h2g2 The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy: Earth Edition

I'd love to know the story behind this. It feels as if there's a lot of story behind it.

I liked it.

Waz

Yeah, there ws a story.... in the 80s I worked for a life assurance company, and met - over the internal phones a bloke from South Africa... he was new to the country, didn't know a soul and he sounded a good laugh, so I arranged for him to meet myself, my then husband and a girlfriend of mine to make up a foursome for an evening out... to cut a long story short, he and the girl did NOT get on, but he, the husband and I did really well, and Andy became a really good mate. He was an absolute reprobate the Dury song "Sex and Drugs and Rock and Roll" must have been written about him, he got through women as most people go through a packet of tissues... an utter rogue, but a very likable one, especially as he never tried anything on with me!
Anyway, he finally decided to go straight(ish) and went training as a copper... and we jokingly predicted that he, as a white South African would no doubt be posted to Brixton - an area in South London that has a very high Black population (Sorry, never thought to check your site before I began this, so not sure were in the country - or world - you're based, no intention to patronize) - hense the references to Kaffirs (S>African slang for blacks) and The Front Line (Railton Road, where a lot of druggie trouble was)

However, Andy blotted his copy book a bit for me when he rather callously went through one of my more sensative girlfriends who had fallen deeply hopelessly and truely madly for him, and just left her sort of hanging... and guess who got to mop up the tears and angst?
Yeah!
So I wrote Hard Man as a sort of Cheer up for her... Andy really was going off the rails a bit by now, and we were all quite concerned for him.. but it didn't excuse him for lousing up a fellow humans emotions quite as harshly as he did. What was doing his head in was that A) he HAD been posted to Brixton and B) as he was probably the most colourblind/nonracist person I have ever met, he couldn't understand why a lot of the population were really heavy with him - and why his colleagues expected him to be a bit more like them....
Poor sod wanted a familly and life, but wasn't capeable of opening up and commiting himself to any one... rather sad, really.

Anyway, we lost touch, and as far as I know, he's not in the police anymore, he returned to S> Africa. But I wonder what became of him sometimes, and wonder if he ever did make a go of happy ever after.

And that is the story of Hard Man!

PS I'm glad you liked it!

Knowing the story I like it even more. (Which is not to say the poem needs elaborating - it provokes thought as it is.) I didn't know the Front Line reference. I did understand the kaffir one. I was told that it originally meant heathen. By someone who was accustomed to being called it as a term of abuse.

It is a sad story.

Don't worry about the Brixton explanation . I'm in the UK but my geography is bad! Couldn't have told you if Brixton was London, Birmingham, or Manchester.
Waz