me but, and its FREE! ¶ P.S.¶ 1. St Rita lived in the 14th Century. ¶ 2. There is a ‘Hair Stylist and Studio’ for women in the main street (just noticed).¶ 3. There is a sporting and recreation area (polo club, rugby field, and more) which is very well maintained and provides an alternative place for me to prop just as I sometimes do in ‘recreation reserves’ in Victoria. ‘Resorts’ are woefully short of such amenities except for the golf course that invariably goes for miles. ¶ 4. There is a hospital here and a library and an Olympic length swimming pool. Towns of this size hardly ever have a full length pool I was told. There is probably no amenity missing except a supermarket of the modern style. ¶ There are some dark skinned asian people here including the family that own the shop. They might be part aboriginal or Torres Strait Islanders. The people in this shop are beautifully gracious in their manner. Compare that to the Brunswick Street jargon of ‘enjoy’ or ‘bon appetit’.¶ a …z”. & “15.09.97 McDonalds BEFORE THE FLOOD ¶ Doktore, at the risk of interrupting your train of thought (but then its so long since I last writ ya) I want you to imagine a tropical night where the temperature is neither hot nor cold but just ‘shorts and singlet’ right. You are conscious that out in the night there is a cloud capped mountain overlooking the town – Mt Bartle Frere, the highest peak in Q.L.D. You are in a main street flanked by wide footpaths covered by a continuous veranda on both sides of the strip. A hundred yards away or so to your left you can see a group of people, mostly young (Torres Strait, or Kanaka types) seated at sidewalk tables outside the ‘Snacks and Eatery’ joint. More precisely you are standing in the doorway of the pub. It is BABINDA. You are holding a stubby of XXXX in your hand. The rain is teeming down. Its perfect except for one thing: its not you but me that’s out there and I don’t have to imagine it because I was there last night and will be again tonight. So it goes! This morn-ing I was talking to a guy from Cairns at the free Council run caravan park I am at which says you can prop for 48 hours but the council worker says it can be forever. Anyway this dude confirmed many of the impressions Id already formed for my-self. The caravan park owners association are trying to close down a similar place to this 40ks north of here at Gordonvale. Apparently they are good at conscripting the media and local politicians. They target several of these rest areas each year

17

and if they succedd in closing one then they target the one next door the following year. The Councils are resisting them and an association of campervan owners is also learning how to mount a campaign. But the park owners are very powerful here as QLD, especially north of Cairns, is run by the tourist industry. Park owners often become councillors too. At Gordon-vale they were coming into the rest areas with cameras and photographing everyone there each day and if you were there more than the 48 hours official limit they were taking the photos to the council officials and demanding that they kick you out. It is worth remembering that these council run rest areas were in existence long before the tourist industry took over and before the private caravan parks were even set up. Same thing happens at ends of wharves, favourite propping spots for me. The wharves are usually run by port authorities who build them and who couldn’t give a shit where you spend the night especially as they are far away in the main city of the region. But at Daintree village the local private caravan park ow-ner came over and pretended that he had the authority to make me shift. So as not to rock the boat I shifted to the public area by the council chambers – there was nowhere else (20/12. but c ‘Tropica - 2’). The more of a resort a place is the more this sort of thing holds true – and remember, in Q.L.D. the forestry admin tell you that you cant camp in state forest, the opposite to the way it is in other states. It is in ways like this that the tourist industry corrupts whatever it touches. I bet that the week that I am spending on Hinchinbrook Island in the near future for an all up cost of $100 will cost triple that am-ount after the fancy resort is built there that the greenies are trying to stop unsuccessfully (apparently there are dugong in the seagrass that is being damaged by the building). German backpackers will be more than happy to pay $300 as at that rate it will still seem cheap to them. So it goes! This morning I went to the roadside ‘serve yourself’ fruit stall where I had bought a paw paw for 50cents yesterday. It was delicious. Ive discovered that tropical fruit has to be eaten soon after its picked if you are to get the subtle taste. Aft-er storage much of the taste is gone even though the texture is retained. When you come here, try a caimito, especially the purplish variety. Anyway the guy who runs the stall arriv-ed and he was anxious I try his bananas as he was interested in my verdict, so I had to eat a plantain banana (starchy, good for cooking, and the normal one used in Africa etc where they always cook em) then he got me to eat one of his cavendish bananas (the normal com-mercial variety here) which is very sweet and finally I had to eat one of the new goldfinger variety which has recently come here from Honduras. Then because he didn’t have a small paw paw he gave me a cantelope sized one which he said was perfect to eat today. He grows all his fruit organically and wouldn’t take more than 50cents for the lot even though I know he sells the large paw paws for $2 each. Great for me as I wont be able to take any fruit on-to Hinchinbrook Island because of the weight seeing as my 7-day pack is about as much as I can carry anyway. That’s the kind of friendliness Ive come to take for granted. What I want to stress to you, Doktore, is that this is not a case of me seeing everything at BABINDA throu-gh rose-coloured glasses simply because I am in a good mood (14/12. but now iem c-n vrithn thruen glars darkli & 1drn ftz th O r just mi. DRUaMlMeOcND sezn such kaesz flap yor rmz reel farst & f u fli-e wae u no yor dreemn.) Every traveller Ive talked to keeps referring to the friendliness of the people in the town. That seems to be why the others are in the council park here with me, alth-ough the fact that its free helps. Now when I bought a cup of coffee for $2.75 at a sidewalk table in Port Douglas where each table had a sort of lantern on it the girl there was very nice too. But youd have to be dead to human values if you couldn’t pick the difference in the kind of ‘niceness’ and there was no discount. Port Douglas has won the tidy towns award and private camp accomodation for an unpowered site is $15 and it is not a feel good place for the likes of me. I don’t cultivate the tidy look so favoured by the Japs at all. Not that the Japs are highly visible there; they hang out at special resort accomodation within the resort and get ferried about in buses from which they are not allowed to get off for more than a few minutes at a time anyway. When they are on the golf course you cant see them because they is so far away – the course goes on forever. Things are glitzy and cheap in an expensive kind of way at Port Douglas. So it goes! I have written these notes at Bramston Beach which is a nice spot but am going back to Babinda tonight because I want another session at the pub and because I intend to buy a hamburger if Ive got any room left after Ive eaten the paw paw. I have to eat the paw paw today as tomorrow I am going to Cardwell from

18

where the ferry takes me to Hinchinbrook and between here and Cardwell (near Mission Beach) they confiscate all fruit because of the papaya fly controls. Hope they don’t spot the weeks supply of coconuts Ive got hidden behind the plastic boxes. I don’t know if coconuts grow south of here. Also tonight from BABINDA Im ringing home to wish Joe a happy birthday and to talk to Helen. I know they are all together as its his 21st. Truth and Justice! A …Z. ¶ p.s. regards to Rudi, Lynne, and Danny Cas-minus in case he does-n’t get the card Ive sent him. ¶ p.s. don’t know if Ill be able to take a walk on the beach as there is a gale bl-owing and intermittent showers.”). 0 much haz chainjd & th FREE kownsl kampn parkz stil FREE. W d-dnt → th Boulders or Josephine Falls ← Innisfail bkoz th hevi & kntnuous drizl maidt mposbl 2 evn c th mountinz. @ Babinda w → th main st & browzd n th op-shop. ← nInnisfail w rpeetd ystrdeez root-een dzined 2 filn th dai juern wcht ddnt stop rainn 4n mnit. Red th ppr n n dfrnt kofi shop wer I paid $4.00 4n x2 shot l@é. Shoptn COLES SUPERMARKT wer, thanx2 th talian nfluens, u kan get reel SALAMI (cacciatore, veneto, sorpressa) & CIABATTA bred (uthrwiez u hav 2 eet taistls OZZIOZZI-OZZI (14/12. OIOIOI thei showtd) bred 4 ppl wv no teef) wch I bort. Rang mum n Sydney (ystrdai Joe had sed n KROKODILE wood b n suetbl TOTEM 4 mi; th larst tiem I met him ♂ sed I wozntn shairer – wotz ♂ on O? but ♂ rkst H 2 pars hiz ♥ → mi) 2 rsk her O her ktrkt pr8shn & twozn big skses. ← Imp-erial Tavern 4 RUM & KOKE (H x1, mi x4) & 2 plai th POKEEZ. Then → Ella Bay (7/12. c botm riet kornrv kuvr map @ G) 2 th same ● w wer @ nite b4 larst. Th rain stopt 4 long nuf 2 low us 2 heet ▲n supe & hav nbite 2 eet 4 t b4t set n gain & drove us →2 th van & tz peltn ▼ gain. Thingz r getn sogi nside but thrz 0 w kan doo O t & therz x2 mor daizvt kkordn 2 th ppr. Thrz no • n → Atherton Tablela-ndsz tz justz raini ther & koldr. Hz reedn ‘The Anvil of Ice’ x Michael Scott Rohan (“a very good and a very powerful writer”) & Im O 2 hav nuthr krak @ YmOaUrRgCuEeNrAiRtZe ‘Fires’ tho shz far 2 ‘liter-ary’ 4 mine & mostv her klaskl lluzionz go ↑ mi hed. Oyair, I bort nuthr peesv SPANSH MAKARL from Pete’s Fish Shop n th kornrv th main stripv (same • z ystrdi) Innisfail & twozn larj filt & taisti & JUICY like th larst 1. I rkmnd Pete’s Fish Shop 2 th Ov OZ & 2 orl mi reedrs O th O O eevn tho SPANSH M-AKARLz th nli kindv fsh thei serv. Bon apetit. Wnzdi 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 qual-ity)) → Babinda Boulders (5kz westv Babinda (“Town of Umbrellas”)) → Murdering Point (so call-ed because in the 1870s small vessels used to put in at King Reef, where an ab-origine 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 host-ile and aggressive to what appeared to them to be invaders. Dungaree was eve-ntually 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 ‘Tropi-cal 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 Au-stralian Tropical Christmas. The delicate indulgence of vanilla oak in this velvety-smooth dessert styled wine will give the dr-inker the fantasies of a rich Tropical Christmas all year round”; bhind th wineri thrzn larj tri loded ↓ wth kmuenl n-stsv 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 Livingsto-ne Creek) → Mena Creek (maijr 2rst @rakshn (so w ddnt go) ‘Paronella Park’ zneer x) → South Joh-nstone (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 b-n n th TROPKS f u kant drink yor DRAGON FRUIT wine n n mpti beech n th MOONLITE? Thrzdi 4/8/05. Th prolbm wth rain zt 4sz u →2 th 2rst beet. U → from ● (m-arkt az *z n th vri xlnt FREE tairoff mapsv Tropical North Queensland) → ● 2 feechrz sumv wch r mor

19

ntrstn than uthrz but lwaiz drievn n lot & uezn plentiv petrl. Insdntli ppl hoo r seln stuf no th@ th 1st ru-lev good sailzmnshp z 2 nevr stop torkn. Wv drunk ⅔dzv th botlv DRAGON FRUIT (n fue daiz bakn th rode ← Cowley Beach w sorn plntaishnv wot lookt like 10ft hgh KAKTS plants wch wv lernt z wot thei gro n) ystrdi evnn wch mai hav kntrbuted 2 n vri dreemfl nite. I dremt I woz blundrn O n n worm dark nite maikn shor not 2 stepn th numerus poiznus SNAIKS I kood just dsern orl O mi feet. Then I dremt how th knskwnsz of EVIL travl thru th BODY HUMAN & HISTORY like n nstoppbl waiv (Hitlr me-rdrz jwz → jwz dspozs plastnianz → muzlmz h8 west 4 sportn zrael (& nvaidn rark) → muzlmz blo ↑ t-rainz n wstrn kaptlz → w h8 muzlmz & trchr (kkordn 2 Amnesty International thei sai n th nuze ths a-m) em etc → muzlmz h8 us mor → O) or SHOAH (but I prefr 2 thinkvtzn waiv bkozt haz peeks & trofs but kntnuze →). Hoo wil b th nxt VIKTIMZ bsidez th bvius muzlmz (& thoze hooz 6ualti znt th NORM-)? 1 thingz srtain - th KATASTROF (16/12. n n rtkln Diogenes, no 159, vol 49/3, 2002 jGeVaInL-LcElBa-AuUdDe klaimz wrnth prosesvn trans4maeshn komprbl2 th Enligh10mnt r th 4lvth Roman Empire, r th Renaissance, r th Industrial Revolution & wchz krktriezd x knfuezion oevr th dfnshnv ‘man’ z lluestr8d 4 gzampl x th klaemv SpIeNtGeErR th@ “There is less difference between a man and a great ape than there is between a sane man and a mentally handicapped man.” (c ‘↑N’ p1). ŽVvIaRiBdLaIsS (20/12. ystrdae w got 7 frshH2O krae (ie woz rong 2 korl em ‘marron’ b4 (c ‘Melbourne → Sydney’ p15)) & 3 eelz. Th eelz w-er smoekt larst niet (uezn red gum); ie had kraefsh suep 4 lunch @ hiz plaes 2dae; Danz maekn n g-oormae kraefsh meel 4 mi & H 4 2niet) reknz owr sensv DOOM zkplaenbl x th gzistnsvn O setv snar-ioz 4 dstrkshn (eg. nukular BOMB, BIOLJKL aejnts, nkreesnli ntgr8d gloebl sistmz kaepblv b-n SAB-OTAGED, posbltiv drmtk KLIM@K chaenjz, posbltiv NVIRNMNTL dzastrz jue2 oe(17/12. You’re ov-erdoing the ‘e’s – its really annoying!)vrpoplaeshn & vrksploitaeshn etc etc) wch ddnt gzis-tn kuplv jnraeshnz goe. Ie gree &f yor not skaird yv got yor hedn th s& - but ♂ sez th kwikr th betr!) z kumn farst. @ leest tz how twoz n th DREAM (n th tropks ppl r lwaiz dreemn O th dreem haus thei r goin 2 bild x th koast, kkordn 2 th lokl xprts n dreemz – th reel st8 jnts). Tz 9.15am & w → Innisfail. (ri-tn nxt2th toilt blok @ The Locality of the Coconuts (hav fotoed th sine …)) 5.50 @ Holloways Beach ↑N of Cairns. Ownrshpv th lngwjv SEX & 6ualti haz trdshnli bn n snshl lmntn th dploimntsv PO-WER both n DEMONIZIN n nmi & nklaimn th ↑ MORAL GROUND th@ justfize hiz trchr & TOTAL LMN8SHN. 1v th prlbmz 4 th kolishnv th wiln z th@ ths wepn z so dfklt 2 dploi sins evn n th vu-ev meni n th west th muzlmz r so knsrv@vn 6ual titudez & n dheerns 2 trdshnl famli vluze. @ leest wen thei dmnized th JWZ thei kood klaim th@ brothlz & sleezi niteklubz & kabraiz wer ownd x thm (& thei praktsd sekrt orjeezn spshl kkazionz & 8 chldrn & bernt ↓ hausz) but wer kan u point th fi-ngr gainst th muzlmzv OZ xpt th@ thei send thr dortrz (so do hindooz & heepsv uthrz) 2 lebnon 2get mareed (thei shood get 25 yeerz 4 t sum poli sed)? In fakt kkordn 2 H (I beg 2 dfr sins tz tiem 2 d-kupl 6 from breedn & famli vluze & 2 dploit 4 plezure & th dvrtizin ndustri) tz th west th@z morli dpraivd & redi 2 mploed. & nwai z Winston HoWARd (17/12. ← ‘Tent Posts’ x MIhCeHnArUiX (c ‘16/2/04 – 27/-2/04’ p8) : “If suffering released a sizeable amount of directly applicable energy, what technician would hesitate to order its harnessing and to have plants built for that purpose? With words like “progress, promotion, community need,” he would silence the ones on the bottom and gain approval of those who, whatever the scenario, plan on be-ing in control. You can be sure of it.”) sed ystrdi nli sum r muzlm xtrmsts & thr r 000zv good muzlmz n O-Z. Goodonya John, thei need sum1 2 stik ↑ 4 em ….(7/12. 2 b kntnuedn ‘Tropica – 2’, god (allah (ya-weh (Α & Ω (NO NAME (21/12. c ‘MEDITATION ON LAKE GAIRDNER’) (16/12. soe 1s gaen ie rtern (c ‘27/11/00 – 7/12/00’ p1) u 2 1v mie faevrt poemz : and suppose // that one old and very wise fish / as he floated slowly, suspended / among the caverns of his life / breathing oxygen freely given / by the garden of moss and weeds, / feeding on the bread that rained / like manna from his fishbowl sky / became aware, in the garden of his mind / that every trembling, every dart-ing fish / however small / left a ripple on his soul, / and the garden that fed him freely / freely took the food he gave, / till suddenly he knew he was only / one small link / in an everlasting chain // and then // with the glassy eye of age / he saw the hand / that dropped the manna from the skies // what could he say to / the suffering and the blind? / what

20

could he say / to the dy-ing and the dead? / what would he say / to the boisterous school of fish he ruled? // I am old and cannot teach you how to dance / I must do my rounds in the confines of the bowl / the da-ncer dances to a song we barely hear / the hand that feeds you dances in the sky))))) wiln.)

21