Welcome to my blog. I started this story through an invitation of Science Alive in Christchurch, New Zealand, who were interested in following my adventures while doing research down in Antarctica. I am a PhD student at Gateway Antarctica at the University of Canterbury in Christchurch. My research looks at the relationship between New Zealanders and Antarctica, their perceptions and their connections and ultimately, their sense of place. I do this by interviewing people from across New Zealand and collecting stories. It is a lot of fun hearing all sorts of stories from all sorts of different people about how they see Antarctica. It's amazing how one single place can be such a different thing to so many different people.
The one unfortunate thing about this research is that I can do it entirely from New Zealand with no need for travel to Antarctica. Luckily for me, my supervisor had a need for a research assistant this summer on his trip down to the ice. His research looks at the environmental decisions-making process of scientists out in the field. If they see a spill what do they do? What personal or social values guide their actions? And how can we improve our education of people going out in the field so they know what to do and why? These are our research questions for our trip down and the way we will get the answers for them is through questionnaires and interviews with the scientists who are going out in the field.
My first job was to print off and organize all our questionnaires, consent forms and information sheets. There are limited resources at Scott Base, the New Zealand reseach base in Antarctica, and this includes paper. When you are travelling to such a remote place you have to make sure you bring everything with you, there are no shops in Antarctica to nip out to to pick up more paper.
The one unfortunate thing about this research is that I can do it entirely from New Zealand with no need for travel to Antarctica. Luckily for me, my supervisor had a need for a research assistant this summer on his trip down to the ice. His research looks at the environmental decisions-making process of scientists out in the field. If they see a spill what do they do? What personal or social values guide their actions? And how can we improve our education of people going out in the field so they know what to do and why? These are our research questions for our trip down and the way we will get the answers for them is through questionnaires and interviews with the scientists who are going out in the field.
My first job was to print off and organize all our questionnaires, consent forms and information sheets. There are limited resources at Scott Base, the New Zealand reseach base in Antarctica, and this includes paper. When you are travelling to such a remote place you have to make sure you bring everything with you, there are no shops in Antarctica to nip out to to pick up more paper.
After my printing and folding and sorting was finished, we headed out to Antarctica New Zealand to pick up our cold weather gear. Antarctica New Zealand is the organization in charge of all the operations of Scott Base, including getting people down there and kitting them up so they don't freeze once they get there. We were ushered into change rooms filled with jackets, snow pants, mitts, gloves, hats and boots. Trying everything on to make sure it all fit and signing it out for the duration of our travels. After stuffing my two new bags of gear into the back of the car, I drove off home to pack up the rest of my stuff. What would you pack if you were going someplace cold? Take a look at the picture and see what I packed.
Well, mostly it was t-shirts and jeans. Since we'll be spending most of our time at Scott Base, which is climate controlled and all the buildings are linked by walkways, there is little reason to need all that winter gear when you are inside. But we still have to bring all those coats and boots for when we want to walk over to visit our American neighbours in McMurdo or go for a ski on the sea ice. And after packing all my clothes, I threw in some books and knitting for the evenings.
Once all my bags were packed (I ended up with three - two to check and one carry on), I snuggled into my own bed for one last sleep and dreamt of the day to come.
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