Friday madness

Are other families as disorganised as ours? On Thursday, I spent the day in the hospital at the fracture clinic with Sir Talkalot and his broken arm. I took a book I'm reading for school to read but got little reading done as Sir Talkalot wanted to talk. So I put the work off. That evening I was feeling ill with stabbing pains in my abdomen -- I thought maybe it was a UTI, but it turned out to be some odd sort of gastro bug that's doing the rounds; in any case, I didn't get any work done.

So:

Friday morning, I wake up feeling feverish and with aches and pains everywhere. And Sir Talkalot has missed his bus. Again. Resigned to having to take him, I'm ready to go when Sir T notices the dogs were out. There's much cussing and cursing (yeah, they're the same thing really, but it sounds good!) as the blasted dogs don't want to be caught, but we get them inside, eventually. By this time we're running late.

We drive into school and get there at 9.05. Sir T has an excursion and is dismayed because there are no buses waiting. No buses, and no students waiting for buses.

"They've gone already. Quick, quick, you have to take me into the Immigration Museum!"

"Don't you think you should go in first and check?"

"My classroom was empty. They're not here."

"How do you know?"

"We just drove past it," he says. (The road to his locker pod goes through the school itself.) "It's empty. I'm telling you: they're gone!"

"Oh."

"Quick! You've got to get me there."

So we head back out onto the road and battle the peak-hour car park that's called a freeway. Sir T is getting agitated by the traffic jam and our slow process. "Don't worry," I say. "If we're caught, so are they."

We get to the Immigration Museum at 9.50. Happily -- unexpectedly -- there's a car park nearby. I have 85 cents in change in the car, so I'm wondering how long that will buy me. Not long, I presume, wishing I'd brought my bag and purse. Even more happily, the meter is out of order -- although this makes me cautious because the last time I parked in a spot with an out-of-order meter, I got a parking ticket, even though I rang and reported the meter as faulty. I had two rounds of fighting that before I won. This time I can't ring as I haven't got my phone. It's in my bad. After all, it was just a quick trip to school, right?

I stay with the car while Sir T goes to see if he's school's at the museum. It doesn't open till 10. And there are no buses waiting. Hmm. They were also going to the Eureka tower, so I'm wondering if they went there first and whether we should wait. And all the time I'm almost shaking with fever. 

When eventually the museum opens, he finds the school cancelled the excursion the day before, and everyone was told -- only we were at the hospital! So we head back to school. It's nearly 11.30 by the time I get home and collapse into bed. I still don't get any work done.

Legacy of Immigration decisions

Sometime about a year and a half ago, my daughter's very excellent (yes, "very" -- the word I tell my students to avoid) singing teacher was given her marching orders from this country. Doina was working here, had been so for a number of years and had built up a steady clientele, but was told that as she was between 55 and 60 and didn't have enough money behind her, she couldn't stay. 

Never mind that her business was flourishing and because she could teach from home, this was something she could long do to support herself. Never mind that she seemed to be the only classical teacher in the western suburbs. Never mind that she has a PhD is music and extensive experience in operas including running them. The good people at the Immigration Department said that such experience wasn't necessary to teach the general public.

Great.

Music is my daughter's life. And while she loves pop, truth is her voice is more suited to classical singing. She sings in the Victorian State Singers, who are as serious a group as you're ever likely to find, and the Australian Girls Choir. She's learning piano and music theory and studying music at school. But her strength is singing. She struggles with piano and is behind where she'd need to be to use piano as her VCE instrument. She's also behind in theory. And in the time since Doina left, we can chart a decline in her voice.

In the meantime, she's had another teacher, who was quite good -- and a great singer -- but who thought that the exercises PH was doing with Doina were far too hard -- so hard, in fact, that she couldn't do them.

The best solution seemed to be to go back to PH's original teacher, whom we left mainly because of the travelling needed to get there and back. Imagine our surprise and delight to find she'd not only moved closer but to our own suburb! Perfect. Only she's not teaching privately anymore. She doesn't know anyone she can recommend in the western suburbs. No, let me rephrase that: she doesn't know anyone who is teaching in the western suburbs.

So, I'm left contemplating travelling further afield, or trying to engage Doina through Skype. I know she's taught violin successfully this way, but I can't imagine how it would work with singing because of the delays. Even a fraction of a second -- Doina's playing scales and arpeggios, and PH is singing them back, only Doina's hearing different notes to the ones she's now playing. How would that be? Perhaps the only way is to give it a try. But I'm angry, immeasurably angry, that we're in this position in the first place.

Such skills are not needed to teach the general public? Such skills were making a difference to my daughter's life. But, of course, she's just the general public so we shouldn't give a shit about her. You know, if Doina had wanted to go, I would have been sad, and said fair enough. But she didn't want to go. She waged a campaign to stay, and many of us wrote supporting letters. I thought mine was strongly argued, but I didn't even get an acknowledgment. I know she'd love to come back -- whether that was viable financially if she were given a new visa is another matter, but it's a moot point anyway. I'm sure PH wasn't the only disappointed student -- we're just one family who's been affected, but a year and a half on those effects are still reverberating within us, just as they are, no doubt, with Doina.

Trains and buses rant

Sir Talkalot continues to miss his bus, which infuriates me because it's impacting substantially on my time. I'm also infuriated that although there is a growing estate just down the road, no public transport services this area. If there were public transport, my problems would be solved, particularly as I think the private buses are way, way, way too expensive.

Princess Sleephead catches public transport. $400 per year gets her a train, bus and tram pass that she can use all over Melbourne, including on weekends. I think she can use it all over the state, in fact. In comparison, the bus ticket costs $2000 per year (although there is a government subsidy of about -- I can't remember. $400? $500?), and this allows him one bus ride to school and one home, on school days, and if he misses that bus then bad luck. There's not another one half an hour later. There's not any service on weekends or on holidays. That's an enormous disparity in both services and price. Oh, come on, government: extend those public bus routes, please!