MAKE POVERTY HISTORY

We headed out on the streets again today to raise awareness of about the Make Poverty History campaign. This time, as well as markets at West End, we walked through the Queen St Mall and Brunswick St Markets in the Valley.

It was interesting how much more supportive people were at West End... how freaked out people seemed to be by it in Queen St Mall... and how nonchalant people were in the Valley. Of course there were exceptions everywhere.

I've never really taken to the streets in support of a cause before. I'm quite hesitant to step out of my comfort zone in this regard. A few things have contributed... one of the main things is being friends with inspiring people like Ben and Sarah - who have seemingly endless energy and willingness to put in effort for these causes. The other thing is that I guess the more you learn, the harder it is to ignore some of the frustrating facts in our world... The fact that 30000 kids die every day needlessly and most of us don't really regard that as a tragedy. We say we do, but if we really DID regard it as a tragedy, we'd be doing something about it. I guess it's a big step to actually believe we CAN do something about it.

ANYWAY - increasingly, I'm hoping to do something about it! So if I don't put postings in here regularly telling you what we're up to - let me know that I'm slacking off!

More Photos

Badly Update!!!

Make Poverty History - Street Theatre / Raising Awareness

Today a bunch of us went on a bit of a street theatre / awareness raising outing for the Make Poverty History campaign. Here's a few piccys of it! (Thanks for the photos Erin!)

The 8 Millenium Development Goals were represented by the 8 white statues:

1. Eradicate Extreme Poverty and Hunger

2. Achieve Universal Primary Education

3. Promote Gender Equality and Empower Women

4. Reduce Child Mortality

5. Improve Maternal Health

6. Combat HIV/AIDS, Malaria and other diseases

7. Ensure Environmental Sustainability

8. Develop a Global Partnership for Development

We're doing it again a few times over the next few weeks and we need more people to come along to either dress up in white or to hand out postcards/armbands - if anyone wants to help out let me know!!

More Photos Here

Photos!

Got back from Indo on Sunday. NOTE: The fact that Sydney Airport has Krispy Kreme donuts only JUST makes up for the fact that it sucks having to fly via there to come home. Duty Free, Customs, immigration, flight transfers all took hours... missed my flight, got put on a later one.

Anyway, just letting you all know I have a bunch of photos HERE from the trip.

Can't get that song outta my head...

Friday afternoon - now in Kuta Beach at Bali. What a surreal week! And the people that work at mines like Batu Hijau experience it all the time... the contrast between mountain jungle / beautiful beach / huge, dusty mine...

Thought I'd post a few photos while I'm still travelling - always seems a little more exciting that way...

On the last evening at Batu Hijau I escaped down to the beach again and went for a proper walk along it. It's so remote and beautiful there. Even more so now that I'm thinking about it at Kuta Beach, Bali. On the way back to the mine town where I was staying I stopped in at a local cafe for dinner. Mine food was fantastic - but I thought I better sample at least one local meal.
Below is the seaplane that took me back to Denpasar, via Mataram on Lombok Island. Had some GREAT views of the islands - I love the volcanoes, which I can't remember the names of at this point.

Seeya!

PS It's that 'I've been to Bali too' song. I much preferred the song that was stuck in my head in Istanbul... or New York City...

The Bouganville Modem

Hey all!
I've finally managed to track down an Internet cafe at this minesite on a remote corner of Sumbawa. Having a good week work-wise. Trialling our driver training system in various vehicles on the mine. Had a tour of the open-cut goldmine pit. Pretty mind-boggling. I'm not really sure what photos I could post that wouldn't be corporately sensitive, so I'll try to post a few from the beach near the minesite. Lots of the contractors/consultants stay at the resort on the beach. I was booked in there, but things didn't work out. Would have been fantastic if they did. It's storybook beautiful down there.

Just uploaded the above photo. Took too long so I'm not gonna do any others! Will post a bunch more when I get back on Sunday morning. You can't see it in the photo, but there are some MAMMOTH waves at the beach behind me. Sometimes the water just seems to explode. (PS I had to hitch a ride here, then run the 5 or 6km back to my residence, avoiding the rabies-ridden monkeys on the way.)

Seeya! B.

PS The Bouganville Modem comment is in relation to the speed of this internet cafe. This posting could very well be being tapped out to the outside world by morse code... well it seems like it anyway.