Cry Baby, Cry Baby, Cry Baby, Cry!

I think I’m turning into a sooky-la-la! For the past couple of months, I just haven’t been able to stop crying!

Imagine that! Strong, masculine Donkey, snivelling away in front of the TV; bawling on the train; wailing on the plane; sooking at the movies!

What’s this? Are we talking about the same Donkey who kicked Brad McMahon in the arse all those years ago? Surely not!

Is this the same Donkey who used to sit in the back row of the bus with all the tough kids and bellow intimidations at the young tykes as they huddled in safety behind the driver? It couldn’t be!

Surely not our Donkey, who cuts up mountains of onions every night, with narry a tear!

Not our Donkey; three times, back-to-back title-holder at La Trobe University for being able to squeeze more lemons into his eye than any other!

It couldn’t be our Donkey – he’s as stone-cold and unemotional as Val Kilmer in Top Gun! Donkey just does not cry!

But alas it’s true, I’ve become a sop! It all started a couple of months ago when I was sitting on the couch, watching the Amazing Race Asia. Our contestants were racing through Auckland, and as is customary at the end of each leg of the race, they are welcomed to the country by a representative of the people, usually dolled-up in some form of traditional dress. So it might be a mountie in Canada, a bikini-clad model in Brazil or a Renaissance courtier in Venice.

But of course, this time we were in New Zealand, and the welcoming official was a Maori man in traditional dress, who blew through his conch shell, and said, “Kia’ora! Welcome to New Zealand”. And when he blew that shell, I immediately deteriorated on the couch into a blubbering mess!

A couple of weeks later, I was travelling by train back into Delhi, sitting between two colleagues, and listening to my Zen in order to ward off further Saving the World shop-talk. Restlessly, I browsed through my library for a while, before settling on a mix of music from Samoa and the Solomons, and some occasional offerings from other parts of the Pacific. And for the next hour and a half, there I sat, hunched forward in the foetal position to keep my face shadowed from my colleagues, stricken with tears as it was, sobbing along to Sharzy, Te Vaka and Tihati.

Not long after that, again back on the couch, I was cranking-up the DVD of Remote Area Nurse (RAN), and just as the menu display was coming on-line, so too did the amazing, haunting voices of the Torres Straight Islanders, as they thundered over the “home theatre system” in incredible, four-part harmony – and I wept! And with Mrs Donkey falling into step beside me, I continued to do so for the next two hours as we saw our beloved Pacific – this time portrayed as a part of our own land, with all the breath-taking scenery, familiarly alien sounds and heart-wrenching drama of that remarkable culture.

And then, a week later, while curled up on a plane seat, blanket over my head so that my neighbour wouldn’t get scared and dob me into the Sky Marshalls, I wept as the music from RAN washed over me once again.

What’s going on … what’s happening to me? I’m still yer regular, macho, red-blooded male Donkey, with an eye for a dame and a thirst for a big, cold beer. I love kickin’ the footy, wrestlin’ with me mates and eating a pint of raw chillies if that’s what I’m dared to do.

I’m tough … and I’m strong … and I’m not a girly sook! But something is happening. I’m feeling more and more displaced. I am missing something … missing someone … missing home … missing a home …

Someone … something … somewhere … is calling.


NB: Just watched the last episode of RAN …and was a blubbering idiot by the end!



Something is drawing me back ... I wonder what it could be? Pic: Sally