2 - 8 April 2013 Issue: 457
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Meeting the ancestors in Uganda travel P9
PASSPORT TAX Should Aussies pay for consular assistance
BEER BATTLES Aussie vs UK
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UK Life P5
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friend of a high-profile Australian entertainer arrested as part of Operation Yewtree in the United Kingdom says he’s “dumbfounded” by the accusations.
AUSSIE ARRESTED IN UK SEX SCANDAL A showbiz friend of the highprofile Australian entertainer arrested last week in England on suspicion of sex offences fears his mate’s life may have been ruined even if he’s never charged. The 83-year-old Australian
celebrity was questioned on Thursday by a British police task force set up following the Jimmy Savile sex abuse scandal. He was released hours later on police bail. “It appears there’s a witch-hunt
going on looking at the number of high-profile celebrities arrested,” the unnamed friend of the 83-yearold told UK tabloid, The Sunday Mirror. “Even if those arrested are never charged, their lives will still have
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been ruined and that’s unfair. “It’s easy making historic allegations against showbiz names.” The friend said he was ...continued on p3
SAY IT WITH SOUL
Sarah Blasko on her new album I Awake | P8
Abbott under pressure on gay marriage SAME-SEX marriage advocates are hoping Tony Abbott will listen to his daughters and change his blanket opposition to gay marriage. Frances and Bridget Abbott have told News Limited they believe same-sex couples should be able to marry and have discussed the matter with their father. Their stance has buoyed gay marriage advocates, who have also welcomed the support of Melbourne’s Liberal Lord Mayor Robert Doyle on the issue. The former Victorian Liberal Party leader on Saturday used Twitter to support marriage equality, and urged others to join him. “Let’s show the world where we stand as a city,” Cr Doyle tweeted. Australian Marriage Equality national director Rodney Croome says the pressure is growing on Mr Abbott to change his opposition to gay marriage. “Frances and Bridget Abbott’s support for marriage equality reflects strong support for the issue among young Australians,” Mr Croome said in a statement. “We hope their stance ... will ...continued on p3
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2 | News
2 - 8 April 2013
Consular costs should be covered by levy on Aussie passports, says think tank By Alex Ivett
Publisher: Bryce Lowry Editor: Alex Ivett Production/Design: Jackie Lampard News Editor: Paul Bleakley Business Editor: Sepi Roshan Contributors: Catherine Burrell, Tim Martin, Georgia Dawes, Phillip Browne, Michelle McCue, Erin Somerville, George Katralis, Lee Crossley, Jacqui Moroney, Will Fitz-gibbon, Chris Arkadieff, Bronwyn Spencer, Daniel Shillito, Mat Lyons,
Nicole Crowley, Alex Bruce-Smith, Sandra Tahmasby, Tyson Yates, Amber Rose, Jennifer Perkin, Josh Reich, Shannon Loves, Charlie Inglefield, Kris Griffiths, AJ Climpson-Stewart, Thomas Jones, Michael McCormick, Alistair Davis, Will Denton, Jennifer Lawton, Chloe Westley, David Beaumont Directors: P Atherton, J Durrant N Durrant, R Phillips and A Laird
Additional content: Who are we? Australian Times is written and compiled by young Australian journalists living in the UK. Contributing on a volunteer basis, they are uniquely placed to reflect the interests, opinions and attitudes of our community. If you would like to join us, contact info@australiantimes.co.uk Address: Unit 7C, Commodore House Battersea Reach, London SW18 1TW Tel: 0845 456 4910 Email: info@australiantimes.co.uk
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THE LOWY Institute calls it the ‘Consular Conundrum’. The increasing demands of Australian travellers overseas for consular assistance from a government operating in a tight fiscal operating environment with competing foreign policy priorities. In 2012 Australians took more than eight million trips overseas. Cheaper flights and a strong Aussie dollar have led to Australians travelling more and participating in increasingly risky activities in more exotic and unusual destinations. Coupled with greater public expectations of the type of consular assistance DFAT are able to provide, due in part to media attention given to highprofile cases, the situation has led to demands on the government which the Lowy Institute says are increasingly difficult to meet. Research fellow Alex Oliver writes “the Australian public’s perception of the services government can provide overseas has grown to a point where they seem to expect that the full suite of welfare services will extend to them across the globe no matter where they go or how they behave.” Ms Oliver also identifies the intense media and political attention accompanying prominent cases as contributing to a culture of expectation. “Successive governments and foreign ministers have become entangled in a vicious cycle in which they succumb to media pressure and stoke public expectations by over-reaching in high-profile consular cases,” she writes. “This cycle must be broken.” The report identifies a number of examples of requests received by DFAT’s consular emergency service which don’t match the reality of the services available. This includes a person asking if the sand in Egypt will upset their asthma, and whether DFAT keeps statistics on average expat salaries in Thailand.
Your Say On: Ryan Harris thunders into Ashes contention A fit Ryan Harris would be an excellent addition to the squad but he is injury prone. Do you take the risk?
Duncan
What’s the point of including an injury-prone 33yo in an Ashes campaign? Ignore anything the pacemen did in India, they were never expected to do much, it was the batting and spin bowling that were under the pump. Scott
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On: Where has all the talent gone?
Ultimately, it’s not just a gender issue some companies have unrealistic expectations when
? What’s your view
A report by the BBC in 2011 identified similar instances of bizarre appeals for help from The Foreign Office by UK nationals. It included one man who rang the consulate in Sydney to ask what clothes he should pack for his holiday. One Briton in Moscow complained to the embassy about a large buzzing noise in her apartment, whereas another in Bulgaria wanted the consulate to sell his house for him. In 2011/12 the Foreign and Commonwealth Office provided consular assistance to UK nationals in 19,874 cases, including 6,015 arrests and 3,739 hospitalisations. In the UK assistance to Britons in difficulty overseas is funded by a £15 “consular premium” levied on the cost of all adult passports. In the Netherlands a €2.50 fee is charged on every trip booked through a travel agent. DFAT currently provides assistance in over 20,000 consular cases in the average year. The traditional approach adopted by DFAT to manage the workload has been to encourage Australian travellers to take more personal responsibility and address their expectations of the services the government is able to provide. Former Foreign Minister Alexander
Downer once issued a strong reprimand to Aussie tourists who behaved badly overseas and then demanded assistance when they found themselves in trouble. He wrote in the Adelaide Advertiser it was time the federal government “told people they are responsible for their own decisions”. The Lowy Institute report suggests a ‘consular levy’ on the cost of a passport or airline ticket, similar to the UK, would help address the funding gap experienced by the government in providing consular assistance. It also recommends DFAT be able to retain the money it earns from providing notarial services in consular offices and embassies overseas. Currently the fees charged for the 180,000 services provided end up in government’s consolidated revenue. “A $20 premium on the cost of a passport, together with the redirection of revenue from notarial services will generate an additional $20-$40 million,” writes Ms Olivier. “DFAT cannot keep cannibalising itself without gravely impairing its ability to serve Australia’s foreign policy, economic and strategic interests.”
they create a job description and instead they should look to hire on personality fit and potential to grow into the role. It’s interesting that only networking face-to-face is mentioned. Job seekers can put themselves out there on many forms of social media and, when skilled, companies can find them on LinkedIn, Google+, Facebook, Twitter and many more.
and seeing the faults and the innovation. I think for Australian Labor, innovation is a dirty word and bureaucracy is God.
Katrina
On: Parliament passes historic national disability insurance scheme
The national scheme falls way short in design. It is like they are building a monument to bureaucracy, rather than a scheme that will serve the Australian people well. This government simply does not listen. We have a chance to build the best scheme in the world by viewing other nations designs
Bliss
On: Public protest planned against alleged police brutality at Mardi Gras I have never witnessed here in the United Kingdom where the police arrested a man , handcuff his hands behind his back, grab him by the throat, throw him bodily to the ground and hold him there by putting a foot between his shoulders. No matter what led up to this incident, there was no excuse for the manner in wich the police treated Mr. Jackson. Great Australians they were not!
Duncan
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News | 3
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Fears for Aussie amid Savile sex scandal not returned AAP’s calls in recent days. No one answered the door at his Berkshire home on Friday. A police investigation concluded earlier this year that Savile was a predatory sex offender who abused youngsters as young as eight over more than 50 years, using his fame to rape and assault victims on BBC premises, in schools and hospitals. The scandal has led to the arrests of singer Gary Glitter, comedians Freddie Starr and Jim Davidson and radio presenter Stuart Hall.
Prosecutors last week said there wasn’t enough evidence to charge former BBC producer Wilfred De’ath who had also been arrested. De’ath subsequently hit out at the Met which he said had been “arresting people on rather spurious allegations” having failed “to get” Savile when he was alive. “Operation Yewtree has gone too far ... it really is getting silly,” De’ath told the BBC.AAP
Crean says persuade, don’t scare, on super
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drawn on the details of any potential budget policy, but said Mr Crean was entitled to his views. Mr Crean, who forced a Labor leadership vote in March and was subsequently dumped from the cabinet, denied he was dividing his party by speaking out about possible changes to superannuation. He didn’t know what was being proposed in cabinet about changes to super, but urged his colleagues to frame the debate in terms of Labor’s vision for the future. “If you spring surprises on people ... people get confused, they get scared because it is their retirement incomes,” he said. “We’ve got to avoid that, and the smart way to do that is to be open with people, be honest with them, tell them what the facts are, engage them in the debate and seek to persuade them.” The Self Managed Superannuation Fund Owners Alliance said Labor was “desperately searching” for ways to fill its budget black hole, and urged it to come clean about any changes it was considering. But activist group GetUp! said talk of a government “raid” on super accounts was a deliberately misleading ploy by the coalition, as nothing had yet been proposed. Opposition Leader Tony Abbott was reluctant to say when the coalition would unwind any changes to the super system if elected, saying it would take time to repair the damage of the Labor government. His colleague Helen Kroger, who accused Prime Minister Julia Gillard of wanting to use superannuation as a “cash cow and her own personal ATM”, agreed the coalition couldn’t fix everything from day one. “All credit to him (Mr Abbott) being honest,” she said. – AAP
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LABOR stalwart Simon Crean has urged his colleagues to frame the debate “sensibly” when it comes to any potential changes to the superannuation system. The former minister said the federal government needed to persuade Australians about the merit of Labor’s plans, not scare them into thinking their superannuation savings were going to be attacked. The government has been accused of engaging in class warfare over retirement savings, with the opposition warning Labor is planning a “sneak attack” on super funds in the May budget. Several Labor MPs ruled out any plans to tinker with the savings of everyday Australians, arguing Labor governments had done nothing but strengthen the super system over the years. But Trade Minister Craig Emerson said on Sunday there was room for debate about the “fabulously wealthy”, fuelling speculation the government could lift the tax rate on super earnings for those with high balances. Mr Crean said he didn’t have an issue with super reforms that ensure long-term sustainability, but opposed retrospective changes that could alter the tax treatment of people’s earnings. “Because that is tantamount to taxing people’s surpluses, your surpluses, to fund our (the federal government’s) surplus,” he told ABC television on Monday. “That’s not on.” Labor backbencher Graham Perrett said he shared Mr Crean’s concerns about retrospective changes, but Defence Minister Stephen Smith said the government would ensure the super system served “the vast bulk of Australians”. As a cabinet member he wouldn’t be
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“dumbfounded” by the latest events. The Australian will not be named by the Metropolitan Police unless he is charged at a later date. He is the 11th person to have been arrested as a result of Operation Yewtree. It was established after a TV documentary alleged former BBC disc jockey Savile, who died in 2011 aged 84, sexually abused
countless children over decades. While the Australian was in the media spotlight at the same time, police have stressed his arrest was not connected to the specific allegations made against Savile. The 83-year-old has reportedly moved out of his Berkshire home and into a London flat in recent weeks to avoid press scrutiny. He was first interviewed under caution in late November 2012, five days after a search warrant was executed at his home. The entertainer’s British agent has
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Abbott’s daughters advocate for same-sex equality ...continued from p1 encourage Tony Abbott to evolve on the issue, at least by allowing coalition MPs a conscience vote.” Mr Abbott’s two youngest daughters said their views were shaped by seeing their aunt, Mr Abbott’s sister, fall in love with a woman. Mr Abbott recently said his views on homosexuality had changed and he now warmly accepted his sister, Christine Forster, as a lesbian after
she left her marriage of 19 years to be with her new partner, Virginia Edwards. Australian Marriage Equality meanwhile hopes Mr Doyle’s stance will also influence Liberal voters nationwide. Mr Croome said the Melbourne mayor supported gay marriage because he believed in individual freedom from government interference - an argument many Liberal Party MPs and voters would wholly support. - AAP
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4 | Exclusive Interview
The Brownie in Motion theory From the editor’s desk > alex Ivett
In the midst of a fascinating chat with Matt Parker, stand-up mathematician - a conversation which covered everything from the need for a maths version of the Big Bang Theory through to why you can’t call it camping if there’s a Sainsbury just around the corner – Matt mentioned a theory which caught my attention. Not being savvy myself in the world of science and mathematics, I wrote it down in my notebook and resolved to google it later. It captured my interest for a number of reasons. One, because he likened life in London to this concept – the theory being that life is made up of tiny and even tinier particles, with the smallest being bumped and jostled around amongst the bigger ones, taken and shaken down paths it didn’t necessarily expect to follow. Two, because it was called Brownie in Motion, and in my mind I had conjured fantastic images of flying baked goods to appropriately decorate the theory. Of course, once I did in fact look it up I realised he was actually referring to the much more logically named Brownian Theory, and I had misheard. The principles however remained eerily applicable to how I’ve experienced London so far. A way to describe or explain what otherwise seems to be complete random movements or happenings. Life in London can sometimes feel like it is slipping out of your control. Well-laid plans go awry. Good friends are made and lost fairly routinely as their life plans change equally quickly. A chance meeting can lead to a new job, or a new place to live. All of a sudden you wake up and realize your life is not only completely different to where it was one year before, it is also completely different to how you planned it would be. This can alternately feel incredibly exciting, or completely overwhelming. However, it is strangely comforting to think that at least there is a mathematical theory out there trying to place some order to what might seem to be unplanned life developments. The best part of the theory – if you just embrace the random jostling of your life particles, you’ll never know where you might end up.
2 - 8 April 2013
the Expat factor
Extraordinary Aussies in the UK coffee shop, you can. The trick is not to get complacent.
I came to the UK in late January 2005. I had studied Physics and Maths at the University of Western Australia and at the end of it nothing career wise really tempted me. I thought teaching would be an easy way to come to London, travel and make a lot more money than working in a bar. I did a Graduate Diploma of Teaching and spent a year teaching in Perth. Initially I came over on a two year youth working visa and I’ve loitered ever since.
My favourite café is the Scooter Café, hidden almost under Waterloo station. There’s this wonderful underpass, which is like a graffiti zone, and one end dumps you out on Lower Marsh. Given how central it is Lower Marsh has a real older market street feel. Scooter café is a retro café with mad cats that sleep on the chair. They do good coffee too which is always a bonus. I try to incorporate it into my everyday routine. Walk in, get a coffee, pat a cat.
Teaching in the UK was hard, at least when you compare Perth to London. At least in Australia if a kid mucks around and you yell at them, they’ll acknowledge they’ve done something wrong even if they continue mucking around. In the UK kids wouldn’t even acknowledge they were doing something wrong. However, after a year in a difficult school, not only will you be a phenomenal teacher and have really honed your craft, when you get back to Australia it will seem easy. It’s a lot more hard work, but it’s also a lot more rewarding. There is the potential to make a big difference. When I was teaching, I started doing stand-up comedy at night. When you start in the scene, every night of the week there is an open mike night somewhere. You get to know the people who run them, and get to know the other people on the circuit – there’s nowhere else like London, anywhere, any city, to get into stand-up. Doing standup was an insurance against future regret. I thought I’ll do this, and even if I’m horrible at least I’ll know.
“Doing stand-up was an insurance against future regret” For me, stand-up was like extreme public speaking practice. Admittedly I’m quite nerdy all the time, but it wasn’t maths based to start with. I just went to entertain whoever was there. You do what’s called testing jokes early on, to get a feel for the audience. I call them litmus jokes, but that’s just me. To be honest, a lot of it is similar to teaching. Teaching trains you to read an audience of people when you’re talking to them, and adjust accordingly. I started to get better known for doing maths stuff, and people started showing up expecting more and more maths. I knew it had got to a certain point at a gig in Plymoth, and a whole maths department from a local school showed up. Suddenly I had to cater for these people who had come for the maths, and still have a normal comedy night. I thought, let’s just go all out. It’s not me just making puns about numbers though - I’m doing normal standup, it’s just the topic is maths.
Last holidays I walked from London to the South Coast. It took a couple of days. You can walk anywhere in the UK. With archaic rights of way, you can clamber over hedges and literally walk over someone’s property. It’s just fantastic. Though you don’t get the same wilderness as in Australia, and you’re never out of earshot of someone. I took kids on a Duke of Edinburgh where we went out camping. We were just around the corner from a Sainsburys.
“I try to incorporate Scooter Café into my everyday routine. Walk in, get a coffee, pat a cat”
Matt parker Stand-up Mathematician
I also work part time for Queen Mary University. I get out there to promote maths to people and help train undergraduates who want to work in local schools. In turn the university hope to get more people applying to do maths, science, computer science and related subjects. There are those who just do academic research who might look down on their colleagues who are doing media work as well, but it’s necessary to keep the subject going. Like Brian Cox – he does TV as well as having a genuine research career at the University of Manchester. I do a lot of stuff on Radio 4 which is good fun. I’m like the radio equivalent of a talking head. I also write for The Guardian on maths and occasionally education. Sometimes I get called up by TV and radio to comment on maths news. Recently, they found the biggest known prime number, with over 17 million digits. I was asked to talk partly about what had happened, and partly why mathematicians were having parties
for it. There’s a website called the Great Internet Mersenne Prime search, which is helping to find the largest prime. Just don’t google the acronym – you won’t find it. A few years ago I put out some maths research I had been working on some years ago and QI picked up the content. They featured my ridiculous maths story and some of the work I did, but then in the final edit forgot to mention my name. The good Stephen Fry has since apologized, mainly because I walked up to him and said ‘hey, I’m that guy’. I do miss the inherent general friendliness of people you don’t know in Australia. It’s a cliché, but London is very busy, very chaotic. While everyone is genuinely nice, sometimes they don’t bother showing it. And don’t walk slowly in front of them on the escalator. Though I do like the density - the fact there are a lot of things happening, very close by. Any night of the week, if you want to go see a concert or go to a cool
Being in London meant my career happened by accident. There’s every form of creative outlet you can think of in London, and you can just on a whim start doing something. In Australia I’d have to have come up with a five year plan, because you don’t just fall into things that way. I loved maths, and loved teaching, and whilst I’ve always loved the creative stuff, I never thought I would be able to combine them so well into a career. It’s the Brownian motion theory applied to London. The random movement of molecules. The air around us, the wind blowing in certain directions – it’s all jostling, so tiny particles which are smaller get bumped around in random directions. That’s what London feels like on a bigger scale. There are so many random things happening in every direction, you can’t help being joshed about. Even if you’ve got a plan you will be jostled and bumped, and if you go with it you never know where you might end up. Matt Parker is currently performing a solo comedy tour – The Number Ninga. Matt also performs Festival of The Spoken Nerd with Helen Arney and Steve Mould – a comedy night for the insatiably sci-curious. It is playing at Bloomsbury Theatre 16-18 April. Interview by Alex Ivett
UK Life | 5
AustralianTimes.co.uk
A tale of two cultures By Chloe Westley
I would be lying if I said London wasn’t my favourite city in the world. Growing up I’ve had the opportunity to visit Rome, Milan, New York, Melbourne – but none of those places seemed to excite my soul in the same way. I knew from a very young age that I needed a kind of adventure. For years I prepared for a University education in the United Kingdom, and on my flight from Brisbane to London, it felt like all of my dreams were coming true. This is why I was so surprised,
and even bewildered when I found myself two months later in my form room sobbing for no reason. I didn’t feel like I had a right to miss home because I chose to leave. My English friends (bless them) said that they were getting quite sick of my longing for Australia and told me to get over it. Suddenly there were new ways of communicating with people, new social customs and different ways of telling jokes to be learnt. I was introduced to the concept of ‘banter’, which meant that I wasn’t allowed to get offended when somebody referred to me as a ‘convict’ or ‘peasant’.
Meanwhile, everybody I had ever known or loved, were on the other side of the world. The biggest hurdle was coping without my family. I moved to this country alone, so if anything happened to me, there was no ‘next of kin’ to call. This was something that I found particularly scary, and my life became a balancing act of trying not to miss home, learning the ropes of English culture and focussing on academic and paid work. I learnt to be more subtle, smile less at strangers and to walk with purpose. I became used to the
gazillion strangers on the tube, and the fact that I wasn’t able to talk to any of them. London sometimes felt like a monster. There were no smiling faces, I had to walk at a fast pace to keep up with the rest of the people, and there were noises all around me. I remembered my walks on the Gold Coast - comfortable, at my own pace, and usually relatively quiet. After seven months of living here however, I feel like I finally have my feet on the ground. London doesn’t feel like a monster anymore. I don’t feel entirely lost or alone, and I’ve learnt to laugh at the cultural differences. I wish I could have written this to my past self. To anyone experiencing any kind of culture shock or homesickness,
you’re not alone. Don’t let anyone (least of all someone who has never moved countries) tell you that it’s an easy thing to do, or that you’re being weak by missing Australia. Don’t lose your patriotism, and don’t lose heart. It’s an adventure.
Beer battles: Aussie vs UK n
When deciding who loves a cold beer more, Poms or Aussies, our sleuth discovers we’re pulling the pints on this one. SUBCULTURE SLEUTH > PAUL BLEAKLEY
A thought struck me yesterday as I sat in a local bar nursing a pint of lukewarm Belgian beer that chilled me to the bone more than a dip in the Thames at the height of January. Australians love a good beer. As such, with the legendary British pub culture, and a boozer on every corner, you would imagine that the pub in London would be a place where Aussies and Poms alike could gather and bond over our mutual love of a cold beverage. I have been in social situations with a pretty wide range of British people since coming to London, from chavs and hipsters to the rich and (semi) famous. A lot of those situations have been in pubs, and has revealed the shocking secret lingering beneath the surface of British society: no matter what subculture they belong to, Poms just don’t like a beer as much as an
Aussie. “Wait, they spend half of their life in the pub!” I hear you shout, and you are right. But - listen to what they order. A posh boy will wander up to the counter of a City bar: “Alright mate? What is your house wine? Oh, really? Nothing French?” A tracksuitwearing lad steps into a local boozer in Bermondsey: “Ay bruv, you got three pints of cider and keep ‘em coming, innit?” A hipster walks into the latest obscure Shoreditch venue: “Can I have
Saying it with paper
n
Facing a first wedding anniversary, our Honeymooning Nomad comes up with her own take on the traditional gift of paper. This April we will also be
Honeymooning celebrating our first wedding Nomad anniversary, something I am very > Jacqui Moroney
The past year has been a year of firsts for me. There was the first Christmas that I have not spent with family. The first time we went to Vegas. The first time we went to Iceland. The first time we missed the entire Triple J countdown on Australia Day. The first time my bag was stolen. The first time I didn’t have travel insurance on a holiday. The first time we got married. The second time we got married. What happens in Vegas…. In the year ahead I can see that there are going to be many more firsts to come. This year will be the first time I can celebrate my birthday in spring, as opposed to autumn, and the first time I will celebrate it overseas.
much looking forward to. As a somewhat untraditional couple, we have not really celebrated past anniversaries as I know other couples do. It took me a couple of years to actually remember the anniversary date of when we first started dating. However, I was very quick to establish that our wedding anniversary, very close to my birthday, deserved to be celebrated each year with traditional gift giving. Why not use a reason to receive (and give) an extra gift every year to its full advantage? After reading so many painfully over the top bride-to-be magazines, I am now well versed in the list of traditional anniversary gifts that could span the next 60+ years of marriage. To give you an idea, paper is given for the first year of marriage, cotton the year after, followed by leather, fruits/flowers and wood for
a cold chai latte? Alcohol is so mainstream.” I am not saying the Brits do not drink beer. There are still some true believers left. I salute the old geezers at Wetherspoons pubs across the city, who unfailingly have three empty pints of bitter sitting on their table when I venture down for a cheap breakfast at 10am. In many ways I have gone native since coming to London. My speech pattern has changed, I have a rough twang in my voice and my skin has gone predictably pale. When it comes to beer, however, I will always call Australia home. If only the Poms could pour a pint properly. the fifth year. Ten is celebrated with tin/aluminum, the twentieth with china. It gets even better as you go on, with silver for 25, gold for 50 and the sixtieth wedding anniversary deserving of a diamond. While we don’t usually stick to the norm, I think that we can use this list to make gift giving a little more fun. So, in the lead up to our first wedding anniversary I was stumped about paper. The first few items that come to mind when you think of paper are rather boring… stationary, gift certificates, photos, books. Thinking outside the box however and you can suddenly see many uses for paper, including itineraries, flight tickets, foreign currency, and hotel bookings. So for our first wedding anniversary we have decided to keep in theme and go on a two week trip to Egypt, home to papyrus – the forerunner of modern paper. And, another first. Perhaps year two will follow with a cotton hammock by the beach in another far-away country.
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6 | Food & Wine
2 - 8 April 2013
Creamy cauliflower n
Trullo in Highbury
This week, from the kitchen of Gordan Ramsay at Claridge’s, Chris Arkadieff By Alex Ivett shows us his three C’s recipe – cream of n REVIEW | With simple Italian fare cooked to perfection, Trullo is cauliflower with cèpes mushrooms. one very good reason to brave the unseasonable spring weather.
chris’s
kitchen
> CHRIS ARKadieff
Cauliflower soup exudes warmth and richness, and it is a perfect partner to one of my favorite French mushrooms, cèpes. You could also use porchini mushrooms if Italian is more your thing. Cèpes mushrooms can be found
fresh and are full of flavour and texture. However, they do come at a price. If buying dried cèpes make sure to soak them for 20 minutes in water. Cooking the cauliflower in milk will help to retain its colour and creates a rich and tasty base for the soup. If you prefer to cook with water, you can add richness by crumbling a cheese, such as Stilton or mature cheddar, on the top of the soup.
p u o s r e w o fl li u a c f o m a Cre with cèpes mushrooms
Serves 6 What you need
• 3 heads of cauliflower chopped into small pieces • 1 medium onion finely sliced • 2 cloves of garlic chopped • 1 bay leaf • 3 sprigs of thyme • ½ teaspoon of ground cumin • 1.5 liters of fresh milk • 1.5 cups of cream • 100g fresh cèpes mushrooms quartered • 1 small bunch of fresh chervil • Extra virgin olive oil
What to do
• Place a medium saucepan on a low heat • Add ½ cup of cooking oil, onions, herbs, garlic and sauté for three minutes until the onions are translucent. • Add the cauliflower, cumin and mix well on a medium heat for
three minutes. • Add the milk and reduce to a low heat and cook for 30 minutes until the cauliflower is soft. • Remove the solid ingredients from the saucepan and blend, adding a small amount of water or milk if required. • Pass the soup through a sieve; the soup should be thick and creamy. • Return the processed soup to a saucepan and add the cream and mix well. Season and leave on a low heat. • Take a small heavy based fry pan on a medium to high heat. • Sautee the cèpes mushrooms for two minutes and season with salt and pepper. Remove and place on a small tray lined with a paper towel. • Serve the soup in warm large bowls, scattering the cèpes over the surface, finishing with sprigs of chervil and drizzle of olive oil. Enjoy.
When the weather is as awful as it is, and winter seems to drag on longer than the British obsession with Home & Away, it’s tempting to spend as many hours as possible at home. Instead of going out, it’s much easier to instead while away the evenings eating canned soup and drinking the dregs of the cooking sherry because it’s too cold to even go to the shops. Even if the fleeting thought of a dinner out crosses your mind, it’s usually immediately cancelled by a quick glance out the window. As the slicing wind blows the biting rain sideways, the possibility of a mediocre dinner at an untested restaurant loses its appeal. Why put on five layers you ask yourself, when all you might get in return is a trek through sub-artic temperatures, angry crowds and only the vague promise of a decent meal at the end of it. That is, unless you’re going to Trullo in Highbury. Trullo is the reason why anyone would make any effort to do anything in this weather. The answer to the question, why should I eat out at all? Not just a restaurant, but a place which restores your faith in the concept of dining out. Why don’t I cook for myself? Because Trullo serves up seasonal, quality Italian fare quickly, efficiently and let’s face it, much, much better than you ever could. Why would I leave the comfort of my own home? Because Trullo is the kind of warm, cosy, consistently full neighborhood bistro which makes passersby insanely jealous looking in, and diners lucky enough to get a booking indescribably smug looking out. Everything about Trullo is simple, classic and intimate. With wood lined walls, long benches lining the window, and a kitchen which opens to the dining area, the effect is like being invited into someone’s home. The staff quickly welcome you in out of the pouring rain, and before you know it, you’re seated with a deliciously light, dry and crisp bottle of Italian white on its way on the recommendation of the knowledgeable waitstaff. The changing menu is efficiently explained, with house specialties identified, and delicious specials described in mouth-watering detail. We can’t go past the pappardelle with beef shin ragu and mussel fritti to start. The mussels, dusted in semolina and lightly fried, are plentiful. With a tangy aioli dipping sauce, it is an excellent starter to share. However, the handmade thick plaits of pappardelle are the absolute standout of the evening, with a rich sauce of melt-in-your mouth, juicy tendrils of beef. As my friend says, “this is the cure to homesickness on a plate”. Warming, hearty, incredible. Our mains, from the charcoal grill section of the menu, are again recommendations – and
Sample Menu excellent ones at that. I Saturday 30 March ~ Dinner receive a pork chop unlike Olives £3.5 Finocchiona £8 I’ve ever seen before. A Antipasti large, tender, deliciously Castelfranco, Ubriaco, blood orange and £7.5 pomegranate salad with moscatel dressing cooked piece of pig, expertly Grilled quail with aioli £8 matched with a generous Agretti with anchovy sauce and pangratatto £8 helping of crispy poached Veal carpaccio with Italian peas £9 Primi potatoes, appropriately bitter New season’s garlic and sourdough soup £6 chargrilled trevise and a Pappardelle with sausage ragu £8 Ricotta ravioli with braised radicchio £8 creamy anchovy sauce. The Taglierini with bottarga £9 other main needs no added Oven extras either. A thick rump of Brill tranche with baked cannellini beans and £18 Italian spinach lamb in a refreshing tomato Crespelle of Jerusalem artichokes and taleggio with £14 sauce with tender cannellini bitter leaf salad beans. Roast wood pigeon with castellucio lentils and £16 chicken liver crostini We don’t know how we fit Charcoal grill in dessert after all that, but Black Hampshire pork chop with poached rosevale £16.5 potatoes, chargrilled trevise and mustard where there is a will there Mackerel with grilled leeks, beetroot and horseradish £15.5 is a way. Salted caramel Bistecca Fiorentina with grilled polenta and £45 ice-cream is properly salted, gorgonzola (for two) a perfect mix of bitter and Side potatoes £4, Side salad £4 sweet. The almond tart has a flaky homemade pastry shell, and is topped with tangy rhubarb. Stomachs protesting, we Trullo is at 300-302 St Paul’s Road finish it all. London, N1 2LH. There are not enough words to recommend Trullo to the extent it deserves. It is the dining equivalent of a roaring log fire. Cosy and heartening, with fresh dishes made with absolute care and passion. It will leave you sated, satisfied, and happy. That is, until you have to take yourself back out into the rain to make the journey home. th
Coffee Cult is over-caffeinated, and will return next week after a coffee free Easter break.
Entertainment | 7
AustralianTimes.co.uk
Alias Ruby Blade documents remarkable story of Kirsty Sword By Kristy Barrett
Image by Alex Meillier
THE YEAR is 1990. A 23-year-old Australian woman from Melbourne embarks on a brave journey to East Timor, a remote area in the Far East. The country has recently opened up to tourism following years of isolation from the outside world. With her video camera in hand, aspiring filmmaker Kirsty Sword begins to document her “holiday” to this war-torn country. Fast-forward to today and Kirsty’s original footage from 1990 onwards makes up parts of the raw and evocative documentary, Alias Ruby Blade,which had its UK premiere last week at the Human Rights Watch Film Festival. Australian Times met the filmmakers, husband-and-wife team Alex and Tanya Meillier, on the second night of the film screening to get an insight
Xavier Rudd in Cape Town
REVIEW | Xavier Rudd performed to sold out crowds in South Africa, offering a taster of the amazing musical talent in store for London when he plays at Koko in June.
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Image by Steed Maher
By Jackie Lampard With an enchanting view of city lights in the background, the open air arena of Kirstenbosch Gardens at the foot of Cape Town’s Table Mountain made for the perfect setting for my first Xavier Rudd experience. Blankets and picnic baskets, filled with homemade snacks and wine, were strewn across the grassy stadium as people waited in anticipation to see Aussie musician Xavier Rudd live in Cape Town for the very first time. An hour long opening set from South African artists Jeremy Loops and Farryl Purkiss warmed up the crowd. Not long after, a barefoot Xavier Rudd stepped up to induce goose bumps across the sold out arena with his opening track ‘Solus’. Rudd, the one-man-band, showed off his instrumental talents with a diverse line up of several didgeridoos, drums, bar chimes, a harmonica, stomp box and lap guitar. Arms waved and the crowd sang along as he played through his two hour set. Even those who had never before heard his talents were dancing (or rather bobbing) to his musical genius. One of his fans attempted a stage dive, but nothing
Image by Steed Maher
got the crowd going like ‘Buffalo Soldier’ - a cover of the hit Bob Marley track. Rudd could barely be heard over the loud chanting of the audience. The adapted lyrics – ‘God save Australia, God save South Africa’ – resonated throughout the crowd. To finish off the set Rudd treated the audience to ‘Culture Bleeding’, before taking a bow and heading offstage. After much pleading from the crowd, the acoustic master returned to wow his fans with a performance of ‘Spirit Bird’ before ending the night with a poem. Boomerang held high, his spiritual nature shone through as he shared a blessing for the earth, the people, and the ancestors of the land we encompass. Legendary. Xavier Rudd is performing at Koko in London on 24 June 2013. For tickets see www.livenation.co.uk.
into the making of this remarkable documentary. “We wanted to create this film in a way that it’s accessible to everyone – even if they don’t know the story of what happened in East Timor,” says director Alex. “In editing the film, we gravitated towards the most intimate footage we could find. Our goal was to keep the audience in the moment as much as possible.” And it works. From the moment the film begins, I am totally captivated. The scenes are unrefined and compelling, the music powerful, and the story deeply moving. It’s not until the film ends 80 minutes later that I stop to take a breath and wipe away the wet tears that have been streaming down my face. Alias Ruby Blade follows the story of passionate human rights activist
Kirsty Sword. After her first visit to East Timor, Sword takes up a job as a researcher for a groundbreaking English documentary film, which sets out to record the struggle for independence in East Timor. Determined to help the Timorese people and get closer to the action, Sword moves to Jakarta, Indonesia, where she works as a human rights campaigner. It’s here that she puts her filmmaking dreams on hold to become a spy for the Timorese resistance to Indonesian rule. Operating as an undercover agent with the pseudonym Ruby Blade, Sword plays a key role in smuggling video equipment and cassettes to the resistance’s prison-bound leader, Xanana Gusmão. Through intimate correspondence in the form of letters and photographs, the pair fall in love.
Their actions along with those of other important Timorese political figures pave the way for the 1999 referendum in East Timor, of which 78 per cent of Timorese voted in favour of independence. This scene in Alias Ruby Bladeis one of the most powerful pieces of footage I’ve ever witnessed. “In the film, when the Timorese people go to vote, they take their pots, pans, rice and blankets,” says Alex. “They know that afterwards, there will be a terrible retribution and their villages will be burnt to the ground. It’s an inspirational scene and a big part of what drew us in. It shows the courage, resilience and individual acts of bravery of the Timorese, and that’s what we want this film to show.” If you don’t know much about East Timor, or want to learn more, Alias Ruby Blade is the film to see.
8 | Entertainment
2 - 8 April 2013
stand the test of time.” Sarah first broke out in 2002 with her debut EP Prelusive. This was followed in 2004 with her debut album The Overture & the Underscore. From these early days Sarah showed signs that she would not be one to settle for the trappings of musical complacency. Avoiding the temptation of some musicians to double up songs from their EP to their debut album, Sarah strived instead for originality and to follow her vision. It has become the key to her success. “My EP was something that I’d essentially recorded in a bedroom, so I didn’t feel that the sounds were up to the quality of the other material I was recording in the studio,” she says. “I also like to move forward and I just didn’t feel the same connection to the older songs. I wanted to embark on something completely new.” Songs covered a range of musical styles, from the grungy undertones of ‘Your Way’ to the electro folk tone of ‘Don’t U Eva’. Sarah says these changes in her writing and style were what set the scene for what was to come. “I wanted it to have more of a unique “sound”, to set the tone for what I wanted to do in the future.” In retrospect, 2006 seemed a sombre year in Australian music, one I believe in years to come will be noted as the year the Australian scene underwent a changing of the guards. The old guys were heading out, and the new crew were stepping in. And Sarah Blasko led the charge.
What’s On Sarah Blasko 11 April @Barbican Centre The Jezabels 20 April @Sebright Arms Chet Faker 21 May @Sebright Arms Xavier Rudd 24 June @Koko Tame Impala 25 June @ Hammersmith Apollo Kate Miller-Heidke 3 July @The Islington Flume 4 July @Heaven Ben Harper & Charlie Musselwhite 16 July @ Shepherd’s Bush Empire Nick Cave and The Bad Seeds 26 - 28 October 2013 @Hammersmith Apollo
The sound of surprise
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Aprilfools @Queen_UK Abdicating. #AprilFools @Joe_Hildebrand I also told Stephen Conroy the NBN was going really well. Man I feel bad. #aprilfools #auspol @GrantMBryant if anyone tries any april fools jokes on me i will not hestitate to punch you in the face @MarniGill *wakes up* Mirror: You look beautiful today Mirror: April fools @MrJChrist Imagine if North Korea were actually just doing a massive #AprilFools prank @themalenanny 6 yr old: “Everyone in the world is dead. April Fools! Everyone in the world will die. Not April Fools.” @Will___Ferrell April fools is the day you tell someone how you feel about them and if it doesn’t go to plan, just say it was an April fools @RealKiddSmyllz #Aprilfools Day. Believe nothing, and trust no one. “So it’s like any other day. Right?
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INTERVIEW | One of Australia’s most original musicians, Sarah Blasko’s sound is constantly evolving, and always engaging. GEORGE KATRALIS talks musical development with the songstress ahead of the UK release of her latest album, I Awake.
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A fear for most musicians is making a piece of music so distinct it ends up defining an era, and by extension, them. Think Oasis. Think Bon Jovi. It happens in Australia too; think The Living End, Powderfinger, even Jet. All bands with a huge following, but also bands left frozen in time. Music, hairstyles, clothing. Let’s be honest. You hear ‘Wonderwall’ at a party and you’re instantly transported back to the 90s. Why? Evolution. It’s not just science. It’s music too. Sadly, a lot of musicians get complacent. They write one hit, and spend the next 15 years living off a reputation while basically re-writing the same song. If you don’t believe me, I have four words for you. Red. Hot.
Chilli. Peppers. I’ve often wondered, how can a musician remain timeless yet current? My answer: endless curiosity. Enter, Sarah Blasko. The vintage clad songstress from Sydney is well on her way to being remembered as one of Australia’s most original musicians. One who has no fear of being stuck in time, nor should she as she continues to create distinctive and constantly evolving music.
An eye for the eternal
An incredible lover of all that is old and unique, Sarah credits her humble early upbringing for her eye for all that is eternal. “I like things that are old and have been lived in,” she tells Australian Times. “It probably started as a kid when my family shopped at Vinnie’s because we hardly had any money. I like things that
“With each album I’ve wanted it to be somewhat of a continuation, but also a shift. I strive to make that progression to make sense, but also offer a surprise element”
Releasing her second album What The Sea Wants, The Sea Will Have, Sarah showed another sign of growth and maturity as a musician in taking a step forward from the preceding album whilst staying true to her sound. “With each album I’ve wanted it to be somewhat of a continuation, but also a shift in some sense. I strive to make that progression to make sense, but also offer a surprise element,” she explains. “On What The Sea Wants, I think that surprise element was the choir, the bassoon and the string arrangements. I was going more organic with this record, it was more of a band record.” Its clever and original string arrangements combined with folk sensibilities is a style commonplace in 2013. However, back in 2006 it was a sound long since forgotten from the 1970s. Sarah was at the forefront of creating a type of music unheard at its time. “I just go with what I want to hear at that time, what I feel. I wanted to make something that would stand the test of time and not be traceable to an era necessarily,” she says. “Certain sounds can really ground things in a decade. I wanted the music to be quite “pure” I suppose. I was just going for a natural sound, not synthesized.”
A versatile vulnerability
Her third album in 2008, As Day Follows Night, not only saw Sarah head overseas to record, but also for the first time go completely solo as a songwriter. It led to an open vulnerability previously unheard in her music. Songs like ‘Is My Baby Yours?’ captured the stripped back incredibly personal side to this evolving musician. “I wanted to take away all the trickery, all the unnecessary layers and explore what space would add to my music,” Sarah says. “I was tired of electric guitars and full sounding keyboards and I just wanted to use instruments that were acoustic. I reveled in the power of those simple elements.”
“I Awake is about dropping any kind of facade, dropping the effort and letting raw honesty and beauty speak for itself” I Awake
Now, 2013 sees the release of Sarah’s fourth album I Awake. Layered with an accompanying orchestra, it is an ambitious production which Sarah claims is created from nothing but thoughts and memories. “Dropping any kind of facade, dropping the effort and letting raw honesty and beauty speak for itself,” is how she describes the album. “I wanted the orchestra to have loads of character and to totally tumble you around and push your emotions to the hilt.” The album goes to great lengths to capture the attention of the listener right from the first note. Although different to the sounds and recordings featured on As Day Follows Night, Sarah’s predecessor albums seem to act as the catalyst to the creation of I Awake. It continues down the path of originality while still completely being the very personal work of its creator. During its origins, Sarah took on the Brian Wilson approach to recording where isolation was preferred. She spent the first half of 2011 in a house in Brighton alone. “It was a very lonely time but then I could be whatever I wanted to be and I had so much creative time on my hands. “I did feel the weight of that expectation almost killed me in some way. I just created so much pressure on myself by having such lofty dreams.” Although Sarah chose to write the album alone, it was recorded in Stockholm, Sweden. Further recordings occurred in Sofia, Bulgaria with the accompaniment of the Bulgarian Symphony Orchestra. “Choosing to work with an orchestra is not something you can do in halves,” Sarah says. “I did almost feel like I’d lost my mind at certain points. People can share in it at various points during the process, but you’re the one who has to go to sleep with it at nights.” In this day and age of get famous quick, and be forgotten even quicker, it’s refreshing to hear someone with a continued interest in their own selfgrowth, not only as a musician, but also as a person and in their craft. With I Awake Sarah Blasko has done something very brave and put herself on record for the world to see. I suggest that to create something so personal must be both confronting as much as it is fulfilling. Sarah answers: “It feels good. It was an album I felt convicted to make and I’m really proud that I took the leap and went where I felt I needed to go, no matter how exposing it may be.” I Awake will be released in the UK on 8 April 2013. Rough Trade East will celebrate the release with a guest appearance from Sarah Blakso on 8 April. See www.roughtrade.com/events for more details. Sarah Blasko is set to perform at the Barbican Centre on 11 April 2013.
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Travel | 9
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The gorilla moves towards me. Sitting just a few feet away, I can feel his body heat and his breath is clearly audible. I am frozen in the equatorial sun.
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By David Beaumont While Diane Fossey and David Attenborough worked hard to put them on the map, vicious levels of poaching have nearly caused their eradication, but now the mountain gorillas of Uganda are making a remarkable recovery in the impenetrable forest of Bwindi. Recent surveys show their numbers have gone from 750 to nearly 900 in the last 18 months. Reassuring. Having trekked from Buhoma for seven exhausting hours, rest was vital before repeating the exercise and the Nkuringo Gorilla Camp provided the perfect environment. A comfortable bed, plenty of nourishment for dinner and breakfast were fully embraced before our meeting at the gorilla trekking headquarters at 8am. Lucky strike. The six Italians due to trek with us didn’t show which meant that we had a private trek which according to locals, is unheard of. The licence to trek gorillas is not cheap at US$500 each, but the income, huge by local standards, goes a long way to preserving these endangered primates. Benson briefs us for twenty minutes before setting off, following trackers who have left camp an hour before to find the Nkuringo family and its 14 members. They all have names and having been introduced to them on paper, we can’t wait to meet them face to face… hopefully. Nothing is guaranteed; failure is not an option. The two of us are a small element in a team of ten, guides, porters, trackers, two gentlemen with rifles. We spend three hours trekking downhill and while straining with hiking boots and sticks, locals pass us by at twice the speed with sacks of potatoes on their heads and no shoes. Humiliating! Two hours in, and word comes through that the family has been found. Relief spreads across the team. An hour later, and the reason the forest is called impenetrable becomes clear. Our helpers turn off the narrow but worn path and slash away at the undergrowth with their pangas while we struggle, now unable to see the ground and therefore our footing any more. After 20 minutes scrambling, the bush opens up and the trackers
smile a warm welcome. The heart beats fiercely with exertion with great expectation. We dump bags, water, sticks (gorillas don’t like sticks we’re told)
and everyone except Benson and one tracker. Clutching the camera rather too tightly, we are ushered to a nearby bush. Inside is the alpha male called Rafiki, (meaning friend).
10 | Travel
2 - 8 April 2013
No closer that 7 to 8 metres we were told, as we can transmit our diseases easily and they don’t have the same immune system as we do, and can therefore compromise their health. This benign but vast 180kg creature is just two or three metres away, separated from us by a few branches and leaves. The heartbeat and camera click away at about the same speed. It’s a close encounter but it’s so placid and silent and not at all scary which is not what one would expect. The silverback’s serenity is infectious. The $500 only buys you an hour with the family, so after 10 minutes with the head honcho, we move on to find mother and daughter, Kasotoro (the hill’s name) and Tabu (problem) who are visibly affectionate. They groom each other, cuddle and even kiss. It’s enchanting and it’s familiar. After precious time with them, it’s time to move on to meet the previous dominant male called Safari (one who walks a lot). He’s around 40 years old, on his own and may only
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have another half a dozen years or so to go. After a while, he strolls off on all fours in the opposite direction and his silver back gleams under the midday sun. The final encounter is with a blackback. He’s a teenager called Christmas (that’s when he was born) whose back will shortly turn silver. As we sit with him, rejoicing in the present, he moves towards me. Sitting just a few feet away, I can feel his body heat and his breath is clearly audible. I am frozen in the equatorial sun. As we climb a thousand feet back to our very welcome hotel, cold beer and warm bed, we reflect in silence. Uganda is a simply stunning destination but, above all, the gorillas must not be missed.
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Travel | 11
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Topdeck’s first North American hits the road LEADING youth tour operator Topdeck Travel has set off on its inaugural North American trip, which departed 31 March 2013. Passengers on the 7 day California Calling trip from Los Angeles to San Francisco will take in the best of western USA, including the Grand Canyon, Las Vegas, Death Valley, Yosemite National Park and more. Topdeck’s General Manager Bec Whiffin said that excitement is built as the date drew closer. “There is great anticipation at Topdeck about the departure of our first North American trip” she said. “Passengers on California Calling will be able to enjoy some fantastic ‘Totally Topdeck’ inclusions such as a Party Bus on the Las Vegas Strip and an overnight stay in Yosemite National Park. “It’s just one of our impressive range of North American itineraries. Each will bear the hallmarks for which Topdeck are known; hassle-free trips featuring more free time, tasty included meals, no compulsory tipping and passionate Topdeck Crew.” Topdeck’s brand new North American trips are proving highly popular and are set to take the USA and Canada by storm in 2013. Some of the key itineraries are: • A 20 day Coast to Coast trip from LA to New York (and
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12 | Travel
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It’s funny how older people always say, “it’s great to be young at heart”. Yet in many businesses, younger workers are dismissed as fickle. Their desire for job satisfaction and mobility is sometimes seen as a cost and disruption to business, rather than a positive challenge to current organisational culture. However, as the talents of young people are becoming more valued, networks and organisations are popping up in the UK and Australia to support our future leaders. And to get ahead in these tough economic times, instead of becoming a lost generation, many young people are taking charge of their own professional lives. Youth unemployment is a major bugbear of many governments throughout the world. One woman in the UK is taking a lead in supporting young people. Claire Young, best known for reaching the final of series 4 of BBC1’s The Apprentice (2008), wants to use her experience to motivate others and to show that with hard work, drive and determination, anything is possible. Young was born in South Africa and her family moved to the UK because of her father’s career. With close friends living in Melbourne and her best friend from New Zealand, Ms Young’s has a strong connection to Antipodeans, and she is also being sought by youth groups in Sydney for speaking engagements. Age has been no barrier for Ms Young and the straight talking, no-nonsense business woman is passionate about spreading that message. Since her stint on The Apprentice (2008), Ms Young has been working non-stop, setting up numerous businesses including a start up scheme for under 18s. Working ‘hands on’ in schools and across multiple
Investing in the future n
Young people need to be informed, inspired and motivated about future decisions. Claire Young is helping students raise their aspirations and think big through a new start up scheme for under 18s. government organisations, Ms Young is helping students raise their aspirations and think big. Ms Young believes that it is important for young people to be informed, inspired and motivated about future decisions, and the younger they start, the better. While Australia has always encouraged apprenticeships, here in the UK the government has started seeing the value of providing support to young people and employees by subsidising apprenticeship schemes. Young, herself, supports the National Apprenticeship Service, heading up their Young Ambassador Network, and works in partnership with the Peter Jones Foundation. Young recently met with the Prime Minister for roundtable talks and has been invited to join the House of Lords Youth Unemployment taskforce. With a host of other appointments both here and in Europe, Ms Young is an unstoppable force. If you are young and want to get a head start and control your future, what do you do?
Decide what you want (or don’t want)
Take some time out to reflect. Identify your goals. Sometimes we are more attuned to what we don’t want rather than what we do want, so try what works for you. Whether you are entrepreneur or a superstar at
work, knowing what your goals are keeps you motivated and focused so you can spot opportunities. Ms Young says that entrepreneurs need energy and drive to keep going, especially during the really tough days. “Life as an entrepreneur never runs smoothly and it’s critical to keep your attitude upbeat and positive; you never know when that all important phone call will come and you’ll need to be on your best game.”
Find yourself a role model
Role models and mentors can be integral to success as they can show you what is possible and help you pave your path. As more women are exploring greater opportunities, Ms Young says that “young girls need to seek role models and experience sparks of inspiration”. In particular, “women in business need to be seen loud and clear. We need figureheads to fly the flag high to encourage the next generation of female business talent to step forward”.
Find your life balance
Every person has a different life situation and we all seek a balance that will work for us. Time to relax and nurture relationships is important. Many young people are concerned, for example, about the culture of working 24/7. Many women are deferring having children and some decide never to have them because of fears for their career. When you find your life balance and have the right support, you can reach your aspirations. Ms Young believes that you can have a career and a family, admitting that you do need to make some sacrifices and learn to delegate. “I run a business, have a daughter and I do this by myself. I’m a single mother,” says Ms Young. You are only young once. The younger we take charge of our own professional lives and careers, the better. With growing support systems and a belief that age is no barrier, you can reach your aspirations. Believe in yourself and nurture your confidence: you need to be own fan club and acknowledge your successes. With today’s economic climate it can be difficult to see the light at the end of the tunnel and keep cheering. Ms Young advises that to be successful, you need to be yourself and JDI - Just Do It. “Take some risks, work hard and set yourself a goal.” The beauty is that this advice can be applied to anyone of any age, gender and ability. Claire Young has numerous business ventures including www.schoolspeakers. co.uk, www.girlsoutloud.org.uk and www.teenbiz.org.uk the UK’s first business start up scheme for under 18s. You can find out more about Claire at www.claireyoung.co.uk Sepi Roshan is Business Editor of Australian Times, and Director of Astute Coaching & Development, helping Professionals become fearless presenters and leaders. Find out more at www.astutecd.com.
Professional Life | 13
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Aussie fixed rates to increase as property moves up n
Interest rates in Australia are not expected to drop any further, so consider locking in a low fixed rate while you can.
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THE Australian property market appears to be turning up, with recent auction clearance rates and home loan numbers suggesting more property hunters are shrugging off concerns and hesitation and making more buy decisions. At the same time interest rate cuts, whilst acting as a catalyst throughout last year, are showing signs of slowing, with experts predicting the next move could be up. The Reserve Bank recognised in meeting minutes last year that the property market appeared to have hit its bottom, and in fact RP Data’s Tim Lawless suggested most markets did that in May. The RP Data price index tracking the combined growth of capital cities suggests a 3.3% growth in prices has occurred since that time (over the past five years average annual price growth in Australia has been 1.9%). It’s important to realise the Australian market is quite fragmented however, with different states, price points and dwelling types performing quite differently. Over 12 months to 31 Jan 2013, Sydney has shown a 2.7% increase and Brisbane 1.2%, whilst Melbourne showed a 0.7% decline in prices over the same period. Units have generally outperformed houses. It is no secret Australian cities are facing property supply challenges, an important factor driving housing price stability and growth that cannot be overlooked. The Australian Financial Review recently reported the National Housing Supply Council saying “the Australian housing shortfall could blow out to 663,000 by 2031, with the Australian population on track to reach 35.9 million by 2050.” The value of housing finance approvals rose by 2.4% in January and property investment lending has been gradually increasing since the middle part of 2012. Overall consumer confidence rose 2% in March reflecting a 17% rise since April 2012, according to recent Westpac-Melbourne Institute Consumer confidence survey results.
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Fixed rates
Until a year or so ago, fixed rates in Australia tended to be higher than variable rates. However the reverse has been true over the last 12 months, and fixed rates have been falling, at their own pace, and separate to reserve bank measures. This culminated in a move by Westpac one month ago to cut their two year fixed rate to 4.99%. Typically three year fixed rates are considered more attractive to Australians, with the majority of fixed rate loans being written over this period. Three year rates are hovering around 5.2-5.4% (still considered a good rate and advisable to take this while you can, if fixed rates suit your situation). This move was noticeable for many reasons. However largely it was seen as a competitive move by Westpac, keen to catch up some volumes lost to competitors in variable rate loans over the last six months. They succeeded in drawing the other three major banks into the same move, and at the same time shifted borrower focus as a result to a two year fixed rate period. Perhaps realising such a move was unsustainable, Westpac removed this rate from the market this week, and I expect the other banks to follow suit quite quickly. Movements in the yield curve and cost of funds suggest that rates are not expected to drop any further but may move up. Hence, get your 4.99% rate while you can.
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Next month’s column: Can the government’s new Help-to-Buy scheme really help you get into property in London? Daniel Shillito is an overseas mortgage broker, CPA and Expat specialist at Aussie Finance and Property Group. Daniel can be contacted on Ph. 020 3239 0479 or visit www.aussiefpgroup.com
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14 | Sport
2 - 8 April 2013
Kennett Curse strikes Hawks again in loss
THE
RUBDOWN
Round 1 Part II By Will Denton
Like an engorged eight year-old who has overdosed on a combination of hot cross buns and red tulip caramel solids, so too are AFL fans currently recovering from the food coma that was the Easter feast of footy. May as well recap at the beginning, when Richmond managed to overcome the apparently ‘new and improved’ Carlton. Now don’t get me wrong, the Tigers did get the ‘W’, but they did some of their finest to stuff it up by not kicking a goal in the last quarter. Mick Malthouse blamed the loss on not using the bench ‘properly’ but he was heard screaming “AND YOU! YOU DID NUTHIN!!!! NOT EVEN
A KICK!” at Club president Stephen Kernahan. After informing Mick that he›s been retired for nearly 20 years, Mick moved on and advised “ok, well at least we still got Steven Silvagni in the 2’s, haven’t we?” Could be a long year for Carlton. Good Friday wasn’t that good as it was spent in the shower with the cold running just trying to feel something. Saturday, however – it was the Bulldogs who were simply glorious. Brisbane rocked up to Etihad well chuffed with themselves and Jonathan Brown was still using the NAB cup as a stubby holder. A relatively good crowd of about 80 turned out to see the Doggies go around for another soul reducing season. What happened in the next two hours was quite remarkable as the team
AFL young guns ready to fire against Europe ...continued from p16
UP THERE: Tom Hawkins of Geelong flies during the round one blockbuster against Hawthorn. The Cats won 13.15.(93) to 12.14.(86). (AAP Image/Joe Castro) ...continued from p16 13.15 (93) to 12.14 (86) loss to the Cats. It was the eighth time in the streak that Geelong have won by nine points or less. “I think we need to introduce a freshness at the club that doesn’t exist at the moment because so many of the personnel have been there for a number of years,” Kennett told 3AW. “They have been listening to the same voice for too long.” Kennett, one of the AFL’s most outspoken figures, resigned as Hawks president at the end of last season. The Hawks have not beaten Geelong since their upset 2008 grand final win. Before they next met in 2009, Kennett notoriously boasted that Geelong lacked the mental drive of his team. Geelong coach Chris Scott and Clarkson played down the significance of the streak post-
match. But the look on Clarkson’s face immediately after the final siren on Monday seemed to say “not again”. Asked if the Hawks suffered any injuries in the game, Clarkson replied: “just a bruised ego - we’ll have to get rid of that pretty quickly, get it back tomorrow. “They’re a good opponent, they’ve been a great side and we haven’t got there this time. “We’ll keep pegging away and we’ll get there eventually.” Cats captain Joel Selwood was best afield, with Scott comparing his efforts to the heroics of Gary Ablett in Gold Coast’s upset win on Saturday night over St Kilda. The Hawks led by 30 points in the second term, but Clarkson felt Geelong’s two late goals in the quarter were crucial. Geelong hit the front in the third term and never gave up the lead again. Hawthorn made a late charge with the last two goals of the match, but the Cats were able to prevail again. “It’s illogical to say that a team that was completely different in 2009 still has a hold over a team in 2013,” Scott said. “I hope our fans enjoy this for everything it’s worth, because it’s not going to last forever.” By Roger Vaughan
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over 80% of the AIS team end up playing in the AFL competition. “Last year’s number one NAB AFL Draft pick, Lachie Whitfield, played in the 2012 Easter series along with 9 other players that made senior debuts in Round 1 of the 2013 AFL season, and we’re sure to see the top 2013 AFL Draft picks on the field. “Victorians Jack Billings, Tom Boyd and Josh Kelly are standouts that will play this Saturday,” MacCormack said. Players in previous academies include the likes of Chris Judd (West Coast/Carlton), Luke
Hodge (Hawthorn), Joel Selwood (Geelong), Lance Franklin (Hawthorn), Adam Cooney (Western Bulldogs), David Swallow (Gold Coast), Stephen Coniglio (♯2 draft pick for GWS in 2011) and Lachie Whitfield (#1 draft pick in 2012). The European squad is made up of top players from Denmark, England, France, Ireland, Scotland, Sweden and Germany. AFL Europe have secured the services of Sydney Swans player Tadhg Kennelly and former Geelong Cat Brad Ottens as head coaches of the European Legion. “These boys have the talent to surprise a couple of the Australian young guns which will lead to a
formally known as Footscray did a total demolition job on the Lions, proving again why the preseason comp is no basis for form whatsoever. Collingwood overcame North Melbourne with only about three fit players on the field, and one of those was Dane Swan’s dragon tattoo. It’s where he gets his power from anyway. Melbourne surprised everyone by being even more rubbish than last year, by getting toweled up by Port. Yes, PORT. Even two days on this is simply unfathomable. And in possibly the most ironically timed performances of all time, Gary Ablett Jr (yep the Son of God) put on a biblical game to single handedly sink the Saints on the Goldy. His last qtr alone just was something to behold. The Kennett curse unbelievably lives on as Hawthorn stuck a fork in the toaster yet again, watching on as Geelong make it 10 in a row since the ’08 GF loss. Luckily things return to normality for round 2 when we get 9 games crammed into just 3 days. Like the great man hopefully we can all resurrect ourselves for work next Monday. great spectacle,” Kennelly said. “The coaching team have had the European boys in camp since Sunday and the squad is really starting to gel and respond to the structures and behaviours we are looking to implement. “I couldn’t be happier with their effort and application to the task.” In addition to the main event, the day will also see the European launch of the AFL 9’s concept with a celebrity match with the likes of Dipper, Stephen Silvagni, Brad Lloyd, Tony Woods, Emma Quayle (football columnist), Tadhg Kennelly and Peter Schwab all having a run. Surrey Sports Park is in Guildford, just a short 35 minute express train ride from Waterloo. The £5 entry includes tickets to the match and the opportunity to win some great prizes, including a signed Sherrin footy and AFL memorabilia. Tickets can be booked at afleurope.org
Slater and Parkinson bow out at Bells DEFENDING champion Mick Fanning survived a day of Rip Curl Pro upsets, but fellow surfing royalty Kelly Slater and Joel Parkinson were shock casualties. Australia’s Fanning won a suddendeath fifth round showdown with Brazilian Raoni Monteiro to make the last eight at Bells Beach. But 11-time world champion Slater and reigning world title-holder Parkinson exited in the third round in the space of a sensational 30 minutes on Monday. Slater, who is battling a mystery back problem, was sent packing by Brazilian Willian Cardoso - a surfer ranked outside the top 34 and competing at Bells as a replacement. The American had been surfing superbly early at Bells, but on Monday struggled to get the right waves and priority when the best sets were rolling in. Slater admitted afterwards to a problem with ligaments around his spine, which the 41-year-old will have scanned before he leaves Australia. “Obviously it’s a bummer (to be eliminated) but I hurt my back a little bit - I’m nowhere near 100 per cent anyway,” Slater said. “At least I’ve got some time - I can rest up for a few weeks. I’ve got to
go and get an MRI and see what’s going on.” In the very next heat, Gold Coast surfer Parkinson had a hard luck story, scoring a perfect 10 and a 9.1 but still getting eliminated by Monteiro by just 0.07 points. Monteiro, competing on the world tour on a wildcard, surfed out of his skin with massive scores of 9.57 and 9.6 in his two best rides. Parkinson rode a massive barrel late in the heat, but was only given a 9.1 when a 9.17 was needed. Yet he was philosophical, admitting he could not have surfed any better in his heat. “It’s hard going out when you’ve got a 10 and a 9.1. You put together an amazing heat and the guy gets you,” Parkinson said. “What more could I have done?” Fanning avenged his best mate Parkinson late on Monday with a fifth round win over Monteiro when he was forced to make the quarter-finals the hard way. Earlier Fanning missed out on direct passage, finishing third in his three-man fourth round heat to South African Jordy Smith and Brazilian Filipe Toledo. In a high-scoring encounter, Smith was red-hot with scores of 9.60 and 9.50 on his best waves to the
FANNING THROUGH: Defending champ Mick Fanning progressed to the quarter finals after beating Raoni Monteiro who had earlier knocked out Joel Parkinson. (AAP Image/ASP/Robertson) Australian’s 8.23 and 8.80. But Fanning survived his battle with in-form Monteiro and was set to face fellow top five surfer Adriano De Souza of Brazil in the quarters, due to be surfed on Tuesday as Australian Times went to print. Australians Kai Otton and Taj Burrow won their way through to an all-Aussie quarter-final showdown. West Australian Burrow pulled through a tight fifth round contest against fellow Aussie Adrian Buchan. By Guy Hand at Bells Beach
Sport | 15
AustralianTimes.co.uk
Give Dugan another chance, say peers
(AAP Image/Penny Bradfield)
...continued from p16 with the NRL delaying a decision on his future until after they meet with Dugan and his manager, possibly as early as Tuesday. While there have been calls from several fronts for the NRL to reject registering a contract for Dugan for the remainder of this season, he has received support from his peers including players from the two clubs which have rejected the former NSW Origin representative. Canberra captain David Shillington, whose club sacked Dugan last month for several off-field breaches, said his former teammate should not be crucified for his errors, while
Broncos prop Ben Hannant called for him to be given a chance to get his life back on track. “I just think Josh Dugan has got plenty of things (in his life) he has to sort out before he comes back to rugby league,” Hannant said. “He’s young, some say a bit immature. “I believe everyone deserves a second chance and this is something he can learn from. “Unfortunately we all make mistakes and do things we regret at times. “Hopefully he can bounce back and learn from this.” By Steve Jancetic and Wayne Heming
Record numbers for Wasps Tag Rugby Festival and spring season competition
White City league leaders, Tumeke, are looking for victory in this Saturday’s Wasps Tag Rugby Festival DESPITE the temperatures still being below double digits and players eagerly awaiting the arrival of spring weather, tag rugby players across the capital have not been deterred. Both the Try Tag Rugby spring season and the 2nd annual Wasps Tag Rugby Festival have attracted record participation numbers. The inaugural Wasps Tag Rugby Festival in 2012 saw 12 teams battle it out for the prize. This year’s figures have almost doubled, with 23 teams currently registered. The Wasps Tag Rugby Festival will kick off on Saturday 6 April at Twyford Avenue Sports Ground in Acton at 11.30am. The ever conquering Chargers are the defending champions but will face tough opposition from Speight’s, Tagquila Sharks and Tumeke. The Chargers and Tumeke are yet to lose a match in 2013. For those players out there who have heard of Tag Rugby but have never played, here is your chance to give it a go in a friendly, social and welcoming environment. Try Tag Rugby will be putting on a handful of free taster sessions so players can see if they enjoy the sport and whether they want to commit to a league. Free taster sessions will be taking place at the following venues: Balham (9 April), Reading (15 April),
Hyde Park (16 April), Southfields (17 April), Shoreditch Park (18 April) and East London RFC (23rApril). If you would like to register for a free taster session, go to www.trytagrugby.com for all details. Try Tag Rugby’s first social outing of the year, the summer season launch party, will be taking place at Waxy O’Connor’s on Friday, 12 April. All Tag Rugby players, partners and friends are welcome to attend to celebrate the arrival of (hopefully) warmer playing conditions during the summer months. Early Summer competition (29 April onwards) registration is now open with leagues taking place at the following venues: Acton, Balham, Borough, Canada Water, East London RFC, Finsbury Park, Fulham, Highbury, Hoxton, Reading, Richmond, Shoreditch Park, Southfields and Wandsworth Town. With a large number of teams returning from their winter breaks and a significant number of new teams expected to join, many venues will fill up quickly. Don’t leave registering until the last minute or your team may miss out! If you would like to register for a Try Tag Rugby Early Summer league, go to www.trytagrugby.com or email info@ trytagrugby.com for more details.
Michael Clarke recovers from gastro AUSTRALIAN cricket captain Michael Clarke spent Sunday in hospital suffering from gastroenteritis, Cricket Australia has confirmed. Clarke, who returned early from Australia’s disastrous Test tour of India with a back complaint, was released from hospital on Monday. “Cricket Australia (CA) today advised that Michael Clarke was hospitalised overnight with gastroenteritis,” the CA statement read. “Clarke has since been discharged from hospital and CA confirms that he is recovering at home.” Clarke is expected to spend the next 10 weeks recovering from his back problem and will miss the IPL to focus on being fit for the Champions Trophy and Ashes series in England.
(AAP Image/Dave Hunt)
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RECORD NUMBERS Cold weather no match for tenacious taggers P15
GALLANT AUSSIES IN UNI BOAT RACE LOSS
n
Australians Alexander Scarp and Alex Fleming were on the losing crew as Oxford beat Cambridge in the 159th University Boat Race held annually in London. Australians Alexander Scharp and Alex Fleming were left shattered as Cambridge fell to favourites Oxford in the historic university boat race in London on Sunday. A year after Australian protester Trenton Oldfield disrupted the race in a protest against elitism, there was far less drama for the 159th running of the event on the River Thames. With security tightened and Oldfield making good on his promise to stay away, the focus was left on the race itself with Oxford taking a narrow lead early and never headed. They won by a length and a half, trimming Cambridge’s overall lead in the event since 1829 to 81-77. No.3 rower Fleming and No.7 Scharp featured in a gallant Cambridge crew that kept in touch for most of the 6.8km race. “I feel a little bit broken and it will probably take a while to digest,” Scharp told AAP. “The race didn’t really work out as we planned but I feel pretty proud of the guys. “I think we put in a brave effort to stay in that long and its a shame that it worked out the way it did.” Law student Scharp was part of the victorious Cambridge crew in 2012 and said the loss would make him hungrier to return for a third straight year. Fellow Victorian Fleming was competing in his first boat race but felt six months of hard work had not gone to waste. “The result doesn’t really change the challenge or the experience,” said Fleming, studying management. “It would have been fantastic to win but I still got a lot out of this.” Thousands of spectators braved the biting cold, bitter wind and a few snow flurries to pack the banks of the Thames for one of the UK’s great sporting traditions. Oxford won in a time of 17 minutes and 27 seconds. - AAP
AFL future stars to make mark in Europe
FOR a third year running, the AFL’s future stars from the Australian Institute of Sport (AIS) Academy Program will take on the European side in the Easter Series near London on Saturday, 6 April. AFL Europe General Manager, Ben MacCormack said spectators will witness the best 30 players at Under 18 level from across Australia when they take on the European Legion at Surrey Sports Park in Guildford. “This match is a window into the future of the game as on average ...continued on p14
Sack Hawks coach says Jeff Kennett FORMER Hawthorn president Jeff Kennett wants coach Alastair Clarkson sacked at the end of this AFL season. The Kennett Curse - Geelong’s winning streak over the Hawks - reached 10 matches on Easter Monday when the Cats won another epic clash by seven points at the MCG. Clarkson’s contract runs until the end of next season, but Kennett was remarkably calling for regime change soon after the ...continued on p14
Dugan blows chances in social media taunts
BELLS TOLL
Parko among the early casualties | p14
HARD LUCK: Joel Parkinson in action at the Rip Curl Pro at Bells Beach. The Aussie was eliminated by Brazilian wildcard Raoni Monteiro despite scoring a perfect 10. (AAP Image/ASP, Kirstin Scholtz)
THE NRL will push ahead with a planned meeting with wild child Josh Dugan this week despite the weekend social media rant which put his return to the field in serious doubt. Dugan put his immediate NRL career on life support after engaging in a vile series of taunts with an antagonist on photosharing website Instagram late on Saturday night, which led to Brisbane pulling out of contract talks with the former Canberra star. It is believed St George Illawarra are still keen on the 22-year-old, ...continued on p15