  We report the discovery of the afterglow of the X-ray rich, long-duration
gamma-ray burst GRB 011211 and present evidence for oscillatory behaviour in
its early optical light curve. The time-scale of the fluctuations, ~1 hour, is
much smaller than the time of the observations, ~12 hours from the onset of the
gamma-ray burst. The character and strength of the fluctuations are
unprecedented and are inconsistent with causally connected variations in the
emission of a symmetric, relativistic blast wave, i.e. flux variations which
are produced uniformly throughout the shell surface are ruled out. Therefore,
the wiggles are the result of spherically asymmetric density or energy
variations. Additionally, there is evidence for fluctuations in the X-ray
afterglow light curve. If real, the resulting difference in the observed time
of the peaks of the short-term variations at X-ray and optical frequencies,
would demonstrate that the energy content across the jet-emitting surface is
not uniform.
