Pink has, by her own admission, quite a love-hate relationship with Australia.
Love, of course, because Australia is a country that consistently embraces her, sells out her shows and buys her music.
And hate? Well, that dates all the way back to a certain incident in 2009, where all her worst fears about Australia manifested into a gross reality.
In an interview with The Daily Telegraph ahead of the launch of her new album Beautiful Trauma, the 38-year-old artist recalls a kind of trauma of her own while deciding to take a break from her Funhouse tour in 2009, where her and her husband Carey Hart went on a 1600km road trip from Cairns to Brisbane.
Far from beautiful, they instead rode into a tropical storm and a plague of insects.
“Oh god, there were so many bugs that I was crying while I was riding. And there were all the signs which say watch out for wallabies and kangaroos everywhere, so I was just waiting to be taken out by a kangaroo while eating the most protein I have had in my life,” she told journalist Kathy McCabe.
“Finally, I had enough and I pulled over. And (Carey) kept going because he doesn’t look behind him. I sat down by the side of the road by myself in the middle of nowhere for 15 minutes until he came back.”
According to former motorcross star Hart, when he did eventually make his way back to his wife, he found her “rocking back and forth” on the side of the highway. Her concerns aside, it was for him, “the best trip ever”.
“I told him ‘This is the worst day of my life, I’m not going any further.’ And he’s like ‘You can’t stay here. It’s only 88km to the next gas station, we’ll call a hotel and get them come and get us.’
“I was like ‘I quit, I’m done, I would rather die.’ He keeps telling me it’s only 88km.
“And 88km later, we’re sitting on a park bench at a closed-down service station. There was nothing there.”
While her presence in the interview some eight years later suggests she did, in fact, survive, her distaste for our fickle outback didn’t dent her love for its people.
And that’s why she keeps coming back.
Top Comments
I guess like anywhere you go, there will be good and bad experiences. You can’t really judge a place on bad experiences all the time. The first time I went to Paris I had my bag stolen- I was terrified, I felt so violated and lost everything but my passport (my phone, credit cards etc). The rest of my time there was counting down the days til we went home and I got sick with a migraine and had to go to a hospital. I was so happy to get home. 2 years later We decided to go back again and stay in a different part of the city. The experience was wonderful and I felt so safe. You can have good and bad experiences everywhere, you just have to have an open mind. Luckily pink did
We drove through a locust plague in central Victoria and were glad to be in a car with the windows up.