Hands up if you are sick of politics, sick of the never ending media coverage on impending financial Armageddon, sick of inaction over climate change, sick of the lies over the Adelaide Oval redevelopment, the resources super profits tax, the crisis in our public hospitals, the national broadband imbroglio and the lack of bipartisan consensus on asylum seeker policies.

"May you live in interesting times."

But interesting times these are, with seismic changes continuously reshaping the way we work, live, and interact with each other. There is also a worrying cultural shift underway in Australia, a cynicism emerging borne out of frustration with government and corporate Australia for failing to act and to act responsibly, openly, honestly, transparently.

25 years from now we will look back at this time in history and reflect upon the moment when Australia changed, when it devolved into a country far less tolerant, bold and fair. So, at this time we would do well to heed the words of our national anthem "Advance Australia Fair".

25 years ago, when working for the Northern Territory Education Department, I developed an "experiential" learning program for academically disadvantaged Aboriginal students. I taught them how to drive a motor vehicle; how to do math while participating in a cricket match, taking turns in maintaining the scorers book; arranged a SCUBA diving course culminating in PADI license certification and an open water dive in the Arafura sea and; developed their practical skills through the fabrication of crocodile traps for the Department of Resources.

Feigning an inability to cope with the mainstream education program soon became very popular among the general student population to the point where non-Aboriginal students began protesting their very tenuous connection to Aboriginal ancestry as evidence of their entitlement to participate. If the measure of success of this program was engagement and a revision of truant behavior, we scored big-time!

25 years ago, a group of mates chartered a plane, (in fact we chartered two planes because there wasn’t enough room on the first plane for the five of us and our beer), to fly us to Grose Island, 100 km west of Darwin in the Timor Sea, for a long weekend of fishing and revelry. On arrival we doubled the number of inhabitants on the island, which comprised the lighthouse keeper, Max, and his good lady wife, (known only as "the Wife"), their two sons, Max junior and Croc, and the "General Hand", Andy, (Handy Andy), a German backpacker who had lost his way many years before. After a days fishing, during which 10 year old Max junior and 8 year old Croc would constantly dive overboard, into shark infested waters, to retrieve our snagged rigs, we settled in around the camp fire to feast on fresh fish, a few quiet beers and "bedtime" stories from big Max. Everything about Max was big, he was a huge hulk of a man, with a booming voice to match, and his leather stubby holder, complete with wooden handle, held a flagon of wine, (two litres), which also held us in awe as we watched him down the entire contents over a period of about four hours without any obvious adverse side effects. Unfortunately, the same couldn’t be said for us! 

We were awoken from our comas at about two in the morning by the sounds of big Max firing up the big engines on his big fishing boat and to the sight of distress flares being sent into the night sky from a cruising yacht that had struck a reef which ringed the island. In the morning, we had an embarrassed Frenchman and his crew for breakfast, (although they didn’t taste that good), and chortled at the sight of their yacht run aground and listing to starboard on the outreaches of the mid-distant reef. After breakfast we surveyed the island at low tide and explored the wrecks of two Japanese Zeros that had come down during the raids on Darwin in 1942. We uncovered huge Queen Conch shells from the mud flats and debrided, drank and ate from coconuts that had fallen from the palms that littered the shoreline.

25 years from now I won’t remember the events of today but will remember fondly the events of 50 years ago. It's life lived during these moments that will carry a smile in every moment of uncertainty, in every movement of change. The other stuff is just stuff that should be consigned to history but not necessarily memory and, if you like to live by proverbs, may you live in your moment of time and may those times be interesting.

Gary Hatwell Executive Chairman