Column 289

Leo, Roving Reporter
Report from: Bathurst
Story filed: Toy Soldiers

Hi people, Leo here. Today I am going to talk about toy soldiers. I've had some vintage Airfix toy soldiers that used to be my dad's when he was a kid, for a long time now. My dad never got around to painting them all but he did try and paint some with enamel paint because acrylic (which does a better job in my opinion) was not invented and he also wasn't a very good painter. Up till now, they've just been sitting around the house and one night I thought to myself ''I should paint them'' and so now I am. There were so many of them as my dad had a lot of boxes. There's Confederate Infantry, Sheriff of Nottingham, Romans, Washington's Army, North American Indians, Foreign Legion, Waterloo Highland Infantry, Robin Hood, Bedouins, Waterloo French Artillery, U.S Cavalry, and the High Chaparral. We also had some vintage WWII battleships but little kid Leo didn't know the plastic melted when put in front of the bathroom heater and little kid me thought that it was a good idea to dry them off in front of the heater after playing with them in the bath (and I always played with them very gently so they wouldn't break) So, I think we all know what happened to the battleships. To this day all I can find of them is a broken turret (as you will see in the photo. This mistake goes for the French Artillery too as I just took off the wheels a bit too much so now they all have one wheel, same goes for some of the Roman chariots, just one wheel). One day when I have finished this massive project of painting my dad's old models I will proudly place them next to my own models, two generations of models.

Until next time
Leo Roving Reporter

Column 288

Leo, Roving Reporter
Report from: My desk
Story filed: A Viewfinder

Hi people, Leo here, hope everyone's doing ok with all the new covid restrictions and anything else that's been happening. Things have been going well here with me and something really exciting has just happened. On Sunday, my mum and I decided to go for a walk at Boundary Road Reserve where we came across a tooth of some sort of animal and some animal guts (not a pleasant sight.) We even brought our own pocket kite and flew it on top of the hill, that was nice. After that we decided to go to the top of Mount Panorama to get more wind for our kite, that was really cool. After that, we thought we'd pull into Time Warp Collectables and say hi. We said hi and looked around and talked to Jo the owner. There was lots of cool stuff like always; there were some vintage lego sets, a cool pocket watch, an ammunition belt, and lots of other things. I was looking at all the old cameras and saw a German-made Voigtlander Bessa camera. It was so cool and in perfect condition, its box was falling apart but it still had all of its pieces. And now it's on my desk. I've always seen pictures of this type of camera and imagined how amazing it would be to have one of these and now I do have one and it is amazing.

Until next time
Leo Roving Reporter

Column 287

Leo, Roving Reporter
Report from: My desk
Story filed: Hello again

Hi people, Leo here feels like it's been a while since I did a column, but it's good to be back in the new Central West Village Voice newspaper. I hope everyone is having a good school holiday. Not much has been happening in the holidays for me apart from a trip to Sydney (before the lockdown) and the Winter Festival. My trip to Sydney was super cool. My dad and I went there for a Suzuki cello concert where I and all the Suzuki cello choir players performed the songs we've been practicing, I am in the junior cello choir. My grandmother came along and dad also invited his friend Frank to the concert. It was really good to see my grandmother and Frank again because I haven't seen them in a long time. After the concert, Frank took us out to this really nice cafe-restaurant. It was so good, the food was delicious and after our meal, I got to have ice cream. That place was amazing. 

The next day was even better. My dad and I caught the train to Town Hall station and walked to Hobbyco in the Queen Victoria building. Hobbyco is amazing - they have all the best toys and kits, everything I could ever think of that I would want, maybe not everything, but mostly everything. There were model tanks, planes, trains, big robots, and on the second-floor LEGO, Meccano, diecast cars, and my favorite bit - diecast planes. These planes were crazy detailed and some were pretty big. We could have bought one but in the end, we bought a model T-35 tank and it was totally worth it. After all that, my dad and I caught the train back to my grandmother's and started to go back home to Bathurst. I would have been back in Sydney for a cello camp and a taiko drum workshop but Covid happened and it was all cancelled. On the bright side, I still have all that time to finish my model tank. How exciting.


Until next time
Leo Roving Reporter