Posts from August 2009

Of course, unfortunately, there is another less attractive side to Aboriginal culture.

When I last visited Australia in 1990, we took a flight to Alice Springs. Back then, Uluru was more commonly known as Ayers Rock and people were freely able to climb the massive sandstone rock. I used to be quite proud of the fact that I had scaled Ayers Rock and written: 'Nice view, bit busy, could use an ice-cream stall' in a tatty visitors book on the summit. Now the rock has subsequently and rightfully been returned to the local Aboriginal communities who view it as a sacred site, I am almost ashamed of the fact.

Twenty years ago, en-route to Alice Springs we saw small groups of Aboriginals congregating in dry creeks, drinking and obviously under the influence of alcohol and we heard that sometimes, they perished when the rains came and the creeks flooded. On this visit, we also saw small clusters of Aboriginals on parkland, sitting, chatting, drinking and occasionally shouting and arguing.

Now this behaviour can be (understandably) intimidating to tourists but to be honest, I walked straight past and the Aboriginals didn't pass me a second glance. They didn't speak to me, they didn't harangue me, they didn't ask me for money. In fact, I've had more hassle off beggars in the South Bank underpass at Waterloo station in London.

It was as if we simply didn't exist and in many ways, I suspect they probably wish we didn't. Not in their country anyway.

In the last week of the great Australian adventure, we took a guided tour from Kununurra to Broome, in a 4x4 truck, visiting Purnululu National Park and the Bungle Bungles.

The scenery was fantastic, the company was great and our guide was interesting, professional, humorous and knowledgeable.

One day, we also took another boat trip and a bushwalk at Fitzroy Crossing with an Aboriginal guide.

The Aboriginal guide was fascinating. He talked about Aboriginal culture, the importance of Dreamtime, respect for the environment, respect for each other, how Aboriginals lived off the land for 40,000 years, the extended kinship model, the need to take just what you want and not what you need. In fact, there are so many areas we could learn from the Aboriginal culture.

At night, we were able to gaze up into a beautiful, dark, crystal clear sky. I was amazed to be able to clearly see the Milky Way, Venus and identify various constellations in the night sky. Then one of my new found Aussie friends broke the silence with a statement that staggered me and made me pause for thought:

'Of course, the Aborigines don't look at the stars. They look at the spaces between the stars.'

A sheet of A4. Blank. Completely blank.

I dont know which is worse. Being rejected by Darren Bent. Or hearing the news via Twitter.

'“Do I wanna go Hull City NO. Do I wanna go stoke NO do I wanna go Sunderland YES'.

Unfortunately, Darren's twitter account 'db10thetruth' has miraculously been closed.

Yet another service in the overcrowded blog comment field is JS-Kit who already have a conventional outsourced blog comment capability (similar to IntenseDebate and Disqus).

JS-Kit recently announced an extension to the service called 'Echo' which also includes any fleeting reference to your blog post, refreshed in real-time from other services like Twitter, FriendFeed, Google Reader and Facebook.

Echo isn't generally available to mere mortals yet. Yes, you guessed it - it's limited beta, invitation only and curiously, you need a Twitter account to even request an invitation.

However, if your name is Michael Arrington, Guy Kawasaki, Robert Scoble or Duncan Riley, you are entitled to use the service which is fair enough as it works best for high volume sites with lots of comments

However, look at this example on The Inquistr of Echo in action on a live site.

Wow - just look at all those 'comments'. Look again closely. Most entries are not comments at all. They are merely links or retweets to the article from Twitter or FriendFeed. The vast majority merely echo the main headline with no additional comment or insight.

Look again and try to find any meaningful comments where people are actually commenting on the post and expressing their opinion. Guess what. The vast majority are mostly classified as 'via Comments'.

So, that's three reasons, I won't be installing 'Echo' on this blog.

1. I don't use Twitter.
2. It adds no value.
3. No-one ever comments anyway.

Theres only one man in the world who could have uttered the following:

On Monday I unfollowed 106,000 people on Twitter.

Yes. You guessed it - Robert Scoble.

And yes, before you ask, he used a script.

Can. Not. Parse. Input.

Does. Not. Compute.

Segmentation violation. Kernel panic.

You see - Thora Hird. I am aware of her work. You fancy her.

I passed through many customs, immigration and security checks at various Australian airports in the last three weeks.

Each airport has its own variant on a dire warning that reads:

'Flippant, amusing or sarcastic remarks will not be tolerated. Offenders may be subject to a $500,000 fine and/or 10 years in jail'.

Of course, we didn't tell Norman Junior III that. My - how we all laughed when he followed our advice and proudly (and loudly) announced to the customs official at Brisbane airport.

'I have nothing to declare but my genius.'

After I finally got over the shock of Michael Jackson (I suspect Mr. Pharmacist with the white pills and syringe in the study) and being genuinely saddened at the recent death of Sir Bobby Robson, Im not sure I can take any more.

Just heard some really crap news. Benson, the world's largest living carp, is no longer living.

Benson, who loved disco dancing, weighed 64 lbs and was between 20 and 25 years old (apparently, Benson lied about his age a lot - similar to Jane Fonda) has died.

The cause of death is unknown at this time but Michael Jackson's doctor has not been eliminated from police inquiries. Benson had been caught 63 times which he used to carp about endlessly to local fishermen.

It is possible that one angry angler threw some unsalted Nobby's Nuts into the lake which may have been responsible for Benson's demise as he had a nut allergy and preferred spicy 'Chilli Heatwave' Doritos.

Im not a big fan of zoos but in Brisbane, we visited Australia Zoo as it had beenrecommended by a few people. Also, we were keen to see some native Australian wildlife during our stay.

I also assumed that Steve Irwin would ensure that the animals were kept in a natural and humane environment. We all enjoyed the day out. We saw crocodiles snapping at a white bucket, the kids fed pellets to kangaroos and wallabies and we cuddled sleepy koalas. We also saw dingos, echidnas, possums, macaws, snakes, wombats, turtles, tigers and the world famous Australian elephant (shurely shome mistake here - Ed).

However, although all the animals looked healthy with large, open pens and appeared to be deliriously happy, I was left with a slight feeling of unease about my experience at Australia Zoo. The image of Steve Irwin aka 'Crocodile Hunter', who took over management of the zoo from a small wildlife park created by his father, was plastered everywhere. Irwin died in 2006 after being attacked by a stingray while filming on the Great Barrier Reef.

Now, obviously, the Irwin family own the zoo and are perfectly entitled to use the image of Steve Irwin as much as they like and I have no doubt that every single picture of Irwin's smiling face together with his catch phrase of 'CRIKEY' has been approved by his widow, Terri and probably existed prior to Irwin's death.

However, I find it a little unsettling that Terri Irwin is also now using her two children, Bindi and Robert (Bobby), whose faces also appear in videos, posters, billboard adverts and promotions liberally scattered around the zoo.