Goodbye Darrell Lea?

I've just returned from spending four days in the Australian countryside where my dad tought me how to use a chainsaw, how to net your fruit trees, how to properly split wood, and how to talk to wallabies so that they don't get scared. I read a lot and I made cannelloni with my mum, and my brother showed me a little of how to ride his manual motorbike. I have a lot to write about in regard to this time, but on the drive home this evening, listening to Radio National, I heard some entirely shocking news that deserves a swift response. Darrell Lea is closing down.


First Rave, and now this? Why is everything good around me coming to an end!?!???!?

  

I consume so much Darrell Lea chocolate that it's not really alright. I'm a fiendish sweet-tooth, and my favourite sweet of all sweets, the king of sugary treats, is Darrell Lea's coconut rough. It only comes out in the colder winter months, and my personal record was 15 packets in just one season. I count down the days and I'm first in store for the special stock arriving, and as the days slowly grow warmer I begin the hoarder's delight of stockpiling packets in my secret top-shelf space. The way the coconut is toasted and the creaminess of the chocolate combine to make the most satisfying yet moorish coconut rough I have ever tasted in my life. I'm serious. I'm really keen on anything coconut and also anything chocolate, and no other brand (either independent or supermarket available) has ever been able to compete with Darrell Lea's secret recipe. 


The facts of the current situation are as follows: that the company has been running for 85 years, it's still 100% owned by the Lea family, and that the jobs of more than 700 people are at risk if no big players step up to buy them out. The administrators have reported some offers already though, so at least we have reason to be hopeful. The company started out as one of those nan-and-pop outfits, where every inch of the layout was oldschool, and they garnered respect and loyalty from their employees - it's one of those places where some of them have been working in the same chocolate factory for decades. Apparently it went through some tough family feud stuff through the years, but nothing like that could possibly tarnish Australia's love for the brand. Even Julia Gillard had something to say about their rocky road. (They mastered the pun of calling it RockLea Road. Go nan and pop.) 


I myself am going into the city tomorrow and, if there's any left, I intend on spending a LOT of money on coconut rough. Until further notice, let's keep Darrell Lea in our hearts and prayers and treat cupboards. 

The end of Rave magazine - a eulogy of sorts.

The end of Rave is, above all else, sad. I have not yet seen or heard of anyone crying out and falling to their knees beating their fists on tarmac until bloody, so we cannot say it is harrowing. Nor is it terrifying, because we know of the motivations and the justifications for the actions and they were economically logical. Distressing might be a reasonable description of the human emotive response to the news, but it does not indicate an adequate emotional investment and subsequent loss. Equally, we may be disappointed, annoyed, furious, or even angry. If you experienced any or all of these responses to the news then I think you’re on the right track and somewhere along the requisite stages of grief and loss, but for me, it was sadness.

The adjective cannot be undervalued. Sorrow is a profound thing. The gentle sadness that comes with some disappointment and a small measure of guilt. I learnt of the news a few days ago in an email from Chris Harms (the editor), and have been sad since. There are larger questions to deal with of course. Questions about the future of print media, Queensland’s cultural identity, and the waning strength of local unity. As usual though, the mind brings the concern back to oneself, and I wondered about my own relation to the publication.

I would read RAVE whenever I stumbled across the latest edition either on the university stands or somewhere in West End each week. Back in the days when I couldn’t even get into 18+ events, and I had to save months of wages just to afford the taxi fares to the all-ages gigs. (Subway paid $6.74 to fresh 14 year old recruits.) I was never quite tough enough to know all the bands either, so Rave took on that status reserved for older brothers, people who work at Rocking Horse, and that cool chick you really wish you were friends with – somewhere between awesome, unattainable, sexy, and frightening. Reading it was like dating someone totally out of your league because you were so damn excited waiting for them to call you out on all the things you don’t know. They (Rave) were also far betting looking than I was.

Fast-forward a few years, and I still approached those pages with ever-so-slight trepidation. I’d sit beside my computer as I read it, poised to YouTube or Google, or (in recent years) follow through to their website for the full story. I’d cut the pages out for makeshift posters on my ceilings and think about how amazing it was that this publication was free. That no matter how many shifts I worked, or how many times I forgot to (read: couldn’t afford to) renew my Rolling Stone subscription, RAVE was always there for me. Loyal from the start.

And now we come to now, and I’ve decided I want to be a writer, and so I email Chris and he says my stuff isn’t too bad, and maybe I could write for Rave. So I pitch a bunch of events coming up in Brisbane for when I finish exam block, and then I’m on the mailing list for contributors and the world of Brisbane explodes into my face and I’m so goshdarn excited and stoked and I can’t wait to start…

And then email comes in, that Rave is no more.

Like a melancholy spanner into the cogs/works of my holiday plans. Now I’m typing up a eulogy instead of reviewing awesome stuff. Now I’m stressing about the future of my city when I would have been in the middle of its making. It sucks. It sucks real bad.

Not only have my rocking June/July arrangements been ruined, but the golden glow I’ve felt towards Brisbane since returning home in February is beginning to wane. The only thing to quell the concerns this new challenge raises, is the crowd-funding project for the Queensland Literary Awards over at Pozible. In the first 24 hours $5000 was raised, and as of this evening, $12'000 has been raised. It’s been on the news and the radio, and its been in my mind as a reminder that Brisbane can do this. I suppose I just have to have faith in my city. That, and make new holiday plans. 

Getting an educayshen.

I was recently accepted into a prestigious study group at UQ, which officially starts next semester. A small number of students and two academics come together and spend the greatest years (read: hours and hours) of their youth indoors in front of computer screens and books. The noble thing about it, is that the topics of research are human trafficking and migrant smuggling. The research we do is new and often taken quite seriously. The not-so-noble thing about it is that its so so very very cliquey and essentially validates all of my I-wasn't-popular-at-highschool insecurities. It's like The Slug Club, except in the TC Bierne Law School. But, I mean, everybody knows this place looks like Hogwarts anyways.

I digress.
 
I study Law/Arts (t)here and it's hell boring, but opportunities like this pop up every now and then to keep things spicy, I suppose. I mean, I'm memorising cases for contract law right now. Do I have deep-seated interest in contract law? No, not really. Again, I digress. So in this group, we research our chosen topic and each week one person presents a kind of lecture/progress-report of their research. We present fully-academic-style papers of approximately 9'000 words at the end of semester and if they're good enough and in a new enough field of inquiry, they get published in peer-reviewed law journals.

I'm brining this up as an excuse to why I haven't posted anything for ages and why I won't be posting for a few days to come - I'm in the lion's belly of a particularly gruesome exam block. Do you know anything about trusts and property law? Because I don't! It'll all be over by next Tuesday though, and things will get a whole lot better after that.

Anyways, my point is that I'll be starting the research for my topic: "Victims of Human Trafficking Turning Into Perpetrators" on the holidays and I'll be keeping you updated. Talk more soon.