Hanging around Harberton

We started off the morning with a good group cleaning – they have a schedule and it seems to work well. Luckily, I was assigned mopping in the lab area, which also gave me the opportunity to look around at the many posters they had on the walls. It very much felt like an old-school natural history museum. On top of all the cabinets there were more bones, and I saw that as a joke someone had posted the flyer for the movie the “Bone Collector”.

For lunch I was invited by Natalie Goodall to dine in her home. I was sorry to miss the delicious casserole-like thing that Kata was cooking up in the museum, but everyone told me that if I had the chance to eat with Natalie I shouldn’t pass it up. The lunch was good – some kind of hearty soup that they also sell to tourists in the café next door. The conversation was also good. We talked about the friend that had put me in touch and also about history, family, etc. Dr. Goodall I think was a little surprised when I showed up since somewhere along the way she had gotten the idea that I wanted to film her and I guess she’d been expecting a whole film crew or something like that. As we talked it became apparent that she really wasn’t so adverse to the idea of being interviewed. She hadn’t liked the idea when she thought it was going to be on TV, but so long as it was just radio and she didn’t have to listen to it that wouldn’t be so bad. To finish off I was offered a choice from the 7 types of cake or so that they serve in the tearoom. All were based off her mother’s cake recipe, which she had carried over lovingly from Ohio. I think I had the orange cake and it was indeed excellent.

After lunch it was arranged that Santiago (yes, the subject of much doting upon by the female residents of the museum) was going to give me and Emi a historical tour of Harberton. I could see why he was admired, but he was good-looking in that yes-and-I-know-it kind of way. To each their own. I must have spent a little too long looking at him because I nearly missed the cue where you are supposed to sweep in a kiss South Americans on the cheek in greeting. Honestly, as an American this takes a little getting used to. When I lived in Japan I used to bemoan the fact that since people usually just bowed to each other it was possible to go months at a time without touching another human being, but this really is the other extreme of things. You mean, I’m supposed to kiss 7 or 8 strangers every time I enter a room? Well, yes, and it’s not as easy as you’d think either. For example, when I realized that I ought to kiss Santiago to make up for being slow I went for it a little too enthusiastically. You wouldn’t believe the damage you can do with you cheekbone when you really launch yourself at someone. I apologized and he said it was fine, but I noticed him rubbing his jaw afterwards. The tour covered a lot of things that I had already read about in Natalie’s book, but it was interesting to see nonetheless. They had reconstructed a yaghan hut and I learned about how they moved the entrance according to where the wind was coming from. Thus, the middens left behind were circular. More on the yahans to come though. Santiago asked why I wasn’t recording him, since I had been recording all the museum residents and I tried to explain that the focus of my project was scientific. At this point he revealed that he did know a fair bit about the native flora, and it certainly help provide a good foundation for the naturalists I would meet in the following weeks.

I was back at the museum in time to listen to some of the guided tours given by the museum residents. It made me think it would be fun to be a curator, though I’m sure that giving the same spiel a million times can be tough, and some of the tourists’ questions were a little off base. After he finished we the tour I was able to have a good chat with Mauro. Turns out he is a big Gould fan but cannot stand Dawkins. Also, he was a little down on the state of South American science. As he put it, why should they do the things that northamericans are already doing, and have a head start on to boot? But I think he answered that question for himself considering that the only thing he ever really loved and wanted to do was biology.

For dinner another invitation came in from the house that Kata, Emi, and I were invited to dine with the Goodalls. Emi especially was very nervous because she wasn’t very confident in her English. She needn’t have worried though, it was not as if we were being interrogated or anything, it was just dinner. We ate fried slices of beef and had a delicious raspberry dessert from raspberries that had just come into season in the garden (a bit late and not that plentiful this year because they had a very rainy summer). Thomas Goodall was a quiet old man with a kind face, though you could tell he wasn’t much into having guests for dinner. Part way through he excused himself to go watch the latest Chilean soap opera.

Back at the museum everyone was hanging out, drinking maté, and telling sexist jokes. It seemed a little odd since they were mostly women, but I guess it is not a bad way to pass the time. And to make sure that I was all caught up on vulgar anatomical terms. Most of the jokes were pretty harmless though. Like, “Al hombre le pasan muchas cosas por la cabeza, en cambio a la mujer le pasan muchas cabezas por la cosa”. Which is roughly akin to “men think about many things, while women fuss over everything”. Well, at least it was clear that in this museum it was the women who were running everything (sorry Mauro, but it is true). As we prepared for bed I regretted not having thought to pack a towel since it meant I really couldn’t shower and I wasn’t sure how many days Kata and Emi would go before they started complaining that I was sharing a room with them. Good thing I was taking off the next day. So far they still seemed to like having me around.

Museo Acatúshun

Maybe it’s just me, but sometimes I think the cultural barriers between scientists and non-scientists are larger than the differences among people of different nations. Crazy, right? Except I’ve noticed that even when I’m bumbling along in a foreign language, if the person I’m talking to has read “The Panda’s Thumb” for example, I’m not likely to run out of things to say. The same unfortunately cannot be said when my well-meaning friends invite me to parties filled with impeccably-dressed/coiffed, cocktail-wielding, young professionals who inevitably initiate conversations about celebrities or sports figures that I’ve never heard of. There’s something about being among a group of like-minded scientists that puts one at ease. You know that you’re among your people and that a certain degree of eccentricity is expected (even encouraged). I was fortunate enough to find that in my lab at Okayama University of Science, and again with the residents of Museo Acatúshun.

Kata picked me up from the B&B while she was on her weekly grocery run to Ushuaia. I was nervous at first, but after I met Kata, her sister Emi, and another museum student named Sil I knew I was going to be in good company. They were so lively and welcoming that it felt like I was reuniting with people I’d known for ages rather than heading off with strangers. Our first stop was a fabric store where I helped Sil pick out a new plastic tablecloth for the dining room table in museum (we opted for one with grey stripes and a white background with pink daises around the rim, both because it was cheery and seemed to be the most durable). Then we stopped by Natalie’s house in Ushuaia to pick up a bunch of moss-covered Cetacean (cifrido in Spanish if you were curious) skulls. They were massive so we couldn’t fit them all in the truck bed but we managed to fit about 11, which we then strapped down with bungee cords for the long drive to Harberton. There is something wonderful about being put to work right away – I felt like I was actually useful and had gained immediate acceptance into the group. What better way really to start the day than by carrying giant whale skulls to and fro? Before leaving town we made one final stop to pick up about 20 kilos of potatoes (yes, that’s a lot of potatoes, but it’s an inexpensive way to feed the many hungry museum students). The ride was stunning and I enjoyed it all the more this time that I wasn’t stuck in the back of a smoke-filled bus. We made some of the same stops: the gate on the beach that frames the Dientes de Navarrino mountains and the windswept Notofagus trees that have grown sideways. The best part was the conversation as we passed around a cup of maté. Somewhat embarrassingly I didn’t really understand how the maté passing worked at first. Basically you have a gourd (or some other intricate cup) which you fill with the bitter herbs and stick in a bombilla (silver spoon/straw with perforations large enough to let the tea through but not the herbs). I kept being passed it, taking a sip or two and passing it along to someone else. They thought this meant that I didn’t really like it (many foreigners find it too bitter and prefer tempering it with sugar), but the truth was that I just didn’t know that once you were passed the cup you were supposed to finish it before handing it back to be filled with water for the next person. Live and learn.

I don’t even remember all the things we discussed, but I know that Emi was very talkative and especially wanted me to teach her to cuss in Japanese after learning that I’d lived there. Of course, at least in the circles I frequented there wasn’t really the same tradition of affectionately cursing at people as you have in Spanish. I tried to explain this, but they said I had to know at least one so I finally settled on “Buta” which means pig and is mildly insulting in Japanese. They misheard my B as a P, and thought it remarkable that “puta” worked in both languages (anyone actually know how you would say “puta” in Japanese, I sure don’t). I did explain to Emi though that her name worked in Japanese too and meant bow (as in bow an arrow, and was in fact my Japanese professor’s first name in college). At first she took this to mean that her full name “Emilia” existed in Japanese, but after only mild confusion I explained it was just the nickname Emi.

We made it back to the museum a little after sunset, and I got to meet the nine residents (10 including me). Eight of them were women and one was a man, and all of them were Argentinean with the exception of one woman who was Brazilian. The one man was named Mauro (kind of like the Kamihori figure of my Okayama days) kept telling me how hard it was to put up with all these women, but that he somehow managed. They teased him relentlessly, kind of like a younger brother. Actually it was amazing to me what good friends everyone was to one another. All these women in their 20’s though clearly did get a little sick of being cooped up in the museum with no “eligible” guys (poor Mauro) and swooned over one of the Harberton guides named Santiago. The one tricky thing for me was that everyone seemed to have about 3 names, but went by a nickname that you would have never guessed from any of the 3. Clearly they had some difficulty with my name too. Mauro finally slapped the table as if he’s had a revelation and told everyone that he got my name. It’s ‘choline’, as in acetylcholine from the Kreb’s cycle (it’s a very bad sign when the Kreb’s cycle is easier for people to remember than your name). This worked for people, since they were all scientists after all. We stayed up talking until it was too dark to see anything at which pointed they switched on the generator and the lights. We had a light meal of crackers, dulce de leche, and candy with our maté, while people told some truly cring-worthy science jokes. (“Why don’t white bears dissolve in oil? Because they are polar”.) Sil gave me her bed for the night in a room I shared with Kata and Emi so that I wouldn’t have to sleep in the cold room at the very top of the museum while she shared Mauro’s room.  I felt at home and excited for the next day.