09 Aug 2025

Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
S1 (00:26):
As I welcome you to this link here on Vision
Australia Radio 1190 7 a.m. Adelaide, online at Via radio,
via Radio Digital and adelaide-darwin to the Community Radio Plus app.
Look for Vision Australia Radio Adelaide your favourite podcast or
streaming service. Hello to you if you're listening through 103.9

(00:47):
FM in Esperance in Western Australia. Some rough weather lately.
Hope you're safe and well. Also listening through the Reading
Radio Network and our big friends there now supported friends
at Disability Media Australia. Find out much more about them
at Powered Media. Peter Greco saying wonderful to be here.

(01:08):
Thank you for making time to tune in this program
coming to you from Ghana can come to you very shortly.
We'll speak to Minister Katrine Hilliard, Minister for Child Protection.
A great programme for sporting clubs for children that might
be troubled will find out much more about that. Scott
Hollier will invite you to nominate someone for the access awards.

(01:30):
Either a website or apps will find out more about that.
We'll speak to Georgia Carter Smith and Young Nisi, who
will tell us about their cat, Rocky, a rescue cat
who's made a huge difference to their lives, will have
Chelsea marchetti here from the Flipper Academy. Talk about knee
reconstructions and what can physiotherapists do? Doctor Monica Ferrari will

(01:53):
join us from the Dental Association to talk about particularly
your kids teeth and their health. We'll also catch up
with Lauren Ayres from orange Sky, talk about Homelessness Awareness
Week and some great work that they're doing. We'll catch
up with Billy Garden from Resthaven to talk about retirement,
living and a fabulous little adventure that they've got coming

(02:15):
up with some young kids. And we'll also be joined
by Evelyn Hayes. The Through the Lens photographic composition is opened.
Your invitation to attend, your invitation to knock on the
door and enter is just a few minutes away. I'm
delighted to welcome to the program the Minister for Child

(02:36):
Protection here in South Australia, Minister Katrina Hilliard. Katrina, we
also appreciate you making yourself available. Thank you for doing
it again today.

S2 (02:43):
Thank you so much for having me on your show, Peter.
And great. It's great to be with you and to
be with all of the listeners of Vision Australia Radio.
Thank you.

S1 (02:55):
Now you must be thinking this is kind of cool
because it kind of combines the your, uh, current portfolio
and the past portfolio, what you're talking about today.

S2 (03:03):
Absolutely. It's an area I'm so passionate about. Um, Peter,
I'm sure you and your listeners would know that many
of us really value and talk about that wonderful sense
of belonging, of being part of a team that comes
with being involved in a local sporting club. We want

(03:25):
every child, no matter their circumstance or their starting point,
to feel welcome and supported when they step onto a field,
an oval or onto a court or dive into a pool.
We want everybody to know that they belong, and that
is exactly what this program is all about.

S1 (03:43):
Well, tell us a bit more about it. Who is
it aimed at?

S2 (03:46):
Well, we know that young people who've experienced trauma, and
that does include many of the children and young people
who are engaged with the child protection and family support system,
that just fronting up to a club can seem like
a really, really big step. We know that when children

(04:08):
have experienced trauma, it can really impact how they engage
with activities with new and different situations. So this program
is about helping all of our sporting volunteers, coaches, officials
in different sporting codes and in clubs to understand, um, trauma,

(04:30):
to understand what trauma related behavior might look like. And
for those coaches and volunteers to be trauma informed and
to really know how to help create those supportive environments
where those kids who really need us and who could
really benefit from being active through a sporting club, how

(04:53):
they can create those environments that that help all kids
to be included and involved. So I'm really grateful to
some of the major sporting organizations, including soccer, basketball, S.C.,
Adelaide Football Club and Port Adelaide Football Club for embracing
this important training. I often say, Peter, that child protection

(05:14):
and family support is everybody's business, that everybody has a
role to play in, including the children who really need us.
These sporting organisations are absolutely playing theirs and I'm very
grateful to them for doing that, and I'm really looking
forward to seeing how we can grow this trauma training

(05:34):
so that more and more clubs across South Australia feel
really confident to include all kids.

S1 (05:41):
One of the great things about the program is you
touched on Katrina, the fact that it goes across the board.
You talked about volunteers, officials, coaches. So everyone is kind
of part of it. It's very inclusive from that point
of view.

S2 (05:52):
Yeah, absolutely. Because, you know, many would know that when
you go to a sporting club, yes, you have interactions
with the coach of your team, but you'll also have
interactions with, you know, volunteers that might be a team manager,
that might be people doing a range of roles around
the club that you also have interactions with administrators of

(06:14):
the club. So it's really important that each volunteer becomes
trauma informed, but also that that a whole club creates
that environment that really welcomes and includes everyone and includes
kids who need that support in a way that is sustainable,
where they can continue to feel safe in that environment.

(06:37):
And that's why we need everybody involved in this training.
So I'm really looking forward to it rolling out in
more and more clubs right across the state.

S1 (06:45):
So you've kind of got a syllabus, if I can
put it that way. As far as the the way
you're managing the, the program.

S2 (06:50):
Uh, yes. So the calm connect coach understanding uh, childhood
trauma and supportive sporting environments learning package has a number
of different elements, and each of those elements is really
focused on building that confidence and capacity, as I said

(07:11):
of volunteers right across the club, to really understand trauma
and really be able to support those children who have
experienced or are experiencing trauma to, to be, but also
very importantly, to stay involved.

S1 (07:27):
Yeah, that's a great point. What about in terms of
the age of some of the kids, Katrina? What sort
of age range are we talking about?

S2 (07:33):
We're talking about a variety of ages. We want club officials, volunteers,
coaches to feel confident, to welcome, you know, if there's
an auskick program, for example, that might start with children
who are six and seven. We want coaches and other
volunteers to feel comfortable, to welcome children at that age

(07:56):
who are experiencing Trauma, but we also want them to
feel really confident about what trauma might look like for
a 13, 14, 15 year old and to be able
to welcome those young people as well into their club. Peter,
we know in your your listeners would know that, you know,
improving that that being involved in sport, being involved in

(08:19):
a club absolutely helps to improve. A young person's physical,
mental and emotional health and well-being gives them a lovely
sense of belonging to a community family. We are determined
that more and more children have that experience, and that
that is absolutely what this program is all about.

S1 (08:41):
We can make lifelong friends. That's a really great, actually. Katrina,
if we talk about inclusion, which is really important, and
sometimes exclusion can be because it's not financially viable or
it's financially impossible for people to get involved. There's some
financial support as well here as well.

S2 (08:57):
Yes. So we are, as I said, as a government
we're partnering with sport to to roll this training out. Also, Peter,
as you and your listeners would know as well, I'm
really proud that our government over the last couple of
years has expanded the sports voucher program. There are now
two $100 sports vouchers available to eligible children and young

(09:20):
people and their families across our state, and we've also
gradually increased the types of activities that are included in
the sports voucher program. So, you know, it started with
all of the, I guess, more traditional sports. It then
expanded to learn to swim and dance classes. Last year

(09:40):
we included guides and scouts, and this year we've. Or
in the middle of last year, we also included music
lessons and theater activities because, you know, every child has
a different set of interests. Every child finds that community
family through different activities and in different environments. So the

(10:04):
more that we can offer a range of activities for
which the sports vouchers can be used to meet the
costs of those particular activities, the better. Um has a
great benefit for children and young people. It also has
a great benefit for families in terms of being able

(10:24):
to meet the costs of having their children active and included.

S1 (10:28):
And in a sense, we're talking about, you know, preventative
medicine or things that are going to help in the future.
And you probably can't sort of quantify that because, you know,
those problems are being avoided by, you know, early intervention now.

S2 (10:39):
Yeah. I couldn't agree more, Peter. It certainly was my
experience as a child when when things were difficult being
involved for me in surf life, saving in sport, in
drama and music absolutely created this lovely sense of not
being alone, of being part of an environment where there
were lots of people to look out for you and

(11:00):
look after you. And that creates something very special that
continues to have an impact right across your life. So again,
the more that we can have children experiencing that, the better.
And if we need to build clubs capacity to make

(11:20):
sure that whatever experiences a particular young person has gone through,
people in that club understand those experiences and understand what
they need and can work with them to provide it
the better. We know, Peter, that turning one person from
inactive to active also saves our health system around $50,000

(11:43):
per person over their lifetime. It is both preventative, as
you said, in terms of physical health, but also in
terms of that emotional, social and mental health and wellbeing
as well.

S1 (11:56):
Katrina, it's a great story. We need a bit of
good news and you've given us that. Thank you so
much for spending some time with us, and good luck
with that. And let's hope that more and more clubs
in particular get involved and will the community will benefit.

S2 (12:07):
Thanks so much, Peter, and thanks to all of your listeners.
It's really lovely to join you.

S1 (12:11):
That's fabulous, isn't it? That's Minister Katrina Hilliard, Minister for
Child protection in South Australia, with some really good news.
And we can always hear it's good news. It's always
fantastic catching up with Doctor Scott Hollier, the CEO for
the centre for Accessibility Australia. Such a positive person who
makes always good things happen. Well almost always. Scott tried

(12:33):
to catch up again.

S3 (12:34):
He's been very kind. Intro. Great to be back.

S1 (12:36):
Well, I guess you probably like good things happen a
bit more often, but you're certainly pulling your weight as
far as that goes. And along those lines, you're celebrating
your fifth anniversary.

S3 (12:45):
We are. So it's been a really exciting time at
centre for Accessibility Australia. That's how we incorporated in June 2020.
Very interesting time to incorporate. We have Covid, but you know,
as it turned out, that was really important given that
so many organizations weren't really digital ready when we had
to pivot online during that time. So it was quite
a busy start. But it was, you know, great to

(13:06):
meet that need at that time. And yeah, over the
past five years, um, yeah, the organization's largely gone from
strength to strength thanks to the great support of others.

S1 (13:14):
Obviously, uh, a lot of good things have happened at
that time. Anything that particularly stands out, I notice you
highlight a few things in your newsletter.

S3 (13:21):
I think some of the things that, um, have been
really great to see is, um, just how much community
support there is around digital access. I mean, just in
the past five years, we've seen the access awards continue
to go from strength to strength, has been really exciting
to see the amount of support that's been around that. And,
you know, this year, being in awards year, um, as
we've been running it every two years, that's been really exciting.

(13:42):
We've seen a lot of improvements around in the policy space,
you know, just this year having the Australian Human Rights
Commission update its guidance. Yeah 2.2 and procurement standards. So
that's been really exciting. And I think also to some
of the projects we've been doing in digital access, we've
had a big project to support digital access, specifically in
Western Australia. We've got some other projects around improving the

(14:06):
accessibility of websites submissions, which are providing support to people
facing domestic violence. That's a project we're just starting. And
also just having great organisations knocking on our door saying, hey,
we need some help with it. Can you get involved?
So you know the team, we've now got 14 staff,
ten of which have digital skills and disability. And to see,

(14:28):
you know, um, so many people, you know, great skills
and talents coming together. Um, yeah. It's been wonderful to
be a part of that.

S1 (14:34):
Oh that's tremendous. Well, congratulations on that. And as I said,
you've recently launched your awards so people can nominate now.

S3 (14:41):
Absolutely. So we have um the awards nominations are still
open until the end of August, so please do jump
on our website. Accessibility awards. We'd love to have nominations.
Nominations are free, so if you know of a good, um,
not for profit or corporate government education, or there's just
a really great initiative or individual that you really think

(15:02):
deserves recognition, please check in a free nomination. Uh, we
really want to celebrate that at the end of the year.

S1 (15:07):
Yeah, we've got different categories in terms of accessibility as
well as you decide, the different, uh, you know, corporates
or government etcetera as well.

S3 (15:14):
Absolutely. And also we're looking at both websites and apps.
So uh, you know, if you have a great experience,
you're thinking, gee, you know, it's a difference in my life.
I really wish that company or that organisation or government
could be recognised for that. Then please do put in nomination. Um,
and then what will happen from here is at the
end of August, our nine member independent judging panel will

(15:35):
take over and start to, um, judge those entries. Then
we'll have the finalists announced around mid October. And then
our ceremony will be at Optus Stadium in Perth on
the 12th of November. So really exciting.

S1 (15:47):
Well we'll certainly stay tuned for that. One of the
great things, Scott, is that we get to speak to
some of the winners after the awards are announced and they,
you know, you can genuinely tell they are really chuffed
at the fact that they were nominated, B they've won,
and C like, you know, they get a feel good
feeling about it and maybe more just a feel good
feeling that they kind of feel like they're contributing into
the to the sort of world of making things more accessible.

S3 (16:10):
Absolutely. And, you know, I think one of the things
with digital Access and why we started the awards is that,
you know, a lot of people do take the time
to really put the effort in. But, um, yeah. While
people with disability might be celebrating that, you know, support
of independence and being able to independently access information. Yeah,
often people don't see that firsthand. You know, if you've

(16:31):
got your phone and you're using that, then the people
who created that often don't get to fully, um, see
the experience that is, um, where that work is being utilized.
So the awards are just a really great opportunity to say, look,
we recognize the work you've done, you've made it compliant
to web accessibility standards, and we really want to celebrate
that and say, this is where the awards really do

(16:53):
come in and do give that recognition to people that
did take the time. And also it does in turn
create support for other organizations. So for example, we've seen
ANZ won a award in our first access of all.
And then um, we saw last time in 2023 um,
Bendigo take out um, the the top award for accessibility. And,

(17:19):
and you know a lot of the when we talk
to organisations about well what what was your motivation. They said,
oh yeah we saw that.

S1 (17:24):
Yeah.

S3 (17:25):
We really wanted to to do a good job as well.
And so even if organisations aren't necessarily aware of how
someone uses a screen reader or important do on a
daily basis, the awards do help raise awareness, and I
think it's been a great catalyst in getting other organizations
to take it seriously.

S1 (17:43):
More organizations like Coles and Woolworths have been part of that,
haven't they? You know, they've kind of jockeyed us to
who's got the better app or who's more accessible. That's
kind of fantastic that, you know, not only is there
competition to keep your prices down or get the most sales, but,
you know, to be more accessible.

S3 (17:58):
Absolutely. And Coles have, you know, won awards previously. And
it is great to see it in a variety of
different industries that that competition continues. And, you know, and
we are the benefits. You know, we do benefit as consumers, um,
to be able to have that or, you know, access
to independent, um, great government services, um, education providers, uh, and, um,

(18:20):
you know, all the way from big, big, um, giants like, um,
Telstra won the award last time all the way down to, uh,
not for profits. Um, and even small schools like, um,
Shenton College, um, took out an award one year. So
it is great that through the access Awards we do
get that full spectrum of organizations, from the giants to
smaller organizations. Which just goes to show that people do

(18:42):
take accessibility seriously. Then there's a great chance to be recognized.

S1 (18:46):
There are too big or too small to be accessible.

S3 (18:48):
Absolutely.

S1 (18:49):
I've got one of the things that says a lot
about you and the way you operate, if you like,
is the Golden Carrot Award. That is such a cool name.
That's such a good name for an award, isn't it?

S3 (18:58):
Well, the thing is that when we were trying to
decide what sort of trophy to have, you know, we
were we were giving some thoughts on, well, what are
the awards about? What are we trying to achieve? And
so often people approach organizations and digital access by saying
you're a bad organization, you're going to get sued. You
have to make your your site accessible, which to be honest,
that that can work. But what we did find is

(19:18):
that when people are motivated by the stick, they they
often do it for a little while and then go, okay,
maybe we'll get away with not doing it now. And
then it tends to fall off as if people want
to do accessibility through the carrot rather than the stick.
If they want to do it because they they really
believe in it and they understand it makes a difference.
Then we find that the carrot rather than the stick

(19:39):
is a much better motivator. And certainly in our work,
we really like to walk beside organizations and support them
in their journeys. So as we thought about it, it
became clear that the trophy needed to be the golden
Carrot to recognize that journey. And the carrot is back. And, um,
in our, um, promotional video that's out there at the moment,
we actually have a talking statue that's, uh, that encourages

(20:00):
people to come and be involved. So, um, yeah, it's, uh,
it's been great to have that as our trophy.

S1 (20:06):
And check that out on your website. Uh, it's got, uh,
and also, you know, um, you, uh, nominate or, um,
acknowledge some individuals that have done great things as well.

S3 (20:16):
Absolutely. And, you know, it's really important, I think that, um, although,
you know, a lot of the focus is around websites
and apps, um, we really want to make sure individuals
also good initiatives are recognized as well. So we have
an initiative as an open category. And it's really important
to recognize, um, great Right individuals. So, you know, for example, um,
in our last awards, we had Liddy Neville, um, professor,

(20:39):
who has been running, um, accessibility and really, um, was
a major pioneer in accessibility in Australia for decades. Um,
and it was great to honour her and recognise her.
And also, um, we've had people like, uh, Jan Wald,
who's a really well known accessibility professional, um, and uh, from, uh, visibility, um,
in WA and also, um, Jane who, um, is um, uh,

(21:03):
who's terrific in the work she's done in government circles. So,
you know, again, sometimes it's people who have been, you know,
massively pioneering and achieved a lot. Sometimes it's people who
have specialised digital access and made a huge contribution there.
And sometimes it's people like Jane who took a government
department that had very little knowledge and virtually transformed the
entire government department to really take accessibility seriously. And yeah,

(21:27):
we really welcome opportunities to acknowledge that type of work.
And also, I mean, the importance of talking about the
awards and getting information out there too is it means
a lot. And Peter, you've been a strong advocate for
a long time, you know, in the accessibility space and say,
you know, your program and you know, others have, you know,
really been great supporters of these processes. And we really,

(21:49):
really appreciate it.

S1 (21:50):
Well, I appreciate you saying that. And I guess one
of the easy things to do is kind of, um,
you know, speak to people like you that are actually
doing what they say they're going to do, rather than
sort of mouthing the words or, you know, trotting out
a few cliches. You know, you've got evidence to prove
what you're doing and it is working and that's, you know,
so it makes it easy to, uh, sort of cotton
on to something like that.

S3 (22:09):
Oh, that's very kind. And one of the things that
is always a bit of a leap of faith when
you start an organisation is to go, well, you know,
is there the support there, you know, will the community
come and really take this on board? And and the
answer is overwhelmingly yes. You know, there are passionate people
across this country that want to see improvements for digital access.

(22:29):
Want to really make sure that people with disability have
that independent access to information? And as I've been going
on this journey, as someone who is legally blind myself,
it's been wonderful, both personally and professionally, to see just
how much support there is out there. And the access
awards are really a reflection of that.

S1 (22:47):
I neglected to mention that for those who don't know,
you may have got lived experience. So you're not just,
you know, parroting stuff. You live it every day of
your life. So that kind of gives a bit more gravitas,
if I can put it that way.

S3 (22:59):
Yeah. Well, that's, um. Yeah, absolutely. I mean, I've, um,
I'm legally blind. I have just a little bit of left, uh, but, yeah,
I use a cane to get around. It's very rare. Um,
mainly on my computer. And, you know, I think often
back to even ten years ago where, um, compared to
where technology is now. And if people do build websites
and apps compliance with standards, then, um, their true independence

(23:20):
can be achieved. And it's it's been exciting to see
that journey.

S1 (23:23):
A reminder of McClellan's book, born at the Right Time.
It's kind of yeah, it's a positive way to look
at what's happening.

S3 (23:29):
Absolutely.

S1 (23:30):
Hey, Scott, how can we nominate, as you say, they're
open now. So people got a couple of weeks or
so a bit longer than that to nominate. How can
we do that.

S3 (23:37):
Absolutely. People want to head to accessibility.org/awards. And you'll find
the nomination page there. There's two nomination forms. One is
for a website or app. And there's those categories there
of government education corporate or not for profit. And there's
also another form about initiative or individuals, um, that have
also done great work in this space. And uh, yeah,

(23:58):
we'd love to keep getting the nominations coming in. We, um,
last time in 2023 as we run every two years,
we had about 130 nominations across the board. Yeah, we're
we're about halfway there now, so we'd love to keep
those nominations coming in. And yeah, really great opportunity to
celebrate great people doing great things.

S1 (24:17):
We'll put those details up there. Shout out Scott, keep
up the great work as you say. And uh, we'll
catch up again soon I'm sure.

S3 (24:22):
Uh, so thank you so much for your work. We
I really appreciate it.

S1 (24:26):
Doctor Scott Collier, the CEO for the center for Accessibility Australia,
celebrating their fifth year and their Excellence Awards open right now.
Or those details up with our show notes.

S4 (24:36):
Hey guys. My name is John Taylor. I'm a member
of the Australian Aussie Paralympic goalball team. And you're listening
to Leisure Link with Peter Greco on the Vision Australia
radio network.

S1 (24:48):
If you're a regular to Australia radio, particularly in Victoria,
you would have heard from the Cat Detector Society in Victoria.
It's a good news story. At the end of it,
let's chat about it with Georgia Carter-smith and their young Macy. Georgie,
lovely to meet you. Thank you for your time.

S5 (25:04):
Not to worry. Thank you for having us.

S1 (25:06):
And nicey, nice to meet you too.

S6 (25:08):
Thank you.

S1 (25:10):
I told you maybe give us a bit of an
idea of how this has come about. Because the Cat
Protection Society was a bit worried about the amount of
cats that were coming in and, um, you know, sort
of being homeless.

S5 (25:20):
Yeah, yeah. So, um, we love the cat protection. We, um,
have always looked there and we love to go in
for a cuddle, but we ended up using them for
their vet section for our cat, Rocky, and they have
been nothing but amazing. And cats like Rocky who were
dumped on my friend's farm, um, have ended up being

(25:40):
the best cat we could possibly have.

S1 (25:42):
Yeah, well, you and Rocky are pretty good friends.

S6 (25:45):
Yeah.

S1 (25:45):
What do you like about Rocky?

S6 (25:47):
He's fluffy. He's fluffy? Yes, he loves me. Is he
your best friend? And when he comes to me, he
always do that. Like, put his head on my head
and hold my head.

S5 (26:00):
He rubs.

S6 (26:00):
You? Yeah.

S5 (26:01):
He doesn't.

S6 (26:02):
He. Yeah. He rubs my head with his head. Uh, did.

S7 (26:06):
You name Rocky or did he have that name before.

S5 (26:08):
I named Rocky? No, he. Well, I named Rocky knowing
it was NASA's favorite character from Paw patrol.

S6 (26:14):
So I said Rocky. Oh.

S1 (26:16):
No no no no, no. She named her first George.

S5 (26:19):
Right. We'll give it to Nate.

S6 (26:21):
Tonight in the therapy cat.

S5 (26:23):
He's your therapy cat? Yeah.

S1 (26:25):
Your therapy. Now what? Tell us what happens. Can you
call him? And he comes.

S6 (26:29):
I say yes right away. Not straight away, but.

S5 (26:33):
Most of the.

S6 (26:33):
Time. Yeah, most of the time he comes straight away.
But sometimes it takes like five minutes to do. Come.

S5 (26:43):
It depends if he's trying to eat or not. Yeah. Yeah,
but every night when Macy gets into bed, it's like
Rocky just knows. And he will come up and snuggle
right up in his arms. And it will be like
NASA's calm way of being able to get to sleep.

S1 (26:58):
Okay. Does he snore nicely? Does Rocky snore?

S6 (27:02):
No.

S1 (27:03):
Do you snore?

S6 (27:04):
No, not that much.

S1 (27:07):
What about. What do. What do you feed him?

S6 (27:09):
Cat food? Yeah.

S5 (27:12):
He looks. He lost a bit of chicken sometimes to see. Yeah.
And he'll try and jump up on the table when
we're eating, and we go. Rocky! Get down!

S6 (27:20):
No I don't.

S5 (27:21):
Oh, you don't you don't you you spoil him, don't you?

S1 (27:25):
You like having meeting with you?

S6 (27:27):
Yeah.

S1 (27:27):
Yeah. I thought you. What's the kind of meant for, uh,
for nature and your family having, uh, you know, someone
like Rocky around the place?

S5 (27:34):
Oh, I see. Who often. You know, he has a
lot of issues with his emotional regulation. You know, Rocky
is just, like, the most calming cat that he could have.
And when he's, I guess, feeling a bit lonely as well. Macy, um,
and feeling a bit distressed, he can always turn to
Rocky as his friend, and it's just I can't even
explain it. Rocky is like the best cat you could

(27:58):
ever ask for. And you know, he came to us
in the most bizarre circumstances and and here we are
with this cat that we couldn't even imagine our life without. And,
you know, Macy tells everybody about Rocky. He tells everyone
at school, and he tells, you know, anyone he can
meet about? Rocky. Rocky? My therapy cat. He's my best friend.
So yeah, I just we are just the luckiest people

(28:19):
in the world to have him.

S1 (28:20):
Tell us about the bizarre circumstances then.

S5 (28:23):
Yeah. So I was, um, on the phone to a girlfriend. Um,
I think it was about the 22nd of December 23, and, um,
her brother had just passed away, so we were having
a conversation, and next minute she she kept saying, I
can just hear these noises. I can just hear these noises.
And she found these, um, kittens. And it was like,
you know, 38 degrees. These pins were dehydrated. And she

(28:45):
rang back and she said, oh my gosh, there's a
third one. And she just said, I can't do this
right now. I can't look after these kittens. I've just
lost my brother. I've got the kids. And I said,
bring them to me and I'll, I'll look after them
and we'll figure it out. So I took on Rocky
and his sister and with the intention not to keep them.
And yeah, Libby was the other kid and we named her.

(29:07):
She ended up going to my girlfriend's friend and also
had an amazing life with with that family. Um, but
we just couldn't part with Rocky. Everyone kept saying, keep him,
keep him. I said, no, no, no, we're not going
to keep him. We've already got other animals and I've
got the kids. But he was meant to be and
he has never left us, and I would never want

(29:29):
him to leave us. So I'm always very thankful. I
was on the phone when she found those kittens, and
then I offered to take them in.

S1 (29:35):
And you say, sometimes these things are just meant to be. Yeah, yeah. The, uh,
the impact on on Daisy's life. So that kind of
almost happened by accident. You kind of, you know, hadn't
explored issues of perhaps, uh, you know, getting a therapy
animal or, I don't know.

S5 (29:50):
We already had an, um, an older cat who would always,
you know, he wanted to cuddle him and stuff. But
being that bit older, he's a bit grumpier and still
really good with Macy, but, you know, getting on. So
I just hadn't really even thought about. Oh, yeah, I'll
get a younger cat for him. Um, and I guess,
you know, you do have cats with different personalities, you know,
lots more playful cats and cats that don't necessarily want

(30:12):
to cuddle up and that's fine. They're all beautiful in
their own way. But when we did end up having
Rocky and he just, you know, constantly wanted to be
held and he wanted attention, and I was like, yeah,
this is this is our boy. And yeah, I think
he's bonded with the fact that his name was after
his favorite Paw Patrol character.

S1 (30:31):
So he named it anyway. So that's probably.

S6 (30:33):
Why.

S5 (30:34):
I didn't get it. I didn't get a choice. So,
you know, it was one of those things. Um, but yeah,
he's just been fantastic.

S1 (30:40):
And I guess, you know, you kind of notice the
difference pretty, pretty immediately. Was it something that kind of, uh, happened, uh, immediately.

S5 (30:48):
There.

S1 (30:48):
It kind of. And does it kind of, you know,
keep happening if you like. Or the longer they're together,
the the more, uh, relaxed and calm Lacey is.

S5 (30:57):
Yeah. Yeah, definitely. So very early on, he had a
thing for Lacey, which is why I was just like, oh,
I can't get rid of this kitten because he just,
you know, he was amazing. Lacey could just, you know,
hold him like a baby and run around with him
and cuddle him, and him, and he just loved it. So, um. Yeah.
And it's just the more as time's gone on, the

(31:17):
more that Rocky just he just knows what he needs.
If Niecy's having a moment and he's really upset, you'll
just see Rocky just appear. And I'm like, how does
this cat know? How does this cat know that Macey
needs him right now? Or, you know, if Nathan knows,
he needs to go to his room and just have
a time out, he will say, I want Rocky, I
want Rocky, so we'll find Rocky and he'll happily just

(31:38):
go sit with Nathan. Or even if he wakes up
in the night and Rocky's not in his bed, he
will wake up, you know, call from the other end
of the house. Mum, I want Rocky, so I have
to get up at whatever time it might be and
find Rocky and put him in his room. And he
will always, you know, fall back to sleep. Yeah. It's
just it's actual magic watching the two of them together.

S1 (31:58):
It's very powerful. I nice to you. What do you
do with Rocky? Do you rub a part of his
body on me?

S5 (32:04):
You tell me.

S1 (32:05):
Does he like.

S6 (32:05):
That? Yes.

S5 (32:06):
Yeah. He sort of puts his head back and closes
his eyes, doesn't he? Yeah.

S1 (32:11):
And is that fine? Is that the signal that he
wants his tummy rubbed?

S6 (32:14):
Yes.

S5 (32:15):
Yeah.

S6 (32:16):
Is he.

S5 (32:17):
Isn't it?

S1 (32:17):
Is he ticklish?

S6 (32:18):
No. No.

S5 (32:21):
What does he do when you scratch his head, though?
What does he do with his nose?

S6 (32:24):
Is he.

S5 (32:25):
He sort of nuzzles it into you, doesn't he? Yeah.

S6 (32:27):
He bites my nose. That means he wants to give
me a kiss.

S5 (32:31):
He does? Yeah. Sometimes he'll sort of nibble at your
nose to give you a kiss. Yeah. He's done that
from an early age, hasn't he?

S6 (32:37):
But I just kiss him over and bite. No, he
bites on hers.

S5 (32:42):
Yeah, but you just kiss him back, don't you?

S6 (32:43):
Yeah.

S5 (32:44):
Yeah.

S1 (32:45):
Maybe eventually he might learn just to kiss, not to bite.

S5 (32:47):
Yeah.

S6 (32:49):
Stay out of the bites. That means kissing.

S5 (32:52):
Oh, cos you. So you know that he means kissing.
So you're okay with it?

S6 (32:55):
Yeah.

S1 (32:55):
Yeah, yeah. You're very understanding. Nicely, which is great. Has
he ever scratched you?

S6 (33:01):
Um. Not really. Not often. No.

S5 (33:04):
No, he's not a scratchy cat, is he?

S6 (33:06):
Only the other cats.

S5 (33:08):
Yeah. On the odd occasion. But with, you know, cats. Cats.
We have.

S6 (33:11):
To. But sometimes he's he's he's not that. Oh, he's
c cat.

S5 (33:17):
He's not a hissy cat, is he. Will he will
he come and sit in the bathroom as well when
you're having a bath?

S6 (33:21):
But he has his pride in. Has he? Yeah he has.
He's twice at me. Oh.

S5 (33:27):
I didn't know that then. But you're not here to
be my. You know. No, he's a happy cat.

S6 (33:32):
Yeah, well.

S1 (33:33):
We're very, very we're very happy to have heard from
both of you today. So thank you for doing that.
We'll put details up for the cat protection Victoria on
our show notes. So if people want to find out
more and maybe they might end up with their own
version of Rocky, you never know.

S5 (33:47):
Yeah, that'd be awesome for them.

S1 (33:49):
Giorgio, thank you for speaking to us. And nicely thanks
to Speak to Us. I'm big on the radio. Being
on the right and being on the radio is better
than being at school, isn't it?

S6 (33:56):
Yeah, yeah.

S1 (33:59):
I agree with that. Hey, guys, thanks for speaking to us.
It's been good fun. And, uh. Well, yeah, they have, uh,
many happy years together.

S5 (34:06):
Yeah. Thank you so much for having us. And yeah,
we hope so too.

S6 (34:09):
And I think, uh.

S1 (34:12):
There they go. That's, uh, Georgia Carter-smith. And also nicely
tell us about their cat, Rocky. And, uh, we'll find
out a bit more about, uh, the Cat Protection Society
by our show. No. Time to catch up with our
favorite physiotherapist from the football academy, Jose Marchetti. Chelsea, how
are you?

S8 (34:32):
I'm good. Thank you. Peter, how are you?

S1 (34:34):
Yeah. Pretty good. Good. Our footy season, uh, getting towards
the pointy end and a lot of players or seemingly
a lot of players tend to get knee reconstructions. Um,
is that. Well, they seem to be quite common. I
guess it's common for a physio to play a role
in their rehab.

S8 (34:49):
Yeah, absolutely. In, um, football players and netball players, agility sport,
especially at a high level, will often see knee recon
surgeries occur due to a ACL injury. Uh, so an
ACL injury. Um, ACL stands for anterior cruciate ligament injury.
So it's a ligament in your knee. Uh, that's responsible

(35:11):
for essentially stopping your kneecap from rotating too far.

S1 (35:15):
Okay.

S8 (35:16):
What happens is when you're playing a sport like footy,
where you're changing direction a lot, if you kind of
stand on that on one of your legs and twist
too hard, which we know from force of tackles or
wet ground or anything really, that's high impact. You can
actually strain or fully tear that ligament through that position.

(35:37):
And so physios can play a role throughout that entire process.
From the minute you injure it all the way through
to when you get back to playing sport. Uh, so
when we're talking about the high level athlete population, if
they've done their ACL, well, um, nine times out of
ten recommend that they have it surgically fixed. And the
way they do that is they do a knee recon

(36:00):
for an ACL ICO repair and ICO can be repaired
by using your patellar tendon to essentially help bring those
ligament fibers back together, or attach something to your knee
joint if you've fully torn it. Or they could use
your hamstring tendon. So it depends on the surgeon that
you have. It also depends on, um, your biomechanics and

(36:23):
what's best suited to you, but it can go either way.
So that's just a bit of a brief summary on, um,
on ACL injury and repair and surgical intervention. In terms
of physio, we're really responsible for the rehab part and
then also the diagnosis for some areas. So we know
it's really obvious when someone's done it on the footy
field and you can see it. But you know essentially

(36:45):
when that footy player comes off the field, it's the
doctor and the physio that are just making sure that
it is that because even though you can see it
and you think nine times out of ten, it probably
is that we're the ones that are testing it and
then making sure that we get the right scans to
ensure that, um, is what we think it is, and
then use the right intervention from there.

S1 (37:04):
There can be kind of conclusively diagnosed with the scan.
I guess until that happens, you're probably not 100% sure.
Would that be fair or.

S8 (37:10):
Yeah, I mean, you're kind of you're always 90% sure
when stuff like this happens. But, um, they will always
do an MRI to make sure. Um, and you also
need to do an MRI because we don't know how
far the tears gone when it's happened. So you've got
a level one, 2 or 3. And so, you know,
your level ones and twos, the ligaments still attached to

(37:30):
the joint. So it's how much it's been I guess
strained or torn a little bit. Your threes are when
it's fully come off the bone. So we need to
make sure we know what it is because that impacts
what we what they do for surgery um, and decisions
of prognosis and things like that as well.

S1 (37:45):
I've heard players say that, you know, there's a bit
of a or not more than a bit, but quite
sharp pain when it happens and then that it almost
feels okay for and you think, oh, no big deal.
Of course. Then the, the scans kind of provide the
bad news. Is that fairly common that way?

S8 (37:59):
Yeah. And again, it depends on what level it is.
So um, often we'll find like a grade three. You're
not like most of them. You're not walking on it.
They could kind of think it's okay if it's fully
come off the bone to an extent. I mean, it
really just depends on the person and what their experience
is with it. I'm yet to see someone that's been okay. Um,

(38:22):
up until like once or twice between being done and
the scan, I think it's pretty common to have, um,
some level of debilitation once it's occurred. But maybe potentially, um,
people may have done a grade one might not experience
as much, but it's not as common in in what
I've seen that you'd have someone feel fine at any
point in time.

S1 (38:40):
So, uh, the surgeon does his job. They come out
of surgery. When does the physio kind of come into
the picture? How soon?

S8 (38:46):
Day zero. So.

S1 (38:48):
Yeah.

S8 (38:48):
Yeah, absolutely. So when we talk about ACL rehab, the
first thing, the first person that you essentially see once
you've woken up and recovered is the physio and mop
is to get you out of bed straight away.

S2 (39:00):
Wow.

S8 (39:01):
Yeah. So that's part of the, um, gold standard ACL protocol.
The physio comes in and, um, we get you on
some crutches, depending on your age as well. I mean,
ACL surgeries are usually for young people and young athletes,
so we'll get them on some crutches hopefully. Day one,
we really just want to get them on the edge
of the bed, standing with their crutches. And then, um,

(39:23):
if they can get to a chair, that would be
ideal to sit out in a chair for a little bit.
Because a couple of reasons. One, we want to make
sure that their muscles stay, um, conditioned because they need
good muscle strength for their rehab process. Coming up. Two
we want to make sure that they're able to sit
up to, um, prevent chest infections in hospital. A lot

(39:44):
of these people are quite young and fit, but that
doesn't mean that they can't catch something while they're in
the hospital. So we want to make sure they're moving.
And that's really, really important that early mobilization in rehab
is crucial. Um, it can really set up the next
kind of steps. And we'll also give, um, you know,
some exercises that are just a gentle bed, exercises that are,

(40:05):
you know, cleared by surgeons, um, just to kind of
get the, the range moving in your knee. Because often
the first thing we kind of need when you've done
your ACL is you need 90 degrees of knee flexion.
And we need that because that's how we sit in chairs.
That's how we get up from chairs. That's how we
kind of are functional. So um, most of the time,
depending on, uh, who your surgeon is, what their protocol is, um,

(40:28):
and where you go for your surgery. Um, the goals
are kind of to get you at least able to
walk to the bathroom with your crutches and to get
a 90 degree knee flexion range before you discharge.

S1 (40:39):
I guess those are little things where I say little things,
but those kind of things, I get it, the bathroom
sitting up, you know, maybe eating, drinking, that sort of stuff.
I mean, you know, it's probably kind of feeling like, well,
I'm in control or I'm doing okay rather than, you know, I'm,
you know, I'm I've been, uh, laid, laid very low.

S8 (40:56):
Yeah, absolutely. Like, we want people to have control over
their their rehab and their body. And we want to
try and get our body moving as much as we can,
because that really helps the rehab process. If we're kind
of staying in bed for three days, our muscles are deconditioning.
It's so much harder to stand up and get moving again,
especially when we've had trauma into the limb. So, you know,

(41:19):
just cutting it open is a form of trauma. So
we make sure that we're we're moving straight away. We're
getting our muscles at their prime ready to go. Um,
we got pain relief on board so that we're able
to kind of do what we need to do with
our body. And that really sets you up for your,
your rehab process. And it really helps with return to
sport as well.

S1 (41:37):
Because you don't normally in hospital very long are, you.

S8 (41:40):
Know. So I think it depends again, it depends on
who you're um, the type of population of person. Most
of the time it's a day. It's a day type surgery.

S1 (41:48):
Wow.

S8 (41:48):
With maybe an overnight stay.

S1 (41:50):
Yeah.

S8 (41:51):
But, yeah, it's, um. Again, depending on the hospital surgeon person,
all that sort of stuff. But, yeah, we're not really
looking at more than 1 to 2 days.

S1 (42:01):
Is the knee reconstruction mainly due to a sporting injuries?
What happen in sort of, you know, conventional life? Much
would you know, I'd know. Would, uh, laborers or, uh,
people that do physical sort of real work, would they
get this sort of injury or is it pretty much exclusively, uh,
sports related?

S8 (42:19):
An ACL, um, is normally sports related. You can have
instances where you can do your ACL, like, I guess,
for lack of a better term, off the cuff, but
it is really rare. I mean, you know, it could
be in a situation where you might go skiing for
a holiday or something, but it is generally in the
form of physical activity. It's not very often you'd see,

(42:41):
you know, a construction worker do their ACL from their job,
unless it was something like they had to do something
out of there, like a high impact physical thing. Um,
it's not like something like a, um, you can have
knee construction reconstructions. Um, in the forms of, like, knee replacements.
That's kind of more your your, I guess, wear and tear,
for lack of a better term type surgery. But this

(43:03):
is more like a, an injury like damage repair type scenario.
And it is often when you have that fixed twist
type injury, which is really that's not really something that
we do every day. So it'd be very rare that
it would happen kind of walking down the street. It's
very often more so in the sporting population because of
the biomechanics of the injury.

S1 (43:23):
Yeah. As you say, you wake up from surgery and
the physio is the first person to greet you in
the hospital for a day or two, then I guess
a lot of it is interacting with the physio, but
a lot of it then is back on the individual
to kind of, you know, do their homework or do
their rehab sort of in their own time. And I've
often heard players talk about how lonely they feel when
they're in the rehab room and their teammates are out,

(43:44):
you know, kicking the ball around, having fun and getting
ready to play the next week.

S8 (43:47):
Yeah, absolutely. I think there's definitely an element of, um,
having to have some psychological support with this, um, 100%.
But yeah, the rehab process is really up to you. Um, and,
you know, your, your physio, um, or your, uh, return
to sport fitness coach, whatever. Um, it's obviously depends on
the level of sport that you're in as to how
many resources you do have. But essentially it's up to

(44:09):
you to do it, because if you're not the one
doing it, the one that's going to return to what
you're doing. But it can be often a very lonely
process for professional athletes, especially when they're in a team
where everyone else is playing and they have to watch
every game. It can be quite difficult. So I think
most of the high level clubs in the AFL at least,
would have sports psychology on board to help players through

(44:30):
those moments. Um, so it's really important to also keep
in mind the mental mental load that comes with these
types of injuries, because they do they are really like
a 9 to 12 month return sport process. So that
is a very long time to be kind of on
your own, focusing on your rehab and your body without
any other people doing what what you're doing, especially when

(44:51):
you're in a team sport.

S1 (44:52):
You can only play Xbox for a certain amount of
time of the day. Chelsea. Fantastic. Now, if people want
to come and or if they want to find out more,
particularly about the wonderful work you do at the Academy,
how can we do that?

S8 (45:02):
Yeah, you can jump online and give us a Google
just if you type in in Google Football Academy with
the first one that comes up, or you can go
to our website directly WWE Academy. And in there there's
a little contact form. Feel free to fill out that
one for your child if you're interested, and you can
see it comes straight through to our enquiries inbox. Um,

(45:24):
otherwise you can email us directly. If you wanted to
give a bit more of an explanation about your child
and what they need, we're more than happy to answer anything.
Or you can give us a call and our number
is on the website.

S1 (45:34):
Will you talk about the first one? I come up
when we think of physiotherapist, you're the first person that
comes up. Chelsea. Great work. We'll catch up again next month.

S8 (45:41):
Thanks, Peter. I really appreciate it. See you next.

S1 (45:43):
Month. Just be my kitty there from the Flipper Academy.
Flipper Academy.com.

S9 (45:49):
Keep in touch with Vision Australia Radio in Adelaide on
1190 7 a.m..

S1 (45:55):
It's Mental Health Week and a bit of an emphasis,
particularly on young people and their teeth. Let's chat about
it with Doctor Monica Farrelly. Doctor Monica for my colleague doctor,
thank you so much for your time.

S8 (46:06):
Thank you.

S5 (46:06):
For having me on today.

S8 (46:08):
Peter.

S1 (46:08):
Well, you've been doing some research, which I guess throws
up some maybe disturbing or alarming results as far as, uh,
parents and their kids are not going to the dentist.

S8 (46:18):
Yeah. That's right.

S5 (46:19):
So I think.

S8 (46:20):
The results are a little.

S5 (46:21):
Bit shocking.

S10 (46:21):
Is definitely the word to use. So the Australian Dental
Association surveyed 25 Australian adults and actually found that 40%
of adults think around two years old is acceptable for
children's first dental visit. As a dentist, we actually recommend
that children see the dentists much younger when their first

(46:42):
tooth comes through or before age one, whichever is sooner.
So there's a bit of a gap there in parents knowledge.

S1 (46:48):
And can a lot go wrong from, you know, year
one to year two?

S8 (46:52):
Yeah. So we don't.

S10 (46:53):
Like to think of it as all doom and gloom,
but it's important to not scare parents, but just to
get them aware of some of the things that can happen,
even in those early years. We use it as a
screening tool to make sure that there's not any holes.
Decay problems with, um, the soft tissues, gums or even

(47:14):
tongues and tongue ties. So it's a really good screening
tool between that 1 to 2 year age group. It
also gets children familiar with the dentist and aware of
the sights, sounds and sensations. That way, if they come
in older years and they have a problem, for example,
it's not as daunting for them to be seated in
the chair.

S1 (47:34):
Okay. I was going to ask you about that, Monica.
I mean, you know, 1 or 2 year olds are
pretty hard to sort of keep still at the best
of times. How do you go to the dentist doing that?

S10 (47:43):
Yeah, I actually really love seeing children, and I love
the challenge of making them comfortable at the dentist. I
don't find that most kids are too anxious about the dentist,
unless there's been a conversation at home that you know
they're going to be very brave, or that it might
be scary. Yeah. Which often comes from parents, right?

S1 (48:05):
You sound like my parents a long, long time ago.

S10 (48:08):
Yeah. And dentistry has gotten a lot better. So a
lot of kids are actually pretty comfortable in the chair.
A great tip that we use as dentists is to
get children to sit on the laps of the parents.
So it's very. Yeah, they're close to the parents. We
do a little practice brushing or checking, um, one of
the parents teeth, and then we can do the same

(48:30):
with with the child in their lap. It's just modeling
that good behavior. And then they feel comfortable. And you know,
we have little rewards stickers, toys, whatever it is, it's
positive reinforcement that you know this is a good circumstance
for them.

S1 (48:44):
No lollies. Monica I take it.

S10 (48:46):
No lollies.

S1 (48:48):
I might take a little bit tongue in cheek, I know,
but maybe it's a bit confronting for the parent. If
they get their teeth examined and they've been doing the
right thing. Or maybe it's a bit of incentive for
them to do the right thing.

S10 (48:59):
Yeah. That's right. I think it can be twofold, right.
We tend to not actually check the parents teeth when
we're doing that little example, but it's just demonstrating to
the kids that, you know, what we're doing is safe
and that if you know their caregiver, their parent is
happy to sit, then they're probably going to follow their suit.
But it is a great reminder for the parents to also.

S1 (49:21):
So yeah. So the double pronged attack. What about in
terms of, um, the work or the attention that kids
can pay to their pay to their teeth, or indeed
that parents can pay to their kid's teeth, you know,
between sort of the age of one, one and three,
or one and four. Before that, maybe okay enough to
do their own teeth.

S10 (49:38):
Yeah. So the rule of thumb we generally have is
that kids don't really have good dexterity to clean their
teeth until about, I say, age six, but some people
can say when they have their Penn license. It's difficult
to get into all the grooves and all the surfaces
of the teeth. So parents helping them in similar tone

(50:00):
get them to lie in your lap if you find
it's a little bit easier to access so that you
know you can actually see what you're doing. But yeah,
young kids, they're not brushing their teeth particularly well. And
we want to make sure that those teeth are kept
very clean. The other thing that the survey actually shows
is that a lot of parents aren't aware of flossing kids.

S1 (50:21):
Yeah, I saw that. They talked about that because parents
tend not to floss their their teeth of their young kids.

S10 (50:28):
Yeah. Most definitely. So 76% of parents are not flossing
children's teeth. It's really important that we're flossing the teeth
as soon as they're touching. Just like adults, you can
get food stuck between the teeth, which can cause cavities
or decay. And in baby teeth, they actually progress a
lot quicker because the teeth are quite small. Kids can't

(50:50):
tell you if they're having pain the same way that
an adult has. Yeah, results can be quite detrimental. Sometimes
the tooth may even need to be extracted or taken out.
And then that opens a new can of worms. If
we lose a tooth early. Whether you get crowding issues
need braces. Orthodontics. So it comes from a place of reason,

(51:12):
but I can appreciate it can be hard to even
get the brushing started for an extra step.

S1 (51:19):
But obviously, you know, getting into the habit is a
good thing because habits can be hard to break. I
guess either good or bad habits.

S10 (51:25):
Yeah, that's right. And I think once it's normal for kids,
they just see it as part of their they retain,
and it's a great encouragement for parents to be flossing
their teeth as well.

S1 (51:34):
What about in terms of toothpaste? Are they kind of
much of a muchness? Not much sort of difference between
brands and prices, etc.. Or is price the guide?

S10 (51:43):
Yeah. So price is not necessarily the guide. It's more
what the age group is and what the recommended fluoride mount.
So for up to 18 months we don't recommend that
children use any fluoridated toothpaste. And then at around six
years to eight years, depending on how high risk the

(52:05):
child is, we might move them to an adult's toothpaste.
So adults toothpaste has about 1000 parts per million fluoride
where kids is around that 500. So it's about really
what is specialized for each kid. If a kid has
lots of holes and they're not swallowing toothpaste, then chat
to your dentist because they may advise that they use

(52:28):
a higher strength, one to better protect their teeth.

S1 (52:30):
Now, I don't want to get too controversial, Monica. Or
you can if you want. What about in terms of
fluoride in the water and stuff like that? I mean,
you sound way too young to have been around before.
Fluoride was sort of more freely available. That has made
a difference. Do you think in terms of people, particularly
younger adults? Teeth?

S10 (52:48):
Yeah, most definitely. I don't have the statistics off the
top of my head, but water fluoridation is a great
policy in protecting people's teeth. Most studies show that the
difference between the amount of decay or holes in teeth
before and after fluoridation is phenomenal. So yeah, not getting
too topical. But as the Australian Dental Association, we definitely

(53:12):
support fluoridation in all water.

S1 (53:14):
And what about what kids are fed. Obviously that's important
as well.

S10 (53:18):
Yeah that's a great point. I think a lot of parents,
you know, always trying to do their best to provide
kids healthy foods. We all know that soft drink is
not great for our teeth, but it's actually quite concerning that, um, 38%
of children in that same survey were having a soft
drink or a fruit juice 2 to 5 times a week,

(53:39):
and 27% of them were having fruit juice every day.
Fruit juice is a little bit confusing, right? Because it
seems like it's healthy. It's got fruit in it, but
it's a lot of added sugars and we would be
much better giving our children fruit as a whole and
water that sugar contributes to decay. And we sort of

(54:01):
start the cycle early of getting children into higher sugar exposure.
So diet's really important. I know it's really tricky with
young kids. So whole fruit and plain water is a
better substitute than having fruit juices. So it allows you
to have all the good stuff from fruit while just
having plain water, which is neutral. The second best thing

(54:22):
would be milk.

S1 (54:23):
Okay. So just. Yeah, sort of any old milk again
kind of helps.

S10 (54:28):
Yeah. Just plain milk. We obviously don't want sugared milks. Again,
plain milk is fine. And obviously some kids are allergic
to lactose and things. Just taking that all into consideration.

S1 (54:38):
Now Michael, what about I guess for anyone like after
a meal, perhaps if you're not in a position to
brush your teeth, is it right that a drink of
water kind of can help a little bit?

S10 (54:47):
Yeah. So water will remove, you know, the bigger food bits.
But what is most important is that we actually wait
30 minutes to brush our teeth after we eat or
drink anything, right? Yeah, that's that's always one I find
in clinic people are very surprised about. So it may
not be public information, but that's actually how long your

(55:10):
saliva needs to neutralize all the acids from your food.
If you go in and give your teeth a good
brush in those first 30 minutes, you're just accelerating the
tooth wear, wearing away the enamel quicker.

S1 (55:23):
There's a lot of people have breakfast, brush their teeth
and then jump in the car.

S10 (55:26):
That's right. Yeah, it's. It's tricky. Everyone lives a busy life.
But there's no harm in, you know, brushing your teeth
when you get up eating something and then just rinsing
your mouth out with water. And then you might want
to use a substitute of a mouthwash after that 30 minutes.
We don't want to wash away the fluoridated toothpaste. That's
another little tip though.

S1 (55:47):
I hope you all have your meal, but wait 30
minutes before brushing your teeth is the sort of optimal.

S10 (55:52):
That's right.

S1 (55:53):
Fascinating stuff. That's wonderful. Now, obviously, this dental awareness week,
that's the message going out there. What I've read up
a little bit about you. You do some really interesting
work in other areas. I kind of, you know, want
to sort of impose upon your time in the future
to maybe talk about the other work that you're doing.
It's kind of restorative or maybe those that haven't done
the right thing, but there's now a lot of work

(56:15):
and research into kind of repairing things of the past,
if I can put it that way.

S10 (56:20):
Yeah. So obviously this generation coming forward, you know, in
their 50s, 60s, they're probably one of the first generations
that they'll have a lot more of their teeth. There's
not as much emphasis on preventative extractions removing teeth and dentures.
So the challenge we're actually facing in dentistry now is

(56:40):
how do we hold on to people's teeth for the
lifetime that they need it? You know, people are living
to their 90s, hundreds. They may move into aged care facilities.
How do we make their teeth functional? So as dentists,
we're always discussing with patient different options. They might have
had a really large filling when they were a kid

(57:00):
that fillings failed. What the next steps are. So it's
it's great opportunity with the technology that's coming through in dentistry.
It's not as barbaric as it used to be. So
we can help those patients in that transition.

S1 (57:15):
Barbaric. Monica, I'd love you to talk to you more
about that in the future. So thank you for speaking
to us today.

S10 (57:21):
No, thank you for having me on the show today, Peter.

S1 (57:23):
That's Doctor Monica Farley there from the Australian Dental Association
talking about Dental Health Week and in particular paying attention
to our kids teeth and our own. Indeed. And we'll
put some details up on our show notes. As far
as the, uh, the message for the week goes on
the Australia Network through your favorite podcast service on 1190

(57:44):
7 a.m. in Adelaide. You're listening to Leisure Link. Let's
welcome to the program. Lauren is the senior manager for
operations at orange Sky and we're speaking about Homelessness Awareness Week. Lauren,
lovely to meet you and thank you for your time.

S11 (58:00):
Thanks for having me today, Peter.

S1 (58:01):
Yeah. Well, you know firsthand that things are actually kind
of getting worse rather than better as far as homelessness goes.

S11 (58:07):
Yeah. Sadly, we're seeing more and more people experiencing homelessness,
and our orange sky shifts are busier than they've ever been,
and it's often new faces coming to shifts every week.

S1 (58:19):
And I guess you're there because, um, you know, people
kind of are almost using you as a last resort.

S11 (58:25):
Oh, it can be really varied. And people come from
all walks of life. Anyone's welcome to an orange sky shift.
At orange Sky, we provide free laundry, free warm shower services.
But most importantly, that connection for people on shift and
having your a load of washing supported or having a
warm shower can really make a difference to people where

(58:46):
perhaps they're having to forgo a meal on the a
meal on the table for the week, or their electricity
bills can be really high. So it's a great option
for anyone, and anyone is welcome to come along to
a shift.

S1 (58:58):
You've done some recent research, and it sort of shows
that perhaps, you know, many of us aren't maybe aware
of homelessness the way we should be, or we don't
perceive it the way we should.

S11 (59:08):
Yeah, you're right, Peter. And I think a lot of
us have the stereotype or that stigma that homelessness is
people sleeping rough that we might see in the park
or on the street. Early in the morning or late
in the evening. And that actually only accounts for about 6%
of people who are homeless or experiencing homelessness. And the
majority of people is really hidden as to what they're experiencing.

(59:30):
And maybe that sleeping in their car or a tent or,
you know, bouncing from family to friend member. Couch surfing
along the way, but just not having that stability or
security in housing.

S1 (59:43):
It's it's a very, very serious matter and can lead
to other issues. I'm thinking in terms of vulnerability or indeed,
you know, maybe more susceptible to mental illness and that
sort of thing.

S11 (59:53):
Yeah. And I think once people are in a really
tough situation, it becomes harder and harder to transition through
and to work through that. And that's why we're really
wanting to encourage Australians to jump on to orange skies
and build that awareness and understanding about what homelessness is
and how in your community and how in your group

(01:00:15):
of friends and co-workers or people that you are connected with,
how you can better identify that and support people in
those early stages?

S1 (01:00:23):
Have you got kind of a bit of an initiative
happening at the moment, or something a little bit different
in terms of your approach?

S11 (01:00:28):
A bigger piece for orange Sky really is encouraging people
to come along to one of our shifts. So jumping
on orange Sky and you can have a look at
where we run, what time and where we're located on
the map, on the website, under Find Us and really
encourage that. It's a service that's available for anyone to
come along, but the most important thing of an orange

(01:00:51):
sky shift really are the incredible volunteers who are there
to have a chat and to connect with people. And
it might be that maybe you don't need your laundry
done or you're okay, you don't need a shower, but
you might want some connection and you're feeling a bit
isolated and disconnected. And that's what orange Sky is there for.

S1 (01:01:09):
I know from the information you sent out that you say,
you know, sometimes people come along and obviously a little
bit apprehensive or, you know, not not quite sure what's
going to happen. As I say, they may feel like
they've been stigmatized, but your volunteers, your people are very
good at making people feel welcome and getting that connection
happening almost instantly.

S11 (01:01:27):
Yeah, they are. Volunteers are incredible people, and they'll usually
recognize a fresh or new face coming to the shift
and be there to guide you through the first shift.
If you do need to have it, go and check
it out. Or you might just want to come and
check it out and see how you feel and try
it another time. But some things to know is that
it's free. Completely free service. You don't need to bring detergent.

(01:01:48):
That's all provided for you, or you've got to do
is turn up with your laundry and the volunteers will
help take care of it for you.

S1 (01:01:54):
Well, when you look after the volunteers that you you
manage the volunteers. Would that be fair to say that.

S11 (01:01:58):
It's a part of my role? But, um, we've got
a lot of volunteers, so there's a lot of hands
to help and to connect. And we've got, um, an
amazing volunteer leaders who support their teams locally as well,
which is a really important part of our organization and
keeps the thread of the rug running.

S1 (01:02:16):
Now, if you're putting the word out there about the
work that you do and if people feel like they can, uh,
you know, uh, introduce themselves to what you're offering, it's
a great thing. What about in terms of more people
getting on board as far as volunteering goes? Uh, are
you always looking for more people in that capacity as well?

S11 (01:02:31):
We are always looking for more volunteers. Um, the best
way to volunteer or to learn about volunteering is to
jump on again to orange Sky. And you'll see on
there that, um, there's some information about volunteering or you
can start an application. But we're always in need of volunteers.
So whether you need to access orange Sky to have
your laundry, whether you're keen to volunteer or to donate, um,

(01:02:54):
that orange Sky website is the best place to pop
on and have an explore.

S1 (01:02:59):
Now you've been around since. Not you personally, but orange Sky.
Been around since 2014. Is that right?

S11 (01:03:04):
Yeah, we'll be coming into our 11th year and just
the need for the service to continue, which is, I think,
as we talked about, quite unfortunate and scary. And it
really is more and more people from all walks of
life are finding themselves in tough times. And orange Sky
is only one part of, you know, the system to

(01:03:27):
be able to provide support. We really do work with
other service providers to provide more of that wraparound service.

S1 (01:03:34):
Now, I'm sure the people that you, uh, you know, uh,
have interaction with are very appreciative of it. And I guess, uh,
a recognition of the community and how much, uh, Australia
likes what you do and appreciates what you do is
you've been recognised in the Australia Day Awards.

S11 (01:03:49):
Yes. Um, Nick and Lucas, who are founders, um, were
recognised and I think they're they're very humble people. But
they'll be the first to say that it's the team
behind them. But I think, yeah, what they did is
to their young people is quite an incredible feat.

S1 (01:04:05):
Well, I remember them on that particular evening when the
awards were announced. And it's it's a very powerful story,
isn't it? You know, for those of us that might
not necessarily know exactly, uh, the life of many people
out there, it was certainly a great way to kind
of be reminded and in a sense, just the fact that,
you know, we can be more grateful for what we've got.
It's a it's a great message to be sending out anyway.

S11 (01:04:27):
Yeah. And I think, um, for me at least, I
know that when I look at the story of orange
Sky and I talk to Nick and Lucas, it really
is that example of seeing a need in your own
journey and taking some action to do something about it.
And I think maybe we can't all do it in
the scale that they have done. Um, but that is
a great example for us all to there's, you know,

(01:04:48):
whether it be to educate yourself and have those awareness conversations,
whether it be volunteering or donating, we all can, um,
do something, whether that be a small aspect or a huge,
huge task to take on.

S1 (01:05:02):
Or it can all be pretty good at saying there's
a problem. Why doesn't someone do something about it? It's
a bit different when someone says, there's a problem, I'm
going to do something about it. And that's what those
particular guys do.

S11 (01:05:12):
Yeah. Very true.

S1 (01:05:14):
Yeah. Whereabouts are you? What what what state are you in?
You're not quite Australia wide yet, are you?

S11 (01:05:18):
We're in all states of Australia and a lot of
regional locations as well. Over in, across the ditch in
New Zealand. Oh. Which really does just showcase the need.
So we're ever growing and always looking to continue to, um,
support more and more communities. We have a lot of
requests coming across the country every day, um, looking for

(01:05:38):
orange Sky to come to their community because that need
is just so great.

S1 (01:05:42):
So certainly the fit is you're well represented, but I
guess you're trying to quite, um, quite spread your tentacles
a little bit further as well into the more remote
and rural areas as well.

S11 (01:05:51):
Yeah. And I think that also is that highlight of
that level of homelessness at the moment. And the different
types of homelessness is that regional and smaller communities really
do have the need just as much as our metropolitan areas.

S1 (01:06:05):
Very true. Well, you're doing a great job. Long may
you continue. Now, in a sense, it'd be good if
you could do yourself out of a job. Lauren, but I,
I don't sense it's going to happen too soon. How
can we find out more to get involved with any
of the aspects that oransky do? How can we get involved?

S11 (01:06:19):
Jump onto Oransky and have a look at the different
ways that you can be involved. Um, and that might
just be having a look at some of the new
research that we've done and understanding homelessness.

S1 (01:06:30):
All right. We'll put those details up at our show notes. Lauren,
great to talk to you. Keep up the great work.
You and all the team they are now, as you
said very honestly, there's a a lot of people doing
a lot of work. You're certainly part of that. We
appreciate you spending some time with us as well on
a busy week.

S11 (01:06:42):
Thanks, Peter. Really appreciate you having us on today.

S1 (01:06:45):
So Lauren is there. Who's the senior manager for operations
at orange Sky, the award winning orange Sky. So this
is Homelessness Awareness Week. And the work that they're doing
is certainly going a long way to help many, many people.
It's time to catch up with our friends from Resthaven
been with us for quite some time this afternoon. This

(01:07:06):
evening under the spotlight is Billy Gardner, who's the manager
for Retirement Village Community Services. Billy, great to meet you.
Thanks for your time.

S12 (01:07:15):
Lovely to speak with you, Peter.

S1 (01:07:17):
Yeah, just a little bit about your role. Uh, you
look after, um, home care and support for people in
retirement living.

S12 (01:07:23):
Yes. That's correct. So, uh, myself and my team, we
work in the retirement living villages and we assist residents with, um,
linking into services, um, as well as managing, um, home
care package clients within the village.

S1 (01:07:40):
No, no, the more recent years in particular, certainly Resthaven
have been doing a lot of work in that area
of retirement village.

S12 (01:07:47):
Oh, absolutely. And we've currently got 33 retirement villages across
Adelaide and the Fleurieu. And that is certainly a lot
of clients and residents to support. I think that, you know,
the beauty of what we do is with working in
the retirement villages is it makes it easier for the

(01:08:08):
residents to be able to ask those questions and seek
support regarding services that are out there, and that can
support them to remain independent, um, and living well in
their homes. I think that, um, you know, we all
know that the aged care system can be a little
bit complex and often frustrating for people, and they then
tend to not proceed with accessing services. So that's kind

(01:08:33):
of where we can step in and, you know, help
them with those interactions with my aged care when they
have their assessments, etc.. And, you know, even before that,
helping them to identify what services are out there that
you know, that really benefit from.

S1 (01:08:46):
Are they much different from, say, people who might be
receiving services that are still living at home?

S12 (01:08:52):
Look, the services are generally the same. Our services are delivered,
you know, by home support workers in the home or
allied health staff, depending what services a client requires. I
guess another beauty of retirement living is that it's one village,
so our workers can go from client to client to client.

(01:09:14):
The residents get to know the workers. They, you know,
build relationships with them. It really breaks down that barrier
of this is a service rather than this is someone
coming to support me. So a lot of similarities, just,
I guess, a more unique care partner approach when we
are on site in retirement living, we're at your home base. Basically.

(01:09:39):
You don't have to come searching for us. You know,
if you call our phones, we answer. There's no, you know,
call center and you ring my number. You get me?

S1 (01:09:50):
Well, they're important differences, aren't they? Because you kind of
talked about the the trust or, you know, building that
connection that is so important.

S12 (01:09:57):
Oh, absolutely. Absolutely. When, um, you know, you see somebody daily, um,
you may not know what they do or what they're
in the village for. It kind of starts those conversations.
And generally when you work in aged care, you know,
you have a real love of people. And, uh, you know,
I'll walk through the village and I'll be like, hello,

(01:10:18):
how are you today? How are you? Beautiful garden. You
just start those conversations that we as humans all love
to have those interactions, you know, with other people just
to stop, you know, a couple of minutes and, uh,
you know, listen to somebody to understand what's happening in
their life and, you know, potentially how they may not

(01:10:39):
even know, you know, that there are services out there
that can help. Yeah. You know, and it's those little
conversations that really start the whole journey.

S1 (01:10:48):
Such a great point you make, Billy, because we're actually
commemorating or marking, uh, Homeless Awareness Week. So that's obviously
a really important message. But Billy, what about in terms of, uh,
you know, I guess life is what it is. So
things change. That's kind of, um, part of it as well,
that there's flexibility if what you required today might be
different than what you might have required yesterday.

S12 (01:11:09):
Oh, absolutely. Absolutely. And you know, I always say what
we start with today absolutely may change tomorrow. And it's
a continuing working partnership. You know, it really is a
partnership to deal with what's happening in life right now.
Things happen every day, you know, in life. And circumstances

(01:11:30):
change quite quickly. And it's about being able to adapt
to the situations as they occur. And we're really fortunate
that we have such a huge team to back us.
And you know, from clinical staff, allied health staff, our
support staff on the ground. There's a whole range of

(01:11:51):
teams within Resthaven that can, you know, be accessed at
any one and given time to, you know, put in
the supports that are required for somebody. I think that
for most of us, you know, we want to be
able to remain independent, maintain our functional capacity, you know,
to continue living in our own homes.

S1 (01:12:11):
We'll give you contact details before we wrap up the interview. Now.
You're doing something pretty, uh, funny or pretty, uh, fun
sounding and, uh, very cool. Coming up in October with, uh, Annesley.
Tell us a bit about this.

S12 (01:12:24):
Yes, yes. Um. Very exciting. Um, so we're currently in
the process of working with the Annesley Junior School to
commence an intergenerational program, and it will run for five
weeks commencing in October, as you said, and the project
has been run previously. It was a gardening program this time.

(01:12:47):
We're hoping to branch out a little bit further and
have small groups of clients and reception children at building friendships,
working on projects together, you know, doing art, crafts, gardening,
reading and just, you know, really promote that relationships across
the generations and hoping to create something, you know, really sustainable,

(01:13:09):
which will flow on, you know, continually throughout the years. Um,
it's a great opportunity for clients who potentially don't have
family here and for reception children, little people that, you know,
may not have grandparents anymore or older people in their lives.
And to start the interactions and let them learn from

(01:13:32):
each other.

S1 (01:13:33):
That's fantastic. And obviously, as you say, learning from each other,
I guess just getting a bit of a different appreciation of, um,
you know, of the lives of, uh, people who might be, uh, well,
a couple so different generations than know what you are.

S12 (01:13:46):
Oh, absolutely. And that's so true. You know, we we
tend to stick with people in our own age groups and,
you know, for, um, the younger generations, um, you know, um,
you know, I guess I even consider I'm old now, um, but,
you know, um, you know, for them to, you know,
hear our stories, our history, you know, even my own

(01:14:08):
children don't, you know, can't believe some of the things,
you know, um, that I experienced. And that was only
in the 80s, you know? So, um. Yeah. So, um, just,
you know, kind of bridging those gaps and sharing that history.
It's a wonderful opportunity.

S1 (01:14:24):
So at this stage it's going to be for five weeks.
So through October. But you've got plans. So I guess,
you know, depending on how things go it could be
expanded as time goes on.

S12 (01:14:33):
Absolutely. Um, the school is, um, very, um, excited to
build something that we can potentially roll out across each
term next year. and keeping it to a five week
program means that while we need a commitment from our clients,
five weeks is such a short time. Um, you know, um,

(01:14:56):
that we can book other appointments around, um, those five
weeks and and having the dates locked in also gives people,
you know, an opportunity to, um, manage their daily calendars
as well. So, you know, it's not a huge commitment,
but I think the benefit of the commitment is just
going to be amazing.

S1 (01:15:17):
It's a great point you make, Billy. I mean, kudos
to the school as well for getting involved because, you know,
it's kind of, uh, well, literally getting out of their
comfort zone in a way. I mean, it's part of education,
albeit a little bit different. I guess it's, you know,
person to person education, which is maybe more powerful than
reading something off a screen or out of a book.

S12 (01:15:36):
Uh, definitely. Definitely. I think the benefit to the younger
generations in interacting with older generations, you know, is just
as beneficial, you know, and it kind of, you know,
will make them maybe, perhaps stop to think, you know,
about things from a different perspective. I know we're already

(01:15:56):
talking reception children, so they may not quite be there, but,
you know, for the other people that may be around
while the program is being run, who may never have thought,
you know, about what life is like as an 85
year old, we're all going to get there one day.

S1 (01:16:10):
Yeah, well. Well that's right. Well, hopefully you all will.
I guess it just gets people a bit of a
different perspective. And, you know, it's the old story about
keep yourself young by surrounding yourself with young people. So,
you know, I guess it's going to work that way
for the rest of the clients.

S12 (01:16:24):
Oh, absolutely. Absolutely. I think the enthusiasm from the clients
that I've spoken to already, you know, the smiles on
their faces when we talk about the program. You know,
I think the benefits are just going to be so
wonderful in well-being. You know, making people feel good about themselves,
about giving. You know, something, you know, for even those

(01:16:47):
people that don't have a lot to give, a little
bit of time, you know, is a wonderful thing.

S1 (01:16:51):
Well, you know, little kids, you know, they, they, you know,
maybe got a few lift filters than us older people.
And yeah, they probably ask really good questions and, you know,
put some of those people on the spot and that
sort of stuff, which would be part of the fun
of it, I reckon.

S12 (01:17:04):
Oh, absolutely. Um, you're absolutely right. Um, little people do
not hesitate. So, um, and, uh, so, um, it'll definitely, uh,
bring quite a lot of laughs, I'm sure.

S1 (01:17:17):
And I think it'll be, uh, definitely a win win.
We might have to follow up with you and, uh, uh, maybe, uh,
see how that goes after it, because it sounds like
it's going to be, uh, there's going to be some
stories to tell afterwards, I think.

S12 (01:17:28):
Uh, definitely. Absolutely. So yes, that would be wonderful to
catch up and give some feedback on how the program, um,
went and, uh, you know, and I'm sure he'll tweak
it along the way until you know it. Um, you know,
is a sustainable project going forward for both the school
and for the older, um, clients?

S1 (01:17:48):
Yeah, I'm sure for people who are in your retirement
living areas, they would know a little bit about what
you provide. But just in case or if there's someone
new listening or someone that might be thinking about going
into retirement, living, etc., can we get in touch with you?
How can we get in touch with you?

S12 (01:18:02):
Okay, so currently, I mean, you can absolutely get in
contact with me and I can put you on to
the right people that can help you. If you're already
in a retirement living village, a rest haven one and
want to know about services, absolutely. Reach out. Call me.
My photo. My details are generally in the retirement living villages.

(01:18:23):
And so you know what I look like even if
you don't know me, um, as well as my team. So, um,
it's really important that, you know, for us that people
have a face to put to a name, and, and
then if they do see us in the village and,
you know, they feel a bit more comfortable and confident
to speak with us, but. Yeah, absolutely. Peter. Um, more

(01:18:43):
than happy to take any calls from people looking at,
you know, entering into retirement, living people seeking services in retirement,
living more than happy to help.

S1 (01:18:53):
All right. People can find out much more from the
website resthaven. Billy, keep up the great work. Sounds like
it's it sounds like it's more fun than work, Billy.
So I'm not sure about that, but, uh, if you've
got that sort of job, good luck to you.

S12 (01:19:06):
I know I'm very, very blessed. Thank you. Peter.

S1 (01:19:09):
That's great. That's Billy Gardner, a bit of fun and
a bit of seriousness as well. Billy is the, uh,
manager for, uh, Retirement Living Community Services at Resthaven. And, uh,
if you want more details, Resthaven.

S13 (01:19:22):
You're listening to Vision Australia Radio in Adelaide on 1190
7 a.m..

S1 (01:19:27):
Well, the time honoured, I think we can call it that.
The time honoured through the lens photographic composition is on again. Then,
and Evelyn Hayes is the person that tells us all
about it. Evelyn, great to catch up.

S2 (01:19:38):
Hi, Peter, how are you?

S1 (01:19:39):
I'm going very well. I'm very sheepish because I'm a
bit slow to the, uh, party with this. Uh, your, uh,
entries closed this Friday, so we're not giving people a
lot of time, so apologies, but how's it all coming along?

S14 (01:19:49):
Oh, look through the lenses are fantastic. Uh, competition. Something
that my team really, really loves. Uh, working on. Um,
we love to see the photos coming in, as you said, uh,
through the lens closes for entries on Friday, so you've
got a bit less than a week to get your
entries in. Now, that means that you can go through
the photos that you've taken over the past year, see

(01:20:11):
if there's anything suitable that meets the categories, or get
out and about today, tomorrow and go and take some
some more photos to submit.

S1 (01:20:19):
Well, the weather's maybe on the improve, so we might
get a couple of good days for a photo taking.
And I know speaking to you over the years, you
get some remarkable photos obviously, but from all sorts of
angles and all sorts of topics.

S14 (01:20:34):
Absolutely. Uh, just last year, I mean, we received over
700 entries last year. The Judges Choice Award winner was
a brilliant portrait, but there were some really interesting photos.
We had, um, a light bulb, that one, uh, one
of the categories. Um, we had some friends fishing. That one.
We had a bubble coral shrimp that won the landscape

(01:20:57):
and nature category. So it really does demonstrate that older
South Australians are very diverse, um, doing all sorts of
different things with their lives. And, uh, you know, pictures do, uh,
tell great stories.

S1 (01:21:10):
That's, uh, a bit of a derivation on the theme
about a light bulb light bulb moment to Avalon.

S14 (01:21:16):
That's right. Um, yeah. The the light bulb won the
artistic photography category, and it's just such a beautiful image. And, um,
we really, we really love to be able to showcase
the winning images and the finalists, um, in a exhibition
at the City Library every year for the general public
to come in and view the, um, the best of

(01:21:37):
the best.

S1 (01:21:38):
That's one of the features of the, uh, competition or
of the whole event, isn't it? The fact that, uh,
at the end of it, uh, you kind of have
your work distributed or displayed and members of the general
public can come along, and it's free and easy to access.

S14 (01:21:52):
Absolutely. Yeah. So our major sponsor is Atkins Photo lab, um,
an iconic South Australian business that prints the, um, the
beautiful winning and finalist images and frames them. And then
they get hung in a beautiful exhibition at the city
library on in Rundle Mall. So throughout October, members of
the public can come in and browse the exhibition. It's

(01:22:14):
a really lovely way to, um, to have the winning
and the finalist images showcased. Most of these um, seniors
card members are amateur hobby photographers, so it's really lovely
for them to have their work exhibited like that.

S1 (01:22:27):
So I guess the thrust of the competition is all
about seniors, isn't it?

S14 (01:22:31):
That's right. You know, I think seniors card members really
love to share their stories. Other members and other members
of the community love to hear them. And as I said,
you know, photos speak a thousand words. Um, it's a
really great opportunity for, for members to, to share photos
that they've taken that really reflect their lives and their interests.
And it does show that, you know, age is no

(01:22:53):
barrier to creative expression. You know, there are there are
lots of avenues through where, you know, older, older people
can learn new skills and develop new interests and discover
new ways to express themselves.

S1 (01:23:05):
That's a great point, isn't it? Because, you know, it's
not someone who's been sort of interested in photography all
their life that might be suited to this is they
might be someone who perhaps, you know, maybe working a
little bit less or indeed retired or for whatever reason,
have sort of, you know, maybe got a little a
new device that they like to sort of show off
or use.

S14 (01:23:24):
Absolutely. A couple of years ago, the overall winner had
only just picked up photography that year, and so he
was just starting to learn about the equipment and learn
about some of their techniques. And and he ended up
taking out the whole competition. So we've had other finalists
and winners that have just snapshots on their iPhone these days.

(01:23:46):
iPhones and smartphones are very, very important. And so it's
not necessarily about having the best composed photograph. It's more
about the story that goes with it. Yes, it does
need to be a well put together photo. And our
judges include Paul Atkins from Atkins Photo Lab so he
would know. We've also got diamonds, camera, video and digital

(01:24:11):
as well that are on board, and also our friends
from Claymore Wines as well who provide some wonderful prizes.

S1 (01:24:18):
Yeah, it's for people that live in South Australia, is
that right?

S14 (01:24:21):
That's right. South Australian seniors card members are eligible to apply,
and you can submit up to four photographs per person.

S1 (01:24:29):
Now, if the photo is taken outside South Australia, does
that still qualify?

S14 (01:24:33):
Absolutely. You know, I think one of the categories is
is active ageing. So you know, seniors on on the go,
whether you're traveling or whether you're uh yeah. So we've
we've had lots of images from overseas and um, and
from interstate. It does demonstrate that, yeah, older people don't
stop just because they're older. They they're out and about

(01:24:53):
enjoying their lives.

S1 (01:24:54):
Take no take no notice of the calendar. It's just
there to make sure you don't miss appointments. Now there
are different prizes available. We talked about the, uh, the
display that you can be part of, but there are
other prizes as well that you could be in the
running for.

S14 (01:25:08):
That's right. So the winner of the Judges Choice award, um,
will win a $500 gift card thanks to diamonds, camera,
video and digital. And all of the winners and finalists
will get to take home their large framed print of
their photo following the exhibition. Winners in each of the
five categories will get a $100 gift card. Thanks to diamonds,

(01:25:31):
and all of our winners and finalists will get a
fabulous 2022 Nirvana Reserve Shiraz thanks to Claymore wine.

S1 (01:25:39):
Oh wow. Okay, it gets better and better now. Um,
the members of the general public can also get involved
by voting, can't they?

S14 (01:25:46):
No. So we've actually changed the voting. So, um, in
the in the past, we've had the, um, the People's
Choice Award where members of the public were able to vote.
We haven't done that for the past couple of years.
But what we are doing is making sure that members
of the public can come in and see the exhibition,
but also we really want everybody to see all of

(01:26:07):
the entries. So we're working on something a little bit
different this year, where we'll have available on our website
for everybody to see all of the entries, not just
the winners and finalists.

S1 (01:26:17):
All right. We said 700 last year.

S14 (01:26:20):
Yep, we had just over 700 last year. We're on
track to beat that this year. So get your entries in.
You've got till Friday.

S1 (01:26:26):
Okay now as you say till Friday to get them in.
What about in terms of the announcement. Because that's kind
of a special occasion as well, kind of during a
sort of a celebratory week as well when it comes
to seniors.

S14 (01:26:37):
It is absolutely. So this year, um, we've got the
International Day of Older Persons is on the 1st of October. Um,
we've also got the Week of Ageing well, which is
the first week of October as well. We will be
announcing the winners of Through the Lens on the 2nd
of October at a special event at the City Library.
And then following on from that will be the exhibition.

S1 (01:26:58):
Okay. I like the way that kind of language has changed.
Not in the more recent years. Things like aging well
and the office for Health and Ageing well, that that
sort of thing rather than, um, you know, negative, negative
words put into it. So, you know, ageing well is
a great thing to be doing. Well, we're all ageing
regardless of how old we are and hopefully we're all
ageing well.

S14 (01:27:17):
That's the aim, That's what we try and do.

S1 (01:27:20):
Well, right now, how can people enter?

S14 (01:27:22):
Okay. So you can enter through the seniors card website.
So it's ww.gov. You can go to the through the
lens page and you can submit your entries through there.

S1 (01:27:35):
All right. We'll put those details up with our show notes.
So people have missed that they can go there to
make sure they've got them right Evelyn great to catch up.
How long have you been involved with this now.

S14 (01:27:44):
Through the Lens has been going now for I think
this is the 13th year that it's been going. So
the seniors card program celebrated its 30 year anniversary last year.

S1 (01:27:53):
I'll remember that. Yeah.

S14 (01:27:54):
Yeah, yeah. Uh, so, yeah, Through the lens is definitely
something that, um, a lot of members look forward to, um,
every year.

S1 (01:28:01):
Well, I said at the beginning, it was time honored.
I'll say it then. It's time honored. So well done. And, uh,
again this Friday. So if you can do it by
this Friday, you'll be very much in the running. Thanks
for spending the time with us again, Evelyn.

S14 (01:28:13):
Thanks for having me, Peter. Much appreciated.

S1 (01:28:15):
That's everyone. Hey. Hi, everyone. Great to see Evelyn. They're
telling us about the Through the Lens photographic competition closes
this Friday. So we've got a few days to get
your entry in. A couple of quotes before we go.
This is from Dave's guide dog, who signs off his
email every time with this. I'm a proud guide dog,

(01:28:37):
leaving tiny paw prints that matter. Thanks to Dave and
thanks to your guide dog for doing that. And here's
one from Carl who often sends them quotes through. Gail says,
breathe deeply. Feel your feelings. Tune out to the world
and tune into yourself. Gail, thank you so much for
your quote as well. Some birthdays before we go. Carol

(01:29:00):
Cook am having a birthday. That wonderful Paralympic cyclist and
also great campaigner for miss. Happy birthday to you, Carol.
Also Brad Binder having a birthday. Another one of our
fine cricketers. He's a current cricketer. So happy birthday to
you Brad. Pam Mitchell having a birthday. Good on you, Pam.
One of our very regular contributors over many years here
on Pam's on the program next week. Happy birthday to you, Pam.

(01:29:23):
Hope David spoils you and Sean Fitzpatrick, that real man
about town having a birthday as well. Sean, a happy
birthday to you. That's it for the program. Sam, thanks
so much for your help, Pam Greene, thanks so much
for yours. Reminding you that Leslie is available wherever you
get your favorite pod. If you like the program, even
if you don't, please tell your friends about it. Always

(01:29:46):
room for one more listener. If you're listening through 1190
7 a.m. in Adelaide, coming up very soon Vicki Cousins
with Australian Geographic. All being well let's link back at
the same time next week. Be kind to yourselves and
look out for others on Australia Radio and the Reading
Radio Network. This is Lesley.

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