Pictures are worth a thousand words, they say, so here I am on my life’s journey in places like Australia, Thailand, Japan, China, France, NZ and Malaysia. As well as a writer and painter, you’ll see a photographer, cook, trainee glider pilot, WOOFer on organic farms in France, ESL teacher, expat in Japan (seasonal festival) and China (community exercises), SCUBA diver, committee member (the day Quentin Bryce joined us for brunch), proud grandmother and would-be easy rider dreaming of a Harley.
Welcome to a snapshot ‘About’ page.
Where I go, that hat goes!
My journey, thus far …
Born in southern Germany of an ‘East’ German mother (fashion designer/dressmaker) and ‘West’ German father (lithographer/commercial artist), I found it unsettling as an eight-year-old that had only recently learned to read and write, to be suddenly unable to communicate in the language of my new environment after my parents’ abrupt decision to emigrate to Melbourne, Australia. The sudden erection of the Berlin Wall in 1961 had convinced them that WWIII was imminent, and the thought had terrified them.
There’s nothing like being locked out of the local vernacular to inspire a life-long interest in language, and, as it turned out, in literature and in writing. All through primary school, I wrote what I’d call ‘English poetry’. They were silly nonsense, of course, but they did rhyme: ‘A book has a look. It could be a crook. Or it could contain knowledge that we would acknowledge’. (Here endeth thy torture, dear Reader!) Aged fourteen, I saw my words in print for the first time when Chapter One of a three-part story, Ninotchka, the Street Urchin, was chosen for the annual school magazine. Opportunities to write and publish essay-length pieces then came in drips and drabs over the years, but in 2020 – a lifetime later – I began writing full time, and in 2022, I’ll launch my first book Going Solo: A Travel Memoir in Search of Meaning, Belonging and Identity (see Home Page for details).
The intervening years had me move from teaching English, Drama and Junior Science at high school, to confounding tertiary students with the complexity of German grammar. I also taught another cohort at TAFE to use potters’ wheels on which they created some interesting shapes – vases with little narrow spouts – just the thing for ikebana floral arrangements, I’d thought. My boss, however, demanded an explanation. ‘How is it possible that you didn’t know those ‘vases’ were bongs?’ What could I say? I was naive. Meanwhile, on the art and craft front, I completed a Diploma in Art & Design and regularly entered paintings in regional exhibitions, played with photography in the small darkroom I’d set up at home, and marketed my pottery and silk paintings as Mureva Design.
My three curious and energetic children kept me busy until they left home, and I then began my ‘solo’ life by moving to Sydney to sub-edit (and sometimes write) for the then-ground-breaking environmental magazine, Green Pages.
An MA in Applied Linguistics, Dip. Ed. and CELTA certification opened opportunities to work abroad. Those experiences of cultural diversity nurtured my creativity and broadened my understanding of people and what makes them tick. From 2008 to 2020, I taught Academic English – mainly writing – in Australia, Vietnam and China, as well as General English in Thailand and Japan, while also examining for IELTS in Sydney, and briefly in Paris.
Travelling solo allows me to better focus on my interests. Photographing, writing about and sharing what I encounter in a way that gives insight into the history, society and customs of places visited are what drives me. While my book takes the reader on an evocative armchair ride to experience this mode of travel, it also discusses the whys, the hows and the transformational potential of exploring the external – and our internal – world. These journeys challenges me to own my values and to re-evaluate my beliefs when necessary while developing my understanding of how culture, beliefs, history and governance influence people’s behaviour, decisions and potential. Observing these initially from the perspective of my uprooted, white middle-class immigrant ‘inner’ child searching for how best to fit into the neighbourhood, the exploration is now focused on becoming an aware global citizen. I’m in awe of, and often challenged by, the contrasts I find while comforted by the similarities we humans share (sometimes it’s the other way around). That quest also means exploring how resources, wealth and power are shared, and what it means to have greater freedom in democracies as opposed to being restricted under autocracies.
In my spare time, whether at home or abroad, I enjoy photographing things that inspire me (architecture, landscapes, art, people, textures, clouds and sunsets). I like reading philosophies on life, and enjoy novels and movies that explore the human condition; its ups and downs – all grist for learning and understanding the joys and rewards of living a harmonious and rewarding life – the holy grail, I think, for most of us. Like many travellers I meet, I go wherever warm climates and my interests take me. My home base is in Sydney.