Required elements for the 2009 Winter International Film Fest of Antarctica:
Props: A roll of toilet paper
“A comedy head piece” (for example ornamental hat, clown wig)
The last northbound ship for the season has departed. Each time a ship leaves, it takes friends with it. Those left behind pay homage to those who are leaving. The water is cold.
Taking statistics seems like a strange thing to do as a hobby, yet for hundreds of men in the Antarctic it makes perfect sense.
Going to be at McMurdo station Antarctica in early October? Head up to the carp shop break room during flight operations at the ice runway for a glimpse into what I mean. A handful of leftover winter carpenters and a few that have been on Ice since August will be gathered around, vying for their turn on the binoculars so that they can proudly proclaim “I saw her first!”. The computer savvy among these gnarled and randy boys will have already done their homework, perusing the flight manifest to determine the ratio of M:F (which is typically 3:1 by the way). Early October is an exciting time despite, or perhaps because of this strange ritual.
If you happen to go to a smaller station, or as the population decreases in preparation for winter, this phenomenon grows ever stronger and the ratio becomes THE hot topic for a short period of time.
At Palmer, the winter population is actually dynamic so the hobbyist statisticians here get more than one chance to examine the inbound manifest. An apparent typo made April’s ship manifest into something quite fun. One of the astute statisticians happened to notice that one of the passengers on the list was neither M nor F but rather ‘R’ and the speculation as to whether or not “Megan” was a pirate led to countless hours of fun and frivolity. I know, I know, doesn’t take much.
Megan showed up and….well, she is a pirate…ACK!!! a pirate. Somebody summon a ninja!
theRRRe she is on the left, posing with the science group she is here with. Turns out she is a teacher from an Alabama high school here on an outreach program and her school’s mascot is a pirate. She keeps really good daily journals and has posted quite a few pictures on her school’s website: http://www.fairhopehs.com
Just less than a year ago I did a review on Werner Herzog’s Antarctic documentary film. See it here: Encounters With Mediocre Cinema at the End of the World – or if you can’t be bothered reading that; my Cliff’s notes version of my own review is that I didn’t care too much for the film. It took me a great deal of courage to actually write that down – it seems that quite a few people in my peer group and in the world at large enjoyed the film more than I did. I think they just like it because they’re scared to not like something by such a typically brilliant filmmaker.
During the season that Herzog came to The Ice, another film crew was also present – a crew that actually wanted to be there and had to work to get to Antarctica. A crew that; when seeking funding was met with responses along the lines of “Isn’t Herzog filming in Antarctica this year?”. A crew that was led by documentary filmmaker Anne Aghion.
Antarcticans pay homage to Anne Aghion's film crew during the annual Halloween party - 2006
Anne’s Antarctic documentary is entitled Ice People and covers a wide spectrum of what it’s like to live and work at an Antarctic research station and field camp. In many ways the viewer may feel like they’re right there amongst the grittiness of McMurdo and conversely the majesty that is Antarctica; all the while imagining themselves exposed to the fierceness of the wind or the constant drone of a diesel engine somewhere in the background.
The greatest thing about this film is the same thing that is great about other Aghion films. It was completely devoid of her ego and became solely about the people and the social dynamics of life on the Ice.
Anne’s film-making style is a huge departure from the spoon-feeding that Hollywood film viewers may have come to expect. She challenges the viewer to take an active role in their own entertainment, likely leaving them less entertained but more enlightened as a result.
Want to know what it’s really like to live and work in Antarctica? You’ll probably have to get a job and go there yourself but the next closest thing to actually experiencing the harshest of continents for yourself is to watch Anne Aghion’s Ice People.
I didn’t know Dr. Houseal, but I know people who did. I only vaguely know the man who was rescued in Greenland. But I have learned about both of these people through the anecdotes that are told about them; and that’s the way it is in “The Program” (the United States Antarctic Program). More and more I learn about people and events through the stories that are told about them. The stories in and about Antarctica and the USAP are some of the best you could ever hope to hear. I know I’m not the first to think it would be a good idea to start writing these stories down and put them together in a book; and in fact, this has been done on a couple of different occasions with varying degrees of success. Trouble is, many of these stories are only funny or interesting if you have inside knowledge. Things that are bizarre on The Ice are, oddly, normal in much of the world…it’s the context of events that make them funny or interesting here. Nonetheless; I’m going to try to put together and pass along a story about the name of a McMurdo band.
In order for this story to make any sense at all, you first have to understand that, in accordance with the Antarctic Conservation Act and surely parts of the Antarctic Treaty (are they one in the same…???…I digress) all waste generated by those engaged in scientific research must be removed from the continent. In certain conditions, human waste is disposed of locally – but by and large everything that is taken in will eventually be taken out – “pack it in, pack it out” on a Brobdingnagian scale. The Program has a group of people who are in charge of facilitating the removal of all of the waste. Trash at McMurdo is sorted into several categories with much of it eventually being recycled once it does get back stateside. One category of trash is “mixed paper” – pretty self-explanatory and mostly what you would expect; a great deal of office-generated waste with a smattering of domestic waste-paper thrown in for good measure. Discarded magazines belong in the “mixed paper” trash category.
The next thing that you must understand for this story to make much sense is that McMurdo is pretty much a man camp. Sure, over the years it’s been toned down quite a bit, much to the chagrin of a few old-timers but probably, really for the best. It may be a kinder, gentler kind of man camp, but it’s man camp nonetheless – you will see things at McMurdo that you certainly wouldn’t see at your workplace back in the states. In man camp, there is a reduced level of outside stimuli. Days run together until they’re all the same….hopefully I’ve done a fair job of setting the tone here.
Imagine a group of people tasked with sorting trash in a stimuli poor man camp. Certain items are removed from the waste stream to be “recycled” locally. If you’re tasked with sorting “mixed paper” and the odd porno mag passes in front of you from time to time, given the environment you’re in, you’d be fairly likely to remove it from the waste stream and save it for later. Imagine this same thing happening over and over again until eventually you have a massive box (tri-wall [20 cubic feet maybe?]) full of porno mags – eventually it all has to go away.
The Program’s waste management team becomes intimately aware of where “away” is when something is thrown away. Every year a couple of them go to (at the time of this story, Port Hadlock, WA) meet the ship and ensure that the waste goes where it needs to go. All of the tri-wall boxes and drums and other containers of waste are put inside of large shipping containers for transit across the ocean. At the other end, these boxes and drums are removed from the shipping containers.
On one particular waste run, one particular box happened to break open during transit and when the shipping container was then opened and a mountain of porno mags came spilling out, the phrase “Porn Spill” was born as the occurrence was reported over the radio. The term has lived on in infamy and each year the McMurdo waste department forms a band with the name “Porn Spill” – many years the line-up varies and includes members from other departments, but the name lives on and the story is told and re-told and has become a part of Antarctic Lore.
