Seriously ... Why are you here? I reckon you should be more concerned about your own cancerous administration than ours!
Analysis UP THE CHINA RABBIT-HOLE - The TV Docudrama Series (Update)
- Thread starter Lockhart Road
- Start date
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Just last night there was a show on SBS that told of the German 'exchange students' in England just prior to WWII...
Janus
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"My brother, you know, he's a lot more compassionate than I am. He's looking, and the limo's driving off, and he said 'Wow, man...Rick really needs help.' And I was like, 'Sure, we just gave him some help. Busted his ****ing ass...I bet you he won't come over here and disrespect like that again.' Wrong. WRONG. We're talking about Rick Mattinson, man."
Ford Fairlane
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Did he make reference to that? I didnt note see that at all.
What I will say, is that this thread by LR has quite some volatility to it. Given the feelings that exist between the two clubs, the appropriateness of a Crows member posting here is highly questionable! If this were a thread on the Crows board with similar subject matter on their club, I would never in a million years even think of posting on it, never mind being allowed to by their mob!
Just my thoughts on it.
RussellEbertHandball
Flick pass expert
I'd say the phrase "putting into context the significance of partnering with the HKFC" covers that.
Ford Fairlane
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- #82
That was how I read the exact post you quoted. Maybe we are interpreting it differently.
We do get crow trolls here and deal with them accordingly, we are sensitive to lines being crossed.
But we don't want to jump at shadows to the extent we nuke someone who is simply making a benign comment.
Peace in our time!
Lockhart Road
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- #84
One of the great misquotes. It was actually “Peace for our time.” And time for the bloke who said it turned out to be pretty short.
It is a slog to read
I'm more of a get straight to the issue at hand / dot point summary kind of guy
I'm more of a get straight to the issue at hand / dot point summary kind of guy
RussellEbertHandball
Flick pass expert
Partnering with the HKFC is fundamental to LR's China Strategy. And it was his strategy for a couple of years before the club got their head around it.
The HKFC changed world Rugby. It was the HKFC that started the 7's tournament that became so successful that it had to be shifted to a 40k stadium in 1982. It was the HK 7's tournament that was beamed live or delayed around the world and showcased the best players all together in one place for a long weekend. The HK 7's was a defacto world cup until the first 1987 Rugby World in Oz and NZ and probably was still bigger than the World Cup until the second edition in the UK in 1991.
Our China strategy was Hong Kong + Guangdong and would have stayed that way maybe for 10 years until Mr Gui turned up to watch us play Peel Thunder that first Saturday of September 2015.
The HKFC changed world Rugby. It was the HKFC that started the 7's tournament that became so successful that it had to be shifted to a 40k stadium in 1982. It was the HK 7's tournament that was beamed live or delayed around the world and showcased the best players all together in one place for a long weekend. The HK 7's was a defacto world cup until the first 1987 Rugby World in Oz and NZ and probably was still bigger than the World Cup until the second edition in the UK in 1991.
Our China strategy was Hong Kong + Guangdong and would have stayed that way maybe for 10 years until Mr Gui turned up to watch us play Peel Thunder that first Saturday of September 2015.
That's the one I was referring to ... didnt notice the second one.
C'mon.
Sanders is one of those guys who says it as he sees it. Far from a follower.
On SM-G920I using BigFooty.com mobile app
Sanders is one of those guys who says it as he sees it. Far from a follower.
On SM-G920I using BigFooty.com mobile app
Lockhart Road
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- #89
Actually the Club latched on to the HKFC base camp theory pretty quickly. This was helped by Richo having been involved with a Magpies event at HKFC in 2006, from which he said they made a profit, and by Koch having his daughter living in Kowloon at the time.
REH you will remember our lunch with Ford and Mick Mummery at the Strathmore during the first week of September 2013 when I brought the reciprocal partnership application signed by KT. I took it back to HK next day.
The theory started in May 2013 when I mentioned it over a beer with the GM of HKFC. Then when we went from 5-0 to 5-5 I kept quiet until we won a couple and I brought it up again. All the correspondence between the two clubs was ghost written by me.
The hook was Adelaide Oval 2014.
The China Strategy would not have stayed restricted to South China for much longer than it did. We were always aiming for Shanghai. Gui’s sudden appearence made it happen earlier than expected.
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RussellEbertHandball
Flick pass expert
Realistically how much resources would we have put into Shanghai say mid 2015-mid 2020 without Gui?
We were struggling to spend enough in Guangdong and none of those potato farmers came thru. Maybe they would have listened to you more if Gui didn't come on the scene and make it relatively easy for the Shanghai move.
Lockhart Road
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How long is a piece of string? Just before Gui materialised Andrew Hunter was up here looking for $10k sponsorships. He asked my colleague and me to help. We just stared at him. Get after something worthwhile we told him. He had no idea where to start.
Yes Gui made it easier for us to penetrate Shanghai (wait for Episode 5 ‘The Mammoth, The Mouse, And The Fox; guess who’s the fox). It started out at $1,000,000 a year. But then came Jiangwan Stadium and self-imposed pressure to set it up for 2017 and the cost went out to $4,000,000 with Gui underwriting any shortfall. Problem was that KT and AH, soft touches that they are, were, took a long time to put the hard word on Gui to cough up the balance, during which interval Steve Dawes was going apeshit. No room for soft touches in China.
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Lockhart Road
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—————————————
UP THE CHINA RABBIT-HOLE - The TV Docudrama Series (Episode 3: ‘Brunetti’).
Voice of Narrator:
The best laid plans ... of mice and men ...
Will go to shit no if nor but ... just when.
EPISODE 3
Brunetti
Theme music:
‘Breakfast At Tiffany’s’ (Deep Blue Something)
SCENE 14 -
Early next morning, Tuesday, 24 February 2015.
Breakfast meeting, make that intended breakfast meeting, Melbourne CBD. Scene is Brunetti just off Collins Street, a short walk from the Novotel. It has an outdoor section and an indoor section. Ander has arrived on time and, thinking he is first arrivee, has taken a table inside. A minute later Keene has arrived, and because he doesn’t know Ander by sight, takes a table outside. They both sit where they are, inadvertently apart, each waiting for the other, also waiting for Road and Robbins who are already running ten minutes late, their taxi a victim of traffic and roadworks on Punt Road. It’s all Road’s fault.
ROBBINS (not for the first time): “This is all your fault.”
ROAD: “I’m a pig - “
ROBBINS: “No-one’s disputing that, LR.”
ROAD: “I was born in the Year of the Pig, the twelfth and last year in the cycle. When the Lord Buddha summoned all the animals and rewarded the first twelve to show up, gave each animal a year in its own name in the order they arrived, the pig was twelfth. He was last of the dozen to front up. He overslept.”
ROBBINS: “I’m a pig, too. I didn’t oversleep.”
ROAD: “You’re the Young Pig. I’m the Old Pig. I’m a Fire Pig - “
ROBBINS: “It shows.”
ROAD: “And you’re a Gold Pig. You’re a running dog capitalist fund manager. You’re greedy and grasping and get up early because you can’t sleep with all that ready money and all those givers out there. I’m a Fire Pig. I lie in bed warm, contented and free of any conscience for as long as I feel like lying in bed.”
ROBBINS: “How much sleep did you really get last night.”
ROAD: “Nary a wink.”
The taxi gets moving. Robbins looks at his watch. Road pulls his Nokia C2-01 2011 vintage out of his Calvin Kleins and checks the time; he does not wear a watch. He used to wear a vintage Rolex, got it bargain basement via his father-in-law’s deceased estate, but his wrist has grown too fleshy for the band; the watch lies on his bedside table, hidden under debris, waiting for him to find it and loosen the band. It stopped months ago. Road has grown accustomed to no longer having the deadweight of a Rolex on his left wrist and automatically starts each day without it.
Unseen ahead, amongst the concrete jungle, just off Collins Street at their CBD destination, Daryl Ander sits inside Brunetti checking his watch. Thorold Keene sits outside Brunetti checking his watch.
The breakfast meeting that Road has organised to set in motion what he calls, in a hushed voice, the China State Net Strategy, is stuck in the starting gate.
SCENE 15 -
At Brunetti, another ten minutes later.
Notes for director:
Camera provides an aerial view from directly above the table at which Keene is sitting outside Brunetti. Road and Robbins finally appear, take two of the three empty chairs. Greetings and handshakes. Questions asked. Puzzled looks in all directions. Phones appear. Robbins stands, trots inside, comes out moments later with Daryl Ander in tow. More greetings and handshakes. Now every one of the four chairs is filled. Twenty-plus minutes behind schedule.
Road is the only one to actually order breakfast at the breakfast meeting. The rest have coffee. Road orders eggs benedict. He is starved. Hasn’t slept, took too long in the shower, has not eaten; has to wing it through another day, would have no doubts, if asked, about his ability to do just that.
Narrator takes over. His commentary on the dialogue of the one-hour ground-breaking meeting at Brunetti is only interrupted when one of the four makes an outstanding comment, and the camera drops into a close-up to catch it.
Voice of Narrator:
Now what’s this all about, you might still be asking. Why is this meeting and these particular four fine fellows taking part in it so important? I shall try to keep it simple at this early stage. This is PAFC hatching a plot to establish contact, for its own ultimate serious benefit, with the People’s Republic of China - at just about the highest state-owned industrial level that exists in the public eye. Got that? Let’s see how they go about it.
Thorold Keene is talking first. He’s picked up the gauntlet. He’s telling Daryl Ander about PAFC community programmes and projects. He makes a good pitch, as he did at the Hong Kong Football Club in May last year, at PAFC’s inaugural international business luncheon. So professional was the CEO’s pitch that it impressed two hard-nosed heard-it-all directors of China Light & Power who were guests at my table. It worked then. What are the odds it’ll work again? Shorter this time, in fact. Keene is selling to the sold. Ander already knows all about it ... and loves it.
Aerial camera pans in on Thorold Keene.
KEENE: “ ... and this is the sort of community opportunity we established Power Community Limited for ... and staffed it with the best Indigenous teachers and past Indigenous footballers we could recruit ... and ... “
Camera switches to Ander, sitting quietly, listening politely.
ANDER: “Yes. I’ve read up on it.”
Camera back to Keene, who has lost his line of pitch, perhaps run out of pitch.
KEENE: “Yes ... well ... that’s wonderful ... “
ANDER: “I was impressed with what I read.”
KEENE: “Yes ... it’s very - “
Camera switches to Road who leans forward, has decided the time is right for him to step in, to cut to the chase.
ROAD: “Daryl, our objective is for the PAFC community strategy, the best in the AFL, perhaps the best of any national sporting club, to be extended to China - through partnerships both here in Australia and in China itself. Robin has told me that you, Daryl, may have a suggestion as to how that might be achieved ... involving someone like China State Net.”
Keene has imperceptibly shifted in his chair, away from Road, yielding the floor so to speak, giving Road the space he needs. Road’s aim is not to be rude, not to be seen to come in over the top of the PAFC CEO in front of their guest. But something had to be done. He couldn’t just sit there while the clock ticked. LR is concerned that his lateness has put dangerous time pressure on the meeting and this is how he can make up for it, by cutting short the preliminaries. He also knows Ander will welcome his intervention, was probably expecting it. The eggs benedict have given Road the fuel and fire he needed to take up point position at some interval during the meeting. He’s done that, whilst accepting the risk of making it obvious.
Camera switches to Ander as, picking his words carefully, aware of sensitivities, he begins his response to Road’s very direct, very welcome question. He’s been told that fitting the word ‘meaningful’ in somewhere will sit well with Keene, and to emphasise ‘community’ as much as it fits in, and then some.
‘Community’ is at present Excalibur when selling to Thorold Keene. Later, four years later, it will become, ironically, the CEO’s potential Achilles heel in China.
ANDER: “Thanks, LR. Yes ... we’re here, I understand, to brainstorm China and Port Adelaide Football Club getting together in a ... meaningful way ... starting with a worthwhile project involving ... community. We’re here to discuss what our first step might be towards achieving that ... “
Aerial camera takes over. We’re back to a screen with all four heads around a table, balding pates looking straight up.
Voice of Narrator:
Who is this bloke? Who is Daryl Ander? You know by now who I am, and you know who Thorold Keene is. But you don’t really know yet who Ander is and, for that matter, you don’t really know who Robin Rockin’ Robbins is. This is an appropriate moment for you to find out.
Daryl Ander is the CEO of Ten-66 Funds Management. They are eighty per cent owned by one of the Big Four banks down here, who leave them alone, let them get on with making a lot of money out of projects Ten-66 identify to be worth investing in. Big projects. Big infrastructure projects. Lately, for several years make that, infrastructure projects in Australia have attracted the attention of State Owned Enterprises from China. One such project was the break-up and sale of the ETSA monopoly in South Australia. The break-up meant that the Transmission Network, operating at UHV and EHV, was hived off. The successful bidder was a consortium of three entities. China State Gas & Power Net was consortium leader; it now owns 46.5 per cent. The Malaysians are a partner with one-third ownership. The remainder, just under twenty per cent, sits profitably in the investment portfolios of Ten-66 Funds Management. What used to be the transmission operation of ETSA is today eighty per cent China-Malaysia owned and answers to the call of a similar acronym: EGSA. That’s Electricity Grid of South Australia.
So, you see, Daryl Ander is the CEO of the corporation that is a partner in EGSA with China State Net. He thus knows both corporations well, works with them on a daily basis. He knows the chairman and the EGSA board members, three of whom are appointed by China State Net. Daryl Ander is a passionate member of the Port Adelaide Football Club. Now do you know who he is, and why he is one of the four blokes down there, sitting around that table outside Brunetti, talking China Strategy, talking history in the making?
What about Rockin’ Robbins? We’ve become good mates, so I know a bit about him. He’s from Unley. In the eighties he was in Tokyo, managing part of an Australian bank branch there. In 1989 he moved to Hong Kong. Not the most comfortable year to do so; it was the year of Tiananmen Square. That, obviously, did not put him off. He started his own fund management operation and opened an office in what used to be called Gammon House but is now Bank of America Tower. We met right after the PAFC Business Luncheon staged at the HKFC in May 2014. He missed it, was in Beijing on business. He emailed PAFC and told them he was so sorry to have missed it, was a passionate member and was available and willing to help the Club with its China Strategy. Rick Mattinson put him on to me.
Now do you know who Robin Rockin’ Robbins is, and why he is one of the four blokes down there, sitting around that table outside Brunetti talking China? Okay, say you, but where did he get the nickname of ‘Rockin’? He doesn’t look like a dancin’ man, right? He looks softly-spoken, reserved, a quiet achiever, noiseless even. Well, Robin’s priority task in the PAFC China Strategy, I often remind him, and he always agrees, is to keep me under control. Of the pair of us he is the foil to my thrust. He is the Felix Unger to my Oscar Madison. He calls the tune, I slow dance to it. Provided I’ve had my medication. Therefore, elimentarily, I have named him ‘Rockin’. He will call me Fred Astaire ... or Red Adair if I haven’t had my medication and it shows. It’s a code we have, to keep me under control.
Rockin’ Robbins has taught me one very important trick. He learnt it during his time in Tokyo. The Japanese never sit down for a meeting until all those invited are privately briefed and their agreement to the outcome is secured in advance. The Japanese call it nemawashi. Robin has used this trick on that meeting down there - well, on three of the four gentlemen at the table. He hadn’t been able to get to Thorold Keene, doesn’t know him well enough to try. Three out of four, however, should be enough to do the trick, which Lockhart Road - that’s me, remember - calls ‘never washy’ not nemawashi. It’s imperative that, as far as the PAFC China Strategy is concerned, at the meeting going on outside Brunetti, the never washy washes well.
Camera zooms in on Ander as he approaches his punch line:
ANDER: “So, in the absence at this stage of a Chinese billionaire benefactor ... we go after the best available alternative, and that’s a partnership with China State Net that will open an alternative revenue stream for Port Adelaide. I can’t sell it to them. I’m too close to them. It will interfere with my independent status in their eyes. It’s up to you three.”
ROAD: “There is no co-operation without mutual benefit.”
ROBBINS: “Who said that?”
ROAD: “My first employer in Hong Kong. He taught me a thing or two.”
ANDER: “It’s right. You have to prove to them that they’re in need of you, that you’re worth entering into a special partnership with, that you are in a position to do something necessary for them that nobody else can ... before they think of asking somebody else.”
ROAD: “Communications.”
ROBBINS: “Communications.”
ANDER: “Communications.”
KEENE (thoughtfully): “And community.”
ROAD: “We’re just in need of an introduction, Daryl. If that’s possible. We’ll take it from there.”
Aerial camera shows Ander check his watch and stand up. He and Keene walk inside Brunetti together, equally determined to pick up the tab. They reappear outside, the debt obviously very amicably settled. After handshakes all round, Ander leaves. Keene resumes his seat. Camera pans in, close-up on Keene.
Thorold Keene rests on his elbows on the table, hunches his shoulders, casts a meaningful look at Robbins, then at Road. He nods slowly. In his eyes there is a real and deep gratitude.
KEENE (softly, sincerely, with emphasis): “My ... ambassadors ... “
Road and Robbins exchange their own looks. Their day has been made.
Later Keene will describe the meeting in an email: ‘Four passionate Port tragics sitting together early one morning in Melbourne, talking together about footy and how they can all work together to achieve great goals for their club. Still hard to take in all the possibilities. Simply fantastic. Sincerely fantastic.
Theme music:
‘Sincerely’ (The Forester Sisters)
UP THE CHINA RABBIT-HOLE - The TV Docudrama Series (Episode 3: ‘Brunetti’).
Voice of Narrator:
The best laid plans ... of mice and men ...
Will go to shit no if nor but ... just when.
EPISODE 3
Brunetti
Theme music:
‘Breakfast At Tiffany’s’ (Deep Blue Something)
SCENE 14 -
Early next morning, Tuesday, 24 February 2015.
Breakfast meeting, make that intended breakfast meeting, Melbourne CBD. Scene is Brunetti just off Collins Street, a short walk from the Novotel. It has an outdoor section and an indoor section. Ander has arrived on time and, thinking he is first arrivee, has taken a table inside. A minute later Keene has arrived, and because he doesn’t know Ander by sight, takes a table outside. They both sit where they are, inadvertently apart, each waiting for the other, also waiting for Road and Robbins who are already running ten minutes late, their taxi a victim of traffic and roadworks on Punt Road. It’s all Road’s fault.
ROBBINS (not for the first time): “This is all your fault.”
ROAD: “I’m a pig - “
ROBBINS: “No-one’s disputing that, LR.”
ROAD: “I was born in the Year of the Pig, the twelfth and last year in the cycle. When the Lord Buddha summoned all the animals and rewarded the first twelve to show up, gave each animal a year in its own name in the order they arrived, the pig was twelfth. He was last of the dozen to front up. He overslept.”
ROBBINS: “I’m a pig, too. I didn’t oversleep.”
ROAD: “You’re the Young Pig. I’m the Old Pig. I’m a Fire Pig - “
ROBBINS: “It shows.”
ROAD: “And you’re a Gold Pig. You’re a running dog capitalist fund manager. You’re greedy and grasping and get up early because you can’t sleep with all that ready money and all those givers out there. I’m a Fire Pig. I lie in bed warm, contented and free of any conscience for as long as I feel like lying in bed.”
ROBBINS: “How much sleep did you really get last night.”
ROAD: “Nary a wink.”
The taxi gets moving. Robbins looks at his watch. Road pulls his Nokia C2-01 2011 vintage out of his Calvin Kleins and checks the time; he does not wear a watch. He used to wear a vintage Rolex, got it bargain basement via his father-in-law’s deceased estate, but his wrist has grown too fleshy for the band; the watch lies on his bedside table, hidden under debris, waiting for him to find it and loosen the band. It stopped months ago. Road has grown accustomed to no longer having the deadweight of a Rolex on his left wrist and automatically starts each day without it.
Unseen ahead, amongst the concrete jungle, just off Collins Street at their CBD destination, Daryl Ander sits inside Brunetti checking his watch. Thorold Keene sits outside Brunetti checking his watch.
The breakfast meeting that Road has organised to set in motion what he calls, in a hushed voice, the China State Net Strategy, is stuck in the starting gate.
SCENE 15 -
At Brunetti, another ten minutes later.
Notes for director:
Camera provides an aerial view from directly above the table at which Keene is sitting outside Brunetti. Road and Robbins finally appear, take two of the three empty chairs. Greetings and handshakes. Questions asked. Puzzled looks in all directions. Phones appear. Robbins stands, trots inside, comes out moments later with Daryl Ander in tow. More greetings and handshakes. Now every one of the four chairs is filled. Twenty-plus minutes behind schedule.
Road is the only one to actually order breakfast at the breakfast meeting. The rest have coffee. Road orders eggs benedict. He is starved. Hasn’t slept, took too long in the shower, has not eaten; has to wing it through another day, would have no doubts, if asked, about his ability to do just that.
Narrator takes over. His commentary on the dialogue of the one-hour ground-breaking meeting at Brunetti is only interrupted when one of the four makes an outstanding comment, and the camera drops into a close-up to catch it.
Voice of Narrator:
Now what’s this all about, you might still be asking. Why is this meeting and these particular four fine fellows taking part in it so important? I shall try to keep it simple at this early stage. This is PAFC hatching a plot to establish contact, for its own ultimate serious benefit, with the People’s Republic of China - at just about the highest state-owned industrial level that exists in the public eye. Got that? Let’s see how they go about it.
Thorold Keene is talking first. He’s picked up the gauntlet. He’s telling Daryl Ander about PAFC community programmes and projects. He makes a good pitch, as he did at the Hong Kong Football Club in May last year, at PAFC’s inaugural international business luncheon. So professional was the CEO’s pitch that it impressed two hard-nosed heard-it-all directors of China Light & Power who were guests at my table. It worked then. What are the odds it’ll work again? Shorter this time, in fact. Keene is selling to the sold. Ander already knows all about it ... and loves it.
Aerial camera pans in on Thorold Keene.
KEENE: “ ... and this is the sort of community opportunity we established Power Community Limited for ... and staffed it with the best Indigenous teachers and past Indigenous footballers we could recruit ... and ... “
Camera switches to Ander, sitting quietly, listening politely.
ANDER: “Yes. I’ve read up on it.”
Camera back to Keene, who has lost his line of pitch, perhaps run out of pitch.
KEENE: “Yes ... well ... that’s wonderful ... “
ANDER: “I was impressed with what I read.”
KEENE: “Yes ... it’s very - “
Camera switches to Road who leans forward, has decided the time is right for him to step in, to cut to the chase.
ROAD: “Daryl, our objective is for the PAFC community strategy, the best in the AFL, perhaps the best of any national sporting club, to be extended to China - through partnerships both here in Australia and in China itself. Robin has told me that you, Daryl, may have a suggestion as to how that might be achieved ... involving someone like China State Net.”
Keene has imperceptibly shifted in his chair, away from Road, yielding the floor so to speak, giving Road the space he needs. Road’s aim is not to be rude, not to be seen to come in over the top of the PAFC CEO in front of their guest. But something had to be done. He couldn’t just sit there while the clock ticked. LR is concerned that his lateness has put dangerous time pressure on the meeting and this is how he can make up for it, by cutting short the preliminaries. He also knows Ander will welcome his intervention, was probably expecting it. The eggs benedict have given Road the fuel and fire he needed to take up point position at some interval during the meeting. He’s done that, whilst accepting the risk of making it obvious.
Camera switches to Ander as, picking his words carefully, aware of sensitivities, he begins his response to Road’s very direct, very welcome question. He’s been told that fitting the word ‘meaningful’ in somewhere will sit well with Keene, and to emphasise ‘community’ as much as it fits in, and then some.
‘Community’ is at present Excalibur when selling to Thorold Keene. Later, four years later, it will become, ironically, the CEO’s potential Achilles heel in China.
ANDER: “Thanks, LR. Yes ... we’re here, I understand, to brainstorm China and Port Adelaide Football Club getting together in a ... meaningful way ... starting with a worthwhile project involving ... community. We’re here to discuss what our first step might be towards achieving that ... “
Aerial camera takes over. We’re back to a screen with all four heads around a table, balding pates looking straight up.
Voice of Narrator:
Who is this bloke? Who is Daryl Ander? You know by now who I am, and you know who Thorold Keene is. But you don’t really know yet who Ander is and, for that matter, you don’t really know who Robin Rockin’ Robbins is. This is an appropriate moment for you to find out.
Daryl Ander is the CEO of Ten-66 Funds Management. They are eighty per cent owned by one of the Big Four banks down here, who leave them alone, let them get on with making a lot of money out of projects Ten-66 identify to be worth investing in. Big projects. Big infrastructure projects. Lately, for several years make that, infrastructure projects in Australia have attracted the attention of State Owned Enterprises from China. One such project was the break-up and sale of the ETSA monopoly in South Australia. The break-up meant that the Transmission Network, operating at UHV and EHV, was hived off. The successful bidder was a consortium of three entities. China State Gas & Power Net was consortium leader; it now owns 46.5 per cent. The Malaysians are a partner with one-third ownership. The remainder, just under twenty per cent, sits profitably in the investment portfolios of Ten-66 Funds Management. What used to be the transmission operation of ETSA is today eighty per cent China-Malaysia owned and answers to the call of a similar acronym: EGSA. That’s Electricity Grid of South Australia.
So, you see, Daryl Ander is the CEO of the corporation that is a partner in EGSA with China State Net. He thus knows both corporations well, works with them on a daily basis. He knows the chairman and the EGSA board members, three of whom are appointed by China State Net. Daryl Ander is a passionate member of the Port Adelaide Football Club. Now do you know who he is, and why he is one of the four blokes down there, sitting around that table outside Brunetti, talking China Strategy, talking history in the making?
What about Rockin’ Robbins? We’ve become good mates, so I know a bit about him. He’s from Unley. In the eighties he was in Tokyo, managing part of an Australian bank branch there. In 1989 he moved to Hong Kong. Not the most comfortable year to do so; it was the year of Tiananmen Square. That, obviously, did not put him off. He started his own fund management operation and opened an office in what used to be called Gammon House but is now Bank of America Tower. We met right after the PAFC Business Luncheon staged at the HKFC in May 2014. He missed it, was in Beijing on business. He emailed PAFC and told them he was so sorry to have missed it, was a passionate member and was available and willing to help the Club with its China Strategy. Rick Mattinson put him on to me.
Now do you know who Robin Rockin’ Robbins is, and why he is one of the four blokes down there, sitting around that table outside Brunetti talking China? Okay, say you, but where did he get the nickname of ‘Rockin’? He doesn’t look like a dancin’ man, right? He looks softly-spoken, reserved, a quiet achiever, noiseless even. Well, Robin’s priority task in the PAFC China Strategy, I often remind him, and he always agrees, is to keep me under control. Of the pair of us he is the foil to my thrust. He is the Felix Unger to my Oscar Madison. He calls the tune, I slow dance to it. Provided I’ve had my medication. Therefore, elimentarily, I have named him ‘Rockin’. He will call me Fred Astaire ... or Red Adair if I haven’t had my medication and it shows. It’s a code we have, to keep me under control.
Rockin’ Robbins has taught me one very important trick. He learnt it during his time in Tokyo. The Japanese never sit down for a meeting until all those invited are privately briefed and their agreement to the outcome is secured in advance. The Japanese call it nemawashi. Robin has used this trick on that meeting down there - well, on three of the four gentlemen at the table. He hadn’t been able to get to Thorold Keene, doesn’t know him well enough to try. Three out of four, however, should be enough to do the trick, which Lockhart Road - that’s me, remember - calls ‘never washy’ not nemawashi. It’s imperative that, as far as the PAFC China Strategy is concerned, at the meeting going on outside Brunetti, the never washy washes well.
Camera zooms in on Ander as he approaches his punch line:
ANDER: “So, in the absence at this stage of a Chinese billionaire benefactor ... we go after the best available alternative, and that’s a partnership with China State Net that will open an alternative revenue stream for Port Adelaide. I can’t sell it to them. I’m too close to them. It will interfere with my independent status in their eyes. It’s up to you three.”
ROAD: “There is no co-operation without mutual benefit.”
ROBBINS: “Who said that?”
ROAD: “My first employer in Hong Kong. He taught me a thing or two.”
ANDER: “It’s right. You have to prove to them that they’re in need of you, that you’re worth entering into a special partnership with, that you are in a position to do something necessary for them that nobody else can ... before they think of asking somebody else.”
ROAD: “Communications.”
ROBBINS: “Communications.”
ANDER: “Communications.”
KEENE (thoughtfully): “And community.”
ROAD: “We’re just in need of an introduction, Daryl. If that’s possible. We’ll take it from there.”
Aerial camera shows Ander check his watch and stand up. He and Keene walk inside Brunetti together, equally determined to pick up the tab. They reappear outside, the debt obviously very amicably settled. After handshakes all round, Ander leaves. Keene resumes his seat. Camera pans in, close-up on Keene.
Thorold Keene rests on his elbows on the table, hunches his shoulders, casts a meaningful look at Robbins, then at Road. He nods slowly. In his eyes there is a real and deep gratitude.
KEENE (softly, sincerely, with emphasis): “My ... ambassadors ... “
Road and Robbins exchange their own looks. Their day has been made.
Later Keene will describe the meeting in an email: ‘Four passionate Port tragics sitting together early one morning in Melbourne, talking together about footy and how they can all work together to achieve great goals for their club. Still hard to take in all the possibilities. Simply fantastic. Sincerely fantastic.
Theme music:
‘Sincerely’ (The Forester Sisters)
Last edited:
Lockhart Road
Cultural Attache
- Mar 26, 2013
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SCENE 16 -
That afternoon, same location, inside table at Brunetti this time.
Robbins and Road sitting together, nursing coffees that have gone cold.
ROBBINS: “How long’s he going to be?”
ROAD (checks latest text message): “He’s in his car, on his way. Says sorry.”
They look up as someone enters. It’s the person for whom LR has been waiting the past two hours, Robbins sitting with him for half that time having completed his fund management business with a Melbourne client.
The silhouette is that of Carlito Cacciatori, Melbourne based director of PAFC, ex-journalist in Adelaide, and CEO of Mick McGuane Media. His nickname is ‘Chicken’ because of his family name’s culinary inference. He tells everyone, however, that he was named after PAFC legend Neville ‘Chicken’ Hayes. He looks flustered, in a hurry, like he wants to be someplace else, like he has a lot to catch up on and better things to do.
CACCIATORI: “Sorry. This media presentation of ours at AFL House ... and then came a review of ‘The Recruit’ ... you know.”
ROAD (nods): “Thorold mentioned the media thing. Coffee?”
ROBBINS: “Have you found a new coach?”
CACCIATORI: “Hinkley is our coach.”
ROBBINS: “Sorry, I meant for The Recruit. Now that Voss is with us. I bet Ken is happy with that.”
CACCIATORI: “Ken?”
ROBBINS: “Hinkley.”
CACCIATORI (looking annoyed): “What’s it to do with him?”
ROAD: “Coffee?”
CACCIATORI: “No time. Sorry. What is it you really want to talk about?”
ROAD: “Well ... media ... communications.”
CACCIATORI: “Okay.”
ROAD (eyes narrowing): “Would McGuane Media be interested in setting up a branch for China, working out of Hong Kong?”
Cacciatori turns a pasty shade of pale, not easy for somebody with a swarthy Mediterranean complexion.
CACCIATORI (frowning protestingly): “Do you think I would even think of taking advantage of my valued position as a board member of PAFC?”
ROAD (thinks: ‘Big mistake. Huge mistake. That went right over his head.’): “Any chance we’ll be seeing you in Hong Kong again soon?”
CACCIATORI (uncertainly): “Are we giving you enough help up there? Anything more we can do to help?”
ROAD: “Everything’s peachy. Right, Robin?”
Robbins (eyes on the guest who kept them waiting so long): “Peachy, Fred.”
It was the code at work. ‘Fred’ or ‘Fred Astaire’ meant LR hadn’t forgotten his meds and was under control. ‘Red’ or ‘Red Adair’ meant he had either missed his meds or was overpowering them, and was out of control or on the verge.
Notes:
Cacciatori cannot wipe the quizzical expression off his face. It wasn’t just the code. Road’s entrepreneurial query out of the blue indeed went flying over his head. There are those who can detect a logical business opportunity in a flash; there are those whose antennae aren’t tuned to detect anything. Road felt let down. He’d let himself down. He’d screwed up. He wasn’t in Hong Kong, he was on foreign ground in Melbourne, Australia, something that momentarily slipped his tired dog-whistling mind. Road had not recognised the need to set the bar lower. He hadn’t given himself a chance to win. He’d let himself be grumbled at and hurried into tabling the question too fast. He’d behaved like a recruit.
He was in shock. This was a senior corporate executive, Melbourne variety? A senior media executive, Melbourne variety? Worse, this was a board member, a director, Melbourne variety, of the footy club that he’d supported since he was seven years old, was now offering his services to, and seeking nothing in return except ... except ... what? Road didn’t know what. He only knew it wasn’t what he’d just had served up to him. But, then, he knew ... he deserved it.
Road felt as flat, as flattened, as an elephant’s armchair.
His priority had been the breakfast meeting. It had gone well. After it, he had let go, had relaxed, had let his adrenaline flow drop to normal levels. Then he had taken it easy while Robin went off on a fund management appointment. He sat in the Novotel’s lobby lounge with his laptop. He’d eaten lunch on his own, back inside Brunetti. Then he’d sat there some more, stayed put at the same table, stayed in the same chair, while Cacciatori kept putting back his arrival until it was two hours past the agreed time.
During all this Road’s battery had run down. By the time the Chicken got there, keeping no secret that he aimed to leave as soon as he could, Road’s battery
was flat. He was sitting duck for an ambush, and that’s what had happened. Part of his jungle training for Vietnam took place at Canungra in Queensland. There the instructors had drummed it into him that, when on patrol, don’t allow your attention to wind down as the patrol nears its end. Most ambushes occur closest to home, they warned him. The same goes for car crashes, he’d heard.
So there. He hadn’t winged it after all. He hadn’t winged it all the way through two days with the Stilnox not working and no real sleep. He almost had. Almost. Right at the end, right at the death, when he was closest to home, he’d crashed and burned. He’d failed those instructors at Canungra whose job was to teach him how to stay alive in the jungle, be that jungle a natural one or concrete. Not only had he been ambushed on the home stretch, he’d ambushed himself.
ROAD (thinks to himself): ‘You’re getting too bloody old for your own good, LR. You’re getting to be a has-been ... when you sit on your arse for hours and let a tenderfoot like that show up so late and waste your time.’
Notes:
Later Road would learn that Cacciatori lost no time reporting his ‘indiscretion’ to Krupp who lost no time reporting it to Alberton. Then, for good measure, the Chicken reported it to Alberton himself. When Road was at the Club later in the week for various working sessions to do with the ANZAC Centenary Luncheon scheduled to be held in Hong Kong on Thursday, 30 April, in the HKFC Sports Hall, he noticed people looking at him strangely.
Especially Rick Mattinson.
The Chicken’s sharpened claw was in.
SCENE 17 -
Back to the Melbourne CBD, Tuesday, 24 February 2015.
Road and Robbins leave Brunetti, walk next door to the Novotel to catch a cab out to Tullarmarine for their flight to Adelaide. At check-in they discover they’ve been bumped, have to wait an hour for the next Virgin Blue departure.
ROBBINS: “What? That’s no way to run an airline.”
ROAD: “Relax. Let’s find the bar. I would kill to sit down with a friendly beer.”
They clink stubbies, toast an eventful day, a successful one as far as the first move in the China State Net strategy is concerned. That was the main thing.
ROAD: “Chin chin.”
ROBBINS: “Cheers. What’d you really think of our Chicken Cacciatori?”
ROAD: “Really lacking. You?”
ROBBINS: “Really, really lacking.”
ROAD: “It’s too bad. Really too bad, Robin. My daughter very recently decided to give up on the CYA system in Sydney and come back to Hong Kong to work. It was a big decision. Her mother is over the moon and the pressure’s on me to create something, an opportunity, for her. Chinese mothers are like that, you know ... motherly. My daughter has a diploma in event management, a degree in architecture, interior design. She has ten years in marketing and advertising management at Nikon and Haier in Sydney. I had her set up, in my mind, to get stuck into getting this one up and running for that ... that .... Words fail me.”
ROBBINS: “What up and running?”
ROAD: “Mick McGuane Media China.”
ROBBINS: “Communications.”
ROAD: “Okay. Mick McGuane Communications China.”
ROBBINS: “Lockhart Road Communications China.”
ROAD: “Road & Robbins Communications China. Alphabetical order. Sorry. You come second on the third letter by one letter.”
ROBBINS: “Oh no. Not for me, LR. I’m the Young Gold Pig running dog capitalist fund manager. You remember?”
ROAD (angles in Robin’s direction his half-empty stubbie of Cascade Premium Light): “You’re Old Gold. Worth your weight in it, mate.”
They clink.
ROBBINS: “And you?”
ROAD: “I’m an old pain in the Fire Pig’s fiery bloody arse. And I’m burnt out.”
ROBBINS: “You made it as far as it really counts, Fred. The Chicken is not worth the effort and the aggravation.”
ROAD: “No, mate. You’re right. He isn’t. But ... “
ROBBINS: “But what?”
ROAD: “But my daughter is. And so is the Port Adelaide Football Club ... the real Port Adelaide Football Club, the one without him in it. Setting up for China with McGuane Media or Communications, or whatever, out of Hong Kong would give us the publicity and promotional arm that we will need to make a partnership with a giant like China State Net - and countless others like them - work on the international stage. It would give us the instrument by which we can do real work, charge decent fees, negotiate retainers in advance, for performing the services of a publicist. A proper alternative revenue stream, in a growth market, Port Adelaide and Power branding, our own merchandise, selling it into China, plus international memberships ... “
ROBBINS (perfectly mimicking the voice and body language of the Chicken): “Do you think I would even think of taking advantage of my valued position as a board member of PAFC?”
ROAD: “Don’t do that, good as it was. Makes me want to chunder on the spot.”
ROBBINS: “Did you consider Collingwood?”
ROAD: “What about Collingwood?”
ROBBINS: “Cacciatori has a conflict of interest. What happens if he ever has to confront a decision where the interests of Port Adelaide clash head-on with the interests of Collingwood, and thus the interests of the guy who pays his salary? Does he put one ahead of the other? If so, which one?”
ROAD: “My guess is the Chicken would try to cash in both ways, once someone else has done all the work and he can take the credit. He’s understudying an expert at pulling that trick. He could claim he started the branch in Hong Kong to expand the whole AFL into China, even Asia, with Collingwood part of that.”
ROBBINS: “That’s how you’ve been thinking?”
ROAD (nods): “That’s how I’ve been thinking. Yes. Farther along the line, once Port Adelaide has built a foundation on rock.”
ROBBINS: “Okay, but think about what will happen when a highly emotive thing rises bubbling to the surface ... like the Port Adelaide faithful and the wearing of the Prison Bars on a more permanent basis, after the proven popularity and the financial success of the jumper being worn in the elimination final last year?”
ROAD (nods): “Or wearing the Prison Bars in China, and publicising the Prison Bars internationally?”
ROBBINS: “If it comes to that.”
ROAD: “Cacciatori is going to have to step down as a director of PAFC.”
ROBBINS: “Maybe a bit overdramatic. He would simply offer to recuse himself from board discussions concerning those topics.”
ROAD: “And become ineffective as far as a joint venture in China, involving my daughter, and PAFC, are concerned.”
ROBBINS: “You dodged a bullet.”
ROAD: “Funny, I was feeling the exact opposite. That I’d been ambushed.”
ROBBINS: “You’re being too hard on yourself, LR. Go rock in the treetops. It’ll liven you up.”
ROAD: “Go rock yourself.”
ROBBINS: “Give Ginger a call. I’ve got the number of the restaurant.”
ROAD: “Sure you do, Robin Williams. I heard you come in late, all tippy-toe hush hush. Dirty old bastard.”
ROBBINS: “I’m not old. Not as old as you anyway.”
ROAD: “You’re still a dirty bastard.”
They clink stubbies again, order two more.
Theme music:
‘Cheek to Cheek’ (Fred Astaire)
Next: Episode 4 - TRIBAL INSTINCT - March 2015 - May 2015
———————————————-
That afternoon, same location, inside table at Brunetti this time.
Robbins and Road sitting together, nursing coffees that have gone cold.
ROBBINS: “How long’s he going to be?”
ROAD (checks latest text message): “He’s in his car, on his way. Says sorry.”
They look up as someone enters. It’s the person for whom LR has been waiting the past two hours, Robbins sitting with him for half that time having completed his fund management business with a Melbourne client.
The silhouette is that of Carlito Cacciatori, Melbourne based director of PAFC, ex-journalist in Adelaide, and CEO of Mick McGuane Media. His nickname is ‘Chicken’ because of his family name’s culinary inference. He tells everyone, however, that he was named after PAFC legend Neville ‘Chicken’ Hayes. He looks flustered, in a hurry, like he wants to be someplace else, like he has a lot to catch up on and better things to do.
CACCIATORI: “Sorry. This media presentation of ours at AFL House ... and then came a review of ‘The Recruit’ ... you know.”
ROAD (nods): “Thorold mentioned the media thing. Coffee?”
ROBBINS: “Have you found a new coach?”
CACCIATORI: “Hinkley is our coach.”
ROBBINS: “Sorry, I meant for The Recruit. Now that Voss is with us. I bet Ken is happy with that.”
CACCIATORI: “Ken?”
ROBBINS: “Hinkley.”
CACCIATORI (looking annoyed): “What’s it to do with him?”
ROAD: “Coffee?”
CACCIATORI: “No time. Sorry. What is it you really want to talk about?”
ROAD: “Well ... media ... communications.”
CACCIATORI: “Okay.”
ROAD (eyes narrowing): “Would McGuane Media be interested in setting up a branch for China, working out of Hong Kong?”
Cacciatori turns a pasty shade of pale, not easy for somebody with a swarthy Mediterranean complexion.
CACCIATORI (frowning protestingly): “Do you think I would even think of taking advantage of my valued position as a board member of PAFC?”
ROAD (thinks: ‘Big mistake. Huge mistake. That went right over his head.’): “Any chance we’ll be seeing you in Hong Kong again soon?”
CACCIATORI (uncertainly): “Are we giving you enough help up there? Anything more we can do to help?”
ROAD: “Everything’s peachy. Right, Robin?”
Robbins (eyes on the guest who kept them waiting so long): “Peachy, Fred.”
It was the code at work. ‘Fred’ or ‘Fred Astaire’ meant LR hadn’t forgotten his meds and was under control. ‘Red’ or ‘Red Adair’ meant he had either missed his meds or was overpowering them, and was out of control or on the verge.
Notes:
Cacciatori cannot wipe the quizzical expression off his face. It wasn’t just the code. Road’s entrepreneurial query out of the blue indeed went flying over his head. There are those who can detect a logical business opportunity in a flash; there are those whose antennae aren’t tuned to detect anything. Road felt let down. He’d let himself down. He’d screwed up. He wasn’t in Hong Kong, he was on foreign ground in Melbourne, Australia, something that momentarily slipped his tired dog-whistling mind. Road had not recognised the need to set the bar lower. He hadn’t given himself a chance to win. He’d let himself be grumbled at and hurried into tabling the question too fast. He’d behaved like a recruit.
He was in shock. This was a senior corporate executive, Melbourne variety? A senior media executive, Melbourne variety? Worse, this was a board member, a director, Melbourne variety, of the footy club that he’d supported since he was seven years old, was now offering his services to, and seeking nothing in return except ... except ... what? Road didn’t know what. He only knew it wasn’t what he’d just had served up to him. But, then, he knew ... he deserved it.
Road felt as flat, as flattened, as an elephant’s armchair.
His priority had been the breakfast meeting. It had gone well. After it, he had let go, had relaxed, had let his adrenaline flow drop to normal levels. Then he had taken it easy while Robin went off on a fund management appointment. He sat in the Novotel’s lobby lounge with his laptop. He’d eaten lunch on his own, back inside Brunetti. Then he’d sat there some more, stayed put at the same table, stayed in the same chair, while Cacciatori kept putting back his arrival until it was two hours past the agreed time.
During all this Road’s battery had run down. By the time the Chicken got there, keeping no secret that he aimed to leave as soon as he could, Road’s battery
was flat. He was sitting duck for an ambush, and that’s what had happened. Part of his jungle training for Vietnam took place at Canungra in Queensland. There the instructors had drummed it into him that, when on patrol, don’t allow your attention to wind down as the patrol nears its end. Most ambushes occur closest to home, they warned him. The same goes for car crashes, he’d heard.
So there. He hadn’t winged it after all. He hadn’t winged it all the way through two days with the Stilnox not working and no real sleep. He almost had. Almost. Right at the end, right at the death, when he was closest to home, he’d crashed and burned. He’d failed those instructors at Canungra whose job was to teach him how to stay alive in the jungle, be that jungle a natural one or concrete. Not only had he been ambushed on the home stretch, he’d ambushed himself.
ROAD (thinks to himself): ‘You’re getting too bloody old for your own good, LR. You’re getting to be a has-been ... when you sit on your arse for hours and let a tenderfoot like that show up so late and waste your time.’
Notes:
Later Road would learn that Cacciatori lost no time reporting his ‘indiscretion’ to Krupp who lost no time reporting it to Alberton. Then, for good measure, the Chicken reported it to Alberton himself. When Road was at the Club later in the week for various working sessions to do with the ANZAC Centenary Luncheon scheduled to be held in Hong Kong on Thursday, 30 April, in the HKFC Sports Hall, he noticed people looking at him strangely.
Especially Rick Mattinson.
The Chicken’s sharpened claw was in.
SCENE 17 -
Back to the Melbourne CBD, Tuesday, 24 February 2015.
Road and Robbins leave Brunetti, walk next door to the Novotel to catch a cab out to Tullarmarine for their flight to Adelaide. At check-in they discover they’ve been bumped, have to wait an hour for the next Virgin Blue departure.
ROBBINS: “What? That’s no way to run an airline.”
ROAD: “Relax. Let’s find the bar. I would kill to sit down with a friendly beer.”
They clink stubbies, toast an eventful day, a successful one as far as the first move in the China State Net strategy is concerned. That was the main thing.
ROAD: “Chin chin.”
ROBBINS: “Cheers. What’d you really think of our Chicken Cacciatori?”
ROAD: “Really lacking. You?”
ROBBINS: “Really, really lacking.”
ROAD: “It’s too bad. Really too bad, Robin. My daughter very recently decided to give up on the CYA system in Sydney and come back to Hong Kong to work. It was a big decision. Her mother is over the moon and the pressure’s on me to create something, an opportunity, for her. Chinese mothers are like that, you know ... motherly. My daughter has a diploma in event management, a degree in architecture, interior design. She has ten years in marketing and advertising management at Nikon and Haier in Sydney. I had her set up, in my mind, to get stuck into getting this one up and running for that ... that .... Words fail me.”
ROBBINS: “What up and running?”
ROAD: “Mick McGuane Media China.”
ROBBINS: “Communications.”
ROAD: “Okay. Mick McGuane Communications China.”
ROBBINS: “Lockhart Road Communications China.”
ROAD: “Road & Robbins Communications China. Alphabetical order. Sorry. You come second on the third letter by one letter.”
ROBBINS: “Oh no. Not for me, LR. I’m the Young Gold Pig running dog capitalist fund manager. You remember?”
ROAD (angles in Robin’s direction his half-empty stubbie of Cascade Premium Light): “You’re Old Gold. Worth your weight in it, mate.”
They clink.
ROBBINS: “And you?”
ROAD: “I’m an old pain in the Fire Pig’s fiery bloody arse. And I’m burnt out.”
ROBBINS: “You made it as far as it really counts, Fred. The Chicken is not worth the effort and the aggravation.”
ROAD: “No, mate. You’re right. He isn’t. But ... “
ROBBINS: “But what?”
ROAD: “But my daughter is. And so is the Port Adelaide Football Club ... the real Port Adelaide Football Club, the one without him in it. Setting up for China with McGuane Media or Communications, or whatever, out of Hong Kong would give us the publicity and promotional arm that we will need to make a partnership with a giant like China State Net - and countless others like them - work on the international stage. It would give us the instrument by which we can do real work, charge decent fees, negotiate retainers in advance, for performing the services of a publicist. A proper alternative revenue stream, in a growth market, Port Adelaide and Power branding, our own merchandise, selling it into China, plus international memberships ... “
ROBBINS (perfectly mimicking the voice and body language of the Chicken): “Do you think I would even think of taking advantage of my valued position as a board member of PAFC?”
ROAD: “Don’t do that, good as it was. Makes me want to chunder on the spot.”
ROBBINS: “Did you consider Collingwood?”
ROAD: “What about Collingwood?”
ROBBINS: “Cacciatori has a conflict of interest. What happens if he ever has to confront a decision where the interests of Port Adelaide clash head-on with the interests of Collingwood, and thus the interests of the guy who pays his salary? Does he put one ahead of the other? If so, which one?”
ROAD: “My guess is the Chicken would try to cash in both ways, once someone else has done all the work and he can take the credit. He’s understudying an expert at pulling that trick. He could claim he started the branch in Hong Kong to expand the whole AFL into China, even Asia, with Collingwood part of that.”
ROBBINS: “That’s how you’ve been thinking?”
ROAD (nods): “That’s how I’ve been thinking. Yes. Farther along the line, once Port Adelaide has built a foundation on rock.”
ROBBINS: “Okay, but think about what will happen when a highly emotive thing rises bubbling to the surface ... like the Port Adelaide faithful and the wearing of the Prison Bars on a more permanent basis, after the proven popularity and the financial success of the jumper being worn in the elimination final last year?”
ROAD (nods): “Or wearing the Prison Bars in China, and publicising the Prison Bars internationally?”
ROBBINS: “If it comes to that.”
ROAD: “Cacciatori is going to have to step down as a director of PAFC.”
ROBBINS: “Maybe a bit overdramatic. He would simply offer to recuse himself from board discussions concerning those topics.”
ROAD: “And become ineffective as far as a joint venture in China, involving my daughter, and PAFC, are concerned.”
ROBBINS: “You dodged a bullet.”
ROAD: “Funny, I was feeling the exact opposite. That I’d been ambushed.”
ROBBINS: “You’re being too hard on yourself, LR. Go rock in the treetops. It’ll liven you up.”
ROAD: “Go rock yourself.”
ROBBINS: “Give Ginger a call. I’ve got the number of the restaurant.”
ROAD: “Sure you do, Robin Williams. I heard you come in late, all tippy-toe hush hush. Dirty old bastard.”
ROBBINS: “I’m not old. Not as old as you anyway.”
ROAD: “You’re still a dirty bastard.”
They clink stubbies again, order two more.
Theme music:
‘Cheek to Cheek’ (Fred Astaire)
Next: Episode 4 - TRIBAL INSTINCT - March 2015 - May 2015
- Tragic news reaches the Hen House Hilton: Peter Chant is KIA.
- Intro to the WTFRW; John Schumann, tribe member, saves the day.
- A 69th birthday song for John England; enter Ugo Alsthom.
- The epic hard-work PAFC ANZAC Centenary Luncheon at the HKFC.
- Planet Road versus Planet Krupp, and ne’er the twain shall meet.
- Road and Robbins talk about collateral damage and first impressions.
- China State Net Strategy: next step the imprimatur of the SA Premier.
———————————————-
Last edited:
Lockhart Road
Cultural Attache
- Mar 26, 2013
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- Thread starter
- #94
There will now be a gap until April something before Episode 4 ‘Tribal Instinct’ is posted.
As you can see from the shorts at the end of the post above, it’s about matters ANZAC, Vietnam, etc.
And it’s a long episode, to make up for the break in momentum.
As you can see from the shorts at the end of the post above, it’s about matters ANZAC, Vietnam, etc.
And it’s a long episode, to make up for the break in momentum.
Look you guys suck. All of you have Oedipal like mother complexes, which you’d act upon if you weren’t in the centrelink queue all day long.
Better?
What I find interesting, and universal, is a long suffering supporters’ love for his footy club juxtaposed over different cultural and climatic environs
Like all my fellow crow supporters I dismissed the China thing, and thankfully it looks like you’ve ****ed it up; but I am also enjoying learning something about it and how it came about
Lockhart Road
Cultural Attache
- Mar 26, 2013
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- Thread starter
- #97
Actually you can’t be juxtaposed ‘over’ only juxtaposed with. Don’t take that seriously, please. I appreciate your external view on proceedings. And I love your likes. Keep ‘em coming. Egotists love likes.
You were on my ignore list but now you’re at the top of my most learned if disadvantaged list.
Lockhart Road
Cultural Attache
- Mar 26, 2013
- 5,496
- 28,380
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- Other Teams
- Port Adelaide Magpies
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- #98
I owe you an explanation for that.
When I posted the OP I’d spent hours, days, no weeks, on what I wanted to write as a lead-in. Then I went and screwed it all up with a spur of the moment introduction which, after the reaction took root, I read again and thought OMG. So I asked the moderator to lock the thread so I could spend some time reflecting and reaffirming how serious I was about this story, about putting it out there as much as I was - and still am - convinced it has to be.
After a week I consulted with Ford Fairlane, took his advice on board and, as a result, reopened the thread and deleted the offending introduction, the creation of which I apologise for from the bottom of my Prison Bar heart.
I am really into this. So much so that I have managed myself into being the sole PAFC volunteer China Advisor to ever be sacked by the Club. I reckon it will never happen again.
Nevertheless, the full story is going to be posted, subject to injunctions, so that not only do you know what has been going on behind the scenes since 2014, but also how bloody hard the Club has been trying in China, whilst denying because of human imperfection its inherent shortcomings caused inevitably by its inexperience.
But sacking me was the stupidest act the CEO and the Chairman have ever perpetrated.
It proved they are more serious about flinching at slings and arrows than they are about capitalising on a once in a lifetime inside introduction to China at a time when it was most needed.
I am still here to serve.
But I know that, human nature being what it is, I will not be asked to recommit to the cause. No way. That would be too sensible, too logical, too much the right thing to do. Too big a thing to do.
So, KT and Koch, suck on it. Until you decide you have no alternative but to pick up the phone and call for the Ghostbusters. But that’s not going to happen, is it. You’ve never picked up the phone and made a call of your own volition. Ever. Chances are you won’t start now. So, you two temporary senior Club cobblers, keep looking over your shoulder until you wake up to the fact that you’re looking in the opposite direction to the direction you should be looking. Ahead. Forward.
Now, even I admit that’s blatantly egotistical.
But I’m in the Pro Drinkers Corner, loving a Dowie and Doole sauvignon blanc, listening to my personal playlist on the hifi system, and getting stuck into BigFooty.
Life is hell in the East. Like hell.
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Janus
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“Do you think I would even think of taking advantage of my valued position as a board member of PAFC?”
I don't know about you, but when someone's thoughts immediately turn toward the negative in a situation like this it generally tells me that they actually have been thinking about it and have been shamed that they've been caught out in doing so. Which is amusing since Krupp and his own Binstrobe Media have wasted no time in sinking their claws into business events centred around the game in Shanghai.
I reckon Robbins is right. You dodged a bullet.
I don't know about you, but when someone's thoughts immediately turn toward the negative in a situation like this it generally tells me that they actually have been thinking about it and have been shamed that they've been caught out in doing so. Which is amusing since Krupp and his own Binstrobe Media have wasted no time in sinking their claws into business events centred around the game in Shanghai.
I reckon Robbins is right. You dodged a bullet.
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