Descriptions of this year’s Dakar Rally in the media, once it had finished, ranged from ‘Brutal. Punishing. Exhausting. Back-breaking. Insane’ (Top Gear); … the jaw-dropping beauty and brutality of the most prestigious off-road rally on the planet. (Red Bull) The Longest and Hardest Rally in the World (Red Bull) For me – I don’t get to see much of the action … [Read more...]
Broome’s Shinju Matsuri
As Australian towns go, Broome has more than its fair share of stories and history. The Shinju Matsuri, or the Festival of the Pearl, has been celebrating the community, its history and its stories each September for 46 years. No other town or city except perhaps Darwin has more strong links between Japan, China, Malaysia, the indigenous communities and European … [Read more...]
EURO 2016 Football – Love from Saint Etienne!
The EUROs are done and dusted and (spoiler alert) Portugal won. Thirty two teams played in ten stadia and a gazillion fans invaded France. I was completely unprepared for the level of intensity and passion that the games would ignite in my small adopted City of Saint Etienne, which as luck would have it has an international standard football stadium. Managing sporting and … [Read more...]
Leg side, Onside, Offside, India
One of my earliest memories is of sitting on the floor with my Dad and listening an Ashes test on the radio, when Australia was playing in England. Dennis Lillee was bowling from one end, Rod Marsh the wicket keeper, and Bob Massie was demolishing the English batting lineup from the other end. Dad let me stay up late because, well, because it was the cricket. And we listened to … [Read more...]
Unexpected Places – The Manual Scoreboard
How many times have you pinched yourself and said ‘well I didn’t expect to be here’?. In fact up until I was about 25 I thought I would meet a nice man and I would settle down and have children who would go to school in the suburbs of Perth. A bit earlier than that, I thought I would meet a farmer and settle down and have children, who accompanied me while I rode motorbikes … [Read more...]
