(U) Kilmore (3)

24th September 1991  Birth of my daughter.

 The blowfly had a young sidekick called Rasputin who was an interesting and influential character in this drama.

T
On a very special day–the day of my daughter  birth to be precise - when the new Principal "Billy Bunter'  was away on business in Melbourne, a most peculiar sequence of events took place: The twenty-fourth of September was a memorable day on all fronts.

At two in the morning Maria  felt her labour pains and off we went to the hospital in which happened to be just beside the school where I was acting as Principal in the absence of Billy Bunter who as in some far off place in Melbourne. It was a very long delivery and my wife  claims that I spent much of it reading a book of short stories by Thomas Hardy!

Anyway, at about eight o'clock in the morning I staggered out of the hospital and went directly to work. I was in fact early and I was the first person at school - or so I thought. In fact, when I got there I met Mr. Coldfish , who had been a  former Deputy Principal-my predecessor no less-and who had resigned some time before my arrival. as time progressed I might other Zombies like Coldfish, in the community, who had worked in the school and fallen out of favour with the blowfly, and been demoted or fired.

I couldn't think what Coldfish would be doing there so early in the morning. He hated the place. I knew he had had several confrontations with the blowfly, eventually resigned in disgust before my arrival - that is one reason I was appointed-to replace him.

Anyway, on my arrival, coldfish came in to my office and said

" I'm sorry to have to do this to you, it's got nothing to do with you, but I'm resigning as a teacher as from this moment "

He promptly handed over his keys and walked off the premises! I had precisely 20 minutes to cover all his classes etc .


This alarming situation was made much worse when the boarding master, the one and only Rasputin___ decided to assist things by going into the boarding house and announcing to all of the students that Coldfish had resigned and that Rasputin, too was also resigning.

Rasputin  was the Senior Boarding Master in a small school of about thirty students!


 A few minutes later, I remember Rasputin  meeting me at the photocopier , presenting me with his resignation,  and saying he had given a copy to the blowfly. 

The blowfly  and Rasputin were very good friends. There is honor and friendship among thieves. I didn't like Rasputin. he disliked me because I threatened his influence over the blowfly. He wanted to discredit me and so made things worse by resigning in order to show the blowfly that he needed Rasputin more than he needed me. There was worse to come.

On hearing of Rasputin's resignation form Rasputin himself the boarding students, not altogether surprisingly, decided to exit the building and sit down on the public road outside the school on strike, just in a place conspicuus enough for the public to see.

At this point I confess I retreated to the science lab at the back of the complex , well outside the battle zone in order to gather my thoughts.

I was wondering what the hell to do!.

There were only about six permanent members of staff at this school. Two of them had just resigned and the third, and most effective - my assistant ,  was in Adelaide for the weekend at a marriage. The blowfly swung into action. He persuaded Rasputin,  little lapdog that he was, to retract his resignation.

Slowly the students started returning to the building.

The reader may be wondering (like I was at the time ) just why Rasputin  had resigned. Well, the truth was I think it was because he felt  threatened by my arrival. He certainly felt he should have been given my job. I think this was his way of not only getting rid of Coldfish, whom he hated, but also me, whom he did not quite hate yet. (But only because he hadn't quite known me long enough for his contempt to change into hatred)

The ‘strike’ was important in another way because Billy Bunter (who was relaxing in Melbourne ____ realized now that he had a real job on his hands – not just a sinecure.

Worse still for me, it became clear to me in the next few weeks that the blowfly  had no time for billy Bunter, and for once I think the blowfly was probably right).
Billy bunter  was lazy. He thought he had a cushy number but he was dead wrong! Soon the Blowfly and his wife were sharpening their knives for the final coup de grace. I knew what was going to happen but I didn't want it to happen- so desperately I didn't want it to happen. But I knew it just had to. I was nervous – no, neurotic - with anxiety.

Soon after this strike , ( but only about three months after our arrival in Australia) Billy Bunter came to me and said

"Look, the blowfly  is mad, completely mad!"

I told him that I had already had known this for some weeks. I confided to Billy Bunter  H that I did not want to have to take over should he decide to leave. Billy Bunter  reassured me by saying "Don, If I decide to leave , you'll be the first to know!"

Famous last words!

However, like many things at this school the manner of his leaving came as a complete surprise not just to me but to everyone. Billy  invited all the teachers to a Christmas party, which, as nowhere else was available was actually held , at my house.

It was the 24nd of December 1991. I remember it well. A couple of other teachers were leaving and it rained very heavily. I remember Billy  leaving early in the pours of rain. It was Christmas Eve.

It was the last time I ever saw him. A few days later I discovered that he had come back to the school the next day and resigned-on Christmas day. I was stunned, to say the very least. Shattered would be a more accurate description –I had backed the wrong horse again –and confided in Billy Bunter  too much –just like the Yorkshireman, his predecessor,  and the  Chairman.

This time there was nothing to be done. I had to take over as Principal, or go home. The latter was not on option because we had no money at all. we could not have paid for the flight.

I began to have panic attacks around this time . I was very nervous indeed about the future. The only person who could possibly have taken over was my assistant. But, not surprisingly, she was not interested. She could see that the chances of survival in such a job were not very high. She had been there almost since the beginning.

The first Principal of this school in the late eighties was " Zombie 1", a local teacher from a local  catholic school . This man, by all accounts was a good man , a good teacher and a good manager.

Unfortunately , he turned out to have no teaching qualifications.

When the Registered Schools Board of Victoria got wind of this he was given his marching orders.

He was followed by another Zombie (2) an  from Scotland who had wide experience of the IB but was an academic in the true sense of the word and soon fell out with the blowfly  as they were not on the same page.

Zombie 2  eventually resigned in disgust and spent six months sitting in the bush working out what to do - something I was later do myself. This was all before I arrived

Then came the Yorkshireman, and then yours truly.

I forgot yo mention the original business manager, who was also a Zombie . He was actually still alive in the community and I  later got to know him. Lets call him 'Bombie' as his name began with a B.

Back to Christmas 1991....

There was nothing to do about Billy Bunter_ - he was gone and had not said a word to me as he had promised!.

Once again I articulated my misgivings to the Chairman , who was by now becoming a bit weary of the blowfly and myself. In the end I knew I had no choice. The one thing I had to my advantage was that the blowfly seemed to like me or was pretending to like me, I'm not sure which it was. He thought he needed me for the time being.

My assistant and her husband very kindly invited us to stay in their house in Adelaide for Christmas, I had come to respect and admire both of them. We had the use of a house in Adelaide and we thoroughly enjoyed the break. I liked Adelaide - it seemed small, clean and civilized.

My assistants husband (also a teacher) suggested the  idea  of solving  the problem of the school management by forming  a management committee.

This turned out to be a great success at first because the blowfly, who was of course on the committee, was in some measure held accountable for what he said and did! I don’t think he was used to this! It worked very well for about six months but in the end it was it was it’s very success which caused it to fail.

 The blowfly decided he  didn’t like being accountable and realized what was happening. He started to ignore the committee and later to actively sabotage it.

But at first it all went well. I had only been appointed to act as Principal temporarily.

I then made a big mistake. Things were going so well that I decided to apply for the job of Principal. I suppose I deluded myself that I could keep the blowfly sweet. 

This turned out to be a major miscalculation

In February 1992 interviews took place for the position. People came from all over the world and in the end no one was appointed. When I took over as ‘Acting Principal in January, I had no intention of of applying for the job. But it went so well for a few months mainly due to the efforts of my assistant  and the general support of the teachers that I was tempted to apply for it. The blowfly  seemed to think I was wonderful (and probably a lot cheaper than an import). I was the blue-eyed boy for a few months.In the end I did apply but was not successful.

The job was given to mr smoothoperator, an Australian, who was at the time Head of an  International school in Germany. Smoothoperator wanted to come back to Australia. But he still had 18 months to run on his contract. This arrangement suited the blowfly down to the ground. He got the kudos for the school of a big fish like smoothtalker  , who was a big name in the council for international schools and  the IB. Meanwhile, on the cheap, I was to be Acting Principal for the eighteen months. It suited me fine. no extra money of course, but i would have the use of the car.

As has been the case throughout my entire career, I was pleased to have any job at all.

(T) Australia, Kilmore

Meanwhile I had started to meet a few academics in the International Baccalaureate community of Australia –which was very small at that time. I remember meeting the IB Australasia representative Chris B who was introduced to me at a conference in Sydney. He obviously knew a fair bit about the history of the school. His almost immediate reaction to me was ‘Why couldn’t they get an Australian to do the job?’ What amazed me was that he said to himself as if he were talking out loud to , and deliberately within my earshot. This was my first experience of Australian bluntness and rudeness in the professional environment!

He had said it without even asking one question about my experience or qualifications! I thought it a quite extraordinarily rude thing to say to my face! The implication being what could I possibly offer that an Australian could not-or to put more succinctly ‘We Australians can do anything as well , if not better than, any foreigner can’. I was to meet this type of reaction time and time again in Australia. The reality was that my job had been advertised in Australia and, for some reason, I know not why, they had not been able to fill the post. That was hardly my fault was it? The job had then advertised in the British press. But B was typical of so many ‘educated’ Australians who did not give you the time to tell them the truth –they could not even conceive of the idea that an Australian institution would have to advertise overseas-it offended their sense of national pride! Although it is beside the point , my own guess is that W did not want an Aussie to do the job because he knew no Aussie would put up with him, and he knew he could ‘control’ an unsuspecting foreigner with a family through the temporary work visa I had.

Australians assumed they we had , like all foreigners, wanted to migrate to Australia to get a job at the expense of the ‘Real’ Dinky Di (Australian born) Aussies.

Actually the truth was we never had any intention of settling in Australia. I regarded it as another few years in another country. We did obtain Australian citizenship in ther end but it was not our initial intention, I had no wish to remain there. I fervently hoped (in vain, as it turned out) that I would not have to return to Australia in order to be near to my children! The reality is that Australia , just like England, Ireland, the rest of Europe and the USA only permit migration becausethey t need workers to pay taxes to support their elderly , and to do the dirty jobs they are not prepared to do themselves. It is high time they were more honest about it. The Australian economy would collapse without it’s legal migrants in the same way the California would collapse without the Mexican ‘Illegals’.

I admire a lot about Australia – especially it’s economic and governmental infrastructure and of course it’s physical beauty. There is a preparedness to innovate and experiment which is refreshing after the ‘Old world’. In a very short time Australia has achieved an enormous amount from inauspicious beginnings. They are right to be proud of these achievements. But in some quarters this pride has been overdone to the point of complacency and arrogance. Many Australians value their independence to a fault. And that leaves me cold. The easiest way to offend some Australians I met seemed to be to offer them something, anything-even a beer or a cup of tea! They would perhaps forgive you an injury you caused them, but not an invitation, a gift, or worst of all an offer of assistance !

The underlying attitude seemed to be ‘What could I possibly need from you that I haven’t already got?”. Many other cultures have developed a spirit of cooperation and interdependence between individuals in order for the group or community to survive. – I can think of many other places I have lived where this is the case in Africa, South America or Mexico. In these places through cooperation individuals seem experience the joy and exhilaration of a communal sense of identity and security. This is what sustains their life. This is what makes them get up in the morning.. But it is precisely this that seems to be lacking in Australia –and in many north European type cultures and their derivatives including the USA. . The joy for an Australian, European or American seems to be obtained in the grim and relentless pursuit of independence from his human companions. His ‘Nirvana’ is to live alone and be completely self sufficient-‘I am an island –I need no-one’ To me this was typified in the quite common but nonetheless staggering quote which I encountered time and time again. “We have a wonderful house ..etc. etc. .. and best of all - NO neighbours!” The last thing wanted was a neighbour. How very, very sad. Of course this trait is also present in England, Northern Europe and the USA, and I’m sure lots of other places too. It is also present in modern Ireland. It is perhaps the hallmark of the “Developed” country. But it seemed to me to be more marked in Australia than anywhere else I had been.

It did not suit me at all. I like the ‘drop-in’ cultures such as in Africa or Mexico, where people feel honoured by your visit and do not look at you quizzically when you arrive on their doorstep as if to say ‘What do you want?’ or even worse, look at you with suspicion! I like cultures where socializing and friendship is valued for it’s own sake – and not as a means to an end. I like cultures where people honour my visit. With some exceptions , sadly, I did not find Australia to be like that. The social life didn’t suit me at all. The exceptions of course –the Foleys and Anne L and the Wares - only served to prove the rule. There were not nearly enough exceptions of them to satisfy my Irish thirst for chat and exchanging experiences. The social life was all in fact very similar to the ‘modern’ Northern Ireland we had just left!

The most absurd thing of all was to find that Australians considered themselves to be a friendly people.

Australians were rarely, if ever hostile –certainly not to us. No-one ever said ‘Piss off back to Ireland’ Even if they had it wouldn’t have upset me. In fact it would have been a relief if they had! No it was something else which did upset me. In many, there seemed to be a strong passive aggression-a smouldering resentment of foreigners about which the Aussies were in denial.

We felt this on a daily basis. A sense that you were excluded – almost as though we were invisible in fact. Many ‘Back door Aussies’ as we were humourrously referred to by our hosts - people in similar circumstances as ourselves, confessed to having the same feeling of being ignored and cold - shouldered by ‘Dinky Di’ Australians. Later on, it was also been interesting for me to see the same phenomenon manifest itself in Brunei. The Australians all socialised together like a group of gabbling geese clucking and screeching at each other and creating a bogus false sense of ‘Bonhomie’ which fooled no-one other than themselves. When a foreigner approached the group he/she was invariably ignored and left with an immense sense of frustration. There was an almost physical sense of being invisible to these people. I often felt like screaming at them at the top of my voice “Go back to Australia and live on your own”


Their lack of interest in anything about one’s background or personal history is obvious to any foreigner arriving the country to settle. (to tourist Aussies can be very friendly).

Most Aussies seemed not to brook even the slightest criticism of their country or culture. The Irish have coped with the English thru humour in the same way as the Mexicans have coped with the invading Americans. The French cope with the English with humpur and vice-versa. But many Aussies just seemed to me to be unable to cope with criticism from foreigners because they had not really developed a real sense of humour about themselves. (At least not by 1991)