First published in The Big Issue

Sometimes city people must leave town to turn their fortunes around, especially as the economy sags. But in Roxby Downs in remote South Australia, Michael Green discovers that mining isn’t the answer for everyone.

As the sun rises on yet another flawless blue sky, Nick Sageman prepares for work. He swings into his 4WD for the 10-minute drive, at 110 kilometres an hour, through the desert to Olympic Dam, BHP Billiton’s massive copper, uranium, gold and silver mine south of Lake Eyre.

A little more than a year ago, the sandy-haired 32-year-old and his partner lived in inner-city Melbourne; now they live in remote northern South Australia, in Roxby Downs. “We couldn’t see any way of being able to build anything unless we could earn heaps more money – which sounds really selfish and it’s not just about money – but for us, we just got tired of living like uni students,” he says. “We’d done it for too long.”

They joined a modern-day gold rush. These days it isn’t about striking it lucky on your own, but rather, about banking a high salary from a minerals corporation. Australians, renowned for living in the east and facing the sea, have begun to turn inwards to get ahead.

In May, the peak mining body, the Minerals Council of Australia, released research predicting a 90,000-strong increase in employment in the industry by 2020. Two months earlier, the Minister for Defence, Joel Fitzgibbon claimed mining companies were stealing the nation’s submariners, following a newspaper report that the navy could only properly crew three of its six Collins-class subs. Since then, however, the global financial crisis has changed many things – not least attitudes to work. It has been suggested that careers in the defence forces now have more appeal to many people. And even if we are recession-bound, a mining job remains a lavish prospect for a worker.

Besides, the canaries are still singing. “There’s good money and plenty of work around so no one thinks much about it,” says Tom Beever, the local Family and Youth Officer in Roxby Downs. “People would know about [the financial crisis] from what they read but there’s no real concern.”

Amid sand dunes five barren hours north of Adelaide, Roxby Downs is full of people from somewhere else. The town recently celebrated its 20th birthday. It was officially opened on 5 November 1988, created by Western Mining Corporation to service the then-new Olympic Dam mine.

Despite its arid setting, Roxby is the land of plenty. With neat streets, perma-blue skies and one boss for all, the town feels like a desert echo of the 1998 Jim Carrey movie The Truman Show. According to the local council, its winding suburban streets and modest weatherboard homes shape the most affluent postcode in the state. In 2006, the median individual weekly income was $1103, more than double the national average.

During the day, the small shopping strip fills with young women pushing their prams. The town boasts a young population and one of the highest birth rates in the nation. Of the 4500 residents, only 150 are aged over 55. Yet, the strangest fact of all is that Roxby is the only town in South Australia without water restrictions. Its sports fields grow lush and green courtesy of the free-flow pumped from the Great Artesian Basin, via a desalination plant at the mine.

For Scott Sauerwald, the desert has been a rich pasture, despite the initial shock. The 42-year-old arrived in town from Adelaide in 1999. “I’d been [working] in an office, in collar and tie, and went to working in a smelter,” he says. “It was a molten metal environment, hot work. After a week I thought, ‘Oh my god what have I done. I wonder if my boss will take me back?’”

Gradually, however, he became accustomed to the physical exertion. Within two months, his wife, Lisa, and two primary school-age children joined him. Part of the attraction was a quieter, safer lifestyle for his kids. “That,” he says, “and chasing money. The wages were definitely better here.” His income leapt overnight by $17 000. Now, adults working full time in the mining industry earn over $100 000, on average.

These days, Sauerwald works in occupational health and safety at the site. Lisa has worked on and off at the mine too. He says couples can “make mini-fortunes” and become financially secure 10 years earlier than they would in the city. He’s seen the benefits on his own bank balance. “If we’d stayed in Adelaide it would have been a grind, a week-to-week existence, whereas here, you don’t worry about the bills that are coming in. Every few years, people can upgrade cars and that material side of things. There’s always that buffer.”

But Sauerwald acknowledges that not everything is perfect. “The big issue here is accommodation.” With high wages, few houses and new fortune seekers arriving everyday, real estate and rental prices are spiralling. BHP Billiton, the mine’s owner since 2005, is planning a huge expansion of operations and a more than doubling of the operational workforce to over 8000. While it’s good news for job seekers, the development will strain local housing and services. “If you can get accommodation here you are laughing, if you can’t, it’s that extra struggle,” Sauerwald says.

Accommodation is not the only problem. The transient nature of the population has some unusual consequences. Although the town has a cemetery, nobody is buried there. “That talks about Roxby, you know,” says Beever. “Not only does no one come from Roxby, but no one identifies themselves with Roxby. They come to chase the big dream of working outback making big money, but there’s been a lot of people leave here shattered because it just didn’t work out.”

As the community counsellor, Beever is exposed to the sadder side of residents’ dreams. “It’s not an easy place to work. Sure, people make a lot of money here, but I don’t know anyone who doesn’t earn what they get. They are a long way from where they come from,” he says.

For many people, a bigger wage just means more spending money, not more savings. Muscle cars and expensive 4WDs cruise the quiet streets at 50 kilometres an hour. One former resident comments on Roxby’s high level of drinking and gambling. Beever agrees: “Even though we’re the highest income in the state, we’ve got one of the highest [rates of] credit card abuse in the state as well. Some people are here because they have to be, because they’re up to the neck in debt.”

For Sageman and his partner, so far, the move is paying off. His wage has surpassed their expectations. “I was looking in the Australian the other day and there were jobs going as a lecturer or a zoologist with postgraduate qualifications. I’m a storeman out there and I’m on about 90 grand. It’s just insane, and that’s totally unqualified.”

The couple are determined not to fall into the spending trap. “I’ve made all those mistakes before,” Sageman says. They plan to return to the city in a few years. “We won’t leave here without some form of security, whether that’s a house, or a block of land,” he says. “We know it won’t always be like this. When we do go back to the city, I’m not going to be able to earn anywhere near as much money. But at least we’ll be able to buy into the market.”

Sometimes, they miss the city life. “Our interests aren’t really the interests of your average person here, I guess, in that we’re not into cars and motorbikes and shooting and things like that,” Sageman says. “We still feel a bit of an odd couple out but there’s more people like us moving up here everyday.”

When they get the chance, they drive out beyond the mine, along the dirt road that leads to the famous Oodnadatta track where the old Ghan railway follows one side and Lake Eyre, the other. Coming over a low rise, the land opens up wide, flat and red to the horizon. It’s the sort of landscape where you can see what’s coming at you, and make plans for the future. From here, it’s Wall Street that seems remote.

The job seeker

Andrea Morris lost her job in Adelaide real estate, and six days later, arrived in Roxby Downs looking for work in the mine. “I just decided, ‘Right if I’m going to do it, lets do it.’” The 50-year-old has just moved in with her daughter and her daughter’s partner, who were already living in the local caravan park. “I could be doing cleaning or something for six months before I get a job at the mines. You just take your chances.”

The ex-mine worker

Engineer Rachael Wauchope left Brisbane for Roxby Downs, and stayed five years. Her career bloomed. She liked living in a close-knit community and being surrounded by the beauty of the desert. “Emus walked through town. One even stuck its head through our front door and had a look around our lounge room,” she says. “I loved my job and had some good friends there. The money was great… but eventually the isolation and the lack of cultural activities got to me.”

The leaver

“My sister was up here and she said it was a good place to make money,” says Brian McKay, a landscape gardener in his early twenties. But things didn’t work out as expected for the Melbourne man; the dollars have come and gone. “I was bored out of my brain so I went out and bought a motorbike. Alcohol also drains his budget. Time to move on again.

In the boozy heart of Aussie pub culture, Michael Green finds a sober, tactical sport and community of rising pool stars.

Saturday

The game begins with an ear-splitting ca-raack. Players burst through the shot like policemen shouldering a door. The balls scatter. Twenty-two pool tables are aligned in a hall in suburban south-east Melbourne and at 10:30am, the frames begin. Competitors bend over their shots. Chins on cues, eyes hooded in shadow. We’ve entered the Whitehorse Club open singles eight ball championships. There’s $10,000 at stake.

Alec ‘Ace’ Evreniadis is here to win. The captain of the Australian pool team hasn’t flown from Adelaide just to make up the numbers. Steve Tran hopes to win too, but he’s not so bold as to say it out loud. Last weekend, Steve won the Melbourne Metropolitan Pool League ‘champion of champions’ trophy. Kolbe Poole, the aptly named three-time Victorian female champion, is here from Ballarat and aiming for the top 16.

Pool, or eight ball, is Australia’s pub game. Snooker and billiards are too complex. We choose reds or yellows, bigs or littles, stripes or solids. You know it: the beer-stained distraction in your local bar, where the balls drift sideways, the cues curve like bananas and nobody agrees on one shot or two.

Today, sure, they’re playing pool, but not like we do. Here, the best manoeuvre the balls with surgical precision. Every week, more 10,000 Australians play competitive eight ball. Each state and territory has teams, clubs, divisions, leagues and associations that make up a peak body. The Australian Eight Ball Federation runs annual national titles. This year they’ll be held in Launceston at the end of October. It’s a global game too. Our national over-50s team recently won the world crown.

The Whitehorse is an Italian social club set back from a six-lane suburban artery. Inside, behind pink curtains, players deliberate among the rows of green felt and low yellow lights. The playing floor is stocked with both wooden and denim-clad legs. It’s early but the bar and the greasy bain-marie are already running hot.

Today, 180 entrants – from teenage to old age – will play all day in a round robin on their allocated table. They’ll be cut to 128 for tomorrow’s knockout for the cash. Steve and Kolbe drew the same group, on table eight. Ace is around the corner on table one, the big game table, set apart from the rest. The crew from Pool TV, a Friday night prime-time show on Melbourne’s community Channel 31, has set up their gear and bright lights.

Kolbe is pool by name and by passion. Her partner, Jamie Stevens, is also a state player. She’s five-and-a-half months pregnant and bustles around the table without discomfort. The 29-year-old wears big hoop earrings and does her hair in a high, sporty ponytail. “I’m extremely competitive,” she says. “I hate to lose.”

Her first two frames go poorly, but she’s optimistic. “Hopefully those are my losses and that will be it.” She sips a can of cola through a straw and says her opponents so far, one of them Steve, are the best in the group.

Entrants and hangers-on cuss and banter while they watch. Clanking stubbies and clicking balls add to the din. The organisers call instructions from their desk: “Greg Daffy, table three. The Daff, to table three.” Bottles pile up on benches.

It’s a man’s game. One player tells me that although all types play, “you don’t really get a full cultural mix”. The stereotypical player is “a white, suburban male who’s into having a good car and a job. A conventional, wholesome, white dude.” And with that, comes booze. It’s an occupational hazard for a game held only in licensed venues. Mid-afternoon, a red-eyed man kicks over three chairs after a loss.

For Kolbe, breaking the mould is a blessing and a curse. “A lot of guys don’t rate women in pool,” she says. They get careless, and that helps her pick up a few frames she might otherwise lose. “But then, I don’t do as much practice as I should do. You get to a certain level and you don’t need to put in as much work. Whereas, with the guys, if they drop off for half a second then they’re not going to be making their state side anymore.”

Fresh from a comfortable win, she is playing a young man from Albury with glam-rock hair and tattoos up his arms. Six balls down, she methodically pots them all. To win, she has an easy black over the corner pocket. And misses. Ashen-faced, she concedes, shakes hands and paces away from the table.

Meanwhile, Ace and Steve calmly dispatch their opponents. Frames roll rhythmically on: the click of the cue on the ball; the clack of ball on ball; and the thud of the ball in the pocket.

The best players barely miss. Like chess, they plan tactics well in advance and lay traps for adversaries. They strike the ball crisply and it courses straight and true. Between each shot they chalk their cues meditatively, without paying attention to their hands.

Eight ball, despite the booze, is a logical and rational domain. With a measure of skill, strategy and application, problems can be solved. Each player, while they take their shot, controls their own destiny. In the end, it’s all about black and white.

But today is not Kolbe’s day. She wins her final frame, but after two more losses, it’s not enough to qualify. “I got myself intimidated after I missed the black over the pocket. It hasn’t been the same since.”

Sunday

Competitors carry their cues in long, thin cases. Ace, wearing black dress pants and polished black shoes, is the slickest in the room. “I’m feeling good,” he says. Yesterday, he was tense from the flight and a long practice session.

There’s a hold-up while the organisers clash with their old computer. Tough-guy banter continues to flare around the hall, even though no one is boozing this morning. Ace, also known as Ice Man, secures a position in quiet corner, slips his headphones over his smooth, bald head and waits.

Steve Tran strolls in late. He’s a small, laconic man who has arranged his life around eight ball, and he knew there’d be a delay. The 34-year-old lives with his mother and works the early morning shift in Australia Post’s mail sorting room. Each night, he drives to competition or knockout tournaments around the city. “I’m single. If you’ve got a partner or you’re married it would be pretty hard to play full-on pool five nights a week.”

Each round is a best-of-five-frames knockout. First up, Steve draws Tracy Givvons. “She’s all right,” he says, chuckling. “But she plays with a different set of balls.”

“Go Trace,” a woman calls from the other side of the room. Trace wins the toss and stands up to break. “Watch me tear him a new arsehole!” she declares, to general mirth, and then doesn’t pot a ball. She shoulders Steve he passes. “If you can’t beat ’em, beat ’em up.”

Steve rests one hand in his front pocket and chews gum as he weighs up the winning shots. “I reckon his cue’s bigger than him,” Trace says, drinking a stubby of Carlton. “Before I started playing big tournaments, I’d always go watch Steve play. My favourite person to watch.”

Nobody kids with Ace. Called to table three, he places his two cues – a thicker tip for the powerful break and delicate tip for general play – with a water bottle and hand towel on a chair nearby. Serious and scrupulously fair, he brushes the table down before play, and then comfortably accounts for his opponent. He doesn’t lose a frame through the first three rounds. Click, clack, thud, they keep rolling in.

The 40-year-old owns two poolrooms in Adelaide. “It’s what I do, basically. That’s what I’m here for.” He has big dreams for eight ball – maybe it could even turn pro. “We all believe it’s a sport that could get on mainstream TV, you know. Some people think ‘oh well it’s just a game, you put the balls in the hole with a stick’, but there’s others that just love it. The challenge of it all.”

On table two, Steve has struck trouble. He stands back from the table, arms folded, and watches the final black roll in. A floppy-haired long-shot has beaten him in three straight frames. Later, he debriefs with a friend, Joe. “I didn’t have the run of the balls. At all.” On a spare table, they recreate the exact specifications of his bad luck. Joe commiserates. “It wasn’t your day mate, that’s all. It wasn’t mine either,” he shakes his head.

As the rounds go on, the crowd thins. Steve stays to watch and mingle. That’s the reason he plays, he says. It’s his scene. “I just go to have some fun, meet some people, catch up with friends.”

Kolbe is still here too. She’s playing in the ‘blonks comp’, for non-qualifiers and first round losers. “They’re really good weekends. It is a bit of a community; we’ve got our own little ‘families’ here and there.” Pool is a low-tech pastime, a hand-written letter among the spam of video games and poker machines. Another night, in an inner-city club, a history student tells me the pool hall is his ‘third place’. We pass our lives in our homes and at our workplaces, he says, but need somewhere else to give us a sense of community.

The sun is setting and Ace is still in the race. In the fourth round, he wins 3–2 with cool, clutch shot-making. “Next round now,” he says with a shake of the head. “Only two to win to get into the final.”

The last eight players draw their opponents in front of the Pool TV camera. Ace draws Terry Bond. It will be best-of-seven on table six. Bond has short, white hair and a barrel stomach that hangs well over his belt.

The national captain goes two frames down. In both, he had a shot on the black. Small crowds now hush around each of the quarter-finals. Some Italians from the club are watching, impressed. Ace is looking tired, but then wins the third briskly. It’s only 7:30pm but feels like midnight.

From the break, Ace sends the white ball rocketing off the table. With a two-shot penalty, Bond pots out. Next frame, tension builds. Ace sighs and peers at the angles as his opponent rolls the balls in. That’s it. The black goes. Losing hurts. “He played well. He didn’t give me any second chances,” Ace says, flat. He puts on his jacket, buys a bourbon and calls his wife in Adelaide.

Most frames end quietly, contrasting the riot of the break. Few balls are left on the table and the black rolls in softly, inevitably. It’s over now for Ace, Steve and Kolbe. In the final, Robbo beats Scary 5–4. He wins the money. It’s 1:00am by the time the Pool TV crew clear off. “If you lose, you lose,” Steve says. “Until next time.”

photography by Michael Green