Meeting the team

From the left: Alfons Hug, Thomas Mulcaire, Ben Opperman, Erika Blumenfeld, Bobby De Beer

Day 3; January 25, 2009; Cape Town, South Africa

The morning started with a bit of a technological jam—my cell phone, which I use as my alarm, didn’t adjust to local South African time from Amsterdam, and was off by an hour.  So, as I was just sitting down to breakfast and coffee at 8am

thinking I had a nice leisurely hour to awaken to the day, Thomas walked in to fetch me.  As it was in fact 9am, and we had to leave at once to pick up Alfons and head to SANAP for our gear fitting, I gulped down what I could in a few minutes, and off we went.

Cape Town is a beautiful city—remarkably so.  Table Mountain is stunning, and is a strong architectural backdrop to the soft historic lines and colors of the mostly Dutch-inspired buildings. As it is summer, everything is in bloom, and so color abounds. Opposite the mountains is the vast sea, which is a mixture of the Atlantic and the Indian Oceans. Alfons is awaiting us, and jumps in the car as soon as we pull up to his hotel. He is immediately friendly and we begin chatting at once, asking about Lunation 1011, one of my video works, and The Polar Project. Our destination is right on the wharf, so the quick drive from Alfons’ hotel and their offices was gorgeous.

Once inside the SANAP offices, Alfons was first to receive gear to try on, followed by me, and then Thomas. The process was quite humorous, as we all got in and out of clothing that was too large or too small, and all of it utterly absurd for the summer weather here in Cape Town. But you had to try on all three of the layers at once, with the boots and the hats, to make absolutely sure that all was the right fit.  Zaid Watson, who is in charge of this department at SANAP and generously agreed to come in on a Sunday to outfit us, was exceedingly patient and helpful. Even so, my outer gear is simply too big for me, owing to the fact that I think a “small” is meant for an average-sized male.  But in the end it works well enough, and in fact, it is the only option.

The fitting took us three hours, and we each walked out with three large duffel bags filled with everything we would need to stay warm and safe in sub-zero temperatures. Our 9 bags hardly fit in our little car, but we managed to squeeze in and race off to our next appointments.

Having dropped luggage off at our respective hotels, we went to go pick up a good friend of Thomas’ who would be joining us on a two hour drive up the coast to Hermanus, where we would visit the Hermanus Magnetic Telescope (HMO), one of ITASC’s sponsors, and meet the scientists who had helped with the engineering of the GROUNDHOG, ITASC’s Automatic Weather Station that we will be relying on to help us predict weather in the field. They also helped build the UMTHOMBO WOMLILO solar and wind powered unit, which is where we will get all of our electricity for our mobile base.

Bobby De Beer hopped in our tiny little red Volkswagen, we zoomed off to Hermanus. The drive was incredible, with huge dark-cliffed mountains lining the one side of the highway, and the ocean lining the other. I felt myself settling into to the adventure, and enjoying all the “new” that travel brings. We were all taking and getting to know each other, and the day was a crisp blue.

Bobby owns a huge shop and a company that builds sets for television and movies. Films and commercials from all over the world come to him to build whatever place or prop they need.  It was Bobby and his crew who built the mobile base structure, based on an original design by architect Pol Tayler. The structure, named ICEPAC, an acronym for ITASC Catabatic Experimental Platform for Antarctic Culture, is currently being erected by our colleague Ntsiki, who is in Antarctica already, with the help of two Brazilian research scientists at the SANAE base.  We recently received photos of them putting it together, and the structure is like a line drawing on a piece of white paper, its black geodesic skeletal structure stark against the Antarctic ice fields in the background. Apparently severe storms have prevented them from continuing efforts, and so we will complete the construction of it when we arrive.

Once in Hermanus, we stopped by the Magnetic Observatory to pick up Ben Opperman, who is a research scientist there and also a collaborator on the development of GROUNDHOG and UMTHOMBO WOMLILO. Squeezing all five of us into the car, we head to the seaside for a long Sunday lunch, featuring local fish, some wonderful South African wines and some very interesting conversation that oscillate between art and science, our expedition, and personal anecdotes.  Everyone I’ve met here has been so fantastic, warm and generous of spirit. Ben and I spoke at length about the auroras and the data they collect from them in the Antarctic, at the SANAE base. There may be an opportunity for me to access this data for my project, as I want to record the audio that the aurora’s make during the time I shoot the final piece.  Andrew Collier, whom I met briefly later in the afternoon, is the HMO research scientist in charge of what they call the “Whistler Experiment,” named for the whistle-like sound that auroras emit.

After lunch Ben gave us an extensive tour of the observatory and its museum, and then we set off for the nearby home of Pierre and Jeanne Cilliers. Pierre is the Head Scientist at HMO, and he also sits on the Board of the National Research Foundation, another of ITASC’s sponsors. Pierre was also involved in the development of the UMTHOMBO WOMLILO. We all sat on their garden terrace and enjoyed additional delicacies and stories about our various projects and collaborations.

On the drive home, in the darkness out my window, I searched for the Southern Cross, a constellation I have longed to see for years and years. Alas, it wasn’t quite late enough, and was still below the mountainous horizon.

Back at my hotel, I went straight to sleep after some quick emailing, exhausted from the long, rich day.

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