As late December and January hit I managed to get involved with a bit of a run of unfortunate luck which lead me to becoming a rather unpleasant drunkard for a short period; some may disagree and that I always am one but they just need to get a grip I say. You see I thought it would be the best way to channel my frustration and anger through drinking many cases of goon, what can I say? I was clearly heavily influenced by the homeless; they seemed to have found the solution to all their problems.
So before I whinge I’ll provide a quick update and back story for the uninitiated. Back in Thailand, hundreds of pounds worth of foreign currency was stolen, in November somebody decided to swipe some old sweaty clothes and at New Year my prized Chuck Taylors went the journey too rather mysteriously. All this contributed to my being completely livid when my iPod got stolen. Now anybody who knows me can appreciate how much I value my music and iPod especially, I literally can’t go anyway without it. Walking just ain’t the same and the radio stations are far too full of idle chatter and repetitive playlists for my taste. I like a nice selection of 60,000 songs. The circumstances surrounding its disappearance did nothing to prevent me from kicking off on people either.
One of the general rules of the Hostel is that only Jerome or I may control the soundtrack to the evenings, it’s not just a question of taste but some people just can’t be trusted with such a delicate matter. So on this evening there was a dozen or so of us having a few drinks on the first floor and as standard the numbers dwindled as the night went on. I ended up a few feet away in the pc room performing the most elementary of schoolboy errors in being drunk on Facebook and after I’d suitably performed enough regretful actions that I’d cringe at in the morning I went back outside......to find it completely empty, speakerless and iPodless. Ah well, I thought, they’ve just put it in the room for safe keeping with the rest of the stuff and I’ll just get it back in the morning. On another note, earlier in the evening I made a point of giving “Sheffield” his iPhone as he’d left it lying about but I felt mine was fine as it was still in the dock being played. So the next day I knocked on the door and he informed me it was the two Dutch guys who had brought the speakers in so I’ll have to have a word with them. And I did. They then gave me the great line
“We didn’t know whose it was so just left it on the table by itself”.
“Come Again?”
“Yeah, we just put it on the table”
At this point I’d imagine the veins were throbbing in my forehead alas Bruce Springsteen singing his part of “We Are the World”. What type of fucking retard would apply logic like that? Obviously some deceitful little tramp had just walked past and thought, “Oh cheers, I’ll take that, thank you very much”. I fucking despise thieves but it’s even worse in this environment as we’re all in the same boat and no we have to muck together or who we’d feel if the same happened to us. I’d already taken a dislike to one of the said Dutch due to him being one of those people who decide that since they go to the gym then it’s only right that he takes his top off at every single opportunity and walk around flexing. These people are always cunts and rarely have any worth at all. Since all the people who were last seen with the iPod lived in 1C i thought it was only right i have a look about so Alexis let me in, i couldn’t see anything though and it’s just not fair to start rummaging through peoples belongings who hadn’t do anything. Thats what was so annoying, i knew that somebody in the hostel had it but i couldn’t go around randomly accusing people without any proof. That didn’t stop me from kicking off on everybody when drunk mind, i made an announcement that the perpetrator had one night to leave it outside my door and if not, Jon and I were going to go through every single persons dorm and if we found it “I’d bite the persons nose off”. Of course i could never do such a thing and none of this happened when sober. I just became a very bitter drunk for awhile. I’d bloody love to know who took it though.
About a week later things got a bit worse too. The summer here brings a long flow of festivals with the first one being the imaginatively titled “Sydney First Festival”. sydneyfestival.org.au/2010 The whole city was on lockdown with 250,000 people roaming through it between parks, various stages and street performers. The hostel wandered down at various intervals through Hyde Park ontoward the domain and Botanical gardens. We left on the evening so by the time we’d actually arrived the whole place was jammed making it near impossible to coordinate with people a meeting point and having ridiculous waiting times to get food and drink. Al Green was headlining the main stage but he left me a little bit underwhelmed to be honest. The lack of organization and terrible compere did little to aid him but the scenes to me were reminiscent of any festival Electric Six appearance at a festival. Everyone just waits around for “Gay Bar” and as soon as it gets played there's a mass exodus of easily 50% of the audience (Let’s Stay Together being the Gay Bar of the day, still, what a song it is). We all decided to head back to the Hostel and “get on it” since it was just far too crowded to hear anybody speak round there, we did manage to see the always lovely sight at a crowded event of people acting the fool and getting floored by Police. Just another reminder of home there. I was still in my repressed anger mode so with Lee Archards encouragement i decided to go round the hostel and “tell everyone what i though of them”. Needless to say i was greeted with unhappy faces on the night and the next day. It was worth it just to see the fear in Amy’s eyes it became her turn and she pleaded with me for her to be skipped. That was clearly against the rules, i must say i really was a bad drunk during this period and i must apologize to those who felt my wrath. The thieving and lack of job success was really starting to get to me and it was about to get worse.
As the next day i awoke to find my credit card missing. Now this is no uncommon thing as i've done this about 12 times now so it's no big deal, i always cancel it and then find it the next day. This time was just a little bit different, i canceled it then went straight to my account online to find it completed emptied over one night. Uh Oh. The transactions were all pending too so had yet to appear on my statements and would take at least a few days to come through, causing more problems. I phoned the Halifax again and as standard they were an absolute joke. I really can't wait to get back home so i can march in the branch, close all my accounts and go "John Veevers style" on them. It will be a complete pleasure. The genius on the phone informed me that i had to call back 9am UK time as that is when the super duper system goes online, apparently he was working off an Amiga or something. Of course when i did i just got fobbed off and told to call back tomorrow. Great. Getting nowhere with the bank i went to the Police station to report the incident if only to get a crime number as i've never had much faith in the Police. If the bank annoyed me then the Pigs made me want to go vigilante and blow the precinct up. The officer who greeted me told me he was going to get someone else as his shift finished soon so he couldn't really be bothered; I guess at least there was an officer there, unlike back in South Shields where when i reported an assault i was told there was no officers there. In a bloody police station. It only took four weeks to see someone too. Anyway my case officer was Super Alex Dewes and as police standard once again a complete prick. He accused me of being "shady" as i didn't know the exact amount to the dollar for each transaction that was processed, he just couldn't grasp the debit system altogether really or that phoning the bank was futile. It was like talking to a child so i said i'd return with more information.
The main problem with being card less was that the bank had to send it home to my billing address and then have my Mam forward it on to Sydney so that would leave me without access to cash for about two weeks. Since they took everything too i couldn't even do a transfer to my Aussie account.
Once i stopped storming about on the Sunday I also discovered that two other cards from my room went missing with Mels and Lassies being stolen too so obviously someone knew what they were doing. For the life of me I couldn't think who could've took at, Rich and I were actually sitting outside the door having a few beers when it happened so they'd had to have been quick as we could've walked in at any time.
Not all was bad as thankfully a lot of people in the hostel were a great help. Rich let me stay for as long as i needed without paying, Skinner lent me money whenever i needed it with Lee and Guy helping me a bit too (I basically spent it on goon and McDonalds in self pity). I'd have been lost without the help so it was much appreciated, some people who are always quick to grab a beer when it's going did disappear though. Standard.
It took days before the bank could tell me what happened which was incredibly frustrating again, i must have spent 60 dollars just on hold. However it seems that at my expense somebody had a great night, blowing 400 at Coles, topping up at a petrol station and having the gaul to stay at a five star hotel on Sydney Harbour. Ahhhh. Cheers guys. Oh I got a call from Super police Alex Dewes too, he asked me if the bank was doing anything and then to just leave it with them. "They know what they're doing". What a bunch of morons. Fortunately after a couple of weeks i did manage to get all my money back, not before the Halifax mucked up again by taking the pending transactions of me twice then trying to charge me for going overdrawn, ah how i love them. I've never heard from the police since either despite telling them about the multiple incidents. Apparently it's a well known thing here though as when reading the backpacker magazine it had a warning a gang committing card fraud had moved on to Melbourne. i'll probably see them there i bet. Thankfully things took a turn for the better when i got a phone call out of the blue for a Job interview. It was about bloody time....
The main problem with being card less was that the bank had to send it home to my billing address and then have my Mam forward it on to Sydney so that would leave me without access to cash for about two weeks. Since they took everything too i couldn't even do a transfer to my Aussie account.
Once i stopped storming about on the Sunday I also discovered that two other cards from my room went missing with Mels and Lassies being stolen too so obviously someone knew what they were doing. For the life of me I couldn't think who could've took at, Rich and I were actually sitting outside the door having a few beers when it happened so they'd had to have been quick as we could've walked in at any time.
Not all was bad as thankfully a lot of people in the hostel were a great help. Rich let me stay for as long as i needed without paying, Skinner lent me money whenever i needed it with Lee and Guy helping me a bit too (I basically spent it on goon and McDonalds in self pity). I'd have been lost without the help so it was much appreciated, some people who are always quick to grab a beer when it's going did disappear though. Standard.
It took days before the bank could tell me what happened which was incredibly frustrating again, i must have spent 60 dollars just on hold. However it seems that at my expense somebody had a great night, blowing 400 at Coles, topping up at a petrol station and having the gaul to stay at a five star hotel on Sydney Harbour. Ahhhh. Cheers guys. Oh I got a call from Super police Alex Dewes too, he asked me if the bank was doing anything and then to just leave it with them. "They know what they're doing". What a bunch of morons. Fortunately after a couple of weeks i did manage to get all my money back, not before the Halifax mucked up again by taking the pending transactions of me twice then trying to charge me for going overdrawn, ah how i love them. I've never heard from the police since either despite telling them about the multiple incidents. Apparently it's a well known thing here though as when reading the backpacker magazine it had a warning a gang committing card fraud had moved on to Melbourne. i'll probably see them there i bet. Thankfully things took a turn for the better when i got a phone call out of the blue for a Job interview. It was about bloody time....
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