Wednesday, August 4, 2010

The importance of kangaroos

Just to prove that I'm actually in Australia:


It still seems indescribably strange that something of this size and shape, which moves by hopping rather than walking, should be living comfortably in a scrubby forest. I know that that's just bias on my part --- I happen be used to deer and raccoons, not kangaroos and possums. The wonderful thing about travel is the way it makes me realize that it easily could have been the other way around.

These photos are from a hike (er, bushwalk) up Mount Ainslie, which we took our first weekend here.

Mount Ainslie is one of two main peaks (hills, really) in Canberra, and provides a wonderful panoramic view, which I took in upside-down:


Michael, sensibly, stayed upright:


Our friend Daniel, who joined us for the hike, even took some videos of the kangaroos, which are absolutely worth watching if you've never seen them in action before. It also drives home rather vividly the fact that kangaroos, large though they are, are quite well camouflaged --- I was there when these videos were taken, and even I have trouble spotting them unless they're moving.




Coming from North America, I expected kangaroos to hop like rabbits or frogs, since those are the only hopping animals I'm really familiar with. But they don't. No wonder the earlier European settlers were so stymied in their attempts to draw and describe the animals here. Just check out this early drawing of a kangaroo:


See? Looks nothing like the real thing. I'm tempted not to blame the artist --- he just had absolutely no frame of reference for what kangaroos should look like. But rather than relying on his eyes and his hands to capture what was in front of him, he allowed his pre-existing notions of animal shapes and structures to get in the way. That's the importance of kangaroos, and the lesson that I try to take to heart when I travel: to see things not as I expect them to be, but as they truly are.

No comments:

Post a Comment