Cockroaches, particularly those with the rapid reproduction habits of the “German” cockroach, are not subject to legal property demarcations and the properties thereof. They do not obey tenancy laws neither. This reality seemed to have escaped the landlord when I tried to explain to him, via the ever-polite estate agent, that I’d rather he arranged … Continue reading »
“I don’t see what I’ve done so wrong that I can’t live like everyone else in the world, live in a house and have a house that I can call home.” – Sam (pseudonym) qtd in Besides one’s self: Homelessness felt and lived, by Catherine Robinson, p.93. Last night I was able to get a … Continue reading »
As a suburban child of the eighties in Australia, my first impression of Nimbin was beamed to me from the butt of a joke. It was either The Comedy Company or Full Frontal, and there was a character who would read a poem from the audience. She was a Hippie, and her poem went like … Continue reading »
The first was Flat 7, a very similar Flat 7 from the original, in that it was up top in an enormous converted Victorian terrace, and on the same street. It had been cut in half though, with the other half made into a Flat 8. It was a box. A very clean and polished … Continue reading »
The facts are there. That to seek asylum is a human right, written into international law in the United Nations Refugee Convention in 1951. That the nation-state of Australia is a signatory to this law, bound by the Convention to provide asylum those who need it. That the vast majority of people who arrive by … Continue reading »
I tweeted this story as “eulogistic urbanism”, which is a term I have started to apply to representations of urban change that incorporate an abject before into a shiny new present; usually while subjects of abjection (‘druggies’, ‘derros’ in the case of this story) are still living there and doubtless have a more complex subjectivity … Continue reading »
