ISSUE #5
EDDIE RELAX
Live easy,
Love often
photgraphy: WildRice Photography make up: dunkle authentic model: Claire Mathieu wearing Shevoke Sunglasses
SMACK. MY HEAD HITS THE GROUND. I ONLY RECOGNISE GLIMPSES OF VISION AS MY OWN. A BLUR OF COLOUR, THE BRIGHTNESS OF THE SUN OUTSIDE THE TENT. BLACKNESS. I’m on the ground looking up, a full circle of faces stare at me, eyes wide and untrusting. A few arms reach to help me up, closer to the staring faces and my vision starts to swim again. We go towards the blinding light outside the tent, with the heavy music still swelling around us. Blackness.
A new face takes up most of my vision. She is close, official, kneeling by my side so I guess I must be on the ground again. I don’t remember falling this time. I don’t remember being lead into the medical tent, or falling from the chair inside, being lowered to the ground or moved to a stretcher by arms I wouldn’t have recognised even if I were conscious. I do remember looking up into the uniformed, concerned faces above me, faces swimming below the tent roof as they peered over me, the faces belonging to the arms holding onto my own.
The uniformed faces are asking the questions, and I can feel my voice moving in my throat to answer them, but I’m sure my mouth isn’t doing it’s part properly. A young paramedic takes my arm and tries to insert a needle to attach a fluid bag. He is still training and it takes a few goes. I close my eyes again and wait. He finds the vein.
As I take in my surroundings I can feel a stinging on my face. My sunglasses must have cut my brow when I fell. The first uniformed face is still close by, she is holding my wrist and talking to another uniform beside me. I’m on a stretcher. It’s sticky and I’m drenched in sweat. Beside me I can see another girl on a stretcher, no uniforms by her side, but she appears to be sleeping. Her makeup is still perfect and the official face beside me says he doesn’t know how girls can do their eyeliner like that.
A quick glance around the tent shows several uniformed paramedics standing around me, talking softly and sending softly concerned glances my way.
This one is nice, she wants me to be okay. I close my eyes and focus on her voice as I will the room to stop spinning.
Have you taken anything? Have you been drinking today?
I guess the fluid felt good because whenever the faces stopped the drip my head began to swim again. I try again to piece together what has happened and where I am.
The kind face beside me has started joking again, and my friend is allowed to come and sit by my side. She looks pretty pale too, I guess I freaked her out a bit there. Sorry. I considered what she and I would rather be doing that morning, rather than spending quality time with a drip and a fluid bag, and where these uniformed faces would probably rather be too. I ask them, do you get to see any of the music?
I’ve not yet been deemed capable by the faces of standing or sitting up, but my mouth has discovered how to speak again, so I take advantage of that by taking to the face beside me. He’s an RN he tells me, from Brisbane. They don’t get to go see the acts, other than listening to the muted echoes that seep through from the main stage outside.
It’s the self inflicted ones that get to you, the people who end up in here from drinking too much or taking pills, he says. On the big three day festivals, you get a bit tired of that by the end.
Yeah I guess. I’m not into pills, never have been. Always said that I’d rather see the gig than end up inside the medic tent for the day… It’s not bad though, he tells me, a whole lot of good that plan did. which I think is said to be comforting rather than honest because I can’t imagine being that close to the festival but still have it out of reach. Must give you a pretty unique perspective on festivals as well, to only see the injuries.
IT MUST GIVE YOU A PRETTY UNIQUE PERSPECTIVE OF FESTIVALS...
TO ONLY SEE THE INJURIES.
Emotions tend to exacerbate themselves... ...I think to myself, feeling the smile creep across myface, spreading from a hyperactive ball of light settled deep in my stomache. I let the sunlight spread through my veins, coursing and flowing like ariver that will inspiree everything it touches. ...My point? It’s easy to be happy when you are happy. It’s harder to let that internal euphoric river flow when your head is made of quicksand and every positive thought that dares to enter is quickly swalloed with a muddy gulp with not even a ripple to show it was there to begin with. Her eyes fall to the floor, slipping from my gaze like water through open fingers. I’m fine, she says. No you’re not. You’re hurting. Worse, you aren’t hurting at all, you’re numb. It’s evident in your eyes, they used to sparkle with mischeif or a story waiting to bubble up through your throat and emerge through flapping, guesturing arms. Now they hang by your side. This is the time it is hardest to find that internal shread of hope. No ball of light waits to course through your body. This is depression. But keep trying, just remember when it was there, remmeber that feeling and strive to get it back. You can. Remember, it’s easy to be happy when you’re happy, so start there.
explore new cultures,
new horizons, new experiences
QUIT YOUR JOB AND
LEARN TO SURF Taste the salt on your lips, feel the heat of the sun on your legs and the gentle push of the wave as it takes your board. Paddle, lift up, arch your back, back leg, front leg, crouch…. and stand. You’re literally walking on water, riding the swell of the sea gently into shore, passing the bobbing heads of swimmers as they duck under the incoming wave. The first time you stand up on a surfboard is a pretty incredible experience. So, he says, you’ve quit your job and now you’re learning to surf. His skin is tanned like leather and his hair bleached from the sun. He’s been surfing everyday for the last twenty-something years. He helps me glide the foam long board through the baby surf. It’s not quite as glamorous as that I’m afraid. I did just quit my job and yes, in the enforced holidays of unemployment, a few friends and I decided it was un-Australian of us to not know how to surf. So here we were, hired rashies, hired boards.
It’s my first time on a board and I feel clumsy sliding on, falling off, spitting out a few mouthfuls of sea water, wiping the water from my eyes with already achey arms- but when you get it, the whole routine together, it feels like nothing else. If I don’t stop smiling I’ll end up with another mouth full of salt water. There has always been something complete about the ocean for me. I’ve heard others refer to it as well, a sense of unquenchable thirst when you are away from the sea too long, a longing that can only be filled when you see that immeasurable stretch of blue, taste the salt in the air and feel the change in the breeze. It’s only been one lesson and I’m by no means a surfer yet. I can wobble and limp my way to a crouch, only to fall right back into the arms of the white water below, but I think this could be the start of something.
LEARN TO LET GO ONCE IN A WHILE. WAKE, WORK, SLEEP, REPEAT. THROW CAUTION TO THE WIND, TAKE A CHANCE, TAKE A LEAP. BETTER TO HAVE LOVED & LOST, TRIED & FAILED, LIVED & LEARNED, THAN NOT AT ALL.
LOOSE CONTROL, & SEE WHERE YOU END UP... EVERY ONCE IN A WHILE.
photgraphy: WildRice Photography make up: dunkle authentic model: Jessica Adjei
DO YOU WANT TO SEE THE REAL EGYPT?
MEET BACK HERE TONIGHT, OUT THE FRONT OF THE SHOP AND I WILL SHOW YOU. I’d seen enough movies to know that wasn’t a good idea. I knew we were just two young women in a strange city, in a foreign country. We didnt know the culture, we didnt know where was safe or who to trust. All we had was our better judgment and common sense and right now I was ignoring both of them to follow a sense of trust I had found in a complete stranger. We left our hotel and walked the block to the tiny shop where we were to meet. Cars stirred the dust on the road as they sped by, leaving the city in a thick haze illuminated by the yellow street lights. Two motorbikes stood quietly waiting out the front of the shop where we were to meet our new friend. My sister’s fingers wrapped protectively over my arm, but we had come this far and there was something that said go further. Our new friend greeted us and introduced the other man with him. They gestured to the waiting bikes, one for each of us and we climbed on behind them and drove into the night, the night air cool on our faces.
We ride across town, dimly lit buildings reaching into the night sky, shrouds of dust cloaking alleyways and the road ahead, making it hard to keep our sense of direction. We duck below an over pass, the roads are quieter now as we begin to slow and the buildings are smaller. I am glad to see the bike with my sister is just ahead of us. Pulling into a dimly lit car park on the edge of the street, we can see many men sitting around small tables out the front of a bar or tea house. They look up from their hooka pipes but seem uninterested before long and resume their conversations. We don’t know where we are. I’m suddenly aware of the very little I know of the man and his friend who have taken us across town. I’m aware that this decision has also lead my sister into the same situation and I wait for what will come next.
I had no reason to believe these men were dangerous.
Two young Australian girls and two middle aged Egyptian men, overcoming fear of the unknkown to form They offered for us to sit at one of a bond of trust and good will. They the low tables outside the tea house took us safely back to the shop and returned with a hooka pipe and and we walked the small distance sweet tea. We drank and smoked back to our hotel. the flavoured tobacco, a common pass-time in the country and we We had no reason to know if spoke of politics, culture and they were dangerous, or if we customs. Our friend owned a were in trouble. It could have papyrus store, and told us of the ended badly, as it has for history of the paper and the art. We others,I don’t know what was talked with them well into the night. the difference in our situation. But there we saw a glimpse of the REAl Egypt.
They showed us kindness and upheld our trust, and in a world where we revel in the stories of the unjust and evil, this is one I believe should be told.
freestyle. It’s a great day to meet interesting people. photgraphy: WildRice Photography styling: Cara Lu make up: dunkle authentic model: Blade and Bow
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