Jonathan, known until recently as “Sri to friends and enemies”, is not really a hippy.

He’s not even a Brisbane Councillor anymore after eight years of high-profile representation for the Gabba ended with his run for Mayor in 2024 where his primary vote touched just under a healthy 20 per cent

Now he’s a musician, writer, poet, philosopher, freelance guru and troubadour – a rapper with hip-hop band Rivermouth which provides songs offering “catharsis and validation for the marginalised and oppressed’’.

Just to illustrate how deeply wedded Jonathan is to notion of truth in art, he actually urges fans to only listen to his songs after first reading the explanatory notes provided with each composition because, in his words:

“If you only listen to the chorus lyrics you are going to arrive at an oversimplified position.’’

Out of this exotic kernel — Queensland’s first Green local government politician elected in 2016 — bloomed a Greens awakening in this state, reaching through both the higher tiers of government and still maintaining a presence, even if the party did take something of a shellacking in the October state election.

Today he lives on a small houseboat moored in the Brisbane River – a lifestyle choice he made as a form of protest against high rents but which also followed this newspaper’s revelation in 2017 that he was living in a crowded share house which was (allegedly) illegal.

That was just one chapter in a somewhat combative relationship with some sections of the media, and I suspected Jonathan may be less than agreeable to breaking bread (or vegan takoyaki) with a representative of the section I happen to be from.

But he cheerfully fronts up to Taro’s Ramen on Stones Corner, full of alternative energy and enthusiasm about a far more equitable and kindlier world he still clearly believes he can help create, and one which already has an existing blueprint among that bunch of Communists more commonly known as the Queensland Rural Fire Brigade.

“Do not write that!’’ he splutters over his Vegan Ramen in the only mild flare of temper in an otherwise amiable luncheon.

“I have not said that!

“You just cannot put words into my mouth like that!’’

But I can, and I will, because that fireys reference is such an artful distillation of his broad political philosophy it deserves ventilation.

It’s the sort of philosophy which frequently draws accusations that Jonathan is, in point of fact, an out-and-out “Commo.’’

He’s not.

He’s a suburban, self-described “good boy’’ from West Chermside who studied hard at school and was obviously well raised by a Scots/English mum and a Sri Lankan born dad.

He became an A student, absorbed many of the Sunday school lessons provided by the socially progressive Uniting Church his mum attended, developed some appreciation of Hinduism from his Sri Lankan-born father, rarely drank and never, despite his alternative persona, took drugs.

“Marijuana, surely?

“Never even had a puff, but I don’t judge people who do.’’

Pauline Hanson’s arrival in the late 90s when he was still only a boy disturbed him, partly because he saw the One Nation movement as hostile to people like himself as well as his dad who left Sri Lanka because of internal conflicts and met his mum in England before settling in Australia.

“These people were saying, somehow, that my father was a bad person because he fled a civil war,’’ he recalls.

“Even then I was conscious that, within the community, there were people who were not happy that I existed.’’

He studied for a Bachelor of Laws (Hons) and Bachelor of Arts with majors in Journalism and Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Studies at The University of Queensland before settling into the world of corporate law where he could still be comfortably residing today if he chose, pulling $800,000 a year and looking down on the river from Hamilton rather than living on it in a houseboat with a faulty outboard motor.

He doesn’t see himself as a Communist. Even the word “radicalised’’ seems to irritate him but when he sees people struggling with poverty, in both the material and spiritual sense of the word, he envisages different ways of doing things which might ease everyone’s burden.

Which brings us to the Queensland Rural Fire Brigade.

“I am sure some of your readers will be offended by this,’’ he begins tentatively, demonstrating an admiral prescience.

“But when you think about it, and when you drill down into all the technical definitions and the theories, rural fire brigades are kind of organised along Communist principles.

“I would not call myself a Communist, but the Communist principle is that each person gives what they can to the people who need it and they are not doing it for personal financial gains, they are not motivated by profit.

“It is this idea that I am not doing this for financial gain, I am doing this because my future and my welfare is intimately connected to the broader community.’’

Extrapolate that notion into the broader streams of life and you will establish a much more civilised form of government, he believes, while also acknowledging the average punter will be reluctant to buy it.

Rural communities, instinctively, understand the power of collectivism, but so-called lefties have hijacked it as a top down, big government control of our lives, he says.

“People don’t like big government control and rightly so.’’

Mainstream Queenslanders, he acknowledges, will recoil from any form of social democracy movement with a name prefaced with “community’’ or “cooperative’’ or (God forbid) “commo’’.

His thesis is so demonstrably true, and so artfully articulated, there’s no sense in arguing about it.

Rural fire brigades in this state have been organic, springing up across the state as landholders even in the 19th Century realised they needed, without any form of government prompting, to help one another fight fires.

“But Jonathan,’’ I say, lamely playing the ageing conservative.

“People always want to get ahead of one another.’’

They may gather to assist one another deal with a common community issue, but still pursue private enterprise, often with the aim of accumulating more than their neighbour.

“Only because we have a consumer society that has trained them to want things they really don’t need,’’ he fires back.

In this area, Jonathan both talks the talk, and walks the walks.

He has little money and few possessions except the houseboat he shares with his partner after giving most of his council salary to charity, or simply people in need.

And he has always been pretty happy, especially in his 20s when he was living in share houses in the West End, playing music, writing poetry, engaging in meaningful conversations and generally enjoying life on a shoestring budget when, gradually, rising rent forced him and his friends out.

It was rental costs which steered him into local government but it was inside the tent of government he realised (in his view) how much damage the entrenched developer/council/housing equation had become.

It is that interconnected relationship which conspires to create what he believes are poorly designed housing projects we don’t really want which none-the-less fuel the spiral of ever-increasing real estate prices.

Today, apart from dealing with domestic issues on the houseboat including collecting rainwater and servicing a compost toilet, he keeps an eye on Green fortunes, tipping Remah Naji, the Greens candidate in the federal seat of Moreton, may surprise in the looming federal election.

He also continues with his music and his writing, posting his missives on “jonathansri.com’’ and maintaining that charismatic appeal which still draws such an enthusiastic following among many people, particularly in the South Brisbane area.

I suggest that he start a cult, if only as a commercial proposition to raise enough cash to fix that broken outboard.

But Jonathan, so clearly disinterested in capital accumulation, insists that he’s not even looking for a paying job let alone becoming a guru.

He likes living in the moment, enjoying things like this seriously delicious (10/10) lunch which incorporates a Vegan Ramen (fire) for him and a Vegan Ramen (red) for me with sides of bamboo shoots, shallots and atsuage fried tofu.

Politics, he insists, is now on the periphery, and Lord mayor Adrian Schrinner might rest easier at night with the news Jonathan has no intention of re-running for Mayor.

For now.

“I mean, ask me again in a few years but right now, I have no intention of running for anything.’’

Food: 10

Service: 10