The Voice September 2015

SEPTEMBER ISSUE 2015

FROM THE EDITOR Sometimes, things change suddenly and unexpectedly.

You discover knitting.

A parent quietly announces they’ve ‘met someone’. Woolworths discontinues your favourite chip flavour. (Something witty about Prime Ministers is probably in order, but it’s hardly ‘unexpected’). A car accident wipes your meagre savings. Or, in my case, they need a new assistant, the editor gets an actual job and suddenly, you’re it.

(yes, we actually have one).

It’s “For a Greater Vision of World Needs”; has been for 120 years. In an age where our first-world government insists on destroying natural wonders, stripping privacy laws and imprisoning doctors who report child abuse on Nauru, we need to wake from our apathy. Students were once the curse of politics. It’s high time to lift our eyes from Netflix and remember it.

We’ve had a bit of a hiatus, as our wonderful editor Charlotte found herself employed as a teacher. Thus, steering the sunny catamaran that is The Voice became my unexpected thing this year, right after an unusually spontaneous backpacking trip and eating pork belly (yep, I’m pretty controversial).

My goals for this editorship are many, and they’ll reveal themselves as we track merrily along.

While we work out exactly what that entails, we can write, photograph, film, create and write and write and reflect on life in this little Bubble. We want your stories, your artwork, your musings, your poetry, your rave reviews and raging opinions. The traditional Chaff may be punishable by death, but there’s a world of un-fine-able words for us to write. Plus, we get five months of holidays to take advantage of Jetstar sales and see the world (or, Bali and Melbourne).

For now, let’s take a sentimental moment to reflect on Avondale’s motto

It’s in this spirit that we bring you The Travel Issue 2015, the September Issue that

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Claudia Houstoun The Voice Editor 2015

Vogue only wishes it could be.

If you want to concur Alex’s choice of Cambodian dish, write an anonymous love letter/stalker note to the person in your Christian Studies lecture, or disagree with Levi’s opinion about Tasmania, write and tell us!

It’s your Voice.

Editor Claudia Houstoun Graphic Designer Blake Parkinson Thanks: Equipped Bible study Thannaka Kenneth Branagh No Thanks: Parking fees Basketball fees Netball fees Fees in general Write to us! Message us www.facebook.com/ TheVoiceAvondale or email thevoice@avondale.edu.au

CONTENTS

CONTRIBUTING WRITERS

2. From the Editor

Alex McAndrew

4. President’s Piece

Alex’s profile picture is him with kids. Get on it, ladies.

5. Vox Pop 6. The Long Haul

Joshua Page

8. When The Earth Shakes

Writing from Kathmandu, Nepal, Josh says: “Krismasko subhakamana!”

10. Social

Ellia Redman

12. Wo {man}

Ever been in a room with 70,000 Adventists? Ellia has.

14. Hometown Heroes 16. The GC 17. In the Silent State 18. While you were sleeping

Blake Parkinson Our-long-suffering graphic designer, we felt Blake deserved to have his face in the magazine for once Dayn Mckay Helping Hand to 31 people and half of Toowoomba, Dayn was always destined for presidency.

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PRESIDENTIAL PEICE Welcome to another semester! I know a welcome sounds a bit silly so many weeks in - I’m sorry it’s taken so long. There have been several changes for the ASA this semester, including The Voice team, and I’m thankful to those people who have stepped up to fill the roles!

I, like most of you, have been super busy. The past seven weeks have flown by. I feel as though I’ve hardly had time to think about important stuff, such as what I’ll be doing next year, and it’s starting to worry me a little! I have, however, come to the realisation that my time is quickly running out at Avondale, which has caused me to reflect a little on my time here. I’ve been able to achieve some of the things I was hoping to, but I’ve always struggled to know how we can improve the spiritual tone of the campus.

Most of us know why Avondale is here, but we don’t often think about it. If asked why we come to Avondale, I think many of us would have answers like: to get a degree, for fun, to meet people (someone), or that we didn’t know what else to do with our lives. All these reasons suggest that we are here in the hope that we can set ourselves up for a successful (comfortable) life.

If you weren’t aware, Avondale was set up as a missionary training college, a place people could come and learn so that they were more prepared to go out to the world and serve God. The place is a lot different to what it was 100 years ago, however, I like to think this is still the reason Avondale is here.

We all need to remember that we are missionaries in training, preparing ourselves for service in whatever adventure God calls us to in life. I believe if we all had this mindset it would change the atmosphere here. Neither I nor any other leader/staff member/administrator can do much to change the spiritual climate – it’s up to all of us. Fixing our mindsets in the right direction can also help ‘soon to be graduates’ like me stop worrying about the future – we’ll be ready for anything with God by our side.

Time is short, just like my word limit. Use your time to make a positive difference – starting now.

Dayn McKay Student President 2015

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VOX POP! WHAT’S YOUR MOST UNUSUAL TRAVEL DREAM?

Emma King

Marie Bingham

To go and visit more third-world countries.

One day I want to become a teacher missionary in a third world country!

I’m planning to travel to America with a friend and go to ComicCon to meet all the actors we love! Plus, all the places from Man Finds Food to sample what he ate!

Talyse Cameron To go to Iceland and frolic in a field full of yellow flowers in front of a huge waterfall.

Travis Metz I actually have a dream to go Mexico and work for Ricardo’s Uncle Juan, because then I get to travel the world for free.

Jesse Herford It might sound disgusting, but I’ve always wanted to try deep-fried Mars Bar from Scotland. That, and go Nessie hunting.

Ricardo Cortes My dream is to return to my motherland, reclaim my title of “Uncle Juan” and hire Travis’ services as my main courier Meagan Bull Being a massive flower person, I dream of going to Japan for the cherry blossom season. It would be the most magical experience!

Caleb Hindley I would love to visit Machu Picchu, Peru.

Not just for the ruins but I would love to explore the mountains around them. I love mountains!

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THE LONG HAUL , A CHAT WITH ALEX Name: Alex McAndrew Age: 21 years old

Degree: BEd Secondary Tell us a little about your adventures over the last year or two in Cambodia. What did they involve?

Since my first year I’ve been to Cambodia five times doing a few different things. The first couple of times I was on short-term mission trips and the other times were individual volunteer jobs with various organisations.

Over the past year, I worked at a school in Phnom Penh teaching English and Drama, helped run church programs such as Adventist Junior Youth and Sabbath Schools, and volunteered at small NGO’s in my free time.

Did you volunteer with an aid organisation? was this difficult?

Yeah I have done some work with aid organisations. Working with NGO’s definitely has its difficulties. There are so many and each of them wholeheartedly believe that what they’re doing is right, but there are still many that seem to be hurting rather than helping.

It’s extremely difficult to try and bring positive change to these places.

Why do you think long term volunteering is important?

I believe that long term volunteering is most effective because the volunteer is able to get to know the people, language and culture.

By building relationships and spending some time at the beginning learning and observing, there is much better chance of having a positive impact.

Why Cambodia?

What was your favourite story from your time overseas?

That’s where God wants me to be. Ever since I first went there on a One Mission trip, I’ve felt that Cambodia is where God wants to use me at this time.

My favourite story is a long one that involves a cross country trip, gibbons, the Cambodian jungle, motorbike accidents, no money, falling off bridges and helpful friends. It’s far too

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long to type, if you want to hear it, come and see me.

What was the hardest moment you faced in Cambodia?

What is your favourite Cambodian dish?

It was always hard hearing about my student’s struggles and situations and trying to help.

But the thing that hit me the most was a traffic accident where two people died. It was pretty difficult to deal with.

Lok lak is a classic that I love.

Did you find it easy to pick up the language?

As the year progressed it became easier. I was really intentional about learning in the beginning, then the more I knew, the easier it became.

How did volunteering work, practicallyfinancially, in terms of your degreedid you have to take time off to do this?

I pretty much put my Australian life on hold.

My degree has been pushed back a year so it sucks I won’t be graduating this year with my classmates. But it was worth putting things on hold for the year I’ve had. I was given a stipend that was paid by Adventist Volunteer Services and that was fine if you’re just shopping at the local market and not being too Western with your spending.

What are your plans for the future?

Cambodia is definitely in my future. Whether I’m only there during school breaks, or for the next few years. I’m not sure where God wants me to be yet, so currently I’m just researching and discussing with various NGO’s and I know God will lead me. For now I’ll just keep chipping away at my degree.

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WHEN THE EARTH SHAKES

By Joshua Page

When people move out of home the first time, they usually don’t go to another hemisphere: but I did. I’m one of three 2014 Avondale graduates sent across Asia for ADRA internships: Tracy Hamilton in Cambodia, Emma McCrow in Myanmar, and I’m writing from Nepal, the gem of the Himalayas.

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Ten Avondale IPDS students visited Nepal last year to monitor ADRA projects. During that trip, the country tugged on my heart.

Was it unique and mystical, or would I have felt the same anywhere else? I’ll never know.

But I do know that at the end of the hardest year of my life, slumped across lists of half-hearted Plan B’s, watching my medical dreams for 2015 running away almost as fast as graduation was running towards me, it took barely a hint of a possibility to reawaken the tugging. Two months after graduating, I boarded a plane bound for Kathmandu.

I quickly learned that the mind adjusts to a short visit and an impending return home much easier than settling down in a foreign country. The inconveniences which had seemed like an adventure last year were a pain now. It was too easy to claim inconveniences as scapegoats, convincing even myself that my leaking toilet cistern or the power outages or the two days of indecipherable meetings in Nepali were really what was bothering me, not being 8000 kilometres away from home.

And there was the food too. For the first month, I loved dal bhat, the rice and lentils eaten twice daily by the Nepalese.

In the second month, I dreaded mealtimes.

But in the third month, I crossed a threshold and found I could happily eat it every day.

A visiting team of Australians gave me not only fantastic company, but an opportunity to realise how much I’d adjusted.

I’ll never forget the ANZAC day centenary.

The earthquake hit at 11:56 am, and within a minute the nine of us meeting for church had scrambled down the stairs, out the door and onto the street. My adrenaline was pumping, and I’d never been in an earthquake before. I had no scale of comparison, and no concept of how badly the country had been hit.

A 7.9 magnitude earthquake that killed 8,692 people, injured over 20,000 and displaced 2.8 million hadn’t crossed my mind.

I definitely experienced survivor guilt. Even messages praising God for my survival were hard to swallow: I’d read stories of churches collapsing and congregations being lost.

My blood boiled when I read in an Adventist publication that no Adventists had died. Were the 8,692 less worthy, less human? Even at the ADRA office, there’s only one other Adventist.

The rest of our staff are Hindu. All but one of

my dedicated colleagues were left out by this twisted yardstick which gave assurances of peace where there was no peace.

A month later, I stepped out of a restaurant, puzzled to see small candles. A glance either way showed people coming out of their houses and adding more. To this day, I can only assume it started spontaneously.

Abandoning all plans to go to bed, I found my landlord instead, who woke his family and walked out with me. For several kilometres, candles lined both sides of the road. Where rubble still spilled over onto the streets, the line of candles continued unbroken over it. At our neighbourhood’s largest intersection, a map of Nepal had been made of tikka powder, with 8,692 emblazoned in Devanagari across it.

Tonight was not a time for sleep; I wandered the streets silently for a good hour. It was the most cathartic experience of my life.

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SOC

Fiesta Greek

CIAL

a and Night

WO{MAN} of the month!

Josh Kros

JADE MORGAN Describe your favourite experience from this semester thus far:

What’ s something you’re really passionate about?

Living in Cooranbong is awfully lonely when everyone goes home, so my favourite part of the semester was probably the first day, running into dorms seeing all my overly excited and crazy friends again.

I’m really passionate about a lot of things; I tend to be an overly enthusiastic person! But, definitely creativity. Whether it’s art, drama, writing or music, it has power to bring out truth in people and the world. It has the ability to speak to people who normally wouldn’t listen. It can grow people and unite people; if it’s used well it can be revolutionary.

What do you look for in a man?

Someone willing to laugh with me and enjoy the simple things in life, like the beach and lazy Sundays. He should have a heart for God and commit 100% to the things he does. Also, has to be able to put up with (and hopefully learn to love) my nutty family and herds of giggling girlfriends!

What is your favourite thing to do on the daily around college?

I love lunch. I’m an off-campus student so going out and sitting in the sun, getting a vanilla latte from Rejuve and catching up with all my friends is the best part of my day.

If you could travel anywhere with anyone for a month: I’d love to road trip and explore Italy, staying in fancy hotels around the countryside and coast! I’d probably take my boyfriend and some of my girlfriends.

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If you could only eat the same food for the rest of the year: This shouldn’t be the hardest question but it totally is. I’m a huge sushi addict!

If you could be any age for a week, what age would you be?

I’d go back to being 10 again. I’d still be stronger than my little brother, I’d have so much power!

If you could go back in time, what event would you see?

Creation for sure. Imagine being able to sit back and watch God do His thing and bring everything into existence. How incredibly mind-blowing would that be?

ss introduces two of Avondale’s finest.

MAYER FLAMENCO What are you looking to achieve by the start of 2016?

Becoming a Calvin Klein model.

What do you look for in a woman?

Down to earth, good sense of humour, able to be my personal masterchef, loyal and likes to watch The Notebook or Netflix and just chill.

Describe your perfect lunch: Having some Mi Goreng at the top of the Eiffel Tower with Taylor Swift If you could go back in time, what event would you see?

I would go back and see QLD smash NSW again!

What is your favourite thing to do on the daily around college?

If you could only eat the same food for the rest of the year:

It’ll definitely have to be going to the toilet!

Mi Goreng for days!

If you could travel anywhere with anyone for a month:

If you could be any age for a week, what age would you be?

Around the world! I would spend a week in each continent with Jennifer Lawrence.

17 again! Then there’s a chance I’d be Zac Efron.

What is something you’re really passionate about?

Define success:

Music, motivating others and eating!

Putting a smile on someone’s face. Putting on a pair of brand new socks. Making Mi Goreng in under two minutes.

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Who is a person that captures your hometown in a nutshell?

Brad Martin

Viema Murray

Newcastle is basically known for two things: The Steelworks and the Knights. But frankly BHP shut down before most of you were born and the less said about the Knights this season the better, so let me tell you about Hamish.

Bridgetown, WA. You’ve probably never heard of it. Understandable, given that its population barely tips 2,300 people. My family and I affectionately call it “Fridgetown”, a place so cold its citizens knit scarves for the trees in the main street.

Hamish is a surfer by day and a doctor by night, and he is the only man I’ve ever met who can rock a mint cableknit sweater as both business and casual. He can diagnose your stomach condition and prescribe where to find the best pide or coffee in town, but you’re more likely to find him on call, heading for the best break between Old Bar and the Hawkesbury.

It’s the home of my Grandad, who has lived there for I-don’t-even-remember-how-long.

He’s in his late seventies but robust, with salt-and-pepper hair and skin like the leather of an ancient saddle. He’s lived in this overlooked part of Australia for his entire life. When he talks about his youth – leaving school in his early teens to work, breaking in wild horses, saving his trusty cattledog from a particularly vicious kangaroo – his faded-denim eyes glitter as his gravelly voice hums along.

I couldn’t give you an exact reason I love Newcastle, but I do. I couldn’t give you an exact definition of a Novocastrian, but Hamish is more Newcastle than Nobbys and Nathan Tinkler combined.

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Then, he sits back in his favourite armchair, his eyelids flutter, and he dozes, his face illuminated by the glow from the fireplace.

Even when he’s asleep, I still reckon he’s one of the strongest people I know.

HEROES Sophia Husband

Levi Ross

Alstonville, NSW. It’s difficult to convey the heroic qualities of a power couple like Geof and Trudi without sounding like I’ve swallowed a thesaurus full of long gushy words. After successfully completing the matrimonial (and nursing) degree at Avondale, they moved to the bustling metropolis of Alstonville. But they were not content to sit idly at home. Instead, they embarked on a mission that has seen them serve the people of Toomelah for over 15 years. Toomelah is a remote indigenous community about five hours west of Lismore.

Geof and Trudi faithfully lead a STORMCo group to it every year, fostering relationships with the community by running kid’s clubs, fun adventure activities and youth nights.

Tasmania. What a place. Hard to pick a person that embodies or defines a place like that. Truly, they’d have to be a majestic, ruggedly handsome, windswept being with unpredictable tendencies and a passion for courting a multitude of people at once.

Someone like… well, the recent Bachelor who, might I remind you ladies, is a PE teacher from Tassie. Alas, someone to embody my hometown, Smithton, will be slightly different. It’s a dairy-forestry town in the North West. Think free spirit; think insatiable need for rain, green grass and a million dollars to blow on a tractor with air-cab suspension and 16 speed gearbox.

Fun fact: there are eight thousand people around Smithton and about sixty-eight thousand dairy cows.

Their dedication has allowed Geof and Trudi to empower the youth of Toomelah and they continue to inspire STORMCo team members to use their gifts to make a tangible difference in the lives of others.

So, Tasmania? Think Brad Stanton, think the Bachelor, Chris Evans, Robert Downey-Jr, Dwayne Johnson, Bear Grylls and Mark Wahlberg, all rolled into one sleepy, high-octane-beauty-adventure so tough we couldn’t be connected to any other state of Australia. Think Smithton, Tasmania? Think enough milk to run the Sanitarium factory until the trucks destroy the speed bumps.

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The GC

By Ellia Redman

Growing up, I have always enjoyed spending time with family, coming together and laughing. My family is an average size: grandparents, a couple of aunts and uncles, and the resulting cousins. It’s a good family, decent size. However, I’ve always wished it was bigger.

This break, I went on a mission trip to Chiapas, Mexico, with the organisation ShareHim. We conducted a two-week seminar series, then travelled to America to attend the Seventh-day Adventist General Conference Session. Being in a city with 70,000 Adventists was pretty amazing. I like to think it’s a tiny taste of Heaven.

The highlight of the GC, for me, was undoubtedly the night meetings. Each world division, from Africa to the Middle East to South America, shared its news.

It was amazing to see how God is still using His people around the world. The song service was spectacular, especially on Sabbath. Hearing the words of hymns being sung for God by so many people, it’s deafeningly powerful.

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It fills you with new fire for God and His plans for His people. I would like to encourage you all, no matter who you are, where you come from, or what you plan to do with your life: go out, meet our wider church family, fellowship with them, minister to them and most importantly, tell more people about our amazing God. In that moment of singing, as I looked around at the people from all parts of the world, it dawned on me that every single person in that stadium loves God. They are His sons and daughters and we are the family of God. The Avondale family is just a small part of our wider church family. My family is bigger than I could have ever imagined.

“Go ye therefore, and teach all nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Spirit.”

Matthew 28:19

In the Silent State

By Claudia Houstoun

“Don’t worry if you work out someone’s following you – it’s just the government monitoring you.”

Such were the comforting words of my friend, newly employed in the capital of South East Asia’s most secretive nation. When Dad first heard I’d be visiting her, his worry eclipsed his carpe diem: “You do know there’s an insurgency there, right?” I’d laughed it off, but suddenly it all felt rather 1984. My friend’s advice continued: “Don’t say anything bad about the country in public, be careful what you Google and if you’re interviewed by a spy, be honest. They’re everywhere.”

The next day, I wander the capital’s crumbling streets. Fifty years ago, the military shot its way into power, closed the country away from the world and tried to limit the inevitable stagnation of its infrastructure. Some things seem torn from a 1970s design book, like Happy World. It’s an amusement park, where couples sit secretively under parasols as monks paddle away on duck-shaped boats and play arcade games. Further downtown, there’s the British Empire’s divorce settlement: swathes of spectacular colonial buildings, now crumbling fleapits. They’re probably not too keen to preserve that part of the past.

The country is global Capitalism’s newest darling, though, and its first KFC opened just a month ago. As I stand on the corner of an amazingly busy street, map in hand, an elegant lady stops to ask: “Where you want to go?”

“The temple – it’s down this street?”

“Yes, you follow me.”

We walk behind a flurry of pedestrians and make occasional conversation. Her eyes are unnervingly businesslike and her questions oddly specific – “What’s your address? What bus line are you using? What date are you leaving?”

Bingo, I think, here’s my spy. Legend says the temple is 2,500 years old and as we walk around it, she tells me of her children and kneels to venerate the Buddha. Pointing down a derelict street, she invites me to tea to meet her boyfriend from Germany. I decide that being trafficked isn’t on the ol’ bucket list and make my excuses.

We eat expensive expat pasta in my friend’s apartment that night and I tell her of my spy adventure. “You silly,” she rolls her eyes, “only men are spies”.

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While You Were Sleeping…

City of Fremantle council is looking to bring the Tiny House movement to Australia: “The median house price in Fremantle is $810,000, this is unaffordable to many good people. Many people would be happier with a modest home than a McMansion.” Tiny Houses are simple, cabin-like homes, generally costing under $20,000 to build. Read more about Tiny Houses here: http://tinyurl.com/lwmkvyd

Two five-year-old boys in Russia recently escaped from kindergarten to buy a luxury car. After several days’ planning, they dug a hole under the daycare fence with sandpit spades and walked two kilometres to a Jaguar dealership. The boys’ parents haven’t made any formal complaints to the kindergarten.

Source: WA Today

Palaeontologists from the University of Milan recently discovered that Palaeolithic people ate oats and other such grains. Response from the palaeo-diet community has thus far been unhelpful: “Abburdagoph, oogabooga mooorph” said one local palaeo man.

Australians can now list on EnoughRoom. org to offer spare rooms to asylum seekers in need of transitional housing. “I had this sense of powerlessness about the refugee issue about a year ago,” said the founder, “but it’s exploded. We have about 100 registered with the site and about 10 of those should be ready to host within a week.”

Source: SBS News

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Source: SBS News

Source: SBS News

Australia has entered Syria’s conflict with Islamic State. The country’s civil war began in 2011 and has since killed 200,000 people and displaced 4 million. Australia’s engagement with the conflict is thus far limited to air strikes of Islamic State bases in both Syria and Iraq. [Ex]Prime Minister Tony Abbot (RIP) said: “Destroying this death cult is essential, not just to ending the humanitarian crisis in the Middle East but also to ending the threat to Australia and the wider world.”

The South Korean government has built a network of digital-detox camps around the country to help its 2 million internet addicts.

The camps target children, with estimates that 1 in every 10 South Korean children is addicted to internet-based activities. Campers are taught to self-regulate their emotions and rekindle face-to-face friendships, during 12 days in the mountains.

Source: ABC News

Source: ABC News

Prediction: artisanal toast will soon become the next hipster food craze in Australia.

Watch this space.

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