My friend Jeff Babb died this morning. I will miss him.
It is hard to accept that only three weeks ago, we met up for coffee and cake at a café in Keilor Road near his home.
How does one measure the worth of a man? In the life that he lived and the people that he loved, or in the way that he faced his death?
Let’s start with how he faced his death. Jeff was diagnosed with a brain tumour in January 2024. At that time, he was given a prognosis that his life expectancy was only another 18 months – something he casually mentioned to me over lunch only a few months ago.
Yet given the knowledge that his days were almost certainly very numbered, he faced his illness without fear, with stoic resolve, cheerfulness and optimism, enjoying every day he had with the great love of life that he possessed, rather than with dread which would have poisoned those days.
He took steps to sort out his financials to save his children and wife hassles in administering his estate after he went, thinking of them, rather than of his own imminent passing.
How many of us can face our own deaths so bravely?
I would rather talk about his full and happy life, albeit one which, at 72, ended far sooner than any of us would have hoped for him. I feel the loss for his grandchildren, who have been robbed of his presence too early.
I first met him in mid 1994 – although I had known of him for several years before that. He had studied at the University of Western Australia under Paddy O’Brien, through whom Jeff and I shared two friends in common, as well as several acquaintances in common.
Hence it was almost inevitable that we would become friends.
For almost thirty years, he was a contributor to News Weekly, mostly writing on his area of expertise, Communist China and Taiwan.
He was as fluent in Mandarin as any non-native speaker could be. At a barbecue at my home a decade ago, he spoke with a colleague of mine who had studied Mandarin in China, and my colleague observed that Jeff had a scholarly accent.
He mostly made a living for many years as a writer and journalist, including almost a decade as a copy sub editor of the South China Post in Taiwan.
In 2018, a friend of mine was disturbed to learn that the ‘Real Bodies Exhibition’ was touring Australia. This is a grotesquely obscene display of the remains of various human bodies, treated in a way that preserves them, showing off the muscles and bones and organs under the skin. It originated in Communist China, and it was rumoured that the bodies were executed victims of the regime. My friend asked me if there was anything she could do about something so wrong.
I rang Jeff and told him about this Exhibition, suggesting that it was exactly the sort of matter which News Weekly would be interested in publishing, given that it concerned the dignity and sanctity of human life, and the failures of communist regimes to observe such.
The result was a two page article in Newsweekly which served as the cover story. Jeff gave a solemn voice to the silent anonymous lives who had been sacrificed to create that grotesque exhibition.
He was a man of integrity, even when it came at his own cost. Several years ago, he had a contract to teach the introductory course in China for a Melbourne based TAFE College, which was the prerequisite before those students could enrol in Australia. He made the honest mistake of failing everyone who either did not meet the 80% mandatory attendance requirement for the course, or who did not put in the required coursework to an acceptable standard. That College did not offer him a second contract. He rightly saw that as a badge of honour.
In saying goodbye to my old friend, who was constantly striving to make his living as a writer because it was something that brought him such joy, I am reminded of Banjo Paterson’s poem A Song of the Pen:
Not for the love of women toil we, we of the craft,
Not for the people’s praise;
Only because our goddess made us her own and laughed,
Claiming us all our days,
Claiming our best endeavour — body and heart and brain
Given with no reserve —
Niggard is she towards us, granting us little gain:
Still, we are proud to serve.
Not unto us is given choice of the tasks we try,
Gathering grain or chaff;
One of her favoured servants toils at an epic high,
One, that a child may laugh.
Yet if we serve her truly in our appointed place,
Freely she doth accord
Unto her faithful servants always this saving grace,
Work is its own reward!
Lost For Words! 