Hello friends,

I was on my way back to Melbourne airport after a vibrant AUSTA string teacher conference and had the most inspiring taxi driver. (More about this in a second.)

My head was already full with amazing ideas bouncing around from all the workshops and presentations I attended. So many amazing pedagogies to learn from! Professor Deborah Cheetham, Yvonne Frye, Ed le Brocq, Dr Gail Barnes and Gary Mc Pherson gave tremendous keynote speeches, plus the Australian String Quartet wowed us with a workshop.

I was thrilled (and exceptionally nervous) to present a workshop, Early Childhood Toolkit for String Teachers. A friendly lady came up to me at the start to let me know that she was conflicted and also wanted to attend another workshop running at the same time. I assured her that this would be no problem.

I felt so humbled when I saw that she had chosen to stay right to the end! She came up to me and told me that she was enjoying it too much to leave!

So when I got into my taxi to leave, I was beyond exhausted. I wasn't feeling particularly chatty, but as time went on, I started to make polite conversation as you do.

I discovered that my driver had come to Australia as an illegal immigrant from Afghanistan, fleeing for his life. His journey had been traumatic, his ship capsizing some distance from Christmas Island. He was left with a small group of survivors on a life raft, out at sea for 14 hours!

Previously to this, on his arrival to Indonesia, he was arrested and put in an Indonesian jail for 9 months. He and his fellow prisoners spent 3 days digging their way out!

Do you know what, despite his horrific story, he was possibly the most positive and inspiring person I've met. We arrived at the airport and I was disappointed to have to leave the taxi!

I went home with a paradigm shift, an overwhelming sense of gratitude.

If you would like to hear any more details about the conference, just reply to this and I'll share with you some interesting take-aways.

As you know, being on my email list comes with perks. :) If you would like the notes and videos from my Early Childhood Toolkit then click here.

Warmest regards,

Laura :)