Getting near the end- email #7 of my teacher exchange in Australia in 2003.
Hey Everyone, it's me again!
Just sitting back and relaxing at my sweet ol' country home, and I thought it was just about time to catch up with everyone. I'm sure everyone is getting right into fall at home - sounds like the weather was absolutely great even into October and then the rains have come. Nice to see the my frisbee teams and squash team have gotten off to good starts in their new seasons and that life at Killarney sounds pretty much the same. I've really enjoyed the updates that people have written me.
The second school was over on September 18th, I had to race up to the airport (a nearly 3 hour drive) to hit the beaches of sunny Queensland. Queenslanders are made fun of by everyone. People say that they speak slow and that they say "eh" at the ends of sentences. I'm not sure about those two things, but Queensland is in perpetual summer. The average temperature per month only has a range of 6 degrees all year - the overall average is about 29 degrees. The major change is that the summer (Dec-Feb) is VERY humid and northern Queensland gets a wet season just like the Darwin area. On the subject of areas that people make fun of, my next destination is Tasmania (Tassie - EVERYTHING is abbreviated) and everyone says that you are supposed to ask people there about their scar on their neck (the less-than-totally-obvious reference, is that they are all in-bred and that they had to lop off their second head - I don't think I'll be saying that).
The last week of the term was full of heaps of rain and heavy winds. I flew out of Melbourne and the flight was delayed because of the winds and the temperature was about 5 degrees. Landed in Cairns at midnight and stepped out into 25 degrees. Feels like holidays. Cairns is less than a totally exciting place on its own - just really touristic (is that a word?). But, instead of a destination in and of itself, it is more a launching pad for the rainforest and the reef. First stop - the rainforest. I took a bus up to Cape Tribulation (more about the history of the area in a bit) which is where two world heritage sites meet -you go out to the Cape Trib beach and in front of you is the Great Barrier Reef and behind you is the oldest rainforest in the world. Wow! The beach is kick-ass! I spent an extra day just hanging out on the beach and it is this amazing view and I was totally alone - what a peaceful, fun day. The rainforest is also just plain amazing. The density of growth and the size of the trees and the incredible variety of plant life is awe inspiring. One tour guide said that botanists are constantly discovering things in the rainforest that either everyone thought had gone extinct or no one has ever seen before. The Daintree Rainforest has so many plants that only exist there and no where else. I even got to see a castuary (sp?) in the wild - it is a big, relatively rare relative of the emu - pretty cool.
The wildlife was fairly non-existent in the wild, but I went to a wildlife habitat and got to see an amazing number of crazy colourful birds, got to feed some kangaroos and check out all varieties of animals that exist in Queensland. Crocodiles are around, and that means that many beaches are unsafe - we went on a riverboat "cruise" and saw a bunch of crocs (not as good as Kakudu, except we got to see two male salties fighting over a woman. I mean a female crocodile).
The famous deadily jellyfish -here is how it all works. They are bred in the rivers and when the wet season comes the water in the rivers rise and flood into the ocean carrying the jellyfish out to sea. There are a number of varieties, with the box jellyfish being the worst (I think). If you get stung - it is pretty bad news. At every beach they have a container of vinegar (which they have to really label its use as for jellyfish stings only, as there was a major problem with people using it on their fish and chips!?!?!?) which you are supposed to pour on the sting and then wait on the doctors. If you have no vinegar (this is great) you are supposed to pee on the sting, and since most of us can't pee too accurately on ourselves, that is what friends are for. Hee hee hee.
It is pretty rough going in Northern Queensland, another day, another fantastic beach with perfect weather. Don't find yourself missing the Vancouver rain much at that point. It is funny - I'd say the two most common discussions/arguments I hear where I am are (1) which is the best footy team and (2) which is the best beach. Newsflash - all of the beaches are great. Yes, some have better surf, and yes, some are longer or more secluded, but all have the softest sand and the most beautiful coloured and temperatured water (in summer we are talking about of course). But, I will say that the ones in Cape Trib. are the palm tree lined ones you see when you see images of the "perfect" holiday.
Here is the brief history lesson that was promised above. Once upon a time there was a massive southern continent entitled Gondwana. Then a whole bunch of stuff happened and all of a sudden there was Australia, and supposedly no one lived there (but the world's oldest algae or something were discovered on the West coast of Australia). They guess that some Indonesians came by boat and somewhere on the journey they became Aboriginees. I'm sure I left out a few things. Then one day, after the Dutch and French (and others perhaps) had passed the place by, Captain Cook, who was actually not yet a captain, landed on the North Eastern coast (current day Queensland). The boat crashed into the reef and Cookie and his botantist George Bankes and their men came ashore and they landed at Cape Tribulation (makes sense). While the boat was being fixed they came upon some of the native peoples and named a bunch of stuff. The best naming story that I've been told is where they drew a picture of this big hopping animal that they saw, and showed the picture to an aboriginee and asked what it was and the reply was "gangaroo", which, of course, became kangaroo. Current day researchers have found the word "gangaroo" to most likely mean "I don't know". I like that story. Cook got the boat fixed and eventually made his way back to England, became a captain and then came on over to North America and got more places named after him. He got around. So if he hadn't accidently crashed into the reef, and became a captain, I might not have been a substitute teacher at a Vancouver elementary school called Captain Cook for one day 8 years ago. It makes you think...
Back to the present - there are both cool things and not-so-cool biting things about staying in backpacker's hostels. First the cool things - you get to meet travellers from around the world and it is really interesting to talk to, discuss issues and compare and contrast your view of the country with the real thing. You come to really realize how much living in a country where most of our media is American-based effects of our knowledge of the world - many of us fight through those biases, but it is tough. It is also funny how true some stereotypes are - I hung out with a group of Germans, shared a room with a bunch of Japanese guys and saw more than my fair share of American students (I apologize to the American readers of this email - but a large group of rich, American students is possibly the most annoying thing to run into - so loud, walking around like they own the place - now, individual Americans that I've met are great, it is just the groups that really get a bit too much to bare). I've met some Canadians, but not that many - it is funny how when you've been away from home for a while, how much fun it is to hangout with a couple from Calgary and a girl from Winnipeg.
"Don't let the bed bugs bite" -never had really given that expression a second thought, and then I stayed in a hostel in Cairns and I woke up one morning and had a shower and sort of was scratching my arm a bit and then I went up to the mirror to check myself out and holy freaking God my arm was COVERED in bites. Like 30 of them all in one spot on my left arm. I thought I could use some cortizone cream that I already had and it might go away on it's own, but 4 days later in the Gold Coast, it was still there and I went to a doctor and I had scabies! How exciting! Never had those before. So, for those who don't know, scabies are body lice that burrow into your arm and go to the washroom and that process is what causes the itchy bump-like bites. Gross and itchy - never two good things to say together. They are gone now - but I've come to realize that the north part of Australia has too many things that want to bite me a lot (remember my sand flies in Darwin?).
On the subject of insects, when I was up in Kakudu and then again in Cape Trib, our tour guides showed us these cool cocoon like things with leaves that these green ants make. Pretty neat, but the cool part is that they got us to...lick the green ants' bums. Yes, you read that correctly. And it tastes like a slightly bittersweet lime. Not a great flavour, but not so bad either. I think I'll draw the line quite sharply at green ants when it comes to licking that area.
So, I came back from Cape Trib and stopped in Port Douglas for a day - another beautiful beach resort sort of place and then back to Cairns (bed bug central) and off to the reef. Of all of the plans that I made this year, these were the ones that I was most excited about. There are so many companies to choose from that go to the reef, and I decided to once again go with a smaller sized group that gave me more activity time for more money. Most tour groups take high speed catamarangs (I have no idea how to spell that word), but I went on a sail boat. So it took longer to get there, but it was sweet as. A fun crew, excellent food all day as part of the cost, and a great group of excited travellers - spirits are infinitely high on this trips. A full day on the boat under Queensland's sun - it didn't matter how much sunscreen I used - I got a bit red. And you have free snorkling and they offer dives for certified people and also introductory ones for those who want to give it a go. I know Maja will be surprised that I went for it, and I was surprised too. I thought about it, and the cost wasn't really an issue - I was quite nervous about being under water for 30 minutes, but then I decided that I might only come here once and I already got this far and that I should just do it. And I did. And it was easily the coolest experience this year. It was soooooooo awesome. Heaps of colourful fish, amazing coral and it was just breathtaking (not literally, because you need to breath the whole time when you are underwater). I was so impressed and proud of myself that I did it - there were 6 others like me out of the 30 who tried it and we were all like little kids afterwards - giddy and silly and it was just amazing! Finding Nemo my ass! It is cool how right on that movie was - the reef looks like the movie. We had wine and cheese on the ride back and it was just so great.
I know that I've said this before, but so many travellers smoke. I just don't get it and I hate that my clothes stink so much. It was funny, in the Gold Coast I shared a room for three nights with a bunch of Japanese guys. These guys, and their buddies next door were hilarious, they slept in until 10, went to the beach all day (they all had these brand new surf boards, but had never really surfed before - ahhh, to be young and rich), got back in and lay around reading Japanese porn magazines (I walked in the first day and saw this innocent-enough looking magazine on the floor and I opened it up and...let's just say that innocent was the wrong word to use) listening to Japanese punk music, then they stayed up all night drinking and smoking and gambling. Full on, to say the least.
The Gold Coast is tourism to the extreme. Theme parks, shops, Surfer's Paradise etc. It is buzzing all day and all night. I went to the waterslide park, but enjoyed the beach more. Enough said. Fun, but too much after a short while.
Then I was off to Newcastle for the Australian Uni Games. Newcastle is 2 hours north of Sydney (I was there when I went to the Hunter Valley back in April). Newcastle is a place that used to be a big industry area and then about 10 years ago a few industries closed down and there are now some pretty bad areas, and a well known rule to not walk around alone at night, and also a scary train stop - where the travel guides warn you to sit near the security guy. Fun. The Uni games were great. The whole team stayed in these apartments together and it was a great time - cards games, team meals, spa baths and fun times. The team was seeded 7th, finished 7th last year and finished 7th this year, so I'm not to sure how much I accomplised as a coach. The team really liked my coaching and the organization that having a coach brings to a squad. I had fun, but I was itching to get out and play myself. This AUG is great - all uni sports are there and it is like a mini-Olympics. We went and watched soccer and squash as their venues were near by. It was great.
So, back in Victoria for school and the winter is slowly ending -we had beautiful sunny days last week followed by a hail storm yesterday, but the tide is turning. I am mailing home a lot of warm clothes (which hopefully is alright). It is cool how this feels like deja vu - reminding me of the beginning of the school year and how far I've come and how different I feel now to when I first arrived. And that the year is long - it is great, but I do miss home and I am getting excited about coming back (as well as feeling sad about saying goodbye to all of the people and things I've gotten into this year).
Hope everyone is well!
Cheers
Tommy
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