Childhood Memories

Fifty cent (lolly) mixtures, playing Elastics, Zap chocolate flavoured milk, VHS recorders, cassette players, ham and chicken luncheon sausage sandwiches, covering school exercise books with Duraseal, only getting toys on special occasions, awkward but "tell it how it really is" school reports - they are just some of the features of life growing up in the 1980s in New Zealand.

They are just some of the many features author and New Zealand radio announcer Dom Harvey highlights in his book Childhood of an Idiot. Before reading this book I will admit I wasn't much of a fan of Harvey but I have him to thank for helping me relive some of the good memories of the 1980s.

We are of a similar age so while reading many chapters of this book, I found myself saying "I remember that". This book is a few years old and when I first saw it I thought about buying it but ended up getting it out of my local library a few weeks ago. Harvey has also written two other books Bucketlist of an Idiot and more recently a book about running.

In the book Harvey reflects on many parts of his childhood including his mother wanting to be posh and her obsession with Llardro - a brand of  porcelain figurines, playing Elastics with his older sister, Juicy Fruit chewing gum, Tangy Fruits at the movies and how we used to believe expressions like "If you pull a face and the wind changes, your face will stay like that forever".

There are a lot of delightful stories in this book. I love the story about Harvey playing Trivial Pursuit with his family and how they couldn't work out why his younger brother was so much better at the game than anyone else. The story about his Mum recording her own singing over that of Kenny Rogers on a cassette tape is hilarious.

I skipped a few "too much information" chapters and the language was raw at times. However, this book will appeal particularly to those in their 40s who grew up in New Zealand.  

Footnote: I took the photograph of this book in my local fish and chip shop Mitchell Downs Takeaways. While I was there a young boy was choosing lollies for his own 50 cent (probably $2) mixture.