It was 1995 and we finally went overseas to Yugoslavia to visit our relatives I have never seen before. Most of the famiky we had in Sydney were cousins that were not so close, so this was going to be a treat for us, having direct close cousins and people that we looked like around us.

So my uncle aged in his 50s, my father’s oldest brother, was really fit and ruggedly handsome for his age. Apparently he was famous for being “Mr Antisocial”, a very tough macho hard headed man, stubborn as a stump. I would describe him as a stoic cowboy tradesman. He had big hairy arms, strong fingers, a stubbled face, and a voice that meant bizness. You didnt mess with him, but somehow we got along like magnets.

I was a nice but wierd teenager at 19, with long blond wavey heavy metal hair, and a beard. Each day he would ride me on his tractor down the mainstreet to our farms, with my hair blowing in the wind like a shampoo add. Localers must have thought he was having an affair with some blond chick by the looks of their faces at us.

When we came back halfway through the day for a delicious village lunch, we would lean on eachother as a joke for support as we lay back stuffed on the couch. We ended up falling asleep in eachothers arms almost everyday. Every lunch we’d sit down together and eat, but I’d always put some music on, that after a few days he got used to my company and would remind me to put the music on.

The same routine happened after dinner too. We sat next to eachother like ‘compadres’, I’d ask him questions, and he be telling me storys.

But I ended up falling asleep every time, because I’ve never in my life been so comfortable and happy and contented like this. Even as a 19 yr old kid, in our culture I was seen as a juvenile kid.

So we fell asleep in eachothers arms every single night that I stayed there. But listen to this - he didnt mind me being huggy with him, and I’d be curious about his work there, and comment on his strong arms, and feel them up a bit, and his shoulders, and his belly, and compliment him. This guy never once flinched or moved away from me, he was comfortable.