Earlier last month, my brother and I decided to visit Mt. Piper and climb up to its summit.
Mt. Piper is a 455 metre mountain located next to the smaller, rural town of Broadford, Victoria. Since the arrival of European explorers in the early 1830s, Mt. Piper has been an iconic landmark of the region.
The mountain was first discovered by the explorers Hume and Hovell and was name after Captain Piper, a naval officer of the colony of New South Wales.
Since then, the mountain has been the site of several mining expeditions for rare metals such as Gold and Antimony. Currently, Mt. Piper is the symbol of the township of Broadford and is designated a Nature Conservation Reserve for the endangered Golden Sun Month and the Blue Ant Butterfly.
I had not been to the abandoned mines but my brother (Jon) said that he used to often explore there with friends when he was in High School. he promised to take me there so I could take some footage with my camera. However, as was evident from the video, he had a hard time recollecting where the abandoned mines were exactly.
At the end of our adventure, we reached the summit of the mountain and was treated to some fine views of the region. I hope you all enjoy the video of our trip up the mountain.
Today, I thought I shall introduce one of my short-films. The title of the piece is Ryoko's Final Melbourne Tour.
It's a tribute film for Ryoko that I made in April this year. I have attached it to this blog for those that are interested in watching it. WARNING: there are moments where Japanese is spoken. Please ensure that you have the closed-captions icon selected to get the English translation.
Ryoko is a friend of mine that I have know since 2009. We met at La Trobe University when I was in my first year of my PhD and she was still undertaking her undergraduate course. we became close friends and would spend a lot of time together conversing and having lunch together on campus. I found her to be both somewhat eccentric yet at the same time intellectually stimulating to talk to. We would often go out to dinner and karaoke together with other friends.
In 2010, I went to Japan to conduct my fieldwork and during my time abroad she was to graduate and eventually find employment in Sydney. She had mixed feelings about her residence and work in Sydney and would, on occasion, come back to Melbourne to visit old friends in which I would feel obliged to help out my good friend by chauffeuring her around the town.
This time (April 2012), Ryoko announced that she had quit her job in Sydney and was returning to Japan. She decided to come back to Melbourne one last time before she would leave, to celebrate with her good friends and give thanks for the friendships that she had with them.
I decided to film this moment in honour of our friendship, however I wanted to give it a little twist to make the moment more memorable. The theme of my project was to create an illusion that Ryoko was some kind of major celebrity who was arriving for her final tour.
I did not tell Ryoko or any of her guests what I was intended to do with the project because I wanted to catch people in their natural state (albeit, some people like Allison caught on pretty quickly). Overall, I was grateful for everyone for cooperating with me on this project. Everyone had fun and kept the atmosphere lively. I had no problem collecting interesting footage for this tribute.
However, the battery on my camera did run out quickly (this was before I bought a larger battery for the camera) and I had to come back to the city at a later date to film extra b-roll footage.
But overall, I was happy with the end product, even though I am still quite new to the editing software. Ryoko seemed to be pleased (and surprised) with the final product. I hope that we can meet again soon and maybe a live in Japan version at the end of this month.
Its been almost year since I last saw my good friends at Takatori in Japan. Yet, there thoughts are still with me. Of course, for the obvious reasons that my current PhD focuses on the organisations that they work for, but mostly because over the course of the year that I was there with them, I couldn't help but admire some of their efforts.
I am planning a trip to Japan at the end of this month and hopefully I will have time to visit the centre. However, as with most things in life, some people have moved on and are no longer there.
One such person, and good friend I made while there, is Mr. Kunimoto.
Today, I have decided to share one of his latest videos.
According to his wife, he submitted this entry into a local competition and won first prize.
The theme of the competition seems to be centred around the letter 'D'.
For Kunimoto, he chose the word 'Deutsch' to explore his challenge of learning the German language.
Unfortunately, this video is in German and with Japanese subtitles so I apologise to anyone who can't understand it.
Although he is currently living in Germany now with his new family, I still admire his style and tenderness. Even though I am new to videography, I really hope that someday I can produce something of similar calibre.
I hope that Mr. and Mrs Arndt-Kunimoto are all doing well with their news lives and child in Germany as I promise that I will up my efforts to better my German (and Japanese).
Since then, the mountain has been the site of several mining expeditions for rare metals such as Gold and Antimony. Currently, Mt. Piper is the symbol of the township of Broadford and is designated a Nature Conservation Reserve for the endangered Golden Sun Month and the Blue Ant Butterfly.
