The Horror, The Horror

It's so hard to remain young and funky when you've got kids; the cool, hip pubs and bars which you once habitually frequented, although just as geographically close to you as they'd been but a year or so ago, seem completely inaccessible these days. 

It's not enough that caring for and raising a child keeps you tied to the home in terms of being there to watch over them through waking and sleeping, but even when you do have the opportunity for a free night away, you're completely knackered from the day's responsibilities such that you know it's gonna take chemicals a damn sight stronger than mere alcohol to even get you into the front bar, let alone on the dance floor ... and that's when the allure of half a DVD movie and an early night is just too good to pass-up.

The only consolation to the passing of your misspent youth is that your fellow offenders of yore, ensconced as they are in their own breeding programs, are experiencing the exact same social  isolation and troubling passage of time as you.  And like you, they are just as happy to let one Saturday night after another pass on by without so much as setting foot out their front door.

But there's something about our culture which demands that at Christmas time, one makes an effort ... kids or no.  The problem, though, is where can a bunch of people, once famous for their selectivity towards cutting-edge venues and significant staying power possibly get together and maintain their hip and groovy status?

The answer is ... no where!

And so, a couple of weeks before last Christmas, in a determined effort to get together somewhere that was both kid friendly and licensed, we all bit the bullet and descended upon the 'dining room' of an inner-city hotel, complete with pokies and bar maids wearing the mandatory, low-cut bodices and push-up bras that any self-respecting, red-blooded, TAB-going Aussie male would expect from someone pouring his $2-Happy Hour pots.

We were the first of our group to arrive, and had to wait in the front bar for 10 minutes until the dining room was opened.  It was here the realisation dawned that this wasn't the kind of place one was wont to frequent in one's wilder days; there were four men at the bar, each wearing Christmas break-up Santa hats and were very, very drunk.  They were all speaking at the same time; their different conversations creating a loud moan that seemed to buzz around the bar and, as if by telepathy, would come together in unison to utter the phrase "f@*king c@nts", before heading off again on murmured, indecipherable tangents.  It was kind of like this,

Drunk Man #1:  "Murmer murmer murmer murmer    - f@*king c@nts -     murmer murmer murmer".

Drunk Man #2   "Whah blah whah blah whah blah    - f@*king c@nts -     whah blah whah blah".

Drunk Man #3:  "Wang wang wang wang wang       - f@*king c@nts -     wang wang wang wang".

Drunk Man #4:  "Yarda yarda yarda yarda yarda      - f@*king c@nts -     yarda yarda yarda yarda".

So, not quite the kind of place we cool, funkmeisters would once have sought-out for a drink, and not quite what one might have had in mind for one's child.  Still, the dining room looked like it might be a little more civilised, so we surreptitiously slipped in, and hid in a dark corner until the booking Nazi was ready to throw open the doors.

Within five minutes, the place was packed with large groups of pre-Christmas revellers ... and their kids.  At every table, there were as many high chairs as there were seats.  We could tell by everyone else's assured movements that we were clearly the only newbies in the place; as we tentatively sought-out our table and tried to work out whether we were yet allowed to sit, we saw other couples stride-in with great purpose and resolve, and once inside, without even making eye contact, the acid-wash jeaned man would head to the bar while the peroxide blond, pink-spangled boob-tubed woman would dump their kids at the indoor playground and proceed to the table where she would fidget anxiously in anticipation of the impending delivery of her bourbon and coke (by the industrious Mr Acidwash) – all this executed with brilliant timing and precision.

Hang-on a minute, Donkey!  Did you just try to slip something by us, and think we wouldn't notice?  An indoor playground ... in a pub?!

Heh heh ... yes, I was getting to that.  One of the things that makes this place kid friendly is that it has an indoor playground [ie: a place you can dump the kids while you get schickered].  This is quite an elaborate set-up, completely sealed-off from the dining room with glass that, while not great for ventilation, does allow one to keep an eye on one's offspring while downing one's pre-Christmas beers and Bundy chasers.

Our friends all arrived, and with similarly haunted looks, we sat down with our kids to order dinner.  This was our next shock, and the second string in this venue's kid friendly bow.  Y'see, it wasn't just the indoor playground that had this place buzzing at 5.10 on a Tuesday evening, there was also the sentence in big, bold, red letters staring back at me when I picked-up the menu, "Kids eat for free!".  Uh oh!

Yes that's right.  Kids are able to select - for free - from a menu of deep-fried goodies, PLUS get a free 'red-lemonade', PLUS a free 'frog-in-a-[red]-pond' desert.  "Sure, it's not the most nutritious feed in the world for a growing body and mind, but hey, it is great value and...", I was suddenly warming to the whole experience, "with the money we save on Hambones' meal, we could try our luck on the pokies".

Hang-on, did I just say that?  Or did I just think that ... blimey, what's happening to me?

So, brushing aside a strange, unexplained, nagging feeling of alarm in the pit of my stomach, the kids ate for free, and we ate our own, larger but equally deep-fried slabs of meat with sides of deep fried potatoes and bright-green, oily garnish.  I was feeling thoroughly ill myself by the time Hambones'd downed his red lemonade and jelly, but it was only fair to let him have another run around the indoor playground with the other kids before we headed home.

As I followed him in to take-up our group's supervisory post (our revolving, continuous presence in the 'fish bowl' constituting the only adults to visit the room all evening), I was nearly struck down by the visceral wave which hit me in the senses as soon as we opened the hermetically-sealed door.  It was at this time when I came to understand the instinctive unease which had been gnawing at me since I first laid eyes on the words, "Kids eat for free!"

Because the thing about kids is that if you feed them high-fat food prepared in bulk, in conditions of questionable hygiene, and you combine this with immediate, post-ingested physical activity in a humid, poorly-ventilated room, one of three things are likely to occur; i) they will vomit, ii) they will shit themselves, or iii) they will vomit and shit themselves.

And another thing about kids is that if you feed them red food colouring (in lemonade and jelly) and you send them into a humid, poorly-ventilated room with brightly-coloured plastic play equipment and rubber floors, they will go nuts; run around and scream at the top of their high soprano little voice boxes.

And another thing about kids is that if they have been fed red food colouring, and been sent into a humid, poorly-ventilated room with brightly-coloured plastic play equipment and rubber floors, and they are going nuts, it won't be long before these kids start pushing, hitting, punching and biting each other like little savages.

And another thing about wild little savages who have been force-fed artificial stimulants and placed inside a glass prison to fend for themselves while the prison guards go off duty to immerse themselves in cheap liquor, is that like any group of beings fighting for their survival, they will factionalise; with the biggest, strongest inmates asserting their dominance, and surrounding themselves with flunkies through which to inflict real, physical pain on the weakest individuals sharing their cell.

So with my sauce-enveloped, fat-saturated meat products sitting rather precariously just above my liver, I entered into this maelstrom of writhing, screeching, vomit- and shit-reeking madness, and physically shuddered as I witnessed two bigger boys beating the absolute living daylights out of a much smaller child, and an older girl clothes-lining other kids in the neck as they were pushed down the slide by one of her accomplices.  In one corner, a little boy was curled-up in the foetal position, screaming as another boy unwrapped foil from a dozen, soft cubes of butter he'd misappropriated from the dining room, and was smearing them in his victim's hair, while in another, a little girl {demonstrating how her sense of taste was inversely proportional to that of her parents for bringing her here] was throwing faecal matter leaked from her bulging nappy at the flat-screen TV belching-out vintage Britney Speares music videos at megasonic volume.

Needless to say Hambones and I didn't last too long in there; by the time we'd dragged him out of that horrendous glasshouse and bundled him into the car, Colour 123 had expended its influence and he'd fallen into one of those post-party hypoglycaemic comas which make it almost impossible to pry a child from a car seat at the other end.  Never-mind coming down from ecstasy a couple of days later, this night of chemical inducement took our wee one a week to recover from.  OK, it was Christmas – a special occasion, and we got to meet up with our old friends ... but everyone else in that hell-hole were regulars.  Given the time it took for Hambones to 'come down' from his trip, these other kids must spend their whole week like brain-dead zombies, before doing it all again, and again, and again.

The experience has definitely placed mortal fear deep into my heart.  My next trip to the pub will therefore be with Hambones and his mates, aged 18 ... and we'll be going somewhere cool.  I just hope I'll still be able to squeeze into my drainpipes.

Under the influence of artificial stimulants, it's only a short jump from indoor playground to juvenile offender. Pic http://cakeplow.com

1 Song

You don’t need to have the mind of a criminal genius to recognise that Donkey hasn’t really been firing on all four hooves of late, and I’d have to admit that I’m not really sure what future, if any, this blog has, but in an attempt to get things moving, I thought a metaphorical soaking in kerosene, a vigorous squeeze and a struck match to the little bugger may just pump some life back in and provide me with an indication of whether I’m onto a winner, or merely flogging a dead ol’ nag.

So I’ve been reading Nick Hornby’s interesting, albeit rather self-indulgent, 31 Songs, in which he wittily reflects on a number of songs and albums which have affected his life in some way, and being at home in Australia at the moment, catching up with family, old friends, their families, old work colleagues etc, I got to thinking about the significant role music has played in my development as a person, and in particular, the special role that a hard-working local blues performer played in shaping my behaviour as a young adult, and which almost certainly directed my actions towards a sense of social justice and responsibility.

Just across the street from one of Melbourne’s oldest and busiest markets, in a quiet, shabby, narrow laneway obscured by hulking, stinking, over-flowing dumper-bins stands a small bar with an unusual, 24-hour liquor license. The Public Bar has, for generations, catered for the early morning appetites of the market workers as they finish setting-up the stalls each morning, receiving the fresh produce as it arrives from the docks and market gardens, and distributing it amongst the sleepy-eyed stall owners. While the city snores beneath their quilts in their hermetically sealed bunkers, the Public Bar hums, as it has done for close to a century, with the nocturnal buzz of union dissention, football club speculation, political dissection, bawdy jokes and negotiation of sexual liaisons (both paid and otherwise), all wrapped-up in the atmosphere of a kind of topsy-turvy six-o’clock swill at the wrong end of the day.

By the time I was old enough to know better, as in many cities of the world, the inner suburbs of Melbourne were changing. The working class battlers, upon whom our politicians of either persuasion love to wax lyrical, had been shoved out of their traditional environs to make way for Porsche-driving young executives or funky hipsters indulging in hedonistic, drug fuelled pursuits of artistic brilliance. At that time, the seedy Public Bar, with its peeling paint, cracked ceiling roses and chipped plaster cornices; with its mildewed wall tiles and filthy, gummy carpets changed its entire image. Oh, the dirty tiles and carpets remained, and the ceiling was still in need of a good coat of Taubmans, but the cracks of the market-workers, poking up out of frayed bar-stool cushions, had made way for the less hairy slots of uber-trendy Levi’s low-riders, and the unshaved chins of the drunken labourers were replaced with the peach-fuzz goaties that characterise recently nest-fled university arts students.

Also part of the change was the entertainment. The satellite TV hook-up of greyhound and horse racing, American football, cricket, billiards and darts was taken down from its corroded stand above the ciggie machine, and in its place live music bloomed. Unlike the slick venues across town with their neon-rimmed mirrors and Cougar Bourbon promotions, however, the Public Bar was neither well located, nor well-reputed to attract headline acts. What it did have going for it, though, was its unusual liquor license; a loop-hole in Government legislation from the 1880s, exploited long ago by the labourers’ union, and institutionalised through eighty years of all night revelry. It was its ability to remain a nightly stayer, long after all the major venues had gone nigh-nighs that soon attracted serious musicians and music fans alike, and which eventually cemented the Public Bar as the place to be after 2am, if one wanted to hear talented musos jamming together and trying out new material before heading into the studio.

It was to this filthy, stained, smoky chamber of horrors that Donkey gravitated after late-night shifts, a move much maligned by his peers, who tended towards the afore-mentioned shiny bars with their neon glow, and where he first learned to feel at home amongst strangers. It was here that he learned to appreciate that a public place can also be owned, in a sense, by the individuals who visit it, and it was here where he first heard many an unknown, talented musician as they emerged from obscurity, and began their climb to the mainstream market. It was also here that Donkey was first blown-away by Chris Wilson.

One late evening, Donkey was plonked on an uneven, rocky bar stool when a touring Sydney three-piece blues outfit, seemingly to me at the time, invited one of the older bar flies up on stage to accompany them. This fat, balding slob of a man lumbered up onto stage and whipped out his harmonica to the usual, good-natured jeers of the crowd and then disaster struck.

No one knew quite what happened, either then or after, but it appeared that a huge freight train had derailed and come screaming through the front window of the Public Bar, bringing with it a howling hot wind and the screech of metal. Everyone in the bar was thrown backwards by the shockwave of the impact, and after a dazed moment or two, I opened my eyes to see Mr Chris Wilson and the three Backsliders in the middle of one of the most amazing blues instrumentals of all time. The noise, reverberating through every one of my organs was as physical as being beaten with a cricket bat; the sound coming from that tiny mouth organ was intense.

I stood there awed for about 18 minutes while the instrumental played itself out, and then joined the throng in enthusiastic appreciation before the group started up again, this time with a much slower air, and Mr Wilson slipped-in with powerful vocals that soared to the highest peaks, and plunged to the resonant depths of the deepest chambers. I was awed … I was hooked.

I talked of little else for a week, and then dragged a friend back for a listen. This friend, far from being a fan of drinking, seedy bars or music, was about as glowing as one could have hoped, “Well, he didn’t play any numbers that I didn’t like”, and so I know Chris Wilson had to be good.

I soon began to see and hear his name everywhere. It seemed as though he was performing somewhere, almost every night of the week. I would come back to the Public Bar every Wednesday to see him, and each time I would see someone else that I knew, who had also stumbled across the performer, been blown away, bought the $10 CD (about the best music buy you’ll ever make) and become hooked.

Looking back, part of the charm of Chris Wilson, and those gigs at the Public Bar, was the interaction of the patrons. Wilson would have a laugh and jeer at someone, who’d give it back just as wittily, and everyone, be they wealthy and well-dressed, wealthy and terribly-dressed or poor and not dressed much at all, would interact with comfortable, jovial banter. I even went along with some of my homeless clients from time to time, who’d become fans themselves, and who, despite their usual, opportunistic requests, would happily go in a shout together – such was the atmosphere of the place, its clientele and entertainer, the Big Man, Chris Wilson.

And what about him? I mentioned he was a hard-working muso, but I also stumbled across him one day in my work, while he was working as a volunteer English teacher to migrant kids. On another occasion, I attended a gig he performed at a barbeque our organisation was holding for disabled children and their families, but it was all coincidence … it had nothing to do with me; he was doing this stuff – contributing his drive and talent – for his community, and clearly other people had discovered him, and his music. It was as if everyone I knew had a secret obsession for this artist, but that we were all unable, or unwilling to share that obsession with each other.

This was supposed to be a piece about one song that blew me away, or changed my life. I don’t think any of Chris Wilson’s songs actually changed my life … it wasn’t a song, it was a place, and a way of interacting, and a feeling of familiarity and solidarity amongst a performer and his audience, and a way of valuing and celebrating people for who and what they are which helped change my views on a whole host of things.

The Public Bar, always changing, I guess, has now had a real-life face lift, and predominantly caters for the booming backpacker market (let’s face it, you just can’t beat the lure of English pounds). The carpet has been replaced with polished floorboards, and the gritty tiles with French windows, but the all-night license still sees the odd grungy type hanging around at 4am, and the open mic nights still lure the avant garde poets on a weekly basis. Chris Wilson is still pounding out live performances, and can be heard all over Melbourne just about every second night of the week, albeit on a different stage, however the lesson remains; the Public Bar, Chris Wilson, and the people that gathered there to see and hear his performances demonstrated to me that there is something to value in being part of a community – that unique, expressive individuals, and the interaction between them, are not easily found in the plastic, throwaway society of today’s cities, but like all things, those that are hardest to obtain, are usually all the more valuable for it.

Blues harp, fags and beer: a pretty typical night at the Public Bar, circa 1995. Pic: http://www.chriswilson.com.au

What's in a name?

There's certainly a case for the argument that political correctness can, at times, be taken too far. This post is an attempt by Donkey to lend a hand to an old friend whose new business is struggling a bit, all 'cause he decided to do what he thought was right.

Prior to his recent change in circumstances which led to the arrival of a couple of little bambinos, and a considerable amount of ensuing pressure from his missus to settle down and make a go of something at home, my mate Daz was a chronic traveller. He's been everywhere; from New Georgia to New Guinea, Greenland to the Galapagos, Johannesburg to Jakarta, Sydney to Siberia. He's seen it all, done it all, eaten and drunk it all and in some cases, shagged it all! He's a man with a million witty yarns and anecdotes from a life on the road, which he has ever at the ready when an opportunity arises in conversation, and no body, and I mean no body, ever tires of Daz's jokes and stories.

The ones I like to hear the most are those which describe the execution of Daz's peculiarly eccentric obsession with a particular form of souvenir which he collects from countries all over the globe. Now, as a kid, I was forced to sit in front of creepy, giggling Simon Townsend and his so-called Wonder World, and then when I got older and came home late after the pub, before the days of tele-marketing and Danny Bonaduce, I'd sit and eat my souvlaki in front of re-runs of Gary Who, and Just for the Record, so believe me, I've been exposed to some pretty weird obsessions with collectables; shells, spoons, plates, figurines of military figures from the Napoleonic wars, chess sets, garden gnomes, toy pigs ... blimey, I could go on and on. And even in my own life - I have a friend who collects drums from all over the world, another who has amassed a vast stock-pile of stubby-holders; I have a crazy mother who's into owls (432 at last count) and even Mrs Donkey's not averse to hoarding the odd-hundred fridge magnets. So yeah, I am kind of used to the idea of people collecting things, and tend not to get too surprised when I hear of someone's particular collectable fetish. But Daz; the thing that Daz has collected, ever since he began travelling, some twenty years ago, is manhole covers!

He's got dozens of them – from almost every country he's ever visited. I say almost, 'cause do you know which is the only country he has visited from which he doesn't have a manhole cover? It's Mongolia, 'cause the locals nicked 'em all and melted them down for scrap-metal and fast cash after the Russians pissed-off back across the Steppes in '91, taking all the machinery and skilled labour with them. I love hearing Daz's story about how he over-stayed his visa by two weeks in the vain hope of stumbling across a stray, forgotten manhole cover, befriending one delectable Mongolian female after another in order to move from house to house in an attempt to evade the immigration police. The way he tells the story, after two weeks of non-stop shagging, he could hardly walk anymore and gave himself up to the authorities, spent a night in a sub-freezing prison cell and was deported on the next plane, never to be allowed back into the country. To this day, he still has maps in his back room with which he intended to attempt a snatch-and-grab of a Mongolian manhole cover by stealing across the border from Kazakhstan on camel-back, but it never happened.

What's great about Daz's stories are the various means by which he was able to get the manhole covers out. More often than not, manhole covers have pretty distinct markings on them making it very clear which country they belong to, and some governments get pretty touchy about the removal of government-issue property. And let's face it, a manhole cover is a bit heavier than a commemorative spoon or a fridge magnet.

About 18 years ago (blimey, has it been that long?) I was in Berlin just as the wall was coming down – I know, I know, even at fifteen, I was just so cutting-edge!) and although the streams of East and West Berliners were moving freely back and forwards, it was still pretty uncertain about what was going to happen. At the American checkpoint, Checkpoint Charlie, there was a museum focusing on the history of all the attempts, both successful and failed, of Easties escaping to the West. In this museum there are some pretty amazing contraptions, such as cars with hollowed-out seats that could fit a person inside, false-bottomed trucks, duel-compartment laundry baskets etc. All pretty amazing stuff, but nothing anywhere about how to get a manhole cover across the border. But guess what? One of Daz's most treasured editions to his collection is an East Berlin manhole cover, pre-1989!

And if you don't believe me, then maybe you should go and take a look. Y'see, as I mentioned earlier, Daz has recently settled-down back in his home town of Melbourne, with his two lovely kids, and his also lovely (although for mine a bit prickly) wife, Lolita. After a period of restlessness in which Daz, in an attempt to provide for his swelling brood, tried one odd-job after another, he finally threw caution to the wind and opened up his own business, combining the only two things he's ever been committed to, making cocktails, and his collection of exotic manhole covers.

Six months ago, Daz opened his funky new bar in the equally funky, and burgeoning bar scene of Flinders Lane, just near Royston Place. When you walk in the front door, you'll be blown away by the awesome, comfy decor, the very carefully selected music (lovingly changed daily and never-to-be-repeated) and the most incredible, mind-blowing cocktails, as you would expect from a man who has worked in every beach-side resort from Bermuda to Bahama (sorry, couldn't resist that one) and who even once over-wintered in Russia in the '80s, working in Moscow's exclusive underground club-scene (believe me, the triple vodka martinis are to die for).

So I mentioned the decor, but what I didn't describe to you is that Daz's massive collection of manhole covers are all there on display; on ceilings, walls, as table-tops, toilet seats – everywhere. And best of all, Daz loves to tell the story of each and every one to anyone who'll listen - where it came from, how he got it out, and usually, how many beauties he had to sleep with in the process. It's truly the most mesmerising experience to be sitting in a very cool space in one of Melbourne's fastest-growing hangouts for the ultra-hip, with swanky tunes forming a very comfortable ambience, sucking back on a thick Cuban cigar (oops, not any more), and watching a master performer mixing incredible potions while relaying an inexhaustible collection of extremely amusing and edge-of-the-seat tales you could ever imagine.

Sound good? You betcha it's good! But at the beginning of this post, I mentioned that Daz was in a bit of financial strife, and the reason for this is that when naming his awesome new bar, Daz was leaned-upon by his hard-arsed, staunchly feminist wife, and as always, he buckled under her very stern gaze and her anticipated, tempest-like Latino fury were he to not comply. You see, not surprisingly, Daz wanted to name his bar, "Manhole", but Lolita said that that was degrading to working women all over the world, many of whom are responsible for doing just the type of work that sees them going below-deck to fix pipes, cables, railway lines etc.

OK, fair point, but what to call it? Daz wanted to keep the manhole theme in there somewhere, but also wanted to make sure, in keeping with every other aspect of the bar – location, decor, music etc - the name remained cool and hip.

Eventually, after much soul-searching, checking with the Australian Business registration people, coming up with suggestions and having them canned by Lolita, she finally sanctioned the name "(Wo)Manhole". Hmmm ... not bad, I suppose, kind of witty, and so they went with it, and it worked. The funksters of the inner city love the place, word-of-mouth has been effective, and Daz is performing to reasonable crowds every weekend. So what's the problem? Well, people hear glowing reports about the bar, and when they hear the name, they go straight to their directories or websites or whatever to look it up and find out where it is, but no directory in the land will recognise the character "(", and not only that, but you can't have "(" in a web address, so no one can find out where it is. Daz, with the perfect outlet for his special talents, is potentially sitting on a goldmine, but no one knows where he is.

So my reason for writing this post today is to help spread the word about one of the coolest spots in Melbourne right now to have a drink, and one of the most entertaining nights out you'll ever have. In doing this, I am doing both Daz a favour and, I hope, you yourselves, 'cause I guarantee you'll want all your friends to go along afterwards. (Wo)Manhole is in Flinders Lane, about two doors up from Royston Place. Have fun, and tell Daz that Donkey said G'Day.


This is a manhole cover in Tibet, a similar one to which is also a proud possession of Daz at (Wo)Manhole, Flinders Lane, near Royston Place. Pic: Hagas
Thanks for your Comments:Kate S, Gouda and Sabrina, I know you guys have sent comments recently, and although I can’t read ‘em now, I do appreciate it, and welcome more, more, more.