For our Australian Culture and Society class, we have broken up into four modules- each of which covers a different subject area. I'm in Aboriginal Australians, and today we had our first class.
First of all, it's important to know that since the First Fleet of European settlers arrived in Australia in 1788, there has been a rift between the colonizers and the Aboriginal people. After devastating losses in the earlier phases of European presence, Aboriginals were able to rebuild their population in the late 19th and early 20th century. Now they are actually greater in number than ever before.
Despite all this, there is still some heavy conflict between the two peoples. Today we learned a lot about the lifestyle and mindset of Aboriginal Australians from an amazing professor. She is half Wiradjuri and half Scot, and is extremely knowledgeable on the subject of Aboriginal people. The Wiradjuri people originated about 250 miles West of Sydney in Victoria.
I walked away from class today with two major points ringing in my ears. We began class by sitting in a circle on the floor, looking at a map of Australia. The map was not divided into the six major areas it is today. Instead, it was divided into hundreds of territories- each of which represented a different group of Aboriginal peoples at the time of European settlement in Australia. The most interesting thing: there were no hard borders around the territories. Rather, the colors representing distinct groups faded into one another, forming blurred lines. Our professor, Jennifer, said that though each territory was predominantly inhabited by one group of Aboriginals, they shared their lands with surrounding tribes. "Borders" were formed by natural land features, such as rivers, valleys, etc. Neighboring tribes could simply drop in for an extended visit, or they could seek help after a natural disaster if needed. The bottom line was, the Aboriginal people were not opposed to sharing their lands in ANY way. This may seem contradictory to what many of you have learned, because many history books (according to Jennifer), present the Aboriginals as territorial people. This is primarily a tactic used to save European face.
After the first in-class lesson, we took a tour around Victoria Park. It was a complete surprise to me to learn that the park is actually highly representative of what Sydney looked like before the Europeans colonized. The topography of the land has been very well preserved, because the colonizers did not bring materials with them that could handle major landscaping jobs. This, and the fact that the bulldozer hadn't yet been invented, caused them to have to develop their city according to the land's structure as it was. We stood on the top level of a car park (parking lot) at the end of the tour to see the lay of the land better. When you're looking for it, it's very easy to see that the city's structure is completely based on natural landscaping. Very interesting stuff.
I could go on for hours about how much more we learned (including how to freshen your breath using peppermint gum leaves and how to clear your sinuses with Eucalyptus leaves), but I am going to save the remainder of my energy for an economics paper I have to write. Thursday and Friday will be busy with homework, so my next post will be a while from now. Hope all is well in the States, and that everyone is learning as much as I am! Lots of love to friends and family!
Wednesday, February 3, 2010
Monday, February 1, 2010
Jolly old town!
This past weekend was one of the quietest, but most enjoyable, we've had yet. We wanted to explore other parts of the city, because we've spent most of our time in the Harbour.
We live between two notoriously interesting neighborgoods: Glebe and Newtown. This weekend, we tackled Glebe-a feat easily accomplished in one day. Every Saturday, there is a market in the Glebe Public School lawn from 10am-4pm, and we have heard from several sources that it's a "must see." We ended up spending almost the whole day there.
First of all, the market is nestled behind a bizarre rainbow fence that looks like a box of crayons gone wild. There's one entryway that is crowded with Save-the-Children-esque solicitors, but it's worth the uncomfortable squeeze to get past them. Inside, countless booths selling everything from candy to watches sit in neat rows filled with shoppers. Kate and I spent hours sifting through mountains of clothes, journals, jewelry, and beyond. It took a LOT of self control to resist the endless temptations.
After we perused the gadgets, we grabbed a snack and decided to get our beach towels and hang out in the lawn. There was a French musician rocking the guitar all day, so we just chilled out and watched the clouds roll by! It was awesome. When we got too hot, we had a picnic of cheese, crackers, and grapes in my air-conditioned room. The day before, we had discovered the fruit market nearby our building, and decided to take full advantage of all they had to offer!
On Sunday, we ventured further down the coast to Coogee Beach! We tried to go there a few times before, but it's pretty far so we kept putting it off. Let me just say it is worth every second of the trek! They have a natural lagoon on one end of the beach that is BEAUTIFUL! Sadly, I didn't have my camera with me because we were in and out of the ocean the whole time, but I will be sure to return and snap some pictures. Kate and I then hiked up the rocks above the lagoon to this park-like area on top of the cliffs. We sat out on a flat rock right at the edge of the cliff for about an hour, and basked in the sun while enjoying the endless expanse of ocean before us. It was one of the most beautiful sights I've ever seen. Again, I'll definitely be back there so I will get some pictures.
Last night Daniel (the filmmaker, not R.A. Dan) made us lamb chops and mashed potatoes for dinner. We were all exhausted from the weekend/week before, so we decided to see Invictus. It was SO GOOD!!!!! I highly recommend it. The soundtrack was bizarre, but it featured a lot of really cool South African music that I want to download.
The next four weekends will be much, much busier than this one. I'll be in Melbourne, Byron Bay, Tasmania, and SURF CAMP!!! Can't wait to start doing some major traveling. I will post some more pictures soon, but I forgot to bring my computer charger so I can't upload them right now.
Cheers, mates! Hope everything is well in the States. I will write again soon!
We live between two notoriously interesting neighborgoods: Glebe and Newtown. This weekend, we tackled Glebe-a feat easily accomplished in one day. Every Saturday, there is a market in the Glebe Public School lawn from 10am-4pm, and we have heard from several sources that it's a "must see." We ended up spending almost the whole day there.
First of all, the market is nestled behind a bizarre rainbow fence that looks like a box of crayons gone wild. There's one entryway that is crowded with Save-the-Children-esque solicitors, but it's worth the uncomfortable squeeze to get past them. Inside, countless booths selling everything from candy to watches sit in neat rows filled with shoppers. Kate and I spent hours sifting through mountains of clothes, journals, jewelry, and beyond. It took a LOT of self control to resist the endless temptations.
After we perused the gadgets, we grabbed a snack and decided to get our beach towels and hang out in the lawn. There was a French musician rocking the guitar all day, so we just chilled out and watched the clouds roll by! It was awesome. When we got too hot, we had a picnic of cheese, crackers, and grapes in my air-conditioned room. The day before, we had discovered the fruit market nearby our building, and decided to take full advantage of all they had to offer!
On Sunday, we ventured further down the coast to Coogee Beach! We tried to go there a few times before, but it's pretty far so we kept putting it off. Let me just say it is worth every second of the trek! They have a natural lagoon on one end of the beach that is BEAUTIFUL! Sadly, I didn't have my camera with me because we were in and out of the ocean the whole time, but I will be sure to return and snap some pictures. Kate and I then hiked up the rocks above the lagoon to this park-like area on top of the cliffs. We sat out on a flat rock right at the edge of the cliff for about an hour, and basked in the sun while enjoying the endless expanse of ocean before us. It was one of the most beautiful sights I've ever seen. Again, I'll definitely be back there so I will get some pictures.
Last night Daniel (the filmmaker, not R.A. Dan) made us lamb chops and mashed potatoes for dinner. We were all exhausted from the weekend/week before, so we decided to see Invictus. It was SO GOOD!!!!! I highly recommend it. The soundtrack was bizarre, but it featured a lot of really cool South African music that I want to download.
The next four weekends will be much, much busier than this one. I'll be in Melbourne, Byron Bay, Tasmania, and SURF CAMP!!! Can't wait to start doing some major traveling. I will post some more pictures soon, but I forgot to bring my computer charger so I can't upload them right now.
Cheers, mates! Hope everything is well in the States. I will write again soon!
Wednesday, January 27, 2010
Woggan ma gule
Yesterday was Australia Day, which is the slightly more extreme equivalent of our Independence Day . Some people refer to Aussie Day as Discovery Day, while others refer to it as Survival Day. If you know anything about the ongoing conflict between European and Indigenous Australians, this disparity is unsurprising. There are infinite activities, events, festivals, performances, etc. offered, and we have been told Sydney is the place to be for the celebration.
Late Monday evening, we were informed by a friend that there was a performance starting at 8 am on Aussie Day featuring traditional Aboriginal dance and music. The participants are all descendants of the Gadigal people, who lived on the shores of Sydney harbor. The morning ceremony is called Woggan ma gule, and it's located in the Royal Botanical Gardens in a spot that is significant to the Gadigal people. It marks the original shoreline of the harbor and also used to be the site of male initiation ceremonies.
What can I say other than it. was. amazing. We woke up at 6:30, RA Dan made us some delicious stuffed French toast, and we headed to the gardens and were all so impressed by the performance. It was completely different than I expected it would be, and I'm so glad we made the effort to go. I would say the most significant thing I took away from the experience was an awareness of how Indigenous peoples have gradually adapted to modern society, whether they wanted to or not. Some of the music they used in the performance was pre-recorded and mixed by a DJ of sorts. The live music mainly consisted of one or two older tribe members singing and a few supplementary instruments.
I also thought of a moment from my freshman year at SMU during the performance. We had a guest artist come to teach us a type of African dance, and at the time I was so unappreciative of the privilege of learning the traditional movements. Seeing an Aboriginal dance firsthand that has been passed down for centuries made me so aware of how meaningful the movements are to them. Every step was so clearly derived from nature, which was amazing to me because I've always favored classical ballet because it's more asthetically pleasant to me. I still love ballet, but it's different to me now. I've already found a couple of great ballet studios around where I live, but I'm going to look around for classes offering Aboriginal dance.
After the dance performance, we walked along the shoreline through the Botanical Gardens for a few hours. At this point it was only about 8:45 am, so our friends were all still fast asleep and we had some time to kill before the festivities began. We walked by the Opera House steps and through Circular Quay before we went back home.
At home, we all gathered on the roof for a little while in our Aussie pride gear. We left for the beach a little later after sharing some midday wine and snacks! We started at Bondi, then walked along the same cliff walk to Bronte where we met up with a bunch of other friends. In retrospect, I remember only putting sunscreen on my face and shoulders, but miraculously did NOT get burned even though I was in my bathing suit the whole day! From there, we came back home for about an hour to shower and regroup, and in the meantime completely missed the fireworks. Oops! We heard they were pretty cool, but not as impressive as some people expected. We finally went to Cargo Bar at about 8:30 pm, which is on King Street Wharf right in Circular Quay, and tore up the dance floor for hours! It was so much fun that we stayed until about 1:30 am despite our early wake-up that morning.
The whole day was a ton of fun, and I think my favorite part of it, aside from the dance performance, was just talking to locals and seeing how truly proud of and in love with Australia they are. Everywhere we went, people were sporting red, white, and blue and Aboriginal red, yellow, and black. I've definitely never seen such a huge-scale celebration before.
Despite the lack of mass-celebration, I hope everyone's January 26th was as fun-filled as ours was!
One final note- my friend Kate is a photojournalism major at BU, and she takes some absolutely stunning photos. She loves taking pictures of people, which is great for us because she captures a lot of amazing moments. Here's the link to her website, which she will continue to update throughout the semester. I'll keep posting the link when she updates so you can take a look at her most recent stuff! She's the best!
http://katesampphotography.com/
Late Monday evening, we were informed by a friend that there was a performance starting at 8 am on Aussie Day featuring traditional Aboriginal dance and music. The participants are all descendants of the Gadigal people, who lived on the shores of Sydney harbor. The morning ceremony is called Woggan ma gule, and it's located in the Royal Botanical Gardens in a spot that is significant to the Gadigal people. It marks the original shoreline of the harbor and also used to be the site of male initiation ceremonies.
What can I say other than it. was. amazing. We woke up at 6:30, RA Dan made us some delicious stuffed French toast, and we headed to the gardens and were all so impressed by the performance. It was completely different than I expected it would be, and I'm so glad we made the effort to go. I would say the most significant thing I took away from the experience was an awareness of how Indigenous peoples have gradually adapted to modern society, whether they wanted to or not. Some of the music they used in the performance was pre-recorded and mixed by a DJ of sorts. The live music mainly consisted of one or two older tribe members singing and a few supplementary instruments.
I also thought of a moment from my freshman year at SMU during the performance. We had a guest artist come to teach us a type of African dance, and at the time I was so unappreciative of the privilege of learning the traditional movements. Seeing an Aboriginal dance firsthand that has been passed down for centuries made me so aware of how meaningful the movements are to them. Every step was so clearly derived from nature, which was amazing to me because I've always favored classical ballet because it's more asthetically pleasant to me. I still love ballet, but it's different to me now. I've already found a couple of great ballet studios around where I live, but I'm going to look around for classes offering Aboriginal dance.
After the dance performance, we walked along the shoreline through the Botanical Gardens for a few hours. At this point it was only about 8:45 am, so our friends were all still fast asleep and we had some time to kill before the festivities began. We walked by the Opera House steps and through Circular Quay before we went back home.
At home, we all gathered on the roof for a little while in our Aussie pride gear. We left for the beach a little later after sharing some midday wine and snacks! We started at Bondi, then walked along the same cliff walk to Bronte where we met up with a bunch of other friends. In retrospect, I remember only putting sunscreen on my face and shoulders, but miraculously did NOT get burned even though I was in my bathing suit the whole day! From there, we came back home for about an hour to shower and regroup, and in the meantime completely missed the fireworks. Oops! We heard they were pretty cool, but not as impressive as some people expected. We finally went to Cargo Bar at about 8:30 pm, which is on King Street Wharf right in Circular Quay, and tore up the dance floor for hours! It was so much fun that we stayed until about 1:30 am despite our early wake-up that morning.
The whole day was a ton of fun, and I think my favorite part of it, aside from the dance performance, was just talking to locals and seeing how truly proud of and in love with Australia they are. Everywhere we went, people were sporting red, white, and blue and Aboriginal red, yellow, and black. I've definitely never seen such a huge-scale celebration before.
Despite the lack of mass-celebration, I hope everyone's January 26th was as fun-filled as ours was!
One final note- my friend Kate is a photojournalism major at BU, and she takes some absolutely stunning photos. She loves taking pictures of people, which is great for us because she captures a lot of amazing moments. Here's the link to her website, which she will continue to update throughout the semester. I'll keep posting the link when she updates so you can take a look at her most recent stuff! She's the best!
http://katesampphotography.com/
Monday, January 25, 2010
Merry old land of Oz
Hello everyone! Just a few quick updates:
This weekend was pretty quiet. Most of my friends were at surf camp (which I will be attending the weekend of Feb 5th), so the rest of us here took it pretty slow. Saturday I went back to Manly beach, and it happened to be the day of the annual lifesaving competition! Basically lifeguards come from beaches all over Australia and compete in various lifesaving contests. It was pretty cool, but more importantly, it was HOT! It was a stifling 110 F (40C) and SUNNY. We only lasted a few hours at the beach and were later told by a local that all the Aussies could be found at air conditioned movie theaters on days like that! Next time it's that hot, I know where to go!
Sunday was equally calm, but a lot of fun. Mallory and I walked for a solid 4 hours around Market City and Chinatown. We picked up some awesome souvenirs and delicious food. We also met up with a couple backpackers she met through her uncle the day before, who were really nice and had very cool stories. For dinner, we met up with our friends who had just returned from surf camp and had some delicious Dim Sum (which is quickly becoming my new favorite!). We all have a ton of reading to do for our classes, so we attempted to study together last night but were distracted by a certain self-inflating whoopie cushion.....compliments of a special Kentuckian!
Today is going to be full of more studying and some postcard writing. I'm trying to get everyone at least one, so send me your address if you want one! Tomorrow is Australia Day, and we'll be hanging out at Manly Beach where there are supposedly tents set up all along the sand with food and drinks. Can't wait! I have to go pick up some obnoxious Australian pride attire. I'll be sure to take a lot of pictures! Hope everyone is doing well at home!
This weekend was pretty quiet. Most of my friends were at surf camp (which I will be attending the weekend of Feb 5th), so the rest of us here took it pretty slow. Saturday I went back to Manly beach, and it happened to be the day of the annual lifesaving competition! Basically lifeguards come from beaches all over Australia and compete in various lifesaving contests. It was pretty cool, but more importantly, it was HOT! It was a stifling 110 F (40C) and SUNNY. We only lasted a few hours at the beach and were later told by a local that all the Aussies could be found at air conditioned movie theaters on days like that! Next time it's that hot, I know where to go!
Sunday was equally calm, but a lot of fun. Mallory and I walked for a solid 4 hours around Market City and Chinatown. We picked up some awesome souvenirs and delicious food. We also met up with a couple backpackers she met through her uncle the day before, who were really nice and had very cool stories. For dinner, we met up with our friends who had just returned from surf camp and had some delicious Dim Sum (which is quickly becoming my new favorite!). We all have a ton of reading to do for our classes, so we attempted to study together last night but were distracted by a certain self-inflating whoopie cushion.....compliments of a special Kentuckian!
Today is going to be full of more studying and some postcard writing. I'm trying to get everyone at least one, so send me your address if you want one! Tomorrow is Australia Day, and we'll be hanging out at Manly Beach where there are supposedly tents set up all along the sand with food and drinks. Can't wait! I have to go pick up some obnoxious Australian pride attire. I'll be sure to take a lot of pictures! Hope everyone is doing well at home!
Thursday, January 21, 2010
Wednesday, January 20, 2010
As I may have mentioned, we are privileged to have a small lap pool in the basement of our apartment building. About 1.5 meters deep and 22 m long, our pool lacks the glitz of Victoria Park’s outdoor 50 m long one, but it suffices for intermediate swimmers like myself. Today I went down with a quick 30-minute swim in mind, and stumbled on one of the most memorable experiences I’ve had yet.
I walked in on a young woman essentially thrashing around in the water. I smiled and said hello, and she smiled, embarrassed, and told me to go ahead and swim; she would stay out of my way. I proceeded to start my laps, and about 5 minutes in I realized she was standing still at one end of the pool, staring at me openmouthed.
Now, I’m not one to enjoy being gawked at. Sure, I’ve danced onstage about a thousand times, but that’s voluntary self-display. I awkwardly nodded at her and hoped she would get the hint. She did not, so I decided to strike up a conversation. After establishing that she was from India and working on her masters in marketing here, she blurted, “You swim like a fish.” Given we were in the middle of a chat about the recession, I was completely taken aback.
I asked her what she meant, and she repeated, “You swim like a fish. I splash around noisily and you swim like a fish.” A few more minutes of conversation yielded the following details about her:
The young woman, whose name I can’t currently remember, grew up in a middle class family in India. She went through college there, and then decided to move to California for a year to take a stab at independence and a master’s degree. Due to the recession, she was unable to find work and struggled to make ends meet. On a whim, she decided Sydney looked promising, and more importantly, sunny. She never learned to swim properly, especially having grown up in a part of India with barely any water to drink, let alone swim in. She said she likes to swim, but she’s easily embarrassed by her lack of technique.
I wouldn’t classify myself as an especially good swimmer, but I would say that I’m a graceful swimmer, like my Mom. Evidently, she hadn’t been exposed to swimming like this many times before. After our conversation faded a little, she asked if she could keep watching me. She was truly impressed by my meager finesse in the water.
As I resumed my laps, it dawned on me that not everyone in the world learns to swim at summer camp, has high school sports, and owns a TV to watch Michael Phelps on. This thought may seem juvenile, but it was a big wake-up call for me to recognize that people from all over the world live their lives so differently. Yes, my anthropological studies have highlighted this, but it was especially interesting to me that people of similar socioeconomic statuses can have such different lifestyles. I would be devastated if I could never float in the ocean again. This woman probably wouldn’t notice.
Fortunately, she lives in the building, so I’ll likely run into her again. My friend Daniel has offered to teach one of our other friends how to swim, so I told the young woman she was welcome to join us. She seemed excited about this idea.
With that said, I’m off to continue this thought in Anthropology class. I expected to go about my day undisturbed, as usual, but like always, the most interesting experiences we have are the ones we stumble upon blindly. Can’t wait to see what I’ll learn tomorrow!
I walked in on a young woman essentially thrashing around in the water. I smiled and said hello, and she smiled, embarrassed, and told me to go ahead and swim; she would stay out of my way. I proceeded to start my laps, and about 5 minutes in I realized she was standing still at one end of the pool, staring at me openmouthed.
Now, I’m not one to enjoy being gawked at. Sure, I’ve danced onstage about a thousand times, but that’s voluntary self-display. I awkwardly nodded at her and hoped she would get the hint. She did not, so I decided to strike up a conversation. After establishing that she was from India and working on her masters in marketing here, she blurted, “You swim like a fish.” Given we were in the middle of a chat about the recession, I was completely taken aback.
I asked her what she meant, and she repeated, “You swim like a fish. I splash around noisily and you swim like a fish.” A few more minutes of conversation yielded the following details about her:
The young woman, whose name I can’t currently remember, grew up in a middle class family in India. She went through college there, and then decided to move to California for a year to take a stab at independence and a master’s degree. Due to the recession, she was unable to find work and struggled to make ends meet. On a whim, she decided Sydney looked promising, and more importantly, sunny. She never learned to swim properly, especially having grown up in a part of India with barely any water to drink, let alone swim in. She said she likes to swim, but she’s easily embarrassed by her lack of technique.
I wouldn’t classify myself as an especially good swimmer, but I would say that I’m a graceful swimmer, like my Mom. Evidently, she hadn’t been exposed to swimming like this many times before. After our conversation faded a little, she asked if she could keep watching me. She was truly impressed by my meager finesse in the water.
As I resumed my laps, it dawned on me that not everyone in the world learns to swim at summer camp, has high school sports, and owns a TV to watch Michael Phelps on. This thought may seem juvenile, but it was a big wake-up call for me to recognize that people from all over the world live their lives so differently. Yes, my anthropological studies have highlighted this, but it was especially interesting to me that people of similar socioeconomic statuses can have such different lifestyles. I would be devastated if I could never float in the ocean again. This woman probably wouldn’t notice.
Fortunately, she lives in the building, so I’ll likely run into her again. My friend Daniel has offered to teach one of our other friends how to swim, so I told the young woman she was welcome to join us. She seemed excited about this idea.
With that said, I’m off to continue this thought in Anthropology class. I expected to go about my day undisturbed, as usual, but like always, the most interesting experiences we have are the ones we stumble upon blindly. Can’t wait to see what I’ll learn tomorrow!
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