1Right, well, for our presentation shall I start with the early life of Thor Heyerdahl?
2Sure.
3Why don't you begin with describing the type of boy he was,
4especially his passion for collecting things.
5That's right, he had his own little museum.
6And I think it's unusual for children to develop their own values and not join in their parents' hobbies;
7I'm thinking of how Heyerdahl wouldn't go hunting with his dad, for example.
8Yeah, he preferred to learn about nature by listening to his mother read to him.
9And quite early on he knew he wanted to become an explorer when he grew up.
10That came from his camping trips he went on in Norway I think...
11No, it was climbing that he spent his time on as a young man.
12Oh, right...
13After university he married a classmate
14and together, they decided to experience living on a small island,
15to find out how harsh weather conditions shaped people's lifestyles.
16As part of their preparation before they left home,
17they learnt basic survival skills like building a shelter.
18I guess they needed that knowledge in order to live wild in a remote location
19with few inhabitants, cut off by the sea,
20which is what they were aiming to do.
21An important part of your talk should be the radical theory Heyerdahl formed from examining mysterious ancient carvings
22that he happened to find on the island.
23I think you should finish with that.
24OK.
25All right, Victor, so after your part
26I'll talk about Thor Heyerdahl's adult life,
27continuing from the theory he had about Polynesian migration:
28Up until that time of course,
29academics had believed that humans first migrated to the islands in Polynesia from Asia, in the west.
30Yes, they thought that travel from the east was impossible,
31because of the huge, empty stretch of ocean that lies between the islands and the nearest inhabited land.
32Yes, but Heyerdahl spent ages studying the cloud movements, ocean currents and wind patterns to find if it was actually possible.
33And another argument was that there was no tradition of large ship-building in the communities lying to the east of Polynesia.
34But Heyerdahl knew they made lots of coastal voyages in locally built canoes.
35Yes, or sailing on rafts, as was shown by the long voyage that Heyerdahl did next.
36It was an incredibly risky journey to undertake -
37sometimes I wonder if he did that trip for private reasons, you know?
38To show others that he could have spectacular adventures.
39What do you think, Olivia?
40Well, I think it was more a matter of simply trying out his idea,
41to see if migration from the east was possible.
42Yes, that's probably it.
43And the poor guy suffered a bit at that time because the war forced him to stop his work for some years...
44Yes.
45When he got started again and planned his epic voyage,
46do you think it was important to him that he achieve it before anyone else did?
47I haven't read anywhere that that was his motivation.
48The most important factor seems to have been that he use only ancient techniques and local materials to build his raft.
49Yes.
50I wonder how fast it went.
51Well, it took them 97 days from South America to the Pacific Islands.
52And after that, Heyerdahl went to Easter Island, didn't he?
53We should mention the purpose of that trip.
54I think he sailed there in a boat made out of reeds.
55No, that was later on in Egypt, Olivia.
56Oh, yes, that's right.
57But what he wanted to do was talk to the local people about their old stone carvings
58and then make one himself to learn more about the process.
59I see.
60Well, what a great life.
61Even though many of his theories have been disproven,
62he certainly left a lasting impression on many disciplines, didn't he?
63To my mind, he was the first person to establish what modern academics call practical archaeology.
64I mean, that they try to recreate something from the past today,
65like he did with his raft trip.
66It's unfortunate that his ideas about where Polynesians originated from have been completely discredited.
67Yes.
68Right, well, I'll prepare a PowerPoint slide at the end that acknowledges our sources.
69I mainly used The Life and Work of Thor Heyerdahl by William Oliver.
70I thought the research methods he used were very sound,
71although I must say I found the overall tone somewhat old-fashioned.
72I think they need to do a new, revised edition.
73Yeah, I agree.
74What about the subject matter - I found it really challenging!
75Well, it's a complex issue...
76I thought the book had lots of good points.
77What did you think of...