Antarctica – New Years Day 2007

I-TASC expedition 2006/2007

Happy New Years Day. Last night we had a party for New Years with everyone having a boogie and some had lots to drink while others took it easy. I took the later strategy and I am thankful not to have a hangover. It was a great party though and everyone had a great time. The PWD guys (they do the maintenance for the base) dressed up as if it was Carnival and did a street boogie with ringleader and limbo and were generally the life of the party.

Now there is a storm building up outside. The sky is as white as the land so all you can see are floating rocks which make up the Nunutaks. If you look at the rocks around the base, there is a wind-strewn fog running along the ground. It will probably be a small storm, running just for a day or two, with relatively low winds. Even so, as I look out the window now, this is what I would call a windy day in Wellington – the fog is moving at quite a pace and I can easily hear the sound of the wind from inside the noisy lab (and this is just the preliminary build up to the storm). I asked one of the experienced SANAE crew to check the antenna and apparently we mounted it fine. In the winter, apparently, the whole base shakes to the storms. One of the over-wintering crew said that you can feel like you are in a boat in a swell. I don’t know if the pictures so far have given you an idea of the scale of the base, but suffice to say that it is massive and it’s difficult to believe this base would move at all. So the storms must be amazing. At times the crew felt the base was going over the hill, they always knew it would be OJ but the shaking was so fierce it freaked them out anyway. I also heard a story from Tom about one of the crews that helped build the base. They stayed in a container bolted to the rock and they had one storm where they knew the container was going to be blown away. Thankfully it didn’t happen.

We had an interesting discussion yesterday about the Automatic Weather Station (AWS) and art. Part of the installation is sculptural, it is a functioning AWS, but also deliberately a monolith. I had not previously understood that the AWS had this artistic sculptural component and I felt very uneasy about it, especially since the casing is larger (quite a bit larger) than necessary to fulfill its desired aesthetic.

For me, this is quite close to the heart of my questioning the role of art/culture here and our presence in Antarctica. It was a great discussion, and I especially appreciated some of Amanda’s comments. I will have to think about it more. There is a balance to be met somewhere, if there is to be a cultural presence here, then it must draw its own lines as to what is acceptable. Art in itself is not a justification for just doing anything that an artist desires. The base has a quite strict environmental policy and the Antarctic Treaty is also quite strict (I haven’t read it, I am taking this information from discussions with Tom who has read it). If anything is to be installed, it needs to have an Environmental Impact Assessment (EIA). The AWS will probably pass this threshold (the Environmental Officer arrives on the 11th of Jan to do this and other evaluations). However, even if it does pass, I am not sure if I enjoy the idea of an overly large object being in the space if the justification is that it is sculptural. It’s a difficult question, as I understand the artistic motivations of the AWS project and I think it is good art, but is that enough?

I also enjoyed some of the points made about the fact that we live in this world and people should come to Antarctica, and culture has a place here etc. It was a position that was touted as being more realistic than my suggested idealism. I’m not sure I am an idealist. I am just a bit depressed about the damage that we have already done to the planet, but I take their points. Perhaps there could be a role for artists here, but that is ‘perhaps’ with a capital ‘P’. If this were to be the case, I think there need to be some lines drawn. One of the advantages of having SANAE governed by the government is that most governments are slow moving and conservative (I never thought I would see the day I thought that an advantage!). This brings quite a strict and procedural process to the activities here, which minimises the environmental impact. Everything done has to be evaluated, checked, and then checked again. Activities that are too dangerous or which do not conform to the environmental policies cannot take place. Having said that, there is, of course, inevitable leakage and some pragmatic bending of rules. It would be good for any group (such as I-TASC) to consider where their own lines are, and how these would be maintained. I don’t think artists should be given free reign to do as they wish, the environment here is just too important for that…

As for my own work, I am still working through my own position in this with regard to the work I am doing here. In the meantime, I am getting on with the chores at hand. This at times makes me feel like quite a hypocrite when I am exploring a line of thought which is sometimes against us being here. I have to acknowledge to myself that my thoughts are evolving daily and I feel I have not yet reached my final point on these issues. So I continue to work on the tasks required. It is difficult to do this at times and feel good about what I am doing, but I must give myself some time to reflect on all this and assist my colleagues at the same time. Yesterday, I did some work on the radio terminal, making some new serial cables to try and crack the mystery of why it’s not working. So far, nada. I should have gone and had more of a party instead but at least we have eliminated some possibilities. I think now I am going to write up everything I have tried, and Marko (in Slovenia) said he would contact the manufacturers and ask for their advice. They don’t get back from holidays until the 5th so in the meantime I will set up the radio station with First so it gets into a more regular schedule. Below is an announcement my colleague Honor (r a d i o q u a l i a) sent out yesterday.

In addition to this call,if anyone can send a full set of Debian CDs (Debian Testing) to the below address, that would be fantastic. We need it for the station and also there is one of the crew that has just done one full year here and will do his second full year to replace our colleague that was killed. He would very much appreciate these CDs as the ones he had sent with the boat are corrupted.

r a d i o q u a l i a call for content

r a d i o q u a l i a have just begun broadcasting a new FM radio 
station in Antarctica.

'Polar Radio' is Antarctica's first ever artist-run radio station. 
It transmitted its first programme on FM on 29 December 2006.

Polar Radio is part of a series of projects run by I-TASC - the 
Interpolar Transnational Art Science Constellation  

Please see the below announcement for more information about Polar Radio.

CALL FOR CONTENT - DEADLINE: 10 JANUARY 2007

Do you have a song, a message, or a sound that you want broadcast in 
Antarctica?

We are looking for your music, sound art, radio plays, radio 
documentaries, and any phonically interesting artifacts you have to 
broadcast on Antarctica first artist-run radio station.  There is a 
supply plane leaving for Antarctica from Cape Town on 11 January.  We 
plan to have a shipment of CDs sent on that supply plane.  We are now 
looking for CDs of:

- music of all different kinds
- radio art
- radio plays
- audio documentaries
- audio books
- archived news reports
- investigative journalism
- podcasts
- any other audio material you would like to have broadcast in Antarctica

If you have sonic material you want broadcast, please make a CD and send it to:

Siphiwe Ngwenya / I-TASC
c/- Pitch Black Productions
7 Prince Street
Gardens
Cape Town 8001
South Africa

The best formats to send are:
- audio CDs
- MP3 CDs

So send what you can 🙂

29 December 2006

I-TASC expedition 2006/2007

Today Amanda, Tom and First Born went to the proposed site for the Automatic Weather Station. We could make a connection easily via the radio modems we had. It was a simple test. From the site on Lorenzo Piggen, some 7km away, they plugged in a laptop to the radio modem. The modem at the site seamlessly connected to the modem here; once the link was established, Tom and First Born browsed (using a regular web browser) to a web server running on my laptop at the base (connected to the other radio modem) and they could see the files I put there for the test. Simple. I could also monitor the data traffic through a program called ‘EtherApe’ and this told me that there were no data errors or loss of data over the link.

Received Packet Statistics 		Transmitted Packet Statistics
			
Receive bytes: 		1236797 	Transmit bytes: 	913038
Receive packets: 	4865 		Transmit packets: 	5396
Receive errors: 	0 		Transmit errors: 	0
Drop packets: 		0 		Drop packets: 		0

Great, so now we know two laptops can connect via the modems over the distance between SANAE and the site of the AWS, and we must now work on getting the modems working with the AWS. We are not sure this can actually work, but if the hardware will actually allow it then it should be easy to set up. Essentially, what we are doing is sending data between two points using the modems and communicating not through the ethernet connectors but through a serial connection (it’s a different kind of hardware and data protocol).

Today I also went to the top of SANAE (on the roof) to trace the cable we will use for the FM transmitter. There are two cables which aren’t being used. I traced these with a circuit connector and it seems the longest cable goes right to the point where we need to mount the antenna and then right back into the base with good length so it will reach to the lab. That is good news. I think all I have to do now is to put the right connectors on and plug it all in. If only technology was that simple (I am sure I will come across problems I hadn’t thought of yet).

In the meantime, life in the outside world continues. My good friend Luka Princic is on holiday for a few days in Amsterdam where I would be if I wasn’t here. Damn! Ah well, I might see him in New Zealand in a few months. And here life moves to its odd insular beat – for example I-TASC met to work out a schedule for working. The schedule calculations seemed to get algorithmic so I said they can do what they like but I would just get up, work, and stop when I couldn’t work anymore. I don’t know, it seems to make sense to me…

Anyway, time for lunch.

…so now its midnight(ish)… the day started productively then went to the pack. The team shot off to check stuff out and there was not much productive I could do here at the stage we are at without them so after a good deal of procrastination I decided to take a break. I went upstairs and, hello, there was someone sleeping in my bed… and it wasn’t me…. I was a bit miffed at first but then I (eventually) woke him up and it seems he is one of the over-winter team and couldn’t sleep because in his room people are talking. No worries, the over-winter team own this place (it’s been their home for a long time) so I apologised and went to throw some darts.

After the team returned and after dinner, I got the connectors I needed from Franz (pretty much the boss). I had tested the cable before and I knew all I needed to do was plug in the antenna and transmitter (using the connectors)… it’s probably the fastest install I have done for a radio station. The only tricky bit was that we were on the roof and it was kind of cold, and putting on the antenna bolts when you can’t feel your hands (actually they hurt quite a bit from the wind) isn’t so easy. Thankfully, Tom was there to share my suffering and help squeeze in the tricky little bolts.

So now stage one of the r a d i o q u a l i a (subset I-TASC) Polar Radio is complete. The transmitter is all fired up and transmitting as I write. Already quite a few of the over-winter crew have come down to check it out and we hope to broadcast tonight so the drivers that leave tonight for the boat (to pick up more gear) can listen for a distance as they disappear slowly into the sunlit night. Chris Munro, if you are listening, I’m playing a song for you.

28 December 2006

I-TASC expedition 2006/2007

Updates coming, sorry for delays, been a bit busy here but we will ensure we update every day now, unless it’s absolutely not possible.

Today we travelled to Lorenzo Piggen, a small Nunatak (Inuit for ‘island’) about 7 km from the base. This is the proposed site of the AWS (Automatic Weather Station). We travelled out there by Skidoo – I-TASC has been given 2 skidoos to use at our leisure.

28dec-1

It was an interesting site and tomorrow we will try a data test between the base and the site. It’s not so far away, so there are no problems anticipated.

28dec-2

What we have to do is set up a radio modem at the base, and then another radio modem and laptop will go out to the site. Then we will establish communication between the two modems. Essentially, this means we have a ‘wireless’ data connection (point-to-point) between the site and the base. If I connect the modem at the base to the internet then out at Lorenzo they could check their email (for example); this is not the intended purpose of the equipment but it’s an interesting exercise anyway.

I would like to try this setup with sending live audio between the two points, and also to try some internet telephony (something like Skype, but I would try a software called Asterisk and some ‘software phones’) and IRC (chat) communication. I will leave this for now and just do a basic test but in the next few days, I will try something a little more sophisticated.

28dec-3

In the meantime, life at the base is establishing a rhythm. We get up every day at 0630 and then do ‘skivvies’ which are the cleaning duties for the base. After that, we get to work (skivvies take about an hour). Then we work until 1300, have lunch, work again and have dinner at 1900. Then we are usually working again until late or we go to the sauna and relax. Sleep comes at about midnight. So it’s a long day. Just when you think you are feeling tired you look out the window and the sun fools you into feeling it is the middle of the afternoon and refuses to let you sleep.

I think many people are a little lost for things to do at the end of the day. Of course, it is beautiful here and a walk outside is a good cure for boredom but at the end of the day most people are very tired and the thought of spending 20 minutes wrapping up in the protective clothing needed to go outside is not as appetising as you might think. Additionally, even though we are on the continent with the least population density, there is no private space which is something of an irony. There is just no way of getting away from people: if you go outside then you must go in pairs for safety’s sake, and inside there is nowhere that doesn’t have people. I am a bit saturated with people at the moment so I might sneak away to the TV lounge when most are asleep and get some nobody time.

27 December 2006

I-TASC expedition 2006/2007

More work on the equipment today. There is a meeting later in the afternoon about the requirements of the FM station. In the meantime, we are plugging in the HF modems to the laptops to see how the communication works. We didn’t get this far last night as we had issues with the Automatic Weather Station software (it’s not compatible with the operating system we are using in the mini PC). The manual was wrong for the modems but we managed to sort out the connectivity. Seems like it is a nice fluent system. We tested connecting a laptop to a High Frequency Radio modem and then connecting another modem to the network, and that works very well. My cable-making skills are not very good but I managed to make a working crossover cable (similar to an ethernet cable but with a different wiring) for the laptop-to-modem connection. After that, the system worked well. For now, this means what we have to do now is to connect one modem to the Automatic Weather Station (AWS) and another to a computer at SANAE. Then we can relay data from the AWS to SANAE via radio, which in turn means the AWS can be deployed remotely.

27dec-1

So everyone is falling into their roles nicely. I am doing the FM station and helping with the tech for the AWS etc; First is doing a lot of work on the PCs we need for both the AWS and the FM station; Amanda is mainly doing video documentation but also was extremely useful with the AWS because she was the only one that read the manual; and Tom is acting as liaison between SANAE and us, and he is also the person responsible for being eternally optimistic regarding the tech (while First and I have to try and implement his optimistic suggestions – actually it’s good having someone optimistic about technology because over the last years I have become a little cynical about it, so his optimism will help push me on.

In the meantime, the room where we sleep is turning into a micro family. Zama and Remmy are really funny, and it’s good to hang out and talk bullshit at the end of the day. It doesn’t always work because the end of the day is quite hard to determine, it being sunshine 24/7. Despite the permanent sunshine, there is actually a definite evening light. The sun gets lower and you can see the longer shadows on the ice, which kind of gives it the appearance of the moon. Below is a photo taken just as this effect is starting, looking through the window of our room. I will try and take a picture showing this effect more clearly. The antenna you see in the photo is used for measuring the distance and shape of the ionosphere.

27dec-2