Long walks viewing Store fronts, house fronts, cityscapes

There are so many amazing events
and already such full days!

I joined Helen, drama and media teacher, Christine, art teacher and
Ginny, my supervisor at the museum- AMAZING teachers. . .
and new friends

Turner from the Tate is in town, and a special night for teachers with the curator touring, was a treasured beginning to the week. His paintings are all about light- the most dramatic light imagined and in his late life masterpieces became frowned upon the more dramatic they became.  His scenes had a great clarity and lightness, rather like Australia in general.

The need for sunnies is real. No wonder it is the welcome gift to many newly arrived to the country. A Colorado sunset can be like Gardner- you blink and miss it, but here they seem to linger for hours, as if the shutter on the camera is stuck. Back to Turner- great exhibit and tons of Culture fills this city. Those who imagine AU to be a cultural backwash, think again.

Heather and I have begun a weekly ocean swim evening, Thursdays for now.  Heather doesn't much fancy the thought of sharks, but helicopters patrol and boaters tend to steer them back out to deep waters. While swimming on Thursday, a helicopter circled and hovered. Kate was pretty sure that there must have been a shark siting. Bob, Kate's dog, and Kate also joined us. Bob got a good swim in, but I am not sure that he is truly keen. Kate and I will again take Bob swimming tomorrow when we stop to boogie board on some beach in route to the Wooden Ship festival near Victor Harbor. We don't want Kate to hear it, but sharks prefer dogs over humans.

Here is my highly organized class (not) waiting for the bus after swimming.

My class is a little UN: These four, really keep me on my toes,
are from Portugal, Mexico, Thailand and the Philippines.

While rambling about swimming stories this was "Swim Week." During this month all students in Australian public schools take a week's worth of lessons. The busses run from school to swimming park about five times a day taking several classes at a time. Getting bags packed, applying sunscreen, counting children and recounting children, gathering lost goggles, snacks, and undies is all part of the action. My career of teaching remains unblemished- I have yet to lose a child.

It was amazing how the kids progressed throughout the week in skill levels. On Monday one little guy  stood on the second step shivering with blue lips was playing a game of splash and even smiling by Friday. The more advanced students were swimming laps and diving for toy fish and shells in a "corral reef" creatively made by the instructors.

City center and Victoria Square

 I have been doing some city walking. The Central market is opened late on Fridays. I leisurely walk around the city after food shopping. Photos of these long AU twilight nights give the city such a wholesome feel.

It is nice to see the whole sky. In the hills you look up
usually to a canopy of trees

iron aprons on  hotel pubs and
historic homes

The free tram takes you to Glenelg Beach

Hahndorf was settled by Prussian refugees in the 1830's. Next time I go I want to stop at the strawberry farm and the former home of artist Hans Heysen, a well respected Australian landscape artist. After a lazy day, I walked around Hahndorf, one of the hill villages and the oldest German settlement in Australia. Ironically, it was filled with Chinese and Indian eateries. Must give them credit for having the best claimed bakery and beer gardens.

The hill area in which I live is an interesting mix of bushland and European-style farmlands. The area is pretty known for the gourmet inclinations. The cellar doors are wineries that have tastings. I think that just in the Adelaide Hills you could go to one daily and not complete your visits in a year. Close by there are cheese centers, chocolate factories and flour mills featuring mouth watering baked goods.

February is known to be the hottest month of the year, but I am tolerating it pretty well. Perhaps better than the koalas:

Top of Mabel Street

And although it is in the high 30c and low 40c there are already signs of fall.  

At the round-about a block or two from the school 2 meter letters read "Forest of the Dreams".
I'll have to find out why. 

Sweet dreams- Hope that everyone at home is staying warm. 

Next week I hope to have some little penguin and wooden ship photos from Victor Harbor- Stay tuned. 

Ninna Marni "Hello, how are you?" Kaurma language

Fire Lighting Paitya (Brown Snake)

Generous Kate, my team teaching partner, put together the school assembly combining our classes because she knows that it is best to produce at the onset of the year. It was a silly script based on organization, or the lack of it. My lively student, Syreet, played the part of the child who always bounced on the schoolbus seat, forgot her playground hat (oh, a serious matter here in AU) and ran in the wrong direction when supposed to be the tail of the New Year Dragon! She and the other kids were great fun, and it was excellent pantomiming. Syreet accepted the part with gusto, but she make sure everyone understood that she was just acting!

At the beginning of the school assemblies the children and staff acknowledge the Kaurma people: 

Ninna Marni 

(A Kaurna word for “Hello, how are you?”) 

. 

“We would like to acknowledge this land that we meet on today is the 

traditional lands for the Kaurna people and that we respect their spiritual 

relationship with their country.  We also acknowledge the Kaurna people 

as the custodians of the Adelaide region and that their cultural and 

heritage beliefs are still as important to the living Kaurna people today.” 

I have since learned that It is recommended that the Statement of Acknowledgement be read out at the 

commencement of gatherings held within the Adelaide area. I have begun learning it this week when it was recited four times not counting the times it was practiced by the children. It was said at the onset of the fifth year anniversary of the Apology to the Stolen Generations with Kevin Rudd in attendance, at the Spirit Festival, at the onset of the Fringe Parade, and at school. During the anniversary Kaurna people told their family stories, and there were not many dry eyes in the crowd of 600.  It was a bit like when Patricia Polacco speaks at CCIRA. 

one of the many fringe lightshows

The Fringe Festival has begun- It is a month long parklands gala including Cabaret, Circus, Comedy, Dance, Film, Music, Theatre, and Physical Theatre- also know as the reckless pursuit of entertainment. I think it lands somewhere between the Mardi Gras, Burning Man, and Copenhagen's Tivoli Gardens. The grounds where the venues take place is called The Garden of Unearthly Delights.

Before the Garden of Un. . .  many exchange teachers met at the Spirit Festival where the Indigenous
 Peoples of the area gathered to Share "Welcome to Country" providing insight into the living local culture of the first nations peoples of the Adelaide plains. Joining the Kaurna people were Narungga, Ngarrindjeri, Ngadjuri, and Wirangu. They all have family ties to the Kaurna. The dances were not too different from the Pueblo Animal and Earthly elemental powwows of the four corners. They brought fire, symbolized the animals of the desert and seemed to have initiated young children. It was a fortunate event to witness. The crowd was friendly and the children happy, even though it was late.

After the dancers finished crowds of kids took to the sand pile when the dances concluded;

People waited and shouted for Jessica Mauboy from the KuKu Yalanji people. She became a huge success as a musician and actress when her journey began with Australian Idol. She is a key role model and is the star in the Movie The Sapphires. I hope that everyone gets a chance to see the newish movie.  www.youtube.com/user/JessicaMauboy

Australia's Bird-Life and City Savvy

Cape Barron Geese

The cormorant

The non-breeding Royal Spoonbill
The breeding spoonbill has a large tuft of feathers
on the back of its head

White Ibis

 I love my students from everywhere working to grasp English. They are so determined. Here is a silly story that may make you smile, although it is perhaps an "I guess you had to of been there” to enjoy story. Here goes anyways. A little girl from the Philippines had one of the stuffed animals that a US teacher left for me. It was an armadillo. She put it on its tail, studied it over and over, and finally said, "different kangaroo."  She was so unsure, but had to give it a name. She did not like my suggestion that it was called armadillo.  Different kangaroo was within her grasp.

Here is what recess duty is like here. It’s “the old cat herding theory” at its best. Imagine getting 150 kids to cross a busy street without holding up too much traffic. The kids don’t seem concerned with crossing quickly like the teachers. For some recess times we cross the road to the parklands. We have a key to use on the signal. The light won’t turn green until the teacher at the end of the line removes it. On the first day of duty at the park we walked off without retrieving the key. There are always a few assumptions made about what other teachers are knowledgeable of! Some teachers claim they get mild anxiety attacks crossing the children. I quite like the idea of herding cats, except when there is a puddle just before crossing and not one child likes to go around it. 

We are still working on going across in groups of four.

Arriving at the park

On Friday my class went off to a park about .5 of a kilometer away. We crossed the main street: King William’s Highway. One little guy thought it would be okay to tie his shoe in the middle of the crossing. It seems as if we have a ways to go with city safety.

At the community garden we dug potatoes and carrots. Then most of the kids nibbled the naturism flowers and leaves. I have only put the flowers on cakes or in salads, not eaten the leaves. They are really peppery, and I think delightful. I ate about 3 leaves before some of the students would try a nibble. We laughed a lot.

All of my mother-like friends at school will be relieved that I have gone to a fire preparation town-hall meeting. The threat of brush fires in the hills is taken extremely seriously. The organization,action plan, flow charts ,and levels of how to act on different rated days are quite precise. Part of it must be because there are so few ways to evacuate this area. I live on a dead-end road in a highly wooded area. Also, the city never wants to have to repeat an “Ash Wednesday” the local fire that killed several people trying to escape in cars. benefits of going to the meeting included Smoky stickers for my students. 

Heather, a group of new friends, and I took the windy roads up to Cleland Wildlife Park where we were able to pet a supervised, quiet, non-stinky koala and several kangaroos. They were lounging around and I was quite timid to pet a kangaroo at first, but as time went by it was like giving Lady a good scratch. I was giving one new friend a good pat and scratch and she was very happy. Then I happened to feel her pouch, and without really thinking, I stuck my hand in. She did not seem to notice. It was warm, moist and Joey-free. My friends were a little grossed out, but really how many people can claim to have put their hand in a kangaroo’s pouch? Earlier Heather told me that she ate a kebob of kangaroo, crocodile, mutton, emu. . So what is stranger?

really, really soft
This is a female. The male is about twice her size.

Enlarge to see the Joey's head and tail

Wishing everyone a happy Chinese New Year: 

the year of the serpent!

      

The Welcome Wagon

There was a welcome picnic, but the grills

 above were not part of it. They were a section of an amusing

 sculpture at Brighton Beach.

Welcome, welcome, and more welcomes. I feel so welcome here. Today at Junior Assembly the group sang the Australia version of "We are One" and I was so moved. The exchange group has welcomed the newbies at Central Market and the park. I have been welcomed by having lunch with Ken and Pauline, at Sylvia's then Chris's for dinner. I have been introduced to great teachers in the staff lounge and am awaiting a Friday after school, but at school, a glass of wine (those famous South Australian wines are chilling. . . in the lounge fridge).  Teachers Ben, Tracy, Mia, Tracy's daughter, and I went to stroll the Brighton Jetty Classic Sculptures.

Mia, Tracy and Pam

 I have also accepted a very exciting invite to the 5 year anniversary breakfast of the reconciliation policy of the stolen generations (with the past Prime Minister Kevin Rudd).

Formal apology to Australia's Indigenous peoples, 2008

Julie Dyson, Welcome to Country

(Djakapurra Munyarryun, The Hon Dr Brendan Nelson MP, Leader of the Opposition; The Hon Kevin Rudd MP, Prime Minister; Albert David; Denis Nuie; Ryuichi Fujimura; Matthew Doyle; Arnold Marika; Glen Doyle), Parliament House, Canberra, 13 February, 2008. Courtesy of Julie Dyson, Ausdance National.

On the 13th of February 2008, the Prime Minister, Kevin Rudd, tabled a motion in parliament apologising to Australia's Indigenous peoples, particularly the Stolen Generations and their families and communities, for laws and policies which had 'inflicted profound grief, suffering and loss on these our fellow Australians.' The apology included a proposal for a policy commission to close the gap between Indigenous and non-Indigenous Australians in 'life expectancy, educational achievement and economic opportunity.'

Food is a main source of my great experiences. Today I had a pie, not a meat pie, but a meal indeed. So now I can honestly say that there are pies in Australia that I will seek out. I still hope that I won't be shunned from the country for my earlier statement, not to be repeated. Ken made a delicious bacon and egg pie which I sampled before anyone else began eating. Not too polite of me, but Ken insisted and was glad to have had it directly from the oven.  It was so good, but later when I went back for more, it was gone. He claims making them is easy, and I intend on becoming an expert.         

I also had another Australian traditional food. The nationality of its creator has been a source of argument between AU and NZ for many years. My loyalties are currently Australian. Pavlova Pavlova Recipe - Taste.com.au is a meringue dessert named after the Russian ballet dancer. It is believed to have been created in her honor following a tour. It was served at our celebratory welcome picnic, and I have learned to not judge Australian food (although I loved it!). Its origin is an argument I will stay away from too. Politics, (meat) pies and Pavlova. Its crisp, soft, sweet and light, but I probably won't try making it since my history with Lynne's meringue cookies flop when I attempt them. 

just a section of the "Everything Asian" food court

Eating a meal out and buying shoes is probably up there with the most expensive items, but the South Australian Teacher Exchange League has taken us to the best spot in town. Behind the Central Market is China Town and it connects to the Asian Food Court. It is an amazing place with food from at least a dozen different cultures. In addition, one stall is a wine bar. So, you buy your take-out and then a glass of South Australian specialities.

The two days of the exchange league "get togethers" were fantastic. They are a great bunch- adventuresome and hospitable: welcoming!

The flags were hiding welcome gifts for the exchange
teachers and language assistants. . .  

There was a wombat for all:
the South Australian mascot, and we were asked to
include the wombat in some photos while out and about!
Get ready for a game of "I Spy Wombat" aka Fatso

Fatso's  name came from Fatso the Wombat who was an unofficial mascot of the Sydney 2000 Summer Olympics created by Sydney cartoonist Paul Newell with Roy and HG from the Australian Channel Seven sports/comedy television program The Dream with Roy and HG, which covered the event. He took the form of a life-size stuffed toy wombat with a lazy, cheerful expression and comically pronounced rump, and usually appeared on The Dream broadcasts on Roy and HG's desk.

Fatso was a spoof of the official Olympic mascots Syd, Ollie and Millie. Fatso proved to be more popular among Australian fans (and some visitors who viewed the program) than the official mascots. Fatso appeared with Gold Medalists Susie O'Neill, Grant Hackettand the Australian men's 4×200 metre relay team on the winners' dais. He consequently appears on an official commemorative postage stamp of the Australian men's 4×200 metre relay team in the arms of Michael Klim. During the Olympics, the Australian Olympic Committee attempted to ban athletes appearing with Fatso to stop him upstaging their official mascots. Poor Fatso was a public relations disaster.  (Wikipedia)

The Group being welcomed under the Morton Bay
Fig tree- and ripe fruit for eating!

Teachers here from Canada, CO, and the UK

At Brighton Beach:

Metal art

More on the amazing Gilles Street Primary School Soon

P.S. I have not seen a koala in a week, but I know they are around. Scat was pointed out to me in the driveway and they continue to grunt, rumble, and snort every night. I hear this sound at bedtime!

What sound does a koala make? - YouTube  Do you still want to see a koala?