Conversations

Dr Culum Brown is a leading researcher in the field of fish cognition, his research has shown that even that smallest fish are capable of learning and can retain memories for months.

His fascination for fish stems from growing up in parts of south-east Asia, where he would spend every possible hour in the ocean with a snorkel.

As an adult, Culum's marine biology studies around the world have revealed many facts whic...

Dr Campbell Costello's work as a vet has taken him out of his family's station in North Queensland to places as far flung as Kazakhstan, Mongolia and Patagonia.

He's acted as the official vet for a sled race in Alaska, for epic horse races in Mongolia and Argentina, and he has run a cattle station in the former Soviet Union.

But after a family tragedy, Dr Costello got his pilot's licence so he could service Australi...

Dr Tanya Latty is an insect scientist with a quirky taste in pets, and a keen eye for detail, but it's the lessons from her brainless pet slime mould that she's most fascinated about.

Tanya studies the behaviour of ants and bees and she's particularly interested in their ability to work effectively as a team to achieve a common goal.

But her pet project is focused on a creature that defies classification.

Slime mould...

When his elders named him Bindi, David Hudson had no idea his future would involve performing with his didgeridoo at the Taj Mahal, or a role in a film starring Marlin Brando  

Western Yalanji and Ewamian man David Bindi Hudson is a performing artist and musician.

His parents were born on Mona Mona mission, near Cairns.

David's mother didn't like being told what to do, and so in 1956 she walked off the mission with h...

Erna Walraven was one of the first female zookeepers to work at Sydney's Taronga Zoo in the 1980s. Despite practical jokes from her male colleagues, like animal dung in her gumboots, Erna kept her nerve.

She was born in The Netherlands, to parents who were involved in the Dutch resistance during World War II.

Erna's love of languages took her to Spain, where she lived for many years with her widowed sister and young...

At 18 years old, Mick Doleman miraculously survived when his ship capsized in the freezing Southern Ocean off Tasmania. But as he floated in a life raft with his nine crewmates, his ordeal at sea had only just begun.

This episode of Conversations was produced by Meggie Morris, the Executive Producer was Nicola Harrison.

It covers ship wreck, overcrowding, emergency rescue, team dynamics, ship captain, Tasmania, roug...

Liz Cameron was 18 years old when a stranger approached her in a book shop. It was the beginning of her induction into a cult, and it was an experience Liz barely survived.

The process of brainwashing happened gradually, first came the love-bombing and the allure of finding a new purpose in life. Then came the isolation from friends and family, along with sleep deprivation, overwork and sexual manipulation.

Liz was ...

Tom Robinson was a 14-year-old living in the Brisbane suburbs when he made a promise to himself to become the youngest person ever to row across the Pacific Ocean.  Nine years later Tom set off from Peru bound for Australia without a support crew and limited communication.

Tom navigated by the stars, made eye contact with a shark and rowed up to 15 hours a day when strong currents pushed him off course.

And when his...

The bestselling Irish author grew up on a farm set on “50 acres on the side of a hill”. Growing up, she witnessed a harsh, misogynistic country that convinced her she would never marry. Claire shares what she has learned about writing from a litter of newborn piglets.

Her works Small Things Like These and Foster have both been made into movies.

Claire's stories often take place in the landscape where she grew up — t...

When artist Vincent Fantauzzo was a boy he was a street-fighting petty criminal with dyslexia and a blazing talent for drawing. He escaped jail time, and grew up to become one of Australia's most well-known portrait artists.

VIncent Fantauzzo is one of Australia's most successful portrait artists.

For his luminous, photo-realistic paintings he's won the People's Choice Award at the annual Archibald Prize more than a...

How a boy from Glasgow named Norman Swirsky grew up to become Australia's most famous doctorWhen Norman was 10 years old his dad decided to change the family's surname to Swan in a response to ongoing anti-Semitism in Scotland after WWII.

Norman wanted to be an actor growing up, but his parents encouraged him to study medicine.

After he completed his studies at the university of Aberdeen he spent time working in Lon...

The author and actor thinks summer in Australia is done bigger, better and weirder than anywhere else. For three months of the year, life slows down and heats up. But for William, summer in Australia is an imperfect paradise where more than anything, people yearn to connect.

Summer can be a hellish time in Australia, where temperatures soar and fires can turn bush and buildings to rubble in an instant.

But despite t...

Journalist and author, Brigid Delaney looked into the ancient philosophy during an assignment from her editor. What she discovered led her to years of study and a brand-new outlook on life that focuses less on happiness and more on meaning and contentment.

Brigid is devoted to the Stoics, a philosophy that encourages its followers to focus on what they can control, accepting what happens outside of that sphere of c...

Cult survivor and psychotherapist Dr Martina Zangger on her ten years devoted to an Indian mystic and how she learned to stand on her own two feet.

When Martina Zangger was 19 years old she became a devotee of the Rajneeshee Movement led by the Guru, Bhagwan.

The cult had its headquarters in a huge ashram, built in rural Oregon, and Martina decided she needed to go there to be closer to Rajneesh to find the healing ...

When Helen Garner began following her grandson Amby's under-16s football team, it was a chance to spend more time with her youngest grandchild before he became an adult and she was fascinated by the spectacle.

She went along to all the games, and to every training session, shivering on the sidelines at dusk, it also gave Helen a new writing project.

As Helen began writing about Amby and his season, she began to real...

At the very end of World War Two, Australian soldiers were sent to Borneo to dislodge the occupying Japanese Forces. The story of their brutal fighting was largely forgotten by their own compatriots, who never understood why they went in there in the first place.

It was one of the largest amphibious landings of the whole war, and what followed was months of brutal fighting on an island that was both a hell and a pa...

While fighting anorexia Lexi Crouch was admitted to hospital 25 times and placed in an induced coma twice. When doctors told her she would die, she began the slow climb up and out to health (CW: discussion of eating disorders)

Lexi was 16 when she was first admitted to hospital and diagnosed with anorexia and spent the next decade in and out specialist clinics.

When she overheard doctors talking about how she was go...

Mark Winterbottom grew up in outer Western Sydney, in a family with not much money to spend on expensive hobbies. But by an extraordinary twist of fate, Mark won his first mini motorbike in a shopping centre raffle at the age of 8.

Immediately, he was off, speedily rising up from bikes to kart racing, and then to V8 Supercars.

Mark won race after race, earning him the nickname 'Frosty'.

But for years, he could not wr...

Heather's brother and grandfather died in a tragic drowning accident when she was 12 and from that day, she began looking for a way to commune with what lies beyond. 

The quest has taken the Stella award winning writer to Buddhist monasteries, Native American dance rituals and sweat lodges, and to the discipline of writing.

And Heather has had an intuitive sense of life's mystery ever since she was a little girl gro...