Heaven On Bourke - The Fact Behind The Filth

You probably already know from reading my blog that I don’t live in a new home, in fact I refer to it on many accounts as a “dilapidated mansion”. This house is so old that it is heritage listed and very slowly it is falling to the ground. I’m not allowed to walk on the far right side of my balcony because the timber has rotted away to the point where you can see down onto the street below. I can’t wear stilettos in my room without the heels piercing through the floorboards and every switch and fixture is outdated to the point where it is almost impossible to fix anything. The icing on the cake occurred merely hours ago when myself and two other housemates were sitting in the living room and Queen K was taking a shower upstairs. After a few moments of Queen K turning the shower on water slowly started seeping from the walls downstairs and before we even had the chance to react the pressure on the old pipes had caused water to burst through the roof.

Frustrated that I couldn’t get ahold of our landlord and tired that things like this kept happening I rang one of the few people with the ability to talk some sense into me, my ex. I haven’t been with my ex boyfriend for a long time yet every now and again i’ll call him up, because for some reason I still value his no bullshit opinion.

He said to me: Paige, I don’t know how you live in that shit hole, since the day you moved in its been falling apart. For the amount of money you pay you could get a new, nicely furnished place a little out from the city where shit like this wouldn’t continue to happen. You’re only still living there because you have always had some weird little obsession with that street. You said you’d one day live on Bourke Street and you did it, so now you can get over it and find a good place that doesn’t look like its going to fall to the ground at any moment. What about Randwick you could get a nice place there.

Ouch.

In my defense, he lives in Randwick, in a new, sterile fully furnished apartment with a sign above his front door that says, “lacking any slither of imagination”.  The idea of living there makes me think I might as well move back home. But I admit it the guy has a point. I do in fact start to lose my shit a little bit when it comes to this street. Since the first time I visited Sydney and walked through Bourke Street with its Edwardian style terrace houses, quaint cafes and the abundance of trees which cascade over the street I’ve waned to live here. Bourke Street was what inspired me to finish high school in Queensland and move to Brisbane to get a degree. When my dad finally gave me permission to move interstate I searched high and low to find a place to live on Bourke. One day I got a call saying that my application for residency had been accepted and that for a price I could rent a room in a very old house that was not necessarily located on the nicest end but nonetheless was technically on Bourke Street. That was the day I finally scored my little piece of Heaven.

Since then the original three people moved out and were replaced by three magnificent Queens. For us girls all in our early 20s this dilapidated mansion has become our unbreakable fort and a refuge in the middle of a rough and highly unpredictable city.

But just because I've now lived here for over a year doesn’t mean I can just pack up and leave, in fact that is hardly the point. My goal has always been to slowly move my way up the street until one day I was financially blessed enough to buy a renovated home adjacent to the little Bourke Street Bakery. Why would I leave now especially since this street has inspired so many stories already?

The purpose of this blog is to hopefully inspire you too, as well as to entertain you and give you a little idea of why I love this little piece of the world so much. I don’t know how much longer the Dirthouse will continue to stand up right but I do know that my burning desire to own a property on this street will not deteriorate until I’m sitting on my full functioning balcony writing about love and drinking tea.