Adventures on King Street

July 29, 2007 at 4:12 pm (me, sexuality, strip club, swimming)

Currently I’m sitting in an internet cafe about 5 blocks from my house, having just finished swimming laps. Being in the slow or medium lanes the whole time, I had time to contemplate something – women don’t generally open their legs up wide or symmetrically when they swim breast stroke. The men were fine, but all the women I was swimming behind were always more guarded; happier to have a lopsided and potentially injurious stroke than to leave their lady-parts vulnerable. I think it’s silly; I read an essay once about how children are brought up to perceive their respective reproductive organs. Boys are more likely to feel proud of their penis, with parents giving them nicknames and helping during toilet training, et cetera. In contrast, the idea of having sexual organs is avoided for little girls – everything children know about female genitalia from adults is littered with insinuations of dirtiness and shamefulness. It seems sad to me that even grown women are too scared or embarrassed to kick their legs apart when they are swimming.

Paul and I did a little investigating of another side of sexuality last night – we visited King Street. For anybody not in Australia, King Street is a main street in the Melbourne CBD, home to practically every strip club in Melbourne – all a couple of doors apart. We tried a couple, but I was turned away because of lack of ID. So we ended up at the Men’s Gallery. When we walked in, I didn’t even notice until Paul told me – I was the only non-working woman there, and every single guy was looking at me. We watched the girls on stage for a while, bought a dance just so we could ask some questions, then left. It’s funny – if one of them had have made eye contact when they were on stage, I would have bought a dance from them, but none did, so I chose the most individual looking one. Their loss.

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Surfing on a Rocket

July 24, 2007 at 3:25 pm (me, musing, work)

Weirdest feeling: being on the verge of utter and unbelievable joyfulness – feeling that it is right around the corner, and all I have to do is grab it. Things are finally falling into place. For a year and a half, I have been a faded version of myself – all the things about me that I like have been trampled and forgotten, to make way for the cold, hard, more survivalist aspects of me. Things are conspiring in my favor now, for the first time in what seems like forever, and it looks like the old me will be making a return.

My bedroom floor right now is covered with the contents of a box – letters, cards, postcards, pretty paper, drawings, little jewels, a video… all manner of pretty things. It’s a box that I have been filling up for years with things that make me smile. I found a card that my Mum gave me before my first opening night. Letters from my teachers from when I was stuck at home, sick in the Spring-Summer of 2003. A video tape from Emma where she dressed up like Charlie Chaplin, played air guitar and wrote, “Happy Birthday Rose!” on the mirror in lipstick. Dreamy drawings from the margins of my Year 11 Literature notes, of Lucien and me. A 3.5 inch floppy disk from Jemima, full of little pieces of our art. A postcard from Galway telling me I need to get myself to the UK as soon as possible. Pouring over all this stuff has just filled me with a rush of affection for everybody I have ever called a friend, a mentor, a parent, a lover or a source of inspiration. Another thing happened: a couple of weeks ago, someone who I considered a friend said something which hurt horribly and completely shook up my concept of self. Through his quasi-intellectualization and projection of his own insecurities, he basically told me that I was worthless, nothing. While reading everything in that box, it reminded me of how many people don’t think I’m worthless.

Other than all that, I’m at the end of my tether at Baker’s Delight. I have something else lined up, but it’s still a month or so away from fruition, so I have to stick it out for a little bit longer. Just thought I’d take an opportunity to bitch about customers for a while.

There are a couple of archetypes who keep coming back. There are the women with strollers and multiple toddlers in tow, who ignore me until they bark orders at me. There are ethnic nonnas who shout at me in Italian/Greek/whatever and point vaguely at the rack, expecting me to read their mind. There are the horrible, flaky, sycophantical pansy-husbands who come in on mobile phones, asking their fat wives what they want while they sit in the carpark. But there are a couple of customers who broke away from these oft-seen moulds, and really have a good shot at being The Worst Customer EVER.

One man came in and grumbled under his breath, “Ah hef row-row”. I don’t know how he expected me to hear him over the sounds of clattering baking trays, the radio, other customers and the trucks roaring down Swan St, so I asked him politely to repeat himself. “I want the brown round one!” he barked grouchily. I assumed he wanted a round wholemeal roll, so I reached for one. “No you stupid bitch, I want the brown round!” I tried to ascertain what the hell he wanted – it was a white round cob loaf (if only I could read minds!). I went through the usual rigmarole of asking if he’d like paper or plastic, sliced or unsliced, et cetera – he simply yelled no. I put it into the bag and he snatched it away before I could even get my hand out, wrenching my fingers as he went, and throwing money at me. No need to really go into detail with the other bratty customers, because I think this one wins.

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Finally My Turn

July 22, 2007 at 3:51 pm (me, performing, sick)

I got it! I’ll be playing Yum Yum in The Mikado, being staged in October. At the first rehearsal, we still didn’t know our roles- so I was sitting there twisting the sleeves of my top into shreds, grinding my toes into the floor, biting my lip until I could taste blood and feeling the most intensely stressed I have felt in a long time. Then it was ok – my name was called, everything went fuzzy, and I managed a little smile. I’m not sure it has all completely sunk in yet; everything will be more exciting when the rehearsal process gets started.

So.. yay!I promise I will post something decent at some point in the none-too-distant future, but right now I’m tired, grouchy, hungry, sick and should really go back to bed.

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Leading Lady?

July 18, 2007 at 12:39 am (auditions, musing, performing)

Two more days of anxious anguish until I find out my fate regarding The Mikado – it seems I have probably got the role of Yum Yum, the female lead, but things could still happen in the next two days to thwart my hopes. I was the only girl called back for the part, so logic tells me that I should have it… but who knows. I can’t sleep very well; I just keep imagining turning up to the first rehearsal and being told that somebody else got the part.

I was talking about this with my shrink, and he said something that shocked a little: “If you get this part, it will really change your life”. It seems incredibly silly to place so much importance on something like a role, but on closer examination, I think he’s right. Confidence is a huge issue for me – for a long time I couldn’t sing in front of people without shaking, and going to tutorials at university is such a huge deal for me because I am so shy and anxious. If I get it, I think it will be ‘the thing’ that changes me; from being a fraidy cat to being “unstoppable”, as Don put it. We’ll see!

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When Fools Can Be Kings..

July 13, 2007 at 6:37 pm (ex-friends, exasperation, friends, lucien, music)

I’ve had Black Holes and Revelations on constantly for the last couple of days, in an effort to stop myself from singing. My voice gets overtired easily when I’m singing constantly in the upper reaches of my range, which isn’t something I want in the midst of auditions. The drawback from this kind of musical therapy is that I really, really, really want to do something that rocks; as opposed to trilling and gliding around near A6, I want to play an instrument and sing, furiously, until my vocal cords want to bleed. Lucien suggested that I’m not cut out for harder music – we’ll see.

Yesterday I spent the entire day with Lucien, being the perfect girlfriend. Despite the fact that I was feeling miserable, I went with him to visit his cousins, helped him pick out his sister’s birthday present, acted as secretary by making a million important calls on his behalf while he was driving, accompanied him to his audition for moral support, made him dinner, then stayed up all night helping with the more creative aspects of the present. I was still in bed this morning when he called me, showering me with love and verbal affection… it was incredibly nice. There is something bad happening at the moment with a friend which has been emotionally exhausting me and driving a bit of a wedge between Lucien and I, so it’s nice to know that my man still adores me as much as I adore him. (everyone – your cue to vomit)

Something I have been thinking about lately is the idea of self-improvement. People left, right and centre are jumping on the bandwagon – going to point of referring to themselves as two different people; i.e. “the new me” and “the old me”. In my opinion, this is rubbish. Self-improvement or betterment doesn’t describe what is happening to these people – they are not taking themselves and improving upon it, they are basically just remoulding the parts of themselves they present to the public, based on what they think the public wants. I have nothing against self-improvement – as some past entries have read, I am very much a proponent of self-betterment. However, I tend to take a different approach – I like to amplify the aspects of myself that I like the most, and shrink the bits I like least. As opposed to basing the shrinking and amplification on what I think certain other people want. Change is good, but you can’t please everybody – and if this is what change is based on, people will end up disappointing those they tried to please, and ultimately themselves.

This view has been very controversial; a lot of my friends are turning into completely different people. For most it’s understandable – they have moved away from their homes, all their friends, to new universities. They manage to change in ways that maintain their integrity and the things that make them a decent person, even if we no longer have so much in common. Some have no excuse, and purposefully strip themselves of all redeeming qualities. It’s these ones that leave me so emotionally exhausted.

I shouldn’t be venting here, but talking to anybody else is not really an option. I’m a pacifist, and this is really my first experience of friend-wars. During high school, I was aloof, disconnected and distant – I had several social circles that I was a valued member of, but I would float in, out and between the groups at my leisure. Of course there were the groups that viewed me as a freak, but I just didn’t concern myself with them. My unavailability made me a popular commodity in my groups, which was nice, but there was also a practical reason for my distance – I avoided all the junk that went on. “You slept with my boyfriend!”, “I can’t believe you picked up my brother!” and “How dare you tell everybody about that thing!”.. I was spared all the crappy warring and bitching and pathetic iciness that went on in high school.

So now I am embroiled in something that I am completely unprepared to fight, and it is such a weight to carry. I can tell it’s about to come to a head; I almost don’t care about the outcome, I just want to not be affected by it anymore.

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Spider-Pig, Spider-Pig…

July 10, 2007 at 5:41 am (cold, homer simpson, reminiscing, taipei)

Maybe my last post was a little premature – I found an abridged version of what I intended to post had managed to save itself as a draft. Here it is. 

I wish that one of two things would happen: a) Homer Simpson was a real person, and would marry me, OR b) I was animated, and Homer Simpson would marry me.

Oh, how I hate winter. Last night I was in bed, snuggling into Lucien’s chest in a desperate bid to keep warm, under three layers of winter blankets. He was warm enough to have his shoulders out of bed, but I was still the human ice cube. He would flinch and pull away every time my icy feet touched his and refused to let me hug him, for fear of my deadly hands. Give me 40 degree days, wearing next to nothing and lazing on the beach after sunset any day.

Dad suggested that I should move to a warmer climate. Maybe I will. If I ever have a child, I would definitely demand that she spent at least some of her life growing up in Taipei. It’s the most wonderful city – Melbourne has its charms, but it does tend towards pretentiousness. Taipei was… well, Taipei.

Our house was on Yangmingshan, a mountain district near the city. It was a squarish white stucco building surrounded by squirrel-infested palm trees, six foot walls, then rainforest. Once a year for a couple of days we would be overrun with these scary little flies – they would swarm into the house in their thousands through every tiny crack, then their wings would drop off and they would die. We’d find them in our beds, our hair, and then their crunchy bodies would litter the floor. Another time after a typhoon, our swimming pool was hijacked by about 50 toads. My brother Vince was enlisted to get rid of them, so he made it a game – picking them out of the pool, tossing them into the air and hitting them over the fence with a baseball bat. Cruel, yes, but don’t people get cane toads with golf clubs in Queensland?

On our bus ride to school, we would pass a butcher in the street who we lovingly named “The Chicken Scrambler”. Outside his tiny shop he would have cages and cages of chicken, geese, ducks and all manner of other birds when we were heading off to school at 7am. By 3 when we were coming home, he’d be hosing down the footpath; blood, feathers and entrails would float towards the drain and disappear. We’d giggle uncomfortably and make “ewww’ noises, while everybody stared. We did this every day.

Michael Mellor was the principal of the Taipei British School when I went there. I remember one day, after one of the Year Nine girls had been publicly caught smoking pot and having sex in a city garden, he took all the junior classes aside for some improvised drug education. He put on a video of some 1970’s rock event in London, and pointed out which people had died, and showed us a before-and-after on Keith Richards. We were suitably scared.

One of my happiest memories is of the last year we were in Taiwan, Fourth of July celebrations at the American School. Hot dogs, fireworks, my whole family together…

Going to a school for children of expats (affectionately called the International Brat Pack), my best friends changed frequently as people’s parents wrenched them away to a new overseas posting. There was Eva (Dutch), Suzanne (Dutch, again), Nurulhuda (Malaysian), Sang Joon (South Korean), Jay (British), Laura (Australian), Thomas (British), Joshua (Australian), Ayaka (Japanese), Vivian (Chinese American), Rafika (Zimbabwean), Emily (Swedish), Adam (Scottish).. the list goes on. The fact that somebody came from another country, had different coloured skin, ate unfamiliar food… I never got a chance to have that seem odd to me. When I came back to Australia and encountered racism for the first time, it took me a long time to understand what the problem was.

It is a very strange thing to realize you have culture shock from returning to your ‘home’ country. I came back to Australia and jumped back into the year level that was age appropriate. On looking back, I really should have skipped a year or two, or simply demanded to go back to Taiwan. It’s a controversial opinion, but primary and secondary education in Australia makes me want to bash my head against a concrete wall, repetitively. In fact, that’s a pretty accurate description of how returning to the Australian education system felt.

In Taipei, we learnt about things like line, perspective, and composition in Art class. Physical education meant learning about many different sports and the way our bodies reacted to different things. Doing substantial amounts of work was simply expected. In Australia, we would draw on old vinyl records with paint markers and call them ‘art’. P.E. meant spending an afternoon once a week playing t-ball (I still don’t know how to play). Spelling words in Grade Six were still things like “frequent”. Gah. Upon coming back, I developed an attitude towards school that took a long time to shrug – basically “I don’t have to even try, and I still get top marks”. Now it’s coming back to bite me… university is a huge jump from high school, and my high school education was mediocre at best.

Recurring Dream by Crowded House was the soundtrack to the entire time in Taipei. Mum and Dad would listen to it because it reminded them of home; nowadays, I listen to it and it reminds me of Taipei, a place I consider as much my home as Australia.

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No, No, No.

July 10, 2007 at 5:19 am (gah)

I just typed out what I considered to be a beautifully crafted post. All about my childhood, growing up in Taipei, a place which is as much my home as Australia. I’m feeling a need to record these things before I turn into a grown up and forget the things that really mean something.

But no. WordPress chewed it up and spat a blank ‘New Post’ page back in my face.

This is too damn depressing. I’m going to bed.

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Mon Danse Absurde

July 8, 2007 at 3:52 am (being down, friends, me, performing, rant)

Fawkes is Christian. I am something else entirely. He does not care to debate such petty little things like existence, whereas I have studied philosophy for the last 4 years. Anytime I get on my high horse.. well, it’s a very high horse to fall from.

I think that philosophy should be taught in all schools, from primary upwards, as a compulsory subject. It teaches one how to argue logically, how to structure arguments and most importantly.. to never lose a sense of wonder. Fawkes had a more maths/science/IT-centric education – a sample of his favourite arguments – “Yeah, but that’s impossible”, “No, it’s just not like that” and “It just is“. But it’s a scab.. I can’t leave it alone. People who don’t question their beliefs make me want to strangle them. If you are pinning your whole life on the existence of a particular being and the assumption that he/she/it wants you to do certain things, you’d want to be as close to certain as you could be, right? Apparently not, for a lot of people.

No, I’m not dissing anybody out there who has already found where they put their faith – it’s a bit more complicated than that – I just hope you have thought it over, and that you realize that there is doubt in everything.

I’m slipping again. This whole deal with my Dad is beating me down, as are two overdue assignments which probably won’t even be accepted now. There is so much to look forward to, but so much rubbish to deal with in the here and now. A lot of people I know criticize me for sleeping so much, and it puzzled me too for a long time. I have a circulatory disorder which means winter is fraught with disaster – a day of normal activities can make me feel incredibly tired and unwell, and staying in bed is one sure way to keep myself completely warm. That’s also the reason why I always go completely hyper during summer – it’s making up for lost time. Another reason I try to sleep a lot is that when I am asleep, I don’t have to think or feel anything at all. Being unconscious is such respite for me. I will admit this, suicide is something that I do think about, not just for me but the implications and such.. I imagine that being dead would be the same as being asleep – feeling, knowing and thinking nothing at all. Ceasing, completely. Sometimes that seems so comforting.

Nobody worry or anything, I’m just overtired and feeling a tad absurd. There is a movie on television that has been on in the background for the last couple of hours. I’m assuming it’s the same movie, but I’m very confused – it seems to have crossed from 1930’s Egypt to 1850’s middle America, and now everybody is speaking in Scottish accents and wearing chainmail. Overtired, anybody?

Something light and fluffy – I went to Louise’s 21st last weekend. Brilliant fun. It was a Mad Hatter’s party, so I wore my beautiful floppy peach and white sun hat. It’s a summer hat, but what the hell? There were all sorts there. It was so nice to catch up with girls from high school – apparently I am missed.

Other than that, I had a lovely chat to Gary Wong – he wrote The Soldier’s Wife and was one of the people in my life who actually believe that I have talent. It was so refreshing to talk to someone not sucked in by the town’s musical theatre scene – it’s all so self-congratulatory and suffocatingly hypocritical. Funny how I keep going back for more though. Gary shared his enthusiasm for Beauty and the Beast, saying how he thought it was something really new and innovative, a sign that things were about to start heading in a better direction. I agreed, but I think it will take a bit more than one show to change an entire culture, but here’s hoping.

Bedtime, I think.

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Wish I Was In Sydney!

July 5, 2007 at 8:12 pm (auditions, boys, performing)

That is something you will never hear me say again, but today, I wish I were in Sydney. Why? The Kitty Hawk came to town… which means thousands of gorgeous American sailors, enthusiastic to have their feet back on dry land. If I were not so blessed with a boyfriend, I would so get someone to drive me up there or catch a train.. with a suitcase full of cocktail dresses, stilettos and red lipstick.

What can I say? I love a man in uniform.

“You remember Bridget? She used to run around your lawn with no clothes on, remember?” Any time that I have watched the Bridget Jones movies with Lucien, he will howl with laughter at every misadventure then say, “Oh Rose, that is just like you!”
I just had a vision of myself if I had have gone up to greet Kitty Hawk; drunk and pathetic, sitting on the lap of a random sailor in a smoky bar, telling him about how my parents don’t understand me. This is completely at odds with the other version of me in Sydney: gorgeous and shiny, dancing the night away with a bevy of beauteous boys, getting kissed and drinking expensive champagne, then seeing them off with a casual promise “to write”.

Mmmm. I have such a burdensome imagination. These are the kinds of silly daydreams that plague me all day.

Other than all that, The Mikado auditions are next week! I am singing “The Sun Whose Rays Are All Ablaze” – sung by Yum Yum in the show. I know all the words, I have worked out meaning, facial expression, gesture, posture, movement, dynamics, .. everything. I’m working on my tone, which is a bit blah due to the cold, but it’s really coming along! I’m confident and excited, a far cry from my usual pre-audition state.

Auditions for me have always been something shockingly terrible. My first musical theatre audition was for The Soldier’s Wife, which was a basic workshop audition. A lot of people went for that show, a lot of regulars with the associated companies, and then there was me. I had done plays since I was about 6, but I had never done a musical. Imagine my surprise when I got the Soldier’s Daughter – it wasn’t a big part, but people with much more experience than I got turned away. This experience didn’t really give me the best idea of how hard it can be to get a part.

Next audition was for Sweeney Todd. I sang brilliantly, I glowed and radiated all the qualities that character needed. I did script with the assistant musical director, and they seemed impressed. Howard, the director, did something strange – instead of saying, “We’ll contact you shortly”, he started going on about how good I was. “That was wonderful Rose, truly wonderful! You have such a lovely voice!”. A couple of days later, his band was playing at my debutante ball where the praise continued. I got my letter a week or so later and my heart fell into my shoe – “Unfortunately…”. I didn’t get in, after all that. Upon actually seeing the show, I saw that I would have looked like a child next to the mature, tall leads (I was 16 and petite).

Until now, auditions have been cause for terror – although I should think logically and realise that there are a million reasons why I may not get a part, the thought just keeps creeping back … they don’t want me because I’m not good enough. So, my new mantra – I am fabulous, so if they don’t want me, it’s their problem.

… ah, excitement! Wish me luck!

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Behind the Barricade

July 5, 2007 at 3:27 am (Uncategorized)

I’m camping out in my bedroom right now. Yes, there is an entire apartment that I could or should be living in, but relations with my Dad have become so unbearably unpleasant that I dare not venture out for more than 5 minutes at a time. I have blankets, socks, oranges, a bottle of Mount Franklin, crispbreads, the internet cable, my phone and some books and dvds. I should be ok, I think.

He refuses to move out. The deal, the only reason why I allowed myself to even consider sharing a house with my Dad was this: Fawkes and I move in, Dad moves out three to four weeks later, we find someone else. It was easy, and it didn’t affect my student payment status. Five months later, he is still here and is now refusing to budge – I’m technically breaking the law by living with a parent and claiming an independent rate, and he makes my life hell whenever I dare venture beyond my 3 square metres. He says shocking things about the way I look, tells me that the degree I have been struggling with is worth ‘nothing’, deliberately ruins my plans and sabotages any time I want to have friends over, clutters up the kitchen and dining area with his experiments and work things, hangs up his clothes in my wardrobe and has no qualms about just coming into my room whenever he likes to get them. Merely the tip of the iceberg, but you get the point. I feel a combination of wanting to scream, nausea and that kind of horrid restless feeling where you want to kick things and cry because you are so frustrated and helpless.

I’ve enlisted the help of Fawkes, Lucien, my Mum and thinking about Dad’s girlfriend… he has got to leave, otherwise I will have a nervous breakdown.

It feels bad to be posting such crud; it really is just a stream of my current state of mind – panicky, overwhelmed, hopeless. But rant over.

Unfortunately, this business is exhausting me to the point where I can’t find anything else to write about. Until I get better then.

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