Duck Shit

One of the funniest photo shoot that I ever attended as a journalist would have to have been when I was still a part-time correspondent. A local environment group won an award from the Prime Minister's office and set up a photoshoot for local journalists down at the river.

The award winners set up river conservation programs and also ran classes for school kids on subjects like the kind of critters that live in their waterways (macro-invertebrates to you technical types). They had been sponsored in this by a major local business -I think it was the company running a nearby minesite. Anyways the mining company had been sponsoring the local River-Watch program and had won an award from the Prime Minister's office and we journalists were invited along.

So I rock up to the river bank one afternoon to find them already set up. They had a table on the riverbank with items like microscopes and various specimen containers (ice cube trays and ice cream cartons to us non-scientific types). the two ladies from the riverwatch group had rounded up a couple of handy teenagers (brother and sister) to be in the photo and they had the town's iconic bridge in the background.
The table and its microscope were to be the foreground with one lady from the riverwatch group and a teenager pretending to look at bugs under the microscope. The other lady was at the riverbank alongside the other teenager both armed with scoop nets and the bridge as backdrop.

First photographer up was the guy representing both the other local paper (my rival) and the state-wide paper(both run by the same company). He was armed with, what has to be,one of the biggest cameras I have ever seen. it was so big he held it in two hands and had to hold the flash-umbrella between his chin and shoulder. He was there for ages and must have taken literally HUNDREDS of shots. The kids were getting restless, the two women were tired of holding the same pose for so long and the media lady from the PMs office had steam coming from her ears!

Did I mention that the Prime Minister's office had sent a media person and a photographer to us for the shoot? She was a big lady and rather fierce; he was a suave Italian with gel-slicked hair, expensive leather shoes and immaculate black slacks and a crisp white shirt. And here he is tip-toeing through the mud and duck-shit beside the Blackwood River!!

Meanwhile I had turned up in my jeans and sneakers fresh from my day-job, grabbed my little Digital Camera and ducked around the annoying guy from the other paper as I fired off a quick series of snaps. I then stood back to enjoy the show. The PMs camera-man was whining about how the other guy was stealing all the light (it was late afternoon) and the PMs media lady was breathing steam and threatening to march in there and tear the other photographer out by the collar.

I could only stand back and giggle.

Fox tail

As a kid growing up on the farm you tend to take things for granted, things that other (non-farm) kids might never experience. Stuff like life, sex, birth and death. I'm not alone in this, plenty of other people who grew up on farms would be nodding their heads in agreement.

Mum still tells the story of the time I was in Kindy and was asked to bring an item in for show-and-tell. It was lambing season and my father had recently killed a fox in one of the paddocks. So he went and cut the dead fox's tail off and presented it to me to take for show-and-tell. I thought this was a great idea and loaded it into a plastic shopping bag.

The next day and my big moment arrived. I stood in from of the ring of my classmates who were sitting on the floor in front of me, and pulled out the fox tail.

I failed to notice the look of absolute horror on the teacher's face. She was fresh out of college and city-bred so my casual presentation of this piece of dead animal came as a real shock for the poor girl! Okay, it had been dead a couple of days and was a little smelly, but I thought it was really cool - as did the other farm kids and we all soon had a rousing discussion on foxes and how to kill them.

I'm guessing the poor teacher needed trauma counselling and couldn't wait to get back to civilised society in the city.

Hot Chilli

The other day I was talking to a customer about chili peppers and it reminded me of the story of my brother N and his first encounter with chili.

Growing up on the farm we had a huge vegetable garden and heaps of fruit trees. My brother and I were always munching on some form of fresh, home-grown produce. I tell you, there is nothing like picking something off the bush and chomping straight into it. Anyway, mum always grew capsicum (what the Americans call Bell Pepper) and they were a favourite of N's. Mum was always complaining that there were never any capsicums available for dinner since they'd already been pilfered.

When N was about 12 we were in Perth and visited the massive markets at Fremantle. At one end of the building is all the fruit and produce stalls. A big heap of long, bright red chili peppers caught N's eye and he asked mum what they were. She told him they were chillies and were related to capsicums. Since N loved capsicum he announced that he wanted to try a chili. Mum allowed him to buy one but warned him that they are really hot. N was still determined and selected a good looking fruit.

Mum cautioned N to just nibble off a tiny, tiny piece to test the heat....did N listen to her??

Nope, nuh-uh, no way...he bit off at least half the chili in a single bite!! He crunched away while we all watched with great interest to see the response. It seemed to take ages!

However, soon we saw the message travelling from N's tongue to his brain. OMG, YEOW!! Poor N was left gasping in pain and bewilderment. We didn't really use much in the way of spices at home so N hadn't really encountered hot and spicy before. It was a nasty surprise!! It took something like three bottles of water to put that fire out but N lost all interest in food for several hours afterwards.

Do you speak another language?

I've always enjoyed learning languages. I don't know much besides English (my mother-tongue/native language) however I also know a few words or phrases in Swedish, Japanese and Filipino.
My father is Swedish and my mother (who's Australian) live in the country and learnt the language. I studied Japanese in high school and I work with a lot of Filipinos so I picked up bits and pieces.

I think learning another language is fun and its a great way to meet people and break the ice. I love meeting someone from, say, the Philippines and saying hello to them in their tongue and watching the looks of surprise and delight on their face. Its great fun. I meet interesting people and they love that I've made the effort and tries to connect with them- especially if they're a little unsure of their English skills.

However I am aware that some other Aussies are a little puzzled, confused or down-right annoyed at my learning another language.

That was re-enforced for me at work the other day. I was in the staff lunch-room and chatting to a couple of Filipino women. I was showing them the words I knew and they were giggling and chatting happily to me. A female department manager over-heard my conversation and was totally puzzled and confused as to why I was taking the time to learn their language. "Was I planning to go to the Philippines?" the department manager asked. "Nope," I said. "So why are you learning the language?"she asked. "Because I want to, because its fun," I said. She seemed genuinely amazed that someone would actually take the time to learn the language 'for fun'.

Am I missing something here? what's so wrong in that? I don't think she was being racist, I think she was genuinely confused.
Hey, maybe I will visit the country one day. If I do I will have an advantage, I'll know some language and chances are I'll have made some new friends who will be only too happy to host me and show me around. Learning languages is fun.

Walnuts for brains

I mentioned in my previous post that I used to be a journalist. As a journo you get used to some of the more "interesting" characters that you meet. The weirdo's, the nutters and the attention seekers.

One of my favorite stories was about the local artist who wanted me to print a critique of a member of the state parliament (who happened to live in my home town...I'd know the woman for years before she became a politician and went to school with her kids).

The Artist wanted me to quote him-without naming him at any time-as saying that this particular politician 'had the IQ of a walnut'! I, of course, protested vigorously saying that there was no way I would be able to print that since a statement like that is considered SLANDER and would cause massive trouble-both for me and for the paper.

The Artist's response? No, it isn't slander because no one has ever proven the IQ of a walnut!!

I didn't print his article.

This was the same guy that wanted me to print copies of the "political cartoons" he used to draw. They were DISGUSTING!! Really slanderous, offensive and just plain gross!! Really sick stuff!

Why you can't ride a horse in a wedding dress

Years ago, in a past lifetime, I was working as a journalist for a small rural newspaper. One day I get a request to cover the wedding of the son of a prominent local business owner. Mother of the Groom (MoG) was also a big advertiser in our paper so I was tasked to get a pic for the social page as a gesture of good will to her.

So I contact MoG for details of the nuptials. That's when I get told the Bride has decided that she doesn't want to take a horse-drawn carriage to the church (so old fashioned), she wants to RIDE THE HORSE DOWN THE MAIN STREET. Good idea but she never factored in the physical difficulty of straddling (as in leg on either side of the horse), while wearing a wedding dress and still looking elegant. Forget the strappy stiletto heels for a moment.

Fortunately MoG had used her considerable local connections and managed to find a local farmer with a couple of quiet and presentable nags to loan for the day. I say a couple because there were two of them, two because Mother of  the Bride (MoB) has decided that making a grand entrance from the back of a horse is a great idea and she wants a piece of the action - I mean, she wants to share in her daughter's special day!

So we assemble in the carpark at one end of town, at the opposite end of the main street from the church. The Bridesmaids/Best Man/Grooms are all to travel up the street in a fleet of vintage cars followed by the horses.

It was while we were assembled in the carpark that they discovered a rather big hitch in this grand wedding plan. MoB's decision to ride with her daughter was rather last-minute and she had neglected to find out if her own wedding attire was suitable to riding a horse....remember they're not riding side-saddle?!
MoB has chosen a lovely mauve suit with a jacket, white blouse and skirt....a short (knee length) tight skirt...see my problem? She couldn't get on the horse very elegantly with such a tight skirt, let alone straddle it.

In the end MoB had to roll that skirt practically up to her groin in order to sit comfortable....roll it up all the way round, not just tuck the back part under her bum and roll a bit of the front in order to free her knees!!

So mother and daughter had to ride all the way along the main street, about 2km, with mum practically using her skirt as a pink belt, showing the world her knobbly knees, veiny thighs and cellulite. The bride's wedding dress was bunched up in a rather odd fashion (again forgot to check the physics of riding a horse when designing her outfit).

That was probably the most bizarre wedding I ever had to photograph; the poor official photographer and I had to work REALLY hard to get some "decent" photos of that event! Pity the bride, you don't want to censor you wedding photos to hide what color knickers your MUM was wearing!