February

I was driving through East Antarctica with my family. As we drove away from Davis we came across sparse suburbs of large homestead-style houses, many of them still being constructed on large properties covered in snow. Although there was woodland, Antarctica maintained its pureness of composition, its clean air, its silence. The houses were modern and Nordic-looking.

After a while we came to a neighbourhood built around fake canals. It became apparent that the people living here were very rich – many had large boats. I idly thought that these houses must all have massive food stocks in case of delayed resupply voyages from Australia. I also wondered about how such a community could exist, considering that Antarctica has no government. I realised that the guys on the boat I’d been watching had huge machine guns. So: it struck me: lack of government didn’t mean freedom here in residential Antarctica – it meant anarchy.

~ ~ ~ ~ ~

I’m on the Aurora Australis, but it feels like the Sapphire Princess. I can’t walk around the decks because everyone’s private balconies are in the way.

~ ~ ~ ~ ~

I’m about to be picked up by the Vasily Golovnin. I’m on a conglomerate of wooden rafts and houseboats that make a nice island on an azure tropical sea. Before the ship can get us aboard, the Russian crew defect and swim away.

~ ~ ~ ~ ~

We’re playing basketball on the deck of the Aurora. The ball comes to me and I kick it. It splats against the back fence, and has slipped through a hole and rolled out into the white foamy water before I can grab it. Further out are several identical balls, as well as one still sitting against the fence. I pick that one up and return it.

The sky is flat and grey and absent – almost like it’s a drab ceiling, or like someone totally forgot to include a sky in the dream at all. It feels almost like the whole ship and southern ocean is indoors, part of a large, antiseptic, quiet soundstage late at night.

Later, as I wander around the back decks, I notice that the sisal which ties a wooden life raft to the side of the ship is unwinding, and the life raft is about to float away. I don’t know how to retie it myself, so I call the captain. The life raft on the other side of the ship has already floated away.

March

I’m in Antarctica with a large group of engineers, most of whom are people I’ve studied with at uni. We are there on a Frat-organised tour. We stay in a sparse house with dark wood laminate furniture including a trapezium table.

The engineers are being loud, boisterous, crude, shallow, and completely unaware of their surroundings. This site in Antarctica is one they use a lot, and over the years they’ve erected ugly chicken-wire fences along various paths over the chunky glacial ice near the base so that they can use it to steady themselves as they walk around. I notice rubbish everywhere - ends of packing tape ribbons, scraps of building material, all scattered everywhere like a highway roadside. They have taken Antarctica and made it ordinary. No-one here sees Antarctica as anything but a part of a pub tour.

~ ~ ~ ~ ~

We are in Antarctica. Someone is taking a group photo of us at the end of summer. Everyone is slightly unsettled and a few people are looking over their shoulders as if they expect to be attacked if they let their guard down. Somehow, the Australian government has passed some law to do with censorship or something, which leaves many of us in danger of being found guilty of something-or-other – the penalty for which is execution. John F. looks at me as we disperse after the photo and grins, but his eyes are scared and he rushes off. No-one lingers too long, except for me and a few others. I think: at least I’m safe, coz I’m one-xteenth aboriginal so it doesn’t apply to me. Or is it the other way around?

The Australian government, in some sick version of Stalinism, is rewarding anyone who reports, captures or kills guilty people. When they start coming after me I realise the country has come under the rule of the bloodthirsty mob – I am now a target, a fugitive. I run out onto an icy peninsula. A man chases me with hate in his eyes. I try to shake him. I hide in a cupboard. I hear his footsteps coming. I crouch. When he opens the door I will headbutt him violently and escape. I am ready and ruthless and will not be stopped. He opens the door. He pauses. I pause. He lets me push past him. I run to the end of the peninsula and stand on an iceberg. It’s an island now – the tide has come in and flooded the isthmus. A mob backs me into a corner. I fight. I escape.

Thank the Lord, a benevolent country or aid organisation has sent a bus to Antarctica to take us out of this nightmare. I get on the bus. It drives away fast, over unstable icefloes that break up as we traverse them. The bus gets stuck just short of the safe zone. I know what must be done. I pull open a window and kick it out of its frame, knock away the thick opaque layer of packed snow that’s formed on the outside, and climb out to help everyone to safety.

~ ~ ~ ~ ~

Marty and I arrive in Antarctica by ship. The mess is set up like a café, with high benches and stools. Doing slushy duty means bringing lattes out on trays with a cloth draped over your arm.

On one of our days off in Antarctica, Marty and I visit the Powerhouse Museum. As we are standing in line I hear on my VHF radio that an American pilot (there are heaps of them there this summer for some reason) is making derogatory comments about me. It makes me really riled that these guys have waltzed in with their huge jets and are destroying the community spirit that was so good in previous years.

April

I was on the ship, and the sea was a beautiful, intense milky aqua. I tried to get people to come out on the deck and watch, but everyone was too busy.

May

It turned out (I dreamt) that Nikki Gemmel and I actually went down to Antarctica on the same voyage, so it’s really interesting to compare her novel with my diaries. My diary will read, “We left on 21st of December…” and hers will read, “We set sail on the Thursday before Christmas…” I think to myself, yes, her way of writing is much more readable.

~ ~ ~ ~ ~

The Aurora Australis was near Stockton Beach, heading out to sea. It looked bright and grainy, as if viewed through digital zoom. As I watched, it rose out of the sea, became airborne like a flying dart, circled around, headed back to the wharf and landed on the water like a pelican.

~ ~ ~ ~ ~

I was on the Aurora, standing on the forecastle. It was evening, and the sun was touching the horizon in front of me just as the full moon was rising behind. The sunset was amazing, stunningly beautiful. I got out my camera, made sure to turn off the flash, carefully allowed it to focus – the photo was going to be one of the most beautiful I’d ever taken in my life: the emerald green dusky sky smattered with golden stars like glitter, and reflected in the ocean, too, like a mirror.

My friend came up beside me just as I was about to press the shutter and went, “OH WOW IS THAT AN ISLAND OVER THERE?” I turned to look; milliseconds later the heavens jerked around like a clockwork toy that’s been stuck for some time and then releases, so the sunset suddenly disappeared and was replaced by dull, metal-grey night. I was tremendously annoyed.

~ ~ ~ ~ ~

I was a part of a group that had to train as soldiers for an upcoming interstellar war. Lloyd S. from Antarctica was showing a few of us how to drive massive, heavy, caterpillar-tracked machines. Several other friends from Antarctica were living with us at the army barracks.

June

I was on a beach, sitting in the sand near the far shelf of what was a series of shelves and aisles set up as if it were a small IGA supermarket. It was our food supply for Antarctica, and Ruth (the optical physicist) was in charge of it. I asked her when we could get our chocolate ration and she said, “It’s all on that far shelf, just help yourself and keep track.”

August

I was heading back down to Antarctica in a Seine fly-boat. The only other person I knew on the boat was Angus. Again, I packed at the last minute, so as the boat was leaving the pier and we were all waving goodbye, I’d suddenly remember something else and grab the pier to stop the boat and yell to Mum, “Can you go and get my sleeping bag please?”

The base had changed since last time. It was now a huge complex of large, double- or triple-story Edwardian-style buildings. In case of bad Antarctic weather when you could be trapped in a particular building for a while, each building had a large cafeteria on the ground floor.

Greg Linteris told me he was interested in visiting Antarctica. I told him he could crash at my place, so he came to stay.

~ ~ ~ ~ ~

I was on the Aurora. My cabin was the one closest to the bow. Andy Thomas was on the ship. I was excited and went and spoke to him. I asked him questions about the morale on Discovery before they returned to earth on the most recent mission etc. He said it was very intense and naturally one’s mind turned to the possibility that suicide will be necessary. Of course, if there’s a carbon monoxide leak, your blood won’t clot so even if you cut your head off with a sword your body will still be able to move around for ages coz no blood will come out your neck. (Logic, in retrospect, was totally AWOL here.) So I said, “Oh – I heard a rumour that astronauts are given a tiny grain of cyanide in a glass test tube before they go into space – just in case,” and he said yes, it’s true.

~ ~ ~ ~ ~

I returned to Antarctica, but was allowed to classify the trip as my first trip – i.e. I was given the privilege of having two ‘first time’ experiences. Throughout the dream I often made comparisons between this trip and the previous one, such as “This time we’re climbing off the Aurora and stepping straight onto floating ice floes, which is interesting because last time we got into small boats and travelled to shore that way” – which is interesting because in real life of course we did no such thing.

Rod, the chef, was the trip leader this time. We stepped ashore with out hiking packs on our backs, and saw emperor penguins with eggs on their feet shuffling towards the water. We stood still so as not to frighten them. When it was time to go back we had little notice. I grabbed my stuff quickly but found I suddenly had about twenty bags to grab – shopping bags, small bags, small boxes, hiking gear – everyone was waiting impatiently while I tried to shove small bags into larger ones and gather my too-much-baggage into my arms.