Can William and Kate be a ‘normal couple’

Hi and thanks for visiting my blog, just for something different with this entry, I am providing a spoken recording of this particular post. I have included my reasons for doing so in the podcasted version, so if you would like to listen, just follow this link William and Kate, a normal couple?

The written entry:

Can William and Kate be a ‘normal couple’ ?

How many times was the word ‘normal’ pushed up next to any mention of Prince William and Kate during the wedding build-up? Who were they trying to kid? What was normal about a wedding that size?

Sure, we all understand the need for some privacy, and William would understandably have special concerns about Kate and the intensity of press interest, but drop the pretense of normality. Since when did being born into a family that that is nurtured and promoted by the state, both as tourist icons, and as the modern facsimiles of a lineage that proves the previous greatness of the nation mean normal?  I think never.

It has been documented that once the media turns its spotlight away from achievements, and onto the details of an individual’s private life, then it is at that moment that the individual has moved into the realm of celebrity. From this point on, the details of their private life become the objects that the media trades, to consumers who are eager for more. This knowledge is not new, and so if privacy ever really was a consideration, then screening a movie about the details of how the couple met, just prior to global coverage of their wedding, hardly removes our gaze from the details of their private life.

Perhaps our fascination with celebrity can be partly explained by the irreverent behaviour we are more likely to get away with, in our acts of celebrity worship. It is as if a mass hypnosis can take over, making ‘out of the ordinary’ behaviour so much more acceptable. People picnicking on traffic islands in London, and handing out food and drinks to strangers is not usual, but people love to play their part when the occasion allows. Maybe this creates a communal sense of belonging that magnifies our good feelings towards celebrity.

Either way, you can’t say that these things are normal or every-day, they happened because William and Kate are part of the state machine that is able to play host to the world on this scale. Examples like the British ambassador in Bolivia inviting a local couple who were tying the knot on the same day, to marry at the British embassy, as evidence that “this is a human event as well as a grand state event”, doesn’t make this marriage ordinary. It really just serves to show just how much their wedding belongs to the state. I’ve learnt enough to know that William and Kate are celebrities, and I’m sure that they know this too. 

When you travel, you can learn with your feet!

Back in November 2010 my wife and I made a trip to the Mungo National Park in NSW. This is an area where human remains dating back approximately 40,000 years were discovered. We travelled there from Mildura in Victoria in a four wheel drive, and the trip included approximately 100km of dirt road, so I definitely recommend not taking a regular car.

Lake Mungo is an ancient dried lake bed which until 15 thousand years ago, was a source of food and water for native Australians. As you approach from the west, it is defined by a massive 35km sand-dune that runs down the far side. The impression is of a huge dry crater when you get your first view, and it feels like a place from another time, which it pretty much is, and if you have any recollection of the 1960’s show ‘Time Tunnel’, there is a strange feeling that you just tumbled into one of their episodes.

The lake viewed from the dune

The highlight is walking around the dune on the far side of the lake, it is here that you are liable to make some ancient discoveries with your feet. The dune acts like a real-time geology class. Yep, you are actually learning about the past, as you walk over it. The wind blows the sand and dust off the dry lake-bed, and this builds up to form the dune. But with weathering, and the progress of time, the sand shifts around, and collectively travels a meter or so each year.

This movement causes the dune to churn as it moves, and the effect is that different fossils successively rise to the surface, so what is revealed one year will be different from the next. You literally have to watch where you walk, in case the reading of the past that is presented to you, is damaged by your enquiring steps. Our guide was of the opinion that with time, many more human remains will be discovered as they rise back up from the soft sand that they were originally buried in.

Ancient fire pit

Walking across the dune is a learning experience. Fossils are so plentiful, that as we walked, our guide pointed out the remains of a fire-pit recently exposed on the surface, which like the shells and assorted animal bones, dated back to when this area was a productive wetland, and frequented by the nomadic people of the time. Mungo National Park is worth a visit, the stillness and the emptiness can make you feel like you have experienced the planet in a way that is unique, and rarely possible, I got the feeling that the earth remembers all. 

Another view from the dune

International learning as it happens

The Libya drama has afforded me a glimpse of learning, as it happens, in international relations.

In blockbuster movies we are trained to expect the lead actor to make the big moves, but this script can get stale, and right now, we the media audience, are looking for a bit more than this in the Libyan situation. It appears that the regular lead, the USA, is attempting to surprise us by not simply swashbuckling their way into the lead role. The world waited for a big move from the USA, but they made us wait. Their actions appear to be informed by recent history, and their involvement is now conditional on the full approval of their international peers.

America was even slow to comment, and in the story linked to above, the Sun newspaper is quoted saying, that had America listened (to what the British PM was saying about a no-fly zone), Libya might already be liberated. Commentary like this suggests a belief that a complete, final, and decisive action is almost obligatory once America finally gets into its head what the ‘rest’ of the world understands. As if resolving conflicts too difficult for everyone else, is as simple as flicking a switch in their military basement. Not this time! US Defence Secretary Robert Gates said this conflict will be resolved by Libyans themselves.   

In Learning by watching teachers are recommended to set a ten minute timer, and count at each interval the students not actively engaged in learning. At the end of the lesson they should average the number of non-engaged students, and multiply this against a separate figure that represents the amount of uninterrupted learning time during the class. The resulting measure provides an indication of the amount of learning taking place during the class.

I propose a similar measure to determine the learning occurring in international relations. At the outset of an international crisis we note down the major players, and we consider down time as the time until one of the players declares their official position. To consider whether players are really engaged and giving their best towards a solution, we have to consider the quality of their engagement. Are their ideas just work that they have handed in before, or is there some improvement in their submission? Remember, turning in the same work is self-plagiarism, and could be considered ‘smart-alecky’ at this level. Excuses like, ‘Not my business’ = not engaged.

Now if the main leads can step back once the momentum is seen to belong with them, and others step up to take on more, then that really would demonstrate an international learning culture.  

Learning is relaxing

Well this might not seem true, but in a sense you know that it is true. Who really wants to carry the weight of knowing everything – that duty is reserved for a higher being, so unless you really do know everything, you can stop pretending,  RELAX, your place here on earth is still assured.

Now that we have established that there is still a lot of learning to get on with, we can reflect on how the process of learning is one of our greatest social activities. It forces us to engage. We become socialized by school, and as adults we learn new skills, sometimes just to meet new people, and so it is one of the most human of pastimes.

If you have read my post ‘The Teachings of Bruce’, you will have an impression of the way that I am planning to present learning in this blog. I am not going to assume a position of authority by presenting up to the minute research in the area of learning, but learning will be a theme in my posts. If on the other hand, you have a deeper or more academic interest in learning and want to share, then great, post your page address here. If others want to dive from here into the deep end, or alternatively dive from the deep end back here and into the shallow end, I’m all for it.

62% of participants in Technorati’s 2008 ‘State of the Blogosphere’ indicated that  connecting with like-minded people was a major reason for blogging, and 73% felt that the sharing of expertise and experiences were major reasons to blog. So, if you are remotely interested in learning, or blog about learning yourself, then my blog could become base camp #1 on the way to finding your blog. Creating this blog is part of my ongoing study at Curtin University, so feel free to drop by from time to time, you might meet like-minded people passing through.

The Teachings of Bruce

“I want you to concentrate.”

Remember Bruce Lee, that’s what he used to do, kwon-sentrate. Now please don’t accuse me of racism because of the tone of my spelling here, I’m just recalling his accent and writing phonetically to remind myself. My friends and I were huge fans of Bruce’s work. We loved his movies, we bought his books, and we consumed his words, he was a teacher.

As teenagers watching ‘Enter the Dragon’ at a cinema in Christchurch, NZ, I remember the audience bursting into laughter at the scene where the tough New Zealand guy was dealt with by Lee’s character, by telling the would be opponent to get into a boat and wait for him there, Lee subsequently set him adrift. This eliminated the need to fight one more annoying challenger. We laughed, because it was exciting that New Zealand got a mention, it made us feel international. Kung Fu was new, and if our man was the fall guy, we were cool with that, at least we had a player.

Bruce Lee emphasized concentration, he knew how to focus, he knew how to keep at his practice, and that was how he became a master at what he did. The words in his books repeated the message – concentrate, focus. This meant keep at it, study yourself, and study your own progress.

Bruce Lee inspired us to open our minds to aspects of Chinese culture, and so our emulations of his magic moves, helped our imaginations cross a cultural divide and freed us from previous limitations. Learning can do that. 

Who would choose to blog about learning?

Who would choose to blog about learning, and is it even a topic? 

Well I am going to find out the answer to that question by making learning, or the activity of learning, the subject of this blog. Rather than choose a specific interest such as photography or Web design, I decided to blog about that personal aspect that is always engaged in the pursuit of knowledge - the learning self.

The need to know more and the need to be able to adapt to changing situations is an aspect of self that directly affects our quality of life. I decided that this blog might give me the chance to step back from the specifics of my study at Curtin University, and provide an opportunity to observe and recollect some of the places and some of the ways that I have observed the process of learning.

Hopefully some of my reflections will include humor, and everybody knows that learning can certainly include that ingredient. Just bring to mind a time where you have seen young children adapt their behavior in response to a new or challenging situation, like who is it that gets to eat the last piece of cake at a party. 

People develop in different ways, but it is guaranteed that nobody can get through life without developing skills along the way. Because my current learning is slightly serious and structured, I hope that this blog might give me a bit of respite, as I consider some of the entertaining and spontaneous situations where I have seen, or experienced learning first hand.