When I was growing up in the west you always knew where you came from by smell. Crossing the Maribyong river, either leaving or returning to city or home, it was the stench of the tannery that curled your hair with horror. You had to hold your breath otherwise you might vomit your last meal while the train slowly crossed the bridge . In another way that crossing made you aware of us versus them, working class v middle class. It was our personal badge of honour . Our fuck you moment to a world of comfortablity in all its smugness. Today I no longer live in the west, however, sometimes I get the urge to visit the seaside villiage of Williamstown, part of the west,now a town of the middle to upper class. I remember it as home of my mother’s birth. In the 1930’s it was a tough , seatown of hard drinking sailors with pubs dotted everywhere. In short it was an alcoholic’s paradise. Now, if you leave from Melbourne, you still cross that river, and instead of tannery stench, you get greeted by this amazing fifteen metre statue of Mazu, part of the Heavenly Queen Temple , the biggest Taoist temple in the world, right here on my stench memory river. Such joy , such transformation, now the crossing is an entry point to the Way!