A Very Ordinary car

Years ago, I published a piece about all the cars I’ve owned.

It’s enough to say that there have been plenty, and some more loved than others, but amongst the collection there are vehicles which simply felt “right”.

It probably had something to do with time and place, but amongst them I’d nominate my Peugeot 505 wagon, my second Renault 12, and my Commodore ute.

Note I haven’t included any of my three MX5s, or the various Falcons I owned over the years.

These were all great cars, but they didn’t instantly feel “right” from the moment I got behind the wheel.

The MX5s were essentially “special” cars for enjoying driving. There’s a difference between “special” and “right”, and it relates to function. Cars that feel “right” are universally useful all of the time.
Ever tried to move house with an MX5? 

The subject of this post, my son’s Mazda 323, does feel “right”.

I’m driving it because he has a job a short cycle ride from where he lives, and simply doesn’t need it, as he lives very close to a railway station for the occasions he needs to get somewhere other than work.

On the other hand, he doesn’t want to sell it in case he gets a transfer in his job to a location not so accessible, so I’m garaging it for the time being.

The 323 is indeed a very ordinary car, but it’s comfortable, reliable, and accessible. By “accessible” I mean easy to get in and out of, and easy to see out of. Modern small sedans are over-styled, and as a consequence neither accessible or with good visibility. This is probably one reason why SUVs have become popular.

The 323 has a six CD stacker and cruise control as aftermarket accessories, and these bits add to the appeal. My iPhone will mount to the dashboard, and with the correct adaptor becomes a basic version of Apple Car play.

This means the phone becomes a satnav.

I’ve found a Bluetooth accessory that allows me to play the tunes on my iPhone over the stereo. It works a treat.

So the 323 has all the mod cons available in our Kia Cerato, but is easier to drive, easier to get in and out of, and easier to reverse, even though it doesn’t have a camera. It’s all to do with the greenhouse, and the ease with which you can turn to see over your shoulder. 
I’m getting on a bit you know…..

Nostalgia

It's been over twelve months now since I retired.

My first attempt at retirement was an abject failure, as it lasted only six months.

This one is permanent. I'm deaf, which makes working in noisy environments impossible. Trying to plan with my co-workers on the way to jobs, and conversing with kids and teachers in noisy classrooms had become embarrassing.

I do miss the work. One of the experiences I miss is flying in and out of places like Quilpie, Cunnamulla and Charleville.

This video was taken as we were landing at Cunnamulla.

The aircraft was a chartered Beechcraft Super King Air.

Cunnamulla was an American bomber base in World War Two, and Lyndon Johnson spent time there. I guess the Yanks figured that the Japanese would get so bored flying over the country between the coast and the outback that they'd shelve any ideas of attacking it.

Enjoy the vid.

My Flying List

No - I've never flown on a Concorde. This one is at the Intrepid museum NYC.

I don’t pretend to be an expert, gentle reader, but I reckon I’m as qualified as any lay person to comment on matters aviation.
I’ve done plenty of flying. Some I’ve forgotten. This I remember in chronological order –
1968 – Slingsby glider at Goondiwindi

Slingsby

1969 – TAA Vickers Viscount (Brisbane – Williamtown – Nasho intake)

TAA Viscount

1969 – RAAF UH1H and Navy UH1B, C-130A and C-130E, DHC Caribou, (Training in 7 RAR)

DHC Caribou

UH-1H

1970 – RAAF and US Army UH1H (Operational flying – More times than I can count – beat walking); DHC – American Airlines R & R charter – Saigon/Bangkok – Boeing 707; Caribou; C -123; Qantas Boeing 707 10/12/70 (RTA)

C-123

Qantas 707

1974 – Lake Buccaneer (GBR trip)

Lake Buccaneer

1977 – TAA Boeing 727

TAA 727

1978 – Air NZ DC-10 (The actual aircraft that crashed at Mt Erebus – ZK-NZP one year later. I always note the rego numbers)

Air New Zealand DC 10

1979 – Boeing 727

British Airways 747

1980 – Boeing 747 – (British Airways – UK & return).

Australian Airways 737

1983 – 1989 – Various Boeing 737s.

DC3

1986 – DC – 3 (“Champagne flight”). My bride got airsick.

C130 during pilot's strike

1989 – C-130 E Townsville/Brisbane during pilot’s dispute. Tail number indicated that it was an aircraft I had flown in during Nasho training in 1969.

Chartered Cessna 180

1993 – Cessna 180 on charter – Mt Isa, Dajarra, Boulia, Bedourie, Birdsville, Windorah (Researching indigenous communities)

QantasLink Super Kingair

1993/94 – Beechcraft Super King air – 4 Flights annually attending Townsville board meetings from Mt Isa.

1994 – 2000 – Various 737s and Airbus 320s – attending national conferences.

Virgin 737

2006 – Singapore Airlines 777 – Brisbane/Singapore. Airbus 320 Singapore/Saigon.

Singapore airlines 777

2007 – Brisbane/KL – Malaysia Airlines 777. KL/Saigon – Airbus 320,Air Vietnam 737 – 800 Da Nang/Hanoi.
Air Vietnam ATR – 72 Saigon/Da Nang.

Vietnam Airlines ATR 72

Malaysian Airlines 777

Malaysian Airlines 737

2008 – 2015 – Numerous flights to Adelaide on Virgin 737 – 800s. Flight to Perth to connect with Indian Pacific – Virgin 737 – 800.
2010 – Darwin/Brisbane Boeing 767.

Qantas 767

2007 – 2015 – Lear Jet; Piper PA-42 Cheyenne; Beechcraft Super King Air (All charters involving consultancy work at Charleville, Quilpie and Cunnamulla – one flight per school term). The Lear was amazing. We hit an emu on the Quilpie strip in the King Air.

Beechcraft Super King Air

2018 – Qantas 747 Brisbane/LA/New York. COPA 737 – Washington/Panama City/Havana.

Qantas 747 - 400

2019 – Various flights to Newcastle – Airbus 320s and 737s. I usually travel domestic every couple of months, and have discovered that whilst Toowoomba’s new airport is convenient, fares to Sydney, Townsville, Cairns and Melbourne are expensive.

Jetstar A320. If you travel with this mob, read the fine print before you book online.

Air north fly Embraer 170s and I have used these various times direct from Toowoomba to visit friends and rellies in Townsville and Cairns.

Airnorth E170

My favourite long haul aircraft is the Boeing 747 – 400 (especially if you book row 46 or 58 behind the exits).
My favourite short haul aircraft – Embraer 170 as configured by Air North.
My most memorable flight – It's a toss up between flying out of a dirt strip in the Colo training area in a Caribou in July 1969 in a massive cross wind. (We were last stick out and all flights were cancelled after ours), and Charleville/Roma on a stormy November afternoon in 2010 when we struck hail and wind shear. Pilot was a genius.

Writing Home - 27th March 1970

When I returned from Vietnam back in December 1970, my mother packaged up all the letters I wrote, and gave them to me.

Because I wrote at least one per week, and I wrote to all members of my close family when I could, there were plenty of letters - over 350 in fact.

I'm making a feature of occasionally posting the contents of these on this blog.

History buffs may be interested, and the insights provided by this primary source material are, gentle reader, revealing, both of the conduct of the war, and my attitude to it.

F.S.P.B. "Anne"
27 - 3 - 70

1735099

5 Pl, B Coy,

7 RAR,

AFPO 4,

GPO Sydney

Dear Mum and Dad

I'll start this now (at 7pm) in the vain hope that I'll finish it tonight. I'll get a fair bit done because it doesn't get dark until about 7:30pm. We are harboured up just outside fire support patrol base "Anne".
Today we completed Operation "Finschhafen" and moved into the F.S.P.B. by A.P.Cs. At the base, we showered, ate, and went to Mass (unique on Good Friday, I suppose). Tomorrow we move into a new A.O. North of here. There's been no word of R and C yet, so I'll assume it's not until after the next Op at least.
Now, the summary of Operation "Finschhafen" -
The battalion had no "kills", which is apparently the basis on which the success (or otherwise) of an operation is judged. Therefore, the operation was, in the eyes of our commanders, a failure, and our C.O. had a dressing-down from the American commander of III Corps about this. To me, this is a lot of nonsense, but then the Yanks have always taken themselves too seriously, when it comes to statistics. I can't imagine it upsetting our C.O. very much, anyway.
                                                           28.3.70
Well, it's now 24 hrs since I began this letter. I'm now about 10 miles north of F.S.P.B. "Anne", near the border with Long Khanh Province, and on the banks of the Song Rai again. Major Warland has decided upon a new approach - we split up into half-platoon groups and sit in ambush for days at a time on as wide a front as possible. As you can imagine, I approve wholeheartedly of this. For all their plans, we covered a lot of ground today (not 10 miles of course - the first 8 were in helicopters) and I'm feeling pretty tired now. There shouldn't be far to go tomorrow, though. As has been the case of late, no sign of the enemy. Our intelligence thinks that they're waiting until the Yanks and we withdraw before they try to regroup again. I hope so.
Because of injuries, one section of the platoon is down to five men, and I'm helping them out with night sentry on the gun. I don't mind, though it does relieve the boredom.
You've probably read of 7 RAR having five blokes wounded in an accident with mortars. They were "Pogos" (base wallahs in normal language) who went outside the wire at F.S.P.B. "Anne" and directed mortar fire on themselves. God knows how they managed it. Anyway, they're OK now, although one is going back to Australia. Another bloke got sick of the scrub and shot himself in the foot, although they listed him as W.I.A. I don't know what will happen to him. Dishonourable discharge, I suppose.
Although I'm not getting any papers, please keep sending them. When my turn comes for L.O.B. (left on base defence) they will be handy. Also when we go back to Nui Dat in preparation for R and C, I will have a chance to read them.
I've been taking plenty of photos of the things we've been doing, but they probably won't get home for you for ages. At the moment, I aim to take a fair library of slides, and buy a good projector when I'm on R and R. I'll send it straight home.
Speaking of buying, I haven't spent a cent since we began Ops three weeks ago. So every cloud has a silver lining. Well, I'll finish this now, Mum and Dad, so I'll be able to give it to the Sarge (he looks after the mail). I'm sorry for poor old Anne. She writes me stacks of really interesting spontaneous letters, and I haven't been answering them. My excuse again is lack of envelopes and paper, but I'll make up for it when I get some. Helen has also been good with mail, and Neil is obviously making a great effort, because I've heard from him three times now, I think.
I think about you all quite a bit, and it's really good to hear about all the little things that happen.

Lots of love,

Bob




 

Time Travel

Williamtown Airport - Pic courtesy News Ltd.

Visiting Newcastle, gentle reader, is always for me a special kind of time travel.

I’m here catching up with an old rifle section mate who is in care whilst the specialists are trying to manage his myeloma.

It’s most likely a consequence of exposure to dioxin all those years ago. It’s bitter to see him in pain, but at the same time good to catch up with two other ex Nashos who travelled up from Sydney. It had some of the flavour of a mini section reunion. We spent about a year together in 1969/70, comprising six months training in Holsworthy, through Canungra and Shoalwater, and then the voyage to Vung Tau on the Sydney.

Three of us did rookies at Singleton, the other at Kapooka.

In Vietnam, we were together in 5 platoon until July, when we went our separate ways.

Every point along the way has its memories of another time.

The airport at Williamtown, now the home of F-35s, is where I disembarked from a TAA Vickers Viscount on my way to Singleton from Brisbane a Nasho. It was my first flight in any kind of aircraft.

Back then, there were Dassault Mirages roaring about the Williamtown RAAF base, which shares the airport.

Last time I drove down to Newcastle, I stopped off at the Infantry museum at Singleton. Strangely, perhaps, that didn’t trigger as many memories, although if you're into military history, it's worth a visit.

The units based there now have privatised security, and the hi-vis vest clothed staff on the gate weren’t impressed by an old geyser seeking a nostalgic wander around.

I don’t remember any ex-diggers rocking up making strange requests on the few occasions when I did guard duty back in the day, but from memory, admission had more to do with the state of the guard commander’s liver or whether or not there were any attractive young women in the party, rather than health and safety protocols.

Newcastle is an industrial centre, but much of the area around the harbour has been gentrified. It reminded me of Teneriffe in Brisbane.

It still has the laid back atmosphere I remember from the seventies. This is perhaps the most obvious aspect of the time travel experience. Even driving there is much as it was back then, with precious little impatience and a tolerance for slightly lost geriatric visitors in hire cars.

It probably just as well the local drivers are tolerant. The traffic engineering is woeful, although obviously roundabouts are seen to be the solution to every traffic flow problem.

The Times They Are A Changin

The lines from the title of this post, gentle reader, obviously come from the Bob Dylan song.

I can remember hearing it for the first time just before I turned 17, when I had saved up money earned from picking tobacco at Beerwah, and had bought a record player. That was 1964.

The song was on Dylan's album of the same name which had just been released in the US.. I was into Bob Dylan, Joan Baez and Peter, Paul and Mary at the time, but Dylan's anthem was the one that really grabbed my attention.

Peter, Paul and Mary were a bit vanilla.

The civil rights movement was in full swing in the US, and I remember being outraged at the TV images of protesters being cudgelled in Alabama after they reacted violently to bombings of the homes of civil rights leaders by members of the Alabama police force..

I remember the song coming over the car radio on a trip from Landsborough to Caloundra (where we had a seaside home at the time) and that my parents weren't too keen on the line "Your sons and your daughters are beyond your command".

I was the eldest of five back then, and was probably giving bad example.




Something like the same sense of outrage is developing now, although it has a very different face. In the US it is led now not by street protestors, but by elected representatives, most of them young and female, and many from minority groups.

To a lesser extent, the same phenomenon is marching through our parliament, as demonstrated by the increasing number of women sitting as independents in the H of R after resigning from the Coalition, or being elected on the senate cross benches.

The videos embedded above (courtesy of C-SPAN) feature Ilhan Omar (a newly-elected Democrat congresswoman) and Elliott Abrams (Trump's special envoy to Venezuela) and Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez.

They're riveting viewing, and encapsulates the force of this new movement, which reminds me so strongly of the youth movement of the sixties. Back then, before the internet, what was happening in the US happened here after a small lag of time. These days, the web has removed that time lag.

I doubt very much that anything will be the same again.

Bring it on.....

Two Reports

Pic courtesy ABC

You may recall, gentle reader, the release, back in February 2011 in the USA, of the  Financial Crisis Inquiry Report.

On this side of the Pacific, on February 1st this year, the report of the Royal Commission into Misconduct in the Banking, Superannuation and Financial Services was released.

These reports were separated in time by eight years, and set in very different locations, both in terms of purpose and intent, but there are some striking consistencies in their conclusions.

Comparisons are intriguing.

The Financial Crisis Inquiry Report (I'll call it the FCIR) has a summary of conclusions dealing with the causes of the GFC. I'll use the headings for this summary including the prose from the report to keep it simple.

They include the finding that the financial crisis was avoidable, that it was the product of widespread failures in financial regulation and supervision, and that there were dramatic failures of corporate governance and risk management at many systemically important financial institutions..

It also found that a combination of excessive borrowing, risky investments, and lack of transparency put the financial system on a collision course with crisis.

It concluded that there was a systemic breakdown in accountability and ethics and that collapsing mortgage-lending standards and the mortgage securitization pipeline lit and spread the flame of contagion and crisis.

The final conclusions were that over-the-counter derivatives contributed significantly to the crisis and that the failures of credit rating agencies were essential cogs in the wheel of financial destruction.

In the case of the Australian Banking Royal Commission (henceforth called the  RCBSFS), Commissioner Hayne lists Four Observations.

Paraphrasing, they are the connection between conduct and reward; the asymmetry of power and information between financial services entities and their customers; the effect of conflicts between duty and interest; and holding entities to account.

Comparing the conclusions of these inquiries is fascinating.

Working from the Australian commission, we can neatly group the findings of the FCIR under Hayne's Four Observations.

Under the connection between conduct and reward, we can group a systemic breakdown in accountability and ethics and collapsing mortgage-lending standards.

Grouped with the asymmetry of power and information between financial services entities and their customers we find a combination of excessive borrowing, risky investments, and lack of transparency.

Under Haynes' holding entities to account. we can align widespread failures in financial regulation and supervision, and dramatic failures of corporate governance and risk management.

The RCBSFS observation of the effect of conflicts between duty and interest cannot be characterised quite so neatly. It actually conflates references to failure of corporate governance, and accountability and ethics.

There is one very clear thread that runs through the findings of both reports. The yielding of financial institutions to unbridled greed without any concern for the consequences to the consumers of the industry (or more correctly - the service) is stark and clear. 

In the case of the GFC, these consequences went well beyond the local scene, of course. The term "collateral damage" comes to mind. Depending on how the politics pans out, collateral damage could occur in terms of the brokerage industry in this country, 

The cliché holds. When Wall St sneezed, the rest of the world caught cold.

What bothers me about the financial services industry, both here and in the USA, is that those responsible for the damage seem quarantined from penalty. 

We know what effect the GFC had on Australian workers. It's been studied. The effect on American and British workers, especially the middle class was comparatively worse.

And the effect on the Masters of the Universe, the traders and financiers responsible for the whole GFC catastrophe? Not much.

I won't be holding my breath to see any local penalties from the RCBSFS. That's not how the finance industry rolls..