mango education

Last night, while the brown rice was on, and before reheating the night before's sweet potato curry, I read a deal of the latest Australian Poetry Anthology (volume 8), which arrived in the mail the day before. There are many mangoes in this book, I thought, that and Ernest Hemingway references. Those would be John Donne references I later realised. Flicking through again to confirm, I only found four mangoes, two of which are mango trees. But the poems with "mango" in them are placed close together.

On Radio National this morning, Fran Kelly interviewed a mango farmer representative from the Northern Territory (Leo Skirlos) about FIFO Pacific fruit pickers. As soon as the Vanautuans get off the plane they're heading straight to the quarantine camps, said Leo. There is no lurgy in Vanautu, there are other diseases, but no lurgy. How will you keep the workers safe, asks Fran. Oh, if a family gets it they'll be staying in the same hut. Fly in the workers, pick the fruit so it doesn't fall to the ground, give them the disease to take home. Ship the mangoes to Victoria. Keep the mangoes safe.

Screenshot taken while undertaking training
via the Australian Government Department of Health Covid-19 Learner Portal, April 2020