Random Observations of Life

New Land, New Life – a documentary everyone should watch

Posted by Robyn Dunphy on February 25, 2013 in General

Today Craig Pendlebury drew my attention to a wonderful documentary about the lives of five refugees that had been highlighted in an article in the Sydney Morning Herald. I am very grateful to to Craig, for had he not brought it to my attention I would have missed it totally. As much as I try to stay abreast of such things, it is not always possible.

Thankfully, the documentary is available on YouTube so I have been able to view it and share it with my family as further evidence of what can be achieved in a new land.

Deng Thiak Adut arrived here in 1998 as an illiterate 15 year old. He is now a criminal defence lawyer. That is a pretty amazing achievement, don’t you think?

The other refugees highlighted in this documentary have similarly amazing stories of survival and achievement.

The documentary speaks for itself. My job here is nothing more than to draw this wonderful testament to your attention. Please view the video and share it as widely as you can.

Craig, thank you! Thank you so much to Michael Power from afterglow.net.au for such great work.

Related (on this site):

Tags: Australia, Deng Thiak Adut, displaced people, Human Rights, Michael Power, news, refugees, war Permalink

11 Comments

Abbott the UnAustralian

Posted by Robyn Dunphy on February 24, 2013 in General

He’s done it AGAIN! What does Abbott have to do to make people wake up to the fact this man is NOT Prime Ministerial material?

Bloody Hell!!

As if all the videos on YouTube of him avoiding journalists, or his terrible performance when Leigh Sales interviewed him, or his lack of knowledge of things he SHOULD know about such as President Obama’s State of the Union address isn’t enough, he has made two major gaffs in the last week alone.

First there was the “We will always speak with a strong Australian accent” rubbish. I don’t consider this at all racist as some people suggested. I believe his intention was to sound “Australian”. He didn’t. It was just a stupid thing to say when many of the Liberal Party’s own candidates don’t speak with an Australian accent. It implies to all Australians that don’t speak with an Australian accent (and there are many, many, many of those) that they are some how not quite Australian in Abbott’s eyes (or ears). Yet THIS man wants to be the leader of our nation? UnAustralian attitude!

Tags: Australia, Liberal Party of Australia, news, politics, religion, Tony Abbott Permalink

7 Comments

A Common Enemy – The Elengia

Posted by Robyn Dunphy on February 2, 2013 in A Common Enemy

***Previous episodes of A Common Enemy can be found on the top menu, or start at A Common Enemy. A little sci-fi in progress. ***

Palenda slithered into the resting cocoon and gently touched Rosna. He knew she was asleep, but he needed to feel her nearness. They had come so far to save their families; perhaps even their species. Such responsibility.

The Elengia always crewed their ships with families. Even so, Palenda and Rosna were exceptional, even by Elengia standards. She was the commander and he, her second-in-command. He could think of no other similar couple in all of the Elengia exploration teams.

Once mated, Elengia could not be parted from their mate for more than five days at a time. The connection between a mated couple was strong and for life. The crewing arrangement was driven by biology, not choice. This ship had 3,000 couples and 4,000 children. All births were twins or more. Singletons were very rare. Most of the children on this ship were under five Elengia years, yet about half were already able, if necessary, to crew this massive inter-galactic ship.

Palenda thought of the history of his species as he waited for sleep to come. Elengias were good at two things: reproducing and science and technology. Reproducing was their problem: too many too often. Any planet in the universe could only sustain so many of any living creature. Despite the incredible advances they had made in science and technology, the Elengia could not find a way to prevent conception in their own species. They had seen many other species in the universe achieve this, yet it seemed to be the one scientific advance that escaped them. What, Palenda wondered, was it about their own biology that they did not understand sufficiently to be able to curb their fertility?

Tags: family, Mating, Planet, sci-fi, Writing Permalink

2 Comments

Wolf in Sheep’s Clothing via WhitWords

Posted by Robyn Dunphy on February 2, 2013 in General

This is an important article for Australians to read. Before you vote this September, make damn sure you know who is leading the pack.

Tags: Australia, news, politics, September, Tony Abbott Permalink

8 Comments

Equal pay for equal work – unless you play tennis

Posted by Robyn Dunphy on January 22, 2013 in General

English: Japanese Tennis player Ayumi Morita during the retirement ceremony for her colleague Ai Sugiyama on the opening day of the Toray Pan Pacific Open 2009 in Tokyo. (Photo credit: Wikipedia)

Equality is something we all believe in. Irrespective of ethnicity, gender or religion all humans should have equal rights and receive equal pay for equal work. Regular readers will also know I am not against a bit of affirmative action when required to correct imbalances that have existed for generations.

Then we have tennis players. Professional tennis players, to be specific. The Australian Open is on, which is why I am contemplating this. I contemplate it every year, an indication it still annoys me.

For those not into tennis, a little background, otherwise you won’t get my work rate analysis. There are lots of tennis tournaments every year. At most of these tournaments both men and women play best of three set matches. I’m fine with that – level playing field, equal remuneration, it is all good!

Matches are made up of sets and sets are made up of games. Games are decided on points, but nothing as simple as 1, 2, 3. No, no. The first “point” is actually 15, the second is 15 and the third is 10. Once the player reaches 40 (15 + 15 + 10 if your maths are rusty) just one more winner will see him/her tuck that game under his/her belt. Unless the opponent is also on 40. NOW a player has to win two points in a row to take the game. Trust me, THIS can go on for a while. A player wins a serve, goes to “Advantage”. The opponent wins the next point, they are back to 40-40. So a game can be short and sweet or long and laborious.

Tags: Australian Open, Ayumi Morita, equal pay, Equal pay for equal work, Gaël Monfils, Grand Slam, news, tennis Permalink

8 Comments

That climate change stuff

Posted by Robyn Dunphy on January 19, 2013 in Family, General

This time series, based on satellite data, shows the annual Arctic sea ice minimum since 1979. The September 2010 extent was the third lowest in the satellite record. (Photo credit: Wikipedia)

Personally, I believe we are damaging our planet. I’m not here to review the MANY scientific articles on the topic – they are everywhere and almost every politician in the world has an opinion one way or the other about the scientific opinions. Then the public have opinions about the politicians’ opinions about the scientific findings/opinion/theories/hypothesises. Confused yet?

On top of that we have Carbon Prices, Emission Trading Schemes, agreements between countries to reduce emissions and so it goes on. And on.

The question for me, a non-scientist just hoping we leave a liveable planet for future generations, is more simple. I ask myself, are we damaging the planet in more ways that we are willing to recognise?

I look at what we do to sustain our materialistic lifestyle.

We raze forests, we dam rivers, we kill other living species to extinction, we dig much “stuff” (minerals, natural gas, etc) out of the ground. We destroy ecosystems and pollute our oceans and waterways. We generally talk about climate change being the result of just our emissions, but I wonder to myself, is that the only cause of damage? Are we not continuing to upset the balance of nature, the balance of the planet overall?

We drive cars massively bigger than we need, we build mansions instead of homes, we use electricity like it is as necessary as water for our survival.

Tags: children, Climate, climate change, environment, greenhouse gases, health, politics Permalink

40 Comments

I will not be renewing my Liberal Party membership

Posted by Robyn Dunphy on January 17, 2013 in General

I’ve been feeling less and less able to to support the Liberal Party for some time. I’ve reached the point where I find I cannot, in all conscience, remain a member.

I was particularly disappointed in Joe Hockey’s attack on the Prime Minister over Christmas. That sort of thing just isn’t necessary in a civilised country.

Then we had the “lovely” Andrew Laming’s recent behaviour, which, as far as I know, has gone without chastisement from his leader.

The Liberal Party’s hypocrisy over the Slipper affair just stunned me.

I can’t support this party with Tony Abbott as leader and clearly I must be the only member who believes he is not Prime Minister material, because no-one else is speaking out!

The Ranjini case is one where the Liberals seem to be awfully silent and they shouldn’t be. Overall, the LNP policies on asylum seekers are not something I can or will support.

Tags: ALP, Andrew Laming, Australia, Joe Hockey, Liberal, LNP, Malcolm Fraser, politics, Tony Abbott Permalink

10 Comments

A Common Enemy

Posted by Robyn Dunphy on January 11, 2013 in A Common Enemy

The Earth seen from Apollo 17. (Photo credit: Wikipedia)

Earth sparkled in the sunlight, a blue and white ball gliding through space in the orbit determined millennia ago.

The ship hovered above, listening to the babel of voices detected by the sound sensors. Leader Rosna shook her lateral tendrils in horror.

“How does this planet survive?”

The sound technician was battling to isolate the various sound patterns, to determine any intelligible communication patterns. Never in all their eons of exploration had the team seen anything like this. This planet sustained life, that much they knew. Would it sustain them? Could they live with the natives? Where the natives controllable? Could they be worked?

First the team needed to understand the degree of evolution. From what could be determined so far, this was a primitive planet. There were no space ships arriving or leaving, although there was a strange looking building orbiting the planet. Primitive weapons had been detected, mostly in isolated areas of the planet. Clearly these would need to be subdued first.

Rosna stared down at this blue and white ball. It looked so peaceful from her vantage point, yet the sounds, the sounds told a different story. So sad. It was the standard practice of the Elengia to peacefully co-habit with the natives of the planets they colonised. To share the technology, solve any problems they found and gently enhance the lives of the natives. So far, this planet was sounding like a disaster.

Rosna considered turning the ship around and leaving this rabble to their own destructive devices. But there was water on this planet and the Elengia needed water. Planets with such water supplies were few and far between in the universe and there were no others in this solar system.

Tags: aliens, earth, family, fiction, invasion, love, politics, sci-fi, Writing Permalink

21 Comments

Open Letter to ASIO

Posted by Robyn Dunphy on January 10, 2013 in General

Ranjini and her boys

In May last year I wrote about Ranjini. Ranjini is still being held in detention and is about to give birth to her third child. Ranjini may already be in labour as I write this. Edit – Ranjini gave birth to a lovely baby boy January 15th!

I want to stress, this is NOT about the whole “detain without right of appeal” issue – this is JUST about Ranjini’s case. In THIS case, ASIO can take action.

Damian Spruce, refugee researcher, adviser and lawyer who teaches Law and Social Theory at the University of Sydney, says:

It sounds like a positive step to ask ASIO to review it voluntarily & could be quicker than waiting for the independent review.

For those wanting a detailed legal perspective of this case, I refer you to Julian Burnside’s excellent article “Jailed for life but not told why”, where he said:

They may remain in detention for years, perhaps forever. How can that be, in a free democratic country like Australia? It is the result of two court decisions which most Australians have never heard of.

First, if a person is adversely assessed by ASIO, they are not told what facts ASIO took into account in forming its views, so it is virtually impossible to show that ASIO was wrong.

David Manne launched a High Court challenge and it seems to have been a partial win which is absolutely terrific, because change will come. It doesn’t immediately assist Ranjini or her children. The Government is also challenging the ruling of the court in relation to those who arrive by boat.

I like to keep things simple. It seems to me, a mere simple citizen, the simplest way to resolve the Ranjini situation is for ASIO to review the findings of the security assessment. We know Ranjini has no right of appeal; surely ASIO have the right to review their own findings. Sometimes we can’t see the forest for the trees: we overcomplicate everything. Let’s take the simplest approach.

Tags: ASIO, asylum seekers, Australia, DIAC, Julian Burnside, politics, Ranjini, refugees Permalink

8 Comments

W for Wonderful Weather

Posted by Robyn Dunphy on January 4, 2013 in A to Z of Australia

Australia is a LARGE piece of land. So large we have several different climate zones, ranging from tropical in the north to temperate in the south and ~~bloody cold~~ cool in Tasmania.

Temperature conversion

Temperate doesn’t translate into any form of constant temperate ranges though! Down here in Victoria, we have be freezing one day and cooking the next. Yesterday I popped out to the shop in bare feet – I nearly burnt my feet on the asphalt! Man that stuff was hot!

While the northern reaches are more humid, down here it can be a very dry heat. Like your oven.

Today is going to be 41 Celsius. For those still using Fahrenheit, here is a quick conversion chart I ~~stole off the internet~~ prepared earlier.

41 C is 105.8 F. Adelaide, I hear, is going to be 44 C and Whyalla is forecast for a massive 46 C.

It is very unusual for us to have these sort of temperatures this early in the year, but of course global warming/climate change is a figment of our imaginations, isn’t it? 😛