Questions of Travel

by Michelle De Kretser

  Tania’s husband, Jared, said that they had used the Ramsay guidebook on their holiday. “It was pretty good on background, but the prices were totally out of date.” He asked Ravi how he could become a guidebook writer. “I’ve always loved traveling, I reckon that’d be a great job.” Behind his back, his wife’s eyes were expressive.

  A lift home had been arranged to spare Ravi two changes of Sunday trains. A tea-planter in his youth, Desmond had worked for the railways in Sydney; he was retired now, but could still recite a rosary of timetables and routes. Merle had a parcel of lampreys ready in a plastic bag. “I always make extra. And two per gentleman.” The old lady took Ravi’s face in both her hands and said, “Darling, you are the spitting image of your mummy. I was in class with her mummy. What do you think of that?” Then she urged him to marry a nice Australian girl.

  A compromise was reached: tenants were found for Carmel’s house. Ravi gave his consent on condition that the old sideboard remained in place. He had returned Angie Segal’s phone and bought himself an up-to-date model. In the efficient shorthand of SMSes, he discovered new ways of complaining to Varunika of Priya’s heartlessness and greed.

  Laura, 2004

  ON A THURSDAY IN February, Paul Hinkel told Laura that he was leaving for Bali on the weekend. It was offered casually, but he took refuge in the shower at once.

  When he came out, Laura was ready. “I think it’s time you paid for this place for a change.”

  In emergencies, he adopted the humorous tone of an adult obliged to negotiate with a perverse, engaging child. “But you’ve already settled up, haven’t you?”

  “You can settle up with me, then.” Seeing, as she spoke, two unequal columns of figures that ended in red, something final and blazing.

  “I’ve got a mortgage. It means a budget.”

  “You’re about to go to Bali!”

  He said, in the same equable tone, that the holiday was budgeted for. Besides, it was only for seven nights. Laura noted that: not seven days, not a week, not the language in which humans reckoned, but terminology lifted from the special offers of travel agencies. But it was the thought of those tropical nights that lacerated.

  Distress showed in her face: it was the signal that he was safe. Between her breasts was a flat, furry mole the size of a ten-cent coin. It was one of the places where he liked to kiss her. Straightening, he added that the prices in Bali had never recovered from the bombing. “You can pick up these amazing deals.”

  That Sunday, Carlo lowered the needle while the pasta was coming to the boil. It was a song he loved, a thick old record Drummond had discovered in the mas when he turned the mattress on the first fine day of a long-vanished spring. Nuits de Chine, nuits câlines, nuits d’amour…In France they had been too poor for a record player, so they had waited until Sydney, until the Archibald, to hear the song. But it belonged to cold, thick-walled rooms in a house the color of dried leaves. Hugo Drummond clasped Carlo by the waist, and he hazarded a tricky half turn around an occasional table. That was love, realized Laura, pouring herself a third glass of wine, it was good for years, you risked your bones for it, risked even the ravioli. “Nuits d’ivresse,” sang Carlo, oblivious to the timer, “de tendresse.” Santa Chiara, expert in spectral visions, looked on.

  Seven nights passed, and Paul Hinkel came back to Laura. His neck, always furry, was now sunburned as well. When they were lying beside each other at last, she asked the question that was asked at Ramsay when you returned from a holiday: How was the book? Out of date, he replied, turning his head on the pillow to answer, taking it earnestly. He was incapable of doing otherwise. The room had been paid for, the condoms supplied, as usual, by Laura. Accounts might be left in abeyance but someone had to keep track of the numbers.

  Nevertheless, Bali marked a change. The part of Laura that had remained aloof, that had never ceased watching and weighing Paul Hinkel, was gaining strength. He had a wife. He was tightfisted. The only books he read had titles like 127 Paths to Organizational Success and The Six Key Strategies of Excellence in Management.

  Tragedy touched their workplace. A freelance cartographer died in a car accident. Laura had barely known the girl, but she had worked for Paul’s unit. He texted Laura to cancel Tuesday because it coincided with the funeral. She saw people return shaken from this event. On Thursday, wishing to console, she asked about the ceremony. “It was really good,” he answered. “Lots of managers went.”

  What had driven him to approach her on that hotel terrace? wondered Laura. She was pretty certain that she represented his first affair. Perhaps she was an item on a checklist: the wild oats of Europe, the career back home, marriage, mortgage, fatherhood, adultery, the mandatory stopping places on the Ordinary Aussie Grand Tour, with renos, divorce and a coronary to follow.

  Thoughts of his wife, until now only a moral unease that occasionally showed its teeth, became regular callers. She had probably been present at office parties, at the only Ramsay cricket match Laura had attended—but Laura was unable to place her. One memory, however, was vivid: la famille Hinkel, mother, father, baby in a sling, at the antiwar rally the previous year. Laura had been walking with a group that included Robyn, Ferdy and Jenny Williams I. Someone said, “There’s Paul.” Laura caught sight of him, the baby on his chest. She was faintly startled by his presence, having assumed that “corporate obedience” was an acceptable synonym for “right wing.” “Good on him,” said Jenny, her tone hinting that Paul Hinkel had surprised her, too. The crowd shifted and engulfed him. But a woman with red hair had walked at his side. A thin woman, Laura recalled grimly, and not very tall. “Petite” was the word. Laura tortured herself with it. To Robyn she said, in an absentminded way, “What’s Paul’s wife called? I’m hopeless with names,” Robyn thought, wrinkling her nose. “Natalie? Something that begins with N. Or maybe T.” Laura knew better, having looked up the phone book: Hinkel, P and M. “I know: Diane,” said Robyn firmly.

  Learning that Paul had lived in Thirroul as a child, Laura mentioned D. H. Lawrence. He remembered that film, said Paul, the one with Peter O’Toole, but he’d had no idea that Lawrence had visited Australia. On the other hand, he was able to tell Laura that Brett Whiteley had died in Thirroul. History, for Paul Hinkel, began more or less with his birth. The boy who had sung in a cathedral knew the Inquisition as a Monty Python skit; he would have been hard pressed to say whether Galileo came before or after Gallipoli. But like many of their colleagues, he possessed a keen knowledge of brands. All her life Laura, poor fool, had bought things if they pleased her or answered a need. At Ramsay, she learned that a kettle was coveted if it was an Alessi, a stereo was desired if it was a Bose. Mystified, she heard, “Love ya Campers!” and “You’re wasting your money if it’s not a GHD.” Paul Hinkel was fluent in this argot, spoke with offhand familiarity of Gaggias and Cons. How he would love, he confided, strapping on his watch, to own a Patek Philippe. “A what?” asked Laura. An expression that might have been pity crossed his face. She had no way of knowing that it mirrored hers when he had mentioned Peter O’Toole.

  For a period of about ten days, Ramsay turned feverish with rumor and speculation, the collective lunacy that breaks out in every community now and then. Some, Laura among them, remained untouched, learning of the epidemic only when it had passed. Eventually, it would be confirmed that it had originated with Sammy Maroun and Mike Rosen in Sales, a conversation that must have gone something like this:

  “You know the way place names are becoming brand names? Like Telstra Stadium, Optus Oval?”

  “Yeah?”

  “So I’m thinking the logical next step is for countries to change their names to global brands. Like instead of Ecuador or whatever, you could be called maybe Nike. It would cost the corporate sponsor a serious stash. Obviously. But it would be the naming-rights deal of the century.”

  “You know, you could be on to something there. It’s not like there’s a lot of leverage to be had from naming yourself after an imag
inary line.”

  “Right. Whereas if you call yourself Nike, all your citizens get great sportswear. And there’d be the dollars as well. Obviously. Dude, it’s gotta happen. I’ll make a note of it in my MAD folio.”

  “You see a cross-business opportunity for us there?”

  “Well, obviously we couldn’t afford a country right away. Not to start with.”

  “Obviously.”

  “But we could maybe afford a city. A cheap one. Somewhere Indian?”

  “No, they changed the names of all their places like a few years back, they won’t want to go through all that again. Think what it’d cost them in mapping. No, I’d say China.”

  “Way to go, dude! And everyone who lives in Ramsay, China, would get our books for free, right?”

  “For sure. The Chinese are like the fastest-growing market in independent travel. They’re gonna love the concept.”

  In the pub on Friday, Jenny Williams I, mischievously po-faced, shared the idea with Peta Bayley in Finance, swearing her to secrecy first. As well as being of a literal turn of mind, Peta consumed a large quantity of alcohol between Friday evening and Monday morning, when she told Ameena Khan, at the adjoining desk, that Ramsay was contemplating setting up a branch in China.

  “I really hope it gets off the ground. I’d love to live in China. Just, like, for a bit.”

  “Yeah, me too. They have great shopping. The fakes are amazing.”

  “I’m going to put it in my MAD folio. That I’d like to spend six months in the China office.”

  “Yeah, me too.”

  The story went underground, developed a tangled root system, spread. It surfaced in Editorial, with Rosie Gatt and Ben Thwaites.

  “Heard the latest?”

  “The China thing? It’s outrageous.”

  “And crazy! Outsourcing production to the Chinese! Like how’s that going to work? Sure it’s cheaper, but what about the whole language thing for a start?”

  “Yeah, I know. Wonder which management genius came up with that one!”

  “And when are they planning to tell us? It’s our jobs on the line here.”

  “Maybe Alan’s going to announce it whenever he’s next passing through on his way to nirvana. Like: ‘Great news, everyone! You don’t have to come back in 2005.’”

  “I’m going to put it in my MAD folio. Like how does it square with that bit in our Mission about treating everyone with courtesy and consideration?”

  “That’s our Vision, not our Mission. Anyway, Alan’ll probably announce it courteously. And with consideration.”

  Not long afterwards, Gemma d’Cruz from Design, out smoking in the car park with Jason Townsend from Tech, asked, “Do you think it’s definitely happening, this China deal?”

  “Yep. Everyone’s talking about it. Any idea who’s bought us?”

  “Just that it’s a huge Chinese consortium.”

  “Unreal! I guess Cliff’ll break the news when he gets back.”

  “So do you think the Chinese will keep us on? Or will they want to bring in Chinese people?”

  “Wouldn’t have a clue. But what I’ve heard is head office will be based there. Seems they’ve already got a business park set up, like there’s this bit of Shanghai that’s going to be called Ramsay? So unless you want to move to China…”

  “But I’m in a new relationship! That is so unfair.”

  “Ancient Chinese curse, Gem: may you live in flexible times.”

  “And what about human rights in China? I’m going to put it in my MAD folio. How it goes against our philosophy.”

  “One problemo, Gem: flexibility is our philosophy. It was one of the Seven Key Innovations we took away from the restructure.”

  Thus it was that Alan Ramsay, midway through a Caribbean cruise, received an email from Gina Piggott, who demanded to know why, as the head of Ramsay’s U.K. operations, she hadn’t been kept up to speed with the company’s expansion into China. At more or less the same time, Cliff Ferrier, back in Sydney from a Tasmanian bushwalk, found himself facing a delegation from HR demanding more or less the same thing. Heidi Koss, supine on a couch in Brooklyn, had already informed her analyst of the latest harassment situation emanating from head office. She couldn’t see her way forward: the game plan was fundamentally flawed. For Americans to have to take directions from Australians was just plain wrong.

  Twenty-four hours later, Laura Fraser, pillowed on Paul Hinkel’s breast, said, “Isn’t it brilliant? Chinese whispers!”

  He shifted, freeing himself of her. All rumormongering did was make work for management, he declared. Two journalists had already called Robyn Orr. It was particularly irresponsible of Jenny Williams I. “For a senior manager not to think through the implications.”

  “It was a joke! Cliff isn’t fussed.”

  “Cliff’s a dickhead.”

  This had the inadvertent effect of reminding them of the terrace above the Pacific where all this had begun, and so of their present purpose.

  Afterwards, while she was getting dressed, it occurred to Laura that she might be Paul Hinkel’s midlife crisis. But he was only thirty-six! She thought, Maybe he’s getting it out of the way early so he can concentrate on his career. This led her to wonder if what she satisfied was his traveler’s itch for variety. Stuck in marriage, stuck at a desk, he had found a way to keep moving; their affair might be no more than proof of his commitment to the Ramsay code. I’ll end up as a bullet point on his CV, Laura thought.

  The previous year, when she had been more or less infatuated with Paul Hinkel, she would have been able, nevertheless, to do without him. Now that she judged and condemned, her craving was consuming and pure.

  Ravi, 2004

  ABEBE ISSAYAS SAID, “MY sister had a son.” And, “She is someone whose life has been, I would say, very difficult.” He gave the last syllable its full value: difficult.

  Aged seven months, the infant had died in his sleep. The tragedy dated from the Paris era. Hana’s husband, Pierre, was working late; she was alone in the apartment with the baby. There was no sign that his death was anything other than the blackest misfortune, but the police questioned her for weeks. “You cannot imagine how excited my sister was when they went to live in Paris. It was her dream. Her idea of the French was Pierre.”

  That afternoon, a Sunday, Ravi had accompanied Abebe, Hana and Tarik to a university in Parramatta. Jodie, Hana’s friend from the supermarket, had recently enrolled in a major in Tourism there. Further study, until then a misty blue realm of fantasy, had suddenly pressed against Hana’s window, and she was as fidgety as a child cooped up. She remarked that Jodie was a nice girl, but no one could call her clever. “Her till never balances.” Hana had read online about a course in Early Childhood Development, but was drawn also to counseling. The question was whether her high school diploma would hold good in Australia, or whether she would have to re-sit Year 12; Hana was investigating this. Meanwhile, she was under the governance of a vision, and it had ordained that she visit the campus “to look around” without delay. In the backseat, she was by turn critical, amusing, enthusiastic, sharp. Away from her, Ravi would look forward to their next meeting. What he recalled then were her full lips, her wide, straight back, the way she so often made him laugh. She had her own distinctive sayings, like “Go and put your head in a bag!” Sometimes, and Ravi could not have said why he found the change so funny, this became “brown paper bag.” Hana was a landscape smoothed by distance; up close, the weather struck.

  An impasse that mother and child had arrived at weeks ago was being circled again on the way to Parramatta. Hana had kept her surname when she married; that was the Ethiopian custom. But Tarik had her father’s name, Giroux. Now she wanted to replace Tarik with Sophie; it was her middle name, and the name of her best friend at school. Mother and child tugged the argument this way and that, like something shapeless and heavy. “Why can’t I be Sophie?” “Your father chose Tarik. He wanted you to have an Ethiopian name. You should be
proud of coming from the oldest independent country in Africa.” Along with Hana’s disavowal of home went a store of patriotic facts—she had told Ravi, more than once, that the word “coffee” came from Ethiopia. “If we call you Sophie Giroux, people will think you’re French. They’ll think you eat bread full of holes.”

  The campus was by the river, far from the center of the suburb. Hana wondered aloud how students who had no car managed: the station was nowhere near. “Bus,” said Abebe, indicating a stop. He proposed dropping Hana off, then driving Tarik back to a park they had passed. He looked at Ravi. “You could come with us or stay with my sister.”

  This pleased no one. Tarik drummed her heels against the seat: why couldn’t she see “Mum’s university?” Hana said, “Don’t start,” and to her brother, “This is Australia. My daughter’s going to university, and the sooner everyone gets used to the idea, the better.” Abebe raised both hands briefly from the wheel: okay, okay. Ravi looked out of his window, embarrassed by the crudeness of Abebe’s tactics, sorry, too, that Hana had misunderstood.

  A few students were making phone calls or smoking outside the library, but the campus was largely deserted. Hana paused by a signpost. In a musing way, she read aloud, “Auditorium.” In the same way, she kept stopping in front of buildings to read out their names. “Whitlam Institute.” “School of Law.”

  Tarik had reverted to babyishness. She clutched her mother’s hand and walked with her gaze on the ground. If Hana freed herself, the child would at once stick her thumb in her mouth. Her gestures were stagy, yet both men saw that her unhappiness was real. Soon, for Ravi, this became unbearable. Hana wheeled on him without warning. “What’s wrong with you? You have a face like a month of Sundays.” Ravi muttered of a headache. “Give him the keys,” said Hana to Abebe. “He can wait in the car.”