FEATURES

ROBERT IRWIN: WILL YOU MARRY ME?

Australian Heartthrob Robert Irwin has captured the heart of Ella Scott. She praises Irwin on his success, wildlife conservation and nature photography, as she professes her love for the famed zookeeper.

I don’t know whether it was his Stellar cover shoot, or his Tik Tok debut that made it happen, but Robert Irwin has captured the hearts of women across the country, and around the globe. Emerging from the legacy of his late father Steve Irwin, Robert has taken his rightful place as Australia’s sweetheart. From his photography ventures captured on Instagram, to his infamous crocodile show at Australia Zoo, Robert has solidified his place in Australian history, as well as Australia’s hearts.

Similar in age, Robert and I have a lot in common. We’re both blonde, we both love the beach, and we both rock the colour khaki. My vegetarianism might have an impact on our love story, but that’s something we can work on.

But in all seriousness, at just 18 years-old, Robert has created an impressive and inspiring career for himself. In 2016, he was junior runner up for the Australian Geographic nature photographer of the year, and in 2017, became a regular on The Tonight Show with Jimmy Fallon. In 2019 he began his campaign to overturn the legislation of harvesting wild crocodile eggs, and the following year won People’s Choice Award for the Wildlife Photographer of the Year, as well as being named as an ambassador for his royal highness Prince William’s Earthshot prize.

He continues to follow his passion for wildlife photography, and his dedication toward teaching people about conservation and the importance of the natural world.

When you don’t find him behind a camera, or putting on a show, you’ll definitely be able to find him on your screens. His Tik Tok account has over 4.5 million followers, and 27 million likes. His engaging and infectious personality has won over the hearts of people across the globe. His authenticity seeps through the screen, as he talks about what he loves, all expressed through his huge goofy smile. He follows Tik Tok trends in his own Aussie manner, using viral sounds and dances with his own Irwin twist.

On Instagram, he expresses his love for photography, sharing behind the scenes photos and videos from Australia Zoo, as well as capturing Australia’s unique landscape. As stated above, he has won multiple awards for his photography, and has an upcoming project being revealed in October named, ‘Robert Irwin’s Australia’.

It’s easy to see why the world has fallen in love with Robert Irwin, I mean, how could you not? His legacy and Australianism transcends generations, and will continue to have an impact on the Australian people for years to come.

His relationship status remains murky, so if by chance you do see this Robert, the offer stands.

by Ella Scott

Australia Zoo

YOU CAN’T TAKE THE GREEK OUT OF THE AUSSIE

Family is complex and so is belonging. Anthea Wilson explores her family tree and her place amongst the branches.

Visiting Grandma and Grandad’s house was always a chore. Maybe it was the hour long drive down to Wollongong, or maybe it was that I felt like I didn’t belong. My dad was adopted when he was a baby to my grandparents Bert and Joan. He is a true blue Aussie bloke that grew up in Wollongong, surf lifesaving on the weekend, wagging school and sneaking cigarettes with friends that later became my godparents. Mum, on the other hand, grew up with Greek immigrant parents. She is a first generation Greek Australian raised on traditional values and good olive oil. My mum lost her mum when she was 10. Her dad, my papou, remarried a woman named Kitsa, my yiayia, a few years later. Apart from my immediate family, the only blood relative I have is my papou, and he passed away when I was 12. This used to bother me growing up. I know my cultural heritage, Greek and whatever version of anglo my father is. What I was yet to understand was these “strangers” I call family.

I was very observant as a child. I remember going from room to room in my grandparents’ house counting how many photos I was in. I would search for my face in every photograph only to notice there weren’t as many photos of me as there were photos of my little brother and older cousins. It was clear to me who grandma’s favourites were and I guess I didn’t make the cut.

I remember calling grandma out on this. “Grandma, why don’t you have very many photos of me?” I asked. When talking about this memory with Dad he told me how caught out she felt. It wasn’t too long after demonstrating how good I am at counting how many photos I am in, new photos of me began to appear in the Wilson home. I still made sure to check, still not as many as my grandkid counterparts.

I always felt out of place with my dad’s side of the family. I wasn’t tall and slender like my cousins and I wasn’t the baby of the family like my brother. I felt like the chubby Greek black sheep of the family. Mum explained to me she felt the same way when she was engaged to my dad in the nineties. Mum and I overcompensate by wearing fabulous outfits to family gatherings, but we often still felt out of place and often overdressed. Just two short, curvaceous wog women in a family of white Australians. Grandad, however, always made me feel special. He would be the only one to compliment my outfit, every time.

Visiting Yiayia with Mum was a completely different experience. We would leave in the morning and drive all the way over to Roselands to pick up a seafood lunch. We would arrive at the small cluttered apartment and sit together at the little table in the middle of the lounge room and eat and laugh for hours. Unfortunately, I can’t speak Greek apart from a few phrases like ‘hi, hello, how are you, I’m good’, despite my best efforts at Greek school when I was little.

So I would sit there and listen to Mum and Yiayia converse in Greek, only picking up on what they were saying through few contextual clues. Although I couldn’t understand what they were saying most of the time, I was included and engaged. Yiayia would reach across the table to hold my hand and tell me how much she loved me in broken English. My yiayia was a poet and philosopher. She would spend her time alone in the apartment writing, keeping her brain active and her imagination alive. She would present her new works to Mum to translate, so I could understand her wisdom. We would end each visit with a Greek coffee. Once the coffee was gone and the coffee grounds were left, we would swirl our espresso cups and tip them over. Yiayia would then read our fortunes in the cup. As of 2022 I am grandparent-less. Even though three out of four grandparents weren’t blood, they were mine and they each loved me in their own way. A special moment for me was when Grandma came and visited me at my retail job selling handbags. She was the original shopgirl working for David Jones when my dad was growing up. I took Grandma around the store and helped her pick out a new handbag. For the rest of the night back at home she sat on the couch with her new handbag sitting right next to her. That’s when I knew that she did love me in her own funny way. Thinking back now as an adult, all the cakes, knitted socks and tapestries she made for me was her way of showing love. It wasn’t as obvious as Yiayia with her grand outbursts of love and affection. It was subtle and often overlooked.

Although my family tree is untraditional I have embraced this part of myself. Family isn’t always who you are related to, it is who is there to help you grow. I have experienced the pain of clearing out their homes and taking home with me a part of them through their belongings. My childhood bedroom is now filled with heirlooms ready and waiting for their next place in the Wilson family.

by Anthea Wilson

JULIA JACKLIN

THE AUSSIE MUSIC SCENE AND ITS MASCULINE PRESENCE

Through the perspective of Australian indie folk singer Julia Jaklin, Jasmine Oke discusses what it is like as a female musician in the Australian music industry

The end of March is drawing near, and yet the Autumn air is thick and pulsing with heat. Julia enters the dark, foreign theatre via the side entrance beside the stage. Her head is lowered as she watches her feet with caution; one foot after the other. Left. Right. Left. Right. They fall softly and with purpose as her black skirt tickles the bare skin of her lower shin - long enough to cover up, but short enough to not jeopardise her steadiness.

She spends most of the performance with her eyes softly shut - but not squeezed tight as they were earlier in her career – she’s gotten much more confident since then. She traces the silhouette of happy memories on the back of her eyelids, and they flutter at the best parts. When at last her eyes must open – lest she falls into a deep slumber – she gazes to the deep back corner of the ceiling, where perhaps arachnids and termites alike have made safe and nurturing homes over the years. With her hair pinned back, she doesn’t have the option to use them as curtains to further close her off from the audience. Instead, she can feel the wet air mingling on her skin – the salt from her earlier walk along Avoca’s shoreline. It’s a nice break from the bustling cities, but it still doesn’t quite feel like home, with its towering mountains and calming waterfalls.

The young girls and women of the audience look up at her in awe, as she smiles back at them encouragingly - she hopes it’s enough. The facade cracks as she makes her first mistake of the night. They don’t condemn her; they don’t give her disapproving looks or act as though she’s done something wrong. Instead, they laugh with her.

“You can do it, Jules!” a comforting voice shouts out to her from the direction of the crowd.

That sweeping swell of human connection rushes through her in a current akin to that of the Katoomba Falls. She now opens to them completely, inviting anyone interested to join her backstage after the show – there’s not much back there other than some blueberries that she was willing to share. There are a few more mistakes, a few more laughs, and cheers of encouragement – but ultimately, there is a sense of utter respect. The crowd is silent throughout each song before erupting into applause at the end every time. With the melody of her soft voice and the gentle strum of her guitar, Julia creates a safe and calm place for all.

But why is it that Julia is generally more comfortable and popular in an international setting? Why is it that so many of us may never have even heard of her? Born and raised in our Blue Mountains, one would think that Julia would feel the most herself on home soil. However, the Australian music scene is largely dominated by masculine voices. When one thinks of Australian music, what do they think of? King Gizzard and the Lizard Wizard, DZ Deathrays, Dear Seattle – a myriad of male-dominated psychedelic rock bands. We’re lucky to have Spacey Jane, with their one female member (wow!).

It’s no wonder Julia has gravitated towards a more international audience. Bumping shoulders with the likes of Lucy Dacus and Lana Del Rey - the indie pop icons of the United States. Sure, there are the likes of 00’s pop icons Kylie Minogue and Delta Goodrem, but there is a lack of a feminine presence on the Australian music scene in 2022. So, if you too find yourself wondering why you don’t listen to as much Aussie music as you’d like, or simply need something new – our neighbour Julia Jacklin is waiting for you, with her new album ‘Pre-Pleasure’ having been released this August. And if you happen to have the chance to see her on tour early next year, I promise you won’t regret it.

by Jasmine Oke

INTERVIEW WITH UP-AND-COMING INDIE ROCK BAND GULLY DAYS

Features Section Editor Anthea Wilson met with indie rock band Gully Days to discuss how they got their start and their aspirations as a band.

After battling my way through peak hour Sydney traffic in the pouring rain, I finally made it to Bondi to meet indie rock band Gully Days.

Gully Days formed in the early months of 2020 unaware of the challenges they were about to face as a newly formed band. In their home studio rehearsal space, I was introduced to lead singer Ethan, guitarist Luke - nicknamed Pookot (it’s a long story) - bassist Holden, and “captain of the engine room”, drummer Lewis. Their rehearsal space is small but full of character with guitars lining the wall. I later found out that Luke’s dad had made most of the guitars, including Luke’s guitar that he plays with. The Gully Days boys were very welcoming and down to earth, I really enjoyed getting to know them.

When I asked them how they got together Luke told me, “I think we all knew each other from surfing, just down around Bondi, Brontë, we didn’t really know we all played a bit of music. First we started out with Lewis, Ethan and myself and then started jamming … then Holden came along.” They started jamming in 2019 and became Gully Days in 2020.

I was very curious as to where the name Gully Days came from. Luke explained the origin: “We originally wanted to call ourselves ‘Salad Days’ which is actually a Shakespearean idiom, but we decided that it would be really good to give it a bit of significance within the local community. So we decided gully, Brontë gully, is just a sentimental place within the local community, so we decided Gully Days would give us some real local value to it.” I never did find out what goes on in Brontë Gully, but rumour has it, it is where Pookot was born.

Gully Days get together at least once a week to rehearse, depending on if they are playing a gig or writing a new song. Ethan and Luke lead the creative process, with Luke coming up with a guitar riff before bringing it to Ethan to craft the melody and lyrics. Luke said, “I kind of imagine Ethan singing something over it and that’s how I kind of give reference to what might be good.” Luke praised Ethan on his lyric writing ability. “Ethan does write about some worldly issues, he doesn’t give himself credit for but he does write some very interesting lyrics.” Gully Days calls it as they see it; their songs comment on society, materialism and they satirise the eastern suburbs. Luke and Ethan then bring the new song to the rest of the band to build up the rhythm and bass.

The members of Gully Days all expressed their musicality from a young age, except for Holden, who said, “I’d never played bass in my life… I just picked it up when they offered.” Each band member came from different musical backgrounds. Ethan grew up singing pop songs, Luke has punk rock influences that he owes to his dad, Lewis learnt jazz and orchestra and played for his school band, and Holden first found his sound with Gully Days.

Luke detailed the experience of their first gig. “The first gig was for Brontë Boardriders which has been like a long running relationship between us and the beach community. It was sort of like an informal gig. We brought our own PA system and everything, we didn’t even, like, have a band name.” Luke described what it

was like to play for the first time: “It ended up going absolutely crazy, it went off essentially… I still put that gig as probably one of the best feelings.” Lewis chimed in and said, “But technically speaking, compared to now it was so ‘loose’, we weren’t technically playing properly as a band back then, but like in terms of the euphoria of playing live as a band was pretty sick.”

I then heard all about the first official Gully Days gig. Luke said “The next gig for us was at the Robin Hood hotel in Waverley. We’re actually going to be playing there in about a month’s time. So we’re calling it, we haven’t played there since we’re calling it; back to where it all started, back to the hood something along those lines. That’s where it all started. That’s going to be hopefully be an exciting gig. That was our first official gig and that was March 2020 that was like our first gig and that was before what was about to come, because two weeks later we were in a full lockdown.”

Gully Days expressed feeling defeated by the Covid lockdowns but they were still determined to make a name for themselves. Luke went on to describe how they navigated getting gigs during Covid. “So we went around and organised some gigs at local bowling clubs, bought our own PA, ticketed the gigs ourselves. Kind of a DIY little thing. Taught ourselves the sound engineering specifics. Put on our own shows, they were 50 people sit down shows. That’s kind how it all started out. As the restrictions eased slightly more and more we were playing bigger and bigger shows so it was just like we just constantly wanted to play bigger shows.” He continued to describe the first gig once lockdown had ended. “I remember the first gig when the restrictions ended and you could finally stand up, it was at this place called the Spring Street Social and it went absolutely wild, like it went crazy.” Gully Days advocated for themselves, walking into venues asking to play there, and essentially walking out with a gig.

In a suburb full of DJs, Gully Days infiltrated the eastern suburbs pub scene with their live performances. The band just wants to get people up on their feet and experience live music. They indicated that their gigs have a more electrifying atmosphere than DJ concerts. Luke explained, “It’s great to see that live music can still have such an impact. A lot of kids have never felt the drums and the guitar, just the rawness of it all going straight through them.” Gully Days ultimately just wants to “play fat gigs.” They have long term goals of opening for someone big and playing a stadium show one day. Gully Days is playing their first festival later this year at the Relish Music and Arts Festival in Bellingen. Lewis told me, “We always said our goal was to play a festival and we’re playing a festival at the end of the year. Now we don’t even consider it as achieving a goal, but looking back to two years ago, it’s massive.”

Gully Days has grown as a band in the two years, they attribute their success to working collaboratively together and being good mates. At the conclusion of the interview I stuck around to listen to them rehearse. I snapped a few photos and had a groove. It was a fun afternoon getting to know the boys. Listen to their latest song “Ay-Oh” on streaming services and follow them on Instagram @/gullydays to keep up-to-date on their latest gigs.

by Anthea Wilson

THE TRAITOROUS BIRTHDAY

Nilab Siddiqi feels betrayed by her birthday. It is a constant reminder that she will never be truly celebrated in a country that doesn’t celebrate its peoples cultural differences.

Under the scalding sun, on one suffocating summer day, I turned 21 years old. While many would rejoice such an apparent momentous occasion, I spent the day navigating the streets of Newtown in an exhausted haze. Now don’t get me wrong, I am fully aware of the melancholy that befalls many-a-people on their birthday, but for me, and for many other children of immigrants, birthdays often feel like reopening of a fatal wound.

I was born in the summer of 2001, a neat seven months prior to 9/11 and, thus, seven months prior to the excruciatingly cruel division of my people, Afghans, from the rest of the world. Nowadays, I often think back to that day and ponder on whether my parents feared for what any of it meant for their young children. After fighting so hard to find their way to this country, fleeing from all sorts of persecution, yet again, they became the enemy.

Many people liken sensations of loneliness and isolation to a person drifting into space, but I’ve always felt that it feels more like drifting through the dense and dark waters of the ocean. Life blooms in every direction you turn. Coral, bright and bountiful, lining the ocean floor, schools of fish, swirling together in unison, snails, clams and crustaceans skittering to-and-fro, but you? You’re drifting through this fierce display of life on your own, and no matter how gracefully you swim nor how successful you are in your doings, nothing will ever change that one simple fact. You are alone.

As Australians, we love to boast about our supposed multiculturalism and how this flat, dustfilled country values nothing more than that but with every cruel birthday, immigrants, and the children of immigrants, are forced to look upon the cracks that run along such a blatant facade. To be an immigrant in this country is to be totally and utterly alone. Each birthday serves to remind us that, in the short amount of time we’ve graced this Earth, we have borne the pain of hundreds and thousands on our own and will continue to do so till we simply cannot bear anymore. Yes, I have the Afghan community tucked into the crevice of the West, yes I have my family here with me, but it just is not enough to fill the void that this country rips into you when you are not white. Every year that void grows deeper and darker and every year I find myself exerting less and less effort to try to close it.

Throughout my life, I have found myself teetering upon the Australian identity. Creeping closer and closer to becoming the person local politicians want us so desperately to merge into, and then whenever something bad happens regarding Afghans, and it always does, I am forced to acknowledge just how alien I am, just how alone I am.

The rise of the Taliban. The fall of the Taliban. The detention of refugees. The death of refugees.

On August 21, 2021, the capital city of Afghanistan, Kabul, fell to the Taliban and every day since then has been filled with the undoing of my country. Swaths of innocents executed, women stolen from homes, banned from schools, whipped and pelted with stones for minor ‘transgressions’, children starved, the country failing.

People look at me in sympathy, they say they’re so sorry, they discuss the source of my pain in University halls and behind retail counters like they’re juicy little points of trivia and not the thing which has left me so desolate.

Despite it all, I march on, reluctantly aging in a place that wants little to do with the likes of me, swallowing the hurt inflicted upon me and tending to my wounds on the days that I cannot.

To age in a country that simply does not want you is a painful thing indeed.

by Nilab Siddiqi

EXPERIMENTING THE BRAIN

Nikita Byrnes met with neuroscience researcher Ana Rita to discuss the potential of neurofeedback to revolutionise treatment for mental health disorders and neurodivergent peoples.

On a Tuesday in the middle of April, the world outside of the Westmead Institute for Research is overcast and windy. Inside, I am waiting to meet Ana Rita Barreiros, a neuroscience researcher and the clinical research coordinator at the Brain Dynamics Centre (“BDC”), a unit within the Westmead Institute that is pioneering research into biological markers of mental health disorders. Ana Rita has come to Australia from Portugal to obtain her PhD from the University of Sydney, a partner of the Institute. Her thesis is titled, “A comprehensive study of the effects of real-time functional MRI neurofeedback on treatment-resistant depression”. Put simply, Ana Rita is researching a solution to depression that does not respond to traditional treatments like antidepressants and antipsychotics. She is studying something that most people know little about – something called neurofeedback.

Neurofeedback is a type of biological feedback that visually presents someone’s own brain waves back to them in real time. The goal is to “train” your own brain activity, so that you can regulate your brain’s responses to various stimuli. It is at once an exciting and a terrifying prospect, to be able to rewire your brain. This type of technology could revolutionise the treatment of neurodiverse and emotionally dysregulated individuals. If it’s so powerful though, and seemingly accessible in its definition, why is it so little-known?

As I sit in the reception area, I look around and I am taken aback by the sheer immaculateness of this building, the architectural glossiness of it. Everything is painted shades of white and grey. Donors’ names are engraved in a marble wall. Ana Rita finds me and welcomes me to the building. In light wash jeans and a leopard-print shirt, she leads me up a set of stairs encased by glass walls that leads to the third floor where the BDC is based. The design of this building is brilliant, if not terrible for acrophobics like myself. Later, Ana Rita will tell me about how the staff and researchers are so proud of the building, because it won the same architectural prize that the Opera House won when it was built. Fame and fortune abound.

I first met Ana Rita over Zoom about a month before our meeting at the Research Institute. During our first online meeting, I was struck by her animation, the passion she has for her area of study, and just how human she is. Her hands subconsciously wave around as she talks. She speaks with a lilted Portuguese accent which accentuates the mesmerising cadence to her sentences. When I ask her a question that she has to think about, she slumps forward, head tilted back and mouth open, cogs turning. When she finds an answer in the library of her brain, she swivels happily in her chair as she replies. Ana Rita is so unlike the stereotypes of neuroscientists; straightbacked, humourless, dedicated only to finding the answers to their hypothesis. And yet, her research is so far out of the bounds of every-day knowledge and discourse.

This might be because neurofeedback is an incredibly “young” path of scientific inquiry in comparison to other scientific practices. In the nineteen-sixties, Dr Barry Sterman began a Pavlovian-style experiment training the brains of cats.

Using electroencephalography (“EEG”) electrodes, Sterman found that the cats’ brains were operating on a particular rhythmic frequency. Sterman’s discovery was that with positive conditioning, we can change our brain’s physical activity. That was the beginning of neurofeedback.

I ask Ana Rita why so few people seem to know about what neurofeedback is. There are a couple key reasons, she supposes. Firstly, science –in particular, neuroscience – has evolved to use a method “so complex” that without focused study and years of training, it isn’t accessible to the everyday person.

Taking me to the open-plan office space where the BDC team works, Ana Rita explains that neurofeedback data analysis is group-based, and there is a “pipeline of complicated steps” starting from data collection to data interpretation. As we walk from room to room down a brightly-lit hallway, it becomes clear that very little of her work is client-facing. Ana

Rita chuckles and explains that her job isn’t as “glamorous” as everyone thinks.

Her job primarily involves software-writing. She programs scripts to process the raw data that is received from the neurofeedback imaging, whether that is through EEG or fMRI scanning.

EEG and fMRI are two techniques used to collect the brain data before the neurofeedback takes place. EEG data calculates the brain’s electrical activity using electrodes on a person’s head. “We map the activity in the brain by really visualising that activity across all the electrodes in the cap,” Ana Rita explains. By comparison, fMRI involves patients lying down in a bed that slides into a circular scanning machine. It uses magnetic resonance imaging data which measures the level of oxygenation in the bloodstream and the brain. When an area of the brain is more active, it consumes more oxygen to meet the increased demand in blood flow, and that creates a similar kind of “brain map”.

Down the end of the hallway, we turn right into a series of rooms where the lights are turned off. We enter one room, turn the lights on, walk to the back of the room, open the door to enter another room, turn the lights on. Eventually, we reach the “data collection room”. It is separated into two sections with desks that bend along the walls. On the right, there is a built-in wardrobe with floorto-ceiling sliding doors. Ana Rita opens one of the sliding doors to reveal a series of giant Linux computers that store and process large amounts of EEG and fMRI raw data. She tells me that in her current study, she has one-hundred and fifty participants. “The data is so ‘heavy’,” she says, gesturing with her hands in a cupped shape, as if struggling with the weight of something invisible. The data must be pre-processed through the software that she writes before it is ready for interpretation and analysis. That’s where the computers come into play. These computers are not the average monitor interfaces, but the blocky, plastic storage devices that have fans whirring loudly, keeping them cool. Ana Rita tells me that the director of the BDC has named each computer after cricket players because they are so “powerful”. She laughs as she admits that she doesn’t know who the names are, but she doesn’t mind. It strikes me that even in such a sterile, technical environment, the people that inhabit these spaces are just that: people. They might be working on extraordinary, possibly life-changing research, but they have the same interests and downfalls as the study participants they work with.

Another reason that neurofeedback is so little-known is because even within the scientific community, each field is so specialised that it is hard for everyone to have a general understanding of each field. “Different scientific fields speak very different languages,” she observes. Telling me this, Ana Rita sighs, hands fidgeting in front of her. This field of mental-health-related neuroscience, especially, she says, receives less funding because of the “huge cultural baggage which surrounds the research”. This in turn impacts funding. She shrugs. “It’s a bit of a niche field in the neuroscience research field and in translational psychiatry.” People are a bit sceptical about this kind of research, she tells me. I understand, I think – research into the brain has always been highly contested. Research into the illnesses

of the mind is difficult, because how do you understand something that you can’t see or touch? Why should we trust this technology?

On average, a new science takes an average of seventy years to become established; neurofeedback has only been “alive” for roughly fifty years. In comparison, psychology as a field of research began in the mid- to late-nineteenth century with the appearance of “alienists” who were doctors that specialised in illnesses of the mind. Mental health as a concept is still, in the twenty-first century, something that is widely misunderstood. Some people still refuse to “believe” in the connection between our physical and mental health; that severe stress can cause ulcers and stomach pains, that depression is linked to a shrinking of the hippocampus (the part of the brain that controls learning and memory). The apprehensiveness and uncertainty surrounding these technologies is unsurprising because there is so much that is unknown, and it is frightening to play around with our brains, that central part of who we are, what makes us us.

The potential for neurofeedback as an intervention is vast and wide-reaching. Dr Barry Sterman’s preliminary research in the second half of the twentieth century showed, for example, that positive conditioning could, over time, promote a sixty-five percent reduction in seizures for patients with epilepsy. Today, it is being investigated as an intervention for neurodiverse individuals, such as those with ADHD and Autism Spectrum disorders. But, Ana Rita is quick to advise me, neurofeedback can be implemented and studied “across a wide range of conditions, and even in ‘healthy’ individuals.” More than that, it’s important to study as an alternative treatment to a range of mental health issues. “When patients are given a treatment, a drug, a medication, they don’t get better,” she explains. “So, what I feel is that patients are seeking for other alternative treatments for their conditions.” So, if it is so important, why isn’t it more mainstream? The answer is that there is simply a lack of access. One fMRI neurofeedback session can cost between seven- to eight-hundred dollars, accounting for a trained person to activate the exercises and the use of an MRI machine. “And, to have neurofeedback as an intervention”, Ana Rita clarifies, “you would need multiple sessions.” The money is in the research. People are still studying the parameters and boundaries to both the EEG and fMRI processes, still studying what strategies work best for different individuals. The money is in finding the secrets of the brain, because so much of it is unknown. All we can hope for is that in the near future, when the parameters are defined and the strategies established, that this doesn’t develop into something that some people – the kind of people whose names are engraved into the sponsored areas of this building – have easier access to over others.

Ana Rita takes the elevator down from the BDC with me and drops me off at the reception with a wave. As I leave the Research Institute, a father and son walk past the building, and I am reminded of how I first came across neurofeedback. In Richard Powers’s newest novel, Bewilderment, a widowed father in the near-future on a dying earth enrolls his neurodiverse son, Robin, in a neurofeedback trial. The experiment works brilliantly until the funding is lost, and then Robin is undone, lost to the hopelessness of a world that cannot, or will not, save itself. Powers writes: “Every one of us is an experiment, and we don’t even know what the experiment is testing.”

by Nikita Byrnes

AUSTRALIA’S QUESTIONABLE MULTICULTURALISM

Is Australia truly multicultural? Under the guise of celebrating diversity, Tiffany Fong uncovers the truth to Australia’s attitude towards multiculturalism.

Australia has a complex and paradoxical relationship with multiculturalism and buried racism. Our rich and diverse history has always included the story of immigrants and refugees who were vital to Australia’s nation-building, yet these stories are often buried by tales of the British.

The rich diversity and multiculturalism in Australia has been paraded since the 1970s, celebrating the range of cultures who have built a home in this country. However, Australia continues to struggle with racism and bigotry, conveniently ignoring issues with racism or reacting defensively to them. Australia’s tension between multiculturalism and racism is evident within various government policies and media narratives ingrained within the national psyche.

As pointed out in a speech delivered by Dr Tim Soutphommasane, Australia’s former Race Discrimination Commissioner, “In a multicultural country, common identity isn’t defined in ethnic or ractial terms”. It seems that as various ethnicities assimilate into the Australian identity, Australian society forgets that except for our First Nations peoples, everyone in this country was an immigrant at one point.

Various tensions exist within Australia’s migration policies, as well as its treatment of people of colour. Australia has been publicly shamed by the United Nations for its horrifying treatment of refugees, yet our refugee resettlement program is incredibly successful. Or, we could talk about how 84 per cent of respondents to The Scanlon Foundation’s survey agreed that “multiculturalism has been good for Australia”, and 71 per cent believed that “accepting immigrants from many different countries make Australia stronger.” Yet many of the respondents reported having negative views towards people from Africa, Asia and the Middle East, and oppose the government providing assistance to ethnic minorities to maintain their customs and traditions.

In other words, Australia would like to reap all the benefits of multiculturalism without grappling with the messiness, vibrancy, and liveliness it brings with it.

In 2017, Dr Southphommasane criticised a Bill to “Strengthen the Requirements for Australian Citizenship”, where applicants would be required to reach an International English Learning Standard (IELTS) of Level 6. He noted that, “Many Australian-born citizens would not possess a written or spoken command of English equivalent to this standard” - a damning comment about both the Bill and Australia’s education system, highlighting the hypocrisy of the requirement. Since 2016, the number of people who use a language other than English at home has increased by nearly 800 000 people.

According to 2011 figures from the Australian Bureau of Statistics, while migrants contribute an estimated fiscal benefit of over $10 billion in their first ten years of settlement, countless barriers still exist. It is well known that recent migrants often face hurdles finding their first jobs despite being qualified or even overqualified for the positions they are applying for. Many of these difficulties arw due to a lack of Australian work experience or references, language difficulties, lacking a local network, or having their skills and qualifications not recognised according to the Australian Human Rights Commission.

The recent COVID-19 lockdowns brought many of Australia’s racist attitudes to the forefront. Donald Trump’s reference to COVID-19 as the ‘Chinese Virus’ not only sparked Asian hate in America, but globally.

Following the pandemic, the Stanton Foundation found that 47 per cent of respondents held negative views towards Chinese Australians, while Asian Australians also reported that 39 per cent of them experienced heightened discrimination increased during the pandemic.

While racism can simmer in society’s undercurrent, individuals who experience it often have a hard time making a complaint about it. When comments are made under a person’s breath or out in public, often it is easier to swallow the discomfort than make a scene. Even when complaints are made to employers, corporations, government or officers, an apology may be made but there are no long-term reparations or policy changes to address the root of the issue. A PR response to address the wrongdoing, but ultimately one that demonstrates that it really isn’t that big of a deal.

In an interview with the ABC, David Le stated that, “No matter the life I may be able to forge in culturally-diverse Sydney, it is improbable that I will ever be seen as an equal in this country.” Racism affects a broad range of people, from Indigenous communities, refugees, temporary migrant workers, people who speak a language other than English as their first language or temporary visa holders and migrants that have been here for over 20 years.

Yet racism does not only affect those who moved to Australia. Indigenous Australians have faced oppression and racism ever since the First Fleet landed. From the removal of Indigenous children the government agencies and church missions until 1969, forced assimilation, and the false declaration of terra nullius - racist and oppressive policies have had an undeniable and ongoing impact on Indigenous people as institutional racism continues to trickle down to individuals. In 2020, the Australian government acknowledged that Indigenous people continue to face entrenched disadvantages due to institutional racism in areas such as the healthcare, education and the justice system. Further barriers exist when attempting to address institutional and systemic racism that may be a culmination of little things that are not felt by a single individual, but by a community as a collective. The Australian Human Rights Commission has noted that racist attacks are significantly under-reported due to barriers in accessing justice but also the lack of concrete change it is likely to result in. In March 2022, the Diversity Council report found that 43 per cent of non-White Australian employees commonly experience racism at work, but only 18 per cent of White workers reported racism as a problem. The huge gap reveals the glaring disparity regarding the lived experience of racism and perceived experience of racism.

In the 2021 Census, 48.2 per cent of Australians have a parent born overseas and 27.6 per cent of the population was born overseas as well. While the rich multicultural community Australia has is undeniable, the overall global trend in western political climates and uptick of individuals experiencing and reporting racism does indicate a growing problem. When intolerance and xenophobia is expressed and shrouded in far-right nationalist rhetoric that is increasingly threatening and violent, placing whole communities at risk.

As our world becomes increasingly globalised and various people from various cultures begin to settle into and call Australia home, it is important to have open and honest conversations about cultural differences and address racism head on.

by Tiffany Fong

OXYMORON: QUIET WOG

Jessica Mohandes-Barg questions her ethnicity in relation to Australian Culture. She explores the challenges of fitting in or perhaps standing out alongside her inner-child.

“Quiet wog.” Have you ever heard that saying? I know it’s cruel in nature but nonetheless true.

It’s puzzling. Of course it was a belief I always mocked as a champion for nurture over nature. Maybe this affliction towards nurture stems from the neglected inner child within myself. You see, since I was a child I gripped onto the hope that I could be trusted with a baby polar bear. Logically it made sense that I had the metaphysical capabilities to raise a baby polar bear in the summer heats of Western Sydney to adore and love me simply due to my nurturing capabilities. Mrs. Baby Polar Bear (deep down I knew she was married) would walk with me to school everyday, share my disdain for loud and sweaty boys eating crayons at the back of the class and lie down on the grass littered with bindis with me during recess. We never talked but we were always bound; bound by our blooming and buzzing thoughts. At some point the idea of Mrs. Baby Polar Bear left, she probably drifted off on some unfortunate sheet of melted ice in the Arctic. Other strange changes preoccupied my time as I grew up, like learning to ride a bike, perpetual sarcasm, the mystery of Tumblr. But the most puzzling of all was learning to drive.

I remember being 16 sitting in a car with a driving instructor who had a painful habit of producing garbled noises out of his mouth (his excuse for small talk). I distinctly remember his astonishment finding out that I was a Christian Iranian, apparently something more obscure and mythical than spotting Big Foot at Bunnings. It took everything in me to not swerve his Toyota into oncoming traffic putting us both out of our misery.

But he told me something.

Something that struck a chord.

“I didn’t know wogs like you exist.”

Of course you can understand my astonishment. “What do you mean?” I mumbled, my eyes piercing into a telephone pole with the burning desire you only see in the eyes of students in week 12 of uni begging for it all to be over.

“Well, I guess you’re just so quiet. Oh! You don’t shout or use the word yallah like all those other people.”

Those other people. If I’m not those other people, then what type of people could I fit myself into? I feel like this is a great time to let you know that growing up, my parents taught me both Farsi and English, so I never felt excluded. I was the only Middle Eastern kid at my Christian High School but I never even realised until I graduated. In fact, I wrote in my highschool Major Work for English Extension 2 (thanks Mum and Dad for the English skills) about how proud I am of both my Australian and Persian heritage. As hard as it may be for both the whites and ethnics to understand. I’m ashamed to say I’ve never been ashamed of my ethnicity.

In a way I’ve been torn by the fact of the existing dichotomy I am as an Australian. It never mattered how much I punched my puzzle piece, squeezing and bending the cardboard edges to fit in, I was never complete. Even in high school people helped me try to understand.

Maybe it’s internalised racism?

Maybe it’s because you can’t drive and don’t have a car to hoon in? It’s your fault for being mean to your driving instructor.

Maybe it’s because you are white passing?

I mean really white passing. White! Me. No way! No? Surely not, I mean I did tick that box in Naplan that one time… but you’ve got to understand there was no Middle Eastern option, it was either tick ‘white’ or tick ‘other’.

There is nothing worse than being other. I suppose the saying is right. I am not an Iranian born in Australia who becomes an Australian. I am just an Iranian who was born in Australia. When you have no space to exist you always believe you are taking up too much space. My puzzle piece will never fit in with the thong-wearing Aussies and will also never be squeezed in with the Adidas tracksuit wearing Wogs.

It can be confusing, all these paradoxes and contradictions. It’s hard to know when I stopped being the child raising Mrs. Baby Polar Bear like a single mother and when I woke up and started questioning my identity as another sunburnt Australian.

All I know is that this is my voice, whether I want it or not.

by Jessica Mohandes-Barg

PUT SOME SHRIMP ON THE BARBIE

Australia has some pretty interesting slang. Priyanka Sanger analyses whether Aussie slang is representative of all Australians or if it’s actually culturally cringey.

Have you ever wondered where that phrase actually comes from? It originates back to the late nineties from an Australian Tourism commission advertisement that stars Paul Hogan. However, the irony is that so many Australians hate that saying as it moulds Australians as laid back country-bums who constantly cook on the ‘barbie’. Australians also use the word prawn instead of shrimp - shrimp is the term used in America. Australian slang itself has been Americanised, like so many things.

To many tourists travelling to Australia after watching Crocodile Dundee in the early noughties, we were seen as the home to snakes, sharks, spiders and many more deadly animals that could potentially kill you. This is one of the factors that reduced tourism rates in Australia. However, in Paul Hogan’s ad, Australia became the 7th most desirable holiday destination in America. This was also the beginning of Australia’s cheesy stereotypes that we all know and hate to be known by.

Personally, I was very dumbfounded by how much culture cringe has affected not just Australia, but people all over the world. When I went to Disneyland in Orlando on a school trip and the theme park workers were meeting and greeting the theme park guests that had come from all over the world, they stopped to talk to my little cluster of classmates. They were asking us a few questions about Australian culture and our school life. We sarcastically replied saying “we rode into school on kangaroos” and that “you need to watch out for drop bears whilst driving”. After we made those comments, some of the other guests looked strangely at us and were very confused about the lives we lived in Australia. One of the parents came up to us and asked us “Is this all true? About the drop bears and the kangaroos?”. As Australia is its own country and continent, people from outside assume that we live differently on this isolated island of ours with no exposure to the outside world.

Due to this stereotypical lens that other countries perceive Australia through (perpetuated largely by Australians ourselves), Australia’s portrayal of our culture was overruled by ‘cultural cringe’. Arthur Angell Phillips, who coined the term, explains that ‘ cultural cringe’ is defined as the inferior dismissal of Australian art and work by bigger western cultures such as America and Britain. This idea was evident in the 1960s and 70s where Australia had a huge influx of migration. There were great shifts in social conventions throughout those years and a great segregation from British cutlure and the ‘American Dream’. As a result, Australia’s national identity became more unclear and was determined by what others thought of their culture.

The talent and culture has been undermined by outsiders to the point that we have had to outsource ourselves to be noticed. If you had to google ‘Australian Celebrities” you will be surprised to see the abundant amount of celebrities that you didn’t realise were Australian. Even I recently discovered that Iggy Azalea was born in Sydney, in Ryde hospital. However, these celebrities fail to represent the multicultural nature of our country. Within our roughly 26 million individuals, Australia is home to over 270 different ancestries. Our population has increased by 60% over the past 10 years due to the high influx of migration. Most of our well-known celebrities fail to show our multicultural nature.

Since we don’t globally exhibit the diverse population that we possess, we fall into these cookie-cut stereotypes formed by ridiculous ideas. We are so much more than our barbecues, beers and stereotypical slang. We are more than just an idyllic holiday destination with a bunch of beaches and bush locations. We are a country that’s filled with so much art, culture and talent.

So next time you rock up to your next barbeque party, your next shrimp… I mean, prawn, dish might not just be your common ‘ shrimp on the barbie’ - it might be a marinated mix of everything that represents what Australian culture means to you.