Can Someone pass me a Babel Fish?....

'De ya hav en trouble unerstandin uz?'.....See my Irish accent is pants. Sparkeys Dad asked me if I had any trouble understanding them....Well no not really....I mean the odd word threw me...but it wasn't like I was having to much trouble understanding them, well no more than they had understanding each other. That was an observation I had made on the train from Belfast to Ballymoney the day before. I sat looking out the window of the train, I was seated across from a father and son, engaged in a loud discussion about something, football possibly, I wasn't really paying attention to the topic. What fascinated me were the constant requests to repeat what was just said, at least I assume that's what 'Wa'!??? accompanied by a quizzical look means. This conversation took most of the journey to complete, but i am not sure how much information was exchanged, I got to the point where I almost offered to translate for them. I decided not to, as that kind of thing spoils the anthropological moment, changing me from being an observer, into a tourist getting a right kicking.

Meet the Parents......

I have a rather strained relationship with my own parents, this makes me rather uncomfortable around other peoples parents. The fact that I had received the same warning for parents I was about to mmet, as i had for the pets wasn't helping. "Careful they can be a bit tricky around strangers" and this time I would not have the assistance of my animal whisperer skills to bail me out. "Around Strangers".....well then, a guy I met on Internet, who has traveled from Australia to stay in our house, must qualify at least as a 9 on the Stranger rating system. I need not of worried, I don't know if it was my rougish antipodean charm (unlikely) or the inate hospitality of Northern Ireland, but I have rarely felt more at home.

Beware of the Dog!!!!......

I am not a pet person....let me just say that now. I don't hate animals, believe me growing up on a farm you can't hate them,...but it also doesn't pay to get too attached to something that maybe on your dinner plate next week. So not a animal person, shame animals never seem to understand that about me.



"Just be careful of the dog, she is a bit tricky round strangers!" or something to that effect....in fact it is always something like that. And of course 30 seconds later I have a new hairy friend treating me like a long lost relative....If only this talent for gaining animal confidence could be transferred to something useful, such as attracting young women or picking winning race horses....but alas I must sit at the kitchen table, with only a big friendly puppy's wet nose poking me in the lap....

Stranger in a Land....

I stepped off the train into the balmy Northern Irish weather, let me say that again, balmy! Sunshine and warm weather just like the don't have in the travel guides, but more about the weather later. Waiting at the platform is either the person who is going to tell me about tattooing, or the serial killer that has had me travel half way across the planet to stuff me in the boot and bury my dismembered corpse in a peat-bog. Let's call him Sparkey. In fact he says "Call me Sparkey!" whenever I attempt to call him anything else. Hands are shaken, luggage is stowed in the boot (blood stain free, as far as I can see).

I always worry about first meetings, it is often hard to see which way things will go, but he is both relaxed and nervous as I am. Talk of trips, weather and all the normal ice-breakers are employed by both parties, but the the tipping point comes surprising early in the trip. Now a tipping point as the name implies can go either way, it can roll the situation back to uncomfortable silence, or as it did in this case it call hurtle off the other side with a nice long drop that breaks the ice. This tipping point was an ice-breaker....

SPARKEY - You see her!
ME - Who?
SPARKEY - The red haired girl, crossing the road!
ME - Yes.
SPARKEY - That's Her!!!
ME - Who?
SPARKEY - That's the Irish Red Haired Girl!!
Me - Sorry?
SPARKEY - The Irish Red Haired Girl!! There's only one! She just travels around all of Ireland, for the tourists to see!!

Like I said, tipping points...you can't make them happen....but when they tip the right way you suddenly know everthing is going to be fine...

More Trains....

Once again I am on a train .....the train for Ballymoney....I doubt they will write a song....

52 mins in Belfast....

Well I can't really say I have been to Belfast, now can I? The Train Station didn't even sell  fridge magnets or snow globes!!! Another city to add to my list of places I will have to spend more time in, next time. A connecting train in less than an hour, time for a coffee and that was it. I was getting tired, the non-stop travelling on the back of a 24 hour flight was catching up with me now. Coffee done...Quick Cigarette...and back on the move...sigh..

Back on Track....

I love a train journey it is the best way to see the countryside, with out any exertion on your own part, and the best way to think. Leaving Dublin by train was one of those mixed emotion things. I knew I hadn't enjoyed it much, but I was also fully aware that I would feel the same of any place if I only stayed in the tourist strip, and god knows my least favourite place on earth is the Gold Coast in Queensland. Hell on Earth and not in a good way, but the countryside that surrounds it is amazing. So I will give Dublin the benefit of the doubt, and next time I come back I will see it properly.

The train worked it's magic though. The countryside slowly passing, gave me time to think, and sketch, and drink some coffee that tasted like it may have already been passed through several other passengers....but I was feeling better, and the further into the countryside I went, the better I felt. Then I saw a peat bog, and it made me happy....I have had the word peat bog in my head since the first year of high school, those seemingly pointless projects they keep you busy with...the only one that every really stuck was "The Peat Bog Man"...murdered and tossed in a bog and nicely preserved so generations of school children could mock his shriveled genitalia....fame is a fickle mistress my friends...but what I remember from that project, was the shrunken mans Tattoo's....proper tribal...for someone in a proper tribe. So I continued the trip with a smile and a bit more confidence, I liked the coincidence...hell i love a coincidence...I like the idea of fate and circle of life and all that crap...not enough to buy a crystal and a tie die t-shirt...but I appreciate the little pointers along the way....My first ever view of a peat bog was a great big pointy pointer....Hakuna Matata Bog Man!!!

Got me a ticket for an airplane.....

...But only because I can't get there on a fast train.  Not a huge fan of flying,  it doesn't scare me,  I just find it uncomfortable and dull.  If I could afford to travel first class I am sure that I would feel very different about it. So after spending 24hrs on a plane with no sleep at all,  I arrive in London to find that an Icelandic volcano has closed the airport and my connecting flight to Belfast has been cancelled...of course. A the strange thing is this doesn't surprise me at all. I am quiet a good traveler apparently, or at least not an easily fazed one. Plan B....a ferry to Dublin and then find my way to Northern Ireland. The ferry ride is pleasant if vaguely surreal, at least for me. The ferry between Wales and Dublin is an exact replica of the one the travels between Melbourne and Tasmania. Every Carpet and fitting, every nut and bolt....the only point of difference between them was the gift shop. In Australia the gift shop is fill with Stuffed Tasmanian Devils, not Leprechauns....but other than that? I enjoyed the trip to Dublin far more than Dublin itself, probably due to the fact I was in the tourist strip, my hotel offered "A Full English" breakfast, that should have been a warning. So I viewed the statues, they like a statue in Dublin, and walked the streets, and drank a beer or three in an Irish pub....but I really wasn't feeling it. I hadn't drawn a stroke since landing...I was starting to worry....

But I don't have a passport.....

So the only person I have found to teach me to tattoo is on the other side of the planet. There is video chat, but that doesn't really seem to be quiet enough. Now I am not an experienced traveller, in fact I have never left the country. I have seen most of my own wide brown land and have stayed in more hotels than many, but I have never taken that plane journey that required a passport. Big expensive step, but hey nothing ventured nothing gained. So I set out to organise things...

• Passport              (check)
• Plane Ticket         (check)
• Place to Stay        (check)
• Confidence           (not yet)

I am not playing XBOX...I am networking....

I am a member of a clan....Not a white sheet and crucifix burning kind of clan, but a group of older gamers from around the globe. Mature people that meet up in the virtual word to beat seven types of snot out of each other. Now one might think that any such organisation might be populated by couch bound under achievers, but this is not the case. This group is made up of people with a very diverse range of professions. Fire fighters, Members of the armed forces, Music producers, Television producers, Web designers, Graphic artists, Quantity surveyors to name but a few. This group also has a Tattooist, and he was the rarest of all Tattooists, one willing to share information. So I asked questions, some sensible, some stupid....but the questions were answered. Wonderful. Now the problem, I had met someone with the knowledge I wanted....Great.....However, I live in Australia and the only person willing to help me lives in Northern Ireland. That's a problem....

Step one....

My first step in learning to tattoo......Hmmm......I could seek out an apprenticeship. I have been told this is in fact the only method recommended by tattooists, no surprise there. I have also been informed that any apprenticeship would not involve any actual tattooing for quite along time. According to the people I have spoken to what it does involve is a lot of cleaning and menial tasks with just enough information being drip feed to keep you hanging around and working for free. I am not good at indentured servitude. So what now? How about the Internet? Surely it must contain the sum of all knowledge in this department? Well yes and no, it contains a lot of information, some good, some bad and some just downright ridiculess. So the Internet provided me with some knowledge, but what it couldn't give me was the confidence to actually get started, at least not in the traditional way...

In the begining.....

As an illustrator or artist I would work with pen and ink on paper. Many hours of tiny strokes, attempting to get everything in the right place, making an image pleasing enough to the eye to make people want to keep them. This gave my artistic efforts some permanence, and me some satisfaction. As I sat in a coffee shop working away on whatever project of day had taken my fancy, occasionally a passer by would stop and comment. On more than one occasion I would be asked if I was a Tattooist, quiet often by someone who looked as though they might have been. When I answer "no" they would scurry away. I would later learn that my particular methods of inking paper would translate directly from pen to tattoo machine. I would also learn that the reason for the rapid departure of these knowledgeable passers by was that they knew this fact even if I didn't. Such is the secretive nature of the tattoo world that all information is guarded feverishly, and excluding that knowledge from outsiders to prevent them from entering the profession. I don't think it should work that way, so I set out to learn....