Day One 14/7/16

Day One Of Mildura Writers Festival

At the beginning of day one, exciting, intriguing and nerve wrecking thoughts about what this subject was going to look like. Writing has never been a big strength of mine - especially showing my creative side of writing so I was a little nervous to say the least :0

Our day started of in a little classroom downstairs of Latrobe University. We shared a little about ourselves , got know each other as well as our teachers Sue and Helen. We also experienced some small writing activities. I was not surprised with how I struggled to get words down onto paper, though eventually I did, it did not compare to the fantastic poems that some people shared. They were all pros! Sue also posed some interesting questions about writing. What does a writer do? Yes, they write! But as a class we began to reflect and come with the conclusion that a writer does a lot more than put pen to paper. Here is what we reflected on as a class. The questions included:
What does a writer do?
Why is writing important?
What makes good writing, good writing?



Lunch was spent with a fair few of the students in WIA. We instantly hit it off and had a good laugh for an hour or so. It was good to meet new people, a fantastic bunch they were!

After lunch we gathered back to class and did a writing activity that I found to be quite challenging. We went off to the Arts Gallery and looked at a few interesting pieces that people had created. We were to pick one of them and connect the picture to the five senses. What did it feel like? What did it smell like? What did it look like? etc.

To end a brilliant day, we finished off at the Mildura Club where Sunil Yapa who is a fiction writer took the stage and spoke about his book.

"Anger only takes you so far and I found love. That's the hope I found.."  

I immediately fell in love with the book 'Your heart is a muscle the size of a fist.' A story about young Victor- a boyish, scrappy world traveller who's run away from home and sets out to sell marijuana to the 50,000 anti-globalization protesters gathered in the streets. It quickly becomes clear that the throng determined to shut the city down- from environmentalists to teamsters to anarchists- are testing the patience of the police, and what started as a peaceful protest is threatening to erupt into violence.


Through out Sunil's talk he inspired us with some beautiful quotes.

"Kindness and compassion is a revolutionary thing."