Koalas, Aborigines, Kangadoo, and Pinnacles. Oh, and a busted knee.

Thursday and Friday was our last fieldtrip of Murdoch. With the same crazy tour guides of our last trip, we set off in our very-touristy looking vans at about 7am.

We drove for a bit until we arrived at our first stop, Yanchep National Park. Here we toured a Koala Park and also caught some crazy half-wild kangaroos hopping around freely, but spastically. Did you know that koalas sleep for nearly twenty hours a day and for the remaining four hours they just stuff their faces with leaves? Also, koalas don't drink water, or even really drink at all- they get all their hydration and water needs from the leaves that they eat. Alsoalso, they only feed on the leaves of the Eucalyptus tree, which is actually oddly enough a poisonous plant, and some think that this is one reason they sleep so much-- because the plant poison makes them drunk! Koalas are one out of only three species of animals that can survive on a Eucalyptus-tree leaf diet.

We then had a three hour long "aboriginal culture experience" in which we: learned how to throw spears, boomerangs, make tools, and learn about dance and the didgeredoo. The spear and boomerang throwing are pretty easily explained by these pictures (shoot, I'll insert pictures when I get them off Maria's computer).
As for the tools, we got to make little tomahawk-like objects. The glue-like substance used to put the sharp rock on the stick handle is made out of: charcoal, some type of seed or something from the grass trees, and... kangaroo poop! Which we also termed kangadoo. We had to crush up said ingredients with a large rock until it became a fine powder. Here's me and Jason attempting to crush up some kangadoo and charcoal:
After this we each got a stick for our handle. We held the stick in a fire until it got hot, put it in the mixture, heat the stick again, put on more mixture, etc. until there was a good glob of it on your stick. Then we had to mold the kangadoo mixture with our hands in order to stick the rock in. Siiickk. And the finished product?(look how long my hair has grown!)

Then it was time for "Didgeridoo and Dance" in which our tourguide dressed up in his aboriginal costume (which looked vaguely like a diaper) and special paint and did a few traditional story dances, such as fishing and one about searching for honey in the trees. I spur-of-the-moment-ly volunteered to help with this and acted out the part of the tree (a superb performance, I might add) in which mostly just stood there with my hands up ridiculously while he danced around me, until the stunning climax of the show where I was chopped down and had to lay down in a pile of sand. Hahah. Very fun tho. He then had us all get up and stand in two lines, one for boys and one for girls, and we each had our own section in which to dance. That was a riot. Lots of mimicking the butterfly with our legs, as he explained it. Then he played some very cool didgeridoo and told us that the females shouldn't play it because legend has that it can make a woman infertile. Huzzah for women's suffrage in the western world.

But that's not all! No, in the same day we trekked to Nambung National Park, location of the famous Pinnacles desert!

Epochs earlier ago the land was once a sea. As most sand was formed, so too here, in which shells are eventually broken down into limestone particles and washed and blown ashore. Over epochs the sea and beachfront rescinded and vegetation grew where the former beach had been. Rain water would seep into the ground and carry the limestone from the sand deep below which eventually compacted into a soft limestone layer. The roots of the vegetation eventually bore down deep into the limestone layer and formed cracks in it. As the climate continued to change, as always, the vegetation began to die and the cracks become more apparent and the top most layer eroded away. The quartz sand that was underneath was sand swept for thousands of years until the crack became more apparent until you could start to see the eroded limestone in what seemed to be pillar-shaped objects rising from the ground. These are the pinnacles.Some are gigantic, both wide and tall, some are small as my knee. Here's me standing next to some pinnacles. Unfortunately, as we're all taking pictures pretending to be pinnacles in the landscape, Taylor's knee somehow dislocated and he collapses to the ground. One of the teachers who were taking us around had to run back to the tour guides who were taking the caravans to the end of our walk on the other side. Sadly, Taylor was incapacitated for the rest of our trip. He had to go to the doctors when we got back who told him that his knee in general was fine although there was a piece that chipped off and was floating around somewhere. But they said it shouldn't be a problem, heh.

After all this we camped at a trailer park, of all places, and then the next day went on a tour of a Catholic monastery which was interesting for its artwork, but generally pretty boring.

And I'm tired of typing, so I'll wish you all a grand farewell and hope you're doing well. Until next time!

Girls don't hunt kangaroos.

Thank god. lol.

But class today was pretty silly. :) It started off a little rough, because it's Labor Day here in Western Australia. Which meant that no busses were running from our bus station. So after some little confusion we called Mary-Anne and she told us to train to Fremantle and then take the bus from there to campus. We finally made it, although we were a half hour late. But it was fiiine.

Today was another Media Frenzy, this time about TV. Sally and I walked into the studio and looked at each other sighing, "Ahh, home.." haha. We split up into two groups again, one group staying in that studio and another group, my group, going to another studio to learn about field shooting. After a brief introduction he told us we would be making our own two minute movie that we had to write, shoot, act in, and edit all in about two hours.

So it was me, Maria, Jenessa, and Loic in one group and our story was about Kangaroo hunting and crossdressing. LOL. Well here's the deal. In aboriginal culture, females aren't allowed to go on hunts because the think we're bad luck (LAME). And Glen, our teacher for the class on aborigines had told us so, and had agreed with the philosophy. So, in our video we first had Loic come out of the center wearing Glen's kangaroo hide and carrying a spear and then begin bragging about the kill he just went on. Then we got all excited that we wanted to try too, and ran to Glen's office. But once inside, he turned us down saying women we bad luck on a hunt. So, getting some bright ideas, we ran to the bathroom to put on moustaches and our hair in hats. A very clever and believable disguise, I might add (psyyyche) (lol, I said psyche). We returned to Glen's office and miraculously fooling him into thinking we were men, he allowed us to go. The movie ends with us hunting kangers in the bushland that is the side parking lot of Murdoch Uni. Hahahaha. It was great.

Unfortunately the sound did not come out.

Which ruined the great speech Glen gave, but luckily we were able to make it work anyways. Good thing the projects themselves aren't graded, only the effort is. Although I was quite embarrassed since this is my major and all. But ah well, no worries.

Alright, that's about all since last night. I'm trying to update more often so I don't fall behind and feel overwhelmed. Tomorrow we're switching groups for media frenzy and doing a studio production, then we have Wednesday off wootwoot.

Until next time,

<3

Blahhh

So, the internet in my room crapped out and I'm forced to go to the public meeting room to get internet connection. Really, I just think whoever's internet I was mooching off of wizened up and blocked my ISP. Because it still says it's connected and Skype still works, but it won't load webpages or Instant Messenger. As if I was really using that much bandwidth please.

I'm really much too lazy/annoyed to post some long update about our South West fieldtrip, but you can read it on Jenessa's site if you want, here. (Sorry Jenessa, lol).

Also, yesterday was insane. We went on our wine tour and that was very cool. My favorite part wasn't even the wine so much as the people we met and the delicious cheese sampling platters at the second winery. I have some very pretty picture of the vineyards. Then Mary-Anne took us out to Subiaco (aka Subi) with some of her friends. Half the group was on the surfing trip, and although I kind of regret not going I would have been wayy too scared if I hadn't had my contacts so I don't even care. But yeah, we went to the Subi Hotel which had a really fun band playing, and they played RESPECT and some Beyonce and me and Jessa were belting them, and all the other songs, out and she started calling us her backup singers and actually said goodbye to us in the mic when we left. Because apparently Australians don't sing while they dance. lol. The Llama Bar was a little annoying. Just lots of people standing around in over-priced clothing talking. Apparently rich Australians don't even dance. Hah.

Ok well I'm pretty ticked at the computer situation, but I wanted to drop a quick line. Do read about the South West trip. Catch ya on the flip side.

<3