ENTERTAINMENT
MANDY NOLAN’S
SOAPBOX
take another road to see if the lights behind fall away.
W W W. E C H O. N E T. A U /S OA P - B OX
WHEN THE UNIVERSE CALLS Sometimes it’s hard to be kind. Often it’s inconvenient. It can cause discomfort. And it can disturb your daily trajectory. The other day I wasn’t feeling kind. I was busy. I was in Mandy mode and I wasn’t ready to listen to someone’s story. Especially someone I didn’t remember. It was around 1pm the Thursday before Splendour when I got a call from a girl who told me she had lost her phone and couldn’t find her friends so could she stay. I assumed she was another disorganised festival-goer looking for a free bed. I didn’t have a clue who she was so I said, ‘My husband is at work. I would have to ask him because I leave for Brisbane at 8am tomorrow. Ring me back in a few hours.’ It was a brush-off. She never rang back. I felt relieved the strangerin-the-spare-room problem had disappeared. I was looking forward to a quiet night with my husband and daughter. I poured myself a glass of wine, relieved the universe had given up knocking at my door. At 6pm the phone rang. It was her. Shit. She told me she was at the police station on their phone. There was
S A T U R D A Y
2 9 T H
something in her voice that made me say Yes. I gave her my address and hung up. She rang back and asked ‘Can you pay for my taxi or pick me up?’ She had also lost her wallet. Something in me shifted. I heard the fear in her voice and realised that she’d asked me for help. When someone does this how can you say No? So I drove to Byron to collect the strange girl with no phone, no wallet and no ID. When I see her I vaguely remember her but not really. Our meeting was more of a passing acquaintance six years ago. But here she is round-eyed looking at me like I am her saviour. Her feet are cut and bleeding. She says, ‘A man has been following me. Can you please check he’s not out here?’ I realise in an instant she’s having a full-blown paranoid delusion, so I take her home. She has a small backpack, but nothing else. I establish that she’s bipolar, that she’s suffering from extreme anxiety. I ask her if she wants to go to hospital to get medication; she says No. She’s convinced a man is after her. She is so scared she is shaking. She keeps asking me if someone is behind us, to
J U L Y ,
F R O M
1 P M
I start to feel a bit frightened. I don’t know this girl. She could have a knife in her bag to protect herself but she could suddenly decide I’m a threat. I’m taking her to my house with my 8-year-old. I keep talking to her. She doesn’t seem to know where she lives. How long she’s been on the road. Where she stayed last night. She hasn’t eaten. She’s very confused. She tells me the name of a counsellor she had when she used to live here who she wants to speak to, so when I get home I feed her and put her to bed and put out a call on Facebook for her therapist, hoping txzhey’ll respond. I’m worried my husband will have the shits that I’ve bought a psychotic stranger home. But he says ‘You’ve done the right thing. You couldn’t have left her.’ I love his compassion. Facebook performs a small miracle; lots of people I know know the counsellor in question. I get her phone number and leave a message. The scared girl is asleep downstairs. But then she wakes screaming, ‘Mandy. Quick take me to hospital now!’ I go to get her backpack but she screams, ‘No time, in the car now!’ In her mind ‘he’ is coming. So we drive. It’s a 15-minute drive to Byron hospital. I’m frightened she’s going to jump out of the car. I hold her little hand and talk gently to her. I have never seen someone full of so much fear; when I allow myself to feel it I want to
COCO REPUBLIC FSTVL 3 HAPPENING AT THE BYRON BAY BREWERY SATURDAY
2 STAGES OF + AL FRESCO + RAVE CAVE
Party After FR
STAMP COCO WITH EE ENTRY
AL ROYALE LIPPO MR HA! YES HOTT ROB BEN POPP SAMMOND ANTON LEAF PALANGI PHIL NICK CUNNINGHAM (LIVE) + SPECIAL GUESTS
PRE-SALE TICKETS ARE LIMITED AT $10+BF $15 ON THE DOOR
30 July 26, 2017 The Byron Shire Echo
So I try the Jungian don’t tell someone they are on the moon, go to the moon to talk to them approach. ‘No-one will get you when I am here. Look at me, I am six foot tall, I am very powerful. I annihilate men.’ Then I lied. I said, ‘I am a black belt’. This relaxed her a little. We made it to hospital but she wouldn’t let me park my car. She felt such urgency to get inside to safety I had to leave it at the front door. We go through the admitting process. I fill in her form but I only know what she has told me and it’s not much. I tell the nurses she needs to be somewhere secure. Now. I’m frightened she’s going to run. Not because she doesn’t want help, but because she thinks the man is coming.
They take us to the room with soft corners. It has a big foam bed and a foam chair. It makes her suspicious. I keep asking for her to be sedated, but we have to wait for a doctor. I have a small stash of Valium at home, I should have done it myself. She’s elevating. The counsellor calls and I put her on the phone to the girl. The girl is pacing and agitated. She is in the hallway. She doesn’t want to sit in the padded room. The counsellor talks her down. I hear the girl repeat, ‘so it’s just a delusion of the mind?’
COCO REPUBLIC NO HASSLE AT MULLUM MUSIC FESTIVAL! If you’re already in
the Coco Family you know it’s Byron Bay’s biggest and best dance party. With pumping house music in the Rave Cave and funky house and disco on the Al Fresco stage all night long, this is a party not to be missed. D DJ'S LIVE MUSIC AN
cry, too. It’s so painful to be near her anguish. I tell her there is no man. She doesn’t believe me. She wants to turn back. ‘He’ll be at the hospital,’ she says. ‘It’s a trap. He’ll come in as a patient.’
If you are yet to experience it and keep hearing how great it is over and over again, this Saturday is your time! Kicking off the music will be local folk artist Nick Cunningham from 1pm. Nick’s voice and beautifully written songs tell stories of his past and dreams to come. After Nick the tropical dance vibes begin on the Al Fresco stage followed by dirty dance beats in the rave cave from 8pm. The full DJ lineup features Al Royale, Lippo, Mr Ha! Yes, Hott Rob, Ben Popp, Sammond, Anton Leaf, Palangi Phil plus special guests. Coco Republic Fstvl 3 kicks off at 1pm on Saturday at the Byron Bay Brewery. Presale tickets are $10 or it’s $15 on the door.
Ten years ago the first Mullum Music Festival pioneered a very different type of music event. No gates. No big headlines. No VIP areas. Basically a ‘no hassle’ festival. A festival where artists and performers mingled, where shows are held in halls, clubs and pubs rather than tents, and instead of driving hours to park in a field and trudge onto site, patrons became enmeshed in the spirit of a vibrant village. It worked. Mullum Music Festival is about the experience. Everyone knows that. It’s all about the people. All of the people. Everyday people! This year the Festival tips its hat to the lineup ten years on by including many of the artists who were on the first bill. It’s a festival homecoming with patrons Suzannah Espie, Mama Kin and Harry James Angus all returning to perform along with Tinpan Orange, JoJo Smith, Liz Stringer, Hussy Hicks, Oka and a swag of acts everyone has grown to love.
Then this extraordinary thing happens. She smiles. It’s just a flicker across her face, but I can feel the relief. She hands me the phone back and she literally passes out in her chair. Her head falls forward and she is asleep. Just as her head drops something peculiar happens. Three police wheel in the most terrifying man I have ever seen. He is heavily tattooed. He is bleeding from the head. He is writhing in the bed. He is clearly in custody. This would have been the ‘man’ my girl thought was going to fake coming into hospital as a patient to get her. She would have lost it completely. It was only a matter of seconds between her falling asleep and his arrival. A small, very ordinary but incredibly important miracle has just occurred. I look at this fragile woman asleep beside me, knowing that she’s finally safe. I speak to the doctor who has come to schedule my unknown friend and I go home. It’s after 11 now. Not quite the evening I had planned. Someone on Facebook said I was an angel. It’s a lovely thing to say, but I’m not. I’m just like you. I’m selfish. I’m full of justifications about why I can’t get involved, but sometimes when the universe calls, you have to answer Yes. (Thanks to the Facebook detectives, I located her flatmate and her mother. She had left Adelaide unexpectedly on Wednesday. The girl is safe and recovering.)
In the decade since the festival’s inception Mullum has developed a reputation for booking new acts. Many of these acts have gone on to play bigger stages all over the world. Such as NZ artist Marlon Williams, who has been selling out shows throughout the US, UK and Europe and returns for this year’s program with his beloved Yarra Benders. With big headlines such as Jon Cleary, the funkiest of the funkiest (I mean he’s from Funky Town – New Orleans), bringing his Absolute Gentlemen, a four-piece riot of gospel harmonies and foundation-rocking grooves. Perhaps nothing typifies the unconventional joy of the program more than All Our Exes Live in Texas. A festival favourite, these four songwriters with four unique voices return to deliver their four-part indie slice of folk heaven. Canadian singer/songwriter Frazey Ford brings her smooth, opulent and electric voice to our 10th Mullum Music Festival; Mama Kin Spender feeds the soul when she delivers heart-stopping ballads and percussive beats, this time around in collaboration with Melbourne musician
Byron Shire Echo archives: www.echo.net.au/byron-echo