Journey Through the Red Center of Australia

I've been back from my trip up through the center of Australia for about two weeks now, and I'm still coming down from the excitement and energy that trip gave me. I can honestly say the road trip will go down as one of the best I've ever taken. The scenery was incredible, the people I traveled with were fun and adventurous, and the tour companies we used were top notch. In fifteen days, we traveled nearly 4,000 km (2,500 miles) across the continent starting in Adelaide and ending in Darwin. To talk about all the incredible parts of the trip would take ages and volumes, so I won't even try. I would upload some pictures, but I'm having trouble figuring that out at the moment. Instead, a few interesting tid bits:

I saw more camels in the Outback than kangaroos. Apparently, when they were building the Gahn railway that runs north-south, they used camels and then let them run wild. They've thrived in the desert that is most of Australia and are so numerous they are set to sell camel meat in the Australian supermarkets soon.

A town we stayed at in the middle of South Australia called Coober Pedy began as a settlement of miners who were looking for opal. The town still exists today with most residents living underground or in the sides of huge earthen mounds. This type of living keeps the home a steady temperature in the hot desert, but makes for a very bleak looking town - no grass, red dirt everywhere, and not much else going on. Coober Pedy (pronounced pee-dee) means "white man's burrow" in one of the Aborignal languages of the area.

Uluru (Ayer's Rock) is the largest monolith in the world and was a difficult climb. There's controversy surrounding if we should be climbing it or not. The Aboriginal people of the area would rather people not simply to keep them safe from falling to their deaths. I debated not climbing it, but couldn't pass up the opportunity.

Sleeping outside every night in a swag on the ground, staring at the clearest starry sky you've ever seen is the only way to spend your time traveling the Outback. I saw the Southern Cross and gases of the Milky Way galaxy it was so dark. Sunrise and sunsets out there can not be matched either.

Once you cross the Tropic of Capricorn, termite mounds begin to show up as you exit the desert and enter more forested areas. The more north you travel the taller they get. Just outside of Alice Springs they were no higher than my shins. In Darwin, they towered over me at just about 10 or 12 feet high. The termites themselves are no bigger than a poppy seed.

In the Northern Territory, there are snakes, spiders, termites, cane toads, and most important crocodiles. The fresh water crocs are pretty harmless and more scared of you than you of them. Plus they only get about 3 feet long. The salties on the other hand... they will kill you. They get to be about 10 or 12 feet long, but have been seen as big as 16 feet (5 meters). Signs were up everywhere that said, "Saltwater crocodiles have been known to enter these areas undetected. Swim at your own risk."

Darwin is a great little town with a decidedly 70s look after the whole place was destroyed in the 1970s after a hugh cyclone hit. So the architecture is in the style of the times. Litchfield and Kakadu National Parks just outside of Darwin are full of amazing waterholes, cascades, and rock jumps. Some are only accessible with four-wheel drive vehicles. Lucky for us, we had some.

So, those are just some of the highlights of the places I went and the things I saw. I had an amazing group of travel partners and we had such a blast together. We also really enjoyed meeting the other travelers on the tours we took. In our groups, we met people from England, Germany, Ireland, Switzerland, France, the Netherlands, Australia, Taiwan, South Korea, Japan, and different parts of the U.S. I met a former Swiss guard who'd protected the Pope, a former professional footy player (who I just recently met back up with in Melbourne), and a French amateur didgeridoo player who made the Northern Territory jungles come alive with his excellent playing. Such a variety of people only added to the excellence of the trip.

So why not take another one? Tomorrow, I head off to Brisbane for a week to tour Fraser Island, the largest sand island in the world, and the southern most parts of the Great Barrier Reef. It's sure to be a great trip to finish off my in between semester holiday.

A Trip on the Horizon

For the last several weeks, it's been nothing but research and writing. That's good and bad. It's good because one of my goals with this sojourn in Australia has been to improve my writing skills, but bad because... well, writing is hard work! I am in complete awe of journalists, authors, and professors who do this for a living.

At the University of Melbourne, they have twelve weeks for teaching, a full week where no one teaches and no one studies, then a three week long exam period. For my classes, I've had sizable papers due in all four subjects. None of the papers alone is too daunting a task, but having each of them due one after the other, the mind and spirit start showing signs of wear and tear. I appreciate the ample time they give us to complete them, but I'm just not used to such writing marathons and would almost like to get it all over with quicker. Almost.

I've written about the use of history in a museum gallery about minds and madness for my history of psychiatry class, realism versus anti-realism in my philosophy of science class, relativism in scientific controversies and the sociology of scientific knowledge for my sociology of science class, and the importance of Descartes' mechanical philosophy and dualism of mind/matter in breaking away from Aristotelian world views in my history of natural philosophy class. Not exactly the stuff of everyday life... but interesting and I feel privileged to be thinking about this stuff more than usual.

So while all my family and friends back home are enjoying the longest day of the year, I am experiencing the shortest. It starts getting dark here about 5 in the afternoon and by 5:30, you'd think it was midnight. Winter in June is a funny feeling. I'm certainly not used to dating academic papers in the month of June. Last night on television they were playing Home Alone and The Holiday both of which take place at Christmas time in the northern hemisphere, but I guess when it's winter time you play winter movies.

But enough about school and the weather...

The time has come for a trip. And I intend to use my five weeks of break between semesters to take a few. Tomorrow I set off on a two week trip from Adelaide in the south, to Darwin in the north. A road trip journey through the centre of Australia. A foray through the dry, vast, featureless, barren, and hot Outback. A backpacking escapade from the southern vineyards of Adelaide, through the red centre of Uluru (Ayers Rock) and Alice Springs, ending in the wild and dangerous Kakadu National Park outside of Darwin. Along the way I'll be seeing heaps of kangaroos and dingoes, crocodiles and snakes, sleeping in a swag (an Aussie type of tent for the Outback), riding in a van with a bunch of other adventure seekers like myself, and experiencing some of the most remote parts of the earth. I'm so excited for the trip I'm about to burst.

This should be something to write home about.

How American...

Every now and then I have a conversation about American-ness with Aussies. Two nights ago I was at a house party for some Dutch friends that are soon heading back to the Netherlands, and admitted to someone I was chatting with that one of the things I was surprised about and didn't anticipate in coming to Australia was a slight anti-American mentality I picked up here and there from people. By no means is this a very strong sentiment among Australians and Aussies are very polite to Americans and give them respect they would give any other foreigner to their country. But there IS something different in the way Americans are treated or thought of. You never hear someone say, "How Lithuanian..." with a rolling of the eyes and cheeky grin. But when someone says, "That's so American..." somehow that means something more than just where I'm from.

The following is something I wrote about two weeks into my stay in Melbourne. I never posted it, but through my conversation the other night I came to some of the same conclusions. Therefore, enjoy my thoughts from around four months ago:

Tonight was an interesting night. I had my first outing with a bunch of Aussies who were showing me the ropes of what it means to go out for a night of drinks with the fellas. "It's a nuance of Australian culture I've never thought about," said one of my mates, "but if someone buys you a drink, you are obligated to give your shout back or you're just shit." I then realized, I'd better buy the next jug of Carlton Draught, or I'd be labeled "shit". Our conversation turned towards travel, and I made the comment that many Americans on the whole don't find the time to travel or simply don't have the motivation to see the rest of the world. The Aussies looked at me with a bit of a smirk on each of their faces. We continued to talk about travel, and finally I asked them a question that dawned on me. With the looseness of the situation, and the carefree attitude that had marked the whole night of teasing conversation, I asked them, "Why does the rest of the world hate Americans?" They immediately became quite serious and replied, "Because they have no sense of how the world works outside of their country. They are ignorant."

America is ignorant. Hmm... I would like to think that my country is full of open-minded people who just haven't had the chance to venture out in the world and see what it's composition is, but the perception by the rest of the world (or at least by these Australians) is that we don't pay attention to anyone else but our selves, and we don't try to hide that fact even if we do go abroad. As much as we (and I) pride myself in being an American, we certainly could do our part to hear about other cultures and somewhat familiarize ourselves with what goes on in other parts of the world - parts with whom we are not at war or in which we do not have troops stationed. True, our media doesn't focus on world affairs as much as say the BBC does or other international new programs, but we as a people could choose to take more of an interest in our fellow nations of the world. We could at least acknowledge the fact that the sun doesn't rise and fall by the American day, and we are not the only nation out there that can influence world events. Americans do tend to become a bit self-absorbed with our own news and events, and forget that a whole world of other happenings takes place everyday of which we are completely and utterly unaware.

Tonight's conversation with the Aussies was very sobering in a way, but not too surprising. I knew my country had a reputation for being unaware, but when it's spelled out for you by three Aussies who don't hold anything back, you tend to get the message a bit clearer.

Characters on the Tram

Tram rides home aren't always this interesting.  But I guess, over the course of an hour and it being after midnight you can meet some interesting characters.  Usually I hop on, sit, and mind my own business listening to my i-Pod or just watch the stores, cafes, and pubs go past.  But last night I had some more excitement than usual.  I was taking the hour long tram ride back to the city from the suburb Bundoora, where I'd been visiting my friend Mark at La Trobe University, when a couple of girls stepped on and literally fell into the seats directly across from me, apparently having just come from a wilder place than another public tram.  Before these Australian white girls had jumped on the tram, the occupants in my immediate area were myself, several Indians speaking another language I couldn't begin to name, a black Muslim couple with the male in very modern day clothing and his significant other in the traditional head scarf and full length dress, and what I assumed was an Arabic couple, again, with the man in modern day clothes and this time the woman in head scarf, long plain dress, and some fabric covering her entire face leaving just enough space for her eyes to look out.  

Before these two girls sat down, no one had been speaking English on the tram.  They both had helium-filled balloons and those very Melburnian/European razor-straight-bang haircuts.  They were talkative, but I was not in the mood to chit chat at the moment and continued listening to my i-Pod.  The tram began to fill up more and more as we approached closer and closer to the city center.  Then a girl dressed up as a pirate got on the tram and sat down next to me.  Suddenly it just seemed silly to continue listening to my music with all these characters surrounding me, so I took them off and the girls soon engaged me in conversation.  Oh... we talked about everything you could think of: the party they'd just come from, why this girl was dressed as a pirate (21st birthday party), the engagement story of one of the girls involving her high boyfriend asking her to marry him in the middle of a mosh pit at a concert... You know, the typical things strangers strike up conversations about.  The best part about being in a foreign country and talking with strangers is the minute you open your mouth, you suddenly expose an excellent conversation point: where are you from?  Melbourne is full of different languages and ethnicities, but they don't get too many Americans.  A lot of times I get asked if I'm Canadian.  I briefly got in a word or two about where I was from when the two girls with the balloons and strange engagement story departed.  Just me and the pirate girl.  

My stop was next, so I said goodbye, or arggg if you like, to the pirate girl, and walked to the next tram stop to wait for my final leg of the journey back to my apartment.  A guy sitting one bench away from me asked for the time, and when I told him, he again noticed my accent.  He asked where I was from, and I told him Kentucky.  "You're a long way from home, mate."  Sometimes I forget that I'm almost 10,000 miles from home being here for almost four months now.  We struck up a conversation because it turned out he worked with racing horses and knew about Kentucky's reputation for being horse country.  This guy gets up everyday at around 3 am to go take care of the horses before they do their training.  Why on earth he has to get up that early I have no idea.  It ended up that both of us were catching the same tram, so we continued our conversation.  He was originally from New South Wales, just over the border, and was the first non-Victorian Aussie I've met.  Of course, he downplayed Melbourne's dominance as Australia's best city and talked up Sydney a bit.  He said that Sydneysiders call people from Victoria Mexicans since they're south of the border.  I found that an odd but flattering comment, as it sort of suggested a comparison between Sydney and the U.S.  It was like the guy was saying, "You know what I mean," with a slight elbow jab and a wink.  I told him about Lexington and the beautiful horse farms surrounding the city, and he seemed pretty excited to find out something new about Kentucky horses.  The tram arrived at my stop, and we said goodbye.

I mention all this because I think it speaks to how life is different in a big city like Melbourne.  Meeting people on a tram, hearing their crazy stories and then parting ways never to run into each other again is something that never happens in small towns and even most American cities lacking Melbourne's unique public transport system.  Before those girls got on the tram, I was the lone American, lone white person, lone English speaker.  I guess that points to Melbourne's multiculturalism as well.  What a funny night.

Professors Strike. Students Rejoice.

Today my professors are on strike.

Well, to be fair, not all of them are. Two of my four professors decided to participate and not come in for work today. I first heard about it on Monday of this past week when one of my professors made the announcement that he would not be holding the usual lecture on Thursday due to his participation in the Melbourne wide strike by members of the National Tertiary Education Union. Most of the University of Melbourne staff are not coming into work today meaning that a few libraries are closed, most of the different school offices are closed, and lectures were canceled. I've asked some of my professors about the strike, and they've offered different answers for why it's happening. One said that workloads on teachers are becoming unbearable. Another mentioned that faculty budgets are in such deficit that many teachers were let go in past years, and now class sizes are too large, and teachers are having to take on too many classes per semester. The strike is trying to bring the university administration "back to the negotiation table", as one of my professors put it, so that some agreement can be made about working to increase funding by the government and decrease class size and workload.

My first reaction to this whole event was: seriously? The professors are on strike? Wow, I've never thought of that. To me a strike is for factory workers or public transit workers. They strike and production stops or everyone is late for work. The point is made very directly and is easily observed. However, with a professor strike, I'm not so sure the effect is quite the same. Today has seemed like a normal day, just with a few of my lectures canceled, some libraries I never visit being closed, and a few people handing out fliers promoting the strike. I'd say lots of students are glad to not have classes, and will gladly "participate" in the strike by not attending lectures. I guess I just don't quite see how this is effective. Seems to me the only people inconvenienced by this are the professors themselves, who will have to alter their course plans, or possibly a few students who may have to work a bit harder to learn material not covered by the professor that day.

My second reaction to this was: why doesn't this happen in the U.S.? Maybe it does and I just haven't heard about it. The Australians do use their unions more than we do, so maybe this is a product of that union mentality. Although, this doesn't quite compare with some French university staff, who according to one of my professors who didn't go on strike today, once went on strike for three months. That's disruptive and the point would be driven home real quick. I asked this professor, who happens to be American, why this doesn't happen in the U.S. He suggested that maybe conditions at universities are better for the most part. Or is it that Americans just don't go on strike as much and the teachers don't utilize unions? I'm not sure, but this whole event is odd to me, and may point to a few cultural and societal differences between Australia and the U.S.

100 Days

So in keeping with the tradition of arbitrarily assigning importance to the first 100 days of the presidency, I would like to use this post to mark 100 days of being in Australia. I can say that I've settled in pretty well. I wander the city map free frequently, and recently gave advice to someone who is coming to Melbourne about house hunting. Amazing how three months can turn you into an expert. I mentioned in a past post that Uni Melb's campus was hard to navigate, but as a mouse soon learns the correct path to the cheese, so have I learned my way around campus rather well. It's really just a matter of getting used to how the university operates, and letting the unfamiliar become familiar with time. I also ride my bike everywhere. To university, to the market, to the park, to friends' flats, to the central business district, any and everywhere. I've ridden my bike so much that it's now second nature to hop on it and start pedaling. I don’t get near as tired as I used to pedaling around everywhere, and Melbourne is set up to accommodate cyclist really well, with bike lanes on almost every street. Because I’m always on the roads, I’ve become well acquainted with driving on the left side. I saw a movie the other day (Star Trek, which was excellent), and a scene showing a car driving on the right side of the road looked strange to me. Now I know I’m settled here.

This Isn't Your Ordinary Football

America is sports crazy. We love football, basketball, and baseball. All other sports are just filler for these big three that rule the talk on SportsCenter and dominate the topic of everyday conversations among a fair chunk of the population. America has plenty of people who don't pay much attention to sports or find the topic boring, but I'd say everyone would agree we are a sports obsessed nation as a whole. Well so is Australia. In some ways they might even be more sports crazy per capita. I found this out when I attended the ANZAC footy match a couple weekends ago. There I came face to face with the funny and entertaining sport of Australian rules football.

At first glance you'd think you were watching rugby. Of course, I don't know much about rugby but I know enough to recognize it. Footy (as the Aussies call Australian rules football), however, is not rugby. And you'd run the risk of insulting the Melburnians of Victoria by saying that. Victoria is known for it's footy teams, and for awhile the sport was only played in Victoria. Rugby on the other hand is very much a New South Wales sport that Sydneysiders get into more. This comparison of footy versus rugby plays into the larger competition of Melbourne versus Sydney that raises its head every now and again when I talk with Australians.

So as I said, at first glance you'd think you were watching rugby, but then you notice that they aren't laterally passing the ball, but bumping the ball to each other with a clenched fist volleyball style. Or they kick the ball to each other or towards four goal posts at opposite ends of the oval field to score a goal. As I over heard a guy from Los Angeles explain to some of his American friends, "It's like if football, soccer, and volleyball all got together and had one love child." I don't know that I totally agree (or if that's physically possible), but I see where he's coming from. Footy's a fast paced, high scoring game, and once you get the gist of the rules, it's a lot of fun to watch.

As I walked to the game with my Rotarian host, Kevin, his daughter, and her friend, I began to feel the excitement in the air. The sky was a bit overcast, but the stadium loomed large ahead of us, a gigantic oval with towering poles with hundreds of lights spaced evenly around the sides. To say this stadium is big doesn't quite cut it. It's enormous, titanic, gargantuan. Kevin told me that on some ANZAC Day matches, over 100,000 people show up to the match. This special match is always a face off of two of the oldest and most popular footy clubs in Melbourne: the Essendon Bombers and Collingwood Magpies. My Rotary host counselor had set me straight when I first arrived in Melbourne about who I should be cheering for. "Who do you barrack for?" he asked. I didn't really have an answer for him and was a bit stymied by his use of the word "barrack". "Well it better be the Bombers or you can go ahead and find yourself another place to stay," he chuckled. The Aussies ask this question a lot when the footy subject comes up. "Who do you barrack for?" is not interchangeable with "Who do you root for?" however. The second question takes on an entirely different meaning, as the Aussies use the term "root" in a sexual context. Anyway...

The game was exciting and entertaining to watch even for someone who didn't quite know all that was going on. The two teams were pretty evenly matched this year, and the game wasn't decided until a final kick by Essendon in the last 10 seconds to put them just a few points over Collingwood. That's right, my team won. The stadium that day had about 85,000 people in the stands all of them either Essendon or Collingwood fans. The fans erupted with excitement or complete frustration after that final kick and the whole place was an uproar. Some were jumping up for joy, spinning their Bomber scarves around in celebration, hollering at the top of their lungs, and others were cursing the umpires and loudly complaining about the last second clutch kick that put the victory away for the Bombers. Talk about being into the game. It doesn't get much more devoted than this.

Again, I'm struck by the fact that hardly a single American knows a thing about this sport. Little do we know that about 9,000 miles away there's an island nation of around 21 million people who go nuts when guys in really short shorts run around for a good two hours punting and volleying the ball to each other, racking up scores like 98 to 86 or so, and taking some pretty gruesome and even bloody tackles while doing so. Just goes to show a bit of the insularity that America still has in this ever more globalized world especially towards Australia and what is happening down here. However, it does make for some great surprises when you visit, and I'd say that footy has added another fan to its ranks.