I drove out of Hull (hopefully not for the last time, you can't get rid of me that easily!) under the Humber Bridge last Saturday at around 6:30am, car packed with the rest of my belongings, my Noah Kahan playlist blasting out of my very low quality bluetooth adapter, feeling a lot of big emotions about the best year of my life so far coming to an end. I hadn't even had time to process the fact that I was driving back home to Birmingham to see my parents for all of 4 hours before they dropped me off at Heathrow departures to fly to the other side of the world. And yet, that is what happened and 26 hours in the air (and 9 hours spent fighting with the free wifi at Ho Chi Minh airport) later I landed on a sunny winter's day in Sydney, Australia. I collected my new suitcase (big thanks to my parents for our impromptu stop off in Stratford Upon Avon to buy one after the original one's zip broke as we left my house) and headed off into the city.
After being immediately baffled by the fact that Aussies drive on the left hand side like we do and that the sea smells exactly like it does at home (both things that are not surprising to anyone who is not delirious from time travelling 9 hours into the future), I found my way to my new home for the next 6 weeks.
The next morning, I walked via the (very pretty) Sydney University campus to the Two Good office in Eveleigh and met most of the team. Pictured below is a mural of Auntie Beryl, who is a First Nations community leader who opened a cooking school for youth in the area on the site where my project is taking place. I know very little about the indigenous population and the issues they face in modern Australia and so getting a introduction to this part of the Two Good history was eye opening, especially considering the referendum that is about to happen surrounding the inclusion of First Nations people in decisions about their traditional lands and communities. Very odd to me that this is not more widely known and discussed back home, considering the UK's part in the white invasion of indigenous lands - a point for someone else to look into, possible LIA project anyone?
This was the first week of my project and for the majority of the time I was completing onboarding activities and immersing myself in the day to day of life here at TwoGood. This included time making and packing shelter donation meals (I am now an expert burrito roller!), speaking to various permanent staff about their roles and how the program functions, and making a start on planning my actual project report.
My project will look at assessing the effects that the Work Work program has on the women it employs (more on this next week!) by interviewing a wide range of people from all corners of the business and trying to relate it to published literature.
I also had my first experiences dealing with the difficult emotions that may come up while on this particular project. Having come from an upper working class background with no known history of domestic violence in my immediate family, seeing some of the problems first hand was a little confronting. However, I used my new support network and chatted through the situation. Feeling a lot better equipped to deal with similar emotions next time as a result!
I have learnt so much already about the trials that come with working with women who have experienced complex trauma and homelessness (just to name a couple of the problems these wonderful ladies have worked through to get to this program!). It has been extremely humbling to get to interact with them in the kitchen and about the office. One of my favourite things they do here at Two Good is eating a home cooked meal all together in the middle of the office every single day. I have had to quickly adapt how I go about conversation and become very aware of my own privileges and selfish tendencies that we as empathetic beings exhibit when faced with complex trauma. No single interaction will be perfect but putting the other person across the dinner table from you as the priority is a great start to retraining that need to ‘fix and save’.
Building trust and rapport with the women has and will continue to be one of my major goals while I am spending time in their space.
This week I have not been a leader. I have taken the time to sit back and observe how the leaders here approach difficult situations and day to day activities. While the environment here focuses on love and nurture, the staff are incredibly aware of their purpose of getting the women ready for the working world. This is shown in the clarity and honesty with which they interact with the women, beginning to redefine their trauma related beliefs about themselves and pushing them to be their own biggest advocates. Leadership at Two Good is selfless and that is what I am aiming to bring into my own leadership toolkit.
As discussed above, modelling from the examples I have observed in terms of clarity, kindness and self awareness will be key to developing myself as a leader and also success in project terms. I also want to continue to push my own boundaries - such as trying new foods (who knew I was so scared of courgettes!) - in order to meet the women at their level of resilience.
For my project, next steps is to finalise the question sets I will use in the interviews and begin to approach/schedule time with participants. Alongside this, I will continue to support the business and immerse myself in whatever I can do to lend a hand e.g. kitchens, events and corporate team building.
In terms of things I could have done better, obviously arriving 24 hours before my first day started was less than ideal, but time constraints that came with finishing my industrial placement last week and the fact it takes 2 full days to travel here meant it was impossible to delay it much longer. I also might have prioritised going food shopping ASAP as I have spent the last few days living off takeaways as I haven’t had the time or energy to go buy and cook for myself yet (this is changing today though!).
Finally, a quick apology to Beccy (my program manager at Leeds) because I am not laying this post out like the template we are supposed to use. I promise all the information is in the following somewhere! Turns out I like to write outside of the Laidlaw box more than I realised.
If you made it to the bottom of this, congratulations, but I do appreciate you taking the time, please do check out the work that Two Good does on their instagram @TwoGoodCo and website: https://twogood.com.au/?utm_source=google&utm_medium=cpc&utm_campaign={{campaign.name}}&gclid=CjwKCAjwwb6lBhBJEiwAbuVUSlgDl8fiQ7HF9kZ_6FCQmlOXp4a6P9CnkxIPnvsiBGSUe2y3uyewuBoCBGcQAvD_BwE