Te hokinga mai – coming home

For all you Blog Tourists – scroll down for my answers to the Blog Tour Questions! Or…read on. Whatever ye fancy. The last bit of this blog is part of the Queensland Writers Centre Blog Tour, Oct-Dec 09. Go here for more guff.

Midnight at Wellington airport was nowhere near as freezing and windy as I was expecting. Chris met me with food, beverages and smiles. Everything seemed small and slow and friendly – as if I had arrived on some refrigerated Pacific Island.

Which I guess isn’t too far from the truth.

Still nigh impossible to believe that my three months as Arts Quensland Poet in Residence are over. I really do feel like Julie just picked me up from the airport last week, and now I’m home. I guess it’s good it’s flown, but it’s sobering. It’s September, for god’s sake.

Sobering.

I have been watching the DVD of the Kev Carmody show I went to at Brisbane’s Botanic Gardens River Stage – and needless to say, weeping like a cry-baby. Still absolutely blown away by the Drones’ version of  Kev’s song ‘River of Tears‘. Kev himself says he’ll never listen to his own version again.

Just beginning to understand the many stories Australia has to tell, and the effect the place has had on me.

The last week is a patchwork of images and emotions. Walking on Mt Coot-tha with your favourite Granadian and mine, the lovely Ivan. Seeing the kookaburra in a tree almost close enough to touch, being shocked at how big it was, expecting a kingfisher, like the one that comes and sits on the telephone wire at home at times when it’s most needed.

Mixing ‘gondwanavista’ in Chris Neehause’s studio across the road, watching the slow fish moving in his tank and loving the Rocky Horry meets Auckland’s Civic Theatre feel of his space.

My last day-trip – on a ferry to Minjerribah (North Stradbroke Island) with J and D. Such an honour to stand on the land of Oodgeroo Noonuccal (Kath Walker), poet, activist, kuia rakatira, and her people. How incredulous I was that we’d actually see whales and dolphins while standing on the cliffs, and then when we did – many of them – I was so stunned I didn’t take one photo.

The Brown Lake - surrounded by manuka vegetation. It really tastes like tea!

The amazing blue of the sky, the pond of sea we crossed, the gorgeous oranges, reds and browns of the tea-tree surrounded Brown Lake, where we lay alone on the white sand, listening to the clucking frogs and the occasional crazy laugh from a kookaburra.

What Jodi called a 'selfie'. Loving the Aus-breviations!

On the Quandamooka

Arriving at Brisbane airport on my way home, wondering if there is such a thing as Second-Home-Sickness. Looking up to see a guy  with an impressive mullet walking through arrivals wearing a Tino Rangatira t-shirt.

Scribbly Gums on the way to Blue Lake, Minjerribah

Watching Riverfire from my Judith Wright Centre perch, with Christine on Skype, feeling like it was my own personal Fireworks Farewell…

Oh you fullas...you shouldn't have!

Helen Avery

The farewell gig, the Mother’Ucking Good Time I had, especially when Graham Nunn and Sheish Money let me be the third member of their band for a bit.

We funked the house.

Graham and Sheish doing stuff from 'The Stillest Hour' - the gig launched this CD, their debut spokenword/music album

The awesome surprise of having Helen Avery and Sally Cripps there – all the way from the freaking OUTBACK!

JB, in her amazing style, had flown them there for the farewell.

This is quite remarkable...rarely seen at such close range in her native habitat

Doubly blessed to have Helen’s gorgeous poems to open the evening – as I said to her on the night, ‘You so brang New Zealand, Bro!’ Her poems from when she and Bruce lived in Rotorua were like walking through a birdsong-ringing fern forest and stepping out into the sunlight, into the low waves of the lake.

Keeping the Judy Beautiful

Most memorable, perhaps, from those last few days, is being at Black Star in West End with Lesson MC Luka, Tamati and the crew, sharing the compelling vibe and stimulation of ‘Words or Whatever’. First act: two sistahs singing sweet R&B over their homemade beats; then a guy called Twin Diealektz whose mum is French Polynesian and his Dad is Mexican. At one point he was rapping in Aztec.

In. Aztec.

The beautiful spirit Ivan brought to the night, lighting candles and reminding us we are never alone. The Benna Zennabomb-shell that dropped the massive goodness down on us all – Benna, that was one of the sh*t-hottest sets I’ve ever seen. And then the amazing Tania Balil, finishing things off in beautiful style with her gorgeous Spanish songs on classical guitar in celebration of Chile’s Independance Day.

Maria – your place, as far as I’m concerned, is my Brisbane Marae.

Last but not least, Graham’s most excellent t-shirt.

Nothing says 'We'll miss you' like rude words on clothing.

At home, even the sky feels a little crowded and kinda over-framed. Who put all these hills here? I know I’ll adjust. The cat will remember who I am and I’ll get used to the layered clothing look again.

But I know my concept of space and silence will never be the same again.

Thanks Australia. Thanks everyone. Like Arnold, I’ll be back. Like the opposite of front. Like dustballs on lino, like cat-fleas in summer, like Riverfire, like spring gales in Paekakariki. Like the Brolga birds to Longreach…

Aroha tino nui

x

Hinemoana

Blog Tour Oct – Dec 09

Where do your words come from?

Most days, from the ether. Some days, the thesaurus, the newspaper, the telly, my relatives.

Where did you grow up and where do you live now?

I was born in Christchurch, a city in the South Island of New Zealand, but I kinda grew up lots of places. Whakatane in the Bay of Plenty and Nelson at the top of the South Island mainly. I grew up a hell of a lot in my ex-boyfriend’s mother’s old blue Falcon stationwagon.

Nowadays I live in Paekakariki, which is on the Kapiti Coast just north of Wellington. It’s a beach village, with lots of artists  – writers, musicians, painters… Though  I don’t see many of them around the place. I think we’re all busy making stuff. Every now and then we see each other on the beach, or getting the early morning milk at the dairy, blinking in the light.

What’s the first sentence/line of your latest work?

She wants to join me on the sad canoe, paddles making fire in our shoulders…

What piece of writing do you wish you had written?

A poem called ‘Still Life w/ Influences’ by American poet Joyelle McSweeney from her book ‘The Red Bird’. My favourite image is:

Up on the hill

a white tent had just got unsteadily to its feet

like a foal or a just-foaled cathedral.

What are you currently working towards?

Having just finished three months as Arts Queensland Poet in Residence 2009 (ahem) I have come home with a bunch of writing that I’m looking forward to fleshing out and tidying up. It’s a collection of poems (or possibly one long poem with about 30 verses) about a character called ‘Nothing-nothing’ or ‘Kore-Rawa’ in Maori. She was inspired by the beautiful indigenous words in Australia that have so many pairs of ‘o’s. Toowoomba, Oodgeroo, Woolloomooloo. The concept of ‘nothing’ also speaks to experiences of invisibility, and the whole ‘terra nullius’ thing, as well as the Maori concept of ‘Te Kore’, which is a state of ultimate potential and creativity.

Complete this sentence… the future of the book is

inside the next two hours, sitting at my desk, looking out at the rain veiling Kapiti Island, the sea turning from dark to lighter turquoise, the cat next to me, twitching in his sleep on the unmade bed.

Heart and soul…

…I fell in love with you heart and soul…<rinkididee>

….just like a fool would do madly…

…gave you my heart and soul <deedinkdeedinkeedinkrinkideedinkeedoo>

I know it’s corny, but that’s how I felt about the Queensland Poetry Festival. And as if my rinkeedeedink piano solo isn’t enough to convince you, Christine took a photo that makes me look like someone really famous whose photo I should no doubt be familiar with but whose name slips my mind.

Is it John Lee Hooker?

Hearts and souls aside (and god knows, there are  far too many of them hanging round poetry circles) the festival worked for me on many levels. It was cerebrally stimulating, emotionally engaging, performatively entertaining, smooth-running and hard rocking. All poets were given the time and respect they deserved, on and off the stage. The state-of-the-art theatre space was an absolutely luxury – my opening night gig was, I think it’s fair to say, one of the best I’ve done, and the technical aspect was a huge part of that. My highlights included (but were not limited to):

• Marisa Allen and Bremen Town Musician (please buy their album ‘no one is holding a gun to your head (Songs To Run To)’ – it is now the soundtrack to my residency. In a good way -  haha!
• Santo – speedpoet from Melbourne and ex-avant-garde pianist. When he performs he kinda conducts with his hands. Music and very welcome madness to my ears.
• Nathan Shepherdson – I just bought his latest book, he read a little from it during the festival. Absolutely unforgettable.
• Graham Nunn read a killer of a love poem to the Festival Director as the last item of the last night. Slayed me.
• Said Festival Director shouting ‘F**k you Santo’ over the crowd on Saturday night, thus ensuring AF Harrold knew for certain he wasn’t in England now.
• A Million Bright Things – one item from each of the poets on the bill, one after the other, all in a row etc. It WENT OFF.
• Performing ‘Talk You Up’ with Chris, my darlin’ from even further down under than here, on Saturday night. It was great to show her off.

With just weeks to go, it’s so hard to believe I’m nearly home. Soon I’ll be walking along the seawall of Paekakariki where the people are cheeky, my village, getting blown about by the gusty westerlies and missing the velvet glassiness of the Maiwar at night, with the Story Bridge lights lifting and dropping in the wake of the late ferries.

Please come and help me celebrate what an awesome time it’s been here. I’m launching my sonic poem, ‘gondwanavista’ on Thursday 17th, along with the new album from Graham Nunn and Sheish Money, ‘The Stillest Hour’. See guff below. Book now, it’s a small room, but I’d love to see you in it.

QWC and 2009 Arts Queensland Poet-in-Residence Hinemoana Baker invite you to the launch of gondwanavista & The Stillest Hour.

Celebrate the closing of an amazing residency program and poroporoaki Hinemoana by launching her beautiful sonic poem into the world! Experience the debut of gondwanavista, created from fragments of the work Hinemoana has composed whilst on residency and embedded in field recordings from her outback adventures.

Hinemoana will also launch the debut spoken word CD from local poetry duo Graham Nunn & Sheish Money, The Stillest Hour. Bookings essential as space is limited.

gondwanavista & The Stillest Hour CD Launch

Date: Thursday 17 September

Time: 6pm–8pm

Venue: Judith Wright Centre, Shopfront Space, 420 Brunswick Street, Fortitude Valley
Bookings: 07 3839 1243 or qldwriters@qwc.asn.au
CD’s will be available for $10 on the night

Where are we, darlin’?

‘Oh!’ said my mother, when I told her about the trip. ‘The smell! And don’t go outside, you’ll get covered in black stuff.’

Thus speaketh a person who’s had to travel on a steam train in her life for something other than novelty value. So far neither of these things have bothered me, but to be fair, I’ve only been riding the Q150 Steam Train for an hour. It’s the last journey in what’s been an amazing revival – the train making journeys since April out into the north, west and south of Queensland celebrating the 150th anniversary of the state (isn’t it amazing what we think of as the beginning of things?) Across this wide, beautiful land people have been drawn out from behind their front doors, desks, tractors, video games and dashboards to stand beside the tracks, wave multi-coloured flags and cheer at history steaming past.

We’re swaying along beside the Bremer River – on the banks of which, Ian the Conductor tells us, the first trains in Queensland (Australia?) were constructed.

‘In the 1974 flood,’ he says, ‘the water was over the tracks here. Came right up to the station.’

There are floodmarks, says Kate Eltham, our Queensland Writers Centre tour manager, above the picture rails in the house of one of her friends.

My first impressions of the Train are largely television related. Terrible, but I can’t help feeling like a character straight out of  my most beloved TV series of late, the western ‘Deadwood’, famous as much for its uncompromisingly colourful language as for anything else.

‘Any minute now some limey gunslingin’ c********r is gonna leap off his galloping horse onto Carriage B and heist us all,’ I text to JB.

‘You should totally blog that!’ she replies. ‘Cos that makes you Calamity Jane.’

Indeed it does. Calamity Jane, along with Wild Bill Hikock and other legends, appears as a main character in ‘Deadwood’, more often than not a little over-refreshed.

The upholstery in Carriage B (‘You do know you’re in first class don’t you?’ says one of the volunteer train staff) is plush black leather, upholstered with important looking black buttons and diamond shaped quilting. Lots of  wood which is a rich bronze colour, the fittings are heavy and dark. My favourite fixtures are the windows. The latches are solid and the frames are heavy, you have to put some decent effort in to raise them. The latches make a satisfying, deep click as they slide home into any number of five different open positions.

The amazing Kate who has the most sparkly smile this side of the Black Stump (Ha! I got to use that saying with a small measure of geographical accuracy!) has already connected wirelessly via a blue plastic magic thing she plugs into the side of her computer (catch up, Hinemoana). Both of us are strangely delighted that the wireless is working – indeed, that the laptops are working. This is a steam train. We should have hatboxes on our laps and be gazing out the windows thinking of simple things – land, cattle, weather. Instead we’re typing to an audience of, potentially, millions. Where are the quills??

The battery on my laptop is dire – so I’ll be writing in short bursts. Beth next to me is reading the article written in Saturday’s CourierMail by Matt Condon about his Q150 steam train trip out to Mt Isa. It’s brilliant – witty, wry, fantastic details. I am trying to resist that good old ‘What is there left to be said?’ feeling. Amazing the myriad ways a writer’s neuroses can manifest. I mean my neuroses, of course.

As we hit the base of the ranges the temperature begins to climb along with the train. Today was predicted to hit 29 degrees, which even the locals tell me is quite amazing for winter. (Ha! Winter?!) All along the line there have been pockets of people, more often than not with sound equipment and cameras on tripods, photographing the train and our blurry, waving hands as we steam past. It makes me a bit teary.

The woman at the far end of our carriage is a Magnificent Waver. In spite of the ‘no hands, arms or heads outside the window’ steam-train policies, any and all passers by are greeted with an energetic jiggling of her right arm in the free air. She is wearing a black hairnet around her short, grey, base-of-the-neck pony tail, plus many and various hairclips. Not only is she a Waving Queen, she also has Magnificent Bingo Wings. I myself am learning to love my Bingo Wings. It’s encouraging to witness someone else so carefree with hers.

Kim, Nick, Kate and Luka

The light fittings in the carriage are old, white, scallop-edged glass with big loopy eco-bulbs poking out of the bottom of them like stamens, like tongues. I stand out on the verandah between carriages for a while, taking in the view – cattle, pale green long grass, even a few hopping kangaroos (I swear I’ll never get over my delight at seeing them, pest or not).

I’m having my usual fight with my cellphone’s predicitve text dictionary: what makes you think I’d want to be typing ‘verandag’ you c********r?! Breathe…

Lady Hairnet opens her window as we slow to a stop. With reckless abandon she thrusts her head out of the window and yells ‘Where are we, darlin’?’ There is a pause. ‘Where? Murphy’s Creek. Thank you!’

There’s soot enough on the floors now to draw a fingerpicture in – it’s gritty underfoot as I walk to the toilet. Matt Condon’s brilliant article returns several times to the refrain ‘No-one mentions that we can see the train-tracks through the hole at the bottom of the toilet bowl.’ I feel the need to mention this myself, but so as not to blatantly plagiarise the meister, I shall simply use its long but not unattractive acronym: NOMTWCSTTTTTHATBOTTB.

In first class, bro.

Clouds of steam drift past the window as we slow down up The Range. The steam changes colour from white to grey to black to mustardy brown. A swallow flies through, looping back and forth.

There’s a truck following us that’s normally used for spraying weedkiller along the sides of the tracks. Today, and I understand with all the Q150 journeys, it follows the train spraying the tracks with water to quell any risk of sparks from the train starting a bushfire.

I buy a ‘Yank’ steam engine badge – the big shiny black one – and a cornbeef and relish sandwich from an astonishingly agreeable man in the dining car. I have clearly interrupted his own lunch.

‘Six dollars for the badge, and six dollars forty for the food,’ he says, modestly covering his mouth to avoid spraying me with crackers and cheese.

My favourite sign so far:

TO STOP THE TRAIN

(IN EMERGENCY ONLY)

PULL THE CHAIN DOWN

PENALTY FOR IMPROPER USE $10

Ten dollars?! Surely this must be a joke, or some little anachronism that’s been left up to amuse us. Because I’m telling you, for ten bucks, if I could find a chain anywhere near that sign, I’d totally pull it. Oh yeh. I’m bad. You know it…shamon…Calamity Jane in the House. Get out of ma way whilst I re-situate ma phlegm.

‘Yeh. And drink some f*****g whiskey,’ texts JB.

Some people got on in Morven dressed as bugs. One green, one blue, one yellow with black polkadots. They were 'Reading Bugs' - promoting reading to children. The large thorax of the yellow and black one was particularly entertaining in the small carriage.

The welcome at Toowoomba is spectacular – the platform’s swarming with flag-waving locals who are, startlingly, not all here to see us. Though it seems by the crowd and the journalists who mob Nick Earls as soon as we disembark that a good proportion of them are probably here to see him.

The reading at Toowoomba Library turns out to be utterly delightful – an impressively large audience, too. Nick and Kim tell completely hilarious stories of how they became published writers. Kim was bullied into it – literally – by aggressive schoolmates. Nick relates a story involving him dressing up as a story-telling armchair and reading stories to children, and a senior citizen with heart failure, in Brisbane’s Botanic Garden (he is a GP too, as well as having written 13 books).

I was crying with laughter. And, indeed, with terror – they are a c*******ingly hard act to follow. I fell back on the good old faithful, ‘How Viggo Mortensen the Famous Hollywood Actor, Activist and General All Round Renaissance Man Published My First Book.’ When will I stop dining out on this?

Probably when I stop dining out on the fact that my Dad was a Maori All Black.

I meet a man who works for an organisation called Greening Australia (if my memory serves me right) and we discuss the Sheepocracy that is New Zealand, and how stunning it is in spite of it all. I give a copy of ‘Kaupapa: NZ Poets World Issues’ to a lovely young woman who says Emily Dickinson is really the only poet she reckons can get away with whinging about how terrible her life is. A girl after my own heart. Plus she speaks Japanese so she pronounced my name perfectly.

The fish bits and the chicken skewers were, by the taste of them, HOME-MADE. I could’ve eaten a whole tray of each. Instead had a very decent Chicken Fettucine at Campari, downstairs from our hotel. Niiiiice.

But late. So I’m a bit shattered. And it’s only Day 1, people.

But before I go to sleep and post this ridiculously long Day 1 Blog tomorrow, I just want to mention a beautiful moment when we were on the train at the bottom of the ranges and the train had stopped. I think it was giving way to another train. But what it was also doing was getting itself enough fire/heat/steam to make the big haul up to the summit. It was ‘Building Up A Head Of Steam’.

So satisfying, when you realise where well-worn words like that originally came from.

READ AND SEE MORE OF MY Q150 STEAM TRAIN TRIP HERE.

Choo. Choo.

I’m off on a steam train!

The Q150 Steam Train is taking me, Nick Earls and Kim Wilkins (among others!) to Toowoomba, Chinchilla, Roma and Charleville for readings in local libraries over the next five days. I’m about to leave with my wheelie suitcase in tow, but keep an eye out here for blog updates and pics!

Ekka-stasy

I know, dreadful heading. Suggestions welcome. It’s fitting though, because I had the most bloody good time I’ve had in ages at the Ekka last Friday.

I’m not a person for crowds, I must say, and I have quite a serious fear of heights. So you’d wonder why I’d go to a place where 50,000 is a quiet night and the best rides are the ones that not only take you up high, but flip you upside down, shake you around and wring you out like a fleece in a woolscour…

Truth be told it didn’t immediately appeal when my gracious hosts here, Julie and Graham, first mentioned it. But their love of the Ekka – seems like they’ve been going every year since they were born – is infectious, and as I was walking down Brunswick Street and turning right at The Den, I could feel my own excitement building.

I’m going to sound like a kid here, but I really loved the lights on everything, the neon and primary colours, the fact that in the first hundred metres I saw a bloke in an Akubra carrying a huge bright blue gorilla.

For the love of God, pass me the crackers and cheese

One of our first stops was for cupcakes and coffee, then we went to view the be-ribboned jars of pickles trays of jam tarts, slices of fruitcakes and lovingly crafted wood carvings. Champion that he is, Graham’s dad won the carving. I hardly knew what to do with myself. Sadly, breaking the glass wasn’t an option, but the pickled onions and cakes with real fancy icing looked like they urgently needed a good home.

Icing mermaid (siren?) on icing rock etc

I went on the chairlift. Refer to my earlier note about heights. I had somehow, from the ground, looked up at the chairlift and thought ‘Meh, how scary could it be. It’s only just higher than the tents.’ And yet, when I found myself standing, waiting for the chair to swing round and cradle me gently under the but and lift me off my feet into the air,  I began to sweat. My palms, my scalp started to prickle.

I handled it, though my legs turned to water and my heartrate tripled. It’s amazing how these phobias don’t even go through your conscious mind – just straight to your glands.

The view from the chairlift

The view was amazing – the tents, the lights, the rides! And to my right, a handsome man on an equally handsome white horse in the stadium, on the green grass, doing tricks with fire in a spotlight. My hands were a bit shakey up on the chairlift so sadly you’ll just have to imagine that photo.

An interesting and possibly little-known fact

Next was the place where people have made works of art out of vegetables, and many other things which they themselves have indeed grown. Seeds, and zucchinis, and things.

Zucchinis and things

And of course, more ribbons awarded. As for these bananas, though I can no longer recall which was the winning bunch. I think we can all agree, however, that Produce was the winner on the night.

Oh for a Custard Apple a Day

Nothing left after all this but to grab a dagwood dog (that’s hotdog for you NZers), a strawberry sundae (the likes of which we don’t have back home but I will start the petition when I return) and take our seats for some V6 action, some ridiculously impressive motorbike stunts on ramps and the famous laser show and fireworks. The laser show didn’t quite work out first time round – some technical difficulties which saw us having to start from the beginning again, and sadly, saw most of the jokes that were kinda funny and endearing the first time round fall spectacularly flat. This only made me love the Ekka even more.

We think maybe they ran out of lady mannequin heads

And I’m going back to get another dose! This Friday 14 August I shall be reading poetry there from 5-5.30pm with Graham Nunn and Sheish Money, but before that, I will be wandering about, patting greyhounds, maybe watching sheepdogs hard at work, perhaps watching a sheep giving birth.

Amusing but completely unintentional cropping on my part

All these wonders, and more besides, await me.

In fact, I’d have to say that the thing I love about the Ekka the most (apart from the fact that Ekka is, it would seem, an abbreviation of  ‘Brisbane Exhibition’, and this has got to take top prize in Aussie Abbreviationisms I’ve Heard So Far) is that while it’s really spectacular, with all the rides and lights and glitz and the scale of the thing, it’s also got that real down-home, ’someone’s-Dad-knocked-it-up-in-the-back-shed’ type feeling. I mean it’s approachable as well as splendid. For you blokes at home, it’s like your best Easter Show with the best rides, your favourite Hutt Raceway meeting, your most beloved School Gala and the Pauatahanui Lamb and Calf Club day all rolled into one.

Can't go past a coupla high-gloss ducks in hats

I haven’t even begun to tell you about the phenomenon of ‘The Show Bag’. But let me say this. Any thoughts that I could keep those Caramello Koalas in my fridge long enough to take some home for my friends as confectionary momentos of the beloved bear itself and its native country were ridiculous in the first place. Graham, you were so right.

Uke Hunt

Just a quickie (as they say)…

An amazing day yesterday, a windy walk over the Story (without an ‘e’) Bridge (horrors, I’ve been spelling it wrong since I got here!) to Kangaroo Point to meet up with my cousin Dale and his rock-climbing buddy Cuan. Loving the riverside BBQ area!

To the slightly over-refreshed guy who screamed ‘SMILE!’ in my face when I was walking in the sunshine down Brunswick Street today, I’d like to offer this – the amazing Stephen Merrit from Magnetic Fields, and an accompanying article from the site with the most appropriate name I could think of right now, ‘Uke(lele) Hunt’.

Enjoy.

Illegal gatherings I have recently attended

I guess the word ‘transformed’ wouldn’t be overstating it. The concert I went to last weekend, featuring loads of Aussie music icons honouring the man some call the Black Bob Dylan - Kev Carmody.

I knew of Kev previously because I’d heard the song ‘From Little Things Big Things Grow‘ which he co-wrote with Paul Kelly, about the Gurindji Strike. This strike was led by Vincent Lingiari and from what I know it marked the beginning of Aboriginal land protest in this country. The strike lasted for eight years before the Gurindji people were given a portion of their land back.

So yeh, although I was familiar with this song and its genesis I hadn’t realised what a prolific and political musical force Kev Carmody has been here for nigh on thirty years.

The concert was called ‘Cannot Buy My Soul‘ and featured the cream of Aussie music – including Kev himself – performing Kev’s songs. Everyone from Paul Kelly and Missy Higgins to Steve Kilbey, legendary frontman of The Church:

The concert was powerful for  me for lots of reasons. It was very moving to be surrounded by eight thousand people who’d all gathered to honour the kaupapa (causes) that Kev’s been singing about for so long. I’ve found that this conversation – about aboriginal rights or histories – is a lot more quiet here than the similar conversation in Aotearoa, where we still don’t make it all work and it’s far from hunky dory, but the discourse is always out in the open air.

The concert featured film footage and photographs of the things Kev sings about and the stunning landscapes and hard out inner suburbs he has called home – and still very much does. Kev’s narration – some live and some pre-recorded – was considered and entertaining, and as well as being extremely educational for someone like me, it also had a massive emotional impact on me.

As well as this, I was very moved by the final message Kev left us with – ‘our spirit walks with you.’ I’ve heard this from Aboriginal spokespeople before – that holding out of the hand. It’s kind of different to the over-riding message of sovereignty we, as Māori, tend to broadcast in New Zealand. I’m not saying this is the case for everyone, but for me I feel I’m more likely to hear – and indeed say myself – ‘Tino rangatiratanga’ ie ‘Maori self-determination’ as a final message on occasions like this, rather than this deeply humble and graceful ‘We want to walk with you.’

I honour you Kev and your people, the indigenous people of this place, of Brisbane and it’s river and landmarks. Tena koutou katoa me o koutou mamae, o koutou wairua kaha hoki. As Kev pointed out at the beginning of the concert, if the gig was thirty years we’d have been considered an illegal gathering. I honour all those who’ve worked so hard over generations to change these things, so that last weekend we could celebrate together the spirit of someone like Kev, and the courage it takes for anyone to do what he’s done.

Here’s another one of my favourites from the night – The Drones performing ‘River of Tears’:

Speaking of rivers. I was thrilled the other night to be walking into the State Library of Queensland and find Paekakariki walking out. Briar Grace-Smith is a stunning writer of fiction and film who lives just around the corner from me in our little beach village on the Kapiti Coast. She was in town for the screening of her film, The Strength of Water, at the Brisbane Film Festival:

If you like films that keep it real – I mean totally real – and let the beauty of that shine, then this one’s for you. It was fantastic to see a New Zealand film where the landscape was such a major player but it’s not all prettied up. Not a snow-capped mountain range or a punga fern forest in sight. It’s kinda like the anti-Piano on that level. I loved the spacious dialogue and the hues of everything. Gorgeous and just plain sizeable, substantial.

Listen out for the music, too – Warren Maxwell and Peter Golub, plus a poignant and charismatic choice of film song, Hirini Melbourne’s ‘Tihore mai te rangi’. I also loved the credits – it looks like they’ve been designed by a true artist, the shape of the letters, the texture and the way they roll around a bit over and under the straight line. Mmmm-hmm.

Kia ora Briar. Kei te mihi ano ahau ki a koe i runga i to tohungatanga, i runga hoki i to mahi nui, mahi roa, mahi rangatira.

Google the tangata whenua

Just a headsup about a couple of writers I’ve encountered since I’ve been here who I reckon would greatly reward further investigation:

Oodgeroo Noonuccal

I mentioned in one of my first blogs that I saw the play ‘Oodgeroo – bloodline to country’ before I left for Blackall.

'Oodgeroo - bloodline to country'

Oodgeroo – aka Kath Walker – was an activist as well as a poet, a woman of great mana and spirit. Her son was one of the founding members of the Australian arm of the Black Panthers. Kath herself believed in the power of korero, of negotiation.

The play hinges on an extraordinary twist of fate whereby Oodgeroo found herself, in 1974, on a plane hijacked by Palestinians. She tried desparately to negotiate with the captors to preserve the lives of all the passengers, especially a German banker who they had signalled would be killed. He was eventually shot by the hijackers. The trauma of this experience stayed with Oodgeroo all her life.

Melissa Lucashenko

Have just finished reading a great article called ‘Muwi muwi-nyhin, binung goonj: boastful talk and broken ears’ by Melissa Lucashenko, an aboriginal writer of mixed European and Murri heritage. The article is in ‘WQ’ – Write Queensland – magazine’s July issue, and it talks about the issue of writing about cultures that are not your own. In Australia, for example, as in New Zealand, wherever a writer chooses to set a story or even a poem, if it’s a real place then there are real people who belong to there:

‘If you decide to write a story set in Cairns, and populate it with Aboriginal people drawn from your imagination, you are writing of the Yidingi. If your story begins in Mount Isa and shifts to Alice Springs, your characters are Kalkadoon, or Arrente…There is no ‘fiction’. It doesn’t matter where you locate your story, there will always be a specific group of local Aboriginal people who ahve a stake in what you think, say and write.’

Melissa Lucashenko

Packing a lunch to cross the road

Blackall with Graham Nunn and my very long right arm

If I remember rightly, in this photo Graham and I are on our way to the artesian mineral water pools which were, blessed be, just down the road from where we were staying in Blackall. It was Graham who said the thing about packing a lunch, even though it has since appeared in one of my poems credited to an entirely different character.

Can't go past the stump bro

Where would the surveyors have been without it?

These are some of the few photographs I took in Blackall during the day. I became enchanted with the place at night – perhaps because of the whole ‘big moon’ buildup? There were a few night-time sojourns down to the Coolibah Motel for a steak so big it was flopping off the plate or a chicken kiev with a tower of roast vegetables. Honestly, when Graham said before we went there ‘Don’t eat all day – in fact, all week’ I should have listened.

Moon over the Blackall stockyards

The amazing Sally Cripps took us to the stockyards one night after we’d done the tour of the legendary Woolscour. It was amazing walking over the cattle on the ‘catwalk’ where the judges and auctioneers usually walk, hearing the cattle making their noises and watching them staring at us under the floodlights.

The Woolscour is an old woolwashing plant that was shut down in 1978 because of the drop in the wool market – something that massively affected areas like this is Australia. The machines are all steam driven and they fire them up for the tourists. Amazing to see and hear! Our tour guide was a fantastic character called Beaver, whose accent was fairly broad and who spoke fairly quickly and quietly. Kind of like a totally Ocker, extraordinarily softly spoken auctioneer.

Bless him, he was the highlight.

Again, loving the night-time shots.

The water and pipe shot is of the hot water that still pumps from the nearby artesian bore into a pond – it used to service the Woolscour itself.

That hot bore water smells slightly sulphurous, like Rotorua but milder. Hardly anyone in Blackall has a hotwater system. When I got back to Brisbane I really missed that smell whenever I turned on the tap. The pool I mentioned, five minutes walk from where I stayed, was a fantastic 50 metres, and beautiful warm mineral water from the bore. It felt like such an amazing gift, being able to soak and swim in there. The water looked and felt entirely different to the chorine pools I’m used to. It felt like swimming in warm sky.

Back to the Woolscour evening. For a person interested in sound, the whole night was a winner. We start with the sound of the hot bore water spilling into the pond outside the Woolscour, move through the extraordinary steam powered machinery and its echoes inside the building, Beaver’s commentary throughout, and then we finished with the (heartbreaking) sound of the cattle calling in the yards. The cattle sound followed us both home over the flat, silent town right into our beds. Kept Graham awake for some time that night, he tells me.

After the Woolscour tour we were taken out the back to the old shearer’s quarters and fed a magnificent downhome dinner of corned beef, mashed spuds, cabbage and carrots, then plum pudding, jelly, tapioca! What more could a girl want?! It reminded me heaps of being on the marae.

Beaver, our Woolscour tour guide

Before I move on to Longreach, I have to give a massive shoutout to Sally and Bill for the feed of crawchies they gave us the first day we arrived. Sweeter than prawns and more tender than crayfish, these little guys were blueclaws, and I for one am most grateful for the sacrifice they (and this unfortunate trap-wandering crab) made for our lunch that day. Word up to the Outbuck Tucker.

Sally Cripps, Crawchie Wrangler

Thanks, Blueclaw guy, you were real tasty

Sorry dude, just a real unfortunate situation

I loved my short trip from Blackall up to Longreach and the time I had with Helen Avery and Bruce Honeywill and Helen’s amazing mum Enid. Helen’s house, as well as the surrounding areas, were all a great source of inspiration – photographic and otherwise!

The wallpaper!!

Leaving Blackall on the bus

From Longreach to Winton to meet the Dinosaurs

Our trip to the ‘Australian Age of the Dinosaurs’ museum was particularly spectacular – the ‘jumpup’ it sits on top of is a flat-topped 75m rise above the surrounding flatlands, and what a spectacular vista. Haven’t seen the likes of it since I lived in Africa.

The jumpup

The jumpup really does look like it jumps up out of the landscape, revealing itself more and more as you drive. It’s freaky.

What stays with me from my time Out Back, apart from the amazing hospitality of all the locals, is the critters – the birds! especially – and the countryside. How it really started to change on the bus trip, from scrub and trees to more of the beautiful blondey coloured Mitchell grass country.

One of the Brolga bird whanau me and Helen met - they come back to the same place in Longreach when it gets dry

I’m still amazed by the subtlety of the countryside – how at first I’ll look at something that looks like the closest thing I’ve ever seen to desert ie dry and dead. Then through meeting Helen and Bruce and Sally and Bill and the rest of the whanau out there, they start to show me how if you look more closely, you’ll see the rich natural life that’s thriving there. The grass looked dry to me when i first saw it, like it wouldn’t nourish anything. But then i find out it’s called Mitchell Grass, and it’s incredibly nourishing for cattle, dry or not.

The different kinds of trees – the contrasts are nowhere near as obvious as they are in New Zealand (to me at least) but nevertheless, there are different kinds of trees, of course there are. This is a gidyea tree, that is an African mimosa. As a poet, it’s very good to be made to look more closely at things, to discern the differences.

Helen arranged a wonderful reading at the local Nursery in Ilfracombe – thanks so much Di for hosting us so beautifully there. A gorgeous outdoor venue for the poems and the other…carryings on…

Mulga Bill and his Bicycle

Before I finish this post, I want to do a big shout out to the fantastic young people Graham and I worked with in Blackall. Three days of workshopping with school students aged 8 to 16, and they were totally up for anything we asked them to do.

Translate words from Maori? Sure. A poem written from someone else’s first draft with only nine syllables per line? No problem. Cutting windows out of newspaper and looking through those windows in order to find a poem there…somewhere…? Let me at it.

Playing language games in the quad

Apart from the absolutely delectable morning tea that we were provided with every day (I’m talking fresh scones and banana cake, people – chocolate cake, pikelets, you name it) it was humbling to spend that time with such talented and hardworking poets, not to mention courageous. Word up to all of you, and word up to Karla the Baking Queen.

I’ve started writing a series of poems as a result of my trip out West – you’ll hear some of these at my Queensland Poetry Festival opening night gig, Friday 21 August.  I’m also making a sound piece, which I will leave with the Queensland Writer’s Centre as my Poet in Residence ‘legacy item’, which will feature poem excerpts and the field recordings I made while I was in Blackall and Longreach.

Koia kei a koutou. Thanks so much for having me.

Back to the big smoke, Brisbane, also very beautiful when the sun goes down…

buy the ticket, take the ride

Well, I certainly bought the ticket and took the ride last Saturday night at the Globe Theatre in the Valley, as part of a wonderful event organised by Outsiders team.

One of the pieces I performed was Hone Tuwhare’s poem Where Shall I Wander which I was comissioned to turn into a song for the Tuwhare project. You can read an article I wrote about it here.

Aroha for now, I hope you enjoy!