Part 9: The Black Power pad/ We see the Queen
My sister showed up in Chch and invited me to the local BP pad. I was rather reluctant to go but considering I had not seen my sister for a while I thought ‘Why the hell not?” So donning my leather and saying my farewells to the flat I headed off. I got there and some prospects asked me “Who the hell are you?!”, ” Things brother”….”Oh, she’s inside”…I wandered in and headed for a pair of bat-wing doors, pushing them open. I was confronted by about 10 large, patch members having a meeting (nearly damn pooed myself…) “Errrrrrrrrr, Hello…..”. Her BF jumped up and introduced me and led me to her room. Then after the meeting we got down to some serious debauchery! Alcohol flowed, Huge gang members gave me handfuls of pills (which you can’t reallllly refuse….) and I got fucked up big time (in a good way…not the other way). They drove me home and I dragged a mate back with me. The next morning I woke up at home with all my gear intact and a few hours missing. “Oh, the BP guys dropped you off and chucked you in bed,” Bron told me.
The next week the BP were all under ‘close police watch’ as they had killed someone a few days later… (That’s why I avoid gangs). But I had a good time and can’t fault them for their hospitality.
The Queen was visiting ChCh so we all spiked up and headed down to see her. Hordes of people were clustered around, G-men were on the roofs surrounding the Square. We held up Ricketts and the Queen saw his ‘God save the Queen’ t-shirt. She was not amused…Some skins we knew were there clapping and enjoying themselves (they were pro-queen). Can’t say I was too impressed, I thought she’d be bigger…
We moved to Buccleugh street to a wicked rundown house. Slug and Shane came down and raided building sites around the neighbourhood. They ended up building a 8′ half-pipe in our backyard! I was always an indifferent skateboarder tho (it’s pretty hard shredding in steelcaps) and used it as a slide. The Aro crew came for a visit and we played D’n’D and got fucked up.
Bron and I broke up…You get that…people grow apart, want different things…ah well. I did discover that trying to drink yourself to death didn’t work in my case cos I’d just fall over and hit my head. I did miss her spiking my hair tho (she was the greatest at spiking! Even rows that would last for days) but I’d learnt to spike my own hair in the early days.
I went to Wellington and when I got back my records had been ripped off again! We sussed out it was the neighbour so Richard, Sean and myself tooled up and went over to see him. Let’s just say he was ‘conducive to our argument’ and gave us pot and got me a few of my records back. More gigs at some pub whose name I cannot remember and vast amounts of alcohol. Had several fights with people one night and got my ass kicked by 2 wanna-be karate kids. So this friend of mine showed me unarmed combat techniques which actually worked!
Shane and I went into business and started printing shirts for the local comic shop as well as Black Flag tees (not that there were many people into BF apart from ourselves but we’d move a few in Wellington).
I was pretty down, debauchery does have its downsides. You can only drink so many buckets of ‘all-in brew’ (a hideous concoction made up of everyone’s alcohol tipped into a bucket no matter what it is) before it gets boring. So on one trip to Wellington (I was on the piss with the Droogs, we needed more alcohol, so I spent my fare back to Chch) I decided I wasn’t going back. Got Shane to sort my gear out and stayed in Wellington.
One night, coming back from the Hutt, the people I was on the piss with drove passed McD’s in the mall. I looked out and saw a shavehead getting the bash. “Stop the fucking car!” I bailed out and ran back, clocking this guy who was slamming this skin-girl, from behind (HAHA). I picked her up (she was still clutching her bottle…skills) and said ‘Gidday’. The pigs showed up, got all irate with her (she was underage) but I grabbed the bottle and claimed it as mine. The cops told us to piss off!
I like Wellington. The high regard I feel for Wellies is indicated by how fucking trashed I get whenever I go there. If Wellington had a decent mountain I would move there…