Jawun Secondment 2018

The past weeks have been very busy, with meetings and writing up my recommendations and final report. So busy that I haven't taken the time to write any posts to keep you updated. Last week I got to sit in on a meeting of the Central Australian Academic Health Science Centre. This MRFF funded Centre is a partnership between health services, health/medical research organisations and educational institutions in Central Australia. They're set to fund collaborative work to benefit the health of Central Australians, and the NPY Women's Council recently became a full partner to the Centre. During the meeting funding applications were assessed and discussed, and a good number of projects were funded for the next two years. Although the Women's Council wasn't a party to any of the current applications, we got a very good sense of what is required to successfully obtain funding for some very relevant projects in the next round.  It also gave me a stronger understandin...

If you're spending six weeks around Alice Springs, you can't pass up on the opportunity to go see one of the most impressive sights Australia has to offer. Uluru presents majestic insights in ancient cultures, history and geology. Two other Jawun secondees and I drove to Uluru last weekend (~ 4.5 hrs by car) to take in the majestic rock and its surroundings, and hear some of the stories that the local people associate with it. It was a magical experience, enhanced by a most excellent tour guide for our walk around the bas e, and the great company of Mick and Jillian.                 Estimates for how long people have lived in Australia vary, with conservative numbers quoting at least 30,000 years, and some studies pointing towards a human presence well over 100,000 years. Hearing some these people's stories that are set around Uluru, about how the rock came to be, and how these stories fit in storylines that connect t...

We're now over half way of the five weeks that we have to deliver our projects. Yesterday, we had the midway debrief session, with all the Jawun secondees. In style, we got out of town and gathered round a campfire, where every secondee spoke briefly (and some a bit less briefly) about the way they were tackling their projects, how they felt they were progressing and what the major challenges had been for them. I feel very lucky that my project is a very close fit to what I don't get to do much in my normal role, but do enjoy doing very much. And with my work experience in research partnering, I can deliver some very relevant input on the Project Brief. A detailed narration of a project These clay pans would form a brilliant foundation for ice rinks. Just flood and wait for the frosts to come! My Project Brief is a well thought out document that asks me to deliver two things: Develop a process for evaluating research requests, in line with NPYWC strategic object...

Because we missed the community-visit to Finke (see one of my previous posts), and not all of us work on projects that require us to go out bush (including me, I’m just pounding away on my keyboard and talking to people!), two of the Directors of the Women’s Council cooked us a bush picnic today. Margaret Smith and Julie Anderson both live in Alice Springs, and showed us how it’s done. We drove a short way out of town, and built two small fires. On these fires, we cooked a damper (a type of bread specific to Australia, baked in the coals of a campfire), sweet and normal potato, and… roo tails. Preparing and eating the roo tails felt a little bit like an initiation.  The ladies clearly have heaps of experience and skill. The way they prepared the damper impressed me to no end. The bread dough was baked in the hot sand and coals, where the fire had been burning for a bit. The sand is covered with flour, the dough (shaped a bit like a focaccia bread) is placed on top, more f...