Manly Beach Clean Up

On Saturday, Martin and I joined a large number of fellow volunteers to help clean up Manly Beach, organised by the Sea Shepherd Conservation Society and the Two Hands Project. Rubbish from all of Sydney's beaches eventually finds its way into the water, and carried on the currents is dispersed into the ocean and can have a disastrous affect on marine life. 

Sorting the rubbish for recycling

It was a gorgeous warm early Spring day, sunny but not so hot that spending a few hours on the beach was unpleasant. At first glance the beach looked pretty clean, but we collected a surprisingly large amount of rubbish. Our main focus was plastics and other toxic forms of polluting rubbish, such as cigarette butts.

One of the Sea Shepherd team

Sydneysiders love their beaches, and use them a lot. While I was collecting rubbish on the beach it was really encouraging to have a number of people say "good on you" or "thanks". Clearly people care for their beach and are glad to see people taking care of it. There is no good excuse for littering any beach, especially the metropolitan beaches of Sydney which are very well supplied with rubbish bins.

Recyclables being separated

Hopefully one of the offshoots of any sort of action such as this is that next time any of the people who saw us cleaning up on that day use the beach, they might be more careful about not leaving any rubbish behind.

One of the Two Hands Project team

We were asked to collect for one hour, and then we returned with our buckets of rubbish to have them sorted into recyclables and general rubbish. There were some speeches made, and a substantial donation that had been collected through facebook was given to the crew from The Sea Shepherd.

Around half of the volunteer crew

Afterwards Martin and I joined a few of the other volunteers for a light lunch, before hopping back on a ferry and making our way back into the city. All in all a truly fantastic day!

A Walk Through Enmore

I'm having a lazy sort of day today. Sydney is being treated to an unseasonal blast of Spring/Summer weather, and I have the day to myself as my beautiful paramour Peter is home sleeping after working a late night shift last night. I decided a lazy day was on the cards because I'm going out tonight to a big leather themed dance party, and so conserving energy and some later afternoon napping were the two priorities. I had a few minor errands to run, so I grabbed the camera and went for a walk in the sun through Enmore.

Go back through this blog, or my flickr photostream and I guarantee without fail there will be annual Magnolia photos. Bigger men than me have tried, so who am I to fight the power of the Magnolia?

I thought this yarn bombed old telegraph pole was charmingly done. Not just "Let's wrap this in a piece or knitting/crochet" but a bit more thought had been put into making it pretty.

But don't stop there, because telecomms switching box thingies need some love and pretty too.

And just a couple of houses down from the yarn bombed telephone pole this little someone came over for a cwtch*.

Once the cwtching was done, I ran my errands and then strolled home through the glorious sunshine. I even got a couple of texts and a loving call from the boy, before he turned in to catch some zzzzzs before he heads to work this evening. All in all a pretty glorious afternoon.

* For some reason, despite being 50/50 Scottish and English in our house ever since I can remember my family usually always used the Welsh word cwtch in relation to the necessary and important cuddling of animals.

Postscript: Here's a sampling of past Magnolia Madness.

Vivid Festival is Vivid

We've had weeks of cool, rainy weather in Sydney so when yesterday turned out to be a fairly mild and sunny day it was quite the pleasant surprise. Not exactly Spring-like, but more like a mild Autumn day that Sydney normally does so well. (I figure we're owed one, given that we bypassed much of Autumn and went straight to Winter this year.)

One of the benefits of my new job is a 7 hour working day, so I finished work at 4 o'clock and the sun was still out and shining merrily. Blue sky. I decided to make the most of it and walk home from work, and burn a few calories in the process. It has rained almost every night for the past however many weeks, and given the total absence of clouds it looked like we could count on a clear night.

So while I was walking I decided it might be a nice night to grab the camera and go and check out the Vivid Festival later in the evening. I rang a friend who was sadly busy, but figured I'd go home and make some dinner and see if I felt like it afterwards. Almost a very big mistake. Friday tiredness + the lure of sofa = inertia. However, I gave myself a kick up the jacksie about 7.30pm and headed out into a pretty cool, but clear, night.


Wow. I'm so glad I did. These pics don't really do it justice, but it was amazing. The centrepieces of the Festival are the stunning 3D projection mapped animations by The Electric Canvas on Customs House, and the sails of the Opera House by SUPERBIEN.


The walk all around the foreshore of Circular Quay was also littered with light sculptures, performers and interactive artworks using light, colour and sound as their common themes.


Some of these pieces were static (like these jellyfish) but many of the pieces used movement and interactivity. Hard to capture in photos unfortunately, but in the flesh they gave everything a carnival like atmosphere.


People, especially families, were everywhere and all along the foreshore people were lined up with their cameras taking pics of the changing animations on the Opera House.


There was a bit of the usual push and shove that seems to be a feature of Sydney crowds, but it was generally a pretty fun crowd. And boy it was a crowd. It seemed like everyone decided to take advantage of the clear night also.


I shot soooo many pics. These are just a small sampling, and I've already put some more up over in this Flickr set. I'll probably add some more as I sort through them.


After a few hours I was starting to tire of the crowds, so I started to head back to the train station. I'd almost bypassed seeing the amazing Customs House light show, but I'm so glad I didn't because the projection mapped animations were stunning.


Here's a film clip of the Customs House light show, which really is the only way to do it any justice.



Such a fun night, and even home in time to see the room reveals on "60 Minute Makeover". Now that's what I call a good night.

Boozy In The Afternoon

Up until about 2 or 3 weeks ago I was working 2 part-time jobs, for a grand total of 6 days a week. Unfortunately the better paying 4 day a week job ended when the company I was working for finished the big project they were doing with one of the major banks. I've had trouble getting another job to replace that one, so I've been trying to subsist on the 2 days a week I am getting at the yarn store. Not very successfully, it has to be said.

When the project with the bank ended, the subcontracted company I was working for said some lovely things about how well I had done and sent me an invitation to attend the staff Christmas party. So earlier today, a postcard perfect Summer day here in Sydney, I headed out to join them for their Christmas lunch.

The Sydney Opera House from this morning's ferry ride.

The invite said that lunch was at a restaurant called "Sails" at McMahon's Point, on the norther side of the harbour. As it was such a beautiful day I was glad that it seemed that the easiest way to get there was going to be by harbour ferry. So once dolled up for what I assumed would be a fairly posh, yet waterside relaxed, restaurant (in what I hoped was a casual with an edge outfit of 501 jeans, slim fit blue military style shirt and skinny leather tie) I grabbed my camera and set off. With the intention to have an enjoyable afternoon and not think about the stressful stuff.

Wave to all the people doing the Bridge Climb everyone!
[Click to enbiggen it, they are the row of tiny figures along the top of the bridge]

As someone who was primarily working on site in bank branches for the company, I had spoken to many of the staff and management but had not actually ever met them, so it was great to put faces to names and voices. The restaurant was nice, a fairly small affair right on the edge of the water and our table butted right up against the window which we were able to open to let in the breeze off the harbour. The food was pretty good, but it was the rivers of alcohol that were memorable. Lordy. I think I had the equivalent of about 3 glasses of Champagne before the food arrived, and by the time we rolled out of there at 4.30pm I had added plenty of lovely Sauvignon Blanc (and one strong coffee) to the mix.

Luna Park, the restaurant was in the little bay just behind.

I kind of hoped it would be an opportunity to network with the management of the company, and thankfully it was. I've been a bit down about the work and finances situation lately, so to have a nice swish lunch at someone else's expense was a nice respite from that stress, but best of all I got some genuine, heartfelt and effusive praise and gratitude from them for the work I put into the project.

They are keen to get me back, and have some large new projects in the works. On the way to the restaurant I had a very disappointing call from my temp agency telling me that a job I was due to start next week has fallen through, and that they were struggling to get other work in. So the praise and the talk of possible new work starting after the Christmas break gave me a boost I needed. Three separate members of the management team all told me independently that they wanted me for this new project.

So boozed and schmoozed, clutching my Christmas gift of luxury chocolates and free movie passes from the company, I caught the ferry back across the water. Feeling a bit happier and more optimistic.

Roughing It

Aside from my involvement with the knit in for Wrap With Love, a few other things have collided recently to make me think a lot more about the plight of the homeless.

A month (or so) ago I was watching a kind of naff, but still tearjerky, show called "Random Acts Of Kindness" on our local tv. I hadn't watched the show before, but I knew the way it went down. I've watched Oprah, Backyard Blitz et al. I knew the drill, people who work tirelessly for others/have special needs/have suffered a tragedy are given things/money/a new backyard to thank them/perk them up/put them back on the road to recovery. Yes I sound cynical, but in truth I'm kind of a sucker for these sorts of things and I always end up in floods of tears. Even when it's only a new outdoor entertaining area/bbq/poolside Indonesian style cabana/beds of ubiquitous cordylines.

So I was watching "Random Acts Of Kindness" when they did a segment with a woman called Sarah Garnett. One night, while Sarah was helping out by serving meals to the homeless, she spotted a homeless man reading a paperback novel under a streetlamp. She started to bring him other books to read, and from that was sown the idea of the Bejamin Andrew Footpath Library. By 2003 the library was born, bringing a weekly collection of books to the street for homeless people to read. Hopefully they return them, but they're not under any obligation to.

The show did lots for her and her volunteer organisation, gave them storage space, petrol vouchers, a new minivan, a computer, etc. Obviously lots more than she expected, and frankly all sensible things that would make the organisation thrive and her life easier. But it was the idea that blew me away. Books for the homeless.

What must it be like to spend days and nights on the streets? Largely invisible to everyone, with few people to talk to and little opportunity for social contact and just some escape? Like Sarah I agree that books can be affirming, entertaining, life changing things and why not bring a little of this to someone who is on the streets? Aside from food, shelter and fatigue, boredom and isolation are apparently some of the hardest things for the homeless.

The other thing I saw on tv was a woman called Jean Madden who brought in her Street Swag to compete on the "New Inventors" show. She didn't win, but she did win the people's choice award and according to a radio interview I heard with her today, she's the only Australian who has been invited this year to take her invention to a prestigious international design competition.

In her dealings with the Brisbane homeless she discovered that fatigue was a big issue for those roughing it on the streets. Many of the homeless have managed to suss out obtaining food, but shelter and rest are much harder. She had the idea to take the great Aussie swag (a portable bedroll and shelter in one) and refine the design so that a homeless person could have a portable shelter during the evening, and a discrete bag to carry belongings in during the day. (Including a book, perhaps?)

She designed a few prototypes, designing them to be simple and cost effective to make, and gave them to some homeless folk she knew, using their feedback to improve them. Making them a camouflage colour so they are hard to spot in greenery at night, and reducing the thickness of the mattress to make more room for possessions, for instance. She has now distributed thousands of them to homeless in many parts of Australia, and has them made by prisoners in jail who in turn receive credit towards a textiles manufacturing certificate.

Again, what an amazing idea. Both ideas aimed at improving the wellbeing of people on the streets. Food and shelter are the obvious fundamental things one thinks of, but boredom and fatigue would have enormous impacts on the mental and physical health of the homeless. Simple ideas making big quality of life changes. I take my hat off to these amazing women.

Pamela Dale's "Twofold World"

I'm still catching up with all the emails and blog comments that arrived while I had gone bush over Easter, and so it wasn't until tonight that I noticed a blog comment Pamela Dale very kindly left on an entry I wrote about her and her stunning ink on paper and collage artworks. Sadly I won't be able to get to Melbourne while it is on, but Pamela informs me she is having an exhibition Twofold World at the Jenny Port Gallery in Melbourne until 2nd May.

Rue Charlot Champagne Shoe by Pamela Dale

If any of you are in Melbourne please drop by and check it out, so I can live vicariously!

Back From The Bush

The weary traveller returns! I had the best time. I spent some of the time wandering the bush with students and lecturers, learning, observing, listening, photographing, and the rest of the time socialising, having quiet time alone, knitting, napping and just enjoying the surrounds. Tall & Handsome was often off with students, but some of the time I tagged along and the rest of the time we got a rare opportunity to hang out together.

The scribbles on the bark are the tracks of burrowing insects, which burrow around under the bark before it's shed by the tree.


Leaf galls on a eucalypt leaf.

The permanent university field station we were based at had very comfortable accommodation, without being so plush that you felt like you were at a resort rather than a teaching field station. I was initially a little worried about feeling like a tag-along, but all the teaching staff and students made me feel very much a participant rather than an observer. The students were such a lovely bunch of kids, all 30 of them 3rd year university students in their very early 20s. Faith in The Young People Of Today restored!

I shot this leech shortly after it was taken off my leg. On one hand fascinating (those orange markings, the way they fling themselves with uncanny accuracy up your trouser leg), on the other hand... ewww.


The shoreline of Smiths Lake, on the edge of the field station grounds.

I took lots of pics. In such amazing surroundings it was all I could do to put down my camera at times! I've added around 50 of the highlights to Flickr in this set, but I'm still tagging the pics and adding descriptions. It's a long slow progress!

Banksia spinulosa growing in the bush.

There were lots of highlights; watching Tall & Handsome with his students, going for an impromptu late afternoon swim in the sea at Seal Rocks while dark rain clouds rolled in, a (surprisingly) exhilarating late night hunt for frogs in a pitch dark forest in the rain, relaxing with good food and a glass of wine in the company of an interesting and enthusiastic group of people...

Early morning checking of the trap lines. Each night 25 small traps were set along several trap lines, and then in the morning the animals were recorded, weighed, sexed, marked (with a tiny dab of pink nail polish!) and released unharmed. In fact they got a free feed, and a snug predator free night's sleep in the bargain.


An antechinus stuartii, a small roughly mouse sized marsupial and so very, very cute. We caught a lot of these little guys who have a unique life cycle, they mate for extended periods of time (like 13 hours at a stretch!), with various partners, and then sadly the 1 year old males all die from the stress of the process. The females can live a little longer, sometimes for a couple of years, but those are the exception more than the rule.


A litoria revelata (or Whirring Tree Frog), a tiny tree frog with a distinctive whirring sort of call. These guys are teeny tiny, that's a medium sized grass blade he's clinging to. We managed to capture and release three different types of frogs (and one intermediate stage froglet), but the night was alive with the calls of many more.

It's nice to be home (where thankfully one doesn't have to be diligent about ticks and leeches) but I miss waking up to the dawn chorus of bird calls, or the late night chittering of the bats and eccentric frog calls. Tall & Handsome is wrapping up the course tomorrow, while I came home early to go back to work today (blech), and then he's hanging out with me until after next weekend. I only got home late last night, so tonight I've pottered around a bit, done a small load of washing, made some chicken soup, puts some pics up on Flickr... and now it's already past the time I was going to go to bed. Without any bat calls tonight...

Mabon

The Autumn Equinox.

Sigh. Although you wouldn't know it from the hot, humid weather today, Summer has ended. Today is the equinox, the "equal night", where day and night are at equal length, crossing over from the long days and shorter nights or Summer to the longer evenings and shorter days of Winter.

For pagans Mabon is a thanksgiving celebration at the end of the traditional harvest season, a time for meditation, thanksgiving, of finishing old business and enjoying the fruits of your own personal harvest.

Sounds pretty good huh? In truth Sydney doesn't have 4 strong seasons, the pictures above were taken by me years ago in Canberra, which certainly does have them. Winters, and even Autumns, in Canberra can be bitter. But even so, seeing the shorter days advancing makes you think about giving thanks for the joys of Summer. Making the best of the warm days that crop up in amongst the cooler days of a Sydney Autumn. Then about settling in for longer, cooler nights. Planning knitting and craft projects to do rugged up on the couch. Autumn and winter foods; soups, stews, risottos.

I think in my ideal world Autumn and Winter would last about 3 months, combined. Long enough for a taste of it, a bit of contrast, some time to appreciate the crispness, the rugging up and the snuggling in, and yet not so long that the frustrations of cold bathrooms, wet feet and coming home in the dark bring.

When I get to be God Emperor/Benevolent Dictatrix of the Universe I shall make it so, but in the meantime, and in the spirit of Mabon, I shall give thanks for the bounties of Summer. Cheers, Summer!

Prepare Yourself For A Diabetic Coma

Because really this is more sugar sweet cuteness than anyone can handle.

Sydney's Taronga Park Zoo welcomed two new additions recently, Meerkat pups! I'm plotzing. Can I have one, pleeeeeeeeeze?

Sparing A Thought

I've put off writing about this because how do you encompass something so huge in a little blog post? How do you write about hundreds of dead? Properties, homes, towns, native and domesticated animals, in fact whole lives gone? I can almost be reduced to tears by a lost favourite coffee cup, what if I had nothing left but that cup?

The scape of the wildfires in Victoria is so horrifying, and every night the news is full of home recorded footage that has left my chin on the floor. Meanwhile another part of this country is seeing the worst flooding in decades. I can't see how extreme weather conditions that brought both situations to bear can't be part of a changing climate. Really, how can it not?



On the upside the support and community spirit has been amazing. The news has tried to hard to find stories of looting and such, and they've found a few, but the overwhelming spirit is one of community, service, support, team spirit and gratitude. Hopefully the horrible events of the past week can see some positives, whether it's practical changes to fire prevention strategies, or whether it's renewed appreciation for the harsh, beautiful country we live in and each other.

Beached!

It's late, late at night as I write this and I'm sunburnt and pooped, but I've had a thoroughly fantastic day. So big a day that I'm blogging it in installments. THAT BIG. (No scratching in the dust for something to write about this weekend, oh no.)

Giant inflated ironman, part of a kids' playground.

Young master O'Brien and I had a lunch date at Bondi Beach with his friend Colin. Getting to Bondi from Newtown by public transport isn't the easiest thing in the world, it's either two train trips and a bus ride, or two buses. In the end I opted for the bus trips, and as it would turn out they were the first of 5 bus trips we'd take during the day.

Bondi icons, although its unusual to see the beach so quiet.

Frankly in my opinion five bus trips is about 4 too many, but they were entertaining in their own way, especially the first trip. As the bus headed from Newtown through Surry Hills an increasingly odd assortment of people got on the bus. By the time two quite rough looking guys got on and sat in the seat in front of me, the bus was full of the elderly, the Russian, and (unfortunately) the unwashed. When I saw one of the rough looking guys in front of me turn and talk to his mate I noticed that he was wearing eyeliner... and his friend was wearing both eyeliner and foundation. Ah, not so tough after all.

In the jaws of the beast!

After a bit of missed bus shenanigans with Colin, James and I agreed to meet him at the restaurant The Bondi Trattoria. Did you know that there two Bondi Trattorias? No, neither did we. One at the south end of the beach... and one at the north. Or at least so Colin thought. (I never did find out the exact name of the restaurant we ended up at...)

Not everybody sunbakes.

Anyhoo, so James and I strolled the length of the beachfront and met Colin at the north end. (There was certainly no hardship in walking the length of Bondi, even on a day that began quite cool and overcast there were beauties by the score.) We had a fantastic meal with Colin, although as gorgeous as my scallops dish was I was a little disappointed by the size of the serving. 5 small scallops... at a shade under $6 each scallop by my reckoning. They were delicious... but without the side dish of veg we ordered, bread and olives on the table, and helping James with his substantial pasta dish, I would have still been hungry.

Bondi is a martini free zone! (L) and full of lots of colourful street art (R)

By the time we rolled out of the restaurant the day had morphed from cloudy and cool to quite warm and windy. We had some time to kill before James and I had to head off to a house warming for Mary-Helen and Sandra, so the three of us strolled along the beach for a while.

Who watches the watcher?

And that's where the sunburn bit comes in! I am possibly the palest person in Christendom on a good day, and even when it's overcast I can work up a nice sunburn in very little time. By the time I finally got home around midnight I was a pretty shade of lobster pink. Nothing says Summer like an accidental sunburn.

[Click any of the pics to see them bigger on Flickr.]

Farewell To The Master

Jørn Utzon
April 9th, 1918 - November 29th, 2008





Photo by me! Yes, it really looks like this.

Sydney didn't treat Utzon all that well back in the day, and even though the relationship thawed in recent years he became too frail to travel. So sadly he never got the thrill of standing by the water's edge looking across the harbour at its glory. Or climbed the steps to see a thrilling performance. Or sipped a sparkling on the balcony at interval, while a cruise ship sailed past.

Utzon was more than the Opera House, as this small gallery shows. Or even better, a search on Flickr that turns up over 600 results. Yet the Sydney Opera House is the perfect marriage of design and location. Something that seems so surprising and unlikely, and yet so perfect.

I'm sure Utzon came to understand the gift he gave Sydney, or at least I hope he did. Despite the acrimony of the past. Truly, Sydney would be so much the poorer without it.

What The Hell Are "Empire Cookies" Anyway?

It was a hot day today and the bus I catch from work starts at the beach, before wending its way through various light industrial areas en route to Newtown. You know what, half a bus full of boisterous post-beach youngsters and half a bus full of full of tired workers, not a natural marriage. I had a good first day at my new job, but I was kind of brain dead with information overload when I got on the bus.

So I was kind of cranky when I had to ask a young guy to move his bag so I could sit, but then when I realised he was a German backpacker and the girl sitting opposite him was a young Canadian staying at the same backpacker hostel, I couldn't help but listen in. It was interesting (and at times frustrating) to listen to two youngsters from overseas talk about the shortcomings of a summer Christmas. I wanted to say "look, I know you can't get the turkey you want" and "yes, it's stinking hot" and "no, fruitcake is not 'weird' or 'gross', even if it doesn't rate against the 'empire cookies' your Grammie makes".

Of course I didn't, but I nearly did nearly laugh out loud when the young girl was scratching at her scalp at said "Sand is, like, ridiculous."

Ah yes, the ridiculousness of sand.

It must be kind of weird to be away from home and having a completely different sort of experience. I mean, we're primed for the concept of a cold Christmas by generations of traditional wintery Christmas imagery, but I would still find a cold Christmas a strange experience. Christmas day without sweating under the airconditioner going full blast? That's ridiculous.

To Australia Via Suez Canal!

I was searching online for vintage posters the other day, when I discovered that the National Library of Australia has a fantastic online exhibition of Aussie travel posters from 1930 - 1950 called Follow The Sun. The works were commissioned by the newly created Australian National Tourism Association to encourage domestic tourism, but also to present an image of Australia to the world. The posters are easily on par with the designs that were being created by shipping lines, railways and tourism boards of other countries, and many of them combine an Aussie aesthetic with deco era sophistication.

Sydney Harbour without the highrises, or traffic snarls over the bridge! Rudey nudies advertising The British Empire Games!

The exhibition is nicely designed, with an interface that lets you browse by destination, iconography, style or artist. Fab! I've spent ages browsing through the posters and enjoying the variety of styles and snippets of info about the artists.

Having grown up in Adelaide these posters are kind of amusing to me, because the 'destinations' are now just a shortish ride by modern motor car from the city. Although they are both worth a visit!

After a bit of digging I discovered that the exhibition was actually mounted between November 1999 and February 2000. So I think it's great that they've kept it online as a resource. There's an exhaustive list of past exhibitions going back to the early 90s, many of which are links to online versions of the exhibitions. (Or you can skip straight to the online exhibitions page.)

I wouldn't mind hopping on a trans continental train and heading West right now! (The West has many handsome charms.) And if the journey could involve a cabin, a cocktail car, dressing for dinner and liveried cabin attendants...

I've foolishly never really thought of The National Library as great resources for visual arts, but it obviously is. It makes me think I should start searching the online library sites of other countries as well, not just art galleries! Meanwhile I have some (imaginary) trips to plan.