Sunlander at Townsville

Sunlander at Townsville
Originally uploaded by chazjac

May 6
Sunlander Train
Sunny, pleasant

(I am actually uploading this on the 8th. So, the shot of the Townsville platform might be problematic if you are following our progress with a map, as Townsville is much farther north than the city of Rockhampton that I mention below.)

We're on the train taking us from Brisbane to Cairns, passing through the immense sugar cane fields and the eucalyptus scrubland tracts. It's about a half hour before dinner begins in the buffet car, so I thought I'd write down a few notes about the last couple of days.

I think I had mentioned that there was a cold circulating through our ranks. The first student reported getting a scratchy throat the night before we left for Fraser Island, with others -- myself included -- becoming symptomatic shortly afterwards. I am still fighting the cold, but it does not appear to be too severe in my case. One student seemed to have it pretty rough on the island, but reports feeling much better now that we're on board.
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My colleague and I just returned from dinner in the buffet car -- which is not a dining car, as the conductor informed me via a somewhat stern lecture this morning. I guess it's not a dining car because the table service is not complete; one orders at a window, sits down, and then the food is brought to you. So, buffet, not dining. It's important to have this right, y'know. By the way, 'buffet' rhymes with 'little Miss Muffett.'

I had the steak, with mixed vegetables and roasted potatoes. Very good, and only about $15. My colleague had the fish and gave it a very good report. The train food on the Sunlander has always been quite good and reasonably priced. The dining-- buffet -- car was very crowded, as a number of our students arrived at 6 pm right along with the older crowd with us up here in the single berths.

As usual, the presence of our student group has not gone unnoticed on the train. Some of the other passengers have asked my colleague and I about the course. And the Club Car hostess just came on the PA system and announced that in honor of the special group from New York, the next movie they show will be Hairspray. I do not have the heart to tell them that the movie is set in Baltimore.

Back to the 5th of May: that was Labour Day here in Australia. I confess that I did not know that they celebrated it here. But it is a holiday that honors workers, particularly union workers. Some of the papers published articles on Monday examining Australian attitudes about the holiday. Many people do not know what the holiday represents, and treat it as another day off-- that's true of a lot of Americans, too. Some business folks want the holiday abolished, since only about 19% of the labor force here is unionized. Others want it moved to a different time of the year; since it falls so close to ANZAC Day, they claim that productivity falls during this time. I just wanted more shops to be opened.

What we would call a 'pharmacy,' Australians call a 'chemist.' There were no chemists open during the day, so I could find no cold medicines. And when one was open in the evening, I found the experience of shopping there strange; I am used to just going to the shelves and finding the product that I need, but that is not at all how it works in Australia. One must tell the chemist behind the counter the symptoms, and then he/she will recommend a medication. I felt so confused by the process that I didn't get anything.

Mostly, I just rested on Monday, like a lot of the students who have the cold. But some students went up to the Australian Zoo at Beerwah, about a hour north of Brisbane. This is the zoo of the late Steve Irwin, the Crocodile Hunter. The zoo is run by his widow, Terri, and their daughter Bindy is prominently featured these days, with her own nature show and many personal appearances. This was the second group of students to go this year; another group had gone before we left for Fraser Island. We had taken the students there in 2006, and it is a nice zoo -- I like Taronga Zoo better, but that's not meant as a knock on the Australian Zoo at all. It is a tribute to Steve Irwin that he could take his parents' small reptile park and turn it into a huge commercial success, and going beyond that to fund wildlife research and rescue efforts in many parts of the world. We might think of Steve as a bit of a nut -- many Aussies do -- but the man did truly good work, spotlighting endangered species and working with governments on the animals' behalf-- he was especially vigorous in his work with the Bengal tiger. And his zoo reflects his love of animals with many mega-habitats for creatures from all over. Both groups of students thoroughly enjoyed their visits this year.

I did get out a bit to develop some photos, walk around the Botanical Gardens, and shop a bit. I found two books for the train: War Letters of General Monash, and The Bone Man of Kokoda. General Monash was one of the first significant military leaders of the ANZACs, and was a brilliant strategist, some say the best ever. He was responsible for many ANZAC and British victories on the Western Front in WWI. I just finished his letters about the battle of Gallipoli, and hope to get through the Western Front letters this evening.

I wrote a little about the Kokoda trail last week. The 'Bone Man' is Kokichi Nishimura, a Japanese soldier and the only member of his troop to survive the battle along the trail. Determined to find the remains of his fellow soldiers, in 1979, he gave away all his assets to his wife and children, and went back to New Guinea. Not only did he work at finding his comrades, but he also began helping the impoverished Papuans. Some friends of my wife were missionaries in Papua New Guinea during this time; it's possible that they might know this fellow. But it looks like interesting reading; I hope to start it in the morning.

We have stopped at Rockhampton for about a half hour, and will depart shortly. The Tropic of Capricorn runs through this city, so we are truly entering the tropics right now. The train will cruise through the night; we will be in Townsville in the morning, and arrive in Cairns in the later afternoon, around 4:15 pm.