Stuck in a Rip

A few years ago my brother-in-laws father was swimming at Whale Beach when he got caught in a bad rip. Being from Ireland he was not an experienced swimmer and quickly panicked and was struggling in the surf.
My brother-in-law, who is a strong swimmer, quickly tried to rescue his father. Strangely, his father strongly rejected his attempts at rescue, as though he was more interested in maintaining his pride, than being saved.

The Beast

In summer my friend Hamish and I would spend a lot of time "boogie" or body boarding. As our confidence and abilities grew we began the rather unusual aim of trying to catch the largest waves of the day or "taming the beast." This would consist of paddling out to the back of the surf and waiting until the largest wave we could find would arrive and then catching it.

Boulder Rolling

When I was a young teenager I used to holiday at a friends house in Jindabyne. Often this was with my good friend Hamish. Hamish and I, when we weren't skiing, would find things to do like smash trees to bits with large boulders. We also took to rolling large boulders down hills. One day, we rolled a large boulder down a hill, just outside the main road. The boulder proceeded to roll straight into the road and into the oncoming path of the traffic. Fortunately, it continued to roll straight across the road and down the hill on the other side. The next boulder we attempted to roll, ended up rolling back onto Hamish's foot and was only removed by a great deal of adrenalin and pain charged effort on our part.

At nightime it was Hamish and my responsibility to start the fire and cook all the steaks. We would sit outside in the freezing cold and look at the stars and feel the warmth on our faces.

Saharan Flood

When H and I went to Morocco after leaving Uni we journeyed west from Marrakesh into the Sahara desert. As was typical for us, but not typical for the Sahara Desert, it started to rain quite heavily. It was allegedly the first time it had rained in 50 years. Little kids were coming out of their houses and looking at the sky and wandering what this strange liquid was landing on their faces. Needless to say, we got stranded by a series of flash floods the miraculously appeared and brought to an end most of the roadwork grid of Western Morocco. I remember placing a rock next to the river to determine whether it was rising or falling - a trick which many with whom we traveled deemed the an act of genius.

Cremated Foot

When H and I were in Bali a few years ago, we happened to cross the path of a rather large Cremation taking place outside the hilltown of Ubud. Like most other Cremations, there was alot of waiting around interspersed with quite frenetic activity. What was memorable about this cremation however is that we found ourselves quite close to the funeral pyre and sticking out of it was this enormous foot. It looked like anyone else's foot except that it had an enormous gas burner aimed at it. As the fire progressed the foot began to turn inwards.

Grandad's Final List

My Grandad died when he was 94. He had a stroke while he was cutting some branches of a tree in his backyard.

In the pocket of his pants my Auntie found a list. The list were items he wanted to research next time he went to the local library. I can only remember one of the items of the list now - Cirque de Soleil. There were about 6 other items on the list I believe.

Hotel My Home

When I traveled In Europe, I organized a rendezvous with my friend John at a particular time in mid-January at a particular hotel in Amsterdam. The hotel was a family inn in a respectable part of central Amsterdam. When I got there, he had left a note stating that he had moved and had left a forwarding address. I followed the address and as I walked along a canal the environment proceeded to become seedier and seedier until it culminated into a hyper-illuminated red-light district street. Here was his new choice of hotel - the Hotel "My Home." When I knocked on its entrance, a window above me opened in an explosion of smoke and a crazy looking American girl, barely visible through the smoke and her dreadlocks, stuck her head out stating "You must be Joel!" - things went downhill from that moment.