By PHIL JARRATT
Did the earth move for you, too?
What a rip-snorting ball-tearer of a weekend we had in Noosa! Warm, sunny days, light winds and fun little waves, and a glorious full (and blue) moon. Perhaps expressing his/her approval, the divine master of everything even let fly with the biggest rumble from the deep we’ve had in a hundred years, like a satisfied burp after a wonderful meal.
Saturday’s earthquake registered 5.7 on the Richter, which is about the same as Newcastle experienced in 1989 when the CBD came tumbling down and 13 people lost their lives. Fortunately for us, both Thursday’s pre-shock and Saturday’s quake were centred deep on the ocean floor 100 kilometres east of Fraser Island, but such a wave of seismic activity does alert you to the fact that you don’t have to live directly over a fault line to be affected.
When we lived in California we became used to the windows rattling every other week, just as we did with the landslide panic on the rare occasions we’d get a few drops of rain. Here in Australia, where quakes are rarer, we probably take a bit more notice, but I didn’t notice too much panic on social media. Just a few WTFs.
My elder sister was visiting at the weekend and we both recalled the Robertson earthquake of 1961, when we were both kids sitting at the breakfast nook in our brand-new cream brick family home with a fabulous view of the ocean and the smoke stacks of the Port Kembla Steelworks, when the house started to shake violently. “I think we’d better all go outside,” our dad said, and we walked swiftly, not running, you understand.
I couldn’t see the point in going outside at all, for being the pessimist and political scientist of the family at age 10, I knew exactly what it was. The Russkies, who had already put a wall around Berlin and shot one of our spy planes down, had dropped an atomic bomb on us and any second now a firestorm would sweep down the Illawarra escarpment and turn us all into human kebabs. I preferred to go out eating fruit loops than standing in the street in my PJs, but I did what I was told.
This was not to be the last time I felt that nuclear Armageddon was nigh, but in fact it was a 5.6 earthquake just 60 kilometres away on the Southern Highlands, which caused $4 million damages and destroyed the famous Robertson bell tower. The Cold War is now such a distant memory that on Saturday all I could think about was getting my board on the car and heading for the beach in case we were about to experience a tsunami pulse.
Meanwhile, in God’s waiting room
BUT that didn’t happen either. In fact it was a serene scene indeed, down at Noosa West Beach over the weekend when I made my comeback in the line-up at Access 11, also known as God’s Waiting Room. With a modicum of rubber on, the water was very pleasant, and apart from the jockeying for position on what passed for an occasional set of waves, we old farts could sit out there on our boards, our legs dangling safely in the clear water, and discuss affairs of state and assorted local scandals.
After a few months away, I have to say I’ve missed my sessions out there, where the act of riding a wave is very much a secondary consideration to the fellowship and joke-telling – a bit like seniors golf, but without the 19th hole or the motorised assist. But also like seniors golf, old fart surfing can still be extremely competitive, as I was reminded when old mate Marto conned me into sharing a wave with a cute little Japanese girl, while he took the next and better wave by himself.
He’ll get his. But I’ll tell you what, it’s hard to beat sitting out there on the edge of Laguna Bay with your mates on a clear and still winter’s morning, with stunning scenery in all directions, and the ability to still struggle to your feet and ride a wave to shore. We are blessed.
Black magic at Q-Pac
Just when I was thinking a weekend couldn’t get any better, I remembered we had tickets for Geoffrey Gurrumul Yunupingu’s Gospel Songs concert at Q-Pac’s concert hall. What a treat it was to arrive at Brisbane’s cultural precinct just on sunset and eat dumplings and other hawker food in the park before taking our seats for an hour and a half of magic from the blind singer from Elcho Island. I’ve watched Gurrumul’s fame escalate over the past six or seven years, but this was the first time I’d been privileged to hear him live, supported by his collaborator and bassist Michael Hohnen and a tight little band, with the full force of the Queensland First Nation Choir behind him. It was spellbinding.
Born blind, Gurrumul first sang in public with his uncle’s globally successful band, Yothu Yindi. Back in the ’80s, when I spent a lot of time in northern Australia, I got to know the late M Yunupingu and his older brother Galarrwuy, both of whom were Australians of the Year a decade apart. I spent time with their Gumatj clan at Yirrkala, and hunted and fished with Galarrwuy, then a fearless spokesman for his people, now in poor health and leading a quieter life.
Hearing Gurrumul lift the spirits of a packed house the other night put me in mind of those wonderful times. It did my heart good.
