Welcome to Country

We’re back near Sydney and midterms are over. If you thought St. Olaf students were serious when it comes to studying for exams, then you thought right. For the week before exams every free second was spent preparing. I, along with a few others, felt that the rest of the group was going a bit overboard, because if there’s one thing that we’ve learned about Australia it’s that Australia is no worries. We still spent most of our time studying though. We would just spend two hours instead of five every night, and that would be in the sauna, and we got up right before breakfast in the morning instead of waking up in the wee hours to get a head start. For me this technique paid off, as I was very pleased with my results.

            Now that we’re done with our exams we have started studying cultural anthropology in depth. An aboriginal lawyer taught us about the history of the aboriginal people since white colonisation of AUS, which began in the late 1700s. You may know this, but AUS is a very young country, being formed in 1901, and since then the aboriginal people have had their culture and country stripped from them. It wasn’t until the late 70s that AUS revoked “The White Australia Policy” from legislation, which only allowed white immigrants into their boarders, and it wasn’t until a few years later that aboriginal people were considered citizens of the country. It took as recent as 2008 for parliament to apologise for the atrocities committed by the government on the aboriginal people. They are still recovering from these, which include massacres and the stolen generation, where children were taken from their families and sent to missions in order to remove their “barbarian culture” and to learn the ways of the west. Most aboriginal people nowadays try to assimilate into modern society, but a few, mostly into the Northern Territory, still hold onto their own cultures and live completely traditional lives in the bush. We also received a lecture on “dreamtime,” which is a poor description but the easiest way to describe the aboriginal’s religious connection to the earth and their sense of space and time. We visited the AUS Museum of Sydney and toured through their aboriginal artifacts. The next day we toured The AUS Art Museum and observed aboriginal art, which is their way to record the stories of their ancestors, which have been passed down orally for thousands of generations. To us the paintings just looked like patterns painted in ochre, but to an aboriginal person the art will reveal both the clan who painted the piece and the spiritual significance that it depicts. I find this incredibly impressive, as there were more than 600 aboriginal languages, and therefore an equal number of unique stories, that existed in AUS prior to British colonisation. But then again it’s understandable that they’d be able to recognise the art since colonisation happened only a few generations ago, while their people have been in AUS and passing on the stories for somewhere around 50,000 years.

            We left the heart of Sydney on Wed. the 21^st, and headed to The Royal National Park, which is located just south of Sydney. Here we paddled canoes up the Kangaroo River while learning about native plants and animals. We cooked beef and roo bangers (sausages) for lunch and learned how to throw spears. While we were eating a few sulfur-crested cockatoos came up to us and begged for a bite. Even though there were signs that said feeding the birds would result in a $500 fine, we snuck them a few pieces of break. After lunch we headed to the beach spent the afternoon there.

            On Thurs. we met another aboriginal man and learned more about the native plants that were utilised by the native people. My favorite plant was the coastal acacia. Its use came from when you crush the leaves in your hands, add water, and then if you scrub hard enough you get a soapy substance that gives your hands a deep clean. We learned to make twine out of tree bark and all of us sat in silence making bracelets and necklaces for about thirty min. We also learned how to throw a boomerang, which was awesome until I threw a bad throw and hit an Asian guy’s ankle. He and his family were angry, and I felt really bad and apologised, but I don’t know if they could understand English. Then in the afternoon we went snorkeling in Chowder Bay. I saw a small stingray, a few crabs and fish, and many sea urchins. Some people found some sea horses, but I couldn’t find them since they were camouflaged in the kelp.

           

            On Friday we helped out the National Parks Service by excavating an old military tunnel near our accommodation. Where we are staying used to be a military base, so there are tunnels that connect lookouts on the bluffs all around the harbour. Once the tunnels were abandoned some thirty years ago, they were filled in to keep hoodlums out. Before we started our volunteer work an aboriginal man named Les welcomed us to his country. This was a spiritual ceremony where he placed three white ochre marks on our foreheads and hands, which sybmolised us listening, looking and learning about his land. He was a very lively man, and later let us eat some “bush tucker” that he collected and even taught us to play the didgeridoo. We moved about 20 wheelbarrow loads out before lunch, which once again consisted of bangers. After work we decided to go to a hidden beach, which turned out not only to be a nude beach, but also a gay nude beach. It was a little awkward for the group of 10 or so of us that went, but we were still able to catch the last of the rays before the sun set below the trees.

           

            We are heading back into the heart of Sydney on Sunday, which is a free day. A girl from our group surprised us by letting us know that her dad rented a 40’ catamaran for us to ride around and snorkel from on Sunday afternoon for four hours. Then in the evening we are going to “The Hunger Games” movie. I think just about all of us have read the book by this time. We are in Sydney until Wednesday, the 28^th, and then we have our second holiday. I just bought my ticket to Brisbane, which is a 14-hour ride away from Sydney Central. I am not sure what we’re going to do there, but I guess we still have five days to figure that out!

This is a picture of aboriginal art (the rainbow serpent)

Emily, Hilary and Todd on the ferry back from Manly Beach

Excavating the old military tunnel at Middle Head

Driving on the Left

Our holiday was a success. We spent Sunday through Wednesday at a hostel in Kings Cross, the backpacker central of Sydney. The hostel wasn’t the cleanest place that I’ve stayed, meaning there were roaches, flies in the fridge, the showers smelled like sewage, but the stay only cost me $22/night and breakfast was included, so I didn’t really care. At least we were able to meet a lot of nice people in our twelve share bedroom! But seriously, we met a lot of nice Europeans. In Kings Cross there were supposedly 1,500 other backpackers, so both the day and night life was lively. Monday night we were invited by a few other flatmates to a barbie at a bar across the street. We received free food after we purchased a beer, so we jumped right on that deal. Two Aussies from the bar joined us for dinner, one old retired navy vet and a guy in his thirties, so we had fun listening to them tell stories about Oz as we watched the rugby league game that was on tv. After dinner we entered in a pool competition of 20 people or so. Ian and Todd were eliminated right away, and I only made it to the last six people, so we didn’t win any of the prize bar vouchers.  During these three days we spent most of our days walking around the city and exploring the botanical gardens in the park adjacent to the opera house and the Sydney Harbour Bridge. We really just bummed around and relaxed, which was exactly what our holiday was supposed to be.

We bussed to Botany, a nearby city, around noon on Wed to pick up our campervan, the Jucy Grande.  It came with its own fridge, stove, sink, dvd player, and water pump in the trunk, and was big enough to seat four. Up top there was a pop-up “penthouse” that could sleep two, but only one of us and some gear slept up there. We departed the rental shop and headed to the Blue Mountains, which are just west of Sydney. I made sure that I drove in the city, as I didn’t trust the other two’s capabilities to navigate traffic on the left, and found it pretty easy. It was a little nerve wracking at first, but as I got more comfortable with right turns and merging right into the fast lane on the highway it was fun. We spent the afternoon literally in the rain and clouds up in the mountains and found a nice lookout pull-off to spend the night. We cook a mean stir-fry in the back and watched a movie in the back of the van. During the whole night only two other vehicles drove by us, so I guess our spot was pristine. We got up Thurs morning and the rain had stopped. It was still a little cloudy, but we cooked breakfast and brought our tea out to the edge of the lookout. We visited a variety of waterfalls and lookouts during this day and found a campervan park nestled in a valley of the mountains. Here we met a few other travelers like us, and enjoyed talking to them at the dinner table. One guy was traveling across Oz in his van for a year, and was only three months into his trip. He normally would have been with his wife, but she had to go home for a wedding, so we kept him company this night. After talking to him it hit me how Australian he was and that Australia is not the US. We had to explain to him what college was, and he was amazed that kids leave their parents at 18 and decided what they’re going to do the rest of their lives. Here most people keep living at home and travel to “Uni” any time after their secondary school. We were going to go south of Sydney for Fri, but Dean convinced us to go north instead. We headed off to Terrigal Fri morning, and spent the afternoon relaxing on the beach. We found a coffee shop with free WiFi afterwards and booked our bus tickets to travel to Canberra the next day, which is where we were supposed to meet up with the group. We found a nice car park near a Little Beach in Boudi Ntl. Park south of Terrigal and spent the night there. We feasted this night, finishing off all the food that we had purchased for our car trip. Sat morning the cockatoos woke us up bright and early, and I drove us again back through Sydney and dropped Ian and Todd off by the train/bus station in the heart of the CBD. I then drove the car back to the Jucy Rental shop and bussed back to them. We rode a greyhound bus five hours down to Canberra and moved into our last hostel of the eight day vaca, which was much nicer than the one in Kings Cross.

We are spending this week in Canberra, which is comparable to D.C., visiting museums and lecturing a little on environmental policy. Then on Fri we are making our way back to Sydney to have our midterm exams… yay! Those will be on Fri and Sun, so this week is going to be a pretty laid back and studious week. On a different note, I received my first haircut of the trip today from Dr. Skiba. It took me a few nights to think it over, but I finally decided that different can be good. The mohawk will be gone in the next day or two so don’t worry, but for now the rest of my hair is at 3/10 of an inch.   

Resting on our way up to Wentworth Falls in the Blue Mtns 

Dinner in the Jucy Crib

One of many falls that we visited. 

We had our cuppa out on the rocks before taking off Thurs Morning

On top of the parliament building with my new hairdo. 

Eight Day Vaca!

Hello! I am writing to you from Sydney! I know Sydney wasn't in the plans, but after Ian, Todd and I were dropped off in rainy Melbourne yesterday morning and all the Jucy Cribs down in St. Kilda were taken, we did the next best thing we could think of: we jumped on a train and headed to Sydney. Our train left Melbourne at 8pm and arrived in Sydney at 8am this morning. We now have the next three days to relax at a backpackers, which costs us $22 a night, and then on Wed we are scheduled to pick up a campervan at 10am and begin our adventure. We are thinking about going to the Blue Mountains or even heading out towards the outback, but we aren't for sure yet. We will figure it out on the go.

So, Sydney is a lot like Melbourne only a lot bigger/urban and a lot more social. There are heaps of bars and clubs and everywhere we walk there are empty beer and wine bottles. Maybe this is just because yesterday was their mardi gras celebration, or maybe that's just the way the city is. This morning we went to the botanical gardens by the opera house and in it found some giant spiders and a flock of bats. An Asian marching band scared the "flying foxes" out the tree as they passed by. The bats didn't like the music too much, but we thought it was great!

We spent last week on Phillip Island, which is just east of Melbourne. The highlights of staying on the island were visiting the nesting sites of the penguins and shearwater birds. They estimate that there are over a million shearwaters nesting on the island, which the birds do by digging burrows a few metres deep for their single egg. When the chicks hatch they make easy targets for pacific gulls and copperhead snakes. This just reminded me that we saw a Kookaburra two days ago catch a copperhead, kill it,  swallow it whole and then brag to the other Kookaburras by laughing away. As for the penguins, they are the biggest tourist attraction for the island. Every night the birds come out of the ocean and parade back to their burrows in the hills. One night after sunset we were able to go down to the parade and watch them. We spent and hour watching group after groups of penguins make their way up the rocky beach and back to their burrows. A ranger counted 650 birds come onto the beach that we were at, but there are thousands that nest on the island. The afternoon before we watched the parade we actually made homes for the penguins. We constructed little boxes for them and placed them in a site that had formerly been someones house, but had been purchased by the park. Reclamation of the land is happening all over the island as they realize how important it is for the nesting migratory birds. The ranger told us that the boxes that we made would be occupied by penguins within two or three days. We made sure to let the penguins know that Oles from the US made their box by decorating the inside with an American Flag and "ole sayings".

Wish us luck as we travel. I'm looking forward to the freedom, and driving on the left side of the road of course. It has been nice being with the group, but at the same thing every hour of our day is planned out for us, so we haven't had much free time to explore on our own and relax. It was quite the change of pace from NZ life, but its good! I'll upload some pictures when I can!

Up in a light house of the Otways! David Richard Skiba, David Richard Wett (and Katie)

Hanging out at the Twelve Apostles

Ke Han, Mary, Dr. Ba, Karen, a weirdo and Todd. This was supposed to be our party face. 

A eucalyptus forest is not a bad place to live as a Koala