Giant Redheads: On coming to Australia, generosity and being a nobody.

(I finally got my pictures up!

Before I even landed in Australia, I noticed three things that seemed strange to me: redheads, giant men and noisy, bossy children. In Thailand, no one raises their voice, red is not a natural hair colour and I dwarf the women and most of the men. At the luggage carousel, I kept peeking over at the men, thinking “Jesus, they’re…massive”.

Lenine’s “special friend” Melly picked me up at the airport and whisked me to Lenine’s where a big vase of lilies, cupcakes and presents awaited me. Due to visa dramas before I left Thailand, I ended up arriving on my birthday. I loved turning 34 as I crossed over the Pacific. That night I settled into the front sunroom, across from Ange, Lenine’s fantabulous housemate, a radical foodie/chef with a PhD in food ethics. The neighborhood I’m in is greek-immigrant-turned-middle-class-environmentalist so everything is fair-trade-this or organic-that. It’s expensive ($18 for a used book?!) but otherwise a lovely, leafy, lefty neighborhood. My lifestyle couldn’t be more different than it was in bkk.

The best thing about Brisbane is Lenine and the warmth I’ve received in her home and from her friends. The second best thing is that it’s not a thrilling mega-city. After the madness of bkk, Brisbane feels like a turn-of-the-century private "sanitorium"—all manicured shrubs, immaculate (and empty) pedestrian walkways, sunny blue skies and friendly smiling people. Really, it's so spacious and clean, I feel like I’m in a David Lynch film. Initially I had all this energy that I was prepared to put into "handling challenges" due to disorientation, language differences or confusion, but the challenges just never appeared. Imagine taking a big breath to shout to someone across a busy street only to discover that the person is standing right across from you. And speaks your language. For days I held my breath and wait to be rocked, confused, lost, frustrated or amused all to hell. But it didn’t happen.

I have very little desire to explore—or at least to explore beyond what I’ve found at arm’s length. It’s not like I’m going to stumble on a Chinese opera being staged at an open-air temple where a friendly middle-aged lawyer uses his limited English to explain the plot and invites me back the next night to see part 3 of the epic opera. That’s one night in Bangkok. Here I stumble on the neighborhood thrift shop, a little riverside dog show or some swings in a pretty park.

I love it. All I want to do is nest: putter, bake, read, do laundry, email home. In short, make a home again. I delight in returning the DVD rental and stocking up on the toilet paper. I’m excited about things like what I’ll find when I raid the grocery store garbage (my friend Warren taught me to dumpster dive), about the Circus Essentials class (Brisbane is a hub of alternative circus) and about baking vegan pumpkin muffins. Especially baking. What was always a pleasure has become a full-blown passion.

I enjoy everyday, ordinary pleasures: queer community, friends, food, learning stuff, sometimes painfully. New but “familiar-new”. I miss some things about Thailand: the heat, Buddhism, my friend Aileen, spicy street food and using the ‘wai’ to greet or thank people, speaking my 50 words of Thai and jaywalking thru traffic. I don’t miss the crowds and the wall of noise that greeted me everyday.

Loneliness, revisited
My loneliness is different here. It’s different to long for what’s right around me. When I was alone in bkk or laos, I was really alone. Because of the language barrier, I couldn’t tell someone how I felt even if I’d wanted to. After the first couple of weeks I was rarely lonely though. Partly because I made friends and set up a home. Partly because when it takes all your focus, your limited language skills and the better part of your patience just to find a subway station, there isn’t much time to miss home.

Here though, I can have a night like the other one at Gay Karaoke (which is so delightfully earnest and irony-free). A young woman walks in that everyone at my table is so happy to see. They all disappear with her and suddenly I’m the only one still at the table. Some queers are slow dancing to karaoke power ballads (my favourite!) and even though I’m around friendly folks listening to music I know all the words to, there is no one for me to dance with. Out of the corner of my eye I see someone who reminds me of a close friend. Another has a stripey shirt that reminds me of my friend P. It’s excruciating. I leave the bar to go find a cigarette, my head exploding. I make it about a block before I find a little alcove on the (immaculate and empty) street and sit down to burst into tears.

I miss you. I miss you. I miss you, I sob to the sidewalk.

No one is running up to me, happy to see me. I am the outsider, observing a group of folks who share long varied connections to each other. No one has known me for more than a week or so. Instead of just smoking, going home and telling my friends about it the next day, I end up sitting on a bus bench with the friend who brought me, crying while he sits with me. I’m so utterly, shamelessly sucky. Between tears, hiccups and blowing my nose, I choke out: “there’s…no one…here (gasp)…for me to…(gulp)…dance with!” Which I think translates to: No one loves me!

I would not do this at home. But here, fuck it, I have no other options. Turns out it’s the best one. I don’t try to make it nice and he doesn’t either. I’m so thankful for that, for his patience and warmth with me. I laugh long and deeply when he quotes a line from Sin City to me: "Dames! Sometimes they just gotta get it out."

Shortly after another friend from the bar comes out, she hugs me long and comforts me. I sigh with relief. When I’m done, I feel so unburdened and relieved that I’m positively walking on air. I go back in the bar and for the first time in my life, sing karaoke unselfconsciously, belting out Nine-To-Five by Dolly Parton, dancing around with unadulterated joy. My face hurts from laughing so much when we all head home at midnight.

Lately, when I’m curled under my duvet at night, I often imagine a lover there with me. Someone who can make it all go away, make me feel safe, protected and cared for. I remember the different chests I’ve nestled on and pick one to dream about resting on.

And I’m so glad I don’t have one. I know there’s a reason that I don’t have a safe “out”. Out of my feelings, out of my fear, out of the challenge of making my decisions about what I want from this life. It’s up to me to figure out what I want and how to get it. If I need some support, I need to find it myself. If that’s not possible, then I need to learn that too. That night in karaoke, my only solace were the friends I’d known briefly. I had to decide whether to trust them. I did and it worked. If I was traveling with someone, I’d never have experienced that.

One of the first shocks I experienced traveling is that stripped of my context, I become a total nobody. No one knows where you’re from or why they should care. I remember when I first got to know Lenine in Toronto, I thought “Wow! Why isn’t everyone excited to talk with her about her experience?” Because you’re no one, that’s why. You’ve gotta earn every connection. Every time someone includes me in a conversation or asks me about myself, I treat it as a gift and receive it gratefully. I worked for that, sister.

The emails I get from you, dear friends, are also such a gift. I read them over once really fast and excited. Then I go back to them and re-read them, enjoying their nuance and humour, imagining your voice and remembering the last time I saw you.

I tell you, I will never look at outsiders the same way. I lived in a perfect bubble in Toronto, insulated by my community, work and friends. I had no idea what this was like. I have so much to learn and I couldn’t have known there was this much to learn.

Generosity
There are those lonely nights occasionally but much more commonly are the days and nights where I am treated to a kind of friendliness we just don’t do in TO.

The Aussies are legendarily friendly. But so are Thai folks And Laotians. (You shoulda seen my last day at Empower: a two-hour flow of food, gifts, blessings, and endless group pictures). In fact, it’s just that in general, Torontonians are misers--my friends excepted of course. For example, that airport pickup I got when I arrived? It was a nearly 2 hour drive away—and my flight had been delayed. Still, Melly gave me the scenic tour on our drive home. I told this to my friend Loralee who said “No one’s ever even picked me up at the Toronto airport!”

Exactly. I’ve never done it myself—it’s so far, expensive, I’m too busy. Ferget it. But this kind of thoughtfulness is routine here. I get invited out, given phone numbers, and have drinks bought for me every time I go out. People I’ve talked to for an hour offer to let me stay with them. Then they buy me a drink. It’s crazy. There isn’t any weirdness or expectations, just friendliness.

I’m stunned at the consideration and thoughtfulness I’ve received in the past year. From my move in Toronto to my friend Aileen sleeping on the floor so I could stay with her after my visa was delayed, to being given a home for a month here in Brisbane, it’s far beyond what I expect—I suspect because it’s far beyond what I typically offer. Was I on bad-house-guest crack until now? I look back and I can’t believe I stayed with people without cooking a single meal for them or making sure to take care of the cat while they were out. What was I thinking?! Just lost in my own bubble of self-interest I guess. I’m pretty sure I’m a much different guest than I used to be. (nb: After Ange read this, she described me as “a fabulous guest”. Yay!)

Why aren’t we all like this? I’ve tried befriending people in this way in TO but I never know when people are going to look at me with suspicion, thinking I want something. I love that if I like someone here and it’s mutual, we don’t have to dance around it for ages, waiting for an appropriate waiting period to elapse before we’re allowed to get excited and hang out. In Toronto, you’re not considered serious or cool if you’re too happy. Y’know what I get to be here? Positive! Happy! Cheerful! It’s great! I’m thrilled! (can you tell? God, I can be so cryptic sometimes can’t i?) How nice it is to be normal.

So dear readers, Torontonians and not, I challenge you to make a new friend this week. Here’s how: meet someone you like? Get their contact info and follow up. Done!
Or give a hand to someone who’s lost. As in, actually take someone to the destination they’re trying to find. Y’know folks do this all the time in other parts of the world but it’s nearly unfathomable in TO. Tell someone how much you like them. Try something that seems “excessively” considerate and tell me how it goes.

But as difficult as my own community can sometimes be, I am more and more sure that it is where I want to be and where I want to make a difference. I’m so glad I’m here right now—I wouldn’t trade that night at karaoke for the world—but the Toronto queer community is still my home and my extended family. Missing home helps me understand exactly what matters to me. I want to know that I’m not just accidentally falling into my life. I want to know what I’m choosing and why. And what I want is community.

Money, weather, blahblahblah
Y’know what else I’d also really like? My money. I have money, I just can’t get it. I’ve fallen into some kind of weird vortex where it is a nightmare for me to access my own money and I’ve been dependent on borrowing money for 7 weeks now. When I say weird vortex, I mean that errors keep happening which even my credit union and credit card company can’t explain.

I’ve been assured three times that my credit card is coming. By the last time, the operator was as mystified as I was. “But that’s…impossible”. Apparently not, Mr. Mastercard International, apparently not.

My bank card? Well, they think the first one was lost in the mail. And when I emailed for the 8th time asking about the replacement card, they told me that they’re now having problems with the card manufacturing and don’t know when they’ll be able to get me a new one. Um, what are THE FREAKIN CHANCES OF THAT? Who’s even ever HEARD of a bank not able to make ATM cards? I can’t bear to email them again and ask about it.

So after nearly 2 months of effort, I have one temporary credit card to show for it. People in lineups get pissed off at me because it won’t swipe and has to be entered manually but hey, it’s mine! I’m SURE there’s a lesson in this somewhere (I think it might be an extension of my lesson on generosity but like most lessons, it’s annoying.)

Finally, I’m freezing cold almost 24/7 because I acclimatized in Thailand and being a hot place normally, Brisbane makes no accommodation for the cold. Windows don’t close, houses aren’t insulated so I feel like I’m camping in October all the time. As I write this, I’m wearing my regular outfit of 3 shirts, tights under my pants, and 2 pairs of socks. That’s what I sleep in. Yes, I know you’re thinking “cry me a river Chanelle. It was 34 degrees for you in February while we dug out from under a metre of snow”. True, but they tell me here that acclimatization changes your blood. I’m cold in a way I wouldn’t be in the same temperature at home. I sleep wearing gloves people. Blue fingers, aching toes, uncomfortable. I am warm in the shower. That's it.

Don’t cry for me though. As my friend Pam put it: “I have no sympathy for your world-traveler dilemmas”. Nor should you! Yeah, I’m lonely sometimes but yesterday I learned to stilt walk in a women’s circus class then went to the queer-youth centre for workshops on gender and zine-making before meeting up with new friends who took me out to the (kinda cheesy) local dyke night (and bought my drinks, naturally). Today I’m going to a photo exhibit (on what might be a date, not sure yet) and then Lenine and I are having a sleepover in Melly’s new apartment tonight. Tomorrow Melly and I go “bushwalking” (that means hiking) before I head to a beach town near here. It can be hard but I’m still enormously privileged. I'm heading to Sydney next week and looking for a few places to stay. If you know anyone who could host me for say a week, please let me know!

Love and all,
Chanelle
P.s. what’s this about rising prices on food back home?? There were food riots in parts of SE Asia but I thought that was localized. So like, is the world coming to an end?
pps. Happy Pride! I had a lovely one myself. You'd have all loved the "Pet Parade" portion of the day. Yes, that's two dog shows i've seen in 2.5 weeks. This place is c.u.t.e.