Out this window, through the vertical blinds, the insect screen, through the sun reflector and beyond our verandah and garden, the houses descend into the small valley and up the other side pushing for position with all the green rainforest, palms, ferns, gums and bamboo.
The rooftops visible in the sway of wet green leaves, where the crickets hang out buzzing around, their insane chatter carrying through the air – thousands of singing messages – here comes rain, here comes sun.
Grey and black clouds dominate the horizon, the air dank and still in my windowed vision, all quiet and anticipatory.
But now it’s time to leave this paradisiacal view and head out over the hill that we live on and down past the beach to the bustling village, buzzing with it’s human insects going about their merry way.
Out of our door the humid air clings shirt to skin and push push push the legs up the hill, short but dramatic, to meet the dirt track through the forest between scattered dwellings.
The crickets see your approach and snap into sudden silence as you pass the tall broken barked trees they inhabit(shh, here he comes!). The air drips moisture from the leaves high above, the ones that touch the sky. Odd insects buzz around often looking for some cool fresh blood to suck on – be quick, flick of the wrists – the Australian wave.
As the hill flats out and you begin to descend the other side, through the trees and buildings, the roar of the ocean beckons you forward, waving all the time. At the end of the road, the bottom of the hill, the sea stands before you far and wide and at it’s edge the crashing glory of the white crested waves, dotted with wet-suited bodies waiting on the big one.
Skirt the beach along the main road where traffic piles up because in this town pedestrians get right of way and that upsets the hoon element in their flash cars, boom box stereos blasting. The crowds are bustling from beach to shop to cafe and not much else. Young bronzed blondes hang round in threes, hanging out, being cool, playing the games of teenagers on the lookout for love, and I’m sure the surfers aren’t interested because they’re thinking about a different sex wax entirely and so the girls get themselves more beautiful and scantily clad in effort to swoon some dude away from his board but they’re still only interested in catching waves and so it goes on, this place a hot bed of sexual frustration. Maybe?!
The pace is slow and what the hell, there’s no hurry, those waves keep coming. These tough old legs carry me back home where, on the telephone wire to our house I spot something odd hanging on and its kinda long and thin and has four thin long double jointed legs and it’s a praying mantis – as long as your forearm and thicker than a hotdog. I hope that sucker doesn’t spot the gap under our front door!
Mentally exhausted, stressed, frayed at the seams – me and my love are flaking it, ok, we do it to ourselves cos we’re on the move again.
On Monday we borrowed Cathy’s car and drove up to the Central Coast, crashing at P_’s overnight, up and out early to house hunt, we drive round and round in circles round the beautiful beachline towns, checking particularly in busy little Terrigal which we like as soon as we drive through. We check out a fully furnished house on a hill with a verandah deck the same size as the house and a dramatic gorgeous view of cliffs, beach and ocean, we love this old wooden shack and dream of sitting out on the verandah sipping wine and feeling the evening sea breeze caress our warm cheeks like silk sheets. Unhappily, it stays a dream as it is just out of our price range and decide to pick on something unfurnished and cheaper so that when we move again (yeah, we’re always moving, might as well think about it now) we’ll have some furnishings to take with us.
And the next day we find us a nice home just a short walk from the beach. With 3 bedrooms and a verandah and garden hopefully we’ll stay here for a good long time and start to settle into some kind of routine, though routine is not the right word but just to feel like this is it, this is where I want to be in the world.
With good access to many beaches and only an hour out of Sydney, it’s an ideal spot and we can’t wait to get there next week, just three days before Christmas, time means little to us these days and I think sometimes there’s no present like time.
So, back that evening we have shocked our systems silly with stress and emotions and excitement, we both run low and have done since, except for spoiling ourselves last night with a swim, spa, sauna and steam room special which chills us out and ultimately knocks us out, then to wake early this morning and into the city to sort out the printing of the invitations for our wedding and do some Christmas shopping and I feel good inside to buy such nice gifts for people and also sad that I’m unable to earn myself any money just yet to buy things for myself but that is something I’ll be getting used to, particularly as I’m applying for a degree course, in English, as well as some other courses if I don’t get into that one. They’ll leave me with some spare time in which I can look for work in the area which I reckon will be booming over the summer season and dead during the winter, so with the sun I may catch some part-time work here and there to supplement Broni’s hard earned cash, things are going to be tight that’s for sure, but money doesn’t buy happiness, to overstate a cliche and really things couldn’t be going much better could they?
So, why so low?
I guess the future is daunting and scary and the stress of job-searching and house-hunting combined with wedding plans does get a bit much. I have to say that Broni is taking control of wedding plans and arrangements and doing an amazing job, I’m not sure why but I can’t get into an enthusiastic mood to work out all these complex details, this doesn’t mean I’m not enthusiastic about getting married but I wish someone could just organise and we could turn up and then we’d be married, but that’s me living in the clouds again. I am old enough to take control of these things but all piled on top of each other is a bit much for little tiny me, and sometimes I wish I didn’t feel like that, jeez, I’m talking in circles here.
Well, now we’re busy packing and wrapping presents and soon to go out to Libby’s and Dougie’s for a bit of a party, that should bring little smiles to our tired faces.
29th March 2021 – Writing this out again makes me realise the significance of that penultimate paragraph. Bigger changes were on the horizon a few years in the future and perhaps this feeling was its genesis.
It’s still raining, which everyone is telling us is kind of unusual but at least it’s making the temperature a little more bearable.
We’re picked up by the Smith clan to head the few k’s up to sister C_’s (she’s not a nun, Broni’s sister you fool!). Joel’s running around like crazy showing us all his new toys that got he this morning – he knows it’s Christmas that’s for sure.
I don’t remember too much about today ‘cept I had a romantic time with Broni because I love her to pieces and we both wanted to show and share our love for each other which we haven’t had time enough for over the last couple of weeks,
Christmas Eve? Weird. It’s raining outside and grey and dreary but it’s not Christmas less your wrapped up in sweaters and tucked in bed with all the heaters on, and despite all the grey rain it’s still warm enough to walk around with a t-shirt on.
We’re still getting the house in order through the day, and early afternoon Broni’s mum and dad, with G_ pay us a visit. They’ve brought us everything else from Bathurst including a fridge – we’re nearly a house ‘cepting furniture still but they do bring the futon too, so now we nearly have a bed.
We feel great building up our new home slowly and gradually and we feel like we’re in a place we’d like to stay for a while.
As quick as they came they left, like a whirlwind and far too difficult for us to make head or tail of – that’s the Smith experience! But hey, dad Smith made an attempt to fix our washing machine but ended up running off with the pump to fix, that guy should slow down (though we’re very thankful for his efforts).
We finish off the day filling the fridge with food, eating some of it and slipping in a bottle of champagne just to see if the christmas spirit will make itself more clear.
2nd Apr 2021 – Since moving out of home, I forget which year – 1992 maybe – and meeting Bronwyn, we ended up living in 17 different places in the space of two years (including moving to the other side of the world). This house was no different as we only ended up staying for 6 months though I forget the reason we ended up leaving this one, maybe a rent increase. I know the next place we lived, an apartment in Gosford, on a hill overlooking the lake was a great place and I loved it there. The bathroom was windowless, stuck in the middle of the whole space and I remember drinking champagne and reading Homer’s The Iliad out loud whilst sitting in the bath. Alas we didn’t even make it through the six month contract in this place as we ended up back in the apartment in Allawah in Sydney.
Up and at ’em five hours later, something like six in the morning, Broni puts the finishing touches on our old place as I load all our boxed up rubbish and essentials into the truck, finally after two hours of that, we hit the road being careful that everything we’ve stacked up doesn’t fall over as we turn tight corners and anyway, top speed is only about a hundred and with the weight we’re only hitting ninety.
It’s hot again today but not so sunny, more a stifling mugginess. As soon as we leave the city we feel some relief from its constraints, the beauty of the Central Coast shining in the sun like pictures of Disneyland when I was young, so deep and colourful like paintings, so perfect not sure if they were real.
I have very fond memories of these and the images triggered my imagination deeply. I wanted to go to these places and see the U.S. myself.
We pick up the keys and pay our bond and arrive at the drive of our new home. The drive is incredibly steep and we realise everything in the truck will fall over if we try to tackle it so we park on the road and have to carry things down one at a time or put the old tea chests on the trolley we hired too. Back and forth till I’m saturated in sweat, in our brief rests we marvel at our new spacious home and it’s beautiful surroundings.
Everything’s off except the washing machine, I stick the trolley under it and bring it up towards the ramp, then with a big pull it drops the six inches off the truck on to the ramp and then hovers in slow motion, teetering on one wheel of the trolley and I’m pushing to stop it from tipping but it’s too heavy and I have to jump and watch as it upends and lands on it’s top corner, crash on the tarmac, front and sides slowly peeling away.
Me and Broni laugh our socks off, can’t be bothered with anger and worry, just pick the thing up and drag it down the back to the laundry room. We don’t think it works and we’ll ask Broni’s dad to have a look at it when he comes on Christmas Eve.
I hop in the shower and hot foot the van back across Sydney while Broni unpacks here at home. The drive is mad and hectic but I manage to find my way across the traffic straight to the rental place which had been broken into last night and had everything taken, did we get out in time? The city is gonna explode, pick a city any city, time limits for destruction.
I run to the train station still full of adrenaline energy, knowing I’m gonna be dead on my feet tomorrow but hell I can’t stop myself in my mad enthusiasm, back on the train up to the city and then up to Gosford and then the bus to Terrigal, all this takes a couple of hours or more and then in Terrigal, still running, still pumping energy I run around the streets trying to discover the best ways to get to our house from the seafront.
A light drizzle now from the dull grey sky but still warm and humid, still surfers in the water. I run the steepest hill I’ve ever seen and look at the map and work out where I am and then run down and up the next hill and down into our street set in the bush and the rainforest, I later discover this way looks the quickest on the map but didn’t account for the two hills, but I didn’t care, I loved the feel of new muscles pushing against my tight skin, pushing me on and on, fell into the shower and into some beer and into bed – fucked!
Today is so hot, skin is melting. The wind burns as it blows, it’s nearing fifty in the sun. It’s too hot to do anything!
Broni, unfortunately, is away in this heat travelling on the trains up to Gosford for a job interview, I don’t envy her as I swim for a couple of hours at the pool, bare feet burning on the tarmac on the walk home.
With most everything packed up already I sit and play cards or tidy up a little more. Broni gets back later and we go to pick up the rental truck which is like the hugest thing I’ve ever driven and it seems ok, I turn out the first corner and head up to the lights and can’t find the brake, the taxi cab in front gettting closer, looking shinier and newer the closer we get, inching forward in a slow free fall, like slow motion replay, brief flashes of the thousand dollar excess hit my brain as I reach for the handbrake, not in the customary, by the seat position but at the dashboard, I’m reaching, Broni’s screaming, we’ve only been in the truck two minutes arggghh, pull the handbrakes, our hearts are pounding, God knows how far the bullbars were away from the shiny boot of the red and white taxi but we made it and sat in the road as the lights changed and we watched it pull away. phew!
Into the hectic traffic we go, confidence not good, we’re headed up to C_ and P_’s in Hornsby to pick up a free washing machine but time is against us, stuck in this pre-Christmas rush hour jam we decide to head east where we’re due for Scott’s 30th birthday at his parents house which has just got the coolest view down to the river and the ocean way in the distance and bushland dark and red in the sunset.
It’s still 30 degrees as we sit on the verandah with a ton of Scott and Lynette’s friends drinking up beer and champagne (mineral water for me) and it’s nine at night, insects buzzing round. There’s talk of a southerly heading up the coast which would bring relief, someone had a call from the south saying they got it at 7 or so, so it should be hitting Sydney very soon. But the air is still and hot.
Out of nowhere the breeze comes, the temperature drops five degrees in as many minutes, it’s such an amazing change it has to be experienced, within a second all the plastic cups are being whipped around the table and after a little tidy up everyone’s out on the verandah letting the wind blow over them.
We have to leave soon after this to go up to Hornsby to pick up the washing machine before everyone’s asleep, we get there about ten thirty and set the dogs off next door, eventually getting this huge machine in the back of the truck and securing it, I didn’t think it was gonna move anywhere it was so heavy but was advised to tie it down.
Anyways, we have a cuppa and leave about midnight and get to the end of the street and stop to look at the map and then the police come over and want to know if we had anything to do with the dogs barking and cop number one is ok and cop number two is a sarcastic asshole and I think twice before giving him some shit cos it’s late and I’ve got better things to be doing than fucking about with some idiot meathead cop, man this guy really lived up to his stereotype.
Anyway, tongue bitten we head off home and straight into that bed for the last time.
Back up the train lines, bright and sunny day over the pollution, block our minds and see only wonder, there’s still a lot to wonder at, the sun and the people drive us barmy at Circular Quay and the Rocks Market, we watch jugglers juggle fire and tell jokes and poor aborigines sit on the concrete, painted up in ritualistic spots and dress and would we know what it meant, could be just some piss take aborigine joke on the tourist influx, Nippon camera’s flashing. There’s an advert on TV of a Japanese women giving birth and as the baby comes out it takes a photo! I don’t know what it advertises, cool huh?
We get on the ferry to Manly, up the river past the north and south head with it’s view out to the open sea and where the boat starts to feel the pull and tug of ocean waves. As we set off we video the Harbour Bridge and Opera House and we’re amazed that there’s all these tall ships in the harbour and then recall something about the Endeavour making a special journey into Sydney for some celebration of Captain Cook’s landing, or something like that, I’m not much cop on history.
So anyway, we’re here by accident videoing these magnificent ships as they sail past the Opera House and wonder at how we could ever have timed things this perfectly, people would be killing themselves for shots like these, though at the time it all seemed quite insignificant, busy taking in the beautiful breeze across the water, watching the whitewash trail behind us.
And past the ocean pull to dock at Manly and walk one block until you reach another beach that stretches onto the horizon (nearly) with waves tumbling in, knocking over all and sundry stood in anticipation, yes, it’s fun and i wanted to be there but we walked around a path at the end of the beach where sand turned into rocks that fell into the water and then round the corner turned back into rocks and some sand and here was our destination, to see Scott and Lynette and their two daughters, Grace and Sophie, who entertained us with their cheekiness.
We did get to go to the beach but only the small one out the front with gentle rocking waves and seaweed. I had a go at snorkling but didn’t quite get the hang of it, though I’ll try it again in future cos I don’t give up that easily these days.
Anyway, before we know it we’ve had tea and the kids are off to bed and it’s time for us to leave and, get this, Scott says he’ll lend me his surfboard, the one that he practiced on when he was young, free and single and now doesn’t have time at all due to other obligations and more important ones too let’s face it, so I figure I’d better get some practice in too before time runs out for me and, shit, I can just carry it to the beach from where we’ll be living! cool!
Sometimes I can’t believe how well things are going for me and other times I don’t appreciate how well things are going for me. We catch the Jetcat back, which is high speed hydrofoil and hang on to yer hats as evening descends on the city as we approach and head home with keen dreams and high hopes.
The pace is slow, the sun is hot, we are moving along, shuffling…. our feet in slow motion, that’s what you get for staying up til two in the morning to watch the beer run out and playing midnight cricket in the street, just a few hours before, some screaming abduction takes place outside waking up those who’d rather be asleep (I did, though, sleep right through it!).
So, we had a rip roaring night and I met another of Broni’s old circle of friends, a guy called Noel, who I chatted to most of the evening. He reminds me of PJ, with his quiet soft spoken voice, so whispery sometimes a struggle to hear. Libby and Dougie their usual mad dog selves, running around feeding us and drinking us (under the table).
The screamings of Woolloomooloo go on around us as we’re tucked in the back yard, away from the eyes of the world but not the eyes of the neighbours, just us and the cockroaches. Stories are spun and topics discussed and we hit politics late on and realise we are too drunk to carry on and already feel the fear of the headache in the morning.
29th Mar 2021 – A few years later Bronwyn witnessed a murder on these streets. As she was sleeping in that top room of Libby’s house, screams woke her and in the morning discovered that a murder had occurred right outside the door. A homeless had been beaten to death. Homeless people were being victimised often around this time as things geared up for the Olympics. A couple of months before the Olympics started all the homeless people were rounded up and dumped in the Blue Mountains and told not to come back until after it was over (or preferably not at all). Bronwyn was later called to testify at the murder trial.
Back up the Central Coast on Tuesday for another job interview for Broni at a private hospital set in beautiful surroundings all landscaped in with the bushland, just a two minute walk to the shiny blue lake and a ten minute drive to the beach, wow! If we could live up here it’d be cool! Its a bit of a fogey area but there are some better spots to live nearer the beach so I could practice being a beach bum, learn to surf and write great novels based on old surf folklore!
We came back home to find a regret letter from Newcastle hospital so that has cut our options down even more, so we’re wondering whether to stay here or go to the Central Coast. In our typical ‘we’ve got no money, let’s go spend it’ style we head out to Indian, still not as good as in England, and get drunk and stoned before crashing out.
Up and at them in the morning and off to the beach again, well, why not? Back down to Cronulla Beach again, there’s a bit of a breeze blowing through our hair and keeping the temperature down a touch, though the sun is scorching through our milk screen. The water is freezing to first touch and it takes us an age to get in to our knees but once that far the ferocity of the water crashes up to our hips before dashing back out again preparing for another attack. Once in it gets better and moving around keeps you warm.
The surf is really up today what with the wind and the tide, waves crash down and throw people five and ten feet backwards and then attempts to suck them back out again. Oh, the majesty of nature and it’s terrific forces, stuck in it’s vortex is like an honour but also a danger, Broni heads out, too rough for her liking, she prefers the gentle lapping of a quiet sandswept beach somewhere. Me, with my new waterwings want to be engulfed in the whitewash of crashing wild water, actually I didn’t really want to be engulfed in it but had no choice when jumping into a wave that crest over my head and then pushed up onto the beach leaving me reeling and writhing in the white foam til the power subsided and I’m left stranded and dishevelled on the sand, wary of more imminent attacks, I get up and orient myself and dive back in, struck by some quirky madness and excitable energy.
People line up and anticipate the waves, a big gasp as someone shouts here comes a big one, spotted about twenty metres out and ominously shadowing the closer crests, as it draws up it’s power from below, your feet are sucked from under you and you realise you have to start swimming inland to catch the wave, but all you see below you is a couple of inches of water and sand, the bulk of water sucked up into the wave that is now over your back and you jump and catch the wave and propelled forwards and then left to scramble to your feet in the whitewash water, a twenty foot section of snowy H20.
As you stand you realise you’ve been sucked across the beach and have to swim along the beach to start again or get out to catch breath but getting out is not so easy with the regular suck at your feet and crash of the waves to knock you down. Back out to warm up and burn in the sun. Awesome.
The two images in this post made me laugh. I know exactly how this kid was feeling.
So after that event we took timeout to recover for a couple of days, but now we’re bugged and have to get a water fix and go up to the pool where I’m improving in speed and stamina, racing Broni and nearly matching, soon beat her! Now half the length of the pool under water, somersaults and handstands, I think it remarkable that just a few months ago I couldn’t swim at all and now I’ve conquered a fear of mine and turned it totally around into something I love and enjoy, what’s next on the agenda?
Ok, we pretty much decide to go and live on the Central Coast and make plans to go and look at houses next week and get some addresses to check out and find something near a beach yeah? We get our first decent Indian meal on Saturday night when we go out with Cathy and I’m starting to feel more relaxed, not so concerned with my internal emotions but more at one with my surroundings, more able to face up to the problems that will come my way and deal with them in an intelligent manner (but i can crack any minute!)
So things are good and on this beautiful Sunday morning I phone up Mark, the guy out of Farm of Tongues that I met last week and have a cool talk with him with some contacts and some possibilities for making some noise in the future with people he knows, he’s going to stay in touch and sounded really pleased to hear from me which makes me feel good that I took the chance to speak to him.
Things are coming together for me and Broni after our long long holiday, who knows maybe get some cheap hack job that’ll get me some money coming in so I can afford all those things I’d like to buy, surfboard, skateboard, mountain bikes, amps, noise machines and a million other things I’d like to get involved in.
Cool, cool, fuckin cool, everything’s cool. Let me finish with my dream I had which was that I was talking to Chrissy and seemed sad and I asked her for a hug and she sensed my worry over the wedding and she said not to worry and that I was marrying the most wonderful girl in the world and then I woke up and held Broni close to me and kissed her, kissed for our humble beginnings, kissed her for today and kissed her for the future.
Catch up again now we’re the other side of the weekend.
Thursday became an exciting day after the discovery of how to make a tape trade list on the computer so I set about doing that, in between playing games and stuff like that, and I get to realise just how many tapes I seem to possess and realise how long it might take to write this list. I do the same for most of Friday and the sun shines in through the window tempting me out.
We leave for the city as Broni has promised to babysit for Libby and Dougie and I’m off to see some bands, having half arranged to meet a guy who does a fanzine. Libby feeds us a treat and decides not to go out after all so Broni and her play together while I make my way across the city to the Annandale Hotel. Aaron, the dude I’m supposed to meet, says there’s two good bands playing tonight so I pay $6 to get in and then astound myself by parting with $4.60 for a beer, the band starts, the room is packed, I look for some dude selling fanzines. As I don’t have any idea what this guy looks like or sounds like, I don’t find him, the band has a good sound, a great sound, but they are boring as all hell grunge by numbers which goes down well with the crowd.
I stand at the back and pick up a copy of the weekly music magazine and see that Phlegm are playing at the Vulcan (wherever that is), Phlegm having already aroused my interest by being reviewed as a noise band and having played with the Boredoms and Ruins in Japan (or something like that), so I happily leave and start walking back to the city, hailing a taxi at the petrol station, getting dropped off near the Vulcan.
I walk down the side streets, luckily having some idea of where I am, but nervous as I walk past three big guys drinking in the shadows of the houses. The Vulcan is within sight though and I head toward the noise. As I go in the band is playing right next to the door, I join about four other people watching, the Vulcan is a divey little back bar but to me seems absolutely great, reminding me of sparsely attended gigs back home years ago.
The band is playing good thrash/grindcore with lots of time changes and wild vocals from the drummer, also a keyboard player content just to make strange noises with his equipment which integrate quite well, extremely tight and intricate they strangely appeal to me and I have no interest in that genre of music really, so I’m already happy to make the decision of coming here instead of the previous engagement.
I ring Broni to let her know what’s going on and then come back in to watch Farm of Tongues, the drums are set up oddly and one bass player has six strings on his bass, he also reminds me of Mick, with a mad look in his eyes like safety behind a guitar, like all of sudden I’m superhuman behind this animal machine (that’s how Mick’d describe it).
The band rip into their songs and are exceptionally brilliant and talented, the drummer all over the place with jazz beats here and there and the three guitarists mixing up all sorts of snippets of styles into short bursts of everything, they remind me of Ruins and Naked City (w/o sax). I talk to Mark, their bass player after and get his phone number to ring him to get a tape of the band, they’ve only been together for six months which seems incredible to me considering how complicated their songs were and how well they played them.
Mark tells me that Phlegm’s drummer has pneumonia so they’ll be playing an improvised set tonight and their guitarist sets up and starts twisting strange noise out of his cut off instrument and his colleague gets on the mic and starts gibbering in a Trumans Water manner and ocassionally picking up the bass and messing around with it. It’s a beautiful cacophony of screeching hell that seems odd in this place but unimaginable anywhere else.
I leave at about half midnight hoping to catch a late train, but missing it I opt to navigate my way back to Libby’s on foot, which I manage quite successfully despite my four beer drunkeness! Broni lets me in and we crash out immediately – to be awoken by little Reg and Gough, running round in the kitchen at some ungodly hour and Libby and Dougie running around after them, we manage to stay in bed for another hour or so before having to play with the kids, we’re both knackered out and running on reserves but manage to keep going the whole day while Libby and Dougie go off to a wedding of a friend and later come back drunk with Christine and Andrew in tow and then launching into more beer and cocktails and smoke for those inclined.
Drunk again we make our way home back, even before sunset, we waste the rest of the evening with TV and pizza and a bath we nearly fall asleep in, ah sweet life.
And Sunday I notice that things here are seeming more normal like I remember the first day here I walked into Hurstville with Broni and I was agog looking at everything, all new and unreal and doing that same walk on Sunday seemed so normal and satisfying, now feeling safer in this place.
I later ring my mum and she asks if I feel I’ve made the right decision and I say despite any bad times I have here like missing people I have undoubtedly made the right choice, I can’t imagine how sad I would feel if I hadn’t taken this opportunity to further myself. Ok, brave soldiers.
25th Mar 2021 – Leaving that first show at the Annandale Hotel and discovering Phlegm and Farm of Tongues at the Vulcan Hotel was an auspicious event and would lead to lots of new friendships. I also distinctly remembering walking back to Libby’s house, walking through Hyde Park in the early hours and having a feeling of absolute safety – something that would have been impossible in England for me at that time. In England you always had to be aware of things going on around you – it felt like there was always someone looking for trouble. In a new country, it may just have been ignorance – either way, it was a feeling that has stayed with me until now.
1994ever 