Perth Voice Interactive

A DOCUMENTARY about Aboriginal rangers and a musician who went to Kenya to share their cultural heritage with Maasai rangers will premiere at Perth Zoo next month.

Maasai warrior and head ranger Joseph Kotoke spends his day tracking elephants and confronting poachers, while Kija ranger Imran Paddy monitors Aussie critters and could treat a snake bite with his eyes closed.

Both work hard to conserve the land their people have lived on for thousands of years.

But Aboriginal elders worried that Paddy and his colleagues were struggling to connect with their job – perhaps given they’re often under-equipped and underpaid – while the Maasai are internationally known for the pride they have in their task.

After a visit to WA by a group of Kenyan Maasai rangers in 2014, the elders decided to look into an exchange program to give their young folk some inspiration.

Warrior

Joining the nine rangers from WA and the Northern Territory on the trip was acclaimed Gurindjii and Eastern Arente musician, Dan Sultan.

The cultural exchange was organised by the Australian-based Thin Green Line Foundation, a small team who provide international support to frontline rangers.

Many of the Aboriginal rangers who travelled to Africa had never owned passports and some hadn’t even left their home towns.

Imran Paddy became a Kija ranger when he was 20 and said the trip was life changing.

“The Maasai rangers were pretty cool, hard working rangers,” he says.

“We found we are different tribes of rangers that all work as one whole group to do the job.”

He was impressed by Maasai warrior Mr Kotoke, who became a ranger at 13, and over the years has been knocked over by rhinos, chased by elephants and fought with poachers.

While most of the Maasai rangers are unarmed, Mr Kotoke is group leader and carries a shotgun or rifle.

“It’s a pretty dangerous job,” he says.

“I lost one of my closest friends and the best ranger I knew when he was trampled by an elephant. But we have to preserve our wildlife for future generations.

“I work for my community and with my people to do this.”

He says the Maasai and Australian Aboriginal rangers learnt a lot from each other.

“We are the same,” he says. “No matter what country we are from, we are still rangers, doing the same thing together. They are conservationists and so are we.

“It’s really important that we look after country and respect it in the proper way as our elders did,” says Gooniyandi ranger Virgil Cherel, who works east of Fitzroy.

Both he and Mr Paddy say they came home with a new appreciation for their work.

Foundation founder Sean Willmore says “The Aboriginal people of Australia were the first park-ranger type people looking after our country and they didn’t have a badge or a title, they’ve always just done it.

“The ranger programs in Indigenous communities are so successful because they’ve been protecting our country forever.”

Ranger to Ranger was made by AFI award-winning film maker Rhys Graham, who offered his services for free.

Ranger to Ranger will premiere at Perth Zoo on October 6 and will include a Q&A with Mr Kotoke.

by MOLLY SCHMIDT

THE Perth Pythons LGTBI+ hockey team are back in town celebrating their gold medal win at the Gay Games in Paris last month.

The Pythons beat the London Royals in the final; sweet revenge after the English beat them earlier in the group stages.

“The London Royals team flogged everyone,” says Pythons captain, coach and full back Reid Smith

”They didn’t concede a single goal in the pool round and scored 20 goals.”

Dominate

After watching the Royals dominate the group stages, Smith says they knew a change of tactics was needed.

“The Europeans play quite a different style and structure to how we play in Australia.

“We knew we had to defend for our lives, which we did, we held them out,”

The Pythons led 1-0 for most of the final: “They didn’t score a goal until the final three minutes, which was very impressive for a team that scored 20 goals in the pool matches.”

It came down to a sudden death shootout and the Perth team came out on top to win gold.

Smith says they were happy just to make the final and went into the game with nothing to lose.

“We were already going to get a medal, so we were a bit more relaxed in our approach, and they had everything to lose… it’s a real Aussie underdog situation.”

The Python’s morale was boosted with some “Aussie-Aussie-Aussie” chants from the Sydney Bent Sticks, who were in the crowd after being knocked out of the tournament.

Hetero-heavy

The Pythons formed at the end of 2015 to provide a home for LGBTI+ people who didn’t feel welcome in hetero-heavy sports teams where homophobia still exists.

“There wasn’t any inclusive space for hockey at the time,” Smith says.

“There’s definitely individual players who took a hiatus because they didn’t feel comfortable playing in a mainstream team… [they’ve] come back to hockey because we’ve allowed this opportunity for them to play in a safe space.

Participation

“We’ve also had new people who’ve never played sport before and are now part of the hockey team.”

The Pythons are based at the UWA Hockey Club on McGilvray Road, and they’ll be starting up training for the new season in October.

On August 8 the team also won the participation award at the state’s biennial sport and recreation industry awards.

The Gay Games started in San Francisco in 1982 (called the “Gay Olympics” at the time until the regular Olympics got sensitive and sued them) and runs every four years.

The next one’s lined up for Hong Kong in 2022.

To find out more about the Pythons go to http://www.perthpythons.com

by DAVID BELL

ENVIRONMENTAL activists will form the shape of a giant red-tailed black cockatoo and a numbat for a 30-minute protest at Yagan Square this Friday (September 7).

The Perth protest is part of national threatened species day, and activist Paddy Cullen says more animals have become extinct in Australia than any other country over the last century as vital forests and wetlands are destroyed.

“We lose an area the size of the MCG every three minutes, just cut down and destroyed,” Mr Cullen says.

“We are looking for a monster intervention; because at the moment everything seems to be getting bulldozed at an alarming rate.

“This is about using people power to demonstrate and save threatened species.”

Last weekend protestors flocked to Yagan Square and the Environmental Protection Authority office in St Georges Terrace to make a human “kaarak” – a red-tailed back cockatoo.

After the colourful display, the EPA agreed to an environmental review of Kenwick’s Greater Brixton Street Wetlands, which is one of Perth’s most bio-diverse sites and home to the endangered cockatoo.

But Mr Cullen says the wetlands are still at risk and the assessment won’t cover all areas.

The site is being rezoned for industrial development, with eight hectares of Marri trees – a vital food source for red-tailed black cockatoos – already destroyed.

Events are being held across the country this Friday to raise awareness of threatened species, with the WA Forest Alliance, The Wilderness Society and The Conservation Council of Australia leading the charge in Perth.

To find our more go to http://www.perthgreenevents.com/?p=6142

by MOLLY SCHMIDT

UNPOPULAR new parking meters in Mount Lawley might be removed if Stirling councillor Joe Ferrante gets his way.

Parking meters were installed mid-year in council carparks on Field Street and at 679 and 680 Beaufort Street in Mt Lawley.

The first hour was free before a $2/hr fee kicked in, but local realtor Stuart Irving says that for more than a month there was no signage to let people know about the freebie, so drivers just bypassed the car parks.

“Just how long does it take?” he wrote in an email to the council.

“I can order a ‘For Sale’ sign for a property and have it installed in less than three days.”

At the September 4 council meeting, Cr Ferrante put up a notice of motion to this week’s council meeting asking for parking relief.

He’d initially tabled a motion suggesting they give drivers the first three hours free, but then decided he wanted the meters removed.

The motion will be voted on at the next Stirling council meeting, and in the meantime they’ll stick bags over the meters to temporarily put them out of action.

by DAVID BELL

A quirky photo of two schoolgirls in fancy dress in the 1960s was one of the winners in this year’s Vincent history awards.

The annual competition attracted more than 100 diverse entries including an account of life on Lake Street in the mid 20th century and the story of a house built on Vine Street for a widow in one day.

All the photos and tales submitted will be added to the city’s burgeoning local history collection.

One of the most memorable entries was a photo taken by Helen Cozens’ father in 1960.

Anzac Cottage

It shows her sisters Roslyn dressed up as a bottle of Passiona and Vivieanne dressed up as a TV for a fancy dress event at North Perth Primary School.

The photo was taken at their family home at 48 Cleaver Street in West Perth, just a few years after the TV was introduced into homes in 1956.

Anzac Cottage was built by locals in one day for Anne Chapple’s grandfather Cuthbert John Porter, who was wounded in Gallipoli.

Ms Chapple is now the custodian of the cottage and compiled a winning history of another house built in similar circumstances the year before – Wynne Villa on Vine Street in North Perth.

The community banded together to build the house for young widow Jenenia Wynne and her five young children – all under the age of eight – after the family’s breadwinner Arthur John Wynne died of enteric fever and toxaemia in 1914 at the age of 34.

Ms Chapple’s history reads in part:

“With all preparations made, on Saturday, March 27, 1915 an ‘unique gathering of charitably disposed and willing workers” assembled at the block at daybreak to commence work on the building.  The volunteers showed great application and by 10am they had laid the foundation stumps and floor joists along with a base of frames and the framework for the walls.

“The work continued into the afternoon and this saw the Wunderlich stamped metal ceilings installed, window frames in place and over half of the jarrah weather boarding in place.  The timber frame for the roof was also in position, ready for the roofing to be installed.

By sundown, the house was all but completed and the workers were able to view their handiwork with much pride.

At the end of the day, there were still some bits and pieces to be completed, but the home was habitable with Jenenia and her five children able move in to their brand-new house.  A jarrah villa with four rooms, two verandahs and the necessary conveniences as well as the land upon which it stood was now home to the Wynne family.”

Con Christ won the Geoffrey Bolton award for life in Vincent, for his piece Living in Lake Street 1941-1967.

An extract reads:

“This is the story of three boys who grew up in Lake Street, Perth in the 1940s, 1950s and 1960s…

Mum, Dad and Con moved into our house at 131 Lake Street in November, 1941. The house was owned by Dad’s old friends, the Kakulas brothers whom Dad had helped in earlier times when they required assistance but never forgot the help they received.”

The list of winners and the full award text are available at library.vincent.wa.gov.au

Just click the “local history award winners” button.

by DAVID BELL

MOUNT LAWLEY senior high school has named its library after living local legend Arthur Leggett – an OAM and former prisoner-of-war.

In 2017 Mr Leggett was inducted into the school’s Lawley Legends Society.

It’s usually reserved for alumni who’ve excelled in their field or made a significant contribution to society since they left school, but also acknowledges people who’s supported the school over a lengthy period.

Mr Leggett, 99, was born long before MLSHS was founded in 1955, but has  enjoyed a long and rich association with the school.

It became caretaker of the e-POW Association memorial at King’s Park in 1996, the same year Mr Leggett became president of the WA branch of the association.

Every year he speaks to the students at their annual service and tells tales at their Anzac Day assemblies.

Mr Leggett, who turns 100 on September 8, served in North Africa and Europe during World War II.

As part of the 6th Division of the 2nd Australian Imperial Force, he was involved in the actions against the Italian army across Libya.

In 1941 he was sent to Greece with the AIF to defend against a German attack.

The Germans forced the allies back to the island of Crete, then invaded the island en masse in the first large use of Fallschirmjägers—paratroopers. Many were shot from the sky, but eventually the Germans would overwhelm the island and Mr Leggett and about 17,000 other allies were captured.

As a prisoner of war he was put to work in the coal mines in Northern Poland for about two and a half years, before being forced on a march across the Czech Alps to Bavaria in the winter of 1944/45.

Naming a library after Mr Leggett is a fitting tribute: he’s published a book of bush poems and also written an autobiography, Don’t cry for me.

by DAVID BELL