Katanya+curent+affairs

This is my artical; PETER HARVEY: If music can move your soul, this choir can move you to tears. It makes you marvel at what the human spirit can do. Meet the Choir of Hard Knocks. This band of brothers and sisters have shared lives of addiction, homelessness and mental illness. Everyone has a song to sing and a story to tell, like Simon Mansell. It's paranoid schizophrenia, right? SIMON MANSELL: Yeah, poly-substance abuse. PETER HARVEY: And how does that manifest itself? SIMON MANSELL: I have delusions of grandeur, I have visions, I hear voices, I see things, just torment, pretty much. PETER HARVEY: Allan Crabbe has been a prostitute, a drug addict and was almost murdered 25 years ago. ALLAN CRABBE: The guy had broken into my home, held me down and put his knees on my shoulders — I was in bed asleep — I woke up and he's got this big carving knife and he cut me there and cut me there, there, in the chest. PETER HARVEY: That's this scar here. This one? ALLAN CRABBE: Yeah. PETER HARVEY: Belinda Foxwell is a recovering alcoholic who has battled depression all her life. BELINDA FOXWELL: I suffer bi-polar depression and I had seriously pushed my limits with drinking and my daughter needed a mother and I knew that, I was at the stage where I simply didn't want to drink any more and I took to myself with a cut-up keycard. PETER HARVEY: Sorry, you did what? BELINDA FOXWELL: I took to myself with a cut-up keycard and tried to hurt myself. PETER HARVEY: Did you cut your wrists? BELINDA FOXWELL: Tried to. JONATHON WELCH: Here we go — one, two, three. PETER HARVEY: And this is the man behind the choir — Jonathon Welch, a former principal tenor with Opera Australia. JONATHON WELCH: Everybody say — I think I can, I think I can! PETER HARVEY: He believes singing could do for these people what nothing else could. JONATHON WELCH: Some of them came in and were very ill but they were so determined that they wanted to make a contribution and be part of this and have an opportunity to shine as well, too. PETER HARVEY: Backed by the Victorian charity RecLink, the Choir of Hard Knocks started last September and is open to anyone. JONATHON WELCH: It's called the revolving door — they come through the door and then they're okay for a little bit of time and then they go back the other side through the door and then they come back and then they go around again and that's part of, that's part of the demon that they are struggling with and the illnesses that they are struggling with too but all I try to say is that the door was always open. PETER HARVEY: This is where you start when you go looking for people who can sing like angels — the backstreets of Fitzroy in Melbourne on six-degree night with sleet in the air. The Salvation Army and St Vincent de Paul come down here to feed these folk and to look after them. The Choir of Hard Knocks comes down here to offer them a way up and out. < SIMON MANSELL: I guess it's like a beacon of light, a beacon of light — lost in the wilderness and we're all alone in the wilderness and we're that beacon of light. PETER HARVEY: Last year, Belinda Foxwell placed daughter Alicia into foster care because her life was spiralling out of control. ALICIA FOXWELL: She was in a schiza, schitcha, I don't know what you call it but she was a bit psycho so she had to go in this psycho-atric ward for a little while but now she's calmed and since she's had me she's been a great mum to me. PETER HARVEY: Today, singing beautifully, Belinda dedicates the Missy Higgins song 'The Special Two' to Alicia and her determination to keep them together. BELINDA FOXWELL: Because I love her, I love her but I want more for her and this choir could bring us that. We could get out of here, not have to live with a bunch of, listening to people having sex upstairs and someone smashing in someone's door or fearful every time you see the police here because don't know what's going on and I just feel this choir could give me what I need which is just my little cottage house and my little backyard with a dog, I'd be so happy but it just makes me feel worthy. PETER HARVEY: Just by spending time with this choir, it's obvious the sense of joy and relief this new community of singers has gained and it's a two-way street for the choir and its master. JONATHON WELCH: If I've touched their hearts and 50 of their hearts then I've done my job and that's a real privilege for me, that they've given me their trust. PETER HARVEY: Well they have. You get emotional about this, don't you? JONATHON WELCH: I do. JIMMY BARNES: Jonathan's I think an amazing guy, just to sort think of doing this and to put it together and I just love the enthusiasm and courage that they all show by getting up and having a go at this, the choir are real champions. PETER HARVEY: What you think of them as singers? JIMMY BARNES: There's a couple of really good singers, there's some really good singers, there's something about hearing them singing that touches a nerve more than some of the best choirs I've ever heard. PETER HARVEY: Australian rock legend Jimmy Barnes is only too delighted to be a mentor to the choir and not just for the singing. He also shares his life and death battles with his own demons. JIMMY BARNES: I went through a period where I became seriously, seriously bad alcoholic and drug addict and I was sort of on my last legs and I thought I was going to be dying. CHOIR MEMBER: I'd like to thank you on behalf of the choir and Jonathon and the crew. JIMMY BARNES: I've been there and I've sat at in front of a mirror and looked at myself, tried to look at myself in the eyes and thought you know, you don't deserve to live and somehow, somebody has, a voice or someone has reached and touched me and pulled me back and it's a very, very dark and lonely place to be and if somebody can let you know that there is hope, sometimes that's all it takes to turn it around. PETER HARVEY: For all the members of the choir, it's been an extraordinary journey. They have been the subject of an ABC documentary series. Their Christmas album topped the charts and their concerts are now sold out. This month, they are performing at the Sydney Opera House. JONATHON WELCH: I can't tell you how proud I am of each and every one of you. I think first of all there's a curiosity but secondly I think it's a real public acknowledgement, too, of the determination of these people, to stand up in public on a stage in front of 1700 people and bare their souls. PETER HARVEY: Is there a danger of it all turning into a freak show because people are going along to see junkies and drop-outs and homeless people? JIMMY BARNES: Because they reflect what all of us are, everybody in life needs a help and no matter how rich you are and no matter how healthy you are and no matter successful you are, at some point you need help and I think they reflect that society needs to give, to look after each other. ALLAN CRABBE: Well I'm singing with Jimmy Barnes, and it's one of the biggest buzzes I've ever had in my entire life. I saw Jimmy Barnes when I was 15, 16 at the Bombay Rock, Ritchie's, Croxton Park Hotel. I saw Jimmy when I was a kid and now 30 years later I'm singing on stage with him. PETER HARVEY: How are you feeling? ALLAN CRABBE: Excited, good, nervous. The choir just gives us hope to keep going, to keep going in a positive line, to show people in this beautiful country of ours and the world that we're not useless, we've got a voice, we've got a heart, we've got a soul and we can do something with ourselves, no matter if we're junkies, mentally ill, whatever. BELINDA FOXWELL: It's changed my life; it's really changed my life. I feel like a person and I feel like, I'm doing something for the first time in my life that's right instead of just being a smoke-head or, you know, struggling every day with alcohol. PETER HARVEY: We shouldn't pretend that this is some lovely fairy tale, that these people have stepped out of the darkness and will live happily ever after. Nothing is ever so simple but there is no doubt that this choir has given these men and women a real voice and a real reason to live. Can I just ask you about the choir, mate? CLARKO: Oh good, yeah. PETER HARVEY: Why? CLARKO: Because I love it. Good people, really. Love it. JONATHON WELCH: For me, anybody who wants to learn and sing, come on board. Just bring it on because I would love to see the whole nation singing and I'm after world domination, I think!

This is my summery 1 year ago all of these people were drug addicts, homeless, mentally ill or hopeless. The kind of people you wouldn't give money to if you saw them begging.They all got another chance at their lives. Jonathon Welch is the founder of the choir. He gave these people another chance. They may not be good at singing but at least they have the courage to have a go. Some of the people even tried to kill themselves. They all have shown courage one way or another by trying to give up something your addicted to and by singing in front of huge audiences. When they first started they probably didn't have many people singing, and didn't expect many people to come and watch. Now the seats in the audience are packed full of people all happy to hear of the recovery these people have made. Now and then they even shed a tear.

Questions 1. If you were a drug addict and you were told by your friends that there was a choir that could help you, would you join and why? 2.Who do you think shows the least courage in this artical?Why? 3.If you had an idea that you think would help people, and you also had power, would you try and make your idea real? 4.What you you do if some body said no to you joining the choir? 5.If you didn't want the choir to exist, what would you do? 6. If you could give any type of medal to these people, what would you give and why? 7.If you could donate anything to this choir, what would you give? Why? 8.If you were the founder of the choir, what would you do if too many people joined? 9. What do you think needs in proving? Why?