the antarctic summer season is just about over; there are only 4 more weeks to go before the great big orange Aurora Australis comes to retrieve all of Davis' summer personnel. not only that, our days here have gone back to what semblance of normalcy this cold and clinical environment can afford; we now have roughly 12 hours of light and darkness. it means that, for the first time after a very long while, i am now able to do some star-gazing again, stare at the moon and marvel at the sunsets this place has to offer.



i've been buried under a mountain of work the past few weeks. there is something about the setting sun that strikes an uncomfortable sense of urgency in me. it is as though the sun is telling me to hurry up and get all my things done, the season is nearly over! i feel as though there are not enough hours in a day, and days in a week to fully complete what i had first set out to do. also, i find myself hampered by the lack of manpower in the labs - everyone seems to be so...disinterested or preoccupied by their personal dramas. it doesn't matter though, Melanie Ho has always been a one-woman power supply unit and will continue to chug on until her batteries run dry.

there are more exciting things to come, which i will reveal here in due time - however, i suspect the lot of you who still continue to read my blog will understand what i am trying to say. i am 7 parts excitement, 3 parts nervous energy and 4.7 parts what-the-fuck-did-i-just-do???...but it's ok, i am looking forward to a new door opening up for me, and new adventures running headlong towards me with arms wide open.

i was watching Saturday Night Fever last night and at one point of the movie, Tony Manero says to his boss, "Oh, fuck the future! Tonight is the future!"

sometimes i wonder if that is what i am unconsciously doing.

When I actually stop and think about it, there is something quite spooky about Antarctica. The other day, I did a mid-week overnight trip in one of the many huts dotted around the Vestfold Hills for some sampling purposes. It was just me and my assistant (fuuyoh!), talking shit, eating cheese and olives, and sipping wine. After a couple of hours, Nature called (as it does) and I had to make my way to one of the tide cracks along the fjord to, err, answer the Call.

That was when it hit me - just how isolated we were.

We were the only people in an area 10km radius. The wind was sweeping through the valleys. I could hear the sea-ice still lodged around Ellis Fjord creaking and groaning, cracking and splintering (which can be quite harrowing if you're trying to take a leak into a tide-crack).

Yet, amid all this noise, the silence was oppressive. I could hear everything, and at the same thing, I could hear nothing. How do I describe this???

And then, I started thinking about Antarctica and the Vestfold Hills. Who has been here before? Previous AAD expeditioners? Dinosaurs? Aliens? Space invaders?

How long has that rock been sitting there before I turned it over? 10 years? 1000 years? 1 000 000 years?

That was when things started to get a tad spooky and I could feel the hairs on my arm stand erect. I can't really describe how I felt that day, when I was being contemplative and philosophical as I was taking a leak. BUT, I think, if there is a Hell somewhere, it would probably be quite similar to Antarctica. Silent and vast, empty and menacing. Rather foreboding-looking too, when the sun sets behind its hills.

And now there is merely silence, silence, silence, saying all we did not know.
William R. Benet