The Opera House is Alive!

I know, I said I need to start updating more, then I go a week without. Oops... it's just really hard to find the time to sit down and think about writing a post sometimes. So, now it's Sunday night, and I have a few minutes to think about this past week before the next one starts. This is probably going to be a pretty long entry, so read what you want, skip what you want... remember this is as much a journal to help me keep track of my trip, as it is for you all, so I won't feel offended if you skip parts.

Let's jump back to Wednesday. After a morning of doing some reading in the library, I headed down to the Opera House. As part of the Biennale of Sydney, French artist Pierre Huyghe created a forest in the Concert Hall at the Opera House. The exhibition lasted for just 24 hours and was titled 'The valley obscured by clouds: A world without metaphor.' After waiting in line for some time, each person going in got a little head lamp to strap on. Upon walking in the door, it was very dark in the concert hall. The entire hall was full of trees, shrubs, bushes, etc... lots and lots of green. There was mist streaming in from the sides, and it really looked like you were walking into a forest. You could see a trail of little lights bobbing around the designated paths through the hall, but that was pretty much the main source of light, with the exception of a few of the small lights way up on the ceiling, which were dimly on. There was a lady walking playing guitar and singing somewhere in the hall as well, very peacefully and soft. She would play a little bit, and then move on to a new spot and play some more. I believe the main idea behind the exhibition was to encourage the audience to get lost somewhere between reality and fiction, finding a special place in nature, and making a connection with the Australian bush. I would have loved to take a picture inside, but photography was not allowed... which I'm actually happy about, because constant photos would have ruined the experience.

Along with Wednesday night came After hours over at the Art Gallery. To start off the evening, they brought in Mark Olive. He is an Aboriginal chef, and his nickname is The Black Olive. Haha. He basically talked about a bunch of different herbs and plants that are native to Australia that the Aboriginal people used to use a lot, and people still can use, but they just don't realize it with most of them. His big push was to promote a lot of these plants as Australia's national cuisine. He whipped up a few olive oil mixtures with some of the herbs, and then let us try them out with some bread, tasty. Mark is currently in the process of trying to get his own tv show going. After his presentation, I went downstairs to the theater, where they were showing 'Ten Canoes.' This is a recently made film about Arnhem Land up in the Northern Territory. It told a (relatively) present day story about a man and his tribe, while linking it to one of the tribal stories about their ancestors and history. Although it was a serious story, there was also quite a bit of humor tied in, which was really funny to see. For example: There was one point where a group of men were walking through the forest on a hunting trip. The man at the back of the line all of a sudden yells out 'Stop!' and the other men freeze, thinking that he heard something approaching, or sensed an enemy nearby. He then goes on to explain that he refuses to walk at the end of the line any longer, because one of the other men in front of him keeps farting, and though it may be silent... it's silent but deadly! hahaha. I got a good laugh out of that one.

Friday, I walked down to Alexadria for a NAIDOC market day. I got down there around 10am, as the event was just getting going. There were booths set up all around the field, with different groups handing out information about anything from Aboriginal census, to teacher recruitment, to sexual health, to native title rights, etc, etc, etc... Also, they had a free BBQ, and a bunch of different local Aboriginal musicians performing. I got talking with one Aboriginal guy who works with the UN, though what exactly he does I'm not totally sure. His wife is a high school math teacher, and both of his boys are learning to play the violin. After discussing my project with him for a little while, he invited me over to his house for dinner later this week. He said that over dinner, he will teach me about Aboriginal culture. Plus, he said that they are going to cook Aboriginal food for me. Awesome. Alex also introduced me to one of his relatives (Les) that does a lot of work with music. I briefly talked with Les, in between all of the running around that he was doing, as part of the event. I did manage to get his card though, and we will hopefully be meeting later this week to have an interview.

Saturday brought with it my last NAIDOC event. I walked up to Woolloomooloo, for their community day celebration. Again, we had music, food, and lots of people. I had a little chat with another one of the musicians who played at this even, and set up a meeting with him later this week hopefully. Then, as I was getting food, who do I bump into again, but Alex! This time his wife was with him, so I was introduced to her, and then sat down to eat with them. We confirmed my coming over on Thursday for dinner, but then I had to take off, because I was going to a performance up at the Art Gallery. The Wangatunga Strong Women's Group was giving a performance with both some singing and dancing. This group of women is from Bathurst Island up off the coast of the Northern Territory. About a year ago, a Sydney musician heard their music, and began a collaboration project with the group, attempting to combine their musics. However, I will get to more about that later, as this performance was just the Wangatunga women. They sang a bunch of songs all in their language about their ancestors, land, animals, etc. It was really fun to watch them, because they were very clearly having a great time. Most of the women looked pretty elderly, but even the oldest one was having a great time moving around the stage. A few of them could speak English, though it didn't seem like they could speak very well, or at least they were pretty shy. Wow, Saturday was a busy day. After this concert, I went down to the Museum of Contemporary Art to check out their collection. They had a really great display of Aboriginal art up on the fourth floor, with lots of bark paintings from Arnhem Land. They also had a exhibit downstairs of John Cage's 4'33''. There was a projector in a small room, constantly looping a video of the BBC Symphony Orchestra's performance of the piece. I thought it was cool that they incorporated a musician into the contemporary art gallery, even if it was John Cage... just kidding Rob! (That book better be done by the time I get back, by the way.) Ah! And we're still not done with Saturday. I then headed over to the Opera House for a concert down in the Studio, which is sort of down underneath the the big concert halls. The concert was put on by Geoffrey Gurrumul Yunupingu, who is a blind singer/songwriter from NE Arnhem Land. Backing him up was a small combo of violin/viola, guitar, and double bass. All of his songs were in his language, and they were very relaxing and pretty. His brother, Mandawuy, is actually the lead singer in the popular Aboriginal rock group Yothu Yindi. I bought a cd after the concert, and it is great, (though I was a bit disappointed that the little back up combo is not on the album.

Finally, we can move on to Sunday. I got up this morning to head out and try a different church. I was thinking all the way back about a year and a half ago, when I was first starting to think about this project. Down in Pennsylvania for Christmas, Uncle Stu said that there was this great church in Sydney that I would have to check out if I ended up going on this trip. This church, Hillsong, is famous for their huge conferences, and powerful worship videos/cds. This had slipped my mind for the first few weeks that I was here, but since I remembered this past week, I decided to try it out. The church has two locations, one in the city, and one in the 'Hills,' which is a little further out in the suburbs. I went to the one in the city, which still took me about 45 minutes to walk to. This church has 4 Sunday morning services, and the one I was in was still packed with probably 6 or 7 hundred people... Let's just say it was a bit different from the 6 or 7 people that I met at the Unitarian church. The worship part of the service was basically a rock concert. Up on stage there was a lead singer/guitar player, backed by at least two other guitars, bass, drums, trombone, sax, and 5 or 6 other people to help lead singing. Behind him, was a choir, which was very into jumping and raising their hands in the air while singing. Behind the choir were 5 enormous screens, onto which was projected video image of what was going on on stage throughout the whole service. Also while they were singing, there were all kinds of lights and colors flashing around the room. It was one of the most powerful worship services I've ever been to, and the entire congregation was so alive and into it. Even the preacher had the whole rooms attention, and was weaving jokes and funny stories into his whole sermon. I don't know if any of the Osbornes are reading this, but thanks for recommending Hillsong to me, Uncle Stu, I'm glad that I at least got to visit it while I was here. After church, I grabbed a sandwich at a nice little cafe around the corner, and then spent the greater part of my afternoon wandering around Centennial Park, which is a huge. Lots and lots of grass, ponds, birds, families, trees, plants, etc. I sat down to read for a bit by one of the ponds, and then wandered through what used to be known as the Lachlan Swamp (named after General Lachlan Macquarie.) These were some really cool paths weaving through this swampy area which was like a mini forest full of paperbark trees and other local flora and fauna. To finish off my busy little week, I headed back over to the Opera House to see the Wangatunga Strong Women perform again, but this time with the Sydney musicians. It was sort of a fusion between jazz and indigenous musics. It was interesting, but I did note a few things. I can't say anything for sure, because I don't know the whole back story on this project, but I felt like it was a little intrusion on the Womens group. I've been reading a lot about the different influences on Aboriginal music, and how the traditional stuff is really disappearing in many places. It did seem like the women got along great with the Sydney group, but it also seemed like they were much more comfortable, and were having a whole lot more fun when they were performing by themselves. This was also evidenced by a couple times in the concert when they were uncertain of where to enter when the jazz musicians were playing, because their music does not have the same kind of structure as we are used to. Again, I could be wrong on that, those were just my observations from the concert, which was very enjoyable.

On a side note, I started feeling a little scratch in my throat on Friday night... :/ I hoped that it might just be in my imagination, but I woke up on Saturday to a very painful throat that made it difficult to swallow. I took some of the medicine that mom thankfully reminded me to pack (thanks mom) and had to go on with my day regardless. This morning (Sunday) I woke up, and the sore throat had moved to more of a stuffy nose, pressure in the head. I again took some medicine, and continued on with the day. It is still hanging around a little bit, but I'm hoping that within a few days it will completely pass over. I just can't afford to miss out on any of my days here.

I had some other thoughts that I was going to talk about, but this is just getting too long... I'll try to post again in a few days with other random thoughts. For now, here are a few pictures, as a reward for reading this whole novel...















(Left) A performance at the Glebe NAIDOC day, with some local Aboriginal guys performing some traditional dances.
(Right) A flag presentation at the Hurstville NAIDOC day. On the left is the Torres Strait Islander flag, in the middle is the Australian flag, and on the right is the Aboriginal flag.




















(Left) An example of some of the Aboriginal art in the MCA.
(Right) The Wangatunga Strong Womens Group, performing at the Art Gallery.















(Left) I don't think I will ever tire of taking pictures of the bridge or the opera house, especially when there are nice sunsets involved.
(Right) World Youth Day is everywhere. This is going to be busy week in Sydney.


Thanks for reading.

-Luke