Christmas Groans and Greetings

 

I really enjoyed this video and I hope you do, too.

Christmas is a week away, the girls and I are going away on Wednesday, Keaghan is down with covid .I had intended to get travel insurance and forgotten but I have it now. The train leaves at 2pm and I don't have covid cover until 10pm (and even if I got covid, I'm not sure how sick I'd have to be to get a pay out)
The girls have moved out to minimise their chances of infection......
........so, things are a little weird here.

I'm often sleepy during the day and now that I've had a sleep study, we have a diagnosis of severe sleep apnoea. Now that I know just how badly I sleep, I seem to be even more sleepy during the day. The power of the mind, eh? 

I'll get a CPAP machine after Christmas.

I hope you all have a marvellous holiday period and there's a Christmas miracle or two in store.

Lots of love!

Recovery Centres

 Before I say anything about recovery centres, it's probably helpful to start with evacuation centres. When a disaster hits, people are urged to go to their local evacuation centre. This will be a place out of the path of the unfolding disaster. People go with their families, dogs, cats, horses and goats. There is the fear and stress of life and death in the air and evacuation centres have chaplains, security and mental health services all in attendance. Meals are distributed to all comers from emergency kitchens. Most people will find an alternative place to go within 24 hours of arrival but some are there for a lot longer.

Recovery centres open when it is safe and reasonable to get helpers into the region. When the Northern Rivers flooding happened, there was an evacuation centre in the grounds of Southern Cross University. The military, sent in to clean up, were also based at the uni and the recovery centre was in another building so Southern Cross University became a central focus for the recovery effort. Every event plays out differently so I'm not sure if evacuation and recovery centres usually operate side-by-side as they did in Lismore.

When disaster affected people arrive at a recovery centre, they are met by Red Cross volunteers who are trained in mental health first aid and will refer people to mental health support within the centre. They also direct people around the centre, give out "trauma teddies" and colouring books to children and have a range of little things to give out. Things like hand sanitiser, fridge magnets and brochures outlining available resources.

The first agency people should sit down with is Service NSW, which is the state government agency responsible for things like car, boat and truck licences and birth, death or marriage certificates. People will tell their story to Service NSW and their details will be recorded. If they are in need of new ID documents, those will be arranged. In a well resourced centre, a summary sheet will be printed and clients  can present them to all services so that they don't have to endlessly repeat their stories and details. If there are state government grants available, people will be assessed for those. Details will be kept so that if new funding or supports become available, they can be offered to registered people.

If there are federal government grants available, the social security agency (Centrelink) will be there to make assessments and process those grants.

There will be a mix of other services: The Salvation Army and Vinnies do cash relief grants.

I have seen local area health services, Rural Mental Health services and Aboriginal Mental Health Peer Support.

Insurance companies attend the biggest disaster events but are mostly absent from smaller centres.

State government chaplains are often available. 

Government housing representatives may be available to organise emergency housing.

There will often be people from local government who have a specific role: I have met  one who was helping people to get new fencing, there are some who organise people to have help with cleaning or give out information about killing mould or try to find out what can be done better next time. Most recently I met a Rural Financial Counsellor who was using recovery centres as a way to meet local people.

Recovery centres are held in town halls, community halls, church buildings, privately owned clubs and resorts. I have been to one in a marquee in a showground, an arts centre and a few roadside or car park locations. The large government agencies sometimes bring an office in a truck so they are completely self-contained and I have been at a centre where the rural fire service brought their truck with satellite dish to provide internet access for all agencies.

The people staffing recovery centres have usually volunteered to be away from home and can be away for weeks. They are generally administrative type workers without any specific trauma or mental health training but are often highly praised for their compassionate response to victims. In some ways I love that their compassion is acknowledged and in some ways I think there would be something seriously wrong if they weren't careful and caring.

If there's anything I haven't told you, just ask!

Tenterfield

This week I went up to Tenterfield on a quick bush fire relief trip. It's quite a few weeks since fire tore through the New England district so most people have received their relief grants and this weeks service was about providing service to the few left navigating the system.
Instead of 6-8 hour days in a packed Recovery Centre, the multi-agency team spent 2-3 hours in each location, seeing only 1-6 people at each location. It was a relaxed team with not a lot to do but I was impressed that the government guy organising us said it was vital support for the few who still needed access to recovery services.

You probably can't see the barbed wire on top of this fence but it's there. I wondered if there was a gaol I'd never heard of but no, this is the showground.

Outside the Tentefield Railway Museum

Tenterfield Saddler, immortalised in song by Peter Allen. The shop was owned by his grandfather and is still open a few hours a day.

A road side rest stop. The little shelter had a large fire place in the back and there was a composting toilet about 50m down the road. We set up here for a few hours and saw a few people who had suffered large losses. 
Bluff Rock in the back ground was the site of an aboriginal massacre, acknowledged with a stone and plaque telling the story.

A scene on "tourist drive 7"

Also on tourist drive 7

Sunnyside Community Hall was another place we worked from. Built in 1902 and obviously well loved.

Tourist Drive 7 passed through farmland where the cattle were allowed to wander across the road. These girls and calves looked at the car with mild interest.

The view from "Mount Mackenzie Lookout" 

There has been rain since the fire so the usual charred look of the fire ground is softened by fresh grass.

The Railway Museum was shut so I took the photo from the gate. 

I saw quite a few goats when I took a drive up over the Queensland border. I'm not sure if they were feral.

The motel we stayed in was rather lovely with well tended gardens and a tasteful dining room. The service was great, too.

"Steinbrook Hall" was another community hall we operated from. Super rustic and super hot  under the metal roof but the verandah on the back had a cool breeze blowing so we sat there. There was much discussion of steak and beer.

The historic cork tree on the edge of Tenterfield. It was a very large tree and quite beautiful.

Kangaroos at Glenlyon Dam

The 1974 Childrens Book of the Year was "The Nargun and the Stars" I must have read it sometime later and don't really remember the book except that it must have described this kind of granite outcrop particularly well because I never fail to think of the book when I see these rocks. 

A lovely old church now operating as a real estate office.

Back to the dam.

The old manse next to the church.

This baby burger and his mates were very interested in me. And very, very cute.

 

I have a busy week of work coming up, plus a dentist appointment, sleep specialist and Milly needs vaccinations before she goes to board while I take the Indian Pacific across the continent. I've been looking forward to this trip for a long time and now the time is almost here!

I'd love to send a post card if you'd like one. I'll probably pop them in the post sometime after Christmas so hit me up!

taikylie at yahoo dot com dot au