Norseman

I’m on a Qantas flight from Darwin to Perth, sitting comfortably in the aisle seat. The middle seat is vacant and there is a copy of Bill Bryson’s latest travel book about Australia sitting there. The owner is an English girl about twenty-eight or thirty, a lawyer she tells me. She’s on holidays and meeting her brother, who is backpacking around Australia. She wants to know what I’m doing in Perth.

“I have no idea,” I tell her. “I’m going to hole up in a motel for a day or two then catch up with a friend, Tim. I know him from Sydney but he lives in Perth now.”

“Oh, you free spirit,” she exclaims, which is not what I expected and I’m not sure if it’s sarcasm or not. We chat for a little while longer. She has come from New York but lives in London. I tell her I just spent four months on Elcho Island (Galiwinku), an Aboriginal community about six hundred kilometres east of Darwin in the Arafura Sea. She doesn’t seem very impressed. I borrow the Bill book to read during the rest of the flight and that’s the end of the conversation until she says, as we’re getting off,

“You should go to Kings Park. They’re having this big flower show on the weekend.” And I never see her again.

Waiting for my bags to come out of the carousel drives me crazy. I pick my two small backpacks off the conveyor belt and coins go everywhere, the small zips have come open. Oh! Screw it. Too embarrassing to be crawling around on the floor of the , besides I’m cashed up, for me anyway. Working on Elcho, nothing to spend money on, no gambling, no drinking and no drugs—just cigarettes. I’ve no idea where to stay so I go over to this noticeboard on the wall of the . It has all these accommodation listings. I choose a motel in East Perth for sixty dollars a night and jump in a cab. It’s a Maori guy at the wheel and we crap on about the All Blacks and he curses the TV stations because all they show is the AFL.

“I understand your pain, brother,” I say. “I’m a rugby league fiend and I hear they show the matches at midnight or later unless you have Foxtel.”

He drops me at the motel and says, “Kia ora, brother.”

I’m going to take a couple of days to look around Perth, have a few bets and take in the sights, get on the train to Fremantle and then it will be Tim time. He’s a big bloke and a big drinker. The last text I had from him he said he was living with a local girl, Tracy. Maybe she has a friend?

In the morning I’m pointed in the direction of Murray Street by the beautiful young receptionist. I head off on foot. Whenever I go to a new place I like to walk everywhere. I just think it helps you get a better handle on the size and layout of the city or town. I make it to Murray Street via a nice park and Wellington Street but I keep looking for a recognisable CBD. I mean like Melbourne or Sydney, but there isn’t any. Hay Street isn’t much different to Murray Street, but St Georges Terrace shows me a bigger, brighter, more business-like Perth.

I wander back to Murray Street and find a not too busy café opposite the Commonwealth Bank, in the mall. I call Tim but get voicemail. I let him know where I’m staying. My coffee arrives and the waiter looks like he must have had a tough night or a bad morning. Next I go to an internet café, email some friends and check on the employment site, Seek. I notice a job for a “retail assistant” in a place called Norseman. What takes my interest is that Norseman is described as remote. I have a plan to go and live and work in Asia, probably Bangkok or Saigon, but I know I’ll need big savings. Norseman could be like Elcho, nothing to spend my money on but also a unique take on WA. I call the number and I get a receptionist who puts me through to this English guy and an interview is arranged for 12 o’clock at an office in Hay Street.

It’s a Monday in October 2003 and starting to get pretty hot. The air is dry, almost arid. The football finals are over. Tim calls me as I’m walking back to the motel.

“Maaate, how are you?” he asks loudly. “Welcome to WA, the state of drinking.” I fill him in on where I’m staying and he says, “I have an RDO. I’ll pick you up.”

“I have an interview at midday. How about 2 p.m.”

“Alright, listen mate, check out of the motel. Come and stay in Cottesloe, at my place. Hey, guess what. Stuart is over here. He’s working in a hotel in Freo.”

“That’s great. I’ll see you at two. Let me think about the other thing. Gotta go. See ya.” I don’t want to be tied into anything. If I stay at his place I have to obey the rules of friendship. I can’t just take off when I like. If I’m over something or had enough to drink I can’t just take off for home. Stuart’s a good bloke, so I’ll be glad to see him. All three of us knocked around Bondi together.

The interview is more like booking a ticket in a travel agency than applying for a job. The Englishman tells me about Norseman. It was a boom mining town that pretty much went bust, although I did a Google search on it and the mine still operates.

“You can buy a house there now for $10,000. We’ll refund all travelling costs if you stay more than three months. You catch a train from East Perth to Kalgoorlie and then take a bus to Norseman. The train I believe is seven to eight hours and another three or four on the bus.”

“You’re telling me I have the job.”

“If you want it, yes. I can see you’ve moved around a lot from your CV and you have to do a bit of everything out there. They have a motel but the main employment is in the roadhouse. Road trains and travellers coming through twenty-four hours a day.” I ask for twenty-four hours to think about it and he agrees. Sounds like they’re desperate for workers but that doesn’t put me off. It’s in the middle of bloody nowhere anyway. I have a change of clothes in my backpack and I call Tim and let him know I’m taking the train to Fremantle and he agrees and tells me he’ll contact Stuart and we agree to meet at the Bar Orient on High Street.

The train out to Fremantle is a pretty good service. Around Cottesloe, some three or four stops from Fremantle, you start getting glimpses of the ocean and then the white sandy beaches. I like it a lot and wonder about Norseman. An old gold mining town gone to seed. Or is it? I stroll around Fremantle and it reminds me of Bondi in size and the village feel it has to it. It’s a modern place with almost the feel of a country town. I eat at McDonald’s near the beach on an outside table. At a few minutes to 2 p.m. I walk around past the old fort on the beach and across the railway tracks to High Street and into the Bar Orient.

Much handshaking and backslapping takes place and we laugh and talk of Bondi. Good times. Tim says,

“Mate, I love it over here, the beaches, the weather and the rent is cheaper. Me and Tracy are talking about buying a place. I have money left over at the end of the week, something I never had in Sydney.”

I think that might have more to do with the unseen Tracy but I don’t say it. Then Stuart starts up the WA band and says,

“Nick, I’ve been here about six months, started out just doing some casual painting when they were renovating and they offered me the night manager’s job. I love it over here.”

“Get off those night shifts, Stuart,” I say, “they’ll kill you. Trust me, I know.” Then I tell them, “I’ve been offered a job in Norseman. Know anything about it?” Blank stares.

Stuart says, “If I know you, I bet it’s in the middle of nowhere.”

“If you call 950 kilometres east of Perth nowhere then you’re spot on.”

Tim has a go, “Jesus, mate. You’re surrounded by paradise and you’re going out there. The gold rush is over, mate. Even Alan Bond knows that.”

Much laughter and a few more beers and I tell them I’m shipping out tomorrow and thank Tim for the offer of somewhere to stay but I’m closer to East Perth station than he is and I walk to Fremantle railway station while calling the English bloke on my cell phone and telling him I’ll be on the train and bus tomorrow. He says to me,

“Oh, the bus is only just over two hours. I’m told they show a movie.” I buy my ticket to Norseman at Fremantle station and the man tells me they’re updating “The Prospector” (the name of the train) in June 2004 and it will be much better with movies and music like plane flights, which doesn’t do me any good. I have an early night back at the motel. I’ll be seeing those Bondi boys again when I pass back through on my way to south-east Asia.

In the morning at the station I almost don’t go but I think of Bangkok and Saigon and parts unknown and I also think about Norseman, population hovering around 1000. I think of it back when the mine was booming, and the mine still operates so someone is making money. I’ve never worked in a roadhouse before either and I step on the train and find a comfortable window seat. I try and sleep but can’t so I listen to this old walkman I have and try and find interesting radio stations (an old habit of mine) but the reception isn’t too good. I press the call button above me just to find out what happens and this lovely girl in a nice uniform asks me what I’d like and I stare at her blankly and she hands me a menu. It ain’t Qantas first-class but I order a sausage roll and a can of Coke. The train stops after about three hours to pick up some passengers and for a break and I sprint for the door with the other smokers and suck down as many of those babies as possible in fifteen minutes and then it’s back on for the long haul into Kal.

When we arrive it’s nearly dark and I call ahead to the roadhouse and speak to the manager. He knows who I am, which settles me down a bit and says he’ll meet the bus. Cool. I wait fifteen minutes and the bus to Norseman pulls in and it is dark now.

The movie is Rio Bravo starring John Wayne, Dean Martin, Ricky Nelson and the beautiful Angie Dickinson. I love this film and the lights are off and there are only three other passengers. It’s a brilliant finish to my long and sometimes painful journey. The pain being the boredom. I step off the bus in Norseman, population now 800 (that’s what the sign said), and take a good look around.

Service station with many, many pumps. A sign says “trucks only” for a number of the pumps and no one comes up to me and shakes my hand. I sit on a log fence for a few minutes. Nothing. I was the only one who got off. The bus continued to Esperance. I walk into the service station. They have a hot buffet going with a bain-marie. I’m pretty hungry. There are lots and lots of aisles filled with Twisties and chips and chocolates; souvenir tea towels and beef jerky and a coin-operated internet machine. I take a seat in the little diner eating area waiting for someone to appear so I can order some food. No one does. I walk up to the cash register at the front and there’s an office close by and I knock on the door. This big barrel-chested man in Yakka pants and an orange fluoro vest (the kind road workers wear) says,

“What’s up, mate? Can I help you?”

“I’m Nick Garides.”

“And that means something because?”

“I have a job here. I’m looking for Mike Rogers.”

He stares at me for a few seconds, then says, “Right, sorry, so many people come and go from this joint. I spoke to you on the phone.”

“Yeah. Two hours ago,” I say and he tells me that I start tomorrow on the cash register at the front where people pay for fuel and souvenirs.

“7 a.m. My daughter, Missy, will be training you. We’re gonna put you up in the motel for a couple of nights until someone moves out of one of the staff houses.” He gives me a key and tells me I can eat what I want from the buffet. Just tell them I work here now. I introduce myself at the buffet and eat up big on sweet-and-sour chicken and rice. Afterwards I walk off in the direction of the motel and find my room and yeah, like any other highway motel room. I shower and crash into sleep.

In the morning I walk across to the roadhouse and even at this early part of the day I’m getting attacked by flies, sticky black flies that remind me of Yulara in the NT where I worked for a short period of time, except these flies are bigger and more obnoxious. The girl at the cash register is beautiful and around twenty-five. I introduce myself and we shake hands and she says, “I’m Missy,” and she starts going through everything and there are about a million keys on the cash register and she says, “I can’t really show you until we get some customers. Don’t worry, it’ll get busy. We get to choose what CDs we can play, just not too loud. Have a look and choose something.” I go for Powderfinger, Odyssey Number Five. After a while I start to sing along, it’s a bad habit of mine and I have a very bad singing voice, and Missy says, “You have a great voice,” while smiling broadly.

I take it and say, “What do you do for entertainment around here?”

“There are dances at the RSL and the pub and other stuff.”

The roadhouse gets busy and Missy gets on well with all the truckies and I’m just trying to do my work and not screw up and the day goes quickly.

She starts walking back to the motel with me and I ask, “Where do you live?”

“With Dad in a house on Roberts Street.”

“Have you always lived here?”

“Yes.”

“Never wanted to go to Perth or Kalgoorlie?”

“I’m not … I’ve been of course but I’ve always lived here.”

“I don’t get it. Why are you here?”

“You’re here.”

“That’s a frustrating answer.”

“Want to make me a drink or coffee in your room?”

“Can we take a walk down the main drag first? Is that what Norseman locals say, the main drag?”

“No, we say we don’t give the time of day to facetious bastards.”

“I’m sorry. I have this very dry, not very nice sense of humour.”

“Apology accepted. Come on, follow me.”

We cross the motel carpark and go right back almost to the roadhouse and then turn onto Roberts Street (the main drag). There is no nature strip, the side of the road is dirt and there are trees lining the road. The flies don’t seem too bad now. It’s a big wide street and rather attractive in a kind of deserted country town way.

“That’s my house,” she says, pointing to a respectable looking, white weatherboard home. There are brick homes too, well built and sturdy, but there’s still this deserted atmosphere and I mention it to Missy and she says,

“I don’t get what you’re saying. People live in these houses and they are nice houses.”

“The guy who interviewed me for the job said that you could buy a house here for $10,000. Is that true?”

“Oh yeah, you probably could, but not my house. I mean Dad’s house.” We pass McIvor Street on the right and a big house with a long driveway and steel garage and further on where there are no empty blocks and the public swimming pool is on the left but it’s not open. Missy’s starting to look pissed off and there’s a statue of a horse or donkey on the left before the roundabout and she says, “Let’s go back. You can see the town centre and the pub tomorrow or later on.”

“What’s up? Are you alright?”

“I don’t know how to put this. Um, I get a lot of shit from the locals for always hanging out with the staff but we get all kinds of people through here and I know all the locals back to front. Right now we have an English couple and this guy from New Zealand, and others from all over have been here.”

“Is the grief from the guys or girls?”

“Both. C’mon, let’s go back. Do you have music?”

“Just a small CD player and a walkman.”

Back at my room she says, “Don’t move out of the room. Just tell Dad you like it. We never get full and you won’t have to share.”

“Have you ever thought of moving to Perth?” I ask her.

“Not that again,” she says. “Oh, you have Pete Murray, Sheryl Crowe and Luka Bloom.”

“You know, yesterday I was in Fremantle and Pete Murray was playing at a pub there tonight. Wouldn’t you like to be there?”

“Oh shut up! Shut up about how great it is everywhere but here! I like you, Nick, but just shut up about that stuff. I’m not stupid. I probably know more about music and books and films than you ever dreamed of. This is a new age. I have the internet. I get whatever is current the minute, the second I want it. I can download anything. New music or films and book reviews and house prices in Perth. You’re thirty years old and you don’t have two cents to your name but I don’t keep reminding you of it.”

“How do you know what …”

“Oh, come on. Would you be here if you didn’t?”

“I came here to save money. I have close to $4000 and I want another $4000 because I want to go and live in Bangkok or Saigon. I came here because I have a goal I want to get to.”

“Oh wow! $4000. Big deal. Why don’t you buy a house here? That’s what you meant isn’t it. This place is so crap you can buy a house for $10,000.”

“I don’t want to argue with you. Pete Murray or Luka Bloom?”

And she sings, “My name is Luka; I live on the second floor.”

“Oh, very cute,” I say, but I have the biggest smile on my face.

The next morning I wake at 6 a.m. and the room is stuffy so I pull on a pair of jeans and open the door, which has a terrific view of the carpark and the other motel units. Missy and I played music for a couple of hours and she talked a lot about life in Norseman and how this guy, Lincoln, broke her heart. He was from Adelaide and had hitch-hiked across the Nullarbor Plain and walked into the roadhouse looking for work. Promised her the earth and then left at midnight one night with a waitress from the motel. When I opened the door for her to leave she kissed me softly on the lips and said,

“See you, tomorrow, Nick. Thanks for listening.”

She left at nine so I got to bed early and I promised myself one of my mantras was going to be Early to bed early to rise. Save money. I shower and make instant coffee, smoke a few cigarettes. Go to the diner for breakfast and have three bowls of Rice Bubbles and about six pieces of toast and more coffee and a final cigarette as Missy walks towards me.

“All ready for training?” she asks and I mumble a yes.

We take over the cash register from Neal, an English guy who has been here for four weeks. “I’m leaving in two weeks,” he says. And I quickly count the till so he can go. It gets busy straight away. I get some grief from a truckie when I stuff up his bill from the diner and he says, “Get with it, mate. I need you to be fast. Time is money in this game. C’mon.” He makes me nervous and Missy steps in and fixes it up and gives him some cheek and he loves it and says,

“Sorry mate, but I need you to be fast.” And I feel like saying, stop talking to me and you’d be a lot faster.

Ten minutes later I answer the phone and this voice says, “Ronny here, order me two serves of chips, burn the bastards and I’ll be there in five.”

I tell Missy and she says, “Simmo. Mad bastard. Those stories of truck drivers on speed. That’s Ronny Simpson.”

Everything is going pretty well. I have the cash register with its millions of buttons and keys pretty much down and there’s a “best songs of 2002” CD in the drive and I’m humming not singing and this guy with long hair and baggy harem pants walks in. His girlfriend is in a tie-dye T-shirt and cargo shorts and I give them a big smile and say,

“How’re you doing? Where have you come from?”

And this guy looks at his girlfriend and rolls his eyes and says, “Where have you come from? The most asked question at the Norseman Roadhouse,” and he says it with heavy sarcasm and I’m about to give him a blast when Missy just pats my bum and smiles at me and I let it go.

He pays for his petrol and buys cigarettes and I ask him, “Where are you headed?” He starts the roll of the eyes again but sees me smiling and walks out.

“Kill ’em with kindness,” Missy says.

I wanted to say to him, you don’t know me; you don’t know anything about me. Not why I’m here or where I’m from. His sarcasm hit a nerve and I put it together with what Missy said about me being thirty and only having two cents to my name and I want to head overseas and then what. I think about it for the whole shift. I can’t shake it.

“Feel like a beer?” Missy asks at the end of the shift.

“At the pub?”

“No, your room. Tomorrow night we’ll go to the pub. You have the Saturday off to sleep in.”

“You’re planning my life are you?”

“I don’t want the local girls seeing you.”

“Oh right,” I say and I can’t quite tell if she’s stirring me or not.

“I have a six pack at home. I’ll bring it over,” she says and I meet Gloria as she arrives to take over the shift. She’s from Stirling, a suburb in Perth, and she says,

“I’m leaving in two weeks.” And, “Are you in the staff house or the motel?”

“Motel.”

“Oh, don’t worry. It’s not so bad here, just don’t stay too long.”

“How long have you been here?”

“Two months.”

“Oh, OK, taking your own advice. I have to go, so, see ya.”

On the way back to my room I stop in at the motel reception to ask about using the phone in my room and how much the calls cost. I introduce to myself to Warren at the front desk, and Monica the motel manager comes out and shakes my hand and we all have a little chat. Monica goes back into the office and Warren says,

“I’m leaving in two weeks.”

“Oh, um, great,” I say and walk out and see Missy walking ahead of me to the room. Missy is short and compact with shiny black hair that she wears (so far) in a thick ponytail. I watch her bum sway from side to side as she walks, and smile. Her eyes are black too and she has thick eyelashes and eyebrows. I see her knocking on my door and still can’t shake that bad feeling I got from that smartarse in the roadhouse.

I rest my hand on her waist as we walk inside. She turns and holds up the six pack.

“Oh, Swan Lager,” I say.

“You should be thankful. This is my treat.”

“You always speak your mind, don’t you?” She pulls two cans off the plastic ring one at a time and places them on the small round wooden table and we sit like we’re about to have dinner together on the two metal chairs with their orange plastic cushions.

“To Norseman!” I say.

“Cheers,” she says softly, thinking I’m being sarcastic and then asks me to put on some music. I put on Lloyd Cole and the Commotions and she says as he sings, Love is all you need, “Who is this?”

“Lloyd Cole. Like it?”

“Yeah, what’s the name of the album?”

“Rattlesnakes.”

“Cool.”

We drink and talk and laugh for a couple of hours and she says, “I better get back. Dad’s going to Perth tomorrow and I promised I’d have dinner with him.”

I nod. I don’t want her to leave. I think she knows it and says, “Do you like me?”

“You mean do I like you in that way?”

She doesn’t answer the question but says, “You know, a lot of the locals make out I’m some kind of tramp because I always hang out with the new male workers who come here but I was only ever with the one guy and he left me. I liked you the minute you walked into the roadhouse. That’s never happened to me before.”

I don’t know what to say and she says, “It’s OK. I’ll see you tomorrow.” And she throws an empty can into the small waste basket on the other side of the room.

“Good shot,” I say, but it sounds really hollow and she closes the motel room door softly behind her when she leaves.

I bring Rattlesnakes to work the next morning and I say to Neal, the English guy, “Only thirteen days left, Neal.” He shrugs and walks out. I thought I was being friendly.

Missy walks in and she sees the CD and says straight away, “You can play that as long as you don’t sing along.” I smile and nod. She adds, “I’m going to let you do everything today, training is over. Dad’s gone to Perth already so believe it or not I’m running the place. I’ll be in the office if you get stuck.”

I simply nod again and three trucks are filling up and three people just walked in and the rest of the day is flat out until 3 p.m. I have my lunch standing up at the cash register and have to beg Missy to get a smoke break. I’m walking out and she grabs me by the arm and says, “Come to the house for dinner. I’m cooking. I have some wine too.” A few of the motel workers and a group of people from the staff house had invited me to the pub. There are about fifteen to twenty people working here. Housemaids, short order cooks, receptionists and barmen and the maintenance guy and I’ve barely spoken to anyone and I say, “I was asked to the pub.”

She looks away from me and I think about it. Who gives a stuff about the pub. “I’ll come over for dinner but we should go to the pub after that.”

“OK. Be at my place at seven.” And I walk out.

I get to her house right on seven and it’s still pretty hot. The house is hot too because she’s cooking and I say, “Any air-conditioning?”

“I’ll put the ceiling fan on and it’s nice to see you too.”

“What’re you cooking?”

“This Malaysian chicken curry. I got the curry paste at this supermarket in Kal about two weeks ago. Want a beer?”

“Yeah.” She goes to the fridge and brings over a VB and I smile and take it and crack the ice-cold can. She sits next to me on the sofa and puts her hand on my thigh and I turn to face her and she kisses me on the mouth and I kiss her back and she says,

“I just wanted to get that out of the way.”

The Malaysian curry is great and she plays a lot of her dad’s old soft-rock CDs. Stuff like Foreigner, Status Quo and Toto and I don’t mind. I even dance badly with her and we kiss a lot and don’t go to the pub and she asks me to stay the night.

The next morning she has to go to work and I have the day off. I sneak back to my motel room but along the way meet the housemaids and some other staff and they all give me a hard time about not turning up to the pub and staying the night at “the manager’s house”. There are no secrets in Norseman.

Her dad went to Perth for three weeks and I stayed at the house the whole time. I’ve been here three months now, living in the motel room on my own but with Missy coming over almost every night.

One morning I go to work and get there ten minutes early because I’m training a new staff member on the cash register. The wheel has turned the full circle. All those who said they were leaving have left and others have come and gone in that time too. Sheila, the new staff member, is about forty and a big woman, more big-boned than overweight, and she asks me,

“How long have you been here?” I tell her and she seems to be waiting for me to tell her how much longer but I don’t.

Two weeks later it is 3 p.m. and I’m sitting on the front lawn of the house that Missy and I have rented and Missy opens the front gate and comes and sits next to me and asks,

“How long have you been here?”

“Over three months,” I say, and she asks,

“When are you leaving?”

“Never.”