“Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander people should be aware that this site may contain names, images and/or voices of people who have since passed away. We wish not to cause any offence.” I met her under the fig tree where, in 1997, friends gathered in the backyard of the small house in Thornbury. She would … Continue reading Under The Fig Tree

In a far distant time, in this city of Melbourne and State of Victoria, there was a high-pressure campaign to recruit teachers. The year is 1950. Joan Healy is 15 years old. She travels to her secondary school my tram. Standing in the crowd, strap-hanging, this tall, shy, awkward young girl is at eye level … Continue reading To Be a Teacher

War-torn Battambang town in the early nineteen nineties was a place of violence. Weapons of war were everywhere. Early one morning as I sat sipping my usual cup of coffee at the little tin table near the market a Cambodian boy, perhaps 16 years old, slumped down beside me, put his AK 47 and rocket … Continue reading For Peace Sake

A good friend of mine, Joan Hamilton, has stories that I need to hear. Joan lived among First Peoples in Redfern in the ‘old-days’ with Mum Shirl; she then shared in the struggles of the Barkindji people in Wilcannia for many years. She learned what it means to battle against grim odds and later in … Continue reading The Time has Come

One of my friends from Cambodia times, sent a message with a request. Kevin Malone is now working with a Karuk tribal man from the redwood forests of northern California; his name is Terry Supahan. Kevin tells us that Terry will travel through Melbourne with a Californian group interested in ecological restoration. Kevin has convinced … Continue reading A friend of Kevin Malone

My front window reaches from ceiling to a half metre from the floor. The road beyond my mini garden is narrow and quiet; on the opposite side there is an ancient towering Chinese Elm. Its dark triple-trunk and spreading branches are there in front of me whenever I look to the light. At night the … Continue reading As the World Tilts

 My country? Images flicker before me. Purple Noon's Transparent Might It is 1943 and we are ‘in the bush’ at our favourite spot on the Yarra River, Veronica and me. We are clinging to a branch close to the water, and jumping in. Our mother says ‘Smell the gum leaves. Look at it all, so … Continue reading My Country

They say that every person born can evoke ‘the feel of the times’ from 20 or 30 years before the date of their birth. Conversations overheard meld with memories, or so it seems. It is a summer day in 1908. The place is Brunswick. Charlotte Healy is giving birth to her sixth child, a son. … Continue reading Joseph My Father

Many who read this will have heard of the death of Irene McCormack. This 52-year-old Australian woman was executed in Peru by Shining Path guerrilla fighters. She was one of a group of five captives who were ordered to lie on the ground in a line, face down. The other four were Peruvian men, respected … Continue reading The Life of Irene McCormack

I am letting myself hope and treasure the joy of life. Faith leaders representing Muslim, Buddhist, Hindu and Christian communities gathered is Sydney to pledge support for the Uluru Statement from the Heart. My friend Sherry Balcombe, a woman of Indigenous Spirituality, was there. My family joyfully celebrated wedding of Michael and Fiona My family … Continue reading Joy and Anticipation

There was a baby girl born in a tent in August 1849 in Ararat, rural Victoria. Her name was Annie O’Neill. Why Ararat? Her parents, John and Mary, had landed in Melbourne in 1841 with two young sons after a difficult 4-month voyage on the Ward Chipman.  The Port Philip settlement was only 6 years … Continue reading Annie O’Neill

Maria Tumarkin The suffering in Ukraine grabs at my heart. I need to see beyond the gruesome images in the media and to catch a glimpse of life in this place of war. I hear of a Ukrainian woman tending a wounded Russian soldier and phoning his mother in Russia to tell her that her … Continue reading Women Speak of War

I heard by ‘snail mail’ from Bob Maat that Sok Thim has died at his home in Phnom Penh. Thim is a Cambodian friend whom I treasure. I met him in the Site 2 Camp. My first memory was of his wide smile and his quirky sense of humour. He laughed about himself. I laughed … Continue reading Sok Thim Remembered

Nobody who knows me well imagines that I am an avid follower of Aussie Rules Football. Yes, I was born and bred in Melbourne where Aussie Rules is close to being ‘religion’. Yes, I was born into a family of avid Carlton supporters. I can even sing ‘We’re the Mighty Blues’ word for word. As a young … Continue reading Footy

In this grim time for planet earth I grasp for signs of hope, seeds of goodness. I recall the healing that gradually, gradually began after the Khmer Rouge horror ended.  Even during this tragic month there have been some sparks of hope. Let it heal The people whose spirit was nurtured here were plunged into … Continue reading Healing

March 28th 2021. This day is Magha Puja for Buddhists and First Night of Passover in Judaism. For Christians it is Palm Sunday, the day of Jesus entering Jerusalem knowing the danger of speaking truth to power. It is a night of full moon. On this night a group of women and men stand in … Continue reading Park Hotel

Sometimes two stories converge, and each gives meaning to the other. Stay with me while I show you. In the time between the two World Wars my mother became a vivacious red-headed young woman working in a factory making silk stockings. On Sunday nights at Jarvie St East Brunswick her family would gather around a … Continue reading Always

It was a time of world-wide depression. Those who were rich lost their investments, those who were poor lost their work, the poorest were homeless and slept on the streets. First, I need to tell you about inner-city Melbourne in 1891. A short stroll from the edge of Fitzroy where Mary MacKillop was born forty-seven … Continue reading Mary MacKillop and Little Lons

I once received a handwritten letter from Bishop Desmond Tutu.. This is the situation. Land mines should never, ever be used as a weapon of war. We both agree. Beginning in 1989 I work as a volunteer in a refugee camp. Asylum seekers held in the barbed wire enclosure of Site 2, on the border … Continue reading Letter from Desmond Tutu

Sun, Sand and Water One magical part of the Port Philip Bay foreshore begins at the McCrae lighthouse and stretches a few hundred meters towards the head of the bay. This was our campsite, summer after summer, for years. It was bushland then, it became crowded later, now it is restored to its original state. … Continue reading Camping

Once I stayed in the walled town of Assisi for seven days, alone and silent. It wasn’t planned, it was wonderful. Francis and the animals On some whim or inspiration, I had taken a tourist bus up the mountain and into this ancient town. I had been busy and would be busy again. There were … Continue reading Assisi and Christmas

Vera and 3yo Joan Veronica was not yet three months old and I had not turned four when World War 2 was declared on September 1st, 1939. Then Japan bombed Pearl Harbour and took Singapore. It was now the Pacific War. Australia was well and truly involved. In all there were 111 bombing attacks to … Continue reading And then there was war

On a sunny winter morning, during a brief spell in Melbourne’s lockdowns, there was the chance for an hours-long breakfast at Riverside Spoons-in Swan Hill. The ancient gums, the paddle boat and the mighty Murray River spoke of history. The conversation was of history far, far back. Gathered at the table were Vicki Clarke Mutthi … Continue reading Yoo-rrook

Just before the second little girl was born Joe and Vera had saved enough money to buy a second-hand 1928 Chevrolet. This car, eleven years old when they bought it, was destined to find a place in the heart of family. This is as new. Ours was secondhand Vera was in labour when Joe drove … Continue reading The 1928 Chev

For 86 years Melbourne has been my familiar ‘home base’. When a Qantas flight plays ‘I Still Call Australia Home’ I think ‘Melbourne’. If you had asked me on New Year’s Day 2019, I might have said, ‘This place is predictable. I could parachute into the inner city, the north, the west, the east or … Continue reading Melbourne and the World

When Joe Healy met a beautiful red-headed girl at a dance in a parish hall in East Brunswick he knew he was not the only one who had noticed her. The lad from Whitfield was now a young man, a licensed plumber working for an established company on the best building site in Melbourne city, … Continue reading Joe Healy Meets Vera Martin

Throughout August 2021 I have followed global statistics charting the spread of Covid 19. There is a saying among foreigners who have lived and worked for decades in Cambodia, and have and forged lasting friendships. We tell each other, ‘You can catch Cambodeitis,. It's a lasting love of this country’. Many of my Cambodian friends … Continue reading Cambodia’s Better August News

In our country we carry a tragedy and a shame. The First Nations Peoples carry the burden in grief that cannot be quenched. We all call it the Stolen Generations story. Archie Roach knew it, he felt in his own being, felt from within. He searched for family, culture and belonging. In some parts of … Continue reading Archie Roach and Nellie Moore

Charlotte in Blackburn as a great- grandmother I was a young adult when Charlotte, the youngest daughter of my great-grandmother Honora was elderly but full of life. She loved to tell stories. She knew that a young granddaughter would want to know what life was like when her grandmother was young. Charlotte was a lively … Continue reading Charlotte

It is one of Melbourne’s crisp sunny winter days. There is a story that I need to re-trace; this is a story that Vera, my mother, told me. I have many details and an important clue. When she was a little girl my mother lived in the family’s King Street café, near the corner of … Continue reading Love Story on Rathdowne Street