Last week while I was looking for pictures for the Dreamtime post I found a warning sign that I liked a lot but had to leave out because it wouldn't have fitted that topic at all. I'll post it now. Would you ever go for a swim in a lake or river if you saw this sign next to it?
No swimming sign in the Kakadu National Park (picture from here)
I'm sure I wouldn't. In fact, I don't think I would go anywhere near the water there. Despite the straightforwardness and obvious usefulness of these signs some people thought that they could be replaced by less sinister warnings. At FreakingNews.com a photoshop contest was organized for the most creative 'Croc-sign' makers. While I don't think it is a good idea to make the danger seem trivial, I had a really good laugh watching some of the ideas the contestants came up with. Take a look at these.
Attention! Rock-Crocks ahead! Drive carefully.
If you throw things in 'you will be asked to retrieve them' , meaning you will have to swim in to take those things out. I no longer wonder why Australia has so many excellent swimmers and so many gold winners at the Olympics.
This last one is a bit of an odd-one-out. It warns you that there is actually no danger of crocs. (Mind you, that huge frozen 'shark-fin' does look a bit alarming, though:) Are there any signs that warn you about dangerous animals where you live? Are any of those remarkable or even funny?
A few years ago I came across a book by Bruce Chatwin titled 'Songlines'. This book introduced me to an ancient view of the world, which I found so enchanting that I decided to read a bit more about it. This system is complex, just like any system made about creation, but I will try to explain the bare bones of it in a relatively simple way. The Aboriginals, the indigenous people of Australia, have a dual concept of reality. There is the plane of everyday activity and there is another one, a parallel reality called the Dreamtime or the Dreaming. This is quite different from the Western concept of dreaming. Aboriginals believe that before humans, animals and plants came to existence, strange archetypal beings roamed the Earth. These totems or ancestors appeared, travelled across the land, performed their deeds and then finally returned to where they had come from or as the indigenous people say "went back in". During their journeys, they established the Songlines, the routes that link all the significant places of creation. For example, the Rainbow Serpent, an ancestor who appears in many dreaming stories, created rivers and mountains on its way through Northern Australia.
Aboriginal people believe that with singing, dancing and fasting they can temporarily reconnect to this other plane of reality and they can heal or gain important insights for their lives. Walking long distances across the land is also one way to enter the dreamtime. Sometimes Aboriginals walk through the entire length of a particular Songline, the path of an ancestor. Some of the Songlines are so long that they pass through several language regions. Hills, rocks, waterholes, caves and all the other formations speak about the ancestors. Because of this, the land is extremely important for the indigenous people of Australia. In the Northern Territory, the two biggest and most sacred sites are Uluru and Kata Tjuta.
An important instrument of story-telling and celebrations is the didgeridoo, the oldest wind instrument on Earth. It is a big piece of hollow wood and it is often ornamented with dreamtime symbols. Traditionally, the didgeridoo is made from an eucalyptus tree that the termites have made hollow. To play this instrument you have to vibrate your lips and have to use circular breathing to make sure that the air flow remains continuous. The sound is unique and cannot really be mistaken for any other instrument. Watch how it is played by an Aboriginal artist.
Now listen to the dreamtime story titled 'The Emu and the Jabiru' and watch the animation. The speaker has a strong Australian accent but the transcript of the video is provided under the video box. If you cannot understand the speaker at first - it's OK - be patient. Understanding different accents is part of learning English and with practice it gets easier and more fun.
Have you been to London since the Millennium? If the answer is yes, then you must have seen the new landmark of the city, the huge observation wheel on the bank of the River Thames. With its height of 135 metres, the impressive structure is quite difficult to miss. Even if you haven't visited England's capital lately the sight of this giant wheel must be familiar from photos and postcards.
The London Eye, or simply - the Eye, was formally opened on 31 December 1999, but it was opened to the public only three months later. Since then, it has become a major landmark of the city and has been visited by millions of people. The Eye has 32 air-conditioned passenger capsules. On a clear day (you need to be lucky to have one of those in London:-) you can see for as far as 40 kilometres from the top of the wheel. The capsules are safe and although they look small from the ground they are spacious and heavy. Each capsule can carry 25 people and weighs 10 tonnes!
Naturally, the capsules don't stand still, they slowly move along the circumference of the wheel as the wheel turns around. Each rotation takes about 30 minutes, which means that a capsule travels at 26cm per second, or 0.9km per hour - twice as fast as a tortoise sprinting. The wheel does not usually stop to take on passengers: the rotation rate is so slow that they can walk on and off the moving capsules at ground level. However, the wheel is stopped when disabled passengers get on and get off.
Triviaabout the London Eye:
- Originally, the London Eye had only a temporary permission for 5 years but it was so successful that the permit was made permanent.
- You can reserve a capsule for your wedding or for your hen party or stag party.
- At the time of its construction and opening, The Eye was the tallest observation wheel in the world. Currently, this is the third tallest in the world. It has been surpassed in height by the Star of Nanchang (160 meters) and the Singapore Flyer (165 meters).
- A souvenir photograph of passengers in the capsule is taken automatically (also for security purposes).
- The Eye is owned by the Tussauds Group, the world's second largest leisure group, which also owns the famous Madame Tussauds waxworks among many other attractions.
Watch this video about the view that you can enjoy from the London Eye (Don't panic about your sound settings, this time there is no sound at all, just watch and relax) :
Do these exercises about the language content of this post.
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