Sunday Extra - Separate stories podcast

This week's mystery caller could be a beneficiary of unusually wet conditions on the east coast – the nectar-loving Regent Honeyeater.

Gill Hicks was the last survivor to be pulled from the wreckage of a bomb blast, when 4 bombs went off in a co-ordinated attack across London on July 7, 2005. Despite the permanent injuries she suffered, including the loss of both her legs, Gill chose not to let the bombings consume her with anger or a desire for retaliation. Instead she has spent the last 20 years dedicating her life to creating peace, diffusing extremism, advocating for survivors and celebrating life through music and the arts. 

Guest: Dr Gill Hicks, author, musician, artist and performer.

Axolotls are the gold medallists when it comes to limb regeneration. Researchers from Northeastern University have discovered not only how an axolotl starts to regenerate a limb, but also how it knows just how much of the limb needs to be regenerated - whether it is just a finger or a whole arm. The research has implications for humans and our healing processes.

Professor and Chair at the Department of Biology at Northeastern University

Before Bluey, before B1 and B2, even before Play School, there was Mr Squiggle. 

The puppet man from the moon with a pencil for a nose was a fixture of kids television on the ABC for 40 years from 1959 and 1999 . 

And now Mr Squiggle is back - not on television, but in a new free exhibition at the National Museum of Australia.

GUEST:

Rebecca Hetherington Daughter of Norman Hetherington and former presenter of Mr Squiggle and Friends.

Mr Squiggle and Friends: The Creative World of Norman Hetherington.   

Australian university sector is in crisis, with headlines repeatedly warning of job cuts, declining enrolments and concerns over the cuts to face-to-face teaching. Professor Graeme Turner shares insights from his new book, Broken: Universities, Politics and the Public Good, tracing how and why our universities have reached this crisis and Australia needs to do to pull out the sector out of this tail spin. 

Guest: Professor Graeme Turner, Emeritus Professor of Cultural Studies at the University of Queensland and author of Broken: Universities, Politics and the Public Good

Reena Ghelani has been working in humanitarian aid for over 25 years crossing the globe supporting communities in crisis. Born in Uganda, but raised in Melbourne, she has recently been appointed to lead international aid agency Plan International at a time of increasing need and decreasing support from governments around the globe, in particular America.

Guest: Reena Ghelani, CEO of Plan International 

On the 10th July, the former Prime Minister of Malaysia Mohamad Mahathir turns 100. He remains in excellent health and continues to work long days taking meetings and writing his blog. He navigated the birth of the new post-colonial nation of Malaysia for the better and the worse during his time as  Prime Minister from 1981 - 2003. He then surprised the world by being re-elected Prime Minister in 2018, aged 92.  

Guest: James Chin, Professor of Asian Studies at the University of Tasmania

More than ONE million lives have been lost on both sides of the war in Ukraine,  since Russia’s invasion in February 2022.

Throughout the conflict, Russia and Ukraine have used anti-personnel mines, a weapon of war that comes with a particularly awful legacy.

Now Ukraine has announced it is to withdraw from the Ottawa Treaty, a 1999 agreement ratified by the UN banning the use of landmines.

GUEST:

Mary Wareham Deputy Director of the Crisis, Conflict and Arms Division at Human Rights Watch

Two years ago, the head of Wagner, Yevgeny Prigozhin ordered 25,000 of his troops to march towards Moscow. 24 hours later they were ordered to stand down. Two months later Prighozhin, his deputy and 10 other died when his private plane exploded over Russia. This month Wagner announced they were leaving Mali, so what has happened to the organisation since the death of Prigozhin?

Guest John Lechner, author of Death is our Business: Russian Mercenaries and the New Era of Private Warfare (Bloomsbury)

You can pre-order the book online here.

When a friend asked pastry chef Christopher Thé to make them a wedding cake and to "go wild" he didn't realise that in a few years his strawberry watermelon cake would become the most instagrammed cake in the world. Christopher was the founder of Black Star Pastry - a cafe in inner city Sydney - and also the creative genius behind the strawberry watermelon cake that would attract tourists from around the globe to his cafe's front door. 

Guest: Christopher Thé, founder of Black Star Pastry, owner of Hearthe and author of Modern Australian Baking (Hardie Grant)

Last European summer, a hazelnut spread from Algeria took France by storm. The sweet white spread called El Mordjene became the darling of tik-tok influencers and was soon in short supply across the country with prices skyrocketing. Now the product has been banned from sale across the EU causing a diplomatic rift between Algeria and it former colonial power, France.

Guest: Lauren Collins, Paris correspondent for the New Yorker

How a hazelnut spread became a sticking point in Franco-Algerian relations. 

It’s the Moaning Tree Frog! 

Heleioporus eyrei has an unmistakable call, but the frog itself is nearly indistinguishable from related species in South West Australia, several of which occur in the same place. This frog species appears to be able to persist in suburbia, and calls from backyards near the centre of Perth.

Winner: 

Thanks to the team at the Australian Museum's Frog Id project run by Dr Jodi Rowley

From sailors, to bikies, to hipsters – the history of the tattoo industry in Australia can be traced back to the convict era.

What began as something of a dark art, is now the domain of baristas, influencers and suburban mums and dads.

This is the story of how tattoos, once tested on skin with handmade guns, eventually found their way onto reality TV and the social mainstream.

GUEST:

Rhys Gordon Tattoo Artist at Little Tokyo and tattoo historian

Objects that tell the lost history of women's stories in Zambia are at the heart of a new exhibition Frame, part of the virtual Women's History Museum of Zambia.

Guest: Samba Yonga, co-founder of the Women's History Museum of Zambia

Launched amid much fanfare back in 2007, Apple's iconic Iphone changed the way we communicated, listened to music and searched the web.

But 18 years on how much can the company reinvent its signature product, which has had no less than 15 versions of its all in one handset.

And how can Apple navigate the dual challenges of AI and Donald Trump?

GUEST:

Brian Merchant Technology Journalist and author of The One Device: The Secret History of the Iphone

Australia's longstanding ties to the United States, have rarely been tested.

But some uncertainty has crept into the strategic and diplomatic framework that's underpinned our decades long relationship with Washington.

Tensions between the US and China, and a push for Australia to spend more on defence is a causing something of rethink on what's often described as our 'special relationship' with the United States.

GUEST:

Peter Tesch Former Australian Ambassador to Russia and Germany

This week's mystery caller is common in inland towns, scrub and woodland – the Yellow-throated Miner. 

Rodney Croome was among a group of people arrested at Hobart’s Salamanca Market back in 1988, for defying a ban on a stall, set up to collect signatures on a petition calling for homosexuality to be decriminalised in Tasmania.

It was the start of a civil disobedience campaign that would lead all the way to the United Nations, and ultimately to Tasmania reforming its punitive laws in respect to homosexuality.

GUEST:

Rodney Croome Tasmanian gay law reform activist, and a founder of Australian Marriage Equality. 

Are we in a parasitic relationship with our smart phones? A new article in the Australiasian Journal of Philosophy suggests that rather than being a helpful extension of our working mind, our endless doom-scrolling and the mining of our data by phone apps, makes our phones much closer to a parasite than a helpful tool.

GUEST: Rachael L. Brown, Director of the Centre for Philosophy of the Sciences and Associate Professor of Philosophy, Australian National University

The Mennonites are a Christian faith stream established in the Netherlands in the 16th century. They are a pacifist faith and live largely without technology. They have spread across the globe through Russia to North America and then 100 years ago into South America. Now as they search for more farming land they have set up a community in Northen Angola. 

Guest: Photojournalist Nadia Shira Cohen, reporter and photographer of the New York TImes article The Mennonite Colony that Made a Deal with a Diamond Company

In 1981 Midnight Oil released their Place without a Postcard album including a song called Burnie inspired by a tour the band did to North West Tasmania. Midnight Oil guitarist Jim Migonie wrote the song with lead singer Peter Garrett. The song was not universally appreciated in Burnie as the town became a battleground between industry and the environmental movement.

Guest: Jim Moginie, musician, songwriter and writer, guitarist with Midnight Oil

Author of The Silver River (Harper Collins)

Justin Heazlewood is an author, songwriter, comedian and performer whose creative work takes him all over the world. 

But after returning to his hometown, Burnie, in Tasmania during COVID, Justin developed a new appreciation for port-side city of his childhood. It has accumulated in his new book, Dream Burnie, an ambitious, memoir, art book and cultural time capsule tracing 20 creative artists who were also Burnie-born. 

Guest: Justin Heazlewood, songwriter, comedian and author of Dream Burnie.

Australian NGOs have been devastated by Trump's USAID cuts, according to a new report by the Australian Council for International Development. Aid organisations partnering with the US on programs and local partner charities have been hit with financial losses that have forced the closure of programs throughout the Pacific and South East Asia. From clean water projects, to girl's education, vulnerable communities are already feeling the impact of the cuts.

Guest: Matthew Maury, CEO of Australian Council for International Development

Tasmanians are going, somewhat reluctantly, to an election on July 19th.

It's been just 16 months since the last state election, with the snap poll being triggered by a no-confidence motion against Premier Jeremy Rockliff.

GUEST

Kevin Bonham Tasmanian election analyst

This week's mystery caller is the Spotted Catbird. 

It's often found between about Townsville and Cooktown, and especially in forest around Cairns.

Fruit makes up most of the diet - figs, palm seeds and berries. And, unlike its southern counterpart, it often comes down to the ground to find food.

Ann Odong's journey from a child in war torn Uganda, to growing up in the suburbs of Perth is a story in itself.

But that was just the beginning for a soccer mad kid who would eventually turn her passion for football into a career with the Matildas.

GUEST:

Ann Odong, Media Manager The Matildas

A lot of people can’t get their head around the phrase our next guest uses to describe herself - to some it sounds like a contradiction in terms, or an impossibility even

The phrase Samantha Ellis uses is “Iraqi Jew", and the reason it’s unfamiliar has a lot to do with a long and complex history that Samantha comprehensively gets her own head around in her new book Chopping Onions on My Heart 

GUEST

Samantha Ellis

S Shakthidharan had a huge hit with his first play Counting and Cracking which covered the history of Sri Lanka's conflict and the migrant experience. His new play The Wrong Gods deals with the big issues of the day like the impact of globalism, progress and the environment all through the lens of a familiar mother daughter conflict. 

Guest: S Shakthidharan, playwright and director of The Wrong Gods, currently showing at the Arts Centre in Melbourne performed by the Melbourne Theatre Company.

For the 50th Anniversary of the release of Jaws, endurance swimmer, Lewis Pugh, swam around the island of Martha's Vineyard, the setting of the Jaws movie and home to many great white sharks. He undertook the 12 day swim to raise awareness of the threat to sharks, which play an essential role in the ocean's ecosystem.

Guest: Lewis Pugh, endurance swimmer and UN Patron of the Oceans.

The Trump Tariffs, the war in Ukraine and Israel's war in Gaza are all casting a long shadow over this years G7 summit, being held this week in Canada.

The G7 was formed more than fifty years ago, in 1973, as a platform for the world’s advanced economies to align on the economic and geopolitical challenges of the day.

2024 shapes as the most challenging year the summit has faced, since it was first held in 1973.

GUEST:

John Kirton Professor emeritus of political science and the director and founder of the G7 Re...

Barbara Slavin brings us latest news in the direct hostilities in the Middle East, which began on Friday when Israel launched strikes on Iran’s nuclear facilities and ballistic missile bases.

Guest: Barbara Slavin: Distinguished Fellow at the Stimson Centre in Washington and lecturer in international affairs at George Washington University.

This week's mystery caller is famously adaptable and opportunistic, even at Lake Eyre – the Silver Gull.

The winner is Dave from Lune River Tasmania

A lot of people can’t get their head around the phrase our next guest uses to describe herself - to some it sounds like a contradiction in terms, or an impossibility even

The phrase Samantha Ellis uses is “Iraqi Jew", and the reason it’s unfamiliar has a lot to do with a long and complex history that Samantha comprehensively gets her own head around in her new book Chopping Onions on My Heart 

GUEST

Samantha Ellis

Akinola Davies was awarded the Camera D'Or Special Distinction for his film My Fathers Shadow at the Cannes Film Festival this year. It is the first time that a Nigerian film has been chosen for the festival. The film follows a man and their two sons as they travel to Lagos for the day on what would turn out to be a turbulent day in Nigerian political history. The film has its Australian premiere at the Sydney Film Festival.

Guest: Akinola Davies, director My Fathers Shadow

You’ve probably heard of the term Rewilding - its an approach that aims to restore wildlife to their former habitats in the face of humans and their habitats.

The University of Sydney’s been examining Rewilding approaches from all over the world and it recently published its findings in in the journal BioScience.

GUEST 

Dr Patrick Finnerty School of Life and Environmental Sciences at the University of Sydney

Mexico's president claims the public election of judges will make for a more transparent democracy. But with only 13% of Mexicans turning out for the judicial elections, will they instead amplify the corruption plaguing Mexico's legal system. 

Guest: Luis Gomez-Romero, Senior Lecturer at the School of Law, University of Wollongong. 

On the 8th June 1972, Vietnamese photographer Nick Ut won the Pulitzer Prize for the photograph of Kim Phuc, a young girl running burnt and naked down the road outside Bang Trang. The photo contributed to a changing perception of the war in America. A new documentary now casts doubt on who actually took the photo, 53 years later. Could it have been a stringer?

Guests:

Carl Robinson, former photo editor for AP

Bao Nguyen, director of the documentary The Stringer.

Six months after Bashar Assad fled the country, Syria is slowing emerging from 50 years of authoritarian rule.

Former Al Qaeda fighter Ahmed Al Sharaa is now in charge, but peace remains fragile and Syria's long term future is far from certain.

GUEST:

Heidi Pett Freelance journalist,  producer and videographer

Everald Compton has met every PM since Menzies, counts John Howard as a friend, and says Julia Gillard was the best political negotiator he ever saw.

Yet he's never belonged to a political party, and says he's a man of deep faith, but doesn't call himself a Christian.

Twice awarded an Order of Australia, Everald has written myriad books, and been a tireless campaigner for social justice issues.

GUEST: Everald Compton Historian, author, and social entrepreneur with a focus on faith, ethics, and governance.   

Can you guess this week's tweeter?