“..what ? the old bloke? with that ute? that yellow ute with that big roo bar? F**k me,I wish I was here to see the c**t! and what did the copper say?did he?…Did he…”
The guy was in the very last booth at the international call center.He had this longish beatles-ish hair,that polished look,that careless attitude,he had forgotten to close the door and everyone could hear his conversation.He just had to be Australian.
The words he used,the cursing like a sailor,his colored,warm,sunny accent reminded me: of the smell of grass at the footy oval;the perfumed shade under orange trees in Victoria;the taste of chips and gravy at the pub; the sting in my mouth when there was too much Bundy rum in my Bundy and coke.Just his voice had drawn me in memories of Australia.
So when he walked past me to pay for his call,caught my eye and smiled,I had to talk to him.
“You Aussie?” I asked,even if I already knew he had to be.
“Yeaaahh…and you Aussie too?”
“Nearly” I said “I lived in Oz for a while”
“Oh bless ya mate! Where about where ya livin’?”
“Mildura.”
“What,that s**thole? You gotta live in Sydney,mate,that’s the place to be”
“Ah,nah,they’re bloody queer in Sydney,they watch NRL instead of watching proper AFL footy,coudn’t leave there.”
He chuckled loudly,said I was a pearler and invited me out for the night.We had a ball;we went into a pub and Josh (That’s his name) complained to the barmaid that they should have VB because it’s the best beer in the world;he resigned to have Carlsberg,I had Guinness. A few pints later,we decided the music was shite and that we wanted to hear some Creedence;Josh litterally bullied the band into playing Fortunate Son.
I met a couple of Irish guys who were traditional musicians;I expressed in a drunken way my interest for Irish music,and I declared I was a bit of a musician myself.But instead of saying that my biggest accomplishment in date was to have learned my finger charts on my tin whistle,I heavily hinted that I was a virtuose,yeah,I was like,the next Moya Brennan, humhum, forgetting to mention that I haven’t even started the Harp lessons yet,It’s for May.I don’t think they believed me,though.I think the fact that I was staggering,could hardly keep my eyes opened and at some stage,half collapsed on one of them seriously harmed my credibility.
All in all it was a fun night even if I’m still a bit embarrassed about it 😆
All the next day,I had a headache,that lasted till the following morning, and had to go through all the trip back home crook.
The following morning I walked in the kitchen only to find a gruesome scene of Gingerbread men body part scattered all over the ground;little Fairy was hidden in a corner,munching on an arm.She had obviously raided the press,and found the place where we hide the biscuits.
Haha, back home safely, at last!
Mxx
Ellie Prepster 