Open House Interviews

Majok Tulba has overcome the trauma of fleeing the war between north and south sudan living in refugee camps and relocation as to australia as a refugee. He has vivid memories of the African sky and the stories he was told as a child he has become a multi award winning novelist and his second novel When Elephants Fight taps into the experiences he lived in refugee camps.

Serbia, a tiny nation of just 4 million people, faced France for the soccer World Cup Final 2018. The Serbian diaspora rallied around the globe. Tony Cava, treasurer of the Zagreb team in Sydney was among the crowd at the Punchbowl Serbian Club barracking for their underdog team.

The Thai cave rescue of the Wild Boars soccer team and their assistant coach gripped the world. It also highlighted that some team members and the coach are stateless people. The Thai government is poised to offer them citizenship but what of the hundreds of thousands of other stateless people like the Rohingya who fled ethnic violence in Myanmar for Bangladesh and the massive Cox's Bazaar refugee camp.

The soccer team and coach trapped in the Thai cave have lived through an unbelievable experience. What are the psychological impacts of being lost and totally cut off from the outside world. They faced the real prospect of death in a dark, muddy, waterlogged cave. There was then the exhausting and risky international rescue mission they were not expected to survive. What were they going through during their orderal and what are the on gong concerns. Professor Justin Kenardy from the University of Queensland is an expert in childhood trauma.

Today's teen drinkers are at high risk of becoming tomorrow's adult problem drinkers and drink drivers. New research from the University of New South Wales provides powerful evidence on outcomes for underage alcohol consumption.

A major report by the ACCC has found we pay too much for our electricity and that the system could be made simpler for consumers to understand. Energy consultant and Associate Professor from the Crawford School of Public policy spoke to Stephen O'Doherty on Open House.

It was four years in the making, but Sydney composer James Humberstone and writer Nigel Featherstone hope their new song cycle will help bring healing to people suffering isolation and depression as the result of traumatic experiences of many kinds.

It is easy to love the people who accept our love and to care for those grateful to be helped. Does our call to love our neighbour really include the gruff and ungrateful, the people who have been removed from society for criminal acts? Professor Ruth Webber has studied prisoners in Australia and the US and says the work of prison chaplains fulfills a Christian mission.

Do men need to change their language? Senator David Leyonhjelm is refusing to withdraw abusive sexist comments or apologise to Senator Sarah Hanson-Young. She is threatening to sue him. Is name calling part of political discourse or was he bullying, slut shaming and trivialising rape?