I'm on the fly getting ready to leave Canberra for Sydney, but since Canberra was a blast (a statement that may raise some Aussie eyebrows) I just have time to show you a few pix.
After a nicely-attended talk at the Australian Institute of Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Studies (and an interview for the local TV News!) the next couple of days were given over to sightseeing, birding, and making/strengthening personal connections.
One day seemed to span, literally, ages of time. We paid a visit to the Canberra Deep Space Communication Complex and hoped for an extraterrestrial message to reach this bad boy:
No such luck, so off to the nearby Tidbinbilla Nature Reserve where I saw my first wild emus...
...but we didn't manage to glimpse the resident koalas in their special enclosure.
My hosts are longtime devotees of Chagdud Tulku Rinpoche and several folks gathered at their place that night to perform their special Red Tara puja.
My other host is Kerrie Arabena, a wonderful woman descended from Torres Strait Islanders. Don't know nothin' about the Torres Strait Islands? Well, git yerself some edumacation! Well, I didn't either, so fortunately Kerrie's cousin Sam turned up to guide us through the Torres Strait Islands exhibit at the National Museum of Australia, where they also had a stunning exhibit, I mean seriously visionary and transcendent, of Papunya Aboriginal Painting. Here we all are in front of the museum's funky architecture:
That night we ahd a big BBQ at Kerrie's house, where she had requested a fire puja to clear negative energy. We complied, and here's the mob, that included Kerrie's pals of aboriginal and Solomon Islands ancestry. After the puja (Kerrie's holding a little Mongolian camel I gave her)...
...we started telling stories and, to my delight, but stomach muscle aches the next day, the ladies were screamingly funny. I mean, I can't remember laughing like that in recent memory. And I'm about to get in the car with Kerrie for the 3 1/2 hour trip to Sydney. Better put on a stomach brace!
OK, they're kicking me off the computer, we really have to go. More soon!
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