A fond farewell to Australia.

The sun is shining on the brooding black Cathedral when I open my curtains on our last day in Australia. The black stone gives a sinister tone to the familiar classic arched and buttressed Gothic shape, with its spires and gargoyles. It evinces fear and threat rather than hope and enlightenment. Yesterday, though, the choir resplendent in red and white marched round the ground parading a rather modernistic Palm with red and white streamers. Ah Palm Sunday of course.

Last night I told the final Melbourne audience that as Tania and I came back from dinner on St. Patrick’s Day a whole convocation of very piddled prelates, priests and Catholic churchmen poured out of our hotel, seizing our taxi. And boy they were lit. Oddly I noticed that in the lobby of the same hotel there was a convention for the Boy Scouts. “Perhaps they are party favours” I said to Tania.

I’m not much of a Church man you can tell. In our Q and A we often get asked about our views on the Church and I try and be as gentle as I can. I say I prefer Science as it can be verified, and not only that but I think that the discovery of the many hundreds of Gods there have been on the planet was the Ape evolving and growing a moral dimension and an understanding of our place in the Universe and where we came from, and where it came from. In other words intelligence and morality and Science, and it is vital that Science is tested and not subject to clerical restraints. This discrete and reasonably modest opinion always results in a round of applause.

Of course I understand the need for people to believe in something, but I find my own sense of awe and wonder in our amazing and extraordinary Universe of which we have learned so much in the last half century, and which we continue to learn more about daily, and which is far more odd than God, and which makes a deity seem not only tiny but petty. We do go on existing after death, but only our atoms and our carbon atoms in particular which have already been through ancient star systems where they were created. We are quite literally star dust. More learning and less superstition please.

It shocks me just how backward America is in religion and their In God We Trust form of Exceptionalism. No love, God did not choose America to be better than anyone else and as to Happiness well you seem to have replaced that with the Pursuit of Fame and Fortune. Both worthless substitutes. Australians are far happier. They have a wonderful country and they take weekends off and decent holidays and travel and exercise and don’t feel the need to be armed to the gills. However, no society is perfect and sadly at the moment they are trying to repeal laws against bullying because they fear it is encouraging homosexuality….

When will the Right get over their homophobia? As The Reverend Whoopsie says in What About Dick, “Our Lord himself had twelve little male friends, all sailors, and nobody said a word…”

Anyway enough preaching. I’m sad to be leaving Australia which I have enjoyed tremendously. Even the fact that we just finished six shows in seven days has left us fairly buoyant. Melbourne spoiled us yesterday with an invitation to lunch for John, me and Tania on the 89th Floor of the Eureka Tower which not only offered us extraordinary views of the whole area but a nice view of the Formula One Grand Prix due to start later.

We were entertained by the close formation flying of six red and white jets spinning and swooping low over the race track and then a single solo grey jet spun and twisted and rolled and climbed and fell backwards in a flying ballet of great daring and beauty. I only just realised it was in fact a Flying Circus! We were also well above the many helicopters that flew into and around the Race circuit of Albert Park.

I hadn’t realised that lunch was to be a full seven course Degustation Tasting Menu with matching wines, and I was able to refrain from drinking for about two thirds of the meal, but in the third hour alas my restraint gave way to discreetly moderate imbibing. In the end we couldn’t stay for dessert as we had another sell out show to perform but it was a fabulous place to have Sunday lunch and it’s open at night for dinner and I can honestly say the food was exquisite. So thank you Christina Rich and if you want to see what the world looks like 90 floors up while wining and dining superbly then eureka89.com.au is the place to start.

I watched the Grand Prix on TV while emailing my pal Martin, who was
desperately trying to stay awake at five in the morning in France. John suggested not entirely seriously that all time zones should be done away with and some people just have to get used to living at night…. 

He is off today to introduce his Fawlty Cast to the Press, while I have to say farewell to the wife for a few days as she goes North to visit my son on the Sunshine Coast where it is apparently pouring.

So on to New Zealand, where I have only ever performed once in Not The Messiah with the Auckland Symphony Orchestra and Choir in 2007 and where I am optimistic that if I can insult the right people someone will name a sewage plant after me…..(because he is full of shit.) John so offended the good people of Palmerston North by suggesting it was the suicide capital of the world that they named their rubbish dump after him. I believe it is called Mount Cleese. I desperately wish to join this movement to rename rubbish dumps and trash heaps after Pythons. What greater honour could there be for comics? We have asteroids named after us, but a rubbish tip! That’s better than an airport. Those in authority please take note and let me know in whose general direction I should fart…

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