Travelblog

“Heron Island, Heron Island, this is the dive boat, everything’s gone horribly wrong.” I heard that twice a day as part of our dive briefing. Jason, a divemaster we had several times, had a way of reciting his safety briefing as if he had said it a thousand times. Every time it would have the exact same intonation and speed, with matching lackidasically rendered frantic arm wave at the “horribly wrong”. Since we are in Australia it was all rendered in a cute aussie accent, one of several varieties we encountered. As it turns out, Jason had done the dive briefing at least hundreds of times. When I asked he said he had worked at Heron Island for a year before moving on to several months with a liveabord crew and then returning to Heron where he was into his third week.

I dutifully listen to the dive briefings and repeat to myself “channel 99” and watch so I know where the grey button is, but after the third or fourth time I find myself trying to imagine a situation where I would actually apply that knowledge. The scene that immediately flashes to mind is very Hollywood: we’ve lost track of other divers but it’s time to come up and so we do. We spot the boat and swim over. As I climb back in there’s an eerie silence… no one is aboard. In my mind it’s a a very movie silence where there’s a sudden stillness in the entire soundtrack as opposed to the wave -sloshing, water slapping wind-blowing reality. Yes, in that situation I would take off my gear and cautiously make my way to the radio. I imagine myself raising the handmike and pressing the grey button and broadcasting into the stillness without really expecting a reply. After all, in diving, two people are left dry on the boat at all times – the captain and a spotter. To surface to an empty boat would be truly the stuff of film. More realistically would be some sort of disaster that required the full attention of the crew. I imagine Jen, our spotter of the dive, heroically grappling with some diver in full gear (ill? Dying?) and the captain rushing to help her. She looks directly at me, a gawking bystander, and barks this marine equivelant of “You, dial 911!”. I suppose having heard it several times before would help me perform appropriately in such an emergency.

However our diving off Heron Island was completely devoid of emergencies and we had 9 tanks of the most amazing coral we've ever seen. Tons of little schools of little fishes, I couldn't help reflecting that it was just like a fishtank, just like a movie. I want to landscape my underwater backyard to match some of the dive sites we saw. Although I've seen little goby fish hovering in front of holes in the sand, this was the first time I got to hover long enough to see a little shrimp pop out of the same hole, pushing sand in front of him. At the information center I learned this paring is very common - the shrimp uses the goby as lookout, and the goby shares the hole. Once I saw this I found it fascinating and on many later dives sought to see how many shrimp I could find. We also were introduced to the Woebegone Shark, a total snoozer for Aussie divers. When we first saw one I couldn't figure out what it was - the guide indicated shark and insisted when I gave him a skeptical look. We could only see the head and it is wide and flat with a weird fringy edge. It seemed like a flounder to me. Later we saw a whole shark hiding under a ship hull and then I could see that it was a shark, about 5 feet long, with two vertical fins on it's tail and the strange beard. The symbol for them, because of the beard, is to hold your knuckles to your chin and waggle your fingers.

Being on land was also amazing - Heron Island is a bird nesting refuge and there were birds everywhere. They supply earplugs in your room. The first day was overwhelming but we quickly got used to it. There are no Herons, actually, just Egrets. The largest populations while we were there were noddy terns and buff banded rails. We did get to experience mating shearwaters, or mutton birds, but it was the tail end of the season and I could imagine the peak being quite an experience. They make noise at night, and it was described as a cross between a cat screeching and a baby crying. I found that hard to imagine, but once we heard one we knew immediately what it was. I'd describe it more precicely as cat yowling - that noise cats make when they're posturing but before they've gotten out the claws, with variations that made me think of ghosts at halloween. It's definately an odd sound for birds. We were also blessed with turtle season - we saw a female drag herself up the beach and dig an egg laying pit. It was pretty dark but we saw her lurch into the trees, saw sand fly and then crept up behind and could vaguely see her lurching periodically. We thought she might be laying but we later went to a turtle briefing and concluded she was probably digging the egg laying chamber. We also got to see baby turtles scamper down the beach to the water. In the darkness, with their little legs rapidly flailing, they almost look like a swarm of bugs. If I didn't already know them to be cute I'd find them creepy.

We made some friends, we met a couple from Canberra who actually came and lived in Belltown for a year in '96 as an adventure. We also met a couple from Seattle, concidentally, who are also in Australia to see the Ironman. It turned out to be a couple we were destined to meet this week, our friend Peter's partner on his movie. Out of all Australia we ended up on the same afternoon dive and Jen noticed I was wearing a hat for a WA State triathlon and so sought us out between dives to say hi.

Heron Island gets two thumbs up. Later this week I'll update about our adventures in the Red Centre involving sink laundry, lizards and a track bug inadvertantly set free.

Housekeeping - if you're ready to get off this email train, drop me a line by Monday and I'll take you off.

For the rest of y'all it's 4 weeks of adventures down under! (March 14-April 11) Admittedly, this is a bit of a quick turnaround for another big trip. Conveniently, the international drivers permits I got us for the Gap Year are still valid. I did have to renew my passport properly as my Berlin replacement was only good for a short time. Bonus - this renewal was free! We also had to get visas for the first time in our travel adventures. Fortunately this was quickly and efficiently accomplished online.

The primary blame for this trip is Peter and Meredith - our mentors in sports travel. They were the instigators of the Tour de France trip, They were the reason we flew 20 hours from London to Hawaii to see the Ironman, and they are the reason we are headed now to Australia (instead of next year) to see the Australia Ironman! We couldn't resist the chance to travel with cool friends. However, we being the people of copious free time that we, are will be going for 4 weeks. For such a long flight (14 hours from LA to Sydney) I wanted nothing less. Because of scheduling we also get nothing more. Darrin just got back from the Game Developer conference so we're leaving Monday. We are only staying 4 weeks because we learned our lesson on basketball last summer by missing Seattle winning the WNBA championship. The Supersonics are having a really good year, so we're coming back in time for the playoffs.

We had initially planned to hop over to New Zealand for a week, but after meeting with a friend and hearing about all the cool stuff there is there, we realized a mere week would be an exercise in frustration. In fact, 4 weeks in Australia began to seem shorter and shorter the more we read about it. The question comes up again and again – how far to drive from Sydney to X? Sydney to Forster where the Ironman will be, how far from Sydney to Melbourne, what about the coastal route vs the inland route? How far away is Alice Springs with Uluru/Ayers Rock? The answer, again and again, is really far. Sydney to Melbourne can be like driving from Seattle to San Francisco (12 hours costal, 9 hours inland). Sydney to Cairns is like driving San Francisco to New York.

Finally I could stand it no longer: is the US *really* bigger than Australia? Darrin surfed up an answer. Australia is 2.95 million square miles. The United States is 3.5 million square miles. Ho ho, of course we’re bigger. But how are all these driving distances so crazy far? Because that includes Alaska. How many of us have driven (or will ever drive) to Alaska? Let’s get serious here. Ditching Alaska and Hawaii, the contiguous United States are only 2.85 million square miles – 3% smaller than Australia. So before you rent your Britz camper-van and pass up that multi-flight boomerang pass, chew on that.

On the schedule: scuba diving trip on the reef, a short hop out to the Red Centre of Alice Springs & Uluru (Ayers Rock), some time in Sydney (where I've got my eye on what looks like Australia's Puyallup Fair - the Royal Easter Show!), the Ironman and then a drive up to Brisbane (Sydney to Brisbane, about 1000 km). Wish us luck, we're heading South!

We’ve been home for 4 days now. It’s been a little bit like Christmas re-discovering the things we own and left behind. Clothes, dishes, computer hardware. I can’t get over how enormous our dishwasher is though I remember when we moved in from a house I thought it was small. We also own a crazy amount of stuff. Lots of clothes, lots of kitchen gadgets and dishes, tons (and now many kilos more :-) of books. Trying to remember things is a little funny: which drawer has the socks, which floor my car is on, how to take the bus to swimming. So far in each situation I do remember, but I have to pause first for a minute to recover the memory, as if I’m re-loading from backup.

We disconnected the batteries of our cars to keep them from running down whilst away, as per the recommendation of my dealer and Darrin’s manual. Monday I went downstairs (after thinking a moment to remember which floor) and pulled off the car cover. I unlocked the door with the key, popped the hood and re-connected the battery. It started right up. I had to reprogram the clock and some radio stations and then I was able to drive away. Driving felt so natural I didn’t even think about it, but I did feel a pang pulling out of the garage that I was driving instead of walking out the front door to catch public transportation. I could have taken the bus, but it would have required 15 minutes of planning and schedule research and timing to catch a specific bus. On the way home I needed a snack, so my car and I popped into a drive through, as opposed to me on-foot being able to pop into a shop. The next day I resolved to take the bus, but didn’t check a schedule and at the stop realized that I could walk back home, get in the car, drive to where I needed to be and park before a bus would even show up to pick me up. Which I did because I was late.

So already I’m walking less, and already I’m eating more. We’ve eaten dinner out the last 4 nights and every time I feel I’ve over eaten. It starts sensibly enough – I go to the restaurant hungry. Lesson #1: only eat when you are hungry. I just stuck with water to drink because that’s all I’ve been having in Europe, maybe the rare diet coke and we had red wine in Italy. A friend at one dinner immediately asked “Aren’t you going to order iced tea?” That was a funny moment - suddenly remembering “oh yeah, I used to always get iced tea.” It was touching that she remembered and noticed. I haven’t had it in ages because you can’t get it in the UK. They jokingly call it “Thames Water” and consider it a perversion of proper tea which is itself passé. So I’ve picked that back up, but I realize it’s a little bit of sugar to start that I haven’t been having.

The truly pathological game begins when they set down the bread. Perhaps it’s that we haven’t been eating at fancy restaurants, but I realize that rarely was there bread or any kind of free pre-meal appetizer on our trip. I know I have dinner coming and the bread is just extra calories when you look at the whole. Nevertheless I’m hungry and it is a real tension to sit there hungry with appetizing food in front of me that I’m trying to ignore. By the time my oversized meal arrives instead of feeling the satisfaction of happy anticipation I feel deprived and I overeat. What I’m eating so far consistently has more cream, more cheese and heavier bread. The Brits have us beat on mayo and fries, but they’re also close behind us in obesity problems.

I’m not sure how I’m going to handle this going forward, I’m going to try to get more aggressive about only seeing half my dinner from the start and I’d like to ask for no bread but that’s more socially awkward. It now strikes me as ridiculously cruel to frame the bread situation as a self control issue. It’s natural to eat food when you’re hungry, and it’s probably natural to overeat when food is abundant because maybe it won’t always be. I think the best alternative is to just not eat out but cook at home, and thankfully I have the time and at least some of the motivation to do that. Note, however, at Day 4 getting to the grocery store is still slipping day-to-day on our to-do list. It was really nice in Europe to never cook at home and never feel like I was engaged in an epic battle to control my natural impulses. It is clear to me that the US cultural/social structure naturally guides one to poorer eating and exercise habits. Calling it a toxic food environment seems appropriate.

We are scheduled to arrive on Saturday at 3:40 on BA 49. I estimate we'll have over 120 kilos of luggage with us, almost what Darrin and I weigh together :-) Andrew is planning to pick us up, and I've asked some friends to check with him on the luggage front, we may not fit! Books are the killer, especially those Dorling Kindersley travel guides we've come to love, they're just heavy. We don't really have plans Saturday evening, I 'spect we'll be home by 5:30. We'll probably eye the mail mountain, put it off and focus on staying awake till at least 9 pm.

It's incredibly hard to leave, I have managed to find a great running club and make some good friends. In thinking about what I'll miss most, in a crazy way it's the things I haven't seen yet. Just this week I discovered a fabulous moroccan tea place that I wish I could go to 10 more times. Just tried the Porchester Baths and would move on to checking out the Ironmonger Baths if I was still here. We only discovered the S & M (sausage & mash) cafe in October and it's a definate favorite. The easy travel, and definately the public transportation and the pedestrian society. I think we'll both come home more trim, from the increased walking and the smaller portion sizes at dinners. I'll miss all the languages and all the variations on English. Virgin Radio is giving away a trip to Australia and their tagline says something like "sometimes it seems like all the Australians are here, so we're going to take you There!"

We've only recently started getting comfortable with the train - we went to Brighton and Oxford last week, both places we could spend way more time. I never did make it to The Potteries to see moorcroft. There's definately fodder for future visits.

Favorite foods I'll miss: rough oat cakes, sausage & mash (much less greasy than I expected), plain chocolate hob nobs, thin crust pizza, nestle triple-berry shredded wheat and no-sugar-added Alpen. I'll miss calling "wild berry" "fruits of the forest".

Foods I look forward to: pho (never found it here!), crepes, non-sweet mexican. Pioneer Organics produce delivery. Sushi. I have found some good sushi here but not many chances to take advantage of it.

Christmas lights are already up here. On Regent Street they're beautiful. The search lights from Oxford Street that I can see from everywhere (literally, from home and from all points on my 11 mile run tonight) are less exciting, particularly since we were galvanized to go to the source and discover that all the stores had closed by 8 despite the lights. hmpf. I definately look forward to seeing all of you and relaxing for the holidays. See you soon!

You don’t know bitter until you’ve seen a town that is still burning the Pope in effigy more than 400 years after the pro-catholic Guy Fawkes Gunpowder Plot of 1605. In the pre-bonfire parades they carry 17 burning crosses in remembrance of 17 protestant martyrs who were burned in the main street of this town, Lewes, in the 1550s. But, truth be told, there is very little bitterness in it. What lives on now is a town that knows how to have a great time playing with fire and is willing to keep up the fun parts of the tradition though the original fiery conflicts are now burned out.

Let’s get the Americans off on a good start with the name of the town: Lewes, which we’ll say correctly if we read “Lewis”. Next I’ll fill in a bit of history. The history I knew already was that of Guy Fawkes – leader of a group of men that plotted to blow up Parliament on its opening day in 1605 when the King would be present for the state opening. Guy was a Catholic, pining under the severe restrictions imposed on Catholics during Elizabeth I’s reign and disappointed that things were not significantly changed when King James I was crowned in 1603. It was still less than 100 years since the Anglican Church had broken away from the Catholic Church and things were far from settled. The plot was simple – over a period of weeks the co-conspirators built up a store of gunpowder in the basement of Parliament and were planning to light it on the day. Somehow word got out and they were arrested only the day prior. Over the next year they were tried, convicted and hung. The King encouraged celebrations of this escape and the saving of the government and thus Guy Fawkes Day was born. To this day on the opening of Parliament they conduct a ritual searching of the basement.

I specifically chose a Seattle return date after November 5th because I wanted to see what Guy Fawkes celebrations were like. I had read of effigy burning and charitable collections (A penny for the guy) in books, but is that really what happens? Not really. Guy Fawkes day seems very similar to the 4th of July – staged fireworks displays but often a bonfire to go with.

Lewes is a town in a larger area called Sussex which has a long tradition of having autumn bonfires. Their historical roots are even older than Guy Fawkes day. The Fletching Bonfire Society is the overarching organization and it links together Bonfire Societies from all over Sussex. One town or another hosts a bonfire every weekend in September, October and November. By their standards, The Big One is held on the 9th of October. Sounds like that would have been interesting, because the 5th in Lewes was quite a sight to see. I think part of what makes Lewes a big deal is that because it’s combined with Guy Fawkes Day, 60,000 people pack the town to watch! It’s just a little bit crazy.

How can I begin to describe it? For starters, 5 different bonfire societies hold celebrations in Lewes on the night. Several other bonfire societies come to march in their processions in support. For each host bonfire society, the evening begins around 5:30 pm and consists of two to three processions through the main streets of the town. A procession is basically a parade, with maybe a group of 10-15 people, then a music marching band of 10 or so, then several more groups of people. They march 3 across and it took each prosession probably 20-30 minutes to pass, so it’s a fair number. All are in fancy-dress or elaborate costumes and each society has a primary and secondary theme. Lewes Bourough had a Zulu theme and a Smuggler theme. One of the societies had a Native American theme, other themes included WW2 and Tudor dress. Finally, and most notably, every person in the procession who is not playing an instrument is carrying a flaming torch. Imagine a 2-foot wooden stick (much like those from campaign signs that are probably not yet cleaned up yet) with the end wrapped in something combustible which is then dipped in paraffin and dried. Most have one torch lit and are carrying an unlit spare.

Sprinkled amongst the groups of people in each procession were one or two effigies. Far from the lumpy straw dummies I’ve learned to imagine, these are actually elaborate fully-painted paper-mache likenesses. In past years George Bush has apparently been popular but we were not so lucky this time, the closeness of the election perhaps raised the hope he’d be irrelevant by the 5th. This year there were a couple Popes (tradition is very important) and then a few parking meters and a parking warden– a reference to a new parking scheme that was being implemented. There was also an incredibly elaborate one of a former head of the BBC riding a ram. These range from 4-10 feet long and maybe as tall as 8 feet. In addition to the effigies there are also one or two groups of 3-4 people dragging flaming barrels. These often looked like a medium-sized steel drum that has been split in half vertically and then each half turned into a cart – so it seemed more like a flaming pull-wagon. One impressive one was a steel cage in the shape of a large water barrel being rolled on its side. Inside was a flame-filled half-barrel mounted to the ends of the larger steel cage by bearings such that it always remained open-side up as the barrel cage rolled forward. There were chains similarly mounted on the outside of the ends and it was by these that two people (wearing big, heavy, fireproof gloves) led that flaming barrel forward.

From reading the website, preparing for these weekends is like a town preparing for the high school homecoming parade: there are regularly scheduled get-togethers to prepare torches in so-and-so’s garage, dip them in paraffin in so-and-so’s backyard, bundle them in packs of 5 for easy distribution – volunteers needed! Preparing 5000 torches for a single society is no small job! Not to mention the effigies. The costumes are judged ahead of time in fancy-dress competitions the weekend before. Programs are put together and jars prepared for charity collections.

Here’s an abbreviated example schedule for one society on the night of:

First Procession: 6:25 PM – assemble in street X and march to the War Memorial (at the center of town – every society does at least one procession past it and honors the society members lost to the various wars) in darkness, Band will play the Death March.

Second Procession: 6:45 pm – with torches lit march from War Memorial to point B

United Grand Procession: 7:40 PM – all societies march in one big procession with not just torches but set-pieces lit as well. These were things like burning versions of the societies initials, emblems or even entire words like “No Popery”. They’d be about 2 feet high and held on poles to a height of about 12 feet.

Forth Procession: Assemble at point C and re-torch. Then process through various streets with torches lit and ultimately end up at our society’s firesite.

Bonfire & Fireworks: about 9pm at the 5 different sites – burn effigies, light fireworks, have a huge bonfire.

Final Procession: 11 pm process again with lit torches back through town to some point and stop and say the traditional bonfire prayers. These vary somewhat amongst the societies but always start out: “Remember, remember, the Fifth of November, Gunpowder Treason and Plot; I see no reason why Gunpowder Treason should ever be forgot. Guy Fawkes, Guy Fawkes, ‘twas his intent to blow up the King and his Parliament; Three score barrels of powder below, Poor old England to overthrow; By God’s providence he was cach’d with a dark lantern and burning match.” At that point some of the societies continue with traditional sections wishing ill to the Pope.

By the end of the evening it’s well past midnight and people have been marching around in costume with flaming torches since 5:30! All the while crowds press in so we can truly feel the heat as the processions go by with their open flames. Sometimes a torch would prove to be not well made and the flame would begin to run down the handle. At that point the person would just drop it flaming on the street, and later folks would kick it aside – basically into the crowd, where it was up to us to stay back and let it burn out. Finally I should mention the topper that made the evening feel truly wild was that in every procession there would be people with ammo bags on their belt full of firecrackers which they would light and drop on the street. These were not wimpy firecrackers, often I could feel the percussion and found myself covering my ears. Many people had followed the advice of the tourist board to wear earplugs and I certainly wished I had a pair.

It was definitely great fun, and definitely something I couldn’t imagine seeing at home. We did get some good photos so check them out! N. Ireland and Edinburgh are now up as well.

Since the US press seems to be long on gossip and short on information these days, here are some actual facts about our election garnered from international press...

The Herald Tribune reported today that 120 million people cast ballots (114 million counted so far), or just under 60% of eligible voters. It's the highest percentage turnout since 1968. In 2000 turnout was 105.4 million or 54%.

Both Bush and Kerry's vote exceed the prior record of 54.4 million votes for Regan in 1984. Right now CNN reports Bush with 59,312,656 and Kerry with 55,780,416. Several papers are pushing the stat that Bush is the first to break 50% since his dad in '88 - without explaning that it's because there have been major third party candidates in the intervening elections.
(00-Nader (2.74%), 96-Perot (8%), 92-Perot (18%!)).

Internationally most commentators were setting up pre-election that it wouldn't matter who won, Iraq would still be a mess. Interestingly the Herald Tribune thinks France & Germany are making signals that they could consider a fresh start. Perhaps this is a validation of the lesson that Long Term Capital Management taught us when it set a record for hedge fund implosion - if you make a big enough mess, everyone else will have to save you. LTCM wasn't exactly pleased with the terms of its saving though. Let's hope Asia doesn't get any big opportunities as the #1-#4 purchasers of our growing debt (japan, china, taiwan, south korea). If GW really wants to "reach out", he can start with restoring the balanced budget amendment before his next round of tax cuts.

I’ve been pretty good about blogging major travel, but I don’t talk much about the little things. An odd little thing occurred yesterday that calls for a blog with a glimpse into the life of Shaula & Darrin.

I recently gave notice on our flat, believe it or not there’s only a month left. An estate agent called yesterday morning and set an appointment to come get a peek that afternoon. She came by, took a look around and left. We continue typing busily away at our computers. I, typing up an excel schedule breaking down Bill & Justin’s pending visit into morning/noon/evening day-by-day and what we should try to do, cross-referencing with tour schedules on the web. Darrin programming, having taught himself yet another new programming language (the O’Reilly Python Cookbook rests on the end of the dining room table), his for-fun project replaced by the inspiration to re-write his spam filtering system. The inspiration was brought on by a hard-drive failure and complete system re-install. Being in the UK made the obligatory hardware upgrade awkward so he’s settling for a software upgrade instead.

Yes, the six-month experiment of a change of scenery seems to be winding down with the geeks having perhaps modified the mould, but not breaking it. The sketchbooks contain one sketch, the cross-stitch kits purchased after we got DSL in the flat remain unopened, however an animated gif of the cross-stitch bookmark I did BDSL (before DSL) is still pending. We still buy more books than we read (or than I really want to haul home, we’ll have to think about that). Shaula is still doing running & yoga, and slacking on yoga – Need to use up those 6 classes I have left! Darrin happens to now be riding the stairmaster at the gym. We drink more espresso perhaps, and love the European thin-crust pizzas.

Darrin got up for a snack a bit after the agent left and asked “Is that her standing outside the flat?” I looked and it was. Twenty minutes later she was still standing there. Was she meeting clients? Meeting other agents? Darrin saw her talking to other people. Another twenty minutes passed. Had her car been booted? Perhaps she was locked out of her car – it was a bit chilly for standing around. At the hour mark that answer seemed to be it, men were sliding wire down her car windows in an apparent attempt to force the lock. At the hour-and-a-half mark we heard a startlingly loud pounding noise and Darrin peeked out to see the men smash in her passenger window with her standing by. She got in, they made an attempt to clean up the glass and then she drove off. That seemed like an awfully dramatic solution to me, but who knows?