in every war or conflict in which Australia has served, children have been involved; as evacuees, mascots, fundraisers, victims, internees, family and community members and in the armed forces.
during World War I, thousands of Australian school children gave their spare time to knitting socks for men serving overseas.
- Australian War Memorial

i'm harry gardner

and i am thoroughly unqualified. though somewhat experienced in the matter of living.

i am on a journey of learning how to live. a journey that has led me through the open fields and bloody riots of Kenya, into the slums, villages and homes of India’s poorest, and has opened my eyes to the needs of Australia, at my front door.
though i lack any piece of paper guaranteeing any ability what-so-ever, i am able to learn whatever is put in front of me.
i have been called an entrepreneur, but i have no desire to earn any money for what i do.
the projects i invest my life into fill my stomach and nourish my mind, and with that I am satisfied.

for a long time now i have believed in Love. the unifying force of Love, it’s power to bridge any gorge, be it religion, sex, race, age or social status. Love is above and beyond all of our social criterias. this Love is what has pulled me into Africa and India and into the homes and hearts of the poor and the underprivileged.

this same Love has shown me the value and strength of acts of kindness, and this is where my value to you comes into play. if you have a neighbour who needs a fence painted, a mother who needs a veranda repaired, a story that needs to be written, a subject that needs a poem, a house in need of spring cleaning, someone to think and develop ideas with, someone to plan an event, or absolutely anything you can possibly think of, i am available to you. i am here to serve you and do not ask for payment for my services, so in that line of thinking would prefer that any requests you may send are not to help you earn money for yourself. i would rather you think of me as a tool for your own acts of kindness.

please contact me, for any reason what-so-ever.

my current status: to find me on an atlas today you would need to look to Gujurat, India, where I am with my Fiancé, learning to play the flute, learning to sew, admiring water buffalos and building pre-schools and community centre’s in the slums of Ahmedabad. i will be returning to the Central Coast, NSW, in December 2009.
- http://thenest.dumbofeather.com/?p=287

..and don't tell yo MAma

Mack the Knife:


Mr Bojangles:


Me & My Shadow:


Beyond the Sea:


such arrogance in one little person..but i almost don't care. i love this album/concert, it's been loved in my family for years and years.
it's much nicer to listen to this concert than to watch. i'd never thought about youtube-ing it til now, and i'm pretty glad i havent..the recording is much more pleasant on most of the senses.
Beyond the Sea especially makes me so so nostalgic for stage band, and saxophone in general. i definitely want to try and scout some sort of semi-casual jazz band wherever i am next year, i think i'll die if i don't !

'a summer road trip has the potential to be either the best or worst experience of your life. if you happen to get stuck in between your chubby buddy and the friend with a stinky fungal infection in a car without air conditioning, its not going to be pleasant. however, with a bit of knowhow, you could have the wind blowing through your hair while you hum along to your new favourite mix tape without a care in the world. to help you on your way, here's our list of road trip must haves.
WHEELS: we're assuming you have a car but if you don't, a borrowed vehicle can be a holiday in itself.
air conditioning is great but you'll probably have the windows down. stereos are nice but if the sound's too good you'll feel like youre in a Just Jeans ad.
cruise control is actually awesome but only if you don't talk about it. before you leave, remember to check the oil, water and tyres. this makes you look cool.
CREW: having friends that can actually be bothered doing something is rare, but that doesn't mean you should take just anybody.
firstly, at least two of you should be able to drive. driving all by yourself makes you the bitch. you and your buddy doing all the driving makes you part of an awesome two-person gang that pretty much rules the car. three people driving is like having three parents: weird.
relegate the slower of the three to the back seat.
if you're a guy, girls can make or break a long drive. the good ones are relaxed, enthusiastic and look so cute and resilient walking out of a dirty truck stop toilet that it makes you want to buy a caravan and drift with them for the rest of your lives.
the bad ones talk incessantly which is shit because most guys won'te tell a girl to shut the hell up.
SNACKS: the food of the highway is beef jerky but to break things up, anything sold in the general shelf area of jerky is also fine.
NORMAL SUNGLASSES, STUPID SHORTS: on the highway, stupid fashion glasses are like red flags for truckies and they can literally get you run off the road. conversely, nothing makes you feel more alive than pulling into a truck stop knowing you have to get out in your ridiculously short shorts.
and the more verbal shit you cop from country types, the more ammo you'll have when you get back to the city.
MUSIC: music is second only to petrol. the only thing to avoid is having too much choice. two hours of recorded music forms an underlying theme that will forever remind you of the awesome time you had. anything more and you may as well put the radio on.
CONVERSATION: apart from talking about who in your group of friends you'd most like to do, other valid topics include politics, high school, as well as tricky philosophical type questions. some eg.s: what would you rather punch in the face: a baby kitten or a baby puppy ? how much would you have to be paid to break your own leg ? or, which would you prefer to be: blind or a dwarf ?
MAPS: one of your friends will inevitably make the claim that getting lost is half the fun of a road trip.
this friend is not to drive.
send him or her to the backseat and bring a goddam map.
the best types of maps are professionally printed and come either in a bound edition, or as an intricately folded sheet of paper. the worst types of maps are drawn in pen on the back of your electricity bill.
MISCELLANEOUS: money - and we mean everyone in the car people ! petrol, food and accommodation costs must be shared. sun cream - getting burned and having to swim in a kaftan for the rest of the holiday is not a good time.
toilet paper - for everyone's sake.'
- Royce Akers, Summer Guide presented by VICE.

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'Derek Riley has put out many of the magazines that get all uber nerdy about surfing; like Stab and Waves. he's also dabbled in porn but that's another story. right here are derek's rules of the beach.
the beach gets nothing but good press. it represents everything we yearn for: heat, sex and escape in a world where lives are lived panting on a hamster wheel. in real life, however, the beach can be a coming together of frustrated men, exhibitionist women and tearful children. the sand annoys; the surf itches; the sun burns.
but since it's not going to keep you away, here's how to shine like a diamond on the sand.
1. overly long or short male swimsuits. you don't want either. leave the ankle-length boardshorts, awash with the embroidery of tweenie Vietnamese fingers, to surfers caught in a nineties fashion trap and lycra shorties for the hairless boys trawling the dunes.
2. pointless ball games. did you read the pack when you bought your made in Israel bat and ball game ? if you read the instructions closely, it reminds you that it is only to be played by cute girls with bubble butts, accents and a military background. not hoary, horny men.
3. willfully swimming outta the flags. if there's anything that gets a lifeguard twitching his pecs, its tough guys diving into rips.
sure, you might be handy in the water (and the women sure do love an explosion of butterfly) but nothing else has the power to embarrass like a lifeguard, sitting on his quad bike, barking insults at you through his megaphone while everyone oohs and ahhs at you being 'saved'. you can't fight city hall, buster.
4. screaming like a girl when a bluebottle gits ya. that includes girls.
it's not a box jellyfish, see, and the only thing you can lose is your dignity. peel off the blue tentacle, scoop some ice out of that cocktail, and rub, rub, rub.
5. a poor hair removal regime. girls, this is not a nice look. boys, you look like the personification of a deforested Amazon. whiskers live on faces and ideally not chests, backs or asses.
6. that big tent. you got kids. nice. love them for they precious gems.
it doesn't mean you have to house them in the Taj Mahal.
7. the second look. it's not uncommon when on the beach you sight someone so genetically blessed that it's impossible not to look. the mystery of the horizontal body, coupled with a hand-span of nylon is a difficult sight to resist.
look, but look only once. look twice, and you'll spend the rest of the day on the sand as 'the freaky pervy dude.'
8. that expensive SLR isn't fooling anyone. you're looking for tit-eez old man.
put it away and console yourself with this - even a Leica is no match for the imaginary powers of the human brain.
9. hey, i'll learn to surf. the sport of surfing is as frustrating as golf and as potentially dangerous as pistol shooting.
you don't surf now? don't start.
10. black sunglasses. if you're the kind of person who has trouble with #7 then these babies will save your life.'
- Derek Riley, 10 Ways to Not Look Like a Dick at the Beach.

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(Stan meets the Goth kids - from the South Park episode 'Raisins'):
Fringe-Flicking Goth Kid: life is pain..life is only pain (flicks fringe). we're all taught to believe in happy fairy tale endings (flicks fringe), but there's only blackness; dark, depressing loneliness that (flicks fringe) eats at your soul.
Goth Leader: who needs that Ken and Barbie love anyway ? everyone's just walking around like a bunch of conformists. go ahead and wear your business suits so you can make $34,000 a year and buy your condominium.
they're all zombies and racing to their graves. love didn't work for my mum and dad, why should it work for me?
Henrietta: my dad is such an asshole. drunken bastard doesn't even know i exist, but then he won't let me go to the Skinny Puppy concert because my heroine addict aunt is coming over (takes a hit of pot). dinner ? that's a laugh, just an excuse for my mum to bitch at me for not wearing girlie clothes like all the other Britney Spears wannabes at the school (takes another hit).
Kinder Goth: they're all a bunch of Nazi, conformist cheerleaders.
Stan: but if life is only pain, then what's the point in living ?
Fringe-Flicking Goth Kid: just to make life more miserable for the conformists (flicks fringe).
Stan: alright, so how do i join you ?
Goth Leader: if you wanna be one of the non-conformists, all you have to do is dress just like us and listen to the same music we do.
Stan: ..kay..
'no matter whether how you see yourself is different to how you actually behave, it doesn't change the fact that over 90% of people who voted in our multi-choice poll recently believed that the statement 'i prefer to be different and not conform' best describes themselves.
this suggests that, at least amongst Dumbo Feather readers, people generally see themselves as nonconformist. perhaps they truly are or perhaps they are actually like the Goth kids in South Park who, in trying so hard not to conform, end up being as similar to each other as the despised conformists are.
i too thought i was relatively nonconformist until i was recently alerted to Christian Lander's acerbic and hugely popular blog, 'What White People Like'. i read post after post in horror. i too prefer to shop at farmer's markets, my computer of choice is a Mac, i love coffee, the term 'vintage' would describe over 60% of my wardrobe and like nothing better to 'get away from it all' camping.
i suspect that rather than being either conformist or not, most of us are actually individualists like Amy who made the comment, 'i voted that i prefer to be different but i think what i actually meant is that i prefer to be myself. i wouldn't go out of my way to try to be different or stand out from the crowd, but if it happens when i'm doing my own thing that's generally ok with me.'
Amy then added a post-script, 'unless there is karaoke involved - then i would prefer not to stand out from the crowd !' Amy, i'm with you all the way.
- Kate Bezar, Issue 22:Dumbo Feather, Pass it On..

i'm observant from experience really.
karate disciple made me cautious.
knowledge is a powerful weapon, awareness will give you knowledge.
the world would be a better place if everyone communicated more; wars wouldn't need to be fought if people could just rationally talk things over, instead of thinking about their own opinions.
if you express your discomfort at its early stages, you can stop something festering into a major problem, simply because its just your thoughts running rampant without someone to talk about it to.
- my best friend.

turning rachteen in five days !

i love how grey-haired i am already. i just really want Paul Kelly's new ish hybrid release of his own greatest hits and other prominent Australian artists' takes on those songs which exist on a twin accompanying cd + John Williamson's new ish hybrid release of his own greatest hits and other prominent Australian artists' takes on those songs which exist on a twin accompanying cd..

ABSOLUTE GREATEST JOHN WILLIAMSON: 40 YEARS TRUE BLUE
CD1: 'Absolute Greatest.' - with general greatest hits
CD2: 'Absolute Tribute.' (this whole blog post was sparked by hearing Ash Grunwald's J W'son cover on the radio last night, driving back from dropping the boy home)
= Flower On The Water (Wendy Matthews);
Salisbury Street (The Waifs);
Galleries Of Pink Galahs (Shannon Noll);
Cootamundra Wattle (Kasey Chambers);
Chandelier Of Stars (James Reyne);
Paint Me A Wheelbarrow (Sara Storer & Greg Storer);
Tubbo Station (Songbirds);
You And My Guitar (Ash Grunwald);
Truckie's Wife (Ami Williamson);
Raining On The Rock (Troy Cassar-Daley);
Wintergreen (The Ordinary Fear of God);
Hillbilly Road (Adam Harvey);
Old Man Emu (Tommy Emmanuel).

..i had thought i greatly disliked about 90% of the artists on that cd but i'm positive that this little musical experience could change my opinion on a lot of them.


and since my blog is accidentally nostalgic and always seemingly dwelling on the past + things i miss or things i have recently re-found in my computer archives or something that i've remembered or a song/image that has sparked a memory or a conversation i'd had a while ago or something that's been playing on my brain for a while now or a past memory or something that i'd written in school a year or more ago..here's another written piece of sorts. or at least, partially so.
in yr 12 Modern History i wrote a hugely extensive assignment on a soldier and the mystery that surrounded his short life and sudden/relatively unexplained death..
i've removed more tedious parts (the vast majority) of the essay, and in their place sequences of dots have been inserted..:
'we are a generation that has not seen war first-hand. therefore, never could we ever fully understand the enormity of the blood that was shed for the freedom of our own.
we are a generation that travels overseas no longer to fight, but to try and grasp why those before us travelled thus far and fought; fought and were killed.
not rarely are the individual lives that were lost in World War One simply blurred into a mass number. perhaps it is less confronting to think of war in this way, though, we must not forget that behind each number existed a face, and for each face there was a name; a life.

the Australian National Memorial stands tall in the village of Villers Bretonneux in southern France, in memoriam to the blood that was spilled there, overseas, so many years ago. the memorial represents the freedom of Australia’s contemporary society, as upon it are inscribed the names of 11 000 Australian Infantry who fell during battle in France between 1916 and 1918, and as a result, have no known grave.
one particular name that can be found upon the great structure is that of Francis John Charles, who was killed on night patrol in late February 1917.

..due to his English upbringing, it is possible that Francis would have held what was perhaps an even closer bond to the Mother Nation of Britain than that of the plainly loyal and young nation of Australia at that time. for this reason, it does not come as a surprise that Francis enlisted when he was just twenty-one years old.

..at that time within the Great War, the personal battle of simply surviving the winter conditions was at the forefront of every soldier’s mind; perhaps even more so than the horrendous war that engulfed them. less and less major battles were being fought as the conditions steadily worsened and grew impossibly difficult to survive in, let alone wage war within.
wounded men drowned in mud-filled shell-holes while around them, shells hit the frozen ground, shattering and dispersing at every imaginable angle.

..it was around this time that the AIF sent out regular patrols to survey surrounding areas, and in doing so, locating nearby German positions. the focus at that time was primarily upon that of the readily approaching and much anticipated Spring Offensive, which would again mark the beginning of major battle along the Western Front.'

hmm i ended including hardly any of it, but the rest was massively informative, and unless you had done the research yourself, i doubt your interest. :)

we're engineers. no, you're pretendgineers.

i was doing some spring ? winter ? what season are we even in ? cleaning this morning and came across a print-out of some long-lost 'Dessert-based gripes' once blogged by a hilarious gf of mine.:
when dessert is involved, this is what makes me really irritable.:
1. people who look uncomfortable when you ask them if they want a slice, like you've asked them a really personal question or a huge favour and they make 'umm ahh' type noises before they finally fulfil your wildest dreams and say 'ok'.
as if this is a huge burden on them and you really owe them now. come on, you were loitering around the cake table and you'd been eyeballing it for the past half hour.
it was a social duty to ask.
2. people who say Pav instead of Pavlova. it makes me so mad.
if you can't bring yourself to utter those whole extra four letters and have to keep things monosyllabic just say "do you want some of THIS" or "how about a slice of THAT"
3. people who monitor your dessert intake and make inappropriate comments. no, I'm not that hungry, i just enjoy a challenge and so if it's 'Alright' by you, yes, i will fill up the barbeque plate with a plethora of delicious and semi-delicious baked goods instead of using your pathetic napkins
4. people who call dessert, "sweets"
it makes me sick.
&
5. people who act like loving chocolate or worse being a *shudder* chocoholic is some kind of quirky and endearing personality trait.
it isn't.
and if you bring it up like that i'm going to assume that by default you have nothing better to add and your profile in my mind now reads: fulfils but does not exceed basic human requirements including an interest in the intake of oxygen and other common substances. no further comments to add.

in conclusion
LEAVE ME ALONE.
= brilliant ? my thoughts exactly ? - with the 'sweets' call in the v least.



1.'my mother taught me to stand straight, sit erect, use discipline with wine and sweets and to smoke only six cigarettes a day.'
2.'my life isnt theories and formulae. its part instinct, part common-sense. logic is as good a word as any, and i've absorbed what logic i have from everything and everyone..
from my mother, from training as a ballet dancer, from Vogue magazine, from the laws of life and health and nature.'
- Audrey Hepburn.
(in quoting those however, let it be known that i do find the excessive girl crushes on Audrey and Marilyn Munroe quite stressful at times.)

1.'if i have a mantra when it comes to fashion design, its good quality and fit with flattering lines and without clutter.'
2.'you wouldn't know it, but i'm very good at relaxing on weekends with no social engagements. i find this time to catch up and reflect is important.'
- Carla Zampatti.

i think this is such a lovely idea of keeping dreams alive and in focus, and this is equally cheeky and light-hearted, office-working/grown-up fun. i don't see why we should opt for a life of grey just because our hair is doing so.


Lo-Tel - Teenager of the Year:

this song makes me so sad. i'm not sure if thats due to its own merit/s, or that it appears in a scene from Looking for Alibrandi that i'm pretty sure - if memory serves - was ridiculously upsetting, but that i seem to have forgotten the specifics of.
the audio quality is sub-par here, but who cares ! it was 2001 ! we were just about riding horse-drawn carts back then.

actually, semi-speaking of, i've been meaning to post this scene for so long now.
its John Barton's funeral scene from the same movie, i get goosebumps.
this song is so close to my heart as well.:



alexa chung..is absolutely brilliant.
she's got so much..steeze. keeps things simple. and what about that fantastic hair :)
and with the no-bullshit, casual atmopshere that she seems to possess in most photographs, amongst a million other things, she has just made me really want to be her best friend.
sigh.
but i suppose her plethora of chanel bags and loooooovely long limbs also add/s? to that growing love..
these looks are a *few* of my favourites, as there were farrrr too many lovelies to put on here (and there is a few that i've kept to myself, out of greed):

i always seem to retun to this

& 1:18

from So You Think You Can Dance.
it starts off kind of awkwardly, and her clothes i wouldn't have chosen for the job, even though they're 'real'. but goddam, wait for about half way. it gets absolutely brilliant.
its dancing like this that makes me cry.

the older of the male judges on the Australian series said once,
'i love narrative-based hiphop (dancing). i love the detail of it.'
oui.



http://petitions.number10.gov.uk/savestmartinscxr/