There's A Hole In My Pocket Dear Lisa
*
The colonel said "these bodies stink wont someone come and drag them away"
we try to clean them up but they mow us down
and the English colonel looks the other way
oh the spirit is willing but the flesh is weak
well I ran for the trench but I had no time to speak
well my heart said yes
but my head said no
when the English
colonel said "its time to go"
He said "Whats a few men?"
He said "Whats a few men?"
He said "Whats a few men?"
The colonel's job is never done
So he declares timeout on Christmas Day
We held the enemy in our arms
and we ploughed each others dead into the clay
well the Lord said death will be no longer
and all of these things will pass away
there will be no sorrow and there will be no pain
and we'll swap cigrettes on christmas day
well my heart said yes
but my head said no
when the english colonel said "its time to go"
He said "Whats a few men?"
He said "Whats a few men?"
He said "Whats a few men?"
Hunters and Collectors
Even then, all through April, he longed to be somewhere else. He had looked at the treks through Nepal, leisurely, four or five hours walking and then stop at an allegedly off the tourist track village for a couple of days. Life transforming. Getting fit. Drinking in dazzling landscapes. The tiered rice paddies. The spectacular mountains. Price a little over $US3,000 plus airfares. He could claim 70 cents a word but that was never going to cover the costs. And it still seemed that fraction early, with Henrietta still in her second last year of High School. So he stayed in Sydney and the damp days followed each other. Suzy is moving back to Moree today; and there is disturbance in the air. Even details like toilets in exotic places fed into his dream.
And always that travelling, that rhythmic necessity, to be well and truly holed up somewhere by three in the afternoon. The best times of his life had been travelling and he hadn't been anywhere - except for the shack - for ages. These festered dreams, feverish in their intensity, the desire to be somewhere else. Old men mutter about how Sydney just isn't what it used to be. Veiled women man the cash registers, a very different place. We changed everything. And everything we raled against in the old days came true, and God sought his vengeance. Oh crystal tree, Christmas tree, warmth from so long ago, family at the hearth, but in isolation was desolation. While magnificent people lived grand lives on our television screens. And all that had occurred became meaningless, erased by a constant search for the new.
These ragged groups that he was going to write about, they barely mattered now. Other tragedies had overtaken their pointless deaths; the tragic beauty of self destruction not even a whisper in the branches of history. Only he could remember. Only he thought it important. Savage losers. Delinquent queens. Those fabulous bars, fabulous stories. He was shortened and fare welled, even before his looks began to fade. Cheapened, sold. Everything had a price. His hadn't amounted to much more than a bottle of whisky and a flashy car. Never do it with a bloke except for money. Rule one. So we ended up in the craziest of places. Piling into the back of vans. Hearing stories of the boy who had to dig his own grave in the National Forest, as we passed through the twisted angophoras on the way to Scarborough, the pub on the hill, the pub where, in the old days when you had to travel 20 miles or more to be served a drink on a Sunday, we all went to get sloshed.
To get sloshed and oggled and to triumph in the lunacy of the campest place in town; well technically out of town. There's a hole in my pocket, dear Lisa, dear Lisa, there's a hole in my pocket dear Lisa a hole; went the trashy old drag queen who put on a show most Sundays, and who, like all those grand old queens of the day, had a marvellously tragic and courageous story to tell. It wasn't that easy to be different in those days. Now it's de rigeur. Well that's not true either anymore, with the new conservatism, the modesty in the streets. He could scream out at the herd and nothing would happen. The buildings still soared above them, utterly indifferent. He was surprised that he should even care, that anyone could expect humanity in a place like this.
And then all those flashes happened all over again. He was in the mountains and he was being welcomed with chai. His limbs ached from the daily walking but he felt better than he had felt in years. The scenery was exquisite. Their guesthouse had a rudimentary charm, he was immediately in love. The team leader was complex and beautiful and a mine of information if you bothered to ask. Patterns formed amongst the travellers. He was so desperate to be away. Why were the Christians persecuted at Passover? Why did even the pure of heart and instinct, at least in a befuddled way, also have to suffer? Selected out for pain. Because pain makes you stronger. What doesn't kill you... Oh cheery oh! He had a smoke by the waterfall down below the village. He couldn't have been happier.
Why don't we seize the destiny which is so manifestly in front of us? Why can't he find his way to the heart of things? Why do we continue on through dreary days that never change. One seedy part of the city or the other. One court or another. The occasional stake-out of the rich and mighty. He was gathering his lost clan. Those who hadn't already passed. He was ashamed not to be who he used to be; older, uglier, bigger. And so he laughed at them with his new found sophistication instead. And he crowds moved through the Star Casino, largely Asian, they love their gambling. Smart cars and dazzling views, lights reflected on the water, the ever present Bridge, the finger wharfs now renovated, beautifully restored. He looked at the view and wondered why his family had not conquered. And he knew his humble story was meant for a purpose; even though he was not in Nepal, not sitting by the waterfall, not talking intensely to people from all over the world.
THE BIGGER STORY:
http://www.google.com/hostednews/ap/article/ALeqM5g3j-vAVG1fg3kEfnogTiH8_4EXvwD97HABI82
BANGKOK (AP) — Thai soldiers sprayed automatic weapons fire and threw tear gas to clear anti-government protesters from a major intersection in the capital in the pre-dawn darkness Monday, with at least 70 people reported injured. Demonstrators responded by hurling at least one gasoline bomb at a line of troops.
Monday's clash marked a major escalation in the ongoing protests that have roiled this southeast Asian nation. The skirmish came a day after the country's ousted prime minister called for a revolution.
While the government has declared a state of emergency, protesters controlled many streets in the capital Bangkok. They had earlier commandeered public buses and forced military vehicles to halt, in one case climbing on top of two armored personnel carriers, waving flags and shouting "Democracy."
A mob of the red-shirted protesters smashed cars carrying Prime Minister Abhisit Vejjajiva and his aides on Sunday.
The red-shirted demonstrators are supporters of ousted former Prime Minister Thaksin Shinawatra who want new elections, saying Abhisit's four-month-old government took power illegitimately. They also accuse the country's elite — the military, judiciary and other unelected officials — of undermining democracy by interfering in politics.
Parliament appointed Abhisit in December after a court ordered the removal of the previous pro-Thaksin government citing fraud in the 2007 elections. Thaksin supporters took to the streets in protest, and their numbers grew to 100,000 in Bangkok last week.
http://www.abc.net.au/news/stories/2009/04/13/2541277.htm?section=australia
Tamil protesters outside Kirribilli House have vowed to remain there until the Australian Government takes some action about the conflict in Sri Lanka.
Three of the protesters are on a hunger strike that started on Saturday, and have also said they will continue until their demands are met.
Around 150 protesters are staging a sit-in on the roads outside Kirribilli House and Admiralty House (the Governor-General's Sydney residence), calling on the Australian Government to push for an immediate and permanent ceasefire between Government forces and the Tamil Tigers in Sri Lanka.
The protest started yesterday, with police estimating a crowd of about 800 people gathered outside Kirribilli House at the peak of the demonstration.
Detective Inspector David Maguire says a decision was made to let the protesters stay.
"It's been a peaceful demonstration about what's happening in their homeland, and they wish to get a message across to the Australian government," he said.
"There's a lot of families here, a lot of children, a lot of women, and so there's no intention at the moment to forcibly remove them."
The only major moment of tension this morning came when a man tried to carry an anti-Tamil Tiger sign into the protest, but he was stopped by police.
The protesters want Prime Minister Kevin Rudd to call for an immediate cease-fire in northern Sri Lanka and for the Government there to allow media to enter the conflict zone.
Sri Lanka's President has ordered Government troops to halt their offensive against cornered Tamil Tigers rebels for two days to give tens of thousands of civilians a chance to escape the fighting.
http://www.nytimes.com/2009/04/13/us/politics/13obama.html?ref=politics
One Obama Search Ends With a Puppy Named Bo
By HELENE COOPER
Published: April 12, 2009
WASHINGTON — For the first time since settling into the White House, the Obama family attended church services in Washington on Sunday, but their closely watched search for a spiritual home was overshadowed by news that a longer quest — for a dog — had ended.
President Obama and his family attended Easter services at St. John’s Episcopal Church, across Lafayette Square from the White House. Known as the “Church of the Presidents,” it is where President George W. Bush often attended services and where the Obamas went for special services on Inauguration Day.
There has been much speculation in Washington about which church the president and his family will regularly attend. They have not had a home church since the presidential campaign, when Mr. Obama and his family left Trinity United Church of Christ on the South Side of Chicago after a controversy involving the Rev. Jeremiah A. Wright Jr. On the Sunday before he was sworn in, Mr. Obama attended Nineteenth Street Baptist Church in Washington.
The White House was quick to say that despite the Easter visit to St. John’s, the church might not be the Obamas’ final choice.
“The first family has not made a decision yet on which church they will formally join in Washington, but they were honored to worship with the parishioners at St. John’s Episcopal Church and at Nineteenth Street Baptist Church earlier this year,” Joshua Dubois, the head of the White House Office of Faith-Based and Neighborhood Partnerships, said in a statement.
What the Obamas have settled on, though, is a dog.
In a long-anticipated decision, the Obamas have chosen a 6-month-old Portuguese water dog — a gift from Senator Edward M. Kennedy of Massachusetts and his wife, Victoria, to Malia and Sasha Obama.
The girls have named the dog Bo because they have cousins with a cat of the same name and because Mrs. Obama’s father was nicknamed Diddley, after the musician Bo Diddley.
“We couldn’t be happier to see the joy that Bo is bringing to Malia and Sasha,” the Kennedys said in a statement. “We love our Portuguese water dogs and know that the girls, and their parents, will love theirs, too.”
The Washington Post, in a front-page article on Sunday, reported the decision.
