A hidden magpie on arrival at Faisal’s. The foliage overhead on Nicholson was dense now, the branches stretching wide; in another few years the strip would draw better custom. Over the last 4-5 years identifying that particular warbler had been more or less immediate after Robbie Bell’s memorable imitation back in ‘17. With eight years on the Equator the earlier calling from the top of the Norfolk Pine in Bab’s front yard had been more or less forgotten, certainly the distinct timbre & melody. There had been one or two masterful mimics of birdcalls in Singapore; and many more no doubt who had failed to reveal their old talent. Only a few weeks before Deng the Sudanese had drifted off from the cafe table to his cowherd years by the marshes and waterways back home, quietly reprising the song of some unnameable bird hidden in that past life. What was so striking about Robbie’s performance in that first Spring meeting was his revelation that as a schoolboy he had spent two years completely mute. There had been some bad bullying in secondary school, something clearly devastating for the lad. Robbie still had an occasional stutter, yet on the phone the voice was invariably radio-announcer smooth. During the mute period you would bet Robbie had been listening hard, to birds and all other aural information.
Melbourne
Uncharacteristic wind-blow five or six days the last fortnight. On two or three of those occasions it had been of such strength that the flutter of leaves on the trees was audible—a first for the region and bringing the reminder of other locales where people had words for a range of winds. (Wind through bamboo in Japanese; &etc. Japan and other northern countries had an extensive vocabulary for snow too, for example.) Kicking against the wind in football matches returned; a semblance of memory, as the example here was of such minor kind. Attempting to mark the football was much trickier in the wind, not so much because it affected judgement of the flight of the ball, but more a kind of rattling of brain & body. Wind returned like an old friend in a couple passages crossing a bridge over a river once or twice, the slender reed of the trunk like a sail on a dhow. You wanted to lean into the adversary as you had done in earlier time. Sometimes larger leaves brought down after a day’s baking by the sun scraped like plastic on paving and made you turn to check behind. This afternoon rounding the base of J. C. Complex a tunnelling was created through the walkway beneath the pillars; a good stern barreling such that the old Chinese chap at the carpet store on the corner, an old compulsive smoker still, adjusted the collar of his polo, where the plastic blow-hole in his throat had let in gushes.
Geylang Serai, Singapore 2011-25
A photograph of Nekula’s St. Moritz in today’s newspaper. Usual tourist item, adventures & food highlighted. The photograph however came as a surprise, the kind of loveliness on display quite unexpected. All the luscious green firs immediately behind the town, sturdy buildings and no sign fancy boutiques. Not what one might have expected. The very wealthy were preserved from crassness possibly; the cultivated, seriously wealthy. (Possibly they still existed and visited such locales.) Jewellery and watch-makers in this alpine town were hidden in modest shop-fronts, without any advertising apart from the family name, perhaps. Examining the wide-angle shot over the morning tea one understood better how Neki had spent thirty years in St. M. and developed such an affection for the place. In fact here was a close counterpart of our Montenegrin coast; the mountains prevailed the same, the firs ringing round and the basin of the lake. Once Neki had mentioned a lake that froze over in winter and drew skaters. Here the water was on the town’s doorstep, like our village in Boka, anchored to the essential enabler of life. Human intrusion could only impact so far in such setting; visitors were forced to adapt to the environment here, adjust their rhythms and quiet themselves. There was an other worldly feel evoked. The Sound of Music was filmed in such setting; but the truth was that domain exceeded the solace of music. In a recent mail Neki had been told that he could be visited now in his adopted new home of Zurich, when St. Moritz had always been assumed impossible.
Melbourne
An Australian writer of Montenegrin origin, Pavle Radonić spent ten years living in SE Asia, from where a disproportionate number of his publications derive. Recent work has appeared in Sagebrush Review, QU Literary Magazine, Hobart & New World Writing. (Post Road Magazine forthcoming.).