‘A six foot fluffy camelid — taking up space in the front room, chewing on the furniture and shitting in the hallway — cannot fill the gaping void that so clearly exists between you and your boyfriend.’
Dear Uncle Randy,
I’m thinking of buying my bf a llama for Xmas, should I ask the landlord first?
–
Perhaps rather than directing your enquiries toward the landlord regarding the admissibility of cohabiting with farmyard animals, you should first be asking yourself, ‘What am I trying to accomplish in purchasing a llama?’ No doubt, they are glorious creatures, capable only of increasing the value of their surrounds per diem. But ask yourself, where is this llama coming from? Is it a genuine gift of abundance and joy; an expression of union and mutual adoration between you and your partner? Or is it a desperate attempt to resuscitate a relationship that has ceased to beat sound and true; a fanciful bid to inject some long lost novelty into a habitual performance of partnership that has succumbed to a lacklustre quotidian monotony? Be honest now.
Evidently, your relationship is in a state of utter ruination. You cause each other nothing but irritation and distress, frustration and resentment. Arguing acrimoniously over everything and nothing, keeping score of numerous offences and transgressions, it has become clear that your personalities are incompatible as you strain to remember the good times and why you entered into this quagmire of toxicity in the first place.
Whilst a llama can certainly offer both charming company and plush wool yields, a six foot fluffy camelid — taking up space in the front room, chewing on the furniture and shitting in the hallway — cannot fill the gaping void that so clearly exists between you and your boyfriend. A llama will not repair your broken love, nor solve your inability to communicate effectively. A llama should never be a band-aid cure for such a gangrenous wound, and it would be profoundly unfair to lay that burden upon such a sweet and unsuspecting creature. Perhaps you should address the emotional chasm that separates your two hearts before you consider shanghaiing another life form into the vortex of your personal shit storm. Consider therapy; consider breaking up. Consider the llama.
‘Are you deliberately releasing your bladder into your pants? If so, romance is inevitable.’
Dear Uncle Randy,
I can’t stop making a tit of myself in front of this hot girl at work. Yesterday I accidentally stapled her skirt to the desk — do you think I’m still in with a chance?
–
When it comes to the mating rituals of the animal kingdom, you simians really have nothing to worry about. Fortunately, hundreds of thousands of years of natural selection have taken care of a great deal of the courtship process. Seduction runs in your bloodline. Your parents, your great-grandparents, all the way back to your lascivious neolithic ancestors, have all been wholly successful in the art of seduction, and each has passed their sexual prosperity on to you.
The problems only really arise when You get in the way of your own natural process.Hooked by desire, wanting, clinging to what could be, you try to ‘figure out’ how to attain the object of your affections. Rather than moving with the rousing instincts of your primordial body, you start thinking with the limited scope of your quotidian mind. Questioning, judging, second guessing each minute communication between you and this prospective mate in a desperate bid to affect a desired outcome. And in such a state you lose flow, you forget yourself, you become stilted, unnatural and wholly unattractive. Good job.
It is uncertainty from within that repels and inspires a flaccid disposition. Humans like confidence. Unwavering certainty in an uncertain world is attractive; it is beneficial to survival, reproduction and the evolutionary heritage you carry forth today. So harness your innate powers! Your carnal prowess is present already, you must simply trust in and act upon your instincts. From this place of relaxed libidinous certitude, only success can arise. Are you stapling with confidence? Are you stammering with conviction? Are you deliberately releasing your bladder into your pants? If so, romance is inevitable.
Now, armed with re-animated aptitude and unwavering self-belief, you can assert yourself and your desire at will. You can express your being freely, brazenly, knowing that all you do and say will be met with joy and acceptance. Create your own chances, attract at will, get out of your way.
‘Embrace your status as a symbol of lacy lust and adorn your washing line end to end with a plethora of aphrodisiac gifts: thongs, stockings, bodacious bras and negligees, all for the taking!’
Dear Uncle Randy,
My underwear keeps going missing from my washing line but only the black lacy things – what can I do?
–
There are infinite circumstances in this world which lie beyond our immediate control. The economy is in ruins; public transport is delayed; it rains on your wedding day; you are impotent at 30; other people exist and insist on having their own ludicrous opinions, feelings, and sexual perversions. One could spend a lifetime beating upstream, screaming into the winds of circumstance, exhausting oneself against the turbulent, unremitting reality into which one is thrown. Or, one may relax and recline, surrender willingly to the current and ride in harmony with the comings and goings of today’s bullshit.
The question remains, what can you do? What action can you take; what does lie within your control? You could stop hanging your laundry out — hang it up inside, or stop wearing black lacy things altogether. You could move to a neighbourhood with fewer registered sex offenders. You could install sentinels to watch over your washing line with guard dogs and submachine guns. You could instigate an international campaign to hunt down and execute the perpetrator, brandishing their severed head as a warning to all prospective panty snatching perverts.
Or you could simply accept the particularity of today’s perversions without resistance, free from antipathy or aversion. Greet the current state of your reality with open arms and live congruently, agreeably. Remove all conflict, find your seat in today’s oddity of life and discover joy in the unwanted and unforeseen. Embrace your status as a symbol of lacy lust and adorn your washing line end to end with a plethora of aphrodisiac gifts: thongs, stockings, bodacious bras and negligees, all for the taking! The legends will be true of the beauteous bounty bestowed. Pervs will come from far and wide to purloin your panties and sniff the crotch of charity and goodwill. And as you give so generously to the world, the world shall respond in kind. In a glory of karmic retribution, gifts shall rain upon you as abundance proliferates throughout your life. Harmony shall restore, devoid of conflict, full of pants.
‘When you are so engrossed in the world around you, the possibilities can’t help but present themselves.’
Dear Uncle Randy,
I’ve been in town for a few weeks now and I can’t find a job. Any advice for the road?
–
There are few trials as disheartening as the downtrodden dejection of being unemployed. Out of work and out of use, drifting jobless through the bustling noise of the world at work, one’s meandering existence can become lacklustre and hopeless. As economic ruin creeps ever closer with each depleting dollar and the stability of one’s material existence is brought into serious question, one shoulders the anxiety of impending destitution. Teetering between the possibilities of deprivation and prosperity, subject to the whims of a saturated job market, one’s fate can seem totally out of one’s own control. Meanwhile, in such a state, the possibility of any spontaneous personal enjoyment of such abundant free time is struck off. Yet, powerless and discouraged, one can only persevere.
A few weeks is nothing; these things take time. Many believe that they will glide effortlessly into the sickest job in the mountains as soon as they arrive in town. Sex magnet bar tender; powder shredding snowboard guru; juiced up adrenaline surging bungee slinger; Mr Connected black suits slick hair concierge of Hôtel Extraordinaire. And sure enough, some do. But most end up eventually getting any old job and making the absolute most of it.
Rest assured, a job will come. It may not be exactly what you imagined or desire, but a job it shall be! And with it will come its own idiosyncratic perks and pros, drags and dead ends, its own people and memories, its own chapter in your life. And whilst such particularities lie beyond your control, knowing that it is sure to come relieves you of the anxiety of unemployment. So relax. Loosen the force of your grip on the outcomes of your choices and experiences. You are free to enjoy yourself, to drink in the town for all its worth. To go out, to meet people make friends have fun. To get to know the individuals that make up this teeming power house of a working town. Because in this town, friends take care of friends. And when you are so engrossed in the world around you, the possibilities can’t help but present themselves.
‘Arise, Apeman! Haul yourself from the primordial swamps, erect your stooping posture and discover the wonder of opposable thumbs!’
Dear Uncle Randy,
People say humans are evolving… are kids going to be super intelligent or fucking stupid fucktards growing up with all this technology, eg iPads, iPhones, games to play with?
–
You’re quite right, people do say that humans are evolving.In fact, I hear it’s all the rage; every species is doing it.Perhaps you should give it a try.Surely you’ve had quite enough of scraping your knuckles along the ground, relying predominantly on your sense of smell for environmental reckoning, gnawing on animal carcasses found in the trash whilst grunting territorially over the fence at your timid, nonplussed neighbours.Arise, Apeman!Haul yourself from the primordial swamps, erect your stooping posture and discover the wonder of opposable thumbs!
Do not forget, “all this technology” is nothing new.Humans have made use of such technical knowledge for hundreds of thousands of years; you are a technological species.The wheel really got things rolling, whilst fire making is still very much in fashion. Numeracy, clothing, and pointy sticks have all come rather a long way.More recently, satellites have facilitated instantaneous global communication, and the internet has bestowed a wealth of pornography and cats at the click of a button.
However, whilst technologies continue to develop at an ever increasing rate, evolution is a slightly slower process.The human tail fell into obsolescence roughly twenty-five million years ago, whilst that new phone you just bought is already super lame.As technology steams ahead like a bullet through the neolithic brain, shaping the world in which you live and how you interact with it at an unprecedented rate, humans can only cling on desperately, simultaneously marvelling at and fearing that which they have created.
Perhaps technology will come to improve life for the better, enriching the young and expanding the minds of the many; saviour of Earth and freer of Mankind.Or perhaps humans will continue to devolve into a race of drooling imbeciles, kept docile and amused by beguiling zeros and ones, gleefully prodding at the digital world of their screens and luxuriating in the sweet rush of brilliant pixels as they flee the malaise of shitty reality.
‘Still not getting the message?! Chloroform them and duct tape them to a chair. Shatter their knee caps and extract their front teeth with a crowbar.’
Dear Uncle Randy,
How do I deal with my flatmates’ smelly trash? My room is near the kitchen and I’m tired of my flatmates stinking out the house so I’ve put the bin outside, but they keep bringing it back in.
–
Other people are, on the whole, insufferable.Cohabiting with such detestable creatures is the ultimate test of tolerance, patience, and compassion.They chew loudly and slurp liquids; they leave a trail of filth and detritus in their witless wake; they verbalise every inane thought that crosses the putrid moors of their mutton mind as if they weren’t an intrinsically worthless bag of dicks; they breathe.Sometimes you just want to scream, to turn on them in a fit of fury and beat the life out of their thick, incompetent skulls.But alas, we are civil, domesticated folk living in peace and harmony, yae.So we must squash the broiling bile deep down inside ourselves, relieving the pressure only by degrees.
Under no circumstances should you address the matter directly; one must never abandon the amiable facade of agreeability.Rather, the passive aggressive approach is always preferential.Through sullen silences and cryptic communications, they will surely realise the nature of their transgressions and adjust their behaviour accordingly.Continue to put the bin out, and every time they bring it back in, put it back out.Say nothing.Confront no one.Smile and laugh gaily as you swallow the encroaching stomach acid; everything is just tickety-boo!
But for some reason it doesn’t work.Somehow, they aren’t capable of reading your mind, of intuitively understanding what’s agitating your inner world.Well then it’s time to up the ante!Innocently destroy something precious to them.Cut their hair whilst they sleep.Film them in the shower and release the video online.Still not getting the message?!Chloroform them and duct tape them to a chair.Shatter their knee caps and extract their front teeth with a crowbar.Is it beginning to sink in now, you trash stinking shit stain?!Get my drift, you fetid bucket of rotting arseholes!?Laughing maniacally, press your thumbs against their larynx and squeeze tight, watching the light dwindle from their eyes.Slice and peel off their face and wear it upon yours, screaming into their mutilated corpse, “Who’s trash now, bitch?!”Eat the brains.Dismember the body.Burn the remains.Return home to make a nice cup of tea in a world free from indoor bins and vexing housemates, purified and odour-free.Recline, relax, and ignore that twitch in your eye.
‘You should be ashamed of yourself is what you should do. You should withdraw into the shadows of your ignominy, retreat to the bell tower and spare us all the burden of your very existence.’
Dear Uncle Randy,
I’ve got a fetish for shitting in the bushes near the homes of local identities… but there’s been loads of coverage on freedom camping and now I’m scared I’ll get caught.What should I do?
–
Everyone has their kinks, crimps and quirks.Each individual on the planet possesses their own particular perversions, their own peculiar strategies for getting their dirty little rocks off.Some people like feet.Some peep through the neighbour’s window on laundry night.Some like to be tied up, spat on, scorched with hot wax, zapped with jump leads and called ‘worthless scum’. only able to bust that nut when doused with ranch dressing and saddled by a leather-clad Taiwanese midget screaming the French national anthem.Different strokes for different folks.
You thrive on the mad thrill of defecating in your neighbours’ bushes.You are, by definition, a deviant.You are atypical; you digress.You are a twisted, non-conformist, abhorrent freak.You are an odious outsider who has no rightful place in polite society!If you were to be caught, brown handed, experts in white coats would do well to toss you in a padded room and observe you from a safe distance through a tiny square window, taking notes and writing long theses on Coprophilia.You should be ashamed of yourself is what you should do.You should withdraw into the shadows of your ignominy, retreat to the bell tower and spare us all the burden of your very existence.You are not at liberty to poop wherever you like!You are not free to roam these vast lands at will and park your rear up wherever in the hell you please.There are rules you know; laws!Proper society has predetermined the boundaries to which you must adhere, freakazoid.
Sure, we could be more “accepting”, we could “tolerate” your particular preferences and facilitate heterogeneity.We could invest in designated poop zones, install poop facilities, open up access, contain, regulate, and in turn alleviate the social symptoms of your particular condition.But why challenge the dominant powers that define normality, delimit rationality, legislate liberty?That would truly be insanity.Instead we’ll just bury you, kick you into the bushes and toss some dirt over you like the turd you are.
‘You are free to denude fully, candidly flaunt your life choices, gyrate, twerk, and thrust the truth all over your parents’ faces.’
Dear Uncle Randy,
So what’s the best way to tell my parents that I’m a stripper???
–
There are times when one must deliver news which provokes unpredictable reactions, which inspires fears of judgement, rejection and, from loved ones, the possible retraction of Love. “I ran over your cat;” “I did a shit in your hot tub;” “I’m actually a sophisticated humanoid sex robot sent back in time to harvest the sperm of fertile men to impregnate the matriarchal society of the women-only Earth of the future and your love for me is unrequited.” Some pills are hard to administer, hard to swallow.
Dropping such colossal truth bombs can require tact and dexterity, a certain delicacy of handling. It is often best that the receiving party is sitting down, drinking warm liquids and breathing into a paper bag, as the truth is administered gradatim so as to reduce the risk of paroxysm. Alternatively, one may brazenly tear down the crushed velvet curtains of ignorance, boldly revealing the bare naked truth cavorting proudly behind, arms a’spread, audacious and proud; “c’est moi, bitches.”
My father was a stripper. Randy Sr. was working the Flamingo Rooms when he met my mother; she was on day six of a two week bender, making it rain mad stacks all over his chiselled everything. I entered their stories several years later after a slew of electric escapades across the globe, intimate and daring exploits between the pair of star spangled lovers. Upon hearing the story of how they met, my father’s work became but one quality of a resplendent tapestry, woven alongside wrestling a bear, discovering the third dimension, and numerous other idiosyncrasies of his legacy. No single facet could ever be said to command the depths of his character, the timbre of his spirit.
It’s the spaces between pages that shape our stories. And it is at the crossroads where our choices lie that we come to define ourselves as individuals, in decisive moments of liberty and autonomy. Should you regard such decisions with contentment and assurance, declaring the fruits of your volition will prove to be of little difficulty. Rather, you are free to denude fully, candidly flaunt your life choices, gyrate, twerk, and thrust the truth all over your parents’ faces.
‘By the fourth day, having found our sea legs, we are actually beginning to enjoy the ride. It turns out that the whole experience is significantly more agreeable when you are not constantly trying to not vomit.’
Holy shit, the ship is moving! How different this is to the stationary quietus of the vessel in harbour. Now at sea we rock and roll, side to side end to end, like a drunken whale rollicking on a bouncy castle full of vomiting children. Walking has become a challenge in linearity. Successfully traversing the ship now requires a balance of anticipation and spontaneity, versatility and bodily coordination; a tail would no doubt be very useful. Our personal movements on board are now subject to the whims of the waves, the commanding swell of the sea. In the galley, one may be lighting the stove on the starboard side one moment, before finding oneself headfirst in the sink on the port side the next. We slide unwillingly downhill on wet floors and must pull ourselves back up towards the sloping walls above us, grasping anything we can as we climb. There are numerous face plants and arse drops to the galley floor, down the saloon steps, across the deck. For many of us, it is a totally new environment and a challenge in the expansion of comfort zones. But that’s why we’re here after all. We came to experience something new, to throw ourselves out of familiarity and headfirst into a world wonderfully different from what we know, to discover what we’re capable of and who we could be. It doesn’t feel great.
On June 1st, we finally depart from harbour, a mere six weeks after the original leaving date. The weather has been particularly capricious this season and a window of fair sailing with southerly winds has been necessary to see us safely off. We anticipate two weeks sailing north, past Cape Reinga — the northern most point of New Zealand’s North Island — before entering the South Pacific Ocean and gliding gracefully up to Fiji within a month. Roughly 1,400 nautical miles; easy. By departure we are elated. The journey we have been waiting for and working towards is upon us at last. After making some final farewells to the outside world, drilling emergency muster stations procedures, and having our documents checked by the visiting customs agent — who fortunately overlooks my well-expired visa status — we detach the mooring lines and motor off to sea, bidding New Zealand adieu. Sunlight bathes the wide open bay and trembles brightly on the water’s surface. As the captain steers the ship out of the dock, the locals we have come to know and love wave us off as we bound up and down the ship, unsure exactly what to do with all the excitement. Crew are perched up high on the yards waving back, looking forward to the fine horizon ahead. The massive 120 horsepower two stroke diesel engine thunders below deck for more than thirty hours as we clear the spit, out of the bay and into the Tasman Sea. Within an hour of departure smoke is billowing out of the galley as the kerosene fuelled oven succeeds in setting itself on fire – not for the first or last time – and a big mess is made with a fire extinguisher. We are escorted by a pod of dolphins playing in the wake of the the ship’s hull as it ploughs through the waves ahead. We cast our trawling lines off the back of the ship and speculate excitedly about the tuna, the mahimahi, the megalodon we will surely catch. And it doesn’t take long for the first signs of seasickness to present themselves amongst the crew.
Whilst two of the jib sails are set, contributing one knot’s worth of drive to our average motoring speed, the main sails remain furled, offering no stabilising effects. Whilst the keel is being barraged by the aquatic forces below, the seventy-two foot masts raise our centre of gravity to swinging point. The ship sways violently as we barrel through the waters. The first mate pukes. One of the French boys takes a quick hiatus from helming to vomit off the stern; wiping himself clean and barking with laughter, he returns to his duty with renewed gusto — his enthusiasm must be commended. Only three, including the captain, are unaffected by the throws of the vessel, and the two crew who continue to prance around the ship effortlessly are met with looks of disbelief and bitter resentment. The rest of us are fragile, and as the undulating hours wear on, crew may be found strewn across the ship like limp rags, used up and cast aside. Each opportunity to curl in to a ball is taken, to breathe deeply and focus on the horizon, to calibrate the inner-ear and the eyes to the precarious demands of this new physical state. For three days I endure an unrelenting condition much like that of a deathly hangover. Pounding headaches, encroaching bile, emotional fragility, all without the joyous revelries of the night before. Frequent pauses in activity must be taken to readjust one’s feet and stomach, waiting for each queasy current to pass.
I am on the captain’s watch and must assist him in kicking the generator into action twice a day in order to charge the batteries, pump the bilge, and compound the bilious nausea. Into the infernal engine room we descend, swinging down the metal steps into this shallow layer of hell. The engine continues to whack away furiously, reverberating off every inch of metal, drumming out hot, steaming noise. There is a leak in the propeller shaft and the bilge overflows with oil and seawater. As it rotates, the engine’s hefty fly wheel scoops and flings this black, salty cocktail up the walls, splattering the pipes and cylinders above. The steel floor is a oil slick, making the challenge of standing upright in one place ever more farcical. The air is thick and the heat of machinery consumes you. I sit before the generator, bum perched on a workbench with my feet wedged wherever they can hold. I grab ahold of the handle, pausing to swallow some sick. I begin cranking the fly wheel, first slow and steady, building momentum, then rapidly, with fervour. Once the wheel is really spinning, we throw the decompression chamber open and the generator sputters into boisterous life. A knife and a shoelace hold the decompression lever open, whilst a yoghurt pot houses the switch for the water pump. We flip the converter switches and record the volts, amps, and time as the batteries begin to recharge. I clamber back up top to lean over the side and check that the water spurting from the side of the hull is black; the bilge is draining. Competing with the roar of the engine, I bellow back down through the hatches to the captain to confirm that we are indeed successfully polluting the ocean, before returning to the helm to tear off layers of sweaty clothing and to try to not pass out. The stars and moon bounce around the mast and the yards above. Our pirate flag flutters in the wind and my head clears of the fumes from below.
Sleeping proves to be equally as testing. At gentler times, the roll of the ship is nothing but gloriously soporific, lulling one into a deep, babe-like sleep, awash with vivid dreams. From one’s bunk, the water can be heard through the hull, trickling along the outside of the ship like a bucolic brook. The pitch of the ship raises you up before dropping from beneath you, seesawing between peculiar sensations of increased gravity and total weightlessness. But there are times when the waves crash against the hull like orchestral crescendos, and the ship’s throws are turbulent and wakeful. During our first night’s sleep, I am tossed relentlessly from one side of my narrow bunk to the other. One of my legs exits my nest to find itself in the saloon whilst the rest of my body slams up against the side of the bunk. I wake grouchy, with bumps and bruises.
By day two we have raised the fore and main sails to their first reef, contributing some stability as the ship heels over to one side. We kill the engine and the world is quiet and decidedly less noxious. All one can hear is the wind and the sea and it is sublime. By day three the seasickness is beginning to recede. I believe there is even some faint laughter heard, carried on the whisper of a breeze — a welcome change from the grunts and groans heard exclusively hitherto. By the fourth day, having found our sea legs, we are actually beginning to enjoy the ride. It turns out that the whole experience is significantly more agreeable when you are not constantly trying to not vomit. At the helm, holding the wheel and leaning with the rolls of the ship proves really quite thrilling; pitching downwards, smashing the bow into the waves ahead before rising once more as the jib-boom thrusts high above the horizon. Even staggering around below deck is somewhat entertaining now rather than mildly torturous. Yet it is clear that we are still navigating the parameters of our new environment, often times learning the hard way. Our German crew member brushes his teeth before spitting over the windward side; his salivary paste flings back and paints my chest and crotch like an X-rated Jackson Pollock; delightful. Similarly, the captain and I watch on as the French urinate over the side, into the wind; “they’re either French or Angels”, the captain quips; stupid or blessed. Our American crew mate dons her full ensemble of foul weather gear, head to toe in blue and fluorescent yellow rubber and resembling a walking inner tube, before noting that, now she’s put it all on, she needs to pee; she returns to her cabin to start again.
After seven days of disappointing empty lines, excitement strikes – we catch fish. Four whopping Albacore tuna! They hit our trawling lines at sunrise as we sail straight over a boil up. Their skulls are thick and they continue to thrash wildly once landed, but we manage to drown them humanely in a bucket of water. Two we wrap in wet cloths and store under the upturned shore boat, shaded and subject to stiff breezes, hoping they will keep for a day or two. The other two we gut, fillet, and deliver to the galley. Over the next four days all we eat is tuna. We have ceviche and sashimi, we fry it we bake it we curry it. We talk about it, we read about tuna. The crew’s farts begin to smell like tuna. Tuna visit my dreams. Tuna all around. On the fourth day I forgo the carbohydrates at each meal, opting for tuna alone, lest it go to waste. Thank you, Tuna, for your sacrifice and service.
By the full moon, we slip past Cape Reinga and find ourselves in the South Pacific Ocean. She rises in a grand fashion, large and orange, vivid through the fleecy clouds scattered over the horizon, lustrous and lucid. I have been in the galley this day, fulfilling my cooking duties. Thick American pancakes for breakfast, tuna pasta with a white sauce for lunch and Moroccan chickpea stew for dinner, with tuna. Over the course of the day, whilst battling the cookers and numerous galley hurdles, I have safely consumed my provisioned bottle of Pinot Noir. Each mouthful is savoured and considered as the luxury it is; there are no vines at sea. Having fed the crew, I emerge on deck to enjoy the evening glow. South Pacific, baby. The sea is very still. The man overboard line is no longer trailing behind us, but rather coils around itself, dipping below the surface of the water. Maybe it’s the wine talking but I’m going in. I change quickly into swim trunks as the rope ladder is thrown over the side. The knotted rope swing is tied to the end of the first yard. Standing on the lowest rungs of the rigging, I swing out with a wavering Tarzan wail. Letting go, I plunge into the deep dark blue. It’s not warm, but it’s not cold. It is however, certainly very deep and very dark and very disquieting. I swim back quickly to the ship perched on the water’s surface, bobbing unassumingly over the abyss, and pull myself up the rope ladder. The whole crew are already in, leaping in to the watery unknown with yells and screams and cheers. “South Pacific, baby!” Our Aussie boy does a backflip off the swing and the crowd go wild. The moon shines above us and it feels good to jump in, to swing, to plunge.
‘Whilst the fourth dimension grinds to a steady halt, the days on board assume their natural rhythm, and the novelty of living aboard a pirate ship gives way to happy habituation.’
I arrive at the ship late in the afternoon on a torrential Thursday. Soaked through to the skin, I stand at the edge of the dock and peer downwards; it is low tide and the deck awaits my greeting three metres below. On my back I’m hauling a hefty rucksack crammed with clothes, and a smaller backpack containing miscellaneous necessities on my front. In each hand — fingers turning purple and numb — hangs a shopping bag bulging with provisions for the voyage to come; rum, chocolate chip cookies, oranges, bananas, beef jerky, peanuts, tobacco, gin, and more rum. I’m ready. “New crew!?”, comes the shout from below, “Are you George?!”; my arrival has been expected. “We weren’t expecting you until tomorrow”; expectations are amiss, the first of many. The scheduled leaving date for the passage to Fiji is in two days, but it would be a further six weeks before we set sail. I drop my bags down to capable hands below and stretch my arms out to bridge the distance between the dock beneath my feet and the slanting rigging. A leap of faith is required. One must simply fall forwards arms out without failing to grab ahold of something wooden, trusting in the opposable blessings of one’s evolution. I descend the rigging with what I would call grace, and within minutes I have shaken hands with all the present members of crew and have successfully located an available bunk. I unpack and ask a lot of questions.
I had found the ship fortuitously, on a gloriously sunny day a couple of months previous, whilst road tripping with a friend. It sits bang in the middle of a small harbour, just north of the Abel Tasman National Park, towering over the neighbouring pleasure yachts and fishing vessels. Strange, stolid faces in the sheer rocks of the coast gaze upon the harbour below: an insouciant scene, doused in the sun’s limpid game with the water’s edge. I wanted to take a look at the boats, and this one was the main attraction. A 137ft, three masted main t’gallant topsail schooner, steel, painted red and black, with a wooden deck, tall, taught rigging, and a long pointy bit on the front. For all intents and purposes, it’s a pirate ship; there’s even a cannon on board, albeit drainpipe makeshift. As my buddy fished from the boulders of the harbour’s barrier, I was invited aboard and taken on a tour of schoolboy wonder. Several weeks later, after some email exchanges with the captain, I return. I have no experience, no clue, not a jot, but I’m eager to learn. Fortunately, I am not alone in this respect. By the time we do set sail we are twelve crew members and one captain; four female and nine male; five Americans, three French, three Australians, one German, and British me; thirteen in total. The youngest is 19, the eldest — not including the captain whose age shall be forever shrouded in mystery — is 30. Each of us possesses a level of skill between none at all and total novice. Fortunately, the captain, with over forty years of experience, is a true sea dog of earned salt.
I quickly discover that there is an absolute shit load of work still to do on the ship before we can make sail. The captain has had to await a crew to gather, like ants to a rotting apple, to provide the labour he needs to get it sea worthy once more. Like all sea faring vessels, it has dedicated itself to steadily decaying with the rhythmic rise and fall of the unrelenting tides. A thick crust of rust coats every exposed inch of steel and in parts it succeeds in eating through to daylight. Sections of handrail have been crippled and torn off by their unforeseen battle with the underside of the undersized dock. The hull has become a marine metropolis teeming with aquatic life, an underwater garden occupied by one overtly territorial, nesting octopus. The entire deck needs caulking and ultimately replacing. Portholes need refitting. Everything that clangs needs to be ground down, scrubbed, primed and repainted. Over the coming weeks I get stuck in and covered in rust dust cuts and bruises. Within the first few days, I stare a little too curiously at the flaring tip of the welder and develop a cheery case of “arc eye”and spend two days recovering in the darkness of my bunk, wearing sunglasses and eating all of my provisioned jerky. A week later, I have a fight with a power tool and a rust hole and almost lose an eye, but acquire a daring buccaneer face scar in the process.
And for six long weeks the leaving date is pushed back and back again. Hopes are raised and dashed, raised and dashed. Week after frustrating week after blasted week, it comes to feel as if we will never leave. The voyage-to-come becomes exactly that: an event forever suspended in the future tense; an expectation never to be fulfilled; a promise that evokes only a perpetuity of unquenched anticipation. The ship has succeeded in rusting its way straight through the fabric of time and space, invaginating itself into an ethereal pocket beyond the coming of future days. We have entered the twilight zone.
Whilst the fourth dimension grinds to a steady halt, the days on board assume their natural rhythm, and the novelty of living aboard a pirate ship gives way to happy habituation. I am woken up early by more efficient members of crew for morning meeting. I sleep in the saloon, my bunk being one of four set into the starboard wall, tiered two by two, privacy contained by perpetually damp curtains. The port-side wall opposite is occupied by the library: several shelves crammed with perhaps 600 books spanning such diverse genres as sailing and marine sciences, the paranormal and UFOs, spirituality, sexuality, erotic fiction, science fiction, and erotic science fiction. With sleep still in my eyes I haul out of my bunk, cross the saloon in five lumbering paces and heave myself up the steps into the galley. Mornings are not my bag. Most are up already but not all, sat around the two tables on folding bench-seats that run the sides of the snug mess/galley. It is in here that many hours are spent diligently asphyxiating brain cells as one sweats over belligerent kerosene cookers in a desperate bid to prepare food for thirteen people — a process which gets only more farcical at sea. I drink tea and choke down uninspiring muesli whilst discussing the finer points of cooked breakfasts and which crew member will be the first sacrifice when we inevitably resort to cannibalism at sea. By 08:00hrs all crew members have assembled and the captain calls morning meeting, in which we discuss progress so far, establish work projects for the day, and tell shit jokes. The list on the cork board fluctuates as completed tasks are crossed off and new ones added as the wealth of necessary repairs is unearthed. We get to work, making a cacophony of steady progress that reverberates throughout the harbour. As well as the ship, we try our best to prepare ourselves for the weeks of uncharted seafaring to come, which generally involves sporadic exercises in knot tying and sail training. We get up on deck and go through the process of setting, reefing, and furling the sails, which initially involves much confusion and shouting. We climb the rigging, haul sheets, tie knots, and gradually come to learn that the processes are not all that complicated after all. It is also during these exercises that I discover that my “foul weather” gear is essentially a wearable sponge and that my hands are very soft.
As progress ticks along almost imperceptibly, so does life in the harbour, and we get to know each other as a crew. We cook and eat, work and relax together; although the captain remains a somewhat enigmatic, hermit-like figure. We come to familiarise with fellow residents of the boating world around us. French François, towering, sophisticated and nonchalant, does repairs to his green wooden boat; we help him lower his half-tonne reconditioned gear box off the dock and into his engine room with a degree of difficulty. Ugly Mike (self-proclaimed), a rugged Kiwi with a white bushy beard, docks his red fishing trawler alongside us and throws three hulking tuna across to us. Some nights Mike will board our ship, beer in calloused hand, to tell sordid stories of his illustrious past and warn us wild eyed of the hazards of the treacherous seas. Al, another Kiwi fisherman, tattooed, with boyish blue eyes, flies his drone and rides his quad bike around the harbour. He gives us packs of smoked Pacific bluefin tuna because he doesn’t eat fish. Captain D, a larger than life Kiwi pirate, a ginger Viking of the seas, takes us out on his boat to go fishing in the bay. He teaches us navigation, how to sail, how to fish, snarling arrrggh! whilst drinking home brew. We sit onboard John and Eta’s Espresso Ship, a vessel once owned by Jacques Cousteau, and drink coffee and play with the puppy Bruce. It is here that mysterious conversations are held concerning hearsay in the harbour, rumours regarding a particular fishing boat and the conduct of its owner. Raised eyebrows and slow nods are exchanged as sentences trail off eerily; ‘did you hear about the guy who disappeared…?’, and ‘you know what happened with the broomstick…?’ There’s Carlos, a lean, meandering hippie, who parks his bus at the harbour; we sit onboard to smoke and play guitar and talk about the universe. The kindness and generosity of the locals, the support and encouragement of the neighbouring sailors, their genuine nature, all colours quotidian harbour life with an tonality of amiability and ease that is commonplace in New Zealand. Each time we hitchhike in to town we rarely wait long before a cheery local pulls over to give us a ride. They seem to know all about the ship and are genuinely enthusiastic to meet us and hear about the progress on board.
At night I sleep well, nestled in my narrow bunk, surrounded by all my worldly possessions. The early mornings, the days of labour and activity, the late night drinking sessions; all contribute to exhaustion and a good night’s sleep. But there are times when we are woken by the creaks and groans of the ship. As it rises and falls with the tide it rubs against the side of the dock, vibrating against its restraints like a broken violin, like the straining efforts of an animal in chains. The groans echo the growing restlessness of the crew, the desire to cast off and set sail. We should have left weeks ago yet we’re still here, tethered to the dock, waiting and uncertain about the future.
There are several events however which punctuate the everyday goings on, mini milestones which remind us that progress is indeed underway, that change is in fact occurring. We fire up the 120 horse power two cylinder diesel engine to make sure it’s running smoothly, filling the harbour with a rhythmic rumble of kinetic energy. Our food delivery arrives: boxes upon crates of enough food to keep thirteen people alive for at least sixty days. Canned fruit and canned vegetables, tomato paste, canola oil, soy sauce, white vinegar, white rice, brown rice, sushi rice, fusilli penne macaroni spaghetti, rolled oats quick oats cornflakes Weetabix, shitty instant coffee and assorted teas, packets of sugar-drink powder, raspberry strawberry plum apricot and mixed-fruit jams, Vegemite, peanut butter, chocolate spread, cabin bread, brown sugar white sugar, brown flour white flour, fast action yeast, icing sugar, cocoa powder, six-hundred eggs, brown lentils, red lentils, split peas, kidney beans, lima beans, cannellini beans, pinto beans, black-eyed peas, chickpeas, decimated coconut, dried dates, raisins, popcorn, long life milk, milk powder, onions, potatoes, cabbages, pumpkins, and enough corned beef to safely see a British family of five through the war. And whilst we will not consume all of this food, we will be thoroughly concerned about its sufficiency throughout the trip.
Once having completed all the necessary work on the boat, we even have a leaving party, before spending another two weeks waiting for suitable weather to set sail.
A sharp journalist for the local weekly newspaper interviews several of us and reports on our having set sail, which makes the front page; the departure was certainly big news to us. And if, after a mere six weeks of set backs, I was beginning to get a little agitated and to doubt the integrity of the whole endeavour, other members of crew – some of whom had been living on board for up to three months prior to my arrival – were downright exacerbated, infuriated by the whole bastard ordeal. It is true, we as a generation are impatient; I know I am at least. Perhaps it is simply youth itself and a basic lack of experience in the gradual passing of all things. Or the influence of the internet and the rapid technology of our service industry; the expectancy of immediate gratification in all its tasty forms. An insurmountable mountain of expectation has been assembled from the constant barrage of images of success and happiness; so much to see, so much to achieve with what feels like so little time. The lives we could be living, the selves we could possess. So much beyond our insignificant immediacy. Whatever the causes, it seems we are yet to learn the virtue of patience, or even recognise its value. Whilst all things come to pass, for us they can never pass quickly enough. But time moves slower for the ship. Decay takes an age and it has witnessed times before and will witness times after us that we cannot know. It is slow and it is patient in its unremitting march towards oblivion. We, on the other hand, chase our oblivion far more feverishly. We want change now and we want life now and we want our deaths now; we want our destiny already. Well here it is, knocking on your big ol’ watermelon head testing that it’s ripe. It’s time. We set sail tomorrow!
G. P. Kazakos 
