Life Is Long

*

He didn’t take the calls. He didn’t answer questions. He was becoming used to his new status. He didn’t have to answer to anybody. Stray winders, stray thoughts, that’s all they were. Nothing clear, but it didn’t have to be. The previous evening they had waited for the rain, plohn tok, to stop before wandering around to the restaurant in a neighboring soi. Today a squirrel ran along the electric wires in the morning sun. His new life seemed astonishingly luxurious, even if it was cheaper than the previous incarnation. Life is long, he had told that demented group, mentioning things about his early years he wished he hadn’t, because everything was about status here and it was important not be seen in lower terms. Come the rain, all would be well. So he acted carefully. Worked hard. Could see the clouds coming and going. Wanted to know, what was the answer? Private gay tours of Bangkok? Wait for the guardian angel to provide inspiration. Come and get cooked. Ignore the ice pipes for sale in the street. Take a bus to God knows where. Or enjoy the day, just enjoy the day. Settle petal; as they used to say.

All will be well, one of the many voices said, but he hadn’t believed it for a long time. He thought an early death and a failure of all organs more likely. Now the morning sun shining on the leaves in his very own Bangkok garden, well it was rented but hey nothing is permanent, could only guarantee the passing of another glorious moment. He was desperately prone to heart attacks. To diving off the slender ledge of sanity. Of finding himself in places where he was too old to be. Of embracing massage boys when everything was for sale. He wasn’t going to make the trek to Sukhumvit for the sake of a meeting he didn’t like. Just hang in the new neighbourhood. Be peaceful at heart. Be a classic older gentlemen. Make love in primitive, bestial, rapid ways. Or enjoy, that was entirely the wrong word, the two hour full service massages on offer, with mirrors and naked boys and anything you could devise. It was all too much. A service economy. A place in the heart. Even he had grown to accept it as his due. To take heart from strangers. To be fully aware there was nothing that could change the past; and everything that could change the future.

Well it had been an adventure, in the strangest of ways. And now he was heading back to Australia for three weeks. He didn’t want to be emotionally confronted. It was perhaps why he was unlikely to bother seeing his father while he was there. It was expensive. It would not be appreciated. And doing the right thing could easily become doing the wrong thing, when you were constantly walked over, constantly dismissed. And now he was old himself; and nobody could walk all over him unless he let them. Where have you been? New York Maria asked. None of your business, he replied. I knew you wouldn’t tell me, she said. And they kind of laughed. The sunlight seeped in from everywhere, blinding them. They agreed the place was full of dogs; and nothing could be relieved. You only did what you could. And let the time pass. Sanity restored; they called it. Well he didn’t want their style of sanity; that was for sure. But at least now in the beckoning twilight he could see things more clearly. Perspective, dear, old Jack said. The dry old queen who used to pop into his head drunk. Well dear, there will just have to be another exorcism. Just not today. Just for today, everything is alright.

THE BIGGER STORY:

http://www.abc.net.au/news/stories/2010/10/04/3029136.htm

A bloody street brawl involving up to 100 people in central Adelaide has brought unwanted focus on South Australia's African community.

Four young men were stabbed in the violence overnight, while four other men, mostly from interstate, have been charged.

Many of those involved in the fight were in the city for a Miss Africa beauty pageant.

South Australian police say the brawl is the result of factional tensions that had been building up over the weekend.

African community leaders are now worried that those problems could destabilise the community in the state.

Revellers in Adelaide's East End were confronted with a violent scene on Sunday night as people brawled off the Rundle Street restaurant strip.

Chief Inspector John Gerlach says some of them were armed with weapons.

"Certainly knives, because most of the injuries were stab wounds, but there was tyre levers, clubs [and] makeshift batons. It was described to me that one even had a post off a bed," he said.

"They were grabbing any sort of weapons they could and clearly they had prepared themselves with some weapons in the event that they did come together, which in fact occurred."

Four men from Adelaide aged between 19 and 21 were stabbed.

http://www.smh.com.au/world/gillards-first-appearance-on-international-stage-as-pm-20101004-1644u.html

The Prime Minister, Julia Gillard, has made her first appearance on the international stage, meeting the head of NATO, Anders Rasmussen in Brussels.

Dressed in a white, short jacket and dark trousers she arrived at the security organisation's headquarters just after 9am European time and was ushered in by Mr Rasmussen, the former Danish Prime Minister and now NATO Secretary General.

Ms Gillard arrived in Brussels early yesterday morning amidst heavy security as Europe and the UK brace under heightened alerts of a terrorist strike.

The leaders of the 27 member, European Union are in the Belgian capital with 18 of their Asian counterparts for a two day summit which aims to foster and build on the centuries-old economic and trade ties between the two continents.

Australia, New Zealand and Russia will take a role at the round-table talks for the first time this week.

The fragile European Union, now set to embark on a grim austerity program to reduce burgeoning sovereign debt, is now looking strategically to its eastern neighbours to boost trade and support many of its more vulnerable economies still in the early stages of a tentative recovery.

Ms Gillard began her day with a breakfast meeting with the Japanese Prime Minister, Naoto Kan, followed almost immediately by face-to-face talks with NATO Secretary General, Anders Fogh Rasmussen.

A press conference was due to be held at 10.15 European time. She was due to meet with the EU President, Jose Manuel Barroso afterward.

Ms Gillard is also due to deliver a keynote dinner address tonight and is scheduled to meet with the French President, Nicolas Sarkozy and the German Chancellor Angela Merkel in the next 24 hours.

She has not yet said if she will meet with the Chinese premier Wen Jiabao.

Ms Gillard said that this was the first time that Australia has had a seat at the ASEM summit, a meeting which provided the opportunity to talk to more than 40 of the world's leaders.

A Bangkok Scene.