go back to where you came from

There was an awesome documentary on SBS last week. It followed some opinionated Australians on a backwards asylum seeker journey: they got to live with new refugees settling in Australia then reverse the trip they took to get here —leaky boats, detention centres and all— to their original war torn countries like the Democratic Republic of the Congo and Iraq.

The documentary didn't make any political statements for or against illegal immigrants, detention centres or immigration policies, it just made clear that the asylum seeker conversation needs to be ongoing and educated. The participants' preconceived notions were challenged (as most of them hated and feared refugees, without having had met any, before the show) as they got to know some genuine people and then found their families back in the home country. They discovered what the living horrors of day-to-day life are; war, rape, hunger, disease. Some of them (the Australian participants) realised that if their positions were reversed, they too may also choose to risk everything by getting on a "leaky boat" for a chance at a better life for themselves and their families.

You can watch the three episodes online here.

~! LeNtiL aS AnYtHiNg !~

"Saving the world, one curry at a time"

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Melbourne has a fantastic chain of vegetarian restaurants called Lentil as Anything; there's one at the Abbotsford Convent, one in St Kilda, and one in Footscray. They're a not-for-profit organisation where there's no set prices or tills, instead you pay-what-you-feel the experience is worth into an anonymous wooden box. 

Lentils at the Abbotsford Convent

I can't say it better than them:

"Lentil as Anything seeks to exist as a model of multicultural community that addresses social isolation and provides support and training to new migrants, refugees and youth. Lentil’s philosophy is based around trust, generosity and social inclusion, and provides an alternative, unique community, to the consumer-driven society that we live in."

"Our restaurants are staffed by volunteers as much as possible (always need more!), new migrants and refugees. Lentil exists as a training venue for the wider hospitality industry, as well as providing English tutoring and access to legal, health, housing and education services for people who are struggling to find a place in mainstream institutions."

Convent

I've spent a lot of time at the Lentils restaurants over the past six months thanks to my internship at Ilura Press. The founder of Lentil as Anything— a cool Sri Lankan guy called Shanaka— helped the founders of Ilura Press by providing free food and venue for one of their first book launches. Ilura Press operates on many of the same values as Lentils; in that it does not gain any profit (the founders create a space for new and emerging writers to be published for the love of literature not money) and it relies on volunteer interns. 


So Shanaka helped us out first, and now we are making a coffee table/ cookbook about Lentil as Anything, which should act as a bit of a fundraiser and awareness-raiser for this generous and necessary organisation which is forever struggling financially because it is taken advantage of.  

Mark, a barista at the Convent Lentil

I've had the opportunity to help interview the chefs, volunteers and floor staff and write up and edit their stories ready for the book. I've heard devastating and inspiring life stories of refugees and migrants who've made it to Melbourne to find themselves without enough money, without language, without qualifications which transfer into Australian jobs, and without family and friends. Lentil has been their saviour; teaching English and hospitality skills, helping with visa issues and housing, and providing a community; because social inclusion is vital to well-being. 

Love graffiti in the Convent

All the backpackers and Aussie locals who volunteer there are also amazing people and have great stories. They're the sort of people who are actually doing something for the community, not just thinking about it. Their time and effort is repaid in friendships, life experience, and love. 


The restaurants are a melting pot of cultures, languages and musicians, and you're likely to see hipsters, families, homeless people and tradies sitting around the same big tables. Everyone's welcome and everyone feels at home. I've mostly been at the Convent; every night of the week there's something on. French singer Remi, a Gypsy jam band, Latin night, African night, Nepalese night... and films shown projected onto the wall. 


Our writing, editing and photography is nearly done. Layout and design has started, off to the printers soon. I can't wait for the finished product, it's going to be a beautiful book! 

*There are lots of ways you can help Lentils survive. Go have a meal there, and pay what you can. Go to one of their volunteer inductions (4.30pm every Tuesday at the Convent.) You could help make coffees, or wash dishes, bake cakes, cut vegies or clear tables. They have volunteers helping with their website, business management, accounting and playing live music. You will meet some truly inspiring and generous people who love life. 


Here's their Facebook and website


Also, buy the book when it comes out so you can cook some of the vegetarian deliciousness at home! (Teaser: African doughnuts, Sri Lankan curries, Japanese pancakes, Lentil burgers, Tibetan momos...)

the ticket that keeps on giving

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1. Coming home on the train a couple of months ago I noticed that they'd changed the ticket gates at my station. At peak hour under the old railway corporation the gates all used to be open, letting us crowds of pushing sheep through the turnstiles quickly. Now they are all shut, meaning every person has to fumble through bags to find tickets. Tempers fray. I feel claustrophobic. Mykis are swiped and rejected, swiped and rejected. Tickets shoved in hurriedly bounce back. The mob stretches back to the train carriages, at risk of spilling onto the track. 

Finally through the ordeal I burst out into fresh air. Ticket in hand I notice a group of girls at the ticket machine. I'm done for the day, so bowl up to them and ask if anyone would like a ticket. They look at me suspiciously. I have to repeat myself. One of them takes it gratefully, I've saved her $7. If I hadn't had to take my ticket out of my wallet to get through the gate, I probably would have walked straight past them and not even thought of it.

2. At the group interview for my amazing, fantastic job which I finally got, we were talking about what inspires us everyday. A girl talked about random acts of kindness, and mentioned she'd been given a train ticket after someone else had finished using it. It had saved her $7. It wasn't the girl I gave the ticket to, but it made me smile, thinking that maybe my action had inspired further action, a ripple effect. I know I'm not the only person in Melbourne who has passed on a train ticket, but it was such a great coincidence that I was hearing about it so soon.

3. On my way home from Queensland after a day of frustrating travel delays. The delays meant my lift home from the airport had fallen through, so I grumbled and paid for the $16 skybus to the city and then was about to buy another metcard at Southern Cross station, scrounging through my wallet for enough coins. A young guy approached me, and called me 'Maam.' He offered me his ticket which he'd finished with for the day. "It's only Zone 1, 2 hours" he said almost apologetically. Just what I needed to get home. I told him he'd made my day. 

I hadn't given my ticket in the first place in order to secure karma for myself. I hadn't done it to make me feel good. I never expected it to come back to me. But what goes around comes around.

These three incidences happened in the space of three weeks.

Now every time I'm done with my ticket I try to pass it on, but recently there hasn't been anyone at the machines buying one.  I stick it in the change slot of the machine, hoping the next person to come along will see it there. 

the word made flesh: literary tattoos

I collect sentences. When reading books I underline the bits that make me say Yes! The lines in which every word is so perfect, in its perfect place. The ones that you'd never be able to write yourself because your brain wouldn't put it together like that— but that work.

I'm also a total punctuation nerd. I love semicolons and em dashes the best in descriptions, and ellipses in dialogue. They can be used so beautifully to portray pauses and silence; often the most important part of a conversation.

So looking at other people's literary tattoos fascinates me! What quotes, sentences, lyrics and words from books & poems have affected people so profoundly that they want them etched on their bodies permanently, often in visible places? When every single letter and piece of punctuation is pain on your skin, what do they choose?

They range from highbrow: 

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“A traveler! I love his title. A traveler is to be reverenced as such. His profession is the best symbol of our life. Going from–toward; it is the history of every one of us.”

- Henry David Thoreau, first published in The Journal of Henry D. Thoreau (1906)

To lowbrow:

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'And so the lion fell in love with the lamb. What a stupid lamb. What a sick, masochistic lion.'

'Twilight' by Stephanie Meyer

 With everything in-between. 

Here are some of my favourites:

My friend Hana. She and her three best friends got a line each from the quote

"Sing as though no-one can hear you

Love as though you've never been hurt

Dance as though nobody's watching

Live as though heaven is on earth."

i heart punctuation

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"But you can’t give your heart to a wild thing; the more you do, the stronger they get. Until they’re strong enough to run into the woods. Or fly into a tree. Then a taller tree. Then the sky. That’s how you’ll end up if you love a wild thing. You’ll end up looking at the sky. But believe me- it’s better to look at the sky than to live there. Such an empty place; so vague. just a country where the thunder goes and things disappear…”
'Breakfast at Tiffany's' by Truman Capote

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'The Sandman' Neil Gaimon

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Hershel did not possess a family of his own. He was not such a special person. He loved to read very much, and also to write. He was a poet, and he exhibited me many of his poems. I remember many of them. They were silly, you could say, and about love. He was always in his room writing those things, and never with people. I used to tell him, What good is all that love doing on paper? I said, Let love write on you for a little. But he was so stubborn. Or perhaps he was only timid.”

 'Everything is Illuminated' by Jonathan Safran Foer.

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Among other things, you’ll find that you’re not the first person who was ever confused and frightened and even sickened by human behavior. You’re by no means alone on that score, you’ll be excited and stimulated to know. Many, many men have been just as troubled morally and spiritually as you are right now. Happily, some of them kept record of their troubles. You’ll learn from them – if you want to. Just as someday, if you have something to offer, someone will learn something from you. It’s a beautiful reciprocal arrangement. And it isn’t education. It’s history. It’s poetry.“

'Catcher in the Rye' by J. D. Salinger

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"Suppose we have only dreamed, or made up, all those things – trees and grass and sun and moon and stars and Aslan himself. Suppose we have. Then all I can say is that, in that case, the made-up things seem a good deal more important than the real ones. Suppose this black pit of a kingdom of yours is the only world. Well, it strikes me as a pretty poor one. And that’s a funny thing, when you come to think of it. We’re just babies making up a game, if you’re right. But four babies playing a game can make a play-world which licks your real world hollow. That’s why I’m going to stand by the play world. I’m on Aslan’s side even if there isn’t any Aslan to lead it. I’m going to live as like a Narnian as I can even if there isn’t any Narnia. So, thanking you kindly for our supper, if these two gentlemen and the young lady are ready, we’re leaving your court at once and setting out in the dark to spend our lives looking for Overland. Not that our lives will be very long, I should think; but that’s a small loss if the world’s as dull a place as you say.”

'The Silver Chair' by C.S. Lewis

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"Greetings to you, the lucky finder of this golden ticket, from Mr. Willy Wonka! I shake you warmly by the hand! Tremendous things are in store for you! Many wonderful surprises await you. For now, I do invite you to come to my factory and be my guest for one whole day — you and all others who are lucky enough to find my Golden Tickets. I, Willy Wonka, will conduct you around the factory myself, showing you everything that there is to see, and afterwards, when it is time to leave, you will be escorted home by a procession of large trucks. These trucks, I can promise you, will be loaded with enough delicious eatables to last you and your entire household for many years. If, at any time thereafter, you should run out of supplies, you have only to come back to the factory and show this golden ticket, and I shall be happy to refill your cupboard with whatever you want. In this way, you will be able to keep yourself supplied with tasty morsels for allyour life. But this is by no means the most exciting thing that will happen on the day of your visit. I am preparing other surprises that are even more marvelous and more fantastic for you and for all my beloved Golden Ticket holders — mystic and marvelous surprises that will entrance, delight, intrigue, astonish, and perplex you beyond measure. In your wildest dreams you could not imagine that such things could happen to you! Just wait and see!"

'Charlie and the Chocolate Factory' by Roald Dahl

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'Slaughterhouse-5' by Kurt Vonnegut

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These two are from the same passage in 'On The Road' by Jack Kerouac

“the only people for me are the mad ones, the ones who are mad to live, mad to talk, mad to be saved, desirous of everything at the same time, the ones who never yawn or say a commonplace thing, but burn, burn, burn like fabulous yellow roman candles exploding like spiders across the stars and in the middle you see the blue centerlight pop and everybody goes ‘Awww!’”

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“Voici mon secret. Il est très simple: on ne voit bien qu’avec le cœur. L’essentiel est invisible pour les yeux.”

English translation: “And now here is my secret, a very simple secret; it is only with the heart that one can see rightly. What is essential is invisible to the eye.”

'Le Petit Prince' (The Little Prince) by Antoine de Saint-Exupéry

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Sam tapped her hand on the steering wheel. Patrick held his hand outside the car and made air waves. And I just sat between them. After the song finished, I said something.

“I feel infinite.”

And Sam and Patrick looked at me like I said the greatest thing they ever heard. Because the song was that great and because we all really paid attention to it. Five minutes of a lifetime were truly spent, and we felt young in a good way.”

'The Perks of being a Wallflower' by Stephen Chbosky

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“…I saw my life branching out before me like the green fig tree in the story.

From the tip of every branch, like a fat purple fig, a wonderful future beckoned and winked. One fig was a husband and a happy home and children, and another fig was a famous poet and another fig was a brilliant professor, and another fig was Ee Gee, the amazing editor, and another fig was Europe and Africa and South America, and another fig was Constantin and Socrates and Attila and a pack of other lovers with queer names and offbeat professions, and another fig was an Olympic lady crew champion, and beyond and above these figs were many more figs I couldn’t quite make out.

I saw myself sitting in the crotch of this fig tree, starving to death, just because I couldn’t make up my mind which of the figs I would choose. I wanted each and every one of them, but choosing one meant losing all the rest, and, as I sat there, unable to decide, the figs began to wrinkle and go black, and, one by one, they plopped to the ground at my feet.”

'The Bell Jar' by Sylvia Plath

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"I took a deep breath and listened to the old bray of my heart. I am I am I am."

'The Bell Jar' by Sylvia Plath

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I love Where the Wild Things Are. 

I've always thought if I have a little boy I'll call him Max,

even if that means him being naughty.

the julie project

A photography project by Darcy Padilla. It spans 18 years of a woman named Julie's life through 'multiple homes, AIDS, drug abuse, abusive relationships, poverty, births, deaths, loss and reunion.'

(C) Darcy Padilla

I came across this somehow and started just scanning through it. Somewhere in there I got hooked, read it to the end, and it made me cry. Resist the urge to skip ahead- every photo speaks volumes.

The most confronting, haunting and thought-provoking thing I've seen in a while.
Have a look if you've got some quiet time alone.
 http://www.darcypadilla.com/thejulieproject/intro.html

friends ♥

“The best friends are the ones you don't have to speak to everyday, who understand why you didn't take their advice and the ones who call you at 4am to let you know they are drunk. 

Who tell you you’re stunning even when you’re crying and remind you that you can do better than the guy who doesn't treat you like a princess. 

They listen when they've heard the same story 1000 times, they call you to gossip about nothing and whether you're dancing on the table or passed out drunk they'll turn and say ‘yeah thats my friend’.”

I don't remember where I read this quote, but I wrote it down because it describes my girls.

travel karma II: mexican payback

As a traveller, you are so vulnerable. You've got your most important possessions on you ready to be stolen, you've got no knowledge of your surroundings so you can be taken advantage of, and if you're alone then you're counting on strangers for friendship, company, and safety. You need all the good energy of the universe on your side!

Travel karma exists: you better believe it. If you find a wallet/ phone/ passport try your best to get it back to the owner (imagine if it was you!) Be nice to strangers! Help someone who's lost! Make someone's day! It will all come back to you times three.

I was travelling through Mexico with Boyfriend-At-The-Time and two of his guy mates. They lost our room key on the beach somewhere in Playa del Carmen. We spent the whole time there hiding our valuables around the hostel room and leaving the door chocked open a tiny bit, so we wouldn't have to pay for a replacement key. Bad backpackers. Karma coming to get ya. When checking out, the boys made a quick getaway, and I got asked about the whereabouts of the key. I mumbled. I lied. I said something about the boys handing it in.

What's three times worse than a lost key? That very afternoon, only a couple of hours later on the bus, I got paid back big time. Yep- passport, iPhone, bank card. The big three, all stolen out of my bag on the bus (the bag was between my feet as I wrote in my journal.) Ouch! Luckily, being with friends, I was able to use their money and phones to organise myself. If I'd been on my own, I would have been screwed. Then again, if I had been on my own, maybe I wouldn't have lost and needed to lie about the key...

Never mind, lesson learnt. I was very very honest for the remainder of my trip.


Has the universe ever paid you back for doing something bad?

travel karma: the swiss miracle

If karma is going to be evident in everyday life, you're going to notice it when you travel.

I owe the world a lot. The amount of drinks I was bought on my trip (not in a sleazy way, but in a 'you're a poor backpacker a long way from home, let me buy you a drink' way) the homes that were opened to me through Couchsurfing, new friends, and long lost family friends, the time out of strangers days that they took to show me something on a map or point me in the right direction. Here's the story of "How a stranger in a strange country absolutely made my day with a random act of kindness."

After a crazy week of partying on a boat in Croatia I dragged my sorry body into Switzerland with the worst flu of my life. I was shivering, feverish, aching all over with a killer headache, cough, and could hardly swallow because my throat hurt so much. Being sick when you're backpacking is the worst— no privacy to rest in, and I felt so guilty coughing all night in the dorms. At my worst I was in tears because I didn't have the energy to swing myself down from the top bunk, in tears because I couldn't eat enough food to take painkillers, and in tears because I couldn't get my t-shirt over my head in the shower! Bit of a misery guts, knowing that it was all self-inflicted by too much fun.

The hostel in Interlaken had a lock-out policy for most of the day so they could clean the dorms, which sucked because I just wanted to be in bed. Took myself down to an internet cafe to upload the Croatia photos onto facebook because it wasn't warm enough to hang around outside, and I didn't feel up to doing anything energetic like walking around town! The internet was slow and expensive, the photos kept failing to upload and then uploading twice. Frustrated but defeated, what else could I do to while away the hours?

Eventually I got chatting with the owner and his friend— in my memory he looks a bit like a skinny Santa Claus, but beardless? Talking about Australia I think. When I was ready to pay (yet terrified of the cost.. I'd been there a couple of hours) the first good news was that the price maxed out at 10 Swiss francs. Woohoo! That's a big chunk out of the daily budget, but not tooo bad. I had a 20 franc note, but the owner didn't have any change. I suggested I go to the shops to break my note, or come back tomorrow to use the internet again and pay then, but the Santa Claus interrupts.

'Just put it on my bill,' he says. 'I have to pay anyway, it's nothing for me' he says. I thank him for the offer, but decline. He insists. Then he gives me detailed directions of how to get to the chemist, which Swiss brand cold & flu medicine I should get, and strict instructions to go to the supermarket to get some lemons too for a hot drink. 'Just think of it as a gift from the Swiss,' he tells me, and waves me out the door.

So in perspective: I've gone from exhausted, frustrated, and resigned to paying a lot of money— to energised, fortunate, and generally uplifted by someone's kindness. A shit day of sickness and wasting money has just been turned upside down: I walked on air out of that shop. 10 francs to him may be nothing, but to me it was huge. I got the miracle drugs from the chemist, made my hot lemon drink back in the hostel kitchen, and was so grateful to that Swiss man. I didn't know his name, and never saw him again (and wouldn't even recognise him now) but he's made such a huge impact that I know in the future I will help some backpacker like this, and 'pay it forward.'

Any strangers made your day lately?

There's a hole in my bucket..

(Dear Eliza, dear Eliza)

I never knew why it was called a Bucket List. Urban Dictionary kindly defines it:
'A list of things to do before you die. Comes from the term "kicked the bucket." '

Cool. So before I kick the bucket, here's some awesome stuff I want to do.

• Round-the-world backpacking trip
• Volunteer with kids overseas
• Swim with dolphins (possibly wild ones!  I have my eye on Monkey Mia in WA)
• Road trip around Australia
• Have a spiritual experience
• Do a season on a mountain somewhere, so I can learn how to ski well
• Be a Couchsurfing host when I move out, to repay my couchsurfing karma
• Go to the Salar de Uyuni in Bolivia
• Skydive
• See the Northern Lights (properly this time, not just the teaser glimpse I got in Iceland 2010)
• Scandinavia/ Iceland in Winter
• Hot Air balloon ride (preferably over Cappadocia, Turkey)
• Do a yoga+surf retreat somewhere in the world
• Star gaze in Outback Australia and actually learn the stars..
• Have a real Christmas tree one year
• Experience an eclipse
• Buy a longboard and live by the beach, so I can surf every morning
• Write a book
• Walk down the aisle without a doubt in the world
• Camping in Corsica
• Experience a white Christmas
• Live overseas for at least one year
• Increase my consciousness level
• Call myself fluent in a language other than English

What's yours?

Why be shy?

I used to be awfully, painfully shy as a kid. I had terrible self-confidence. I hated competitions because I was scared I'd win, and then there'd be attention on me, and I'd be embarrassed.

Thank god I grew out of that.

I'm still a quiet person-- that's my personality-- but slowly, slowly, things are becoming clear to me. I'm realising that we're all the same. Every single person in the whole world has insecurities, it's not just me. We're all just blood and guts and thoughts bundled up in different packets of skin. We're all just spirits having a human experience. We should be nice to each other.

When travelling solo last year, I revelled in the solo-female-backpacking life. I made friends on every bus ride, at every hostel, in every city in every country. Travellers have this openness and approachability that I wish we carried in everyday life. It was the easiest thing in the world to walk into a situation in a city/ country/ continent where you didn't know anyone, and to make a room-full of new friends. The trick was just to smile at them.

Back in Melbourne I snapped out of it. I have a life here, I have family and enough friends in this city, so I stopped connecting with new people. It was inevitable. Even when travelling up to Queensland on my own I found myself shutting myself in my ipod and book, not saying 'hi' to anyone sitting around me as I would have done overseas. It's a completely different mind frame. It's easy to be private and unsociable, on familiar soil.

For me, losing face is the cause of all shyness. I don't want to appear dumb/ desperate/ rude/ wrong/ annoying/ unattractive, so I often choose to keep my opinion to myself incase it portrays me 'badly.' At this stage of my life, this is the major habit I am trying to change: to care less what other people think. My heart knows none of it matters, so why does my brain care?

Shyness is an especially annoying hurdle in second language learning. To think of all the hours of French lessons I've done through high school and Uni, terrified of speaking out loud incase I made a mistake. Ridiculous. Outgoing people are willing to practice speaking at every opportunity, and don't care if they make mistakes or have trouble being understood. In this way they learn faster than those who hold back. I really tried to change my language habits when I was living in Peru, and it worked. I made ridiculous mistakes which had the kids roaring with laughter where I volunteered, I struck the barrier of being not-understood with my host family, and I flaunted my terrible Spanglish accent in the language classes. And I learnt so much in that one month, it killed me to realise how much better I could have been at French by now if I didn't care so much about how I sounded!

All habits can be changed. I just need to take the more difficult option (for me) every time— to choose to try and speak in Spanish or French when I have the opportunity— instead of standing back or answering in English or trying to get out of it. Stop taking the easy, lazy choice.

So, why are we shy in front of strangers? There are billions of them in the world. It's your friends who actually know your soul, and they're the ones we can let loose with. They're the only ones we should care about. Hence the inspiration for this blog.

From the infinite wisdom of Dr Seuss;

"Be who you are and say what you feel, because those who mind don't matter, and those who matter don't mind."