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Story by Hung One On
Here’s a story. Some is true and some is pure bullshit, some artistic licence. I’ll let you decide.
I was born in Tamworth, the country capital of NSW however as a young kid my parents moved down to Wollongong on the south coast or should I say more precisely, Austinmer, a northern beach suburb of Wollongong. Seven surfing spots within a 5 minute walk, how lucky was I. For anyone that has travelled down the coast from Sydney to Wollongong we lived opposite the Headlands Hotel which strangely enough is on a headland.
We were considered strange as we were from the country, my dad was from overseas but worst of all we were Catholic, what ever that was. Later in life I learned that Catholics have caused all of the world’s problems but as a kid I neither knew nor cared, as long as we could play cricket.
Strangely enough, in the small row of houses were we lived our neighbours to the north were the Bowlers, to the south were the Bettermen’s which we renamed the Batsmen so we called ourselves the All Rounders. Sadly this is a true lie.
But hey, let me introduce you to my family. My Dad was called Dad, Dad One On which turned out to be very convenient. My Mum was called Mum One On again which turned out to be very convenient. My mum and dad had doctorates from the University of New England which is no where near England at all. Mum majored in Crap whereas Dad majored in bullshit. My big brother’s name was Have, Have One On and my big sister was called Urge, Urge One On, oh and lets not forget our blue heeler, Sandy, who never told me what his last name was but Mum said a priest had given her Sandy as a pup and his name was Sandy O’Way, so I guess mum named him after the priest.
Anyway we were considered strange as we were from the country, my dad was from overseas but worst of all we were Catholic.
Anyhoo, this was the mid 1960’s and I had had enough of my big brother giving me a hard time. Throughout the entire year, through scrimping and scraping I had managed to save five bob, can you imagine that, five whole bob, yes, gob smacking. Anyway, a mate of mine called Gerard who came from Holland showed me a trick with tennis balls. Remember how they were always yellow, bounced to much and had the big circular line through them. “Pump the ball half full of water Hung” said Gerard “That way they skim along the ground” Gerard grinned. Gerard didn’t seem to mind that I was from the country, my dad was from overseas and I was a Catholic.
I think it mainly because Gerard was from another country, his dad was from overseas and he was a Catholic but I’m not really sure.
Gerard’s Mum and Dad had the best sausage in town. His mum would fry it and the smell was amazing. “Bedunk Mrs Van Camper” I would say, yum. The adults washed it down with beer but we were too young to drink so we had soft drink. Gerard had five brothers, Hank, Henk, Hink, Honk and Hunk. We all referred to them as the “Vowels” although I never knew why as their last name was Van Camper. Mr Van Camper ran the local shop but it was tough going with all those mouths to feed until one day he got sick of being asked about holiday rents in Austinmer and opened up a business called Hank’s Camper Vans which was a play on his name. He is now a millionaire.
So Gerard gave me the doctored ball, my precious, my time had come. Boxing Day 1966, Mum’s backyard, “Hey Have” I called rather exuberantly “I bet you five bob I can get you out under double figures” I baited knowingly. See my brother Have was a pugilist of the first degree. As when we moved to Austinmer, being strange as we were from the country, my dad was from overseas but worst of all we were Catholic, my big brother belted the crap out of the biggest villain in miles, suddenly he was a hero. “Listen, you little prick, I belt you for a hundred then I’ll belt the shit out of you” replied Have, smirking to himself for the easiest five bob he would ever make.
Anyhoo, I put Sandy in as keeper and Urge at mid on, mum’s flame tree as mid off. The first few deliveries I let him tonk me around the place and while he wasn’t looking I threw the ball over the neighbours fence and replaced it with the doctored ball. I bowled the doctored ball and bowled him middle stump as it slid through along the ground.
Have started to come for me with a stump but Sandy realised what was happening and started to growl and bark at Have. Sandy started to bite Have just as Mum appeared, “ What’s all this noise?” she shrieked “ Have, bugger off and leave Hung alone, who owns this five bob?” Mum’s and questions hey.
Me and Sandy went down to the Halfway Shop with our winnings. I had a whole dollar. Can you imagine that, one whole dollar, ten shillings in the old. My newly found wealth was staggering, I was rich. Mrs Drew, who ran the Halfway Shop, was rapt when I told her the story, I had a pie and a can of soft drink and Sandy had some left over pork sausages that Mrs Drew got out of her fridge and I had 85 cents left over, 8 and a half shillings, can you imagine that. It doesn’t get any better that this.
Funny though, after that things changed. My big brother started his apprenticeship at the steelworks as a fitter and turner. When I asked him what did a fitter and turner does, he replied “they fit and they turn”, wow, what a guy. He never played cricket again, that was for little kids like me, he was a man now.
My sister Urge was very pretty and was a boy magnet however she went to uni and eventually married a rich bloke but she stopped playing cricket. Cricket was a little kids game, not for a beautiful intelligent woman with her life ahead of her.
Sandy got killed by a truck and mum and dad were always too busy arguing about things like thermal currents in the upper atmosphere and their effect on climate so it boiled down to just me.
Luckily Gerard came around. “Hey Hung. Thirroul are looking for players. Wanna come? Train Tuesday and Thursday afternoon at Gibson Park.” “Is the Pope a catholic?” I grinned, you know sometimes when things change it’s okay. Life just got a whole lot better.
Therese Trouserzoff said:
Hung, you’re a killer ! I laughed so hard I nearly shat. No wait, I think I might have actually …. sorry, I have to go now …. 🙂
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Big M said:
Try folding a paper napkin into the crease of your bum.
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gerard oosterman said:
Try nappies for the more mature. Some come scented with ‘Brut’.
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helvityni said:
Try some pull-ups, they work on 3 year olds, 30, 50, and onwards…They allow you to hang onto your poo…and the settee stays clean…win/win/win for mom/pop/shopkeeper and for that old sofa…
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Hung One On said:
Thank you Michael. I think my stories should come with a warning like don’t drink beer while reading and insure you incontinence aid is in place.
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Big M said:
Hung, this reminds me of your futuristic, intergalactic cricket adventures, only not intergalactic, and in the past, and without the Helvitastic! Glad you were able to play for Thirroul, I think the pub’s still there (I believe Manne was picking up glasses there, or, at least he looked quite mannish).
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Hung One On said:
Thirroul is a league and cricket town and the next suburb south of Austinmer. We won more than we lost in league and only ordinary in the cricket. Too many Catholics probably. 🙂
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Big M said:
You’ve gotta watch out for them tykes.
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Hung One On said:
That’s right I remeber now, that’s what they used to call me. One day I went home and said to mum “What a tyke Mum?” She explained it to me. It took me years to figure it out.
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algernon1 said:
Too many left footers
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algernon1 said:
Hungster did you ever play cricket at the “burgh”. Is it true that you knew Gez before the the pigs?
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helvityni said:
…we ‘met’ Hungie on the Unleashed, never met him in real life, we have only met Emmjay and BigM, unfortunately we could not go to Canberra to see Madeleine when she was there for some conference…
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algernon1 said:
I think we’ve all met Emm haven’t we. I’ve spoken with Hung though not met him
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Hung One On said:
I’d love us all to meet up especially now I have improved heaps. We could call it the St Pigs Day Festival.
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Hung One On said:
I played a season of league for them but not cricket. I think they wore Balmain jumpers and were called the Tigers. I had another name for them but this is a family show. 🙂
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algernon1 said:
A former work colleague once lived at the “burgh” and Coalcliff. Had many a story. Lives and retired at Hervey Bay nowadays
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vivienne29 said:
A very good story – it lives!
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Hung One On said:
Thank you very much Miss Oliver. Now I’ll let you in on a secret. My son come over from Melbourne and my wife and brother in law turned up at the door with a truck load of food and we had a fantastic lunch. Is was the best Christmas I’ve had in ages Viv. Everyone had a great time. I got about 4 hours sleep and when to work that night. At 2 am I had my ham and cheese sandwich for smoko. Now I would rate lunch 11 out of 10 and my sandwich 5 out of 10 so am I glad it all changed. I was so tired driving home the next morning I wanted to fall asleep at the lights but some soul behind me tooted the horn and woke me up enough to get home.
Cheers
Mark
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vivienne29 said:
What a memory – Miss Oliver. I’m using that at the oz Guardian.
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Hung One On said:
Yeah, you said once that is how you came up with SO. Cheers
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nev cole said:
Yo Hung…and Merry Bloody Christmas
Nev
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Hung One On said:
Cheers brother Nev, merry Christmas to you and yours.
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sandshoe said:
I get it. While the bigs like Have and Urge and Mum and Dad were rippin’ around looking like they knew exactly what the word was and where you get it, it was like that with me a bit. I didn’t even mention my big brothers Jock and Angus but their names both pretty much reflect the prevalent culture on our side of the tracks. Any similarities end there. Dad wasn’t from Australia either but no-one could understand a word he said. I feel bad Sandy was run over by a truck. You being Catholic though some magic probably worked for Sandy. We were stuffed. We weren’t Catholic. Our cats died. Dad was so strict against magic we weren’t allowed to try to bring any back with hocus pocus and he said Catholics were full of baloney. We didn’t even eat ordinary sausages.
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Hung One On said:
Hey shoe, In my suburb we had a family of folk from your original part of the world, fantastic family, 7 kids plus mum and dad and when you went to their house and they all talked you couldn’t understand a word. One to one was fine
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helvityni said:
Nice one, Hung One On, I have no more letter ‘O’s left…
It’s funny and sweet, so polite of you to say ‘bedankt’ to Mrs Campervan, who came from Wollongong…. 🙂
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helvityni said:
…a good picture too!
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Hung One On said:
Thank you H, I wasn’t sure how to spell the word but Mrs Van Camper said it meant “Thanks” in Dutch. I learnt many more words as the real Van Campers treated me as one of the family from the first day I met them. The bigger boys looked out for me at school and both sets of kids from the two families became friends.
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gerard oosterman said:
Good story Hung one, very funny, spontaneous and tightly written. Every line twinkles. Does this Gerard still come around? Austinmer, was that the place D.H.Lawrence lived for a while or was that Cole-dale?
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Hung One On said:
You very smart man to know that Gez. We lived down the street from his house in Thirroul and it was named “Wywurk”. I immediately thought, this is my kinda guy.
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