Recently I did a couple of remote contracts on the Gibson desert in WA
The kids stayed with their father.  I hate flying.  Its the only way to get there is on a tiny plane
So with much courage ( in the form of Valium ) I got on the plane !

On the way home from my first stint out there we went through a storm! Well the turbulence was horrible, I was squeezing the strangers hand in the seat behind me so hard, he probably had a crush injury! At one point we got flung sideways I totally screamed !
After we got through it, the pilot gave me the thumbs up! I said " I screamed"
He said " I know I heard you! That was rough weather !"
But we got home safely

Here are some pictures
The landscape is stunning

I'm a registered nurse working with aboriginal peoples in remote Australia.

When I had to fill in my university application I wasn't completely sure what I was going to do I put down both nursing and for a Bachelor of Arts. I was accepted to Griffith University Gold Coast for nursing and started uni in 1997. I have not looked back since. 

I loved uni and did quite well. I chose to do my grad year at Longreach as both my grandparents lived in rural areas I quite liked the idea of doing a rural placement. Little did I know that 17 years later I would still be out bush.

Prior to starting at Longreach I worked in two nursing homes. I learnt a lot there and it is definitely a good place to get your basic nursing skills.

My graduate year at Longreach was not for the faint-hearted. Back then there were still a lot of what I like to call “battle-axes” around and they were quite hard to work with. They expected absolute perfection in everything and were quite hard on young nurses. It was tough to begin with and I had to deal with a lot of difficult situations with no support because that was how it was done in the old days. I was given heavy patient loads and told not to complain!

During my grad year I rotated around several hospitals: Alpha, Barcalden, Aramac  and Winton. Each place I met new people and learned new things. The enrolled nurses taught me how to take blood cannulate and do the practical dressings. There was nobody else there to ask or to mentor me.

 

Without a nurse educator to sign off on your progress and competency, it was sink or swim.

The hospitals I worked in had hospital-based ambulances, so even in my grad year, I was already going out on callouts. The first time, I was a nervous wreck.

It was the middle of the night and I was called to a lady who was unconscious after seizure. All the way there I kept saying to the driver, “You get the stretcher and I'll get the oxygen”. He must've thought I was a complete nut. It was raining, and I couldn't get into the gate. Eventually, I got into the house, a big old Queenslander. 

I got down on the bed to see if I could get a response and in doing so knelt in a cold puddle of urine. Somehow, that snapped me out of my shock and I was able to wake and stabilize her, and get her on the stretcher and back to the hospital safe and sound.

I would meet my first long-term boyfriend at Alpha and I ended up staying there for a couple of years. 

During my time at Alpha hospital I learnt to do pharmacy orders, store orders, rostering and accreditation activities. 

I also did a lot of callouts, working on call. Some situations were quite unimaginable. Things that even now I can’t believe happened, things you’d see in bad dream or a horror movie. Most of the stories really are too terrible to tell.

There was one incident where we had a heroin overdose, but both the doctor and the ambulance driver were too drunk. It was up to me, a junior nurse, to save the patient. He kept having fits and would periodically stop breathing. We were 50kms from the hospital, but some somehow I managed to keep him alive until we got there. Years later, a senior nurse from Rockhampton hospital we he eventually got sent told me that I saved that kid’s life that night.  

During those few years I did a short stint as a level 2 at the Clermont Hospital – now bear in mind, I was still a fairly junior nurse. One particular night we were evacuating a man out, and I had to put his catheter in. I only had one enrolled nurse working with me, as the Doctor was busy elsewere.

I successfully put in the catheter, but then realized that the man’s foreskin was still stuck up. I didn’t know what to do, so I rushed to the other nurse in panic, and asked for help, to which she replied “No way, I’m a lesbian, I’m not going near that thing”! 

When I got back to the patient, the head of his penis was starting to turn a scary purple colour. I did the only thing I could think off, I grabbed some gloves and started pulling on his penis. After what seemed like forever, his foreskin rolled back into place, and I swear to God, as I looked up to him, the old man lifted his head from his deathbed to give me a very strange look!

The people in the towns became like family. There, also, I learnt how to drink a lot of alcohol in order to self-medicate when the shifts were really bad. When the time came to leave Queensland, I was sad to leave a lot of good friends behind.

But in 2004 it was time to move on, and I headed for Tennant Creek in the Northern Territory. What an adventure that turned out to be. I was going for three months and ended up staying for one year. We were on call all the time, and back then, there were only one nurse and one doctor on a late night shift. 

It was before the Intervention and Close the Gap campaign, and before the strict alcohol restrictions were implemented. ED would be a bloodbath night after night. We were so short staffed, we regularly worked 12 hour shifts, clocking up 20-30 hours overtime a fortnight.

I would take turns with another nurse flying people on the plane to Alice Springs, even though it often made me sick. There were a lot of nightmare stories: the deaths, the suicides, the assaults and the chronic diseases. Broken bones and broken people. Alcohol continued being the most effective way to self-medicate.

There were good times too though, again the people in the town became like family and our presence made a tangible difference in saving and improving people’s lives there.

After 12 months there I headed off to Fitzroy Crossing in the Kimberley’s and had an absolute ball. I met a great bunch of nurses. We used to go head to the river on our days off and cook fish and potatoes in the fire, it was a great community atmosphere.

Again, we worked on call with hospital-based ambulances and again, we saw some harrowing cases. I remember one of the worst – a 4-year old burn victim. I took him to Perth, where he spent the next 12 months healing.

While I was in Perth, I finished a grad certificate in applied health sciences, in rural and remote health. From there, I decided to return to Brisbane and see if after all the years in the outback, I’d be able to work in a city hospital.

I got a contract at the emergency department in the Royal Brisbane hospital. It turned out to be a good job, which I enjoyed. To be honest, after the challenges and the extreme injuries I encountered working remotely, I found city hospital with its abundance of nurses, doctors and support staff, to be quite easy.

Though I like my job, and being close to my family, I hated the city life with its traffic and pollution, it’s restrictions. Eventually, I headed back out bush to Julia Creek, and that’s where I met Zach. After 12 months working together, we decided to make a go of it, even though I was already committed to go to Yuendumu, a remote aboriginal community in the Tanimi Desert. We said our temporary goodbye and headed off.

This was my first aboriginal community, and it turned out a tough one. Again, this was before the Intervention, and not long after aromatic fuel came in. We worked 15-18 hour days. The food available in the community was of such poor quality that I lost five kilos while there, and was getting sores that wouldn’t heal on my body. But I loved it.

I decided to head up to the Cape to be closer to Zach, and found work on Lockart River and Wujal Wujal. It was a nice change from the desert, though it did rain a lot. But we had some great nurses and the food was certainly better.

Still, we faced some tough situations there. We worked on call, and we would carry two way radios (as there was no mobile service) and a special tool to cut down people who had hung themselves. We used to dread picking the tool up, hoping it would not be our turn to do the grisly task.

A lot of the suicides were a direct result of the dissemination of aboriginal culture, where young men, no more than teenagers, found themselves unable to pass traditionally into manhood, which was devastating for them.

Almost no family was spared by such death, making it impossible for it’s members to not be affected by grief, which in turn led to more suicides, propelling the vicious cycle on and on. The impact on the communities and the culture was deep and deadly.

In the end, Zach and I decided that we would head back to Tennant Creek, where the we could go back to on-call work and working in the ED, helping people with serious traumas and injuries. While living in Tennant Creek, I had my children Bailey and Temperance, and started my Masters Degree.

I got a job at the RFDS GP practice, which was great for a couple of years, but when the practice shut, I took a job at the aboriginal medical service as a chronic disease care coordinator. Working with a senior aboriginal health worker who I really got on with, I really felt like we had a big difference in people’s lives.

We would go out into the community and talk to people. We’d educate and help them manage chronic diseases and how to utilize mainstream services. We would coordinate meetings with consultants in Alice Springs and help the families understand what was happening to their loved ones. We saved a lot of people from dying.

One case in the particular was a young 30-something lady with two children, undergoing ‘futile treatment’ – in other words, she was going to die without necessary dialysis. I knew this patient had a diminished intellectual capacity, and my heart went out to her. I couldn’t let it go, so I asked anyone who would listen for help, and didn’t stop trying until I got an emergency guardianship order that allowed her to remain on dialysis. Once we organized proper care and a safe place for her to stay, she underwent all her treatments and surgeries and ended up working as a volunteer.

I loved the work, and the satisfaction being a health worker brought me. But there were a lot of times I felt burnt out and verging on admitting defeat in the face of rampant drug and alcohol addiction, domestic violence, and lack of housing and support.

I felt a lot of hopelessness in myself and around me. The smell of poverty is not something that can be breathed lightly. Hearing the story of a 6 year old that has been raped, or someone that has been beaten, is dying or homeless, or starving from the community, from the family is a lot different to hearing it on the news. Hearing it while standing in filth, breathing in the rotten garbage smell, the smell of overcrowding and unwashed bodies, seeing the mange-covered dogs and the children running around with sores and green snot dripping onto their top lips, is a lot different to hearing it in the sterile environment of a hospital or clinic.

But keeping things in perspective and setting small goals, I felt I was still making a difference, keeping people alive just a bit longer, or making terrible, hard lives just that a little bit easier. 

After 9 years in the community, I felt like I became an integral part of it. I had my own skin name. I hardly needed anything translated, I could understand and even speak enough Walpri to get by. I learnt a lot of the people’s culture, and how to navigate its intricacies.

But it was time to move to the city to ensure my children got a proper education, so we returned to Brisbane. And while they adapted quite well, I found it harder. 

I got a job for an aboriginal medical service in Woolloongabba. It was very different to what I was used to in remote areas, and I struggled getting used to it. Consequently, I took two remote placements on the NG lands Blackstone and Wingellina. Out in the dessert, I feel at home and my spirit is happy and free.

My children’s education is paramount, and I’m willing to sacrifice everything to make sure they have the best life, which is why we continue to live in the city. These days, I have to balance my work life with my kids, and I don’t want work to take away precious time with them. But every now and then, I need to get out into the bush. 

After 21 years of nursing, a Bachelors and a Masters, and many shorter courses, I am still learning new things and loving my work.

I have also started a Bachelor in Anthropology. Through my profession, I have become fascinated with why people do the things they do. I am keen to learn more about the human condition and to challenge myself further with my nursing.

Nursing is hard work, and sometimes it doesn’t feel very rewarding. It’s hard to talk about work with people who aren’t doctors and nurses without freaking them out with the gross or horrific details. Only other nurses can find humour in all the poo and vomit stories, as well as scarier things – that’s our way of coping with it all, I guess.

But overall, it is an awesome job, and I love it. 

I have no regrets in my career: I have done everything I ever wanted to, and there are still many more years to come of learning, caring and meeting beautiful people. 




 Assignment two 

ANT2004

Due 21 Oct 2015

 What is meant by ‘ethnic cleansing’ and ‘genocide’? What is the evidence such behaviour is very ancient? How might it have changed in recent times?

This essay will discuss ethnic cleansing and genocide, what they mean and how and why they are different. On the service Genocide and ethnic cleansing appear to have similar definitions however upon closer examination they are different practices. This essay will also look at case studies from history showing that while the terms ethnic cleansing and genocide may be recent they acts are not. In particular the ethnic cleansing and genocide perpetrated on the Australian Indigenous population from the time of Captain Cooks landing in 1777 up until the mid-1900’s.  Finally this essay will discuss if ethnic cleansing and genocide may have changed in recent times, or if the practice of ethnic cleansing (Wees, 2010) and genocide remain the same as it always has.

The term genocide was first coined by a Polish man – Raphael Lemkin in 1944 (Krieken, 2004). In describing Nazi Germany’s practices of various forms of killing or annihilating Jews, the definition can also in a more broader sense be used to describe the variety of ways different groups can be eliminated including that of their physical environment and culture (Krieken, 2004; Hinton, 2002). Lemkin, lobbied+ to have Genocide recognised as a crime and eventually succeeded.  Genocide is the crime of eliminating a group of humans that is recognised by most international laws and by the Unite Nations (Hinton, 2002)

Ethnic cleansing may seem the same as genocide but it differs in that ethnic cleansing can be used to eliminate, destroy or forcibly remove from an area (Sirkin, 2010) another cultural or religious group by any means necessary, including removal, changing laws, bullying and intimidation , mass killings – genocide (Sirkin, 2010). The terms genocide and ethnic cleansing are often used interchangeably (Sirkin, 2010). International law has classed ethnic cleansing as a crime against humanity which can include murder, enslavement, and deportation.

The differences between the two acts become clearer when genocide is looked at more closely – in order for the crime of genocide to be present there must be a specific intent to destroy a group of people that share a common identify such as race, ethnicity or religion. The victims of genocide must belong to a protected group and a single act could constitute as genocide (Sirkin, 2010) 

Crimes against humanity such as ethnic cleansing can occur in any population group and a single act would unlikely constitute as a crime against humanity (Sirkin, 2010)

When a group of people are denied the right to exist that is genocide 

Ethnic cleansing is more of a descriptive term rather than a legal term ethnic cleansing Is used mainly to achieve ethnic homogeneity and can be done without mass murder genocide on the other hand is an international crime under the United Nations and is usually achieved through mass murder and its purpose is to destroy the entire race ethnic all religious group

There are many examples of genocide and ethnic cleansing in history, long before there was ever a term for it – Many indigenous peoples were being forcibly removed or killed by invading societies, Since the sixteenth century European nations have moved throughout the world often displacing , confining or destroying native (or Primitive) people (Goody, 2002)Genocide has occurred for centuries, from the well-known, Jewish holocaust and the genocide of the Rwandan Tutsi to lesser known Ancient Assyrians intent on the destruction of Babylon and the Mongols of Genghis Khan (Hinton, 2002).  It is thought that genocide has been a part of the human world since the beginning, in ancient Greek and roman society genocide and ethnic cleansing were common practices in order to annihilate ethnic groups or enemies (Wees, 2010).  Often the invading solders would kill all men of age and sell the women and children into slavery.  Sometimes the killing was indiscriminate including animals and when the killing stoped those left alive were split up from their family groups and sold separately ensuring the complete destruction of that group (Wees, 2010). History records even buildings and whole towns were burnt to the ground, there is some debate over the lands being sown with salt or covered in tar due to the time and cost involved but it could have been done on a small scale (Wees, 2010).  In some events in history total villages were wiped out and the buildings burnt to the ground.  In others all the men including male children were killed to ensure the line could not continue and women were sold into slavery.

In later times ethnic cleansing and genocide was practiced in Australia after Captin Cook landed right up until the 1960’s

Aborigines were wiped out by most of the 5 types of genocide described by Krieken, (2004)

Which include (a) Killing members of the group; 
(b) Causing serious bodily or mental harm to members of the group; 
(c) Deliberately inflicting on the group conditions of life calculated to bring about its physical destruction in whole or in part; 
(d) Imposing measures intended to prevent births within the group; 
(e) Forcibly transferring children of the group to another group. (Schabas, 2000)

In the early part of the ninetenth centuray Europeans assumed the Aboriginies would die out, however as the continant was settled and explored relationships were created with Aborignals sometimes resulting in what was known at the time as ‘half caste’ children.  It soon became obvious to the settiling Europeans Aboriginals were not going to die out so they were often removed from their lands seperating them from their culture.  The children were forcibly removed, records are patchy at best so it is not known how many children were taken. At the time it was thought that removing “half caste” children to assimilate them into a European way of life and leaving the Aboriginal population to die off was the right thing to do.  In 1937 a Chief Protection officer in Western Austraila – AO Neville asked “Are we going to have a population of 1 million blacks in the commonwealth, or are we going to merge them into our white community and eventually forget that there ever were any aboriginies in Austraila?” (Commonwealth of Australia, 1937:11).  What is known as the Stolen Generation refers to the forced removal of children from their families.  The Children of mixed blood or ‘Half Caste’ as it was called at the time were taken from their familes by force or decit – one women recalls the police coming and telling the parents that the kids had to go to school, the children were loaded into the car and were never seen again. Many children were taken far away from their home lands and seperated from their siblings in order to separate them from their land and culture.  Often Aboriginals were placed in camps or areas such as Melville island and left to die out. (Eller, 2006)

Under the definition of Genocide these acts meet the crietira of genocide – the forced removal of children, serious mental harm and infilicing conditions calculated to bring about the destruction of people

All of this also resulted in the destruction of cultural values and was either deliberatly intended or a consequence of the acts of genocide, the destruction of cultural values comes under the definition of ethnic cleansing which is a term used to describe a wide number of atrocities but is not a crime in isteslf unlike genocide 

The crime is the indiviudal events that take place during a period of ethnic cleansing which often sees massive abuse of human rights, intimidation, bullying, removal, mass murder or genocide (Cohan, 2007).

In even more recent times in the last ___ years the world has seen genocide and ethnic cleansing being practices, the atrocities that have occurred in Rwanda is a well known example

The difference between genocide and ethnic cleanisng in the past and today is minimal

There is now a term for it and genocide at least is recongnisaed globally as a crime and has been defined by the United Nations 

However forced removal and mass killings still take place.  There is more media coverage and anthropologist are beginning to realise they need to look more closely at genocide and ethnic cleansing.  However as good anthropolgy is ethnographic study this is quite difficult.

In ancient times the motivation for genocide may have been sligthly different in some instances, however political gain and resources seem to be a common thread as does religious differences, language and culture 

A difference is that in most cases other coutries would step in to stop a whole town being massucured and burnt to the ground.

The rwandawn genocide is considered a moden genocide (Eller, 2006)

The population growth makes it hard to  a whole group and wide spread slavery or the ability to sell large groups into slavery dose not exsist, although slavery still exsists it is illeagal.  Other countries will take in refugees and protect them from acts of genocide but it is usually too late to shelter them from ethnic cleansing as simply by being a refugee in another land human rights abuses have occurred 

In modern times the world has the united nations to turn to and genocide is offically recognised as a crime against human rights 

Initating group leaders can be held accountable and stand trial for crimes against humanity 

With modern warfare and technology ethnic cleansing and genocide can occur more viciously and if not stopped by outside groups could be quite successful, although as mentioned before population groups are often more numerous and wide spread if ethnic cleansing and is described as the expulsion all removal of the population from their lands due to either religious or ethnic discrimination political strategic or idea logical considerations or a combination of these reference Bell -fialkoff.

Then estimate cleansing has been around for many centuries although in ancient times the practice may have been because of a different motivation the Romans and Greeks practised estimate cleansing on a smaller scale to procure slave labour during the Middle Ages ethnicity was not a source of prosecution but religion was mini anthropologist's remark that most of Native Americans suffered definite cleansing when they were forced to reset all in allotted territories ethnic cleansing Ndis century is more motivated by nationalist movements in order to cleanse and area

But scholars often note that the difference between ancient ethnic cleansing Angie on your side and modern closing in genocide is that of the nationstate