Lesley Truffle's Blog, page 20
January 26, 2016
Beach Dogs
Bayside Melbourne is dog heaven. I know many of the dog’s names but only a few of their owners’ names. Summer, winter, autumn, spring – the dogs are out there on the beach before first light.
I don’t have a dog, so when walking the beach I cunningly solicit contact with other people’s dogs. There’s Ralphie, Sage, Harold – there’s also Hank, Henri, Ned and Bella. And then there’s the new puppies, all wide-eyed and eager. Greeting every stranger with an abundance of trust. Rolling on their backs and exposing their plump bellies.
Running, sniffing, barking, diving into the icy sea, rolling in fetid rubbish and dead birds, chasing balls, Frisbees or anything else that moves, including slow seagulls. Even the old dogs still get on by; being coaxed along or getting wheeled along the sea promenade in fancy dog wheelies or clapped out kid’s prams. These dogs are the old salts with grey muzzles and patient eyes.
One of the old salts is a tiny mongrel who accompanies his petite elderly owner along the promenade well before sunrise. No matter the season, she’s always dressed top to toe in black. And in summer when she breaks out the faded black shorts, you can see how much dog and owner resemble each other. For they both have sturdy bow legs and the most marvellous rollicking motion when they promenade.
These two blithely ignore the unspoken rule that you have to stick to the left side of the footpath. After all, you don’t want to get mown down by sweaty blokes in mantights, running behind baby three wheelers, or short fused mothers shoving child pushers the size of small cars. But nobody gives the lady in black any stick, so she and her mongrel own the footpath. They plough on in a straight line, forcing the belligerent and impatient to go around them. Seeing them always makes me smile. They are true anarchists.
Another old salt was the handsome golden Labrador who used to swim straight across the water, keeping in line with his owner walking along the water’s edge. The Labrador got slower and slower and then one morning he simply didn’t appear on the beach, but his owner continued to show up. And so it goes.
About five women, probably in their eighties, used to congregate at the top end of the pier and chatter away in Russian. In winter they wore homemade woollen scarves, knotted under their chins, and in summer faded floral frocks. The only thing that didn’t change was the sturdy European footwear. All chatter ceased when they began their morning exercises. Gripping the railings, they would execute deep knee bends and then move into some vigorous arm twirling and shoulder shrugs. But one by one their numbers diminished and now they are gone. And their bench on the pier remains empty in the early mornings.
I always look for the dog owner with the bright blue hair. She’s hard to miss even in the stygian gloom of winter at 6am, leading a posse of three small, unkempt terriers across the road. Single file, no dog leashes, just the shining beacon of phosphorous blue under the street lamps.
When they get to the sea wall the terriers immediately head for the same beach ramp and line up. No kidding, those three dogs behave as though they’re queuing for the gents’ toilet at a football match. Politely waiting in line for the mongrel in front to lift his leg and piss on the bluestone. And only when the first dog has finished his business does the next one take his turn.
The seawall stretches several kilometres from St Kilda beach to Port Melbourne, but those three dogs only ever want to piss in one place. The exact same spot, every day, without fail. Then when they’ve had their designated time running amuck on the beach, the woman with blue hair leads them back across the busy road and they disappear around the corner. Still in single file.
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January 23, 2016
Postcard from Zeehan Tasmania
Zeehan was dead quiet when I turned into Main Street around ten am. There was nobody about, so I stood in the middle of the road taking photographs of the marvellous 1800’s and 1900’s era buildings. For during the silver boom Zeehan had been widely known as the Silver City.
The Rescue Shop was open. It sells secondhand bric-a-brac, everything from second-hand saucepans to bright hand-knitted dog coats. The West Coast can be chilly even in summer, and a small fire was burning. The fragrance of burning wood filled the shop. When I purchased a delicious pot of home-made berry jam, the proprietor told me I was her first customer for the day and she was madly hoping that I wouldn’t be her last.
Zeehan is home to an old-school museum called, The West Coast Heritage Centre. It’s the sort of museum I fell in love with when I was a kid. It’s got: old steam engines, surgical equipment, blacksmithing equipment, mining, minerals and several old buildings with historical installations.
There’s no interactive media or flash video displays but they do have immersive experiences – such as a faux mine shaft with dust, gravel, a flickering screen and empty chairs – where you can enjoy yourself by freaking out and getting claustrophobic. I indulged in both.
What made it so spooky was that I was the only person in the museum apart from the woman on the reception desk and a bunch of old ghosts.
There’s some fabulous lumpy full-size mannequins hanging around the joint. In the old Police Station, which is now part of the museum, a dodgy looking nineteenth century policeman hovers behind the dusty counter, with his black bicycle and night stick close at hand.
Upstairs there’s a fine collection of original photographs and memorabilia documenting the goings on of the regional miners, life in Zeehan and surrounding towns. Zeehan lost a disproportionate number of its young men to World War One. The camera has caught them proudly wearing their new Australian army uniforms. They look too young to have died fighting in the trenches. So many lives lost before they’d even had a chance to live.
The Masonic Lodge installation is fascinating with ritual paraphernalia, the symbolic carpet and dusty old photographs of Zeehan’s Freemasons in full costume. Several blokes are wearing ornamental aprons and out-sized gloves that resemble classy oven mitts. According to the plaque on the wall, Freemasonry is all about high ideals, sound principles and using the symbols of ancient stone masons to illustrate moral values.
In some of the group photos there’s a strange ghostly whiteness at the bottom of the image. It looks like sea foam washing around the gentlemen’s ankles. On closer inspection this turned out to be a fluffy, white fur rug. The rug appeared in the 1913, 1914 and 1915 group photos and then disappeared as mysteriously as it had appeared. There was no such frivolity in the 1916 group shot. The Freemasons are unsmiling, serious and stoic.
I liked most of the displays but I loved The Gaiety Theatre which you enter through a weed strewn back entrance.
On the Gaiety screen a silent black and white Ned Kelly film played, accompanied by some ghostly piano music. The floor boards creaked loudly as I made my way to the back of the theatre. I got the impression I was intruding even though nobody else was there.
The Gaiety Theatre Grand Hotel was built in 1898, by the mustachioed Edward Mulcahy, for the princely sum of £7,075. The double storied building has two tower structures at each end, elegant embellishments and majestic curved arches. It’s a powerful building from a time when optimism and prosperity was rampant.
Zeehan was once the third largest town in Tasmania and The Gaiety Theatre was the place to go and the place to be seen. One of J.C. Williamson’s tableaus was billed as, We place the world before you. Various professional stage shows and performers were also imported from the mainland.
So if you happen to be in that neck of the woods, the West Coast Heritage Museum is well worth the price of a ticket. And donations can also be made towards the proposed Gaiety Theatre renovations.
The poster above features in the Gaiety Theatre, at The West Coast Heritage Centre, Zeehan.
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Postcard from West Coast Tasmania
Driving up north from Zeehan yesterday morning, the bushfire smoke got so dense that I had to turn my headlights on. Winding around the sharp hairpin bends became increasingly surreal as visibility diminished, yet the bloody roadkill of the previous night remained starkly visible. So many furry wilderness animals. Gone. A local bloke told me it happens when nocturnal animals get mesmerized by oncoming headlights and freeze instead of fleeing.
But with my car, The Flying Tomato behaving herself and Keith Richards thrashing his steel guitar at full volume my mood lightened. And I started getting nostalgic for my youthful self, when a gentleman of my acquaintance and I drove across the Nullarbor Desert to Perth. In a shonky old Peugeot, powered solely by rock music and an indiscreet quantity of Cannabis.
The glow of nostalgia faded abruptly when I whacked a blowfly with the road map. While doing 100 kilometers an hour. Thank god there was no oncoming traffic when I swerved erratically. I’ve learnt my lesson. I blame my lack of concentration on the fact that my first car was a motorcycle. And subconsciously I’ve probably always operated on the assumption that cars were just comfortable armchairs on wheels.
The West Coast is absolutely stunning. Several times I’ve passed keen cyclists on heavily laden bikes peddling up steep mountain roads. The West Coast caters to both the intrepid and the laconic. You can thrash down the Gordon River in a kayak and treck through rainforests. Or you can sit soft on a cruiser or a restored steam train and volubly admire the bravery of the pioneers. Both cruise ship and steam train offer premium packages which involve much sipping of champagne and noshing on Tasmania’s delicious produce. So I did both. Knowing that next day it would be back to the protein shakes and quinoa.
In the 1800’s a railway track was forged from Strahan thorough to Queenstown. It was built through inhospitable terrain at a great cost to those doing the laboring. You can’t get too cosy with the nobility of such enterprises though without considering the Black Wars, the Black Line and the usurping of Tasmania’s indigenous population.
Getting back to the ongoing bush fires. Smoke has been affecting much of the North and North West Tasmania. And to date about 54 fires are not contained or under control. Folk around here are decidedly tense. Nobody has died but 41,000 hectares of land have been burnt out and the wildlife and flora are taking a beating.
Tasmanian wine growers are anguishing about the bushfire smoke haze that threatens to taint their grape crops. And North West honey producers are getting jittery as they were in the middle of their peak harvesting season. And all over this marvellous island of milk and honey, gourmets and gourmands are getting nervous as hell.
Most West Coast fires are lit by random lightning. A local boat captain told me that there were fires burning in the wilderness areas that had been flaming for years. Namely because some areas are so inaccessible that it’s just not possible to get in and deal with them. In the wilderness areas there’s 2,000-year-old Huon pine trees under threat. The Huon pine is one of the world’s oldest living organisms, still unchanged even after 135 million years. It’s a mighty slow grower at only 1-3 millimeters per year.
Recently there’s been community protests against logging in Lapoinya in the north-west. Arrests were made, charges laid and fines imposed. Civil Rights groups maintain that laws such as jail terms and on-the-spot fines have effectively made anti-logging protests illegal in Tasmania.
Meantime Tasmania’s firefighters are getting exhausted from what seems to be an unending battle. But all is not lost. The NSW Rural Fire Service is sending firefighting personnel, vehicles and two winch helicopters over to Tasmania. And nine strategic planning specialists from Victoria are flying in too. Hopefully there might be rain coming to ease the burden on the fire fighters.
The image above is a section of a photograph featured at The West Coast Heritage Centre, Zeehan. These men were members of Zeehan’s Firebrigade. They were photographed in 1903, exhausted after fighting fires for many hours at the Palace and Zeehan hotels.
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January 20, 2016
Postcard from Penguin
The Little Penguins who live at Penguin in northern Tasmania are the smallest of all penguins. But when swimming in the wild waters of Bass Strait they can power through the waves at about forty kilometers an hour.
I suspect the town of Penguin has never experienced a crime wave, mainly because the original goal – built in 1902 and decommissioned in 1962 – is roughly the size of a rural outhouse. Although admittedly outdoor lavatories don’t usually come complete with heavy duty locks and multiple bolts on the outside of the door.
Being devoid of windows, the small goal must have been a ghastly experience, especially in summer heat. And no doubt everyone in the small township would have known exactly who was in there sweating it out.
Getting to Tasmania on the ferry was not easy. For during a wild storm The Spirit of Tasmania 2 chucked a tantrum, slipped free of its moorings, tipped sideways and bashed its arse on Port Melbourne’s Station Pier. Resulting in significant damage to its rear.
The Spirit’s bad behaviour screwed up the sailing schedules. And despite the best efforts of management, I experienced several delays. This resulted in spending over thirteen hours on the ship before disembarking at Davenport around midnight.
Mind you, it is kind of fun slipping into a darkened port, late at night, on a quietly moving ship. Sinister shades of Count Dracula in the film Nosferatu.
Is it possible to lose a tomato-red car on a ship? Yes. And while other passengers started their engines, I ran around the lower decks trying to work out where my bloody vehicle had gone.
It was only when I realized that I was under the baleful gaze of a stack of caged dogs – in the gloomy section signed as Pets – that I realized I’d been doing laps of the wrong deck.
Fortunately with only seconds to spare, I made it to my car. Narrowly avoiding the ignominy of having my car registration announced over the intercom. Very loudly.
Pointed but polite requests were being made that certain folk must return to their cars pronto because they were holding up the disembarkation process. I was aware that those who were impatiently waiting to get off the boat were rolling their eyes and fuming. Understandably so.
So what the hell do people do on a ferry for fourteen hours? They eat.
The dogs languishing in the small cages might not have been so damned pleased to see their owners returning, if they knew that the upper decks are awash in: soft tub chairs, reclining deck chairs, mega kilos of chicken breasts wrapped in prosciutto, lamb shanks lolling in red wine and several tons of succulent roast porterhouse. Along with salty potato crisps, premium ice-cream, meat pies and more sauced-up sausage rolls than you could possibly poke a stick at.
During dinner service, an elderly lady was losing control of her laden dinner tray when a young bloke stepped up, gallantly took hold of her tray and offered to conduct her back to her seat. A sweet smile lit up her face as they wended their way through the crowded deck. Small acts of genuine kindness never fail to cheer.
The Spirit is the perfect place to get oiled, ossified or embalmed. A lot can be achieved in thirteen hours. You can’t take alcohol on-board but the top deck bar caters to even the most dedicated drinker.
One burly, red-faced bloke was having a swell time drinking the boat dry. He must have been a seasoned sailor as I noticed he was the only passenger not staggering like a drunk when we hit the rough patches and the entire boat shuddered dramatically. And like everyone else I found myself clutching at the furniture and smiling nervously.
I took the photograph at sunrise in Penguin on the north coast of Tasmania.
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January 15, 2016
‘Tommy’s Story’ bronze sculpture by Bill Perrin
This bronze sculpture is titled: Tommy’s Story and it’s situated on the sea wall, in Melbourne’s bayside suburb of Middle Park.
I frequently pass it on my way to St Kilda and sometimes I see kids trying to lever the cap or the boots off the wall. Tourists reverently touch the bronze clothing and then take selfies posing alongside the hob-nailed boots.
An American tourist was examining the sculpture up close from every angle. He stopped me and asked, Are you from round here? Who was this dude? For there is a mystery about Tommy’s Story that speaks simply and directly to people.
Tommy’s Story has been on the sea wall for over a decade. It’s a wonderful sculpture with a back story. At one stage a local wag made a sign that read: BACK IN 5 MINUTES, and propped it up next to the boots.
The artist, Bill Perrin, told me Tommy’s Story was part of a series of public artworks marking the locals memories about place. When Perrin originally created the sculpture he patinated the bronze with subtle colors. An early photograph shows the the leather boots to be a deep polished tan, the corduroy pants a rich brown and the neb cap, shirt and waistcoat had been patinated in various shades of silver-grey. Time and sea air has broken down the wax sealant and now the sculpture is a mellow bronze color all over.
Before making the sculpture, Perrin had 1930’s clothing made by a professional tailor from scratch. The close attention to period details show especially in the cut of the trousers, the belt buckle, buttons and the waistcoat bindings. Molds were then made of the garments and boots and molten bronze was poured to create the finished piece. As Perrin expected, all the beautifully made clothing perished during this process.
The back story is that in the 1930’s – during the time of the Great Depression – there was a local bloke name Tommy who used to work across the bay on the wharves as a wharfie. It cost money to take a bath and get public transport to work. So Tommy would strip off his clothes (probably further down in Port Melbourne), leave them on the beach and then swim across to the other side, where he would put on his work clothes. After a full day’s physical work, he’d take off his work clothes and swim all the way back home.
If you’ve ever flung yourself into the icy waters of Port Phillip Bay in winter, you’ll know that this was no mean feat. Some days the sea would have been so choppy and devious that it would have been a struggle to make the distance. Tommy must have been a very fit, skilled swimmer to make it all the way across and back every single working day. And many of those swims would have been done in the pre-dawn darkness of morning or possibly late at night.
As Julie Shiels, the creative director of the project puts it,
‘Traditionally, a monument like this would represent the man. However in this work, the absence of the body, and therefore a specific identity emphasizes the egalitarian nature of working class values. Tommy is a monument to all men who wore the working man’s clothes.’
Tommy’s Story by artist Bill Perrin, is part of a City of Port Phillip project: Margins, Memories and Markers.
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January 12, 2016
Café and Street Dogs
Café dogs are highly socialized, even the ones that make trouble: the yappers, howlers, sneaks and leapers. I was sitting outside my favorite café, about to plunge into a delicious Sunday breakfast, when a big Labrador head appeared from under the table and thrust itself into my lap.
I dropped my fork and the dog’s owner yanked on the leash. He was mortified. ‘I’m so terribly sorry. It only happened once – a café patron slipped her a piece of bacon and she’s never forgotten it.’
I laughed as the dog was still slyly eyeing off my mushroom and cheese omelette and subtly indicating that the absence of bacon had been noted – but a piece of toast would be acceptable. Labradors are slaves to their stomachs and this one had a truly wicked grin. I patted her and she was very friendly but her eyes kept drifting back to my plate.
Among my favorites are The Hounds of Hell. They make their appearance when the local newsagent first opens and they wake up the whole damned street. The first time I heard them I was stunned, it sounded like they were being brutalized. The hair on the back of my neck stood up.
I rushed around the corner and there they were – two plump, long haired Cocker Spaniels: heads up, venting ear-splitting, blood curdling howls. When one dog ran out of steam, the other took over. Why? The newsagent told me that it’s a ritual. The owner ties his dogs’ leashes to the bicycle rack and the minute he steps into the newsagent, the dogs howl. And they keep it up until he reappears and ticks them off. Every single morning at precisely 7.05 am.
Then there’s the magnificently spoilt dogs. They only frequent the stylish cafés where water is supplied in posh chromed-up dog bowls. These dogs travel with their own small rugs – so they don’t have to park their arses on the cold pavement outside the cafés in winter. Hey, it’s not the dogs fault – if you were a shivering mongrel, would you turn down the offer of a snug pastel-blue bunny rug? Often they’re the same dogs that take their exercise wearing expensive subtly branded dog coats.
And then of course there’s those dogs that get to sit on top of their owners and share the Vegemite toast. It’s especially comedic when the dog is a fully grown beast, draped across the owner’s knees, with long long legs dangling and big head resting on the tabletop.
But my absolute favorite is the pug who sits opposite his owner on his own chair as the owner proffers tasty morsels from his own fork. Backwards and forwards goes the fork. And when the plate is empty, the owner leans across the table and plants a big kiss on the grunting pug’s head.
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January 11, 2016
Andy Warhol | Ai Weiwei Art Exhibition at the NGV
At first I thought it was an odd coupling – the subversive Chinese artist/activist Ai Weiwei and the silver fox Andy Warhol – but it works. Over 300 works are spread across the ground floor area of the NGV in two sections: the main exhibition and Studio Cats for children.
Both Warhol and Weiwei are known to have a thing for cats. Weiwei lives with about thirty felines, and he reckons most of them found him. And at one point, the late Warhol had at least twenty cats lounging around his New York pad. Warhol’s favorite cat was named Hester and the other nineteen were simply called Sam.
On the day I went to the NGV, the Studio Cats area was full of gleeful adults reclining on the fake fur bean bags, making video self-portraits Warhol-style and whooping it up with cat-themed activities involving images of Weiwei’s cats. Even the small plastic chairs sported magnificent fake fur tails.
With the mood lighting and sophisticated installations it felt like a New York nightclub. I deeply regretted that there were no iced Mango Daiquiris on offer. Warhol was a Tennessee whiskey man but on such a stinking hot day I don’t think he would’ve refused a chilled Daiquiri.
Weiwei has a wall installation of flower photographs with an old black bike leaning up against the wall. It’s a work of subtle beauty with an underlying sadness. Every day during his home detention, Weiwei placed a fresh bunch of flowers in the basket of his bicycle parked outside his front door – in clear sight of the Chinese authorities CCTV camera – and photographed it. As Weiwei put it, ‘If there is no free speech, every single life has lived in vain.’
Everyone in Weiwei’s small Lego room were very subued. Initially Weiwei was denied his bulk order of Lego bricks on political grounds. Fortunately after an International outcry, the order was filled by the Danish company. The entire room – including the creaking floor – is lined with Lego overlaid with quotes and hard hitting statements about human rights and the need for freedom of expression.
These issues are also explored in Weiwei’s video installations and photographs. Often he uses humor to get his point across; as in the photograph of his wife lifting her skirt provocatively, while the authorities are busy looking the other way at Tiananmen Square.
When I read The Philosophy of Andy Warhol: (From A to B and Back Again) I was very taken with Warhol’s theory of the diminishing return of socks and his sly humor. And despite the political pressure put on Weiwei, he’s not only retained his provocative sense of humor but continues to use it to critique the Chinese regime.
Warhol and Weiwei never met but the pairing of these two provocateurs at the NGV makes absolute sense.
The Andy Warhol | Ai Weiwei exhibition will be on at the NGV Victoria until 24 April 2016
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January 7, 2016
Melbourne Trams in Winter
It’s still dark but we’re all off to work. St Kilda road is gloomy but the tram is now trundling past the National Gallery and the bare trees are festive with colored lights. City buildings are silhouetted against a sky that is slowly lightening. The tram is past its prime and the brakes are a bit dodgy. Dripping umbrellas, sodden passengers, windows that won’t open and heating that knocks you out. As one elderly gent put it, ‘You could grow orchids on them trams they’re so bloody hot.’
There’s a rolling beer bottle and some slimy substance underfoot that you really don’t want to investigate too closely.
Sometimes it’s better not to know.
Then there’s the sinister bloke dressed all in black who has placed his banana on the empty seat next to him and leaves it there, even when the tram fills up and people have to stand. He’s pasty faced and seems to be a tad sweaty and more than a little twitchy.
There’s not a punter present who wants to challenge his pin-pricked eyeballs by asking him to remove his banana. Nobody knows what their fellow man is on and bad things can happen if you happen to rub a stranger up the wrong way.
People get on and off. There a bit of a hold up when a mother gets her mega pram jammed in the doorway. Her kid wails as four blokes wrestle with the hardware and try to lever the pram over the metal railings on the tram steps. She’s finally on and we’re off again.
The pram is now barricading a bunch of business folk right up against the windows that are dripping with sweaty condensation. The mother thanks everyone and looks shamefaced. I feel sorry for her, she seems close to tears. Maybe the pram is the least of her problems? The kid keeps wailing.
Finally we reach Swanston Street and the end is in sight. Thank God. That is until an impatient driver accelerates through a red light, collides with another car and shuts down every tram going either up or down Swanston Street. Nobody is hurt but the tram tracks are out of action whilst the police arrive, bring in the tow trucks and redirect the peak hour traffic.
The punters are cursing and snarling, our driver resigned. Everyone reaches for their phone to tell their bosses they’re late. Again.
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