The End to Things Down Under

The Story

Short Summary of Events
Went to the outback, saw the big red rock of Australia, realized how ridiculously large Australia is as well as how empty, and made my way back to civilization to end my trip of Oz in Melbourne. Will fly to Malaysia in the next few days...

A Slightly Longer Version of Events

The outback is a beautiful, harsh, and strange place. A german guy, a dutch girl (the driver and owner of the car), and myself set out to drive north into the center of Australia to see the desert regions of the country and the crazy people who actually live there. The drive would be over 3000 kilometers total, so we were getting ready to being in the car together for a long time. After the first day of driving through farm land and only mild desert conditions, we arrived in port agusta, a small port town but large in comparison to towns we would be visiting next. My self and Timo (the german) slept in the car while Kirsten (dutch girl) camped in her one person tent. I had the opportunity to have a great conversation at the campground we were staying at with a very wise man from south africa who was also traveling in Australia (also now lived in australia). We talked of things we have learned from traveling, uncertainty in life's experiences, vocation and perspective, and other similar topics. We both shared in struggling to name the exact lessons learned but certainly knew change was occuring.

The second day of driving in the outback was when we really started to realize the barreness Australia. There would be 100 kilometer stretches where we would only see a few cars on a two lane road surrounded by flat desert with minimal vegetation as far as the eye can see. The towns, often separated by about 300 kilometers of nothingness often only consist of a gas station, a pub, and occasionally an area to camp or a few rooms to spend the night if needed (you can't drive at night in many parts of Australia because the kangaroos will jump into your headlights. Occasionally you will see dirt roads leading off into the desert with a small sign that says a towns name and usually the +70K's it takes to get out there...who actually lives out there, its probably best not to know...

Our next major stop was in the opal mining town of Coober Peddy. This place has definitely stood out in my experiences thus far in Australia. It is the first place where I encountered a large number of aborigines. Prior to this point I attempted to cultivate an empathetic perspective towards aborigines when discussing their predicament (their predicament being that many don't work and have a problem with alcohol) with Australians. Upon arriving in the town we were shocked to see a large number of aborigines aimlessly wandering the streets, sitting around the shade of trees drinking, some passed out on sidewalks, others wandering about and shouting each other obviously drunk. This was within the 1st minute of driving through the town (only takes a few to drive around the whole town (probably a population of only about 200-300 people at most). This would be one of many experiences that have made it very difficult for me to respect aboriginal culture. I greatly empathize that their land was stolen, their culture destroyed, and their people systematically killed or enslaved by various means. But it is diffuclt to think in this same manner when confronted with most aboriginals appearing very dirty and with little concern for contributing to society. It was very difficult for my travel companions and I to keep from making jokes about experiences with aboriginies. I suppose it shows I need to work on better understanding their past and present social situation.

The next day we arrived in Alice Springs (almost exactly in the center of the country) where we continued to encounter similar aboriginal experiences. We spent two days in Alice Springs (greatly enjoying the airconditioned room and an actual bed as opposed to sleeping in the car) seeing the town and surrounding mountain ranges. The temperature was about 45 degrees C at the peak of the day (113 F) even getting up to about 52 C once or twice (about 120 F). Myself and Kirsten were having some trouble with the heat. Going from the airconditioned car/room to the heat outside messed with both of our bodies, so we took things pretty slow.

We then went to see Uluru (Ayers rock), the large famous red rock of Australia - it is about 350K's from Alice Springs. It was quite magnificent, we went to visit it several times seeing the sunset there and sunrise. We also went to see the Olgas which were just as spectacular rock formations, if not more, than Uluru. After spending a night camping about 2K's from the rock, we travelled to Kings Canyon which is a vegetation filled canyon you walk through ending at what is normally a large waterful (no water this time of the year). After a night camping we were ready to start making our way back to civilization (Adelaide).

The drive back was long and tiring as the barren desert ceases to captivate us after a while. We spent another night in Coober Peddy meeting a hilarious man from Hong Kong who created an odd look out center (right next to the official look out center - which was quite a sad sight) over the town and tried to sell us his Opal that he got from his personal small mine. We spent some more time talking to an opal miner who we met last time in town at the campsite we were staying at. He had some great perspectives on travel, ethical business practices, and Australia's overprice economy. We attempted to discuss the gray areas of business ethics which led to some fun disagreemnts. On the way back to Adelaide we stopped for a night in the Flinders Range National Park where we saw, by far, the most Kangaroos ever. At our camp site they would literally just jump right up to us and watch us set up camp. We fed them a little kangaroo food and they decided to follow us around for the evening, quite a fun experience. After a beautiful hike the next day into the Wilpeana Pound (a dry basin surrounded by mountains in about a 5k radius) we drove back to Adelaide ending our 9 day trip to the outback and enjoying Christmas in Adelaide.

I took a bus to Melbourne (SE Australia) and am just relaxing and preparing to head off to Asia (specifically malaysia) on new years eve. I am currently staying with someone from couchsurfer.com and exploring the city, running errands, and hanging out with random aussies. I saw this spectacular experimental fusion band two nights ago that played quite some strange but very talented/difficult music. Last night I had a fun time hanging out with a large group of hippies all in their mid/late 30's. They brought over about 8 acoustic guitars and we spent the night jamming to old folk and blues songs.

The Reflection

I still have been pondering memory.

How should I utilize memory saving devices in specific relation to travel experiences? I encounter a variety of travelers who will have fellow travelers write in their guest book, some will write all their experiences in a journal, some will take pictures of practically everything even minimally noteworthy things they see, some will take video of places they stay, and then there are some who don't take pictures or write about any of their experiences. A large diversity of options for an obviously large diversity of personal values.

I have the opportunity to attempt to record my experiences so I can one day look back and read remember all of the same feelings and encounters I am having now. But how important is it to cultivate memories of the past? Obviously our past has formed who we are today but how much of that is due to us attempting to remember? It seems our past experiences form who we are in their respective present moments. For example people's lives are changed with the encounter of a new person or place at that very time and moment, not so much in the memory of the moment. But that really brings up the interesting topic of phenomenology, a topic I am becoming increasingly interested in. What is experience? How are we impacted from our senses. How does the interplay between memory, our senese, and cognitive activity form our concepts of identity and reality? ...

But getting back to memory, another possible perspective is that since we experience so many things in our lives there is no way to possibly remember every encounter. So if we truly value our experiences we will attempt to save the important ones in whatever means possible so that we may never forget the lessons learned. Perhaps that is truly respecting the opportunities we are given.

And yet another perspective is that trying to use memory saving devices is an attempt to control our environment and not trust in the mystery which is beyond us. Perhaps we will be reminded of our past experiences in the appropriate times and that our attempts to save each moment is based in a fear that we will not have the opportunity to experience the same feelings yet another time in life. Is fear the basis of trying to capture experience?

And perhaps there is no proper perspective - each moment we must listen within/without to hear how to chose in that specific time. Personally speaking (that is if it is even possible to not speak personally...and what does that even mean?) I struggle to know how much time to devote to writing my experiences and trying to capture my experiences. It seems I either forsake experience now for the sake of saving only a portion of it later. Some people advise me to try to capture everything while others advise to focus on the actual experiences and if they are important enough, they will remain in my memory.

So many perspectives, so little Truth. Perhaps we have to let go of Truth and embrace the truths that become realities to us in our daily experiences.

ciao!
Karl