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Ellie
Ga
REPORTS FROM A TARANAUT
download pdfs of Ellie's
reports
from the polar
ice
Report 1: weeks 1 -
3
Report 2: weeks 4/5
Report 3: several weeks
in November
Report 4: polar night
Dec/Jan
excerpts of dispatches
sent ...
weather report from
Ellie Ga // March 15, 2008 //
Unpacking the Refrigerator
Over this week, discharging the 25 some-odd tons of material from the
boat, I began to empty out the refrigerator and I threw out rotting apples,
oranges and lemons that we had probably picked up in Portsmouth, England.
I remember how precious fruit was during the expedition and I remember
recording the sound of us eating the last pieces of fruit back in October
or November. I threw out molded cheeses which we were only allowed to
eat on Thursdays and Sundays with a glass of wine. I found a sack of rotten
potatoes and remembered the debate about whether to eat the last potatoes
on Christmas Eve (as proposed by the French) or on Christmas Day (as suggested
by the « anglos » Grant and myself). Thursday, on the eve
of his departure, Grant and I sit on the porch of the house and talk about
how much time it will take to reconstitute the memories of life on the
ice since it all disappeared so rapidly. I tell him about throwing out
the rotten food and he says, « Yes that’s it--everything was
precious on the ice : fruit, cheese, wine, electricity, water, time alone,
time with other people. »
And on the ground there is always more.
i am in lorient. it has been crazy. we arrived last saturday with an
armada of boats and 3000 people in front of whom I got up on a stage and spoke
french to. Agnes B, fancy clothes, circus tents, seafood, fellini
without the italians. surreal. then we began emptying out this massive
boat and i have never been so exhausted and had so little time to
myself. the good news is that I have a beautiful house on the beach
where i will live until june and my bedroom window opens onto the sea.
i will write more descriptions soon and also tell you some of my ideas
for the work i want to do. this month has been so intense. my hair is
very grey.
as for the sun:::yes there were 2-3 days when there was an intense sun at
-6° under horizon which is the equivalent to what is called pedestrian
twighlight and coming from the south, which is now the ass of the boat
and the cool thing one day was that there was the moon and the daylight
or rather intense twighlight like in a technicolor film of big america
like Giant or something and it was an energetic moment. that was 3 days
ago i think and since then we have had bad storms winds and it is cloudy
damp overcast so no pedestrian twighlight to be seen:::on the horizon it
is possible to see a dark band and this is the ice edge
weather is crazy
-19c with a wind of a whopping 40nds
the strongest ever
no visibilty even pissing off the side of the boat is a disaster
declined the toilet today::just didnt have the energy
we are at 75°45N and 9°45 W careening towards the ice edge maybe and the
excitement of exiting is now renewed
problem with trying to make a lecture about the future is that every day
the future arrives
weather a balmy minus 14 120 miles from ice age; humid cloudy damp
smells a little salty like the sea
a quick walk to toilet just in indoor clothes and a hat
my sense of time or rather sense of time of the immediate future has
evaporated
speaking of which
the hour thing
i wanted to keep track of the days as hours because at the northpole
there are no hours just one long day (the polar day) and one long night.
i started this method and there was one slight problem we aren ot at the
pole
so i had to wait until the sun disappeared on october 6 to begin
counting the days as hours correctly
Oct
21:
if you weren't on the other end i probably would stop all together
then last night we got onto the topic of ham radios
and apparently the ham operators only mission is to make contact
once they confirm they end transmission
i love this idea of the ham operator sitting at a table trying to make
contact with as many people as possible
in fact it is a competition in russia
anyway i am hogging the computer so i must go
but i want to say thanks
and yes i agree that it should be intimate
i am working on a constructed piece with all the parts that may be
interesting for a general public i have attached the intro:
i will send in parts
it is challenging capturing the scene in sounds
The drift. La derieve. La sortie. Not a day goes by when some combination of these words is not spoken. It’s on everyone's mind and for some of us (myself included) it is a bit of an obsession. Audun and Herve LeGoff work on their own model for the exit, Grant collects everyone’s predictions and places it on the corkboard of daily tasks, weather reports, sun charts. Unlike in the old days of exploration, where explorers had to work extremely hard (not to mention rapidly—if given only few brief moments of sun) to know where they were, we here know exactly where we are. It is not where we are that we are concerned with, but where we are going. And of course how long it will take to get there.
there is so little time to write to people and i prefer to send you
email dispatches instead
sometimes i think that if i write down too much i will drain the
experience
and what is the experience
it changes moment to moment
but it is very normal in some ways
what other dispatches do you want
will keep sending the maps but if you think other formats will balance
my binder i do like a good old fashioned homework assignment