tales of an ex-patriot august 2010

8/8/2019 Tales of an Ex-Patriot August 2010

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TALES OF AN EX-PATRIATE

A DECADE OFTRAVELLINGTHE WORLD

BY

JOHN R. AARONS


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TALES OF AN EX-PATRIATE

CONTENTS

1 Sailing the Ocean Waves Melbourne to Rotterdam 1965

2 Girl with Flowers Utrecht, Holland 1965

3 A Trigger Happy Cop! Terneuzen, Holland 1965

4 House sharing Terneuzen, Holland 19655 Put a Dutchman in a Uniform Terneuzen, Holland 1965

6 5 Star Vacation Terneuzen, Holland 1965

7 Smugglers Terneuzen, Holland 1965

8 The Shoes that wouldnt die Terneuzen, Holland 1965

9 Our London Flat London, UK 1966

10 Strike Action Redcar, UK 1966

11 Britain Ruled the Waves Tilbury, UK 1967

12 Upsetting a French Traffic Cop Arles, France 1967

13 Turkish Delight Istanbul, Turkey 1967

14 Spying during the Cold War Sofia, Bulgaria 1967

15 Speeding Fine Yugoslavia 1967

16 Help, Police! Rome, Italy 1967

17 Buying a Used Car New Jersey, USA 196718 Credit cards Montreal, Canada 1967

19 X-Ray Hearing ! New York, USA 1967

20 Rich Uncle Mississippi, USA 1968

21 Water skiing Nassau Bay, Texas 1968

22 Weekend in Paradise The Bahamas 1968

23 The Horseman & Fisherman Hawera, NZ 1969

24 Right of way Taranaki, NZ 1969

25 Dangerous driving Hawera, NZ 1969

26 Sake anyone ? Tokyo, Japan 1970

27 Endless People Mover Erlangen, Germany 1970

28 Light and Sound Vlaardingen-Holy, Holland 1970

29 Communicating, French style Paris, France 1970

30 German Hospitality Berlin, Germany 197031 Dutch Conformity Holland 1970

32 The Proud Dutch Holland 1971

33 World of Intrigue Holland 1971

34 Duty Free Camera Holland 1971

35 Running Around in Circles Paris, France 1971

36 Greek National Treasures Rhodes, Greece 1971

37 Moving House Holland to Belgium 1972

38 Belgian Catch 22 Antwerp, Belgium 1972

39 When it rains, it rains The French Riviera 1972

40 Is the bridge safe? Geel, Belgium 1972

41 Industrial trouble Charleroix, Belgium 1972

42 It pays to be rude New York, USA 1973

43 Texas roadworthy Houston, USA 197344 How to lose a car at the airport Houston, USA 1973


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45 Taxi! Mexico 1973/1974

46 Complete a Project on time Houston, USA 1973/1974

47 Dining out West Virginia, USA 1974

48 One way to make new friends Houston, USA 1974

49 Cougar Houston, USA 1974


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HOW IT ALL BEGAN

SAILING THE OCEAN WAVES

MELBOURNE TO ROTTERDAM

1965

As a young man, I spent a year travelling around the world with my best friend Dario, and on my return toAustralia, could not stop talking about what we had seen and experienced during our travels.

Some time later, I met and married Lenis and our first year of marriage was punctuated with discussionsabout those adventures in different countries. It wasnt long before she said to me that she was tired of justhearing about those places and wanted to see for herself what the world was like beyond Australia.

Lenis and I departed the Port of Melbourne in April 1965 aboard the Italian ocean liner, MSS Flavia boundfor Rotterdam in the Netherlands.

The voyage was to take almost 6 weeks with one-day stopovers at many exotic ports of call on the way.

The first place we stopped was Adelaide where we had a full day to explore this quiet and attractive city andto visit some people we knew there. We sailed out that evening and headed for Fremantle in WesternAustralia which necessitated crossing one of the worlds roughest stretches of ocean, the Great AustralianBight. The moment the ship hit these rough waters I turned green and for the next two days, I didnt want to

go anywhere near the dining room and the wonderful aroma of Italian cuisine ! My dear wife being a much


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better sailor didnt suffer at all as the ship heaved and bounced through the rough seas.she never missed ameal!

The moment the ship turned the corner at the bottom of Western Australia and headed north, the sea becameas flat as a mirror and I immediately felt terrific. We spent a wonderful day in Perth which was a cityneither of us had ever visited before. That evening, the ship departed for Aden. The ship had to sail rightacross the Indian Ocean and of course it was the middle of the monsoon season! If I thought the seas wererough in the Great Australian Bight, I was wrong, totally wrong! The Flavia was not a very large ship bymodern standards and we were tossed around like dandelions in the wind! The ship made very little progressin the bad weather and it took us 4 or 5 days to reach the calm waters of the Red Sea. Needless to say, I wasonce again missing from the dining room at meal times for most days and on the rare occasion I did go, I ate

little more than a bread roll.

In those days, Aden was a British Protectorate and there was a large contingent of British troops stationedthere to protect their ships passing through the Suez Canal. When we stopped there, Aden was about to bereturned to the people of South Yemen and although we did not experience any problems with the locals, wewere told that there had been many attacks on the British troops in recent times.We hired a driver for the day and he took us around the sights and told us stories about life under Britishmilitary rule. Soon after we left, the British military barracks was blown up and that hastened the Britishdeparture!

The next stop for the Flavia was Suez at the entrance to the Canal and we left the ship there to take a tour toCairo and the Pyramids. Egypt in 1965 was ruled by President Nasser and he had invited the Soviet Unionto station troops there to protect them from attack from Israel and the West. We were not allowed to take

photographs except at nominated sites such as the Pyramids as there were troops moving all around Cairo.After spending a marvelous morning at the Cairo Museum, we were taken for lunch to the Cairo Hiltonwhich was no longer run by the Hilton hotel chain since Nasser had kicked the Americans out of Egypt andnationalized their businesses. As we were finishing each course of our lunch, a group of very large Nubianmen would come up to our tables and swiftly remove the dirty plates and cutlery, sometimes before peoplehad finished eating.This became a bit of a game with us to see if we could stretch out the last small morsels and each time agiant came to take away the plate we would make a great pretence of still eating. Eventually, I asked ourwaitress why they were so determined to get the plates and cutlery away from us and she explained that sincethe government had taken over the hotel, they were unable to get replacements for the crockery and cutleryas they were made exclusively for Hilton with the hotels logo on every piece! So every time something was

broken or taken by a guest for a souvenir, they had to make do with a continually shrinking stock oftableware!

After lunch we were driven out to the Pyramids where we had our first and last ride on a camel.I would like to tell you how much we enjoyed the experience but that would be far from the truth!

The camel ride was included as part of our full day tour package so we werent prepared for what happenedonce we had mounted the camels and started up the hill to the pyramids. The camel driver asked for moremoney from us otherwise he would have the camel gallop instead of just plodding along at walking pace. Todemonstrate, he gave my camel a nudge and the brute leapt forward almost throwing me off its hump! Leniscalled out from behind for me to give the man some money before things got any uglier! I tossed him someloose coins and he begrudgingly restrained the beast at a gentle bouncing trot. These unpleasant animals

belch and break wind as they carry you along and with a great sigh of relief we dismounted the smellycreatures at the entrance to the pyramids !

After touring the pyramids, we headed north in our bus to the city of Port Said where we had dinner in anightclub and were entertained by belly dancers. Later that night we boarded the ship to continue our


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journey to Europe and related our adventures to our friends who had stayed on the ship as it made the tediousall-day journey through the canal.

We then sailed through the Mediterranean to Italy and followed the west coast all the way up to Genoa whichwas the home port for the ship. We had plenty of time to see the sights of this famous old city as we stayedthere two nights whilst many of the crew left the ship and replacements were brought on to look after us forthe remainder of the voyage.

Leaving Genoa, we hugged the coast past the French Riviera, the Costa Brava of Spain, past the Rock ofGibraltar and on to Tilbury in England. Most of the Australian passengers departed the ship in England andwe and a few Dutch people remained aboard for the last leg of the voyage to Rotterdam.

Some Dutch friends in Rotterdam picked us up at the docks and drove us to a hotel they had booked so wecould drop off our luggage and sit quietly over a drink and a chat. We hadnt seen these friends for a coupleof years since they had left Australia and returned to Holland. We wanted to catch up with all the things thathad happened to them since last we met.

Problem was.the hotel they had booked for us was operated by the Seventh Day Adventists and of coursealcohol wasnt available! They did have ersatz wine for sale so that had to satisfy these four thirsty

people!

Here begins my series of experiences as an expatriate Australian covering almost 10 years spent living andworking in a number of countries around the world.

The tales commence in Holland which is where the adventure began for us and continue following ourmoves to and from a number of countries over a period of more than 9 years.


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GIRL WITH THE FLOWERS

UTRECHT, HOLLAND

1965

I had been working in Melbourne for the Australian division of a large Dutch engineering company, andwhen they heard that I was heading for Holland they offered to arrange employment for me with the parentcompany. Soon after arriving in Holland, I made contact with the companys head office in Utrecht, andwas told that they had organized a position for me in the drawing office of one of their divisions inAmsterdam. Because we were from overseas, they had also arranged for us to live in one of the company-owned houses located in Utrecht. The family normally living there were currently in Russia on anassignment and would be away for at least a year.

Having accepted the job and accommodation offer, we moved into the Utrecht house straight away andbegan to settle into our new life in Holland. We met a few of the neighbours, most of whom were workingfor the same company although in different divisions and found them to be extremely friendly andwelcoming to a pair of young Australians.

One day during our first week in the house when I was at work in Amsterdam, Lenis answered a knock at thedoor to find a cute little girl standing there holding a lovely bunch of flowers. When she took the flowersand thanked the girl, she asked what her name was and where she lived. The child stood there with astunned look on her sweet face for a full minute then ran off up the street and into a house a few doors up onthe same side.Lenis followed up the street to the house where the little girl had gone and knocked on the door. The girlsmother came to the door and Lenis thanked her for the flowers then asked what had frightened her daughter

and caused her to run away from our place. The mother explained that the girl, who was only about 3 years


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old, had never before been confronted by someone speaking any language other than Dutch and was totallyspooked by the encounter.

This reaction surprised us tremendously because the television in Holland was full of American and Britishshows, which are shown in their original form with Dutch sub-titles at the bottom of the screen. CertainlyDutch adults have no problems adapting to languages they are confronted with regularly but the 3 year old

probably hadnt watched a lot of television yet.

After that, the little girl became a regular visitor to our house during the time we lived in Utrecht so the storyhas a happy ending. No doubt that woman now speaks English as if it were her native

tongue as do the majority of the Dutch in this day and age!


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A TRIGGER HAPPY COP

HOLLAND-UTRECHT 1965

At the time we left Australia on our first trip to Europe in 1965, policemen did not carry guns when onregular patrols around the city, in fact we had never even seen a revolver except in the movies. It was ashock to our system when we arrived in Holland and saw that all police personnel had holsters strapped to

their belts and these were huge! We could only imagine that the guns they had inside the holsters were likesmall cannon!

It was somewhat scary for us to see cops everywhere apparently armed ready for battle, even the traffic copsat major intersections had holsters which were enough incentive for us to obey their commands!

Fortunately, we managed to stay on the right side of the law so didnt experience first hand how these policeofficers behaved under difficult circumstances. Our dealings with Dutch police were to ask directions andwe always found them friendly and polite.

One day when I was having lunch in a pub, a tall cop entered and sat at the bar not far from my table. Icouldnt take my eyes off at all the gear he had attached to his belt.There was a night-stick, whistle, two-way radio, hand cuffs and a massive gun holster!

He ordered a beer and while the barman was filling the glass, I stared in horror as he unclipped the gunholster and fiddled around inside. I was about to see what the gun they carried looked like and was scared

but excited at the same time.

My horror turned to amusement as his hand withdrew not a gun but a small package and laid it on the bar infront of him. He then unwrapped the package and out came a sandwich he happily ate with his beer!

Talking with a Dutch friend a few days later, he explained that the gun holster was part of the standard policeoutfit and that they only carried guns in them when they were assigned a specific task such as an arrest of acriminal or a particularly dangerous situation requiring the police to be able to defend themselves.

No doubt in this day and age of world-wide terrorism, the police actually carry guns all the time when they

are out on patrol as they now do even in Australia.


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HOUSE-SHARING IN A SMALL VILLAGE

TERNEUZEN, HOLLAND 1965

Moving to the village of Terneuzen in the south of Holland was a shock to our systems. We soon discoveredthat living in a village was very different from living in a city and accommodation choices were extremelylimited.

We initially stayed in an old hotel whilst looking for a place to rent but this village was too small to cater foran influx of foreign workers like us and we had a lot of trouble finding anything at all.Eventually, we were told about a woman who had a beauty parlour on the main road out of town who livedabove the shop. It seemed that she had spare rooms that she would be happy to rent to us so after a brief lookat the place we decided out of desperation to take it because nothing else had been offered and we wouldhave to live in this place for the following 12 months.

The place was 3 storeys high and we were allocated the bedroom in the attic, the lounge room on the secondfloor and shared use of the kitchen, which was inconveniently situated on the ground floor behind the shop.We also had to share the bathroom with the woman.Well, the owner turned out to be the wicked witch from the west, the arrangement was terrible and we didntstay there very long. With the kitchen and bathroom on the ground floor behind the beauty parlour, Lenis

was virtually unable to use them during the hours the shop was open.

We heard about a place further along the same road where the owners had converted the second floor into aflat for their son and his wife when they first married. They had now moved into a place of their own.We looked at the place, which was one of a long row of identical terrace houses and decided that it wasconsiderably better than putting up with the problems at the beauty parlour.

Dutch row-houses have been the same design for centuries so even though the one we moved into was notmore than a few years old, the layout was the same for any old place all over Holland.The ground floor had a lounge room in the front, a dining room in the middle and a kitchen in the rear.The toilet is always located in the space under the staircase.Upstairs there are 3 bedrooms and a small bathroom. (This is the major difference between a modernhouse and an older one, as the latter did not have a bathroom.)

In the house we rented, the front bedroom, which had a small balcony overlooking the street, had beenconverted into a living room, the middle bedroom remained as our bedroom and the rear bedroom had beenconverted into a kitchen.The bathroom was ours exclusively as the owners downstairs never came up the stairs.not even if we wentaway for the weekend, which we did often!They used to wash their hands at their kitchen sink and occasionally were observed stripped down to theirunderwear bathing with face washers that fitted over their hands standing in the kitchen!The worst thing for us was the fact that the claustrophobic toilet under the stairs had absolutely no ventilationwhich was bad enough in itself but worsened because the old man smoked cigars in there and the aromanever really went away!

We had many funny things happen to us whilst we lived at that address, one of the funniest being the night Icame back from having a few drinks with work colleagues. Car parking was in the street and I was notalways able to find a spot exactly in front as was the case this particular night. I locked the car and openedthe front door and walked into a lounge room of strangers! Wondering for a moment who all the visitors


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were, I suddenly realized I was two or three houses further along the street! Giving my apologies in my bestDutch, I stepped back out into the street and hurried to the correct front door!

PUT A DUTCHMAN IN A UNIFORM

TERNEUZEN, HOLLAND 1965

People everywhere like to dress up, but in Holland, when a man is given an official uniform to wear for theFederal or Local Government, his whole character changesunfortunately, normally not for the better.

The best examples of this are the men who are put in charge of opening and closing the little bridges crossingthe canals along which barges and sail boats move around the country. These men are possibly retiredsailors who are glad to don the Bridge-mans uniform, which is not dissimilar to a naval uniform. Once heis wearing this symbol of authority he transforms from a quiet retired type to a man of the world wieldingreal power!

The boats using the canals, generally move very slowly and yet the men operating the draw-bridgesinvariably blast their sirens, turn on the flashing lights and halt the traffic on the road long before the boat isanywhere near the bridge thus causing lines of cars and trucks to bank up on both sides of the bridge for long

periods.

Then, after the boat has moved through the crossing, it seems that Bridge-man always disappears into histiny office to make a cup of coffee or call someone on the telephone because the bridge stays up for a long

time after the boat has long since disappeared from sight along the canal.

If one looks closely at the face of the Bridge-man, it is clear that he is thrilled with the power he has over allthe car drivers, motorcyclists, bike riders and pedestrians forced to wait at his bridge for interminable

periods. I have seen the most devilish expressions on the faces of these men whose job would probably beextremely boring without this game they seem to play.

Just like Clark Kent changing into his Supermans uniform, other examples of the power transmitted bywearing an official uniform can be found all over Holland from the lowly ticket collector at a train station tothe doorman at a swank hotel.

It is impossible to rebel against this type of officialdom because all the yelling or tooting of car horns at theperson will only cause him to make you wait longer.

WHO WAS IT THAT SAID CLOTHES MAKETH THE MAN?


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SMUGGLERS

BELGIUM-NETHERLANDS BORDER

TERNEUZEN, HOLLAND

1965

In 1965, long before the EU came into being, Holland, Belgium and Luxembourg were a trading partnershipcalled The Benelux and in principal, operated open borders between the 3 countries.

Problem with that theory was that in practice, these countries had different sales taxes applied to variousproducts that they wanted to protect which resulted in large price differences for certain goods.

The result of all this meant that customs officers were stationed on the main roads leading to and from eachof these countries and their job was to check not only what trucks were carrying into a country but also what

private individuals might have hidden in their cars!

At this time we were living in Terneuzen which is located in the South Zeeland province of Holland which isthe southernmost part of the country bordering with Belgium.Terneuzen is a very small town and theres not a lot to do there at any time. Because of this we would driveto Antwerp in Belgium at the weekends to visit galleries and museums as well as doing our main shoppingfor the week.

Some of the people I worked with at the plant we were building outside of Terneuzen were Belgian and theytold me about goods which were much cheaper in Belgium than in Holland. These included such staples as

butter, meat, alcohol and cigarettes which were highly taxed in Holland.

They also explained that the border town on the road from Terneuzen to Antwerp is a small place called DeKlinge and if you drive the way the signs direct, you will have to pass through the Customs Check Point.On the other hand, if you ignore the signs and turn off just before the boom gates, you will pass through

streets of nothing else but houses and then loop around back onto the main road on the other side of theCheck Point!

The first time we tried this, we had driven to Antwerp, bought a couple of kilos of fresh butter, some cartonsof English cigarettes and some packs of coffee beans which were also cheaper in Belgium. I was driving acar with Dutch registration so knew the Customs people would stop me and check what we had in the car if Itried to go through the Check Point.

Turning down a side street as instructed, I wound my way through the town and then looped back onto themain road and sure enough we were back on the road to Terneuzen, well past the Check Point!Of course, all the way back to our place, I was checking the rear view mirror to see if uniformed officerswere chasing us but fortunately we were in the clear.

From then on, for the rest of the time we lived in Terneuzen we continued our smuggling career without everbeing apprehended.


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5 STAR VACATION

TERNEUZEN, HOLLAND

1965

The language spoken in South Zeeland is basically Flemish and the people spend more time in Belgium thanHolland because it is easier to drive to Antwerp than to any Dutch city for shopping.

We lived in the top half of a small two storey house on the main road leading into the centre of the town andit was one of a whole row of identical houses. Many evenings I arrived home and found my key wouldntopen the front door as I was at the wrong place! They all looked exactly the same!

The neighbours on one side were a couple with 4 small children. They lived like sardines in this small houseand really looked forward to their annual vacation when they could take off for a holiday in the wide openspaces.

Vacation time for them meant pitching a tent in a camping resort located on the other side of the town on thesouth bank of the river. The husband used to talk to me when we were both out in front of our houses on aSunday washing our cars and I got to know him quite well. He was an accountant working for the local

branch of the Dutch Taxation Office and used to ride a bicycle to his office in town.

His car was a tiny Dutch-built DAF and he was so proud of it that it was treated like one of the family!

For months he was excitedly telling me about the forthcoming summer vacation and how he had boughtsome new camping equipment to use during their 4 weeks in the sun.

Eventually, vacation time arrived and early Saturday morning we watched from our balcony as he and hiswife loaded all the kids into the car and tons of tents, stoves, pots and pans and food onto the roof rack of thewondrous DAF workhorse! There was no room left for the husband so he hopped on his bicycle and

followed the car across town to the camp. That afternoon, the skies opened up and it rained like a tropicalstorm all night and didnt ease off for days. By Wednesday, the camping site apparently was like a swampand later that afternoon, the waterlogged family arrived back home!

When we talked to them the next day, they told us what a disaster the whole holiday was. Imagine howmiserable it was with 6 people sitting in a tent staring into space wondering what they can do next toentertain the children and then having to slosh though mud to get to the bathrooms and toilets.

As we were not living there the following year, I cant say for sure what that family did for their nextsummer vacation but my guess would be that they attempted the same type of holiday again.especiallyas they bought all that new camping gear the year before and hardly got to use it!


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THE SHOES THAT WOULDNT DIE

TERNEUZEN, HOLLAND

1965

This short tale is about the time when I worked on the construction of a chemical plant in Terneuzen andalmost became a believer in mystical events.

During the early months, the site was little more than a muddy patch of ground as foundation work wascarried out for the equipment which would be installed at a later date.I kept a pair of old shoes in the site office to wear during the day and changed back into my better shoes fordriving home.

Near the end of the job when the entire area had been paved, I decided it was time to throw the worn out oldshoes away, so one evening, I dumped them in the garbage bin outside the office. Next morning when Iarrived at work, the shoes were back under my desk!Thinking that maybe I only intended to discard them the day before but forgot to do it, I walked out to the

bin and dropped them back in.

The following day they were back under my desk again! I realised now that it must be the cleaner whocame every night and swept out the office. Obviously he didnt believe in throwing anything away and

probably wanted me to wear them until I died!

Deciding that dropping them into the garbage bin was obviously not the way to get rid of the smelly oldthings, I stood by the back door of the office and threw them into the long grass some metres away. Thatstricked you, I thought and went home.

Next morning, they were back under my desk, somewhat muddier than ever but still there!The cleaner must have decided he wasnt going to give up on them and gone looking for them until hesomehow found them.

Conceding defeat, I left them under my desk until the project was complete and it was time to leave Hollandand go to another project on the other side of the world.

I never met the cleaner so can only assume that he was responsible for this strange gameon the otherhand, I often wondered whether the shoes could have kept returning by some other means ?


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OUR LONDON FLAT

ENGLAND 1966

After working for a year in Holland we took a holiday and travelled to Scandinavia before arriving inEngland to await our green cards to emigrate to the USA. Once we had these I was to work in the companys

New York Office.As the bureaucratic wheels of the U.S. immigration department turned very slowly, the company arranged a

job for me in their London office whilst we awaited our visas for the USA.

We had rented a basement flat in South Kensington not because it was a great place but it had its very ownbathroom. This is not the norm in London where one bedroom flats and bed-sitters usually have onebathroom in the whole building for the tenants to share.Our place was in a great location being walking distance from the Victoria and Albert Museum and a shortwalk to Harrods Department Store and of course, close to Kensington Palace where we were regular visitorsfor afternoon tea!

After we had been in London 6 months, the company offered me a chance to go to a project they were doingin a tiny place called Wilton in Yorkshire. I jumped at the chance which meant we could do some sight-

seeing in the north of England and possibly take in Scotland as well.

The Personnel Manager at our office had been having an affair with the managers secretary and heapproached me to ask if I would sub-let our flat to him while we were up in Yorkshire and we agreed. Hislady friend would move in and take care of the place for us as well as having somewhere convenient forthose two to carry on their affair.

We had been in Yorkshire for 3 or 4 months and as far as we knew, the rent was being paid each month andeverything was O.K. when I received a telephone call one night from the landlord to say that things WERE

NOT ALRIGHT !

It turned out that the rent had not been paid since the first month and the previous evening, the woman livingin our flat had tried to commit suicide! She had swallowed a bottle of sleeping tablets then as she was

dropping off, called a hospital to tell them what she had done. The hospital notified the police who hadrushed to our flat, smashed in the front door and the ambulance people had carted her off to hospital whereshe apparently recovered fully from the overdose but not from the broken love affair.

It seems that the woman mistakenly believed that our well respected personnel manager would leave his wifeand kids to marry her, which of course he had no intention of doing. When she found out that she wasnothing but a plaything for him she decided to make her disgust for his behaviour public by the feebleattempt at suicide.

We were landed with a bill for the unpaid rent plus the cost of repairing the front door !When I raised the problem at the office, the manager was sympathetic to our plight and promptly fired thePersonnel Manager but could do nothing about recovering our money as British law did not allow garnishingof an employees salary.


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The lesson to be learnt from this experience is that even when a person has an important position in acompany that does not guarantee acceptable behaviour.

SUB-LETTING CAN BE FATAL!

STRIKE ACTION

YORKSHIRE, ENGLAND

1966

We rented a house in the town of Redcar which was close to the site where I had to work and settled in to adifferent lifestyle after our 6 months in London.Yorkshire at that time was very much a heavy industrial area with everything from shipbuilding to coal

mining and chemical plants throughout the county.The working class reputation of the area was reflected in the number of Working Mens Clubs that dottedthe landscape and to which we occasionally went to see big name stars performing in front of huge crowdsfor a very small admission price.Apart from the great entertainment, the clubs offered cheap meals and drinks and gambling tables where onecould play Crown and Anchor and Roulette with small bets.

I started work on the site of the chemical plant our company had been building for the past year and verysoon discovered how different it was from the construction site in Holland. Despite the fact that all thetradesmen employed on site in Holland were members of Trade Unions, we completed the erection of a huge

plant in the scheduled 12 months without one day lost to a strike. Of course there were times when the unionrepresentatives approached the management and asked for various things to improve the conditions for theworkmen and agreements were usually reached without any fuss.

At the construction site in Yorkshire, there were disputes almost every day over such issues as how long itwould take a man to walk from where he was working on the plant to the washroom. This had to be firmlyestablished to determine what time they downed tools for morning tea, lunch, afternoon tea and knock-off atthe end of day! This meant that if they were gazetted to stop for morning tea at 9.30am and it wasestimated that it would take an average of 6 minutes to walk to the washroom, then 4 minutes to wash, theywould stop at 9.20am. Ten minutes for tea then 6 minutes to walk back to the job meant that 26 minuteswere need for this break!Another major issue that kept arising was when they would stop if it rained..imagine that? In Yorkshire itrained almost every day of the year! They were always arguing about how long it had to rain before theycould go to their mess huts and play cards whilst being paid for being on the job!In Holland by contrast, where the climate was very similar, the tradesmen normally put on wet weatherclothing and continued with their activities unless there were safety issues such as working on slippery

structural steel.

One day as I was walking under a pipe bridge checking off pipework on a drawing pinned to my clipboard, Iobserved a man working on the bridge ahead bolting up flanges. A moment later the spanner he was usingslipped and dropped to the ground ahead of me. I walked over, picked it up and stretching on my toes, wasable to pass it up to him. He mumbled thanks mate, and I continued on my way. A moment later I heard aloud whistle, then a loud voice screaming EVERYBODY OUT!

Next thing, 200 men walked off the job leaving the site deserted!I walked quickly back to the office and asked the supervisor what was going on. He replied that the unionshad called a spot strike because a non-union person had handled a tool!My gentlemanly action of handing the fitter his dropped spanner was the cause of all those men walking offand heading for the pub where they stayed for the next 3 days! They finally returned to the site only whentheir cash ran out and their families were demanding money to buy food for the table.


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ITS A WONDER ANYTHING WAS EVER COMPLETED IN BRITAIN IN THOSE DAYS!

BRITAIN RULED THE WAVES

(BUT NOT THE WATER NEEDED TO BATHE)

TILBURY, U.K. 1967

As the end of the project in Yorkshire approached and there was no sign of the American immigration visasfor which we were waiting, we decided to make a tour of southern Europe.

We purchased an old camper van from a company in London which handles these and took it back to Redcarto carry out some renovations.Lenis sister wrote to tell us that she was coming to Britain to work for a while and we suggested she mightlike to come with us around Europe before settling down to work in London.

She was arriving by ship and would disembark in Tilbury.

We arranged to drive down on Saturday as the ship was due to dock Sunday morning. The drive fromYorkshire was uneventful and we arrived in Tilbury around the middle of the afternoon. I hadnt madeany enquiries about accommodation as I expected that there would be lots of motels and hotels in the areawhich is not far from London along the Thames River. What a mistake!

As we drove into this town, we immediately noticed the lack of any commercial enterprises, no motels or

hotels as we expected.Stopping at one pub, I went in and asked the manager if they had a room to rent. She nearly bit my head offsaying that this was a pub, not an inn and no, they didnt have any rooms to rent. She then went on to tellme that there were no motels or B & Bs in this village but she did know a woman that sometimes offered aroom to let in her house. She telephoned the person and then happily told me that they would give us a roomfor the night. She gave me the address and explained how to find the place.

It was only a couple of blocks from the pub and easy to find. It was an old two storey terrace house and thelady who greeted us explained that we could sleep in the attic for 30 shillings and this included breakfast.Grateful for having a roof over our heads for the night, we trudged up the steep stairs to the attic and parkedour suitcase. Coming back downstairs, I asked the woman where we could find a restaurant for dinner andshe laughed and told us that there were no restaurants in Tilbury. The pubs served lunch but not dinner andthe only place she could suggest was a fish and chip shop down the road.

So we took her advice and sat in the street and eating fish and chips!

Returning to the house, we needed a good wash after the greasy meal and enquired where the bathroomwas..looking absolutely stunned, the woman explained that they didnt have a bathroom and they washedat the kitchen sink! The kitchen was also their sitting room which meant that they were sitting there all thetime we washed. The toilet was right down the back of the yard and we had to take a torch to find it!Having nothing else to do in this wondrous town, we went to bed and hoped we didnt need to use the toiletduring the night.

Next morning, bright and early, we dressed and went down to the kitchen to wash and have breakfast. Theless said about the meal the better, it was a greasy mess of eggs and bacon partaken with the rest of theirfamily all sitting at the same table in the kitchen.

We couldnt wait to get out of there and departed as soon as I handed over the 30 shillings.


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untangle the traffic mess. Im sure he wanted to write us a ticket but we spoiled his fun by not stopping tosay au revoir!

TURKISH DELIGHT

ISTANBUL

1967

Travelling from the top end of Europe to the border with Asia in 1967 in our old Bedford Camper Van, wewere able to enjoy the scenery at our leisure, stopping whenever we decided we liked the look of an area orcontinuing when we didnt. The van had probably covered the same ground a number of times and seemedto thrive on the driving along familiar roads!

Despite the age of the vehicle and the hundreds of thousands of miles it had travelled, it generally ran welland only gave us minor problems during our trip.

Soon after crossing into Turkey from Greece we had filled up the tank and headed towards Istanbul wherewe intended to stay for a few days. On the outskirts of the city, the engine started spluttering and greatclouds of black smoke belched from the exhaust. We limped into the city and found a great campsomewhere near the airport.

After getting established on our campsite, we took a bus into the city heading for a market called Akserai.This was easy as most of the buses passing the camp were heading for Akserai anyway.The market was great and we stocked up on food and drink to take back to the camp.

We walked back to the bus station and then stood with our eyes wide open as we looked at the dozens ofbuses and had no idea which one would take us back to the camp. We didnt even know the name of thesuburb where the camp was located or even in which direction it was from where we were!

We tried asking some of the people waiting at the bus station but none spoke English. Shaking our heads indisbelief at our stupidity at not checking out how to get back to the camp before we left, we then approachedsome of the taxis that were lined up nearby. Eventually we found a driver who spoke English and explainedto him our predicament. When I explained that the camp was on the main road from Greece, he said heknew where the camp was and would take us there.

It turned out that this was no ordinary taxi, it was one of many which picked up other fares along the wayand although it was a big old American car with lots of space, it soon had 7 passengers plus the driversquashed in like sardines! We were so squashed we had trouble breathing even though the windows werewide open! The journey seemed to take hours as he detoured down back streets picking up and dropping off

passengers along the way.

We had no idea how the driver worked out the fares as there was no meter and people were coming andgoing the whole time. When we eventually arrived at the camp, although we had travelled further than anyof the other passengers, the fare was extremely reasonable and we were pleased to have made it back OK.

As for the old van, we took it to a Bedford dealer the next day and it turned out that the problem was the lowoctane fuel sold in Turkey. They tuned the engine to suit the fuel and this solved the problem until wereturned to Italy some weeks later where we had to have the engine retuned for the higher octane fuel soldthere.


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Turkey was a great place to visit despite their lousy fuel!

SPYING DURING THE COLD WAR

SOFIA, BULGARIA

1967

After Turkey, we drove through Bulgaria and stopped in the capital Sofia for a couple of days.

This was at the height of the Vietnam war and there were propaganda posters all around the city showingphotos of captured American soldiers with their tanks and planes. The Soviet masters of these communistsatellite countries ruled them with an iron fist and their presence was felt everywhere.

I carried an 8mm movie camera to record our travels and this may have appeared suspicious to some peopleas we had no sooner started walking around the city centre when we noticed that we were being followed bya grim-faced man. He was staying about 20 metres behind us and whenever I turned around he would lookin a different direction. We werent positive at first that we were actually being followed but after half anhour of seeing the same man still behind us, we were convinced.

I decided to have some fun with him by doubling back every now and then which caused him to scuttlearound trying to hide behind corners or inside shop entrances.

We went into a caf and sat down for coffee and a snack. We could see him pacing up and down outsideand made him wait for quite some time. Eventually we left the caf and he fell into step behind us again. Idid not film much during this time, not so much because of the situation but because there was little ofinterest worth wasting expensive film on.

By this time we were getting tired of having this shadow so ducked into the one and only department storethat existed at that time. We pretended to be interested in the goods that were displayed and noticed thatevery table on the ground floor had the same items for sale, blue work shirts. We then rode the escalator tothe next floor where once again the tables were displaying blue work shirts!

Noticing that our follower was some way behind us at this stage, (maybe he was fascinated by all the bluework shirts) we scurried around to the other side of the store and jumped on the escalator going down as hewas just starting to ride up. By the time we ran outside, he must have been looking for us on the upper floorso we headed back to where we had parked the campervan and took off out of the city centre. Keeping an

eye on the rearview mirror, I was relieved to see that we had escaped the surveillance and appeared to be freeagain.

As a footnote to this story, we then experienced communism at its worst as far as we were concerned.Stopping at an attractive looking modern high-rise hotel, I went inside and asked the woman behind thereception desk if I could have two rooms for the night. (Lenis sister was travelling with us at that time.)The receptionist replied that there were no rooms available. The place appeared to be deserted and thekeyrack behind her was full of room keys. I pointed this out to her and she just flatly reiterated that they hadno rooms for us. Feeling pretty angry by now I asked to see the manager and she replied that it wouldnthelp so I became angrier and said that I wasnt going until I had spoken to him.

She went away and came back with the manager who asked me what my problem was. I told him that wewould like to stay at the hotel and wanted two rooms for the night please. He began to explain theirreluctance to give us rooms when our conversation was interrupted by a group of Russian military officerswho came in demanding accommodation. They were immediately handed keys and signed the guest book.


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After witnessing this I said to the manager that obviously they had rooms available so why couldnt we get acouple. He replied that for a start the Russians had priority and were never to be refused entry whileWesterners were not required to receive the same hospitality. He said that as the hotel was state owned andrun, under the communist system, the hotel employees received the same wages whether anyone stayed thereor not.Therefore, if he gave me the rooms I asked for, they would have to prepare them, as well as having to changethe linen etc. when we departed, cook meals for us and generally have to do extra work. They preferred notto give themselves work if they could get away with it so there was no way he would agree to give us therooms. He then directed us to a pleasant camp nearby which was privately owned and had plenty of spacefor our camper .

No doubt Bulgaria is more receptive to foreigners these days but we have never wanted to return.


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SPEEDING FINE

YUGOSLAVIA

1967

Glad to leave the repressiveness of Bulgaria with its deeply communist regime, we drove into Yugoslaviawhere their form of communism was relatively easygoing.

In Belgrade for instance, we were photographing the impressive parliament building and one of the guardsbeckoned us to walk right up to the main entrance and with gestures, invited us to look inside the main lobbyarea. Of course the president Tito was not around at the time and things may have been different if he had

been but nonetheless we felt that they were friendly towards Western tourists.

The countryside we passed through was very lush and particularly beautiful in the mountain areas.It was while we were driving through the mountains heading towards Zagreb that we suddenly were stopped

by police. There were a number of cars with foreign registration plates lined up along the road and we joinedthe line.

This was well before the days of speed cameras and as we waited I watched the police carry out theirselective halting of cars with the foreign number plates. Yugoslavian cars were not being stopped!

Eventually a policeman approached us and handed me a speeding ticket and requested payment in US dollarsor British pounds. I cannot recall the exact amount but is may have been around 20 dollars.He gave us a receipt and I asked why it was that only foreign cars appeared to be stopped and he explainedthat Yugoslavia was in dire need of foreign currency to pay off some of its international debt and this wasone way they could help!

Despite this questionable method of raising funds, we still enjoyed our short visit to this country.


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HELP, POLICE

ROBBERY IN PROGRESS

ROME, ITALY

1967

Castello St.Angelo

Whilst in Rome during our 3 months travelling around southern Europe, we visited the magnificent CastelloSt.Angelo.

As we walked through the ancient rooms looking at the old relics on display, we marvelled at the design andconstruction of this castle which served as a fortress overlooking the Tiber River.

To reach the parapets and gain a fantastic view of the city of Rome spread out below, one has to traverselong spiral ramps as it is quite a climb to the top.

When we reached the top, I was busy filming in all directions and suddenly my sister-in-law cried out thatshe could see someone forcing open the rear doors of our van which was in the car park directly below wherewe were standing. I looked down and sure enough there was a man getting into the van so I called outHELP, POLICE and starting running back down the long ramp. Calling out all the time for help, I

eventually found myself at the front entrance where the guard refused to let me pass as the exit was rightaround the other side of the building! All this time I was worrying about how many of our things had been


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stolen by now and continued to call out for the Police. No-one seemed particularly interested in my plightand must have thought I was a loony on the loose!

Pushing past the guard, I broke out into the open area in front of the castle and ran to the van.When I got there the back doors were wide open and the thief had disappeared. Climbing inside I lookedaround and apart from noticing a few things scattered around there didnt seem to be anything missing. Ieven found that I had left my wallet on the dashboard with passport etc still intact!

Absolutely amazed, I stepped back out into the sunshine scratching my head in wonderment when I noticedand elderly man sitting on a bench nearby. He beckoned me over and proceeded to explain what had

happened in Italian. As my knowledge of Italian was limited to hello and goodbye, I stopped a passingstudent who said he could speak English. He interpreted the story related by the old man and it seems that henoticed a man forcing the rear doors of the van which obviously belonged to some foreign tourists. Hewatched for a few minutes and when he saw the guy rummaging through the cupboards he called out to him.The would-be thief took fright at being watched, dropped whatever he was holding and took off at greatspeed.

I asked the student to thank the old man and offered to give him some money for saving us from beingrobbed. He refused to take any money but asked if we had American cigarettes as he preferred those to theItalian ones he normally smoked. As it happened, we smoked in those days and had cartons of duty freecigarettes we had bought on the ferry coming over from England.

I gave him a carton and he was very thankful.

What we learned later was that when one parked in a public car park in Rome, there were people hangingaround who would watch over your vehicle for a small fee and if you didnt engage one of them, the chancesof having your car broken into were extremely high!


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BUYING A USED CAR

NEW JERSEY, U.S.A.

1967

Working in the companys New York head office for the first time, we initially stayed in a hotel near theoffice while we looked for an apartment. One of my work friends who had moved from England before ustold us that there was an apartment available where he lived in North Bergen across the Hudson River in

New Jersey. He said that it was only a short bus ride into Manhattan and he walked from the bus stationeach morning across town to the office in Park Avenue.We arranged to go with him after work one evening to look at the place which we liked and agreed to rent

for a 6 months period until my next construction assignment came along.

The apartment wasnt luxurious although considerably better than the London basement flat we had lived inpreviously.

We decided that we would spend weekends visiting the sights of New York and travelling around the area tosee as much of the countryside as we could rather than sit around in the apartment.

We needed a car to get around so while I was at work during the week, Lenis looked at some second handcars in nearby car lots. She finally found a car she liked the look of and we went together on a Saturdaymorning to take it for a test drive. It was a 2 door Chevrolet Corvair, in gold metallic paint and had verylow mileage on the clock. I took it for a drive around North Bergen and quite liked the way it handled.We agreed on a price with the salesman and arranged that he would have the registration changed on the

Monday and come to our apartment that night with the car. I would have the money to pay for it outright so


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CREDIT CARDS

FIRST EXPOSUREMONTREAL, CANADA 1967

We heard about the World Fair that was being staged in Montreal whilst I was working in New York and

as it sounded like a lot of fun, we decided to take a 4-day break and drive up to Canada. This World Fairwas called EXPO 67.The countryside in upper New York State is beautiful and we enjoyed the scenery along the way.

The city of Montreal had set up an accommodation service and on arrival we were booked into a room at aprivate house which was conveniently located opposite one of the stations of the brand new undergroundMetro train system.

The first morning, we took the Metro to the site of the World Fair and as walked through the entrance andalong a walkway leading to the exhibitions, a man stopped us at a booth belonging to Diners Club. Heasked if we had a credit card and we explained that we were from Australia and had been living in Europefor the past two years where credit cards were virtually unheard of.

He suggested that we apply for a Diners Card right there and then which he said would be invaluable for usas we were going to be residing now in the USA where everything can be paid for by credit card.


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X-RAY HEARING

(Shouldnt believe everything you hear)NEW YORK

1967

I had been working in New York at the companys Head Office in Park Avenue for some months when Ideveloped very uncomfortable pains in the region of my stomach.

I was an engineering draftsman in the days when drawings were produced with pencil on transparent filmand we worked on very large drawing boards which could move up and down, swivel from horizontal tovertical position and could be locked in any position between.

We were supplied with chairs that were not unlike bar stools and although reasonably comfortable,It was generally easier to stand most of the time so we could reach all areas of the drawing currently beingworked on.

I explain all this as it is relevant to my problem.

My stomach pains worsened to the extent that I was in so much agony one day I asked the office manager ifhe could recommend a doctor for me to see. He must have thought that there was a chance I could die on the

job so with management approval he arranged a consultation for me with the medical clinic that attends tothe companys directors. Possibly because I was a foreigner whom the company had brought to the USA,they felt somewhat responsible. In any case, I duly arrived at the doctors consulting rooms convenientlylocated only a couple of blocks from the office and was given a thorough examination. The doctor then

proposed that I return the following day to undergo a series of tests that would include drinking a bariummeal then having a set of X-rays taken around the aching area.

The drinking of the thick foul tasting barium meal was an experience I will not expand upon here. Suffice it

to say I would not wish it on my worst enemy!

I returned to the doctors rooms two days later to get the results of the tests and X-rays and had to wait forquite a time as he was busy that morning. I was sitting reading a recent issue of National Geographicmagazine. I recall it was only about 7 years old when I heard the doctor call out to the nurse to bring in theX-rays. They were talking with the door open and I nearly fainted when I heard the doctor remark thatthese were the worst examples he had ever seen and that they were so bad, that even though he was obligedto consult with his partner, he already knew what the outcome would be. By the time I had overheard all ofthis conversation, I was ready to walk outside and step in front of the first Park Avenue bus that came along!

The nurse then came out and told me the doctor would see me now. I entered his office apprehensively andsat down nervously in front of his desk. Looking me squarely in the eye, he advised that they could findnothing wrong with me other than some bruising above my waist which was probably caused by pressingagainst the drawing board all day, every day for months as I leant over the drawings I was working on!Incredibly relieved, I then told the doctor that I had heard him telling the nurse that these were the worst X-


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rays hed ever seen and he laughed and explained that theyd had a salesman in earlier that week trying toconvince them to change the type of X-Ray film they were using. He had left samples for them to try out andthis was the result!

I think that was the night I got my first taste of American Bourbon and it is still one of my favourite drinks!

RICH UNCLE

MISSISSIPPI

1968

My mother was one of 3 children born to a family living in the East End of London, Englandin the early part of the 20 th century. She had a sister and also a brother who showed great promise as amusician at an early age. When he was 16, he told his parents that he wanted to go the USA and make hisfortune and they agreed to let him try. He wrote occasionally to his family telling of his adventures in NewYork City and told them that he this is where hed have the best chance of being a millionaire by the time hewas 21.

During the 1920s and 30s, his parents did not hear from him and it was during that time that they migratedto Australia so it is likely he didnt have their new address anyway.

In the early 1950s an article in a Melbourne newspaper woke us up to what was going on with our long lostuncle Joe. The report with photographs said that a woman claiming to be pregnant with Uncles child, hadlocked herself inside the millionaires mansion in a town called White Plains in upper New York Statesaying that she wouldnt move out until he admitted that he was the father and established suitable financialarrangements on her behalf.Dear uncle then proceeded to deny that he was the father and had the services to the house disconnected. Asit was the middle of winter at the time, without electricity, gas or heating oil, the woman lasted only 2 daysin the freezing house before she emerged and took off to thaw out.

Soon after this event took place, my grandfather received a letter from Joe asking him to visit him in NewYork and airplane tickets were supplied for Gramps and his second wife.They stayed with Joe for some weeks and came back full of praise for the long lost son who had made hisfortune in America.

All of the above is to set the scene for our eventual meeting with this amazing person.

In January 1968, I was assigned to a project in Texas and we drove from New Jersey to Texas via Floridaand Mississippi where Uncle Joe now resided.He lived in a small town called McComb where his factory was located and which was the major employerin the county.We arrived at McComb late afternoon and checked into the first motel we saw. After unpacking, I went tothe desk and asked the manager if I could borrow the phone book to find a number. Being the South, hereplied that he would do it for me and asked the name of the person I wanted to contact. When I told himmy uncles name, he put the book down and saidyou mean Mr. Joe? Everyone in this town knows Mr.Joe! He then dialled Joes home number and passed me the phone.After explaining who I was, he told me to wait there and he would pick us up in a few minutes.


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While we waited, we talked with the motel manager who told us that virtually all the businesses in McCombrelied on Mr. Joes company to such an extent that the locals would say that he virtually owned all ofthem!A short time later, a two block long Cadillac pulled up outside and this short guy puffing on a huge cigarhopped out. He looked just like one of the characters you see in Hollywood movies portraying the successful

but ruthless American businessman who made it to the top having started with nothing.

He took us to his beautiful home where he lived alone having been married and divorced a few times,including having re-married the first wife after having one or two other wives in between !

Realising that it was around dinner time when we were sitting at his place listening to his life story, he

telephoned a couple who worked for him at his factory and told them to come over and cook a meal for hisrelatives who had just dropped in from Australia! We were somewhat embarrassed that he did this but this ishow he operated. He was the Lord of McComb Mississippi and people jumped whenever he told them to.

In a nutshell, he told us that when he arrived in New York as a young lad, he had 10 pounds in his pocketand his violin! He managed to get some odd jobs playing in theatre orchestras and even wrote a musicalwhich was performed in a small theatre there.

None of this was going to make him his fortune and what he observed very quickly was that the people withmoney all centred around Wall Street buying and selling shares.He called on stock-brokers trying to get a position as an apprentice broker and eventually managed to get a

job cleaning the office of a broker for a few dollars a week. The bonus was that after he cleaned the office inthe evening, he could sleep there which saved paying rent !It had a greater advantage though, during the night after he had the cleaned the office, he would sit at the

desks and read the ledgers which had each days trading history neatly written by clerks using pens and inkfrom an inkwell. One of his jobs was to fill the inkwells each night ready for the next days business.Studying the comings and goings of the stock-market proved to be very educational for this lad fromEngland and he found a company in the listings whose shares were being sold off for next to nothing despitethe fact that it was a large structural steel manufacturer. Looking into this company, he found that it ownedall the property and equipment in the factory and had virtually no debts although it appeared to be losingmoney at a terrible rate. He took a train and visited the plant and was most impressed. Returning to NewYork City, he started buying up as many of the shares as he could afford every week and by the time he was19, he was the majority shareholder in this steel company.He then moved on to the board of directors and immediately started to take control of the management of thecompany. By the time he was 21, the company was making tremendous profits and he was a millionaire!

When World War II commenced, the company won some large government contracts to manufacture

components for tanks and personnel carriers and business boomed for him from then on. After the end of thewar and thousands of soldiers who had left home as boys were now returning as adults wanting to getmarried, buy a house and settle down. The latest building material being promoted for new houses wasaluminium and Joe saw a tremendous opportunity to get in on the ground floor of the pending housing boom.He sold the steel plant and moved to Mississippi where jobs were scarce and there was an abundance ofcheap labour available. He also received State Government grants to assist in establishing a largemanufacturing business in the small town of McComb.The factory produced aluminium doors, windows and insect screens with virtually all phases of themanufacturing carried out at the plant. They brought in aluminium ingots and rolled and extruded them intothe various sizes and shapes they needed.

Years later, he moved to Orlando, Florida where he established the companys Research and Developmentdivision and he built himself the most amazing modern house on acres of prime real estate in the heart ofOrlando.


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Anyway, back to 1968 and our meeting with him at his home. When he showed us through, he pointed outthe light switches were diamond studded, the toilets had piped music in them and his bedroom had paintingson the wall that could have been hanging in the state museums around the world.

We suggested to him that he should visit Australia and see the two sisters that he had left behind in Londonsome 50 years earlier. He replied that he would definitely go to see them in the next year or so.

In 1970 when we were again living in Holland, my mother wrote to say that her brother Joe was going tovisit her and in fact stay at the house with her and my father. She was very excited !Months later, she wrote to say that the visit was awful.he did little else but talk about how rich he was andyet not once did he offer to take them out for a meal or pay for anything the whole time he was there. On the

last day he was there he gave Mum a watch which she thought was very nice until a few months later itstopped and when she showed it to a jeweller, he told her it was rubbish and to throw it in the bin! Wasntworth trying to repair it!

Despite (or because of) his millions, he was a miserable old so and so and my mother never wanted to seehim again!

Footnote: At the age of 90, Joe suffered a heart attack and was rushed to hospital where the doctors toldhim he needed a triple by-pass but as he was so old, (and rich) they refused to operate. If he died on the

operating table, they were afraid that they would be sued for millions and the hospital board wouldnt takethe risk. Uncle Joe wasnt ready to leave this world, so turned around and bought the hospital then orderedthe doctors to give him the by-pass!

He lived another 5 years after the operation, no doubt a tired lonely old man!


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WATER SKIING IN NASSAU BAY

(OR HOW TO PUT YOUR FOOT IN IT}

HOUSTON, TEXAS

1968

Living and working in Houston for the first time was an exciting time as life in this cowboy town wasdifferent from anything we had previously experienced. We had found a great apartment in the suburbcalled Nassau Bay which was alongside the NASA Space Centre where at that time, astronauts were being

prepared for the first moon landing. We rubbed shoulders with the Space Centre people every day in thelocal restaurants and supermarkets and in some ways, felt that we were part of this incredible world.

Getting to know Texans and observing the kinds of things that they liked to do was an eye opener for acouple of people brought up in a cultural city like Melbourne as well as having just spent 6 months in NewYork visiting galleries and theatres etc.

In Houston, the main activities were hunting deer, fishing, water sports and swilling beer inside dark anddingy roadside beer joints.

My boss at the time had been born in Texas and although he had worked in many countries around the world,was very happy to be back in his native state and again able to enjoy the things he loved best.

One of these activities was water skiing and he was well equipped with a fine boat and all the necessary gear.We had gone water skiing with Floyd and his wife once before to Lake Houston which was fun but actuallyquite a long drive out of town so when he suggested we water ski another weekend, I came up with the

brilliant idea of skiing on Lake Nassau which was a man-made lake right in the heart of where we lived.Floyd was a little apprehensive as he had never put his boat in there before, but when I pointed out a ski

jump there, he agreed.

Came the big day and he arrived to pick us up and drive the couple of hundred metres to the boat ramp. Welaunched the boat and all jumped in for what we hoped would be a full afternoon of skiing. Once we wereout in the middle of the lake, he suggested that his wife and I should ski as a pair so we put our gear on and

jumped overboard. To our collective surprise, instead of going in over our heads and bobbing back to thesurface as we expected, we went thud into about a foot of muddy reedy water ! Standing there less than kneedeep we must have looked a sorry sight!

We tried to ski but the reeds kept tangling in the boats propeller and we couldnt get up enough momentumto ski properly so we quit and dragged the boat back onto the trailer.We then spent most of the rest of the afternoon cleaning the weeds from the propeller and underside of the

boat.

I apologised to Floyd who was upset that my suggested venue turned out to be a lemon and for wasting hisday for water sports.


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Despite the fact that we lived in the area and often walked around the lake, we had had no indication that itwas so shallow and had often seen boats whizzing around so assumed it must have been a decent depth.

Needless to say, for the rest of our time in Houston, we were not invited to go water skiing again with theboss!

WEEKEND IN PARADISE

CARRIBBEAN INVESTMENT

1968

Whilst residing in Houston in 1968, we happened to read an ad in the Houston Post one weekend whichoffered inexpensive holidays with a travel club which had its own luxurious aeroplane, a triple tailedConstellation, proudly painted along the entire fuselage with the American flag.We thought that this sounded marvellous so went to the next club meeting where we were so impressed withtheir operation, we joined up immediately at the end of the meeting.Shortly after, we received notification that the club was planning a 4 day trip to a luxurious resort inAcapulco in Mexico and we jumped at the chance to take a holiday there.

At that time, the main airport in Houston was called Hobby Airport and had been built when Houston was amuch smaller place. As the city expanded, the airport became surrounded by what was now one of its innersuburbs and we happened to be living nearby and were just becoming accustomed to the roar of the planesflying just above our roof all day causing the TV picture to go all wavy.

Anyway, the time came for us to leave for the holiday and we fronted up at Hobby Airport Saturday morningwith our suitcase packed with beach attire and books to read as we pictured ourselves lazing about on sunlounges sipping tequila cocktails! We joined the group of excited fellow club members in the exit loungewhile the club president told us about the type of accommodation they had reserved for us and about theentertainment the resort usually provided.We stood around for an exceptionally long time chatting with the other travellers until we began to suspectthat something was wrong. The club president went off to talk with our pilot and when he returned, told usthat the hold up was due to bad storms between Texas and Mexico which were right on our flight path. The

pilot was waiting until they subdued before he could submit his flight plan to the authorities. Another 2hours passed and we were all getting fidgety when they announced that the storms had turned into hurricaneswhich meant that the trip had to be cancelled. The club president then suggested that we could either go toLas Vegas or to the Bahamas instead of Acapulco and we would take a vote on it. All but a few of the

people wanted to go to the Bahamas so the president raced off to make arrangements for accommodation.

An hour later we took off.

The Constellation is a large plane propelled by 4 conventional engines which meant that it did not fly as highor as fast as the modern jets. This gave us a great view of the countryside as we flew over east Texas,Louisiana, Mississippi and Florida before passing close to Cuba and arriving on Grand Bahama Island.After a marvellous welcome by the Customs and Immigration officials at the airport we were taken by bus toa fantastic modern resort hotel with its own private beach. We enjoyed every moment of our stay there andwere wined and dined in great style every meal.

One day while wandering around the small village near our hotel, we spotted advertising signs outside realestate agents shops, offering land for sale in a new estate being developed in the middle of the island. Wetalked with an agent who explained about the development and then took us for a drive to look at the blocksof land. The best blocks were those which fronted onto a waterway that was being cut right across theisland but these were of course very expensive. We settled on a nice block at the end of a court which had a

proposed green belt running along the rear boundary.


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The development was being sold on the basis of 10% deposit and monthly payments at very low interest.There was also an annual service fee which was supposedly to cover installation of services such as power,water and sewage at a later date once people started to build homes on the sites.We signed a contract of sale and some time later, when we were back in Houston, we received a copy of thecontract confirming that we now owned a slice of paradise. Every year following payment of the annualservice fee, we would receive a glossy magazine showing how the development was going and what plansthe local community had to ensure that this would become a showpiece of the Caribbean.

Some years later, when we were living in Belgium, we decided to pay off the remaining amount of the loanand received the title for the land which was a very impressive looking documentStrangely, the title which had originated from a New York lawyers office, showed our signatures but as we

had never been near that lawyers office, someone certainly had copied them from the original contract ofsale document! From the first dealings with this development company, nothing about the way theyoperated ever seemed to be strictly above board although on the surface they seemed to be professional andstraight forward.

A couple of years later, the glossy magazines stopped arriving and we had a suspicion that nothing washappening in the grand development so stopped sending the annual fee. We then wrote to a couple ofestate agents asking them to sell our land and one wrote back to say that they had more lots on their booksthan there were buyers. During the intervening years, The Bahamas had attained independence fromBritain and now had its own government. The new government proved unpopular with overseas investorsand the countrys reputation as a tax haven suffered to the extent that development dried up. Apparentlyafter all these years, no-one had built houses on the hundreds of vacant lots and most buyers had beensuckers like us who had fallen in love with the place whilst on vacation and had no intention of ever building

houses! Also like us, they had grown tired of paying out good money every year to a developmentcompany that did not use it for the purpose originally intended, and now they were all trying to get theirmoney back for the land.

To cut a long story short, we tried on and off for many years to unload the land and eventually after havinghad it for more than 30 years, we sold it for about one third of what we had originally paid and then onlyafter we had paid all the outstanding annual service fees owing. We finished up losing a lot of money onthis investment but like to feel that for some time at least, we were able to brag about owning our ownlittle Slice of Paradise!

We believe that we must be amongst a small group of people in the world who purchased a block of land,held it for 30 years then sold it at a loss!


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This is the block of land with its new ownerTHE HORSEMAN & FISHERMAN

HAWERA, NEW ZEALAND

1969

Spending a year in New Zealand working on construction of the Kapuni natural gas processing plant was notexactly an exciting period of our travels. Life in this part of the world was extremely quiet with virtually noentertainment other than an occasional rock concert in larger nearby towns such as New Plymouth.The plant was located in the dairying province of Taranaki at the foothills of the Fuji like Mount Egmont(since renamed Mount Taranaki).

We joined a pottery class held one night each week in the local high school to give ourselves somethinginteresting to do.

There wasnt even a restaurant in Hawera, the small town we lived in, only a couple of pubs and a fish and

chip shop. We had to drive to New Plymouth or Wanganui to dine out for a reasonable meal and they werea 120 kms round trip from Hawera !

We often took a picnic into the nearby countryside at weekends and usually chose a spot alongside one of themany streams that ran from the scenic extinct volcano, Mount Egmont (since renamed Mount Taranaki).As streams were stocked with trout, I bought a fishing licence and would attempt to catch some for ourdinner. Mostly the fish were much smarter than I and we went home empty handed.I was fishing once during my lunch break at the construction site where a stream ran through the back of the

property when along came a parks ranger and threw a stick of dynamite into the water. Within seconds,stunned trout floated to the surface and he carefully tagged each one before tossing them back. They soonrecovered and swam away leaving me thinking that maybe I would do better that way rather than throwing aline in!

One lovely sunny afternoon as we sat by one of these picturesque streams, a young girl road up on amagnificent tan horse. We struck up a conversation and she explained that her family owned the farmlandall around us and she was lucky enough to have acres of property to ride her horse.


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She then asked if either of us would like to have a ride and Lenis immediately declined but suggested that Ishould take it for a spin . Now, I have to say that my riding experience mainly centred on riding thecarousel at Lunar Park when I was a child and once hiring a horse when on holiday with a friend. That ridewas a disaster because after going only about 200 metres from the stables, the nag turned around and tookme straight back to where we had begun and then refused to go any further !Anyway, as both Lenis and the girl were insistent that I ride this beautiful gentle horse, I agreed and theyhelped me to climb into the saddle. No sooner did I grab the reins and get my feet firmly into the stirrupswhen the horse took off like greased lightning! We disappeared over a hill at incredible speed and I wasexpecting to hear the crowd cheering us on as we zoomed past the winning post!I had absolutely no control over this horse and he did whatever he wanted with me hanging on like grim

death! I began to panic especially when it ran right up against a boundary fence and tried to tip me off overits neck! I was calling out for help and hanging on for dear life when eventually the girl came running upand grabbed the reins and settled the horse down. She explained that horses know when a rider is not incontrol and therefore dont want them on their backs.

I dismounted, thanked the girl and have never attempted to ride a horse again.

RIGHT OF WAY- NEW ZEALAND STYLE

TARANAKI, NEW ZEALAND

1969

During the year we lived in New Zealand, we never quite got used to animals wandering all over the mainroads and fortunately, we personally never had a meeting of our car and a sheep or cow.

Despite the lush countryside of the North Island, farmers were determined to get just that little bit more feedfor their animals by letting their herds graze along the side of the country roads. Now this was apparentlyquite legal although they were supposed to string a low voltage wire along the edge of the road to keep the

beasts contained between the farmers property fence and the traffic.

Sometimes they complied with the regulation and other times they didnt bother. This resulted in driverssuddenly coming around a bend and finding sheep and cows all over the road as they searched for some juicylong grass!

Many was the time when we found ourselves driving along a country road, rounding a bend and having to hitthe brakes suddenly because there were sheep ambling along down the middle of the road! Drivers were not

permitted to toot the horn and frighten the sheep, but had to patiently crawl along behind them until suchtime as the leader of the flock decided to move to the side of the road and start nibbling the grass. It wasvery frustrating, particularly if one was on the way to an appointment and didnt have a lot of time to spare.

The interesting point concerning this regulation is that although the farmer is required to graze his animals ina responsible manner, a vehicle driver who unfortunately finds himself in an altercation with one of them, isin fact the guilty party. The rules of the road give right of way to animals that after all are the backbone tothe New Zealand economy!

My company was building a natural gas plant on some farmland in the province of Taranaki and we had aperson appointed by the government to watch over our construction activities throughout the year we werethere.


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This fellow had the misfortune late one night as he was driving home after visiting friends when he collidedwith a rather large cow in the middle of the country road. He was slightly injured, the car was a write-offand the cow was dispatched to animal heaven!

The driver was subsequently charged with dangerous driving and killing an animal from which its ownerderived income. He had to pay for a replacement cow, court costs and a further hefty fine for the dangerousdriving.

This experience showed clearly who has the right of way in New Zealand and how important the meat anddairy industries are to the economy of that country.

DANGEROUS DRIVING NEW ZEALAND

A KIWI KANGAROO COURT

HAWERA, NEW ZEALAND

1969

We had rented a house on the outskirts of the small town of Hawera which is home to New Zealands largestcheese making factories. The house was situated on the main road that leads to the site where we were

building the plant and I found this to be very convenient. At least that was until our superintendent (who hadbeen brought out from the companys Paris office), decided that twice a week, he would leave his companysupplied car for his wife to use and instructed me to pick him up on those mornings. Unfortunately, he lived


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in a house in the old part of town and this meant that I had to drive through the town to where he was livingthen return back past my place to head for the site. This also meant having to get up earlier and that added tomy displeasure!

One bright sunny morning, as I drove through the town, I collided with a van that turned across my path at anintersection without signalling that the driver intended to do so. The van rolled over spilling loaves of breadonto the roadway.I bumped my head on the rearview mirror and the van driver had some cuts and bruises.A nice lady from the house on the corner came running out with cups of tea whilst we waited for the policeto arrive.Some 15 minutes later up rode the constable on his rusty bicycle looking like something straight out of a

British comedy show, Bobby helmet and all! Out came his little notebook and so began question time for thetwo drivers.The van driver, who was the towns only baker, admitted that he hadnt signalled that he was turning andagreed that basically he was at fault. We then had to go to the police station which as it turned out wasabout 100 meters away from the accident scene, and sign the statements.I called my boss and told him what happened and was given the day off to recuperate from this shockingevent!The next days local newspaper carried the story on the front page with graphic photographs showing thedamaged vehicles and headlines exclaiming LARGE AMERICAN CAR HITS LOCAL BAKERS VAN.(The large American car was actually an Australian built Ford Falcon station wagon. It is the blue car thatcan be seen parked in front of the house in the photo above).

Nothing more was heard about the event until a few weeks later we had a visit one evening from two

detectives explaining that I had been charged with dangerous driving and was to appear at the town hall thefollowing week to face the travelling Magistrate who called in once a month to handle such cases.A New Zealand friend suggested that I hire a local lawyer to look after things for me and recommended a

particular mate of his for the task. A couple of visits to the lawyer and some hundreds of dollars later, wewere ready to face the Magistrate. Suitably attired in my best suit and tie, I arrived at the town hall and satdown with the lawyer. The Magistrate was seated up on the stage and called for the police to read out thecharge. The policeman had prepared a large drawing of the crime scene which was completely out of scaleand showed heavy black lines signifying my car braking for a long distance before the intersection. He thenread out a number of chapters from an American publication which referred to traffic accidents in the 1930swhere skid marks had been measured and estimates made of the speed of the car prior to the collision. Fromthose old cases he had ascertained that I must have been travelling at more than 70 kms per hour and this wasa 60 km per hour zone. I pointed out to my lawyer that the drawing he had prepared was totally misleadingdue to it being so far out of scale and I had an engineering drafting knowledge to back up my statement.

Secondly, motor cars built in the 1930s had poor braking systems and needed much longer distances to stopthan modern vehicles of the late 1960s. My lawyer replied that these were good and valid points but in thistype of hearing, one is not allowed to question the evidence presented by the police.

After the policeman had finished giving his theories on the cause of the collision, the Magistrate called onme to come up on stage and relate my side eof the story. I explained what I was doing in this town andwhere I was going on the morning of the crash. I pointed out strongly that visibility was excellent thatmorning and that as I approached the intersection, I saw a van moving towards mewhich suddenly turned right across my path without signalling. I was too close to it to stop in time andalthough braking hard, my car nudged the side of the van and it rolled over.There really was nothing I could have done to prevent the accident and I said this to the magistrate.The van driver was then called to tell his story which went something like this.

tales of an ex-patriot august 2010

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