Opening Night of July National Conference

Our gala event for July National Conference 2007 was held at the Melbourne Town Hall with some 250 attendees. We welcomed all delegates and other participants to our conference through an address from the Honourable James Merino.

We also announced our national awards. Congratulations to AIESEC in Adelaide University under the leadership of Robert Kwok for receiving Local Committee of the Year Award and AIESEC in the University of South Australia under Laura Allen for Developing Local Committee of the Year.

And to all our award winners, you can be incredibly proud of your success:
Excellence in Incoming Exchange: AIESEC in the University of South Australia
Excellence in Outgoing Exchange: AIESEC in Adelaide University
Excellence in People Development: AIESEC in Queensland University of Technology
Excellence in Finance: AIESEC in Monash University
Partnership Award: AIESEC in the University of Queensland
Project Award: AIESEC in the University of Sydney

As it should be

Happy Birthday Mum!

For the first time in two years I am at home to celebrate my mum's birthday with her, as it should be. I have an amazing mother; she's always been whatever I needed her to be and more.

While I'm quite sure there's many things we don't understand about each other, I know that nobody knows me quite like her. That nobody loves me quite like her. She gives more and takes less from our friendship than what I do. You're the person I hope to be in all the things that matter.

Thank you for being all that you are and doing all that you do.

Summer Nights

BBQ weather: my favourite part of summer. The season kicked off this weekend with a birthday/Christmas outdoor feast which I can't see being topped in the coming months. The amount of bread, salad, cheese, chocolate, chicken, fruit and pate eaten was copious (and the Nativity Scene re-enactment too embarrassing to recount!).

After warm days and busy weeks, ending a weekend with good company and a lazy evening is the way to go. I love that this is one of the ways Australian's choose to define themselves - it's so universal.

Home = Habitat

I returned home a few days ago (after locking myself away for studying) and have noticed our backyard turn into somewhat of an animal sanctuary.

We've had 13 Rosellas, 9 ducklings and a Koala call our trees and shrubs home.

I guess that's one of the good things about Australia that I take for granted. It contrasts heavily with when I was last travelling, a trip to Hong Kong - I don't think I saw a single animal (not even an insect) in the city.

I'll put up with Australia's flies if it means we have beautiful birds and unique (if not slightly odd) native animals.

Cheesefest 2006

The name says it all. When I really should have been studying I instead trekked into McLaren Vale with the crew and gorged myself on cheese and wine. There are few guiltier pleasures for a Sunday afternoon.

It was all a bit too exciting.

A celebration of the 8th kind

My little brother turned 8 just a couple of weeks ago and it was a truly great party.

I LOVE kids parties, I get right into the whole 'pass the parcel', 'eat a doughnut hanging from the clothes-line' and 'pin the tail on the donkey/other relevant object' experience. Games co-ordinator is always my role (yes, that's the official title).

What was very special about this occasion though was that it brought such a variety of children together. Shankar attends a new-arrivals school and out of the 10 children there, only about 3 were born in Australia. And looking at them you never would have known it. A lot of the time we hear that kids can be cruel, and they can. But more often than not I see kids being more liberal than adults.

Neglect

Poor blog … and poor-self! I need to dedicate more time to reflection, I've realised how important it is.

Ever so slowly more and more things are entering my list of "when I have time". I even have a folder where I keep a set of interesting emails and articles to read "when I have time".

I think it’s about time I move them into the “I’ll make time” category.

So, certain things I am committing to (outside the norm) in the coming weeks and months are as follows ...
- drawing and painting
- piano
- reading newspapers

Excellent, it's in the personal learning plan!

A good day at uni

Today was one the days where uni is so interesting I hate the thought of ever leaving. We were discussing a hypothetical case of an undergraduate university student who creates a chocolate while on course-credited work-experience. The place of work-experience and the university were attempting to claim all rights to the design and expression - essentially giving the student no claim to his own work.

The number of intellectual property laws alone that had to be considered were huge. There were 12 separate arguments, solely based on copyright, for the student to consider. Because of the legal ignorance of the student he had been taken advantage of.

The average situation I'm faced with in lectures is that we deal with big cases that boil down to insurers fighting insurers who really don't care about a couple million dollars.

But there are some lofty aims of the law that can be forgotten in that situation; there are people who need their rights protected - in this case, they need to be free to be creative.

Adelaide's Crazy People

There are a lot of things to like about Adelaide but something that always reminds me I am home are the resident crazy people.

They seem to weave their way into the make-up of Adelaide city; there's the tram ... there's the Mall's balls ... there's the guy that walks up Rundle barking like a dog. You don't need to be warned against these people, they are harmless eccentrics that remind you Adelaide is a small town.

Well a new person joined the ranks today. She reminded me of "Feral Cheryl" (the anti-Barbie), standing outside the Public Library loudly expressing her opinions on porn.

Cheryl, welcome.