It is a Great Country..really, it is, honestly, truly....

I found myself in deep shtuk (is that how you spell it, is it even a word, I think it is) over the last post but one. Writing a piece with a title like that (it, like the headings on many of my posts is a lyric…from the once mighty No Tag) on the eve of three weeks in the home country was a foolish thing to do it seems. Whilst there was no abuse as such, last week in Ponsonby Road outside Santos, a person I don’t know from Adam made a point of crossing the road to sneer at me “if you don’t like it, stay away”, and I half expected Kim Hill to lash out at me on my interview. That she didn’t, on National Radio, was a source of much relief. I can deal with the questions about the punk-nazi thing (it was thirty years ago for gods sake and I think that we are still getting a bite out of it from Kim speaks for itself, it worked) and the righteously, almost naïve, questions about Indonesian timber which were put in a manner that could only have come from a warm comfy studio in Wellington, but having to defend my patriotism was not something I wanted to do. There were emails too…..nothing too nasty but somewhat bemused and flicked with a sense of betrayal.

I really can’t get my head around the idea that its somehow treachery to live elsewhere. When did this precious little concept gain popular currency? There was a thread full of it on Biggie recently which did my head in. Certainly as a lad New Zealanders were encouraged to leave and it was happily accepted that some returned and some didn’t. Both gave the nation a depth that it otherwise lacked. They still do. William Pickering and David Low are as much about what New Zealand was, is and will be as any All Black. Both were my heroes as a youngster, someone to look up to and aspire to be, as much, no more, than any muscle bound redneck running up and down a paddock with a ball was.

So let’s get things straight. I love my home country. OK? It’s my nest and my heritage; where my whanau and most of the people I hold most dear live. There is nothing more breathtaking than turning into the top of Hakanoa Street in autumn. I love it. I love the warm soft well fed look everywhere, the homeboys in Queen Street who are so wannabe staunch and have no idea how funny they are; I love hearing drum’n’bass, almost a forgotten genre elsewhere, coming out of cars and shops; I love George FM, an independent station that programmes people rather than music (which gives it an edge over bFm, which, incidentally, I also love); I love the fact that so many people try so hard to do something special and so many succeed and even those that don’t at least try and then try again without knowing the meaning of give-up. There is a strong, almost inbreed resistance amongst many to the mediocrity that the Canwests, the TVNZs, the NZ Heralds, the multinationals and their ilk try to foist on the populace as a norm, which gives the nation its spirit and its colour.

And I’ve done my bit so I’m allowed to look around….I don’t feel like a New Zealander within the fences that often implies and never have, so, without apology I’ll live where I wish. Oh..and don’t ever call me a bloody kiwi….

This last visit, for three weeks, I felt more alien than ever before though. Driving was odd, interaction was odd, systems I’ve known all my life I was clumsy with and almost scared of and I got rather sick of having to justify a life in Indonesia to those who were incredulous at me putting myself and my family at such risk…..ummm….fuck off….

One final note…what on earth is wrong with Auckland Airport. The staff (with the exception of the rather pleasant guys x-raying bags at immigration) would do well to hop on an aircraft and fly to Singapore and look. That odd thing on people’s faces is a smile. A special brickbat goes to the seven kilo hand baggage fascists …”that’s 7.2 kilos..you’ll have to check it in now”…..taking a book out and holding it under my arm satisfied them…that’s logic. Petty backward bureaucrats that make Auckland look silly….

George FM Yesterday 10am-12 noon

Ten City-Suspicious (Joe Claussells High Life Dub)-Ibadan 1996 Arthur Russell-Lets Go Swimming (Walter Gibbons Coastal Dub Mix)-Rough Trade 1986 Strafe-Set It Off (Walter Gibbon vox)-Jus Born 1984 One Way-Lets Talk-MCA 1985 Alexander O’Neal-A Broken Heart Can Mend-Tabu 1985 Main Source-Just Hangin’ Out (Your Hood mix)-Wild Pitch 1991 The Chi-lites-My First Mistake-Mercury 1977 NYC Peech Boys-Life Is Something Special (Larry Levan Special Edition)-Garage 1982 Lillo Thomas-I Love It (for Richard)-Capitol 1983 Lil Louis & The World-Nyce & Slow (The Heavenly mix)-FFRR 1990 Tackhead-The Game-4^th & Broadway 1987 Marc Romboy & Robert Owens-In My Mind -Systematic 2006 Capracara-Flashback 86-Souljazz 2006 Oxia-Domino-Kompact Extra 2006 Caucasian Boy-Northern Lights (Prime Cutz mix)-Strictly Rhythm 1993 Herve-What You Need The Most-Dubsided 2006 Sly & Robbie-Ticket to Ride-4^th & Broadway 1984 Malcolm McLaren-World’s Famous-Charisma 1984 S-Xpress-Supafly Guy-Rhythm King 1988 Fast Eddie-Yo Yo Get Funky-DJ International 1988

What a Great Country This Is / like fuck it is

I note, with some bemusement, the story in the Herald about the failure of the website designed to lure expatriate New Zealanders (of whom I am one), back to the mother country.

It’s not really a surprise is it.

What a silly idea, dreamed up in some boardroom full of overpaid shirts trying to extract a fat fee from the government, and I’m sure it did. The only surprise is that someone was gullible enough to buy it, to think it might work. To think that those who have left might be prodded to return by this, is just silly. Even if one was to read it and take it seriously it fails. It simply tries too hard to convince the reader that something is happening and repeatedly tries to imply that New Zealand has made the jump from mediocrity to exciting. Witness the music and entertainment pages…so try hard…so “look, its all happening here”. And its all so unnecessary and thoroughly insulting to those of us who know that exciting things have always happened in New Zealand, that the only real difference now is the momentary interest the mainstream are now taking in the undercurrent. Musically, I’m still not sure if the recognition is a good thing, if the voluntary quotas achieve much more than a blanding of the centre. Certainly the “New Zealandness” of the music being foisted onto the airwaves, as the record companies direct all their efforts towards commercial radio play, seems to be lost, especially in pop. R’n’b and New Zealand’s hip hop are another matter. Try as it might, many of the urban sounds coming out of NZ do not sound like the massively polished sounds coming out of the US or the UK. It retains a naïve clumsiness about it and more power to that, it’s an individuality that gives it spark. And then there is Fat Freddy’s. I don’t like the music particularly but I love them for the people power it indicates, and the voice it gives to my belief that the tryhard aspect of the failing website is unnecessary. Things are happening in NZ, and they always have been and the lack of this is not the reason many have left.

One of the things that has driven many, myself included, away is intolerance. I was terrified by the failure to criticise and the acceptance by the media of inherent racism in the National Party’s election campaign last year, and the way in which so many of my countrymen rallied to the bigotry. I had hoped we developed beyond that. Any I find myself uncomfortable with the creeping mediocrity and aspiration to mediocrity that I see, and the media celebrates.

I hate the rules, the lists of bylaws that greet you as you arrive at the beach, the fascism of the road rules and the way they are enforced. I know these exist for a reason but it is the layering of these on top each other over and over again, with the myriad of other regulations and rules that neuter the soul. There are things like the mess that New Zealand’s Employment law is, administered by the overpaid, out of touch with reality, buffoons that call themselves the Employment Relations Authority who encourage a whole new industry of parasitic ambulance chasers.

Those are some of the things that drive us away.

And then there is the case of Phillip Sturm. I really should say, before I go on, I know Phillip. Not well, at all, more in passing, and I’ve never had a conversation with him beyond small talk. I should also say that I have not seen the court records and my understanding of this case comes from what I’ve read in the media and, more importantly, from people I know who are privy to the details, some of whom were witness to some of the events surrounding the alleged offending.

To say this stinks is a massive understatement. Nothing I have heard or read indicates that is anything more than good old fashioned gay bashing. Over one hundred years since the British establishment drove Oscar Wilde to an early death, on the other side of the world, in the old Empire we continue the grand tradition. Yes Sturm is guilty, but only of being a promiscuous gay male, and not a particularly pleasant, as those who know him will attest, human being. Neither crime should put him in jail for nine years. But it has in clean green NZ.

The evidence that Sturm drugged and assaulted several men is ludicrous. None of the drugs alleged to have been used by him are capable, as hundreds of thousands of highly respectable New Zealanders know, in the quantities alleged, of the stupefaction required to substantiate the charges, and the original judge was correct to toss that out. That a second trial and the appeal court overruled this indicates that the whole notion of justice is a farce in New Zealand when applied to those who don’t sit in the centre of society, who don’t play the game. I reside in a country now which the world derides for its corruption but this case went down a country which is trying to sell itself as one of the great places to live, a sophisticated, haven of lifestyle.

The whole case is an evil nonsense, and confirms the notion, that the earlier witch trial of Peter Ellis made many of us believe, that New Zealand is not necessarily a place we want to live.

And no one says a word….

It’s just an opinion, ok

1. A window into a society or a culture, it seems to me, is indicated by the way they ride their bicycles. A silly statement, perhaps, made after countless hours avoiding the very many slow, happy, meandering cyclists here on the streets on Bali. Australians tend to ride their cycles aggressively as if they are more important than they are; New Zealanders, with their silly hats (yes I know why they have them) don’t seem able to work out whether they are riding a cycle or aspiring to a motorcycle; Germans ride clean bicycles on designated pathways and park them tidily in the correct place; and Americans always have more gadgets on the bike than they need to do the job. The Indonesian ride is best done at a pace which somehow defies the natural pull of gravity to pull them over at that speed, and involves a glazed, content look. Tidak Apa Apa…it doesn’t matter.
2. Dear Ms Caro….NZ Film directors seem to have this infuriating habit of making a wonderful, groundbreaking, and moving movie and then, almost without hesitation rolling over for the Hollywood dollar and the house in Malibu. Witness Lee Tamahori (or perhaps not). Once Were Warriors, still, after all these years, fucks with my mind. The first time I saw it in a theatre, the whole place left after in complete silence. Now, I’ve seen it half a dozen times and every time, despite the familiarity, it chills me, and I crave that alternative happy resolution that we all know will never come. But, Lee’s work post Warriors is relentlessly nothing…not good or bad but simply Yankee nothing. Roger Donaldson is another (although his No Way Back may be the highpoint of Kevin Costner’s career but, really that’s not saying a lot), and he has, last year, finally done something worthy of his talent. But how many years did that take. I want to wave the flag and go yeah..look, a Kiwi, but when it’s the likes of Cocktail, its hard. So….. If I’d wanted to watch Erin Brocavich, or whatever it was called, again, I’ve would’ve watched it, not made the mistake of spending two hours on a lame poor cousin of it called North Country. And how bad was the bloody courtroom scene. Whale Rider was not Warriors, or even Quiet Earth or Smash Palace, all of which I regard as NZ masterpieces, but it was still a fine, fine film and something to be proud of and work from, so what happened? Was the lure of the big house too much or is it, I hope, a clever foot in the door, and better is to come. I know we don’t own you or have a right to expect anything, it’s just that we do…regards, disappointed of Sanur.
3. I wonder if any mainstream politician in America has the balls, the dang gumption, to actually stand up and tell the truth about Iraq to the US constituency. To date, none have. Both Democrats and, more so, Republicans, still cloud their rhetoric in a façade, in a myth, the right with the something called “freedom and democracy”, with “winning”; and the left with the “bring the troops home” bullshit. No hint of liability or responsibility for destroying a people, for the deaths of god knows how many…
4. I don’t get Mariah Carey. I really don’t. She is gruesomely ugly (I’m not usually one to make judgements like that, and I don’t feel that comfortable doing so but she insists on popping out all over my screen and it’s not pleasant. She made the choice to put herself up on show); she can’t sing…well she can but it’s a mediocre caterwaul at best; her materiel is generously best described as sub mediocre; oh, and she can’t act. And she’s not even doing the Watuzi on the boardroom table with Tommy Mottola anymore. At least when she was on Sony, her success made logical sense. But now, I don’t understand. And I really don’t want to. Not that she cares…
5. I wasn’t born to co-exist with snakes. I’ve known a couple over the years but I mean the ones that exist in the wild (and in our garden) here in Bali. Brigid almost stood on a brown thing a few weeks back, on the front steps. We (well, not actually me) cornered it in a hole before Gustu, the gardener, filled the thing in with fast dry cement, so I guess it remains there. Yesterday, a barking dog, the dachshund, caught the household’s attention and Brigid found it head to head with a raised, flared Cobra in the garden. Pulling the dog away by its tail, the, now experienced reptile-er, Gustu, dispatched it with a stick and put it outside in the sampah, the rubbish, only for the guy over the road in the motorcycle repair place to come over, bite its head off, and eat it raw. This is not Ponsonby…..

As they Pulled Me Out of the Oxygen Tent ………..

This is really a post without a home, a series of, to quote myself, unrelated thoughts about nothing in particular.

I’ve spent the past two days crawling around unventilated sawdust and grime filled factories in central Java, in temperatures about the mid forties, chalk in hand, inspecting furniture.

And my wonderful Brigid is still there.

And I miss her tonight.

Last night I was in a bar in Jogja, about ten feet from the President of Singapore, a Mr Nathan, who was on his way to meet the Sultan, I’m told. Most taxi drivers in Singapore will tell you he is little more than a puppet, a façade for the real king boss, the omni-present Mr Lee, who now has “retired” but rules through his son, the Prime Minister. Taxi drivers allegedly reflect the pulse of public opinion globally but, really, tend, I think, to talk rather more than listen and are a little less reliable than their reputation would have you believe. Still, scratch the surface in Singapore and the democratic glean is replaced by a good old fashioned self preserving autocratic first family, of immense and growing wealth. All the talk in Singapore seems to be what happens when the old man and Mrs Lee pass on, and it can’t be long. All bets, it seems, are off…apart from the certainty that Lee Jr will be looking for employment fairly quickly as he gets jostled out by the next generation of real players. Spend any time in Singapore and you’ll know there are plenty of those.

Friendly, polished dictators have always been popular with American politicians of all shades. I stood reasonably close to another a few weeks back as he exited, with help from a selection of unamused goons, from his car. I rushed into the hotel, saying loudly to Brigid….”Suharto is here”, then, after a glare from the concierge, thought better of it.

It’s not everyday you stand next to a military dictator, a man allegedly responsible, directly or indirectly, for the deaths of half a million or more. We didn’t get to chat….

He was quite short..at least age had shrunk him. Impressive he was not.

I had a quick squizz today around the editorials in the US media. Not the big stuff but the little newspapers, which I always find more fascinating and less pretentiously clever than many of the NYT or WaPo’s rather self important columnists. I swing through these from time to time and the drift of opinion is always interesting. Post the damage control speeches this week from the obscene buffoon in the White House two things are evident. Firstly, right now, Bush is fucked, about as fucked as a politician can be, although I don’t underestimate the inane ability of the US public to swing back; secondly, it’s for the wrong reasons. There is no guilt over the needless deaths of unnamed and uncounted tens, perhaps over a hundred, thousand Iraqis. No sense of communal responsibility for rushing gung ho, with overwhelming joy into this, for re-electing the man who, by the time of the 2004 election had so obviously manipulated and knowingly created a war with a lie. Instead, they don’t like him because he doesn’t have an “exit plan” to save the asses of the good old boys out there fighting for “freedom”. Until they find it in themselves to admit the fault I doubt they will ever find it possible to work towards an “exit plan” which provides justice for those they have wronged, not merely a safe return for “our troops”. The United States owes Iraq that and they are a long long way from it right now. The editorials still muse about “victory” and there is a delusion that such a thing is possible, a failure to realize that even if Iraq mutates overnight into a grand and peaceful democracy, the United States has long lost this war in so many ways.

Perhaps I need to lighten up a little. My current reading doesn’t help. Having finished Martin Short’s biography of Mao, feeling so completely insignificant and struggling to balance his evil with his genius, I’ve now plunged into William Taubman’s intriguing biography of Nikita Khrushchev, a man, whom all reason tells me, should never have been more than a sycophantic cog in the Soviet machine but ended up bringing the planet closer to Armageddon than any man before or after; and, the massive tome from one of the hard right’s great bogey men, Robert Fisk’s The Great War for Civilization. I looked at this for weeks, fondled it in Singapore but resisted due to size and price. However I need to read this. My respect for Fisk is immense. Of all the commentators he was and is there and has been for a very long time. His detractors sit, mostly, in Eastern US cities sporting forth bile, and I can’t for a moment imagine the likes of Kristol and Novak actually removing themselves from their comfortable worlds, and fat column fees, long enough to experience what gives Fisk the substance and credibility they lack. That coupled with the fact that virtually every prediction he made before and after March 2003 has come to be. And he has as little time for brutes like Saddam and he has for Bush who is no better. So, when Amazon offered a deal on it….it may take me weeks to come up for air, but I’m hoping to be all the better for the commitment.

I want to understand you see….

I’ve been listening to Elvis Costello’s live My Flame Burns Blue and I don’t know what to make of it, whether I like it or feel it’s another string to those who decry the mans decline. The ego of Costello irks me somewhat these days, his opinion of himself is clearly increasingly inflated and I think, perhaps he should leave the jazz-lite to his wife, although his take here of his Almost Blue is vastly superior to Diana’s. Its all in the voice and Costello has that over her. I hate Diana Krall’s voice with an irrational passion.

Maybe because I’m such a big fan, and a completist…I buy, or con from record companies, everything, although not in every format as I used to…I’ve listened to this quite a bit in recent days and there are moments, and it grows here and there but only just. And to be honest, with the possible exception of God Gives Me Strength, the originals of all his own tracks herein are vastly superior. I guess he has every right to make this record, I’ll give him that, and I’m not demanding a return to 1980, but it feels mostly like pointless bar, albeit a big bar with an Orchestra, fluff sadly. I’m far more excited by the prospect of the forthcoming collaboration with Allen Toussaint, due in the next couple of months they say.