I'm halfway through my commitment to match my charitable giving with my alcohol spending.
See how much I've paid for booze so far. And see which charities are going to be better off for it!
The other day after work, I was flowing with the peak hour crowd down Anzac Parade, when I witnessed something awful.
An Aboriginal man was heckling and shoving an East Asian man. The Indigenous guy was yelling obscenities and things like "Go back to where you came from!" to the suited up Asian guy, who was trying, literally, to shake him off. That was Awkward thing Number 1.
People just watched. And did nothing. That was Awkward thing Number 2.
By people, I mean mainly Asian people. The University of New South Wales appears to be predominantly Asian, even the law faculty - a contrast with the College of Law at my own alma mater. That was Awkward thing Number 3.
And I did nothing because, frankly, I'm both Asian and female. I actually thought I might get hit. That was Awkward thing Number 4.
It made me think about how Australia is not the place I thought it was when I was little.
I’ve always been a cynic. From the time I was in primary school hearing about French nuclear testing in the Pacific, Aung San Suu Kyi being put under house arrest and the Monica Lewinsky scandal, I didn’t have much faith in people.
Strangely enough, this dark view of the world eventually led me to Jesus, my hope. So now I am this walking paradox, being both a cynic and an optimist.
Two weeks ago, I blogged about democracy and the need for greater participation. On Monday, a bunch of us put that into practice by meeting with over a hundred senators and members of parliament in one day.
The Eurovision you know and love.
The song was perfect. The dress was perfect. The hype was perfect.
Okay, so in hindsight we were never going to win the thing. But for a long moment there they really made us believe it was possible.
And the winner of the Eurovision Song Contest 2016 is … a Korean-born Australian? One who would have celebrated not with champagne but with a glass of lemonade?
It was too good to be true. For all the logic that Eurovision famously doesn’t follow, this perhaps would not have been in the spirit of Europe - not the Europe of the twenty-first century ...