Submitted by Anonymous on Thu, 07/17/2008 - 08:54
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Kuril Islands Biocomplexity 08

Hi Dr. Etnier,

 I was wondering what you do for fun while you are at the Kuril Islands.  Do you watch any movies?  Is there an excersise room on the ship?

 By the way you are a good writer Dr. Etnier.  You are funny!  I loved the part when your movie screen didn't work and I'm dying to know what's in that bag!

Nathan Gill

Sat, 07/19/2008 - 06:02

KBP Team

Thanks for the compliment Nathan! Good writing is, of course, a really important part of good science. We may not have many chances to be funny, but we use writing skills in just about every aspect of our work:keeping detailed records of equipment and supplies that we need; notes and details of what we encounter during our excavations; and, finally, we have to be able to clearly communicate our results to our Russian colleagues, to our finding sources (like the National Science Foundation!), and in professional geology and archaeology journals. That's a LOT of writing!
As for your other question, there are two main phases of the field work: getting there, and being there.
Getting there is pretty dull, really, and we're still in the midst of that. It will take us a total of 4 days to cross the Sea of Okhotsk to get to our first stop. While we're crossing, people are filling in the time in a variety of ways. Some folks are watching DVDs. Some folks are reading. The seas are a little too rough to play card games or the crew favorite, Blockus. At least, not if you want to avoid getting (more?) sea sick!
Exercise is tough, too, especially in rough seas. If the seas are flat, it's not too difficult to get in a workout of basic stuff like sit-ups, pull-ups, and push-ups. But there isn't an exercise room on this ship. So no bicycle trainers or treadmills or anything like that.
So that's the "getting there" part. Once we hit the "being there" part we get a ton of exercise just through our day-to-day work. Lots of strenuous long hikes (often with VERY heavy packs full of field gear and, if we're lucky, lots of great samples!). Lots of manual labor, usually involving shoveling dirt. By the end of the summer we will have dug (and re-filled) lots and lots of holes. By the end of a typical work day, not very many of us have the time and energy to do any additional exercise.
--Dr E.