Years ago I had the idea that I wanted to go to tattoo shows and write stories about the people who go to these shows. I even fantasised that I would write a book about contemporary tattoo culture. I was gunna be the next Hunter S. Thompson, but without the drugs and without the booze and without the ever present fag hanging out of the corner of my mouth. I had it all planned, I even bought a big fancy camera for it and then the government said NO! I kind of stopped paying attention because the whole thing pissed me off so much, so I directed my attention elsewhere, you know, to stuff that didn’t make me so cranky, like shredding it on my mountain bike. Because of this I might have missed the re-emergence of tattoo shows in the meantime. The Hervey Bay Tattoo show this year is the first one I’ve seen advertised in ages and it was ‘cos of the mountain bike that I found out about the show; I saw it advertised in a weird location when I was out riding last weekend: on the Toogoom boatramp.

I wasn’t sure what to expect at the show because I’d never been to one before. Overall, it was OK, but not super exciting as a spectator. I guess I might have tried harder to like it if I was getting paid to write about the event, or if my tattoos were in the show, or if I was paid to spit raps like one of the dudes running the event. In the end I had to leave before the judging because I’d run out of tolerance for sitting around waiting for something to happen. I asked one of the event people when judging would be. He looked at me like I really should have known better than to ask such an obviously ridiculous question, and said, “Could be ten minutes, could be an hour.” He kept glaring at me, so I called it and left.

I got to talk to some interesting people about their tattoos. I lobbed straight up to a table of bikies, simply because they looked the scariest. They all took a bit to get going, but they warmed up in the end. I asked Zipper why he got his tattoos. He and Andy both gave similar reasons: as a form of therapy. Zipper said it was better to get a tattoo than cut himself or hurt another person. He said he used to be very angry (he still kind of seemed that way if I’m really honest) and it was a way for him to manage his anger. I wanted to get a photo of them all, but given that Zipper had his sunglasses on inside, I didn’t think asking that would be very smart. This is Mad Dog, one of their crew:

I talked to Cassy about her tattoos. She had some amazing realist artwork on her legs in WWII theme. She told me about her son and his traumatic brain injury from a quad bike accident. I got distracted by her telling me the details of the tattooist who did her artwork, so I didn’t write down any info about why she got these tattoos. Durr. Just as well I’m not getting paid! Oh well. I really love the female aviator on her lower leg.

Laura had Fuck Yeah on her toes, which was meant to be a matching tattoo shared with her sister-in-law, but apparently the SIL is chckenshit and will never get anything tattooed. Laura and her husband had a matching ink thing going on. I didn’t talk to everyone at the show, but out of the people I did meet, they were the only ones with matching ink. I didn’t catch Laura’s husband’s name, but he was a biker too.

I didn’t talk to these following people, but I liked their ink, especially the war-themed back tat.

If I ever do this again I’ll have to reacquaint myself with my camera and lenses instead of shuffling everything around every five seconds. I’ll also have to register as a journalist because then I won’t seem like some random weirdo just barrelling up to people and taking notes about them. Most people were pretty good about talking to me, but there was one person in particular, who after telling me how great they were, started acting all suspicious about what I was doing. They had a stalker and didn’t want the stalker to find them, which I found kind of strange given that they had just entered their semi-naked body in a tattoo show where photography was permitted without restriction. I just said OK and walked off. They aren’t included in this post.

I’m so grateful that I’ve put the effort into developing my interpersonal skills to the point of being able to interact with all kinds of people in all kinds of situations. I once would have been too scared to do this kind of thing, especially talking to scary-looking and potentially unfriendly people like the bikies. I’ve done this by exposing myself repeatedly to uncomfortable situations, which has taken the form of public speaking at large community events, speaking up about important stuff at work even though I was certain the consequences would be negative, approaching strangers on the street to tell them I liked their style, talking to homeless people about their situation and also by being a good listener. Kindness helps; kindness to self and kindness to others.