Conversations

Lynne Shori grew up with her hero dad, thinking her Papua New Guinean mother was dead. As an adult, she discovered the truth and set about finding her lost family.

When Lynne was growing up, it was just her and her dad.

Lynne's dad was her hero; he was different and adventurous but she always felt safe with him when they went on hair-raising adventures together in the Highlands of Papua New Guinea.

He had always told Lynne that her mum had died in childbirth.

But when she became an adult, Lynne discovered this wasn't true.

Just as she turned 40, Lynne set off to a remote island in northern Papua New Guinea to discover the truth of her family story.

Once she started gathering all the answers to her lifelong questions, Lynne and her father then set about healing their own, very special relationship.

Find out more about Wantaim PNG, and the work they're doing across remote Papua New Guinea, online.

This episode of Conversations was produced by Meggie Morris. Executive Producer is Nicola Harrison.

It explores the Pacific, Pasifika, family origin stories, Stolen Generations, charity work, tok Pisin, Manus Island, father daughter relationships, mixed race children, Australia's relationship with PNG, sanitation, education, discovering your truth, mental health, mother daughter relationship, Melanesian culture, family, siblings, blended families, Oceania, geopolitics, knowing your parents, therapy, estrangement, reunion, forgiveness, grief, identity, Sydney, finance, mid-life crisis, rehab, sense of community, family secrets.

To binge even more great episodes of the Conversations podcast with Richard Fidler and Sarah Kanowski go the ABC listen app (Australia) or wherever you get your podcasts. There you’ll find hundreds of the best thought-provoking interviews with authors, writers, artists, politicians, psychologists, musicians, and celebrities.

Steve Biddulph spent decades working to understand what children need as they grow, but then in his mid-50s, Steve gained an insight that shifted almost everything about how he saw himself.

Steve likes to remind us that humans are 'big sensitive mammals' with needs for connection and self awareness.

As a psychologist (now retired) and parent educator, he has been at the forefront of an evolving conversation about masculinity, emotional intelligence, caring for our children and making sense of our own childhoods.

His best-selling books include The Secret of Happy Children, Raising Boys, Raising Girls and Manhood.

But it wasn't until he was in his mid-50s that Steve gained an insight into a huge facet of his own story.

He was having a lunch with a friend, a psychiatrist, who began asking him a series of pointed questions.

That conversation shifted almost everything about how Steve saw himself.

This episode of Conversations was first broadcast in 2021 

The producer was Nicola Harrison and the Executive Producer was Carmel Rooney.

Further information

Fully Human: A New Way of Using Your Mind is published by Pan Macmillan

Environmental journalist, Michael Dulaney looks at viruses and bacteria that can move between bats, horses, seals, pigs, voles and even polar bears, and the conditions that lead to human infection.

These diseases are known as zoonoses.

Michael says climate change, urban sprawl, animal farming and even homelessness contribute to wild animals coming into ever closer contact with people, leading these illnesses to move from creatures to us.

To understand how this process works, Michael has researched the volunteers dedicating their lives to conservation. 

He has camped out on a freezing Victorian night to try to catch ducks with a net shot from a cannon, to test them for bird flu. 

He has gone frog hunting in the jungles of Indonesia, and he’s visited a suburban Melbourne apartment where a dedicated citizen gives up her master bedroom to a collection of injured flying foxes, while she sleeps in the spare room.

Michael also explains how the curious case of Trench Fever fits into the zoonotic puzzle. It was found first in Edmonton, Canada in 2022, when patients developed a serious heart condition after they were given organs donated by homeless victims of the opioid crisis.

Further information

Sentinels: When diseases spread between animals and humans is published by Scribe.

This episode was produced by Alice Moldovan. Conversations' Executive Producer is Nicola Harrison.

This episode covers H5N1 bird flu, covid-19, pandemic, lockdown, flu, cat flu, swine flu, hendra virus, horse racing, horse trainer, fly by night bat clinic, Werribee poo ponds, necropsy, chicken farms, disease-proof pigs, PRRS, CRISPR, vaccines, vaccination, smallpox, pox virus, borealpox and northern red-backed vole.

To binge even more great episodes of the Conversations podcast with Richard Fidler and Sarah Kanowski go the ABC listen app (Australia) or wherever you get your podcasts. There you’ll find hundreds of the best thought-provoking interviews with authors, writers, artists, politicians, psychologists, musicians, and celebrities.

Colleen Gwynne led the investigation into the murder of the British backpacker and eventually confronted his killer in prison.

In 2001, Peter Falconio and his girlfriend Joanne Lees were ambushed on a remote stretch of road in the outback and Peter was shot dead.

Colleen was working as a cop in Alice Springs when she was asked to take over the complex murder case.

With help from the F.B.I, her work saw Bradley John Murdoch arrested and charged.

She confronted him in prison, and refused to be intimidated, despite his intense aggression towards her.

Murdoch was sentenced to life imprisonment and died in 2025.

After leaving the police force, Colleen took up another challenging job.

She became the Northern Territory Children's Commissioner, tasked with protecting vulnerable children.

Colleen's own story mean she brings a unique understanding to the work.

This episode was first broadcast in 2018 

The producer was Nicola Harrison and the Executive Producer was Pam O'Brien.

Nikki Goldstein was in a coma in the ICU at St Vincent's Hospital when she first 'met' Rabbi Eli Schlanger. When she woke, the pair embarked together on a project to share the wisdom, compassion and universality of several Jewish teachings.

Although they were from very different worlds, when Nikki gained consciousness and met Rabbi Eli properly the two became fast friends.

Then, they started writing a book together - based on the deep and expansive conversations they began having about hope, personal growth, spirituality and modern life.

Rabbi Eli wanted Nikki's help to share seven ancient Jewish guidelines on living a good life, which he believed could be helpful to anyone, Jewish or not, who was looking for a way to live in a world that feels increasingly chaotic.

While Nikki and Rabbi Eli didn't agree on everything all the time, they did both believe these teachings to be universal in their compassion and wisdom.

The pair had just recorded their last conversation for the project in December last year, when Rabbi Eli was one of 15 people killed in the Bondi Beach terror attack.

Nikki decided to honour his memory by finishing their book alone.

Conversations with My Rabbi is published by HarperCollins.

This episode of Conversations was produced by Meggie Morris. Executive producer is Nicola Harrison.

It explores religion, faith, modern living, disconnection, hope, radical empathy, togetherness, multiculturalism, learning from others, spiritual, family, near-death experiences, autoimmune disease, anti-Semitism, terrorism, grief, tragedy, suffering, meaning of life, spiritual teachings, friendship, prayer, meditation, Judaism, secularism.

To binge even more great episodes of the Conversations podcast with Richard Fidler and Sarah Kanowski go the ABC listen app (Australia) or wherever you get your podcasts. There you’ll find hundreds of the best thought-provoking interviews with authors, writers, artists, politicians, psychologists, musicians, and celebrities.

Gardening Australia's Hannah Moloney on the heartwarming and heartbreaking reasons humans continue to lovingly tend to their gardens — for healing, beauty and joy.

For thousands of years, tending to a garden or a small farm meant human survival. 

But now, with massive commercial farms, genetically modified crops, refrigerated freight and modern irrigation, we don't need to tend to our own gardens to survive.

So why, then, do so many of us still lovingly plant, water and cultivate flowers, fruits and vegetables? Or watch 'lawn porn' to relax?

It's a question that Hannah Moloney has asked thousands of gardeners from around the world.

Hannah is a permaculture educator, landscape designer and the Tasmanian presenter for ABC TV's Gardening Australia. 

Gardening is in Hannah's blood, having grown up in a herb nursery run by her green-thumbed father in the Brisbane suburbs.

For Hannah, gardening remains a lifeline, a way to bond with her family and a joyful act of protest.

Why We Garden is published by Simon & Schuster.

This episode of Conversations was produced by Meggie Morris. Executive producer is Nicola Harrison.

It explores gardening, hobbies, outdoor activities, mental health, grief gardening, why we like being outdoors, gardening as meditation, the beauty of our gardens, Australian native gardens, vegetable patches, how to grow your own vegetables, fruit trees, family origin stories, losing a parent, pregnancy, motherhood, postpartum depression, gardening for healing, creative inspiration, human history, horticulture, climate change, global warming, food scarcity, food supply, drought, flood, famine, Costa Georgiadis, green thumb, meditation.

To binge even more great episodes of the Conversations podcast with Richard Fidler and Sarah Kanowski go the ABC listen app (Australia) or wherever you get your podcasts. There you’ll find hundreds of the best thought-provoking interviews with authors, writers, artists, politicians, psychologists, musicians, and celebrities.

Zenith Virago was a married mother of two, when she left her family to begin again as a lesbian.  Then she found a new path as a death walker, helping people navigate their life's end. 

Zenith grew up in England, and she was still at school when she fell in love with another student. 

At seventeen, she married Richard, Head Boy of the local Comprehensive school. 

They had two children, Jodie and Todd.

Then at 24, Zenith had a realisation about who she really was. She left her husband and children to begin a new life as a lesbian in New Zealand,

Eventually she arrived in Byron Bay, where she met a community of people who inspired her.

One day, Zenith's dear friend Sylvia died unexpectedly doing yoga in her garden. Rather than outsourcing to the funeral industry, Sylvia's loved ones took over her funeral and cremation themselves.

This experience launched a new path for Zenith, and she became a ‘death walker’, helping people navigate the end of life with reverence and calm.

In the midst of her new chapter, the death of a former lover brought her third son Tane back into her life unexpectedly.

Further information

Original broadcast February 2019

Learn about Zenith Virago's Natural Death Care Centre

Help and information are always available

Lifeline 13 11 14 24 hour counselling

Beyond Blue's telephone and online counselling 1300 22 4636

Conductor Alexander Briger has led orchestras all over the world. But his niche occupation is not the only fascinating thing about him. Alex's family history is wild.

Alexander Briger has stood in front of musicians all over the world, summoning a gigantic, beautiful noise from them.

Classical music was a huge part of Alex’s story growing up.

He is the nephew of the famous conductor, the late Sir Charles Mackerras; and descended from the so-called "father of Australian music", Isaac Nathan.

Another branch of Alex's family tree astonishingly connects him to the man who murdered Rasputin.

Rasputin was a Russian peasant and mystic, whose abilities as a faith healer drew him into the inner circle of the Russian Tzars.

Fearing his destructive grip on the monarchy, a posse of aristocrats led by Alex’s ancestor, Prince Felix Yusupov, drew Rasputin into a trap, luring him to his death in a Saint Petersburg basement in 1916.

In recent years, Alex was invited to Russia to conduct a modern opera, coincidentally called and about Rasputin, in a full circle moment.

Alex is back in Australia right now as the chief conductor and artistic director of the Australian World Orchestra, the only ensemble of its kind in the world.

The Australian World Orchestra is playing in Melbourne on 19 August and in Sydney on 20 August. You can find out more about the orchestra and its performances online.

This episode of Conversations was produced by Meggie Morris. Executive producer is Nicola Harrison.

It explores classical music, Russian revolution, family history, Paris, Munich, Berlin Philharmonic, conducting, symphony, Mahler, the great Western composers, Wagner, Stravinsky, Shostakovich, Jewish Australians, whacky history, Yusupov, how did Rasputin die, European politics, Bolshevik Revolution, the October Revolution, exile, ballet, Sydney Conservatorium of Music, Australian classical music, Australian expats.

To binge even more great episodes of the Conversations podcast with Richard Fidler and Sarah Kanowski go the ABC listen app (Australia) or wherever you get your podcasts. There you’ll find hundreds of the best thought-provoking interviews with authors, writers, artists, politicians, psychologists, musicians, and celebrities.

Adele Dumont was a teenager when she first started pulling out her hair, an urge that became so uncontrollable she was left with a bald spot.

She would sometimes enter a trancelike state, covertly sitting on her bathroom floor, picking at her scalp for hours on end.

The urge to pull at her hair was uncontrollable, and secret.

When Adele finally put a name to her behaviour, she learnt that trichotillomania has a complex history and psychological understanding, much of which remains unknown.

This episode of Conversations was first broadcast in 2024

The producer was Meggie Morris and the Executive Producer was Carmel Rooney

Further information

The Pulling is published by Scribe

Some helpful resources on trichotillomania include Trich Stop and The TLC Foundation for Body-Focused Repetitive Behaviours

Ralph Jackman was a sports journalist who retrained as a teacher in midlife, and got his first job at Melbourne’s Parkville Youth Detention Centre, where he was tested by the troubled and bright, charismatic young men.

At the centre he found students who struggled with basic literacy, and he also met boys who were yearning for more than juvenile justice could provide.

Ralph created bonds with some of the boys that proved his teaching was making a connection. 

But he also saw how hours of isolation in their cells stamped the hope out of the young men, despite the committed teachers’ best efforts.

Further information

Detention is published by Allen & Unwin.

Conversations' Executive Producer is Nicola Harrison. Research by Alice Moldovan.

This episode covers incarceration, troubled youth, youth work,  behind bars, youth detention, Tony Abbott, Hugh Jackman, 

To binge even more great episodes of the 'Conversations podcast' with Richard Fidler and Sarah Kanowski go the ABC listen app (Australia) or wherever you get your podcasts. There you’ll find hundreds of the best thought-provoking interviews with authors, writers, artists, politicians, singers, psychologists, musicians, and celebrities.