Yeah, that

would be, it would be setting.

Yeah.

And the first novel I wrote, you know, I was aware that I hated setting and, and you get a kind of head of steam going when you're writing one day and then you come to a, um, passage where, okay, you know, the characters just arrived in this small Northern Ontario town.

She steps off the bus and I've got to describe what, what she's seeing around her.

And I would just put square bracket, insert description of street scene here and, and square bracket and then move on and go back and do it.

And, uh, you know, it worked because as you say, eventually you have to do it.

So Doing short stories, does that then translate into a more traditional novel that you would write that's a standalone with one story beginning, middle, and end? Does it change your approach to more of a non-short story project as well?

Doug, tell me more about that, because you've been reporting on what is happening in Yuendumu, which is outside of Alice Springs.

Yeah.

Like, they got one health clinic there-It sort of started there.

They would tell me it would've been around early April is when, when they were aware that something was actually going on, because people in those communities would say that, you know, the Royal Flying Doctor comes in once a week.

That's, uh, the usual.

But it started coming in every day, and no one really knew why the Royal Flying Doctor was coming in, and they were like, "Okay, something's here." And then one of the blokes that I spoke to, he went to the health clinic for a health checkup, and while he was there, the, the nurse told him that, it, there is a, this thing called diphtheria and it's sort of spreading across the NT right now.

And he got tested for it.

Did you get a sense of how the vaccination effort is going in these remote communities in the NT?

So getting more into our conversation of, you know, surviving the nightmare of a deactivation slash property turn in, what has your experience really been like so far?

It's like for any of you out there that have taken a melatonin to try and sleep one time and you kind of start having some crazy melatonin dreams.

It's like that.

That's what deactivation is like when you say nightmare.

The term that I like to use is operationalizing deactivation where your COOPs and FOOPs from your S3, like your entire focus from supporting a battalion even as an S4 is no longer current operations.

And it's what is the most efficient and safest and moral and ethical way possible to turn in all this equipment.

And so the Army gives us a goal and say, this is your E-date.

Yeah, go ahead.

Can you tell me what it was like when you first arrived in town?

I arrived there basically just before lunch on Thursday, and searches had still been taking place about 5Ks out of town, not far from Old timers Camp.

And, you know, there was a big, uh, search party there walking through the buffel grass.

You know, I'd stuck around there for a little bit, had a chat to a few people.

But we decided to go out to Old timers Camp to go and try and approach the family 'cause, you know, heard that they were open to speaking to media and to putting their concerns, or, you know, what they wanted to say, you know, people to search for Kumanjayi Little Baby.

And unfortunately, when I got there, I, I wasn't aware that police had just left before I arrived and had just informed the family that they had found her body.

There was a lot of hope, you know, throughout the week that that wasn't going to be the case.

Can you tell me about what we know about his arrest and how that evening unfolded?

Could we see that happen?

happen?According to the leader of the opposition, uh, down here, um, Jess Wilson, yes.

She has said, uh, on multiple occasions that the coalition here in Victoria, the opposition, they do plan to scrap treaty, scrap the entire process within the first 100 days if they win government in November.

That will undo a whole bunch of work that's gone into this and, and a whole lot of money that's already been spent as well to establish this treaty.

And what, uh, opposition leader Jess Wilson says is that they will establish a First Peoples' Department.

Um, they have offered an alternative, but there isn't much detail in what that is.

I've spoken to the co-chair of the, um, First Peoples' Assembly, um, Ngarra Murray, and what they believe that scrapping this treaty would do is just basically going back to business as usual when it comes to, you know, First Nations, um, affairs i- in this country.

Just finally, to bring it back to what's happening in Victoria, do you think the Albanese government is watching to see the outcome in Victoria to perhaps then use it as a blueprint for moving forward federally?