My Guitar Goes Walking, Part 4 (Busking in the sun)

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Saturday 3rd December, Hyde Park fountain, 15:50 -17:30

Taking advantage of a break in the crummy weather, I headed to Hyde Park. I had tried the Tunnel which was full but there were plenty of spots around the fountain near St Mary’s Cathedral and along the tree covered boulevard in the park. Looking for the right blend of sun and shade, a spot in the flow without being the centre of attention, I settled north of the fountain, out of its windy spray, with enough distance between me and an older busker who had set up along the path to the train station.

It was an open space, so projecting vocals was tough, made even more difficult than last time with a steady breeze blowing, sweeping my music away. As it was, I wasn’t feeling the vibe, not connecting with the people. Things didn’t improve when a wedding party turned up with horse and carriage to steal the show (though it was a fantastic day of sunshine for the newly weds).

The old fellow eventually called it a day and I deciding that it wouldn’t be quitting if I was to move from my poor position. No point in stubbornly bashing your head on a wall right? I thought I’d at least try a different wall. The old fellow had been sitting on one of the benches playing guitar with an amplifier. The spot was well placed to catch the people coming from St James train station plus there was a bench to sit on, so I thought I may as well borrow some of his wisdom and see if his spot in the sun would be more favourable.

Unlike my previous busking sessions, the sun shone over the city buildings rising to the west, over the path and over me and so I put on my sunglasses. The effect on me was surprising. The shades cut me off from the people and allowed me to pretend that it was just me and the guitar in the lazy afternoon sunshine. As I sat there I played only for me, played the songs I wanted to play without worrying about details like acoustics. It was like I was sitting on the brick fence at the bottom of my driveway, basking in the last of the day’s rays, playing just to play, singing just to sing.

There is a kind of freedom in that, a relaxation, when there is no need to perform, no effort to connect with the crowd. I’m not saying that shutting the window to people is right, after all, why go busking otherwise? Why even leave the house? But it was nice to play the way I play for me, to put feeling and soul into the music with no other agendas, no fear and no need to impress. That is the performance I want to let them see.

In the future I’ll see if I can’t play up to the crowd with some songs and let go and lose myself in others.

1.5 hours earnings: $3.55

Incubation

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It took four days of writing and an additional day typing it up on the laptop but I have just completed my first story. The first draft that is. It’s come in at 5,389 words, some of which are editorial notes so they don’t really count. Is that long or is it short? I have no idea. It feels short but it is just an episode of a greater story set in a novel that is still bubbling away in my head.

It’s also light when compared to the four days I spent writing it but the truth is I never really wrote for more than a couple of hours a day. The final session I wrote 900 words in 90 minutes. That’s probably just shy of my goal: 2000 words in three hours writing. I don’t write that fast or that long yet but that’s okay for now.

I want to talk about the myriad details that went into creating the story, all the cosmic gears that fell into place to drive the writing but without the actual story in front of you I’m sure it would be very boring. And since only the first draft is complete I’m not ready to ‘open the door’ so to speak.

I will say a couple of things on it though. The working title is “White Mist. Red Evening” (sounds like chengyu, those four character Chinese idioms. I wonder how it translates in Chinese). The plot was inspired by a dream fragment, a visual that defied the odds and stuck with me upon waking. It happened to also come with (or was that later?) a single word in English, “banaca” (don’t ask me, I have no idea why). Combine with some Magic and running it through the old Japanese translatorfier and I had the basics of my story.

The characters actually came earlier, out of one of my sewing projects, but they were just minor characters waiting patiently in the green room of my mind.

The final piece came when I was sitting in the library. I was working with Candy Wars, my first story that I’ve mentioned before. King says that you have to keep riding the wave of enthusiasm when you are writing a story. You need to keep momentum otherwise the characters grow stale and you’ll lose the passion. I was doing that for Candy Wars but I hit a wall which will require a bit of ground work on my part.

So I was sitting on a couch stuck for inspiration. I sat there and let my mind drift, almost nodding off at times, for an hour and a half. I had been watching the people come in and if you’ve ever been to Customs House library you’ll see that all the newcomers do the same thing and that is they take touristy photos of themselves standing over the model of Sydney set into the floor.

I’m not sure how or what but something clicked and I had my setting. There was even a guy sitting next to me on the couch dropping f-bombs every second word over the phone. He made it into the story too.

I did worry that I was not following King’s advice to stick with the first story. Of course having started the second one, should I then halt its momentum and slog away at the first one? In this case I think the answer was clear and it worked out but I can see it could be a nasty dilemma in the future.

The story seemed to flow from scene to scene as the ink flowed from pen to paper. One funny thing did occur while I was writing. I ran out of pages in my notebook which was a first for me as a writer. Then the ink ran out of my pen. These are good things to happen to a writer (so long as you have more of them).

Another piece of advice from On Writing is that once you finish the first draft you should put it away for six weeks or sufficient time to come at it with fresh eyes when it’s time for the second draft. So I’m going to put my baby into the incubator for a couple of weeks at least. Sleep tight.

My Guitar Goes Walking, Part 3 (Late night busking)

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Thursday 17th November, Pitt Street Mall, 20:30 -21:38

I actually went out to Pitt St Mall late on a Friday night but it was dead. I thought I’d make the most of the opportunity and took out my guitar anyway. I sat down and checked out the acoustics; a sound test before the real thing if you will. I left my hat on and was just some dude playing guitar on a lonely street. I did have a fellow from Samoa try to sell me chocolate to raise money for education back home. I don’t know how much luck he had with the Friday night crowd or lack thereof. Sydney is pretty disappointing that way. I suggested Thursday late night shopping might be better. He came back later and even played the melody of Creed’s One Last Breath. When the slightly inebriated dolts started appearing on the streets I knew it was time to go home.

A week later I decided to take my own advice and tried Pitt St on a Thursday night. As expected there were plenty more people wandering around. So many it was quite intimidating in fact. I did not want to set up where it was too busy and I’d attract too much attention. I know, not a very good strategy for a busker ay? I decided on a patch of street light more on the edge, next to Skygarden. Even then I considered just heading back to the familiarity and comfort of the Tunnel. But that would be a waste and the coward’s way out.

So I do what I do every time. I lay my case down and unzip it, pulling out my guitar and go about tuning it, all the while thinking of what the passerby sees. Probably what I think when I see a busker. Here’s a fellow playing for some change. And that’s about the extent of it. No big deal.

It was a short session. I quickly came to appreciate the acoustic advantages of the Tunnel. Out in the open your voice goes out…and keeps on going, lost to the void. I felt I had to consciously project my voice otherwise I wouldn’t be heard. I guess that’s why buskers have amplifiers.

I’d made a dollar and the shops were starting to close, the people thinning out. Once again there was a nice Asian woman who stopped to place $3 on my guitar case and soon after I called it a night. Pitt St Mall at night. During the day will be another challenge.

1 hours earnings: $4.00

The Valencia Incident

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Last night the police contacted my parents about an accident involving my brother’s car. Thankfully for us they had made a mistake in the number plates of the car involved and my brother is safe. Following this scare I am sharing this account of my own brush with death. I’ve wanted to pen it since reading Stephen King’s account of his own life-threatening incident where he was struck by a van and was severely injured. Thankfully he survived. I got lucky too.

My account may not be completely accurate. Memory is not so reliable and hell, I got hit by a car. Besides, I’m a writer. I’ve a creative license and I like to use it.

The Valencia Incident

Spain 2009. My friends and I are holidaying and that morning we had taken part in La Tomatina, the famed tomato fight that takes over the Spanish town of Bunol. After heading back to our hostel in Valencia and cleaning the tomato juice from our ears we headed out to a club for our final night on tour. The previous night was the Water and Wine Festival in Requena and I had imbibed copious amounts of the latter libation. It was a wild night and suffice to say I nursed a terrible hangover the next day which meant I was not touching alcohol this night out at the club.

A quick aside. If you want a hangover fix, try a tomato fight amongst thousands of people crammed into a single street. Maybe it doesn’t have to be tomato. Oranges perhaps? The adrenaline will brush aside any of the lingering symptoms of hangover. But wear expendable clothes.

I was tired and bored at the club, so me, Smack and his fiancée, Queen decided to take a taxi home. As we crossed the street outside the club a car came around the corner. It was a pedestrian crossing so I assumed we were safe. Assuming that others are following the same rules as you is a great way to get yourself in trouble. But of course that’s what society is so what can you do?

We saw that the car was not slowing down despite our incredulity so we hustled to get off the road. I remember reaching the safety of the curb (another silly assumption) and thinking to myself Alright. We made it.

How wrong I was. All I remember is the sensation of something pressing into the back of my leg. My foot seemed stuck to the ground and so I toppled forward.

The next thing I remember is the gurney being raised and then I was in the back of an ambulance. At some point someone tested my reflexes by running something along the base of my foot but that might have happened on the ground. At this point I was lucid enough to text message Smack, GET IN HERE RIGHT NOW. I was scared by the unknown and wanted the support of my best mate.

I’m told that the car was being driven by a drunk driver. It had mounted the kerb and struck me; I had hit my head on the ground and was lying in a pool of blood. I was unconscious and having a fit for a couple of minutes, my breathing slow and shallow. Smack thought I was going to die. Then I relaxed and my breathing strengthening.

One more metre per second, one more metre or maybe just a foot and maybe I wouldn’t be here right now to type this. It was a close thing. There is a world of difference between life and death but the line dividing them is a thin one indeed.

Queen had rushed back to the club to get help and my other friends had soon rushed out. My good friend BFG had stripped out of his new Zara shirt to wrap it around my head to staunch the bleeding. Thanks BFG!

I was taken to hospital where I remember my black CK jeans being removed, shorn right up the length of the legs. You know that old piece of advice from someone’s mother. Always put on clean underwear when you leave the house because you never know when you’re going to be struck by a bus. Well it turns out it is good advice. I distinctly remember being pleased to get compliments from the nurses on my blue satin boxer shorts with red love hearts all over them.

Only one of the nurses spoke English and in a mad world of the unfamiliar I grabbed on to her like a lifeline. She translated the doctor’s words for me. I remember her telling me that they were going to have to insert a not-so-thin probe into somewhere thin and not-so-used-to-entry-of-foreign-objects. They said that it was not going to be comfortable. Scared, I asked them if it was going to hurt. It did. But apparently whatever reflex they were testing for was still working and to this day I’m thankful for that.

I remember having my head shaved so that they could stitch my scalp together. I think I remember the eight staples going in.

During the night I complained to the nurses who didn’t speak English. Somehow I dredged up my limited Spanish. Frio. Frio. I tried to convey that I was cold or hot or that my head hurt. The compression bandage that was probably keeping my brain from swelling was uncomfortably tight. The nurses did their best and what felt like hours later I think I got some relief in the form of drugs.

I was told that a head specialist was going to come in and run some CT scans on me. I don’t remember much of the scans themselves; a shame, but I in high school I’d done work experience in a radiology clinic so nothing too new there. The wait for the scans and then the doctor’s opinion of them seemed interminable. In fact there’s not much worse than lying in bed not able to sleep when you yearn for nothing more than the oblivion of sleep. It’s the same whenever I have that afternoon coffee.

The news was all good and I was released the next day. Most of my friends had flown on to Ibiza but I went to stay with Smack and Queen. I gave my thanks and said my goodbyes. I even got a photo with my guardian angel though I’ve shamefully forgotten her name.

When I was released from the hospital I had only the clothes I’d come in with so I tried to pin my jeans back together. They didn’t hold together too well and I ended up walking in jeans with incredibly high slits in them, much like an incredibly risqué dress. The fashion hasn’t seemed to have taken hold in Valencia. My white shirt was blood stained and I must have looked to the locals like I’d been in a fight for my life. Well I do like to attract attention when I walk down the street. The blood stains washed out and I still have the white shirt I was wearing that night. Not so my love heart boxers unfortunately.

Ignoring common sense I was desperate to continue my holiday (don’t let getting hit by a car stop you). The next stop was a week of partying in Ibiza. I couldn’t fly for concern over blood clots in my head so I booked a ferry to rejoin my friends. Dancing in clubs with a bandage around the head makes for an interesting spectacle. Many took it to be part of my costume. I had a great time singing and dancing with friends in Ibiza and don’t regret making that decision, immature though it may seem. Even as I write this I’m listening to and watching Big Bang and 2NE1 video clips and I just want to get up and sing and dance. There’s an energy in it; it’s food for the soul and that’s something I hope never to lose as I get older.

To this day I’m not especially careful about crossing roads. I was right back on the horse so to speak. I am more aware that you need to look after No. 1 but it’s impossible to live without making some assumptions about society operating according to certain rules. Down that path lies paranoia. We walk the street taking for granted that we don’t have to be on the constant lookout for rogue cars. And for the most part it works. Truly there is no avoiding some of the things life throws our way. You just have to deal with it. Hopefully we are prepared.

The Taste of Fear

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I got a nasty surprise last night when my Dad called saying that the police had reported my brother’s car had been in an accident. I immediately tried to call his phone but it rang unanswered. I tried the house phone but it went to the answering machine. I immediately took the train home and tried to not let my fear run away without knowing any more facts. Still, it was impossible to stop imagining a car accident, hospital and even death.

It came to me that finally I was getting a taste of the anxiety over a loved one being involved in a life-threatening incident. A couple of years ago I was involved in just such an incident while in Valencia. My friends and I were leaving a club and without going into the details here, I got hit by a drunk driver. I had been knocked unconscious. I was taken to hospital, got some stitches and spent the night in observation. For a time it was not certain whether it might have been worse.

However the incident has never filled me with fear or a feeling of mortality. Even right after the incident I showed no signs of shock. I was cautious not to fly immediately but I did end up taking a ferry to Ibiza within only a couple of days so as not to miss out on the partying we had planned. Ah the folly of youth.

It turned out I was in fact too close to the incident to feel the fear. While my friends feared the worse, ironically I was the least worried since it is impossible to worry when you are unconscious. Not so last night. As I ran the streets back home I police van passed me with lights flashing, my anxiety shooting up. Then it turned off down another street and I thought to myself no, the police are not going to be visiting that news upon our house tonight. I trusted that the cops had GPS and were purposefully not driving towards my house. Then a black car coming up the street slowed down as it neared me. I squinted trying to read the number plate. Yes! Some number completely unknown to me. I wanted absolutely nothing new and unknown to me right now. No news is good news right.

I turned into my driveway and there was my brother’s car. That’s something. I put my key in the door but knocked on it anyway to get in as quickly as I could. And there was my brother opening the door for me, safe and sound. He was on the phone explaining to my Dad that the police must have made a mistake in the car owner details. I hugged him in relief. It turns out his phone was on silent and when the house phone had rung he had ignored it. What was he doing at the time? Playing some video game. One can only laugh.

My Guitar Goes Walking, Part 2 (Melbourne Cup day)

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Tuesday 1st November, Devonshire Street tunnel, 11:45 -13:52

The first Tuesday of November. Melbourne Cup day. With nothing else much going on I decided to go out busking again, still very much high on the success of my first busking session. Still not too daring I decided to go back to the Tunnel.

It was an ill-omened start when I spent twenty minutes trying to tune my guitar. This was unacceptable. The damned battery was low and causing the electronic tuner to give wild readings.

Rant aside. Recently I returned to the music store where I had purchased my guitar. The store guy said to try replacing the battery so I purchased one. But he sold me the one that he’d pulled from out the back, not even a new one from a packet. I knew this at the time so I can only damn my own timidity. Still, what the hell sort of service is that? Okay, rant over.

After finally getting close enough my guitar was tuned, sort of, and I was good to go. As I said it was a bad start and it didn’t get much better. My chord formations were messy, my strumming hand rigid. My confidence was down and I went quiet with uncertainty over the lyrics. Where was the connecting with my audience?

Granted it was Melbourne Cup day, when everyone is heading to the TAB with their money, so maybe not the best day to go busking. All in all it was a downer, especially compared to my debut but even a poor second performance is still a performance out there in the real world.

2 hours earnings: $2.00

Dark Heavens trilogy by Kylie Chan

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White Tiger, Red Phoenix, and Blue Dragon by Kylie Chan

The Dark Heavens trilogy offers an innovative take on modern fantasy, blending Chinese mythology and martial arts to produce something that is refreshingly different to the western myth-based fantasies prevalent on the book shelves.

The story is set in Hong Kong, meaning when I finally travel there I’ll get to visit all the places named in the books; always a fun game. Sprinkled throughout are other cultural tidbits about such things as food and yum cha. Sometimes I would read references like cheongsam and mangle the pronunciation in my head. CHEE-ONG-SAM? What’s that? And then the Aha! moment would arrive when I connected it with the Cantonese section of my brain. Of course none of this is prerequisite knowledge to enjoy the books. Rather they’re little Easter eggs for those in the know and slices of Chinese culture for everyone else. I in fact was learning plenty of things about my culture I didn’t even know. Next time I visit the Taoist temple I’ll hopefully be able to pick out some of the gods and bodhisattvas.

Okay, so the flavour is minty fresh and there’s plenty of choc chips throughout to spice things up but how about the writing itself,  the icecream in this horrible metaphor?  Happily the answer is smooth and creamy. Perhaps the greatest compliment I can give it is that it is easy to read. The dialogue is easy on the ear, the snappy exchanges between Emma and Leo very realistic. Even the sarcasm, always something of a risky proposition in written form, comes through clearly. Anyone who has tried and failed to convey sarcasm via email will know what I mean.

Kylie often introduces something new without immediate explanation, leaving the reader in the dark. Thankfully she doesn’t torture us too long, revealing the answers soon enough. Her style takes a little getting used to but I found the fast pace kept me happily turning pages. In fact there are few if any loose ends and all the major questions posed are nicely solved by Kylie. I for one was wondering how one can tie down a god.

In my own attempts to write fight scenes I tend to overchoreograph in excruciating detail every punch and counterpunch. Kylie’s execution is far better than mine, providing detail without bogging down the action. Martial arts evolves to incorporate energy manipulation; the ‘magic’ of the story. We’re talking chi, chakras, elements, yin and yang, things we in the west have heard of even if we don’t quite believe in them. Running up walls? Why not? I’ve heard  those Shaolin masters really do that stuff. I’m not sure how much license the author is taking but again she seems to have gotten the balance between the real and the fantastic just right.

I do have a small gripe with the book names. The titular characters are not that pivotal to each book, so why name the books after them? They do make a neat pattern and like Kylie Chan I’m not sure I could have passed up the opportunity to use those titles either. In contrast the remaining member of the four winds, “Dark Heavens” makes a perfect name for the trilogy. Though not the main character, Xuan Wu, god of martial arts, Mr Dark Heavens himself, is the hook on which this fantasy hangs.

Despite not being a series I’ve seen hyped about elsewhere I’m happy I picked up this fantasy. Fresh, witty and well executed (it’s from an Australian author too!), I’m looking forward to reading the sequel trilogy, Journey to Wudang.

Early rising

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My dragonboat team, CCA (Chinese Cultural Association), had its Christmas party last night. It was a nice affair at La Tratt, fine dining in the Fairfield RSL. Everyone at that point thinks Fairfield! Not what you might associate with nice but go in there and it really is as if you were no longer in the west.

As usual the Dirty Santa had winners and losers (some of us aren’t very good at buying gifts). The reason for this post, however, is the espresso I had at the end of the three course meal. It was almost 10pm, considerably after my 4pm coffee curfew. The result of this is that I am wide awake now typing this at 5am. I did get some sleep but I don’t think I’ll be getting back to sleep anytime soon. So I figured I may as well use this.

Coincidently I was recently thinking of the below article that my younger sister, whose birthday it is today, sent me a year ago.

http://www.stevenaitchison.co.uk/blog/the-5-benefits-of-being-an-early-riser/

I gave it a go back then and no longer keep to it but it is an inspiring way to stretch the hours of your day.

Yuta from Yokohama

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I was on an errand walking up Pitt St Mall yesterday when I saw an Asian with a guitar case on his shoulder, pulling an amplifier behind him on a trolley. What the hell, I’ve got five minutes. I introduced myself as a fellow busker. It turns out Yuta was from Yokohama and played jazz fingerstyle (no singing though). In fact he’d actually been busking earlier in the main spot at the Westfield entrance. Obviously he was not afraid of performing for the day crowd. I thought it might be a bit rude to ask how much he’d made and didn’t want to hold him up from setting up. Maybe I’ll see him play next time and get to use a bit more of my Japanese.

A Hole to Work In

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There are a couple of rules for writers that most people could guess at. One should write every day. Secondly, you should have a place to write that is free from distractions. Well these are not really rules but they are truly great pieces of advice, especially for fledgling writers such as myself. I’m talking about the second rule today but it is related to the first anyway. If you’re going write everyday then it helps if your writing place is easily accessible.

In his most excellent book On Writing, Stephen King prescribes a writing environment free from distractions. No phone, no copies of the latest novel you’re reading, no internet, no blogging and definitely no Facebook. In fact since I’m currently using good old pen and paper for a first draft I can probably do away with the whole computer. A prison cell in other words. If your cell has a window it had better look onto a brick wall or empty car park.

I must say that I agree with the above in theory; I just haven’t gotten around to installing a prison cell or buying an office for writing. Instead I usually write lying on the carpet of my lounge room or at the kitchen table when I’m in house. Other places I’ve written are in a secluded park (like a secret garden) under the train lines between Milsons Point and North Sydney, on the couches of various shopping centres, in libraries too (Steve actually says park benches and library carrels should be last resorts).

Recently I’ve been most productive when I take my notebook and pen to the Westfield shopping centre and choose a café I haven’t tried. I like to people-watch over a coffee and although there are lots of people and noise all around I find that once I start writing these are quite easy to tune out. I don’t bring the latest novel. I don’t have the internet to tempt me.  I order an espresso (which obviously doesn’t last very long) and get down to business. The Westfield is only a short walk from my home though rain still proves to be a deterrent for getting to my writing place.

Provided it’s not too busy the café staff will let you sit there for hours having only ordered one coffee. The only problem with this is that if I have the coffee late in the afternoon, say 4pm, I have trouble getting to sleep that night. But that’s a probably a good thing as it pushes me to do my writing earlier in the day. Steve gets his 2000 word quota written in the morning and then has the rest of the day to do other things which seems like a good goal.

The beauty of writing is that you can do it almost anywhere so really all it takes to write consistently is discipline (maybe I’ll write about this when I have some). But café writing combines some fun activities and while I haven’t found my Elephant House yet (none of the cafes in my area have the right vibe), cafes as a group have been where I’ve gotten some good writing sessions in.