Festive Times in The Festival State

Adelaide Fringe Parade

As ‘Mad March’ fast approaches, Adelaide, the capital of South Australia is well into its festive season. Already this summer the city has hosted the Tour Down Under (January 17—22), that annual international bike race that was first staged in 1999, with the local rider Stuart O’Grady taking the win. Since then the Tour has grown to become the biggest cycle race in the southern hemisphere with international cycle stars like Cadel Evans, Marcel Kittel, Andy Schleck and Andre Greipel just a few of the many great cyclists who have participated. 

But the Tour Down Under is only the starter event for South Australia’s festival season. Underway as I write this is the Adelaide Fringe (February 17—March 19). The Fringe has been taking place for more than 55 years, and this year features a veritable smorgasbord of more than 500 acts covering everything from comedy to cabaret, music to magic, visual arts, theatre, film, and so much more.

For many local and visitors, the Adelaide Fringe holds more interest and excitement than the premier arts event in South Australia, the annual Adelaide Festival (March 3–19). This major international festival has been taking place since 1960, and features a program of theatre, opera, music and dance, more visual arts and film, talks, and installations, some commissioned specifically for the event.

Writer's Week

A major component of the Adelaide Festival is the free Writer’s Week (March 4–9), which takes place in the open air at the Pioneer Women’s Memorial Garden. This year, as always, Writer’s Week celebrates a diverse range of writers and writing, and includes writers from Chile and Cuba, Ireland, Iceland and Indonesia, the United States and Canada, and of course a host of writers from Australia. For a book lover like myself, the opportunity to listen to some of the best writers on the planet talk about books and read from their latest works is not to be missed.

But wait, there’s more!

Rev heads, have not been left out. Somewhere, in the middle of this high art and low culture, the annual Supercar motor race, the Clipsal 500 (March 2–5), hits the streets. During this event visitors get to indulge their love of fast cars, burnt rubber, skimpily clad women, and high-octane fuel. At the end of the day's activities on Friday and Saturday night, participants can rock into the night to the music of the Hilltop Hoods, The Funkoars, Baby Animals and one of the great Aussie rock bands, Hunters & Collectors.

But Mad March (as the locals refer to this period every summer), is the gift that keeps on giving. If you have not yet been exhausted or financial broken by fast cars, highbrow theatre and arts, books and their writers, and the almost unlimited shenanigans of the Adelaide Fringe you can always put on your tie-dye T’s, braid your hair into dreadlocks, douse yourself in patchouli oil, and spend a weekend at WOMADelaide (March 10–13).

This four-day world music festival is located in the city’s Botanic Gardens, and this year includes more than 60 acts and speakers from more than 20 countries. Among the performers this year are the Hot 8 Brass Band from New Orleans; the Specials, a band that brought an updated version of British Ska music to the world; and The Philip Glass Ensemble which will be performing music from Koyaanisqatsi. Apart from the music, WOMADelaide features workshops, Planet Talks, an ElectroLounge, a KidZone, a host of international food stalls, and a Healing Village for those needing some time out from the feasting and dancing.

Whew! I'm exhausted simply from the anticipation and the promise this list of amazing events suggests. Sadly, time, money and age will all combine to ensure that at most, I will only be able to dip into the many sweets on offer. But then, that is probably exactly how it should be.

Dear reader, you may not be able to attend any of the above events at this time, but I seriously encourage you to think about planning a visit to Adelaide during the summer festival season. If there is one thing I can guarantee you, it is that you won't be bored.

Crop Trust: Global Seed Vault

Nestled in the Svalbard archipelago lies a small unassuming-yet-sturdy building created to last forever. While it may look minimal, this building is one of the most important in the world because it hold the key to continual hitman survival. It houses the world’s largest—and most secure—collection of crop diversity.

While the Svalbard Global Seed Vault isn’t the only gene bank in the world, its seed collection is the most likely to maintain funding while also withstanding war, natural disasters and climate change.

Built by the Norwegian government and encouraged by the Crop Trust when the vulnerability of other gene banks came to light, the Global Seed Vault serves as a timeless record of crops throughout generations. It is meant to ensure—regardless of what happens to the planet—that agriculture can survive and thus, the human race can survive.

Since 1903, more than 93 percent of fruit and vegetable varieties in the United States have gone extinct. With a changing climate, the only way agriculture can adapt and continue to feed the world is with crop diversity. The Global Seed Vault’s mission is to ensure agriculture remains resilient to environmental changes.

There are currently more than 880,000 samples in the vault—seeds from every country in the world. Ultimately, the hope is to greatly increase this number. The vault has the ability to store 4.5 million varieties of crops and a maximum of 2.5 billion seeds.

It is every citizen’s moral duty—and in the world’s best interest—to come together to fund the Svalbard Global Seed Vault, helping it to not just survive, but thrive. Every $625.00 saves a single crop variety. Please join GoPro in supporting Crop Trust’s Seed Vault to safeguard crop diversity forever.

Below, follow world-renowned scientist Cary Fowler into the heart of the arctic, where the Svalbard Global Seed Vault lies nestled in the frozen Norwegian landscape.

GoPro Cause: Forever Securing World Food Supply with Crop Trust from GoPro on Vimeo.

Want to get involved? Visit Crop Trust here…

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UPDATE: FEBRUARY 25, 2017

Just days after adding this post, more information popped up on my Facebook feed linking the a Smithsonian magazine story titles, Syria Just Made a Major Seed Bank Deposit in the Svalbard Seed Bank.

According to the story, in 2011, during the Arab Spring, “…an advisor to the Crop Trust, which operates the vault in Svalbard, reached out to the Syrian-based seed bank to ask if they needed to back up their seeds. Though officials initially refused, they eventually acquiesced—just in case. Soon after, the political situation began to degrade.”

Thankfully, 49,000 types of seeds arrived in Svalbard just before turmoil hit Aleppo.

Read more from the Smithsonian magazine here...

Writers From Life's Other Side

A small selection of books bought this year

Over the past few years I have made a point of seeking out writers that have never been on my radar, despite the accolades they have garnered for their writing. I am especially interested in discovering and reading writers from ethnic backgrounds that offer a new and unique (for me), view of life that I have never experienced or imagined. Additionally, I have been seeking out male and female writers of colour, who tend to add another layer of insight and experience to their writing that non-white male and female writers are simply unable to provide.

Among my female 'discoveries' have been Maya Angelou (I Know Why The Caged Bird Sings); Zora Neale Hurston (Their Eyes Were Watching God); Jesmyn Ward (Men We Reaped, and Salvage The Bones); and Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie (That Thing Around Your Neck, and Americanah).

Male writers of colour that have also come to my attention and join my list of new 'discoveries' include the brilliant and insightful Ta-Nehisi Coates (The Beautiful Struggle, and his stunning follow-up, Between The World And Me); Teju Cole (Every Day Is For The Thief); Colson Whitehead (Apex Hides The Hurt); Ernest J. Gaines (A Gathering of Old Men); and Daniel Black, whose recent book The Coming, I examined here...

Still more of my recent book buying adventures

Of course, I am not completely ignorant about the pantheon of great African-American writers who were, or are contemporaries of the above writers. Men such as Langston Hughes, James Baldwin, W.E.B DuBois and Ralph Ellison are names I have been familiar with for many years. Of these four writers, the only one I had read was James Baldwin. Indeed, earlier this year I reread two of Baldwin's now classic essay collections, Nobody Knows My Name (from 1961), and The Fire Next Time (1963).

I had read these and other books by James Baldwin during my 20's, but was motivated to read them again because two contemporary writers, Ta-Nehisi Coates, and Jesmyn Ward have responded to Baldwin's famous essay, The Fire Next Time, by publishing in these past couple of years, Between The World And Me (Coates, 2015), and a collection of modern essays edited by Ward called The Fire This Time (2016).

Until recent years, my knowledge of female minority writers has been all but non-existent. I have read Toni Morrison over the years, and while I was familiar with Alice Walker and her book, The Color Purple, I had not, and still have not, read that or any other of her books. To be honest, I can not recall having read a novel by another woman of colour before Toni Morrison, which, for an avid reader like myself, feels like a terrible admission to be making.

Clearly I have a lot of catching up to do, and the list of authors, both male and female that I am adding to my reading list, continues to grow and expand. I just hope I have the time and energy to do the authors and their books, justice.

Here are links to some of the books I have read (or plan to read) this year...

• Between The World And Me, and The Beautiful Struggle, by Ta-Nehisi Coates
• Salvage The Bones, and Men We Reaped, by Jesmyn Ward
• The Underground Railroad, and Apex Hides The Hurt, by Colson Whitehead

All are worth reading.