Midnight sun Madness - Holtsfred the environmental music festival 08

Bodø Kulturhus (cultural house)

My brother Ross (the architect), has just been announced one of the winners for a design competition here in Norway!

The task was to design the new culture house in Bodø, a town south of Tromsø. There were many, many participants, so many in fact that they had to put off announcing the winners for a further 3 weeks in order to get through all the designs. But the judges were impressed with Ross' artist ideas, as well as 3 others who are sharing first place.

Congratulations Ross (& co.) on the prestige and great prize money, you absolutely deserve it.

The snow is melting

Spring is on the way here in Tromsø. It's a relief to have six months of snow living over and now I appreciate the sun more than ever. Since Tromsø is an island, there are many rocky 'shores', not quite beaches, but still nice places to breath in the salty breeze. Actually, it's not that salty.

A great thing about those spectacular mountains are they form a nice wind barrier, so it's rare to get icy winds here. A relief as they really would be Arctic icy hehe.

Kråkeslottet cast

Here is the lovely group TANT (Tante Augustas Nasjonale Teater) which I have been directing for the last 10 months. Here we are mid-season of our interactive theatre labrinth called, Kråkeslottet - på tid å komme seg ut. Roughly translated into The crows castle - time to get out. The show was all in Norwegian, what a challenge!

We all learnt a lot during the creative process. We pushed through the challenges of performing in a labrinth with an interactive audience and found fun ways to improvise. As director I found physically challenging warm-ups the best way to prepare the performers for the dark emotional states they needed.

Overall a very positive experience and I'm sad not to be able to continue directing them. But many of them have re-found a passion for the theatre after this experience and so I know they'll go on to do fabulous things.

Balance

After living in an array of locations over the last five years, I am now seeking balance. A type of balanced living (or as close as possible), where creative and academic, work and play, winter and summer all collaborate towards equality.

I admit the extreme conditions of northern Norway have made this pursuit more important, however both Sydney and Brisbane had their extremes also.
Sydney presented a hard working horse-race, continually running for the money seeking class and acceptance. Brisbane exposed a more relaxed side of living, but its lack of cosy, colder seasons and mountainous views became disappointing. Let's not forget Hobart with its low and less excitable employment situation as well as the forever shifting weather, leaving temperatures between 'being able to ski' and 'wear a dress' without carrying a jumper 'just in case'.

Norway has of course been the most extreme. Culturally different, climatically crazy (24hr darkness, midnight sun) and strangely isolated. However all of this has made me very adaptable so here's to hoping Melbourne provides some of the balance I'm seeking.

At least the weather will act a wee bit more normal there.

Family Fun - Skiing the Slopes

Turning Twenty-Three

Yes, it's happening still - that ageing process. It's no problem though. Too many exciting things still to come to start worrying about that. Martin and I celebrated with a steak and a musical (Chicago).

I thought i'd share the difficulties of driving in snow and ice:

¤ The car can, on any hill, decide it doesn't want to grip anymore and slide backwards towards cars also trying to drive up the hill.

¤ When having to give way to the right all the time, this sometimes becomes impossible when driving up a hill, as it would cause one to have to do a hill start on ice (not possible thus option 1 happens).

¤ It can be quite embarresing when stuck in the snow, alone, to ask for help from the postman, a man walking his dog and council workers to help push the 70's hippie van free from the snow. Especially when asked in bad norwegian.

¤ Finally, it takes an extra 20 minutes to leave the driveway because you have to shovel all the snow from the road and scrap down the ice off all the car windows.

Australia day in Norway

It's the day when thoughts drift back home. Something that i try to avoid as it only surfaces longing and wishes to return.

Today i'm pondering the dry, crispy summer grass, the sound of crickets in the cooling evening and the feeling of the body moulding into itself with the warmth of the suns rays. Oh and creamy, milky chocolate.

I also think about how relaxing life can be in Australia. In the easy, chilled way of life, yes, but mainly because it's comfortable, it's my culture, holds my memories family, friends and ways of communicating that only australians understand.

I've gotta get away from the north and get back to the warmth.


Shelly Beach: the beach i grew up on and look forward to visiting it again soon, actually i look forward to visiting any beach.