Hometown revisited

Hamilton has come on.

It still gets the occasional poke in the ribs, but its no longer in the recovery position. Poor old Huntly gets that one now.

Following the South African rugby tour in 1981, the infamous invasion of the pitch and the calling off of the game, political cartoonist Tom Scott wrote "there's a lot of nice people come from Hamilton, it's the ones that stay there that spoil it."

That was both genius and less than generous. I'd just moved on from the Tron and it was like both a pat on the back and a kick in the pills.

Our family moved to Hamilton in the 1970's when the pop'n was 100,000 and I was 15. These day's it's double and I'm nearly four times that.

Dad spared us Huntly, commuting there each day for work.

Life was rugby in the winter, rowing in the summer and holiday jobs on the land. Picking up hay or cutting animals up for export at the freezing works.

Cafe culture was kona coffee or percolated in the urn with a custard square at the counter. If you wanted coffee in Dinsdale on th road to Raglan, It was Greggs instant at the Shell station. Full cream from the bottle.

Friday nights I'd ride my shiny Honda SL125 round the city block and park up outside Meltzers surf shop, find out where the parties were and we'd be off. Led Zep 3, Slade, Elton's Yellow Brick rd.

I had my arse pinched for the first time in Hamilton - the wonderful Operatic Society.

Man we could prance, and being straight it was fun making up the numbers.

With the Hamilton rowing club, we sneaked in a girls crew. Took it to the committee and they said no, girls bring the pikelets on regatta day and besides, there's no toilet facilities. So we did it anyway when the boys weren’t training, coaching the clubs first female crew.

I fell in love for the first time in the Tron - not quite Paris, but when the stars wink over Hamilton lake on a clear night parked up in the Cortina, it could be.

My dad always said  “if you find a nice girl, leave her that way”.

He didn’t often say much my dad, and when I asked him some advice about gardening he said, “just one piece son, don’t get caught.” Ahahahah

As Uni students we had some great financial perks.

No fee’s in the late 70’s, we got paid a small student allowance and best of all, our holiday jobs pulled top dollar. All bow to the freezing works.

It was bow to the east actually, mother England having brushed us off so we sold to Iraq/Iran etc.

Affco, Horotiu. A mere blip on the map between Hamilton and Ngaruawahia.

Soon as you came within half a kilometer you could smell it.

Once you were in, you were in. Season after season.

It meant we could go flatting, run a car, drink up large – the money was primo.

I worked 4 or 5 seasons at Affco, on the gut trays separating innards, the beef chain chopping out eye fillets, the cooling floor corralling the stiffs, and in the stockyards, guardian to the bobby calves and pigs.

At 19 I was earning more than my mother who was a charge nurse at Waikato hospital with 20 + years experience.

A gravy train while it lasted.

We’d be working away and suddenly union bosses would call an ‘All Up’ and hundreds of workers would assemble in the carpark where some geezer would bark that working conditions on the mutton board were untenable - steam coming out of the pipes or something, and it was Strike!

A rugby league fixture that arvo in neighbouring Ngaruawahia was pure coincidence.

Farmers were earning close to nothing for some of their stock and we weren’t helping.

Different balance of payments these days.

Thanks to the slaughterhouse, I owned two MkII Cortina’s at the same time. One column shift/bench seat, the other bucket seats, stick shift and a bit more grunt. I was going places, could’ve been Mayor if I’d stuck around and played my cards right.

Young Hamilton came with it’s own university, just out of trainer wheels but holding ground.  

Doing hometown Uni is a bit weird.

Your old chums watch you get bent as opposed to you gapping it to Otago where you can get buggary bent w/out being observed. We got tidily surveiled as we kicked up middle class styles with Johhny Rotten sneaking into the suburbs.

There were a lot of firsts in Hamilton.

That first love?  Pulling into her folks driveway for the second time to see that Yamaha TY250, low slung, twice the cc, chrome nuts glistening on the crankcase, fresh tread on the tyres. 

I remember that u-turn like yesterday.

In Hamilton I discovered hard work, rock n roll, motorbikes, weed, getting drunk, girls, and a critical suspicion of authority. Home for 6 years, good old landlocked Hamilton.

Once I’d done, things moved quickly.

Goodbye to the seasons at Affco, the regatta’s at Karapiro.

A tank of gas, a bag of weed and I was gone.

Closing on 40 years later and I’ve been making my peace with the Waikato.

There’s a greater mix of elves and hobbits now. Still a few Orks.

This year my old high school 1^st XV got owned by Hamilton Boys High School’s 4^th XV, 40 something nil - hammered. Hamilton can be a tale of two cities. 

I made lifetime friends in Hamilton.

One of my teachers from that school remains a great mate, sold me his band gear when he hung up his gigging axe. 

And I have a special Tron friend who never left. He was the first person I ever asked on a date. He's never pinched my arse (though there's still time) and his family and I have become 4eva chums. He's just set me up with an avocado tree.

A little while back the two of us dug up the high school time capsule, a few of us catching up at significant b/day.

New Hamilton is going places. 
They’re working on the ringroad and there’s grass, diggers and development everywhere. Both sides of the river still home sizeable tracts of comfortably - or uncomfortably conservative brethren.

Fair to say mainstream narrative wins the day, and I've been known to resort to meds for hometown visits. You wouldn’t diss dairying too loud.

They’d have you in Garden Place in stocks and pelt you with sour cream before you could say soy latte.

Mooo.

Here’s to the shire.