Seachange by Mike Dixon - HTML preview

Mike's Tales

I am now retired, in the sense that I no longer have to work for a living.  That gives me time for writing.  Three of my short stories are relevant to business.  The first is about competing with criminals (something most prospective business people overlook).  The second is about asset stripping in unexpected places.  The third is about making money in a war zone.  I end with a plug for my novel The Suitcase.

Sea Change

So you are fed up with your boring office job and want a change.  Wouldn't it be nice to live in one of those fabulous tourist destinations where it's summer all year round?  How about going into the diving industry?  You could buy a boat and take tourists to the Great Barrier Reef.  Or you could establish a yachting business in the Whitsunday Islands.  You might even set up a backpacker hostel.

Many of my friends in the tourist industry had professional qualifications.  Some had worked as accountants.  Others had escaped from government offices.  Some were failed academics.  Most were wandering souls.  Few of us realised we could be competing against hardened criminals when we left our cosy middle-class jobs for a more eventful lifestyle.

I'd heard of money laundering but had never given it much thought.  Put in simple terms.  Money laundering is what happens when dirty money from illegal operations (e.g. drugs) is processed to make it appear legitimate.

Just imagine that you set up a business and find yourself competing against people who don't care if they make a profit.  Their sole concern is to launder money.  They'll undercut you at every opportunity and intimidate your staff.

I got to know a couple who had escaped the stress and strain of the big city for the peace and tranquillity of North Queensland.  They'd earned enough as financial advisers to buy a backpacker hostel located in a veritable tourist paradise ... rainforest, tropical islands, scuba diving ...everything you could wish for.

It didn't take them long to realise that all was not well in paradise.  Like other hostels, they had a backpacker bus which called at the central bus station.  There was, of course, competition for customers.  They expected that but what they encountered came as a shock.  Hostels were competing to offer the lowest price.  One was a huge resort and it was prepared to put people up for free!

Nothing made sense.  The resort's previous owners had gone bust.  They'd spent a fortune and had failed because there weren't enough tourists to support their lavish project.  My friends started to make enquiries.  With their professional background, it wasn't difficult to discover what the new owners had paid and how they had raised the finance.  A considerable bank loan was involved.  There was no way they could service the debt from their takings.  The logical conclusion was that they'd soon be bankrupt like the previous owners but that didn't happen.  Even with a ridiculously low bed price they stayed afloat.

What about restaurant and bar taking ... could they be sufficient?

That seemed unlikely.  If you want to make money from booze and food it doesn't make sense to put up your customers at a give-away price.  My friends went round to have a look.  They discovered a lot of activity but not enough cash flow to satisfy the bank.  While sipping drinks beside the bar they were recognised by one of the owners and told, in no uncertain words, that they should stop snooping around and clear off.

Months went by and the situation got worse.  Fights were breaking out at the bus station and one driver was injured when he was hit by a backpacker bus.  The region's reputation as a tourist destination was under threat and the local authorities took steps to calm things down.  They called a meeting of the warring parties and picked a hotel as a suitable venue.

The day of the meeting duly arrived and the participants turned up at the appointed hour.  It wasn't difficult to tell them apart.  The shire council people wore suits and the hostel owners were dressed in the smart casual attire that was fashionable in the tourist industry at the time.  They contrasted with the partners in the big resort who wore silk shirts, gold medallions and expensive watches that dangled ostentatiously from their ample wrists.  The meeting got off to a bad start and ended abruptly when one of the hostel owners had a beer glass smashed in his face.

The attacker was a senior partner in the resort.  A charge of assault was brought against him and he was summoned to appear in court.  But, before that could happen, he fled the country to avoid arrest on drug-related charges.  Interpol entered the act and he was extradited back to Australia.

As far as I can make out, he and his partners were working a scam that went something like this.  The resort was purchased at a time of high inflation with money loaned from the bank.  Black money from the sale of drugs was passed off as hostel takings and used to service the debt.  Interest payments are tax deductible so nothing was lost to the tax office.  If everything had gone according to plan, the black money would have reappeared as legitimate capital gain when the property was sold.

Strangler Fig

When it comes to a fight, the leafy jungle is just as competitive as the concrete jungle.  No holds are barred in the race to the top.  In the concrete jungle the ultimate prize is money and power.

In the rainforest it is sunlight and power.  Plants need sunlight to prosper and some need a lot.  That poses problems if you start life on the forest floor.

As a lowly seed you won't make it to the top unless a gale blows down mummy and her friends (a bit like waiting for the boss to die).  This gloomy scenario applies to most rainforest trees ... but not the strangler fig.

In corporate terms, the fig's strategy is takeover followed by asset stripping.  It issues an attractive share offer (figs).  The birds (punters) act as intermediaries.  They take the figs, digest the bits they want and discharge the rest (otherwise known as toxic assets).

The toxic assets (seeds) are deposited in the upper branches of a potential victim (tree) and sprout.  The seedlings have a place in the sun and prosper at their host's expense.  They plant roots in their host's bark and sap its strength.

Their next trick is to send down aerial roots.  These reach the forest floor and dig themselves in.  The fig's life as a strangler has now begun.  Shoots spring up and envelop the host.  In time it dies and the triumphant fig takes its place.

If you take a walk in the rainforests of Queensland and northern New South Wales, you will see strangler figs and their hosts in various stages of takeover.

Patches of rainforest dot the eastern coast of Australia from northern New South Wales to the tip of Queensland.  Many are World Heritage areas.

Ladies of the Night

Every army has them and they are usually called camp followers.  The ladies of the night perform a vital function that is often overlooked in history books, which tells you a lot about the people who write the books because there's no shortage of information.  It's not hard to find, as I discovered when I agreed to help with an oral history project to mark the fiftieth anniversary of the Battle of the Coral Sea.

Oral history is what you learn by talking to old people about what they did when they were young.  It is important because it records things that don't get written down when they happen ... sometimes for good reasons.  The oral historians who recruited me to their team were professionals with academic reputations to defend.  I had nothing to defend and didn't share their inhibitions about delving in murky corners.

The Battle of the Coral Sea was fought in 1942 from bases in northern Australia.  Tens of thousands of virile, young American troops flooded into a region from which most women and children had been evacuated.  Not surprisingly, they found themselves desperately short of female company.

The academics lacked my sort of contacts.  While they were interviewing former mayors and church leaders, I got talking to the father of one of my diving mates.  He was a police officer in 1942, aged twenty-four and based in Townsville, which was the main garrison city at the time.

He told me about the Curtin Express.  I'd heard the name before and thought it was some sort of coffee shop.  The truth was far more interesting.  The name referred to a train authorised by Prime Minister John Curtin, in 1942, to solve the problem of loneliness amongst the troop.  The Mob (Aussie for organised crime) lent a hand and passed round the word that the train would leave Melbourne on a certain day and travel north to Townsville.  Any female person could travel free of charge.

The train became known as the Curtin Express and the ladies who travelled upon it were called Curtin girls.  I interviewed some and was told about others.  One was a formidable woman who used the proceeds of her wartime endeavours to found a business empire.

That was explosive stuff.  I'd unearthed information about the murky past of people who had carved out highly respected places for themselves in the post-war years.  The academics didn't want any part in it.

They weren't interested in the ladies but I couldn't stop thinking about them.  Their remarkable story had to be told in some way, even if that meant casting it as a work of fiction.  That's how my novel The Suitcase was born.  It is a mystery thriller set in the recent past.

If you like to relax with a book you could buy a copy of The Suitcase from Amazon.  But that would be contrary to the advice I have just given.  I told you never to spend money unnecessarily.

There is no need.  I’m giving copies of The Suitcase away FREE to my friends.  To receive a copy CLICK:  http://eepurl.com/bIEZdT