It seemed only fitting that The Waifs, an Australian band that has been
one of my favorites forever, blasted on my ipod when I deplaned in
Sydney about a month ago. As the sister group belted the following
words: "Take it in. Take it all in. Now is the time that will not come
again. Take it in. Take it all in. This is the day and its here for
the living," I couldn't help myself from getting emotional. Once again I
was starting a new leg of my adventure, and finally getting comfortable
with embracing the constant state of limbo the Watson is. Always on the move,
I am finally getting to the point where I don't need to remind myself to
take in the breathtaking beauty of the people, places, and things I am getting
to experience and soak in. Finally I'm coming to the long awaited feeling
I have been looking forward to: MY LIFE ROCKS!
A week into my stay in Melbourne I rode 50 kilometers out to
Frankston, Victoria to participate and observe the Hip Cat Circus
Program. My friends in Australia tell me that Frankston is filled with
Bogans. What is a Bogan? I have no idea. I think it might be the
equivalent of a red neck back in the states? Anyways, set directly on
the beach, Frankston seems similar to your typical slightly down-and-out
city suburb. What sets Frankston apart however, is the gigantic,
state-of-the-art, community arts building it boasts. Hip Cat Circus
began as an offshoot of West Side Circus, a social circus in
Melbourne. In the two weeks I got to watch and participate in the Hip
Cat circus I found myself continually impressed with the community
they have created there. Thankfully, I wrote down the games, community
building, and art building activities they did. So far, Hip Cat has
been the best community I have seen in youth circus to date.
Near the beginning of my stay in Melbourne my friend at 'Ultimate
Victoria' was supposed to teach Frisbee in Frankston, for Disabilities
day. He happened to be away that day and asked if I would fill in for
him. I was particularly excited because there was a circus skills booth at
the event as well. So I gladly obliged and took the hour long train out to
Frankston and taught Frisbee for a couple hours to people of all ages
that were autistic, blind, deaf, paralyzed, developmentally disabled, and
more. After the Frisbee session was over I went and joined the circus
station. To my delight the people there were welcoming and had lots to say
about all-access circus and other events and groups dedicated to arts
empowerment within Victoria. Therein lay new connections here in
Melbourne: Hip Cat Circus, Ready Set Play Kids, and AcroYoga
Melbourne. The three facilitators were experienced in everything from
Acroyoga, fitness, circus, arts administration, personal training, and
more. AWESOME! All three were inspiring and were able to help send me
in some new directions for my time here. Not that I needed more
opportunities here...
In the short three weeks I was in Melbourne I somehow managed to meet
with five circuses, contact four more, take pole, dance, parkour,
aerials, do training on my own, and take tumbling. I also conducted interviews with
people from all of the above. I have somehow managed to play frisbee
five times and played in 2 tournaments. I went on multiple runs, took numerous
trams and trains, rode on a motorbike, went to a benefit
concert, went to the NICA graduate showcase, ate the best kebab (say
my Aussie friends) in the city, ate kangaroo (See picture of me eating
Kangaroo and enjoying it! Also note that I have since dumped most of my
clothing and what I wear in this picture is pretty much what I wear everyday.
Nothing like lightening the load!), biked over 150 kilometers, taught disabled
people frisbee and circus, taught some future team Australia teens some frisbee
skills, walked a huge amount of the city, discovered some of the best pubs
and cafes in Melbourne, met some amazing people, been too sore to walk,
and laid in the grass doing absolutely nothing. I feel so alive. Actually as I just read
back what I just wrote I sound a bit like a robot... But I knew what I
was getting into when I arrived. I tried to fit in as much as possible
when I got here seeing as Melbourne is one of the best places to study
circus in the world. I also spent minimal time outdoors when in
Indonesia, so am more than appreciating the outdoors here in Australia.
Sophie camp has begun again. I spent my time in Melbourne observing
social circus programs, and training myself in circus. As I have come
to realize, it is incredibly helpful to be able to do circus if you
want to teach it. I also spent lots of time with friends I have met
playing new games I have learned. What kind of games you ask? Imagine
a bunch of hyperactive early 20s closing their eyes and seeing who can
sprint faster into a fence 20 yards away. Yeah, I told you my maturity
level is dwindling!
What was next? Well...after completely depleting myself of energy I,
of course, hurt myself! So I went to Sydney and spent a few days on the
Northern beaches running the beaches, scrambling over the rocks, looking
out into the gorgeous scenery, making some new friends, and relaxing. I then
hopped on a bus up to Byron Bay. I have come to think that this is my
favorite place in the world. If you get outside the few kilometers of
Byron Bay tourist town you seen endless rolling grassy hills,
waterfalls, vast ocean views, and the kindest people I have come
across on my trip. The past two days have been spent running around
the hills taking in the beauty, observing the couple of circuses in
these parts, and training, training, training on the trapeze and
fabric. I love it.
What is next? Tomorrow I leave to go up to the Woodford Folk Festival.
This festival has been described to me as the following: a mix between
Telluride Bluegrass Festival, Burning Man, and Woodstock. I will be
volunteering at the circus tent from xmas to new years in exchange for
free admission to the festival. I have some intensive courses I will
be taking through January, and then have hopes of heading out into
central Australia with a couple guys I met for an undetermined amount
of time. We'll be bringing a whole lot of discs and juggling balls and
hope to teach some circus and ultimate for a couple of weeks. But as
always, I really am just winging it! The Watson freedom will allow me
to take advantage of whatever opportunity crosses my path in the
coming weeks. Crossing my fingers that it works out. I can't wait for
the rest.
Happy Holidays All! Happy New Year! I miss you all dearly!
HELLO STRANGERS! Greetings from down under!
I haven't really been near consistent Internet since I left Indonesia in November. Although I have been writing for these blog posts, I haven't had a chance to put them up. So here comes a couple:
That I could possibly fill you in and do justice to the events since my last post is unlikely. It would turn into the craziest, lengthiest, most heartbreaking, hilarious, and probably most boring blog post known to man. But with the coming new year I have resolved to be better at blogging- even if it means condensing lots of time into a few well-chosen words.
McDonald's is one of the only places with free Internet in Australia! Here I sit in McDonald's borrowing a kind stranger’s computer because I recently left my computer in Sydney as I begin to explore the northern parts of Australia. Let me tell you, it is so liberating to have less stuff to drag around with me and worry about! I have some pictures and videos I will post when I have better internet access.
If there is one thing I am learning on this trip it is to stay present. I have even been finding that taking pictures takes me out of the experience. In one of the few times I have spoken to my dear friend Hannah Sohl (who is also on a Watson Fellowship) we marvelled together on how difficult it is to articulate our experiences to anyone else. The whole concept of the Watson- solo trip and all- makes it inherently a bit hard to explain. But I will try.
If you squint your eyes, you could almost mistake Melbourne, Victoria for Austin, Texas or some other super-hip, cutting edge American city. Constant buskers on the street, music on every corner every single night, OpShops (consignment clothes etc), incredible public transportation, welcoming people, everyone dressed "alternatively," and much more. I am in culture shock to say the least. I look up at night and there are stars! There is a blue sky! I can walk down the street for more than 5 minutes without being called Mr! I can take off my socks and shoes and wade in the ocean without fearing for my health! I can lay in the grass! There IS grass!
Even though I am gulping up the clean air, and wearing tank tops and shorts that I wasn't able to wear in Indonesia (a Muslim country) I find myself missing Jakarta. Something about the utter overwhelming crowdedness, the absolute poverty, the environmental disaster of it all……My roommate there hired a driver once that owned a monkey who smoked. I mean, literally! Looking back, Jakarta doesn't seem real. Five person families riding on one motorbike with no helmets, children dragging around dead rats on a leash as a pet, getting woken up at 4:15 am every morning as the call to prayer was blasted on a loudspeaker through my window. But there was something about Jakarta. There was never a dull moment. The pace of life- although slow due to traffic that made a 5K journey take upwards of two hours - seems so hectic, it was almost fun. The Indonesians, despite some overarching negative patterns Expats will tell you about, were very friendly (to this white woman), and they were extraordinarily funny just about all the time.
Although I did venture briefly to the 1000 Islands and to Bali, I spent the majority of my time in Jakarta. Indonesia itself is said to be one of the most beautiful, biodiverse places on earth. Above, I am of course only speaking about the parts that I experienced. The other night I met an Australia who had written his thesis on Leftist Radicals in Indo. I spoke about my disenchanted opinion of Jakarta and he offered his wisdom in response. I hadn't known much about the history of Indo, and when in Indo it is hard to find. Expats basically know nothing about it, and Indos don't really seem to care. I look forward to speaking more with the Aussie I met to find out more about the beautiful country of Indonesia.
Anyways, it all comes down to missing the kids in Cilincing. I spent approximately 7 weeks going to Cilincing Tues-Fri, and hanging out with the students when Hidung Merah bused them into Jakarta proper for training on Sundays. And of course, at around 7 weeks was when I really started to make breakthroughs with the kids. They started to trust me and joke around with me, right as I was getting ready to leave. Awesome. Tuesdays and Thursdays were spent tutoring kids on anything from English to math. Of course I couldn't really speak the language so that presented some interesting situations and circular conversations. By the end of my time there I could get around in Bahasa Indonesia. The other day on a bus in Melbourne I eavesdropped on some Indonesians and felt so accomplished! But I can feel it already slipping away. Wed, Fri, and Sundays were spent doing circus skills and English. Man oh man, were these kids awesome! Juggling clubs while standing on shoulders, passing rings, flexibility. Their skills were impressive, and their hunger to learn inspiring. Although sometimes they did need a little kick in the butt!
I had the unbelievable opportunity to take on a lot of responsibility with Hidung Merah because when I arrived they were just losing many employees and volunteers. Every morning I walked an hour to the office through the most traffic filled streets I have ever seen. Then we'd drive the hour to Cilincing. Many a Tuesday and Thursday was spent with Ddy, the field manager for HM. Ddy, an aspiring Indonesian rock/pop singer, would belt out the words to American pop songs and I would follow suit. Then we'd tutor from 10-3pm or so in the small circus space. Laying on the mats, joking with the kids, and trying to get some work done. When I taught a 15 year old boy to do algebra in five minutes I finally got a complete picture of the disrepair the Indonesian school system lies in. They had been learning algebra for months, and he still had no idea what was going on! All it took was 15 minutes of one-on-one help to explain it.
The people I lived with in Indo can attest to the fact that I smelled like fish, mussels, sweat, and shit the entire 2 months I went to Cilincing. But besides the stench I dragged around with myself for a couple of months, I found myself always on the brink of tears. I have never been great at separating myself from the experience of others and I found it extraordinarily hard to separate myself from the poverty that I saw in Indonesia, and in Cilincing specifically. I have never seen people living the way they lived there. In trash villages, fishing villages, and small settlements I saw on the side of the road I saw easily the most unsanitary living I have ever seen. As I mentioned in my previous post, I constantly battled with my place in the lives of the kids I was volunteering with. They seemed so happy in their lives. Who am I to judge the way they live? Perhaps living simply and with a smaller view of the world is a more satisfying way of life.
Anyhow, I happened to arrive at Hidung Merah when the kindergarten group (ages 3-6) was beginning. I ended up helping out with the structure of the class and some of the content. While I never felt that my lack of language skills held me back with the older kids, the kindergarten class was filled with little menace children that did need discipline. I wished I could have helped out more in that regard. My disciplinarian skills centered around my ability to constantly run around picking kids up and and putting them elsewhere.
My time with Hidung Merah was largely spent learning how to juggle, teaching fitness and some beginning acrobatics, running around chasing 3-6 year olds, teaching a bit of trapeze, and trying to be cool enough for those 13-17 year olds to like me. Hidung Merah can take credit for my juggling skills! In the 2 1/2 months I was in South East Asia (which short trips to Singapore and Malaysian Borneo), I spent considerably more time with children than adults. Thus I am noticing that my maturity level may well be dwindling!
When I applied for the Watson, I cited my previous abroad experience in Israel as the inspiration from my social circus study. I wanted to use circus in the same ways that my program at the Arava Institute had used working on environmental issues as a central focus for bridging differences among Israelis and Arabs. I wanted it to be more successful, thinking perhaps using a performative tool instead of another highly contested issue (the environment) would have significantly more potential to empower individuals, create community, and move us toward peace. Additionally, when I was dreaming about my year as a Watson fellow, Indonesia was not part of my application. Thank god I added it! I can honestly say that I accomplished the above goal when I was in Indonesia. In my humble opinion, I saw with my own eyes that the organization Dan Roberts (the coolest guy ever!) has created in Indonesia, not only empowers children to have dreams, but it also instills within them a work ethic and accountability you would be hard-pressed to find in other Indonesian children. Giving children the opportunity to have aspirations, to develop skills, to learn how to help others and develop trust has an impact far beyond the particular circus skills they may acquire. My experience in Indonesia was challenging in almost every way, but I also know that these challenges have made me a stronger, more responsible, more effective and passionate person.
Hidung Merah is contemplating sending some of the kids to the US to train this spring and summer. I am already more than looking forward to seeing them when I get back to the states.
Also a special thanks goes out to Anne and Matt Stanley, Linley York and her fam, Dan Roberts and family, Ddy, Children of Cilincing, Elo, Carmen, and Lisa. Thanks for being my home away from home.
On to Australia!
