My next assignment was back up in Auckland; my elder brother, Conor, and his fiancé, Kate, were heading down to Kuratau for a much needed break over new year’s and I had been drafted in to cat/house-sit for a week. The price for putting two cats into a cattery in Auckland is about $30 a day, so by offering my services I would be saving them money, as well as keeping Harry and Winston happy at home. On top of this I had some work to do around the house. Nothing big, just mowing lawns, digging out a veggie patch, and going to war with the resurgent Wandering Jew (we still hadn’t come up for a final solution for that last one). I couldn’t wait to get up there; Conor and Kate have been so good to me over the years and I considered it an honour to be able to help them out (though I’d probably have to catsit for a year in order to achieve some sort of parity with them). But before I could do that, I’d have to actually get to Auckland. My trusty thumb would be my travel tool again.
The Rolls-Royce of hitchhiker thumbs. I wish mine was this bendy.
The journey started off normal enough, with me sleeping in. I woke up late to a gloriously sunny day, showered and packed as quickly as I could, but missed the 1035am bus that would take me to the highway. With Mum at work, there was nothing to do but wait an hour for the next one. It finally arrived and I got on. I love catching the bus in Paraparaumu; both my Mum and uncle drive buses, and I know a lot of the other drivers, which means there’s usually a pretty good chance that I’ll get a free ride. Not this time though; I didn’t know the driver so I had to use some of my meagre savings to buy a ticket. We pulled into the station and I disembarked and walked about 500 metres to a spot with a straight and a shoulder. That’s when the madness began, slowly at first, building to a crescendo as I neared Auckland.
I sat on the side of the highway, ‘Auckland’ sign in hand, and waited, and waited. It got to about 1pm and I was still sat there. Suddenly a disheveled car pulled up with a disheveled looking South African bloke inside. I asked where he was heading and he replied ‘Waikanae, bru’. My heart sank as Waikanae was only about 6km up the road. I thanked him for stopping but said that I didn’t think it was worth the effort. He said that he’d hitched from around there before and it was much easier from Waikanae since the cars had to slow down to 50kph, rather than flying by at 100kph, like they were doing where I was sitting. Flawless logic. I jumped in and we chatted for the short journey. Mark had come to New Zealand 10 years earlier and loved the peacefulness of our little islands. Then he brought up the 1995 Rugby World Cup.
For those of you who are not rugby fans, firstly, what the fuck? Secondly, some background here; the 95 World Cup was held in South Africa, a year after the apartheid era came to an end. The Springboks had only been re-admitted to international rugby in 1992 and this was the first world cup that they were competing in. There was a feeling of hope in the air; the tournament was seen as a chance to unify the country and begin the long road towards reconciliation. Goodwill poured in from around the globe, in the hopes that South Africa could finally put the demons of yesteryear to bed and forge a new path. It didn’t pour in from me though; I was 11 years old and wanted desperately for the All Blacks to crush those sons-o-bitches. We cruised through the group stage, putting the sword to Ireland, Wales, and Japan (who we thumped by a world record 145-17!), before seeing off Scotland and England in the knockout phase. South Africa were less emphatic but still managed to beat Australia, Romania, and Canada in the groups, before vanquishing Western Samoa and France to make the final. It was played at Ellis Park, Johannesburg, in front of a record crowd of 63,000. Nelson Mandela attended and donned the iconic Springbok jersey – once a hated symbol of apartheid – in public for the first time. This brought a tremendous roar from the (mostly affluent, white, probably racist) crowd and seemed to be the catalyst the Springbok team needed to beat a seemingly unstoppable All Blacks side. After 80 minutes of hard fought rugby, the score was 9-9. By the end of the first half of extra time, the teams still couldn’t be separated and went into the final half tied at 12-12. Then, in a moment out of some cheesy sports movie (I’m looking at you, Invictus), Joel Dtransky, the Springbok first five eight, snapped a drop-goal to seal victory and send the crowd into raptures. The underdogs had defied all odds and through sheer doggedness and determination, pulled off a victory that would go down in history.
At least, that’s the official version of events. In New Zealand, it has long been speculated that our team were deliberately poisoned in the run up to the final. Many of the All Blacks were indeed ill before the game, and after the final whistle, the New Zealand coach, Laurie Mains, alleged that a mysterious waitress known as ‘Suzie’ had deliberately poisoned the All Blacks’ water. Colin Mead, All Black legend and manager at the time, blamed dodgy milk. While it is true that about half the team were sick before the final, it seems pretty far fetched to claim that sabotage had occurred. It just feels like sour grapes. Mark was having none of that though; he was absolutely convinced that sabotage had taken place, sighting the desperate need for something the South African public could rally around as the motive for such brazen skullduggery. He stressed just how divided the country was at the time and was so emphatic and convincing in his argument that I have since decided that, yes, our beloved All Blacks were in fact poisoned before the world cup final. But then again, I do love a good conspiracy theory, and this is one of my favourites, right up there with reptilian overlords run the world and Vincent Van Gogh was Jack the fuckin Ripper!
Any work of non-fiction that states ‘THIS IS FOR REAL!’ on the front cover gets my vote
So I was 6km up the road but my South African co-conspiracy-theorist was right; after flashing my biggest smile for five minutes I was picked up. A ute packed with old TV’s, refrigerators, and all sorts of shit, pulled up. The driver, Hemi, said he was going to Bulls, about an hour up the road. I threw my stuff in the back with his crap and jumped in. Hemi was about 50 years old, shaggy, very friendly, and morbidly obese (his belly was pressed against the lower part of the steering wheel and he occasionally used it to drive). He also had an interesting smell about him. It was a bit like parmesan cheese mixed with sweat, smoke, fart, and corn chips. I cracked a window. We started chatting and I asked Hemi where he was coming from. His answer confused me; he said he’d been in Wellington visiting his sister and a ‘nut doctor’. I wasn’t sure if he was talking about his bollocks or brain, so I asked. He was talking about his brain. My sphincter tightened. He seemed normal enough but what was with all the junk in the back? And the smell? Luckily he just turned out to be a weird but kind fella. He dropped me off on a good stretch of road outside Bulls.
While waiting for my next ride, something crazy happened; I was sitting on my pack, sign in hand and thumb out, when I heard the low, guttural sound of a truck horn. I looked up and saw Steve the truckie driving in the direction I’d just come from! You may not remember, but Steve had given me a ride from Turangi to Paraparaumu not more than 10 days previously, so it was a bit of a bloody coincidence to meet up on a lonely stretch of road outside of Bulls! He jumped out of his truck and came over to say hello. He couldn’t stay long as he had a (gorgeous) girl in his truck. I wished him well as he got back into his truck and headed off, leaving me shaking my head in disbelief. New Zealand, eh?
Fifteen minutes later, a young couple picked me up. They were heading to Hamilton, about 230km up the road. Now I felt like I was getting somewhere! Matt and Christy were friendly but seemed a little quiet to begin with. I was doing most of the talking until we got near Taupo, when all of a sudden the Christy turned around and asked me, “Do you like to get high?”. Why yes, yes I do! We stopped on Lake Taupo and they pulled out an impressive sized water bong. We each had a few hits and Matt took to the road again. I was enjoying this new dimension to my travels; stoned, watching a beautiful sunset, and yarning about weird shit that the sober mind simply cannot contemplate. Now that the shackles were off, they were much chattier. They also didn’t bother to pull over to re-bong. Their little car became a hotbox of joy in no time. Luckily, it was the least suspicious automobile ever designed. I’m not a big on cars, so can’t remember the make or model, but it was the quintessential nana-mobile. It had circular window panes in the back and looked like a car version of Thomas the Tank Engine. The logic behind owning this car was genius though; they went on a lot of road trips, and smoked a lot of weed while doing so, but they had not once been pulled over in their glorified mobility scooter.
Actually, I think this was the car they were driving
With Hamilton quickly approaching, they gave me a couple more bong hits for luck and dropped me off at the north end of town. Dusk was fast approaching and it was beginning to dawn on me that I might not actually make it to Auckland that night. Also, I was fucking high and didn’t know the area at all. I sat on my pack, stuck my thumb out, and waited. Then my weirdest ride to date appeared. A woman in a tiny car filled with kids pulled up. In a thick Australian accent she said that she was going about 45 minutes up the road and asked if I wanted a lift. Obviously I was keen, but I didn’t think I’d be able to fit myself and my pack into her tiny car. She made her eldest son get in the back with her three other kids and I climbed into the front seat with my pack on my lap. Now, I was obviously still stoned but I swear the conversation was stunted and uneasy from the beginning. The kids in the back said nothing and the Mum seemed to talk more to herself than to me. I gathered that she was born in New Zealand but emigrated to Australia as a teenager. She’d brought her kids to New Zealand for a holiday and to show them where she’d grown up. The car grew silent when I ran out of things to talk about. After what seemed like an age, the Mum spoke again. I immediately wished that she hadn’t, for the next thing to come out of her mouth was this; ‘Yeah, I’ve always wondered what the taste of human flesh was like.’ Fucking hell! What followed seemed like an eternal silence until finally the youngest son laughed a little and chastised his Mum for being a such freak.
It turned out that 45 minutes up the road was more like 15, so they dropped me at a turnoff in the middle of nowhere, not that I was complaining. By now it was pitch black and I was still roughly 150km from my brothers place. I found a spot under a lamppost, and amazingly, after about 10 minutes, a couple pulled over and wound down their window. There was a brief audition for the part of passenger while they weighed up if I was a madman or not. They decided I wasn’t and gave me a lift. My savours were a couple in their 40’s; a kiwi guy and his Filipino wife. They said that they’d been talking about picking up hitchhikers and then saw me on the side of the road. I said that it was providence. He asked why I used that word and I told him that I didn’t know (I never use it, I don’t believe in fate). He took that as a sign from god. What came next was a 150km long recruitment drive/ear fucking. I was grilled on my faith, and when it was found to be lacking, given my very own sermon. Still feeling a little stoned, and not wanting to be kicked out of his car on the last leg of my journey, but also not wanting to appear too meek in my views (although that would place me in line to inherit the earth), I trod a thin line between honesty and contempt for belief in sky-gods. I did mention dinosaurs and eyeball eating worms at one point. I said I found it weird that there was no mention of dinosaurs in the bible and cruel that a loving god would create an animal that eats peoples eyeballs. He just replied with that tired old adage; ‘The lord works in mysterious ways’. The lord sure fucking does! The irony with this statement is that it’s used by Christians (and, I’m assuming, other monotheists) as a get-out-of-logic-free-card whenever they’re presented with a point or fact that contradicts their fairytales, but they are quick to dismiss scientific findings that go against their beliefs because science hasn’t answered all the questions in the universe. That’s the point my savour was making as we neared Auckland. I was tempted to tell him that the science works in mysterious ways, but held my tongue.
I was very grateful for the lift though, especially as they dropped me right outside my brothers house. I couldn’t believe it; I’d made plans for Conor to come and pick me up from somewhere in/near Auckland, but being good Christians, they wanted to make sure that I got to my bro’s safely. Thank god! Wait, what?
[I honestly didn’t plan for this entire story to be about an 600km journey, but after looking through my notes and revisiting that day, I realised it was a yarn worth telling. Better than talking about looking after cats. Unless you’re into that. In which case, look out for my next story!]
No Fixed Abode 