On the 6th of April 2005, cousins Jamie Mackenzie and Ben Wylson set off on their bikes on a journey which will take them to over 50 countries and to every one of the worlds great continents, all without the use of an aeroplane.
Saturday, May 27, 2006: ST JEROMES CHARITY BASH Monday 5th June
On Monday the 5th of June, come along and help raise money for the Free Wheels East charity, Practical Action, at the famous St Jeromes cafe/bar, 7 Caledonian Lane (Off little Bourke Street). Jamie and Ben will be there from 7:00 - 1:00 resurrecting the notorious Skillywigler of Koh Tao with sounds ranging from Dog Mendelssohn Rock to Indy Quack, Crackle Blues and Raw Bat Jazz; enjoy music from Beck to Captain Beefheart, from The Black Keys to The Shins. Expect Mooney moments of masterful murmuring melody with resounding rhythms of round rhapsody rolled into crescendos of coconut cornettos and coral-coloured coals, the bucking beauty of lonely bounties.
Wednesday, May 24, 2006: Globalisation, word domination, megalomania
FWE has had their web editor, Guy Campbell, give us a run down of the FWE website statistics. We were thrilled to find out that, so far, in the month of May, we have had a phenomenal average of over 2000 hits per day from more than 60 countries around the Globe. Most of our hits came from the U.S, with the U.K close behind, followed by Australia and the EU. Free Wheels East continues to grow in popularity. This can only mean that our charity, Practical Action, will be getting more donations on-line to do more good around the world in their fight against poverty. Thousands are reading our story. We hope that -through this website- people will dare to go on an adventure of their own, realising that if we can do it, anyone can.
Sunday, May 21, 2006: Neurons take wrong turns
Do you have any idea what it is like to say the same thing on loop for more than 7 hours a day? When you begin talking the brochure talk you have life in your voice, but by lunchtime the life has gone. By sun-down you are a ghost of the person you were at sun-up, a gibbering idiot, mad as a hatter with every wire crossed, saying incoherent, nonsensical things like "We cycled from Dover to Dunkirk, took a road train across Europe, took a ship from Moscow to Beijing and rolly-pollied to Singapore". At this end of our day we are received with bemused expressions. The public have but one agenda: to get as far away from the strange blond loonies spoiling their walk as fast they can. Husbands pull wives away protectively with one arm wrapped tightly around their shoulders, eyes wide with suspicion; "Not interested" they say, simultaneously picking up pace and quick-stepping it away to safety. Not to worry, here comes another couple.... FWE: "Excuse me, sorry to bother you.." Couple say nothing because, having seen the last couple's reaction, they think, Perhaps we'd better walk on past, too. It is a natural tendency of the human being to do exactly what every other human being does. Nobody will stop to listen for a long time now and it's all because of that first suspicious couple. Then what's this? A family from Queensland. We go through the pre-recorded spiel and the family surprisingly are sufficiently amazed by our record that they ask us to sign autographs, ring our bells and pose on the bikes for photographs with us. Before you know it, hey presto! What's this, a crowd! Even the original suspicious couple on their way back from the shops stop off and buy a brochure. People come over to us and ask us for a brochure, no spiel necessary.
Kindness triumphs over rudity every time. Vernon Reid of Living Colour, the pioneering Grammy-winning, platinum-selling rock band, stopped off to interview us for possible future sampling. Before leaving he plonked us on the guest-list for Living Colour's gig that evening. We went along to watch the Chilli Pepper inspiration but had to leave early because Phil Daniels, the Scottish comedian had invited us to a street party.
Sunday, May 14, 2006: Welcome to the pleasure factory
We're surrounded on all sides by lumbering buildings that scrape the sky and cloud, glowing high-rises that illuminate and dominate. The streets have become accustomed to our padding feet that trawl the concrete in search of sales from dawn to dusk; oh, what industrious beings FWE have become!
Days ebb & flow as a tide on the Cornish coast with money marching from walking wallets to our burgundy bags slung right to left over our burly shoulders. Life has assumed a familiar path that kindles memories of a life long ago: Morning mugs of Earl Grey, lunch breaks and the customary jubilation that follows a hard day's graft. Home cooking, comfortable sofas, television, books, a bathtub, wardrobe, carpets, telephones and duvets. It's a life we had forgotten but are slowly remembering, slowly becoming acquainted with once more.
The good folk of Melbourne have forged a place in our affection, good hearts defeating the bad in a battle that was closely fought for several weeks. Meals, drinks and guided tours - we have become inundated with delightful calls of attendance from all quarters of the Victorian capital city; it's a factory of pleasure, a treadmill of sunshine. How can we express our gratitude to these wonderful people who welcome us thus: Jodie & Michael, Leanne O'Connor, Cathy-Ann, Crazy Mary and Aaleeah, beautiful Kate, Caitlin, Phil Daniels, Angela at the Spudbar in Richmond and a bunch of other sparkling characters of distinction?
Tick-tock, tick-tock, time is ticking, funds are raising, we are smiling and Melbourne is shining.
Sunday, May 07, 2006: Wonderful news for FWE friend Joe
You may remember us mentioning the plight of Ben's friend Joe Matthews, who, without warning, in March this year, suffered a series of massive heart attacks, following which he went into a coma. The doctors explained to his desperate family that Joe would need to have a heart transplant to survive. The Great British Public went wild in Joe's favour after the press brought to light his plight. The exposure helped Joe raise £50,000 towards getting a new heart.
We are happy to report that Joe found a heart; he came back from the brink of death; his operation went well; his new heart has not been rejected. Joe lives on.
We have a photo of this legendary character with his new heart, holding his old heart, smiling broadly, and will send the picture to our web editor to be put in our gallery section. Don't look if you are squeamish! The image is quite remarkable. We will send a few more photos of our bike ride along with it too and will let you know when they are published.
Welcome back Joe!
Thursday, May 04, 2006: The brochure extravaganza!
Talk, we talk talk talk and talk more, and some more. White flecks of spittle, some dry on the lips, others in the form of a spray hit the unfortunate FWE accostee in a blizzard of sailing, congealed saliva. For nearly every daylight hour we tell our story. Our only release -and therefore excuse- not to be on the street is the beautiful rain; there's nobody about when it's raining. That is not to say that we don't love to hit people with the FWE phenomenon; there is a point, though, when the voice becomes a low constant of booming, heartless words. You know you sound like you've said it a 1000 times before, and you have.
We meander the Melbourne metropolis in slow gear -on foot, that is- with side-slung bags filled with our pretty promotional campaign material, the limited edition FWE brochure. "Excuse me, sorry to bother you. My cousin and I are on a world cycle ride; so far it's been nearly 9000 ks. Here..." -at which point the brochure is pulled from the side-slung bag - "are the highlights of the first year of the adventure, we call ourselves Free Wheels East." Sometimes the acostee's face becomes a beaming sun of envious appreciation at our achievements to date, the rays of which we soak up, an enzyme to flood us with joy. Sometimes they have a sour, pinched, sneering demeanor which makes one feel as worthless as an unwanted something trodden into a new carpet. We call this sort the 'rat'. One sunbeam cancels out five rats. This is the equation. If one is forced to overcome the ordeal of experiencing 5 rats in a row, it is hard to pick oneself up, yet we always seem to summon the strength in the end.
Apologies; we are painting an inaccurate picture and over-generalising the people who are Melbournites. There are, of course, all sorts of in-betweeners who do not fit into either of these aforementioned extreme brackets; these middlers do not play with your emotions in the way that the others do. They do not slap you in the face or massage your ego; they are courteous. The courteous ones are divided into two kinds also: the ones that buy a copy of the brochure and the ones that politely say "no thanks". We call the upper-middle the 'positive courteous ones' who might not be interested in cycling -you would never see them on a bike- but they buy a brochure because they want to be supportive of something they appreciate in terms of use of initiative, hence the encouraging reward of a purchase. It's 'the negative courteous ones' and the 'rats' who don't buy. To further generalise, the Sunbeams wear bright colours and scarves, whereas the Rats can be found in the CBD and wear white shirts, blue suits and blue ties, they walk far too fast, they are already mentally in the office getting on with the next piece of paper work. This is only in our experience, though; we know that there are some more-than-wonderful people who wear suits out there. It's only that the suits are better at making us feel like underfoot matter than anyone else!
There is a marvelous bonus in our endeavor. We have already been invited to drinks and homely meals with some Sunbeams. In the few days we have talked, there has been phenomenal interest from the media. In a nut-shell: 1 film producer, the editor of a national newspaper, a published poet, many journalists, ethnic radio stations, an ABC Ozzy rules national sports commentator, and many more. How are we going to fit it all in?!
Practical Action
We are pleased to get feedback in the form of emails from those whom we've spoken to, many of them telling us they are making donations to Practical Action on-line. We estimate that every single interested person will tell at least three more about it. One person - a seed to shoot, sprout, blossom, pollinate, fertilise and seed again; a FWE/Practical Action forest of wonder.
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