woroni VOL. 68, Issue 05. Week 9, Semester 1, 2018
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food for social change "Food reminds us that, deep down, we are all the same."
unfair game "Who can you trust in this unfair game?"
how changing consumer habits can help save your planet and money
broken plans "Sometimes it feels like I'm carrying the spectre of chronic illness around on my shoulder."
GIVING STUDENTS A VOICE Woroni investigates employers' illegal workplace behaviour
Text: Max Koslowski Graphic: Sophie Bear All the names in this piece have been changed to protect those individuals’ identities. When Lauren started working at a major food chain in Canberra city, she just wanted to make some quick cash to support her through university. Instead, she was underpaid by more than $5 per hour, and was not given any weekend or holiday penalty rates. When she left the workplace and had a look at her superannuation account, she realised that even though superannuation had been taken out of her payslips, no such account had ever existed. “It was a culture of chronic underpayment, overworking people and making people scared,” Lauren told Woroni. And when she thought about reporting the franchisee to the Fair Work Commission she stopped herself, because she “was too scared” about how her boss would react. Lauren’s story is not isolated. In the past week, Woroni has spoken to more than 30 students who have been underpaid, unfairly dismissed from work, or not paid the superannuation and annual leave that they are entitled to. Jonathan had just started working at a highend Canberra bar when his boss requested that he, along with all the other staff, attend two days of training.
“All of the staff were required to come to two days of compulsory training to get to know the venue, the food and the drinks we would be serving,” he explained. “No staff members were paid for training for either of those days.” It is illegal for a business to not pay for work training: the only time they can ask you to work for free is during a trial shift, and even then, the rules are strict. An employer can test out a potential barista for an hour to see them demonstrate essential skills, but they cannot keep them in unpaid trial shifts for a week. This wasn’t the only way that Jonathan’s workplace shortchanged him. He didn’t receive penalty rates, or over-time, throughout his time there. And his boss managed to avoid paying him the casual hospitality award by signing him onto to cheaper, part-time award rate: even though he never received consistent hours. Lisa also worked at a popular Canberra bar, and was similarly rorted. She was often pushed to stay back at work for an extra three or four hours of unpaid work. “I was a waitress, and service stopped at 10pm for food but they’d keep me there until one or two in the morning cleaning up the club with no extra pay,” she said. Lisa was also illegally classified as a parttime worker, which meant that she accumulated leave throughout her time
as a waitress. But when she went to leave the hospitality job, she struggled to get a hold of the money she was owed. “I had to chase up a few different people to get my holiday loading when I left – took about two months – but it got to me eventually,” she told Woroni. Students have reached out to Woroni with claims that they are getting paid as little as $11 per hour. For a low-level, 20-year-old casual hospitality employee, the award rate is $23.51 per hour. When working from 7pm-12am, employees must be paid an extra $2.13 per hour. For work between midnight and 7am, they must be paid an extra $3.19 an hour. Casual hospitality workers are also owed penalty rates for work on Saturday, Sunday and public holidays. These range from $28.22 per hour on a Saturday, to a base rate of $47.03 an hour on a public holiday. The Fair Work Commission has an anonymous reporting service that helps them catch out businesses that are exploiting workers. In 2017, Cafe Garema in Canberra city was taken to court by the commission for paying its twelve employees between $14 and $20 per hour. The owners also failed to hand out payslips, and keep records of pay.
The year before, the Fair Work Commission forced Nando’s, in Canberra Centre, to pay back their young workers more than $27,000. According to their report on the matter, workers were paid a flat rate of $18 per hour. Last week, the ABC reported that Melbourne's Barry cafe was accused of underpaying staff by at least $5 per hour. The Fair Work Ombudsman is investigating the claims. "Young workers make up about 16 percent of the Australian workforce but account for a disproportionately high 25 percent of requests for assistance to the agency. Last year 44 percent of the litigants we filed in court involved young workers," Fair Work Ombudsman Natalie James said earlier this year. “Young workers can be vulnerable in the workplace as they are often not fully aware of their rights or reluctant to complain if they think something is wrong." For international students attending university in Australia, the problem is even more evident. According to a report from the Migrant Worker Justice Initiative, a quarter of international students earn $12 per hour or less. W Woroni is investigating claims that students have been mistreated at work. If you have been underpaid, or otherwise exploited, email the news editor at max@woroni.com.au.
Vol. 68 , Issue 05
News
Discover
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Light Up Your Night with Wildlife that Shine! Elizabeth Suk-Hang Lam
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Bridging the Gap Between Domestic and International Students Noah Yim 6
Meanwhile, In Canberra... Greens Have High Hopes for a High Green Vote Jasper Lindell 7
Food for Social Change Georgia Alexiou Papagianni 8
Creating Everyday Aya Miki 9
Syria: Who Wants What and Why? Daniel Mehareb 10
Another Side, Another Story Harry Pollock and Shania Lim
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The Need to Achieve The Sustainable Development Goals in Australia Jessica Woolnough 34
Behind The Tag Student Wanting to Eliminate Apparel and Textile Sweat shops (SWEATS) 35
How to Make Money: How Changing Consumer Habits Can Help Save Your Planet And Money Lydia J. Kim 36
The Royal Banking Commission: The Actuarial Perspective Felix Ryan 37
‘TORN’ Features
Shining a Light on History Brody Hannan
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How to Survive the Blistering Canberra Cold Sophie Johnson
Torn by War: An Environmental Perspective Lydia J. Kim 13
Matthew, Noah, John, Emmanuel Jemma Sbeghen 14
Photo Series: Torn Christine Song 16
Venice Marc Perry Multilingual 17
A Troubled Night Charbel El-Khaissi 18
Unfair Game Asefeh Abedini 19- 30
international Pullout Valterri Kuusisto: Art & Design Feature 31
Culture 38
Spoilt for Choice: Going to the Movies in Canberra Adrian Ma
creative 45
Where Are You From? Anonymous 45
White Noise Sarah Kim 46
Weightlessly and Without Effort Laura Ly 46
Walls Mahalia Crawshaw sATIRE 47
Did You Know I Went On Contiki? Stephanie Bear & Milly Roper 48
Moroni: The Headlines That Didn’t Make it to the Front Page Woroni Editors Lost, Scared and Confused Non-Selective Public-School Kid Finds Himself in A Labor Left and Right Mixer Liam King
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The Book of Mormon Alisha Nagle 39
Thirty Seconds to Mars: America Chiara Cementon 40
Take a Walk Through 20th Century Fashion at NGA’s Exquisite Cartier Exibition Alexandra Elgue 41
Smashing the Stigma: Surrounding Mental Health Jessica Woolnough 42
Broken Plans Miriam Sadler 43
Centre Stage: Female Playwrights Ria Pflaum Kat Carrington Amanda Dheerasekara
acknowledgement of country
We acknowledge the Ngunnawal and Ngambri people, who are the traditional owners of the land on which Woroni is written, edited and printed. We pay respects to Elders past, present and future.
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This paper is recyclable. Protect the environment and recycle me after reading.
We would also like to acknowledge that this land – which we benefit from occupying – was stolen, and that sovereignty was never ceded. Within this ongoing echo of colonialism we commit, as writers and editors, to amplify the voices and stories of Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander people at our university. We will honour the diversity of their stories.
Board of Editors
Editor in Chief: James Atkinson Deputy EIC: Nathalie Rosales Cheng Managing Editor: Jonathan Tjandra Content Editor: Mia Jessurun Radio Editor: Zoe Halstead TV Editor: Linda Chen Art Editor: Sophie Bear News Editor: Max Koslowski
staff and Sub-Editors
Financial Controller: Brendan Greenwood Website Development: Nick Sifniotis Senior Sub-Editor: Ben Lawrence Senior Sub-Editor: Eleanor Armstrong Comment: Georgia Alexiou International: Brandon Tan Multilingual: Charbel El-Khaissi Arts: Miriam Sadler Reviews: Josie Ganko Environment: Jessica Woolnough Science: Liam King Business & Economics: Miles Tiley Creative Writing: Annabel Chin Quan News: Noah Yim News: Phoebe Lupton News: Kobie Chen News: Alessandra Hayward News: Luke Kinsella News: Dan Le Mesurier News: Jacob Thornton News: Georgia Clare News: JJ Klug News: Jade Lin News: Max Lowe Executive Producer: Steph David Presenter Liason: Sonja Panjkov Radio Technical Officer: Adam Bell Music & Events: Annika Law Breakfast Producer: Imogen Purcell Radio Producer: Dorothy Mason Radio Producer: Maleika Twisk Radio Producer: Byron Dexter Radio Producer: Gil Rickey Radio Producer: Lulu Cathro Radio Producer: Darcy Bembic Art & Design: David Liu Art & Design: Millie Wang Art & Design: Hannah Charny Art & Design: Clarence Lee Art & Design: Valtteri Kuusisto Art & Design: Eddie Landale Art & Design: Maddy McKusker Senior Camera Operator: Bremer Sharp Senior Video Editor: Shasha Ma Camera Operator: Manya Sinha Video Editor: Caitlin Jenkins Video Editor: Hayley Pang TV Producer: William He TV Producer: Zachary Schofield TV News Reporter: Isabella Di Mattina TV News Reporter: Judith Zhu TV News Reporter: Ayaka Miki Tsu TV News Reporter: Amanda Au
Contact
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Week 9, Semester 1, 2018
NEW ‘ANU STUDENTS FOR RAMSAY CENTRE’ FACEBOOK PAGE RUN BY STUDENT WHO HOSTS DISCUSSIONS ON ‘SUPERFASCISM’ Text: Dan Le Mesurier & Jacob Thornton
A new, pro-Ramsay Centre Facebook page has been created by a student who has shared articles about “superfascism” and the belief that women have “no soul”. The Facebook page, named ANU Students for Ramsay Centre for Western Civilisation, voices support for the developing partnership between ANU and the Ramsay Centre for Western Civilisation. Created last week, the page is administered by ANU student Jamie McHugh. The page’s posts have been limited to links to the Ramsay Centre’s various sections on its website, as well as articles relating to the Centre from conservative media publications. ANU and the Ramsay Centre are currently in negotiations regarding a potential degree program, with corresponding scholarship opportunities, which would be funded entirely by the Ramsay Centre. Such a partnership would see the hiring of 12 extra staff to facilitate a new degree focusing on western civilisation. This degree would feature 16 courses, 12 of
which would be compulsory courses relating directly to the new degree, and see a cohort of 60 students; half of whom would receive full scholarships. Executive officer of the Ramsay Centre Emma-Kate Bos said in a comment to Woroni that the Ramsay Centre is “100 per cent in agreement” with ANU’s emphasis on the need to employ “smart and critical academics” to teach and present a comprehensive and critical analysis of Western Civilisation. In addition to this, CEO Simon Haines told the Sydney Morning Herald that universities “will retain their independence” in the rollout of the program. Speaking to Woroni, ANU Students for Ramsay Centre founder McHugh said that he “and a number of other students […] felt that there was no student group speaking in favour of the ANU-Ramsay Centre collaboration on a new degree for Western Civilization.” While some students have reacted to the Bachelor of Western Civilization degree with hostility, others have voiced support in online discussions and in-person forums. A vocal critic of the current CASS/ humanities syllabus, McHugh has
stated that “the quality of higher education in Australia is abysmal.” “It seems to me the Australian higher education system has become addicted to easy money from international students.” The page has been promoted by a number of ANU students on ANUrelated Facebook groups and pages. One Facebook group where the proRamsay Centre page received popular reception was the ANU School of Traditionalism. This group, also run by McHugh, includes links to and discussions about fascist and anti-Semitic publications, including articles advocating the thoughts of Julius Evola, a selfdescribed “superfascist” Italian philosopher who also worked in the intelligence wing of the SS during World War II. One post linked to an article about Evola’s views on women, which included the belief that women have “no soul, or being.” “Because humanities departments are dominated by this extreme left ideology, universities are failing to adequately educate students in their own culture, history and values,”
McHugh said when asked to explain the ideological basis for ANU Students for Ramsay Centre. Questioned on whether his new Facebook page shared any motives with the ‘ANU School of Traditionalism’, McHugh replied that both share “a desire to affirm rather than critique […] the culture, history and values of Western Civilisation.” The ‘ANU School of Traditionalism’ describes itself as “Anti-progressive. Entirely reactionary” in an apparent reference to comments made about McHugh by a Young Liberal member following the collapse of their shortlived political alliance prior to the AGM of the ANU Men’s Network. The Facebook page ‘ANU School of Traditionalism’ is not affiliated with the Australian National University. Nor is the page ‘ANU Students for the Ramsay Centre for Western Civilization’ affiliated with either the ANU or the Ramsay Centre for Western Civilization. ‘ANU Students for the Ramsay Centre for Western Civilisation’ currently has 29 likes. An opposing Facebook page, ‘Keep Ramsay Out Of ANU', has 128 likes. w
ANU WIFI, WEB SERVICES BACK UP AFTER MORNING OUTAGE Text: Max Koslowski ANU’s webpages, WiFi and email services experienced an outage on Wednesday morning, before going live again by 11:20am. The outage included a shut down of both the ANU-Secure network and the Resnet network. A Wattle support technician said that “Wattle will not be able to be accessed during the ongoing outage”,
but that scheduled Echo360 recordings will continue to be captured.
general services while the outage remained.
“For any issues related to assignment submission, or other assessment that is managed on Wattle, please make note of the details, so a job can be logged after the outage has completed.” the technician continued.
“We won’t be able to access our systems which means no student cards, transcripts, or enrolment confirmation letters. We can still provide you with general advice, but please be aware our services will be limited by this outage,” they posted on their Facebook page.
ANU Student Central said that they would only be able to provide
ANU’s emergency text service also relayed a message, saying that “ANU is experiencing an outage
across the IT network affecting all internet, email, WiFi and access to network drives. We are working to resolve the issue ASAP.” When asked why the outage had occurred, ANU re-emphasised that they were investigating the situation. By 11:20am, services were back online. The outage lasted around three hours. w
Vol. 68 , Issue 05
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‘THEY ARE SOFT TARGETS’: NEW DOCUMENTARY HIGHLIGHTS INTERNATIONAL STUDENT SEXUAL ASSAULT
content warning: sexual assault and harassment, If this article has distressed you, you can access support at: 1800 RESPECT: 1800 737 732 institutional betrayal, victim-blaming attitudes Canberra Rape Crisis Centre: 6247 2525 trigger warning: graphic content, descriptions of aggravated sexual assalt and rape Text: Max Koslowski A new documentary released by Al Jazeera sheds light on how damaging campus sexual assault is for international students studying in Australia. In the documentary, an ANU student tells of how she was sexually assaulted as a first year campus resident. One night, her perpetrator followed her back to her room, forced his way into the room, and raped her. “I got pushed on the bed and I got raped,” the student told Al Jazeera. “He kept saying, ‘I’ll get what I want’”. “I couldn’t move my hands. I could only scream.” When the ANU student went to the police about the incident, she didn’t find the interaction too helpful: “The policewoman, I think she was trying to comfort me. She said ‘Don’t worry it’s definitely not your fault, but next time just be careful.” “What’s next time?” The student wondered. “And what do you mean be careful?”
The alleged perpetrator was an ANU student who was originally from Canberra. The documentary was released on Al Jazeera’s 101 East program, a weekly current affairs broadcast about the Asia Pacific. It’s the culmination of a half-year investigation into sexual assault across Australian universities: the half-hour piece includes testimony from students at other tertiary institutions. “Women often blame themselves when it comes to unwanted sexual encounters, but international students even more so,” said Aela Callan, one of the piece’s reporters. “They are afraid of their visas being taken away and being sent home, so they don’t speak up. On top of that, for cultural reasons, they fear their families may also shun them.”
have a strong commitment to providing a safe and respectful environment for all students, staff and visitors,” the spokesperson said.
An ANU spokesperson told Woroni that the university was deeply saddened to hear of the ANU students’ assault.
He said that ANU first years must now undertake the mandatory ‘Consent Matters’ module, and that the university has partnered with the Canberra Rape Crisis Centre to provide specialist counselling services.
“Harassment, sexual assault and violent behaviour of any kind is unacceptable and has no place on campus, and we
In the Australian Human Rights Commission survey on sexual assault and harassment released last year, it was
detailed that one in every five assaults were against international students. “They’re considered to be soft targets,” activist Alison Coelho says on the documentary, “and they’re considered to be soft targets because they don’t know where to seek help.” There are currently over 500,000 international students studying in Australia -- it is the country’s third largest export, valued at over $32 billion a year. w
ANU LECTURER JILL SHEPPARD INVITED ONTO ABC’S Q&A Text: Max Koslowski Political science lecturer Jill Sheppard was invited to appear on the current affairs discussion program Q&A to talk about class divide in Australia. Q&A is an hour-long Monday night program that often hosts politicians, commentators and popular figures to answer questions from a public audience, usually about the news of the week. Sheppard will appear on Monday’s program alongside other academics and commentators. “I’m sickeningly nervous,” she told Woroni. “It keeps being shared on Facebook and I feel like everyone I know will be watching. Usually I don’t have to tell anyone that I’ve been on TV until after the fact.” And while she is nervous about the upcoming show, Sheppard believes she has a duty to clearly represent her research to the public. “Being an academic is an incredible privilege, and I think it’s incumbent
on us to communicate our research to a public audience. And the more accessible we can make that research – in the way that we explain it, and the audiences that we talk to – the better.”
multidimensional measures of social class”.
“So, despite tremendous misgivings about doing media appearances like this, it’s part of the job. Besides, I always figure that if I don’t say yes, my place will be filled by one of the same old academic types. I’m taking my few opportunities to chip away at the status quo.”
And one Sheppard’s key motivations for appearing on Q&A was to share that research.
At ANU, Sheppard lectures two courses: one on media and politics, and another on Australia’s political institutions. Some of Sheppard’s most recent research investigates class identity in Australia. A 2017 paper published in the Australian Journal of Political Science — titled ‘Class, capital, and identity in Australian society’ — Sheppard was able to paint a picture of of the six different “class types” in Australia. Along with fellow ANU political scientist Nicholas Biddle, Sheppard writes that despite “obvious class-based cleavages, Australian society is stratified by objective,
One of the conclusions of the paper is that “Australians are acutely aware of their class identity”.
“I hope to explain my research on social class – and other aspects of Australian political and social life – in a way that everyone watching the show can understand,” Sheppard said. “I want to insert some caution and rigour into what are otherwise increasingly antagonistic public debates.” “And I want to represent my lower middle class roots. I’m a fully fledged adult (mostly), but I still always want to make my parents – who gave me incredible opportunities and support – proud of what I’m doing.” Sheppard explained to Woroni that class divides can be hidden. “I always think of an example from my high school. By the time I got to thinking about university options in Year 12, I’d been getting pretty good
marks for years (and I even ended up being dux of my school). I presented my draft university preferences to our careers counsellor for his advice, and he strongly advised me to apply to TAFE as my second or third preference,” she said. “People in my home town didn’t aim high back then. We didn’t know what was available to us. We didn’t know that we could move interstate – or even overseas! – to keep studying. Plenty of brilliant kids never knew how talented they were, and were never encouraged to try to find out. And that’s not malicious on anyone’s part; it’s just the effect of being down the class spectrum. The lower your class, the smaller your world.” For Sheppard, just appearing on Q&A helps that divide: “As a very easy first step, I try to expose students from similar class backgrounds to opportunities and prospects that no one in their home town can show them.” Sheppard appeared on the program on Monday 23 April.w
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comment // campus
Week 9, Semester 1, 2018
Bridging the gap
between domestic and international students Text: Noah Yim Graphic: Sophie Bear According to a recent ABC News report, Australia is hosting more international students than ever before. The total population has increased twelve per cent since last year, to a whopping 542,045 enrolments. It contributes $32.2B to Australia’s GDP. In 2016, we here at the ANU had 11,622 undergraduate student enrolments, of which 2,602 were international student enrolments. I remember being very confused when I first got to university at how there seemed to be such a divide between international and domestic students. Neither side seemed to want to talk to each other, and mostly kept to themselves. When brave individuals broke ranks and reached out, most people seemed to express aversion or outright hostility. This might be why there seems to be so much misinformation on both sides; Chinese media framed the baseball bat attack last year at the ANU as a racist attack, and there are very often opinion pieces which espouse that international students of particular nationalities pose an inherent threat to Australian academic culture. Most of these suspicions sound like thinly veiled racist criticisms. Not to say that all of these opinions are just racist finger-pointing; I think that there are legitimate discussions
that we need to have. But how can it be that all students from ONE country are all threats to Australian academic culture? Also, it’s been made very clear that the baseball bat attack was not a racially motivated attack. I think that it’s very human to fear the unknown, and it looks like this general air of seclusion and suspicion is fuelled precisely by that. But we need to rise above this petty race-baiting and racist finger-pointing if we’re to have legitimate discussions and have a cohesive campus community. I think that the best way to do this through talking to each other, and as the dominant demographic, the domestic student community should be the one to initiate it. I’d like to look at what’s been going on at the ANU and highlight some of the fantastic work that certain individuals and groups have been doing to support this. The International Students’ Department has been doing their usual wonderful work; for example, they publish the yearly International Students’ Living Guide. This year, it’s 40 pages long, full of useful information that domestic students might never even think about, like where to go, and what to take to set up a bank account, or what kinds of mobile service plans there are, or where to get groceries. On reading this document, you can really tell that its content is the product of years of experience in engagement with international students. It made me realise, once again, just how assimilated I am in Australian
society and that I just take my knowledge of our social norms and establishments largely for granted. The Interhall International Committee has also been working to further integrate the international and domestic student communities. Notably, in their activities, they held the College Feud held at Ursula Hall earlier this year, to which there was an impressive turnout from both factions. This cause has actually been taken up by groups other than the usual groups that we’d expect to be concerned with promoting cohesion between international and domestic students. Earlier this year, Bruce Hall celebrated the Lunar New Year – they held a cultural trivia quiz and a workshop hosted by Chinese students who taught others how to make tang yuan. This article barely starts to cover the amazing things that different people and groups have been doing around campus, and doesn’t even touch on the awesome efforts of individual people. But, what I have seen and heard to be going on around campus and within our ANU community to integrate the uncomfortably distinct domestic and international student bodies is very promising. I cannot overstate my respect, gratitude and appreciation of the individuals and groups behind these noble efforts. Though we have a long way to go, I like to think that those efforts have set us down that path, and made that distance that much shorter.
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Vol. 68 , Issue 05
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meanwhile, in canberra... greens have high hopes for a high green vote Text: Jasper Lindell Graphic: Hannah Charny
So, you want to have a serious conversation about drugs? Prepare to speak out against the two major parties who are united in their opposition and don’t expect a fair hearing from the capital city tabloids. Talkback radio won’t be kind either. Society is told to look at illegal drugs equally, with fear and derision. Drugs are the domain of delinquents and good-for-nothing young people and no serious conversation is required, unless you’re talking about crackdowns, raids and policing. But the tide has changed on medicinal cannabis in Australia, so maybe public opinion is shifting on recreational use too? The Greens certainly hope so, announcing their a plan to legalise recreational cannabis while citing 55 per cent public support. Sales would be limited to people over 18, there would be no advertising, the drug would be sold in plain packaging and the tax revenue would fund education and drug treatment programs. “Prohibition has failed,” the Greens leader said. Di Natale, who was a doctor before he was a senator, continued: “the
‘tough on drugs’ approach causes enormous harm. It drives people away from getting help when they need it and exposes them to a dangerous black market.” The Greens’ policy would turn that black market into a lucrative one for the budget bottom line. Independent Parliamentary Budget Office costings released by the Greens show the policy would create a $1.8 billion a year windfall for the budget. A 25 per cent excise on sales, like the one applied to tobacco, along with GST and a reduction in law enforcement costs, would generate $3.5 billion for the government by 2020-21. Of course, the major parties have been quick to denounce the proposal. The federal health minister, Greg Hunt, said the policy was not “safe, responsible or something which should be allowed.” The opposition leader, Bill Shorten, called the announcement “political clickbait” and said the Greens want to legalise ecstasy. Cripes! (It’s not true, although the Greens platform includes decriminalising all drugs.) Shorten was right about one thing. The announcement is political clickbait. Remember back a few weeks to the Greens’ loss in Batman. Labor’s popular trade unionist, Ged Kearney, is now
installed in Canberra after the Greens failed to break through Melbourne’s Bell Street curtain. Column inch after column inch has already been dedicated to this result, but most conceded the Greens’ flagship anti-Adani coal mine campaign failed to cut through. Although heinous, the reality of a mine which will be a bigger greenhouse gas emitter than the entire country of New Zealand wasn’t close enough to home. The Greens, then, are clearly looking for something will resonate in their wouldbe heartland: the inner city. Is legalising cannabis the policy to do it? Head to the official-sounding http:// drugs.org.au/ and you will be under no false pretences about who the Greens are targeting with their campaign website. The site, titled “Just Legalise It”, is loaded with pictures of bright-looking young people enjoying a picnic and going to a gig. The kind of people who might turn their vote Green, if they haven’t already. But the Greens are not seen as a governing force. Perhaps the lesson of Batman is that voters will choose a party with a real chance of governing in the hope that at least some progressive positions will be adopted. The Greens just don’t have that kind of clout. Fans of legalising cannabis will take the win if, at some point in the future, Labor comes around to the idea and makes it happen. The Greens will cry foul over policy plagiarism, because a win on principle in this scenario doesn’t translate to political capital for the minor party. (edited) And “makes it happen” is the key phrase here. Cannabis is a state issue. But it could pay off the Greens, who probably now realise they need to pursue issues closer to home, and to capture the kind of attention that only comes with announcing policies others are quick to label controversial. What makes cannabis so controversial? Everyone who says we have to see it that way. “We need to get real about cannabis. Almost seven million Australians have
tried or used cannabis socially but right now just having a small amount of cannabis in your possession could get you a criminal record,” Di Natale said. In 2008, Malcolm Turnbull, then opposition leader, gleefully told Tony Jones on ABC’s Q&A: “Yes, yes, yes. Yes, I’ve smoked pot. There you go.” This was a very different era, of course, where Turnbull was prepared to say Tony Abbott’s climate change policy was “bullshit”. How things have changed. Some things don’t change, though. Or take ages doing it. Would politics be better if policy could adapt faster? Chances are a politician will say the slow and deliberative process is what ensures we don’t rush a slew of madcap, harebrained policies through parliament and then need to apply constant legislative patches. But that’s exactly what we have now: this slow process hasn’t stopped bad policy before. Once an idea finds its political legs, it’s hard to stop it running. Before alcohol prohibition was adopted in the United States, Sweden and Russia in the early decades of the 20th century, expert commissions and committees in all three of those countries warned against the policy. It was later repealed after disastrous results. But few experts are able to put a stop to an idea with political backing and popular support. The experts now calling for an end to drug prohibition probably feel they have something in common with those ignored a century ago. Australia’s serious conversation about drugs has a long way to go. In Melbourne last month, 3AW host Tom Elliott said a safe-injecting room in North Richmond was a “Trojan horse”, predicted “probably” all drugs would be legal in five years in Victoria and said: “This is the thin edge of the wedge stuff.” If all progressive proposals about drugs have to be thin edges of wedges, then maybe the Greens’ announcement could be a thin edge of the wedge to force the serious conversation about drugs that Australia needs to have. Jasper Lindell is Woroni's political columnist and a former news editor
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Week 9, Semester 1, 2018
food for social change Text: Georgia Alexiou Papagianni Graphic: Clarence Lee
Food did not only bring us closer, but also made us equal. We came to see each other as individuals, with our own struggles, pain and ambitions.
“Fusion” might be the only way to describe Australian cuisine. It blends colours and flavours from the Mediterranean all the way to East Asia. It is the symbol and signifier of the multiculturalism that takes place in Australian society today. Australia prides itself on the mix of populations that have brought their own palates.
In Australia, this wide mix of cultures made me think about the ways we approach food. Even though it’s said to celebrate multiculturalism, I felt like some cultures are emphasised and seen as more important than others. In my university exchange year here, I have witnessed the adoration of all things European combined with partial indifference to the non-West as ordinary.
Food is more than just a necessity; it is a tool through which we can achieve multiculturalism. Regardless of our cultural, ethnic and religious differences, food just brings us all closer. Certain flavours, spices can instigate strong memories. Food sometimes takes the form of celebration, on our birthday, or nostalgia, when as migrants we miss our local cuisine. I spent my summers cooking in refugee solidarity kitchens in Athens. There, hierarchies did not matter. Someone would know the recipe and the right amount of ingredients, and we would all work toward the same goal. Cooking for 300 people was not always easy, but we managed. Simple tasks, like cutting a kilo of onions or chopping hundreds of tomatoes could be seen as mundane, but it was an opportunity from people around the world to get to know each other. The kitchen became our safe and even favourite space. Asylum seekers, locals, and independent volunteers became a family. Sometimes the recipes were not our greatest achievements, but with the right spices, they became our pride. The final result was a mix of cultures; Syrian, Afghani, Greek… and sometimes Philippine.
In Levenstein's words, migrants often neglect aspects of their native food that they consider ‘inferior’ as a way to assimilate to a white settler culture. At the same time, they focus on colonial foods and methods to foods that are thought of highly in their host country. At a time of increasing ethnic violence and discrimination, we realise we don’t actually live in a post-racial world. However, food reminds us that deep down we are all the same. It is so powerful in uniting us, that it’s said it can solve the Israeli-Palestinian conflict. Humous embodies the few things the two populations embrace and share in common. Respect for the same regional cuisine can help shape the ways in which they see each other. In our local context, the Canberra Multicultural Festival sought to do this with great success. It gives a voice to the hundreds of communities that live in Canberra that we would otherwise overlook. However, I believe we can do better ourselves. Maybe it is time to set aside our preferences and better engage with communities and flavours we ignore.
comment
comment // international
Vol. 68 , Issue 05
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creating everyday Text: Aya Miki Graphic: Sophie Bear
A new form of palliative care has recently been introduced in the Netherlands. Hogeweyk is the world’s first dementia village; an enclosed society built for people living with dementia. They can do errands such as buy groceries, get haircuts and dine out. From choosing the sugar intake in their coffee to hurrying off to work, a day at Hogeweyk allows patients to imitate even the most mundane aspects of their lives before being diagnosed with dementia. Within the gated community, residents are free to roam around and take walks along designed streetscapes. The only locked door is the at the reception, where new residents are admitted in and outgoing residents depart. Instead of locking residents up in an elderly care ward, the concept of a dementia village like Hogeweyk respects the conviction of human life and the freedom of choice. The decisions made by one with Alzheimer's at the village are recognised as legitimate as the convictions by one without it. There is no right or wrong when it comes to the reality that residents create for themselves. If you want to stand at a bus stop to go to work today, you are allowed to do that for as long as you believe you need to. This normalcy and routine was carefully designed and promoted by the founder of Hogeweyk, Yvonne Van Amerongen, and is the future of palliative care.
room’s smell. This is done to ensure a smooth transition into the village and to bring in a sense of semblance to their past life. Moreover, residents who have chosen to reside in the same theme are more likely to share the same values and enjoy the same activities, maximising the potential for friendships in old age and reducing memory loss. For example, if you were a high-baller in your time, you would probably feel most at home in the ‘upper-class’ lifestyle, where residents would have high-tea and listen to classical music. The artworks hung on the walls would be idyllic oil paintings and portraits of aristocrats. The furniture would be grand, but slightly non-functional, plush but a little intimidating. Everything possible to mirror a resident’s way of life is integrated through the collaboration of dementia carers, architects and interior designers.
Hogeweyk groups different types of individuals according to different aesthetics. There are seven lifestyle themes to live in: artisan, upper-class, cultural, urban, homey, Indonesian or Christian. Everything is built around the focused theme – from the a plate’s design to a
The creation of such a microcosm is reminiscent of the experience we expect at an amusement park, where we want to get lost in the confines of a new reality. If you have been to Universal Studios, their all-white performers and the scent of turkey legs is a reproduction of
Can the concept of the Netherlands’ Hogeweyk be successfully applied to different cultures and different parts of the world? We are beginning to see this concept applied and curated internationally, given Australia’s first dementia village, Korongee, is set to open in Tasmania in 2019. The lifestyle themes coming to Tasmania’s dementia village range from ‘tradie’ at one end of the spectrum to ‘artist’ at the other end.
a dreamy 1980’s America that appeals to those who like it. To some, believing in a false reality is attractive where you live the rest of your life perfectly content in an artificial reality. The idea of creating a world within our own is isolating. It would mean to live in a bubble where power is manifested in knowing the real world. This power segregates those who are ignorant and those who have this power of understanding and reason. It is like an episode from Black Mirror, except the patients never find out they are living in a reality built and monitored by others. It seems creepy to walk into a grocery store, bring your groceries to the cash register and ‘pay’ for it when the worker there is a qualified dementia carer, not a supermarket checkout staff. Being conscious of reality, we recognise the tradeoff between the truth and fiction, but it is questionable whether these residents face the same conundrum. Every lie told by the workers at Hogeweyk could really be a backhanded form of mercy. For people living with dementia, there is no sense that Hogeweyk is artificial or that they are being duped. Residents are simply happy with the freedom of choice and reassured by its normalcy. In the end, when we start to lose our faculty of reason but our convictions remain as strong and real as ever, we should respect the power of autonomy. I believe the best way to preserve that is through the establishment of dementia villages. I would be grateful to be in one if I were to get dementia, and who knows, maybe the brain really is in a vat and our entire lives are a simulation.
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comment // international
Syria: who wants what and why? Text: Daniel Mehareb Graphic: Hannah Charny As you may have heard over the past few weeks, coordinated tripartite attacks from the US, France and Britain have taken place in the outskirts of Damascus. In this tired seven year war, it’s often quite easy to lose track of who is fighting who and whom supports whom in the quagmire of rhetoric, accusations and generalisations. In this piece, I will be examining this war from a sectarian point of view, so buckle in for some rhetoric, accusations and generalisations.. It’s important to first know who is in the fight and why they are fighting. Put simply, it is the current regime vying to defend its existence against a plethora of rebel groups, some of whom like or dislike each other more than the regime. The current regime is the Syrian branch of the Arab Socialist Ba'ath Party, which claims to follow the tradition of Ba’athism (Arabic for ‘Renaissance’), however, it is often argued that it is a corruption of the ideology and many have begun to label the regime as neo-Ba’athist. Simply put, the main tenets of political Ba’athism are Arab unification, Arab nationalism, Social and Economic progressiveness, one-party rule and secularism. It is the latter two tenets that have fueled the fire of rebellion and led to the current conflict we see in the Middle East. It is the forced secularisation and the unwillingness to accept political pluralism established by the current regime that rebel groups use as their justification. They accuse their secular minded government of being the enemy of Allah, and of punishing devout
citizens. Those who are seen as being too religiously minded are put on watchlists, as sheikhs and imams are under strict government surveillance, and wearing the hijab is frowned upon in the public sector. Islamist rebellions have been happening in Syria since the ‘70s ever since Bashar’s own father Hafez Al Assad implemented a constitution which omitted the requirement that the president of Syria must be a muslim. Many see this action as a response to the fact that Assad family are of Alawite origins, a little known about sect whom many mainstream sunnis do not consider to be muslim. Ultimately, what once began as hopeful protests that reached every segment of society inspiring hope for a more pluralistic future has degenerated into a matter of pure sectarianism. Here’s a basic break down of the many parties involved:
1. Sunni Muslims: Generally support
the rebellion. View Assad as having oppressed Sunni Islamist movements and view his secularisation of Syria as being forced and specifically targeting them. View his rule as disenfranchising, the majority Sunni population generally favour democratic reforms as they are the vast majority of the population and thus are set to benefit from them the most. There is great diversity in the groups they support, with the most radical supporting ISIS, Islamists supporting the various Islamic rebel groups such as Jaysh Al-Islam (Arabic for ‘the army of Islam’), and non-sectarian moderates supporting what is left of the Free Syrian Army.
2..Christians:
Have been an oppressed minority in the region for centuries and this has been recently exacerbated with the emergence of ISIS
and other jihadist organisations. They have often had to rely on rulers for protection. Support Assad for his perceived role as the bulwark against political Islam. Their position is viewed as begrudgingly supporting the government for its secular protections.
3.
Alawites and Shiites: Despite not being considered a denomination of Islam by mainstream Sunnis, Alawites, the sect that the ruling Assad family hails from, has developed a strong affiliation with the Shia power of Iran and it’s Shia proxy in nearby Lebanon. Like the Christians, they fear retaliation by the Sunni majority if Assad loses power. They are traditionally the bulk of Assad’s support base and see Iran and Russia as their allies.
4. The Kurds: A distinct ethno-linguis-
tic group that have traditionally been victims of campaigns of forced Arabisation and cultural genocide. Seek to establish cultural autonomy at the very least, are anti-Assad and also do not get along with many of the other rebel groups as their rebellion is mostly ethnic based, as opposed to religiously or politically motivated. It is important to remember this is by no means a comprehensive guide of the war. No article of this word count could accomplish that. It is also important to note that many other actors and stakeholders have been left out, such as the Druze and Assyrian minorities, and mentions of external actors have been kept to a minimum. However, hopefully this informs you just enough to begin to make up your own views on the war. made that distance that much shorter.
Vol. 68 , Issue 05
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Another Side, Another Story ANU students reflect on their exchange experiences...
Text: Shania Lim Graphic: Millie Wang & Katie Ward I spent the last six months on a life-changing adventure when I was given the opportunity to study abroad in France through ANU Global Programs. My main reason for picking France was because my dad taught me the language and I wanted to follow in his footsteps of living in France.
seminars. Assessments tended to focus more on presentations and the final exams were not as intense as ANU’s, given you did your fair share of revision. Classes were conducted in English, but everyone has the opportunity to study French as an elective, and that was naturally one of my favourite courses there.
Fortunately, I was allocated my first exchange choice, which was one of the top business schools in France, Ecole de Management (ESSCA). The university is a business school of management with people studying various aspects of business. The main campus of this institution was located in Angers, but I was extremely fortunate to be assigned to their Parisian college. ESSCA was very much like a city university, situated along the banks of the Seine river on the west side of Paris. It is much smaller in terms of size and very different from the campus community that I was used to at ANU.
Despite this, I found that ESSCA’s administrative procedures were a little inefficient regarding timetables and their choice of educators – somewhat ironic since it is a school of management. However, I was very happy that ESSCA assigned me to a French buddy, Audrey, who, alongside the other French students I met in ESSCA, was surprisingly welcoming and helpful with my integration to ESSCA. The French students were all extremely excited to meet the international students and enjoyed going bar-hopping and occasionally brought me and other internationals out to their favourite neighbourhoods in Paris. In comparison to Australian students, I noticed that the French students were very expressive during presentations and almost everyone has already had some kind of internship exposure during their second year of studies.
The expectations from my host university were much lower in comparison to ANU’s. ESSCA’s education system is different from ANU’s as there are fewer tutorials, and classes were three hour-long
Living in a big city like Paris can be overwhelming at times. I was initially concerned about my safety in France, especially after the recent terrorist attacks, but I learnt that you just have to be attentive at all times and
not worry about the factors beyond your control. I did not mind the less hygienic conditions within the streets of Paris and subway stations. I think Paris is a city that has been through so much; it is what makes the city so old and full of culture and that is what gives Paris its historical identity. Among the people I mingled with, I found that people who grew up in Paris are not as warm and optimistic as people in Australia. Parisians are taught the value of melancholy, and I guess this is why they have a reputation for being a little aloof. Although, it is useful to brush up a little of your French before arriving, many of the French people I met were able to speak English, defying the traditional stereotype. There are definitely some difficulties when adjusting to a foreign country like France, but, all in all, my time in Paris was a very enriching experience. I was beyond fortunate for this exposure and glad I managed to learn so much about the French culture. ost importantly, I got to grow as a person and understand the careers I wanted to pursue in the future from this exchange. I’ll definitely miss my favourite bakery, the smell of bread and cigarettes in the air, the art and incredible architecture, the talented musicians busking around subway stations and most importantly, the meaningful friendships I got to make, but I guess every good thing has to come to an end.
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Week 9, Semester 1, 2018
Text: Harry Pollock Graphic: Millie Wang During the second semester of 2017, I was lucky enough to study abroad at the University of Gadjah Madah (UGM) in Yogyakarta on the island of Java; made possible for me by the New Colombo Plan. Originally, I was hesitant to pounce at the opportunity given the unknown logistics involved, however, all it took was a gentle nudge from my friend who previously went on the same program to be sold on the whole opportunity and it has by far been the highlight of my time at university. My interactions with UGM were actually quite challenging, but it was quite the character-building experience. In the first week I was there, I learnt that one of my lecturers was on a pilgrimage and would not be back for several weeks with no replacement in that time; course outlines were yet to be written and due dates were being changed left, right and centre. If this were to happen at ANU, it would greatly conflict with the times that I would plan to be at Moose! The hardest part of my study abroad was trying to communicate
with UGM to find courses I could get pre-approved course credit for as part of my degree. With course outlines not written and census dates approaching for both universities, I nearly ended up taking courses that wouldn’t give me credit for my degree and would end up prolonging my degree (which isn’t the end of the world). It took a bit of effort to resolve this issue, but what fun is life without a little bit of a challenge? Despite the minor difficulties I went through with the university, it was all worth it once I was in a beautiful country such as Indonesia. It is hard to be stressed about organisational matters when you are climbing active volcanoes, hooning around the country on a motorbike, eating exotic food or being extremely Aussie and jumping on an under one hour flight for a cheeky weekend away in Bali. Yogyakarta was an amazing city to live in for a semester, the food was amazing and cheap, the
people were kind and welcoming, and the madness of the streets was an eye-opening experience. Overall, the best part of being in Indonesia was being able to study the language and to be able to apply what I learned in class immediately as I stepped outside of the classroom; something that you can’t easily get when studying in Australia. It was very rewarding to be able to feel your level of fluency increase when making a conversation becomes much easier from a day-to-day basis and certainly an experience that I will miss in the future. Going on exchange to learn the language added another layer of authenticity to the experience and improved my relationship with the local population which I would not have been able to have had were I speaking English. Although it is not the easiest way of going on exchange, I would encourage any student, regardless of your level of language fluency, to give a language-based exchanged a go.
Vol. 68 , Issue 05
Prompted // features
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torn by war Text: Lydia J Kim Graphic: Sophie Bear
“We are probably living in the most peaceful time in our species’ existence,” suggests Steven Pinker in his 2007 TED talk The Surprising Decline in Violence. His claim, however, is based purely on the decline in human casualties over time: it does not consider the disturbance caused to our environment, and how this in turn affects mankind. Though it may not be at the forefront of discussion, the increasing concern for our environment that runs parallel with prolonged conflict in the Middle East begs the question – how might war actually impact our environment?
The Consequences
Worry for the environment in armed conflict is not a recent phenomenon, but with technological advancements over the last century in chemical and nuclear weaponry, anxiety has been on the rise. As if genocide isn’t enough, the environmental impacts of modern warfare are so long-lasting that they serve as a painful reminder of bloodshed even many generations after. America’s use of Agent Orange in the Vietnam War is only one example of permanent devastation on the environment caused by such weapons. Millions of litres of the herbicide were sprayed across South Vietnamese tropical forests in efforts to defoliate and expose hiding spots and to cut food supply. To this day, hardly any of region’s affected forests have recovered. The impacts on health have been far-reaching as well. Dioxin, a powerful carcinogen present in Agent Orange, has been the reason behind several health crises in Vietnam including birth defects, skin and lung cancers, and mental health issues – to name only a few. Food chain
contamination, a by-product of chemical pollution in soil and water, is still being dealt with today. Moreover, deforestation and loss of biodiversity mainly caused by bombing have posed major issues in war-torn countries. In Rwanda, not only have they led to the disruption of ecosystems following its 1994 genocide, but the lack of natural resources in an overpopulated country paired with systemic political unrest has impeded economic development ever since. Burning oil wells are another serious concern, as is the case in Kuwait. Over 700 oil wells were set on fire during the war in 1990, with some flaming for more than eight months. An increased presence of sulphur dioxide in the atmosphere has increased the likelihood of acidic rain and photochemical smog within approximately 1,000-2,000km of Kuwait, according to a report published by Nature. Both are extremely hazardous to environmental and human health.
Attempts to Mitigate Issues
There have been a number of, less publicised efforts to raise awareness around the relationship between the environment and armed conflict, as well as efforts to establish legal frameworks to penalise relevant offenders. The International Day for Preventing the Exploitation of the Environment in War and Armed Conflict, instituted back in 2001 as 6 November by the UN General Assembly, is an example of an international effort to bring attention to the ‘unpublicized victim of war’. Moreover, two legal documents since the Vietnam War and the 1972 Stockholm Declaration have come to be: The Convention on the
Prohibition of Military or Any Other Hostile Use of Environmental Modification Techniques (ENMOD, 1976) and the First Additional Protocol to the Geneva Conventions (1977). The International Committee of the Red Cross and Red Crescent (ICRC) Guidelines for Military Manuals and Instructions on the Protection of the Environment in Times of Armed Conflict is another indication of the widespread acknowledgement of the issue. These efforts have not, however, incited enough legally binding changes to constitutions. Back in 2010, UK campaigners submitted a proposal for the UN to acknowledge ‘Ecocide’ as a fifth crime against peace to be tried at the International Criminal Court. The proposal applies both to individuals and states, and considers both intent and negligence as criminal offences.
Going Forward
Though no notable progress seems to have been made since its submission, the ecocide proposal should serve as a precedent for an international push for regulation around war crimes against the environment. The need for action is especially relevant in this age of great political unrest, rapid weapon-related technological advancements and increasing environmental degradation. The protection of our environment during war is not only intended to encourage conservation and preservation of our planet, it is the least we can do to ensure the well-being of future generations in countries already ravaged by war.
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Week 9, Semester 1, 2018
Prompted // features
Matthew, Noah, John, Emmanuel Text: Jemma Sbeghen Graphic: Sophie Bear
Matthew
Noah
John
Emmanuel
Soft Parisian nights, talking once more about vice. Popping cheap bottles of rosa moscato out of 16th story windows; cork bullets in the city dark. Your sunken name echoes through my conversation. ‘Nick, Matthew, Josh, Finn, Riley, Matthew.’ A haunting, shuffling fear blows in with the mention of you. The fear that we will never speak souls again, or deepen the initial trench of obsession and understanding until it strikes a hidden vein of love. Dissonance and dislocation is what you arouse as we stretch outwards before the blaring fan, smearing red lipstick over the rim of my glass.
In the dark it is about the pull of your skin. So soft and delicate, a tragedy waiting to begin What about the smooth, running mess of your hair? Fingers linked, your back crafted to the bed.
They call you heartbreak in the flesh. Rough and beautiful in that strange state of unrest. A brief bound of blue in a red sad chest. You’re oxygen, a drug, for which I can become an addict, with luck and under symptoms they'll just put ‘moonstruck’ God, if we could just … Love. Not fuck, not sin, not lust. Just love.
I’m hearing chanting in my ear. Am I crazy or inspired? Is there a difference between the two, or has my mind simply expired?
You are the story I continue to speak. You made a divine mark on me. But, now, it’s time for you to disappear. From my thoughts, my words, my stories, my nights with friends. And my languid hours spent ruminating and splashing sad thoughts across my mind. Stepping into the street we cancel the taxi. Walking alongside a phantom friend, whispering sad secrets about the hidden desires for me and you. The heavy, clumpy air creates droopy eyelids and shallow breaths as she suggests: ‘It’s for the best.’ But I wait, eager for your call. My ghostly crush. My one minute fall. With regret and longing.
What about ‘friends’? What about Him? Through words and touch I tease your heart out, hoping to share in my ugly misdoubt. It is a night of laughter But a morning of sin Not the mellow kind or the fun kind but the sad kind It floods my eyes with a bitter sea salt Floods my mind with a crisp sense of fault A fresh blood runs like an offensive settled wine between our lips as our teeth clamp around the flesh that speak one truth – our truth. Surely, we will not speak it. We will not speak it, ever, However heavy the gravity keeping what we love and what we’ve done, sealed.
Gravity, B, it’s divine. It will pull us back together. An emotional gravity whose name reads ‘destiny’. And she will foresee how the world will divide us, but also inspire us, be kind to us and crush us. She’s cruel. But then so are you. Cruel in your kindness, me in my blindness. Destiny, she will tear us apart and heartbreak will keep it that way. I don’t want that, but do you? You: Mr. Heartbreak in the flesh. Me: destiny, at my best.
Are you there God, or has your voice become silent? Hushed by the sin, we use to fill the quiet. You hate and you hurt, and I’m sad and I bleed And I pray for an answer But you won’t ever speak. I’m confused and I’m angry, and I speak of a time when it will be love filling my soul, and not resentment on my mind.
Prompted // features
Vol. 68 , Issue 05
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Week 9, Semester 1, 2018
Prompted // features
Vol. 68 , Issue 05
Prompted // features
venice Text: Marc Perry Graphic: Valtteri Kuusisto
Many years later, after the horrors of both wars, and even after he’d settled down and married, William Rhys Alexander would still sometimes remember the very last time she had smiled at him. He remembered other things of course, but often his strongest remembrances were inextricably linked to his strongest imaginings. After the shell took his arm in the Battle of the Somme, he remembered slipping his hand into hers as they watched the fireworks over Sour Jdid Square that time in Casablanca. Had it been the same arm? Or a different arm? As the morphine had started to set in, he supposed it didn’t matter. It was the imagining of the arm that mattered, and the imagining of the feel of her skin and of the firelight in her eyes. He hadn’t realised it then, because it hadn’t happened yet, but thirty years later to the day, another couple would cross that same square on the silver screen to set the past behind them. They, at least, would always have Paris. He imagined reasoning this even after she had left, although this was not remembered reasoning, since of course Casablanca had not happened yet. Sometimes, in that melange of uncertainty between the wars, he remembered their holiday in Venice, with its long walks, and the moonlight glittering off the canals and palaces. His mind was undimmed by the loss of something as inconsequential as an arm, and his accounting job ticked over, and over, only a
minor part to play in the eventual downfall of the world economy in 1929. But he saw the moonlight of the canals in the dimes and the nickels, and so of course he remembered. How could he not. Even later still, once he’d settled down with a family in a well-off townhouse where he would live out the rest of his days, he remembered the hotel in London, and the last night that he saw her. The fire in her eyes had died, along with the fire in his. As the reasoning went, the fire in their hearts had died, too. Was it time to part? Was it ever time to part? He had supposed it mattered, really, as few partings of ways are ever kind. Would they meet again? He had supposed they had to. Few partings of ways are ever kind, but fewer still are absolute. And so, he remembered this parting, and believed that others should remember it too, or at least imagine it, entirely for the smile that was the last he saw of her face. She drew her coat around herself and turned to him one last time. “Venice, then?” “Venice.” He had nodded. He imagined his smile to be that of an old man remembering the good times past. Maybe instead he remembered his smile to be that of a young man imagining the good times to come. Then she smiled at him too, turned, walked into the night, and was gone. He set down his pen, looked out over the Rialto, and wept.
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Week 9, Semester 1, 2018
ةبرطضملا ةليللا A Troubled Night Text: Charbel El-Khaissi Graphic: Sophie Bear
ق َ َلزْنا َ َ يصيمق َت ْحت ٌد رابو ٌفاع ِض ٌحاي ِر ءطبب يمهل َرَدَخو. ىلع سلاج ُتنك ملعلا ةكرح ُتدها ْشو يتقش ف ْقس يتيانب بناجب ٍةعاس ج ْرُب َقْوف. Cold, weak winds slid beneath my shirt and slowly numbed my skin. I was sitting on the roof of my apartment and watching the movement of a flag atop a clocktower beside my building. ةنخْدم ْنم ْ َددَع ُتدهاش ْعا َف ت ْرالا ا َذ َه ْنم يت راكيس ناك ْنكلو ًاضيا تيبلا ْنا َ ّخَد ْتَثَفن يتلا ةديحولا. From this vantage, a number of house chimneys could also be seen, but my cigarette alone was the emitter of smoke. .قت ْنا َ سمشلا بورُغ ىلا ينيع ُ َل يف ةنيدملا تلعش يذلا يده ْشملا قلَخو قُفألا َ َ َ ةقرت ْ ٍحم ةنيدم ُمهَو. My eyes moved to the scenic sunset, which inflamed the city in the horizon and created an illusory image of a burning burgh. ُجَع ْزتو يتيؤر يف ةرئاط يتأي ءاسملا مالس اهت ك ّرحم. قُفألا يف سمشلا بورُغ ىلا ةرئاطلا ترط يل زألا ءوضلا اهباكرل تدعو ناك اهنأك. Forthcame an aeroplane into this scope of vision, with its engines irritating the peace of the night. It flew towards the sun in the horizon as if promising its passengers the eternal light. يهجو ىلع عومدلاب ترعشا ةظحلا هذه يف ُتع ّمد اذإ وا تيكب ُتنك اذإ ُت ْفرع ام نكل
ريخألا سمشلا ةعشا نم ىتح وا يناخ ّد نم. In this moment, a tear formed upon my face, but I knew not if it was because I was crying or whether they were stinged tears from my cigarette smoke, or perhaps even from the intensity of the burning sunset. ءيضي اديور اديور سمشلا ي فَت ْخي امك سمشلا ىتح رثكأ ةجردب ةنيدملا تايانب ًارخأ ءامسلا زكرم ةرمقلا ذخأو ًِايلك يفتخي. Slowly the sun dimmed and slowly the building lights illuminated, until finally the sun disappeared completely and the moon took centre stage of the night sky. نم يفنأل ةيلقملا تاذلا ةحئار لصو ةفورعم ريغ خبطم. ءاشعلل تقو ناك ةليللا هذه ىّشعتا ْنل نكلو. A scent of burning oil reached my nose from an unknown kitchen. It was dinner time, but I would not eat tonight.
Vol. 68 , Issue 05
هنادرمناوجان یزاب UNFAIR GAME Text: Asefeh Abedini Graphic: Hannah Charny
Who can you trust in this unfair game? Would you ever forget what happened to them?
so maybe one day you will fall in love again!
؟هاگدادیب نیا رد درک دامتعا ناوت یم هک هب ؟دمآ اهنآ رس رب هچ درک شومارف ناوت یم رگم When everything is crystal clear, to which light you will leave your soul to be salvaged?
تناتسهوک نامارخ یوهآ یابیز نامشچ زا …رزگب یک هب یزور زاب ات، لد هک هب و اجک هب ؟یدنبب You look with your eyes full of worry to prove that we can? Alas, we might have been able to, but not anymore….
تسا نشور تیارب زور دننام زیچ همه یتقو، ی راپس یم رون نیمادک لقیص هب ار تحور ؟ما هدش راگتسر هک What do you replace the caged birds with when your rent eyes do not feel the life?
ییوگب هک یرگن یم تنارگن نامشچ اب ؟میناوت یم ام میتسناوت یم دیاش ام هکنیا زا غیرد، اما میناوت یمن رگید.
یم نیزگیاج هچ اب ار هتسب رپ یاه هدنرپ ینگ هدرک اهر ار یگدنز تا هدیرد نامشچ یتقو ؟دنا Whom will you search for when a bird’s neck is pressed between their harsh fingers? یولگ هک ینامز تشگ یهاوخ هک لابند هب یا هدنرپ هدرشف هظحل ره یتخمز ناتشگنا نایم رد ؟دوش یم رت When will your heart’s limbo end the doubt between being alive and living the life while they are planting the lies in your blood? و یناگدنز دیدرت نیا هب یک تلد خزرب داد دهاوخ نایاپ ینام هدنز ؟دن راک یم وت نوخ رد ار غورد یتقو Leave the beautiful eyes of the deer in your mountains behind,
There is no way left anymore, Take yourself and go… تسین یهار رگید، !ورب و دزدب ار ترس
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Week 9, Semester 1, 2018
Students l a n o i t a n r e t In Pullout Thank you d Liu, Yip Lew Ch Agrawal SutoraDbahvi in i, Marco Tanaya, Nic Daniel Kang, Kevign, rie Ong, Mina Kim ole Hou, Rebecca Matheir work plan and Ev ynn Lim for all and designing thisning, sourcing,editing pull out!
Text: Surabhi Agrawal Graphic: David Liu
Hey people! Welcome to Woroni’s International Pull-Out Edition! I am Surabhi Agrawal and I am from India. I am currently pursuing Master of Economics at ANU from Semester 1 2018, and completed my undergraduate degree of BA (hons) Business Studies from De Montfort University, UK. I had been exposed to life as an international student before but my experience of completing two months in Canberra remains a super exciting one. I would like to share some of my experiences. First, irrespective of whether you are an introvert or extrovert, talk to people. You must understand one thing that if you are afraid to talk to a stranger, the person in front of you is equally nervous. You need not go out of your way to make friends rather let the number of people remain low but genuinely connect to them. Second, don't ever feel shy to ask questions whether it’s regarding academic or non-academic matters. We are all here to learn and broaden our horizons. No matter how small your doubt is it is worth asking because 'Doubt is a pain too lonely to know that faith is his twin brother.' Third, a really crucial one, focus on your academics and let it remain your priority but do not ignore the extra curriculars. The reasons being life is not just about grades, it is about the experiences we cherish and the knowledge we acquire and deepen. Get involved in Debating, Volunteering, Skating, Trekking or whatever you are interested in! I wish you good luck for your time at ANU and otherwise! There are lots of places to go for help on-campus and in Canberra, including many 24-hour telephone services:
Beyond Blue - 1300 22 4636
anu.edu.au
Beyondblue provides information and support to help everyone in Australia achieve their best possible mental health,
1800 RESPECT - 1800 737 732
whatever their age and wherever they live.
1800 RESPECT offers support options for people experienc-
You can call, chat online, or email. There is also support for
ing sexual, domestic and family violence. If you or someone
people whose first language is not English.
you know is experiencing violence or abuse, you can contact 1800RESPECT.
ANU Counselling - 02 6125 2442 Free and confidential counselling is available on campus for
Q Life - 1800 184 527
all currently enrolled ANU students, including ANU College
QLife is Australia’s first nationally-oriented counselling and
students. Open 9am-5pm Monday-Friday.
referral service for Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual, Transgender and Intersex (LGBTI) people.
ANUSA Student Assistance - 02 6125 2444 The ANUSA Student Assistance Officers are able to support
Lifeline (24/7): 13 11 14
and assist students with various issues including financial,
Canberra Rape Crisis Centre: 6247 2525
academic or advocacy issues. The service is confidential and
Crisis Assessment Treatment Team (24/7): 02 6205 1065
free. They can be also be contacted via email: sa.assistance@
Vol. 68 , Issue 05
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10 Things No One Tells You About Studying In Australia: The South East Asian Version Being an international student in Australia is great: quality education, lovely nature and people, and amazing experiences. But there are some things that only international kids will understand about studying in the land down under. 1. You never realised how much you would be willing to pay for food from home. Have I paid $10 for some Hainanese Chicken Rice that costs $2 AUD back home? Yes. Am I proud of it? Debatable.
2. You’ll never take one hour travel times to another country for granted again. Travelling one hour back home could’ve gotten me from Malaysia to Singapore, while the same amount of time here wouldn’t even get me out of the ACT.
3. Having to have more than just T-shirts and shorts in your wardrobe. Seasons back home were pretty much hot and wet, and suddenly now you have to deal with cold? Hello sweaters and cardigans.
4. Trying to talk to Australians and learning their slang. Oh yeah mate, we’ll just head down to the local maccas and have a squiz, if you’re keen for anything we can grab a bite. 5. Spotting an accent from home in 0.1 seconds You know how dogs can smell treats from a mile away? Yeah, that’s like you with accents from home. Walao eh, bro.
6. Getting unreasonably annoyed at Asian-sounding dishes that aren’t actually real. Okay but has anyone actually figured out what exactly are ‘Singapore Noodles’? 7. Having to get used to how big Australian birds are. Why are magpies and crows so big? They make the sparrows and quails back home look miniature.
8. Getting homesick not just for your family and friends, but for food too. Don’t get me wrong, I miss my parents dearly, but also, nasi lemak, roti telur, kolo mee, cendol... 9. Meeting people from all around the world. The people back home are already super diverse, but here you’re meeting people from France, America, Mongolia and so many other countries. And the best part is, you can all bond over that international kid lifestyle. 10. Bonding with other international kids about the struggles of missing home and living overseas. Who else is going to understand the struggle of finding flights home and how much you miss visiting the Kopitiam? Not only do they understand your struggles, they also help make this strange place a little more like home.
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Week 9, Semester 1, 2018
Open-ended Questions Text: Daniel Kang Graphic: David Liu My name is Daniel Kang, I’m a Singaporean currently trying to wrap up my fourth semester of Law and International Relations here at the ANU. I was initially planning on writing out advices for international students, but after careful consideration, I think I’d like to share my struggles – something I’ve finally found strength to put into words. I share this today as penance for the terrible job I did an international representative of my college; for all the slip-ups I’ve inexcusably committed, but most importantly – as an honest account of my life that assertively recognises the ostensibly incessant struggles that my life has been, but equally testifies to the immeasurable goodness and blessings. I initially found it incredibly hard to talk to people about my problems – not because I held privacy as scared, but because of my brokenness. I have had people through various seasons of my life become privy to almost every intimate detail about me – only for our paths to diverge especially when I desperately needed support. Each mentioning of an event in my private life is an extension of trust to me, and a cry out for emotional support. Understand, please, that it is unpleasant, undesirable and terribly unintuitive for me to be expected to sit with a stranger, and be expected to present the broken pieces of a season – may I just ask to sit and speak with someone I can trust, to whom I don’t have to curate my life with exceeding care or shield from worry, or with whom I can shield myself from judgment? I do want to be involved in the community; to get involved in the multitude of amazing social activities both college and on campus. But how can I not be miserly with my time, when my mother is squirreling away every cent she can to ensure that I can graduate? How can I forsake my studies and throw myself away from learning when I realize that my mother has essentially discarded her ability to buy her dream house, to go on a lavish excursion overseas, to flex an infinite amount of freedom in spending? How can I express this when I was essentially scolded by a countryman for being stupid for not being more social? How may I say – my education here will cost half a million – if this number is perceived not as my chains but merely an excuse? When I say – look, I’d really love to come tonight: but I can’t, I’m really bogged down in work, I have to study – I am pleading for understanding – I fully understand that grades aren’t everything. But with so much at stake in my success here, with the spectres of failure, a word spelt with just everything that can’t form success: I can’t swallow the ‘what ifs’ that I will face when I’m rejected for a job because I can’t impress. Inadequacy is a cast iron prod straight out of the furnace, ready to sear shame and scar regret into my skin. I lament at the stereotype that I have become – the studious Asian student: crammed up in rooms so stuffy, so sterile, a wonderfully apt representation of how I occasionally feel stripped of all my qualities. May I please stress that I am not humble-bragging or being modest when I say that I devote myself to such studious efforts because I lack intelligence – I can’t. I am not the brightest pupil, and I’m not incredibly well-spoken, there are just too many inadequacies I hold for me to resist trying to possess myself with diligence and hard work. It is a hard, bitter pill to swallow when I watch people affirm me for my competence in my work when they come to me for help, and then have my existence as an afterthought. It is an insurmountable effort for me to discontinue helping people – strangely enough I ardently do want to invest in and watch people grow. But I am so desperately trying to face a struggle to develop relationships in the process, I’m earnestly trying to assert myself and be accepted for it – so much so that “why” just seems like a lofty, open-ended question. Still, for every struggle, and every drawn-out season of difficulty – I can count the blessings and extremely wonderful memories I have made here. I have to catch my breath to fully count the number of overwhelmingly good people I’ve met here – my fountainheads of life, support and lessons. What has been an incessant struggle has not altered the simple fact that I have been incredibly blessed in an amazing country. If I may please stress a point – every person has a struggle to face, or a maze of difficulties to navigate through, and every person has a story to tell. International students aren’t looking for pity, we aren’t looking for charity and we aren’t looking to impose ourselves and make demands, or further an agenda. We would love to bring colour to your lives; to share our stories; to be blessed and bless – as a guest, I kindly ask that we may work together to achieve understanding and discourse.
Vol. 68 , Issue 05
Moments Text: Ayaka Miki Graphic: David Liu
I had a crush on my economics teacher I asked him to write me a university recommendation He asked me, ‘are you a feminist?’ ‘I don’t know’, I replied. Cheeks red, happy to talk to him, laughing as my friend calls a classmate feminazi Walking home. My backpack, my trumpet Too heavy for me to run as a man masturbates, leisurely on his bike, face covered by a helmet. Next to me engine running, riding, rubbing at my walking pace. Cheeks red, my heart pales. I pretend not to see. ashamed I could never tell my parents. Until finally, I could. An internship, a Linkedin profile. I serve tea I serve tea for three months A woman tells me, there are jobs for men and there are jobs for women ‘Who are you to be ungrateful for the opportunities you get?’ I take the train to the Australian consulate. I’m picking up my visa! It’s far away, I’m using Google Maps. A man in a suit takes pictures of me. His gaze is unashamed, scouring my body Prematurely, I get off at the next stop, I push myself into a crowd he’s lost me. I get on the next train, stand in the women’s only carriage. I look behind my shoulder, same man behind me, swaying to the same lurching on the same train. My life feels like a video game. Driving school. We learn CPR. “Right, girls aren’t really getting it. Girls only. More rounds of practise” One, Two, One, Two. We push away on a plastic corpse. Bend down, latch our mouths to the dummy’s and exhale His face pressed to mine, ‘let me watch you do it, let me help you learn.’ Clammy and sweaty, red-faced from CPR and his body heat next to mine ANU. I see strong women. I hear people talking about things I only thought to myself. I don’t blush anymore. It feels good. ‘Are you a feminist?” I think I know the answer to that now.
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Week 9, Semester 1, 2018
A GREEK IN A NON-GREEK WORLD Text: Georgia Alexiou Papagianni Graphic: David Liu
Australia prides itself on multiculturalism and the migrant populations that have settled here throughout the country’s history. While I was preparing myself for my exchange year at ANU, I was excited thinking I would find myself surrounded by Greeks. At home, we hear of Melbourne as the second most Greek place in the world outside Greece. I thought I’d overhear my language on the street and bump into dozens of tavernas in Canberra. When I arrived, I could spot remnants of Greek heritage here and there. The Hellenic Club offers all the food and Greek entertainment I could ever need. Even one of the buildings in Civic is called Omonoia, after the second biggest square in Athens, so I thought I would fit right in. Then the truth hit me. Greeks arrived generations ago and now only traces of their heritage are left. I tried to associate with Greek-Australians my age but I struggled to, as our experiences were so different. I realised the language is slowly disappearing. The reality was quite different from my expectations and I felt like I don't belong here. Thanks to my great last minute skills, I had to rush to renew my passport on time while in Australia. This is a process that takes less than a week in Athens, so I expected the same from the embassy here. Little did I know, passport applications abroad are a little more complicated and I became entangled in the ultimate kafkaesque bureaucratic situation. The embassy was unable (or even indifferent) to renew my passport on time and my visa status was soon coming to question. I felt helpless and distressed. I had numerous appointments every week in Yarralumla hoping that my application would at least leave Australia in the near future. What was particularly puzzling was the attitude of the staff there. A fellow Greek told me Australians are generally ‘slow’ and that’s just not the way things work here. Instead of consoling me, the same woman gave me a half an hour lecture about how I had to “change my ways”. I was told that I would have to change my attitude and worldview if I wanted to stay in Australia. In her opinion, I continued to live with a “Greek mentality, whatever that meant, and I would have to assimilate. The very member of the community I sought support from criticised me for my national identity. According to her, the Greek community in Canberra is close-knit and would exclude me if I behaved in a Greek attitude. Her words didn’t hurt me because at the end of the day I'm only an exchange student, but her approach startled me. I never thought I would have to drop my cultural baggage in order to strive in the non-Greek world. I would not want to abandon my history to participate in a community that lives off its imagination. This event made me question the ways we think of our migrant selves. Do migrant populations really embrace their cultural identities? Or are we still struggling to make sense of our ‘otherness’ in the Western world?
Vol. 68 , Issue 05
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Nowhere Girl Text: Sunny Tan Graphic: David Liu “There will be plenty of bad, but what you need right now is distance”. That's what my therapist said, four days before I left for Canberra for the first time. She and my psychologist had just agreed to take me off antidepressants for a trial run. I laughed a bit, but my knees were shaking. Coming to Australia was a spur-of-the-moment decision. I had not expected the ANU to accept my haphazard application, much less for a course as niche as ‘Digital Humanities and Public Culture’. I had not expected my parents to agree to the exorbitant costs of an international education. Most of all, I had not expected that a humanities course would sate people’s expectations of an honours graduate in communications, who could have gone to law school, or to work in some multinational. It was Canberra – an unexpected fringe-like city in the middle of nowhere, that allowed me to breath. Touching ground, it was like nowhere I had ever seen – there was the suggestion of metropolis, and yet the sparsity was deafening. It was that exact emptiness that called to me. Here, in the middle of nowhere, I was not a high-performing former student leader who dropped off the face of the earth because she became depressed “for no reason”. I was not one of many siblings who each possessed accolades in academics and sports and were the children of two extremely successful lawyers whose footsteps seemed impossible to follow. I was not someone who had to be extremely successful and whose every action had to bring some kind of honour to the places I graduated from and the country I lived in. Distance, it turned out, was not just a function of space. It did not just mean being an ocean away from my family, friends, and the Philippines. Where there was overwhelming expectation and the busyness of everyday life and the impulse to overinvest in the political environment in the former, there was now just the wide streets of Canberra. Zero night life and too much room to breathe here, some would argue. But being so desperate to end my life for so long, I had forgotten just how nice air could taste. It was not about being away from home – my friends and family were always just a skype call away. It was about being the farthest as I had ever been from my past self as I or anyone else had ever known her. There were still bad times – the undignified desperation of hunting down part-times to feel self-sufficient, eating less to save more, losing sleep over ghosts of past conflicts and relationships, pushing myself to the physical brink to succeed academically even though every phone call with my mother ended with “…and stop worrying about your grades.” Let’s not forget all those classic depressive haunts that I had borne for years and years: “Is it worth it? Am I worth it?” Sometimes, the cold embrace of self-harm and suicidal thoughts made violent comebacks I couldn’t suppress. But that distance saved me time and time again. Questions of worth withered under the unexpectedly bright potential of everyday. In a ‘boring’ city that had ‘nothing’, I could start from nothing and knew no one. I could be anything. I fell into dance-classes, even if no one had ever told me in my life that I danced well. I willingly assumed being the baby of my friend group of fellow Filipinos, even if I had always played the leader or the big sister in any clique I’d ever been in. I jogged weekly along Lake Ginninderra, even though I used to hate the very thought of cardio. I would sleep in every day for a week and abuse the privilege of being new, small, and anonymous in the massive ANU, even if my past student-leader self tsk-tsked at this behaviour. My therapist had once said, “we aren’t trying to turn you into the person you were. We’re trying to make you understand that it is okay to be the person that you are now.” I am now reminded of this every time I pick up my phone to the screeching of magpies outside my window. Opening my Facebook messages or emails used to be a difficult, anxiety-inducing task, because it was always either demands for work I did not want to do, or socialising with people who liked versions of me I hated being. Four semesters later at the ANU, I can tell you proudly that I can open all my notifications and not even think about it. I am glad that 25 weird years and infinite nights of suffering from an overwhelming of self-hatred wondering “what the hell is the point?” has led me to this oft-joked about spit of land in the middle of the bush. ANU and Canberra allowed me to reinvent myself – academically, socially, personally. I know a lot of people dislike or even outright hate Canberra, and I don't blame them. But I love this place. It is cheesy, but it is only cheesy because it is true: it helped me to love myself.
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Week 9, Semester 1, 2018
My reflections on Cross-Cultural Communication Text: Tianran Lin Graphic: David Liu
Ever since I stepped foot into the ANU, the phrase “cross-culture communication” has been thrown around so often that it’s easy not to pause and think about what it means to us personally. Studying in Australia has made me become aware of the way people communicate their thoughts, opinions and ideas. Inadvertently, it has also made me reflect on the way I express myself to others. As an international student, translation and interpretation is a major part of my life. I have to constantly process the information I’m receiving, and then translate it into my second language. Being able to accurately use my words is important because it helps me to precisely express myself. I have found myself in various interesting scenarios due to a mistranslation between languages. For instance, one day I was trying to explain to a group of friends that I play the Nintendo game ‘Super Mario’. In Mandarin,, however, the words translate into ‘Super Mary’. As you might expect, my friends roared with laughter upon my apparent ‘mistake’ of Mario’s gender. Another instance was my mistranslation of Hegel’s “All that is real is rational; and all that is rational is real”. In China it is often mistranslated as “Existence is reasonable” and one day I used the mistranslated phrase with a friend. My friend, however, was kind enough to correct me on my mistake. Mistranslation may lead to inaccurate expressions, which in turn create possibilities for misunderstanding. It is important to have clarity when it comes to communicating with others. t is important to be respectful, patient, inquisitive and reflective. Learning and improving a second language is never easy, but being open-minded about it can help deepen mutual understanding across cultures. Besides improving the language, it is also crucial to understand culture and how it influences and spreads values within an environment. While I was reading a brief introduction on a showcase of the Battle of the Somme at the War Memorial, a group of young people were being rowdy and disruptive. I do not know how much they knew about the War, or its impact on Australia. The point is, it is important to be respectful towards the foundations of a country. When you deepen your knowledge of a country’s history, it is easier to understand cultural differences. Actively meeting people and their cultures halfway opens the door to better communication. In general, it is important to be open-minded and to never rely on assumptions when communicating. You may believe you’re knowledgeable enough about something, but there’s always more room. Reflecting upon this should make cross-cultural communication easier and more comfortable.
Vol. 68 , Issue 05
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Studying China’s Air Pollution from Australia Text: Ruiying Zheng Graphic: David Liu I am a Chinese student doing a Bachelor of Environment and Sustainability at ANU. I have a great passion for exploring environmental issues as well as formulating possible solutions. Over the past two years, I have gained the multidisciplinary perspectives, skills and knowledge I need to engage with complex environmental problems through investigating the situations in China and Australia. Here is a brief of China’s air-related problems with critical analysis and recommendations. Air pollution has been increasingly recognised as one of the major global environmental threats to sustainable development, particularly in urban areas of developing countries. China is experiencing the fastest rate of economic growth, as well as more severe air pollution than ever before. According to the Air Quality Index computed by government agencies (based on concentration of PM2.5, PM10 and other harmful molecules), some northern cities show a frequent unhealthy or hazardous air quality over the past ten years, especially during winters. As a typical non-point source pollution, China’s air pollution is driven by a variety of contributors. Local sources of air pollutants are mainly from transportation, coal burning, urban dust pollution and industrial emissions. Additionally, there are sands and dusts transported from surrounding provinces by prevailing winds. Air pollution has destructive impacts on the entire society in terms of threats to human’s physical and mental health, reduction in agricultural output, economic loss, and environmental costs. Therefore, an advanced policy framework is urgently required featuring multifaceted strategies and sustainable patterns of development. The Ministry of Environmental Protection of China has made many relevant laws since the 1980s which regulate quantitative emission standards and provide specific targets and methods. Some desired outcomes have been achieved; however, they had limitations in tackling evolving environmental problems. Thus, they have been amended after 2012 when PM2.5 crisis emerged across major northern cities. One of the key policies applied currently is the establishment of an air-quality forecasting and assessing system that is open to the public. For instance, a ‘Red Alarm’ indicates the need for dust masks and less outdoor activities. Nowadays there are many effective policies for air pollution control in central cities with emphasis on vehicle and industrial emissions. For instance, private car use is limited by an odd-even license plate rule, trucks with diesel engines are prohibited in urban district, and an advanced metro system has been built to provide better public transport service. Moreover, upper limit on emission of toxic particulates is set with penalty on excessive emission. Internal capabilities can be seen in this problem solving process. Public behaviour change becomes more feasible in China as it has an increasing number of educated population and it implements various incentives to make people change. However, there are also vulnerabilities and limitations. Tough policy instruments can lead to unintended consequences in terms of economic recession, unemployment and disaffection among stakeholders. Moreover, this issue is complex and requires collaborative action over a widespread area. Nevertheless, the current policy framework focuses more on jurisdiction-based management but lacks regional coordination. Additionally, external circumstances exploited show opportunities for further actions. There is a wave of economic transformation across developing countries where traditional industries are encouraged to apply clean technology to their production. Long-range air pollution has also become a global concern and more international cooperation via regional forum and agreements is emerging. One policy recommendation for mitigating this problem is enhancing credibility and on-ground enforcement of law to be made. Firstly, formulate an interdepartmental committee across relevant provincial agencies aiming to establish a live air information database that works in tracking sources of pollutants, quantifying cross-border transport of pollutants, and providing statistics for decision making. Then form a combination of administrative and societal supervision and broaden means of stakeholder engagement through new platforms. Another recommendation is creating incentives for main stakeholders to change their attitude and behaviour. Government should provide industries with monetary and technological support for traditional industries to enable structural transformation, phase out high-emission plants operating in major cities, and subsidise development of clean energy techniques. For transportation sector, government should increase vehicle purchase tax on buying fuel-inefficient cars, deliver cheaper public transport service, and lower market access threshold for emerging energy-efficient transport industries such as car sharing and ride sourcing. In addition, educating the whole society on the importance and urgency of air pollution control and what could be done for that as citizens is also important. Government should initiate more regular meetings of affected stakeholders and in particular those with expertise to investigate further into this issue and find sustainable pathway for the country.
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Week 9, Semester 1, 2018
My Fight against Culture Text: Intifar Sadiq Chowdhury Graphic: David Liu
Content Warning: sexual harassment, victim blaming attitudes and insitutional betrayal
I wonder how many of you will raise your eyebrows at this title. It must be taboo to talk against any culture – you simply don’t do it, right? But I don’t know how else you could name this piece after having the argument “oh, it’s culturally ok!” repeatedly injected to you. Every time I went travelling, I’ve used this argument to justify disturbing acts like sexual harassment. In fact, at this point, I feel almost coerced to believe that everything that is wrong can be justified by some culture out there. Culture is like God, like Mother: “Oh it’s ok to do this because Mom said so,” “God will approve of it.” A simple Google search pulls out a definition “culture is the social behavior and norms found in human societies.” For all you researcher-types, an academic source will give you something similar with the keywords society, behaviour and norms. Justifications of any behaviour based on culture, implicitly accepts it as a norm. Simply put, culture is occasionally misused as and perverted into a justification – even to justify sexual harassment. Unfortunately, this is grossly prevalent in various societies, which embarrassingly extends to even the highly developed ones. Now, what is sexual harassment to me? The police in Italy asked me the same question when I tried complaining about a gondolier (Venetian boatman) who inappropriately touched my ankle. Adopting the definition under the Australian Human Rights Commission, I said “sexual harassment is any unwanted or unwelcome sexual behaviour, which makes a person feel offended, humiliated or intimidated.” I even pulled out an Italian legal paper, which more or less read the same. I felt all these uncomfortable emotions from an unwelcome interaction in a foreign land. Sadly, all I got was a blatant “So what?” He suggested that it’s ok because the perpetrator didn’t touch my ”sexual parts.” Similarly, the police in South Korea gave me a confused look when my friend and I approached them for help because a man was following us. They simply asked us “What can WE do about this?” and suggested that this was an everyday phenomenon, which does not require their assistance. These were points in life when I questioned my own personal understanding of sexual harassment. Probably that is how you feel when people in power repeatedly brush off your feelings and nullify your emotions of fear and anxiety. They urge you to believe that you are wrong. And then there are those people who stop you from acting because you must respect a foreign culture and not act against those – let’s say – tolerable actions. I have had people I unconditionally love tell me, “take it as a compliment!”, “forget it, it’s a cultural thing” and “you are just overreacting.” This is the point where you almost believe that YOU are wrong. But, no one teaches me how to not be anxious when someone catcalls. No one teaches me how to take that as a compliment. How do I forgive and forget sexual harassment only because it is culturally justified? Sometimes it feels like an unwinnable war against culture. This is not a normative piece. I don’t know what prescription can prevent the misuse of culture or the encouragement of such distressing gendered norms. I stress that this problem is not exclusive to the above-mentioned countries. The more I travel, and the more I get out of my safe bubble, the more I realise that this is a global phenomenon. No matter how many elites are signing treaties or running campaigns, these words still can’t shape the reality that at a grassroot level – sexual harassment remains ‘OK’ in significant parts of this world. Culture is still used as a veil to justify belittling and disrespectful acts of harassment. There are perks to being a frequent traveller– you gain experience, knowledge and exposure. But you also face these situations where your opinions, thoughts and emotions zero down to insignificance. Yet, you are advised, if not told outright not to act because it’s not your own turf. Today I am mustering up the courage to advise and speak against this. Respect and celebrate the variety in cultures as long as you are not disrespected in the process. Don’t let anyone misuse culture to authorize wrongdoings. Don’t keep quiet only because there is no chance of bringing the perpetrator to justice. You have no idea how many people you are giving voice to when you decide to speak out.
Vol. 68 , Issue 05
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An Increasing Demand for Cheap and Quality Food at University Text: Richard Haowei Hong Graphic: David Liu
As full-time university students, we spend most of our time at university, Monday to Friday, eight to five. Being a student like you and me is not easy. We face formidable challenges with respect to the food in university – especially on its price, quality, variety and so forth. The Pop-up village was built last year to replace Union Court. Since the establishment of the Pop-up, it has experienced much controversies in particular on the food sector. Google reviews have given the Pop-up village a rather low average rating of 3.6 stars with most of the negative comments centered on food. Most complaints highlight that the food is too pricey, with few options, and of fairly low quality. This issue becomes more logical with a more thorough and careful consideration of the matrix of reasons that have contributed to this problem. The chief culprit, and biggest contributor to the problem, is the lack of competition. We have to acknowledge that the Pop-up Village is a closed market where new businesses cannot get in and old businesses do not have the incentives to get out. In other words, the Pop-up Village can be considered oligopolistic and specifically designed for students. In this case, Pop-up eateries prefer not to compete with one another because, by doing so, they have a holistic control over the market price. Therefore, in this ‘closed economy’, the direct beneficiaries are the eateries but not us students. While some may argue that we have the right to choose not eating at the Pop-up, and it is true, in practice the result shows otherwise. Apart from ANU, the area that also serves food is the Canberra Centre. However, to walk between the Canberra Centre and ANU will take around 15 minutes. As a full-time, rational student, we try to make most of our time studying or attending lectures. Consequently, to save both time and hassle, most of us might well eat at university by accepting the incredibly high market price and with very low variety to choose from. In sum, the food sector at university faces a lack of competition, resulting in high prices and low quality. We have seen an increasing demand for a better, cheaper, and more variety of food. Although some actions have been taken by students to lower the price, such as the uni food options, the payoff is not yet promising. To best tackle this issue, we need to stand together and bring back the competition to the market.
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An International View of The Bachelor of Western Civilization Text: Kevin Marco Tanaya Graphic: David Liu
A few days ago, I went to a 24/7 convenience store near the City Bus Station. I was strolling around the aisles when my attention was caught by the recent edition of Quadrant in the magazines section. Particularly attention-grabbing was an article written by former Prime Minister Tony Abbott about the Ramsay Centre of Western Civilization. I was aware of the recent furor surrounding the Centre and its proposed collaboration with the ANU to create a ‘Bachelor of Western Civilization’ degree. Intrigued, I went over and gave it a quick read: Mr. Abbott went through the rationale behind the center and the life of its namesake, Paul Ramsay. Personally, I find no fault in theoretical foundation and structure of the plan. A degree focused on Western Civilization that would, according to Mr. Abbott, be studying how the West coped with the biggest challenges of humanity would certainly have something to offer academically. Mr. Abbott said that the pedagogy would be based on the style of teaching of Oxford and Cambridge. This is not a bad idea. Nor did I find it particularly jarring that the Center would provide scholarships for both undergraduate and postgraduate students for the purpose of the study of Western Civilization. This would provide economically disadvantaged individuals with access to higher education, which is almost universally recognized as a good. However, I find particularly the rationale behind the degree itself puzzling. What I understood from the article was that Western civilization is an intrinsically valuable concept and that many people would love to live in it. But a lot of young people are turning away from this and therefore it needs advocacy if it is to survive. This degree is part of the Center’s efforts to do just that. Now, I agree that Western Civilization and way of life is valuable. Indeed, one of the reasons I chose to study in Australia aside to gain a better education was to gain an understanding of what it is like to live in a Western society. Now, after almost 1.5 years, I am a firm supporter. The very notion that Western civilization in Australia is somehow under threat of abandonment and in a way dying confound me. I certainly do not find it so. Call it an outsider’s perspective or anything you like, but I find that Western civilization permeates almost every fiber of Australia and that it is indeed alive and well. It lives in the political institutions and safeguards of Australia’s democracy. It lives in the academic culture of the university, with its emphasis of rational thought and empirical pedagogy. It lives through the courts, and the principles of rule of law. It lives in the media and the poor, often abused concept of free speech. It lives through civil society actors and the ‘thousand points of light’ that is charities. It lives through the now universal concept of human rights. I haven’t even begun to mention the way it lives through popular culture. Any degree that holds as its basic rationale an advocacy of Western civilization is, I think, superfluous. There is also a risk that the degree is run according to the same academic standards and enjoy the same academic independence as the rest of the undergraduate offering. If this risk eventuate, the degree could be subpar, not nuanced, and not in good faith. It would also be uncritical. Emphasizing critical thinking was supposed to be one of the West’s strong suit. Any degree which aims to promote Western Civilization by uncritically affirming it is paradoxical. This is not to say that we should not have the degree at all, mind you. Reasonable minds might differ and I find it a good idea to have an equivalent degree to Bachelor of Asian Studies for any international students who are interested in studying Western Civilization. This is probably not the primary intention of the center in creating the degree. But I believe if academic quality, independence, nuance are guaranteed and that the degree is conducted in good faith, it can be a force to foster a deeper understanding across culture lines. It might also increase the option available for international students if they wanted an education in the humanities. The concept of a quality Oxbridge-like degree closer to the region could indeed appeal to future Asian students who may not have the chance to go to the UK.
Vol. 68 , Issue 05
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A Young Entrepreneur’s Story Text: Daweena Tia Motwany Graphic: David Liu
When I was 16 years old, I knew that I wanted to be a student at ANU. A year later, I was fortunate enough to visit the campus and I was reassured that I did want to be part of the ANU community. After two years, my dreams came true and I was accepted into ANU. I told myself to not hold back from any opportunity that came my way when I first moved to Canberra. I was unsure whether I had enrolled in the right course or if moving away from home was the best idea. Despite my insecurities, I kept my head held high and continuously reassured myself that I would be alright. Before attending university, I was always told the cliché that I would be able to find myself by experiencing new things throughout my university years. Being a person that likes to prove others wrong, that cliché couldn’t have been more right. I can definitely attest that I have been able to find my passions and my true self, through my journey at ANU. Being a Politics and International Affairs student, I have been educated on many human rights issues and the inner workings of politics in various countries. Attending lectures and discussing various atrocities that take place in different countries has made me acutely aware of the lack of opportunities many individuals around the world face. In addition to studying, I have participated in various clubs and societies at ANU, including AIESEC and the International Relations Society. Through AIESEC, I was given the opportunity to develop purposeful leadership and volunteered to educate in Mexico. There, I taught English to university students and young working adults. With the International Relations Society, I learned about how inclusive ANU is with its international community. The amalgamation of being educated by world renowned lecturers and the non-academic opportunities available at ANU has allowed me to develop a passion for helping individuals who are not given the same opportunities as I am. This inspired the creation of my company. It aims to develop and aid young adults wanting to develop confidence in speaking English. The emphasis on confident communication in my business allows me to concentrate on individuals who do not feel like they are able to be confident English speakers in a social and professional environment. ANU gave me the confidence to start something of my own, as I am exposed to an institution that not only provides me, but students from all around the world to further pursue our dreams and passions. I will forever be proud to say that I am a part of the ANU community.
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Woroni is proud to have the largest art and design ever, with seven sub-editors in addition to our art editor, Sophie Bear. The team's beautiful works are featured throughout each of our editions in 2018, on our Instagram (@woroni) and our website. This edition, we are dedicating this particular page to feature the work of one of our newest team members, Valterri Kuusisto. You can see more of Valterri's work at his Instagram accounts, @tonguep0p and @moustachedpotato.
discover // environment
Vol. 68 , Issue 05
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Light up your night with wildlife that shine! Text: Elizabeth Suk-Hang Lam Graphic: Maddy Mckusker
It is a nice and peaceful night, so you decide to chill out by having a moonlight walk on the beach. The breeze is gentle and mild with the sea forging its own sea-song. The hanging full moon is smiling with the company of cheerfully glittering stars. Suddenly, you notice something shining in the ocean. Curiosity has driven you to come closer to the sea, just to find out you are surrounded by a mysterious shimmering bluish glow in the water. Horrifying? Don’t worry, this is not a ghost story – this is simply because some animals (and bacteria) actually light up themselves. You may find this surprising but, in fact, about 80 per cent of animals living in the deep sea shine! Scientists have made use of this self-illuminating property of marine animals
to detect biological activities in the deep ocean. The light-emitting capability of animals is a major factor in many ecological interactions. But, not all animals that shine produce light by themselves. For instance, some animals only glow when they are under a spotlight.
So, how do animals shine? They can be classified into two main types: some species light themselves up by emitting light from the chemicals in their body, while others simply emit light after receiving it from their surroundings. Species that can emit light from their body are called bioluminescent species. They can produce light through chemical reactions within their body. Just like how you need a light bulb and a switch to turn on your light in your room, bioluminescent species have a light-emitting molecule (luciferin) and a corresponding enzyme catalyst ‘switch’ (luciferase) to control its light. There are four luciferins that can produce light in marine
organisms. Yet, the luciferin-luciferase system is not arbitrary – one type of luciferin can only be triggered by its specific corresponding luciferase. This is just like how your key can only open your door, but not the lock next door. Light is given out when the luciferin binds with oxygen with the help of the luciferase, therefore, making them glow in the dark. However, some animals do not glow in the dark, they glow in the light. It is like a solar-powered torch – they shine only after receiving light from surroundings. Scorpions and jellyfish are two examples. The proteins in the shells of scorpions absorb high energy UV light and emit it as lower-energy bluegreen light (as observed in the image). The process can be thought of as a second-hand trade – you buy a bicycle for $300 to commute to school and sell it for $200 due to wear and tear after two years. This is different from bioluminescence, where the process does not involve chemical reactions and animals only glow after they have absorbed light.
Why do animals glow? Different animals glow for different reasons. For example, deep-sea anglerfish glow to attract prey, pony fish light themselves up to blend in with lights filtering down from above, vampire squids shine to confuse predators and click beetles use light to make themselves look larger. For scorpions, since blocking parts of its shell could diminish the signals being sent to its nervous system, some scientists think that scorpions use this information to detect shelter. However, it is still not well understood exactly why these animals shine and scientists are yet to come up with an answer. Whether it is to find a mate or confuse their prey, these species glow. So, next time when you go for a field trip, don’t be scared when you see something glowing in the ocean! However, when you have spotted scorpions with a UV torch, be sure to stay away from them!
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Week Week9,9,Semester Semester1,1,2018 2018
discover // environment
The Need to Achieve the Sustainable Development Goals in Australia
Text: Jessica Woolnough Graphic: Clarence Lee
The idea of sustainable development has been on the forefront of much of the developed world, encouraged by international bodies such as the United Nations. Contemporary definitions of sustainable development suggest that human development needs to occur in a manner that allows both social and economic capital to grow, whilst ensuring the environment is protected and maintained. In 2015, the United Nations released a set of 17 ‘Sustainable Development Goals’ (SDGs), which offered a total of 169 targets and over 300 corresponding indicators for countries to aim towards during their development. These goals span the range of the three core themes of sustainable development: protecting the environment, ensuring global social development and achieving lasting economic growth. Overall, the intended effect of the SDGs is to promote sustainable development worldwide. Rising popularity and attention towards this new UN framework sparks the question of how relevant these goals are for well-off nations such as
Australia. So, why would a country like Australia need to achieve the SDGs? Goal 1 aims to end poverty in all its forms. This is still very relevant to Australia, considering three million Australians are living in poverty (according to the OECD poverty line, which is set at 50 per cent of Australia’s median household income for a given period). We then have Goal 2, which aims to end hunger and achieve food security. This is still a huge issue for over 3.6 million Australians who experience food insecurity each year. In fact, demand for charitable food relief rose by around 10% in Australia last year – suggesting food insecurity is far from being addressed. Even Goal 4, on the topic of achieving equitable and inclusive education for all, is still a shockingly prevalent issue that Australia needs to solve. For instance, by the age of 15, children from the lowest socioeconomic households in Australia are, on average, nearly three years behind in school than the children from the highest socioeconomic households. Furthermore, approximately 40 per cent of children from these lowest socioeconomic households do not complete Year 12. Then, there is the ever-persisting issue of gender inequity, addressed by
Goal 5. Working women in Australia take home $262.50 less than men each week, with the national gender ‘pay gap’ remaining between 15-18 per cent for the past two decades. There is also the alarming fact that domestic and family violence is the leading preventable cause of death, disability and illness in women aged 15-44 years in Australia. Finally, let’s not forget our nation’s beautiful and unique environment. Out of all Australia’s plants and wildlife, around 93 per cent of our frogs, 92 per cent of our vascular plants, 89 per cent of our reptiles, 83 per cent of our mammals and 45 per cent of our birds are all unique to Australia. That is, these species do not naturally occur anywhere else in the world. This makes Goal 6, ensuring sustainable water management, and Goal 15, ensuring sustainable land use and conservation, extremely important. We are also currently one of the world’s worst per-capita carbon emitters. This turns up the pressure on Australia to seek sustainable and reliable modern energy (Goal 7), sustainable consumption and production (Goal 12), and to combat climate change (Goal 13). Let’s not forget how achieving these
goals will also benefit the Australian public. For example, achieving Goal 7 would solve South Australia’s energy affordability and security woes. Hopefully, at least one or more of these goals and issues have resonated with you – expressing just how relevant the SDGs are for Australia to aim towards. Whilst some of these statistics may sound very dire, remember that just because it is, doesn’t mean it should be. The world is what we make it, so it is up to us to facilitate positive change. As such, I implore you all to help take the SDGs into your households, your broader communities and your workforces. Whilst it may be easy to dismiss achieving these goals as the responsibility of state and national politics, there is a lot that households, communities, and industries can and should be doing to support reaching them. From learning how to be an ethical bystander, to investing in a reusable water bottle, to getting involved with a local community group – the opportunities are endless. Perhaps, with enough of us working towards achieving the SDGs, we’ll soon see a fairer and more sustainable world.
discover // environment
Vol. 68 , Issue 05
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Behind the Tag Text: Students Wanting to Eliminate Apparel and Textile Sweatshops (SWEATS) Graphic: Sophie Bear
Clothing labels can be a pain in the neck. Yet, the itching and irritation of a tiny fabric tag frequently distracts from its significance in supply chain transparency. Decades, even centuries, of effort by unions saw information such as country production, material composition, clothing care symbols, and – for some countries – registered identification numbers, become a legal requirement. The union activism of garment factory workers around the world has not ceded with the implementation of labels and tags. Abuse of working rights including forced overtime, unrealistic quotas, verbal abuse, physical violence, unsafe working conditions, no pay, sexual assault and harassment, are still a daily occurrence for many. In most garment producing countries, formal legal channels of dispute resolution to seek remediation and to stop violations include lodging a complaint to the labour ministry, bringing an action to court, and arbitration. Despite the assortment of available, formal redress paths, these options present numerous obstacles and are often overshadowed by the blurring of factory and government interests; even the rule of law. Enter the clothing label. Given the way this globalised economy is currently fashioned, apparel brands wield considerable power and influence in garment-producing countries. Perhaps more importantly, they also have the finances to address violations in factories. Apparel brands are a nexus between supply and demand within the fast-fashion paradigm, and if they are leveraged, they can be an effective means for remediation of labour rights.
Unions regularly workshop strategies on brand engagement through clothing labels – to help address issues still facing garment factory workers. They recently completed exercises on clothing label analyses and writing complaints to brands. These two steps are incremental – once the brand is identified, a complaint can then be brought to them. Clothing label analysis Clothing label analysis requires workers to collect different labels that appear in their factory. They keep a log of the percentage of garments produced at their factory allowing them to identify the brand, its volume and export destination. This record keeping enables workers to self-monitor which brands are using their factory and acts as supporting evidence to demonstrate to the brand that their factory is the one producing their apparel. Writing complaints to brands Workers write up accounts detailing when and where a violation has occurred. They also list which Cambodian labour laws are breached, the repercussions and explain what the brand should do. This process demonstrates that workers are aware of their rights and are empowered to call for action. A recent example of the importance of clothing labels is the case of Kingsland Garment Factory: an H&M and Walmart supplier. The factory closed down without notice and the employer took off overseas despite owing workers about $230,000 in unpaid wages, severance and other allowances under Cambodian Labour Law. Through tracing clothing labels from its factory, workers identified and lobbied both Walmart and H&M. In response, one Walmart warehouse in Oregon even organised a solidarity strike with the Cambodian workers. Through their action, the workers received the amount owed from Walmart and H&M.
Cambodia is a major player in the highly competitive global garment industry. Its economy has long been reliant on the largely export-oriented garment sector, which employs 847,419 workers, approximately 90 per cent of whom are women. Of the total $10.79 billion in factory revenue generated last year, more than $7 billion was from Cambodia.
However, more information is needed on clothing labels to ensure the supply chain of garments can be traced. For example, unlike the USA, Australia does not have Registered Numbers (RNs). These five figures are a basic attempt to facilitate and increase supply chain transparency. Australia should similarly require that RNs, factory names and addresses are added to clothing tags for products going to the country.
Garment factory union leaders from the Cambodian Alliance of Trade
Bent Gehrt, the Southeast Asia Field Director for the Worker Rights
Consortium (WRC), explained that in addition to adding more information to the clothing tags, transparency needs to go further. One way to do this is to facilitate public disclosure of the brands and retailers’ supply chains. Gehrt wrote: ‘All of our member universities have a contractual right to receive from the brands that use their names and logos a quarterly list of production facilities complete with name, address and contact information. This information is then compiled and published by the WRC in a searchable website, that both students and garment workers are able to access.’ 18 years ago, the WRC was the first entity to make supply chain information publicly available, but it is increasingly becoming the norm with around 70 brands already disclosing the factories they use. Clothing label analyses at the ANU Clothing label analysis is also happening at the consumer side of the supply chain, including here at ANU through the SWEATS #TagTheTag campaign. The campaign aims to gather data on the apparel brands and the country of production of ANU merchandise. It also aims to raise awareness about the sources of our apparel and to understand the supply chains that exist in the production process. Through this exercise, students found that most of ANU merchandise was produced in Bangladesh, Cambodia, China and Honduras. To push for greater supply chain transparency, and to encourage consumers to engage with brands and find out #whomademyclothes, SWEATS is re-launching #TagTheTag. Members of the ANU community are encouraged to take pictures of apparel tags inside t-shirts, hoodies, jackets, etc. from any ANU branches, such as ANUSA, PARSA, Residences, ANU Shop, and ANU Sport. You may post them directly on the event page, or email them to sweats.club.anu@gmail.com. Clothing labels are here to stay. Adding a few extra numbers and the name and address of the origin factory onto them will not make them any more irritating. What it will do is help us all see where our clothes are made, and for garment factory workers producing the apparel. These details can be a significant asset for remedying abuses through brand engagement.
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discover // environment
How to Make Money: How changing consumer habits can help save your planet and money Text: Lydia J. Kim Graphic: Hannah Charny & Katie Ward Living sustainably shouldn’t be a luxury, just as it shouldn’t solely be about making sacrifices. It’s about using resources wisely – including our money – so that we can save and end up with more. After all, a penny saved is a penny earned! Seeing as us uni students are always looking for ways to improve our finances, here are some tips and tricks on how to do exactly that, while being good to the Earth:
Meal-prepping and meal-planning isn’t only for gym-junkies. So many advantages. To begin with, you know what and when you need to buy, meaning you’ll be able to avoid any unnecessary purchases, especially of foods that will only end up rotting in your fridge. Secondly, preparing your own food means you don’t need to eat out or rely on Uber Eats all the time – these are dangerously expensive habits many of us fall into. Lastly, you get to use reusable containers and cutlery instead of disposable ones you get with takeaway. Win, win, win!
Reusable containers The first thing that comes to mind: water bottles. Instead of buying bottled water and chucking it out after a couple of gulps, refill your own reusable one. Plastics are compromising our water and air quality, so cutting down on our consumption of it only makes sense. KeepCups are another amazing innovation, with a lot of cafes around Canberra (e.g. Greenhouse in Canberra Centre, Atticus Coffee in CBE, Coffee Lab in the Pop Up) charging customers less when you BYO reusable cups. Watch out for refillable packaging next time you go shopping as well. You’d be surprised to see how much cheaper it is to refill and reuse items like soap dispensers, salt and pepper grinders and pens. Don’t forget your snazzy shopping bags if you don’t want to have to pay for plastic ones!
‘In order to be irreplaceable, one must always be different.’ Words by the beloved Coco Chanel. What better way to achieve individuality than by ditching fast fashion and fleeting trends? We’re talking about big brands that sell cheap clothing that begin fraying after a couple washes. Don’t fool yourself into thinking ‘cheap clothes = win’. The costs start accumulating and a bit of maths will easily reveal that you could’ve bought something wayyy nicer if you’d just tamed your inner impulse shopper on your last trip to H&M. Instead, visit your local thrift store, join a clothes swap group on Facebook, share pieces with friends – take advantage of it all!
Invest in the right tech Electronics are expensive, but it’s not something we can realistically forego either. Purchase proper earphones and cables that are guaranteed to last longer than a month, even if they’re a bit more expensive. Like clothes, the costs of individual counterfeits add up and end up costing you a whole heap more. They also accumulate in our landfills: this year alone, we expect up to 49.8 million tons of e-waste globally. Consider buying properly refurbished computers and phones that are often a couple of hundred dollars cheaper. Take advantage of programs like Apple’s GiveBack as well, where companies take your old electronics in exchange for gift cards. If not, at least make sure that they’re being recycled – electronics are made up of valuable minerals that can be easily reused!
Out-Diva Aunt Flo #RIP – gotta love having your period! DivaCups are definitely the way to go. For only about 50 bucks, you can save on menstrual products for at least a year depending on how well you clean and store it. For an option closer to home, the BKSS is currently stocking discounted JujuCups – an Australian offering in the menstrual cup market. Every year in Australia alone, we dump around 18 metric tonnes of harmful chemical-emitting sanitary waste that never really decomposes. Ew – it’s just not okay.
Re-think your food It’s no secret that the meat industry is detrimental to our planet in so many ways. A simple Google search can tell you enough. No, I’m not suggesting we all become vegan either – I myself eat meat. What I am suggesting, however, is that we be more mindful of how much and of what we consume. Cutting down on meat isn’t only good for the environment, but it’s also good for your wallet! Another helpful tip: keep an eye out for ugly fruit and veg. Supermarkets like Woolworths and Harris Farms often sell ‘deformed’ produce that taste perfectly fine at lower prices.
Transport Ditching cars isn’t feasible for everyone, especially if you travel long distances on the reg. However, whenever you can, try to use your bike instead. You’ll be able to skip out on petrol and any additional costs that come with owning and driving a car. Public transport can save you from having to pay hellishly for parking tickets as well!
discover // Business & Economics
Vol. 68 , Issue 05
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The Royal Banking Commission: The Actuarial Perspective Text: Felix Ryan Graphic: Sophie Bear The Royal Commission into Misconduct in the Banking, Superannuation and Financial Services Industry has undoubtedly brought some egregious evidence to light. Thus far, AMP revealed it effectively stole from customers by charging them for services they never received. Consumers had been given financial planning advice that was purposely incorrect or misleading; for example, a Westpac customer claimed that following Westpac’s advice had lost her $500,000. Even in death customers haven’t been off the hook; with evidence indicating that deceased customers were charged for financial advisory services. Worse still, major regulators such as the ASIC (Australian Securities and Investments Commission) have been given false information about these activities to prevent them from curbing this behaviour. Most recently, it was revealed that the FPA (Financial Planners Association) failed to investigate or regulate the activities of its members, to point where corporations such as Dover Financial were actually recruiting financial advisors under investigation. Yet this is not the first time that Australian Banks have been apprehended for misdeeds; over the last decade the major banks have been subject to nearly $1 billion worth of fines. Various offences include 55,000 instances of terrorism financing and money laundering by the major banks and CommInsure (CBA’s insurance branch) using outdated medical definitions to avoid paying out insurance. But when the activities of the major banks’ financial planners were uncovered, showing numerous cases of signature forging and unauthorised use of customer accounts, the idea of a royal commission fast became a popular option. The following 2014 senate inquiry into these activities later strongly recommended a royal commission to follow up these reports. With mounting public and political pressure and the possibility of an independent motion of a banking commission being made in the senate, the government announced the $75 million banking commission late last year.
The banks too have welcomed the commission as a means to ‘deliver certainty to the financial sector, our customers and the community’ rather than resisting such an ‘unwarranted and costly distraction’ of an investigation as they had previously argued. A perspective that is often left out of much mainstream business commentary is the actuarial one; with the eye-catching stories of Royal Commission it is once again difficult to deifier from the mix. But, as always, it provides the most interesting and insightful framework with which to analyse recent events. In the actuarial profession the main concern is risk and how to manage it, and in the increasingly complicated and interconnected world of insurance and banking risk has never been more important to consider. From this angle, conventional risk management strategies are viewed to have failed the major players in the industry and are the key reason that they find themselves in the hot water of a Royal Commission. Primarily, banks have not considered the rapidly changing technological and societal conditions in which they function; this new risk being termed ‘social risk’ by actuaries. While some of the major banks’ actions may have once been considered acceptable in a more ‘neo-liberal’ or laisse-faire age, the Australian population now have a rightfully higher expectation of their financial intermediaries and little tolerance for such deceitful practices. Further, the role of social media means that it is easier than ever before to call out malpractice and spread the information to a global audience. Unpacking the categories of this concept of social risk further helps to explain some of the individual and broader cases brought before the commission. The CommInsure episode is a textbook example of where financial intermediaries haven’t kept up with the changing pace of society or technology and were met with justified public outrage. The poor dealings of financial planners can partially be attributed to ‘true values risk’ (a specification of social risk), where the actions of management and employees in this area conflict heavily with publically espoused values and rhetoric of financial services and the norms of
society. More generally, the financial services sector has failed to pick up on social risk and has increasingly found itself in front of parliamentary hearings, paying fines and facing public scrutiny (especially among millennials, who are beginning to bank with smaller startups). Now, they’re in front of a damning Royal Commission, which is the final nail in many of these institutions’ reputations among the non-banking public. So, returning to the commission itself – what does the future hold for the financial services industry in Australia? Since a final report from the commission is not due until February 2019, it is hard to say what will happen. Already, AMP boss Craig Meller has resigned and pressure is mounting on AMP chairman Catherine Brenner to do the same. AMP is now facing criminal charges for their activities, and with each day of the commission public and political pressure mounts to punish the offenders. However, no-one senior in the Australian banking sector has been apprehended previously, no staff were sacked over the CommInsure scandal and to date only a handful of guilty financial planners have had their employment terminated. Various speculations on suitable solutions have been proposed from a variety of differing interests; some suggest de-regulating the sector all together, breaking up the major banks or simply waiting to see the outcome of the commission before deciding. Regardless of the verdict, the insurance and financial services sector in Australia is due for massive change in the next few years due to the advent of social risk, whether it is actively recognised by firms or not. The proposal of a new ‘social risk officer’ by actuaries in businesses to inform their decision making would have potentially avoided some of the worst activities of the financial sector; clearly an enamelled and broader understanding of risk and societal norms is paramount if these businesses wish to regain public trust and function without scandal in the future. For now, however, the commission carries on, with firms paying the reputational and monetary price for their lack of social risk management.
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Week 9, Semester 1, 2018
Shining a light on history Text: Brody Hannan Art: Clarence Lee When was the last time you looked up at the night sky? The last time you saw a sky full of stars? Living in Canberra, we are lucky to be able to see the stars and all their constellations on any clear night. Small towns and regional areas even more so. It wasn’t until I went on exchange to London that I realised what I’d been taking for granted while living in regional NSW, and then Canberra. The light pollution in London – one of the largest megacities of the world, with a population of almost nine million people – was so bad that you couldn’t see the stars at all. I went on a roadtrip to a small coastal town with friends who’d grown up in London, and they couldn’t help but stare at the stars – like it was the first time they’d seen them. It’s hard to imagine a time when our cities weren’t filled with “artificial” light – so bright that it blocks out the “natural” light from the night sky. But before electricity, that was exactly the case. Humans had relied upon the stars, for navigation, and the Lunar Cycle, for planting crops and predicting the seasons, for millennia. People even used the moonlight as the only way to move around their cities at night – the streets being so dark that people rarely ventured outside once it got too dark. Unless it was almost a full moon, cities and their narrow, dark alleyways were just too dark for it to be safe at night. Just prior to the Industrial Revolution of the 18th Century, people started to
fill their streets with lamp posts, that could provide light for cities at night. In the early years of street lighting, when gas and electricity were expensive, street lights were only turned on when they were absolutely needed. Street lights were typically not turned on in full moonlight, when the sky was clear – people understood that it was light enough outside and so to use streetlights that consumed expensive gas and electricity was just a waste of energy. But all that changed with the establishment of the national electricity grid in the 1930s. At night, when people weren’t burning enough energy in their homes, cities needed a way to “burn off” all that excess electricity. And so streetlights began to illuminate cities every night of the week. It was also at this time that most cities established their standard of lighting – a minimum brightness standard. It's not hard to see how this progression ran away from us and has left us here, with cities full of light pollution. However, increasingly people are seeking to reverse this trend, limit modern society’s dependency on lights and reduce the amount of energy we use lighting our streets at all times. Lunar resonant street lights, for example, are just like normal streetlights but also respond to ambient moonlight. Each light has a very sensitive photosensor that picks up moonlight, cloud cover and other atmospheric conditions. When the moon is full, they dim down to save energy. This responsiveness is an ingenious way of saving energy and creating a new urban connection to the cycle of the moon. If a cloud passed over the moon, you would see the lights all over the city flicker with the cloud
shadow, creating a living, breathing city that responds to the world around it. In 2013, two ANU alumni – Danny Bishop and Chris Duffield – won the Vice Chancellor’s Special Commendation for Alumni Innovation and Entrepreneurship. Their company, Organic Response, uses sensors to detect people’s movements and only turns on the lights directly in front of them, while the others remain off. In a large commercial office building, you can imagine how much electricity – and money – this would save every year. Connecting innovation to social change requires an understanding not just of
science, but of the history behind how and why things are used in the way they are. The inventor of Lunar Resonant Streetlights, Anton Willis, for example has a Bachelors and Masters in Design and Architecture. Danny Bishop and Chris Duffield had backgrounds in Finance and Engineering before they formed Organic Response. Science is much more than just stats, numbers and formulas. You don’t even need a BSc, just a bit of creativity and a way of seeing new solutions when others see the status quo.
culture // art
Vol. 68 , Issue 05
spoilt for choice: going to the movies in canberra Text: Adrian Ma Graphic: Valtteri Kuusisto
Why do we enjoy sitting in a dark room watching images projected on a screen? It’s a weird practice when you think about it, and even more so when you realise we do it with groups of strangers, laughing, crying and screaming together. No other species on Earth engage in such narcissistic, self-observational behaviour on the same scale – a global industry that netted a record $40 billion in box office receipts last year. And, unlike other forms of entertainment where Canberra is usually left holding the short straw (see: concerts, sporting events, theatre), Canberran moviegoers are actually spoilt for choice. In fact, Canberra’s population of around 400,000 people has no less than six major cinemas between us. And that’s not even including the ANU Film Group or the Arc Cinema at the National Film and Sound Archive – or the new multiplexes that will soon be built in Gungahlin and Queanbeyan as early as next year. By comparison, the Gold Coast, with more than 620,000 people, has only eight major cinemas (although they do have a couple of fun theme parks to make up for it). Reports do indicate that ticket sales at Australian cinemas have been flatlining for 15 years despite rapid population growth, with at streaming services like Netflix and improvements in home cinema threatening their business. But it’s not hard to see a silver lining Cinemas today are working tirelessly to appeal to as many different audiences, and to give us a reason to
leave the comfort of our homes and spend a few hours (and dollars) with them. Dendy recently added six new screens, making them the biggest cinema in Canberra, while Hoyts has upped the ante by replacing all their seating at Belconnen and Woden with electric recliners. Palace Electric in Acton remains the go-to destination for film festivals, showcasing the latest and greatest international films, many of which never see a general cinema release. Meanwhile, Capitol Cinemas Manuka and Limelight Tuggeranong continue to compete for the bragging rights of having the cheapest tickets in town. If you’re into classic films, the NFSA’s Arc Cinema screens retrospective films throughout the year. Then there’s the ANU Film Group, which has been around longer than anyone else, having screened films for the Canberra community since 1966. They screen a wide variety of more than 170 films a year, and membership is open to everyone. Have I mentioned we are spoilt for choice? A quick survey of the session times at the various cinemas around Canberra indicates that nearly 40 different films are showing on any given day. These aren’t just Hollywood blockbusters but also retro classics, foreign films, documentaries, concerts, family fare, low-budget indies, and even a couple of Bollywood features thrown in for good measure. Combined with the thousands upon thousands of films now available on streaming services, there has probably never been a better time to be a movie buff. All we need now are more hours in the day. Adrian Ma is the head of the ANU Film Group.
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culture culture
Week 9, Semester 1, 2018
the book of mormon Text: Alisha Nagle Graphic: Hannah Charny Since the silly geniuses behind South Park are responsible for the multiple Tony Award-winning musical The Book of Mormon, I certainly had some idea of what to expect when I saw it last year. But I never thought it could be as truly brilliant as it is – I never imagined I would feel so inspired while also dying of laughter during this clever satire. Mormon is the story of a bright young missionary in The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints. Kevin Price, the golden boy of the Mormons, is about to be sent to a new place where he will help to spread his faith – which, just like for real Mormons, means travelling from house to house in boy-scout fashion. He hopes to be sent to his favourite American city, Orlando, instead he's sent to Uganda, Africa. Along for the journey is Kevin's new mission companion, Elder Cunningham, arguably the worst missionary ever and a dorky compulsive liar. Will Africa be “like Lion King”? No. No, it will not. If you’re planning on seeing Mormon, it’s probably better to know as little about it as possible. The plot is hilarious, yet somewhat of a shock to the system – not surprising considering creators Trey Parker and Matt Stone are known for addressing various unsavoury topics in South Park with outrageous bravery.
Lyricist Robert Lopez who wrote music for Frozen and Avenue Q also lent his talent to the project. The result is equally bold as South Park, but this time with a grandiose and sickeningly catchy score. Mormon sometimes verges on being crass – but this is the type of musical we need. Behind the black comedy is a powerful message about humanity, the unspoken plight of developi n g nations a n d the role of religion in our troubled modern society. The events that ensue during Kevin’s trip to Uganda satirise not only the Mormon religion but also the premise of faith and its apparent absurdity in the face of poverty and despair. Kevin arrives in Uganda to hear a lively ‘Hakuna Matata’ parody called ‘Hasa Diga Eebowai’ – only to realise the Ugandan locals are singing “eff you” to the heavenly father. As Kevin watches in horror, the locals turn to the audience and sing: “If you don’t like what we say, try living here a couple days. Watch all your friends and family die – Hasa Diga Eebowai!” The
confronting nature of this song and others is the reason for Mormon’s success – rather than simply walking out disgusted; audiences recognise it has something important to say, and become all the
more s w e p t away by the plot.
I ’ d a
Not all of the satire relies on profanity. The song ‘Sal Tlay Ka Siti’, in which Ugandan girl Nabulungi dreams of escaping the horrors of her village to find paradise, is powerful in a different way. Her sudden hope that the Mormons – a bunch of sheltered white boys from a rich nation – can somehow save her tribe struck with war, AIDs and famine is truly sad and resonates palpably with the audience. The delicate balance between profanity and emotion Mormon uses to deliver its satire is something compelling that never witnessed before in musical.
Moroffenp e o behind
mon is never really sive to religious ple. The clever irony Mormon’s plot is
that religious values actually end up being necessary for the desperate Ugandans to begin improving their situation. The absurdly bungled version of the Mormon faith Elder Price recites to them ends up inspiring them all the same. Religion does have a place in our world when it encourages compassion and hopefulness amongst the pain and trials of life. The actual reasons you believe in something, however ridiculous another person might find them, are unimportant. What matters is feeling that you can make a difference to the people around you and help inspire peace – then your life has meaning, even if you believe after death Jesus will give you your own planet. Combine this social commentary with amazing sets, clever costume changes and an overwhelmingly talented cast, and you’ve got yourself one of the most successful musicals ever made. If you do see Mormon and enjoy it as much as I did, you might also consider watching the South Park Movie. While slightly dated, this is a musical comedy with as much to say as Mormon – complete with fabulous medleys parodying the likes of Les Misérables. The Book of Mormon undoubtedly represents the pinnacle of Parker and Stone’s creative ingenuity, and it’s realised to perfection with the current cast here in Australia. I’ll be seeing it at least one more time before it leaves Sydney.
Thirty Seconds to Mars: AMERICA Text: Chiara Cementon Graphic: Hannah Charny
Released on 6 April 2018, their first album in five years, Thirty Seconds to Mars attempts to reach contemporary music standards in an amalgamation of over-produced bullshit and half-hearted political statements. Influenced by the new age of club sound, this new album is an altered approach to music distinct from Thirty Seconds
to Mars’ classic American rock sound. With features from pop artists such as Halsey and A$AP Rocky (the shallow pop effect has never been so distinct in a single name), the album is sure to take a more mainstream turn, however the highlights are still the more authentic rock sounds. Remedy especially is a refreshing focus on guitar, brilliantly spared of any unnecessary bass drop. Even if the weary electronic sound can be ignored (which is somewhat achievable after multiple listens), this new style is still questionable for a band; all I hear is the exhibition of the
single voice of a wannabe solo artist. The band might as well be called ‘Jared Leto and a little guitar’. On a more encouraging note, there appears to be a theme of America’s maddening recent events laced throughout the lyrics. The song title of One Track Mind itself perhaps says enough about American voters in general and possibly the stagnant position of America’s own president. However, the rest of the lyrics are more cryptic and not easily interpreted: “do you believe that you can walk on water” and “what a
dangerous night to fall in love” are trying to send us a message, but you’ll only be able to find that meaning on an artificially stimulated high. The produced sound, ultimately, doesn’t give us a clear, cleanly rock trip to Mars but an erratic trip over the whole universe. The attempt to protest America’s corrupted future is lost in an equally superficial and dumb cacophony. So, if you’re looking for a shallow, synthetic listen, this album is your next stop.
culture // reviews
Vol. 68 , Issue 05
Take a walk through 20th century fashion at NGA’s exquisite Cartier Exhibition Text: Alexandra Elgue Graphic: Hannah Charny When you walk into the Cartier exhibition at the NGA, you are greeted by the almost blinding radiance of a jewelled tiara. The item, which was worn by Emperor Napoleon Bonaparte’s great-niece on her wedding day, aptly sets the tone for the exhibition that follows it. The collection of over 300 pieces boasts items iconic to some of the biggest names of the 20th century, including Elizabeth Taylor, Carey Grant and even the British Royal Family. However, there is much more to the exhibition than the fame of Cartier’s admittedly impressive clientele. The showcase, curated by Pascale Lepeu from Cartier and private collections, ties together craftwork from across the globe in a stunning mosaic of style and history. As you progress through the exhibit, you are ushered through different eras of jewels and design. Showing off styles varying from early art deco to the age of glamour, the showcase captures the progress of fashion through the 1900s and with it, the rich history behind each movement. Cultural influences are also highlighted as central to the history of Cartier. The carefully curated layout takes visitors on a journey from India through the Islamic nations, to Asia then Egypt before returning to the Western world with the royal display. Here, you can find celebrated jewels such as the ‘Halo Tiara’ worn by Kate Middleton on her wedding day. Finally, the Hollywood section ends the tour on a dazzling note, showcasing pieces such as the engagement ring worn by Grace Kelly or the diamond necklace gifted to Elizabeth Taylor by her third husband. Alongside this emphasis on history, there is attention drawn to the many anonymous craftsmen who created these pieces. In a wing dedicated to the craftsmanship behind the
art, the museum reveals the hours of intricate design and execution devoted to each of these pieces. With cases showing the myriad of tools used, sketches of early pieces and videos demonstrating each step of the jewellery making process, it is difficult not to be left in a state of awe. On the subject of behind-the-scenes work, commendation must be given to Nathalie Criniere, the designer of the exhibition. Her artful touch of having each room painted to reflect the jewels within it, such as the blue of the Egyptian display or the steel grey of ‘masculine luxury’, combines with the pieces themselves to tell a story of their origins. Other touches, like portraits of the jewels being worn or marble busts of their owners, bring the display to life beyond their cases. Still, if you are going to the Cartier exhibition simply to look at the jewellery, you will not be disappointed. Diamond-studded necklaces stand alongside elaborately carved brooches, some so overlaid with gems they seem almost unwearable. There are truly jawdropping works to view: whether it be a 478-carat sapphire worn by Australian opera singer Dame Nellie Melba, or the staggering garland-style necklace and choker commissioned by Maharaja Bhupinder Singh, which uses thousands of pearls and gemstones from his royal treasure. Almost more incredible are the subtler pieces; cigarette cases and mantle clocks with minute detailing and diamond inlays that would have required exquisite precision to create. The Cartier Exhibition at the NGA is not simply an assortment of flashy stones to ogle. It is a celebration of the cultural landscape of the 1900s and the popular icons of the time. This is one exhibit that is most definitely not to be missed! The Cartier Exhibition runs until 22 July 2018 at the National Gallery of Australia.
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Week 9, Semester 1, 2018
culture // life & Style
content warning: discussions about mental illness.
Smashing the Stigma Surrounding Mental Health Text: Jessica Woolnough Graphic: Sophie Bear Seven. That is the number of people, of a class of 30, that will be dealing with a mental health issue. Of these seven, only two will reach out for help. The other five will suffer in silence. One of the reasons for this silent suffering is the stigma surrounding mental illness and help-seeking behaviours. To help overcome this stigma, and foster help-seeking behaviour, one thing you can do right now is to start a conversation with someone. Specifically, have the “are you okay?” conversation. This act can be a difficult thing to do, and you may not know how to respond if someone says they aren’t okay. Luckily, there are plenty of online resources that give tips on how to have this conversation, such as R U OK and Beyondblue. Here are some of their tips on how to have this conversation.
Are you okay? 1. Before you can look out for others,
you need to look out for yourself. And that’s okay! If you're not in the right headspace, try to think of someone else in that person’s support network who could talk to them.
2. Ask “are you okay?” Try to be
relaxed, friendly and concerned in your approach. Help them open up by asking questions like “what’s been happening?” and mentioning specific things that have raised your concern for them, such as “you seem more quiet than usual. How are you going?”
3. Listen. Try your best not to judge,
and take what they say seriously. It’s best not to interrupt or rush the conversation, so don’t be afraid to sit through periods of silence if they need time to respond.
4. Encourage action. You might con-
sider asking questions like “what’s
something you can do for yourself right now?” or “how would you like me to support you?” If they have been feeling really down for more than two weeks, it’s important to encourage them to see a health professional. Offer to help them seek out support – whether all they need is for you to point out a good GP or service, or help walk them to the waiting room. It’s best to be positive about the role of professionals.
– so it is important to engage with the help you need. This poses another reason why we need to smash the stigma surrounding mental health, so that we can foster open conversations on how to seek help, and what it was like to engage with said help. Because, if you’ve ever heard anyone share their personal story on mental health issues, you’ll hear about how important it can be to seek help and support
5. Check in. Remember to check in
Smashing the Stigma at the ANU
with them in a couple of weeks – sooner if they are really struggling. You can let them know you’ve been thinking about them and were wondering how they’ve been going. Ask if they’ve found a better way to manage the situation, but remember not to judge them if they haven’t done anything since your last chat. Whilst asking someone how they are sounds like such a simple thing, it can really make a difference to someone having a hard time. If nothing else, it shows them that you are thinking of them, and their wellbeing. For others, it can be the conversation that finally encourages them to seek help.
It’s okay to not be okay If you realise you aren’t okay, or that someone around you isn’t okay, there are plenty of options out there that can help. It’s okay to not be okay, and the best thing you can do is to reach out and seek help. And there are many ways to do this. You could reach out to family and/or friends for support, or chat to services over the phone or online, such as Lifeline (13 11 14) or beyondblue (1300 22 4636). You could book an appointment with ANU Counselling. You could book an appointment with your GP, who can do a mental health plan and direct you to services and health professionals that would suit your needs. It can be scary when you realise you might need help. It can also be scary going to access mental health services for the first time. However, looking after yourself is paramount
this Uni Mental Health Day (and any other day), make sure to check in with yourselves, and those around you. Start that conversation. Perhaps check out many of the initiatives and resources on campus, or look up more information online. No matter what you do, remember that it’s okay to not be okay – and that it is super important to reach out and seek help if you need it. Here is a list of free services if you find yourself needing to reach out.
It’s easy to see why smashing the stigma surrounding mental health is such an important task. And it’s a task the ANU student body hasn’t shied away from, with initiatives like Batyr and Civic2Surf showing just how motivated many of us are when it comes to fostering a positive mental health discourse. If you haven’t heard of Batyr, they are a for-purpose organisation who delivers peer-topeer programs that engage, educate and empower young people on the topic of mental health. They train young people with lived experience to share their mental health journey, and how they sought help. Civic2Surf is the key fundraiser for Batyr and sees over 60 students participating in a running relay from Civic to Bondi to do their part to smash the stigma. Both initiatives were started by previous ANU students, and now see thousands of students across Australia positively engaging with the topic of mental health.
On-campus support:
The willingness and efforts of the ANU student body present the exciting opportunity for us to really make a difference in the area of mental health and help-seeking discourses. This work is also super important in the context that it can encourage people to seek help early on, which is especially salient given the current strain on mental health services. And, whilst the ANU student body has been taking a lead on smashing the stigma surrounding mental ill health, there is still so much more to be done. That is why
Beyondblue: 1300 22 4636 Beyondblue is over-the-phone support that also provide options via email and online chat. They have a range of resources available on thier website.
ANU Counselling (02) 6125 2442 You can book a standard appointment (50 mins) anytime. To book an on the day appointment for urgent help (25 mins) call at 9am or go into the Counselling Centre just before 9am. Services available 24 hours a day, seven days a week: Lifeline: 13 11 14 Lifeline is a crisis support service. They also have an online chat service that is available 7pm till midnight, seven days a week. 1800 RESPECT: 1800 737 732 1800 RESPECT is over-thephone counselling. They have a triage system, so the first person you speak to is not a counsellor. You can ask for a counsellor
Q Life: 1800 184 527 QLife is a nationally-oriented counselling and referral service for queer* identifying students, and is available for over-thephone support from 3pm till midnight seven days a week.
culture // life & Style
Vol. 68 , Issue 05
Broken Plans Text: Miriam Sadler Graphic: Sophie Bear The summer before I started at ANU was the summer of wild expectations. It was imagining that everything I’d read about college would be true. I dreamed about freedom and booze. I’d have a wild group of friends with exotic pasts, who’d be my confidantes until my dying days. And I arrived at university in this whirlwind of dreams. I signed up for every college event, spent my days eating cheesy wraps and my nights seeing how many people could pile on a single bed. I ate my first ever Maccas. I found my group: less wild than I had imagined perhaps, but prone to outbursts of extreme laughter at the dinner table (much to the chagrin of our fellow residents). I drank vodka out of a water bladder and I left my own special mark on Mooseheads. Life was a narrow sphere from Daley Road to Civic, and it was perfect. Then the unexpected arrived. I like to attribute my health problems to a tumble I took into Lake Burley Griffin. But, maybe, they were always there, hiding under the surface and triggered by who knows what. Upheaval? Canberran air? College food? I’ll probably never know.
were surely assuming that I, the girl with the so much potential in year 12, had been sucked into a void of failure. And some of these opinions were even made to my face. “You’ve had some troubles haven’t you” …. do you think you’ll go back?” The choice to come back was not an easy one. Not least because I felt like all academic skill had left me, but also to have to face people who knew that original version of me and who would surely be disappointed by the person I had become. In the end I had to prove myself – even if coming back to Canberra was a plunge, pretty much like starting first year all over again. I’m still torn between who I was and who I am now. In some ways, I can’t even recognise the first year version of myself; my expectations of the person I would be by 21 and the person I am now are wildly different. Sometimes it feels like I’m carrying the spectre of chronic illness around on my shoulder, using it as an excuse to retreat and not participate. Any more than two glasses of wine, and I’m taking a nap for the rest of the week. I’ve narrowed my group of friends to people who accept I’m differently abled and I’ve embraced 9pm as a suitable bedtime.
It started with back pain. Then it was neck pain, then fatigue, then knees that couldn’t bend anymore. I rallied hard against the setbacks, but movie nights in each other’s rooms were replaced with my friends coating my back in Extra Strength Deep Heat. Enjoyment seeped away. I was torn between the lively soul I’d been and the withered body I was becoming
But, I’m also stronger and more resilient than I’ve ever been. I have tentatively started to participate in things. I drank two gin and tonics a few nights ago and stayed up until 1am. I’m a little bit broken, sure, but I’m also trying my hardest to embrace my uniqueness, my differences. It took me a while, but I’m trying to accept that this is just a recalibration of expectations.
I struggled until, eventually, I had to move away. And, I felt truly miserable for a long time; having to accept defeat, even just for a little while, was a crushing blow. In my mind, this was the end of my chance at university – my chance to live that life plan I’d created at the end of year 12. I felt like everyone had an opinion behind my poor, crippled back. They
And, so, this is my message to anyone going through the same thing. You might carefully build your life plan in year 12, complete with social circles and job prospects, but the unexpected can and probably will happen. The person you are on the cusp of adulthood might not be the one you morph in to. The important part is accepting yourself.
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culture
Week 9, Semester 1, 2018
Centre Stage: Female Playwrights Graphic: Sophie Bear Ruminations from three women on old, current and emerging female playwrights along with their reflections on the playwrights’ influence and how it has touched their lives.
Nakkiah Liu
By Ria Pflaum Nakkiah Lui is my favourite new playwright. She’s my favourite new playwright because she makes me feel like I’m a real person. I know that sounds really strange – of course I always feel like a real person, but Lui’s play Black is the New White was the first play that I’ve seen in years that made me feel like my experiences as a young biracial woman having fairly consistent existential crises in Australia are not just valid, but that the things I say are worth listening too. I first saw Lui speak at All About Women, held at the Sydney Opera House. She was speaking as part of a panel describing the different waves of feminism, an as a ‘millennial’ Gamilaroi/Torres Strait Islander women, she spoke for the current wave of feminism, stating that we as young women could dictate what we looked at as success not as replicating privilege, but creating equality. These themes echo throughout Black is the New White and all her comedy, with her actually side-splittingly hilarious writing challenging not only the way we think about race, but also the way we think about ourselves.
Sarah Kane
By Kat Carrington Sarah Kane’s work and career has been bookmarked by controversy and, ultimately, tragedy. It begun with the 1995 production of Blasted, a play with such graphic imagery of sexual assault, torture, and cannibalism, that audience members walked out disgusted and literary critics roasted Kane for seemingly senseless and shocking brutalism. Her career ended in 1998 with her suicide and the posthumous production of her last play, 4:48 Psychosis: a play that many critics treat as Kane’s suicide note, an insight into the mind of a woman, quite
literally, on the verge. Both were shocking moments that shaped British theatre in a way that continues to shadow and influence Kane’s five completed plays. However, the alluring context that surrounds Kane is not the reason for my recommendation. There is something so captivating in each of Kane’s works: an energy that is more compelling than even the most brutal images and actions of her plays. Kane has the incredible ability to turn the most repressed feelings of individuals into recognisable representations. Above all else, Kane brings a sense of morality to these works. In Blasted, the inner turmoil of an unstaged and unseen sexual assault is reflected through the outer turmoil of civil war. In Cleanse, the fleeting nature of love is explored via brutal scenes of torture. Sarah Kane’s plays explore the very worst of human nature, and surprisingly, there is something relatable in each of her works.
Amy Herzog
By Amanda Dheerasekara Amy Herzog’s 4000 Miles holds an especially special place in my heart – it was the play with which I made my, albeit slightly disastrous, dir e c - torial debut. What drew me to Herzog’s writing was how masterfully she brings together the combination of progressive political dialogue and an intricate web of raw, rich and brilliant characters. For how deeply enmeshed political commentary is in her writing, her characters - their trials and their joys - are never clouded by grander political agendas. The other thing is that her stories are contemporary - they could easily take place in your bedroom, or living room, or kitchen, right now. In fact, watching a Herzog play is almost akin to quietly slipping into some such private space and taking a seat at the table and observing, unnoticed, as the householders – and their friends, and their visiting relatives, and their lovers, and their neighbours – go about their lives.
culture // life & Style
Vol. 68 , Issue 05
How To Survive the Blistering Canberra Cold
Text: Sophie Johnson Graphic: Sophie Bear
Winter is a difficult time of year. For those of us who aren’t Canberra locals, we have t to get used to freezing days, biting wind, and a sun that just never warms us the whole way through. But, whether this upcoming winter is your 20th or first here in Canberra, these eight tips and tricks will help you make it through (mostly) unscathed.
Crank the heater up. The heaters at college (or, at least, those at B&G) are actually pretty good. A word from the wise: you can turn the knob halfway, and for some of them this is a good middle ground between “help me I’m sweating through my socks” and “my first toe just fell off it’s time to let hypothermia take me”. Otherwise crank it up, but leave your window open just a sliver and your room will warm up without getting too stuffy. eave the window open when you’re not in your room. It’s cold when you first get back, but you’ve got to let some fresh air in there.
Layer, layer, layer. One of the best things about winter (for me, at least) is the fashion, but you do need to be smart. Go for lots of layers so that you can shed them when you arrive for that tute at AD Hope (which is unfailingly 30 degrees all year round), and then layer back up for the ride home. You should also invest in a puffer jacket – those bad boys are God’s gift to the frozen.
Wear gloves. Honestly, if you have to ride from campus into Civic on a freezing morning, or basically venture anywhere outdoors (which, let’s be real, we all eventually have to) then invest in a set of gloves. It doesn’t matter if they’re from Top Bargain or Mimco, but those babies are going to help you through the worst of winter. I went through an entire Canberra winter without gloves, and my hands were wind-chapped, cracking, and very unhappy with me. Learn from my mistakes.
Take a hot shower/bath. Particularly if you’re living off-campus and don’t want those gas and energy bills to be through the roof, take a bath or shower instead of turning on the heating. You’ll warm up, it’s a bit of self-love time, and you’ll actually feel toasty for the first time in months.
months.
Go ice-skating. Since it doesn’t actually snow in Canberra you’ve got to take what you can get, and in our case that means going ice-skating. Each year around June there’s an outdoor ice-skating rink set up in Garema Place. Go and have fun with your friends, fall over, get blisters from ice skates that never fit quite right. It’ll make winter that little bit more bearable.
Get a hobby, and catch up with friends. Coming from Queensland, the cloudiness, windiness, rain and general cold weather here can be a huge downer. During my first year (and hell, let’s be real, the years after too), I really felt the loss of the sun and struggled to get out and about as much as I usually do. It’s all too easy to curl up under the covers on a cold day and refuse to get out of bed, but it’s a dangerous cycle. Don’t start regularly missing your classes, and make sure that you’re still catching up with friends and doing the things that matter to you.
Head out. Go clubbing if that’s your thing (enough drinks in and you won’t feel the cold, I promise), or head out for some eats and drinks. Grab a hot chocolate from Koko Black or literally anywhere on Lonsdale. Head to the Old Bus Depot Markets, take a stroll along the lake, or get a bit of shopping done in the city. You’ll be a bit chilly, but almost everywhere has heating on in winter, and you’ll feel better after getting out and about.
Eat warm foods. Embrace your cuddlier winter body and shovel warming foods into you. Come winter, I load up on Mum’s spag bol recipe, Nanna’s curry, and my best friend’s chili. Grab recipes that you know work, and make food that warms you from the inside
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Creative
Week 9, Semester 1, 2018
where are you from? Text: Anonymous Graphic: Sophie Bear Where are you from? A question simple in words but layered in meaning. Don’t take it so serious you say, don’t take it the wrong way you say. But how would you know what it means to us. You probably grew up in the upper suburbs of North Shore, went to a private school filled with others of your kind, played Sunday sport with families of similar backgrounds, and only ever spoke with people of the same colour. How would you know what it means to us.
Creative
I grew up in the outcast town of Western Sydney, went to a public school filled with people looking to pick on my kind, played violin everyday with teachers who favoured kids of your kind, and have never befriended anyone of your skin colour without being looked
down upon. We are not the same. You were born into the skin of royalty, a family of mainstreamed cultures and a life of the privileged. I was thrust into the race of colour, a household struggling for acceptance and a world of discrimination. We are not the same. You have never had to explain how to pronounce your last name to the obnoxious PE teacher, never been told you were not good enough because of your skin colour, never had people make fun of your Mum’s cooking. You do not know what it means to us. I can recite every word to Advance Australia Fair, identify every player of the Wallabies squad, sing each verse of Waltzing Matilda. But I will still be told to “go back to your own country”. You do not know what it means to us. You will never know what it means to us.
white noise Text: Sarah Kim Graphic: Sophie Bear I see red when I stop thinking Stop waking teeming bursting Red is livid, rupturing, filling me up with a scalding peal that doesn’t stop. I taste green when I stop caring Stop giving having wanting Green is ugly, hankering, filling me up with a roiling growl that doesn’t stop. I feel blue when I stop knowing Stop falling sinking drowning Blue is still, unnerving, filling me up with a lulling hum that doesn’t stop. I hear white when I stop listening Stop seeing tasting feeling White is kind, blanketing, filling me up with a piercing shrill that doesn’t stop.
creative
Vol. 68 , Issue 05
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content warning: sexual coercion
walls Text: Mahalia Crawshaw Graphic: Sophie Bear
Weightlessly, and without effort Text: Laura Ly Graphic: Sophie Bear The sea holds me the way the sky does. Weightlessly, without effort. Except that I fall in the sky, but float in the sea. No, I don’t fall in the sky; I slip through it and into the nothing between the two. Only to not fall in the sea, but ease downward instead, slower and surer. Time helps with the fall; weight – lessness is prolonged in the sea. The sky holds me in it, spiting time. No, it doesn’t hold me; it drops me down into the sea. The sea catches me! After – wards, I cannot return to the sky. The sea holds me tight; no matter how hard I grapple, I cannot free myself of its catch. Waken! Thank goodness I am still trapped in the nothing between the two. I am held here; the sea and the sky hold me in, weighted. Still without effort.
My body is a church that many people visit In and out, in and out But it is not me that they worship They only see their own hunger reflected back at them From empty eyes And feel my pleasure when they hear me scream The singing of the choir, little boys and little girls crying out to their God, ‘Oh God!’ I’m screaming out in pain But he can’t hear me I can’t hear me All we can hear are the sounds of sticky bodies and Release His body is silhouetted in the flickering Candles that are not candles Stained glass windows twinkle rainbows outside He thrusts forward. Again and again. And again He is not like the last Or maybe he is He is lost He is broken A lamb Forlorn I clutch at this, at him Nails sliding Further in They are all lost I hold myself out for them For the sore, the heaving All for – Nothing He forces me open, pushing Opening me up for Forgiveness Pulling from me, myself “This is my body” Luke 22:19 “Remember me” The blood of the covenant spills on to the floor I pull up my jeans I can still feel him running down my legs He leaves me at the train station I am left crying in a bathroom stall 40p to get in to a bathroom stall I don’t even need to shit Shit.
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Week 9, Semester 1, 2018
satire
DID YOU KNOW I WENT ON CONTIKI? Text: Stephanie Beer & Milly Roper Graphic: Hannah Charny So, I don't know if I've mentioned this, but I recently went on a Contiki in Europe. It literally changed me. And, I know when people say that it's, like, so stupid. But, like, it DID change me. I'm no longer a wealthy white girl from the North Shore. I'm a wealthy white girl from the North Shore who went on a CONTIKI. My understanding of the world has expanded completely. Did you know that there are third world countries in Europe? TBH, I thought they were a myth because my North Shore high school kind of just skipped over poverty in History and Geography. Honestly, Europe is so diverse. When I went on the Contiki I met a guy named Jacques. It's pronounced "Jaq" with a rolled tongue, it's French and you've probably never heard of it, unless you went on a Contiki too. When I was on the Contiki I went to Germany. It is like, so diverse. Like, I thought Sydney was diverse because one time my Mum and I accidentally
ended up in Bankstown and we saw an African person. But, when Angela Merkel said she was going to let in one million refugees I didn't know that she was being serious. And they actually went to mainland Germany, because Germany doesn't have islands like Australia does, where you can just send the non-white refugees. I also went to Greece, which was hella crazy. It was not like the way my Greek friends, who have never been to Greece and dropped out of Greek school, describe their country. Budgeting was also super hard. Halfway through my trip I was almost broke, with only $5000 to get me through another three and a half weeks. One time, when I dropped below the $4000-mark, I had to wait a whole four hours until my parents transferred more money to my account. It was honestly really scary, and now I get why Centrelink is a thing and should be available for all people (regardless of whether or not their parents are millionaires). Not being able to afford to buy Smirnoff 700ML was a serious bummer. My mother and father
were so generous because they wanted me to have the "time of my life," but I am paying it off by working in a casual position at my Dad's firm. Honestly, all I do is go on Facebook on his work computer. Sometimes I have to do it for four hours and then it's tough. IDK, I guess the Contiki just made me a better person, and no one else will ever understand me or be on my emotional, spiritual or metaphysical level. On another note, please follow my new blog "I’m_different.tumblr.com" to see some cool, never before seen pics of the Eiffel Tower and my friends and I drinking solely Pimms at trendy roof-top bars. Xoxo Contiki girl P.S. I went on Contiki. P.P.S. It was amazing and I really found myself.
SUdoku By Mia Jessurun
Edition Four Solutions
Vol. 68 , Issue 05
satire
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Woroni W
the headlines that didn't make it to the front page ESE uni s H T t a h w e Believ make themselve r e v e N l 'l You doing to the beneficiaries e r a s t n e d g stu bout bein alist system a r e t t e b l fee sive capit s e r p p o n of a
YOU WON'T BELIEVE W HAT THIS CASUAL EMPLOYEE DID TO GET A PA YRISE !!!!
"Nah that's cooked" stu editor launc dent attack on fa hes food indust st after hearin ry about frien g treatment d's
b??? o M a Start ? b o j t Shi
Overcaffein ated and Un derpaid??? ??
Not Getting Paid? STAR T A CRUSAD E
Im not sure how to shorten the concept anymore... um.. Young Workers R Screwed???? In big letter In smaller les: DADDY WILL HEAR ABOUT T tters: Sy UNDERSTAFFED AND UNDERAPRECIATED: Student Editors Revolt?? back against being udney uni boy fights ??HIS se ? Is that too b road???? d as cheap labour????
Lost, scared and confused: non-selective public-school kid finds himself in a Labor Left and Right mixer Text: Liam King From Kiama High in rural NSW and the the son of teachers, James wasn’t quite prepared for ANU. Engineering seemed to have been confused with computer science, no one talked to each other in class and everyone drank cocktails, not kegs. He certainly wasn’t ready for this bustling lakeside function room. Lavender-scented CMFEU t-shirts, outfits made up of an SDA hat and RM’s…
seeing the political battlelines everyone had been talking about before had become a task of splitting hairs – or haircuts. He bumped and jostled around the feverish networkers, falling to the back of the room with little resistance, like a pinball in a machine without bumpers. Now and then he agreed to statements he didn’t understand, with a non-committal nod and an empty word. Warm, wine-ladened breaths whispered: “but, like, its not a trust fund, it’s a long-term deposit”; “they’re just talking shit, I’m
not rich, the tennis court is in the front garden”; “a $50,000 gift every year from my parents isn’t really tax dodging, I don’t have the faintest idea where the bank account is. Besides, everyone does it”. The worst were the arguments. James couldn’t see clear thought, despite the apparent sea of “pragmatic hats” and “thinking caps”. The room was split chaotically on who the ‘real’ terrorists were but mainly divided on whether the Shiraz was better than the Sauvignon Blanc.
A quick jog took him out of the room. That politics could never be for him became cognizant far before he’d found the door. Back in the kitchen now, after handing out the last of his tray, he felt at peace. Until he had to wash the functions glasses with Kenny at the end of the shift. No one knows what Kenny did for the first 40 years of his life, and the missing pinkie finger and neck tattoos didn’t invite questions.