Read Online Filling in the Gaps by Peter Keogh - Free Book Online

touches me today.
    Mind you, I was not all that kind to some people - unintentionally, I hasten to add. One of our regular patrons when I was box office manager at His Majesty’s Theatre was severely disabled in a wheelchair. Very severely disabled! However, I was unaware that he had been a professor and lecturer at the University of Western Australia before he became so ill. His mind was still perfect but his body was just a shell. I would hear a loud banging as he manoeuvred his electronic wheelchair through the box office doors but he very much resented any assistance. Once he was inside I would ask him to try to point to the poster of the show he wanted to attend but his frustration only grew. No matter what I tried we could not connect and understand each other. Finally, he pointed to a sort of Monopoly board that was in a pouch behind his wheelchair. With great difficulty he managed to spell out the words ‘I AM NOT AN IDIOT!’ I was mortified and very upset. Soon after a new staff member arrived who was very willing and able to communicate with him. To my great shame, after that incident whenever I heard the wheelchair banging and crashing its way into the box office I would hide under the counter and send my staff member out to assist him. I believe he is still around today and I hope that he is dealing with people who are kinder to him than I was.
    Another interesting and sad patron during my term as box office manager at His Majesty’s Theatre was a gentleman I only knew as Reg. He was quite elderly and never seemed to be very well. He bought just one ticket to every show and always asked to sit at the back of the theatre and on the aisle because he said he had an odour emanating from his body that was offensive to a lot of people. He had often been abused and asked to leave public transport because of this odour. I always felt very much for this man and became involved in several lengthy conversations with him. He occasionally abused me for some minor thing, which he would explain later was caused by his ‘illness’, so it was easy to make allowances.
    I eventually asked him if he would mind explaining to me what had happened to him to cause the awful odour, not to mention a large number of open and weeping sores on his body. I could only see the sores on his arms and neck but apparently they were all over his body. He explained that in 1956 the British and Australian governments tested nuclear devices on the Maralinga Range in South Australia called ‘Operation Buffalo’. Prior to selection, the Maralinga site was inhabited by the Pitjantjatjara and Yankunytjatjara Aboriginal people, for whom it had a great spiritual significance. Many of them were relocated to a new settlement at Yulata, and attempts were made to curtail access to the Maralinga site. Sadly, these were often unsuccessful. Reg was one of the servicemen who was used as a sort of guinea pig on these sites. The authorities never acknowledged this until they were forced to because so many servicemen were either dying or becoming very ill from all kinds of sickness. In 2001, Dr Sue Rabbit Roff, a researcher from the University of Dundee, uncovered documentary evidence that troops had been ordered to run, walk and crawl across areas contaminated by the Buffalo tests in the days immediately following the detonations. One of these troops was Reg, as the British government later admitted. Dr Roff stated that “it puts the lie to the British government’s claim that they never used humans for guinea pig-type experiments in nuclear weapons trials in Australia.” Reg finally received a small pension but nothing could ever compensate for what he had been through.
    I am very glad that Reg came into my life; he taught me a lot of things. However, my staff, including Sach, could not serve him because the odour would make them retch. I often used to walk Reg into the back of the theatre without paying for a ticket if a