Up the Line: Book 1: the Beginnings

By Kenneth J. Hall

The trilogy is about a young and fresh out of university engineer who lands a job in SE Asia. Totally unknown territory for him. All the mishaps and mistakes and misunderstandings. Local ladies. Other expats. Beautiful ladies and some not so nice. Generally how he muddles his way through whilst employed by the UK government and not end up in jail.
Beginnings is how it all came about and is based in the UK, learning curve is based in SE Asia, and all the confusion and mishaps. In Old Asia Hand, which is when he feels he has a handle and a firm grip on life in SE Asia, and how mistaken he can be.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Partridge Publishing Singapore
• Release date: Jan 12, 2016
• ISBN: 9781482855494

Kenneth J. Hall

Kenneth J. Hall is a retired British mechanical engineer who has spent most of his adult life as a contractor working around the world. Of latter years, he became rather selective in where he chose to work and with whom. As a result, he acquired a vast store of interesting knowledge and background information. His books draw upon this experience, and his characters are a mixture of composite persons with a large dose of pure fantasy. He has been heard to remark that writing is far better than real life as he can make his characters do exactly as he wishes. He now lives with his Indonesian wife and their teenage daughter in SE Asia and spends his time writing, sitting quietly in the sun, and drinking cold beer.

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Copyright © 2016 by Kenneth J Hall.

ISBN:      eBook         978-1-4828-5549-4

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CONTENTS

Chapter 1

Chapter 2

Chapter 3

Chapter 4

Chapter 5

Chapter 6

Chapter 7

Chapter 8

Chapter 9

Chapter 10

Chapter 11

This book is dedicated to that peculiar species of animal, the British Ex-Patriot worker. Without whom, the world would be a far less interesting place.

It is a complete work of fiction and any resemblance to any persons, either alive, or dead, is pure coincidence.

CHAPTER 1

S outh Bank Farm occupies two hundred acres of South facing, and gently sloping land, in Pembrokeshire. The county is sometimes known as Little England beyond Wales and is located in the Western extremity of Wales, the end of the Pigs nose, if one looks on a map of Britain. Washed by The Gulf Stream and having fertile soil, combined with a gentle climate along its coastline, it has been a reasonably easy place to colonise since Neolithic times. Actually it's a county split by an ancient line of fortifications known as the Lanskar. Originally something to do with the Vikings, I believe. These being latter day settlers. No doubt students or scholars of local history will give its exact geographical placing and reasons for it being thus named. Sufficient to say, better armed, and no doubt more murderous, interlopers, over the early centuries had arrived in the coastal regions and pushed the indigenous people North, into the hills beyond the Lanskar, whilst occupying the more fertile areas of the South for themselves.

I suppose that I am a descendant of those immigrants, but it must have been touch and go, as South Bank sits on the English speaking side of the Lanskar by about 2 miles, or 3.2 Km. if you prefer.

130 acres make up the majority of South Bank's South facing slope, which is bounded by a small, fast flowing trout river that eventually finds its way into the arm of the Eastern Cleddau river. Our part of the river forms a loop, and this loop is joined East to West, by the Leat. This being a man made conduit, or small stream, dug in bygone years, and that forms the northern boundary. The purpose of this glorified ditch was to provide power for the overshot water wheel of Cwm Bach Mill, now long fallen into disuse, and home to successive families of barn owls for as long as I can remember.

North of the Leat, is then really Cwm Bach Mill land but is long been incorporated into South Bank farm, and comprises mainly of 40 acres of sloping, mixed oak and beech woods and some poor grass land. Home to badgers, foxes, rabbits, wood pigeons and grey squirrel. As productive farmland goes, not the best, but a handy place to put cattle in the winter months, as it is well drained. It prevents them from chewing up the fertile meadows and fields of South Bank with their hooves during the wet weather. It also then gives one time to clean up the yard, disinfect the milking machine, or any one of a thousand other or so jobs that make up the never ending daily chores of running a small mixed dairy and beef farm in West Wales.

A small road runs from North to South and basically forms the Eastern boundary, with our farm house lying on one side, and a small triangle of land on the other side of the road, being occupied by the old mill itself, and the mill cottage.

My only sibling was named John, and was born 11 years prior to my arrival, I guess that I was a mistake. Perhaps the by-product of a very successful day at Carmarthen Market, or a bottle too many, of my Mothers home made wine. Any way, John is a good solid, straight forward, earthy, dependable name, and so did the owner grow up to be. Perhaps if I had been named Tom, or Frank, I would have followed in the trait. In the event I wasn't, and I didn't.

My father was christened David, and he married a Daisy, who was small, dark and energetic. My father and brother followed a similar pattern in both shape and mind, roughly square and very deliberate. My father had farmed South Bank all of his life, and as far as I know, so had generations of Bridgemans' before him. His brother and sister, Gwyn and Blanch, occupied the Mill Cottage, and neither of them had married.

Blanch was a very trim and prim little lady and was the eldest. Getting on in years, she spoke very nicely, with no trace of local accent, but she had rather resigned herself to Cwm Bach and the oddities of her brother Gwyn. She had been a Matron or something in a hospital in Western Super Mare, during the post war years. I always got the distinct impression that she had never known anyone of lesser seniority than that of a consultant surgeon and that living in Cwm Bach and keeping house for her irascible brother, was not entirely what she had envisaged for her autumn years. More so since keeping house was a long lost cause with Uncle Gwyn.

As for Uncle Gwyn, well, he had the reputation of having been the worst farmer in the county, and had generally made a living from the mill itself, which, during his lifetime had been converted to a saw mill, powered by the then, no doubt, new fangled electricity. I suppose that the last corn to have been ground using water power, would have been in my grandfather's time.

Now the old DC motors lay rusting and the old mill stones had been left leaning against a roadside wall, gathering moss. Witnesses to the passing of years and the coming of sliced bread. Uncle Gwyn would tell tales of logs sawn, and of wagons being repaired, knowing his character however, I personally harbour grave doubts that he would have involved himself too actively in such ventures. Now Gwyn pottered, in fact, I can only ever remember Uncle Gwyn pottering.

He went in for bee keeping at one time, I remember, for the purpose of brewing mead, as I recall. The bees however turned out to be a singularly vicious breed who obviously had other ideas regarding the end use of their labours. The final result being that they thrived, to the extent that they colonised the local church belfry, ultimately descending upon the vicar and the parish bell ringers, whilst the latter were ringing the changes, hospitalising several, and making headlines in the local paper. Killer Bees Best Bell Ringers. The Haverfordwest Fire Brigade, eventually resorted to chemical warfare and destroyed the nest, but other broods no doubt survive in hollow trees around the county, biding their time to avenge themselves upon humanity. The original hives are still functioning, although left strictly to their own devices, and periodically, on a warm, still, summers day, a swarm can be seen winging its way off to swell the numbers of its murderous brethren, waiting upon their day of retribution.

My mother brewed beer regularly and each September also made vast quantities of wine, activities perhaps prompted by some errant family gene left over from the union with an itinerant French onion seller in generations past. Such gentlemen, I'm assured, were frequent visitors in years gone by. Arriving in Milford Haven in fishing smacks and peddling around the county on their bicycles, wearing their raunchy berets and smoking Gaulois and with onions hung over their shoulders. That and the smell of old fish and garlic, would I'm sure have proven all too overwhelmingly exotic to some local maid, resplendent in white apron and black pointy hat. I have no doubt that if that was the case, then more than one gene is floating around the county. More so since I am told that these itinerant peddlers of the mainstay of a cheese and onion sandwich originated in Breton and that language bears close ties to Welsh. Mind you, I suppose I'll meet you around the back of the hay stack, is much the same in any language.

My mother spent most of her life at home, orbiting around a huge AGA cooker that had originally burned just about anything one cared to feed it. Cwm Bach woods having made up a fair proportion of its bygone diet. Of latter years however, it had been converted to burn oil. The big open fire place of Cwm Bach now being reserved for the larger by products of the annual hedging activities of the farm and careful forestry of the woods. It had always made for a cosy kitchen and central heating in winter, along with a constant supply of hot water, and place to dry out wet working clothes, plus of course a never ending supply of boiling kettles and hot meals all year round.

My mother's beer was clear, dark, frothy, strong and very palatable. She was a longstanding member of the, Cleddau and Maeinchwylch District Wine Circle and often took prizes for her efforts. Some members of the aforesaid organisation would however, I suspect, have provided a lifetimes study for anyone wishing to produce a treatise for use by Alcoholics Anonymous, or any temperance society. I attended many a monthly meeting and enjoyed myself immensely, though I still feel that perhaps they should have renamed themselves, Alcoholics Unanimous.

Their year would begin with an annual general meeting, a look over their finances, usually about zero, and a degree of optimism that they might be able to attract guest speakers from some wine shippers, or major brewing establishments from somewhere in the country. All of which was good honourable stuff. Unfortunately, either due to distances involved, or perhaps to reputation preceding invitation, all of whom gave profuse excuses, and failed to materialise. Consequently, meetings tended to fall back upon a well tried formulae of tasting each other's highly alcoholic products, with of course small pieces of cheese, To clear the pallet. Such enterprises, as I recall, always beginning well, with noble sentiments like, Nicely presented George, who does your labels for you?

Then would follow the ceremonial opening of the bottle, ritual cork inspection, sniffing and holding the glass to the light. All accompanied by comments such as, Delicate bouquet, this dandelion of yours. Super clarity. It would then be sipped in an appreciative manner whilst discoursing politely upon the various merits of types of yeast available locally, or other such esoteric topics. However, given an hour or so of such pleasantries, the demon drink would begin to take a hand in the proceedings. Whereupon the more robust society members would be foregoing the foreplay, and products of field and hedgerow would begin to flow freely. The net result being that several church halls had regretfully had to point out that their premises were already booked for the nights in question for the forthcoming year, and as a consequence, the Society had a rather perambulatory nature.

Uncle Gwyn's beer on the other hand was definitely of another genre. He, like my Mother, also brewed, but Gwyn liked to improvise and experiment, and to add little garnishing touches such as orange peel, or a bag of prunes. The result was most certainly alcoholic, and given time to mature, no doubt might even have been drinkable by the average human being. Uncle Gwyn did not fall into this category, and quaffed vast quantities of his evil brew somewhat prematurely and straight from the vat, by the simple process of dipping in an old chipped jug. Having first moved to one side its normal scum of dead flies, wasps and one occasion a long expired and very bloated mouse. Gives it body boy was his comment. Both he and his dog, a large and friendly Welsh collie, high in aroma, but low in brains, seemed to not only survive, but positively thrive on a diet of this liquid and home cured ham. The result being that both were rather rotund.

Jefferson, the dog, at least got to run off a few calories chasing rabbits, squirrels and the odd car. Whilst Uncle Gwyn, although having had the reputation locally of once having been a ladies man, hadn't chased anything in years. Gwyn finally became so fat that he could no longer tie up the laces of his boots. He overcame this problem however, in a typically Gwyn-expedient manner by simply discarding his bootlaces altogether and not bothering with them ever again.

As far as I can recall, Uncle Gwyn owned a couple of collarless shirts, both rather grey in colour, and two pairs of trousers. The latter having had numerous gussets sewn into the rear of them, with vaguely matching material, but never on any occasion, as I remember, did it enable their top button to be fastened. The whole sartorial ensemble topped off with a scruffy felt hat that like its owner, had seen better years. I suppose that had he have been born at a later date, Gwyn would have made a perfect role model for a conservative person's idea of a Hippie, or New Age Traveller. Providing of course that Gwyn wasn't required to actually go anywhere. Whether my Uncle Gwyn held some deep seated aversion to travel, or was just too idle to move far, I never worked out, but throughout the whole of his life time, the furthest he went was Swansea, about 80 Km. away. Had he ever been, as stories went, a ladies man I can only assume that in his more active days there was either a total dearth of men in general in the area, or that the local ladies of his acquaintance were totally devoid in both sense of taste and smell. Mind you, I have never placed much faith in local rumour, as experience has taught me that the commonly heard, and often repeated local phrase of, Ell of a boy roughly equated to, just about as boring as myself. Whereas Steady old boy meant exactly as boring as myself!

I also discovered at a very early age that quite often casual Pembrokeshire conversations fell into two definite groups. Those that took place indoors and greetings that took place outside. Now the former did make some attempt to impart information, albeit usually inaccurate and frequently slanderous, and they did have a beginning, a middle bit and an end. They also relied heavily upon time markers, aimed at adding a degree of verisimilitude to the tale and impressing upon the listener the truth and accuracy of the statements made. These were made up of little phrases such as, It was a Tuesday, I knows it was a Tuesday, 'cos the vicar had just called about the flowers for the church. No, I tells a lie, it was a Wednesday, and we'd just 'ad a bit of fish. This would then be coupled with generic markers, such as, You knows 'er boy, William the Granges eldest girl, married that fellow from up the line. Then would follow some snippet of scandal or lurid gossip, exaggerated almost beyond belief, to be revelled in by both parties.

The, Up the line phrase, is commonly heard in Pembrokeshire, and refers to the days of steam and The Great Western Railway, whose lines ended at three or so points along the coast. Therefore, anything out of the county could be quite accurately described as being Up the line. As I said, at least these conversations did attempt to communicate some information, no matter how incorrect or scurrilous. Not so outside greetings. These little gems of lucidness normally took place between red faced, rotund, rural men folk, complete with large boots, thumb sticks and collie dog held on a length of bailing twine. Greetings would be exchanged over a convenient gate or hedge and would run roughly thus: Wyayboy. This would elect a reciprocal, Wyay. Then would begin a contemplative period of time spent leaning on gates or sticks, looking wise and thoughtful, punctuating long pauses with Ay-ay or a long drawn out Ayyyyy and the occasional Damn ay.

The dog, long used to the routine, would first scratch itself, and then lie down and go to sleep, as this sort of thing could go on for some considerable length of time. I did once, in the interests of science manage a whole seven minutes of such nonsense, but had to concede defeat, and fled. On the whole I suppose, a stranger could be forgiven for enquiring if there was any local expression that equated to the Spanish Manyana The answer would I fear have to be Yes, but it doesn't carry the same connotations of urgency. Not, I must add, that either my parents, or brother were in any way lax, or followed these patterns. In fact, the opposite was the truth, with South Bank being a model farm, its yard free from mud and muck, its hedges trim, its ditches clear and generally it was regarded as amongst the best kept farms in the area.

Cwm Bach Mill cottage was however, a totally different story. It was far removed from neatness and perfection. Apart from beer and home cured ham, Uncle Gwyn's other passions were home grown tobacco, an evil black shag that rivalled Pembroke power station in its ability to pollute the atmosphere. That and walking sticks, and general fiddling with bits of wood and scrap household articles. I must admit, his walking sticks were quite famous in the district. He used to scour the banks and hedges for suitable hazel wood and then strap them to pieces of angle iron to ensure their final straightness. Or, he might decide to impart a special twist, or even a double twist by training ivy or honeysuckle to entwine themselves around the chosen stock. This did effect some very interesting patterns in the final product. Each stick represented several years of work and attention. He never sold them, just systematically made them and kept them, filling the mill cottage. So that every corner had its complement. When I had damaged my spine he presented me with one that I have to this day, but as far as I know, I was the only person thus graced. He also excelled in making weather vanes from plastic bottles, with propellers carved from bits of wood, and the whole thing having various moving parts and little men busy pumping handles, or waving their legs or something. Thus Gwyn left a trail of wood shavings, odd nuts and muddy footprints in his wake exacerbated by Jefferson's input. Since no one made any real attempt to clean up, more a sort of moving around of existing detritus, plus the open wood fire, Cwm Bach was home to its own little eco-system of mouldering bits and pieces, dropped and left in obscure places to be sniffed and chewed at leisure by Jefferson and equally long lost and forgotten oddments left by Gwyn. Add to that the local wild life that sneaked in to avoid the rigours of winter, and then finding the environment wholly conducive to breeding, decided to stay, the cottage was a hygienist's worst nightmare, but could possibly have been of singular interest to Greenpeace, Richard Attenborugh or the Natural History Museum. I once discovered a large, desiccated bat, long since deceased, under a carpet and it offered me hours of pondering in later years, as to how it had managed to get there, and met its end.

The main structure of the mill itself comprised of a separate building built alongside the leat. This was on a small sloping bank below the cottage. It was really two separate buildings, of two separate eras. The newer sawmill a sort of annex of stone and slate, with an open side to accommodate the logs, and with the saw bench still in tact, but with the pulleys for the belts that had been driven by a huge DC motor, long since disconnected.

The old panels that rectified the current, and controlled the voltage, thus changing the speed of the saw to accommodate different diameter blades and timber of varying hardness, stood gently rusting, along with the motor. Home now to nesting sparrows and blackbirds.

Of the old mill itself, this once contained the feed system, gears and drive shaft etc. All of which was still there, but worm eaten and rusting. With floors damp and rotting. Stairs with treads missing. Bats in the rafters and the odd hole that allowed shafts of sunlight in summer, and rain at any other time to quietly corrode and destroy. Mould grew on its walls, green next to the water wheel wall, brown in other places.

The wheel was itself, an iron skeleton of rust, with the odd bit of oaken plank still grimly hanging on. All in all a small boys dream place, but fraught with danger. Many a time was I warned of rotting floors, and the dangers of clambering and climbing, warnings unheeded into my early teens, until one day a floor finally gave way under my weight, and I ended up draped over rusting machinery on the floor below. That fall resulted in a damaged spine which was to give me pain for many years to follow, and a longish spell in the local hospital I remember that Uncle Gwyn, much to the objection of the ward sister, who no doubt had very real visions of Black Death, or Anthrax following closely in his footsteps, visited me, and cheered me up no end by commenting that, Books and 'umans is similar boy, both 'as spines, damage 'em and theys not much use after. Just the sort of cheery news to set one up for the rest of one's life. Actually his words were to prove to be all too prophetic, and whilst giving me the perfect excuse for not playing rugby, which had never appealed, over the years, my back continued to make its presence felt. Being at its best uncomfortable, and occasionally, at its worst, downright painful. It also excused me from the more manual work that goes with the territory of running a farm.

I always enjoyed living on a quiet, dairy/beef working farm that was large enough to be profitable, but small enough to be manageable by two fit persons. It's just farming that I dislike. In winter it seemed to consist of endless dark, cold mornings of moving unwilling cattle. All of whom seemed to delight in giving birth standing upright. In the middle of a windswept field. In the rain at midnight. Not being a tall person, I always seemed to end up flat on my back, in the mud. With icy cold water creeping into my cloths. Underneath a huge slippery mass of new born calf spread all over me. I having attempted to cushion its fall and prevent it from breaking its stupid neck. I have to admit to having very negative thoughts where cattle are concerned, that border on the almost pathological. They are totally insensitive creatures, immune it would seem from pain. Either receiving, or handing it out to others. Dehorning calves springs to mind as being a perfect example. This is performed by with what would appear to be an updated version of a medieval branding iron wielded by the local vet. This, I would have thought should have produced some reaction. I mean, most mammals would at least have a headache from having a red hot iron dug into their skull, not so cows. Ten minutes later they are sucking away, or chewing stupidly like it never happened and still with the smell of burned flesh in the air and little gobbets of overcooked horn lying around the yard. Also, grown beasts have always seemed to take a personal delight in standing firmly on my foot, resulting in the odd broken toe and lost nail over the years, or systematically attempting to crush me against any handy upright solid surface, preferably one with dangerously sharp projections. Why something that possesses five stomachs should then have to partially vomit its pre-digested food back into its mouth and start all over again is quite beyond me. What with all that going on at one end and all that steaming, high velocity ejection of foetid liquid at the other, I wonder how anything as wholesome as milk can come out of the middle.

Summertime only seemed to afford longer hours of daylight in which to prolong ones labours. Though I will be the first to admit that I enjoy cutting grass and making silage. I also enjoy hedging, as I was always given the job of keeping a couple of bonfires fed. But I fear I must have been a disappointment, as from very early on, it was pretty obvious that I was not cut out for a career on the land.

We only kept beasts. Dairy cows, bullocks for beef and calves that would eventually become enormous Friesian cows. No chickens, ducks or other stock, not even a dog. Damned Jefferson and Gwyn is enough trouble boy, being the general opinion. I did eventually introduce a couple of cats that I rescued from being drowned at an early point in their lives. These were named Jake and Ellwood and grew into a pair of enormous fat lazy creatures that seemed to spend all of their time sleeping next to the AGA in winter, and on sunny window sills in summer. Neither showed any affection whatsoever, had no interest in catching mice, and seemed to treat the other occupants of South Bank as necessary, but rather inferior beings. I did also at one time acquire a pair of beautiful polecats.

These were named Snuffles and What-What, after the odd little noises they made. They were truly beautiful creatures, gentle and intelligent too. They had sort of two tone fur, black at the roots and golden brown at the tips, and I gave them the full run of the old green house. This being a little lean too annex of natural stone with a glass roof that had a grape vine in it. But apart from that we carried no other passengers. Neither did we own any shotguns, traps or bait. Nor did we give the local hunt permission to attempt to impale themselves on our fences or wire. As a consequence of this, Cwm Bach woods positively teemed with pigeon, foxes, badger and the odd rabbit that survived the foxes and myxomatosis that would flair up from time to time. Now, if it is true, as I have heard said, badgers do in fact transmit TB to cattle, then I can only assume that our badgers were totally free of that particular pathogen, or that the herd was immune. And other than the attentions of Jefferson, who had never been known to catch anything, and I doubt would have known what to do with it, had he have done so, the wild life was free to procreate and plunder the neighbouring countryside at its will. Returning to the sanctuary of Cwm Bach woods afterwards to sleep off its excesses. Can't see the point in keeping anything that won't keep me. Was one of my father's favourite phrases, which upon occasion left me in some doubt as to the security of my tenure.

Realising that a farmer's life was not for me, placed me in a rather odd situation, sort of a round peg surrounded by all too many square ones, and each with a handy square hole to pop into. Everyone of my age was connected directly, or indirectly to the farming industry in one way or another, and pretty well everyone and everything followed a well worn pattern that was understood and accepted as the norm.