This week was the official start of Autumn in Australia. Soon the 40C and 35C degree days will become sparse, and before you know it, we'll have rain again. Which will mean an end to bushfire season. But that's not until May. Because Australia is flamable. Seriously. Gum trees are "Gasoline trees". They thrive in bushfire environments.
You pretty much can only have a campfire between May and September. The even have fire rating signs. During a total fire ban, even tradies can't use tools with sparks, so when a power line went down in Mundaring during a total fire ban, everyone was without electricity to power their air conditioners.
The beginning of this 2016 bushfire season saw a devastating fire south of Perth in January. It wiped out the entire town of Yarloop. 121 homes completely gone.
This is a before and after image.
But a few weeks ago, the threat was a bit closer. From our office windows, we could see smoke billowing over the treetops. Luckily no one was hurt, but they evacuated a school and a retirement complex.
We even got an email about it at work.
It was a bushfire in my favorite urban bushland. The ones I discovered and walk or run through once a week on the way to work.
My white gum trees with green leaves, home to black cockatoos and kookaburras, are now turned brown.
It's a bit ironic that firework season coincides with bushfire season with fireworks almost every night from my window.
And I'll be enjoying the last hot days of early autumn when there are no bushfires and plenty of water...
I've been in Perth for 928 days. And for 921 days, a large part of Perth's waterfront in the CBD (and my cycle path) has been closed for construction. Hidden behind fences, construction vehicles, and an occasional glimpse of men in hi-vis. It's the big Elizabeth Quay redevelopment project that has kept the city talking. It also included digging out the previous esplanade to create an inlet.
I can deal with inconveniences, but Elizabeth Quay has been a major inconvenience to anyone wanting to cycle, run or walk the popular bridge to bridge. Instead of smooth access on a mixed-use path along the foreshore, it's a dangerous and always changing detour that diverts through the city, crossing major intersections, bus routes, and most annoyingly, several looonnnng stoplights. I know several people (including myself) who change their activity plans to avoid this area.
It's been under construction since I arrived, which means I never knew what it looked like before. Apparently there were trees. Old trees. Now the trees are gone.
There's been a lot of opposition and public criticism over the project. People say the city has wasted it s money. There were many complaints for spending $1.3 million on a sculpture.
There's still construction to be done, including a five star hotel, restaurants and cafes.
But Elizabeth Quay is finally open. Finally.
I've finally seen Elizabeth Quay (it took a while to make that 10 minute walk, I've gotten so used to avoiding the area), and I think it's a very good thing to happen to Perth. It's a perfect waterfront public space for the city. It's a place where things can happen, like Fringe and the Perth International Arts Festival going on now. And they've even made it a little bit of Home.
It's what every waterfront city needs.
The ferry to South Perth is now right next to one of two major train stations in the CBD and the busport instead of two blocks away. Way to go public transport planners.
It's got a less-than-efficient bridge that now allows walkers, runners, and cyclists to connect seamlessly through the CBD along the waterfront.
There's a really fun water park for kids too. Too bad it's been closed already. Twice. For health reasons.
t's got a statue of a cormorant (or a penguin if you prefer) in a boat - aka First Contact if we're being official.
And the $1.3 million Spanda statue isn't so bad. It's good for climbing if you're a kid.
This weekend was the opening of the Perth's International Arts Festival.
Each year, the festival starts of with a big, free event. Last year, it was the Giants. You remember, those big huge puppets roaming the streets of Perth.
The year before that, it was a bizarre pirate ship with Darth Vader projected onto the apartment buildings. Yes, I was as confused as you.
This year, it was a little closer to Home.
Home was a story about Western Australia.
A place less foreign then the French performances of Giants and pirates.
"As the Swan River carves a winding path from the Indian Ocean through Fremantle to Mount Eliza and from Perth to the Hills, Home celebrates 40,000 years of culture, shines a light on the fragile beauty of Western Australia’s landscape and charts an epic journey of arrival, foundation, boom time and resilience.
Director Nigel Jamieson – a master builder of grand public performance and storytelling – has assembled a roll call of Western Australia’s most renowned artists to dramatise our relationship with the place we call home. Our place. For Home, Jamieson has collaborated with Noongar elder and artist, Dr Richard Walley, and the 14 clans of the Noongar nation to create a spectacular Welcome to Country. Through dance, music and song, the Welcome to Country celebrates the powerful connection we all share with this precious land and sets the stage for Perth International Arts Festival’s most ambitious home-grown event ever."
It was one of the best Welcome to Country performances that I have seen, and I realized I haven't shared the Welcome to Country and Acknowledgement of Country practice with my devoted readers.
I must admit that I was unaware of the ongoing struggles of the Australian aboriginals. When most people think of Australia, they think of surfing, kangaroos and koalas, not the Stolen Generation. I by no means intend turn my blog into a political rant, but it was only 8 years ago the Prime Minister officially apologized for taking Aboriginal children away from their home. Ironically, it was 8 years ago to the day of the performance of Home.
What is a Welcome to Country? According to the Noongar protocol:
"The Welcome to Country ceremony is an
acknowledgment and recognition of the rights of
Noongar people. The act of getting a representative who
has traditional local links to a particular place, area or
region, is an acknowledgement of respect for traditional
owners. It is respect for people, respect for rights and
a respect for country. The land, waterways and cultural
significant sites are still very important to Noongar
people. It is an acknowledgement of the past and provide
a safe passage for visitors and a mark of respect."
I have no good video I've taken myself, but here's some good ones. Even G20 had a Welcome to Country.
And the performance before Home was a very memorable one.
And we got an expert reminder of the Noongar people (the people of south western Australia) and their 4 kin groups, 6 seasons, and 14 clans.
We as Americans have no acknowledgement to the Native Americans whose land was stolen. I like it as a small tribute to the people who came before. After all, it wouldn't hurt us all to take the time to pay tribute to our past.
A non-indigenous person can't do a Welcome to Country, but they can do an Acknowledgement of Country, and I've been to many meetings or seminars where the original custodians of the land are acknowledged. Many corporations or government agencies provide guidelines.
So for all that I've had the privilege to learn, experience, and love from my time in Perth and Western Australia...
I wish to acknowledge the traditional custodians
of the land I am living on, the Whadjuk (Perth
region) people. I wish to acknowledge and
respect their continuing culture and the contribution
they make to the life of this city and this region.
Land of Tasmanian Devils, yes (mom) they are real. And unfortunately suffering from one of two contagious cancers, facial tumour disease, which unfortunately they pass to one another while biting/fighting over dead meat. True story. Luckily there are several conservation efforts trying to save the devils - however they might do better to not release them into the wild during peak tourist season when 40 newly released devils turn into 12 road kill devils in less than 2 weeks.
Tasmania is a beautiful place. From the icons of the Bay of Fires...
...Wineglass Bay...
...and Cradle Mountain.
There are also lots of trees. BIG trees. Huon Pines that are thousands of years old and Swamp Gums, the tallest hardwoods in the world. It thus makes sense that forestry is one of Tasmania's biggest industries. And combined with the miles of coastline, it makes for some good bushwalking.
Tasmania is known for its local produce and seafood. Cherries, raspberries, gooseberries, and even young berries (cross between something and something) were all in season. Then there was the salmon. I don't like smoked salmon, but I liked this one. Oysters on the East Coast were suffering from an algael bloom that cleared by th time we left. But on the recommendation of the publican in St. Mary's, I stopped at the stand on the right on the way into the Freycinet Peninsula. Taste of the Sea. And the scallops. Scallops are one of my not favorite seafoods. Who knew you could put them in a pie? Three days of scallops in a row. Yum.
But perhaps the most interesting. is Tasmania's convict past. Tasmania or Van Dieman's land was where the bad guys went. Australia has a whole has a convict past, but it's most evident in Tasmania, where people were sent for crimes from stealing candles, to throwing vitriol, to bush ranging to murder, Those convicts that were really bad or committed further crimes after arriving in Australia were sent to Tasmania.
And apparently the convicts built a lot of bridges. And buildings. And tunnels. We stayed in a room across from the ghost in Room #6 in the Bush Inn in New Norfolk (didn't sleep very well there!) But the most famous site is Port Arthur. A little cove on the southern tip of the Tasman Peninsula is one of Australia's most famous sites. And not for good reasons. After reading For the Term of His Natural Life, convicts endured some of the most heinous corporal punishment and hard labor on this natural prison peninsula. But Port Arthur also has a recent dark history as the site of the 1996 Port Arthur Massacre which caused Australian politicians to make drastic changes in Australia's gun laws to make Australia such a strong contrast to the current situation in the US.
Despite bein a major tourist attraction, there is no town built up. Just the site and a convenience store, a hotel, and resort cabins. It's eerily somber and somber. It's even more eerie on a ghost tour. There were enough harrowing taes of convicts and punishments to make someone run most of the way home...
Where strange things happen when you take pictures
And with another state ticked off the list there's just one territory left...
