16 minute read
Humans of UniSA
Everyone has a story. Humans of UniSA is a deep dive into the lives of our fellow students to unravel the threads of their personal history, quiet ambitions, and their hopes, worries and joys. Take a fleeting glance into the vivid lives we pass by each day in the hallways and classrooms of UniSA.
When I was a kid, all my spare time was writing books. So, I was like ‘well, journalism seems like the only degree that I can get academically where I can get the creative side as well.’ I started off writing the normal, usual kids’ ones but then as Twilight and everything came out I used to write fantasy ones but yeah my dad always said I was like the next J.K. Rowling.
He was born in Scotland. He was 15 years older than my mum when they got married. When I was maybe seven, he started drinking a lot, and his dad was an alcoholic, and his brother was also an alcoholic, so it was just in the genes, unfortunately. I think it started when he lost a lot of jobs and turned to drinking and from there it just escalated from when I was about seven to when he passed away when I was 15. So, it was seven or eight years of just pure hell with him.
I think I was angry a lot. My whole life at the start, it was very much trying to be understanding—trying to understand alcoholism as a disease. I remember being 11 and sitting in an AA meeting with my mum because she would go to them to understand how to help him and then I would also go to try and support her. And I remember sitting in this room with all these recovered and current alcoholics, and I think they were distraught that someone so young was sitting in a room with them trying to understand such a complex disease. And that’s what we always said, ‘it’s a disease, alcoholism is a disease’, but when he went to rehab and then booked himself out that’s when it felt like that is not a fucking disease, that’s a choice. I think angsty little Anastasia was very angry about that, all the time.
And then, of course, we didn’t have my dad anymore, like, it wasn’t him. And everyone was always like ‘your dad was so great, your dad is amazing’, and I was like ‘I don’t really remember him.’ I only know seven years of my life with him, and I don’t really know what he was like without the alcohol because him drunk was the only person I knew, and I didn’t like him.
I can only imagine, now that I’m older, how he felt not being able to be who he wanted to be and having that addiction just pulling him under. He couldn’t get out of it, and there was no getting out of it. When he passed away, it was almost like, not a sigh of relief, but we didn’t have to think about if he was alright anymore because he was just gone.
We moved out a couple of years before he passed away and I was working at Kmart. And I remember my mum had Aunty Lucy in the car and I was like ‘oh! Aunty Lucy what is up?’ and I got in the car in the undercover carpark at Tea Tree Plaza. We drove to get out then Aunty Lucy just pulled over and they both looked at me. Mum got out of the car and then she put her hands on my shoulders and I just knew immediately. My mum, yeah. We don’t always get along but she is my role model. If she was stressed about money or if she was stressed about my dad she did not let us see that. I commend her for that because I think if she added that onto my shoulders, I wouldn’t have been able to handle it. I think she did amazing and still to this day if she’s struggling with anything you can see it but she won’t lay it on me. You know, I lost my dad and my brother lost his dad but she also lost a husband who she thought she was going to spend the rest of her life with. I don’t know who it is harder on.
Oh god, oh, there was this one that I wrote I think her name was Ava and she went away to her auntie’s house and her aunty turned out to be angel. Because I was obsessed with the Fallen books, so, prime Twilight time. And you know the book Hush, Hush? I loved that book. Oh my god. I don’t know how her aunty was an angel— fuck you. Ask eleven-year-old me, I don’t know. I wrote 250 pages of this book and it’s just sitting on my hard drive and that is about as extensive as it got.
I don’t think I have the creativity anymore. Yeah. I don’t think so. I’m reading again. I just bought a Kindle because I haven’t read a serious book since high school. Yeah. I used to go through two books a week. Nose in my book all the time. I wanted to be reading and I wanted to be writing but I wasn’t. But I’m reading Eleanor Olliphant is Completely Fine. Did you like it? I’m halfway through. Yeah, I’m getting that vibe. She seems like she’s fucked up. And when she asks for Mrs Brown because she’s at Bobby Brown. She’s so socially awkward—I love it. And when I’m reading it, I’m like ‘I wouldn’t be able to write like this’ and I think that’s what puts me off now. Maybe one day I’ll write a book. I’ll put you in my acknowledgements.
And I think the other thing is with my dad because he thought I was the next JK Rowling—yes, so bad. It breaks my heart because I loved her but she’s sucky. The fact that she felt the need to be vocal about being transphobic and now she’s ruined her entire fan base. I read this article on Buzzfeed about trans people who have Harry Potter tattoos and now they’re completely detached from it because they said ‘Harry Potter was my life growing and made me feel like I belong somewhere and now the person who wrote it is transphobic.’ I can’t even imagine what that would be like. Hectic. Anyway, don’t want to be the next JK Rowling because she’s transphobic.
But my dad was a writer. He used to write poems for my mum and they were amazing. Seriously amazing. That’s where I get all my creativity from. He used to read books after books. You should see my front room, it’s covered in three massive bookcases. That is all he did is read books. I reckon until the day he died, which I obviously didn’t see him a lot, but I reckon he would’ve been reading.
Anastasia Monaghan
James Karas Bachelor of Business (Design and Marketing)
Ienrolled in Business Management, but I’m changing it up next year to do Business, Design and Marketing. It’s a business degree... with... brackets. Basically, I realised that dedicating my career so far to hospitality hasn’t really paid off, and I—in I trying to get out of hospitality and move into a sales-based job, or repping, something like that, trying to move into the 9-5 life—I found that I just wasn’t even getting a look-in with my resume, despite having a lot of experience. Twenty years of experience at management level hospitality, you know I was going up against people with degrees and, ‘sales experience,’ and I mean you can argue that hospitality is sales, but unfortunately, hospitality doesn’t really have much validity in other people’s eyes outside of hospo, which is really frustrating.
So yeah, I made the leap. If I don’t do this now I pretty much will be stuck in hospitality forever. I’d always aspired to own my own business but you know, seeing a number of businesses that I was on board with through the opening and whatnot I realised what a struggle it is, how much is involved and how much money you actually need behind you to do it. I didn’t have any money behind me. I’ve had debt. So, I thought ‘put that on the back burner and try to get a degree.’
I think, there is still that kind of desire to create a space and an offering and an experience within hospitality, but I think I need to step out of hospitality for a bit and look at doing it potentially later when I’m in a better financial position or when I’ve established myself in another career path.
I think at the moment I’d just be doubling down—putting everything in on trying to start up a business now, if I was to continue down that path... it’s kind of all or nothing, you know what I mean? It’s too much of a gamble to take right now. Despite everything that’s happened with COVID, I’ve only ever done one thing, and I feel like I’ve done it well but now I’ve got an opportunity to kind of diversify and try and step into other fields and gain some other knowledge and things like that, which will all, in turn, help me in the long run if I do decide to come back to starting my own business. I’ve actually got a pretty clear goal as to what I want to achieve at the end of it. I think the real reason I’ve always wanted to have my own business is to create something, create a space and a name and a brand, an environment, an offering that people can come and enjoy, but it’s never really been about me wanting to wait tables and carry plates and scrub dishes and all that stuff seven days a week.
Through some past experiences, when I was on board to set up a venue for someone else, I’ve had the opportunity to oversee the fit-out and the branding and you know, establishing some of the initial processes and whatnot involved in opening up a hospitality venue and I loved that, and I made some connections through doing that which I hope I can tap into, and I’d like to build a career out of doing that for other people.
The other parts of my personality?! Um, I don’t know... music is a big thing, are we just talking personal stuff? Okay. Like, music is massive for me, and that’s also another reason I wanted to have my own space, so I can just crank the music that I like, you know? One of the best parts of when I was, well essentially the general manager of Mimasu, I had total autonomy of how I ran that business and I used to play my music in there and customers would comment all the time and it gave me such a thrill to know that people were digging my music. I’ve been collecting records for a couple of years now hoping one day maybe I’ll be a DJ but I don’t think that’s ever going to happen... just at home, living room DJ...
I think I’ve chosen hospitality, and stuck with it so long, because I’m a people person. I like interacting with people, I like meeting people, you know? I’ve been able to build good relationships and good rapports with people over the years who have only ever just been customers. You know, customers who come into the cafes or restaurants that I’ve worked at and for some reason they remember me, and when they see me somewhere else they recognise me and say hello. Walking down the street in Adelaide, everywhere I go I bump into someone that I know somewhere and most of the time it’s because I’ve served them somewhere. I guess I’ve taken a lot of pride in that, that I’ve been able to build those relationships, and you know it kind of made sense for me to ‘capitalise’ on that if you want to talk in those terms.
When I thought about having my own business and being the face of something... you know I feel like I’ve built up something over the years. I’m a recognisable character to a lot of people. If I could be the face of something I thought that might give me an advantage. I don’t know. I guess I kind of like the attention! I like being recognised by people, I like people! I also like recognising people. I’ll always stop and have a chat with someone in the street, that’s just, that’s who I am I guess.
Interview and Photography Emma Horner
Iwas born in Ethiopia. I moved to Australia when I was nine months old. I went back to Ethiopia when I was three. I haven’t been back since. I went to Canada and Alaska on my 18th birthday. I went to Cambodia a few months later to do—what do you call it—I was working in hospitals and such, like community work. And then I went into Asia a year later with my best mate. We went to Thailand, Laos, Vietnam, and Cambodia again. And then I went to Peru about a year ago now. When I was in Japan, I was probably there longer than anywhere else. It feels more homely, I guess. It felt like the safest place I’ve been, ever.
Now it’s winter, I will look out my window, and it’s always raining and I’m like ‘that kind of reminds me of Tokyo,’ because I lived in Tokyo for four weeks. That was the first time I saw snow, and the first time I’ve properly lived out of home. I was a bit more independent. Japan is really important to me because it was a bit of a step. It was my first time backpacking, my first time doing a lot of stuff. Also, I made a great bunch of contacts and friends who are also into writing and creative works. I was working with Global Hobo, which is cool.
My best mate just moved to Geelong, so I want to go there and hang out with him for a bit. When talking about proper travel, I’ve always wanted to go to Jordan and Egypt. Because you know, everyone goes through their Egyptology phase when they’re a kid. Also, one of my favourite movies is Indiana Jones and they shot a lot of that in Jordan so, why not!
We’re always really open with each other. One of my favourite parts of my friend group is that they don’t really hold back, and not in a bad way. Like, you can be as real as possible around them and it’s a really friendly environment. One of my best friends, she studies psychology and she runs this little mental health blog, Embrace The Mess, by the way, if I’m going to plug anything. It’s streams of consciousness and thoughts, and being active about how you’re feeling and stuff. That’s always empowering. It’s always great to talk about how you’re feeling.
I’ve never worried about my mental health because I know that I can open up to people. It’s been hard for some people, I know. But the more you branch out, and connect with others outside of school, and become more of the person you’re meant to be, the more comfortable you will be being able to express yourself.
I like being able to hang out with myself sometimes. Like I said, talking to my friends about stuff, that is super healthy. But sometimes I just need time for myself. I’ll go for a long hike for a day, or go to the park and read a book, or listen to music.
My favourite things? I went through this phase when I was a kid when I read a lot, like my room is basically a library now. After that, I had eye surgery so I couldn’t read for a little bit, so I started getting into music. After music, I got into film. One of my favourite books is probably Fear and Loathing in Las Vegas by Hunter S. Thompson, a big reason why I’m interested in journalism, because of how crazy you can make it. I’m always finding new music. One of my favourite performers is Bon Iver, who I got to see live in Tokyo, which was one of the best experiences I’ve ever had.
I really love rom coms, actually. But not like weird Matthew McConoughey early 2000s movies, but like proper rom coms. Like 500 Days of Summer or Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind, things like that. I think film or art, in general, is about the human condition. And the best way you can find out about the human condition is through romance and how people develop through that.
What influences me? A lot of the time I like writing after I’ve travelled. Because obviously if you’ve been in another world for a while, that gives you inspiration.
Well. My thoughts are pretty—pardon the pun—but they’re pretty black and white. I can’t really think anything more to it; it’s pretty straightforward because it is my life. It’s also my life that I’m having to protest for, actually. So, when I think about BLM, like when I was saying to my friend the other day, I’m not sure exactly where I belong in this argument. I’m not African-American, I’m Australian, but I’m not Indigenous. So, what am I fighting for? It’s pretty rough. I was saying to a friend the other day, you know, I didn’t realise how much this affects me. But I can’t help but think about the cycle of racism that has filtered through my life.
What I have experienced here, is people saying racist things and not realising they’re racist. They’re just being stubborn, or not educated. It’s not like people are going out of their way to be a horrible person, which isn’t to say that hasn’t happened, but a lot of the times it’s not realising how racist they’re sounding.
Don’t say ‘I understand’ because you don’t. You can say ‘I don’t understand, but I will help.’ It’s just knowing what is right, and what’s wrong, and doing something about it. Rather than just sitting there on the sidelines.
Love. Pretty much. That’s cheesy, but I always love watching the movie Love Actually. Like I said, I love rom coms! But how love actually is everywhere. That’s what gives me hope. The majority of things in life aren’t pushed by hate. They’re pushed by love. And even if it’s a bad thing which is being pushed, at least they’re pushing it because they love something or are passionate about something. Rather than ‘I hate that person so I’m going to be like that, it’s I love that thing so I’m going to be like that.’
