The Taming of Tame
20th October 2007
Act 1, Scene 1:
It is dawn in Tuhoe country. A pale sun filters through morning mist onto dense forest and rough farmland. A NZPost delivery car drives up a winding gravel road towards a battered weatherboard house.
Tame Iti, public nuisance and erstwhile terrorist, stands before the bathroom mirror shaving with a long-handled razor. He is dressed in dirty camouflage clothing and orange day-glo jandals.
Suddenly the bathroom door bursts open. Hone – large, bald and wearing a floral dressing gown – bursts in. The force of his entry causes Tame to cut himself badly with the razor.
“Oh, for f---‘s sake, Hone, this happens every morning. Can’t you enter a room without causing a riot?”
“Sorry, Tame. I just needed to pee.” He looks at the long curved line of blood on Tame’s cheek. “Geez, bro, look at your face. You must be the worst shaver in the world.”
A third large Maori man, Pete, appears at the bathroom door. “Hey, youse fellas, come and see what we got in the post.”
The three men shuffle into the lounge. It is filled with rifles and other small arms. Numerous cases of Tui beer are stacked against the walls. A cardboard box sits on the table.
Tame looks at the address on the box and beams. “Aw, choice! It’s the stuff I ordered from those anarchist mob down in Wellington.”
Pete grabs the box and shakes it. Tame thumps him. “Aue, man! Leave it alone or you’ll get us all blown into the next lifetime.”
“What do you mean?”
“It’s full of explosives, bro.”
Hone peers at the box. “The label says it’s full of avocadoes.”
Tame looks crafty. “Pete, get me that book off the shelf.”
“This book? The Weekend Terrorist?”
“Yep. In the back it’s got code names for all sorts of weapons. Check out ‘avocado’.”
“Avocado – grenades!”
“Yep, grenades. Brothers, the revolution is on its way!”
Hone and Pete launch into a stirring haka which shakes the room. They remember the contents of the box and stop. Tame slices the lid off the box with his razor and rummages among the packaging. His eyes light up as his hand closes on an object.
“This is it, fellas. Death to whitey!” He pulls his hand out with a flourish and waves it high.
Hone and Pete are stunned. “Shit, Tame. It’s an avocado.”
Tame is still caught up in the moment. “Avocado, boom!” Seeing their expressions he looks at his hand. He is holding an avocado. “Those dopey, bloody anarchists! Imagine if I’d thrown this at the cops!”
Pete remembers something. “Oh, speaking of cops. The postie said there’s heaps of them gathering at the bottom of the valley.”
Tame is not interested. “Prob’ly after some poor bugger’s dope patch. Hone, see if there’s anything else in that box.”
Hone rummages. “There’s a bag of carrots.”
Tame checks his book. “That’d be the rocket launchers. Any salad dressing?”
Hone pulls out a bottle. “Yep, ‘Country Lite’. What kind of weapon is that?”
“None, we were just out of salad dressing.”
The three men sit dejectedly on the sofa. We hear the sounds of police sirens faintly in the distant but Tame, Hone and Pete don’t notice.
Tame looks around the room. “We can’t be real terrorists if we haven’t got some bombs.”
“We’ve got all these guns, Tame.”
“Yeah, and about 50 rounds of ammo. That’s a piss poor revolution. Nuh, we need some boom.”
Hone grabs a case of Tui’s. “Don’t forget the Molotov cocktails I’ve been making.”
Pete cracks up. “Tui’s Molotov cocktails. Yeah, right!”
“You reckon? Well, watch this.” Hone pulls out a bottle. A piece of paper is twisted into the neck. He lights it and throws the bottle into bathroom. It lands in the shower, smashing. Orange liquid pours out.
Tame dabs his finger in the liquid and tastes it. “What are you on, Hone? This is pineapple juice.”
“Yeah, well they didn’t have any of that Molotov in the bottle store so I thought I’d do pineapple cocktails instead. Not bad, eh? Only, I’m not sure why we’re supposed to light it.”
Tame sighs. Armed police pour over the back fence.
Pete comes to the rescue. “Never mind, bro. I’ve got a secret weapon.” He reaches behind the couch and pulls out a battered guitar. “I found a few sticks of geli up at the works camp and I’ve wired them into my guitar. You name the target, Tame, and I’ll go up there. Third verse of Loyal I hit D minor and the whole place goes sky high.”
“And so will you, bro.”
“Yeah, but I reckon that’s okay. It’s like that guy Al.”
“Al?”
“Yeah, Al Qaeda. That Arab bloke who blew up New York.”
Tame interrupts. “Nuh. No way. No suicide bombing.”
“Why not? I’m happy to die for Tuhoe.”
“Yeah, you martyr yourself for Tuhoe and then what happens? Me and Hone have to take tangi leave and the whole movement grinds to a halt for three months.”
Hone remembers something. “Actually, Tame, I’ll be gone for a few days anyway. I promised my cuz in Petone I’d help him drop a new diff into the Fairlane.”
A tear gas canister sails through the window.
To be continued…
