Archduke Sir Harry Moore Interviews Wuxi Expat Blogger Andrew Cowlinch

Long-time Wuxi China Expatdom luminary Andrew Cowlinch consented to an interview with Archduke Harry Moore. The interview took place at the Chong’an Temple tea-house.
Archduke: Good-morning Mr Cowlinch. It is a pleasure to meet you at last. It is strange that
despite your high-profile status and eminence here in the WCE, we’ve never actually met until now. (Moore squints at Cowlinch curiously)(Moore then slid two cartons of Lucky Strikes, three of Nanjing Hong, and a sizable cardboard carton of Marlboros across the table towards Cowlinch, who
declined the offer; Moore paled visibly, and appeared to lose his composure for several seconds).

Cowlinch: Your Archdukiness, this is probably the greatest moment of my life, greater than the birth of my son Bam Bam. Your stating that I have a high-profile status is news to me. You see, I am something a recluse out here in the Hui Shan district.
Archduke: Andrew (if I may?) you first arrived in the Expatdom in 2004. That makes you something of an ‘institution’ here, an honourable incarnation, so to speak. What influenced you to settle here in Wuxi?

Cowlinch: (Squirming). To have you call me by my first name would make me proud. As for your questions. (loosens his collar to let off steam). You don't throw softballs! The truth is that the Ayatollah of Mordor is to be credited for bring me here. (Starts sobbing) It's my shame!! I know.
Archduke: Do you travel to our satellite Expatdom-dependencies very often? For instance, are you a frequent visitor to the Suzhou, or Shanghai Expatdoms? Do you like those places?

Cowlinch. The shame of my previous association with the Ayatollah of Mordor keeps me holed up in Wuxi and mostly in my Hui Shan compound.
Archduke: Do you enjoy spending time at Gambays, in the 1912 Bar District? It is well-known that you have thousands of contacts and friends in Gambays’ plush Tiki Bar… Do you relate well with your many native, er, pardon me, Canadian compatriots, or, perhaps, do you mingle in more ‘global’ Expat circles?

Cowlinch: I do go to Gambay's in disguise. And if I can, I pick fight with the Canadians like Duston Short, Farok Bagolli, and the guy who was the head of the All Natural Naked English school. I do mingle with Expats of a conservative or reactionary persuassion. Our Anne Coulter and Sarah Palin Fan and Gun club has thousands of members.

Archduke: You’ve often spoken about your close family relationship, your son Bam-Bam, and your lovely wife, Wilma. Did Wilma have any problems adapting to life here after she’d been a South American freedom-fighter for all those years?

Cowlinch: If it wasn't for Bam Bam, I think she would be the jungles of Venezuela fighting the Chavezistas. I think it pains her so, like anyone who supports basic human decency, to see what is happening in that country.
Archduke: Perhaps you could tell us about a typical day in the Cowlinch residence (Moore glances at his notes) I see that you moved to Hui Shan after initially living in the Meicunzhen Gardens Estate? (Moore appears confused).

Cowlinch: I have a hard time remembering where I have lived in Wuxi. The place names are all in Chinese and so I just make them up for blogging purposes. As for the day in the Cowlinch Residence, it starts early. I get up at 4:00 AM and pray for an hour. I then get ready to work in the coal mine where I work alongside the miners, teaching them English on their breaks. The students and I go down to the pits at 5:15 AM. Walking to and from the mine, I write my blog entries. I get home about 11:00 PM and go to bed at 3:30 AM after having said my prayers. I am not sure what Wilma and Bam Bam do during the day.
Archduke: Andrew, I’m sure that your career as an English teacher is a demanding role.
Can you describe what you find most satisfying for you there at the Hyl…, I’m sorry, (flicks through notes) I meant, your, ah, current English College?

Cowlinch: The fact that I haven't killed anyone is testament to a remarkable strength of will that I possess.
Archduke: And you’d undoubtedly be a close confrère of Andis Kaulins, the Expatdom’s pre-eminent teacher of English and blog-essayist? (Moore leans forward to peer closely at Cowlinch). How would your describe your, ah, how can I put it, your… relationship with him?

Cowlinch: Andis has an intensity that is very off-putting to average people. There are times that even I find him hard to get along with. He will ignore me for days on end and then ask me for a cigarette for which he never thanks me. And yet I feel an intense psychic bond with him. It is a bond that is stronger than the one I have with my wife Wilma.

Archduke: (Are you sure you don’t want a cigarette?) Do you and Andis often get-together for after-work drinks? Are you a political-animal? Do you discuss, and possibly argue, about politics with people? Have you ever had it out, mano–o-mano with Andis Kaulins?

Cowlinch: Andis never goes to the pub unless someone else is paying... I am afraid he is like me in that regard. As for politics, Andis and I are in complete agreement. When you agree on the truth of the matter, what is there to discuss?
Archduke: Did you know Andis Kaulins before you moved to the Expatdom, maybe when you both took honours at Winnip…., ah, Andrew, I again beg your pardon, (Moore desperately flicks through his notes) I’m terribly sorry, aren’t you from Mani…no, I don’t appear to, have the name of your alma mater here.

Cowlinch: Andis and I are different people. I in fact got a degree from Brandon University.

Archduke: Late in 2012, you seem to have piqued the British Expat community, with one of them describing you as “a wanker”. Tell me, have you since kissed-and-made-up with our Brit cousins, or, is there maybe a lingering, simmering animosity? (Moore leans forward again, frowns, and aside, asks “how tall are you, Andrew?”)

Cowlinch: I am afraid that the Englishmen who one would see in the movie Dambusters, of the great TV series Civilisation, who helped win World War 2, who wrote Shakespeare plays, who voted for Thatcher, and had an empire that sun never set on are not to be found in the Wuxi China Expatdom; the Brits in the Wuxi China Expatdom are all Pouncey Tory Squishes, Blairites, National Health Care Sandanistas, the Rolling Stones, and rude like Pierce Morgan. There is no accommodating these people. To be called a wanker by them is a great honour. As for my height, I am proud to say that I am taller than James Bond, as he was envisaged by Ian Fleming.

Archduke: Also, in 2012, you hit world headlines when the enchanting Miss Pamela Anderson nominated you for the Fred Astaire Golden…, umm, beg your pardon, I meant, ‘The 2012 Wuxi Expat of The Year’!! Would I be correct in assuming that you and Pamela enjoy a ‘special affiliation’? Expats are open-minded, so please, no need to for you to…(stops abruptly).

Cowlinch: I am wired in the same way that Sexpats are. I admire Pamela's physical assets and I would be lying to say I didn't. Be that as it may, I am married. End of story. I, unlike a Sexpat, can control my impulses.

Archduke: Changing tack for a moment, you once described the former King of Wuxi as “a homophobic homosexual”. Many Expats wonder just how, and when, it was that you became deeply-suspicious of the Ayatollah of Mordor? Could you give us a character-sketch of the criminal? Is it true that he fled the Expatdom so fast that he didn’t have time to put his pants on? Did you see his getaway?

Cowlinch: The former King of Wuxi was blind to his hypocrisies. And to be honest, I choose to be wilfully blind to them too. I first pretended not to see the labour camps he was setting up to punish his political opponents, his trouncings of free speech, his employing of bully boys to steal candy from babies, his rigging of elections, his bad taste in movies, his bad taste in art, his bad taste in music, his stealing from the poor to give to himself, and his cheating at bridge. But I couldn't remain blind when he started to praise Barack Obama and Hugo Chavez. When he said that Barack was a good president, I realised that he didn't even possess a single speck of human decency and that he was a tyrant combining the worst features of Stalin and Hitler and some Chinese guy I won't mention. If was he to redeem himself, I realised, he was going to have to do it by spending the rest of his life in prison. And so I joined up the resistance with Gorzo and You and Harry Callahan and Lloyd Bridges and Gregory Peck and General Allenby. I wasn't able to see his getaway, but I was able to smell it. The day he left was the first time in years that I could smell the peaches of Yang Shan.