The Angel of Bang Kwang Prison by Susan Aldous, Nicola Pierce Read Free Book Online Page B

few token toughies.
    When I felt I was ready I began to counsel people. It always amazes me; the amount of people who don’t have life sussed and imagine that they are the only ones who are cocking up. There are so, so many of us who are terrified of making mistakes, feel lonely and isolated, and have been through some amount of shit in their lives. People seemed to trust me and wanted to tell me their worries, perhaps because I could show them my tattoos, scars, and many piercings. I could talk realistically about drugs and drink and nothing impressed me because I had already been there—I couldn’t judge people since I had made the same or even worse mistakes. I didn’t use big words because I didn’t know them myself and I couldn’t patronise anyone because I was still in my teens.
    I had a new reason to get up in the morning and new friends to hang out with. I guess it was only a matter of time before a happier and healthier me attracted someone new into my life—there hadn’t been anyone serious since Simon . I was 17 years old when I met Peter, a gentle fun-loving hippie, who was four years older than me. There is that famous line from Charlotte Bronte’s novel Jane Eyre when she says, ‘Reader I married him.’ I would have to a make a slight change to that: ‘Reader I could have married him,’ because he did ask me! He was the first guy to ever propose to me but I didn’t take him up on it, although, we did have an informal ceremony, where we exchanged vows of love, in front of friends and, even, my parents. This was their compromise for not allowing us to marry. He was lovely; a long-haired hippie who wrote his own music, travelled nowhere without his guitar, shared my love for Janis Joplin and Jimi Hendrix, and my love for helping others. I had been about to leave Melbourne for Queensland where I had accepted a job as nanny. The family had been recommended to me. I love kids and was ready to see more of Australia so it seemed perfect, until I found myself falling for Peter. He took me out for a hot chocolate on the day I was to catch my train and quietly asked me not to go. And so I stayed!

    We actually set up home together in a mobile home for a while. It was a bit of a shock living with a man. I discovered that I was still quite selfish and needed to learn how to share my life with someone else. We lived and worked together for two years, travelling around Australia and finding people who needed our help. It was a lovely two years; just living day to day and meeting all sorts of people in all sorts of places. This really opened my eyes to the world outside of the limited life I had so far experienced. When money was tight we managed to get odd jobs, though Peter frequently made a bundle busking on the streets. His good looks and warm smile usually had people reaching into their pockets for some coins.
    Pete’s brother Brian was working in a uranium mine in the middle of nowhere, Jabiru, about 300km from the city of Darwin, the capital of the Northern Territory. Darwin was the scene of Australia’s worst natural disaster to date when Cyclone Tracy hit on Christmas morning in 1974. At 3am the anemometer at Darwin Airport recorded winds of 217km an hour, just before it stopped working. In all, 65 people died that day, 16 were lost at sea and never found, and 1,000 people needed medical attention. Brian got Pete a job in the mine, so we headed down there.
    It was a long, dusty, stifling drive into a very desolate area—small shrubbery bushes were the only things to be seen for miles around. Jabiru got its name from the large jabiru bird, so named by the Aboriginals. The bird was also known as the ‘Police-bird’ and ‘Black-necked stork’. In 1970 uranium was discovered at Ranger in Arnhem Land, with more uranium discovered the following year at Jabiluka. Uranium is the principal ingredient for fuelling nuclear weapons and nuclear reactors—the raw material of the nuclear industry, the most lethal