Bundjalung to Brazil

The Northern Rivers Echo last Thursday:

Alstonville High School student Mirryndah Nixon-Anderson’s highest priority while on a 12-month exchange in Brazil is to learn Portuguese and teach her host family some of her own Bundjalung language.
The 16-year-old from Goonellabah leaves for Sao Paulo on Friday where she will live and study for the next year thanks to the Rotary Club of Lismore Central, which is sponsoring the exchange.
As part of the adventure she’ll also go on a 21-day safari in the Amazon and she’s practically jumping out of her skin with anticipation.
“When Rotary rang to offer me the place I ran to tell mum and I was nearly crying I was that excited,” Mirryndah said. “I’ve been counting down every single day – it’s scary but it’s going to be awesome.”
Mirryndah’s dad, a professional Aboriginal dancer with the dance company Descendance, has taught Mirryndah several dances to share with her host family and her aunty Patsy Nagas has given her some paintings to give as presents. She already knows some Bundjalung language and is also looking forward to telling Bundjalung stories and leaving her hosts with a sense of what her own culture is all about.
“I think it’s important to tell them about where I come from because Aboriginal Australia isn’t really a well-known culture overseas,” she said. “I want to share some of that history with them.”

I'm sure everyone wishes Mirryndah the very best as she embarks on the trip of a young lifetime.

Photograph from The Northern River Echo

Turnbull and Joyce: exactly who holds the reins?

Ever since John Howard stirred the possum in a classic piece of political mischief, by encouraging the Queensland Liberal National Party's Senator Barnaby Joyce to consider moving from the federal upper house to the lower house, it has been interesting to watch the bull ants scurry about the disturbed nest.

According to The Australian:
"SENIOR Nationals have hatched a plan to breach the constitution of Queensland's Liberal National Party to ensure that a National takes the Senate spot of Barnaby Joyce if he shifts to the House of Representatives.
The move has shaken the Liberal Party, which is guaranteed the spot under the LNP constitution if it is vacated, and threatens to split the recently formed LNP in the run-up to a state election.
Liberal sources said federal Opposition Leader Malcolm Turnbull had told the LNP leadership through intermediaries that the plan was unacceptable to him and to the Liberal Party.
Mr Turnbull declined to comment yesterday."

It's all rather amusing when you consider that Joyce and other Queensland LNP pollies are now members of the Queensland branch of the Liberal Party of Australia and up to six of these MPs have a right to sit in the Liberal Party Room according to Senator Mitch Fifield in his recent Finding Our Way Back speech to the Young Liberals.

Indeed Fifield was quite blunt about the type of dilemma that Turnbull now finds himself in:
"The simple fact is if we are not in Coalition, we can’t win. We won’t win. If we are not in Coalition at the next election we may as well not bother turning up. 1987 is a case in point, where the coalition split caused by the Joh for PM push cost John Howard any chance of victory."

Yep, a divorce at this stage will cost the Libs any chance at either gaining power at this year's Queensland election or the 2010 federal election.
Mal needs to take it like a man, because the Nats appear to have the upper hand for now and they know it.

What on earth was eBay's Australian management thinking?

I know that eBay is now an extremely large online business with a high traffic volume, but nothing excuses finding this posted on its Australian website this week.

One is never permitted to mention a chappie called [redacted] who employs Pakistani slave labour to churn out shockingly putrid copies of early [redacted]. We are not permitted to ever mention his trade name which ends with [redacted] or his second personal name which approximates the Brand Name of Australia's leading Lawn Mower which is a Beauty of a Mulching Beast called a [redacted]. Off limits too is any reference to his well known past time of grooming young lads on the internet by sending them unsolicited gifts - junk which some poor Pakistani labourer has spent a day making for 4 or 5 rupees. He is not only protected by the Storm Troopers of the Gulag Much Vaunted Safety Division here at the Bay but also by the FBI who despatch IC3 agents all over the world whenever he sqeaks or squeals ............

The fact that eBay Australia does little to rein in this serial offender against good taste and good manners speaks volumes for its obviously lackadaisical attitude towards the company's wide pool of clients and their customers.

Makes one think twice about buying or selling on this site which appears to have a high tolerance for inappropriate and splenetic posts.

A Sunday meander through Northern Rivers art

Rock Pools At Brooms Head by Steven Giese
A Dog's Tale by Julie Hutchings
A Native Waterlily by Debrah Novak

All three artists exhibit at Arthouse Australia, Yamba NSW