Blogs from Oceania - page 7827

16 September 2002 Ever since returning from Wahgunyah I’ve been suffering from a bad back. The cause, lugging my equipment in and out of centres. I hope this is not a prelude to an early retirement. Last month I turned fifty and I wonder how many more years I can keep crawling around on my hands and knees getting children to say “monkeys” so I can get a smiling face. It’s not a thing I want to be doing when I’m sixty. This morning I left home about 8.30. The weather was wet as I drove to Yea where I branched off to Bonny Doon. It was a pleasant drive, rolling hills with good grazing paddocks on both sides of the road. Two hours after leaving Melbourne I joined the Hume Freeway; the weather was still ... read more

Greetings friends today we are finishing up our time in the hippie alternative lifestyle town of Byron Bay. It is a very small town centered around relaxation and surfing....but mostly surfing. Lots of strange dirty people wandering around the beaches and hemp shops and plenty of hot bods hitting the waves. We are staying at a hostel called The ARts Factory. Very strange....it was created by 2 american vietnam draft dodgers who came to australia and started a dance club. Now it is a very hippie place with all sorts of zany sleeping, eating, living options: you can sleep in a double decker bus, or a giant teepee, get free didgeredoo lessons etc. Last night we saw a neat aboriginal culture show where some natives danced and played the didge. His playing was really great. At ... read more

11 September 2002 For most of August I didn’t take any photographs in Kindergartens or Daycare Centres, instead I was working for another photographer. He had commissioned me to get group photos of school bands, after they played on stage at Monash University. It was a welcome break from the stress of getting the required number of photos of children in a limited time span. Instead I watched the school orchestras play for about thirty minutes. For about fifteen minutes an adjudicators would get up on stage with the children and help improve their performance. At the end of that it was my turn. From the balcony I would instruct the students to arrange their chairs so everybody could be seen. With all eyes looking up to my position, two shots were taken. I would thank ... read more

This photo was taken at Milford Sound, in New Zealand’s south island. We were staying in a hostel that was like something from a horror movie. It consisted of log cabins in a forest and was powered by a generator that went off at 11pm. We were only there for two days, waiting for enough snow to get some snowboarding in Wanaka, a few hours north. While we were there I got chatting to an Australian guy who had a really girly name, like Hillary or Lindsay. We talked the usual small-talk bullshit for some time before he asked me where I was from. I told him Scotland and he asked where. He had been in Scotland once. I said Fort William and he was like No way! That’s one of the places I visited! ... read more

1 July 2003 It was seven forty-five when I drove out of the motel in Culcairn and continued my way north along the Olympic Highway. It had been raining most of the night and the paddocks looked water logged. I’m not prepared to say the drought has broken in this part of the state but the locals tell me that they are getting more of this weather. Found the Pre-School in Henty, but nobody was home. I drove around the back to see if there was a car parked but there wasn’t. I waited in front of the centre until it was close to starting time then rang the centre. The director answered and asked if I was in the blue car outside? I said yes and drove around the back again where she let me ... read more