NZ Miners

Lovely to hear the service in the Maori Language on TV today.

Rest in Peace.

SSGT Salvatore Giunta - Medal of Honour

I just watched the video of Staff Sergeant Giunta being awarded the Medal of Honour by President Obama. So my last post is now wrong: Obama didn't use a teleprompter this time and I actually thought he did a very good job.
Giunta is a truly humble individual who sounds very deserving of the honour just bestowed upon him. His speech afterwards was as good as you will see anywhere. He and our own Trooper Mark Donaldson VC seem to have been made from the same mould. Giunta’s statement that he would give it back in a second if he could have his friends who were killed in action back with him was truly inspirational.

Robert F. Kennedy

I watched A Ripple Of Hope last night on ABC TV, about Robert F. Kennedy and the night Martin Luther King was assassinated. Robert Kennedy was an inspiring orator. I can't help but compare his heartfelt speech on the night Martin Luther King died, spoken without notes, to current politicians, both in Australia and around the world.
Most of the current Australian politicians would be lucky to read a speech without tripping over it in some way, and I haven't seen a speech by President Obama where he isn't reading from a teleprompter.
I wonder what a different place the world would be today if either "Bobby" or his brother John, had not had their lives cut so tragically short?

Wild Dog Tier - OCS Survival Training '82

The boys from OCS Portsea class of 1982 snow survival training at Bernacchi (ANARE training centre Wild Dog Tier) Tasmania. Rock : "get me a chopper"