Episode Transcript
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(00:01):
And it's welcome to your What isit? What is what? Your it's
your ninth? W's you ever together? Right? Yeah? How many is
it? Yeah? Yeah it's nine? Wow, you're giving you how to
run for his money? Yeah?I suppose we're fighting it out. You
know who keep going the longest?Oh yeah, who should have put my
money on? Well you's got nochance, so no brainer. Yeah.
(00:24):
So you know why I'm here forthis winter, right? Yeah? You
are studying which one of us inhere loses it first? Close? But
I was a slightly more refined wayof putting it, I'm sure. Yeah,
but you know I've got bets onthat one. Oh really, Cat's
share and spory your months and monthsof research. Not a chance, I
mean, unless you want to cutsome corners, put your legs, have
(00:47):
a drink, you know. Fortunately, there's a little bit more to it
than that. Yeah, I wasthinking, when was our first time wintering
over together? That was three yearsago at Aurora? Oh yeah, good
times they work, Yeah they reallywere. Are you good to start?
Is that all right? Oh?Yes, so we haven't done hether No,
I've got to read out okay,okay, well yeah, let's go.
(01:08):
Great, So as you know,I am doing a psychological study of
the crew here on the base formunity industries to help them understand and improve
based life. Yeah yeah, youcan just go through. Well, I
need to read you the skipper disclaim. My life is too short for this.
Okay, fair enough. All theinformation is in the base contracts and
the health and safety Yeah yeah,okay, first question goal Okay, So
(01:29):
for the audio record, can youplease state your name, age and your
role here on the base. Yes, I am Anna certainson. I am
forty eight years old only I hadmy birthday a few weeks ago. Yeah
yeah, and I am the basecruel plumbing engineer. Well, firstly,
happy belated birthday, thank you.And can you take me through what a
crew plumbing engineer is? What isthat? Yeah? Sure, you're looking
(01:53):
for an apprenticeship been plumbing. Icould do with some useful life skips sure
yeah, okay, Well the mostimportant things here are you know, water,
sublime, sanitation, sewage, andof course heat. Although I do
share that heat stuff with Mark,that's because that's really his specialty. But
(02:15):
you know, if any of thosethings go wrong, we're in big foging
troopol here on the base. Nowater, we're fucked. If the water
gets dirty, we're fucked. Andno heat, yep, well we're fucking
dead. So it's basically my jobto make sure none of those things go
wrong. We do daily checks,maintenance, water testing, We flushed the
(02:36):
systems, pipe protection, that sortof thing. But that's just the day
to day to try and prevent thingsgoing wrong. I'm guessing there's a butt
in there someone. Yeah, you'reguessing right. Things do go farging wrong.
Water freezes, pipes burst, andinsulation degrades. There's bacteria built up,
and you just have to be prepared, especially in winter, to find
(03:00):
the faults and then fix them quickly. Okay, and how do you prepare
for wintering over, Well, you'llorder all the parts that could go wrong
before you're sealed off. But Imean you can't have space for everything,
and then you're making parts out ofwhatever you can find. In one winter,
there's three systems on the toilets thatbroke after the third one went.
(03:22):
I'm there using a balloon to testto a straw for a float. Am
I even joking? It sounds likea craft project? Yeah, yeah,
like you know, build a machineto crager boiled egg. Yes, exactly,
if we actually did that one.Yeah, we had a competition.
I beat a civil engineer. Nice, very impressive. So would you say
your job changes during winter? Yeah, for sure. Anything that's external it's
(03:47):
going to take three times longer.And well it's three times to fix just
going up, shooting up to gooutside. It's it takes time. And
then you go and you're try todig ice and snow and a broken pipe
and try not to break a sweat. So can you prepare for that yourself?
I mean sort of physically? Yeah, well I keep pretty fit.
(04:08):
I mean the gym every day,wow, every day? Yeah, I'm
triadly Yeah you know this, yes, remind me you do that in Denmark?
Yeah. Well I missed the ironMan in the Heagon this year because
well because I'm here. Okay,what is an iron Man? Well,
it's you do you swim nine kilometers, then you go on the bike for
one hundred and eighty kilometers and thenyou run a marathon, just a casual
(04:30):
marathon. Yeah yeah, yeah,just a little you know, jog in
the park. But the last oneI did was in fivection I think,
and I finished in eleven hours andforty minutes, I take it from you.
That's good. That is very good, very good. Well, we
could maybe set up one here onthe base. Yeah, well they've actually
done something like that before on themachines in the gym. Really yeah,
(04:54):
I mean you you went quite madactually because people getting all these stupid the
injuries on the machines and the runningand stuff. But I've I've wintered over
so many times now I have asort of muscle memory for it, I
guess. And how do you mentallyprepare for it what you're giving me?
I'm sorry, it's my job toask. Okay, well, it's my
(05:16):
job to winter over. I've beenpaid decent money for it, fair enough,
And is that your sole motivation fordoing it? Yeah? Yeah,
I guess so. I mean peoplework to make money, right, yeah,
yeah, but some people are herefor different reasons. Yeah, that's
true. That's true. Well,the thing is, my sign is trying
to buy his own place, youknow, back in Copenhagen. Then the
(05:40):
prices of apartments have just gone wellcompletely ridiculous, and so I'm trying to
help him out with the deposit.It's very fucking expensive there, Yeah,
telling me it's very good of youto No. Yeah, yeah, I
guess, but you know, therest is up to him. It's just
a start. I'm helping you outwith so like my daughter brought a place
with a partner and I help thema little bit with that. Okay,
(06:02):
So do you think this might beyour last winter? Why you think I'm
getting to old for it? No, it's not what I meant to imply
at all. So I think itmight have been. No, I promise
you it's not. I promise.I'm joking. No, I can't see
it being my last one. No, out of curiosity. Actually, how
did you get into antarctic based work? I think you already know this,
(06:27):
But anyway, I was working inthe construction industry back in then. Mark
one of the biggest construction companies actually, but there, I mean, I
like a challenge and the big companiesthey have this kind of mindset, this
way of thinking, and not reallyfor me. I thought about doing my
own stuff, but it's just toomuch face to face with the clients,
(06:48):
and well, I hate people work. He's a big company, yeah,
but I never see them. It'sperfect. You never have your boss breathing
down your neck. That's training.But as you know it's it's mostly online
now, yeah, yeah, Iget that. So what are you most
looking forward to about your time here? Besides the paycheck? Have you have
(07:10):
you heard of Cold Blood? It'sa Nordic true crime podcast, can't say
have Oh? Yeah, it's basedon this true crime thing in Denmark.
It was a big really yeah,I mean you haven't You never heard of
it? Sorry it was so successfulback home. But anyway, but I've
got a lot of podcasts to listento. You like true crime. I
(07:30):
watched all of it, listen toall of it. Why do you think
scandy noir is a thing? Yeah? You know, I was. I
was actually thinking about that, andI don't know. It's kind of a
cliche, isn't it. But butmaybe it's the dark. You know,
bad things happen in the dark.Bad things happen in the daytime too.
Yeah, but that's your territory really, now, I get. I mean,
(07:54):
people get bad moods in the dark, don't they. Yeah, they
do. Do you think that's trueof you? I like the dark early
morning, it's a good time totrain. Yeah, yeah, you want
to try? We could spot eachother in the gym. Yeah, now,
I know you're taking the piss.If you don't want to do that,
you can join me in laying downsome puzzles. Some puzzles. Yeah,
(08:16):
yeah, jigsaw is really hard ones. You know, you complete them
and then you leave them for thenext set of people coming. Yeah,
it's really Yeah, it's very good. You know, I got this thing
where I shouldn't really tell you this, but please, it's all confidential.
I take out one piece of thejigsaw. What. Yeah, so it's
(08:37):
impossible for the next person to completeit. So you finish the puzzle and
you take a piece of the puzzleout. Yeah, I take it with
you. Yeah, bring it withme so soon as that sounds infuriating,
yeah for them, but for meit's hilarious. Well, I have to
admit, jigsaw puzzles are definitely moremy speed over triathlons and iron Man.
Okay, cool, you can joinme on that. Then. Can I
(09:01):
move us on to our questionnaires thatyou filled out? Yeah? Sure,
I do have a warm around withMark in What the time is in about
eight minutes? Okay, Well we'llbe done by then, I promise.
Yeah, we're just doing some biologicsfive minutes max. Okay, great,
So your Meyer's Briggs test. Youwere e STPA. Cool, it means
nothing to me. That's gay,So i'll give you a quick rundown of
(09:26):
it. A right if you've doneone of these before? Yeah, yeah,
sure, these big companies love thissort of thing. Yeah, but
I don't remember what it came outas. E STPA entrepreneur. Okay,
and what does that mean? Fairenough? It means resourceful, pragmatic,
nonconformist, hence the balloon and thestraw project big into social activities. Yeah,
(09:46):
I do like a drink after work. Yeah, and I have seen
that, and it's not my fault. Your life way. So entrepreneurs tend
to dismiss emotions over logic. Doyou think that's true? Yeah, I
suppose. I mean I believe there'sa solution to most problems. I can't
really see why people get so workedup or a thing that that has a
(10:07):
fix. So yeah, yeah,for sure. And are you okay to
if we just discuss some things inyour medical form? Yeah? Sure,
great. It says you're on statins. Do you have an issue with cholesterol?
No, No, it's just preventative. So you stated you take a
number of supplements. Are any ofthese prescribed. No, it's all over
(10:30):
the counter. I got creatine,beta, alanine, el carnatine. Yep.
I mean they help protein building themuscle. Okay, and if you
had any advice from a nutritionist.It's very common for triathlets to take supplements.
Of course, I wouldn't know anythingabout that. So you want to
discuss my blood work too? Howabout the pace test? May note?
(10:50):
I think we can leave your pissout of this. Really, yes,
because I am an open programs Iknow, I know. Okay, one
final question then we'll let you getIs there anything worrying you about wintering over?
Like I know, I know you'rean old pro at this, but
anything concern you at all? Well, I am getting older. That's playing
(11:13):
on my mind. But other thanthat, No, no, I like
it here in winter. You know, my favorite bit has always been you
know when you watch that last planego, that's when you know there's no
going back onwards. Indeed, yeah, Mark, you're about your hand wag
(11:33):
one. Oh sorry, don't worry. We're done. As I said,
just a little little chat. Thanksfor your time, okay, So for
you to go, yeah, absolutely, okay, thank you. Just by
the way, do you know what. The best bit of my day is
gone. It's in the evening.Yeah, and I turned my radio off.
Mark come in. Yeah, Yeah, we can take a look bit
(11:56):
of pressure about mm hmm. Abaseline interview notes with and Sorenson. And
is the second oldest person on thebase and he's easily got the most physical
job with all the supplements there workingout and his last statement it's clear that
he's worried he's not physically up toit. And I know from previous that
(12:16):
he's actually quite competitive. I wonderhow that will play out with the younger
crew, might see them as athreat, might try too hard to keep
up with him. One of thethings that came out on his Myers Briggs
test is he has a tendency toforeground effectiveness over social harmony. He'd rather
win and ruffle feathers. And thisis definitely an honorable guy though, And
(12:39):
he's doing the whole winter overthing athis age just so that he's sunk and
get on the property ladder. Asign of good values and beliefs. A
reminder to self, I need tolook up predentaive statins. Get all the
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