Published The Advocate, March 6, 2005

ONE of the painful asides in leaving Tasmania is everyone on the mainland keeps asking, ``So how’s the weather down there?’’ as if surprised to find no signs of frostbite. Visiting my daughter last week in Sydney, at first I took the question good-naturedly and said it had been lovely on the Coast since the wind dropped. Eventually, though, hot and sticky in the Sydney humidity, even I lost patience and snapped: ``Better than here!’’ Steamy, crotch-rot Sydney: A 30 minute queue for a taxi at the airport with sweat cascading between your shoulder blades; the strong BO tang of the cabbie; and fresh sheets stained forever brown with the distinctive sweaty outline of whoever slept on them last – The Shrouds of Sydney. On the taxi ride to Coogee, petrol prices ranged from 99.9 to 109.9 cents a litre, offering motorists a competitive choice, unlike in Tasmania. Also from the cab, I swear a chalkboard outside a supermarket read: ``Special. Chicken Fed Corn.’’ Which only goes to show how far genetic modification has penetrated the food chain. On the headland overlooking Coogee Beach, a monument stood in memory to the 20 local victims of the Bali bombing in 2002. Their names were listed on a bronze plaque and alongside three of the boys’ names someone had stuck their photographs: one on a surfboard and the other two with drinks in their hands having a good time. Those who are now dead were once very much alive, and they are missed. Below the memorial, closer to the cliff edge, bunches of flowers leaned against a white guardrail where the Virgin Mary, or a fence post in shadow, appeared to the faithful in January 2003. I stood and looked and saw nothing. The Art Gallery of NSW contains a Tom Roberts oil ``Holiday sketch at Coogee 1888’’ painted close to the spot of the Virgin’s apparition. The painting is recognisably Coogee: The beach and the headlands are the same shape, as is the late surf break, and the heat haze sky and the sharp shadows on the sand are typically Sydney. A couple of distant buildings dot the summer-baked hills instead of takeaway pizza joints and Roberts’ women are parading along the beach in long dresses and carrying parasols. Down on the real beach, meantime, a young girl in a bikini ran off with a mobile phone stolen from the fold of a large chap’s beach towel while he was swimming. ``Stop that girl, she stole my phone!’’ he yelled, lumbering after her. A couple of young lads looked very interested in tackling her but she was too quick, and skipped up the steps and was away. In a nearby bar I had a beer with the poor chap, who said he was up from the bush visiting his two sons at a private boarding college. He said the school fees were horrendous, never mind the stolen phone. I winced and also felt a chill financial wind. My daughter had announced she was getting married in September.