This week makes my eleventh in Port Hedland, my fifth in my new house, and, thanks to the recent hire of Full-time Linguist Number 3, my last as the newest staff member at work. It’s been a very active eleven weeks, as there’s a surprising amount going on in this town if you’re willing to try anything, which I believe I may have a history of being.
I’ve been to events hosted by the rec center, the library, the historical society, and the gardening club; I joined in on an impromptu half marathon, started a running club, joined a team for the 24-hour Relay for Life cancer research run, and am apparently going to soon be hosting a monthly swing and salsa night.
I even spent a weekend at the horse races in Marble Bar, a tiny speck of a desert village about two hours inland from here that boasts a couple hundred residents and the dubious distinction of being (supposedly) Australia’s hottest town, deemed as such because at some point in the not-so-distant past it recorded 161 consecutive days in which the temperature never dropped below 100o.
I rode down there and camped with a lady I met at the half marathon, plus her friends, whom I met for the first time when we all got in the car together—a motley crew of very sunburned middle aged mining employees and cohorts, all of whom liked their whiskey and most of whom liked it for breakfast.
While Port Hedland is not exactly a destination spot for touring artists, I also got to see a traveling circus that passed through town, though I spent the whole show wincing as families of slightly overweight acrobats performed creepily Oedipal poses and lifts on each other with noticeable effort. Other than that, we don’t get much in the way of shows up here; the cultural centre has movie nights sometimes, but they’re usually about Justin Bieber and the entry fees are somewhere north of $15 a person, so I don’t anticipate stopping by there. Even with a join-all spirit I still have to have some standards.
The town itself, though, has proven to be a surprisingly agreeable place for joining and launching various activities. It’s large and active enough to have a decent array of things going on, and has a big enough population (somewhere between 15 and 20,000) to support groups and events, but it’s still small enough so that new activities seem to make a big impact. Like my new running club, for example: it’s the only one in the area, and its founding actually made it into the newspaper (i.e., small town), but I think at least a few people are quite keen to join (i.e., it’s large and active enough). It’s a funny little place. I actually quite like it.
But of course, I spend most of my time at work, and I’m happy to report that I really like my job too. I like my coworkers, who are intelligent and have good senses of humor—my boss once acted out what it might be like to slap me with a fish. I like the building—it’s quiet and full of light and has a ton of usable outdoor space. I like the people it connects me with—I’ve met some highly respected Aboriginal elders, as well as local leaders in both Aboriginal affairs and general town activities (not to mention the staff of the Museum of Australian Democracy, with whom I leaped from the hood of the Land Rover. Our organizations are collaborating on a traveling photography exhibit on the Aboriginal political history of the Pilbara region, and they came from Canberra for a visit a few weeks ago. I accompanied them on day trips out to two semi-remote communities and discovered along the way that they have a fabulous sense of fun.
And finally, in other exciting news, I have internet at home now! The cell phone provider up here (there’s only one) also offers little USB stick modems on which you pay by the kilobyte. Service is pretty decent if often a bit slow, but I’ve found that it reasonably fulfills the main purpose for which I bought it, which is the making of internet-based phone calls. Assuming a patient interlocutor in a quiet environment who doesn’t mind repeating things three or four times, it’s quite sufficient, and since obtaining it I’ve been calling Americans with gleeful abandon. If you haven’t yet received a staticky 8am phone call from Australia, then let this be your warning—you could be next! (Hint: say “Hello?” at least five times before hanging up. Sometimes the Pacific gets in the way.)
Between work, other various activities, and a longstanding penchant for procrastination, it takes me a while to get these posts up—but I’ll aim for another one within the next few weeks! Affection to all from down under!
