I add this link to my website as a tribute to life.

 

Maybe now in new awareness gained from the horrendous Australian Bushfires I will proceed steadfastly with what I sense to be my life ordained task of Bridge Building. I was previously trying to build a one directional bridge. A one way bridge does not connect two shores!

 

February 2009 Australian Bushfires

 

 

One of my dreams when I initially came to Egypt was to begin building bridges of understanding between people throughout the world. My foundation pylon already securely in place to support this bridge was my life in Australia as an Australian. Yes, as we Aussies say I am a ‘True Blue Aussie’

I’d lived my entire life in Australia never having set foot from her shores until 1999 when I miraculously found my way to Egypt for a brief holiday. Within hours of landing in Cairo I knew I had to return to this country. At that time I had no idea that that sense of knowing was my first inspirational thought leading me toward my bridge work!

I’ve now lived in Cairo for over seven and a half years. I’ve talked a lot about building bridges but in my talk I’ve not taken any real action apart from constructing a pylon of personal understanding of the Egyptian culture and lifestyle! A bridge cannot be built without action. Work is needed if a path of connection is to be created between two foundational pylons!

Sure I’ve talked a lot about life in Egypt to many via either a few magazine articles I‘ve written, my photography, my website and of course the spoken word naively thinking this was efficient bridge building. And I’ve mentioned time and time again how life in Egypt has enriched my soul in the endeavor of bringing a new level of awareness to  Westerners’ of life in Egypt that they didn’t previously have!  

Maybe in a very small way this has been a form of bridge building, but it was inefficient as it was one sided building. For a bridge to be constructed to the optimum construction must occur from both sides simultaneously knowing full well that that a perfect central connection point will ensue!

 

I, somewhat naively was bringing awareness to only half of the builders, which was crazy! I was only building half a bridge and it is impossible for half a bridge connect two points of separation.
A little over a week ago in attempting to construct what I now realise was a one-sided bridge I sent an email about Cairo’s ever growing air pollution problem to an Australian media personality. I subsequently received quite a terse reply about how insignificant a little pollution seemed to him while he was fighting to save his farm from being burnt to the ground in the bushfire!

 

Now until that time I had no idea Australia was ablaze and that people were dying and being left homeless. I had received a few emails of koalas cooling themselves under back yard sprinklers and accepting drinks from humans but thought this was simply due to the extreme heat Australia was experiencing at the time.

 

 

I felt so embarrassed firstly that I didn’t’ know that my country; my home was suffering as it was, and secondly that I had bothered him at such a tragic moment in his life. I still haven’t replied to his email from 11days ago but what I have done is this….

I delved into as many internet news reports as possible concerning the out of control bushfire racing through Victoria, Australia. As I read I relived the past fire experience I had had in Australia over 20 years ago when fires that raged up the east coast of Australia. For several nights I could see flames in the distance as I sat praying the wind didn’t change direction sending the flames to engulf our home.  But what I experienced was nothing compared to the horror of this fire.

This fire has changed so much for so many people. Many people, animals, plant life and homes have been killed injured or destroyed. This fire shamed me into realising that I had in some ways turned my back on part of who I really am in my quest to better understand life. This fire also changed me; it has helped purify and transform me back to being essentially Australian.

I pray I never again forget even briefly my Australian heritage which has fundamentally shaped me into the person I am today. I am so sorrowful that so many suffered in this tragedy and I am so ashamed that it took this horror to remind me of who I am and of my original purpose in coming to Egypt to live.
Hopefully I am now back on track so that I will get on with engineering the bridges that I came here to build.

 

 

I posted photos of our Australian fires on facebook to help bring awareness to Egyptians of one aspect of life in Australia of which they had not been aware. Most Egyptians see Australia as being a land where life is constantly great and unchallenged. For them to see this aspect of Aussie life opened up a doorway of interest that previously did not exist.

 

My heart continues to be heavy for all the suffering that has taken place in Australia. Some of the photos that came across the internet screen were just too upsetting to place on facebook but these scenes of horror will not leave my mind.  But, it is these scenes that will always remind me that, as Peter Allen said so well quite some time ago; “I still call Australia home!”

 

 

I love you Australia and I am proud to be called Australian. I know that I am no-one of great importance and maybe the difference I make in this world during my lifetime will only be very small, but any difference no matter how minute  I may make that  helps unify humanity as one with each other, and with all life forms is more than OK with me. If each of us can make one small difference in our life time in this direction then very soon bridges of love, understanding and compassion will connect all mankind and through this connection peace and harmony will once more be in place throughout our world.

These trees and this land offer us the example of the miracle of life that is available to us all.
They will regenerate; this fire or arsonist did not defeat them.
Like them we can regenerate after any disaster we encounter, that is of course unless we choose not to!
I choose life…..What do you choose?

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A survivor’s story taken from an internet news report:

Fotini Jackson

 

Greg Jackson and his wife Fotini have lived on Bald Spur Road, on a ridge above the town, for 21 years. With Fotini's 80-year-old mother, they barely escaped with their lives. Fifteen of their neighbours died in the inferno.

Greg said: "I've fought big bushfires in the Blue Mountains (west of Sydney, NSW), but I've never seen anything like this. Homes just blew up. You can't fight a fire front like this.

"My home blew up. My roof lifted off. It's a Colorbond roof—with 110mm roofing screws that could withstand 150 km winds, but it just blew up. The fire was funnelled up as though up a chimney. It was like a thermonuclear explosion.
"One of my friends described it brilliantly—it was like the firestorms that took out Hamburg. I've seen many houses burning in bushfires, but I've never seen houses explode like that."

Fotini added: "We opened the roller door of the garage and all we could see were flames. The bushes were still burning but our neighbours had a bare patch of grass, already burnt. We ran there and threw a blanket from the garage over mum's head. She still has burns on her legs from running across the garden."
Greg continued: "We've all been frantic for three or four days. We were a very tight knit community, with a lot of long term residents in our street. I knew my neighbours and I saw them burn to death in their cars. They didn't have a chance."

Greg said the government's "stay and defend or go" policy was "fruitless". "The first we knew about the fire was the noise—we thought it was plane engines, it was deafening. ‘Stay and defend or go' is fine if you know when the fire is coming. No-one here knew where it was coming from."

The critical issue was early warnings, he continued, but "they [the government] just won't spend the money. You'd need at least an hour's warning because here in Kinglake there are only two ways out—Whittlesea to Yea or St Andrews—and that was no way because of the fire."

 

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There are countless stories to tell; this is simply one. 7000 Australians were left homeless and 181 known deaths. To count the loss of wildlife and domestic animals is impossible. Australians in true Aussie spirit have raised huge amounts of money food and clothing to help the survivors.