Farewell to the pretty city - for now.

After a couple of months of plugging away at AFTRS, putting together Next FM and then jetting off to the wild west I've had a luxurious week in Sydney (well amongst running around catching up on months of "life admin"). I had completely forgotten what it was like to have a day to myself to go for a walk, lay on the beach and read the paper without having to think about how each story would translate to radio.
The other day I did the Bondi to Bronte, a walk I have trudged about 5 million times. Sculpture by the Sea is on at the moment and initially I was miffed at the groups of people walking 6 abreast at a snail's pace while I try to sneak around them without tumbling off a cliff.
But I slowed down (unusual for me) and took a good look and was rendered a bit speechless and overwhelmed. Events like this normally make me clutch at my pearls and aggravate my gag reflex but really, we are so bloody lucky.

Sculpture by the Sea marks a year exactly since I moved home and it has quite possibly been one of the best and worst of all! At least I know I'm alive.


I'm flying back to Kalgoorlie on Sunday for a 6 week fixed term contract with the ABC which I am thrilled about. Everyone at some stage should visit and even live in the middle of Australia to see what else exists apart from the beauty of the coast.

Day Six – over and out

Today started with the quintessential Kalgoorlie event – the Skimpy Breakfast. Up at 5.30am, facing the prospect of boobs and eggs, I was ready and raring to go.

The pub was packed! At 6am! It opens at 6 and there was a queue outside waiting for it to open. The group I was with were the only people not dressed in fluoro orange. The orange people turned their heads in unison like fairground clowns when we walked in and I felt only mildly like a gatecrasher.

The interesting opening hours are for the miners who work the night shift as the Super Pit which is a 24/7/365 venture – why wouldn’t it be? If I owned a hole in the ground that produces 22 tonnes of gold per annum and had a bunch of trucks worth 3.5 million bucks each then I’d want it running all day and night too but that’s another story.

Legally, you’re only allowed to drink in public at 6am if you’re a miner but we snuck in and got away with it. Breakfast involves instant coffee and a workman’s breakfast for 10 bucks. Oh and included in the 10 bucks is a waitress with almost nothing on.

I was going to embellish at this point (radio is life plus 30% right?) but I can’t lie. I didn’t see a single nipple. The barmaid was wearing mesh undies (yes, with nothing over them) but I think it was a cold morning in Kal and much to my disappointment, she was wearing a boring old black cardigan. JIPPED!

That is why I have decided to take up an offer of a job here in Kal, because I need to come back and experience a REAL skimpy breakfast.

Don’t fret, it’s not permanent at this stage – I’ll be working until December 10 when the station literally hits the stumps and shuts down in order for cricket to take over the airwaves until mid January!. Wow, cricket must be important – and I must have missed that memo.

So my final day at the ABC in Kal has been doing the following:

Sitting on a mini-bus for two hours driving around the Super Pit looking for nuggets and marvelling at the stats (no one could answer how much money the hole brings in every year) and the size of the tyres.

Then having a little snooze on the way back to town.

b) Looking for temporary accommodation in this sweet little goldmining hub.

I’m really looking forward to spending 6 weeks here to see if I can actually handle living in the middle of nowhere away from the coast... And also because all of the media gang were telling me of all the cool stories they’ve had to cover (mucho violence in these parts, earthquakes, ghosts) in their time here. It’s going to be awesome. Feel free to visit.

I’m off to find a patch of floor at Perth airport to sleep on.

Day Five: Feelin' Alive (actually a bit sad as I'm leaving tomorrow)

Another lovely day in the Goorlie! 27 degrees and sunny, not a cloud as far as the eye can see. I’m not sure some farmers around here would care to hear me gloating about that but it’s lovely nonetheless.

Better than yesterday at least. I braved the 37 degree blustery weather to go for a run around the cemetery (don’t ask me why, it just piqued my interest when jogging by) and really enjoyed the run on red sand. The flies make it a bit tough though, running in that kind of heat with your mouth closed is tough.

The cemetery is typically divided into religious denominations the boundaries of which are marked with lovely, well-kept signs.







That is unless you don’t have a religion, then you just get a dodgy, hand-painted sign nailed ad hoc to a tree. Maybe I was heat delirious but I found it pretty amusing at the time.


This morning I was on Breakfast again with John and had a blast yet again. He’s a very relaxed host and station manager and it makes the team here work really well together.

Today is “Theme Thursday” and John and I brainstormed yesterday and somehow came up with the theme of feet. Do not ask me why.

The idea is that we play a bunch of songs revolving around a theme and weave it through the show. Strangely enough, when I was researching the ins and outs of feet (a quarter of all the bones in the body are below the ankle!) I discovered that October is “Foot Health Month” (what cause doesn’t have a month these days?) – talk about finger on the pulse I’m so current.

Of course the Kings’ Blue Suede Shoes got a run as well as a bit of old Nancy Sinatra and her walkin’ boots plus my favourite of the day and I swear John picked it just for me – jazz legend Fats Waller and his track Your Feets Too Big. There is some serious hatred of big feet in that song.

As part of Feet Fursday, I interviewed a local podiatrist who had some great tips on keeping your feet nice if you’re in mining work boots all day...

For the rest of the day I helped script the Mornings Show and finished off my package on carers in the local Kalgoorlie area for Carers Week.

Having a big dinner tonight with the local professionals of the area – all of the media people, doctors, physio and speech pathologists hang together – and getting really excited about my Skimpy Breakfast tomorrow morning. Boobs at 6am. Things are tough here in Kal. Unfortunately for you boys, no cameras allowed.

Day Four: Wanting More!

This morning I was lucky enough to co-host ABC Goldfields breakfast show with Station Manager John Wibberley. John’s a lovely and very experienced radio genius and his method of show preparation is, well, don’t. His catch phrase is “let’s just shoot the breeze” which I was happy to do.

We did a whole lot of weather, absolutely no traffic and a bunch of bushfire warnings as it was 36 degrees and windy as all hell. Wednesday is also “who am I” day – a popular on air competition with the listeners apparently and I got to be Charles “Chestnut” Clyde, vicious criminal and the hubby of Bonnie. Phones ran hot.

The rest of the day was spent editing my Carers package and misting up a little listening back to Deanne talking about how attached she is to her charge, Lois.

Kalgoorlie: Day Three & All's Well

Another beautiful day in Kalgoorlie! Getting up at 5am for a run is so much easier when it’s sunny. After slicing it up on the beach volleyball court last night my health kick continues.

It’s Carers Week all over the country this week and to find out more about what great stuff carers in Kalgoorlie and surrounding areas are doing, I went along to a morning tea organised by the Goldfields Individual and Family Association to meet some local carers.

Iris, Nicky and Deanne

First of all, I just want to say how selfless and lovely these people are. They are mostly unpaid and a large proportion of them care for family members and it’s a 24/7 job.

I interviewed Anthony Thomas, the Director of GIFSA and chatted to a number of carers who were all very modest and stories about the work they do day-to-day had to be dragged from most of them.

Brian & Maureen with their daughter Jenny

The morning tea was held at Hammond Park, a fauna reserve in Kal. The park is lovely and green and a lovely breeze was filtering through the gum trees and I kept getting distracted from my interviewing by three emus that were eyeing me up.

Most of the day after the tea was taken up with me struggling on Netia (the ABC’s editing and playout system) to finish the earthquake package. I managed but it took three times as long as if I had used Protools and I don’t think it sounded quite as slick as it could’ve.


Later in the day I was escorted to the Superpit! I can’t help but say it in an Arnie accent, I have no idea why...

And all I can say is that it is phenomenal. HUGE. The pictures do not even come close to the scale of this thing. The trucks going down the road into the pit look like ants and tunnels in the side of the walls look like needle pricks when in fact they are over 2 metres in diameter.

Phwoar! There was so much dust around that I ended up completely parched, what else can one do but head to the Exchange Hotel for a beer and Parma Tuesdays, half price chicken schnitzel!

The girls kept takingme for laps around the front bar, the “Wild West Saloon” where they have the infamous Skimpies (topless barmaids if you missed my first Kal blog) but alas all I saw were a pair of butt cheeks. As a female when you walk through the bar it’s as though the men have NEVER seen a female before. They put their beers down (a feat in itself) stand up and turn around. Not just their heads but their entire bodies, for appreciative stares.

The chicken parmagiana at the Exchange was seriously the size of my head and, never being one to back down in the face of a challenge, I ate the entire thing. I impressed the locals that’s for sure.

I’m still on East time so I went home full of chook and was asleep by just after 8pm! Nanna Lollback.

Boulder Earthquake - 6 months on

My first assignment at ABC Goldfields was to go to Boulder and chat to the locals to find out their experiences of the Boulder Earthquake which was 6 months ago today.

Luckily, I had experienced a very similar earthquake in Newcastle in 1989 and telling my story encouraged the radio shy locals to open up.

This is what went to air...

"Where were you when the builder Earthquake struck?

Here at ABC Kalgoorlie, we were in the office lamenting that it was a slow news day and were looking for a story for the beginning of the Mornings program.
Then the ground shook. We all looked at each other and suddenly we had one of the biggest stories of recent times.

It might be hard to believe but the Boulder Earthquake measuring 5.0 on the Richter scale was 6 months ago today.

Alex Lollback spoke to the residents and businesses of Burt St to see how the rebuilding process is coming along. She asked where they were when the earth shook... "

Monday - Day Two "So Far So Good..."

Woke up at 5am and it was sunny! It still wasn’t enough to drag me out of bed for a run and I ended up at ABC Goldfields-Esperance at 7.30am in time for the morning editorial meeting.

The station only broadcasts Breakfast and Morning shows live as well as local news and the rest is networked from Perth. The editorial meeting was pretty relaxed and they gave me a story to work on right away – writing a script for Astro Dave, their space regular.

It’s pretty cool hearing your first script being read on air almost verbatim (meaning it wasn’t absolute rubbish), the host Natalie is pretty young and I was impressed at how cool and calm she was on air.

Later in the day I headed over to Boulder, about 10 minutes away from the main street of Kal. Boulder was once a separate gold mining town that had a vicious rivalry with Kal. The suburbs in-between took over, joined them up and eventually the city absorbed Boulder (much to resident distaste) hence the proper name Kalgoorlie-Boulder.

This week sees the 6-month anniversary of an earthquake in Boulder that severely damaged a bunch of beautiful heritage buildings. The main street looks like the set of a Western movie but with scaffolding all over it.

It was my job to chat to the locals and see what they remembered from the day and how the were fairing 6 months down the track. I always find it amazing and hilarious that people think they’re going to be on TV when you hold a microphone in your hand. The absence of a camera doesn’t seem to tip them off, nor does the fact that I introduce myself as being from ABC RADIO. Bless.

The coolest place I visited was the pharmacy where they had all of the old cabinetry and brown and blue tincture bottles that looked like they were from the turn of the century. And luckily for John, the owner, only two of about a thousand bottles broke in the earthquake.

All in all it was a great first day at work placement and I “stayed back” until 5pm editing my piece. My official finishing time is 3pm. Unheard of.

I’m about to head to beach volleyball match with a bunch of out-of-towners who all live here for work. It seems like a pretty social place. What I’m really looking forward to is a Skimpy breakfast on Friday morning. Apparently it's never too early for boobs in Kal.

Work Placement... 1st time in WA

Sunday - Day One

After tearing out of the AFTRS studio after my final on-air shift of Home and Living I was on a ridiculous adrenaline high.

I left a few misty eyes behind me and coupled with the euphoria I was feeling was pretty indicative of the entire year.

It sounds so clichéd but it was one of the best and one of the worst years of my life and this was essentially the final day.

It’s a good thing that I had no time between the demanding mistress that was Next FM and the unknown quantity of the Wild West, otherwise I would’ve kept myself up at night wondering what it would be like.

I pried myself away from the airport shops after the impulse buying of shoes that are highly inappropriate for my destination, got on the plane and I realised it was the first time I’d stopped in weeks. So I really settled into my seat with my newspaper, glossy magazines and my shitty airline blanket. BLISS.

Stopping over at Adelaide airport made me aware I wasn’t in Sydney anymore. As the pilot reminded us to turn our watches back as Adelaide is 30 minutes behind a real “Aussie” bloke yells out from the back “it’s a fair bit more than half an hour behind mate”. In the terminal, the abundance of press-studded trackie-dacks and tatts confirmed his sentiments.

The descent into Kalgoorlie (the last time I’m officially allowed to use the full name is now, before touching the ground) is almost as breathtaking as the one into Sydney on a fine day. The earth is red as far the eye can see and the pits and dams of the goldmining industry are like acne scars on the adolescent WA soil.

After settling into my room (bigger than some of the studios I have been looking at in Sydney) I went for a walk around town. Mental note one: Kal hasn’t discovered Sunday trading yet. Not even Coles and Woolies were open and I forgot to bring toothpaste. (shudder)

The only places open on a Sunday night were the inhabitants of Hay St. If you know anything about Kal, you’ll have heard of this famous street. The world’s oldest profession is alive and kicking in Kal and hugely celebrated. All of the pubs had signs for “Skimpies of the week” which I thought may have been a brand of beer but it turns out, a Skimpy is a topless waitress. Got to keep those miners occupied eh?

I love how they take "groups by arrangement" Willy Mason would be totally into that.

So I ate Red Rooster, felt gross and then slept for 8 hours. Made resolve to go for a run in the morning to compensate.

Little Red - Interview with Taka Hogan the drummer

Take a listen to my chat with Taka, the drummer of Little Red. He had me in stitches.

Little Red moving to another galaxy!

If you've heard Little Red's song Rock It and it made you tap your tootsies then you'll want to be listening to Sunday Sessions tomorrow on Next FM with Carly Wallace.

I was lucky enough to chat to Taka Hogan, the Drummer from Melbourne retro-rock band Little Red a little earlier in the week. They were heading towards Sydney in what sounded like a very messy and somewhat chaotic tour van. Almost Famous it certainly wasn't.

Carly will be playing the two-part interview tomorrow night (10th October 2010) from 7-9pm plus playing a hand-picked selection of tracks from their diverse yet spectacular new record.

Britt, my weekend Breakfast co-host and I were lucky enough to get to the Little Red concert at the Metro on Friday night here are some of the pictures.

Check back on the blog from Monday morning for a full version of the Little Red interview.

-

Alex