bilateral kellerberrin

At a kids soccer match. The goalie keeps messing up. He doesnt seem to understand the limits of where he is allowed to handle the ball. Runs all the way up the pitch and picks it up. But they let him off every time because they dont want to discourage him.

…..

We went up the hill towards sunset. I had a notion to drive to the bottom and then walk up, as i have not been having very much exercise lately. It was a gorgeous sunset, the kind i deliberately avoid taking pictures of. But i shot a few this time, i thought perhaps josh would want to see them. He loves a sunset shot. At the top of the hill, we could distinctly hear shouting and cheering. The sound was carrying very clearly from the sports oval below in the town. A footy match was on.

I was excited to go to the game. There was no entry charge, and people had even driven their cars onto the ground, right up to the edge of the boundary line. I imagine when it gets colder, they sit inside their cars, like a drive-in movie. Kellerberrin/Tammin was playing Northam. Keller has a kind of bright blue red and white outfit a bit like the old Fitzroy, and Northam calls themselves the “Bombers”, but they have a sort of Hawthorn uniform.

We got talking to Jennifer, who works on fundraising for the Bombers. When she found out Cristina was from Colombia, she started telling us about some exchange students she had hosted. One of them was from Brazil, and he took a whole three months to “hit the ground”. Seems that instead of having to “earn” the right to go on exchange, its a privelege thrust upon them. (A privelege of the wealthy, of course). And so it sounds like he didnt really want to be there, spent most of his time online emailing his girlfriend back home.

Jennifer and I talked a little about the internet, I wanted to ask her more, actually. She mentioned that people tend to keep within their own groups online. I wondered what she was referring to. Perhaps she’ll read this and leave a comment.

Anyway, Northam was way ahead on the scoreboard – Jennifer said they’d been training since January and were in good shape – although for my money, you couldnt beat the handsome royal blue of the Keller uniforms. Cristina was getting cold, so we pushed on, bumping into Selina briefly, who said a quick and flighty hello and goodbye.

It seemed like we wanted to do something, so we headed over to the “Doodli” – the tavern at Doodlakine 15 km out of town, which Donna had recommended as a good place to eat. It was warm and friendly and full of families, so that kept Cristina entertained, watching the toddlers muck around. We were served by Amanda, an English traveller from Dorset, and we ate a pretty good leek and potato soup. Amanda has been working in the pub, full time, for almost eight weeks. She’s that sort of irrepressable British traveller who will take on any adventure, even such a long time in a town with a population of 33 (or is it 23?).

The “Doodli’s” claim to fame (you can’t miss it) is that they hosted a big Jimmy Barnes concert. I was quite inspired by this bit of cheeky entrepreneurialism. The pub owner rang up Barnsey’s agents and asked how much he would charge for such a venture. They booked it and set about promoting like crazy. From the news articles plastered to the walls, it seems that at first, locals thought they were going to get some guy with the same name as Barnsey. No-one believed it could be possible. But it happened, and over 3000 people came to watch him rock out.

I think Amanda said he’s played there four times now, so it must have become a tradition, and Barnsey probably gets a kick out of it too. Perhaps he’s adopted the tiny town as his spiritual home (working class man, back to his roots, etc etc.)