tram.

I stopped outside the door and checked my mobile phone. Three missed calls - two from Katie and one from Clark. I was already late.


I felt as if the dust were to settle from my previous bout of embarrassment, I may never take the tram again. Besides, after a day like today in which I received a sufficient amount of shame to make sleep very troublesome tonight I was due some good luck. It was only a few stops.


I kept trying to rationalise my decision to myself as I set a brisk pace to the nearest stop. A tram was pulling up as I arrived and I did my best to blend in with the crowd shuffling on to the PTV can.


I feebly waved my Myki near the reader to give the impression that I’d touched on, hoping nobody would notice. It was noisy, it’d be fine. I spotted a seat and made a beeline for it.


“Mate, it didn’t beep”.

“Excuse me?”

“You weren’t close enough, you have to do it again”.


I thought back to the poster of the man in the hammock - he’d never have to deal with this crap.


“Oh, no, it turned green. Don’t worry”.


He cocked an eyebrow at me and gave a wry little smile.


“Whatever you say mate”.


This guy was my age and wearing a suit on a weekday. I'm not sure we'd ever be mates. I broke eye contact as quickly as I could and sat down, resting my legs awkwardly on my bag. Tinkly muzak began to emenate from my phone within, no doubt Katie trying to reach me again. It was feasible I was stuck in class. Or it would be if they’d known me for less than ten minutes.


My hands rummaged around until I found the phone and I swiped across.


“Hey Katie”.

“It’s Clark”.

“Oh right, hey mate”.

“Where are you? You know the lunch specials end soon and there’s no way I’m paying for bloody rice”.

“I won’t be long”.

“Coming from you, that could mean anything”.

“Ten minutes tops”.

“Rightio. They’re out of dosas”.

“See you in a tick”.


It was probably about time I changed my ringtone, but there was nothing wrong with it, really. It was mine, it worked, it was effective. But it was probably also reflective of laziness. I felt like I should care more about it. I felt like I should care more about a lot of things.


One thing I did care about was the odd incident with the professor in class. I spent most of the time in there thinking of a way I could ask “how did you know my name?” without coming off as someone in desperate need of psychiatric help. Of course I didn’t think of anything appropriate and a multitude of possibilities ran through my head.


Did he notice me slacking off? Probably, but there’s 50 other people who are as bad or worse in the same group. I briefly considered that we might have a Good Will Hunting moment, that I was some kind of untapped genius. I liked that idea. It was also the furthest thing from the truth.


“It’s the best time of the year in this city”.


I didn’t look particularly distinctive. I often thought that my hobbies made me distinctive, but they were merely possible means to more hammocky ends. Find me a university student who doesn’t have a keyboard he plays in a band that hasn’t released any music. Or who has dreams of writing that one brilliant play, or novel, or whatever. Or who wants to make the next ‘big thing’ app.


“You only have a short time to enjoy it. It’s always too cold or hot. Candela or freezer. But right now it’s perfect”.


What about an app that helps you make apps? An app to organise your tech startup? I mean, it wasn’t brilliant, but I could be a facilitator. Helping others make the big app could help me make my idyllic island paradise a reality.


“Bon salud”.


I didn’t even notice the man had sat down next to me. He took a long draw from a can of coke and exhaled with great satisfaction. He had dark, leathery skin and a salt and pepper beard.


“Excuse me?”.

“When the weather was like this in older generations, it was the perfect time to harvest the bamboo. Or at least that’s how the story goes”.


The day had already been too long to have to politely smile at the ramblings of a crazy person. I’m all for being friendly but I really just wanted time to think.


“The bamboo was sent to America. They had a game called Waltes that they used the bamboo for, they learned it from the natives. You had one old man, three old women and 51 pieces of wood to play with. And un tiki burl. A little one. For the board”.


I had to admit that this was one of the more odd ramblings I’d heard from the type of person who speaks to complete strangers on the tram.


“There was a hole in the burl so the dice could jump. There were six dice. Two people sat opposite each other and the dice sat inside. They picked up the bowl and bang, slammed it down so the dice jumped”.


He punched his fists together as he said this.


“These dice only had two sides. You would try to get the dice to all, disculpami, all but one to jump on the same side and you would take sticks depending on the side that came up. When you had a bundle of seventeen, you took one out and made a point. Five points wins the game”.

My stop was coming up. I smiled at the man and grabbed my bag.


“That sounds like a really, really great game. I’ve never heard of it. This is my stop coming up”.


I stood up.


“Tickets please”.


My heart skipped a beat. My phone didn’t as it jingled away in my bag again. More large men in grey surrounded by similar looking rent-a-thugs. They were coming my way. The older man smiled at me.


“The problem with the game is that if someone is losing, they can keep adding sticks and changing the count. It was...bad sportsmanship, but they did it. You can play forever”.


I looked at him with panic in my eyes. I wished he would shut up.


“That’s all well and good, but I could do with some bad sportsmanship right now. You’re talking about a game of chance which is something I understand all too well. As you can probably tell, luck isn’t on my side today”.


He smiled and drank from his can of coke again.


“Depending on who you ask it could be a game of choice. The best way is to choose not to play. Unless you have trust”.


The inspector stepped up to me.


“MyKi please”.


I looked around desperately. The man smiled again.


“I, uh, here, I’m not sure if the machine was worki -”

“It was working. MyKi please”.


$219 bloody dollars because Clark didn’t want to pay for rice. I could have bought a lot of rice for that. I don’t even like rice. I handed the card over.


“Thank you. Have a good day”.


He walked back to the other end of the tram, chuckling as he told the other inspectors about my nerves.


The man smiled again. I turned my MyKi over in confusion as he drained the remainder of his coke.


“Maybe it is a game of chance”.


The sun bathed the tram in odd, fractured light as it pulled up to the stop outside Gujarati. I saw Katie and Clark laughing with their phones on the table.


As I went to get off, everything felt a bit surreal. The MyKi was surely a system failure - god knows they have enough of them. But I was torn. As crazy as it was, I felt like I had to ask the old man a few questions. They were out of dosas anyways.


But I also didn’t want to deal with that uniquely shameful guilt from flaking on your friends. I didn’t think “I wanted to talk to this old dude on the tram about his bamboo dice game” would cut it.


Do I stay on the tram or go and have lunch?