“That’s a Good Lesson for Everyone.”

I’m out for a drink with Gil, Tisi’s big brother. He’s the last piece of The Hatcher Family puzzle. I’d met Sipola, Tisi’s younger sister, earlier in the week and her parents stayed with us in Melbourne.

And it’s official: they’re all fantastic, without exception.

***

An older man comes over selling chocolate for some fundraiser or other. Gil buys a macadamia nut bar. After the man leaves, Gil ponders aloud whether the charity was legit, then concedes he’s not too fussed if it isn’t, since he got something in the exchange.

He goes on to tell me about a time he and a friend were approached by a guy who wanted $5 for drugs.

“So I said I’d give him $5 for his shoes.”

The friend, who until this point has been enraptured as Gil waxed on about his personal philosophy, was disgusted that Gil actually took the shoes.

He was disenchanted with the religion. I told him he could still be my disciple, but he ran away.
I wasn’t going to just give the guy 5 dollars; there needs to be some kind of exchange. That’s a good lesson for everyone. The shoes are 1½ sizes too small. I still wear them. I get blisters.

The Ekka: Mexicantina

August 13th

Thursday. I turn up at the Show grounds early. After three days, my body is objecting less to both the hilly terrain and separation from The Silver Steed (and here I’d thought it was only my heart and soul that loved that glorious bike so dearly).
Plenty of time for a morning visit to the Poultry Pavilion.

Did I mention that I love the Ekka?

Things at The Mexicantina are slow; it’ll be just me and Terry for the next three days. Peter, his wife Leslie, and Abby are split between the two other stands.

Terry is a brassy broad in her mid-40’s. She’s loud, all fake-nails & frosted-lipstick, running a steady commentary on nearly every being that saunters by: about all the bogans (funny, as I somewhat considered her eligible for bogan-status); the scantily clad teens dressed like “thur givin’ it away;” how obese people repulse her -- “I don’t know what it is, but they make me feel physically ill… oh! There’s another one! No, I can’t look.”

None of this is said quietly.
I’m smiling and nodding to be polite, trying my very hardest not to pass judgement on her. And I’m doing surprisingly well.
Until around midday, when Terry – speaking to a customer – says, “Well, I’m not racist, but…”

At this moment, I’m making a bean burrito, my back to her, and I freeze. I remember a comedian’s bit – maybe Chapelle or Chris Rock – about how the words I’m-not-a-racist-but are without exception followed by a horrifically racist statement.

Terry does not disappoint.

From this point on, it is increasingly difficult not to judge Terry for all her outrageously judgemental comments. She decides I can’t take a proper break, despite the relatively easy pace of the day. (Later, Peter and Leslie separately ask whether I had a break. They each knowingly roll their eyes and say to make sure I do the next two days.)

I crack at 5:20, enveloped by a grumbly rain cloud of surliness. At 6pm on the dot, I take off my apron and say 'bye without offering the standard polite “is there anything you need me to do?” – secretly hoping that yes, yes there are helpful things I could do before leaving.

I trudge through the evening crowds to Divine Donuts.
“Hey Sunshine!”
“I need a hug.”
“Oooh. Do you also need wine?”
“Yes.”
In an instant, I’m seated on a crate, glass of locally-made wine in one hand, telling Tom and D’Jean about my day in the International Food area while they start to close up.

“I think I also need a chocolate donut without the donut.”
Tom smiles and comes over to my crate, carrying the pump they use to inject organic Belgian chocolate into the donuts.
“Open up.”

My chore in the clean-up is to lick the chocolate spoon and spatula. A dough ball is lobbed over and makes the most delightful thwack as it hits my leg.

The Ekka: Trades-ies

August 12th

Tom’s concerned: it’s his first time at The Ekka and business is much slower than he was expecting. Attendance is generally down (Swine flu? Hiked admission rates? Theories abound) and all the vendors are feeling pinched. Tom had assumed The Show would at very least be on par with other festivals Divine Donuts has been at and staffed it accordingly.
No matter how much I try to reassure him that I don't need buckets of hours, he still feels responsible for me, that I came all the way to Brisbane for work that may not be available (I repeat several times it was an excuse to get to Queensland and be a carny).
Then, luck of luck, word comes by Tom’s friend Nemo that a neighboring stall is desperately short staffed for tomorrow.
And Wednesday is Show Day!

All the states in Australia are allotted the same number of statutory holidays. So where Victoria has a day for the races (for The Melbourne Cup, the city has the day off work, gets dressed up, the girls put on beautiful hats, and everyone goes to the races), all the towns and cities in Queensland have a Show Day. No school, businesses close, and everyone hits the Show grounds. But unlike The Races, no one gets dressed up and the girls do not wear beautiful hats.

Show Day passes in a blur of people and vegetarian Mexican food. Never have 9 hours disappeared quite so quickly. There are four of us dishin’ up tucker nearly non-stop. When Peter, the owner, says they could definitely use my help for the rest of the week, it’s good news all around.

***

I arrive back at Sally and Carlie’s properly beat, the bike ride home the final nudge. Brisbane has some bastard hills, including a long gradual one on the last stretch. The house is at the bottom of the most ridiculous slope imaginable; I can barely walk up it in the mornings (no exaggeration). But on the way home, it’s bliss. The thought of it makes the slow climb possible. At the top of Jones street, deep breath and down, so fast it makes me giggle every time. I coast far beyond the house, chuck a u-ey [as they say here], and head back.

***

The ladies are also tuckered. We’re playing on youtube, relishing the video for “Love is a Battlefield,” deeply mesmerized by Pat Benetar’s ‘angry shimmies’ [check it out: you will not be disappointed!].
The Internet trail leads to another Australian mystery: The Rock Eisteddfod. This has been introduced to me before and, much like The Show Bag, I don’t get it. We watch clips, I have the girls explain it a couple times, we Wikipedia it, but The Rock Eisteddfod is beyond me. My Canadian brain can’t make sense of it and all the excitement it carries. And while it’s no angry shimmy, The Rock Eisteddfod is pretty damn good.

Behind the Scenes

I meet up with Tim and Callan, the guys we're driving with out to the desert. They're performing at the Ekka as The Leaping Loonies.
We're meant to be going over plans for the upcoming adventure. But first, the boys vent about their performing conditions.
One of the stages they're scheduled on is too small for the tumbling in their act.
The tech dudes are dinks.
Especially the sound guy, who's not only a dink, but doesn't know what he's doing.

But what really has them in a tizzy is that they're sharing a dressing room with kids. They have been informed they can't get changed. In their dressing room. Because of the children.

Tim's solution: go outside on the grass and strip down.
In front of everyone's children.
Take that, the Ekka!

The Ekka: Day 1

I've finished my first day of work and am wandering the grounds of The Ekka. The smell of deep fried food, diesel, and horse manure mingle delightfully in the air. At one point, walking through the midway, assaulted by flashing lights and blaring sounds, I get a little misty-eyed with bliss.

Sally described the Ekka as "perfectly mediocre."
Perfectly mediocre.
Who would want it any other way?

***

Earlier that day, I inadvertently snuck into the Ekka.
I was to meet Tom at Gate 1 and he'd give me the necessary day pass to get in. I follow my Google route from West End through the centre of Brisbane, past The Valley and kinda-sorta around a barrier-type thing. No one bats an eye and I coast by what look very much like Exhibition-esque buildings and stands.
Almost as though I were inside the grounds. Huh.

After a few requests for directions, I'm at Gate 1, calling Tom to come get me. He finds me leaned up against my bike, shades on, looking all kinds of chill, on the Ekka side of the gate.
"You're inside already? How did you get in?"
"Oh... oh! Yeah, I thought maybe I was... I don't quite know how; I just sort of ended up here."
What's funny is that it's true on multiple levels.

***

The Show crowd -- Queensland country folk and bogans a-plenty -- don't know what to make of the organic doughnut concept.
I'm informed that it is essential to my Ekka experience to consume a Dagwood Dog with sauce -- essentially, a mega corndog smothered in ketchup, in all its beige-y glory.
I don't.

I do, however, visit The Showbag Pavilion to further my understanding of the Show Bag.
And try my hand at hustling some fellow carnies on Sideshow Alley.

And I love the Ekka, in all its perfect mediocrity.

The Ekka

August 10th

The Queensland Royal Show.
The Ekka.
It can only be good.

I'm working for my friend Tom's business, Divine Donuts, serving up organic coffee and doughnuts. Perhaps not your typical carny fare, but I'm claiming carny status nonetheless.

I have died and gone to heaven.
I don't know exactly what it says about me that my vision of a personal heaven is working at an Exhibition. But it can only be good.

What sparked this childhood dream? Could have been my dad's reading of Charlotte's Web a couple times when I was young. [There are no piglets at the Ekka this year for fear that they'll catch swine flu from the humans.] I have sparkling clear memories of my first Albert County Fair: the animals, candy apples, a ride on the Ferris Wheel at night.

Then there was the herald of summer: The Bill Lynch Show. The midway. We never knew exactly when it was coming to town -- The Blinch, as my brother and I called it -- and then one day, bam! it was there. The Coliseum parking lot transformed, full of rides and stands and trailers.
Just driving past, I could feel the stickiness of the ground under my feet, the hot sweet smell of fresh candy floss, the teenage screams from The Zipper, the unnatural scrawniness of the AC/DC lovin' operator of The Gravitron, sporting his Confederate flag sleeveless shirt.
And at night: the lights, oh the lights!

One summer, a carny at the Ex in Toronto showed me the trick to his particular game, having me practice over and over until I could get it right, explaining the importance of confidence and nonchalance in equal measures. I left instilled with a sense of innate carny-potential and spent the remainder of our family vacation working on my carny barking skills, no doubt to the delight of my parents. After all, what more could a mum and dad want for their 11 year old daughter?

***

"What are Show Bags?"
"How can you not know what Show Bags are?!"
"Um... "

Carlie and Sally are shocked -- shocked! -- my I-don't-think-we-have-them-in-Canada explanation hardly satisfactory. Clearly, I must be mistaken.

"They're the best part of the Ekka! When you're a kid, you spend ages going through the Show Bag list in the newspaper..."
"The newspaper?"
"Yeah! So you can decide exactly which ones you want and make a wish list. The Bertie Beetle ones are the best, especially since the stopped selling the Bertie Beetle candies in stores. Now you can only get them in the Bertie Beetle Show Bags."

I still don't get it. I do, however, enjoy how many times Sally has just said Bertie Beetle.
"I bet the list is up on the website!"
Sure enough, over a hundred different themed bags to choose from, with every imaginable kind of loot from candy to toys to lingerie to fishing gear.

We peruse the list, oo-ing and ah-ing over the endless options.
I still don't really get it.

Survival Skills

Operation: Prep for Desert Circus Training finds me on a run through the bush near Lucas's house.
Out on these tracks, it's hard to imagine that I'm so close to Sydney. To the end of the street, up the hill, a left turn, and the suburban trappings of Beacon Hill suddenly and completely disappear.

The dusty trails crisscross through dense growth, over craggy rocks, twist, turn, and occasionally open up into fields of mud-sculpted BMX jumps. It's bright and sunny, a warm Australian end-of-winter morning. Best to head back to the house before the sun gets too high.

"I don't remember coming this way."
"Sorry, what was that?"
"I didn't come past any of this stuff when I came up. None of this is familiar."
"... I see."
"How did I miss the turn-off?! There was no off to turn onto!"

I retrace my steps back to the last spot I most definitely recognize. Then forward again along the exact same path, apparently convinced that this time, things will turn out different. They do not.
"What?! No!"

The narrator pinches the bridge of their nose, rubs thumb and forefinger in small circles, while slowly shaking their head. "Now remember: the most important thing about being lost is not to panic."
"I know that."
"Thought it was worth mentioning."
"I'm not panicking."
"Fine."
"I'm not!"

"You seem slightly... agitated, that's all."
"I am agitated! It's hot, I'm thirsty, I don't have my phone, and I have no idea how I got here."
"Um, you ran...?"
"Shut up. Shutup shutupshutupshutupshutUP."

"Have you considered trying one of those three side trails?"
"I hate you."
"You think you hate me."
"..."
"But you don't."
"I think I hate you, then. Why are we even talking?? We don't do this."

The narrator shrugs their shoulders, accenting the gesture with an eyebrow raise and slight half-grimace. I hate the half-grimace. Apathetic bastard.

"Weren't you paying attention? You're always big into describing surroundings; I take it you don't bother remembering any of the shit you go on about."
"Remember?! When there's an endless array of details, textures, sounds, emotions, reactions, and so forth, desperately calling out to be captured?"
"Clearly an essential task."
"Indeed! You were so thoroughly consumed by the sunshine and your musical selection, you can't even recall which way you came. Forget about the rabbit-warren beauty of these tracks, the pungently sweet smell of the wattle trees, the sound of the rocks crunching under your sneakers..."
"Shut up."
"Make me."
"Other people notice things without being plagued by a narrator!"
"Of course they do."
"Arghh."

By this point I have backtracked yet again, and am no closer to my destination. I stand facing the second trail off the main path. I could always get myself back to this point easy enough if it came to that.
"Yes. Because we've been doing oh so well here."
"You are not helping. I wasn't even talking to you, anyway."
"Oh, I see. So you're talking to yourself now? That certainly isn't promising."
"What the...? Who do you... where do... and honestly! How can you even? Argh buu, bah!"

The trail is the correct choice. In fact, as soon as I clear the overgrown entrance (which you would assume I'd remember from the initial time through, but then, you'd be wrong), it comes back to me and I'm home, slurping down water in no time.