Letters/Articles continued from page 11 Red Devil Park to the sports centre, with access points at Railway Friendly Bar and Mitre 10, and additional access through a link at the Shirley Street Caltex through to Wentworth Street. Build a comprehensive set of bike trails servicing the town centre. Encourage more public transit by bus and minivan. (While the railway could be great for tourism, waiting for it could be Waiting For Godot and truthfully, how many people are going to give up their cars especially without paid parking in town?) West Byron can wait while Council resolves these things. At the rate Council is going, plan on ten years. Then, proceed with the West Byron development as a cutting-edge national example of how to build an off-grid, sustainable ‘suburb’ complete with permaculture landscape designs, hempcrete buildings, solar panels, rainwater tanks – the works. Stop kicking the can down the road seeking more community input. The ideas are all around and residents are sick of the endless banter and no action. Make a commitment to showing the rest of the country how it is done. At the rate Council is going, Byron will be left behind. Edward Kent Suffolk Park
Don’s a legend A quick thankyou to Don Page MP. I was given a tour by you of your parliamentary office in Sydney as part of a high school captains tour of the NSW Parliament House in 2010. I had the opportunity to meet you at various school functions over the year. The dedicated representation you’ve provided to your local community over 26 years (longer than I’ve been alive) is inspirational. You have greatly assisted my university career, as I now have nearly completed my Bachelor of Economics at Queensland University. Thanks Don, you’re a legend! Elliott Johnson School captain, Byron Bay High School 2010 Clunes
Strange emissions A friend from Murwillumbah told me that ‘smart’ electricity meters are currently being rolled out there. This follows a letter from Origin Energy to customers in our area stating there will be ‘no more door knocking’. It appears to pave the way for installers to enter a person’s property without informed consent. There is
The Mullumbimby Kid continues his dreaming peered from those rickety doors, dogs barked; paw-paws clung to the heavy air and bananas were tiered to the sun.
Michael McDonald
One of the more prolific sons of Mullumbimby, poet, artist and ‘lapsed scientist’ Edwin Wilson, has published Mullumbimby Dreaming under his imprint Woodbine Press. The book is a collection of his artwork and poems, along with drawings by Elizabeth McAlpine, who illustrated several of Wilson’s books before her death from breast cancer in 2006. While it stands in its own right as an impressive and interesting book, Mullumbimby Dreaming will also serve as the catalogue for Wilson’s exhibition at the Tweed Regional Gallery from Friday August 8 to October 12. That Wilson is prolific is attested to by the inside covers of Mullumbimby Dreaming, which display the cover images of the artist’s 25 books. And fortunately the contents of the book prove that Wilson is talented as well as prolific. It is an excellent summary of the development of his pomassive opposition in Victoria where nearly 100,000 households are refusing these devices. A smart meter on your home will emit health-affecting microwaves, snoop into your appliance usage, and quite possibly result in higher bills. While posing as green and energy efficient, they are part of a global agenda to dominate, profile and milk consumers. Wake up, Byron Shire! Go online today and search ‘refuse smart meters’. Helen Burns Byron Bay The wi-fi paranoids have again come down from the hills to fabricate a case for its danger. If anyone cares to do a search on wi-fi radiation and health they will find that at the levels of radiation posed by routers and PC-type devices no reputable bodies have found evidence of danger to health. Princeton University states, ‘It is the general consensus of the scientific community that the level of RF exposure due to wireless networks is so low compared to the many other RF sources in the modern environment that health concerns from wifi exposure are not an issue.’ The precautionary principle recommended is to continue monitoring, not to abandon the use of wi-fi. Of course, there is one major adverse health effect that is oc-
Q
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Rainforest clawed along the creek with lawyer-vine and maiden’s blush, as virgins waiting for the priest; and grapes hung purple in a tree-fern Parthenon, planted by Greek farmer – Pan played a giddy tune in the lantana. Detail from The Mullumbimby Kid, by Edwin Wilson.
etry and art over the decades. Not only poetry and art, but also botany and history. In his artist’s statement Wilson covers some of the history associated with his memoir The Mullumbimby Kid, and the mystery associated with his half-brother, also christened Edwin James,
who he only made contact with at the age of 61. Wilson’s love of plants – he put his science degree to use for 20 years at the Royal Botanic Gardens in Sydney – melds together playfully with history in poems such as Mullumbimby Creek (Grapes Growing Wild):
curring that could be avoided. This is the unnecessary anxiety caused by the spreading of unfounded fears of wifi by the wi-fi paranoids. But they are in luck. Only the other week I overheard a woman in a cafe say that she was wearing an amber bracelet which shielded her from wi-fi radiation. That sounds just as sensible as the wi-fi paranoia to me. But if you want a more scientific approach you could use a Faraday cage shield and wrap your house in tinfoil (insulation in the walls and roof) or wear a tinfoil hat to protect you head. Or they could rely on the inverse square law, stay in the hills, and leave the business of wi-fi radiation to those of us who actually live in the towns. John Purssey Mullumbimby
One shministi said, ‘I will not lend my own hand to the occupation and to acts that contradict my most basic values: human rights, democracy and the personal responsibility each and every human being bears towards fellow human beings.’ Criticism of the Israeli government and support for BDS (Boycott, Divestment and Sanctions) against Israeli companies like Soda Stream triggers accusations of anti-semitism and Israel-hating but critical Jews are labelled ‘self-hating’. M Mizzi advises me to ‘divert (my) attention to Chinese mining companies’ but China is Israel’s third-largest trading partner, and bilateral trade between the two countries was worth over $10 billion in 2013. China is second only to the US in joint high-tech projects with Israel’s Chief Scientist Office, and has surpassed Europe as the second leading source of high-tech capital. There are also growing calls in Israel to restart the arms trade with China, although currently US pressure has prevented this from happening. No doubt these partners in persecution share an ethic of ruthless exploitation and it’s probably only a matter of time before we see Israeli weapons levelled at Tibetans. Gareth W R Smith Byron Bay Letters about Bentley blockade overleaf
Israel and China M Mizzi claims I hate Israel (Letters, April 22), which is curious given that I support, among others, the Israeli Committee Against House Demolitions, B’Tselem (The Israeli Information Center for Human Rights in the Occupied Territories) and Yesh Gvul (supporting military refusniks). Byron Friends of Palestine salute the wonderful young Israelis who refuse military conscription and pay like Or Ben-David with repeated prison terms.
Where the road ends at Mullumbimby Creek, Greek Cypriots built stilt homes after the war on black volcanic stones; dark-eyed children
Q Mullumbimby Dreaming and some of Edwin Wilson’s poems can be downloaded in PDF at edwinwilson.com. au and the paper version of the book is available at The Bookshop, Mullumbimby. See the Tweed gallery at http:// artgallery.tweed.nsw.gov.au.
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The Byron Shire Echo April 29, 2014 13