Streets of Your Town: Recent Episodes
Nance Haxton
From the Wandering Journo at Stories that Matter Studios this is The Streets of Your Town. The podcast that takes you on an audio journey through theatre of the mind highlighting a different slice of Australian life each episode.
There’s a little patch of paradise in Queensland’s south-east corner - in some ways not far away from the big city lights of Brisbane, but when you get there, you feel like you could be at the end of the earth.
The Scenic Rim spans more than four thousand kilometres with landscapes ranging from lush rainforests to rolling paddocks and serene lakes, with stunning views and an increasingly world renowned foodie scene.
This June is Scenic Rim’s Eat Local Month - and Streets of Your Town is taking you there to the cornucopia of pleasures on offer from the region’s farmers, who are increasingly teaming up with local chefs to create unique experiences from farm to plate.
Eat Local Month is a great opportunity to meet the makers - as I did at the launch of the event to whet the appetite for the 100 unique culinary experiences just an hour’s drive from Brisbane and the Gold Coast that fill June with joy - ranging from a Long Lunch under the Jacarandas to High Tea and Cocktails in the Rainforest.
So sit down with me and Executive Chef and Owner of restaurant Roastbeef and the Frog Olivier Boudon, and then Theresa Scholl from Valley Pride Produce to hear about how they are diversifying into agritourism and making meaningful connections with customers right on the farm.
For more shownotes and links - please go to my substack for this episode at soyt.substack.com
https://www.eatlocalmonth.com.au/
nancehaxton.com.au
Recently I spent a gloriously rare fine day in Glasgow for Streets of Your Town, wandering around the city’s renowned concert halls and gig venues with music journo Fiona Shepherd - who’s also the co-founder and lead guide of Glasgow Music City Tours.
She’s been taking tourists back stage around Glasgow’s renowned live scene for ten years now, sharing many stories from decades past right up to the present about the iconic performers who have come to the city to perform, or who made their big debut here.
And even though Australia is about as far away from Glasgow as you can get - she hears that rich vein of musical influence clearly - going both ways across the seas.
So come get your walking shoes on and join Fiona and I at the celebrated Glasgow live venue King Tuts Wah Wah Hut, to chat about how Glasgow became so celebrated that it became one of the first three cities in the world to be given the title of UNESCO City of Music.
For more shownotes and links - please go to my substack for this episode at soyt.substack.com
https://glasgowmusiccitytours.com/
nancehaxton.com.au
On my recent travels through the UK and Ireland for Streets of Your Town, I was amazed to find how strong the cross pollination between Australian and Indigenous music and Gaelic traditions were, and how it continues to evolve.
While I was in Glasgow, I was lucky enough to meet Graham Mackenzie from award winning instrumental folk trio Assynt. Sitting in his Glasgow living room, his fiddle sits between us, never far from his thoughts, as we chat about the band's recent Australian tour.
The band launched in 2018, and had long held aspirations to play in Australia. Even the pandemic - while delaying their plans - couldn’t hold them back for long, and last year they came to the Woodford Folk Festival to perform and do workshops. The trio also toured down the East Coast on a hectic trip for the Festival of Small Halls.
Inspired by the great piping, fiddle and Gaelic traditions of the Highlands where he grew up in Inverness, McKenzie’s self-penned melodies for Assynt have a contemporary edge while rooted in centuries-long musical traditions.
Graham tells us on Streets of Your Town how he is relieved to find their workshops and performances both in Scotland and Australia are now filled with young people embracing their fiddles and traditional Celtic instruments, and wanting to pick up tips.
One of his favourite aspects of coming to Australia was hearing First Nations performers at Woodford Folk Festival, seeing it as a rare opportunity for two age-old cultures to learn from each other.
For more shownotes - please go to my substack for this episode at soyt.substack.com
For this episode of Streets of Your Town, wander with me Nance Haxton to County Kerry on Ireland's west coast, to discover how close Australian and Irish cultural traditions are beyond the musical sphere.
Tim Hanafin has lived in Kerry all of his 85 years, in a tiny village called Inch. The town is still known by many as the location where the epic Oscar-winning movie Ryan’s Daughter was filmed, putting County Kerry on the tourist trail in the 1970s.
Tim is known throughout the Dingle Peninsula as the man who recites poetry from a deep well of decades of learning, with a poem appropriate for every event, whether it be wedding, funeral or spontaneous celebration.
When I speak to him in front of a cosy fire at Foley’s Bar overlooking the miles of sand dunes constantly evolving on Inch Beach, it doesn’t take long for the Australian influence on this far-flung county to appear from his extensive back catalogue of poetry.
Tim tells us how he thinks the affinity the Irish have with Australians goes back to the days of British rule, and continues to be expressed to this day.
and for more shownotes please go to my substack for this episode at soyt.substack.com
It’s not often that we get to watch a musical star on the rise. A performer whose passion and talent has enabled them to rise from tentative beginnings to starring in one of the world’s most beloved musicals.
Here on Streets of Your Town, we’ve been lucky enough to watch Vidya Makan’s singing and writing prowess be recognised over a few short years.
We first met her in the pivotal role of Catherine Parr in the juggernaut Australian production of Six, then as the creator, writer and performer in her musical The Lucky Country at Hayes Theatre in Sydney, and now we catch up with her again in one of the most competitive and sought after roles around the world - as Eliza Hamilton in Hamilton.
And for those who can’t get to Sydney for this run, make sure you watch ABC TV on December 20 at 730pm or the digital broadcast on Iview, to see Vidya’s part in A Very Musical Christmas, recorded in Sydney and with all proceeds going to mental health charity Beyond Blue.
Her greatest joy is watching her fellow performers shine. Sit back and enjoy our chat on Streets of Your Town, with Vidya Makan.
and for more shownotes please go to my substack for this episode at https://soyt.substack.com/p/makan-creamer-mcgrady
If you thought that a play about post-apocolyptic zombies couldn’t be compatible with meaningful and hilarious social commentary and analysis of colonial occupation, then you haven’t heard of the radical new production Eat, Slay Zombie.
Emerging First Nations playwright Alinta McGrady tells us on this episode of Streets of Your Town how she took her idea born in covid lockdown and created this fast-paced action packed show that is about to open in one of Brisbane’s most prestigious theatres.
This is just the start for this talented Aboriginal woman who has been storytelling in various forms her entire life.
Eat Slay Zombie shines a spotlight on modern Blak and queer experiences through a horror/comedy lens, with a fresh take on the hero narrative that places historically marginalised characters at the forefront of a dangerous world.
Will our Blak women heroes survive this nightmare, and navigate a world that is actively trying to kill them?
Let’s sit down for a chat with Alina to get some insight into her creative process….
and for more shownotes on Alinta please go to my substack on this episode at https://soyt.substack.com/p/makan-creamer-mcgrady
On this episode of Streets of Your Town, we feature someone I’ve wanted you to meet on this podcast for years. I’ve written about him for national media outlets such as The New Daily and National Indigenous Radio Service, about his achievements acting as a Barrister on some of the most challenging human rights class actions across Australia.
Joshua Creamer is a proud Waanyi and Kalkadoon man, who still sees himself as the boy from Mt Isa. But his role now is Chair of the Truth-telling and Healing Inquiry in Queensland - which has been gathering the history of the state since July 1 this year.
He tells us how significant this Inquiry is for Queensland and Australia, and what a privilege it is for him to lead this once in a generation investigation to give Indigenous people a voice in Queensland’s history.
and for more show notes on Joshua please go to my shownotes at https://soyt.substack.com/p/makan-creamer-mcgrady
Just before I head overseas to the land of my ancestors in Scotland and Ireland, I was lucky enough to stumble into an Irish music session in Brisbane.
The Irish accents flew thick and fast, to the accompaniment of the bodran, Eilean pipes, tin whistle and fiddle.
Jack O’Leary is one of the musicians who makes this weekly quest to reconnect with his homeland.
He tells us on Streets of Your Town, how Irish music and Australian culture have intertwined, to the degree that you can find a similar Irish music session, at most cities and towns throughout Australia.
Contact Streets of Your Town host Nance Haxton AKA The Wandering Journo and find socials links HERE
Get the full story, and join The Wandering Journo tribe at substack.soyt.com
See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.
It’s not often we get an Australian jazz singer legend on Streets of Your Town, but we are lucky enough to enjoy that on today’s episode.
Vince Jones is well known not only in this country but throughout the world as one of Australia’s most renowned jazz musicians.
He tells us how the love of his craft started young, in the lively jazz surrounds of Scotland.
And after half a century of performing, and a lifetime of loving music, Vince is gladly still on the road, performing and creating his distinctly Australian take on jazz music.
Contact Streets of Your Town host Nance Haxton AKA The Wandering Journo and find socials links HERE
Get the full story, and join The Wandering Journo tribe at substack.soyt.com
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For Paralympian athlete Gerrard Gosens, taking on the challenge of swimming across the English Channel is more than just a physical one.
It’s also mental, as the blind swimmer confronts the elements and conditions of the day and then figures out how to overcome them.
Gerrard tells us on Streets of Your Town podcast how he is well into an intense training regimen preparing for his attempted channel crossing in August - swimming from the UK to France in his quest to become the first blind person to do so.
It’s a big leap from his previous sport of running - having represented Australia in long distance running in three Paralympic Games and three IPC World Athletic Championships from 1996 to 2011, as well as the Paratriathlon at Tokyo 2022.
Contact Streets of Your Town host Nance Haxton AKA The Wandering Journo and find socials links HERE
Get the full story, and join The Wandering Journo tribe at substack.soyt.com
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Some people when they visit Australia, simply can’t stop themselves from coming back time and time again.
So it is for Irish performer Ciaran Olohan, who is bringing his show The World of Musicals in Concert back to Australia for the fourth time.
And he’s not just taking it on the well worn route to the capital cities, Ciaran and his crew are doing the big lap of Australia, taking their show that has graced stages across the globe to some of Australia’s most off the beaten track locations as well.
Ciaran tells us on Streets of Your Town, how music has always been a part of his life from his childhood in County Wicklow to today with a career taking him to the US, Canada, Germany, Norway, Spain and China. And he ponders how much Irish music and Australian musical traditions have in common.
Contact Streets of Your Town host Nance Haxton AKA The Wandering Journo and find socials links HERE
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In this episode of Streets of Your Town Elise McCann gives us insights into her creative process, particularly of late in the musical adaptation of Groundhog Day which had a season in Melbourne.
Elise admits that despite her success as a musicals performer, like anyone, there are days that get the better of her, and that’s how she decided to create the stress and motivation app Hey Lemonade.
Together with her fellow performer friend Lucy Durack they hope to turn around people’s woes with the Hey Lemonade app that they designed and built.
As Elise explains, the app offers three-minute talks on various topics, written by a team of writers and psychologists, and delivered by a diverse range of well known voices from the entertainment industry. A bit like a portable pick me up in your pocket.
Contact Streets of Your Town host Nance Haxton AKA The Wandering Journo and find socials links HERE
Get the full story, and join The Wandering Journo tribe at substack.soyt.com
See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.
Broken Hill-born country singer-songwriter Raechel Whitchurch spent most of her childhood travelling in her family's country music band, before establishing herself as one of Aussie music’s most recognisable country artists.
But her path to songwriting was far from guaranteed. In fact, it wasn't until her family saw Kasey Chambers’ family group The Dead Ringer Band perform in Broken Hill that country music became a family career. Her Dad thought it would be a great way to make a living, so they all became self-taught musicians.
After several local talent quests, the Lee family packed their lives into a caravan and hit the road on two laps of Australia and a six-month stint in Arnhem Land performing in their travelling country family band, The Lees. Raechel, the eldest, was aged only 12, but it’s a lifestyle she has taken on as her own into adulthood with her husband Ben and three children on the road as well.
And as Raechel tells us on Streets of Your Town, her songs don’t flinch from telling the hardships as well as the fun times of life in rural and remote Australia.
Contact Nance AKA The Wandering Journo and find socials links HERE
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New Meanjin/Brisbane band Yirinda is widening the scope of Indigenous music with a unique take blending Aboriginal language and songs with classical genres.
Yirinda combines ancient Aboriginal language performed by Butchulla songman Fred Leone with dramatic soundscapes from Samuel Pankhurst, accompanied by a string quartet, to invoke thousands of generations of story and culture through music.
The band has just released its debut album on vinyl, CD and digital following on from their performance debut at last year’s Brisbane Festival, before going on to play at the Woodford Folk Festival over New Years.
Fred and Samuel tell Streets of Your Town about their unique evocative sound evolved, and their excitement taking Yirinda on the road with a tour up Australia’s east coast, finishing in Cairns on May 31.
Contact Nance AKA The Wandering Journo and find socials links HERE
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There’s only two people who have made it onto Streets of Your Town podcast more than once. And journo and author extraordinaire Trent Dalton is one of them.
With the Netflix series adaptation of his first breakthrough novel Boy Swallows Universe now number one in Australia and top ten in the US, it’s time to revisit this Brisbane born and bred talent, whose gritty but hopeful representations of the wrong side of town in his novels have thrust beloved Brissie icons such as the Story Bridge onto the worldwide map.
He knows this underworld because he grew up in it, and Trent tells us on Streets of Your Town how he never could have envisioned as a young child how a story he wrote could one day make it onto screens around the country and around the globe.
Contact Nance AKA The Wandering Journo and find socials links HERE
Get the full story, and join The Wandering Journo tribe at substack.soyt.com
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Well happiest of New Years to you all, my dedicated Streets of Your Towners!
With all the agitation and conflict in the world at the moment—I thought what we need on Streets of Your Town to start this year is whimsy. Something to make us smile and stir a sense of childlike awe in us again.
And so off I meandered in Mildred the Cantankerous Kombi to the Woodford Folk Festival. It’s on every year in the foothills of Queensland’s Sunshine Coast hinterland, helping hippies and hippies at heart to spread harmony and see in the New Year with three minutes of silent contemplation.
The festival attracts more than 130,000 people to the pop-up town of Woodfordia on the site of a former dairy farm, making it the largest gathering of artists and musicians in Australia.
Amidst this glorious muddy throng of people and throbbing music is a contemplative corner of Woodfordia called the Lettering House.
It’s where festival goers can go back to times gone by, and connect to their fellow Woodfordians the old fashioned, non-digital way—by writing a letter or typing it on an old fashioned typewriter.
A team of Woodfordian Posties search out the identify of each letter recipient, often based on the vaguest of addresses and identifies, who then get on their bikes to find them and deliver the letter by hand, or notify the recipient by text that they have a letter to pick up from the Lettering House.
So sit back and let’s ponder the magic of the Lettering House through the words of Postal Clerk Aaron Smith, a volunteer who comes up from Tasmania every year to help spread his bit of Lettering House joy and wonder through the festival.
“So this is the place where we’ve rejected emails and embraced slow communication,” Aaron says. “It’s like slow food, but a far better feeling.
“We’ve got four different ways that anyone at Woodfordia can mail a letter inside the festival. It’s completely free, paid for by just the magic of Woodfordia. So we have tonnes of unique stationary self-addressed envelopes from Woodfordia, and you can write a letter to really anyone in the festival if you know who they are, their name, and their number. And then we simply let them know they’ve got mail and they can come and collect it at any day in the festival, 9am to 9pm.”
When I was in the Lettering House on the last day of the six-day festival, it was absolutely packed. All the typewriters were being used, and tables were crowded with people jostling to use pens and paper and write their missives.
Aaron says that’s not unusual, and part of their job is actually teaching many people how to write and address a letter, as that skill is being lost with electronic communications like email.
“You’ve got people that come in here that have been writing letters from home to family that may not be in Australia every year and they know exactly what they want to do and they’re doing it from Woodfordia for that once a year,” he says.
"We’ve got people that have never written a letter before and have swapped them around and started writing the address at the back because that’s just not what they’re used to.
“One of the amazing things is we have some typewriters, and I tell you what, if they’re five or if they’re 42, you put someone in front of a typewriter and they always start with D-E-A-R, ‘Dear’, it’s an instant reaction we seem to have to that connection.”
When I met Aaron he had proudly just united one of the letters with Tim—which can be challenging because, as he says, “there are quite a few Tims. We like the unique names.”
The Lettering House postal service is free and has been a tradition at the festival for years. They also offer a pen pal exchange, where festival-goers can write letters of advice or welcome messages for others to take.
“We deliver directly to performers, volunteers, or stores where we know directly where they’re going to be. And there’s a letter exchange wall, which is kind of like pen pals of Woodfordia. It’s going off and it’s encouraging people to take that away with them. We’ve got some people that have responded probably six to eight times with a pen pal over the festival.
“You can write anything. So some of it’s just letters of advice. We’ve got a lot of ones just that say, ‘welcome to 2024’, and you can grab that if you really want to.
“We have Woodford Tinder going on at the moment on one of the forms there. There’s a few that definitely get quite a bit of fan mail.
“It’s amazing how certain baristas are definitely popular for fan mail. And I think the lifeguards have also been getting a lot of shout outs and when it’s 39 degrees, and there’s a lifeguard in the middle of the lake…well, we love delivering to that guy. Because it means we have to swim to him.
“We’ve got the Youth Wall there, which is a lot of bad dad jokes being passed around.
“But on that last day, we say don’t be afraid to take a letter with you. Letters are kind of like books. If they sit on a shelf, the magic is not always there. So we really want them to kind of spread out and grow those little letter-y wings and fly away.”
Aaron likes to think that while the Lettering House has it’s own bit of Woodfordia magic, hopefully people continue reconnecting with the fun of letter writing when they return home as well.
“I think it’s that pen and paper. People forget part of the magic of letters that I find is—they're not instant. It’s in the past, but it is also still the future, but it’s not the present—a letter. And that’s really valuable in a Woodford festival when you get every emotion in Woodford, we joke among some of the Lettering House Posties, if you haven’t cried and laughed out loud in a single shift, it wasn’t the post office.
“And I feel you can have that in a letter, which is very different to our modern, instant communication methods where we expect that person to have that instant emotion with us. Instead, we have this beautiful reflection and repeat, where I think today we forget to enjoy the past and try too much maybe the moment."
Talk to you soon my Wandering Journo tribe—I have another great podcast coming to your inboxes soon from Woodfordia—an incredibly innovative band called Yirinda that could be touring near you this year! Don’t miss them if they do!
Nance
Get full access to Streets of Your Town: The Journo Project at soyt.substack.com/subscribe
You can’t be what you can’t see. It’s a saying that prompted a former AFL player to create a children’s band, so that his kids could be exposed to more than the bland musical world they were offered.
Nick Gill is the founder of children’s band The Quokkas, which he started in 2020 with a mission to show children a modern and inclusive Australia through song.
State Library of Queensland acquires my podcast!
How thrilled am I! My little indie podcast Streets of Your Town has become the first podcast purchased by the State Library of Queensland! While the library has made in-house podcasts, this is the first time it’s bought one already in existence into its digital collection. 70 episodes in all from about 105 in existence will now be held at the library for generations to come to enjoy!
Get full access to Streets of Your Town: The Journo Project at soyt.substack.com/subscribe
I’ve just returned from one of the most exciting secondments of my now three decade journalism career—to the Cathedral of Sport the great MCG, where I was part of the National Indigenous Radio Service (NIRS) team covering the 2023 AFL grand final between Collingwood and the Brisbane Lions.
Get full access to Streets of Your Town: The Journo Project at soyt.substack.com/subscribe
My amazing Wandering Journo Tribe!
We made it! Can you believe it Streets of Your Towners—this is it—the 100th episode of the little indie podcast that could.
Thanks for making this milestone with me—and here’s to many more episodes of Streets of Your Town. Thanks so much for your support—could do this without you!
xx Nance
Get full access to Streets of Your Town: The Journo Project at soyt.substack.com/subscribe
We made it Streets of Your Towners - the 100th episode of the Streets of Your Town podcast!!!
This episode we return to the man who so kindly kicked off this crazy Streets of Your Town adventure!
The man whose storytelling is equally masterful with words or with the palette knife - who is bookending this series by featuring in episode 1 and 100.
This internationally renowned artist - harking from a family of journo’s - generously started this podcast series by telling his story - from his idyllic country childhood to rebellious teen, and on to becoming Deputy Mayor of Brisbane, before rediscovering his creative talent anew.
Today we re-visit David Hinchliffe in his inner Brisbane city Fortitude Valley home - to find out what’s changed for him on the street where he lives, what’s different post pandemic, and what has remained the same or even more important than before. The same themes that all of us have pondered, as we reflect on our how our lives have changed too.
See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.
Today on Streets of Your Town we’re revisiting Vidya Makan, who you may remember meeting on this podcast in December 2022 when we featured her as one of the talented performers in the smash hit touring musical Six.
The show broke all attendance records at the Queensland Performing Arts Centre during its 2022 season.
But this Somerville House and Queensland Conservatorium graduate has not left her run there, and has now debuted her own musical written in collaboration with Sonya Suares, at Sydney’s Hayes Theatre, again to rave reviews.
The Sydney Morning Herald described Vidya as “a gifted storyteller”, and her show The Lucky Country as “remarkable” - where “national myth-making gets a well overdue shake-up”.
We go backstage at the Hayes Theatre on Streets of Your Town to speak to Vidya after yet another standing ovation for The Lucky Country, and find out how this acclaimed Brisbane actor, singer and composer/lyricist came to realise a dream that she could be seen for who she truly is on stage.
See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.
Today we’re revisiting Vidya Makan, who you may remember from her episode in December last year when she was one of the performers in the smash hit touring musical Six.
Get full access to Streets of Your Town: The Journo Project at soyt.substack.com/subscribe
From a shy kid on the fringes to years later bringing together an eclectic group of musicians in an orchestra bearing his name, Matt Hsu has found the power of music and passed that joy onto dozens of others.
The Matt Hsu Obscure Orchestra has quickly established a following as one of Australia’s most respected ensembles, bringing together a diverse band of BIPOC, First Nations, disabled, non-binary queer and trans artists at the intersection of art and activism.
Streets of Your Town takes you behind the scenes to one of the orchestra’s recent musical imaginings at the Museum of Brisbane, bringing the exhibits to life with a roving performance.
The 22-piece ensemble challenges many of the assumptions around traditional orchestras, replacing pomposity with dancing the night away to a range of world instruments made out of found objects.
And as the award-winning Taiwanese-Australian composer and multi-instrumentalist Matt Hsu tells us on Streets of Your Town, his otherworldly and joyful compositions aim to celebrate difference, promote inclusivity and bring together cultures.
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This week’s Streets of Your Town takes you into the world of fast and slow fashion, and what we can all do to lessen the burden of clothes waste on the world.
Have you ever looked down at what you’re wearing, or into your wardrobe, and wondered where those materials came from?
Who made your outfit, and at what cost to them compared to the cost you paid for it?
Or pondered what the true cost of that bargain t-shirt is when fast fashion wastage is taken into account?
These questions are what drive sustainability consultant Jane Milburn on her quest to get as many people as possible thinking about the way they dress, and how to make better choices to become independent of fast fashion.
She tells us on Streets of Your Town how low cost unethical clothes are creating pollution and contributing to modern day slavery, and how her recent travels for her Churchill Fellowship meeting 55 slow fashion practitioners from around the world has given her tips on how we can all play our part to reduce the burden of clothing waste on the world.
See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.
This week’s Streets of Your Town takes you into the world of fast and slow fashion, and what we can all do to lessen the burden of clothes waste on the world.
Have you ever looked down at what you’re wearing, or into your wardrobe, and wondered where those materials came from? Who made your outfit, and at what cost to them compared to the cost you paid for it?
Or pondered what the true cost of that bargain t-shirt is when fast fashion wastage is taken into account?
These questions are what drive sustainability consultant Jane Milburn on her quest to get as many people as possible thinking about the way they dress, and how to make better choices to become independent of fast fashion.
She tells us on Streets of Your Town how low cost unethical clothes are creating waste and pollution and contributing to modern day slavery.
Get full access to Streets of Your Town: The Journo Project at soyt.substack.com/subscribe
You never know who I am going to meet on my travels in Mildred the cantankerous kombi. In this episode of Streets of Your Town, we enter the creative wonderland of artist, teacher and jack of all trades Angus MacDiarmid.
He lives in a converted church in the little town of Boonah in Queensland’s Scenic Rim.
Despite its close proximity to the bustling cities of Brisbane and the Gold Coast, much of the Scenic Rim remains untouched.
So if you are lucky enough to go for a road trip through this magical area, make sure you keep an eye out for Angus, and if you’re lucky, he may even paint your portrait.
On this day in Boonah, I was lucky enough to cross paths with Angus at his home - a beautiful old restored church in the middle of town, that he shares with his partner Jenny.
He happily tells us how he and Jenny came to settle in this quiet corner of The Scenic Rim, and create their perfect colourful creative home to pursue their lifelong love of art.
Get the full story, and join The Wandering Journo tribe at substack.soyt.com
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Performing in the national spotlight is far from a passing phase for Julian Kuo - whose dedication to his craft since a young age has been rewarded with a prized place in the Australian cast of Hamilton.
The multi-award winning musical by Lin-Manuel Miranda is winding up it’s Australian run with the Brisbane season ending on April 23.
Before the show continues on its worldwide run, Julian reflects with us on Streets of Your Town, what it’s like to be part of a musical held in such esteem, that many of these Hamil-fans know more about the show’s intricacies than the cast.
Such is the dedication of fans to the show that they have become something of a tribe - known universally as the Hamil-fam or Hamilfans.
One of the many great quirks of the show is that it relies heavily on rap as well as sung lyrics to tell the story of Alexander Hamilton - one of America’s founding fathers. It also features a diverse cast from a range of cultural backgrounds.
Such is the dedication of fans to the show that they have become something of a tribe - known universally as the Hamil-fam or Hamilfans.
Julian has arguably one of the most difficult roles in the cast, as swing.
As well as learning half a dozen parts in his role as a swing, he is also the cast representative for the worldwide Hamilton social justice initiatives Ham4Progress and the Racial Justice Taskforce - which he tells us is one of his most passionate projects as it fits so well with his sense of social justice.
And as Julian explains, being such a pivotal part of giving back to the communities that both inspired Hamilton and supported its success, has been one of his greatest rewards.
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It’s rare that a musician makes such a mark with her first EP that Rolling Stone US magazine raves and international world music festivals beckon for you to play.
But that’s exactly what has happened for Brisbane born and Melbourne based artist Tiana Khasi, whose eloquent and distinctive music will grace the WOMADelaide stage this weekend.
Her debut EP, Meghalaya – titled for Meghalaya, India, the land of the Khasi tribe whose name she proudly bears – is a testament to the power of her storytelling and ability to weave themes of family, self-empowerment and identity into the contemporary vernacular of Australian music.
And as she tells us on Streets of Your Town, Tiana credits finding her voice at such a young age to her life’s journey honouring her Samoan and Indian heritage.
This combination of influences makes for a unique sound that was further honed from expert teaching at Brisbane’s Conservatorium. By exploring and integrating her past, Tiana creates a new take on soulful r and b that sets her apart.
Get the full story, and join The Wandering Journo tribe at substack.soyt.com
See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.
It’s rare that a musician makes such a mark with her first EP that Rolling Stone US magazine raves and international world music festivals beckon you to play.
But that’s exactly what has happened to Brisbane-born and Melbourne-based artist Tiana Khasi, whose distinctive and captivating music will grace the WOMADelaide stage this weekend.
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There’s not many awards he hasn’t won for his groundbreaking musical theatre work, and now Lin-Manuel Miranda has shown he keeps his promises too.
The Tony, Grammy, Emmy, Olivier and Pulitzer Prize winning creatorcame to Brisbane this weekend, to watch the Australian company perform Hamilton - his worldwide musical juggernaut that combines jazz, hip hop, R&B and Broadway musical styles to tell the story of American founding father Alexander Hamilton.
He also made a visit to the Brisbane Ludo studios where they make Bluey for a guest appearance on the Australian children’s show phenomena, and gave a press conference for selected media while in town.
For the first time on Streets of Your Town, I will play the entire 20 minute press conference with Lin-Manuel Miranda, because it’s so unusual to have this sort of access to someone who is essentially musical theatre royalty with a worldwide following.
To say I was excited when I got the press conference invitation with a day’s notice is an understatement. I was not throwing away my shot on this one.
Lin-Manuel Miranda was delightfully frank giving insights into why he came to Australia now, and breaking down his song-writing process.
While COVID threw his initial plans to visit the Australian cast into chaos, even forcing their auditions for Hamilton onto zoom, he said he could not walk away from his commitment to meet the cast and see the show as soon as he could.
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The Tony, Grammy, Emmy, Olivier and Pulitzer Prize winning creator came to Brisbane this weekend, to watch the Australian company perform Hamilton—his worldwide musical juggernaut that combines jazz, hip hop, R&B and Broadway musical styles to tell the story of American founding father Alexander Hamilton.
Get full access to Streets of Your Town: The Journo Project at soyt.substack.com/subscribe
The long awaited bio-pic paying tribute to the incredible feats of Jessica Watson has finally been realised, highlighting the struggles she overcame to become the youngest person to sail solo and unassisted around the world.
The movie True Spirit was mostly filmed in south-east Queensland, with Jessica Watson’s courageous feats navigating some of the world’s most challenging stretches of ocean now tapping into a worldwide audience through Netflix.
Speaking to me by Zoom, Jessica Watson tells us on Streets of Your Town how the movie has taken many years of development with director Sarah Spillane and working closely with the star Teagan Croft, but she’s thrilled with the final results.
Watson says she hopes now more than a decade after her amazing feat, that if another young woman wanted to do something like this, she wouldn’t have to face the same obstacles she did.
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This episode of Streets of Your Town comes to you (again!) from the streets of the Woodford Folk Festival, where the sublime singing of Punjabi Australian singer and dancer Parvyn Kaur Singh drew me into her orbit.
As it turns out Parvyn had just completed a cross country adventure from her South Australian home, bringing all her family up in her Subaru wagon so she could perform at the Festival. She brought her new solo expression to Woodford audiences for the first time, synthesising a lifetime of dance and song into into her debut record ‘Sa’.
Her eclectic influences range from electronica and jazz to her background in Sikh devotional music and her training in Indian classical music and dance.
But while Parvyn was one of the farthest flung artists performing at this year’s festival, she’s actually also one of the longest participating - having come to the Woodford Folk Festival since she was a child. As Parvyn says - she’s been coming to Woodford before it was known as Woodford.
And as she tells us on Streets of Your Town, Parvyn feels grateful to be giving back to the Woodford Folk Festival post pandemic, just as her solo career is taking off, having been featured in Rolling Stone India.
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This episode of Streets of Your Town comes to you (again!) from the streets of the Woodford Folk Festival, where the sublime singing of Punjabi Australian singer and dancer Parvyn Kaur Singh drew me into her orbit.
Get full access to Streets of Your Town: The Journo Project at soyt.substack.com/subscribe
With the mega-hit musical Hamilton officially opening its Brisbane season this week, this episode of Streets of Your Town podcast is highlighting one of Australia’s brightest new musical theatre talents.
I was lucky enough to speak to Callan Purcell—the man taking on one of the most renowned roles in musical theatre—Aaron Burr—in the Australian production of the worldwide phenomenon that is Hamilton.
Aaron Burr is Hamilton’s nemesis in the show, and this young Indigenous performer is rising confidently to the challenge of fleshing out this pivotal character.
Even though Purcell has performed the lead role of Alexander Hamilton in the Sydney run when he was acting as understudy for Jason Arrow, he’s excited about the opportunity to make the character of Aaron Burr his own in the Brisbane leg.
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This episode of Streets of Your Town comes to you from the streets of the renowned Woodford Folk Festival, an annual gathering in the week leading up to New Years Day that transforms this peaceful rural idyll into a thriving community of more than 130,000 people, larger than the nearest Sunshine Coast town of Nambour.
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This episode of Streets of Your Town comes to you from the streets of the renowned Woodford Folk Festival, an annual gathering in the week leading up to New Years Day that transforms this peaceful rural idyll into a thriving community of more than 130 thousand people, larger than the nearest Sunshine Coast town of Nambour. As I wandered through the many stages on this land now known as Woodfordia, which was purchased almost 30 years ago to give the festival a secure and ongoing home, there was one band that stood out and beckoned me into the Pineapple Lounge. They are The Moving Stills.
And as The Moving Stills vocalist and guitarist Tom Mahler tells us on Streets of Your Town, their dedication to getting to their next gig from their Central Coast base knows no bounds - hitting the road through 2023 as part of their Volcano tour as well as promoting their new album coming out in August.
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Performing in Six the Musical’s Australian tour is the culmination of a lifelong journey for Queensland Conservatorium graduate Vidya Makan, and the realisation of a dream that she could be accepted for her true self on stage.
The critically acclaimed Brisbane actor, singer and composer/lyricist has forged her way quickly into the ultra competitive world of musical theatre not only as a performer, but also as a writer, winning awards for two musicals of her own creation now in development, one of which is slated to debut in Sydney’s Hayes Theatre in May next year. She stars as Catherine Parr in Six the Musical, and as she tells us on Streets of Your Town, it’s a show close to her heart.
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Watch and listen to Vidya Makan's song I Need You To See Me which she mentions in this interview, on Youtube at: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=99WPIneNxG0
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In this week’s Streets of Your Town podcast I speak to an Australian treasure.
The thrill of performing has never left Marcia Hines, not since she started singing in her church choir as a child in Boston more than 60 years ago.
She first moved to Australia from Boston to Sydney at just 16 years old, to star in the Australian production of Hair. Since then, she’s become one of Australia’s most beloved musical treasures, with a career spanning more than five decades, 22 albums, and countless chart topping singles and multi-platinum records globally.
In fact her need to connect with live audiences, has only grown stronger after the limitations of the pandemic.
"To be honest, Nance, it's just good for the business to be getting back on its feet, my business, my industry,” she says.
“It feels like we're coming home. And after what we've all gone through in the last few years, I'll have to say now, we need some joy, and that's what performers really like bringing to the table, joy.”
Marcia is an inspiration to women and Australians everywhere, constantly reinventing herself and setting industry benchmarks.
And as she tells us on Streets of Your Town, her urge to perform on stage is rebuilding anew as she starts the national tour of her latest show Velvet Rewired, which kicks off its run at a the Wynnum Fringe this week.
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Sometimes you meet someone whose dedication to their craft is so meticulous and thorough, you just have to find out what drives their passion.
So it was with international award winning photographer Erick Regnard. He and his twin brother Ian have travelled the world doing high-end art and advertising photography.
They heard about the wonders of underwater photography in Niue, a tiny island off Tonga, with water so clear it was like being suspended in space.
And so they designed their underwater polaroid camera and housing, and after many months of planning took off on their adventure. In a true twist of fate they went searching for whales but instead came back with astounding underwater photos featuring a female model that make you question the laws of physics.
These photos have won awards from all around the world, and are now on display in a special exhibition called Floating Bits, in Brisbane’s Maud Street Photo Gallery.
Erick tells us in this episode of Streets of Your Town, what keeps driving his creative quest, after decades of taking astounding photos all around the world.
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Sometimes you meet someone whose dedication to their craft is so meticulous and thorough, you just have to find out what drives their passion.
So it was with international award winning photographer Erick Regnard. He and his twin brother Ian have travelled the world doing high-end art and advertising photography, shooting for more than 25 magazines worldwide such as The Wall Street Journal and Harpers Bazaar.
One of their previous exhibitions which toured the world was called ‘On Unfavourable Days’, featuring portraits of surfers and celebrities such as Helena Christensen, Richard Branson, Jack Johnson, Henri Salvador and the Buena Vista Social Club. It went from Perth to Sydney, Hong Kong, Paris, New York and Mauritius, where they were born. Their work is internationally renowned and Brisbane is now lucky enough to be Erick’s new home.
They heard about the wonders of underwater photography in Niue, a tiny island off Tonga, with water so clear it was like being suspended in space.
And so Ian and Erick designed an experimental camera format that had never before been used underwater, and after many months of planning took off on their adventure. The unique underwater format they pioneered has since featured in National Geographic.
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This episode of Streets of Your Town is a story of hope and reconciliation, through science.
The people of the Torres Strait Islands in far north Queensland have known for thousands upon thousand of years how their people have journeyed far across the Coral Sea, and now - finally - that First Nations knowledge is being more widely recognised.
The Queensland Museum exhibition Connections Across the Coral Sea: A Story of Movement, brings together First Nations knowledge with archaeological research, showcasing for the first time a part of Queensland history that has not been previously acknowledged.
It shows how extensive international trade and relationships between ancient seafaring cultures of southern New Guinea, Torres Strait and the northeast coast of Queensland went back thousands of years, much further than science traditionally gave credence to.
I was lucky enough to interview a traditional owner whose expertise was pivotal in bringing this exhibition together, Dingaal spokesman Kenneth McLean, who explains how significant it is to have their extensive history given the platform it deserves.
I also spoke to one of the key archaeologists involved in this research, Professor of Indigenous Archaeology Ian McNiven from Monash University.
He says this exhibition is a pivotal development in science finally recognising the oral history of this region that has been handed down through hundreds of generations, giving it the scientific respect it has long deserved.
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This episode of Streets of Your Town is a story of hope and reconciliation through science.
The Dingaal and Ngurrumungu people of Far North Queensland have known for thousands upon thousands of years how their people have journeyed far across the Coral Sea, and now finally, that First Nation’s knowledge is being more widely recognised.
The Queensland Museum exhibition, Connections across the Coral Sea—A Story of Movement, brings together First Nation's knowledge with archaeological research, showcasing for the first time a part of Queensland history that has not been previously acknowledged.
It shows how extensive international trade and relationships between ancient seafaring cultures of Southern New Guinea, Torres Strait and the north-east coast of Queensland went back thousands of years, much further than science traditionally gave credence to.
I spoke to Jiigurru Traditional Owner and Dingaal spokesman, Kenneth McLean, whose expertise was pivotal in bringing this exhibition together.
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It’s not often you talk to someone whose love for what they do is so infectious that it draws you into their world and makes you want to be part of it.
That was how I felt after speaking with Maestro Umberto Clerici - the world renowned cellist with a vision to take the music of the Queensland Symphony Orchestra to the world stage.
As he tells us on this episode of Streets of Your Town, he defied the traditional route of how to become a conductor by being appointed the QSO’s Chief conductor designate, starting his three year term in January 2023.
Maestro Clerici’s approach as conductor is unique, not only rising from the orchestra to conductor in a highly unusual progression, but also as he describes, taking on his conductor role like an architect - giving the vision, but making the orchestra more independent.
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Rising from impoverished beginnings in communist China, to international ballet dancer and author of best selling autobiography Mao’s Last Dancer, Li Cunxin has lived an enormous life on stages around the world. But as he tells us on this episode of Streets of Your Town, he is still full of gratitude for the opportunities he’s been able to embrace, particularly his present role as Artistic Director of Queensland Ballet, a tenure which has just been extended. Mao’s Last Dancer became an international best seller and movie, but Cunxin says the role which he is most proud of, is leading Queensland Ballet and its dancers. To celebrate his tenth year at the helm, he has personally curated a triple bill of his favourite works the company has performed. And in a wonderful confluence of historic events for his beloved Queensland company, he is also about to open its new home, fulfilling a transformation he envisioned from when he first began.
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Nearly two decades on from her meteoric rise to fame with her surprise Australian Idol win at just 16 years of age, Casey Donovan is enjoying a renaissance in her musical career. She’s on a national tour around Australia starring as Judy Bernly in the musical production of 9 to 5, attracting many accolades, with spontaneous standing ovations after her showstopper solo Get Out and Stay Out. And she won’t stay still once that tour’s done, going back on the road in September with a series of live and intimate shows in her solo tour dubbed BluesDay - featuring her favourite bluesy tracks. On Streets of Your Town Casey tells us how thrilled she is to be back on stage after the pandemic years, and how she can feel the excited energy from the audience from being together again as well. What I love about making audio stories like this, is you can hear the joy and the energy in their voice. I defy anyone to hear Casey’s giggle, and not get a smile on their face.
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Reviving Indigenous languages through song is the driving force for Rochelle Pitt-Watson’s music.
Her Quandamooka and Meriam heritage underlie all of her songs, and she hopes that performing them brings some relief from the stresses of these post-covid times.
Rochelle is one of the First Nations artists taking centre stage at the Queensland Performing Arts Centre in May for Clancestry—A Celebration of Country.
She tells us on Streets of Your Town about the significance of being part of a festival that showcases and celebrates First Nations artists, on land that for thousands of years has been a meeting and cultural place for Indigenous people of this land next to the Brisbane River, or Maiwar.
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This week on Streets of Your Town, we speak to renowned author and proud Wiradjuri woman Dr Anita Heiss, who is a special guest of the 60th Brisbane Writers Festival coming up in May.
It's a pivotal year for Anita, as its ten years since the original edition of her book "Amy I Black Enough For You" was released, and it's also the 60th anniversary of the festival itself.
In Brisbane, and many areas around south-east Queensland and northern New South Wales, floods have inundated our homes, towns and cities It hit local communities hard, particularly artists who received little help from the government during the pandemic.
While Australian artists may have been largely abandoned during the pandemic, they are now gathering to raise money for those inundated by flood.
Some may say that gathering to talk about art in the midst of a crisis is flippant. But Anita tells me on the podcast, many artists are gathering to raise money for those inundated by flood. And gathering together again she says is actually crucial for communities to recover.
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I figured we all need some light and hope in the world right now, so I’m bringing Streets of Your Town to you from Daylesford in regional Victoria, where the Chill Out Festival takes over the town from March 10 to 14.
Many of you will know plenty about the party that is Sydney Mardi Gras. What you may not know is that little Daylesford is on the map for its own pride festival, which this year celebrates its 25 year silver jubilee. The town comes alive with a Carnivale, champagne and Chill Out Street Parade, that transforms the central highlands of Victoria into queer country.
Come sit with me at Larder, one of the town’s most well known coffee haunts, where I meet Mathew Charlesworth, who tells me how Daylesford is the gay capital of regional Victoria. This isn’t just a recent phenomenon, Daylesford has become well known for being a friendly space for LGBTQI communities from around the country, for decades.
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Karen Jacobsen's voice is familiar to the users of more than a billion devices worldwide, as the voice of Siri.
But her movements in the past year are less well known than her voice, which has directed people to their destination through GPS devices around the globe.
The pandemic meant she picked up from her home of 20 years in New York, and returned to Australia. She tells us on Streets of Your Town podcast, that she thought this would be a short sojourn.
But more than 18 months down the track, Karen and her family are still living in the Whitsundays, and Karen has just released her latest album “Ready for What I Came Here For”, which she started recording in New York before Covid-19 hit, and finished by recording remotely from her island home.
She tells us in this episode of Streets of Your Town how she feels she is now embarking on the most exciting chapter of her life as an independent artist in her 50's, embracing the positivity of her music and message.
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The Queensland Museum is bringing a touch of Torres Strait Islands beauty and complexity to Brisbane until the end of April 2022, giving city people a rare glimpse of these remote islands in the exhibition: Island Futures: What lies ahead for Zenadth Kes?
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While many people have heard of the Torres Strait Islands at the northern tip of Australia, not as many know the fascinating history and influence this archipelago paradise has played in Australia's history and future.
From the tip of Cape York to the borders of Papua New Guinea and Indonesia, the Torres Strait—or now increasingly known as Zenadth Kes—covers an area of more 200 islands over 48 thousand square kilometres.
The Queensland Museum is bringing a touch of this beauty and complexity to Brisbane until the end of April 2022, giving city people a rare glimpse of these remote islands in the exhibition: Island Futures: What lies ahead for Zenadth Kes?
This episode of Streets of Your Town podcast takes you on a behind the scenes tour of that exhibition with co-curator, renowned broadcaster and proud Torres Strait Islander Rhianna Patrick.
She explains how hard it is to capture such a complex society of interwoven stories—the interconnectedness between people, place and knowledge which is the foundation of their identity.
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Today's Streets of Your Town podcast goes to North Stradbroke Island in the sparkling jewel that is Moreton Bay in Queensland’s south-east. You can bliss out listening to the waves lapping at my feet as I interview incredible artist Delvene Cockatoo-Collins.
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Today we're going to North Stradbroke Island in the sparkling jewel that is Moreton Bay in Queensland’s south-east. It’s known as "Straddie" to some. But to the Quandamooka Aboriginal people, who have a connection to the island going back more than 20,000 years, it is known it as Minjerribah, meaning “island in the sun”.
Delvene Cockatoo-Collins is a First Nations artist based here, like generations of her family before her. Her works are now sold around the world and were featured in her designs for the Gold Coast Commonwealth Games medals, and her representation of the white whale Migaloo floating high above the audience in the opening ceremony.
Today Delvene takes us on a walking tour of the island, which she does regularly for day trippers keen to get a First Nations perspective of the important artistic and cultural sites on this patch of paradise. We start our conversation for Streets of Your Town under the trees on the beach near Dunwich, or Goompi, where Delvene finds many of the materials she uses in her evolving arts practice.
Streets of your Town podcast would like to acknowledge the traditional custodians on whose land this story was gathered. I acknowledge that for tens of thousand of years Our First Nations people have walked this country and shared stories on this great land down under, and I walk in their footsteps today. I pay my respects to their Elders, past, present and emerging.
Read more about Delvene’s work, see the back catalogue of episodes and learn more about my work as The Wandering Journo at the Streets of Your Town website at https://soyt.substack.com
https://cockatoocollins.com
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Tucked away in the hustle and relentless movement of Cairns’ famous Rusty’s Markets in the middle of town on Sheridan Street, is a local institution. Billy’s Coffee has its own loyal gathering of locals every market day, and behind the coffee machine coordinating the barista symphony is the ever smiling Billy Hoade.
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"Tucked away in the hustle and relentless movement of Cairns’ famous Rusty’s Markets on Sheridan Street, is a local institution. Billy’s coffee has its own loyal gathering of locals every market day, and behind the coffee machine coordinating the barista symphony is the ever smiling Billy Hoade. He’s been serving up coffee from his beloved Papua New Guinea for more than 15 years, expanding now to running his own roastery. And today, on Streets of Your Town, we’re going to find out from Billy himself, what keeps the locals coming back."
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This episode of Streets of Your Town straddles two continents on opposite sides of the world—Ireland and Australia. Where the wild ocean whips the rocky cliffs of Ireland’s west coast, the people of the small county of Mayo are contemplating whether they can overcome a hoo doo of 70 years.
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This episode of Streets of Your Town straddles two continents on opposite sides of the world - Ireland and Australia. Where the wild Atlantic ocean whips the rocky cliffs of Ireland’s west coast, the people of the small county of Mayo are contemplating whether they can overcome a hoo doo of 70 years. Is it a Coincidence or a curse? I delve into the mystery of how this county has not won an All Ireland Gaelic Football Final since 1951, despite making it to the finals of arguably Ireland’s most important sporting contest, ten times. Some blame an infamous curse apparently placed on the entire football team by an angry priest. But as our guest Stephen O’Grady so eloquently explains, Gaelic football is more than just a sport. It’s about identify, about Irish emigrants and the longing for what was left behind, and about where we call home. Is it our memories, or where we live presently? Stephen O’Grady grew up in Mayo, with the imprint of his county’s woes in Gaelic football finals a constant companion while growing up. He says Gaelic football is more than just a sport, it’s a crucial part of life in Ireland. He tells us how he hopes this is the year that Mayo overcomes the weight of expectation from the entire county, and wins the All Ireland final against Tyrone on September 11."
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Across the sparkling Trinity Inlet that separates Cairns from the southern beaches beyond, is a small Indigenous community that’s successfully renewed its sacred country from years of degradation, and is now on the cusp of great success. Mandingalbay Yidinji country straddles two great world heritage areas in far north Queensland, the Wet Tropics and the Great Barrier Reef, stretching out to the Coral Sea. In this episode of Streets of Your Town Executive Director Dale Mundraby tells us stories that have been handed down through the generations, including how his ancestors met Captain Cook. Dale Mundraby explains how his people have been part of this land for many thousands of years and are now eager to show it to others who come to visit and take part in their Ancient Indigenous Tours. He invites us to come and visit, and tells how it’s a great privilege to show guests where the salty water of the sea meets the freshwater flowing from the surrounding mountains, and introduce visitors to the bush pharmacy of food and medicinal plants in the surrounding rainforest.
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This week in Bundaberg, on Queensland’s central Coast, a small but significant ceremony started to turn a long history of exploitation and shame around. And we bring it to you on this episode of Streets of Your Town. Bundaberg Mayor Jack Dempsey, took the step of becoming the first representative of any government in Australia, to say sorry for blackbirding, the practice where more than 62-thousand Pacific Islanders were brought to Australia from the 1860s to the turn of the 20th century. Many were forcibly removed from their Pacific Island homes to work in appalling conditions on cane fields in towns such as Bundaberg. You will hear from Australian South Sea Islanders in the audience on this special day, with many of them brought to tears, as the Vanuatu flag was raised outside the council chambers alongside the Australian flag and the Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander flag. It was recognition some of them had waited a lifetime to see and hear.
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This week on Streets of Your Town podcast we feature the extraordinary documentary, Scattered People. This six-year labour of love follows two young Iranian asylum seekers Mas and Saha, navigating Australia’s immigration detention system, and the unexpected connections they make through music.
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This week on Streets of Your Town we feature the extraordinary project, called Scattered People.
The documentary was a six year labour of love, following two young Iranian asylum seekers navigating Australia’s immigration detention system, and the unexpected connections they make through music.
Musicians such as John Butler, Missy Higgins, Dan Sultan, Archie Roach, Baker Boy, Michael Franti, and Katie Noonan all took part.
Scattered People is a heartfelt story about connection and the power of music to give people a voice. All proceeds from screenings in cinemas around the country go to local asylum seeker projects in each local area.
It takes enormous commitment to learn a new skill like filmmaking. But to see that project through to screenings around Australia six years later, with rolling screening dates around Covid lockdowns, takes that commitment to another level.
The documentary made filmmakers out of everyday Australians John and Lizzi Swatland. Lizzi joins us on the podcast today, along with choir mistress Yani Mills.
https://www.scatteredpeoplefilm.org
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In efforts to bring you a little lock down cheer and hope in the world, in this episode of Streets of Your Town we’ll meet a group of people who cook home made meals for the homeless, rain, hail, or pandemic shine.
"Dig In" hasn’t missed a single service to the people who eagerly await their homely meal, with hundreds of volunteers on the roster to cook every Saturday since it was started by four school mates on October 28th 2017.
Come with me on this episode of Streets of Your Town to meet this joyous group of Dig In volunteers who gather to cook every Saturday, in a humble commercial kitchen at inner city Brisbane high school St James College.
The wholesome meals they’re creating are destined for homeless people living rough in the city, who often yearn for but cannot access a freshly cooked home made meal.
Co-founder Lucas Ryals and brand ambassador and fellow lawyer Brad Marland are now looking to expand Dig In to the next stage of providing home made meals in specially designed vending machines accessible by the homeless with a special code, in towns far beyond the organisation’s Brisbane beginnings.
They’re also looking to expand Dig In’s service into high schools.
Lucas tells me in this podcast how it was a shock to them to learn how extensive a problem homelessness and poverty is, and how some students go without food for days. He hopes that the nourishing meals provided by Dig In can help remedy that, and improve school grades and attendance as well.
https://www.digin.org.au
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It’s a giant grass that many Australians would be familiar with seeing, but not so familiar with eating. Bamboo is nutrient-rich, and is in fact a staple of many Asian country’s diets. Big Heart Bamboo founder, farmer and entrepreneur Becky Dart is forging a new industry on Queensland’s Sunshine Coast—growing, cooking and preserving bamboo to eat.
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It’s a giant grass that many Australians would be familiar with seeing, but not so familiar with eating.
When properly prepared, Bamboo is nutrient-rich, and is in fact a staple of many Asian country’s diets.
Big Heart Bamboo founder, farmer and entrepreneur Becky Dart is forging a new industry on Queensland’s Sunshine Coast - growing, cooking and preserving bamboo to eat.
We walk around her bamboo farm on this episode of Streets of Your Town, and Becky explains how Bamboo is the world’s largest grass, one of the remaining large species from the megafauna era and one of the oldest plants in the world. When prepared properly it is also highly nutritious, and is revered as a delicacy in many Asian countries.
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With Reconciliation Week 2021 in Australia drawing to a close, Streets of Your Town speaks to trailblazing Aboriginal entrepreneur and proud Wiradyuri man Birrunga Wiradyuri. Birrunga is the co-founder and principal artist of the aptly titled and multi award winning Birrunga Gallery & Dining, in Brisbane.
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As part of Reconciliation Week in Australia, Streets of Your Town speaks to trailblazing Aboriginal entrepreneur and proud Wiradyuri man Birrunga Wiradyuri. His gallery and dining experience in the heart of Brisbane, aptly named Birrunga, has overcome the challenges of COVID to continue as the only Indigenous-owned and operated commercial Cultural hub in Meanjin, otherwise known as the Brisbane CBD. As well as being an accomplished artist of international renown, Birrunga is well known for his work inside prisons both pre and post release. He invites us all to visit his gallery during Reconcilation week and beyond, to come and listen to his stories and the stories of his people.
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While Australia’s history of blackbirding is becoming more well known and understood, there are many local histories that are only now coming to light. It’s estimated more than 62,000 Melanesians were brought to Australia to work as indentured labour on farms between 1863 and 1904.
A garden and gathering place nestled peacefully next to the Caboolture River at North Harbour just north of Brisbane, stands as tribute to the kanakas, or South Sea Islanders, many of whom were brought against their will from islands throughout the Pacific, to become labourer’s at the Moray Field plantation.
Today their descendants, known as Australian South Sea Islanders, gather at this place to remember their ancestors, and pay tribute to the backbreaking work they did with little recompense, to establish Queensland’s agricultural prosperity.
Daniel Awiyawi is one of them. Daniel hopes by speaking about this history on Streets of Your Town podcast, that more people will get a better understanding of blackbirding in this region, and how many islanders were deceived into coming on those ships to Australia.
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Australian singer extraordinaire Katie Noonan is refusing to let the Covid-19 pandemic get in the way of her dreams. This incredibly prolific musician has produced 20 albums, and won five Aria’s for her endlessly innovative body of work. Her creativity knows no bounds, from leading the Queensland Music Festival as artistic director, to putting a jazz spin on 80’s classics in her last album The Sweetest Taboo. Now, as Katie tells us on Streets of Your Town podcast, she is giving audiences the chance to hear Indigenous songs and newly commissioned Australian music alongside late Renaissance and Baroque masterpieces as part of the eclectic repertoire of her new Australian Vocal Ensemble, or Ave. I was lucky enough to speak to Katie in a break from final rehearsals before Ave’s debut in Brisbane on Saturday April 10, before the album's release in August and Ave tours around the country in September.
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While I was in Adelaide recently for the city’s world renowned fringe festival, it was wonderful to see the city buzzing again in the aftermath of the Covid-19 devastation on the region’s all important arts sector. All the little theatres were full of innovative creativity and people happily walking through alleyways underneath glittering lights as they made their way from one show to the next. One of these little productions I stumbled upon absolutely blew me away - Happy Go Wrong by Andi Snelling. This emotional rollercoaster of a one-woman show takes you from the heights of elation, to the depths of despair, much in the same way as Lyme disease has upended this performer’s life. Andi will tour "Happy Go Wrong" as much as her health allows this year - so keep an eye out for her show in your town. Until then, have a listen to her tell us on Streets of Your Town podcast how she had to build her life again from scratch, and is still unravelling on stage and off, the ramifications this tick-borne disease has on her existence and identity.
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This week we celebrate International Women’s Day around the world, and the achievements of women through the ages. As part of those celebrations I was invited to speak for a group of senior hospital administrators at a celebratory breakfast for International Women’s Day.
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This week we celebrate International Women’s Day around the world, and the achievements of women through the ages. As part of those celebrations I was invited to speak for a group of senior hospital administrators at a celebratory breakfast for International Women’s Day. This year’s theme was Choose to Challenge - so I looked at how that has driven my journalism and inspired my love and respect for the power of audio storytelling.
Part of my speech talks about my investigation into a pivotal case, which highlighted how Australia’s justice system fails intellectually disabled victims of sexual abuse. If this is triggering for you, you may not want to listen to this episode. But I include it because it’s an important issue in Australian law that still must be addressed. South Australia remains the only state to have changed its Evidence Act, to allow people with an intellectual disability to give evidence with assistance in court. Most cases are dropped, because people with cognitive disabilities are seen by the courts as unreliable witnesses.
I highlight in this speech how great journalism can create great change.
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Rapa Nui, or Easter Island, is the most remote island on earth, more than 3700 kilometres off the coast of Chile.
For many people the main thing they know about Rapa Nui is the hundreds of giant stone statues standing up to 20 metres high, looking out over the island.
And while these colossal statues known as Moai are incredible, there is so much more to this remote volcanic island, where the civilisation remained largely untouched by external influence for a thousand years.
Yoyo Tuki comes from a family of storytellers going back generations on the island. He tells me on this episode of Streets of Your Town, how he now divides his time between Australia and Rapa Nui, sharing his music and songwriting with a distinct Rapa Nui flavour not only on our shores, but in music festivals around the world.
Yoyo’s music blends the influence of his sculptor grandfather, whose name Mana Roa means Great Wisdom, with Spanish influences and some of the local Rapa Nui dialect, a Polynesian dialect similar to Tahitian, with some of his more modern compositions in English.
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How do you come back from devastating defeat? What do you do to recover when you realise something you believed in, is not anything like what you thought it was?
Mel Manley is the owner of The Imperial Hotel at Eumundi, which under her creative guidance has become the main meeting place in this bohemian hamlet in the Sunshine Coast hinterland.
She is also a great believer in giving back, and so supported the establishment of an orphanage and charity in Nepal, in the hope of giving children there a safe place where they could receive education, good food and were safe from harm.
But years later, after gaining the trust of the children in their care, she discovered those children had living families, and were not in fact orphans. As Mel later realised, this was part of a global trend.
The number of orphanages across the developing world has grown dramatically in recent years. More than 80% of children in these orphanages are NOT orphans at all. Research shows that children are often taken from their families, trafficked into orphanages and used to generate funds, in a form of modern day slavery.
She is now the chief advocate for the charity Forget Me Not, which has reunited 700 orphans from Nepal, Uganda and India with their families, and also supported them for years to readjust to normal life.
Mel tells how she came back from the devastation of realising she had been so cruelly deceived, and how we all can learn to look for the gift in terrible events.”
https://fmn.org.au
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Today on Streets of Your Town podcast we talk to former Senator Natasha Stott-Despoja about her appointment to a top United Nations role aimed at ending discrimination against women.
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Today on Streets of Your Town podcast, we talk to former Senator Natasha Stott-Despoja about her appointment to a top United Nations role aimed at ending discrimination against women. This interview is brought to you in conjunction with Griffith University's Gender Equity Research Network, as a special co-production to mark the international campaign of 16 days of Activism Against Gender Based Violence. Natasha Stott-Despoja will begin her four-year term in January as one of 23 independent experts monitoring the efforts of countries around the world to improve gender equality. She tells us how the need to protect women's rights is even greater in the wake of coronavirus, and how she keenly feels her responsibility in her new role as the only expert on the committee from the Oceania region.
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Nestled in far north Queensland Wet Tropics rainforest that stretches from the surrounding mountains to the ocean, is the small settlement of Mission Beach. The World Heritage Area is brimming with natural beauty and incredible vistas, looking out to the the Great Barrier Reef and the tropical paradise of Dunk Island in the distance. Conservationist and artist Liz Gallie tells us on his episode of Streets of Your Town podcast how she has made this town her home for decades, and sees it as part of her responsibility of living here to fight to protect the environment and endangered animals such as the Cassowary, from encroaching development. I stumbled upon Liz at her stall at the Mission Beach markets, where she sells beautiful silver jewellery she has crafted herself in her paradise home, with inspiration from the surrounding rainforest.
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Many people will remember Senator Jordon Steele-John crying as he read the names of 34 Australians with disabilities who had died from abuse and neglect to an almost empty Senate chamber two years ago. It was his stirring words that finally ended an almost decade long fight to bring the Commission into being. But he is now concerned that failures in the legislation supporting that investigation, are putting the entire Commission process at risk. He tells me on this episode of Streets of Your Town podcast, that he's spoken to many whistleblowers who are now not giving crucial evidence, because of a lack of legislative protections. He's only 25, but age and disability have not stopped him from becoming the youngest sitting member in the Australian Federal parliament and its youngest Senator.
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Ten years ago, halfway through completing his medical degree, Dinesh Palipana's car crashed, leaving him a quadriplegic. Dinesh lost all sensory and motor function below his chest, affecting his fingers and half his arm. It took him seven months of recovering in hospital, but he emerged still determined to become a doctor. He went on to complete his medical degree, and now works as a resident at Gold Coast University Hospital in one of the busiest emergency departments in the country. Dinesh's refusal to accept the loss of his dream is paving the way not only for him, but for people with a disability around the world. He tells me on this episode of Streets of Your Town how he found his life's purpose in medicine, and that he's so relieved he didn't listen to the naysayers who told him he could no longer become a doctor after his accident.
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As the Black Lives Matter movement gathers pace around the world, prompting Australians to reflect on race and discrimination in this country, debate is growing about Australia's legacy of blackbirding. More than 60,000 Pacific Islanders, then known as kanakas, were forced, coerced or deceived into leaving their native lands and shipped to Australia between 1863 to 1904. They worked in often cruel conditions, and were paid a pittance as indentured labourers on farms. Their graves, many unmarked, are still being discovered. Many thousands of their descendants still live in Australia, and are proudly known as Australian South-Sea Islanders. Brian Courtice is the former federal member for Hinkler, who lives on the farm "Sunnyside" just outside of Bundaberg in Queensland. He's had to come to terms with the farm's blackbirding past, and in this interview on Streets of Your Town podcast, he renews his calls to the federal government and the Australian public, to not only recognise this chapter of Australian history, but also support ways to heal the ongoing pain of the generations who followed. This interview is on Brian's front porch, with his grandchildren running around him, continuing the generations of his family who have lived on the farm since the 1920s. He shows me photos of a recent tour of local schoolchildren who came to his property. They came to see the graves of South Sea Islanders who died on the farm, and learn about local history. The site is now heritage listed.
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This episode of Streets of Your Town - The Journo Project podcast features Gerard Ryle, the director of the International Consortium of Investigative Journalists. Before becoming the ICIJ's first non-American director almost ten years ago, Gerard spent more than 20 years working as an investigative reporter and editor in Australia, writing on subjects from politics to financial and medical scandals, and police corruption. He led the worldwide team of journalists working on the Panama Papers and Paradise Papers, two of the biggest investigations in journalism's history. Under his leadership over the past seven years, ICIJ has become one of the best-known journalism brands in the world. Reporters Without Borders has described Ryle's work with ICIJ as "the future of investigative journalism worldwide" naming him as one of "100 information heroes" of worldwide significance.
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This episode of Streets of Your Town - The Journo Project features Nas Campanella, who is thought to be the only blind newsreader in the world. Nas is a journalist and radio newsreader on the Australian Broadcasting Corporation's national network, Triple J, and a proud journo who has wanted to do this job since her teens. She secured a highly sought after ABC cadetship in 2011, spending her first year newsgathering in Sydney before moving to Bega where she began newsreading. Nas lost her sight when she was six months old and uses an audio speech program to help her read the radio news bulletin. In 2013, Nas joined Triple J, where she produces, writes, and reads the news several times a day. She also files television reports for the ABC.
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This fearless multi-Walkley award winning journo has exposed corruption in almost every realm of society, from unions to rugby league, in health and politics, to behind the scenes of the media itself. Kate McClymont is an investigative journalist with The Sydney Morning Herald. She was awarded the Gold Walkley for her coverage of the Bulldogs salary cap rorts saga, and in 2017, was inducted into the Media Hall of Fame. Kate's latest book, Dead Man Walking, tells the story of the lives and shoddy business deals of Michael McGurk and Ron Medich. And as Kate tells me on this episode of The Journo Project podcast, her unlikely big break into starting her career, came from busking in Kings Cross.
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The New York Times Australia Bureau Chief Damien Cave has reported from locations around the globe from Mexico to Baghdad, and is still getting his head around some of Australia's colloquialisms and quirks. On this episode of the Journo Project, Damien Cave sends a warning about the lack of press freedom in this country, saying Australia is one of the most secretive democracies he has ever reported from. He says that has greater implications now in the midst of the Coronavirus pandemic.
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It’s an important turning point for The Journo Project, my loyal subscribers. The prestigious publication Griffith Review has commissioned me to produce and release an all encompassing podcast on Truth and Press Freedom, featuring the interviews that you all made possible.
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This renowned journo and multi-award winning author started his career as a cadet at the Gold Coast Bulletin, going on to write for some of the most respected broadsheets in Australia. To many people, Matthew Condon is now more well known as a true crime author, writing a series of books that now make up the definitive history of Queensland's corruption years before the famous Fitzgerald Inquiry. He's also the author of ten fiction books. And yet Matthew still proudly introduces himself, as a reporter first. In this episode of The Journo Project, Matthew Condon tells us how he landed the pivotal interview with notorious former Police Commissioner Terry Lewis, and how that started him on his diversion into the crooked underbelly of Queensland, exposing the truth behind generations of endemic corruption.
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For renowned journalist and multi-award winning author Matthew Condon, protecting his sources, and listening, make the crucial cornerstone to his successful 35 year reporting career. In this latest episode of The Journo Project podcast, Matthew talks about his undying love for journalism.
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It took ten years of research and writing through some of the toughest times in her life, but journo Helen Pitt's determination was rewarded. She not only completed her book on the machinations of building the Sydney Opera House, simply called "The House", but her work was also recognised with the 2018 Walkley Book Award. Helen is a senior journalist with the Sydney Morning Herald, and credits the skills she learnt there, with being able to see such a monumental project through to fruition. In this episode of The Journo Project, Helen tells me how her journalistic investigative skills revealed aspects of the making of the Opera House that had never come to light before.
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It took ten years of research and writing through some of the toughest times in her life, but journo Helen Pitt’s determination was rewarded. She not only completed her book on the machinations of building the Sydney Opera House, simply called “The House”, but her work was also recognised as winner of the 2018 Walkley Book Award.
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This episode of The Journo Project podcast features one of the great stalwarts of Australian journalism - Walkley Award winning television reporter Chris Reason. He has travelled the world telling stories, starting his life in journalism delivering papers for the Redland Times in south-east Queensland's sleepy bayside, going on to become the youngest correspondent in Seven Network's history, when he was posted to London. He's now Seven's Chief Reporter. His television reports are seen all over Australia, covering some of the toughest stories, including the recent bushfire crisis in NSW, the Boxing Day tsunami in Thailand and then Banda Aceh; and the September 11 terrorist attacks from on the ground in New York. Chris tells us on The Journo Project about the high cost involved for many journos on the front line of such events, and the vital role of the press to keep people informed and hold those in power to account.
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This episode of The Journo Project features one of the great stalwarts of Australian journalism—Walkley Award winning television reporter Chris Reason.
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Zoe Daniel is returning to Australia with her family after finishing her four year stint as Washington Bureau Chief for ABC News. In that time she has travelled from Alaska to Washington and to 44 states from one side of the United States to the other. But as well as her Washington posting, this brave storyteller has worked on the frontline of some of the world's worst disasters and most protracted conflicts. On this episode of The Journo Project podcast she tells us about the life of a foreign correspondent and her love for speaking to real people on the ground at each of her varied postings, from Africa, to Thailand, and finally the USA. Zoe also talks about what coping mechanisms she has developed over the years when covering disasters and dealing with communities in shock, and then having to bring those stories back to the Australian community.
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This veteran broadcaster is one of the great journo survivors. Sandra Sully's face and honeyed dulcet tones are familiar throughout Australia in her role as Network Ten journalist, presenter and Consulting News Editor for 10 Daily. She's delivered the biggest news around the world ever since she was the first Australian television journalist to cover news of the September 11 terrorist attacks. Sandra tells me on The Journo Project podcast how she continues to be a story leader, as the first woman to co-host the Melbourne Cup, travelling to East Timor to make a documentary on the nation post-liberation, and editing the special edition book "Agenda" celebrating great Australian women for International Women's Day.
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This three-time Walkley award winner is the Anchor of one of the ABC's flagship television programs 7.30, presenting the current affairs show for a decade in one of Australia's most competitive work environments. And in this episode of The Journo Project, she still proudly introduces herself as a journalist first. Leigh Sales has just won the 2019 Walkley Book Award for Any Ordinary Day, with its intertwined stories of people enduring unimaginable tragedy selling more than 100,000 copies in Australia. As the Walkley judges said when awarding her Best Book, "In a writing world steeped in memoir, Leigh Sales turned her personal story into journalism." Hear her rallying call to journos and the public about never taking Australia's press freedom for granted.
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He was the first reporter in Australia to be sent to jail for not revealing a source in one of his investigations.
And while it was 30 years ago, Tony Barrass says he has no regrets, and would do it all again to uphold one of journalism’s most important principles.
“I think the fundamental issue is that there’s always going to be friction between what journalists do and what governments do,” Tony says.
“I think it's very healthy and I think that's the way it should be, of course. But I’ve still yet to find any or been told or read any practical solution to what is always going to be a strong friction between the two bodies.
“It was my little 15 minutes of fame, I suppose. But I obviously watch what’s going on in this space in the industry as the years roll on and there’s been numerous instances where journalists have been threatened with jail and heavily fined. The Right To Know, I think, is a fantastic campaign and I think it will resonate with people who have a sense that how important journalism is to the role of, well, democracy itself.”
Tony was tested far more than many journos early in his career, when he was jailed for a week for contempt of court, and was fined 10 thousand dollars for refusing to reveal the source of his report on malpractice in the Perth Tax Office.
He says it was the only honourable thing to do in the circumstances, although he feels deeply for those journos now put in similar dilemmas.
His experiences then have again come to the fore 30 years later, as the merits of press freedom in Australia return to the spotlight of public debate.
“In my circumstance, it was a case of really if I reveal the source, I would have thought my career would’ve been over,” he recalls.
“Let’s hope journalists don’t have to make those decisions very often.
“Without a free press, you, the average Australian, doesn’t get a chance to understand and be informed about issues that really matter to them. They may not know these issues matter to them. But in a broader sense, a healthy democracy only thrives on a healthy media.”
From starting his reporting career in the working class suburbs of Newcastle, to making his way over to the wild west coast, Tony Barrass has worked as a journo all around this wide brown land.
Above: Tony Barrass (right) being awarded the 2018 Arthur Lovekin Prize for Excellence in Journalism
The long-time newspaper man and stalwart of the West Australian media landscape has won many awards for his writing on a range mastheads and rounds, and says finding stories is simply a matter of being curious.
“People who live here sort of cringe a bit when you call it the Wild West, but there is a sense of that pioneering spirit here and there always has been,” he says.
“There’s always been a sense of a bit of a chip on the shoulder perhaps because there is a great divide in the West, not unlike Queensland.
“It is a very unique state and it throws up very unique characters. If you’re in the business of journalism or reporting or capturing some of that spirit well, there’s plenty to work with over here.
“Whether it’s the person you’re sitting next to on a bus, whether it’s the person who’s driving a tractor in the back blocks of the Wheat Belt, everybody has got a story. Nobody has a bland, dull life.
“Everybody’s either been through some sort of heartache or a tragedy or a triumph.”
Tony recently made the jump from journalism to politics, following a well-worn media path to become the Senior Media Adviser to the Leader of the WA Opposition, Liza Harvey.
He says his greatest hope is that, particularly in a state the size of Western Australia, stories from beyond the big cities are not forgotten.
“We’re probably doing less of it now because this stuff costs money, to get up to the Kimberley or get up to Pilbara or just jump in a car or jump in a plane,” he says.
“It is a lot of money and it does cost, and I think we’ve got to be really careful to make sure that the people who run these news organisations…that they don’t lose that sense of duty when it comes to giving a voice to people in remote and regional areas of Australia.
“Because it is a very, very big country and we need to make sure that it’s not just the voices of Sydney or Melbourne or Brisbane or Perth. It’s the voices of the Kimberley or Outback Queensland or Northern Territory are just as important as those who live in the big cities.
“And that they’re not forgotten. We’ve got to really make sure that we tell them regardless of the costs and the price on an airfare because they are so pivotal to the evolving Australian story.”
What I’m reading
It may not be the most earth shattering news story but that’s why I love it and it gives me such joy amidst so much depressing news around the world. This kid Colt is AMAZING. What a champion coming up with an invention that not only impresses at home, but wins a NASA competition. The simplest solution to a well known problem.
The Year 5 student burst into tears when he heard that his invention had beaten thousands of entries from around the country to win the littleBIGidea inventing competition.
Horseriding accident sees boy lose his fingertips, so he created an invention to make sure it never happens again —ABC News
Upcoming
Next week I will have more amazing Journo Project interviews brought straight to your inbox in glorious face-to-face quality for you to listen to at your leisure, direct from Sydney. I am heading there for this Thursday's Walkley Awards, the night of nights for Aussie journos everywhere.
I have a couple of ABSOLUTE CRACKING JOURNOS for you next week—but I’m going to keep you in suspense!
Hooray for the little poddie that could—The Journo Project!
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From starting his reporting career in the working class suburbs of Newcastle, to making his way over to the wild west coast, Tony Barrass has worked as a journo all around this wide brown land. The longtime newspaper man is now a stalwart of the West Australian media landscape, having won many awards for his writing on a range mastheads and rounds. He was tested far more than many journo's early in his career, when he was jailed for a week for contempt of court for refusing to reveal a source. He says it was the only honourable thing to do in the circumstances, although he feels deeply for those journos now put in similar dilemmas. His tells me about these experiences in this episode of The Journo Project podcast, as press freedom in Australia returns to the spotlight of public debate.
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This multi-award winning radio documentary producer specialises in telling taboo stories that most people flinch at, bringing important societal issues out of the shadows. Perth based radio documentary producer Kirsti Melville challenges the traditional assumption that journalists shouldn't mine their own experiences for their stories. On this episode of The Journo Project, she talks about her struggles with bringing to light social justice issues that also expose individual people's pain. Her documentary The Storm vividly tells the personal story of the life-long impact of child sexual abuse, from the perspective of her former partner Erik. But through that sharp lens, it sparked a national debate about sexual abuse, and led to feedback from hundreds of listeners commending Erik and Kirsti for their bravery and honesty, and helping them better understand the long term ramifications of this complex issue. She tells me on this episode of The Journo Project, how she navigates the ethical and emotional challenges of how to produce this intimate confessional style of audio journalism.
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This multi-award winning radio documentary producer specialises in telling taboo stories that most journos would flinch at, bringing important societal issues out of the shadows.
The Perth-based reporter Kirsti Melville tells me on this issue of The Journo Project podcast about her struggles with bringing to light social justice issues that also expose individual people’s pain.
“It's always bittersweet winning an award and being acknowledged for work that’s born of someone else’s grief,” she says.
“So I just feel kind of conflicted about that.
“Whenever you’re present somewhere where there’s a lot of really great stories, it’s usually because of someone else’s disenfranchisement or disadvantage.
“I will only ever do the story, obviously, with the full and willing participation of the person involved.
“And that usually takes time, and it usually involves me approaching them or them approaching me or whatever, and then asking them to sit on that for quite a bit of time to make sure this is really what they want to do; to expose themselves.
“I guess the beauty of working in radio is that you can... People are freer to speak without being identified. So that opens up a lot of opportunities that television doesn’t."
Her radio documentary “The Storm” vividly tells the personal story of the life-long impact of child sexual abuse, from the perspective of her former partner Erik.
But through that sharp lens, it sparked a national debate about sexual abuse, and led to feedback from hundreds of listeners commending Erik and Kirsti for their bravery and honesty, and helping them better understand the long-term ramifications of this complex issue.
She challenges the traditional assumption that journalists shouldn’t mine their own experiences for their stories.
“It was really difficult to work out; to tread that fine line between being self-indulgent, revealing too much, but giving enough that the audience felt confided in,” she says.
“So that was just a constant, walking a tight rope, running it past my EP [executive producer] all the time.
“But the other thing I had to do was... It was so much unrelenting horror in that story, that I had to find ways of lightening it. And one of the ways that I used was to make the character of the bush. Make the bush a character in the piece.”
She says it’s increasingly challenging navigating the ethical and emotional challenges of how to produce this intimate confessional style of audio journalism.
“What I’m particularly drawn to is the taboo and the unaccepted,” she says.
“And it’s about for me, trying to understand that world and trying to get people to have some empathy for people we may not otherwise have empathy for.”
Keep an eye out for how Kirsti goes at the Walkley Awards on November 28 this year where she’s a finalist for her story “The Ghosts of Wittenoom”. The awards will be broadcast live on Sky News Extra (Foxtel Channel 604) and streamed on the Walkleys website.
Beyond the Pod
The amazing journo and now worldwide bestselling author Trent Dalton, who I hope you all remember reading his favourite part of “Boy Swallows Universe” at the end of his episode of The Journo Project podcast, has just finished his next book, as this tweet shows.
Can’t wait to see how his latest creation goes. And don’t forget “Boy Swallows Universe” is coming to the Brisbane stage from Queensland Theatre in 2020. What a highlight that will be to see how they translate his vivid coming of age tale onto the stage!
Listen again: Trent Dalton, from journo to author
I had a wild time at the Brisbane U2 concert this week with lovely hubby Andrew. It’s been a lifelong love affair with this band—and also a rare source of music overlap for Andrew and I—when we moved in together the only CD’s we doubled up on were from U2. Such are The Wandering Journo’s eclectic music tastes. The last time we saw them live was in Adelaide for the Vertigo tour in 2006 when we moshed in the front after lining up for hours!!! While we were up in the gods in the comfy seats this time, it was still sweet as.
I love the band even more for making a t-shirt that actually fits this Wandering Journo of—as the lovely author Alexander McColl-Smith would say—“traditional build”. I find the band’s continued creativity through the decades an absolute inspiration: that once you find your calling, you can keep on at it and reinvent yourself.
As many of you know I also produce podcasts for Griffith University, and this week I had the pleasure to meet and interview the new Head of Women’s Football at the Gold Coast Suns, Fiona McLarty. What a pleasure to be able to highlight the achievements of this incredible athlete. The podcast was picked up by the Gold Coast Suns and put on their website too!
What I’m reading
While we’ve all been overwhelmed with the tragic tales of overwhelming loss coming out of the bushfires around our nation, I found this little gem of a story that gives me comfort. There are angels all around us, friends, and sometimes in the most unlikely of places. Small gestures such as these make such a massive difference in so many ways.
A woman stands playing Pachelbel's Canon on a harp to a distressed horse, shrouded in bushfire smoke, at a large animal evacuation centre.
It's an unexpected sight amid the rushed activity during the recent bushfire crisis, yet it clearly has a positive effect, calming the anxious animal, and quite possibly soothing anxious owners as well.
Harp therapist soothes anxious horses at NSW bushfire evacuation centre —ABC News
And it’s not just journos who are calling for reform to ensure Australia’s press freedoms are protected. Even the legal eagles are coming on side, as this article from The Conversation shows:
The imperative to protect press freedom is fundamental and deserving of general recognition and protection. In light of these concerns, our international obligations and the rule-of-law concerns for legal clarity, consistency and proportionality, it is time for a Media Freedom Act.
Australia needs a Media Freedom Act. Here’s how it could work. —The Conversation
And the lack of these media protections in Australia is increasingly becoming a talking point overseas too, with renowned broadcaster Larry King joining the clarion call:
“I don’t think there is anything more important than the first amendment,” he said. “If the US didn’t have it, we would be limp and we would be in trouble. I can’t believe Australia doesn’t have laws to protect a free and open media—and if there are police raids on the press in Australia, you need them.”
Larry King calls for legislative change to protect press freedom —Alliance for Journalists’ Freedom
Upcoming
Next week we continue our Perth sojourn of The Journo Project, with the Wandering Journo taking you behind the scenes of Parliament House in Perth for my interview with the multi-award winning reporter legend Tony Barrass. Here we are outside Parliament House.
Tony was jailed for a week 30 years ago for refusing to reveal a source in one of his stories. He tells me that, sadly, there hasn’t been a lot of legal progress since then.
Thanks again to so many of you who have made these trips possible by becoming paid subscribers to this Journo Project…your support has paid for me to travel to Perth and to also go to Sydney in a couple of weeks to catch some more amazing journos who are going to be in The Harbour City at the same time as the Walkley Awards. Thanks for believing in my vision that the only way to do this is face to face audio with the best journos around the country. The interviews are so frank and fearless—and that’s largely because of you enabling me to sit down with them.
Hooray for the little poddie that could—The Journo Project!
Thanks to you all, my Wandering Journo tribe!
Talk again in a week!
If you believe in journalism and wish to support it, subscribe to the paid version of this newsletter. The same content is free for anybody but your support helps sustain this podcast.
Get full access to Streets of Your Town: The Journo Project at soyt.substack.com/subscribe
This investigative journo, author and broadcaster has brought stories to light from some of the most remote corners of Australia. From a range of rural towns around Queensland, Amanda Gearing has covered national news for The Australian, The Times in London, ABC Radio National and Crikey. Amanda tells me on this episode of Streets of Your Town - The Journo Project podcast that it all started from a small office in Mt Isa, where her career began. "I think my model of journalism is probably a little different from others. The way I approached it was probably different, probably a bit more intuitive in a lot of ways. I went in very blind dumb and stupid, where angels fear to tread. But I toppled corrupt councils, I had hospitals built, I had roads built, I had public housing upgraded before I turned 22."
See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.
This investigative journo, author and broadcaster has brought stories to light from some of the most remote corners of Australia.
From a range of rural towns around Queensland, Amanda Gearing has covered national and international news for The Australian, The Times in London, ABC Radio National and Crikey.
And it all started from a small office in Mt Isa, where her career began.
“I was always a very philosophical, idealistic type of person,” Amanda says.
“I was involved in debating and all that sort of thing, interested in the world.
“I think my model of journalism is probably a little different from others.
“The way I approached it was probably different, probably a bit more intuitive in a lot of ways. I went in very blind dumb and stupid, where angels fear to tread. But I toppled corrupt councils, I had hospitals built, I had roads built, I had public housing upgraded before I turned 22.”
Amanda won a Walkley Award for Best Radio Documentary for her coverage of the 2011 flash flood disaster in Toowoomba and the Lockyer Valley in “The Day that Changed Grantham”.
“It was sheer human suffering in that case,” she says.
“What happened was a flash flood came down the Lockyer Valley.
“In the final analysis it was 23 people who had died.
“It was a shocking event…absolutely traumatic…My thought as a mother was, ‘when these children get a little bit older, or even get born, in ten years’ time or 15 years’ time they are going to want to know, Why did this happen? Why did my sister die? or Why did my Mum die? Who tried to save them?’
“I decided at that point that someone had to write this all down.”
She’s also unflinchingly covered an international child sexual abuse scandal in institutions such as schools and churches in Australia, and its ongoing ramifications.
“So that story, because it had been the Archbishop by then was the Governor General of Australia, it went big instantly,” she says.
“So from me sitting in a little rural courthouse in Toowoomba, there was nobody else connected to the national media. Because I was writing for News Ltd it just went bang to national. And that started the calls for the Royal Commission into Child Sexual Abuse which happened another ten years later.
“It was obvious from then that we needed a Royal Commission into child sexual abuse, there was a big disaster on our hands. There was political opposition to it at the time and that political opposition ebbed and flowed, ebbed and flowed and it wasn’t until we had a secular prime minister who was willing to actually open the lid of the can that we finally got that Royal Commission.”
She says there’s a lesson in her experience that you don’t have to necessarily work at big publications such as the Washington Post to make a difference as a journalist.
“It’s people power, it’s a bit of media power, a bit of just doing one foot in front of the other never really knowing if it’s going to work or not,” Amanda says.
“You go into these things not promising. Because you can’t promise that what a particular mob wants will happen. But you can have a jolly good crack.”
Beyond the Pod
I stumbled across this story the other day, pleasantly surprised to find that one of my most popular Streets of Your Town episodes from series 1 has made it to Triple M!
“We aim to get people learning about turtles, about conservation... and hopefully people take that knowledge away and do something in their everyday life to help turtles and other marine animals.”
Mon Repos Turtle Centre Featured On 'Streets Of Your Town' Podcast —Triple M
Woo hoo! Crack the champagne and have a listen to the turtles of Mon Repos, in case you missed it first time around!
What I’m reading
This story certainly comes under the “sobering but really important category” of must-reads. It’s incredible the obstacles that many people still face to get the most perfunctory level of justice in their lives.
“I first met Jody at the Bandyup women's prison in Perth, where she told me her story and showed me the scars on her body left by her ex's violence.”
Australia is turning a blind eye to violence against Indigenous women, but we will not stay silent—our lives matter —ABC News
While this immersive story from the New York Times just makes me want to cobble together all my little bits and bobs of savings and ring my travel agent to say, “get me there ASAP even if its by ten different flights that have to link up along the way!” One day I will get to Cuba—one day!
Discovering Cuba, an Island of Music —New York Times
And this story just makes me laugh, as I remember all the conflicting advice I was given when I was a journo for the ABC about the “correct” way to pronounce this word…
“All English words ending in -meter or -metre derive from the Greek word metron,” [Prime Minister Gough] Whitlam told anyone who would listen during a sitting in parliament in 1975, “in which the penultimate syllable is short, the letter e in English reproducing epsilon”.
Are you pronouncing 'kilometre' correctly? —ABC News
Upcoming
I will be on a Wandering Journo creative hiatus for the next two weeks—precious time to recharge and organise the next chapters of this series of the Journo Project podcast. Thanks to so many of you who have validated my work so much by becoming paid subscribers. This support has paid for me to travel to Perth in a few weeks to interview some bloody great journos from the West who largely go unheralded. Hooray that you my crowdfunders have enabled this little poddie to become such a success, enabling me to travel around Australia to celebrate great journos and great journalism that holds those in power to account. I truly can’t thank you enough.
If you believe in journalism and wish to support it, subscribe to the paid version of this newsletter. The same content is free for anybody but your support helps sustain this podcast.
Get full access to Streets of Your Town: The Journo Project at soyt.substack.com/subscribe
Speaker, broadcaster and reporter for Channel 7's Great Day Out program, Karni Liddell, is not only a renowned journo and speaker. She's also travelled the world competing as a swimmer at the highest level, ultimately as the Captain of the Sydney 2000 Paralympic swimming team. She tells me on The Journo Project podcast, that her greatest hope is that she can soon stop talking about the disability discrimination she sees every day, because it doesn't exist anymore. Her TED talk was watched by thousands of people around the world and she was the only TED speaker on the day to receive a standing ovation.
See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.
Speaker, broadcaster and reporter for Channel 7’s Great Day Out program, Karni Liddell, is not only a renowned journo of note.
She’s also travelled the world competing as a swimmer at the highest level, ultimately being recognised as the Captain of the Sydney 2000 Paralympic swimming team.
She loves that her job reporting for Great Day Out, is not predicated on her disability.
“What I loved about Channel 7 was they didn’t want me to be ‘accessible holiday journo’. Even though everything I do is in my wheelchair…but that’s not the focus. I’m just a journalist. And I don’t know if I’ve ever just been a journalist,” she says.
“I’ll tell ya I didn’t study journalism and communications to just talk about me.
“The whole story is not just about me and the medals that I won.”
Her passion for social justice is a big motivation for her storytelling, with her speaking talents helping to raise more than one million dollars for various disability charities.
But one of Karni’s greatest frustrations is the assumptions that people make about her capabilities, because she uses a wheelchair.
She says people need to be more aware of how traumatising that can be for people with a disability.
“You don’t get through a day without someone being way too nosey and personal wanting to know why I’m in a wheelchair,” she says.
“I think it’s because people don’t know what to say and…they don’t realise that they may be the tenth person asking me that question.
“I don’t want to talk about it. And most of the time I don’t think or understand or remember that I’m in a wheelchair, just like you don’t go to the park and think ‘I’m walking’. That isn’t in your head. If someone came up to you and said ‘let’s talk about you walking’, that would feel weird for you.
“It feels the same to me—I don’t think I’m in a wheelchair, I just am. And talking about that you’d find really boring and weird. And I feel exactly the same way.”
Not limiting herself just to writing stories that matter, Karni is also the National Disability Insurance Scheme QLD Ambassador and a member of Dame Quentin Bryce’s Domestic and Family Violence Council, as well as a radio broadcaster, social commentator and highly acclaimed international speaker.
Her TED talk was watched by thousands of people around the world and she was the only TED speaker on the day to receive a standing ovation.
Karni tells me on The Journo Project podcast, that her greatest hope is that she can soon stop talking about the disability discrimination she sees every day because it doesn’t exist any more.
“I’m sick of talking about it, it’s been 30 years. At school, integration wasn’t done well,” Karni says.
“We’ve got to get this right now. We’ve got to start thinking about disability differently.
“Disability: why do we keep thinking of it as negative. It’s never going to go away. We’re always going to have it. It’s natural. The world will always have 20 per cent of people with a disability no matter what we do. We can’t stop it. So why make 20 per cent of the world feel s**t about themselves.”
Beyond the pod
It’s been another big week for The Wandering Journo! I’m making my mark in the podcast stakes—this week, the podcast peaked at #20 on the Chartable Australian News Commentary charts and cracked the top 100 in the US.
What I’m reading
This is just stunning—such a beautifully drawn and beautifully told piece about the surprising final words that people say before they die. I know it sounds morbid—but in fact it’s just fascinating. From a hospital palliative care doctor who knows.
Dying Words Aren’t What I Imagined —Spiral Bound
While this story by Nicolle White is a fascinating deep dive into how to travel around Australia while showing respect for our Indigenous people.
It is absolutely thoroughly researched and also references the incredible book from Marcia Langton, Welcome to Country: A Travel Guide to Indigenous Australia. Both of these I highly recommend. It’s not just Uluru that has cultural significance for the traditional owners, and we should respect that, and have a better holiday because of it!
“Professor [Marcia] Langton notes that traditional owners make ideal travel guides, given their extensive and historical knowledge of the country.
“By joining an Indigenous-run tour or enlisting an Indigenous guide, travellers will also be giving back to communities where there may be few opportunities for work.
“It will also help invest in the preservation of the world's oldest living culture.”
Uluru isn't the only place where tourists are asked to respect Indigenous cultural history —ABC News
Upcoming
Next Monday’s podcast of Streets of Your Town—The Journo Project, sent straight to your inbox, features rural journo extraordinaire and Walkley Award winner Amanda Gearing. Make sure you look out for her tips on how she has produced the award winning stories from parts of Australia that are often neglected.
Thanks to you all, my Wandering Journo tribe!
See you in a week!
If you believe in journalism and wish to support it, subscribe to the paid version of this newsletter. The same content is free for anybody but your support helps sustain this podcast.
Get full access to Streets of Your Town: The Journo Project at soyt.substack.com/subscribe
Today on Streets of Your Town - The Journo Project podcast we meet someone whose passion for journalism hasn't waned since the reporting fire first started in her belly at seven years old. Listen to the amazing Dominique Schwartz tell us about travelling the world as a founding member of ABC's iconic program Foreign Correspondent, being shot at in the Middle East, and now travelling Australia in her role as Rural and Regional Affairs correspondent. She also talks about her concerns for press freedom in Australia in the wake of AFP raids on ABC and News Corp.
See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.
This fearless journo was one of the founding members of the ABC’s iconic program Foreign correspondent.
Since then Dominique Schwartz has been shot at in the Middle East, and reported from the scenes of devastating mine collapses and attempted rescues in New Zealand and Chile, in just a few examples of the amazing journalism assignments she has worked on around the world.
“My career has been very organic and life just takes its turns and you roll with whatever opportunities present themselves,” she says.
For those wanting to emulate her career and work overseas as a journalist, she says to start small and build up a portfolio.
“You might be lucky enough to be sent overseas, that’s great, but for a lot of people it’s about travelling and picking up stories—maybe it’s in your holidays you pick up stories and then you come back and you file them,” she says.
“But really I think if it’s not happening for you and you really want to do it, just go, because there’s so many stories out there. And there’s so many different platforms that you can get, you might not be paid particularly well so you do have to take your savings and live on them, but you do have to create your own luck a bit as well."
Dominique now calls Brisbane home, when she’s not travelling from one end of Australia to the other, pitching her swag in some tiny towns as the ABC’s National Rural and Regional Current Affairs correspondent.
She tells me on The Journo Project podcast how she still has the fire in her belly to tell the stories from places less travelled.
“I think I was always interested in travelling—from the moment I started earning money I was saving to go travelling,” she says.
“The bottom line is you need to be curious, you need to be able to ask questions, and the simplest of questions, and the most obvious questions often lead to surprising answers or surprising lines of inquiry.
“And you need to listen. That’s actually one of the things I think we have to really remember in this fast-paced era of journalism where there are so many demands on our time.
“There’s a real danger that you can go out and ask just this, this, and this, but you might be missing a far better story if you’re not open to it.”
Her desire to become a journo started as a child, and has not waned since she was accepted as one of the few school leavers ever to be awarded a coveted ABC cadetship.
“Probably from around about seven I wanted to be a journalist,” she says.
“I always liked writing, and I was always interested in stories and just finding out about people.
“I used to write letters to the local paper, I wrote into essay competitions and I did journalism workshops in my holidays.
“I still think just get out there, do whatever you can whether it’s doing something in a voluntary capacity at a radio station…it’s only going to help you in the long run.”
Her experiences reporting from challenging regimes around the world has informed her concern about recent developments threatening press freedom in Australia.
“It is very important that we fight for whistleblower protection and also protection for the press,” she says.
“In the US and the UK that’s enshrined—it’s not in Australia. And it’s all right to say oh yeah we appreciate it, well ok you appreciate it, let’s enshrine that in law.
“Why are we journalists? We are journalists because we want to make sure that our democracy works well. We want to make sure that those are treated unjustly have a voice. We want to make sure that those in positions of power are conducting themselves in a way that befits their position.
“It’s not about journalism, it’s about democracy, and its about you Australians living in a place where you can say what you want, that the machinery of government is working well, that corporations are being responsible, that unions are being responsible and not corrupt.
“If journalists aren’t asking the questions who are?”
Beyond the pod
It’s been another big week for The Wandering Journo! This week I was one of the amazing Kelly Higgins-Devine’s guests on her “What Do You Reckon” panel on ABC Brisbane. And I was a panellist with Christopher Wayne—a very Batman name but actually one of the naked magicians who has just come back from a season in no less than LAS VEGAS. I mean truly how fantastic is that. So after he spoke about how amazing his life is I got to talk about, well, my excitement about hopper ants and getting my first magazine cover story. That’s ok—I’m still proud!
You can hear the conversation with Christopher here:
Or if you’re in a more bookish mood, you might want to snuggle up with a blankie for a few minutes and listen to me read part of A.A. Milne’s stunning book House at Pooh Corner. Kelly Higgins-Devine got us to pick our favourite book passage for Australian Reading Hour which was celebrated last week. I won’t ruin the meaning this book has for me by telling you here, in the hope it encourages you to take a minute to listen to it instead. Some books are for reading in your head, some are for reading aloud. This is one of those. And it’s NOT just a kids book. House at Poor Corner has wandered with me for most of my life, from a dusty antiquarian bookshop in Brisbane all around Australia on my various postings, and back to Brisbane again.
So get your cuppa, and sit and listen to a bit of timeless nostalgia while I read about Winnie the Pooh and Christopher Robin here. I think this is where I first got the idea that wandering is indeed a very useful way to spend your time.
What I’m reading
For the absolutely comprehensive rundown on who’s going to make it to the top of the mountain that is the Rugby World Cup, you can’t beat this article from the New York Times. It drills down right to who the most influential players and teams are from each pool—and the way the results have played out so far it’s pretty much right on the money. This writer clearly loves his rugby!
The Rugby World Cup, which opens Friday in Tokyo, is likely to be about which of the 19 other teams has the right stuff to knock the two-time defending champion New Zealand All Blacks off their throne.
A Look at the Teams in the Rugby World Cup —NY Times
And this article took me right back to my cadetship days at Quest Newspapers’ The Wynnum Herald, my time at the ABC Port Augusta outpost, and to Broken Hill ABC where I was presenter and producer of the morning show for six months. It also echoes a beautiful sentiment in Dominique’s podcast where she speaks so eloquently about the importance of the local journo! I realise now the incredible responsibility I had in those smaller places where the voices of journalists are few—unlike when you’re the big national reporter competing against so many other voices and outlets. So hooray for the local reporter on the front line of democracy!
Of all the jobs I’ve had as a journalist, the one that now looms as the most important—the one where, I have come to believe, I had the most impact—was the four years I spent as a general assignment reporter for my hometown paper.
Back to the homefront —Trust, Media & Democracy
And now for the ICYMI file and the keep-your-Tuesday-night-this-week-free file too, here’s a link to the recent Lisa Millar episode of The Journo Project (or listen on Whooshkaa).
You can listen to it before you tune in to her special Foreign Correspondent Report this Tuesday night at 8pm. (Watch the trailer, available now.)
Upcoming
Next Monday’s podcast of Streets of Your Town—The Journo Project sent straight to your inbox, features the amazing journo and Paralympian Karni Liddell.
And proving yet again that The Journo Project is ahead of the curve, you can listen to Karni next Monday straight from your inbox, and then go and see her amazing speaking skills live at an October 10 event! I first saw Karni speak at last year’s Women in Media conference and was BLOWN AWAY by her passion and storytelling ability.
SCREEN QUEENSLAND R.I.D.E SHOWCASE AT BIFF
Running as part of the BIFF program, featuring Karni Liddell as a keynote, the day will feature a number of thought-provoking and informative panel discussions with special guests from across the industry.
Showcasing local and national screen success stories, the event aims to inspire new and emerging practitioners – helping them to develop their careers and chart pathways that encourage greater diversity in the screen sector.
Karni Liddell is a former world record holder, Paralympic swimmer, speaker, TV presenter, Mother and clinical social worker. Karni was born with a neuro-muscular wasting disease and her parents were told that their first-born child wouldn’t walk, crawl or live past her teenage years.
Karni broke her first World Record at the age of 14 and she went on to win medals at every Paralympics she competed at and she regards being captain of the Number 1 team at the Sydney 2000 Games as her greatest sporting achievement.
An internationally-acclaimed and sought-after keynote speaker, Karni’s TED speech has been watched by thousands of people around the world and was the only TED speaker on the day to receive a standing ovation.
Merch!
Another happy keep cup owner this week is David Harris, past science journalist but now artist and designer here in Brisbane, enjoying a cuppa on a perfect Spring morning.
Are you loving The Journo Project podcasts? Then become a paid subscriber and you too can get a limited edition keep cup to give an extra kick to your cup of Joe in the morning on your way to work.
Thanks to you all, my Wandering Journo tribe!
See you in a week!
If you believe in journalism and wish to support it, subscribe to the paid version of this newsletter. The same content is free for anybody but your support helps sustain this podcast.
Get full access to Streets of Your Town: The Journo Project at soyt.substack.com/subscribe
This tenacious journo was recently recognised as South Australia's Journalist of the Year for the second year in a row, for her relentless investigations. Angelique Johnson believes in the power of gut instinct, and tells me on The Journo Project podcast how she would encourage all journalists to spend time nurturing and developing this undervalued resource, in their quest to uncover stories that matter. Her groundbreaking stories exposed abuse and mismanagement at the Oakden nursing home, sparking a government investigation and eventually its closure.
See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.
Angelique Donnellan (in green) reports on a press conference by former Prime Minister Tony Abbott
This tenacious journo started her career in some of South Australia’s most remote locations, as a junior reporter for the ABC.
This year, Angelique was recognised with the award of South Australia’s Journalist of the Year for the second year in a row, for her relentless investigations.
Angelique believes in the power of gut instinct, and tells me on The Journo Project podcast how she would encourage all journalists to spend time nurturing and developing this undervalued resource, in their quest to uncover stories that matter.
Her groundbreaking stories exposed abuse and mismanagement at the Oakden nursing home, sparking a government investigation and eventually its closure.
“The Oakden scandal was one of those strange stories that once you started digging into it, it was a bit of a puzzle, the pieces started to fit together and you could build on it,” she says.
“It was one of those stories, and this is another bit of advice I have, trust your gut, when something seems off dig a little deeper. If you think the answers aren’t there, ask the questions.
“Definitely with investigative journalism I trust my gut a lot. Don’t accept things at face value at all. Dig and dig and dig and persevere would be my recommendation.
“Always follow up would be another tip of mine, there might be a story that seems like a one hit, but often they’re not. Dig a little deeper and it’s part of a bigger issue.
“As it went on month by month, we put the pieces of the puzzle together and found out there was systemic abuse and neglect at this facility.”
Angelique has gained a deserved reputation for unearthing stories that have otherwise gone unnoticed, such as her reports on pet food causing serious illnesses in dogs—which led to a Senate inquiry.
“The pet food industry is self-regulated, which a lot of people find hard to believe,” she says.
“At the end of the day you don’t really know what’s in your pet food and the standards to which it’s been made.
“There were things like plastics and metals in pet food, materials that in human food would promote a recall to alert the wider public, but in the pet food industry there’s no need to issue a recall because there are no laws surrounding that. It’s such a big industry, billions of dollars.”
The advice she would give journos starting out is “just be prepared to work hard”.
Angelique (right) with her sister and photographer legend Tricia Watkinson.
She remembers early in her career narrowly missing out on the ABC cadetship, and despite her disappointment, learning resilience from that experience.
“After that I started off a few days a week as a casual employee with ABC in Adelaide, and that was definitely straight into the deep end,” she recalls.
“I got quite a few of the 2-10pm shifts which on one hand you think, terrible hours, but on the other hand, a lot of good stories would happen, if there were any emergencies late at night, you’re writing up the news stories for the next morning. So it actually was a really great start. You had to learn fast.”
She then worked in a range of regional postings, from Port Pirie, to the outback town of Broken Hill, and Mount Gambier in South Australia’s south-east.
She says it’s in those remote towns that she honed her journalistic craft, and she still calls on those skills she learnt today.
“The thing about Broken Hill, having come from a big city. You felt quite isolated. It does feel like it’s in the middle of nowhere,” she says.
“I can remember how different it was to live in a place like that, in a big city you take water for granted, so it was my first real experience of just how hard it is in regional communities.
“I wouldn’t be the person I am today without that experience. You had a bulletin you had to put together each and every day and it was up to you to find stories...the bulletin has to go to air.
“You always got enough stories. You always made it happen.”
Beyond the pod
It’s been a big week for The Wandering Journo! On Saturday I was thrilled to get my first magazine cover story—with the Adelaide Advertiser’s SA Weekend magazine. Watch out for those Hopper Ants they are NASTY! Really proud to be able to shine a light on such an important issue and such groundbreaking research from Australian scientists.
Unfortunately it’s behind a paywall—but if you’re in SA you hopefully bought a copy on the weekend. For those of you who have a News Corp subscription you can read the story here: Trapped by Deadly Hopper Ants in the Adelaide Hills.
What I’m reading
This story is quite revealing about the assumptions we make about our success…and how few of them may be true.
From the socio-economic situation we are born to, or the education we receive; to the colour of our skin and gender we identify with: all of these things affect the opportunities we are offered.
Privilege is the hidden ingredient for success that we don’t talk about enough —ABC News
While this feature shows me how we can rediscover our mojo in the most unlikely of places...
“To have that space around me and that separation from society, that’s where the magic happens. You can just strip everything away and start again.”
How five months in the wilds of New Zealand gave Laura the courage to change her life —ABC News
This last story is just a great validation of our common need across the species to swap songs and get together I think!
The music made by male humpback whales is instantly recognizable. Rich and haunting, it mixes disparate pitches and textures in a way most human musicians wouldn’t dare.
In the South Pacific, a Humpback Whale Karaoke Lounge —New York Times
Upcoming
Next Monday’s episode of Streets of Your Town—The Journo Project, sent straight to your inbox, features the ABC’s national Rural and Regional Affairs reporter Dominique Schwartz. She was one of the founding members of the ABC’s iconic program Foreign Correspondent. Since then she has been shot at in the Middle East, and reported from the scenes of devastating mine collapses and attempted rescues in New Zealand and Chile. Dominique Schwartz now calls Brisbane home, when she’s not travelling from one end of Australia to the other. Her desire to become a journo started as a child, and has not waned since she was accepted as one of the few school leavers ever to be awarded a coveted ABC cadetship. She tells me on this next episode of the Journo Project podcast, how she still has the fire in her belly to tell the stories from places less travelled, and how concerned she is by recent developments threatening press freedom in Australia.
If you believe in journalism and wish to support it, subscribe to the paid version of this newsletter. The same content is free for anybody but your support helps sustain this podcast.
Get full access to Streets of Your Town: The Journo Project at soyt.substack.com/subscribe
This brave journo reported from the highlands of Papua New Guinea before women were given the proper credit they deserved for the stories they gathered. Maureen Mopio-Jane has covered some of that country's most difficult stories, from Bougainville, to the horrendous levels of domestic violence that continue to haunt the nation's families. She tells me on this episode of Streets of Your Town-The Journo Project podcast, how crucial radio continues to be in Papua New Guinea, and how from a very young age she wanted to be the voice coming out of that box.
See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.
This brave journo bravely reported from the highlands of Papua New Guinea before women were given the proper credit they deserved for the stories they gathered.
Maureen Mopio-Jane has covered some of that country’s most difficult stories, from Bougainville, to the horrendous levels of domestic violence that continue to haunt the nation’s families.
She tells me on this episode of Streets of Your Town—The Journo Project how crucial radio was and continues to be in Papua New Guinea, and how from a very young age she wanted to be the voice coming out of the radio.
“It started when I was a little girl and my Dad was a politician and he was interested in self government in 1973,” Maureen says.
“So he would sit us around this box…which was the ABC at that time, and listen to talks of self government and people like Sir Michael Somare at that time trying to be leaders.
“He would sit us around the box and then I thought that the voice is coming out from it—it was very magical and all that.
“And I was thinking—I’d really like to be the voice in that box.”
Maureen went on to be a newsreader and reporter for NBC in Papua New Guinea. She also worked as a TV reporter for EMTV, a PNG TV company, where she covered the riots in Lae Morobe Province and covered stories in Bougainville.
“Unfortunately I didn’t get credit for it, but I got a television set and a letter to say that, congratulations, you covered a very important story,” she says.
Maureen also reported on the scourge of domestic violence in her community, well before it was accepted as a topic that should be discussed.
She now works as a producer and broadcaster for 4EB Radio in Brisbane, and continues to use innovative approaches to gather her stories.
Above: Classical lndian singer Menaka Thomas with Maureen Mopio-Jane.
For her last series on climate change, she brought together various interest groups to ensure they were all heard as part of the project.
“What is climate change in the Pacific? People tend to ask,” she says.
“Oral tradition is important. So I had a ‘listening party’ for my climate change project.
“And we say, if the people are having sea flooded around their houses and homes and gardens and affecting the water system and all that sort of stuff, how can you explain that things are happening?
“So that’s why I thought, oh, I need to tell the stories that people know that there’s something happening in the Pacific.
“Storytelling techniques is very, I guess, it’s traditionally told and passed on from my relatives and ancestors down. So that’s why I was able to tell this story.”
Above: Dr Noritta Diop with Maureen Mopio-Jane at the recent First Nations conference at Mt Samson.
Today, Maureen continues to fight for a more inclusive and diverse range of stories in the international media, particularly from the Pacific region.
“Look at it from all different angles rather than one person doing a story or gathering comments from everybody else who are involved in that story,” she says.
“That way you get a broad perspective of the whole story and get the right people to talk on it. If it’s in the Pacific, it’s not only just PNG. You have Micronesia, you have Polynesia, you have Melanesia. It’s all different.”
She’s concerned about recent threats to press freedom in Australia after the AFP raids on News Corp and ABC, particularly from her experience reporting from Papua New Guinea where those freedoms were not as well established.
“It’s a human right and it’s a right to have to speak freely,” she says.
“I guess we’ve come to a country that’s a free country. And we exercise the freedom of press and exercise the freedom of speech as opposed to back in Pacific islands, the little snippets of a freedom of press being threatened here and there.”
Behind the scenes
While putting together this week’s edition of The Journo Project, I also managed to squeeze in a quick Q&A with comedian extraordinaire Mikey Robins for the Brisbane Writer’s Festival! It was fantastic catching up with him at Mantra Hotel at Southbank surrounded by fascinated fans all keen to hear about his very aptly titled book Seven Deadly Sins and One Very Naughty Fruit.
Of course one of the questions was when are going to get Good News Week back on our screens? Sad news from Mikey though is that he can’t see that happening any time soon. Not because the crew don’t get on anymore, in fact he had lunch with Paul McDermott a couple of weeks ago: “And I picked up the tab—so nothing’s changed”. But Mikey says the TV networks just aren’t willing to pay for a staff of six comedians writing such brilliant one liners any more, as the whole funding model for television has changed. Pretty good explanation for why there’s so much relentless reality tv on the box!
Beyond the pod
Congrats to our very own Journo Project podcast interviewee and legend Mark Willacy—his legendary status has now been officially recognised by the Queensland Clarion Awards as Journalist of the Year! Proof yet again that The Journo Project is ahead of the curve, which you my loyal Wandering Journo tribe make possible with your support. Hurrah and congrats for Mark—let’s celebrate by listening to his episode again!
What I’m reading
“But the Pacific is a region that has long hosted alternative expressions of gender, and this current cultural moment has given its peoples a chance to contribute to a global conversation.”
“Fa'afafine, fakaleitī, fakafifine — understanding the Pacific's alternative gender expressions” —ABC News, 31 August 2019
Reading this article gave me so much joy and took me right back to when Andrew and I travelled to Samoa for the most glorious holiday more than a decade ago. I put together a story on the Fafafine pageant for Saturday AM while I was there—typical Wandering Journo I can never turn my storytelling brain off even when I’m on holidays! Here’s a link to that story too: “Samoa holds traditional cross-gender community pageant”
I remember meeting Velda in a market in Apia, and being so struck by her grace and confidence. She was so beautifully patient explaining the long tradition of fafafine to me as well. We have so much to learn about tolerance from our brothers and sisters in the Pacific!
And this story is straight from the putting a smile on your dial department of feel good quirky yarns—my favourite ones to write as well as read.
“Max uses a unique, trust-based training method taught by Tara Lea and Russell Osborne from Camel Connection at Lakes Entrance in Victoria, which enables him to take a camel from the wild, and within two days have a lead on it. By four months, he’s milking it.”
“How a blind man is taming one of Australia's best kept secrets” —ABC News
I remember eating camel roast when I was a reporter in Port Augusta, and thinking it was better than beef! Fascinating how good their milk is for us as well. The friendship this beautiful man has with his herd is stunning, and thought provoking too.
And who wants to come with me to see this? I am so there…
“Franklin is certainly presented at the height of her power in the resynced, remastered result—a film that moves and breathes with the urgency of the moment.”
“Aretha Franklin dazzles in new doco Amazing Grace, featuring never-before-released footage” —ABC News
Upcoming
Next Monday’s episode of Streets of Your Town—The Journo Project sent straight to your inbox, features the South Australian Journalist of the Year for two years running, Angelique Donnellan. She started her career in some of South Australia’s most remote locations, as a junior reporter for the ABC. Her relentless investigations range from exposing abuse and mismanagement at the Oakden nursing home, sparking a government investigation and eventually it’s closure, to her reports on the pet food industry which led to a Senate inquiry. Angelique believes in the power of gut instinct, and tells me on The Journo Project podcast how she would encourage all journalists to spend time nurturing and developing this undervalued resource, in their quest to uncover stories that matter.
Merch!
“The only way to start to day!”
So says the Chief of Staff of Cairns ABC and beautiful human Fiona Sewell—showing the Wandering Journo’s influence is spreading far and wide around the country and around the world! Are you loving The Journo Project podcasts? Then become a paid subscriber at this link and you too can get a limited edition keep cup to give an extra kick to your cup of Joe in the morning on your way to work.
Thanks to you all, my Wandering Journo tribe!
See you in a week!
If you believe in journalism and wish to support it, subscribe to the paid version of this newsletter. The same content is free for anybody but your support helps sustain this podcast.
Get full access to Streets of Your Town: The Journo Project at soyt.substack.com/subscribe
Peter Ryan's expose of the Commonwealth Bank scandal and more than 53-thousand alleged breaches of anti-money laundering and terror financing laws, won him a Walkley Award for the best coverage of a major event or issue. But renowned ABC senior business correspondent Peter Ryan proudly tells The Journo Project, that he doesn't have a business degree, and doesn't need one to keep the big financial players in Australia accountable. Peter Ryan has used the same journalistic rigour for all the roles he has taken in the newsroom over decades, from leading the ABC's US bureau in the 90's, through to his business expertise today. He says he still applies principles that he first learnt as a junior reporter in the Sydney tabloid The Daily Mirror.
See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.
Australian Broadcasting Corporation’s Senior Business correspondent Peter Ryan is a firm believer in the importance of breaking down financial complexities in his reporting.
His expose of the Commonwealth Bank scandal and more than 53,000 alleged breaches of anti-money laundering and terror financing laws, won him a Walkley Award for the best coverage of a major event or issue.
But, as he proudly tells The Journo Project, he doesn’t have a business degree and doesn’t need one to keep the big financial players in Australia accountable.
“I was musing last year when we were covering the Banking Royal Commission and I was on the air with AM and in a Q&A on the program and I said after 30 years of being a journalist and having been a police rounds reporter, I felt that the Banking Royal Commission was more about being a crime story than it was being a finance story,” Peter says.
“When you look at white collar crime, which there tends to be a bit of a gulf between that and normal, regular crime by criminals…it is people being robbed, having their bank accounts played with, fees being charged when no service was provided.
“People who put money into Superannuation funds looking for a retirement nest egg and discovering that it's been eaten away by fees or advisor commissions. It is a crime story and a number of people have lost their jobs.
"No one’s going to jail as a result of the Royal Commission, but there have been some big heads that have rolled right at the top of banks.
“And so it’s important that we report these issues in a way that people will understand.”
Peter Ryan has used the same journalistic rigour for all the roles he has taken in the newsroom over decades, from leading the ABC’s US bureau in the ’90s, through to his business expertise today. He says he still applies principles that he first learnt as a junior reporter at the Daily Mirror in the glory days of Sydney’s afternoon newspapers.
He’s very concerned about the recent raids by Australian federal police on his journalistic colleagues at ABC and at News Corporation, and the implications for press freedom and democracy in Australia.
“It certainly is a worrying situation when just around the corner from where we're speaking the federal police were going through files and they had the oversight of the ABC's executive editor John Lyons who was there with them and he was live tweeting this whole event which was extraordinary,” he says.
“It’s also incredibly important that the public was able to see what was happening.
“ABC News 24 broadcast that as well and so I think that really showed journalists here what can happen if you have a situation where supposedly independent agencies such as the federal police do have these powers to raid, and to be concerned whether they were doing this more so to scare off other whistle blowers or leakers."
Beyond the pod
More important media follow-ups for The Journo Project podcast of late—the word is growing thanks to you, my Journo Project subscribing supporters! This week it was Griffith University’s Machinery of Government site using my wrap of The Journo Project so far.
It was wonderful putting together a special wrap up edition of the podcast and interviewees like Hedley Thomas, Trent Dalton, Peter Greste, Mark Willacy, and Adele Ferguson, tied in with important perspectives from media law guru Professor Mark Pearson and Griffith Review legend Julianne Schultz. You can listen to that podcast and read their perspectives.
And a couple of my recent podcast subjects are having big weeks—if you needed any proof that Streets of Your Town is ahead of the curve, here you go!
Hedley Thomas—my first episode of The Journo Project—will speak at a big Walkley Foundation event in Perth soon about Press Freedom—one of the big recurring themes of The Journo Project podcast!
Take the opportunity to share Hedley’s episode of The Journo Project here and get people talking about why media freedom matters to our democracy! (https://soyt.substack.com/p/how-hedley-thomas-made-a-world-renowned)
And for the ICYMI file: I cannot describe my excitement that one of my previous Streets of Your Town interviewees has made the big break in New York! Congratulations to Kurt Phelan—Home Hill boy and now lead in the New York Broadway production of Rent, the musical! Some of you may remember he graced the Aussie stage as Johnny in Dirty Dancing: the Musical.
He was kind enough to be featured in my podcast Streets of Your Town in one of my favourite episodes too, where he spoke so candidly about the joys and challenges of the actor’s life. Congrats Kurt and thanks for showing me your positivity in tough times, giving me faith that if you follow your passion and ride that roller coaster out, dreams can come true. So proud of you! You can hear Kurt’s interview all over again at this link: https://player.whooshkaa.com/episode?id=297017
What I’m reading
“Adut Akech is a 19-year-old modeling superstar. But after a magazine misidentified her in a photo, she says she is no longer staying quiet about racism in the industry.”
“She’s a World-Famous Model. So Why Did an Australian Magazine Get Her Photo Wrong?” — New York Times
This is such an important debate on race that Australia seems to keep having to revisit over and over. Sometimes I find it’s the overseas-based companies such as The New York Times who can pass a fresh eye over the cultural dilemmas that lead to such awful situations.
Upcoming
Next Monday’s episode of Streets of Your Town—The Journo Project, sent straight to your inbox, features amazing Papua New Guinean reporter legend Maureen Mopio-Jane. She bravely reported from the highlands of Papua New Guinea before women were given the proper credit they deserved for the stories they gathered. Maureen has covered some of that country’s most difficult stories, from Bougainville, to the horrendous levels of domestic violence that continue to haunt the nation’s families. She tells Streets of Your Town—The Journo Project how crucial radio was and continues to be in Papua New Guinea and how from a very young age she wanted to be the voice coming out of that box. Today, Maureen continues to fight for a more inclusive and diverse range of stories in the international media, particularly from the Pacific region.
Thanks to you my Journo Project Tribe—see you in a week!
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Lisa Millar has been in the reporting game for decades, working as a journo everywhere from small outback Australian towns to New York, Washington and London. The long time ABC foreign correspondent and now co-host of ABC News Breakfast recalls the many moves she has made as a foreign correspondent over the years to go to where the stories are breaking. She proudly started her lifetime of storytelling in the small Queensland town of Kilkivan where she lived until she was about ten years old. Lisa Millar tells me on this episode of The Journo Project how she's always found a way to find great stories, meet great people, and make great friends, finding happiness wherever she is based. "I think I am learning things every single day about this job that we are doing," she says. "I love it. It's my family."
See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.
Lisa Millar has been in the reporting game for decades, working as a journo everywhere from small outback Australian towns to New York, Washington and London.
The long time ABC foreign correspondent and now co-host of ABC News Breakfast recalls the many moves she has made as a foreign correspondent over the years to go to where the stories are breaking.
“I have certainly bounced around a bit over the years,” she says.
“I’ve lived in some of the biggest cities in the world and some of the smallest towns in Australia so I feel like I’ve had a great taste of everything.”
She proudly started her lifetime of storytelling in the small Queensland town of Kilkivan where she lived until she was about ten years old.
“Kilkivan back then had a population of about 400—we didn’t live in town, we were about a kilometre or two out of town which made us feel even more isolated,” Lisa says.
“It was such a small place that on a Friday afternoon it was a big deal to do a trip into town to go to the library and be able to get out a couple of books and 20 cents worth of mixed lollies.
“And I actually think that is where my love of reading and writing began, before anything to do with journalism.
“I remember interviewing members of the family with a tape recorder and feeling oh so very important.”
Lisa Millar tells me on this episode of The Journo Project how she’s always found a way to find great stories, meet great people, and make great friends, finding happiness wherever she is based.
“I turned 50 earlier this year and I think I am learning things every single day about this job that we are doing,” she says.
“I love it. It’s my family.
“I think everyone has a story.
“You just need to sometimes be quiet and that’s something I’ve learned over the years, is just being quiet.
“There is a real art form and technique to knowing when to just actually shut up and let someone tell their story.
“They might pause, and there might be silence, but you just stay silent, and then they’ll feel that comfort of revealing something of themselves that they may not have otherwise.”
She was looking forward to settling back into Queensland life until being offered what is now her new role co-hosting three hours of live television every weekday on ABC News Breakfast from Melbourne.
“I am so lucky that I wake up every day, even if it is at 3 o’clock in the morning, thinking ‘I love this job!’, and I cannot believe that I can still say this after 32 years of doing this job,” she says.
Lisa tells me how some of her most memorable stories have come from the most unlikely of places.
“You sort of get into this situation where your normal is the normal—you think is normal—and then when you step back you go ‘wow that was so not normal’,” she says.
“I think everyone makes sacrifices if they go overseas.
“There is a certain danger element in it. There are personal sacrifices that you have to make. I would thoroughly say to people, my god, it was the best time of my life. The experiences of it were just incredible.”
Behind the scenes
As I started my interview with Lisa in one of the famous “Tardis” booths at ABC Brisbane—in-between her publicity interviews for her move to Melbourne to co-host ABC Breakfast—she was telling me with great excitement about how she was on the front page of the Gympie Times—again! As you will hear in the podcast, Lisa was a cadet at the paper, moving up there half way through her final year of her university degree when she was offered a cadetship, after the existing cadet left the office in a blaze of glory. It proves to me one of my favourite sayings, you can’t predict the wind but you can set the sails! It seems to me that Lisa is an expert at setting her sails to suit whatever posting she is in around the country or around world: a rare talent that proves her commitment to her journalism calling.
As she tells me on this episode of The Journo Project:
“I worked for the Gympie Times for two years, they taught me the basics,” she says.
“When people ask for advice about journalism I say ‘Go out to the regional areas if you can’. There are so few opportunities out there these days sadly.
“But starting at the Gympie Times and not in the city I just credit with so much of who I am.”
In the backstreets
A couple of my recent podcast subjects are having big weeks—if you needed any proof that Streets of Your Town is ahead of the curve, here you go!
Peter Greste is hosting an important discussion on press freedom at the Sydney Opera House on September 1, titled “My Crime is Journalism”. Here’s a link if you want to revisit his episode of Streets of Your Town—The Journo Project, or listen on Spotify, or you can even go back through your personalised emails and get the link that way! His comment on the McDonaldisation of news is one of my standout favourite from the series so far.
Peter Greste:
Everyone keeps talking about the business models for journalism. If we talk about business models, the underlying assumption is that it's okay to consider news as a commodity to be bought and sold. Think about it in these terms, if we prioritise only those stories which are popular, then we'll only end up with the McDonald's of news. Now we all know that if all we consume is McDonald's, we'll end up with diabetes. So you got to eat your greens, you got to have your spinach, you got to have some salads and some broccoli from time to time.
Nance Haxton:
It's all right to have a bit of McDonald's, just not too much McDonald's.
Peter Greste:
It's okay for some McDonald's from time to time, that's great. We all love it, we all need it, there's nothing wrong with it. But you've also got to have a balanced diet. The same goes for our news.
Nance Haxton:
That's what we need to argue for.
Peter Greste:
That's what we need to argue for. We need to recognise the importance of news as a public good.”
Also, the amazingly talented lawyer Carol Taylor from series 1 of Streets of Your Town is featuring in the Mercedes Benz Fashion Festival Brisbane. Her fashion creations catering for the needs of people with a disability are absolutely stunning—get to the parade this Wednesday night in Brisbane if you can!
If you want to remind yourself of how incredible Carol Taylor is—and how her designs are changing the face of fashion hopefully worldwide—you can listen to her episode of Streets of Your Town on Spotify.
What I’m reading
They say our people were born on the water. When it occurred, no one can say for certain. Perhaps it was in the second week, or the third, but surely by the fourth, when they had not seen their land or any land for so many days that they lost count. It was after the fear had turned to despair and the despair to resignation and the resignation gave way, finally, to resolve.
‘1619’—A New York Times Audio Series
I know we’re all pressed for time, but wow I have to recommend this podcast to you for an incredible example of what high end seamless audio can achieve—put together by a much bigger team than my solo Journo Project! The New York Times podcast 1619, is an immersive historical audio documentary looking at slavery in the United States, and how the ramifications of it still ripple through US society today. Absolutely brilliant. This is one to listen to in a quiet space, where you can truly absorb its impact. Just promise me you won’t just read the transcript—listen to it as it is meant to be digested!
Upcoming
Next Monday’s episode of Streets of Your Town—The Journo Project, sent straight to your inbox, features ABC Senior Business correspondent Peter Ryan. His expose of the Commonwealth Bank scandal and more than 53,000 alleged breaches of anti-money laundering and terror financing laws won him a Walkley Award for the best coverage of a major event or issue. But this renowned business journo doesn’t have a business degree, and tells me he doesn’t need one to keep the big financial players in Australia accountable. Peter Ryan has used the same journalistic rigour for all the roles he has taken on in the newsroom over decades, from leading the ABC’s US bureau in the 90s, through to his business expertise today. I can’t wait for you to hear how he still applies principles that he first learned as a junior reporter in newspapers.
Thanks to you my Journo Project Tribe—see you in a week!
If you believe in journalism and wish to support it, subscribe to the paid version of this newsletter. The same content is free for anybody but your support helps sustain this podcast.
Get full access to Streets of Your Town: The Journo Project at soyt.substack.com/subscribe
Award winning journo Isabella Higgins confidently says that as a proud Torres Strait Islander, she knows a black and white future is possible for Australia. She is the Indigenous Affairs Correspondent for the Australian Broadcasting Corporation, often travelling from her Sydney base to some of the most remote outback locations, to bring to the nation the stories of the oldest continuing culture on earth. Isabella tells me in this episode of The Journo Project, how she aims to elevate Indigenous voices to a more regular part of the national conversation.
See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.
This journo has bravely told her story of the racism she’s experienced and overcome growing up as an Indigenous woman in Australia, and how it has informed her award winning reporting.
Isabella Higgins confidently says that as a proud Torres Strait Islander, she knows a black and white future is possible for this nation.
She is now the Indigenous Affairs Correspondent for the Australian Broadcasting Corporation, often travelling from her Sydney base to some of the most remote outback locations, to bring to the nation the stories of the oldest continuing culture on earth.
Isabella tells me in this episode of The Journo Project how she aims to elevate Indigenous voices to a more regular part of the national conversation.
“I think our media is mostly made up of white journalists and sometimes it is really hard for a broader audience to understand why this issue is important,” Isabella says.
“Or without the context of understanding, it's easy to kind of frame it in another way. So I always see it as my job. You've got to give so much context to everyone about, why is this important, why should everyone be listening and paying attention to this?
“And I think if you do it in the right way and you bring people with you and you make people realise, these are Australian stories, they're really important. People can be really receptive and really touched and can really see the amazing spirit and strength of all these communities.”
Above: Mitchell Wollnough, Isabella Higgins and Dean Caron on the road.
As the winner of the 2019 Walkleys Young Australian Journalist of the Year Award for Shortform Journalism, Isabella says it’s important for young people to gain confidence in their news sense and storytelling, so their perspective is heard in the newsroom and in the news.
“In the earlier stages of your career, if someone says it's not a good story, it's pretty easy to think, ‘Okay, it's not good enough.’ And just leave it right there,” she says.
“But the longer you work in the game, the easier it is to spot a story. You kind of know what people like to see and read and hear.
“And now it's at a point where I don't get too many of my stories knocked back, thankfully. And it's pretty great that the ABC has invested in this role. And so Indigenous stories are seen as important.
“I think the most important thing that we do now is to bring a diversity of voices to the stories that we do.
“Because I think in Indigenous affairs, and broadly the news, it's often the loudest voices that get heard the most. And sometimes it is the people who don't have the microphone, who really do need to have their stories told or whose perspective is so often missed in the really important arguments.”
She says diversity of stories in our news bulletins should reflect broader Australian society.
“It's so important because Australia's a diverse country and we should be representing Australia and the issues that Australians care about,” she says.
“And we're looking at now, how do we make people engage with news? Well you need to make sure all Australians feel represented and you need to make sure that they are stories that impact their lives.”
Isabella encourages all people to report more Indigenous issues, with her biggest advice being “always make sure you have Indigenous voices at the centre of the story”.
“I think in this day and age the most offensive thing you can do is have someone whitesplain an Indigenous issue,” Isabella says.
“And I'm not saying that you can't have white people in a story because this is Australia. Black and white people work together.
“I think it's really important to be sensitive about the Indigenous people you use as well. Are they the representatives from this community? So if you know you've got the respected elders speaking on an issue, then you can be pretty sure that these are the people who were trusted in the community to speak out and you can be pretty confident that they represent the views of their community.”
And here’s the proof of life pic: Isabella and I in the utilitarian surrounds of ABC studios in Sydney’s Ultimo doing our face to face interview for The Journo Project. I was lucky enough to grab Isabella between the amazing assignments that take her from one end of this amazing country to the other. She loves my Wandering Journo logo—as you can see! And I love her perspective as a successful and insightful young reporter. It’s important to me that The Journo Project covers a diverse range of reporters around Oz—thank you to my wonderful paid subscribers who have helped this vision become a reality!
What I’m reading
AFL legend Adam Goodes ended his glittering footy career at the centre of a racial row. In a new film he tells his story.
The mark of truth - The Weekend Australian
Sadly the bulk of this story is behind the News Corp paywall, and if there was ever a story that deserved to be released from the paywall for the importance of the wider community to access it, it’s this one. Or perhaps consider becoming a paid subscriber like I am so you can read this and other stories from the Weekend Oz in their entirety. I just love the Weekend Australian’s long form arts coverage and magazine. It’s where so many of Australia’s great journalists get to spread their wings and fly.
I’ll be seeing The Australian Dream this weekend, and I hope you can too. These are important national discussions to be had, and I’m excited The Journo Project is part of spreading that conversation too.
Serious foodies are taking their skills back to the regions – and fuelling local economies in the process.
Bringing home the bacon - The Australian
And for the foodies amongst us—and the lucky ones who were at the launch party of The Journo Project only a few short months ago—look at our amazing bamboo entrepreneur Becky! Better get in quickly and get your supplies before they run out.
Upcoming
Next week’s episode of Streets of Your Town—The Journo Project features a journo who I managed to grab for a face to face interview in between filling out the paperwork to break her rental lease, and going on the plane to Melbourne to become co-host of ABC News Breakfast! Lisa Millar spent almost ten years reporting from the US and the UK, starting her secondment with the Twin Towers still burning in New York, and leaving London as Brexit pandemonium took hold. She was looking forward to settling back into Queensland life but is now excited about being in the routine of three hours of live breakfast television every day alongside her old mate Michael Rowland. She tells me on the Journo Project about the highs and lows of the life of a foreign correspondent, and how some of her most memorable stories have come from Australia’s small country towns.
If you believe in journalism and wish to support it, subscribe to the paid version of this newsletter. The same content is free for anybody but your support helps sustain this podcast.
Get full access to Streets of Your Town: The Journo Project at soyt.substack.com/subscribe
Mark Willacy is a renowned investigative journalist for The Australian Broadcasting Corporation, who's won five Walkley Awards for his stories. He's reported for the ABC from some of the world's most isolated areas, and was a former Middle East and North Asia correspondent. Mark tells me on this episode of The Journo Project, that he still aims to make a new contact every week, and goes to extraordinary lengths to protect his sources. He says investigative reporters are having to dust off some of their older methods as well as being expert in the latest digital technologies, to better protect sources in the digital age.
See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.
By his own description, this journalist has escaped some pretty close calls “by the skin of my teeth” in the 30 countries he has reported from. His time as Middle East correspondent was challenging enough but, as the photo below shows, his time in Baghdad, Iraq, came pretty close to ending his splendid career when he was nearly shot by US Marines.
Get full access to Streets of Your Town: The Journo Project at soyt.substack.com/subscribe
He's been in the journalism game for more than four decades, and even with that impressive pedigree still proudly calls himself a hack. While Hugh Riminton's face is familiar to many people around Australia for his Walkley Award winning television work, it's his mellifluous voice for which he is most well known. Hugh has worked in 40 countries around the globe as a foreign correspondent, and now embraces new technologies such as podcasting in his storytelling pursuit. In this episode of Streets of Your Town - The Journo Project podcast, he speaks openly about the high price often paid by journalists on the front line, in order to get the truth out.
See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.
He’s been in the journalism game for more than four decades, and even with that impressive pedigree still proudly calls himself a hack.
While his face is familiar to many people around Australia for his Walkley Award winning television work, it’s his mellifluous voice for which he is most well known.
Hugh Riminton has worked around the globe in more than 40 countries as a foreign correspondent, and now embraces new technologies such as podcasting in his storytelling pursuit.
He co-presents “The Professor and The Hack” podcast with Peter Van Onselen, talking all things politics.
In this episode of The Journo Project, Hugh speaks openly about the high price often paid by journalists on the front line, in order to get the truth out.
“When you're with people who are suffering in all kinds of circumstances, you have to expose yourself to them a little bit. You can't be hard boiled about it,” he says.
“I think you definitely want to be sufficiently restrained in the degree to which you expose your body and soul to the worst of awfulness because otherwise you simply become ineffective.”
Hugh Riminton is one of those rare journos who crosses the public broadcasting and commercial broadcasting divide.
He is Network 10’s National Affairs Editor, while at the same time presenting Sunday Extra on ABC Radio National.
“Really I'm a newsman and I'm curious about what's going on,” he says.
“I don't want to manipulate, there's a temptation to manipulate commercial current affairs. You don't have to do that in news.”
Hugh is concerned that the recent Australian Federal Police raids on News Corp reporter Annika Smethurst and ABC journalist Dan Oakes have worrying ramifications not just for press freedom in Australia, but also for whistleblower protection.
"The primary purpose is to intimidate whistleblowers,” Hugh says.
“What we have to understand here is that we have a situation where people who find information out that is really damaging to our fellow citizens, if they blow the whistle on it, they get punished.
“All of these things are in the public interest to know how our government works, and that they've got a mechanism in place that will jail people for years for doing good things for the country and then harass and intimidate journalists.”
“Everyone should be aware that when people in good faith find out things that are wrong about the way things are operating, they have to be allowed to speak up for the good of the country and not face going to jail at the behest of some really unattractive bullies that we've allowed to take positions of power in this country.”
Even after 40 years in the game, Hugh says journalism for him, is still about the story at its heart.
“It's completely about storytelling,” he says.
“Finding out what's going on and then trying to be honest and about what's going on and try and do it in some kind of narrative clarity. That's the discipline of the game.
“The technology has changed immensely, but the technology will change and change again. It doesn't really matter. All of that is subordinate to the storytelling and just finding out what's going on.”
“Journalism is a fabulous job. And in the course of 40 years, I've met thousands of people of every kind, incredible nobility, decency, self-sacrifice, intellectual rigour, everyone from Stephen Hawking to Nobel prize winners to complete rogues and b**s and murderers and all these things. I've never met anyone who wasn't human and I've never met anyone who wouldn't be within the range of Shakespeare to imagine.
“And if you care about it and you want to tell stories and have a great life, I can't think of a better calling.”
Behind the scenes
It was such a joy to interview Hugh Riminton at the ABC studios at Ultimo in Sydney—not only did he give me half an hour of his precious time for our enjoyment on The Journo Project podcast, but the poor man volunteered to drag my luggage the entire way! Those of you who know my quirks know what a truly horrendous packer I am. So poor Hugh definitely proves that chivalry is not dead if he can drag my heavy luggage around!
What I’m reading
“When Dr Kelly first stumbled across a memory device that was a piece of wood with beads, shells, stones and other found objects carefully nailed onto it, she thought it was a "load of rubbish"—until she made her own.”
Improving your memory using ancient indigenous techniques - ABC News
I absolutely love this article about how to jog memory. There is hope for us all yet—hurrah! Now to find the time to apply some of these tips…
Upcoming—Mark Willacy
Next week’s episode of Streets of Your Town—The Journo Project features a journo who has won Australia’s premier journalism prize—the Walkley Award—five times for his investigative reporting. Mark Willacy has reported for the ABC from more than 30 countries, and was a former Middle East and North Asia correspondent. He’s been named Queensland journalist of the year and this year, won a Logie Award for his Four Corners story on the Thai Cave rescue. Make sure you don’t miss my interview with Mark next week, where he tells me how he still aims to make a new contact every week, and how he goes to extraordinary lengths to protect those sources.
With such an an amazing line up of journos giving rare insights into the craft and the dangers they face making Australia a better society, I hope you will join me in trying to get the word out to more people about The Journo Project podcast. Please share this email with your mates and encourage them to subscribe (there is a free option!) so they get the email straight to their inbox every Monday with the latest amazing journo—and they get it a day before its broader release to iTunes and Spotify and all the other podcast providers! The importance of press freedom and the fight by Australia’s journos to expose wrongdoing needs to get out to more than just journos!
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Merch!
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Until next week my Journo Project tribe!
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In this episode of Streets of Your Town - The Journo Project - I interview eight time Walkley Award winning business writer Adele Ferguson. Her investigations into Australia's financial services, franchising and retirement living industries have sparked numerous inquiries including the Hayne banking royal commission. This year Adele was also made a member of the Order of Australia for her services to journalism. She tells me in this interview for Streets of Your Town The Journo Project - how she gives all the credit to the whistleblowers who played such a crucial part in her investigations, saying the awards are as much theirs as hers.
See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.
She has the reputation as a journalist who goes where many fear to tread, even to the extent of writing the unauthorised biography of Gina Rinehart, the richest woman in Australia.
Adele Ferguson is a multi-award-winning business writer whose investigations into the banking sector, franchising and the retirement living industries have sparked numerous inquiries.
She’s won eight Walkley Awards, two Quills, and this year was also also made a member of the Order of Australia for her services to journalism.
She paid credit to the whistleblowers that have played such a crucial part in her investigations, saying the awards are as much theirs as hers.
“Oh, absolutely,” Adele says. “Without them, none of these stories into the banking system, franchising, wage fraud or retirement villages, would ever have come about without brave whistle-blowers.”
Her work is so respected she is one of the few journos to regularly work across different networks, from the public broadcaster ABC, to leading newspapers such as The Age and Australian Financial Review.
Her investigations go behind corporate spin to expose wrongdoing, with her series of investigations into the banks helping to bring about a Royal Commission into the sector.
As Adele tells me on this episode of Streets of Your Town—The Journo Project podcast, her main motivation after two decades as a reporter is giving vulnerable people a voice.
“I wanted to make a difference,” Adele says.
“I always loved writing, you know? And so maybe it was a calling in a way. I always had an interest in journalism, but I thought maybe politics was the way to really get change. But you know, looking back, I think journalism, you can really get change.”
She says it’s crucial that investigations have a combination of real people telling their stories, and documents to back that up.
“Because if you have the documents, they've got nowhere to go, because the argument that companies have always used is it's a few bad apples, they're isolated cases move on,” she says.
“You've got to get it right because you know, these companies are very powerful and if you get something wrong, they will pounce.”
She says Australia should celebrate its whistleblowers rather than condemn them, as they play such a vital role in society.
“You know the laws do not protect whistleblowers. It's just shocking. In America, they have a whistleblower day. They get rewards,” she says.
“Here, they're seen as snitchers and troublemakers and they're punished.”
Adele is concerned about the wider ramifications of the recent raids on Australian media outlets at the ABC and News Ltd.
“It's chilling, you know, two weeks after the federal election you have, in consecutive days, two different media organisations getting raided,” she says.
“It's frightening because it just has a chilling effect on whistleblowers speaking up, you know, and the impact on the journalists and the organisation, it's just horrendous.
“Don't give up. Don't fall for spin. Always try and cut through.”
Behind the scenes
What’s a girl to do when she’s got a few hours to spare in Melbourne after finishing my interview with Adele but stumble across a superb socially aware coffee and brekky at the Kinfolk Cafe.
Look at this little bowl of happiness served with a smile by amazing volunteer Huk. They address social inclusion through great coffee and seasonal food—with all profits going to charity. Hurrah! Let alone that was the best cuppa, smashed avo and baba ganoosh I think I’ve had in my life. Well worth a visit when you’re in town and say hello to Huk for me!
I then stumbled out the door to follow the throng of Melbournites on their way to their religion of choice—at the MCG of course! My beautiful Melbourne friend and fellow freelancer Elissa Doherty warned me that it wouldn’t be a bad idea to take a sleeping bag—and she was not far off! Man it was bone chilling cold up there in the gods!
What I’m reading
And in a beautiful piece of Journo Project podcast timing, Adele is launching her Banking Bad book this week! In it she tells the full story behind the royal commission into the banking sector. Adele is coming to Brisbane State Library on August 12—and she’s also visiting many other venues around Australia in coming weeks—you can check out this link to see if she’s coming somewhere near you!
For those of you feeling similar to me that this year’s expectations and pace are all just becoming a bit too much, I found this article from the New York Times a massive encouragement!
How to Do Less and Achieve More — NY Times
And now for a giggle—along with a side of sage economic advice on theme with this week’s business journo extraordinaire podcast—digest this one with a cup of coffee at your favourite cafe…
Here’s Some Money Advice: Just Buy the Coffee — NY Times
Upcoming
This week, thanks to the support and contributions from my beautiful Wandering Journo subscriber tribe, the Journo Project podcast travels to Sydney to meet the legendary journo with four decades of evocative storytelling under his belt—Hugh Riminton! This self-described “hack” has won Walkley Awards for his investigations, and has also traversed different networks and media such as television, radio and online with ease. I spoke to Hugh in the ABC studios at Ultimo, just near where he now broadcasts as presenter for Radio National’s Sunday Extra. This on top of his role as National Affairs Editor at Network 10! He tells about his time as a foreign correspondent reporting from more than 40 countries, and his fundamental belief in the importance of the Fourth Estate to keep those in power to account. Hugh will land in your email inbox one click away from your earbuds next Monday—the day before the podcast's release onto iTunes, Spotify and Soundcloud! So keep subscribing to this email, and share it with a friend, and you’ll keep getting great episodes like this ahead of their official release!
Merch!
Wonderful to see a tweet from the amazing Deanna Nott at Wings PR this week live in action listening to the recent Trent Dalton episode on bluetooth through her car stereo!
Thanks Deanna—you’ll be receiving your limited edition Wandering Journo keep cup in the mail very soon to accompany you on those long drives to clients while you’re listening to the podcast!
Thanks to all of you, my wonderful subscribers for your amazing support of my this podcast, Streets of Your Town—The Journo Project! Please share this email link with a few of your friends who will also rally the call to protect press freedom in Australia. Thank you for helping me fulfil the vision I have for The Journo Project: interviewing great Aussie Journos face to face using the highest quality audio so that you feel like you are there as part of the dinner party conversation.
Get full access to Streets of Your Town: The Journo Project at soyt.substack.com/subscribe
In this episode of Streets of Your Town - The Journo Project podcast I interview amazing Network 10 senior journo and presenter Antoinette Lattouf. Antoinette is an award winning journalist who's worked across television, radio and online. She tells me how she was determined not to be pigeonholed as a journalist who could only work for SBS or ABC because of her Lebanese heritage. And Antoinette is now channelling those experiences into her role as director and co-founder of Media Diversity Australia, the new nation-wide not-for-profit organisation run by journalists and communications professionals, working to make the media more reflective of multicultural Australia.
See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.
From a young age, Antoinette Lattouf can remember wanting to tell stories.
“I was fascinated by human stories and journeys and policies,” Antoinette says.
She has now channelled that passion into what she describes as her “dual role” as senior journalist and presenter at Network 10 and director and co-founder of Media Diversity Australia, a not-for-profit organisation that’s working to make news media more reflective of multicultural Australia.
Antoinette says her Lebanese heritage has always been a strong motivator for telling the stories of an often overlooked but significant group of people.
“My parents came over as civil war refugees, and seeing their journey in Australia, but also being at high school when September 11 happened, and then growing up, trying to identify and reconcile being of Arab lineage,” she says.
“I felt really frustrated that my community was spoken about, and there was so much media narrative, and public scrutiny, and our voices were missing. So I guess that inspired me to pursue a career in journalism, even though my father was dead set against it.
“He said, like many migrant parents or immigrant parents, ‘What kind of career is that? Become a doctor or a lawyer or if you don’t want a career, then become a hairdresser’."
Antoinette says she’s had “an interesting and perhaps an uncommon career trajectory” by working for both public broadcasting and commercial media. This is despite being advised that she could only work at SBS because of her ethnicity.
“I’m super proud of the fact that I started at SBS and then went on to the ABC, and had my formative years and my training alongside some of the best journalists in the country,” she says.
“But I also felt that despite the fact I was told that SBS was the only place that someone like me could be, I decided no, that I didn’t want to be limited by that stereotype.
“When 49% of Australians were born overseas or have a parent born overseas, I’ll argue that we are no longer a minority. Different is the mainstream. And our media needs to engage that, reflect that.”
She says the ramifications of a homogenous Australian media dominated by white faces, when that doesn’t reflect wider society, are stark.
“Another problem is in story selection,” she says.
“When you have people who are generally of a similar background, geographically, education-wise, socio-economically, quite often they have similar thinking and similar contacts in their phones.
“If everybody’s grievances and story ideas in an editorial meeting are the same, mirrored on the same life experiences, and same connections, then that’s problematic because we’re out of touch with the greater Australian public.”
Her Network 10 stories such as the expose on forced marriage in Western Sydney have won many awards, and defied the stereotype that they can only be done by heavier ABC programs such as Four Corners.
“These stories are important,” she says.
“To the national discussion, to policy leaders realising this isn’t something that just happens in the Middle East or in Asia or in a far away land, this is happening under our noses and we don’t realise it.”
Recently Media Diversity Australia extended its scope to include people with disability, who Antoinette argues face similar issues having their voices heard in the wider media conversation.
The organisation is partnering with a range of universities including Deakin, Sydney, and Western Sydney, and former Race Discrimination Commissioner Tim Soutphommasane, to do a diversity audit of news and current affairs television.
One of the disturbing aspects of working in the public arena as she does, is that she is targeted by some minorities, purely on the basis of her race.
“Women generally, and then women of colour get trolled the worst on social media,” she says.
“I have young children and when there are threats towards me and my children, you know, I had to engage Network 10’s security management because I just kept getting harassed by someone simply because of my ethnic background.
“He just was like, ‘Oh, because I don’t like your type, I’m just going to harass you on a daily basis.’ Not because he disagreed with a story I did, not because I wronged him and misrepresented him in my coverage, simply because of who I was.
“It stops you from using those tools of the trade. I mean Twitter, yes, it is an echo chamber, but this is where journos do a lot of their work, and find their stories. So I can’t just leave Twitter. Trolls try to cut you off from that, and scare you off, or break you down, break your spirit down.”
She says maintaining that support network for culturally and linguistically diverse journalists through Media Diversity Australia is vital, not just for the public impact, but also for those new journos coming through.
“Some of the work we do is just supporting young, diverse journalists who are like, ‘I can’t cope with the backlash, I can’t cope with the vitriol. My family can’t cope seeing me cry any more. They’re telling me, I told you so’,” she says.
Antoinette’s best advice to budding reporters is to believe in their ability to tell stories.
“Don’t change your name. Don’t change who you are, because what you bring to your craft and your authenticity, is what’s going to set you apart from what is an increasingly homogenous industry,” she says.
“I would have made a terrible hairdresser, and I’m very glad I didn’t listen to my father, and that every day I wake up, loving my job, feeling that I’m contributing to public debate.
“You have an important role in democracy, and without our voices, without diverse faces, I think, broader Australia suffers from it.
“It’s a real privilege to be a journalist, and I think it’s a real privilege to be a face and a voice for your community, be that geographic, or cultural, and I think unless we have those different voices, those communities are going to suffer.”
Beyond the podcast
This week I had the immense privilege of talking to ABC Brisbane evenings presenter extraordinaire Kelly Higgins-Devine as a panellist on her “What Do You Reckon?” segment. We had a great old yarn with fellow panellist and most impressive small businessman Declan Kluver. We talked about sport and what our favourite sporting moments were, of which I couldn’t really go past my memories with lovely hubby Andrew McGarry and our third date—the 2004 Grand final at the MCG. And Kelly was so kind to ask me about The Journo Project! I have attached the Soundcloud link (below) to that few minutes of Journo Project ABC fame for your listening pleasure. Thanks Kelly for helping us get the word out to more people. The Journo Project is not just for Journos! We all need to stand up for media freedom in Australia. YEAH!
What I’m reading
Next week’s interviewee, Adele Ferguson, has written a book telling the full story behind the royal commission into the banking sector in “Banking Bad”, which is being launched in the first week of August at good bookstores all around Australia. Check out this link to see if she’s coming to a city near you and perhaps you can go and meet her too and thank her for being a great journo!
It’s from staying informed by reading the wonderful work of journos such as Adele that we can play our part as good corporate citizens and keep the banks accountable, so they don’t go back to “business as usual”, with extraordinary wealth coming at the expense of ordinary Australians.
Also as is my want, I’ve found for you my favourite “stuff of life” piece of recent times. This week from SBS we have a brilliant article “Do You Know what Aboriginal land you’re on today?”, a fantastic guide for all of us wanting to pay due respect to the traditional owners of the land on which we travel. You can look this up from wherever you are and make a good start on connecting with the extraordinary living oral history of this land Australia, through the Indigenous mob of that area.
Also this story from ABC on Yarrabah and how this community is using social media to take control of the public narrative written about its people.
"A lot of those stories would be on the front page of the paper but there were a lot of good stories happening here as well that I felt needed to be heard." —Senior Constable Adam Frew
Social media and podcasting has an immense power to get to smaller groups than “broadcasting”, and make them feel connected. Like us, you fantastic Wandering Journo tribe!
And also, just for a laugh, a piece from the New York Times, “Mid-Brexit, Britons Pause to Debate what Really Matters: Tea”
Upcoming
This week, thanks to the support and contributions from my beautiful Wandering Journo subscriber tribe, I travelled to Melbourne to interview our feature interview for next week’s episode—eight time Walkley Award winner and amazing business journo Adele Ferguson! Her award winning investigations into financial services, franchising and retirement living industries have sparked numerous inquiries including the Hayne banking royal commission, and earlier this year being appointed a Member of the Order Australia for her services to journalism. She will land in your inbox one click away from your earbuds on Monday July 29—the day before the podcast’s release onto iTunes, Spotify and Soundcloud! So keep subscribing to this email, and share it with a friend, and you’ll keep getting great episodes like this ahead of their official release!
Merch!
Gotta love happy faces like my wonderful Griffith University co-lecturer for Digital Audio Media Journalism—Eduardo Jordan-Perez. You too can get a happy face like his, who got the smile on his dial as the proud owner of a Wandering Journo pen and keep cup! Thanks Eduardo for supporting my work. For all my paid subscribers: I send you keep cups and pens and extra hugs and thanks, as your support enables me to travel to meet amazing journos like Hugh Riminton, Antoinette Latouff and Isabella Higgins, and bring their stories back especially for you, my Journo Project supporters!
Thanks to all of you wonderful subscribers for your amazing support of my new podcast series, Streets of Your Town—The Journo Project! Please share this email link with a few of your friends who will also rally the call to protect press freedom in Australia. Thank you for helping me fulfil the vision I have for The Journo Project—interviewing great Aussie journos face-to-face using the highest quality audio so that you feel like you are there having the conversation with us!
Get full access to Streets of Your Town: The Journo Project at soyt.substack.com/subscribe
He's the kid who grew up in Brisbane's tough northern suburbs who went on to win two Walkley Awards for his powerful feature writing. Now Trent Dalton adds screenwriter and international bestselling author for "Boy Swallows Universe" to his credits. He shares with me on this episode of Streets of Your Town-The Journo Project, how he credits much of his success to his grounding as a reporter, considering himself a journalist first, and author second. He also has some great tips for budding writers on how to bring a narrative to life.
See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.
He’s the kid from Brisbane’s tough outlying northern suburbs who went on to win two Walkley Awards for his powerful feature writing. Now Trent Dalton adds screenwriter and international bestselling author to his credits.
Get full access to Streets of Your Town: The Journo Project at soyt.substack.com/subscribe
In this episode of Streets of Your Town - The Journo Project I interview Peter Greste, a journalist with decades of experience as an international correspondent in countries from Afghanistan to the former Yugoslavia, Africa, and South America. But it was when he was imprisoned in an Egyptian jail for 400 days that his reporting became truly world renowned. He tells me he is still shocked that reporting on what he describes as a run of the mill story, could end in such incredible circumstances. But he says he has since realised the bigger picture of what was happening, that it was the a crackdown on media freedom. He warns that Australia is on a similar slippery slope, calling for an urgent review of the many national security laws passed by Federal Parliament in recent years. He says these changes have eroded media freedom, to the point where they limit and even criminalise the legitimate work of journalists, with deeply damaging ramifications to the very foundations of our democracy.
See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.
In this episode of Streets of Your Town podcast—The Journo Project, we feature Peter Greste, a journalist with decades of experience as an international correspondent in countries from Afghanistan to the former Yugoslavia, Africa, and South America.
But it was when he was imprisoned in an Egyptian jail for 400 days that his reporting became truly world renowned.
He says he is still shocked that reporting on what he describes as a run of the mill story, could end in such incredible circumstances.
“When we were told what the charges were, being members of a terrorist organisation, aiding and abetting a terrorist organisation, financing a terrorist organisation, broadcasting false news with intent to undermine national security, these charges were crazy,” Peter says.
“These were serious hardcore terrorism offences, as serious as you could possibly get short of actually pulling the trigger on on an AK47 in a crowded room, and it just made no sense to me. It really didn't.
“I think at each stage of the process we thought that it wouldn't continue, because the gap between what we'd been accused of doing, those very serious terrorism charges, and the reality of what we had actually been doing, which was, to my mind, some pretty mundane journalism, that gap is so wide that I couldn't see how anybody could have conceivably made that connection.
“People have said, ‘Well, maybe it's because you guys were working for Al Jazeera. Al Jazeera have been accused of siding with the Muslim Brotherhood, and therefore, you're part of that, put up in that kind of wider conspiracy’. I felt that if that was the case, why would the Egyptians come after an Australian and two Egyptian producers?
“It made no sense. If you wanted to make a conspiracy about Qatar malfeasance in Egypt, then there were other better ways of doing it.”
He says he has since realised the bigger picture of what was happening.
“The more I thought about it, the more I realised this wasn't about anything we had done, it's about what we'd represented, and that was press freedom,” he says.
“The government was simply trying to intimidate all journalists that were operating and sending a very clear message, you will not speak to the Muslim Brotherhood.
“Cairo used to be the hub for regional coverage, it no longer is. Very few news bureaus have a permanent presence there.
“The authorities have locked up, threatened, and intimidated pretty much anybody who is doing what would considered to be authoritative, credible journalism. It's almost impossible to operate. Local journalism has also been brutally handled. Anybody that questions or challenges the authorities is either in prison or in exile.”
Professor Peter Greste is now the UNESCO Chair in Journalism and Communications at the University of Queensland, and also a founding member and director of The Alliance for Journalists’ Freedom.
He is a champion for media freedom in Australia, calling for an urgent review of the many national security laws passed by Federal Parliament in recent years.
He says these changes have eroded media freedom, to the point where they limit and even criminalise the legitimate work of journalists, with deeply damaging ramifications to the very foundations of our democracy.
“Clearly Australia is not Egypt, and not about to become Egypt anytime soon, but, and there is a but here, if you think about what happened to us in the abstract, where the government used national security legislation and framed it so loosely that it could be interpreted in a way that criminalised what would normally have been considered as legitimate journalism, then we're seeing actually the same kinds of trends taking place here in Australia,” he says.
“Ever since 9/11, Australia has passed more than 70 pieces of national security legislation, more than any other country on earth, and a lot of those are so loosely drawn that they criminalise legitimate journalism. This is not an abstract idea.
“When we saw the raids by the Australian Federal Police on News Corp and ABC journalists a few weeks ago, I realised that this was always going to be coming.
“So understanding that has actually made me feel quite concerned.”
Peter Greste’s work as an international correspondent is extensive.
“I felt enormous sense of responsibility, but also an enormous sense of empowerment, because let's face it, the one thing that journalists want is for their stories to make a difference. It's important that we tell the stories,” he says.
"We also want our stories to move the dial in some way. In Afghanistan, you could see, when you did a story, you would get a reaction. Sometimes it was positive, sometimes it was negative, but there was almost never, no reaction.
“I went to Yugoslavia with Reuters, to Belgrade. This was just after the war…a lot of very serious internal struggles for political power, and also the fallout of the end of the Bosnian War.
“I also realised that actually I had a passion for international news, and so I went to Latin America and had five years in Mexico, Chile, and Argentina covering pretty much everything from Mexico on south.
“I remember speaking to the Zapatista rebels in Mexico, in Southern Mexico in Chiapas and going off to do stories about the rebels in Colombia, the FARC rebels in Columbia. We saw the elections that brought Hugo Chavez to power in Venezuela. All of these incredible moments that I still feel very privileged to be a part of.”
Recognition for his international reporting culminated with the prestigious Peabody Award for his documentary on Somalia.
But that story came at significant personal cost.
“Five years earlier, I'd been in Somalia, my first trip in with my producer Kate Peyton, and we were doing a whole series of stories about the country as it was emerging at that point, and someone took a shot, put a bullet in Kate's back and she died as a result of that,” he says, pausing at the memory.
“I had to pull out of Somalia very, very quickly as you can imagine.
“It was pretty horrific. It was the worst time of my life, I'd say, worse than even imprisonment in Egypt.
“Losing a friend and colleague like that is extremely tough. But I also felt quite bloody-minded about it. I felt that the arseholes who'd done that were trying to send a message to us to frighten us away from Somalia.
“Both of us had gone in fully understanding the risks we were involved with, but also feeling that I would be dishonouring Kate's memory to run away and never return.
“So I conceived this idea, this portrait of Mogadishu basically to finish the work that Kate and I never managed to get done, never managed to achieve on that first trip.
“I didn't want it to be about me and Kate, because obviously what was taking place in Somalia at the time was incredibly tough for hundreds of thousands of people, and in fact, what I'd been been through was pretty typical of what everyone in Somalia had experienced. You couldn't find anybody in the country that hadn't lost a close friend or relative at some point.
“So while that experience needed to inform the project, I wanted to make sure that it wasn't about us, it was about Somalis themselves.”
He says he still sees himself as a storyteller, and never takes for granted that responsibility.
“For a lot of people, a lot of journalists obviously, writing is their passion. For me, writing was the excuse,” he says.
“For me, the journalism was the kind of excuse that I needed to go off and have all of these adventures, to indulge my curiosity. The writing part of it wasn't really the thing that inspired me, what did inspire me was that licence to indulge a curiosity.”
Behind the scenes
This week I had the opportunity to talk to everyone listening in to ABC Brisbane 612 about what The Journo Project is trying to achieve. Funnily enough it was a live cross from the Cairns ABC studio! When presenter Matt Wordsworth invited me to come on and talk about my new podcast series, I wasn’t going to say no! So on our first day of holidays in beautiful far North Queensland, we got off the plane and headed straight for the ABC studio to get the “cans” on (as they call headphones in the biz) and talk to Matt down the line. You can listen to the interview on Soundcloud.
The Journo Project launch party
Thanks to all of you wonderful subscribers for your amazing support of my new podcast series, Streets of Your Town—The Journo Project! It’s wonderful to know there’s as many people out there who hate click bait as much as I do and are willing to support and celebrate great Aussie journos. I had a little launch party in Brisbane on Friday when the first episode featuring amazing investigative journo Hedley Thomas landed in all of your inboxes. It was such an exciting moment and wonderful to share with my subscribers and friends such as Karni Liddell, who will be featured in a future episode! Stay tuned! And please, share this email link with a few friends who will also consider supporting press freedom in Australia.
What I’m reading
"…life clutter builds up when we fill our lives with social events we do not really want to go to, work tasks we say yes to, when they are not our responsibility, toxic relationships and unhelpful thoughts and feelings"
Burned out and overwhelmed: should you embrace the joy of no? — The Guardian
I can’t tell you how relieved I was to read this article! I felt like the weight of the world was lifted off my shoulders—and that I can celebrate moments of joy for what they are—fleeting moments in life. Another reminder to slow down and be present in the moment so these precious moments don’t pass us by.
Upcoming
Next week’s episode, which will land in your inbox next Friday (the day before it’s release onto iTunes, Spotify, and Soundcloud), is the amazing journo and now author Trent Dalton! He took some time out from writing his second book, the follow-up to Boy Swallows Universe, to speak to me about how his years as a dual Walkley winning feature reporter for The Courier Mail and The Australian were the perfect training for becoming an author of a worldwide sensation novel. So keep subscribing to this email, and you’ll keep getting great episodes like this ahead of their official release!
Merch!
To the extra special members of my subscriber tribe—who have paid to support my work—I want to say a HUGE THANK YOU. And my thank you to you is a special edition Nance Haxton Wandering Journo keep cup! Not a bad deal for helping me keep this podcast going—and arriving in your earbuds before the rest of the world! Your support enables me to fly to these amazing journos around the country and to fulfil the vision I have for The Journo Project—interviewing them using the highest quality face to face audio so that you feel a part of the conversation too!
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This podcast is all about celebrating great Australian journos. Our first interview is with one of Australia's leading investigative reporters. Hedley Thomas is the co-creator and presenter of the phenomenally successful podcast The Teachers Pet, which at last count, has been downloaded more than 50 million times around the world. But what you may not know, is that this award winning podcast was Hedley's first foray into that new technology. Hedley has been in the pursuit of truth for many years, in the process winning Australia's most prestigious journalism honour - the Gold Walkley Award - not once but twice. And all without having a social media presence.
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Thanks for joining me on the journey of Streets of Your Town—The Journo Project. Where every week I will speak face to face and one on one with one of the best journalists from around the country, revealing candid audio insights from the the top practitioners of the reporting craft.
One of Australia’s leading investigative reporters Hedley Thomas, features in our first episode of The Journo Project podcast.
He’s the co-creator and presenter of the phenomenally successful podcast “The Teacher’s Pet”.
The success of his true crime podcast caught Hedley by surprise, not least of which because this was the first time he had ever produced one.
“I knew it would be a challenge because I hadn't done it before, and my grasp of technology is pretty tenuous,” he says.
“Anyone who knows me well can relate stories about my hopelessness with the vagaries of technology and the systems.
“So I thought that combining long form journalism with a podcast, and this incredible story about Lyn Dawson and her disappearance in 1982, and suspected murder, with the kind of deep diving that I wanted to do on the investigative side.
“I felt that it could tick a lot of boxes, possibly even give me some credibility on the technology side for a change. And I was also intrigued about this new medium.”
More than 50 million downloads later, Hedley now has a worldwide phenomenon on his hands.
But this is only his latest project. The respected reporter has been in the pursuit of truth for many years, winning Australia's most prestigious journalism honour—the Gold Walkley Award—not once but twice. And all without having a social media presence.
He advises young reporters not to let building a social media presence take time away from the more important aspects of journalism.
“I don't do Twitter,” Hedley tells The Journo Project.
“I just think that it's a great time waster. If they spent less time doing that and more time honing skills, the sorts of skills that I think will stand them in much better stead like, reading for example, books about investigative journalism, reading even, if they're interested in crime and in solving or trying to investigate cold cases.
“And that's also about their mental health. Like if they become high profile, it seems to me that all they do is attract haters, and people who just want to tweet abuse at them. So what's the point of it?
“Strangers tweeting anger, and hate, and abuse at each other in this little echo chamber that the overwhelming majority of Australians don't give a fig about. Why are we doing it? Why are journalists so enamoured of it? I don't get it.”
He says despite the emergence of digital technology, the art of investigative journalism has not changed much in his practice.
“For me, a lot of it is gut feeling, in terms of the identification of an angle, or a story that is going to be one I want to pursue,” he says.
"If I have an edge over some of my colleagues, and I'm not saying that I do, because I don't want to blow my trumpet, but some of them who've known me a long time have said that, they think I can perceive and read and see things, and see the underlying angle that others aren't seeing.
“See the potential for what might look like a plain vanilla kind of story, to actually being, no there's something really rotten about this.”
He says the the recent Australian Federal Police raids on media outlets will have a chilling effect both on journalists, and whistleblowers, and is an extremely worrying trend.
“My view is that it was significantly about intimidating would be whistle blowers, who will be seeing the very public spectacle of police going in en masse to the offices of the National Public Broadcaster, and into the home of one of my colleagues at News Corp.
“And the coverage of that, has a chilling effect on people who know that bad things are happening, or being covered up, that need to be highlighted in the media.”
Take the time to listen to Hedley’s full interview, and details of the threats against his and his family’s life that he’s had to endure as part of his work, on the podcast link at the top of this newsletter. Streets of Your Town—The Journo Project is also available on iTunes, Spotify, Soundcloud and other podcast providers.
Behind the scenes
For the Hedley Thomas appreciation society out there, you’ll be glad to know my investigative reporting uncovered his favourite brew: a skinny flat white! I’m sure he’d appreciate a few more of those as thanks for the amazing work he does for our democratic process! It was great to meet Hedley at the place where he wrote so many of the scripts for The Teacher’s Pet—the Brookfield General Store.
The Wandering Journo’s itinerary
I now have 15 incredible Aussie journos confirmed for the weekly rollout of Streets of Your Town—The Journo Project! They’ll be landing weekly in your inbox. Please feel free to share my email and share the word about my upcoming episodes with Peter Greste, Trent Dalton, Adele Ferguson, Antoinette Latouff, Isabella Higgins, Mark Willacy and Hugh Riminton, to name just a few! Let’s tell the world about the amazing journalists that we have in Australia, and what incredible changes for good that they have helped make to our society.
What I’m reading
“Look at dishes this way and washing up isn’t the shouldering of a burden but a renewal of the conditions by which all this—the talking, the eating, the communion—can happen again. (Your closest friends already know this; what more concrete expression of intimacy is there than a friend elbow deep in dirty dishwater, long after everyone else has gone home?) As a religious person without a religious affiliation, handling a dirty sink isn’t work; it’s a sweeping of the altar.”
Letter of Recommendation: Washing Dishes - NYTimes Magazine
I just love The New York Times, and am such a proud subscriber. I encourage all of you to subscribe to and support a media organisation that you’re passionate about. It’s not just the big exposes and the incredible photography of the NYT that gets me excited as a journalist, but also the wonderful slice of life pieces that are written so beautifully. This one is a great example. Who could have thought that washing the dishes could produce such philosophical insights? LOVE IT. It proves to me yet again, that stories are hidden everywhere, and often in the most unlikely places. We just have to find them, and tell them.
Next week: Peter Greste
You’re not going to want to miss next week’s episode. Put it in the diary for a Friday landing now—none other than PETER GRESTE talking direct to your earbuds about what he sees as the global war on journalism, as well as taking us behind the scenes of how he ended up in that Egyptian jail for 400 days for his reporting, on what he describes as a run of the mill story that he never expected could end in such incredible circumstances. We also hear the background to his illustrious career before and since, such as how he was awarded the prestigious internationally recognised Peabody Award for his documentary on Somalia. We also hear how Professor Greste is now the UNESCO Chair of Journalism and Communication at the University of Queensland and founding member and Director of the Alliance for Journalists’ Freedom.
Merch!
All you journo lovers out there I’m sure would know the journo love of a good freebie. Thanks to so many of you who have subscribed to my free newsletter and podcast and to those extra special members of The Wandering Journo tribe who decided to support my work by becoming PAID subscribers—YIPPEE TO YOU! Your support helps me celebrate great Aussie journos and fulfil the vision I have for the quality of this podcast—enabling me to travel around Oz to meet these amazing journalists face to face and ensure you feel right in the middle of the action listening in our conversation with that glorious face to face audio quality. Not scratching your head trying to hear through the crackles of a bad mobile phone line or dodgy computer connection! For those paid subscribers, you have some special Wandering Journo merchandise coming your way. And what better merch could a journo design than a coffee cup and a pen—two things journos are pretty notorious for nabbing at every opportunity! (Shhhhhh!)
If you believe in journalism and wish to support it, subscribe to the paid version of this newsletter. The same content is free for anybody but your support helps sustain this podcast.
Get full access to Streets of Your Town: The Journo Project at soyt.substack.com/subscribe
Gary West has driven trains along a remote track in north Queensland for more than four decades, and looks back on his career with fondness about what has changed, and what about trains has remained the same after so many years. He tells me this episode of Streets of Your Town podcast about his life driving a steam train driver in rural Queensland, and how he wouldn't trade some of the wild experiences along the way for any other life.
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Have you ever stopped to contemplate how difficult it is to find appropriate clothing, if you have a disability? And not just functional clothing, but fashionable, beautiful, and fun clothing. Imagine being at the top of your career, leading your own legal practice, but unable to find appropriate professional clothing to wear. This is the dilemma that faces solicitor Carol Taylor regularly. A car accident in 2001 left Carol Taylor a quadriplegic, paralysed from the chest down, and unable to move her fingers. Since those difficult days, Carol has become a mother, and returned to work becoming principal of Taylor Law and Conveyancing. And now she adds artist and fashion designer to her achievements. Carol's works are now on display in the exhibition Agency by Design: Expressive Design for Disability at artisan in Brisbane until July 13 2019. Her dream now is to create designs for beautiful garments that can be made into patterns, for people with a disability around the world to wear.
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Get an audio insight into an entrepreneur's mind in this episode of Streets of Your Town featuring Craig Jones, the founder of Australian skincare brand MooGoo. He started making MooGoo cream in a saucepan in a tiny two bedroom apartment, and now runs a company producing more than 40 all natural skin care products all made in Australia, exporting to seven countries around the world, and employing around 100 people. We hear how he transformed a simple idea to help his mother's psoriasis, into a thriving company that applies its environmentally friendly ethos to every aspect of the product chain, including recycling. And if you've ever wondered what's really in that sunscreen that you lather all over your body, Craig Jones tells us how he is leading the charge calling for greater transparency and more rigorous testing of Australian sunscreen products, arguing that consumers deserve to know what is in their sunscreen, in the same way they know the ingredients in their food.
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It's been described by Sir David Attenborough as one of the world's most dangerous ants. And it's prolific, found in colonies throughout Australia, resulting in an estimated two hospital emergency admissions a week in Adelaide alone. The native hopper ant, also knows as the jack jumper, may be small but it packs a painful sting in its tail, so much so that for a significant number of people, it causes anaphylactic shock and even death. Yet two esteemed researchers tell us on this episode of Streets of Your Town that the hopper ant problem is not receiving the funding needed to properly respond to the growing number of allergic reactions.
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Imagine not being able to see, and catching the train to work. Then someone grabs your hand and drags you on the train, leaving you unsure of where you are and even if you are safe. This has happened to Brendon Donohue more than once on his way to his job as a compliance officer in central Brisbane. Brendon spends his spare time lobbying for fair access to public facilities for all people, regardless of their disability or otherwise. In this episode of Streets of Your Town, I meet Brendon at one of his favourite pubs, near his home at South Brisbane.
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Townsville in lush North Queensland is not necessarily known as a hub of classical music from around the world, but it will soon be transformed. This is Artistic Director Kathryn Stott's second Australian Festival of Chamber Music, and she tells me on this episode of Streets of Your Town how this time she's scored a number of coups. This includes five world premieres, five Australian premieres and 40 of the best chamber musicians on the planet playing compositions from the 13th century to the present day, over ten days of a balmy North Queensland winter, in July and August. And proving her commitment to emerging artists of the genre, one of those world premieres is from Brisbane born and now London based composer Connor D'Netto, who has also been chosen as the Composer-in-Residence.
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Las Cafeteras is all about fusion. Based in LA, this eclectic band mixes Afro-Mexican, hip-hop, folk and first nations musical styles into a frenetic celebration that pulls people to their feet. Band member Hector Flores sees their music as a metaphor for how the world should be. He wears his Mexican heritage proudly, calling for more understanding and tolerance through music and food, spreading his message of social justice across musical and physical borders. In this episode of Streets of Your Town podcast, I speak to Hector straight after the band's electric performance at Adelaide's world music festival, WOMADelaide.
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Dangerous Song is a unique performance that combines the human voice with modern electronics, age-old instruments, and the calls of endangered animals to create an intriguing and moving musical piece like nothing I've seen before. In this episode of Streets of Your Town you'll meet the creative team behind this moving piece, as they prepare for the WOMADelaide world music festival and hopefully a tour around the country soon after. Interwoven throughout the performance are refrains of distinctive Mongolian throat singing and the haunting sounds of the Mongolian horse head fiddle.
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This is "Stories of Survival," a special edition of "Streets of Your Town," for International Womens Day, brought to you in collaboration with community support group, the Southwest Wellness Collaborative. Libby had spent much of her adult life working towards a good life for her husband and children. So, it was a shock to her when soon after her husband died, she became homeless. Community workers such as Claudia Cunningham (pictured) are increasingly helping older women in her situation.
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It's a strange thing indeed to connect with a country on the other side of the world to where you grew up, so much so that you feel the same sadness when leaving it as you do when you leave home. But this is the experience of Luka Bloom, the great Irish songman who for more than 40 years has put his passion for social justice to music, and given voice to those who aren't often heard or recognised. His songs have touched a chord in Australia, so much so that he has now toured the country more than a dozen times. In this episode of Streets of Your Town, Luka Bloom tells us about the euphoric joy he feels seeing a Fremantle sunset, and feeling the appreciation of his Australian fans, wherever he goes.
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On a tiny stretch of sand, near the southern most tip of the largest living thing on earth The Great Barrier Reef, is Mon Repos. Less than two kilometres long, this beach is a critical landing point for endangered loggerhead turtles from throughout the Pacific. And Cathy Gatley is the ranger in charge (of this conservation park), ensuring that this patch of turtle paradise remains their haven. In this episode of Streets of Your Town, Cathy tells us how she balances the needs of the endangered loggerhead turtles and the lucky few people who get to the beach to see this wild event.
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Imagine for a moment, the fear you would feel if you had to leave the only home you'd known, and all of your family, at just 15 years old because your life hangs in the balance.This was the harsh reality that faced Pakistani refugee Imtiaz Ali. It has taken seven years, including a journey across the seas in treacherous waters, and many months spent in detention centres unsure of his future, for Imtiaz Ali to finally become an Australian citizen. In this episode of Streets of Your Town, Imtiaz tells us how his life experiences have shown him that nothing is impossible.
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Go behind the scenes of the glitz and glamour of the Gold Coast and find yourself immersed in the ocean alongside Rob Layton in this episode of Streets of Your Town podcast. Regardless of the weather, you can find Rob at Burleigh Beach on the southern end of the Gold Coast, surfing and taking photos as the sun rises for another day. And he's also wanting to spread the word on how that phone in your pocket is capable of much more than just taking good selfies.
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From the Wandering Journo at Stories that Matter Studios this is The Streets of Your Town. The slice of Australian life podcast that takes you on an audio journey through theatre of the mind each episode. Today, we take you behind the scenes of the evocative and triumphant performance of Chasing Smoke by Casus Circus. Casus Circus is Australia's only Indigenous contemporary circus ensemble, and is about to go on tour around Australia and take Chasing Smoke to the Edinburgh Fringe Festival. I was lucky enough to speak to the visionary director of Casus Circus and Chasing Smoke, Natano Fa'anana.
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From the Wandering Journo at Stories that Matter Studios this is The Streets of Your Town. The slice of Australian life podcast that takes you on an audio journey through theatre of the mind each episode. Today, we head to Brisbane's westside, to meet artist and social entrepreneur, Kagi Kowa. She tells us about her journey from Sudan to Forest Lake, and how that journey of self-discovery continues to this day, years after she first came to Australia's shores.
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From the Wandering Journo at Stories that Matter Studios this is The Streets of Your Town. The slice of Australian life podcast that takes you on an audio journey through theatre of the mind each episode. Today, we head to the unheralded jewel of South Australia to the Clare Valley. It's here at a Seven Hills Country Womens Association function, that an ancient bus and an energy powerhouse collide, when we meet Amanda Blair, wandering around her charity vintage clothing bus, Dulcie's Shop of Real Opportunity, which has raised more than a hundred thousand dollars for South Australia's homeless.
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From the Wandering Journo at Stories that Matter Studios this is The Streets of Your Town. The slice of Australian life podcast that takes you on an audio journey through theatre of the mind each episode. Today we have a wander with one of Tassie's favourite adopted daughters, former wicketkeeper of the Australian Women's Cricket Team, Julia Price. We find out what took the Queenslander so far south she shivered through her first days in her new home, and how she was invited to join the greats of the game as a life member of the Marylebone Cricket Club at Lords.
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From the Wandering Journo at Stories that Matter Studios this is The Streets of Your Town. The slice of Australian life podcast that takes you on an audio journey through theatre of the mind each episode. In this episode we go to one of Brisbane's funkiest inner city laneways, Fish Lane, to eat Vietnamese with talented Aussie actor Kurt Phelan. We hear how since playing Johnny in the Australian production of Dirty Dancing, he is now living the transcontinental life between Brisbane and New York.
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From the Wandering Journo at Stories that Matter Studios this is The Streets of Your Town. The slice of Australian life podcast that takes you on an audio journey through theatre of the mind each episode. In this special edition of SOYT - Stories of Survival - we go to the Hub Neighbourhood Centre in Inala, to meet Benjamin Parsons. The Hub has helped him pick up the pieces at pivotal points in his life. He has a message of tolerance, asking us to look more sensitively on people in the community who at times have struggled, as he has.
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From the Wandering Journo at Stories that Matter Studios this is The Streets of Your Town. The slice of Australian life podcast that takes you on an audio journey through theatre of the mind each episode. In this special edition of SOYT - Stories of Survival - we go to the Sherwood Neighbourhood Centre, to meet Leigh Winsor. On January 11th 2011, he found himself at the Sherwood Neighbourhood Centre with little more than the shirt on his back. He was one of thousands of people caught in the floods that swept through Brisbane and Ipswich. This is his story of survival.
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From the Wandering Journo at Stories that Matter Studios this is The Streets of Your Town. The slice of Australian life podcast that takes you on an audio journey through theatre of the mind each episode. In this episode we go to the beautiful paradise of Stradbroke Island in sparkling Moreton Bay. We speak to Michael Bulloch, the owner and operator of Coffee in Cylinder's, a pop-up coffee shop on Cylinder Beach.
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From the Wandering Journo at Stories that Matter Studios this is The Streets of Your Town. The slice of Australian life podcast that takes you on an audio journey through theatre of the mind each episode. In this episode we find out about the pop culture phenomenon of cosplay. Justine - or as she is more well known Jus-Z - tells us how dressing up as your favourite character is not a task for the faint-hearted.
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From the Wandering Journo at Stories that Matter Studios this is The Streets of Your Town. The slice of Australian life podcast that takes you on an audio journey through theatre of the mind each episode. In this episode we find out about a special convoy raising awareness for post traumatic stress disorder, that is about to make its way through many Australian country towns. Stand Tall for PTS will head off from Brisbane on October 2nd 2018 through rural New South Wales and on to the Invictus Games in Sydney. It will also have a special opening day in Brisbane at Wests Rugby Union Club on September 30, to get the message out that post-traumatic stress can affect ANYBODY.
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From the Wandering Journo at Stories that Matter Studios this is The Streets of Your Town. The slice of Australian life podcast that takes you on an audio journey through theatre of the mind each episode. In this episode we meet Ruthie Akerman, editor at Forbes Magazine, in New York. We find out about the favourite Streets of Her Town, and the literary geniuses who lived there before her, in Brooklyn.
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From the Wandering Journo at Stories that Matter Studios this is The Streets of Your Town. The podcast that takes you on an audio journey through theatre of the mind highlighting a different slice of Australian life each episode. In this episode we go to New York to meet Aussie entrepreneur Meggie Palmer, whose start-up "PepTalkHer" is making its mark in one of the toughest cities in the world.
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From the Wandering Journo at Stories that Matter Studios this is The Streets of Your Town. The slice of Australian life podcast that takes you on an audio journey through theatre of the mind each episode. In episode 9 we meet Greek Australian Marie Scoutas, who is carving out her dream life in New York. We talk to her about the favourite Streets of Her Town, near Union Square in the heart of Manhattan.
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From the Wandering Journo at Stories that Matter Studios this is The Streets of Your Town. The podcast that takes you on an audio journey through theatre of the mind highlighting a different slice of Australian life each episode. In this episode we go to the beautiful and remote Aboriginal township of Lockhart River, nestled overlooking the rainforest and Great Barrier Reef in far north Queensland's Cape York. We meet the principal of Lockhart State School, Siobhan Jackson, and find out what brought her to this isolated paradise at the tip of Australia. We also meet internationally renowned Aboriginal artist Patrick Butcher.
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From the Wandering Journo at Stories that Matter Studios this is The Streets of Your Town. The podcast that takes you on an audio journey through theatre of the mind highlighting a different slice of Australian life each episode. In this episode we meet authors Jas Rawlinson and Nicole Gibson, and discuss that most difficult of subjects - our mental health - and how we need to take away the stigma of talking about suicide.
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From the Wandering Journo at Stories that Matter Studios this is The Streets of Your Town. In this special edition collaboration episode with Miro Magazine we meet Artistic Director of modern dance ensemble Expressions Dance Company Natalie Weir, and find out about how her latest co-production with Hong Kong's City Contemporary Dance Company "4 Seasons" is building bridges between the two cultures.
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From the Wandering Journo Nance Haxton at Stories that Matter Studios, this is The Streets of Your Town. The podcast that takes you on an audio journey through theatre of the mind, highlighting a different slice of Australian life each episode. Today we meet Marcus Brady, or That Tourism Guy, who takes us on a bushwalk through his favourite streets of the tiny town of Speewah, deep in the far north Queensland rainforest.
From the Wandering Journo at Stories that Matter Studios this is The Streets of Your Town. The podcast that takes you on an audio journey through theatre of the mind highlighting a different slice of Australian life each episode. In episode 3 we take you to the famous beaches of Australia's Gold Coast.
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From the Wandering Journo at Stories that Matter Studios this is The Streets of Your Town. The podcast that takes you on an audio journey through theatre of the mind highlighting a different slice of Australian life each episode. In episode 2 we meet entrepreneur Kathryn Lyons, who is taking her message of the importance of accessibility for all around the world.
Today, we meet internationally renowned artist and former Brisbane Deputy Mayor David Hinchliffe, and find out about the Streets of His Town, in Brisbane’s vibrant Fortitude Valley.
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