Shifting

By Hunter Writers Centre

an anthology compiling the best 40 short works from the hunter writers centre travel writing competition 2014.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Hunter Writers Centre
• Release date: May 27, 2014
• ISBN: 9780975835487

Hunter Writers Centre

Hunter Writers Centre is a not-for-profit, incorporated organisation established in 1995. We are a leading literary centre in Australia committed to developing and supporting the artistic and professional development of aspiring and established writers. We publish more anthologies of Australian writers than any other writers centre in the country. We coordinate annual, national writing competitions of high calibre and publish the shortlist in a print and e-anthology. The 3 national writing competitions we conduct, offering over $30 000 in prize money, are: The Newcastle Poetry Prize; The Newcastle Short Story Award; Grieve - poems and stories in honour of grief awareness month.

Book preview

Shifting

Hunter Writers Centre

Published by Hunter Writers Centre

Smashwords Edition

Copyright 2014 Hunter Writers Centre

Newcastle NSW 2300

Email: [e-mail]

Website: www.hunterwriterscentre.org

Facebook: www.facebook.com/HunterWritersCentre

Shifting: Travel Writing Anthology 2014

eBook ISBN: 978-0-9758354-8-7

Cover design by Tessa Pascoe

eBook layout by Tessa Pascoe

Published by Hunter Writers Centre

© Each short story is copyright of the respective author

© This collection copyright of Hunter Writers Centre

All rights reserved.

No part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted in any form by any means electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording or otherwise without the prior consent of the publishers.

Table of Contents

Introduction - To Travel Hopefully...

Shifting

Polish Portrait

The Flight of Poetry

Boxes in Bombay

Befriending the Piglet

The Unholy Holy Land

Street Theatre

The Boab Tree

Cuba

Destination Australia

Don’t Pay the Ferryman

Anxiety in Padang

From China with Love

Kiribati

Offerings from the Kimberley

Point to Point

Pink Crocs and Ribbon Fish

A Close Shave

Bon Appetit

Bharath Matha

Culture in the Caves

Down in the dumps

Feminine Face of the Divine: Chartres Cathedral

Friday Night in Kathmandu: February 1984

Glenorchy Story

In the Sound

Into the West

The Mariners Trail – a Feast for the Senses

Mayan Adventure – Hell flight to Palenque

Mexico

Mountain Climbing for Beginners

Murray River Sketch

Oh Tyranny, where is thy Sting?

Park of the Pleasant Retreat

Seeing With My Own Eyes

Smiles for Tips

Space

St Petersburg

Street Theatre

The Thrill of the Reveal – Kakadu by Night

Three Colours Orange

Where Paradise Touches Earth

Winter Charm of a Silent Night

Introduction - To Travel Hopefully...

Walter Mason

When I was a little kid growing up in North Queensland in the 1970s, my grandmother had a big, brown biscuit tin. I don’t suppose people have biscuit tins anymore – I certainly don’t. My doctor is adamant that a man of my size has no place eating biscuits. But certainly then every household had one, and I was inordinately proud of my grandmother’s because it was covered in little phrases and pithy sayings. The one that always struck me said, To travel hopefully is a better thing than to arrive.

We weren’t allowed to speak during meals, and so I would ponder this saying, turning it over in my mind like a Zen koan. To travel hopefully is a better thing than to arrive. To travel hopefully is a better thing...  To travel hopefully... It seemed absurd to my childish mind, and I had no idea then that this was a quote from Robert Louis Stevenson – nor even did I know who Robert Louis Stevenson was.  Our family literary tastes ran more to Reader’s Digest condensed novels, the collected works of Billy Graham and Arthur Upfield’s Bony novels.

Anyway, after repeated meditation I remained convinced that it was the destination that mattered. Getting anywhere was, to my impatient young brain, a necessary agony. But something in that phrase stayed with me because more than twenty years later I became a travel writer, and I soon realised the great importance of hope, particularly in the face of cancelled flights, twelve hour bus trips across Cambodia, and cheap hotel rooms positioned so closely over hip-hop clubs that the vibrations went through my body as I attempted to sleep.

It is about process, about being in love with life and its richness and not shutting our minds to anything but our own narrow range of expectations and desires. Life happens in all the preparation, in all the annoyances, the unforseen twists in the road, the detours and the frustrations. If we remain too solidly focused on the main game we forget the blessings of the play. As some wise person once pointed out, when you really examine it, the best part about going to a party is getting dressed up and waiting for the taxi to arrive. That is when we are most thrilled, most truly alive to our experience. If only we could remember to pause and acknowledge this.

The beautifully crisp and concise travel tales that follow all remind us that we need to take the path of living seriously. Not to dwell on the rewards of having arrived at our destination, but to remember our duties and obligations as citizens of the world. We travel among people, among sisters and brothers, yet how often do we really stop to acknowledge the people around us? In writing about travel there is almost always hope, and perhaps that is part of the reason for the continued popularity of travel writing. Sometimes the journeys might be difficult, the conditions challenging – and those are the stories we tend to love the most. Because they remind us of the journey we are all on.

How often do we stop to recognise the strangeness and wonder of our everyday lives? How often do we peer past the magic in our lives, dismissing our everyday glory because we are distracted by the thought of something else? Something better, something further away, something in the future. Then we are not travelling hopefully.

We are travelling, always. We each have something we strive towards, though it might seem humble to someone else. My ultimate destination might be Ulaan Bator, but for somebody else it’s Auckland. In travelling we become wiser, normally more sophisticated, people. We grow in all directions. When we travel, spiritually, mentally or physically, we create new stories, we generate new experiences. I hope you enjoy these stories of people who travel thorough life hopefully and have used their creative gifts to share their insights with us all.

Shifting

Holly Bruce

Winner – People’s Choice Award

It all hinges on where you are, and where you want to be. Simon, my boyfriend of six years, drops the goodbye bomb. My eyes land on a lush glossy poster of Ho Chi Minh City as I pass the Travel World window. The assistant, sitting primly at her desk within, confirms Vietnam is where I should be. I put my stuff in storage, leave the job I hate, and fly out on a shaky budget. I want the chaos, the history, so huge and sprawling that it will swallow mine on touchdown.

I fly out of my life on Tuesday morning, no stop-overs, and land in the middle of millions of other lives, on the same day. I descend through the clouds into a steaming, writhing, Ho Chi Minh City afternoon. I check-in to the Saigon Mini Hotel. The budget accommodation features clean comfort, and though the air-conditioner toils, like an old man jogging uphill, the fan circulates what cool air there is. I sink to the starched white sheet and sleep.

The following morning, map in hand, I swim

Reviews for Shifting

[jshillingford_2 · Rating: 4 out of 5 stars]

Very good anthology about feline shapeshifters. And, unlike many shapeshifter novels, here the cat state is the norm, not the human one! In "Outcast," Anneal is human banished by his people for his unnatural prediliction (homosexuality). He becomes lost in the mountains right before a snow storm, but finds what he thinks is an empty cave. It's actually the den of Ferris, a very special mountain lion. In "The Beast Within," Lee is the alpha of his pride, and he takes Rex in, making him his lover. When family turns against them, they face hard choices. Will their love destroy their placce in the pride? Good stories, though not deep, with explicit M/M sex.