Journeys and Reflections

A Day in Canberra March 6, 2006

After a night at the hostel watching Firefly episodes, we got up and went to the War Memorial, where we saw Australia’s tribute to the war dead and learned about their actions at Gallipoli in WWI and other wars. Thinking seriously about war always leaves me quiet – war is such a terrible thing, and the memorial depicted it well. There is always courage and humanity and misunderstanding on both sides (even when there actually is one side clearly in the right), but the overall feeling I have, especially seeing depictions of the WWI trenches, is overwhelming sadness. All the images of men living and dying in misery in the trenches, and for what – a couple yards gained only to be lost the next week.

After Chinese for lunch we headed to the new Parliament House, which was a beautiful building built right into a hill. We could actually climb up to the roof of the building on top of the hill and look out over the city. After a tour through Parliament we headed to a park to hang out for a few hours and had a good and fairly intense game of ultimate. The downside was we had to pile sweaty into the bus for the long ride back to Sydney, only interrupted by dinner at a pub in a town along the way.

Blue Mountains March 4, 2006

Today was our one real free day in Sydney, so Kristen, Anna, and I decided to head out to the Blue Moutains for some hiking. We got the 9:25 train out to the small town where we eventually found our way to the cliff’s edge. When we arrived, everything was shrouded in fog, but right as we came to Echo Point, the fog began to clear, and we ended up with glorious day for hiking. We climbed by the Three Sisters down into the valley (1000 stairs!) and then back up again and along the rim stopping at various overlooks. When we came back through Echo Point the Three Sisters were gorgeous, and we stopped to talk for a while with Adam, an old Polish immigrant who told us the legend of the Three Sisters and showed us cool things through his binoculars like the face on one of the Sisters and the giant bees’ nest in a cave on the cliff. After a long day of hiking we stopped at a street-side cafe for a chocolate milkshake and great pasta, and then caught the two hour train back to Brisbane, where wandered back to the hostel after throwing the frisbee for a bit in a streetside park.

Finishing Coastal Forest Ecosystems February 26, 2006

My first class in Australia is actually complete. Yesterday we went back out on the river for another two transects – by now we have them lightning fast. After our last transect we climbed for a bit and took a bunch of pictures high up in the trees and hanging upside down. Then we went to another stand of Rhizophora for Kat to film a bit of her movie, in which I star as Dave the Crocidile Hunter. Then it was back to resort to begin putting together all of our data. Percy and I ended up taking over the results, which meant a lot of time with Excel working with data and making graphs. The others somehow figured out what our results meant, and we ended up with quite a good presentation.

Meanwhile, we were writing a new song to finish off our presentation: “Mangrove Love Song,” a mournful country ballad recounting a love affair with a mangrove gone sour. Kristen, Percy, and I wrote it all last night, finishing it up pretty late and not introducing it to the whole group till this morning, but it’s a good song. Matt does a Johnny cash-style talking bit that’s amazing, and harmonica’s always work well with laments.

We got up this morning for a last minute practice. Then we introduced the song to the group, making a few last minute changes. Then it was off to the presentations. We were last to go, but our presentation went over well, and song turned out pretty good. The verses are low and Kristen and I were shaky on the lyrics, so I don’t think many people got those, but the chorus was good and Matt’s bridge was amazing.

The afternoon was spent doing our final assessment for the course: three hours to answer to essay questions. That done, a few of us wandered to the beach to watch the waves for a bit (we can’t get in because of killer jellyfish). Then I went back and relaxed in the pool for a while.

Tonight we’ll have our final dinner with Norm and Mike and crew and then do a night of fun at the bar. Apparently there’s a sound system, so I think I may get to play through all the songs again. I’m looking forward to trying “Mangrove Love Song” with a mic.

For those interested, here are the lyrics . . .

Mangrove Love Song (When Your Branch Broke)

1.The first time I saw your buttress flare,
The sweet music of mosquitoes hung in the air.
I breathed in your stinking pits of mud
Felt your rough bark and smooth young bud
Tasted the salt you excrete from your pore
I knew I had to come back for some more
It all began on that warm summer day
A love that flourished in the rain’s cool spray

CHORUS: When your branch broke, you broke my heart
And I landed in the mud and was back at the start
I saw my bleeding soul in your oozing red sap
How did I ever fall into your trap?

2. Thinking back on the days of estuarine delight
Those pneumatophores, they just felt so right
Your propogules were always on my mind
How could I have been so blind?
I couldn’t see through your tangled web of roots
Your slippery branches didn’t hold up my boots
Did you think of how it’d make me feel
Leaving me to be to be crocs’ next meal?

BRIDGE (spoken by Percy in a Johnny Cash voice):
Well mangroves, I’ve known a few in my day. Rhizophora, she was the first, she was nice, but those prop roots wandered off way too soon. Sonneratia, well her apples turned out to be a whole lotta sour and not a lotta sweet. Bruguiera, oh sweet Brugy, those knee roots had a mind of their own. And now Xylocarpus, I thought you were the one, till I found myself face down in the mud and with one o your cannonballs laying by my side. So my advice to all you guys out there, they may seem great at first, but stay away from them mangroves, cuz you’ll only get hurt . . . big time. I been hurt before, and I’ll be hurt again, cuz I’m in too deep. But take the advice of me, Norm Duke, a hard core mangrove addict, they’ll love you, they’ll leave you, and they’ll ruin you.

Mangrove Transects, Pt. 2 (and the Lamington Song) February 24, 2006

Today we returned to the mangroves for another day of clambering over prop roots and slopping through mud. It didn’t rain as much today, which meant there were a few more mosquitos. We did four transects, 50 m each as yesterday. Today I had my camera in Kristen’s waterproof housing and also Kat’s video camera, so we got a decent bit of good footage and photos. Our look for today was “surprised” – every photo we had to have a look of shock. There was some pretty good climbing today – at one point we found a mangrove trunk that curved around almost in a full picture. Matt hung from the top doing the splits, I lounged in the curve of the bottom, and Kat stuck her head into the middle for a great picture.

We’ve come to have very strong preferences for what type of mangroves to be dealing with. We highly prefer Rhyzophora because it has big prop roots that make for great climbing and the least mud. Brugiera just has small knee roots which make poor footholds and produce a lot of tramping through deep mud.

The last transect was probably our favorite – we had plenty of good Rhyzophora to climb and got a solid rainstorm at the end. Meanwhile, Chris, Olaf, and Chelsea had the toughest transect yet – slogging through deep mud with swarms of mosquitos. The videos we have of them coming back to the boat are priceless – Chris and Olaf weren’t too happy but Chelsea still had a smile on her face. We boated back, enjoying the rest and singing songs from “Les Miserables.”

Today is Zubin’s 21st birthday, so after dinner we threw him into the pool according to the old Stanford tradition. Then after the evening debriefing, Kristen and I presented to everyone the new song, “Lamington,” recounting our adventures in the rainforest with Mike Pole. It went over great, and I think Mike was honored by having a song written about him. Afterward a few of us sat around talking with Mike for a few hours and then I settled down to watch men’s aerials for a bit before heading to sleep.

Here are the lyrics to the song . . .

Lamington (The Leech Kingdom)

1. Call me Mike Pole; I’ll be your guide to fire and trees
With a leech in my eye, I can’t pause to cry, just push on down the trail
Meet tutor Conrad, who wrestles snakes and tastes like sexy,
And Rob, plant demigod, will sing us all to sleep
Now we’re all here, let the activities begin

Commence the transects, with piles of leaves of entire margins
“What species is this?” “Let’s say they’re the same” and on the story goes
Old fire boundaries, where Eucalyptus meets the booyong
And tests to give the studious a pang of fear
But the sunset blaze reminds us why we’re here

CHORUS: Lamington, Lamington,
O take me away to your leech kingdom
Lamington, O Lamington
With Mike Pole as our guide
We’ll wander far and wide
From the day’s first rays ‘til the fire of the setting sun
In Lamington

2. Up the Caldera, singing songs of pop and Broadway
“Silence please, respect the trees, they’re older than you know.”
Across the stream, waterfalls one after another,
The beauty’s too much, can’t take it in – all rush and foam and roar
But the winner is the summit’s view of cloud.

Then the leech attacks, grabbing hard to socks and ankles
And Ryan’s found a new lover to leave a hickie on his neck
The rain comes down, and the trail’s a mass of fog and mudslides
Slip and slide, keep pushing on, it’s only five miles more
If you run you’ll make it back for Happy Hour

3. What amazing fauna, from paddymelons to shining glow worms,
Blue lobster-looking things that put up quite a fight
Conrad’s the master, from possums to his leaf-tailed geckos
Emily, watch out for snakes, they care not for your shoe
Now the commodore is calling to the frogs

(Spoken: This next verse is a description of the duckbill platypus based on personal observations by our very own Courtney and Kat)
Hm
Hm
Hm
Hm
Then they awoke, but there was nothing to be seen.

Swimming Upstream (Through Crocidile-Infested Waters) February 20, 2006

Today was our first real taste of the Daintree. After breakfast, we all piled into cars and took off to the forest. Courtney, Kat, Kristen, and I ended up in the small car, which actually was great because it was the nicest and we had the windows down the whole way, enjoying the cool wind. The cars were pulled on a ferry across the Daintree River, and then we split into three groups for the day.

In the morning we spent the first bit with a guy named Allen who has been replanting rainforest in areas which were cleared for grazing. It’s pretty amazing how fast the rainforest can get reestablished. After just four years, there were trees close to thirty feet tall. Next we went with Norm for a walk on the boardwalks, wandering through the jungle until we reached the boundary with the mangroves. We stopped by the beachside for lunch, throwing the frisbee for a while as usual after eating.

The afternoon was when things got interesting. We were with Mike Pole – the goal of the day was to reach a stand of rare gymnostoma, but the trail to them was pretty rough. The first group tried to reach it and had problems, so the second group just hung out and swam in Noah’s Creek, only to be told there were often crocidiles there. For our group, Mike decided to try swimming up Noah’s Creek to reach the trees, with Mike assuring us that the chance of encountering a crocidile was basically nil. So in to the cold, tropical river we piled, swimming against the current and pushing ourselves forward against the current. It had to be the most amazing “class” experience I’ve ever had – hanging out in this clear, tropical stream while Mike talked about various plants. A couple came out wanting to know what we were doing, to which Olaf the tutor responded we were testing out a new type of lecture setting. They told us off for swimming in the river to which Mike calmly responded that everyone is entitled to their own opinion. We swam on for a while but eventually turned back and let the current carry us back to the bus.

Afterward we stopped at a tropical ice cream shop where got to taste the fruit of the jungle in ice cream form. There Mike talked to Allen, our rainforest expert, only to find out that Allen would in fact not recommend that we swim in Noah’s Creek (although he’s done it himself several times). And the couple who told us not to swim apparently have tourists onto their property who swim in the river all the time. Regardless, it was a pretty amazing experience.

Mossman Gorge February 19, 2006

After a morning lecture with Mike Pole on Flannery’s theory of extinctions, we drove to Mossman Gorge for lunch and a visit to the Dreamtime Aboriginal center. We took a walk and had lunch on some rocks on the river bank, and then we wandered down a bit further to a good swimming hole. Percy and I jumped and swam around a bit, bringing the frisbee in with us. The water was cold but refreshing. We couldn’t stay in very long because we were supposed to arrive at 2 for a guided tour of the forests. As it was, we still arrived almost ten minutes late (our group has a problem with this).

Our Aboriginal guides took us into the forest, showing us how they have been using all the different plants of the rainforest as a supermarket of sorts where they can make everything that they could need. It was actually really cool seeing all the different uses for the rainforest plants: leaves that make soap when rubbed together, nuts that burn like candles, beans that drug fish to sleep when put in water.

After a brief concert on the digereedoo we drove to the resort where we will be staying for the next week. It’s a really nice place – only a short walk from the beach and a whole complex of pools. One of the pools had a log going across it on which we had no end of fun engaging in mortal combat, mercilessly grappling with each other to throw the other person into the water. The log was then converted to a volleyball net for another flurry of fun activity.

Somehow we got here three days before the resort was expecting us. You wouldn’t have guessed it from the dinner they prepared for us: pizza, prawns, amazing salads, brownies with ice cream (and a lot more that I was just too full to eat). We decided this will make a good place to live for the next week.