Mood:  a-ok

Unbelievably, we have already finished the end of the first term of ACSC '08.  We have four terms throughout the year, so, obviously, three more to go, but it's strange to think that we are already a quarter of the way through this tour...

Last week we completed Management of the Australian Defense Organisation (not a spelling mistake in Australia), and the Command, Leadership, and Ethics models.  In completing them, we also wrapped up the overall unit, "Foundation Studies."

CLE was actually pretty interesting.  Some of it was the same ol', same ol' we have been getting through military training since the beginning of time, but some of it was pretty cool.  We have Commander Lippon, who was the Commander of the USS Cole when it was attacked, and the new U.S. Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff come to speak to us.  We also had some Aussie big-timers come speak, but I doubt that you would have heard of them...

Technically, the Foundation Studies unit (and thus, Term 1) doesn't end until we are back from our Joint Capabilities tour.  We leave tomorrow (Sunday) very early in the morning on a ten day trip around Australia to see thier warfighting equipment and talk to their soldiers.  We will see tanks, aircraft, ships, submarines, just a ton of stuff, broken out over three military bases that very literally circumnavigate the whole of Australia.  It should be an interesting trip.  I just wish Kimberly could come.  She can't, but then, neither could Jacoby so it's sort of a mute point.

Once we return, we will begin Term 2 - Strategic Studies.

Last night (Friday), we had the McKaskills over for "Pizza and a Movie Night."  I went to Pizza hut, the McKaskills, and Bobby (friend of Jacoby's from school, also an American) came over, and we all ate and watched 300, which the McKaskills hadn't seen.  All in all it was a good night, which ended around 11p, which was fine, because....

Today was my first Adventure Race.  Think Eco-Challenge.  All in all, the course was about 24km on mountain bikes, 9km on foot, 3.4km in a kayak, and another 300m or so swimming.  It was a tough race!  We were in the slow group, since two of the three of us had never done it before, so we started early in the morning.  The guys truly competing started an hour later.  Anyway, we started at around 10a and finished around 2p.  Roughly four hours and change!  We actually led (the slow group) for about 2-3 hours of the race.  Then we couldn’t find one of our checkpoints and fell back pretty far.  Because of all the cross country bush-breaking we had to do to finally find the point, one of the guys (Brett Chandler, the one with experience) had a blow out on his bike.  By the time we got that fixed and made our was through the rest of the course to the finish line, we were still right up close to the front.  Kimberly and Jacoby were there and said we finished around 10th for the day, but the novice course(much shorter distances) was also finishing, so we don't know what that means for us.  Also, the fast people hadn't got there, yet.  Officially, we'll find out how we did via e-mail, once it's all compiled.  I'm extremely happy with our team's performance.  By the way, it was me, Brett (an Aussie), and Phillip (a Brit).  I'm not sure of Phil's last name.

That's about it for this week.  Sorry, no pictures.  I'll write more after the Capabilities Tour.

- Ryan

Posted by kisajaja at 5:47 AM CET

Updated: Sunday, 9 March 2008 9:33 AM CET

Share This Post

Post Comment | View Comments (1) | Permalink

Mood:  happy

-Or Chinese New Year, anyway.  We are celebrating it tomorrow in Canberra's China Town.  Also tomorrow is the Australian National Kung Fu Championships, in which they will determine who will represent Australia in the next Olympics. 

This morning we went to a different fruit and vegatable market which is supposed to be even better than Fyshwich market (where we usually go).  It was okay.  Probably fresher stuff.  Prices were probably a little cheaper.  It was a LOT more crowded and harder to get around.  

Later today is the Pacific Island Showcase and the Indonesia Showcase, both taking place downtown.  Between those two events is the U.S. Embassy celebration of Mardi Gras as the Marine House.  It's more about the BBQ than the beads... :)

Last week in school we started two units.  One was MADO, or Management of the Australian Defence Course, and the other was Command, Leadership, and Ethics (CLE).  We did more MADO than CLE.  Next week is more CLE than MADO.

MADO has been all about the governance and accountability of the Australian Defence Force.  We've learned about their capability developement process and acquisitions, how their government interacts with the military (accountability), the changes in their defence force structure, and the like.  It has been interesting, particularly when looking at how vastly different our military does these things.

We have an Adventure Race coming up!  In preperation, we went mountain biking last Wednesday, which was a tremendous amount of fun.  -And also I'm not good at it!  I spent about an hour stumbling along the trails, falling off the bike, running into rocks, or just not being able to negotiate the hairpin turns of the trail.  There is a degree of skill required that I just don't have.  Yet.  But the race is next weekend, and while they don't post the route or specific details about what we will have to do (sort of the point of the "Adventure"), they have released what we all need to be prepared to do.  It includes a 24km mountain bike ride, a 9km bush run (cross country), 3km kayake, and a mystery 300m, that my team is guessing will be a lake crossing, since they made a strong point of telling us that we need to waterproof our gear.  The race is expected to take between 4-5 hours to complete.  It'll be a fun day!

Yesterday, Kimberly and I went on a tour of the Old Parliment House.  Jacoby didn't want to go.  Anyway, Old Parliment House was built as a temporary fit for their Parliment back in 1927.  After the war, they just couldn't afford to build the one they had planned, so they built this one until they could.  It stayed in use until the 1980's, when they finally completed and openned the new one, which you have already sen in pictures.  It was a neat tour, followed by snacks in the Old Parliment Cafe.  The snacks were great anmd we met some really nice people that we talked to for about an hour before we had to leave for our next event.

Immediately following, we had a dinner at the college.  It was a social dinner, so there were no speeches or formal presentations.  It was merely a chance for our Guidance Groups to get together with our spouses, meet everyone, and just enjoy each other's company.  We stayed for a few hours and again, met and conversed with some really great people.

That about sums up last week.  Next week is more CLE and MADO, and then the Adventure Race on Saturday.  Sunday I leave for a ten-day ADF Capability Tour, in which we will travel around Australia's military bases to see what they've got.  I'll have much more on this, later.

- Ryan

Posted by kisajaja at 11:55 PM CET

Share This Post

Post Comment | Permalink

Mood:  happy

Today deserves a special mention on the blog.

As I've already stated, Canberra is currently celebrating its Multicurtural Festival, which it does every year.  We went last night for the kickoff music and dance at the Fringe stage, which was great! 

Today, we went back to the festival and found over 160 tents with people from all over the world, each one with food to sample or buy, there are four stages with dance groups and musicians coming and going every 15-30 minutes.  We sat for a while and listened to some great music from around the world.  We saw several dance groups perform.  -And we ate.  Oh, man, did we eat. 

Being Saturday (yeah!) we literally went from tent to tent and sampled just about everything from the dates and figs in the Middle East section (United Arab Emerates, Iraq, Saudi Arabia, Iran, Syria, all where there) to the pastries of Greece and Sri Lanka, to the rice and curry from India and China, to the kebabs of Bosnia, and so on and so on. 

Then, when all was said and done, we went to the National Gallery for their Underground Sounds concert.  It was held in the underground parking garage of the National Gallery.  It was a no alcohol, no smoking, free to the public, Australian Hip Hop concert, complete with local rappers and DJs and a few from around Australia (and one from the States).  It was a great concert!  It was amazing to see kids, grown ups, teens, everyone just enjoying the hip hop music of today.  Seriously, this would never happen in the states.  There were people of ALL ages, just head bobbin' along with the music...

We are going back to the festival tomorrow, but it is a different venue of events.  We are hoping to find some fun at the Greek Glendy event, and then attend the BBQ at the Coale's house in the afternoon.

-That is, after I run about 150 miles tomorrow morning, to make up for today...  :)

Posted by kisajaja at 11:19 AM CET

Updated: Saturday, 9 February 2008 11:36 AM CET

Share This Post

Post Comment | View Comments (1) | Permalink

Mood:  happy

-And so ends the Critical Thinking and Communications unit, along with another week.

 First, last weekend.  We went to a few events last weekend.  Friday night, Rob Sanders, my Syndicate Buddy, invoted Kimberly, Jacoby, and I over to his house for pizza and information sharing about Australia.  I think I wrote about this last week, so I'll move on.  Sunday morning, we drove out Hall to partake in their market experience.  It was neat!  It's easily the largest flea market we have seen so far, and we were told it was small in comparison to it's usual size.  We walked the whole thing, plyed with the animals for sale, bought some woodwork and such.  It was a really nice market and we will be back! 

Sunday night we went to the Irish Club, had dinner, and listened to a small band playing Irish/celtic folk music from 5p-8p.  We stayed for the whole thing.  They were fantastic!  The club does this every Sunday night, with different groups performing different types of music, so we will enjoy varying degrees of entertainment from week to week, but last week was perfect.  The band was great, the food was good (and cheap!), and the people went out of there way to wander over to our table and introduce themselves and make us feel welcome.  I can see us spending several Sundays evenings there.

 This week was all about learning some of the many different tools for identifying/defining the problem or issue, assemilating large quantities of data, breaking large problems into smaller details, evaluating decision criteria, developing countermeasures for threats and weaknesses, etc, etc. 

This week's sport, which happens every Wednesday afternoon, I went with the running club on a short run.  I am not actually a member of the running club, simply because I wanted to try something different.  I joined the Adventure Racing Club, which is sort of like Eco-Challenge.  As such, thre are several disciplines including running, mountain biking, kayaking, canoeing, even rock climbing and rapelling.  They always throw in something out of left field like roller blading or scooters, as we were told by the team last year.  Anyway, our first race is coming up in two weeks.  Last week we trained with the runners.  Next week will be with the mountain bikers.

Jacoby started Hogwar-, now wait, Canbera Grammar school this week!  To be honest, it was a rough first day.  His Housemaster assigned him a "buddy" to show him to his classes and make sure he had someone to talk to, to ask questions, and such.  Turns out the kid assigned wasn't at all interested in helpng Jacoby, so he was left to fend for himself.  He did fine, and got where he needed to get, but attitudes flaired a bit when he got home, presumably out of frustration.  Wednesday was a much better day.  Thursday was fine.  Friday was another rough day, for reasons I don't fully understand.  Apparently he burned himself in Science (on the bunsen burner, then got splashed with water by another student playing in the sink, then he got moved to a different math class to ease overcrowding in the first...He swears this math class is harder, to which I say, "Good!"  All in all, his attitude got the better of him and it stayed with him throughout the evening.  It wasn't until we got to the festival last night that it sort of abated a bit.

And that brings us to the Fringe Festival.  Last night started the Canberra Multicurtural Festival, which will go for eleven days.  Last night was a kick-off music and dance show with several artists/groups/troops introducing their acts and saying where they will be throughout the show.  It was fantastic.  They had a drum group called Circle of Rhythm that was probably some of the best drum work from three people that I've ever heard.  We saw the Chooky Dancers perform three songs worth, live. (You can see them on youtube, if you are interested).   -And there were others.

We will be going back today for music, dancing, and food throughout the day, tomorrow, and next weekend.

We also have an American gathering on Sunday.  The Coales (LTC Joe Coale and his wife Melissa) are students in CDSS (sort of like our War College, but on the same campus as us) have invited all of the Americans (all 4 of us) to their house for a BBQ. 

So, busy weekends ahead!

- Ryan

Posted by kisajaja at 9:48 PM CET

Updated: Saturday, 16 February 2008 10:23 PM CET

Share This Post

Post Comment | Permalink

Mood:  happy

Last week was a busy one!  We had our first unit of lectures, which covered Critical Thinking and Communications, we had our first paper due, and we had our first official formal event, which was a Dining In at the school.  Not to mention the Volleyball competition and the social engagements.

Our first unit is Critical Thinking and Communication.  It is mostly Australian Grammer, sentence structure, essay writing (both defense and academic), and such.  It also covered argument formation, organization, fallacies in reasoning, and critical outlook. 

Our first paper was called Exercise Aspirant.  In it, we had to describe the major lessons learned in our career thus far, our near- and far-term aspirations for our careers, and what we hoped to gain from this year at the staff school.  They didn't tell us this, but these papers were "formatively assessed" against the critical thinking evaluation criteria and was used to give the instructors an initial assessment of our writing abilities.  Luckily, I did pretty well on it, though it was "formative" (meaning not formally graded) and not "summative" (meaning for an actual grade).  It was a 1,500 word essay, plus or minus 10%.

Next week we will be doing Exercise Short Talk, which is a 5-minute oral presentation of the same material.  It is also formative, and will judge presenters' briefing styles and abilities.

The Volleyball tournament was held on Wednesday, and was used to formally introduce the students to the weekly sports requirements.  We get to pick the sports we will participate in from now on, but last week was Volleyball.  Kimberly and Jacoby showed up for the games, which were held on the outdoor sand courts on the campus.  My syndicate won fourth place of the 15, or so.

I said that Kimberly and Jacoby came.  The truth is, they showed up after having left the Prime Minister's XI Cricket match against Sri Lanka.  This is something like an "all-star" team.  Basically, the Prime Minister picks eleven up-and-coming stars of the game to compete against an international team.  They discribed the game as being dreadfully boring, which we knew.  The most fun part of the game was talking to the people in the stands.  As it turns out, both of the people on their left and right had recently been to the D.C. area in the States, so there were lots of stories to tell. 

Apparently the players were pretty bored, too, as several of the Sri Lankan "outfielders" decided in the middle of the game to just wander over and sign a few autographs, get some gatorade, hang out with the crowd and then rejoin the game.  It was a one-day match, which is a fast game, but still takes all day (7 hours).  Australia was batting the whole three hours they were there.

 On Wednesday night, Jacoby and I went to Hapkido for our second class in Australia.  I think Jacoby likes the class, as he is making friends fast and once class ended, he began to play/spar with one of the other younger adults.  I eventually had to tell him it was time to go.  It looks like Jez Attridge may be joining the same program, which is great.  Jez is my British friend from the course, who is married to an American from California names Jana.  Anyway, Jez and I were talking Martial Arts the other day, so I invited him to the school.  He came and liked what he saw, and says he is interested in joining up!  It'll be fun to train with him as he is just a good, fun guy to be around.

Saturday was a quiet day.  We went to the Greek Club for lunch, which we became members of last week-end.  It was a great lunch, followed by dinner with my officially assigned "Syndicate Buddy" and his family, Rob and Gail Sanders and their son Matthew.  We had a great time eatting home-made pizzas which Gail is very good at making.  We sat and talked about where to find things in Australia and what to see on vacations.  We talked mostly about Tasmania, since I think that is our next trip.

We also joined the Irish Club and will be going there for dinner tonight to hear Irish folk music and enjoy some traditional Irish fare.  But, this morning, we are going to the Hall Markets, which is a flea-market sort of "trash-n-treasures" in the town of Hall in northern Canberra.  It is the largest one around, and only happens once a month, on the first Sunday.

Good luck with your next week!

- Ryan

Posted by kisajaja at 9:59 PM CET

Updated: Friday, 8 February 2008 9:48 PM CET

Share This Post

Post Comment | Permalink

Mood:  happy

Today is Australia Day, for those of you that didn't know.

Australia Day is the day in which the Aussies celebrate their creation as a nation.  If you think of the American Independance Day, you are on the right track.

I've heard a few conflicting stories as to what is ACTUALLY being celebrated, though.  Wikipedia tells me that is celebrates the founding of the first colony in Sydney.  It was a penal colony established by England in response to not being able to send them to the Americas any longer (American Revolution stopped that practice).  They celebrated the first Australia Day twenty years later, mostly because they were still alive.

I've also heard that this day commemerates the date in which each of the Aussie States adopted the Aussie Constitution and became a Federation.  It celebrates the creation of Australia as an independant nation.  Personally, I think this one is true.

Kimberly, Jacoby, and I went to the kick-off of the celebration last night, which was a free concert at the Parlament House.  We heard, among other Aussie bands, the Basics, the Veronicas, and a few Country bands that were pretty good!  The best performance was by the Veronicas.  I'm not sure if they are played in the states ort not, but they are all over Aussie radio. 

The other big performer was Lee Kernaghan, who was also named Australian of the Year, due to his efforts at providing aid to the farmers hit hardest by the seven-year drought.  He is a country music singer sounding a lot like anything you would hear on WMZQ, back home.  I really enjoyed his music!

Today we have been invited to a couple of BBQs.  One is at our landlord's house.  The Hoebee's seem to be very nice people and wanted to make sure we had something to do on this important day.  Afterwards, we will go to Bryan and Hiedi's house for a get together in which several of the ACSC students were invited.  This one is sort of the "social ice breaker."

Tonight is fireworks.

Have a great day!

Posted by kisajaja at 7:07 AM CET

Share This Post

Post Comment | Permalink

Mood:  happy

Orientation week is over (even for the Aussies) and school has officially begun!  As of Friday, we have started on our first module, called Foundation Studies, in a unit called Critical Thinking and Communication. 

Our first paper was due on Friday, which was a 1,500 word essay on the major lessons learned in our career, our career aspirations (both near- and far-term), and our goals while attending the course.  The assignment was mostly to introduce ourselves to the school staff, but it was also the first chance that the staff had to evaluation our abilty to write.

This is pretty important, because the rules are significantly different between writing in the US and writing in Australia, particularly when dealing with military writing.  Not just the spelling, but also the grammer rules are different in several cases, and even the "structural rules" are different.  For example, the Aussies only put one space after a full-stop (period).  I find it difficult to write in a manner that I KNOW is wrong in my country in order not to lose points in theirs...

We also had an Introduction to Speed Reading class this week which I found interesting.   There is a more in-depth class coming up on the weekend that would be optional for me to take.  I think I'll let that one pass.  - Not that I don't need it, I just feel like an old dog trying to learn a new trick. 

Orientation week (most of last week) went well, and all of the Overseas Course Members (OCMs) mingled with the Aussies.  We are now one big, happy class, waiting for school to kick in in earnest. 

- Ryan -

Posted by kisajaja at 8:53 PM CET

Share This Post

Post Comment | Permalink

Mood:  happy

I have officially completed my first week of school...sort of.  Technically, despite my having gone all week, school hasn't started, yet.  If officially starts on Monday...sort of.

Here's why.  The first week of school is an orientation week.  We all get our pictures taken, get broken down into our study groups (syndicates), get our lockers assigned, get a tour of the facilities, etc, etc.  No actual classes take place during this week beyond the admin and control sorts of classes that are designed to teach us what the course will be about.  That is week one.  That is next week.

All of the international students had to go to classes this week as well.  We did all of the same things that will occur next week, but we also got classes on Australian laws, customs, history, government, all of the things that the rest of the class will know very well once they arrive.  We also got a bus tour of Canberra.  Since next week is considered week one, this must be Zero Week!

All in all it was a good one.  We got to meet all of the international students and develop our own friendships before the Australians come into the mix.  The Australian Army is small.  There are only about 25 thousand of them.  To give you some perspective, we have more than that on Fort Bragg, North Carolina on a day to day basis.   You take that number and you count only the Majors, then take only the ones eligible for the course, and then you take only 120 of them and you can see how it is possible that these guys all know each other.  At least this way, the international guys don't feel like they are standing in the middle of someone elses class reunion on day one.

Outside of school, nothing much has happened this week.  Jacoby's school won't start until mid-February, so no news there.  Kimberly took her first drive in Australia while I was in school.  She drove to the Embassy and checked the mail.  It would have been a great trip if we had gotten any.  :)  Anyway, she made it there and back with no issues, so at least we got THAT out of the way.

We have plans to go to the McKaskills house this Saturday evening for a BBQ get together with them and some other friends.  Outside of that, we have some grocery shopping to do and that's about it for the plans.  Looks like a quiet weekend ahead.

Next week:  Week one!  I'll let you know how it goes.

Posted by kisajaja at 7:19 AM CET

Share This Post

Post Comment | Permalink

Mood:  a-ok

The next morning, we left for Melbourne around 8:00a, for what would be a three hour drive.  We got to Melbourne around 11:00a, which was way too early to check in, so Kimberly stepped in with the suggestion of going to see St Kilda beach, another area she read about.  It was a nice beach and very near was the small shops and bistros you might expect.  We grabbed lunch, walked the beach for a while, then headed to the hotel.

Now I have to tell you about some of the differences between Australia and the U.S.  The Australian states enjoy much greater autonomy than the American states.  They have their own driving rules and common practices, for instance.  Some states, you have to stop before entering a traffic circle.  Others, you get run over for doing that.  Sometimes pedestrians have the right of way, others not so much.  One of these rules in Melbourne is that if you want to turn right, you do so from the left-most lane.  No joke.  Keep in mind the left-hand driving rules throughout Australia.  At an intersection, if I want to turn right, I pull into the far left lane and sort of merge with the traffic waiting for their light to turn green, although I am perpendicular to them, just waiting to be t-boned.  I’ve just become first in their line.  My light turns red, their light turns green, I now finish my turn and continue to drive.

I didn’t know this.  I just about got us killed a half-dozen times on the way to the motel-suggested parking area.  I couldn’t figure out what I was doing wrong!  Why can I not turn right?!?  It seems to be upsetting people and I don’t know why!  At one point, a guy in a van yelled at me, “What the hell are you doing, Mate!”  I was relieved!  I thought it was OBVIOUS that I had NO IDEA!

Finally, I said forget this and headed back to the motel and just parked at the closest available lot, which ending up costing $76 to park for less than 24hrs.

After parking, we walked up to the motel, dropped off our stuff, and armed with a few maps, went out to see Melbourne!  We had two venues here, as well.  We wanted to see the Night Market, which takes place at the Queen Victoria market grounds, although the night market is completely different, and we had tickets to see the Old Melbourne Gaol (old way of spelling “Jail”).   The market would start at 5:30p.  The Gaol tour would start at 8:30p.  Until then, we just toured around using both the free Tourist Bus, which drove around an hour loop that basically gave you the lay of the land, and the free City Circle  Tram which looped around the main downtown area of Melbourne.  Both were cool.  The bus was good because of the history and commentary it provided with each of the districts.  The tram was good because the windows rolled down and you could take pictures from it.

 Chinatown

 On the Tram

The market was packed at 5:30p and stayed that way until 7:00p, when we left.  They had all manner of shops, though it was mostly clothes.  We walked back to the hotel (5 blocks) and dropped off our loot, and then headed for the Gaol.

The Gaol Tour

We arrived at the Gaol at 8:00p and joined the other people already waiting for the doors to open.  This is one of the oldest jails in Australia, built in stages, starting in the 1850’s.  It stayed open and used until 1975.  A vast majority (something like 90%) of the executions that took place in Australia, took place at its gallows.  This included, of course, Ned Kelly, an Australian folk hero something like Robin Hood or Jesse James.  I’m sure you can find his story on the internet somewhere, if you are interested.  As for us, I just announced to this group of people that I had no idea who he was and a very nice Australian man told me the whole story!  It was told to me again once we got inside.

Great tour!  It was at night, lit by candles, with a tour guide in character as one of the inmates, and also the executioner, which was apparently common.  He took us from cell to cell telling us about the most famous inmates.  He talked about life in the prison.  He showed us the gallows and explained how they worked.  It was really well done and it was a lot of gruesome sort of fun.

Then it was back to the room to sleep it all off and begin the long journey home.  I’m not going to write about that, simply because nothing of interest happened.  It was long, hot, and uneventful.

Posted by kisajaja at 12:19 PM CET

Updated: Thursday, 10 January 2008 12:34 PM CET

Share This Post

Post Comment | Permalink