Tugga, Drew and Gerry were casting eyes everywhere as well, sizing up who was willing to play on tour and when was the best time to strike. It was a different era and morality from Hackett’s present-day life in Melbourne. Most passengers were away from home, work, families and friends for the first time and everything was a new adventure to be embraced. A tour guide from another company succinctly summarised the mood one evening in the Zombie Bar in Florence. He outlined the fundamentals that he believed applied to most trips: ‘passengers hang up their coats, their brains and then their morals – for the duration.’ The mantra for passengers and road crew was, ‘What happens on tour, stays on tour’.
The moral ambiguity of sexual freedom while touring didn’t suit everyone. A few settled into monogamous arrangements while others continued to play the field. Helen and Hackett fell into that second category. In between shagging each other when the mood suited them, they enjoyed the company of other passengers. That was how Judy, Denise and two other girls from different tour buses had ended up sharing a tent, or Hackett’s spread-out sleeping bag, during the trip. It had been one of the most liberating times of Hackett’s life, details of which had only ever been shared with Ferdy after returning to civilisation in London. His friend had been blasé. Ferdy’s business venture had netted him £20,000 while Hackett spent £3000 living the Playboy lifestyle on a budget tour. Marianne had never budgeted anything in her life; her European visits were always five-star. Hackett, therefore, was cautious about sharing experiences from his first European adventure with his wife. He told her nothing.
Hackett looked more closely at the faces of Helen, Judy and Denise; his three Kiwi birds. Of the three, Judy was the stand-out: an attractive blonde with a fresh-faced country look and a megawatt smile. From a farming family, Judy was on the trip of her dreams. Hackett recalled that Judy fell in love with Europe via cultural documentaries and books as a teenager. Ancient castles, medieval abbeys and bustling cities were such a contrast to her rural life in New Zealand. She was determined to visit the most famous landmarks before marriage and children tied her to a farm existence in Waikato. Judy was supposed to travel with a girlfriend, but she’d cancelled just before the trip because of a family problem. Hackett remembered Judy saying after one intimate encounter that she was glad there was no one to report back to her boyfriend – or parents. Raven-haired Helen was originally from Rotorua. That’s where she met Tugga and the lads before moving to Sydney for better jobs and pay in the early ’80s; along with tens of thousands of her contemporaries. She was still a Kiwi at heart, Hackett remembered, but was already being influenced by the darker side of Sydney. She always talked about getting stoned. He was surprised to learn that she was bisexual as well and had made attempts to bed other girls on the trip without any apparent success. Denise was another sweet mid-20s girl from Waikato. Hackett didn’t consider Denise as cute as Judy, but she was a lot of fun and up for a bonk almost anywhere. God knows how I ever found time for those American girls on the Contiki trip in Venice!
Hackett looked at more faces and tried to match them with names. He would make a guess and then turn the picture over to see if he was correct. Not all the passengers put down their full names or home addresses. Many picked up tour nicknames for silly habits, stunts or mishaps. These trip monikers were more commonly used on the picture, although some had bracketed the nicknames with the ones assigned by their parents at birth. Tugga’s name was there. It merely said: Tugga Tancred, NZ.
Hackett never learned the origins of Tugga’s nickname or much more about his New Zealand life, apart from his early rugby prowess. That was reaffirmed by Drew and Gerry who’d watched Tugga smash scrums since high school. Tugga had always been their leader and he decided their daily agenda. If the itinerary didn’t interest Tugga – ‘not another crumbling church’ – he would locate a bar and settle in with Drew and Gerry to drink beer, schnapps, grappa or anything else alcoholic. They made sure the bar was close to where the bus was parked or the camp site. Hackett found himself regularly drawn to Tugga and his compatriots after his own excursions.
No wonder the other passengers considered me part of Tugga’s Mob.
The Volendam picture made Hackett think about the end of the trip, when most of these details were written down. Hackett had to admit much of that final 24 hours in Amsterdam was fuzzy. He was wasted, like never before, or since, and considered himself lucky that Ferdy was in London to meet the returning bus, otherwise he wouldn’t have found their flat again.
Hackett’s last night on the trip in Amsterdam was spent enjoying copious amounts of space cake, a cannabis-fuelled high that obliterated several hours from his existence. He had no idea what happened. Like most of the passengers, Hackett was ignorant of the strengths of the cake offerings in cafés and the delayed hit from the cannabis. No buzz arrived after the first samplings, so they pressed on into La La Land. Luckily, eight of the tour group and the driver/guide abstained from the cake feast. They spent the rest of the night rounding up the new space cadets and herding them back to the camp site. Hackett had one recurring memory, when the dry horrors kicked in, of a female yelling that she couldn’t breathe. Another passenger reassured the screamer she was still alive because the whole camp site could hear her.
Consequently, many of the space cadets were physically present on the last day to help pack up the tents, but mentally their brains were still in another galaxy. Hackett was earthbound, so firmly connected to the turf he couldn’t rise from it. His limbs didn’t have bones anymore; they had turned to jelly. He had preceded the space cake binge with a long booze session with Tugga’s Mob in the camp bar. That left Hackett without energy to drag himself from his tent to assist with the packing duties. Occasionally a face would appear at the tent flap to rouse or motivate him, but to no avail. The packing continued around him until it came time for his tent to be folded and loaded into the bus. Suddenly he found himself tipped upside down into blinding light. He heard the laughter without any sympathy. Bloody Aussies – can’t hold their piss or their cake.
Somehow Hackett scrambled together his possessions and shoved them into his backpack. Through bleary eyes he noticed his copy of the Volendam picture dumped beside his kit. A kind soul had obviously taken his picture to the group information exchange. That was appreciated. However, he noticed for his details they had merely written: Andreas, Space Cadet, London or Melbourne. He wondered if that was the same on all the other pictures.
It hadn’t concerned him at the time, that no one on the trip probably knew his proper name. And it certainly wasn’t a problem now; he didn’t want any of those former companions turning up on the doorstep of his South Yarra villa wanting a bed for old time’s sake. The nickname ‘Andreas’ stuck from day one when they were all introducing themselves on the bus microphone. Hackett revealed his birth name was Andreas, in honour of his family’s German heritage, although he preferred to be called Andrew. Naturally, that was enough for a busload of Aussies and Kiwis to take the piss by calling him Andreas for the duration.
Hackett pulled over an A4 notebook and wrote down the names he considered worthy of a Google search for old time’s sakes: Andrew (Drew) Harvey, Gerry Daly, Helen Franks – the other members of Tugga’s Mob. He also wrote down Judy Williams and Denise Howard, the trip girlfriends. Luckily their surnames were included on the back of the picture because Hackett couldn’t recall them. He didn’t bother listing the Contiki girls from Venice, given he couldn’t even remember their first names.
What a party place that Venice camp site was.
Hackett’s first port of call when he researched someone prior to a business meeting was LinkedIn. Facebook was next on the list as it contained pictures and more personal details that often proved helpful. It would reveal families, friends, hobbies and interests – all good background information.
If Hackett ever wanted more leverage in negotiations he would turn to Google for the dirt. The most salacious stories sat higher in the pecking order because of the volume of hits.
Hackett remembered Drew’s stocky build, thick brows and constant struggles with the values of the various European currencies.