Looking for Inspiration, Still Searching for Illumination

Today is the 37th day of 2014. Today I finished yet another book on my 'List of Books to read' which is one of my New Yera's Resolutions.

The original list was:

    - Better than Fiction (collection of short stories, already started on iPhone)
    - Heart of Darkness (on iPhone)
    - Villette  (on iPhone)
    - On the Origin of the Species  (on iPhone)
    - Around the World in Eighty Days  (on iPhone)
    - White Men'll Never Do It (already started, paperback)
    - Bewitched & Bedevilled  (on iPhone)

I added to that list Kangaroo and Lady Chatterley's Lover, both by DH Lawrence, and have now read all of these books except one - On the Origin of the Species. I started it today, and I freely tell you now - I am going to struggle with this one. 

I have added to this resolution the following books that I already have downloaded onto my iPhone:
 - Grimms Fairy Stories
 - Treasure Island
 - Robinson Crusoe

I also have a book of Aboriginal Dreaming stories to read, and I'm really looking forward to it!


Today I also went some way to achieving another of my New Year's Resolutions. I went for a run, and in going for a run, I ran for 5k. I walked the first half-k, but after that, full on running. Well, yknow, jogging-running. and resolution no.5 is "5. Improve my health by exercising and healthy eating so that by the year's conclusion I am able to: -Run 5k..."

Well the healthy eating isn't really happening (I've just spooned the last drops from a jar of Nutella into my mouth), but the exercising is. It's hard to practice sit ups and push ups in a cramped dorm, but I plan to get over my self-consciousness and start doing them in the park. The same goes for Yoga. I was surprisingly flexible when I practised last night. Still not at the floor though. The resolution says by the end of the year. So I just need to keep practising! 


Just one more thing to note: I came to Australia to fall in love with the country, to work, and to maybe start a new life. I quite like the country, I've had a bit of work, but there's no life for me here. 
I am not ashamed to say that I misjudged this, that I miss home, that I miss the life I had. That I miss my mum, my dad, my sister, my nan, my grandad, my cat, my friends. That I miss my bed, and my things. That I don't miss the cold but I do miss cuddling up in my slanket in front of the Xbox. That I don't miss my bath and not having a shower but I do miss putting my shower gel and shampoo on the side of the tub and being able to leave it there. And I miss my mahusive bath towels. 
I am not ashamed that I thought I could come out here and work. I might not have tried my hardest, but when you sign up to a freelance database and all the runner jobs are going to Location Assistants and APs, you realise that maybe there just isn't the work for the inbetweener. I'm not far enough up the ladder. For a woman so focused on her career, having had nothing and no one else that truly mattered, this was really hard to come to terms with. But the blow was softened by enjoying the travels. Falling in love with new places, meeting new people, learning new ways of doing things, a new language (schooner! pot! doona! dunny! G'day! Arvo! How you going?!)

And for a woman who doesn't want to get married or have kids, I sure have realised how important my family is to me. 

Crikey this heat is hot.

I have been in Australia for exactly 16 days. I've been away 22 days now but I am only 16 days into a 365 day visa, and it feels like I'm running out of time.

Tonight I'm seeing the Brisbane Christmas tree lights being turned on. They're solar powered, because if you didn't know, Queensland is the Sunshine State of Australia. So here I am, sweating my bits off in 30 degree heat, celebrating the approach of Christmas.

Talk about head screw.

16 days, feels more like 60. Feels like so much longer. 2 weeks ago I jungle surfed through a rainforest. A rainforest!! I've snorkelled the Barrier Reef. I've held a koala. I've taken a train ride that lasted a day and a half. I've been burnt three times, and I've peeled too. Parts of me are still milky white. I've partied, got drunk, thrown up. I've made new friends. I've tried octopus, and lobster. I've been scared the day lights out of when a massive (not poisonous) spider crawled out from under a TV unit whilst watching a creepy tv show.  And I've had work experience at an Aussie production company, and there's more to come.

And I've been here only 16 days.

And in the next 16? More work, as well as a short road trip to the beach and to Australia Zoo.
And then maybe a train ride to the Gold Coast.

I came here to find work. Unlike other backpackers, I wasn't coming to see Australia, to experience the beaches or the outback. These last 6 weeks of 2013 were for holiday, and then 2014 I would work as much as I could. Now I realise there needs to be time for both. I've been here 16 days, and I want to see more. I want to see it all.

And I only have 349 days left to do it in.

You call it "nothing", a word to cover ignorance.

Ignorance would be bliss if it were ignorance we could be blame.


I am not very worldly. I have travelled, but never really immersed myself in another country's culture. Excluding Trek last November, I have never spent longer than 2 weeks in one country at a time. I've been to France a lot, but I barely speak the language and generally go with the prejudice that they hate vegetarians.

I don't speak any foreign language to an acceptable standard of fluency. And until recently I had never realised how little I sought out in knowledge about foreign countries, their cultures, and their history.

A couple of weeks ago I met Brian Avery, a US activist who spends a lot of time campaigning around the Israel/Palestine conflict. (His blog is here)

Before I met him, I quickly Wikipedia'd the conflict as it is one of those things I knew existed, but not why or for how long. I accepted it as part of our world, I had never questioned it before. I knew the names of the West Bank and the Gaza Strip and I've heard of Hamas as the baddies and that was it. The sum of my knowledge about what I now understand to be a complex war dating back 70 years.

I'm not going to pretend that an hour with Brian made me an expert. In fact, it made me even more confused.

I want to blame my own ignorance for not challenging my own thoughts on this. But it's a laziness to not discover more. It is a laziness that media outlets depend upon- that we will swallow their wisdom of the day on any given topic.
It's also a (terrible) way of trying to protect myself: I get so upset over the bad things in the world, I get so wound up about the killing and the hate (see this blog about my inability to cope with it). So if I seek out more knowledge of the awful things, surely I am just going to make myself more upset? There's nothing I can do about other countries problems, is there?
My ignorance would tell me there isn't. But knowledge is edging its way in. Knowledge that as an individual I can make a difference. If I understand more, then that already changes things a bit.

Australia is not a third world country (as my GP pointed out when I asked if I could get a years supply of the contraceptive pill). But that doesn't mean people don't need help. I will need to work in order to live. But I can surely find time to volunteer. It's my year, I can do what I want with it.

I have the opportunity to live in a country and get to know the people, the culture, the good and the bad. I'm not brave enough to go somewhere like Rwanda where my sister is, not yet. But I think this is a step in the right direction. A step away from ignorance.


*A big thank you to Danny Eve, whose random Doctor Who quoting on Twitter gave me the title for this blog!