Author: Austral-Indonesian Tujuhbelasan

KARTINIISM # 1 Vulnerability In A Dark World

Sadly. so sadly, the softest women’s voices hide themselves in quieteness in this shouting world.

I was a midwife for 32 years. I cannot understand why mothering gentleness is so widely scorned.

Kartini knew that the tender love of mothers is the heart of our world.

Geoff Fox, Hari Kartini, 2021, Terra Nullius

Pepohonan #4 Jaya Tree Poetry

When poetry goes from one language to anohter it has to change to remain poetry.

I call this transcreation,

Dwijaya Saifil Munir sent me a wonderful spontaneous poem about the holiness of trees.

I transcreated it into English.

Then in performance I transcreated those lines into a homage to a big city garden tree.

I then transcreated that into a partial reconstruction of the original Indonesian poem in the subtitles.

As Paul McCartney wrote about his landmark indie album, Wings’ Wild Life, “Can you dig it?”

Geoff Fox, 17th February, 2021 Terra Nullius

Sustainable Development #16 Personal Survival in The Culture War

Cultural Warrior Philipp Zey travelled around the world on a bicycle with a trombone, a golf club and a German pasta shaper.

He shared music, his golf swing and pasta meals using locally available ingredients with hosts and new friends in the cause of peace, understanding and freedom across and up and down Europe, Asia, Australia, South America and Africa.

It is unlikely that anyone in the world has ever played didgeridoo on a trombone down a drain in Australia better than Philipp Zey did for my camera just because I asked him to.

Aboriginal elder the late Aunty Dot Peeters said his playing was “excellent”.

Geoff Fox, February 1 , 2021, Terra Nullius

The Fundamentals #9 Managing Our Times

Amanda Woods of San Diego is young and smart.

I am older. But I learn from and with her.

Martin Luther King Jr, born on this date in 1929 taught that “…… the wealth of cultural and technological progress in America is a result of the commonwealth of inpouring contributions.”

This human commonwealth exists across races, times and places.

When it is shared in freedom and justice, it can grow.

When it become tyrannous, it dies.

Geoff Fox, 16th January, 2021, Terra Nullius