There’s something they don’t tell you when you move to Nimbin: time operates differently in this village. Those familiar with the concept of “island time” may note some similarities, but there’s quirks to Nimbin that make it an entirely unique phenomenon where time becomes as malleable as clay.
When I first arrived in early 2023, I was still carrying the habits forged in 20 years of working in corporate and government environments with tight schedules, deadlines and meetings on the hour.
I wouldn’t have considered myself a model of punctuality, but I was generally on time or early, or extremely apologetic for being any more than a couple of minutes late.
It wasn’t long into my time in Nimbin that I realised those old habits had to die for me to maintain any semblance of sanity. The famous sign at Daizy’s (pictured) alluding to their very vague hours of operation should have been the first clue that my approach to time needed to be amended, but I wrote that off as one business’s fun way to dismiss their unreliability.
The first few times I arranged to meet someone in town, I found myself on my second cup of coffee before they arrived. I will admit I was a little put off by this. Were they avoiding me? Didn’t they value my time?
Of course, that was not the case at all. Once they explained how it worked in Nimbin, things started to click into place and I immediately knew that I needed to loosen up my approach. This is how I have come to understand how it works.
Firstly, there’s the roads. Just getting to the village can have many unexpected obstacles and challenges. Closures and detours, roadworks, cows on the road, trees on the road, random objects that have fallen off the back of a truck on the road, or an overly cautious driver are all common enough to cause a delay.
Then there’s the conversations. When you’re new to town and somewhat anonymous, aside from a few street dealers asking for your business, walking from the Bush Theatre to the Funky Corner is fairly uneventful, but once you start making connections, just getting from Feast to the post office could take half an hour or more.
People in Nimbin value their connections in the community and take the time to build and maintain them. This often means stopping for a chat, even when you have somewhere else you need to be. These conversations also happen in line at shops, filling up at the servo and numerous other locations across town.
Of course, there’s a myriad of other factors that come into play. Ultimately, the result is the same – a set time generally means a 30-minute window that starts at that time.
This can blow out to an hour but things will mostly like happen in that time, it’s just a matter of being patient. There’s rarely a rush and everything happens at the time it’s meant to.
Most importantly, 4.20pm is sacred.