Orange Juice With Jonas
Beginning anew in this large and intimidating arena, I met up with Jonas who was standing at the bar also waiting to get served. Now Jonas can always light you up with his happy-go-lucky attitude. Pumping me up with his frivolous humor that I much enjoyed, I stood there chatting with him and his friend that to my knowledge is leaving within a week or two. It wasn’t too long until Jonas decided it was time to head downstairs and give the pokies a shot.
The three of us walked downstairs, more than happy to escape the voluble canter upstairs. Noticing Linh again on the pokies trying to redeem his money, I cared not to spend another dollar as I was happy with my small earnings. Instead, after chatting with Linh for a minute who looked caught up in his machine, I went over to sit between Jonas and his friend who was also playing the pokies.
Both of them were hitting up but the surprise of the night came when Jonas thought to chuck a dollar into the dollar machines, hit the button once and instantly won $40, lucky bastard. Calling for the assistant, we watched the other guy bet one dollar worth of credit to which he tried to successfully double up but one dollar just isn’t anything to start off with. Upon receiving his money, he screamed out “I’m shouting you all to a drink” and unable to say no to his newfound generosity, I headed upstairs again, to the nomadic tune of the night.
Pausing to chat with Linh who was still playing hard on the pokies downstairs, I remarked on Jonas’s earnings and how I would be upstairs grabbing my free orange juice. Thao was nowhere to be found but once upstairs I had seen him chatting to Matthias and some girls from work again. Jonas was a commanding figure that night, tall, outgoing and with a smile on his face that wouldn’t leave him for the whole night. Making our way to the bar for him to order our drinks, I stood comfortably chatting to both Jonas and his friend.
Soon after, Linh walked up to me and noted that he was heading home to which I understood his unfamiliarity. Linh was the first to drop off and leave, thinking I would be the first but figuring wrong. With the comfortless poise of Thao, I figured he would be the second to leave and was looking towards heading off as we chatted later in the night but I alas was the second of our three to leave. Grabbing the drink of orange juice that Jonas had bought me, he started telling his story about his last indoor cricket game and how they ended up losing.
A Quick Hello To Selma
Before our little trip to the bar where I was walking around aimlessly, I noticed Selma near the bar with some tall guy by her side. Looking as if she was also standing in line to buy some drinks, she walked up to me quick invitingly to which we shared some comforting words. “Hey, how are you going” I uttered above the crowd, “Where abouts are you sitting”. As she pointed to the right of the bar to where a small setup of disco lights was stationed on the opposite side of the pool tables, we began upon some small chat and then she was off to mingle some more.
Selma just has the best attitude and even in those days where I was quiescent and timidly quiet, she would look towards me with an inviting smile, just waiting for me to say hello and saying so herself if one didn’t arise. If only we had some more time to develop on our friendship, have lunch here and there, you never know…
Lost Among The Colleagues
Soon after this little chat with Selma and my ambient conversation with Jonas, we decided to pick ourselves up and head towards the direction that Selma had noted. To my surprise, when arriving I had seen Gawain there and already feeling as an outsider, the ladies from work around our age who were there by the dozen didn’t help my intimidated loins. Nevertheless, with my hands in my pockets, I walked over to Rhett having a chat and talked with Thao who was also standing there looking almost as desolate and lost in space as myself.
Jonas had parted into his own little corner chatting to a woman and Otto (The guy who was with him at the bar and who is leaving in a week) was also as celibate to ladylike conversation as I. There was no sign of Selma who would have made my deliverance seem all the more beneficial, making me seem less like an outcast who has to try and chat to fit in. I’m not good at smooching when it comes to groups and chatting with Rhett, Otto and Thao seemed to be the extent of my conversation.
A couple of the girls kept looking at me from the corner of their eyes as they were deep into other conversation intrigued as to whether I would come out of my shell but of course, my anxiety forbade me. Therefore, when I had finished my drink of orange juice and feeling uncomfortable around Gawain who looked as if he couldn’t act the same around me, I noted to Thao that I would put away my cup and never came back.
Rhett Plans A Big Night
Arriving at the bar, I noticed Rhett with some lady friend of his, buying some more beer and getting himself drunk. Already his words were slurred after two beers but I figured this to be put on to some degree. Explaining that he still had a cab charge which he could take all the way home (Having not used it for his overtime the night before), he was going to get pissed as a fart for the night and then use it to get home.
However, from what I hear, Rhett didn’t home until heaps late, staying back with Selma and many others to which they all got trashed. Selma ended up falling over four times through the night and as she shared a cab home with some guy from work, I know exactly what would have been going through his mind as he dropped her off first. Anyway, in this short time, I said goodbye to Rhett, shook his hand and then made my venture out the way I had come through in the first place, away from the following eyes of the main group.
Goodbye Without A Kiss
Passing Selma and her group of friends who were dominantly women, I couldn’t walk so close past her without at least saying something so when right behind her I grabbed her attention to which she turned around and said hello. “Are you going now are you” she asked to which I agreed, noting that I had been around for an hour. Not being in the same place at the one time, in the three minutes that we chatted away we felt strangely drawn together, so much so that our last seconds were beguiled ones.
Feeling her friends’ eyes upon me as they sat down with their smirks and judgmental perceptions, I knew they were all thinking in their minds “We all know you like her”. That’s probably what prompted me to almost resort to leaning in and giving her a kiss on the cheek as appreciation but despite my seeing her willingness, we left untouched. The same thought looked like it was in Selma’s mind as in those last seconds of our goodbye she was thinking of drawing in and doing something in egression.
I’m sure alike of me she would have been thinking “Should I kiss him on the cheek, it wouldn’t be right just to let him walk off without at least a handshake which wouldn’t be right anyway” or something on the lines of that. Despite the discrepancy to a harmonious wind-up, the just didn’t prevail and we left hampered and robbed.
Meeting Tatiana On The Way
On the way to the train station I noticed Tatiana making her way to the City Hotel and as we both smiled from a distance I decided to stop and have a chat to her. Our chats are too far and few to which we started off with my noting that she looked like the girl from ‘Just Shoot Me’ and after that, because of my anxiety it sort of died off.
Looking as if I was trying to avoid her and conversation each time she walked past, our first fling to acceptance was continually impeded, creating momentum every now and again like Friday night. Chatting about her heading to the City Hotel, I noted how it was fairly packed and then was back on my way to the train station. With the time now being almost 6:30 p.m. and my having a schedule of the night to keep, I bid goodbye to the City to which the irony was in the fact that I unknowingly headed back down there for a fairly eager night of clubbing.
A Chico Roll For Less
Catching my train home, there really wasn’t anything worthwhile to note apart from my grabbing some sleep and when back in Campbelltown, time to spare had me trekking down the main street. Slightly hungry despite my needing to count my expenses, I headed into King’s Café, a place I had gone to once before to which I got a chico roll given to me for a cheaper price upon my having a scrap of money.
Wishing to make amends, heading into the store I confronted the same dude who with his tail behind his feet didn’t look too much in control of his decisions. “Do you remember last time I came here and you gave me a chico roll cheaper” I inquired casually. Shaking his head as if he didn’t remember I went on explaining “Well last time you let me buy a chico roll for less money, maybe thirty cents so this time you can take some money out of what I give you so I can pay you back”.
The idiot must have thought I was trying to barter with him again to which he looked at me as if to say I was asking for a bit too much but regardless, he brought me my chico roll and my change. Waiting until I was out of the shop to count my cumbrance, I found there to be twenty cents extra that what the chico roll was worth. Misrepresented by my words to his lame premise, I was chuckling to the fact that I’d gotten it over him twice now.
Simple pleasures created simple measures, eating my chico roll to the bus-stop on Dumaresq Street. Waiting around impatiently as I tend to do, the bus finally arrived and I, on my way home did feel relief. When finally home eagerly awaiting the Football game in an hour, I had something to eat, a shower and then sat enthralled for the next two hours.
A Football Game And Chevy’s Plans
However, the game against Parramatta was a dooming one which was in all a great game but one that left me shouting and bitching at the foul decisions upon each try. There is no doubt that there was controversy surrounding each try and I’d like to think that if that six pointer given to Parramatta from a forward pass wasn’t awarded, Brisbane would have had the tenacity to win them over.
Anyway, with the winding down of the clash between Parramatta and Brisbane, the windup for our night at Chevy’s was just beginning. When heading home from the station and down Queen Street, I sought to glaze past Chevy’s to which at that time I noted they weren’t even open let alone selling tickets. It was later that I found out they were selling tickets at music stores such as ‘Central Station’ but it was too late to the death of the night.
During my patience after the Football game and with my being almost readily dressed I gave Tyler a call on his mobile phone, hoping to see what was to unfold for the night. While the Football was playing, Tyler decided to head for a drive to Nero’s house to which the both of them smoked some pot in his stay. Knowing that this could have been potentially disastrous for our night as they would be dregged out and too lazed to care about heading out, I feared for a ruined night but didn’t care whether I stayed home on the computer.
The Backlog Grows
The night now sadly has to come to an end, so soon into chronology but yet so far. From tomorrow and all the action surfaced around it, I feel that there will be no time for these pages and therefore, in the history of my memoirs this will be the biggest backlog. Not only will I have to fend for last Friday but I’ll have to encompass the worth of Saturday, Monday, Wednesday, Thursday and then the conceivable Friday and its night.
That’s just one step off being a whole week that I have to endure amongst these pages and all I can say is, help. Nevertheless, each time I say to myself that I’m going to cut back the depiction I think to myself, that day was too worthwhile to take anything away from it and each day I think to myself will have no such greater worth but something seems to always pop up.
Therefore, as the time is now 11:19 p.m. and I’ve finished watching the lame ending of two beautiful girls singing horribly on the Footy Show, it’s time to retire to my bed and ready myself for tomorrow to which I hope to wake up on time. Until tomorrow night where the weekend is still uncertain, let us hope that it is an adventurous day and night to which chronology still with a bitten tongue bids no speech…
Diary Of A Mad Chaos is a daily diary written from March 1996 until today, of which individual books and book series have been created, namely “The Lost Years” an exploration of young, entwined love, the “Wubao In China (猎艳奇缘)” book series which provides an extensive comparative analysis of the cultural differences between Eastern and Western societies, and the book titled “Foreigner (华人)” an exploration of race relations in Australia.
