“You’re a dick, but you’re a funny dick,” Christian Elderfield’s teacher said to him when he was in year 11. Christian, the 446th person I've met on my quest to have lunch with 500 strangers, took his teacher’s words to heart and started entering comedy competitions. Christian turned out to be good at writing and delivering [...]
Christine Wan, the 445th person I've met on my quest to have lunch with 500 strangers, has a love for communicating and education. Christine used to be a financial adviser, before deciding she could do more meaningful work as a teacher. Unfortunately, though, the public school system can be very bureaucratic, which can make it hard [...]
Bronwyn Penhaligon, the 444th person I've met on my quest to have lunch with 500 strangers, sometimes asks her clients a tough question: “What are you going to do about it?” Bronwyn is a strategic psychotherapist, which means she does more than just help her clients understand their predicament – she also helps them move to [...]
Renée Brack, the 443rd person I've met on my quest to have lunch with 500 strangers, has a story that is crazy but true: notorious gangster Chopper Read pointed a gun at her face, pulled the trigger … and she lived. Renée was an investigative reporter at the time, and the first TV journalist to interview [...]
Ian Lindgren, the 442nd person I've met on my quest to have lunch with 500 strangers, had been in the Australian Defence Force for almost two decades, when he was posted to the Multinational Force & Observers, an independent international organisation with peacekeeping responsibilities in the Sinai border region between Israel and Egypt. Ian loved his [...]
Dr Andrew Leigh, the 441st person I've met on my quest to have lunch with 500 strangers, describes himself as an introvert doing an extrovert’s job. Andrew is the Assistant Minister for Competition, Charities, Treasury & Employment, as well as the Federal Member for Fenner in the ACT, which means a large part of his role [...]
Gretchen Reggie Hart, the 440th person I've met on my quest to have lunch with 500 strangers, went through a long, horrific health experience, during which she lost a marriage and a career but gained an appreciation of what really matters. In 2015, Reggie, who was a financial adviser, caught influenza B, which should’ve been a [...]
Glenda Mitchell, the 439th person I've met on my quest to have lunch with 500 strangers, grew up as a hyper-competitive high achiever who wanted to stand out from others. These things were interrelated for Glenda, because she recognised that if she could perform better in sport or attain higher marks in school, she could carve [...]
Heather Hawkins, the 438th person I've met on my quest to have lunch with 500 strangers, performed an astonishing feat of endurance in January 2016. Heather ran seven marathons on seven continents in seven days – in Antarctica, Punta Arenas (Chile), Miami, Madrid, Marrakesh (Morocco), Dubai and, finally, Sydney. According to the rules of the World [...]
When Aadil Abbas decided to leave India in his early twenties, he had one question for his parents: “In which countries don’t we know anyone?” Aadil, the 437th person I've met on my quest to have lunch with 500 strangers, knew he had family in many countries; but rather than begin a new life that would [...]
