Friendship

Have you ever wondered how strong a friendship is?
Well for a real test try writing a book together!

Our friendship began on an inspirational basis. Gina was inspired to join the Mawson Institute for Antarctic Research after reading an article about Pene, off to spend a winter at Mawson station Antarctica. Later, Gina initiated a summer project which resulted in Pene going back to Antarctica after her first trip had been aborted. We encouraged each other and learnt from each others experiences. The scarcity of women physicists and the similar nature of our work strengthened our bond.

When thinking of writing about Antarctica, Pene realised that Gina's experiences in Alaska were a perfect counterpoint to hers at Mawson. Based on our email letters, FrostBytes went beyond atmospheric physics to the description of life in Antarctica and Alaska.

Writing FrostBytes gave us both the opportunity to think about our experiences in an objective fashion. We asked ourselves 'What were the important points and what stories did we want to tell?' The most important things were to be honest both about our emotions and what we were doing. Maybe we could provide inspiration to younger people by telling the story of how we were able to do the things we did. Could we humanise the image of scientists? Add some reality to the hero status of the Antarctic expeditioner? The bottom line was that we were willing to publish our personal letters and story, as long as we didn't sacrifice our friendship in the process.

Sharon, Gina and Cathy on a fine Alaskan day