This afternoon

I think a great way to spend a rainy afternoon is to giggle along with Žižek at Bligh and time constraints. Highly recommended.

Elsewhere

There's a new post

Fancy that. 

Though it's taken me this long for it to sink in, for culture shock to become usual and for me to realise that the last little while has been amazing. Not being back, but the experience I've had.

So I'll take every penny possible to get myself back for longer and won't be updating this anywhere near as (ir)regularly as before. Maybe I'll get to put up a few photos.

Vancouver

Vancouver is known for it's rain, and I saw some of it today. But not before I saw some brilliant sunshine over a lake in the morning of coming in. And two bald eagles flying over the docklands on the way in to Vancouver.

Heidi Nagtegaal and Kristi Malakoff are being exhibited at the Richmond Art Gallery. I know this because I'm living here for the next few days - not at the gallery, but in the suburb - and it's one of the first things I saw here. Picture crocheted facial hair lined up in all colours on the wall. Picture silhouetted outlines of children dancing around a maypole, life-size and almost real.

The second thing I saw, or went to see, in Vancouver was East Hastings. I was told on the train on the way that West Vancouver has the most expensive post-code in Canada, and that East Van was the poorest. I don't know how true that is but I can tell you that the homeless we gave food and clothes to were not lacking for numbers. There I met Paul, who has in his life hitch hiked from Alaska to Mexico and from Halifax to here. I would rather be hearing his stories than writing out my own.

I went to a place called Finn Slough this afternoon. There houses of varied size are sinking back into the river, propped up by their owners with the use of all kinds of things from buoys to boats to antlers.

So

The train. Ah, great. Marvelous. Wonderful. And I suppose I'm glad that I did it when I was younger, could spend 3 days not lying down properly to sleep and have a ball while doing it. 

Interesting things:

The heating in the coach car (mine) failed the night before the morning that we pulled into Winnipeg (average maximum temperature for February: -11. Lowest recorded temperature for February: -45. Temperature during the day as we walked in the sunshine: -22). It was great - I pulled up my sleeping bag and practically had the whole car to myself.

I was offered a job in Jasper.

I was nearly left behind in Hornepayne.

I saw moose running along a frozen river at dusk. I saw eagles swooping over the dockyards.

I looked out the window as we were going through Alberta to see diamondy frosted trees glittering in the morning light. 

Where I'll be for the next few days -

On a train!

This one, to be precise. I will not be emailing, contacting or anything. No requirements other than a gentle appreciation of the scenery. No tasks beyond touristing.

Since research is good for you - try and find Brooke Miller's song Country from the Dome Car, which was the first of many good recommendations that I heard. I'll be trying to see if the tempo matches the time marked by the train.

Sunday afternoon thoughts on a Monday afternoon

But it's a public holiday so it feels like a Sunday. Ontario has an incredible amount of public holidays - today is "Family day". I've been walking around in the traitorous sunshine - cold and freckle-inducing - so here are the thoughts I've been thinking.

I've long had a fascination for cold places - I loved the Snow Queen and all the Russian fairy tales I read at school. (It's funny what you remember, I can remember being told off for "vandalism", and for a while I thought it meant peeling the laminated edge off a desk. I remember making candles out of old crayons and bricks of wax and I remember the small and treacherous chili bush in the playground. I would turn the air conditioning to the lowest temperature setting, take the books about Baba Yaga and shiver under my blanket for authenticity.)

So while everywhere I go locals will talk about the "better times of year" - I have really enjoyed shivering with authenticity. I like the look of empty trees, I like the sight of my breath, I like the feeling around my nose and cheeks when I walk into a shop or house after being in the cold. I'm not too far away from the time when I'll have to return to familiar stars but it saddens me that I'll have to leave all the new ones behind.

Unexpected surprises

I suppose it wouldn't have been unexpected if I thought about it, but what with the Canadian dollar being friendly with the Australian to a point, and if you don't count the silly sales tax that not a single shop owner adds to the written price of anything - CDs in this country are cheap. Fantastically so. It's been a trying few days since I figured that one out. 25 kilos is still the maximum weight I can move back to Australia...

Sudbury

There's a song about this place. I'm fairly sure if you type it's name into google you'll find it, so sleuth away if you're so inclined.

My experience was not the same as described in the song, but I won't predjudice you... maybe I'll tell more about it later.

First though - the wind on a snowy day sometime this week must have been a blowy one, the trees on the way back to Toronto had been given a snowy exoskeleton. Snow bones for the trees.

Impossible land

To furnish my post below:

Yet we still love this impossible land, even when appalling bushfires strike every few years, and when it is not drought it is flood; much of Queensland was still flooded yesterday, with crocodiles heading south. We love it even when, at times like this when fire demonstrates it has a mind of its own, the love is unrequited.

From here. He also says, interestingly - "Don Watson says that while most Australians live in cities they still imagine Australia as a landscape."

What an odd thing.

Toronto

The other day I went to the Art Gallery of Ontario, recently renovated by Gehry and is as such an amazing piece of architecture. The centrepiece, as the volunteer guide told me with great authority, is a great twisty staircase in the middle of the building. When you stand underneath all you can see are curves and waves and graduated shades of wood and light.

It's only reopened recently, so there were lots of locals wandering around, commenting on the new layout and themed galleries, and the little nooks and crannies. My favorite of these was a little hidden alcove above one of the sections of Canadian art, which had a balcony looking over one of the rooms and armchairs to sit in.

As I wandered through the sections the thing that struck me most was the early Canadian art - European Canadian, that is. As in the colonial art in Australia, there are images of an enourmous landscape decorated with fascinating new trees and plants and animals and people. But the Canadian art is so much more triumphant - there is victory, even though (if your only reference point was the artworks) the only seasons here are autumn and winter, and life is tough. They are victorious.

Australian art on the other hand is full of uncertainty, to my eyes. Early artists weren't even very sure how a eucalypt looked - which is not like a cross between a poplar and a willow. The art tradition that has produced works about children lost in the bush or explorers left out to die meant that the Australians in these works of art are survivors, but not by much. You oughtn't like the bush - it's beautiful but it's not nice to you.

And this morning when I heard about the fires in Victoria and NSW I don't think that's changed, or if it has, not by much either.

On America but not in America

I'm in Canada instead. And it's nice, and it's snowy and I'm going to go explore.

The last full day I have in Ireland

Brought with it a few interesting things. Russia had generously donated a great deal of cloud, which has meant quite a bit of snow.

Which was lovely, not very cold to stand out in while the sun was shining in the morning - there was a mystery cloud delivering some snow that wouldn't stick, and the sun was up so it was like a painting by Magritte.

However, unlike Russia, Ireland and England aren't used to it. No snow tyres for them, thank you very much, and don't even think about asking for salt for the footpaths. So Dublin and Heathrow airports may be my temporary homes until the weather clears. Calloo, callay! Oh frabjous day.

Leaving

I will be leaving Europe on Tuesday. It's not a happy thought.

I'm sure my next stop will be marvellous, it's just that I wish I had longer.

Paisley

Ian Paisley was on a talk show tonight. He was greeted in this household with a little bit of growling at the screen in somewhat realistic attempts to mimic his accent, and a commentary about the Troubles and how hard it was to take his more mellow comments seriously given the pain of the past.

Irish history is fascinating and desperately sad. Every current action and mood is given a link to some kind of pain dealt to someone in the past, going back centuries. I, seeing things at a face value, am quite literally performing a fly-by.

Just for a while back there

I've been listening to Tom Waits while driving through windy hillsides.

I've been listening to Leonard Cohen while sitting by the fire.

I've been reading Dylan Thomas and Seamus Heaney. I would, if it was at all possible, rather like to have a stroke that affected the language centre of the brain in such a way that instead of producing word salads I could only ever talk like Dylan Thomas' poetry. No one would have the faintest clue of what I was saying, but it would be beautiful.

I saw two Irish wolfhounds and a peregrine falcon yesterday. I petted two of the three, and felt that it was overall a rather aristocratic day.

Yes

It's a normal kind of word, definitely the standard in affirmative communication, but I've experienced a new incarnation of the word 'yes' while in the north west of Ireland.

The locals here say it while breathing in. Try it sometime and see what it sounds like. I assume it's so that the lungs have enough air to continue the conversation the same breakneck speed it was begun.

But a sharp intake of breath means something rather different to me. So imagine sitting around in a room having a conversation, while your head whips round at every breath inwards. It's a funny old world.

"We'll make a Donegal lass out of you yet!"

So said my host when I managed to bring in the turf (what they call peat).

But in the meantime I would like to call a toast - to me, for successfully lighting and sustaining a wet and soggy turf fire, now smoking away in the range. I won't say it's the best fire I've ever made - but turf is a tricky beast and I'm very proud of myself. Even my 'checking' every five minutes to see if the little dragon hasn't fallen asleep hasn't hurt it.

So you'll have to excuse me, today the skies are a gorgeous blue. I think the Irish must have engaged in a bit of subterfuge in order to wrangle it, so I will stomp around in the sunshine for as long as I possibly can.

As I walked along the cliffs

Yesterday I went to see the edge of Ireland - up and down the coast as it drops into the Atlantic. At one of the spots we stopped at we had to walk from halfway down the road as Donegal council decided to fix things a little.

I lost my boot in the mud at the edge of the road, found and reclaimed it, and walked up along the cliff edge to the top of the hill. I looked over at the sea - an enourmous expanse of silvery blue with pearl-like spots where the sun shined upon it. We went back to the car, and the hail and the rain edged us sideways, hitting my face like little vengeful bullets.

Back at the house, as we were dry, I saw that the mud from the clifftop had left a golden glitter to my shoes. They sparkle like the stars now.

Other forgotten things

Besides the standing stones and megalithic tombs I saw today - eerie echoes of people half forgotten about and misremembered - I've forgotten to tell you about some things here.

The house that I'm staying at uses peat in the range downstairs. Peat smells wonderful - just the right kind of earthy home smell that makes a good welcome into the warmth. Although, the places where they scrape it off the surface of the bogs look like rubbish tips with piles of different coloured bags full of peat sitting at the edge of the rows.

These little piles of plastic are a lot like the horribly coloured and terribly out of place holiday homes that are being built around this area. They have butter-coloured fenced walls and the kind of soul-less similarity is heartbreaking around here. They just don't fit, the stone walls nearby will crumble to the edge of an unyeilding edifice to comfort and security built of pastel colours and no sensibility of the area it sits in.

And the sea creates masses of foam, the parts where the waves crash near the rocks look like milk. As they curl the greens and blues and purples of the waves turn to white, and the spray hangs in the air, taking its gentle pleasure in falling back into the sea.

Somewhere very elsewhere

I caught the bus from Dublin to Glencolumcille the day before yesterday. If you've not heard of the second place, I'm not surprised - I was the only one left on the bus after Killybegs (just a short way away from Donegal) and when the driver let me out, on the street corner in the rain, all I could see was a shop and a house and a road.

And it was really raining. I haven't been properly rained on since I've been overseas, but this rain finally justified my carrying a raincoat around for the last 3 months. Pity then that it was stuffed under my sleeping bag at the foot of my backpack.

So instead I ran into the local shop, a tiny little room lined with newspapers, magazines, cigarettes and lollies. There I talked to the very friendly shop assistant until I was picked up by the friends that I'm staying with here, who are sporting a few more wrinkles (and in the case of their children, many more inches) but are otherwise exactly as I remember.

And, incidentally, this part of Ireland is amazing. Absolutely beautiful, in a wild and untamed kind of way. There are cottages here, pointed out to me by my hosts, that were lived in not 15 years ago but now have the look of an ancient ruin. Which echoes the standing stones and megalithic tombs dotted around the landscape, in at least one case in the middle of a village, and in another a domesticated stone can be found next to a patch of vegetables.

And the landscape. There are cliffs here that are apparently the tallest in Europe, valleys that have been visited by Dylan Thomas and absolutely breathtaking beaches, both with sand and with round white stones that make the most beautiful sound I have ever heard as each wave recedes into the ocean. And always the hills, and always the wind, and always the rain yeilding to glimpses of sunshine, the appearence of which makes the hills practically sing with colour - purple and red heather and bracken, every shade of green you can imagine, silver stones, and golden clumps of grass. It's very little wonder that this is the land of woods and waters wild.

W B Yeats

A very odd person indeed, was our man Yeats. Into all kinds of weird and wacky Victorian symbolism and spiritualism, whose wife he asked to marry him after being refused by the daughter of a former infatuation.

But for all that he seems to have gotten his poetry out all right.

I mention him because today I went to the National Library - they have, besides copies of all his and other Irish authors' works, an exhibition on the life and loves of Yeats for the free perusal of anyone who wanted to see it. And I did, and so I did.

Yesterday, besides the Guinness storehouse (a marvelous institution!) I went to wander around Trinity College, to see if I could see the book of Kells. I couldn't - they're fixing up it's box or something similar - but what I did see was the library. Oh, deary me! Its the most beautiful room I've been in so far - rows and rows and books and books and winding staircases and little enclaves.

Somehow I don't think they'd let me take it back though.

My goodness...

My Guinness!

The streets next to the Guinness storehouse are as black as the brew, and the air smells like vegemite.

Ireland

Please forgive this terrible correspondent. I warned you that I wouldn't be as consistent as I'd like.

I caught a bus from London to Dublin last night. Normally this might not be possible, I was imagining the wheels turning into fins and the bus swimming across from Holyhead - but alas, no. Just a normal run-of-the-mill ferry crossing the Irish sea in gale-force winds. I slept through it though, goodness knows how!

Dublin in the daytime is pretty and fun. For some reason it feels like I'm travelling again, maybe it was being sick but the time I was in England didn't really feel like I was overseas. Everything was so familliar.

I look forward to any travel tips for Ireland that you, dear reader, have - but mostly I'm looking forward to looking. Those of you who have not been to Ireland before won't know how green the grass is. And wet the ground is.

London

I've found the transport in London to be alarming. I don't mean that it's bad - which it may be, but compared to Sydney seems really quite good - I mean that it behaves in a very odd way. The tube bounces - moving the same as the cartoon trains and buses at the start of Sesame Street - and no-one on it seems to notice.

Walks

One of my favourite things about England is the number of public footpaths through farmland and over and around landmarks. The signs are often confusing and a little fluid with their use of distance, but perhaps in a place where everyone has walked before that's the mystery.

Ware

I woke up this morning in a tiny town in Hertfordshire. Today I may well wander through snowy fields or in to town to see what I can see.

In the new year

I believe it might be a very good start to a year to wander around the Lake District on a frosty day. So I did.