August 2011

Monday the 15th

With this post, I can finally say that I feel established in Australia for several reasons: I know my way around the city and surrounding suburbs quite well; I have a balanced pattern of work and play; life in the share house is comfortable and free of tension; I know of places to exercise and get good groceries/food; and most importantly, I have made many new friends and connections. Feeling welcome in a new social network certainly gives me more confidence to experience as much as possible during my time in Australia, which has turned me into somewhat of a “yes man” who rarely turns down opportunities to see whomever/whatever wherever and whenever. Compared to how I acted in college when attending to the many duties and assignments for which I was responsible, I feel energized here and almost have to pinch myself sometimes to stop and realize that I am actually here seeing the sites, speaking to receptive audiences, meeting great people, and working alongside bright cancer researchers after planning for so long. This is what makes life satisfying, and this is what helps me appreciate the vital essence of humanity, which rests upon subconscious foundations of innate socialialty that transcend any particular nationality.

Enough digression, what did I do over the past few days? My lab group officially welcomed me by having a morning tea that consisted of several people baking delicious cakes, cookies, and other pastries for everyone to share and enjoy over conversation and explaining why I am in Australia. Afterwards, I did my first official Rotary presentation, which allowed my lab group to see pictures from my home, learn about me and my family, understand the goals of Rotary and the Ambassadorial Scholarship, and ask questions about related topics. The presentation went very well and lasted about 35 minutes. Successfully completing this first presentation definitely reduced the initial anxiety that I had. Around this time, I contacted many Rotary clubs to set up more presentation dates and have since been dealing with a flurry of emails to arrange specific dates. I plan to give multiple presentations to Rotary clubs throughout August, September, and October.

I also recently spoke to the Rotaract Club of South-West Brisbane. Rotaract is basically a young professional version of Rotary with all members between the ages of 18 and 30. Rotaract clubs also have advisors who are local Rotarians. The Rotaract members were very friendly and enjoyed hearing about life in Pennsylvania. They already invited me to social events, including a Nepalese fundraising dinner to provide aid for an orphanage in Nepal that some of the Rotaractors will be visiting in January. The food was great and reflected both Indian and Chinese culinary traditions. There was also live music by an accomplished tabla player and, of course, excellent company. I plan to contact the other nearby Rotaract clubs to set up more speaking arrangements and opportunities to meet other Rotaractors.

I recently went to my first rugby league match, which was between the Brisbane Broncos and the New Zealand Warriors at Suncorp Stadium, the stadium holds about 50,000 people. Unlike the beginning of most sporting events in the U.S., the national anthem was not sung or played. I found it hard to spot an Australian flag not only in the stadium but also just about anywhere I have been; patriotism is certainly not as popular here as it is in the U.S. Before play started, one of the spectators proposed to his girlfriend, and another spectator ran across the field at the end of the match with security guards chasing him around! He wasn’t a streaker but put on a good show. The Broncos won by just a single point in the last few minutes, so the match was great to watch.

In Australia, three types of rugby are played: rugby league, rugby union, and Australian Rules football (aka footy). Each has its own set of rules and playing field, although league and union seem to share many similarities. Rugby league is easy to follow and interesting to watch, as the ball is moved quickly down the field by the offensive team. Unlike American football, the ball goes in play almost immediately after the previous tackle; no time is spent in huddles or setting up plays. Also, rugby players do not wear any pads and seem to hit just as hard as American football players, so the matches can be very intense.

At a past Rotary meeting, I presented a bowl that I made to Rotary of Fortitude Valley (my host club) to show my appreciation for their hospitality. They will use it for collecting tickets for raffles:

I have had a couple of opportunities to drive a car, which has been both exciting and a bit intimidating. Driving is exciting because I am able to see much more of the local area than by walking, biking, or public transportation, and it helps me learn the locations of roads and important landmarks. Driving here is intimidating because some of my confidence from driving at home for multiple years is lost when I’m on the left side of the road. Turning and navigating intersections takes undivided attention to signage and cognition to resist all habits previously learned while driving on the right side of the road. Also, becoming comfortable with a right-hand driver’s seat and shifting with my left hand is a gradual process.

The QIMR often has several academic lectures during the week, and Ian Frazer gave an interesting talk this past week about cancer immunotherapy that gave an overview of the different ways that the human immune system can be activated to prevent and attack cancer cells. Besides being an interesting topic, I wanted to see Ian speak because he is one of the principal creators of the HPV vaccine (Gardasil) that induces immunity against the handful of human papillomavirus strains known to cause cervical cancer (in total, there are about 200 types of HPV). He is currently involved with a project to determine if other strains of HPV can be causative agents of squamous cell skin cancer.

As part of social activities at the QIMR, I joined the student team in a trivia contest. Although we didn’t win by correctly answering the most questions, we won best team costumes, since we each dressed up as different elements; I was silver (Ag).

Sunday the 28th

I had a familiar visitor meet me in Brisbane recently. Dave Gau, an Ambassadorial Scholar and fellow Pitt alum studying in Armidale, caught a ride up with a professor up to the city. We went to a unique Japanese restaurant in Chinatown called Wagaya where you place all orders on a touch-screen computer and a waitress brings out the food/drinks in just a few minutes. A couple of other good restaurants I have tried are Punjabi Palace in West End and the Fishmonger’s Wife, which has been reviewed to have the best fish and chips in Australia more than once; I haven’t had a lot of fish and chips here, but my meal there was excellent!

This past weekend, I had the opportunity to travel a few hours north of Brisbane to Kingaroy, which is the peanut and navy bean capital of Australia. The view of the town is dominated by large peanut silos (see below), and the peanuts there tasted good. Here is a picture taken while we were driving (there were some spots on the window).

The driver was a Rotarian in my host club who builds and services air compressors used to fill tanks that are used by firefighters, divers, miners, etc. His company also works with hyperbaric chambers. The reason for the trip was to fix a malfunctioning relief valve on the Kingaroy Fire Brigade’s air compressor. Here is a picture of their unit:

With my host, I went to see “Cat on a Hot Tin Roof,” a play by Tennessee Williams set on a cotton plantation in the Mississippi Delta that is overrun by intense deceit and “mendacity” among the characters. The play is essentially the culmination of years of lying between family members brought about by disputes over whether and how the father of the family should distribute his assets, since he finally learns about his terminal cancer diagnosis. It’s a depressing story but surely relevant to the emotional pain of receiving a terminal diagnosis as well as the struggle in drafting a will.

The play was held at the Queensland Performing Arts Centre, which is located along the Brisbane River in a region called South Bank. Several museums, a library, and many shops and restaurants are also nearby. At night, South Bank also offers great views of the city:

This past week, I took the train up north to speak at the Cooroy Rotary Club. Cooroy is a small town in the hinterlands (the land beyond a coastal region) of the Sunshine Coast and the name comes from the Aboriginal word for “possum.” Logging used to be the major industry, and there is a refurbished kiln and sawmill in the town that serves as a museum and woodshop for the Cooroy Woodworking Club. I really liked their focus on woodturning, all of the nice bowl blanks, and the funding source for the lathes:

In Cooroy, there is also a modern and eco-friendly library built into the side of a hill with a grass roof; an amphitheater abuts the library and provides a great place to hold community functions.

My presentation at the Rotary Club went well, and my hosts for the night were great!

They showed me around another town, Eumundi, which is famous for some of Australia’s best markets and excellent strawberries. Here is a picture of the mountains and valleys visible from my hosts’ house:

The next day, another couple from Cooroy Rotary showed me some of the nearby scenery and the surfing town of Noosa:

Noosa is a swanky vacation spot with great beaches and surf. There is also a Noosa National Park, and the area is preserved as a biosphere, so special building codes are in place (including a maximum height of three stories), and there are no traffic lights in the entire town (just roundabouts). Richard Branson owns a private island here as well. We had lunch at the surf club overlooking the beach. When the weather is better and summer begins, this area will be packed. I am definitely planning to visit the Sunshine Coast again to see more of the area and go bodyboarding or learn how to surf.