Your invite

Original, Chewy Caramel, Double Coat, Dark, Love Potions Double Chocolate and Raspberry, Love Potions Chocolate Mud, Love Potions Sticky Vanilla Toffee, Latte....

I’m talking Tim Tam’s, the iconic Australian biscuit launched in 1964. I was given a bag today that contains almost all of the above varieties..... (SEVEN packets!!) So if you can get to Sydney, come over and help me eat some of the most delicious bikkies on the planet : )

25 hugs before breakfast

Yesterday I visited my local church in Sydney. I joined in for the songs, prayers and readings. I sat and listened through the sermon. All of that was OK. But nothing could beat the smiles, hugs and greetings from a group of friends who have known me for over a decade and so quickly forgive a three year absence.

Mum and I had a late breakfast at home afterwards. (Bagels and coffee with melon & blueberries on the side...v good!) The skies were a perfect blue and the air was warm but not too hot. It was a textbook late summer Sunday. Only one thing left to do: run. I stepped suburban paths around Fairlight, Shelly Beach, Manly and Queenscliff and remembered hundreds of times I've walked, cycled...even skateboarded those same pavements. It was fantastic. 25 hugs before breakfast and I feel like I'm home.

sup

Langauge fascinates me. I've been in Australia for almost two weeks and have listened in on many amazing snatches of conversations.
Cool Bananas.
Not on your nelly!
OK Batman, talk to you later.
People actually speak like this! Normal looking people with jobs. Morning commuters on the train. Regular people come out with such weird vocab. I'm enjoying the free entertainment...

We Say Sorry....

This is a good day to be in Australia.

We apologise for the laws and policies of successive Parliaments and governments that have inflicted profound grief, suffering and loss on these our fellow Australians.

We apologise especially for the removal of Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander children from their families, their communities and their country. For the pain, suffering and hurt of these Stolen Generations, their descendants and for their families left behind, we say sorry.

To the mothers and the fathers, the brothers and the sisters, for the breaking up of families and communities, we say sorry.

And for the indignity and degradation thus inflicted on a proud people and a proud culture, we say sorry.

You can read the full apology that Kevin Rudd (the Australian Prime Minister) will read tomorrow here.

Kids in Poipet

The NGO Goutte d'Eau (GE) has conducted a survey of 210 children living on both the Thai and Cambodian side of the border near Poipet. Results published in the Phnom Penh Post on January 11 showed that:

30 percent of the children interviewed said they regularly slept on the streets. The most common reasons they gave were fear of returning home, lack of earnings to turn over to their parents, domestic violence or simply that they preferred to stay on the street with siblings or friends. Of those street kids who had homes, 89 percent lived in one-room plastic shacks. The sanitary conditions in the homes were inadequate, particularly in the rainy season.

Most of the children were under age 15. Half reported they worked all day everyday, most commonly scavenging and begging. Many worked as street sellers or cart pullers, transporting the flow of Thai imports across the border. Only a few children described theft or smuggling as their main form of income.Daily wages ranged from 20 to 200 baht, or about 50 cents to US$6.

Most of the girls earned a living by carrying umbrellas to shelter tourists from sun or rain while waiting at immigration. That job was of particular concern to social workers who say that kind of close contact with wealthy adults can lead to prostitution. Yann Grandin, an advisor to the NGO reportedly said, "Umbrella girls have admitted to our social workers that they sometimes have sexual relations for money”.

The survey revealed that 75 percent of those interviewed had either dropped out or never attended school. Of those who had attended, fewer than 20 percent had progressed beyond grade 3. Only 20 percent of those interviewed were natives of Poipet. The rest were from a variety of poverty stricken families who moved there to find work.

"This extremely unstable scenario makes the families concentrate all their efforts on daily survival, with no expectations or plans for the future," Grandin said.

Learning to Rock in Thailand

Here are a few photos from my short trip to Thailand at Christmas. Singing karaoke on the street with a stranger was a highlight!

Poetry

“You campaign in poetry but you govern in prose.” This is a political slogan that Hillary Clinton re-used early January after her New Hampshire win.

I’m not in politics but I like the phrase. Unfortunately I think I do better at poetry than policy.

From Feb 8 until the end of May I will be in Australia. Speaking. Traveling. Preaching. Poetry. It is easier than my usual work in Cambodia. That scares me a little.