Friday, January 27, 2006

Happy Australia Day

From the people who brought you the drunken masses of New Years Eve, Cricket Matches and the Melbourne Cup, comes the latest installment of 'is this entire country intoxicated???'... its Australia Day! Mind you, it is our own damn fault for choosing to partake in these large congregations of youthful exuberance, but gosh - these people seem to be just constantly drinking to no end. Lest we be so judgemental.

Australia Day marks the arrival of the First Fleet to Sydney cove in 1788, providing the foundation for the white settlement of this country. Conversely, indigenious groups have declared it to be both a Day of Mourning and Day of Survival. Officially, it is accompanied by the year's 'greatest Australians' being declared and publicised in the newspapers - seeming as if Nicole Kidman has won half of this years awards, from Outstanding Performance by a Anthropology Student to Best Red-haired Humanitarian in a Non-Scientology Role. If only her Oscar run was this thorough and complete - it really seems as if there is a shortage of celebrities for this country to fawn over.

Yesterday we attended, along with 70,000 of our closest friends, the Big Day Out concert and festival extrodinare. It was an all day event, my friend Tyler and I getting picked up by Peggy straight from the airport, as we had just returned from the reef. The grounds were at the spacious Sydney Olympic Park, held over several acres and spanning multiple venues, giving you much to choose from at any given time. There were different types of musical genres all being played, from techno / electronica to rock. For those of you so inclined, the set list can be found here.

But back to the cutting social commentary... with our friends Rich and Michelle, we took a good spot for people as well as concert watching and hunkered down for the afternoon to laugh at drunks. It was a fairly Anglo crowd, with some noteable exceptions (both green and token - pictured). All were jovial and good-natured, quelling Peggy's fears that our section would mirror those she's experienced at the Cricket matches and erupt in violence.

Having known Peggy and her family for eight some-odd years, I've been fortunate enough to attend the San Diego County Fair each summer, where Mrs. Mannen is one of the HFICs (Head Fairgoer in Charge). Chana has the logistics down cold of crowd-control and people management. Should San Diego / Del Mar ever be invaded by Tijuana, the fairgrounds would be an excellent rallying point for the fleeing masses, solely due to the organizational abilities of the Fairgrounds staff. That being said, what we witness yesterday was just the opposite. People jumping over 8ft barricades in order to get down to the stadium turf, human pyramids formed, then collapsing on crowds of people. Aluminium cans (as opposed to plastic cups) being sold by the million as an alcoholic beverage container. No visible security / staff, other than aimless alcoholic beverage container recyclers with large bags mingling amongst thousands of screaming, stomping fans -- no doubt trying to casually and convienently perform their recycling duties as close as possible to the stage of their favorite band.

The Australian acts got the best response, with the finale performer really receiving only a lukewarm reception. I guess that people had already had their fill of sunshine / booze / distorted guitar riffs and co-incidentally began heading for the exits. What we had been waiting all day and night to finally see, ended somewhat anti-climactically. Having had early, 6am wake-up calls three out of the four days, as well as sleeping on a boat / in a loud, cheap hostel on those occasions, we were absolutely spent.

posted by ncawthon at 6:00 PM

Tuesday, January 24, 2006

Moonwalk

One of the more impressive parts of the trip were the night dives. The past two evenings, we jumped into the water with our gear and flashlights and spent a half-hour bobbing around in the darkness. The surreality of the experience was incredible; with such depravity of senses (and gravity), one could easily imagine themselves on the surface of the moon.

Up above, the boat was illuminated with floodlights, giving a glow for which we were able to use as reference. It reminded me of the scenes in E.T. - The Extraterrestrial when they're chasing after poor little E.T. and Elliot with their floodbeams through the forrest. It would have been difficult to get lost with the boat giving off such a large amount of kilowatts in the area, and the thoroughness of the safety procedure has been quite good.

The beams of light from each diver would zig zag through the water, illuminating the floating particles and giving the immediate area of faint green glow. Fish would swim in and out of the range of light, eyes dilated to make the best of the surrounding darkness. We were fortunate enough to have seen two green turtles on our dive last night, both absolutely massive - easily the size of a love seat. One had hidden themself under an overcropping of coral as to say, 'don't bother me - I'm sleeping'. The paparazzi scuba photographers strobing the scene with their flash bulbs didn't make that wish a reality.

posted by ncawthon at 1:54 PM

Reefer Madness

Day three of our scuba diving trip is just beginning, with the Pro-Dive II's inhabitants slowly stumbling out of bed for their morning briefing. We've had a great two days of diving, Tyler and I having the option of doing eight dives thus far with three more coming up today. We're about 60km off the coast of Cairns, we can see the hazy city lights in the distance in the night-time.

There is a crew of about eight twenty-somethings, all quite energetic and eager to get along with every batch of new passengers that come out. We've been blessed with fairly decent weather, a few hours of sunshine each day. The dives come in rapid succession, just as you're gathering your wits, its time to go dive again. After awhile, its a blur between life on the boat and life under it.

We've seen a plethora of marine life, two different kinds of turtles - one as big as a table - white tipped sharks, moray eel, trigger fish, bat fish and a whole lot more. Visibility has been good, our dives all being quite easy and relaxing. We're rarely going deeper than 60ft / 20m.

The boat has a smattering of German, Canadian, UK, Dutch and American divers, with the average age being about 30 or so. A bit older of group than I had expected. We've had a good time getting to know them all. It took three days, but I think I've got all the names down.

No seasickness evident as of yet from any of the passengers or crew, the quality of the food may be a testament to that. Everyone seems very into their photography kits, with most everyone having a camera with underwater casing. We've had the opportunity to rent cameras here but have passed - I'm not a real big fan of adding another distraction on what is already a situation requiring full concentration. Another device to fumble and fiddle with won't help my experience any. So, regrettably, no underwater pics for this post.

Back to Cairns this evening for a day of decompression before heading home to Sydney for Australia Day.

posted by ncawthon at 1:53 PM