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After 21 hours of labour, I was brought kicking and screaming into the world.
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Not long after i was born, when I was learning to walk, the USSR collapsed. The dissolution resulted in severe economic crises, in Russia, but also in North Korea and Cuba.
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Thirty five people were killed and more wounded on this day in Port Arthur, when Martin Bryant committed one of the deadlist killing sprees by a single person in history. As a six year old who was soon to pick his favourite football team, I had absolutely no awareness of the massacre. It's odd how children live so much in their own worlds.
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On this day the North Melbourne Football Club beat the Sydney Swans to win the AFL Grand Final. Watching at home, I decided right then that the Kangaroos were going to be my team. I have barracked for them ever since, spending many late nights catching their games.
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On this day four aeroplanes were hijacked by terrorists, two of which were flown into the Twin Towers of the World Trade Center complex in New York.
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I was on my first holiday with my family, staying in Brisbane. I remember getting up early and switching on the television expecting to watch cartoons. Every channel showed the September 11 attacks. My eleven year old self was disappointed by the lack of cartoons. It was only as I grew older that I understood the significance of the events I had watched unfold that morning.
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Not long before I was discovering the joys of the coast and waveriding, ethnic conflicts were coming to a crescendo across Australian beachside suburbs, especially Cronulla. The riots were an ugly incident, condemned by the major political parties. Nonetheless, the riots resulted in a dirtying of Australia's international image as a multicultural country.
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I was at Hawley Beach, near Devonport. I woke up one morning and the beach was a seething mess of waves. As a passionate boogie boarder, I paddled out. I caught a really big wave, and as I rode across the face of it the lip of the wave fell over me, so that I was inside the 'tube' or 'barrel'. I didn't make it out, the wave dumped me, but that experience was so peculiar and mesmerising that I have been boogie boarding and surfing ever since.
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I have never been more nervous than when I went for my driver's license. Thankfully, I got it on the first go and haven't looked back!
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On this day Barack Obama became the first African American President in history. Not long after I got my driver's license I was sitting in front of the television in awe at the spectacle of Obama's acceptance speech.
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According to the United Nations on this date the human population reached seven billion. As I was finishing off exams and preparing to graduate, seven billion people were going about their lives on this earth. Thinking about it, I feel inidividually insignificant, but also a part of something important.
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On this date I graduated from a Bachelor of Arts degree, majoring in English and Philosophy. This milestone was important to me not only because it represented three years of work, but also because I developed signficantly as a person during that time.
