uluru

Just a short up-date. Right after going down south to Hobart for the Easter Awakening, my C4 class and a heap of other younger Tasmanians begin our pilgrimage to the nation's heart, to Uluru. Buses will converge on the Rock from most of the more popular compass points, and we will spend a few days with the Indigenous people of the Centre. They tell me that the Journey is all as much a part of it as the destination. This is a real life changing adventure for lots of people. There are kids from Schools that we are working at that want to come, and all is being done to see that as many as possible can come, but it's an exercise in faith for us all to see where the money will come from! A team is already on their way to set up base camp for us. To follow their travels, have a look at Uluru Journal, in a short time, hundreds of us will join them in the shadow of Ayers Rock, Uluru.

I hope I will get to be re-united with my nice warm sleeping bag in Melbourne on the way through, those central Australian desert nights can get a tad chilly...

Back to the Bubble

I have spoken of the Bubble effect before. I managed to capture this image the other day from the van window. Notice the power station and the lines going up the hill towards town. It takes a lot of power to maintain a bubble of this size, we need a Hydro-Electric Scheme of our own to do it. Can you see the pipeline behind the town, going down the mountain? It supplies water from the Great Lake (up on the Mountain plateau) to keep the Electricity happening. Very clever engineering. And so our venerable village on our holy hill radiates the glory of God to the surrounding countryside. Actually the source of power here comes from a far higher source than the Hydro Commission...

hear the art on heart fm

Tune in tonight to hear the Biz, Loz and Honza show on Captain Midnight on 95.7 heart fm. Here's Biz and Loz in action in the studio. The captain is probably off flying around the broadcast area in his Sopwith Camel or re-arranging his collection of art deco and Memphis design furniture. He doesn't get on the radio much, but he watches what goes on, and keeps us all in line. And you can drop us a line and get your request played between 9 and 12 tonight. The number is 1300 um... 6? 72... 9? um... I'll get back to you. Leave a message...



hear the art heart hearthearthearthearth earth earth eartheartheartheart hear the art....

Living in 'the Bubble'

One of my classmates tells me that living in Poatina is like living in a bubble. Sometimes, when the light is just right, you can even see the bubble shimmer as you approach town. It's a unique place, unlike any other town in the area, a place of safety and refuge for some, a bit too isolated for others.

Well, it IS a bit of a drive to a supermarket, and mail doesn't seem to find it's way here. The road doesn't even go through the town, you have to take a turn-off. The streets are safe for young people to walk on, or ride their scooters. Some of them here even ride unicycles to school...

Just in the last week they have put speed bumps all around the town, not so much to slow the traffic down, as to give the unicyclists more of a challenge! I'm a bit worried about the lack of street sense of the younger children when they leave the bubble. They've never really had to worry about watching for traffic as they play on the road.

One thing that sets Poatina apart is the 'Book of Norms'. It's a bit like Leviticus, but with less animal sacrifice. By following the guidelines set out therein, it makes this level of community life possible. Some of the norms take a little getting used to, but by setting up clear boundaries, everyone knows where they stand, and the vulnerable are protected. It's an interesting paradox that people are more free when they know where the boundaries are.

By the way, if you click on the pictures, you can see them at a bigger size, if you want!

Monument

This is a view of the monument that you see as you come up the main road and drive into the village. I don't know how many bits of glass that they had to melt down to create the glass bricks but it was quite an involved process for Keith, one of the guys from the arts colony to produce this. He had a good sized crew to help him. It's very symbolic, and I'll probably put a few more shots of it here every now and then.
Anyway, it's about a three minute walk out of the village from my place. It can be a bit tricky crossing the cattle grid in the dark, but it's a place people like to stroll to. On a clear night, outside of city limits the stars are spectacular!

Captain Midnight

Last night I made my radio debut on the Captain Midnight Show on Heart FM, our community radio station. I was in the the studio with three young ladies, and it was a lot of fun. Freda spent most of the night laying on the floor, she had turned up a day early for her shift but decided to hang around anyway.

Freda is from Ghana, and today marks 50 years since their Independence from British rule, the first sub-Saharan nation to do so. She said nothing on air, the microphones didn't pick up her snoring either.

So it was mostly the three of us chatting and playing lots of music, the Biz, Loz and Honza show. Biz was our trainer, she's done a lot of radio here, despite her youth, and Lorraine did Captain Midnight last year as part of her C4 course, as I am now. So I was the only Newbie...

Anyway, looks like I'll be on every Monday night for the next few months on 95.7 Heart FM in the midlands between 9pm and midnight. I was going to put the number for requests here, but I can't quite remember it... You will just have to put your favourite radio song in my comments, and we will see what we can do!