11 January
by Amanda Rodrigues Alves
The last few days have been spent mostly inside the base. Adam and First Born working on the radio station, Thomas working alone because he had to finish an enviromental report (those kind of bueraucratic things that he hates but has to do) and I stayed with the video. I don't have much to do actually, there is not something to shoot all the time and we were having problems with the camera's time code so I couldn't log what we had done so far. So I managed to see quite a lot of films in my computer and also to read the 704 pages of Dostoyevsky's The Devils, in english. Luckily I finally found out what was wrong (with the time code) and I have been logging today what we shot so far on the trip and writting down all the time codes, so we'll know exactly what is on each tape and at what time. This is very boring work but I'm almost finished.
I'm not a professional video maker and there has been a lot of problems with the video, specially the sound and mostly because we are using an external mic. The other day Adam had to make a new cable for the mic because the old one was not working properly and we lost some good audio of Thomas talking about our unit. Today as I was logging the old tapes I found out that the recordings we did on the plane taking off were gone. We filmed things on top of it because after taking stills from the footage I didn't put it back to the original place, so Thomas came, saw the camera and went outside to film a sunset and did it on top of the footage without knowing. This was very frustrating, but I managed to get some similar footage from Struan, one of the scientists that also filmed the plane taking off.
We had a meeting a few days ago and the topic was basicly our group dynamics. Or the fact that we were not a group. I think that the fact that we were all working separately and also the fact that Adam and First share one cabin and Thomas and I share another, among other little things, naturally creates a division in the group. But I think when we all start working together on the Groundhog unit things will start to flow and the group can exist again. But still we had to make some decisions that might help the integration and dynamics, some basic relationship rules.
Generally I'm feeling a bit claustrophobic here. It is an amazing experience and also unique. I'm glad I had the chance to come and see it for myself but I have to confess that I don't find all the work we are doing interesting. I think the project as an utopic idea is brilliant and the fact this first part is happening has a strong symbolic meaning. But then I'm not jumping up and down with excitement and enthusiasm and I think there is an external pressure for me to be feeling like that. This is not the sort of place you can just say goodbye to and go home. I guess this is teaching me a lesson on the decisions I make in my life and also is forcing me to stick to my decisions and do the best I can here, even if I'm not interested in it at all. I think this frustation of mine has been apparent in my face and affecting the relationship with the group.
Anyway I know that this might not be so interesting, but I just thought most of our posts here don't reflect our everyday experiences and feelings and can be too technical or just talk about the landscape, and I wanted to show that not all are peaches. But then again I think some of the others can be feeling enthusiasm and this might just be my mood this week.
We took the Groudhog unit outside onto the helipad today to take some pictures and we are posting them here as requested on the comment yesterday. I think Thomas will soon reply to the comment with a text he has about monoliths and art but tonight he is not feeling good and went to bed at 6pm.
