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How Australia Was
Well, it was great, thanks for asking. I'm handling the jet lag now I'm home not by sleeping at the wrong times, as is traditional, but by going through the usual hours of the day feeling weird and dreamlike. Hello desk, hello computer! (They haven't quite started to answer back.) Presumably, my actual dreams are now even more concrete and to the point than usual.
We visited Cairns, the Great Barrier Reef (by snorkel), the Atherton tablelands, Uluru, Sydney and Melbourne. So much wildlife: we became particularly friendly with a big blue fish on the Reef, who hangs around a particular platform, waiting for photo ops. I'd sorted my deadlines so that I didn't have to do much work, and was able to relax for the first time in months. Thankfully, unlike with some of my holidays, this time I found that the journey from work mode to relaxation wasn't too hard. So no horrors. In Sydney, my old friends from local Doctor Who fandom got together for a reunion, which was a delight. We checked out the MCG and the Tim Burton exhibition in Melbourne. Thanks to the wonders of FourSquare, I was able to carry out an impromptu book store signing or two. Hiking around (not on) Uluru was a grand experience. And that was where the guidebook proudly told us that we could meet an indigenous person.
The position of indigenous people in Aussie is quite strange. We went to several places, like a treetop rainforest walk, which were specifically indigenous in origin, and made much of the local people's contribution, but where there was no sign of them. We expected to find, at the park around Uluru, with strict prohibitions about when and how to enter, indigenous people on the ticket desks and in the shops, but the only one to be seen was our guide, Sarah Dolby. She spoke only the local dialect, and was accompanied by an English translator who was Japanese, because Japanese and her language share many similarities. Sarah was an awkward mix of guide and tourist attraction, to the point where she told us we could take photos of her. Nobody did. However, it was clear that she was leading the tour, that this experience was down to her. And the funds generated by the tourism here go to the Uluru family, and hence to indigenous causes in general. Sarah and her translator were clearly friends, laughing together and exchanging bits of Japanese. It's impossible to call this exploitation. But it still felt awkward. One's own internal racism is usually swiftly overcome by meeting the people in question. That's harder to do when you can't. If you're a tourist, rather than someone who lives in rural Queensland, it's almost as if these people are 'the elves', always living somewhere over there, unseen, strange, different. We were told much about how they used to live, as hunter gatherers, but not a single thing about how they live now. They seem valued these days for difference, for mysticism, which is nice, but doesn't say anything about housing and education. Sarah's language was first written down in the 1980s. The first indigenous MP was elected a couple of weeks back. This isn't a rant at a country which does now seem to be moving swiftly in the right direction concerning indigenous rights, more a note of how recent and awkward and strange it all seems. While the local people ask visitors not to climb Uluru, there's no actual prohibition. That feels like the grind of old politics, like a deliberate arrow pointing at powerlessness. 'Minga' is the local word for those who walk on the rock: 'ants'. It's a nice combination of description and insult.
Near Cairns, we went whitewater rafting on the river Tully, and there was this guy sitting upfront beside Caroline, very sure of himself. He kept talking over what the guide was saying, and advising us what to do. And then, going over a set of rapids, his foot stamped down on Caroline's, and twisted, almost completely removing the nail of her big toe. After a bit of glue and dressing, she kept going. She dived off the big rock. On another set of rapids, she got flung out, grabbed and flung back into the raft. I may have mentioned before how tough she is. The toe now looks weird, but everything looks like it's growing back as it's supposed to.
And so to Worldcon. Aussiecon 4 was quite a laid-back example. Lower attendance, but we always knew that would be the case. A kind of simplicity and straightforwardness to the panel topics that didn't always make for the best debate, but precluded much awkwardness and confrontation too. The 'racism in SF' panel was the first one of its kind I've seen without a cross word. The lack of useful internet facilities in... well, all of Australia, really... meant that the Twitter stream was slow, and that, these days, is the pulse of a convention. I enjoyed Guest of Honour Kim Stanley Robinson's lecture on Virginia Woolf's fandom for SF writer Olaf Stapledon, and how his Star Maker influenced her own later books. It was fun, if awkward, watching George R.R. Martin gamely filling an hour about the forthcoming HBO adaptation of Game of Thrones when he wasn't allowed to show or tell us anything. I held my own, just about, alongside the great critic John Clute on the 'Western influences on SF' panel. And sank my shallow knowledge on Charlie Stross' iceberg on the time travel panel. (An essay to come on this blog about how SF is losing ground in the gap years between great theories of physics.) But my favourite panel, and I think it went down well with the audience, was Just A Minute:
(Nicked from the Shane on the Go blog, hope he doesn't mind.) Sorry about the sound. The participants were Patrick Nielsen Hayden, Jennifer Fallon, John Scalzi, Ellen Kushner, Cat Valente and China Mieville. Scalzi won it, by being ruthless like a hawk that had got out of the wrong side of bed that morning and had issues with mice. I think we might have succeeded in making the game a Worldcon fixture now.
The best thing about this Worldcon was the bar talk and late conversations. I sat up with Jonathan Strahan and Liz Myles, and had a meaningful post-gameshow chat about religion with kind atheists Scalzi and Mieville. We met many new friends, such as Valente (oh my God, force of nature), Seanan McGuire (great intellectual) and Alaya Johnson (pointed and precise). The demolition of party culture in the other hotel, by means of sudden management strife, meant loads of authors ended up in the Hilton bar. The shared circumstances of our lives as SF and fantasy writers, especially when it comes to the Olympics that is the Hugo Awards, creates a great sense of togetherness. It's my favourite thing, to be in a bar full of my peers. We did two dinners in two nights with George Martin and his wonderful gang, including Melinda Snodgrass. That's another specific belonging, the way we're all part of subgroups, in this case the Wild Cards authors.
The night before the Hugo Awards, I dreamed I was a young boy who was going to be in a boxing match. I was quite looking forward to it, thinking I might land a lucky punch or two. But when I got to where it was going to be held, I ended up not fighting at all, and had to work hard instead, hauling buckets. See what I mean about concrete and to the point? Thankfully, on the night of the Awards, when I'd failed to turn nominations into wins, my dreams were of being led into a surprise party. The surprise being, I guess, that it wasn't so bad, that, as Scalzi put it, caring about the Hugos more than the work is a kind of idolatory. Or as Valente put it in her first post-ceremony tweet: 'time to write a better book'. I aspire to that bravery. It was a pleasure to announce another Hugo win for Doctor Who, and to read out Graeme Harper's speech. What do you reckon, five nominations out of five next year? Or is Stargate: Universe going to get a shot?
Because I'm an idiot, we actually packed up and left the night before we were due to fly out, and after a lovely meal at the airport, had to slink back to the hotel, only to find all our friends in the bar again, and more, and seemingly always. And it is a bit like that, this being the party that travels round the world. That old guy with the long white beard, hoping he'll get the Big Heart Award before the Hugo ceremony... that'll be me one day.
There'll be a Ten Things post full of stuff very shortly. Until then, Cheerio!
Labels:
China Mieville,
Doctor Who,
Hugos,
Scalzi,
Worldcon
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Sounds like you had a great time, Paul - colour me envious.
Weirdly, I was responsible for a programme item at Aussiecon 4. At the 1987 Brighton Worldcon some 3 hrs of video was shot of the proceedings. Nothing was done with these at the time and for the next twenty years they sat in a box at a friend's house. Last year, fearing the tape would degrade if ignored much longer, he transferred the lot to DVD. A few months later, I edited this down to 90 minutes and copies were distributed to attendeees at this year's CORFLU. Word of this got to the Aussiecon committee, they asked me for a copy, and I gather it then formed an item in one of their programming streams. It's a small world.
- Rob Hansen
It was a pleasure to have met you at Aussiecon 4 and being on the franchise panel which you moderated was one of my con highlights. Unfortunately I missed "Just A Minute". Seeing the video makes me regret having missed it even more.
we tried to attend the JaM panel, and went to the room listed on the pink sheet. However, we ended up listening to the Girl Genius Radio Players instead - very entertaining, and we're glad to have witnessed them, but not what we expected.
As for the airport thing, don't feel alone in this. After the 2001 WorldCon in Philly, we also tried to check in a day too early, due to a slight confusion by the travel agent who confused the day we wished to leave the US with the one we wished to arrive in England on.
Oh yes, Rob, I know what that was! You are the secret power in the world of fandom. Cheers, George, lovely to have shared a panel with you. Bell: yeah, Just A Minute got hugely shunted up and down. Sorry. And that makes me feel better, thanks!
Hardly, Paul. These days i'm more of a dusty archivist. For example, having recently uploaded an album of photos from the 1949 Worldcon, I'm currently scratching my head over which of some 300 photos from the 1957 London Worldcon to follow suit with and how best to present them.
- Rob Hansen
I was terribly amused by your description of John Scalzi at the Just A Minute panel, enough so that I quoted it in a comment on his own blog (I hope you don't mind), and he replied that it was "a very accurate description."
One of these days, perhaps I will work up the money and courage to go to a con, and I can see some of these things for myself.
I love photos from ancient Worldcons, usually of people with much brylcream and/or pointy futuristic shoulderpads and jodhpurs. Yes, I saw that, Brian! And you have to come to a convention, there's really nothing like it.
You met Seanan! Seanan who got a tiara! *SQUEEE*!!! [BOUNCE, BOUNCE] =:o>
...And you'll get to meet Talis in Novemeber, too. You are having such a fabulous year! =:o}
I so thoroughly am! And I am so pleased at having met Seanan. Who's Talis, and where am I meeting them?
I'm slowly catching up on all the Aussiecon posts! Glad to hear you enjoyed the visit to Aus, Paul. As a British ex-pat myself (been here since '96) I share many of your impressions, even now.
It was great to meet you at Worldcon, especially as we got to be on a panel together. That comics panel, with the incredibly well prepared James and his statistics, was good fun, even if I was something of an odd one out on there. And I have many fond memories of the Hilton bar... and many hazy ones too.
Hope to see you again at future cons.
Yes, great to meet you. And James was, indeed, well prepared!