Author: Wan Kerr

Introducing the Studio 99 Westender corporate challenge!

Studio 99 fitness is initiating a 10-week corporate challenge to help local West End businessmen and women become healthier, by reducing their average weight by 10kg over 10 weeks.

Studio 99 Fitness is a local personal training studio that has been operating out of 99 Melbourne Street for over 5 years, focusing on personalized fitness programs in a fun, friendly and safe environment. With trainers boasting over 20 years industry experience, Studio 99 is the leader of personalized fitness in West End.

2014 is the year to create a healthier workplace environment through regular exercise and health and fitness education. Studio 99 is passionate about changing the health and fitness culture of West End’s business community.

Through the challenge, Studio 99 aims to not only make West End businesspeople fitter, stronger and healthier, but also to improve workplace environment and productivity.

Current corporate clients of studio 99 attribute fewer sick days, increased energy levels, and workplace productivity to regular exercise at the studio.

There are three different packages available for the 10 week corporate challenge:

The platinum package incorporates
–           One free weekly group class.
–           One health and fitness seminar.
–           Weekly newsletter.
–            Individual measurements and tracking.
–            Individual training program.
–           2 one on one sessions with a personal trainer.
–            Individual nutrition program.

Mention “The Westender” when registering your business, and receive the first week of the platinum package for free.

Studio 99 Fitness
99 Melbourne Street South Brisbane
www.studio99fitness.com.au
Mobile:0431340389
Email: matt@studio99fitness.com.au

Macrame is so hot right now. This February, Reverse Garbage jumps on the Macrame bandwagon with a Macrame Plant Hanger workshop, with a twist.

RG workshop facilitators introduce their signature salvaged materials as an alternative to traditional macrame materials.

Within the workshop, participants will be shown the ropes, exploring basic macrame techniques to create their own quirky, unique and sustainable plant hangers.

“Brisbane has seen a renewed appreciation for handmade items.” says Workshop Co-ordinator, Nadine Schmoll.

“Taking part in this workshop will allow participants to create their very own one-of-a-kind piece of art, while also treading lightly on the earth by diverting materials from going to landfill.” Nadine says.

The Macrame Plant Hangers Eco-Art Workshop runs on Saturday 22 February from 10:00am – 11:30am. The workshop will be held at Reverse Garbage, 20 Burke St Woolloongabba and is suitable for participants aged 13 years and up. Please note: plants are not provided.

WHAT – Macrame Plant Hanger Eco-Art Workshop
WHEN – Saturday 22 February 2014
TIME – 10:00am – 11:30am
WHERE – Reverse Garbage, 20 Burke Street Woolloongabba.
CONTACT & BOOKINGS – 07 3891 9744 
or workshops@reversegarbage.com.au
COST – $25 per person (includes materials, tools and facilitator), please note, payment is due on booking and fees are non-refundable
AGE – suitable for 13 years and up!
MAXIMUM – 15 participants per workshop
FURTHER INFO – www.reversegarbage.com.au

ABOUT

Reverse Garbage Brisbane is a not-for-profit worker run co-operative that promotes environmental sustainability and resource reuse. Reverse Garbage collects high quality industrial discards, diverting them away from landfill and sells them at a low cost to the general public. Established in 1998 to support Friends of the Earth – Brisbane, Reverse Garbage was also set up to provide meaningful and ecologically sustainable employment and to be an example of a truly sustainable enterprise.

Reverse Garbage runs a variety of environment and waste focused art workshops and educational talks and tours to suit every age and group. Their mail order service provides regional areas with access to salvaged materials and Reverse Emporium gallery and gift shop provides local artists, craft workers and designers who salvage, reuse and up-cycle materials an outlet so sell their works and wares.

 www.reversegarbage.com.au

Peter Nash of New Farm is sitting in a remand cell at the Brisbane Watchhouse, awaiting an extradition hearing which could see him being flown under police escort to the US where he’s facing some very serious charges, indeed.

Nash was arrested by the Australian Federal Police in his New Farm apartment on Friday. He appeared in the Brisbane Magistrates Court the same day and was remanded in custody. His next court hearing is set down for 19^th February.

Peter Nash, 40, has been indicted in the US for his alleged involvement with the Silk Road website, which claimed to offer a cloak of encrypted anonymity to buyers and sellers who did not wish to have their identities known, taking a commission for its services.

From reports on US news sites, the FBI now has access to some of the conversations on the site.

Peter Nash has been indicted “for conspiracy to traffic narcotics, conspiracy to commit computer hacking and conspiracy to commit money laundering.”

Nash is listed in the indictment as the website’s primary moderator and was allegedly paid between $US50,000 and $US75,000 a year.

If found guilty, he will face a maximum sentence of life in prison.

Anyone walking down Boundary Street in recent days will have noticed a hive of creative activity at the People’s Park in the middle of the street, with numerous people engaged in renewing the large mural which covered the entire wall on the northern side of the park.

This mural is a collaboration between Jugglers Art Space and five Indigenous Australian students, studying at Griffith University, Southbank Campus (formerly known as QCA). All the students are just finishing their first year of the Bachelor of Contemporary Australian Indigenous Art.

According to Andrew Gall, one of the artists, “As a group, my fellow classmates and I came up with a design and storyline for the mural. We sought guidance from one of our lecturers, Mr Laurie Nielson, who was the lead artist on the previous mural. The design was then shown to Mr Peter Breen from Jugglers and Councilor Helen Abrahams, both agreed that the design would be suitable and a start date was set.”

The new Mural will be officially launched, and presented to the people of West End, at a ceremony in the Park at 4.00 pm on Monday 9^th December. Light refreshments will be served. More information on the opening is available from Councillor Helen Abrahams’ office on 3403 2165.

The story reads from left to right when facing the wall:

Our story is ‘History in A Day’, that is to say from the far left to the end of the mural on the right, has a pallet of blended colours taken from sunrise to sunset then on into the night and finishing with the vibrant colours that make up the modern style of Graph art.

As you look to your left you will see a young Aboriginal boy sitting, looking down the river in a thoughtful pose, what he is thinking is left up to the imagination of the viewer. The young Aboriginal boy also represents a time when the river was young.

The river meanders through a tranquil natural bush setting until it reaches the next phase of its growth. Now it is midday and the colour tones have changed. This stage is represented by a young Aboriginal man, who is also looking downstream.

However this young man is standing next to a signpost and the name on the signpost is “Boundary Street”. The signpost is wrapped in barbed wire and a chain restricts this young Aboriginal man’s movements, illustrating a significant point in the history of both the river and West End.

(In Colonial times, Boundary St in West End and Spring Hill marked an actual boundary, which the local Aboriginals were prohibited from crossing to enter the young settlement of Brisbane, outside certain hours – Ed.)

As the day is coming to an end the river meanders past a site where the sacred fire used to burn bright, within the dancing flames there is a name, Musgrave Park.

It is evening now and the colours have changed, the river has grown older and bush has gone. There is an elderly Aboriginal man looking towards where the bush used to be, now there is a city with building taller than the trees which once stood proud and tall, the river keeps flowing on into the vibrant colours of the city lights, which reveal West End.

The Artists on this project are;

From Jugglers; Jordan Bruce (Lead artist) & Gus Eagleton

QCA Students were Emily Martin, Tori-Jay Mordey, Warraba Weatherall, Jason Murphy and Andrew T Gall.

Photo Credit: Kate Bennett, Embellysh Photography.
Caption: Back Row: Jason Murphy, Gus Eagleton, Andrew Gall and Cr Helen Abrahams
Front Row: Tori-Jay Mordey, Emily Martin, Jordan Bruce and Warraba Weatherall

Office workers can rest assured – as long as you are physically active, your desk job won’t kill you.

While increasing attention has been paid to the detrimental effects of overall sedentary behaviour in recent years, new research from the University of South Australia shows that long periods spent sitting can be combatted with moderate physical activity.

Published today in the international journal Obesity, the study shows a desk job won’t put you at risk of obesity and associated health problems as long as you exercise.

UniSA Postdoctoral Research Fellow Dr Carol Maher says her study is good news for office workers.

“The nice thing about these results is that people with desk jobs can be reassured that as long as they are doing a bit of activity, their desk job isn’t putting them at risk of obesity,” Dr Maher says.

“And our results suggest the amount of physical activity needed is actually very achievable.”

Dr Maher’s study was done on 5083 American adults, taking cross-sectional analyses on a nationally representative sample from the April 2003 to June 2005 US National Health and Nutrition Examination Survey. She undertook the study while she was a visiting scholar at Pennington Biomedical Research Centre in Louisiana last year.

“I looked at how people’s physical activity and sedentary activities were related to the risk of being obese and overweight,” Dr Maher says.

“We classified people into three activity and three sedentary groups – low, medium and high physical activity; and low, medium and high sedentary activity.

“We found that low physical activity was a strong predictor of obesity. People who had low levels of physical activity were up to four times more likely to be overweight or obese than people in the moderate and high activity groups, while sedentary time was unrelated to being overweight.

“Obesity was more strongly related to not being active than either TV time or total sedentary time.”

Dr Maher says the amount of activity needed is ‘achievable’.

“Small differences in daily moderate-to-vigorous physical activity of just five to 10 minutes were associated with relatively large differences in the risk of obesity.”

The full study can be read at http://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1002/oby.20430/abstract

The Westender is now twenty-one years old.

Part of the community, we just keep getting younger as new journalists, designers and artists come on board to keep the flag flying. We are proud to work with local design house Text and Image who have produced our new look.

You don’t get to be this young, though, without a bit of a back story. Founding editor Kerrod Trott lets a few secrets out of the bag …

In 1992 I was running a desktop publishing and marketing bureau – Perfect Pitch, no less – in Thomas Street (and living at Rio Grande in Vulture St) when my business partner and I had the great idea of starting a local newspaper as a showcase for our design and writing skills. We had one John Jiggens (aka John Freemarijuana) as our founding editor.

I’d been involved with community publishing in the 80’s when I lived on a Multiple Occupancy outside Lismore, working on the Northcoaster and publishing my own title, Incredible Times.

Thus was the Westender born – before there was a Quest newspaper in the area, before Brian Laver started his Neighbourhood News, and long before the glossy West End Magazine.

Fast forward to 1999, when I returned back to West End after a lengthy pilgrimage to ashrams, temples and holy sites in India. Out of work, and at a loss for something to do. I know, I said to myself, I’ll start the Westender again!

This, the second incarnation of the Westender, ran for several years and dominated the market. We had a delightful newspaper war running with Brian Laver and his Neighbourhood News, swapping insults in print and spreading the most scurrilous gossip about each other.

I had to cease publishing the Westender for personal and financial reasons and get a couple of real jobs to pay off my bills.

Then, in 2009, I was persuaded by a business acquaintance to re-commence publication. The third incarnation of the Westender was as a colour magazine, with a print run of up to 43,000 and letterbox dropped to homes throughout inner Southern Brisbane. We briefly ran on a weekly schedule, before the 2011 Brisbane floods dealt a body blow to the local business community and advertising revenue dried up.

(The Westender has never received any funding, its sole source of income has always been the support of the local business community, and the support of the creative local community.)

We managed to bring out a couple of special editions – usually at election time – but never quite recovered.

Here we are now in 2013 and, with a new business partner in Geoff Ebbs, the Westender is back in print, incarnation number four.