Sweet sweat

I went to a conference in Canberra. For those who don't know, Canberra is the Capital of Australia, otherwise known as the bush capital because it's built in the bush. The story goes that when the States of Australia agreed to join together to form a federation back in 1901, the two largest cities, Sydney and Melbourne vied for the honour of being the nation's capital. In the first act of a perfect democracy, a compromise was reached, and the capital, Canberra, was purpose-built as the home of the Commonwealth of Australia, half way between the two cities - consequently it's stuck out in a paddock in the middle of nowhere where it's blazing hot in summer and freezing in winter and no-one wants to live there except for the hapless politicians and public servants who run this country. Check this site for a tour of points of interest

The city was designed by American architect, Walter Burley-Griffin, around a man-made lake. Now that lake is surrounded by parkland and walking tracks interspersed with aggressively modern public buildings. There are ducks and sail boats on the lake but I'm told the water is so filthy from the urban run-off that people have been hospitalised from taking an accidental plunge from a boat. Be that as it may, we stayed in a hotel at the lakeside and took a nice 15 minute walk every morning and afternoon around the lake to our conference venue - decidedly refreshing in the crisp and sunny autumn weather. The conference itself was held at the National Museum where some inspired architect had improved the conference rooms by adding a wall of glass overlooking the lake. Watching the water traffic sure beat watching PowerPoints for 8 hours a day.
So much for one week of my absence. The other time was taken up with visiting family- here's a sample:

Nanna, mum, dad and three children aged from 7 to almost 2 go to the beach. I'll mind them while you go up to the kiosk and choose some lunch says Nanna. Mum looks askance - I'll take the baby with me. No, no says Nanna, I can manage, he'll be fine. Famous last words!

As soon as mum is out of earshot baby picks up two handfulls of sand - eat! he proudly proclaims with a huge grin and proceeds to stuff the sand in his mouth. No, no! says Nanna -yuk! - wiping baby's mouth out with the bottom of her shirt. Unperturbed, baby picks up two more handfulls. Eat! he laughs - Yum! - and proceeds to ingest another huge mouthful, this time crunching it merrily, the grains gritting against his tiny teeth. Then he spies a sea gull on the edge of the waves. Off he runs merrily cackling -duck, quack quack- as he heads for the ocean at a rate of knots. Off goes Nanna in hot pursuit. Grabbing him from the jaws of a watery death, wails are suddenly heard from behind. Miss 7 screams - she's thown sand in my eyes, they hurt, they hurt! Nanna turns around to find her trying to rub the sand out with her sandy hands while miss almost 3 stands by looking angelic and puzzled about the commotion. Master almost 2 throws himself onto the sand screaming and yelling and trying to escape back to the 'duck' while Nanna tries to brush the sand out of sister's eyes, admonishing her not to rub more in from her hands. One eye on baby, one on big sister and ready to murder the angel/demon, Nanna starts to realise that maybe she is not capable of looking after three children on the beach for 10 whole minutes!

Then there's the suitcase -overpacked as usual- that loses its stabilizing legs somewhere in transit. On the way down it had the legs and I was just able to lift it- just. On the way home, it's gained at least 5 kilos, I can no longer lift it except with two hands and exerting all my body weight. There's no way I can get it down the aisle of the two trains I'm obliged to catch. On the first train I'm saved by a burly wharf labourer -about 6ft 3 and 15 stone- who picks it up and throws it onto a seat for me. I narrowly avoid falling between the train and the platform while getting off the first train as the bag overbalances, taking me with it. Getting onto the second train I almost suffer the same fate and am saved by the timely intervention of a Korean backpacker who then instructs her husband to lift the bag off for me at the airport. Thank God for kindly travellers!

In two weeks I caught 4 planes, 9 trains, 2 trams, 2 buses and 2 taxis. Kind relatives and friends gave me lifts 10 times.

I arrive home with a cold and feeling exhausted and wretched. Was this a holiday, I ask myself? Am I completely insane? If most of them really wanted to see me might they not make an effort to visit me just once in 5 years? As I say after every trip 'home' (3 times a year for the past 5 years) - next time Bali! But then I'd miss all those babies growing up and my mum looks forward to my visits so I guess I'll just go on punishing the rest of the family for the forseeable future!

But my trip was entirely uneventful compared to that experienced by a colleague who attended the same conference. He was on a fully loaded passenger plane that had just taken off from Adelaide when it suddenly went into a steep dive. I got really frightened when the cabin staff started falling over, he tells me. Down, down, down it went - I could see the water coming up to meet us, he says, and I started feeling under the seat for the life-jacket; I can tell you I prayed, I was begging God to help me. Eventually the plane levelled out with some serious bumps and wing dips from side to side. The pilot calmly announced that another jet liner had crossed their path and he'd been told to decrease altitude immediately to get out of its way. My colleague reckons he was shaking for the whole weekend.

Good to be back - thanks to those who missed me- it's nice to know you are out there.