Chapter One. Leaving Jungle City

This story will start the way stories of this type normally do. Somewhere near the middle. More often than not in a particularly vague situation, which is then used as a platform to explain how, the main character had got there. My current setting could only be described as a Swedish Spa. Cheap cask wine had escaped from various glasses into the water and there seemed to be legs everywhere. It was very, very late and I could feel a body part that was definitely not my own stroke my chest. As I slipped in and out of consciousness only one thing ran through my mind.

‘This is something I will never tell my Mother about.’

****

Somehow I had managed to land a summer job in Hamilton. Which was great. As a student money is this sort of glowing substance that you only ever see on music videos or very briefly as it swoops from some magical government bank account into your own and then immediately into that of your landlord (who you will never, ever meet). This job would mean that I could finally have some of my very own. Which I could then stuff in my anemic looking wallet and use to embark on another student myth, known as Spending Money On Stuff That Isn’t Rent. However there was a slight problem. I had vowed to never live in Hamilton again. It was with this issue in mind that I had left my cosy Mt Eden flat to walk for some reason or another down to the city. Over the course of the forty-minute plod a very attractive solution had worked its way out of the bowels of my mind.

I would move to Raglan.

I mean why not? The place was fantastic. At least it sure beat Hamilton. The waves. The sun. The parties. It would be the summer of my life!

I didn’t know the half of it.

As it was only mid-year and very much still winter I pushed the idea back into the mind-bowels and continued doing whatever the hell I was doing back then. It wasn’t until the middle of exam season that I gave it another thought. It was then that I realised I had barely one week left until I would be effectively homeless in a strange faraway town. I had a friend who once stayed in a cave north of Auckland. He told me it was the way to go. I tend to pace when I get excited about something and after four laps of my flat I eventually laid the idea to rest. It would have been amazing. But firstly I didn’t know if there were any caves in the area and secondly, four months is a long time to live underground with no electricity, sanitation or Facebook. I desperately needed somewhere to live. So I did the sensible thing and began trawling around online until I found an option.

“Waitetuna Valley Road: we are situated on a beautiful organic lifestyle property half way between Hamilton and Raglan. $60 a week. We also share the land with 20 chickens, 4 goats, 2 pigs, 1 dog and 1 cat” the advertisement stated.

Old Macdonald had a farm. And it was in Waitetuna. I was running out of time. It was dirt-cheap. I took the number and left a message.

A couple of days later I found myself at an acoustic gig at the Wine Cellar on K Rd. I was busy admiring the Blonde Brigade that for the last month, for some reason had been stalking my every social movement (I wasn’t complaining). Suddenly my unstealable cellphone (more on that later) started titillating me through my right pocket. The combination of skinny jeans and phones seem to have that effect on me (I’m not complaining about that either). I scampered out of the darkened bar and took the call. What I met was more high-speed car chase than conversation.

“Hiitsanitayoucalledaboutthehouse.”

“Er. Pardon?”

“Yeahitsanitafromwaitetunayouleftamessage.”

“Um. It’s quite loud in a here. I’m having trouble hearing you.”

There was nothing wrong with the sound level. She just had that annoying way of speaking that reminds you of a barrage of machine guns. Not unlike the sound that comes out of the rooms of my nerdy Hobson Heights flatmates. Every single night. (Poor guys.)

After about five minutes of conversation with Ms Gunfire I extracted the information I needed. I had a place to live. One email and one phone call and I had a place to live. I really, really hoped it was going to work out. With that weight off my mind I sat my last exams and prepared to leave Auckland for my big adventure.

****

With all my earthly possessions packed into the car I took one last wander around the Jungle Flat. The run down house just outside of Mt Eden Village had been my home for the better part of a year and I was a little sad to be leaving. It was one of those flats that develop their own legend due to their inherent awesomeness. In this case the Jungle Flat is known for its general quirkiness and the sheer amount of interesting people that have flowed over its rotting porch over the years. The reason it is called the Jungle is simply because it has one. Twenty years ago the back yard was a beautiful, albeit typical Epsom villa garden. Twenty years ago people stopped caring about it. It is now its very own urban-tropical rainforest. You can go so deep into it that all you see is trees and foliage and the occasional chimpanzee. At the edge of the forest is a cottage, which is reminiscent of the one in Snow White and the Seven Dwarves, or the Gingerbread Cottage in Hansel and Gretel. Whatever your take on it, the outdoor portion of the Jungle Flat could be found in any typical fairy story. If you go in there at night there is a good chance some kind of witch/troll/other mythical creature will kidnap you and steal your clothes. That would just be awkward. Don’t go in there at night.

The house itself is just as unique. I would suggest that every single part of it is either broken or has had a recent fix-up attempted on it. Either way the chances of it working properly for you are about as high as outrunning the centaur that lives in the far corner of the garden. Before you even get inside you’ll find the sensor light will not light your way (which actually led to stalker problems), the old fridge that grew a layer of mould while in the kitchen (it certain didn’t keep your food fresh) and the door knob that would fall off the second you touched it.

Once you had managed to trick the flat into letting you in, it just got even crappier. There was no carpet in the hall, which is really great in winter, and if there was wallpaper it was threatening to join the rest of it, which had peeled off and disintegrated some fifty years earlier. From there you went through the make shift door (an old bed sheet) and into the living room. There you were confronted with this bizarre piece of ‘art’ which was apparently ‘very expensive’ but to me it looked like a depraved toddler had been let loose in the supply closet of a high school art class. Again the wallpaper was spiraling toward the floor and the furniture consisted of three very ratty looking couches. And by ratty I mean a colony of rats could very well have been living inside them.

From there you stepped down into the kitchen/dining room area (through a real door this time). The kitchen was all you would expect. If there were cupboard doors, they would fall off when you tried to open them. The drawers would be touch-and-go to as whether they would open for you or not. I have already mentioned the ‘fridge’. Directly across from there lies the bathroom. I would probably puke a little if I tried describing it to you so I will save us both the horridness of it. The dining room was in a similar state to the lounge, with a couple of interesting additions. Firstly it had a revolving table which seems classy. Of course it wasn’t due to the fact that the tabletop was in no way connected to its base. Any attempt to use it would result in your spaghetti bolognese blending into the already stained carpet. The only way to overcome this difficulty was to have an even number of people eating at it to balance the forces of your respective dinners. Even this didn’t guarantee anything. The other amazing feature of the dining room was the ceiling. It was bright green and at nighttime the little critters would positively glow. If you end up having dinner in there (after navigating the logistical nightmare of the table) whatever you do, don’t look up. We have now reached the rear of the house. From here you must attempt to get through the ranch slider door, which will of course be stuck, and end up on the deck which overlooks the forest. The deck and adjoining stairs are made of pieces of rotting timber, if, indeed, they are actually there. Many ankles have more than likely been snapped over the years due to the missing boards. Also, never try and go down the stairs in slippers when wet. Tried that. It isn’t worth it.

At the bottom of the stairs lies the Dungeon, which stored the washing machine, other miscellaneous crap that has been accumulated over the last two hundreds and oddly enough, caked in a thick layer of dust, a lone bottle of ancient Corona (which disappeared about mid way through the year.) The Dungeon is also home to a grumpy gnome who was banished from the Jungle by the other fairies. Just kidding. Anyway, despite the complete shittiness of the place, the Jungle Flat was my home and I loved it.

And that’s because the physical attributes of the flat were only half the story. It’s always the people that make a place and I definitely shared the Jungle with a few characters. There was Anna, who was an advertising guru and also doubled as my relationship consultant. Ben was my roommate who had been there at the Jungle as long as anyone can remember. He studied jewelry, and to be honest, he was rather quirky. Jono was a television news personality. He lived in the Gingerbread Cottage and gave me some of my best laughs over the year. Romelli was from Peru; artist, musician, filmmaker and very good friend. Last but not least was Michelle. Michelle looked like Amy Winehouse (but unlike Amy, is a well functioning person). She studied right next door. Because yes, once you put on your David Livingstone boots and macheted your way through the undergrowth, the University of Auckland lay just across what remained of the fence. (It took me almost six months of sweaty exploration to obtain this information.) At one point we even had a cute, but very smelly ginger kitten, which would entertain us with her antics. With this little band of characters I journeyed through the experience that was the Jungle.

I could tell a thousand stories about my time there. In fact I could write a novel about the experience. But since this story is about my wonderful summer and not The Jungle Book (I went there) I will just tell a couple. I have entitled them The Untheivable Phone and The Stairwell Strikes Back and in their own way they sum up what the Jungle Flat was all about.

I was wandering home one night from late night drinks at Circus, an Eden Village café. The road I lived on was poorly lit, and since it was a murky winter night the area was near black. About halfway down the road it bends in a z shape and in the corner there is a dodgy park that is frequented by various half-lifes who go there to smoke weed and P or whatever with their douchebag friends. I wandered past and heard a yelling in the distance. I stopped and looked into the darkness. There seemed to be nobody there so I put it down to my imagination. I was about two hundred metres from my house when a car careened around the corner and stopped abruptly about twenty metres in front of me. A guy about my height wearing a hoodie swaggered toward me. It took me about three seconds for my brain to register an important piece of information, I was about to become a mugging victim. The little shit grabbed me with one hand and held his other arm behind his back.

“Give me your fucking phone” he demanded.

If my throat hadn’t completely seized up from the shock of the situation I would possibly have laughed a little bit. I have one of those crappy phones that were made light-years ago. It couldn’t connect you to the internet, start your car, or wash your dishes. The only ‘extra’ it had was quite a powerful torch function, which has come in handy many times over the years. Anyhow it certainly wasn’t going to get these guys rich after they had flogged it off, if indeed they could trick anyone into buying the bugger. I handed it to him. He still had his hand hidden behind his back and I wasn’t going to take any chances. This cheap piece of plastic and electronics certainly wasn’t worth losing my teeth over. And anyway, fighting would have been pointless. Criminals are inherently cowards and travel in packs. There were three others in the car. I wouldn’t have stood a chance. He grabbed the phone and scampered back to the car, which screamed off, past the Epsom Bowling Club, and into the night.

Okay. So here I was, minus one phone, but otherwise completely untouched. I quickened my pace back to the safety of the Jungle. I was about one hundred metres from home when I heard a roar behind me. They were back. Only one thought rang through my mind:

“Fuck. I am about to die.”

I nearly pooed my pants. Nearly, because I knew that soiling myself would not help the situation. I clenched my butt cheeks and readied myself for whatever was about to happen next. This is when the story gets good.

The rolled about fifty metres ahead of me and stopped. A big brown dude with an afro leapt up off the drivers seat and yelled at me, and I quote:

“Bro, your phone is too shit.”

Then the guy in the passengers seat opened his door, placed my phone gently on the road, and the troupe once again sped off into the distance. I waddled up to where they had placed it and picked it up. I couldn’t believe what I was holding. I had my phone back. And like myself it was completely untouched.

With adrenaline pounding through my system I ran back to the Jungle and called the cops. They only took about forty-five minutes to come around. Which meant the criminals could have already driven it to Huntly. I guess it’s the thought that counts, and for the Auckland Public forty-five minutes is a dream run. There was a loud rap on the door causing one of the art-pieces in the hall to hastily come off its hinges. I opened the door and two burly policemen stormed inside, radios blazing. I led them through the darkened house into the dining room. I go to switch on the light and nothing happens. That was odd. I looked up and noticed that the green/pink-tinted bulbs had disappeared. I was later to found out that one of the flatmates (who shall remain unidentified) had nicked them and put them in her own room to set the mood for a romantic evening with her latest crush. So here I was, standing in the dark, with two bemused armored cops. One of them, obviously the thinker of the pair, took his torch (which looked liked it could kill a deer), and placed it upright on the trick-table. With a click he turned it on and the room was filled with a glaring light that filled every crack and corner. Those things have some serious kick. With the newfound ability to see what we were doing, the police could now finally begin to take my statement. Apparently I was attacked by a gang of six-foot Mob members, who were armed to teeth with knives, and guns and all sorts of horrible devices of death and destruction (my imagination tends to get the better of me). With the i’s dotted, t’s crossed, ‘facts’ all taken down, and offers of tea and/or coffee turned down, my two new law-enforcing friends disappeared into the night, probably already at least an hour late for their next assault call-out.

The second story has less to do with me, and everything to do with the very real personality of the Jungle Flat. One particular weekend a group of friends had come up from Wellington and were using the house to eat, sleep, shower, all the general necessities. It was Saturday morning and a few of us were bantering in the dining room. Suddenly there was a crash from elsewhere in the house. Seconds later Toby, (or was it Craig?), wandered in with what looked like a serious case of dandruff coating his head and shoulders, and carrying a large piece of plaster. He then sat down next to me in the rickety-fluffy-pink-chair and starting a conversation with me as if the situation was anything but ludicrous. I dusted some of the plaster off his shoulder and asked him what the hell had happened. Apparently as he was walking under the stairwell a square metre chunk of it had fallen off and straight onto his head. A freak accident? Or something more sinister? I think that the Jungle is mostly benevolent, but does have a bit of a mean streak. If it doesn’t like you, it will fall on you. I guess the Jungle didn’t take a liking to him. I don’t know why. He’s a top guy.
****
“Have you got everything?” my Dad asked.

I snapped out of my nostalgic daydream and replied, “To the best of my knowledge”. It later turned out that my knowledge had some gaping holes in it.

I was going to miss the Jungle Flat, and Auckland in general. My time spent there had been incredible and both the place and its people have been burned into my heart forever. With a teary eye I got into the passengers seat and my father drove us out of the city. I said cute little goodbyes to the familiar places and landscape as we drifted by. We hit the Southern Motorway. This was it. The start of a new adventure.

All rights reserved by the author. 2009.