13 December, 2016. 17:43
ERROL PARKER | Editor-at-large | Contact
SPEAKING TO THE ADVOCATE via satellite phone, retired traveller Michael Hoskins told our reporters that the endless monotony of the Nullarbor Plain is slowly killing him and wasting sweet little time he has left on the planet – but that pales in comparison to what was on offer in Adelaide.
Over the weekend, the Indian-Pacific rolled into the South Australian capital with its precious cargo of the living dead, with each of them looking to ‘spend the kids inheritance’ on snowglobes and whatnot.
However, the 71-year-old former anaesthetist doesn’t share the same lust for the unknown like his other ‘Platinum Class’ passengers his wife has forced him to interact with over the past four days have.
“Adelaide was by far the worst. They organise these ‘experiences’ at every stop but they don’t serve any piss and everybody is so old,” he explained as he discretely enjoyed a Peter Stuyvesant in the shower.
“You can’t even smoke on this fucking train. There’s ten of us who have to cram into the bathroom and blow the smoke through the steam exhaust fans like we’re schoolboys. But anyway, mate, when we got to Adelaide, they piled us onto this fucking minibus and drove us around like we’re invalids”
“At least on the Nullarbor, I can just stay in my room and read. Every cunt on this train wants to talk to you and tell you about them. Cunt, I don’t care about you. Just let me eat my steak dinner in peace. But yeah mate, back to what I was saying. Adelaide is a dump.”
More to come.
Dear Sirs,
As a Western Australian I could actually muster a small measure of sympathy for this chap if he’s also on his way with a briefcase of pilfered GST money that he’s offering to return – the Nullarbor certainly isn’t the exciting playground it once was.
I remember my times there fondly – endless horizons, a smattering of natives to shoot, Mussulman camel drivers chattering away excitedly as they prepared their evening meal of halal goanna and spinifex, the odd bit of spicy sodomy, our special “Freaky Fridays” when we’d all dip into Tagh Mahommet’s stash of exotic Mussulman baccy and then strip off all our clothes and have a lithograph taken of us riding our camels backwards, the tingle of excitement when we’d thought we’d spotted a badly lost Easterner wandering in the distance who we could shoot and bury, and then the inevitable crushing let-down when it turned out to just be the desert playing optical tricks on us. They are cherished memories.
I recall saying to Sir John Forrest at the time that once the railroad was up and running the Easterners on their way here would be starved of entertainment at least until they got to Kalgoorlie, when we could haul them out of their carriages and beat them senseless by way of greeting before carting them off full of grog down to the Hay Street strumpets to have a surreptitious lithograph taken of them buggering Miss Cecily’s toy poodle Hercules (I personally detested that little barking rat with a passion, but you’d be astounded just how much you’re prepared to ignore and forego when there’s something better than sodomy on offer – Sir John was in furious agreement with me on that one, let me tell you) which we could always use against them should the need arise.
I know Sir John’s government dabbled with the idea of entertaining them – and by extension, us – by building a spur-line just outside Kalgoorlie which passed under a sign that read “Arbeit macht frei” and into a high-fenced stockade, but I think that started causing problems with assorted hand-wringers and Easterner’s rights organisations, and I believe it came to naught. Which was a pity. Someone will probably pick up on it again in the future I suppose.
So yes, it certainly is a bit of a dull trip these days. Which is probably an excellent excuse not to make it. Which may, I feel, tend to be what you young folk of today quaintly refer to as a “win-win”.
Regards
Ron Muppet