How we cite our quotes: (Section Break.Paragraph)
Quote #4
"Anyway, we've got chickens," you said. "And when you're—" You stopped to look at me before choosing the right word. "When you're acclimatized, we can go walkabout, pick up some bush foods. And we should catch a camel, too, sometime, maybe a couple. We can keep them in the boulders, stick a fence around." (10.24)
One of Ty's goals in bringing Gemma to Australia is to initiate her into a more natural way of living—to "acclimatize" her to the wilderness and distill the city from her system. At this point, though, stuff like going "walkabout" and catching camels has to sound pretty ridiculous.
Quote #5
I stared at you. You could have been joking, or saying something to scare me. But I don't think you were. You had that faraway look in your eye, the look when your eyes went a bit misty and it seemed as if you were looking out even further than the horizon. Just at that moment, I wasn't scared of you. Right then you looked like a kind of explorer, looking out over the land, planning where to go. (13.42)
It's interesting how Ty's connection to the land makes him less frightening to Gemma. Where Gemma only sees endless sand, he seems to see life and speak a language with nature that she can't understand.
Quote #6
"This sand is the oldest in the world," you said. "Even the land I sit on now has taken billions of years to form, worn down from the mountains."
"Mountains?"
"Once there was a range near here higher than the Andes. This is ancient land, sacred, it's seen everything there is to see." (13.49-51)
Ty doesn't just see the wilderness of Australia as a cool place to spend some time—he actually seems to see it as part of his heritage. The land has evolved and eroded to the point where it is today so he can live within it.