[GoNative]

During my university days I became very involved in human rights issues, especially those associated with Tibet. I became the president of the Tibet Support Group at the university and was the media officer for the Australia Tibet Council. I also helped organise the Melbourne leg of the Dalai Lamas tour of Australia in 1992 and got to meet him personally.

My wife and I have always been very interested in environmental issues and we helped start the Friends of Kororoit Creek group in Melbourne. There are a number of Friends groups around Melbourne and other areas in Australia where local people volunteer to maintain and rehabilitate creeks rivers, coastlines or other areas of environmental importance that may have become neglected. I was president and my wife the treasurer of the group. In conjunction with the local council and donations from local industry we organised many days weeding, planting, clearing rubbish and generally improving the local environment along the main watercourse in the area we lived. We also got local schools, church groups and businesses to come along and help from time to time. We ended up planting 10's of thousands of trees and shrubs. I look forward to heading back one day to see how it's all turned out.