West Timor – Mine of Women, and the Palm-Wine Bomb I never thought to see a mine run by women. By why …
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The first of a series showing where I eat in Nanjing. May be useful to other ex pats or travelers here. I …
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Biogeography & Vegetation
Australian Grasstrees – ancient registrars of fire
by Mike Poleby Mike PoleIn Australia there are trees that look like inside-out chimneys. Strong but sensitive – a fungal attack can leave them as a …
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Palaeobotany & Palaeoclimate
Five Degrees of Global Warming – The Leaf Fossils of Kakahu, New Zealand
by Mike Poleby Mike PoleSometime in the 1980s my Prof, ‘JDC’ (Doug Campbell of the Otago University), showed me a box of spectacular leaf fossils that …
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Autobiography & Travel
Would you like a beer? – Guests of the Kalimantan Police
by Mike Poleby Mike PoleRoni is a Batak. This is a christian tribe that lives in the Lake Toba area of the otherwise Muslim Sumatra. The Bataks …
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Autobiography & Travel
Chromite and Pine Forests – the closest I’ll ever get to the Old Syria
by Mike Poleby Mike PoleOn March 21, 2011 I was sent to do a job in the far south-east of Turkey. Me and Erol, my indispensable …
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Palaeobotany & Palaeoclimate
The Giant ‘Lake Manuherikia’ – an extinct lake from the New Zealand Miocene
by Mike Poleby Mike PoleAlexandra lies at the junction of the Clutha and Manuherikia Rivers. The usual translation of the Maori word ‘Manuherikia’ is that it means …
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Archaeology, History & Culture
(Both) Battles of Breitenfeld – a day’s walk near Leipzig
by Mike Poleby Mike PoleIt is a macabre thought that in these days of GIS and databases, someone could probably come up with a map of …
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A few years ago I used to teach American classes that came to the University of Queensland. One evening my Stanford class …
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Palaeobotany & Palaeoclimate
Globalisation in the Jurassic – the fossil fern Coniopteris in New Zealand
by Mike Poleby Mike PoleOne of the plant fossils that turns up in New Zealand’s Jurassic rocks is a delicate-looking fern frond called Coniopteris (Arber, 1917; …