KEEP IT IN THE PHAMLY

Sometimes I feel I spend all my attention on detail at work and, as a result, my personal life descends into oblivious chaos. When I received my building pass for the new job, I knew the basic, pleb, navy lanyard was just not going to do. No, I had to get something bright, something pink, something that would make my office outfits pop.

And so I found myself on the Yarn website (https://www.yarn.com.au/) browsing their lanyards section. Yarn is owned by non-indigenous people but works to provide a marketplace for Australian Aboriginal Indigenous designers and producers to sell their wares. I fell in love with the Kangaroo Dance Lanyards by artist Charlie Chambers Jnr. (Aboriginal Jarowair man) and ordered one online. I took so long to publish this post that all their lanyards are now sold out. Here's a link to Alperstein Designs aboriginal art products including lanyards, which also support original Australian design. 

Lo and behold when the parcel arrives, I discover I have indeed ordered 1 pack of 10 lanyards. Oops. Faced with the fact I only have one neck and, therefore, only need one lanyard I decided to pimp the other 9 lanyards out to my team at work. I expected to get rid of a few but they were surprisingly popular and were gone within a few days.

Next followed a fun couple of weeks of trying to get people to deliver the lanyards interstate as part of their work travels. Some forgetful types carried the lanyards to Sydney and back to Brisbane. But eventually, with a little help from my work friends and Australia Post I got all the lanyards out to colleagues along the East Coast. It was fun to see people's faces light up over receiving a tiny gift, and the team bonds it built to have a cluster of us rocking the same pink and blue kangaroo art lanyards. We are our own lanyard gang, with an origin story that makes people giggle to remember I am a dope despite appearing super organised at work.

I was very happy and very glad to make it to Melbourne for a whirlwind trip in June this year. I was there for 48 hours and made zero other plans (sorry any Melbourne friends reading this) besides the 90th birthday and conspiring with my cousin to surprise my Aunty on my one free night. 

I stayed with childhood bestie, B (back when I used to have best friends, now you're either a good friend or not a friend) in her mum and the Birthday Boy's house in inner-city Melbourne. Their glorious two storey old Victorian home is where I spent most of my time when I wasn't at school or at home. The sights and smells brought back nostalgic memories of many years in my child to teen-hood. I hadn't realised until I stayed here again (this time in the guest room instead of B's bunk bed... partially because I'm an adult but mainly because her bunk bed is no longer around) that this house was my childhood sanctuary. The feeling of calm and nurturing that little me would have been too oblivious to observe and appreciate did not go over my head this time. 

Kitchen where I spent many hours of my youth

Birthday Boy was like surrogate father to younger me. He'd take care of us after school, made sure we did our homework and had snacks. When we got to high school because neither of my parents drove or had a car, he'd carpool Little Sissy Pham and me to school. He was always generously looking out for us growing up. I didn't clue on to the fact he needed us kids just as much as we needed him. 

The Maritime Union of Australia hosted Birthday Boy's big bash. It was a momentous occasion where they acknowledged the wrongs of the past that saw Birthday Boy ousted from the union and no longer employed. The timing happened to align with B bringing home a few kids from school who Birthday Boy took under his wing as part of his full-time stay at home dad duties. 

I was honoured and humbled to get an invite to his birthday, along with a function room full of other guests he'd positively impacted over the years. I wouldn't risk a COVID-19 lockdown and quarantining for many people, but Birthday Boy and B are extended Phamly. Worth the trip. Wish I could have stayed longer but I had a postponed 2020 wedding to fly to Cairns for. That saga will be another blog post. 

The always well-stocked fruit bowl from where I tasted nectarines and peaches for the first time

Temp desk before moving offices. Tad cramped.

In May 2014 a lady named Giselle contacted me about my 2012 Scrabble Letters post, asking to buy JADE off me for a room in her house that has a feature wall dedicated to scrabble words using the letters TYPO sold in 2012. Gisele collected them on eBay and Gumtree, and stumbled upon my blog on her hunt to build more words on her wall.

At the time, I had the letters decorating my desk. They were a gift from Little Sissy Pham and had sentimental value. Over the years, the letters have moved with me from office to office, and desk to desk until finally this year when I moved to desk too small to fit my standing desk and the letters. So I felt ready to finally say goodbye.

I reached out to Giselle on the off chance that 7 years on she may still want the letters and wouldn't you know, she did! In the spirit of Buy Nothing, I gifted the scrabble letters to Giselle. She lives interstate so it had to be shipped which is not in the spirit of Buy Nothing that aims to reduce environmental impacts by keeping items in your local area. But I figured it'd be better the scrabble letters continue their life in a home where they'll make someone happy, rather than go into storage and probably eventually landfill once I inevitably move desks again.

Hot pink blazer gifted from my local Buy Nothing group

Mother Not In Law got me into the Buy Nothing Movement when she was here over Xmas/New Years. The idea behind Buy Nothing is to give and share locally to reduce waste and reuse items that some one else no longer needs. It started as an experiment in Washington, USA and it's managed to make its way to Australia. 

Back in the day at an old workplace, I got myself a posse of interns and found a rare gem I wanted to hire. So I did. She was young, jumped into the workforce straight out of high school, and hadn’t bothered with a degree. I admired her go-getter attitude.

She was looking for regular, paid work that would complement her true passion to become a full-time DJ when she applied for an internship in the fashion company I was in, which led to a full-time, permanent role. At the time I described to management my reason for wanting to hire her was a spark that I saw in her. A spark I identified with because I had that same hunger to succeed despite little to no experience when I was her age.

Now I have nearly two decades of workplace experience, I recognise that spark is the difference between someone who has cares about what they commit to doing, and someone who is looking for their next suitable position description to adhere to.

We’ve stayed in touch over the years, and it’s been a blessing to watch her grow into the successful person she is today. She credited me for giving her a break into a professional field, proper training and the foundation for a better life. While I did give her a chance at the beginning of her, I can’t take credit for the strong, independent woman she is now.

I’ve watched her DJ adventures in club circuits, at festivals, overseas in exotic party places like the Maldives. Makes me want to get in touch with people who gave me a go over the course of my career - catch them up on some of the highlights they helped make happen either directly or indirectly. How about you? Have you had any people in your life you want to credit with boosting your career or improving your personal life? Consider reaching out and sharing the love or paying forward their kindness by helping a young up and comer get a leg up.