“Have you met the Alpha Boss?”
It was a question asked to me as I chatted with residents in Echuca East on Saturday afternoon, near the new levee that has been built through the neighbourhood.
My answer was no, I haven’t met the Alpha Boss, but they certainly sound like the kind of person you would want to meet.
I’m told to go for a walk. The Alpha Boss and his wife live just around the corner, on the wet side of the new levee. If I reach the end of the long, tall dirt wall, I have gone too far.
I’m told that’s not likely though — the house has a current set up that would make it rather hard to miss.
You see, the couple who live there, Jemima Hayes and her husband, James — the Alpha Boss — are DJs, and they have been playing music for the neighbourhood.
It sounds fantastic, far too cool of a scene to pass up. I say goodbye to the group and head off towards the house.
It is a surreal journey to get there.
I’m walking on top of the new levee that runs down the middle of Pakenham St, Bowen St and Goulburn Rd — Echuca’s great divide.
On one side of the street, houses that are now protected. On the other, homes that are already surrounded by floodwaters.
Properties on the wet side of the wall have sandbags stacked high to try and repel the water that has now submerged their front yards.
I walk past a tinnie making its way along an engulfed street.
There is a sombre feeling around, totally understandable given the seriousness of the situation.
But down the round, one house is doing its best to help lift the mood.
As I keep walking, I start to hear it — the faint sound of music in the distance. It gets louder as I get closer, the beat and tune more clearly identifiable.
Soon, I get to the house. Simply put, it is an incredible sight.
The scene
With floodwaters from the Murray River surrounding their home, James and Jemima have set up their DJ decks and a speaker on top of the very sandbags that are helping to keep water from inside their house as they play music for the whole neighbourhood.
With the Murray River approaching the highest level it has reached in more than 150 years, the contrast of what was happening in Echuca and the scene in front of me was extraordinary.
Jemima has her headphones on, pumping the air with one hand as the other adjusts settings on the decks which are balancing on a slab of Melbourne Bitter on the top row of the sandbags.
Next to her, James is dancing away with a sailor’s hat on his head, because, why not?
The music is pumping, and it is very, very good – Jemima has DJ’d at plenty of gigs, including the festival Groovin’ the Moo, and her skills are audibly apparent.
Deep house and techno are today’s genre of choice, some of Jemima’s favourites.
She turns the music down to say that James is coming out to have a chat.
He emerges from around the back of his house, slowly wading through the knee-deep floodwaters to get to the levee, before climbing up to join me.
It was Jemima who first got James into DJing, and he said the music was all about trying to keep the mood upbeat.
“Jemima does commercial stuff, but I just do it so she loves me more,” he joked.
“We got married in March and she said we had to do a back-to-back set at the wedding, so I had a crack.
“Hopefully we can make light of a tough situation ... we are just trying to keep everyone positive.”
The floods have had a big impact on James and Jemima. Not only is their home surrounded by water, but they have been forced to shut their businesses.
The couple own and run ALPHA Tyres in Moama and transport business Wolf Freighters, both of which have been put on hold, for now.
“We’ve had to close our business (ALPHA Tyres) in Moama, so we have had to stand down five or six people, hopefully for only a week or so,” James said.
“We had to stop the freight company cold turkey, we just bought another truck and just put a bloke on full-time, but now we can’t get down to Melbourne.”
Floodwaters are already surrounding the house, with dozens of sandbags helping to protect it.
With water levels still expected to rise, James said he was hoping for the best.
“I am a little bit confident with the way things are going, if it stays nice and slow like this, I think the pumps that we have will keep up,” he said.
“We are pretty dry inside, the house is dry as a bone.
“We had heaps of help getting ready, it wasn’t just us. It was crazy the amount of people who came who you had never seen before to help out.
“Seeing what we have done in the last week, it has been amazing.”
As we chat while standing on the levee, it is impossible not to ask James about the massive wall that has left dozens of homes cut off.
But he said he isn’t mad about it at all.
“I’m actually not, at the end of the day,” he said.
“We have insurance, it’s just a house, it’s all going to be fine.
“Someone should have made the call for this levee bank well over a week ago, but who wants to be responsible for making that call? Nobody.
“We are left holding the bag this time, it is what it is. We have a really good community behind us.
“I don’t think we should waste our time trying to point the finger, I think we just need to see what happens, get over it, move on and learn from it.
“Last time (in 1993) we didn’t learn from what happened. I’m not pointing the finger at anyone, it’s just a tough situation.”
As we wrap up our chat, James said the music would be playing well into the evening, adding that I was more than welcome to come back later on. It was an offer I took him up on.
Party time — with a twist
A few hours later, I am back with beers in hand, not really knowing what to expect.
I’m standing on top of the levee again. Neighbours are out their front of their houses enjoying a drink at tables set up in the floodwaters, with James, Jemima and their friends next door, the music still playing as promised.
I’m invited down to join them on the wet side of the levee, and it’s now that I realise I haven’t exactly dressed for the occasion — boots and jeans were not the best choice of attire.
But sometimes as a journalist, you have to get your feet wet, and this was one of those occasions.
Off come the boots and socks, up go the legs on my jeans and down the levee I go and into the water as I make my way to a wet and undeniably unique dance floor.
I take out a beer, put the others in a nearby Esky that’s been built in to almost be part of the sandbag wall, and I soak in what’s happening around me.
People are laughing and chatting, enjoying a drink as the sun sets on a warm spring evening as the music pumps in the background.
It would be a scene not dissimilar to countless house parties going on at the same time around the country, if it wasn’t for the sandbags, the new levee and the fact that everyone was standing in floodwater.
Everyone is having a great time, with the party and the music a welcome escape from the tough situation at hand.
The decorated sailor’s hat is doing the rounds, and at one point it ends up on my head, albeit for just a short moment.
Normally, that hat would be the most spectacular headpiece at the party, but not at this one.
Jemima ducks inside for a moment and re-emerges with a magnificent sailor hat of her own.
It’s silver, with the dozens of gemstones its adorned with glistening in the porch light — it even has her name spelled out in stones along a band on the front as well.
It really is the most incredible, unique party I have ever been to — an example of how the worst of scenarios can bring out the best in people and how positivity always finds a way to shine through.
But even as the music plays, the sounds of generators pumping water out from inside nearby homes can be heard.
It is a stark reminder of the seriousness of the situation Echuca, Moama, Echuca Village, Torrumbarry and the entire region is facing right now.
It was Mother Nature who created circumstances for the unique party, and it was Mother Nature who brought it to a close.
Flashes of lightning in the distance illuminate the sky, and dark clouds loom over head. Rain starts to fall.
Suddenly, it is back to reality. The music stops. With floodwaters already surrounding dozens of properties, the rain is bad news.
With water levels already high on the wet side of the levee, the additional rain posed a serious risk as it threatened to push even more water inside homes.
The party comes to a close as attention now turns to far more pressing issues — making sure pumps are switched on, ensuring sandbag walls are holding and checking to see if water is entering the house.
With the festivities concluded, I walk back through the waters, up the levee and make my way back home.
Looking back, it was a night I could never have imagined. Even now, despite having been there, it feels surreal trying to describe it.
It was a night and a party that summed up the community spirit that has been evident across the region in recent weeks — persevering in the face of immense difficulty and hardship, coming together and making lasting friendships with people who a week ago you had never met.
It was a night like no other.