alicespringstomind

The only sidecar I ever encountered until I came here was on our television screen in the 1970s. George & Mildred was an English comedy series which I loved as a child. The opening sequence featured Mildred in her old fashioned helmet looking decidedly unimpressed from the low-set sidecar attached to her husband George’s old … More Sidecars and Pyjamas

Houseboats on the Mekong

October 31, 2013

Kampong Cham is on the tourist trail for houseboats on the Mekong, which seem to anchor here at least a few times a week. At the riverside in the town centre is a stretch of about 300 metres of expatriate-targeting restaurants and cafes with westernised food options, meals of $4 instead of the local … More Houseboats on the Mekong

A Week in Cambodia

October 27, 2013

Phnom Penh is a city of wide boulevards crossing narrow litter-filled lanes. The crowded streets are swarming with motorbikes ducking and weaving between trucks, mini buses and cars, all diligently transporting a surprising variety of people and goods. The traffic rules are loose, if not completely absent. Whole families travel on mopeds in various configurations, … More A Week in Cambodia

Starting Out With Medecins Sans Frontieres

October 19, 2013

Medecins Sans Frontieres exists to deliver medical assistance to vulnerable populations in humanitarian crises. The organisation was founded in 1971 by a group of French doctors and journalists who had been volunteers with the International Red Cross. These men had signed an agreement with Red Cross which blocked them from speaking out when, whilst working … More Starting Out With Medecins Sans Frontieres

Arrivederci, Alice Springs

October 13, 2013

September 25 A few months ago we (two colleagues and I) did a vaccination drive at one of the town camps. We had been approached by Department of Health and Aging (DoHA – the Federal department), asking if we had any way of providing them with photographs of indigenous people having their recommended vaccines, because … More Arrivederci, Alice Springs

The Effect of Scarcity on Your Brain

September 24, 2013

I’m sharing this article from Science Magazine last month, because it is highly relevant to the work I’ve been doing for over 10 years with some of Australia’s most poverty-stricken, marginalised people. I must think about this issue almost daily, and have intuitively known that the stress people are under contributes to the often frustrating, … More The Effect of Scarcity on Your Brain

Development Projects Abound

September 21, 2013

Nine months in Cambodia is bound to be a life changing, fabulous experience, of that I have no doubt. Meanwhile, I am signed up to a news service from East Timor and the other day I read an announcement about a vaccination program in Timor which sounded incorrect. Here’s the correspondence that ensued. You just … More Development Projects Abound

I know what you think of me

September 18, 2013

The below is stolen from a NY Times blog, and I LOVE it. Recently I received an e-mail that wasn’t meant for me, but was about me. I’d been cc’d by accident. This is one of the darker hazards of electronic communication, Reason No. 697 Why the Internet Is Bad — the dreadful consequence of … More I know what you think of me

Cinema in the River

September 16, 2013

I’m leaving Alice Springs in four weeks from today. It’s starting to feel very close, and there are many people who I need to leave behind, which is saddening. As the Alice Festival is currently on, and last night Cinema in the River (ie in the dry riverbed) was featuring an indigenous movie, Satellite Boy, … More Cinema in the River