SMACK IN THE MIDDLE OF A SYDNEY STREET ...

Travis decides to take a coffee before conducting his heroin walking
tour of Kings Cross.

We sit in one of Sydney's funkiest inner-city cafes and within minutes
he points out an attractive young woman having lunch at the next table.

``That's heroin there, look how dead her eyes are,'' he says. ``Just
look at them. They're dead in the middle. Look at the way she's
scratching herself "And the grimace, the anguish on her face.

That's heroin and people would never know just looking at
her."

Travis knows well the infamous turf of Kings Cross. He started using
heroin at 15 and continued for 20 years. He is now dying of the AIDS
virus.

"I suspect it was a dirty needle," he says, looking into his
coffee.

"It's not me, it's never been me, but I have picked up dirty needles
off the street and used them. Needles so blunt it's like putting a
fish hook into your veins. That's what the dope does to you. You do
things you would never ordinarily do."

As Travis outlines his battle with the drug, the debate about
establishing injecting rooms - shooting galleries - continues to rage.
That decrees from the other side of the world, from the Vatican,
should thwart a potential solution to Sydney's horrific drug scene
seems not just impractical but ludicrous as Travis reveals what's
happening on the streets.

"Let's start our little walking tour," he says, and we leave the cafe
and head into Darlinghurst Road towards William Street and the Cross.

We haven't been walking five minutes and Travis is apprehended by
something he has found on the footpath.

"Here we go," he says. "You see these everywhere."

What he has found is a tiny blue balloon used to package a single
taste of heroin. He secretes it in his pocket. He says the going rate
for such a balloon is $40.

We walk along the main drag of the Cross, past adult shops and strip
clubs. "Right here," he says, demarking a strip of footpath outside a
sex shop, "this is the first zone. This is called Kiddies Corner from
here up to that arcade. Here you have young children - Caucasian,
Aboriginal, Asian - from maybe 12 up to 16 years old. Men and women
come to these kids and will give them $20 to feel them up or whatever.
These kids will take heroin, cocaine, whatever, in exchange for that."

"Now," he says, "if we go across the road here, this is where the
second zone starts. This is what I call the Dead Eye Zone."

We stand at the entrance to a narrow lane.

"The Dead Eye Zone is usually comprised of middle-aged ex-criminals -
male and female - who sell and score here," says Travis. "You have to
understand that in the heroin trade there is a language. It has its
own language. It can be body language, the tugging of an ear lobe. Or
looking someone directly in the eyes. That's all it takes."

Indeed, as we progress down the alley we are followed by a tall,
balding Asian man. When we stop, he stops.

"Don't look at him," says Travis. "That's a score if you want it.
Don't look him in the eyes. I tell you, I've known this scene for a
long time, and even now, when I look them in the eyes, when I see that
angst, that evil, it still scares me."

As we continue Travis points out the third and final zone, around the
fountain not metres from the Kings Cross police station.

"This is the Transients Zone," he says. "Perhaps the tourists. Perhaps
people wanting to score for the first time, or whatever.

"Unless you have been involved in the heroin scene, unless you know
the characters and the way things work, you wouldn't have a clue what
goes on.

"I know a woman, a home maker who is very well known in Sydney
society. I see her up here with her Prada shoes and her Prada bag and
her Chanel outfits. I'll see her in a restaurant and I'll see her
nodding off. That's the heroin. She's a major heroin addict. But who
would know that? Nobody. People think all heroin addicts are homeless
people. That's simply not the case. I know doctors and attorneys who
have huge heroin addictions."

Travis himself was a professional before the advent of his illness. He
is hugely intelligent, widely read and artistic.

"When I started using at 15 years old I didn't even drink or smoke,"
he says. He hints at a difficult family history.

We continue the tour to the Wayside Chapel, site of an injecting-room
trial earlier this year. The chapel sits quietly in a Kings Cross
backstreet and on this day there are several street people coming in
and out.

Travis is bemused at the Vatican's decision to halt the involvement of
the Sisters of Charity Health Service with the proposed safe-injecting
rooms.

"I just don't understand it," he says. "You've seen the needles we've
passed on the ground just getting here. There's a brothel around the
corner that has doubled as an injecting room for years. I remember the
days when you'd get 10 people in a room all hitting up. I guarantee
you, even today, you sit for eight hours outside that brothel and
you'll see at least one person a day being carried out after an overdose."

We sit outside the Wayside Chapel at the end of our tour and smoke
cigarettes. Then Travis remembers the blue balloon he picked up.

"Here," he says. "This is probably a rip-off deal." He unwraps the
blue rubber. "Wait. No it's not. There's some stuff in here, look."

He smiles. "There you go. You just have to walk the streets of Sydney
and you'll find heroin at your feet."

Is it the real deal?

"I'll let you know tomorrow," he says.