1001 Nights Cast

Dan jumped down from the tram and started to run. There were others streaming intently in the same direction. He felt part of a purposeful mob. He wended his way closer to the stage. It was four minutes away from twelve and there was a restless anticipation so thick Dan felt like he might choke on it. His heart was beating fast, he was thrilled and angry all at once. Thrilled that suddenly the man they all thought was the devil incarnate could be so foolish to present himself to them, here, on their turf. Angry beyond sense at the lies they’d been fed for so long, the backtracking, the blame-shifting, the pleas of ignorance, the war no one wanted, the sudden attempts to rectify two hundred years of hurt and mistreatment with an army.

Somewhere near the front of the crowd a man was handing out what looked like handkerchiefs to people in the crowd. He had a garbage bag full of them and was throwinig them towards the back of the audience and with a megaphone started imploring people to ‘Come on Howard!’ Dan caught a flying stack of them at the same moment he felt a ripple through the crowd. People were laughing and pointing at the linen rags. They were screen printed with a stencil of Howard’s face and the words ‘Cum On Howard!! Do it for Australia’ printed across the top. Underneath the face were the words. ‘It’s time to give a toss’. Dan burst out laughing and started to give them out to those around him. From the front of the audience, with his rags all distributed, the megaphone man started singing ‘Cum On Johnny, cum on, cum on’. In seconds, the crowd was in full voice and Dan was giddy, screaming at the top of his lungs.

An MC stepped up to the mic and called for some quiet. After a couple of time-stretched minutes, it finally came, but only by the threat of the Prime Minister’s departure without addressing the gathering at all.

‘Here to speak to you about the Liberal Future of Australia, The Prime Minister Of Australia, Mr. John Howard!’

There was a dull murmur of applause from the crowd, a scattered whoop and a wolf whistle from next to Dan that got a chuckle from those in the vicinity. The day was suddenly still and hot. The midday sun was bright even though behind clouds. In the distance Dan heard a half-hearted rendition of ‘Cum On Johnny’ which faded out as it began. Howard ambled to the podium and there was a still, warm silence as he shuffled his papers.

Dan could smell his own sweat before it mingled with someone else’s and was gone. Howard’s voice floated onto the crowd and stuck to them like thick molasses. He talked monotonously about the economy under his government, then attacked the opposition’s lack of economic experience. He talked about the jobs he had created and forgot to mention the rights he had taken away. He talked at them instead of to them and the collective despondence was proving like a good dough. The Prime Minister started to speak about the ‘Indigenous Situation’. For a moment, Dan drifted away and thought about his country, how he wasn’t proud of it any more, the insidious creeping zeitgeist of the last eleven years that made it difficult to reconcile a sense of national pride with the daily news of life under these people: the same feeling that made a person think about moving to New Zealand. Without realising it he started humming and came back to the day, brighter now with the sun out and people shading their eyes, their faces scrunched up looking at the squat, bespectacled man on the stage still talking to someone but to none of them.

The people around Dan looked at him as he continued to hum. Some of them returned their gaze to the stage but a young couple next to him started to hum along with him and then slowly, more people began to join in. He hummed, keeping the same pitch, stopping only to take breath and more people took up the sound, a counter drone to that coming from the stage. The hum was loud and police and bodyguards were twitching minutely in recognition although they pretended otherwise. It had spread across the front of the stage and people were smiling and humming as it continued to take towards the back of the audience. Howard was looking slightly perturbed and lost a train of thought, quickly regained it, only to lose it again moments later. He stopped for a moment and then said something about climate change and renewable energy. But he could no longer be heard above the hum which began to rise in pitch. He turned around to the MC with a look of confusion. He turned back to the audience and forced a smile. The pitch was rising slowly as if they were inside a plane as it took off. Dan was high on the wave of the cresting sound which suddenly shattered and burst into a collective scream that was a co-mingling of agony and ecstasy and went on for thirty seconds until all were out of breath.

The Prime Minister had gone and Dan could see only the backs of four suited bodyguards trotting away. The crowd was still and mute, unsure what had happened but the mood was of something positive. No one seemed to know what to say to one another, even those who had come together were mute. The police looked ready for action but there was no violence in the crowd and the officers looked sad all bound together and puffed up waiting for something that would never come. Slowly the crowd started to murmur and disperse. For the first time since the election had been called Dan felt a calm come over him.