Christmas report

Merry Christmas from Freo.
It is christmas day here and still christmas eve in the US. We have a had a very relaxed and peaceful day. After opening gifts and having a nice breakfast of ham and eggs we got sunscreened up and walked to the beach. Santa must have had a huge load of boogie boards on the sled last night because not only did Margo and Grant get them but loads of other little ones were taking theirs out for a maiden voyage.

The waves were pretty small at first and within 10 feet of the beach. Not the best for riding. The tide was as low as we have ever seen and there were spots of gravel and shells that are normally submerged. It was fun to find beautiful shells and sit in the warm sun.

I took my snorkeling gear and went out to the grass fields that are in 10- 25 feet of water off shore. I love finding shells out there. I have been warned to collect the shells in a bag and not to hold them in the hand or keep them agains the body as there are poisonous octopi that live in discarded shells as well as a cone shell in which the mulusk can shoot a poisonous barb that can really hurt.

I stayed out for 30 minutes collecting interesting shells and starfish for the kids to see on the beach. When I returned we all gathered to look at the bag. After going through the shells margo and jeri were taking a closer look when they screemed and dropped the shells. A small octopus had popped out of one of the shells! We caught the 1 inch octopus and quickly made a hole in the sand full of sea water. We let the little guy go in there and watched as he swam around. I don't think it was one of the poisonous ones but it is hard to tell as they can change their color instantly.

Here are a few of the gift highlights:

Boogie boards for M and G
Shark tooth necklace for Grant
roman style fashion sandals for Margo
New sun hat for Jeri
New sketcpad and pens for John

As for Christmas down under: Lots of people wear a santa hats or those golf/cowboy style hats that are painted green or red. On chrismas day people go to the park or beach for a bbq. The kids all out for summer holidays at the moment so lots of vacationing and travel also.

As for us and travel we have some exciting plans for the next few weeks. On New years Eve we have been invited to camp out in a forest south of Margret river four hours south of perth. It is said to be very beautiful. We will stay there for a couple of days then I will be doing another artist residency in a town called dwellingup which is an hour or so south of Perth. It is known for its outdoor sports; rivers, mountains and forests. The residency is run by Alan Lamb, a cutting edge artist know for sound experimentation. We are looking forward with great excitement.

Life in the market is really fun. Today, being christmas day has been by far the quietest of all days here. on a normal weekday there are hundreds of people from all over the world wallking by our little front yard.

The kids went into the market last week and saw a really interesting set of magic pens. hard to explain really but very cool. The set was 30 dollars which we determined to be too expensive. We suggested that they might want to raise the money themselves. After some thinking they determined that the best way to their goal would be a lemonade stand. After all there are hundred of thirsty people walking right by every day. Once we started organizing for the sale we found out that our neighbor two doors down has a lemon tree and he was happy to help.

With Jeris help the kids made several pitchers of real lemonade. Margo and grant made the signs that hung over the low garden wall. Small glass $1 and a large $2.

The first customers were the street musicians that we have gotten to know. Soon crowds pickup up and the kids overcame their shyness. By the afternoon they had made just enough to buy the pens. It was a lot of fun and a wonderfull money lesson.

Left hand Traffic:
For the first week we were really confused and even walking across the street was stressfull. The flow of traffic was very hard to predict, especially on roundabouts.

Having a bicycle and riding in traffic helped me get used to it all. If it got too stressfull I could just jump up and ride and ride on the sidewalk.
The other thing that takes getting used to is knowing where to look to see a driver. we austomatically look at the wrong side of the car. I have glanced up to see what I thought was a 9 year old driving, or someone reading a newspaper. After a moment I realized it was the passenger. Not easy to overcome habits.


We have a car that is loaned to us by Carola whoo works at Artsource, the organization that is sponsoring my residency. It is a little hyundi Getz. Driving on the left is quite the transitiion for someone used to right hand traffic. On top of this challenge is the fact that the car is a manual transmission. Just remembering which side of the car to get into in a challenge.

As for the driving it is tricky. the pedals are in the same configuration but the gearshift is on the left of the driver and the turn signal is on the right of the steering wheel. IF I want to indicate a left hand turn I usually turn on the windshield wipers. For a right hand turn I do the same thing...

Following other cars is pretty easy. The tricky part is when in a parking lot and everyone is keeping to the left by instict. Margo and grant have been trained to yell "stay on the left" randomly from the back seat to help me remember.
Driving is a totally saturating task at this point.

staircases, sidewalks and grocery store carts all go on the left also.


Anyway, Happy hollidays to all. It looks like the weather is pretty rough in the midwest and north east. We miss you all!

j

Freo at last

This is our house.
Well we have made it to Fremantle (Freo as it is known here by the 'strians)
We have been here a week and things are falling into place.
Let me tell you about the town. For those of you that have seen Charleston or Savannah you will have a pretty good idea of what a 18th or 1th century town by the sea is like. Lots of old and low buildings, nice parks. Very easy to get around. I have a borrowed bicycle which makes getting around town super easy. Freo is famous in Australia for its artistic culture and coffee house scene. I don't think that I have been to a place with more restaurants and coffee houses per block. Amazing considering how expensive it is to eat out here. More on that below.

Freo is 20 miles from the state capitol of Western australia (W.A.) which is the city of Perth. Perth is a beautiful and modern city. There is a train every 10 minutes or so from Freo to the city. Perth doesnt have the reputation as a city with more than workplaces and apparently it is quite deserted after 6pm.

Our house. It is 140 years old and never had a major remodel. We were a little shocked when we first got here but since we have made it into a comfortable place to live. It is smack in the middle of the market. Freo is favorite for its market. We are in the middle of it. The market is a huge ordeal 5 days a week although the weekends are biggest. There are great butcher stalls, veggies, baked goods, souvineirs, magicians, musicians- a bit of everything and lots of people coming and going. It is an exciting place to be actually. Grant and Margo spend part of each day out on the front porc playing legos and talking to the musicians that play on the corner in front ofour house. The mausicians are only allowed to stay in a spot for 45 minutes so they have several that they know and chat with.

Last night we decided to go out to eat and we had to walk all of 75 feet to a little food court that speciallizes in excellent chinese/thai/malay/indonesian food. After dinner we went to a video arcade as a birthday treat.

There is a large park with a huge rope climbing structure 5 minutes from the house. There is a nice sand beach for swimming on the indian ocean just 2 minutes further. Freo has a very nice swimming pool compound with waterpark, playpool, and two large pools. There is a free bus network that goes around the city and it makes life pretty easy.

Australia is crazy about sun protection and almost every playground has a sun shade built over it. Also the whole aquatic center is in the shade. School kids wear uniforms here and every uniform has a wide brimmed hat of some sort.

The montessori school that had promised us enrollment for feb, marc, april called to say that they have lost a teacher and that they can't accomdate us. We have to figure something else out. There is a public primary scool just close by our house and we will look into it.


Cost of living: It is alot more expensive than we anticipated. Western Australia is doing just fine economically atthe moment. Most of their economy is based on the mining and sale of natural resources they sell to the chinese and the rest of the world market. The Australian dollare is worth .90 of the usd but the prices for everything is usually 50% higher. We don't eat fast food, but here is a comparison of prices- Specialty burger in the states 4.50-- with fries and drink 6.00. In Australia the same burge is 6.50 and 9$ with fries and drink. We see this across the board. A beer in a pub is between 7 and 10 bucks.

With the market nearby Jeri has been cooking great meals and we havent eaten out much.

AS for my art. Things are moving along well and I have a proposal out to the Fremantle Art center to do a large installion of sculpture and video. I will update the blog when I find out more. The theme of the work are the many wrecks of Dutch and english ships that happened onto the shores of western australia 100 years before Capt cook supposedly discovered the continent. Google "ship Batavia" for a true story that is unbelievable.

People are very friendly and we are having a great time. The weather is early summer and the high each day is close to eighty with 60s at night. Really very nice.

Four days in Sydney

We left Brisbane for Sydney on the 27th of nov. In sydney we stayed at a hotel right on the beach in a beach community north east of the city called Manly. A famous surfing beach and beach scene. There was a pool on the roof of the hotel and Between that and the beach it was lots of fun. With kids this age it is important not to schedule too much city stuff so we went into the city as a family just once to see the sights.

The Sydney opera house is the most iconic building in a really dramatic skyline. The opera house is better than I imagined. To walk around it is to get a million different perspectives and angles. Look at my artist blog to see some creative photos:

Sydney sure is a nice city. We think that it is the perfect combination of london and San Francisco with the weather of LA (at least while we were there.

We took the ferry into the city one day and went to the part of the city called darling harbour. We went to the Sydney aquarium which was first rate. Pictures below.


jeris take:

We are in Sydney
for our last day and have really been having a great time. It is a
gorgeous city.
with ferries to take you all over the city. Really beautiful. The
opera house is so amazing. The kids have been keeping up the pace pretty well, getting in
to the swing of long walks and long waits. We have a pretty good
system down, lots of hang man and silly putty silliness, and the like.

John is trying to perfect an Australian accent, which is giving him a
pretty tough time. Its funny though. We are staying in a hotel on
Manly Beach, which is a pretty famous surfing place. We having been
having a great time playing every day. Grant has discovered how to
dive into the waves and he is crazy about it. They play and swim
until they are shivering. We were sitting on the beach the other
evening when we saw 4 yellow crests cockatoos flying and playing in
the trees above us. They look exactly like your birds, Tom and Pam,
except yellow in tint. The would land on a branch and then flip
upside down and spread their wings out. It was hilarious. We just
couldn't believe it. and now we see them quite a bit. It's pretty
neat.

Tomorrow we leave for Fremantle and I am very excited to see our digs
and get out of our suitcases. Our hotel room is a big mess of dirty
laundry and generalized chaos. I am excited to have a kitchen and a
bit of routine.

Thanks Given

Jeri writes:
It's Thanksgiving here, and I too feel especially thankful for all of our people at home. It is strange being down here where TG is not celebrated,
Especially as it is quite hot and humid. I like holiday too. Just
about pure gratitude! I love that. And food. We are missing the
food boat here today, I am frying chicken though, so it will be
pretty good, if not the norm.

We are all doing great. We went to the Australia Zoo a couple of days
ago, it was a 2.5 hour train/bus ride, but worth it. Really amazing,
almost as much like an animal conservatory. Big and beautiful. It is
Steve Irwin's (crocodile hunter guy, "She's a beaut") legacy. maybe
some of you have seen him wrestle crocs, he had a wildlife show and
died a couple of years ago due to a sting ray sting . He is
definitely an australian hero. We saw a pretty cool crocodile show
and the birds were really amazing too. All of it.

Taking the train to go anywhere is pretty cool. Takes alittle
figuring though, logistics of being on time, getting groceries, stuff
like that. But I think we will like it. Tomorrow we will leave for
Sydney for 4 days, and then head to Fremantle, where we should be
able to settle in.

Intersections are a bit of a stressor with the
left sided traffic. I am just not used to it and feel like cars are
coming out of no where, wondering what my problem is,and why I don't
just cross the street.

Have found people to be very nice here
overall.

John and the kids are out on the deck playing battleship, I think we
will head into town later and find someplace to swim and maybe go to
the science museum.

We have started just a little homeschooling.
Doing a math worksheets, reading and writing most days. Very little,
but I think they will get into the groove of it just fine until we see
if they will be able to go to a school that will start in Feb. They
will each make a scapebook too, which will be a big part their work.
But mostly we will explore and play.

Happy Thanksgiving.



This last photo of grant and the lizard: these things are running around everywhere. Grant is plotting the capture of one but hasn't worked up the nerve yet. They will bite hard!

marsupials

On Saturday (day2) we took a train to a boat to a koala reserve up the brisbane river. The lone pine reserve is one of the few place in the world where one can hold a koala. Lots of fun. We are all still jet lagged but it is getting better.

first two days

The Flight went well. Thats a relief. The idea of a fourteen hour flight with two young children was a bit daunting. We had melatonan tablet at the ready but in the end we didn't need them. I think we slept for 6 or 7 hours each. we went on Virgin Australia and everything was better than expected.


The weather is unusually hot here in brisbane apparently. After getting to our rental house in a distant suburb of Brisbane we started exploring the neighborhood. Right away we noticed the trees and birds were way different than we were accustomed to.

We were all in bed by 8:30 pm.

And awake by 4am.

At about 4:25 am I gave in to the idea that we werent really going to go back to sleep due to our screwed up clocks. The sky was just turning light so we decided to go for a walk. Wow, what a cochaphany of birds. There all sorts of large and small birds that we have never seen including groups of lorikeets. very exotic looking.

Ready... Steady.... Go!

It has been a long time coming. We found out that I had been selected for the residency in Fremantle back in mid February. We have been excited about it for the whole time since, but a family can only stay so excited for so long. Well here we are on the night before our departure. It is finally here. Things are a little hectic and nervous. Our dog definitely knows something is up and is upset. Jeri and I are having a hard time relaxing: Memories being jogged about things still to be done before going, lists to be completed. We don't know what to expect in the next days and months. We have, until now, been focusing on the deadline aspect of it all. Getting our lives in order to be gone for 6 months.

We have been blown away by the visits, letters, parties and wishes. I hope that everyone reading this blog feels at least half of the love and support that we have felt from the different friends and communities of which we belong.

Here is our itinerary for Nov 18:

We leave white salmon mid afternoon for a 5:30 flight to LA. by 10:30 pm we will be on a direct flight to Brisbane. We will stay there for a week then go to Sydney for four days. By the 1st of December we will be on our way to fremantle. In case you aren't familiar with it, it is a Victorian era city located on the Indian ocean just a few miles (kilometers?) from the regional capitol of Perth. Here is a map.


Double click the photo to see the whole thing. Brisbane is on the east side and fremantle is on the west.


Our flight goes diagonally over the pacific. We will be on the plane for 14 hours. It will all be at night. The flight should arrive at 6 am on the morning of 20 (somehow we miss the 19Th)

As for baggage we are just taking suitcases. Although I will be working there and making art I am not bringing any tools other than video equipment. We have a lot of baggage but I think it will be manageable. It is spring and soon to be summer in the southern hemisphere.

Grant: I am really scared cause I don't want the plane to crash. I am looking forward to finding a gecko and also getting a baby snugly wombat. It will fun to go the Australia zoo.