Inside Australia's Immigration Detention

Good morning.  I normally write an email to you in the evening.  But today, I am sending you this early edition because I am going back to bed.  I am falling apart.  I found bleeding from the inside of my right ear and have a swollen jaw caused by the worn out filling of one of my left side teeth.  My crankiness must have come from the physical ailment.  I have to add these items to the list of my battlegrounds against IHMS (the health service provider). Yesterday, I received a few letters from IHMS in relation to my long-standing war on glasses.  IHMS and I have been fighting since November last year.  In short, I want new glasses and theyr did not want to give them to me.   The first round of the fight was concerned with an appointment to be seen by the optometrist who visits Villawood only once a month.  I won the first round last month.  But then, IHMS informed me that it would take 6 to 8 weeks for the delivery of...

I got some documents from the Immigration through FOI.  It seems my litigation is looked after by a senior legal officer in the legal section.  The senior legal officer is taking instructions from the Directors of cancellation branch etc.  Obviously, I was severely demoted from 2006 when the Director of the legal section was taking instructions from the First Assistant Secretary who reported to the Deputy Secretary who had a meeting with the Minister regularly.  I am very happy with my rapid demotion in the last 11 years.  Hopefully, I will be demoted even further in the next week or two. Today, I tried an activity entitled 'Music'.  In that activity, a lecturer (the same one as knitting and ESL) distributed a sheet of paper which the lyric of one of Adele's songs was printed with some words were deleted.  Then while we listened to the song, we were required to fill in the missing words.  That's not music.  That's dictation!   ...

It was an extremely busy day.  The problem was that I attended four activities without giving up my normal routine of having coffee and reading newspapers.  Every activity starts at half past and finishes at quarter past.  So during these fifteen minutes break, I rushed back to my compound to work on emails.  I served my final submissions on the other side, knocked off the last assessment of the online course and so on. Other than ESL and circuit training at the Gym, I tried one science(-like) course and the movie club today.   The lecturer of the science(-like) course showed us a TV program which was concerned with scientific research of the illicit drug use and its effect.  The real drug users participated in the experiment.  I learned the kinds of commonly used illicit drugs, how to use them and the effect of them....  For an ignorant person from a country where the drug control is almost flawless, all the information was new....

It was a busy day again.  I went to the gym for strength training with a personal trainer.  I usually do aerobics using a treadmill, a cross trainer, a bike and a rowing machine myself.  But I decided to learn how to use machines for strength training while I am here.  I booked a personal trainer at the induction yesterday for today's exercise.  So I was nearly murdered (?!) today.   Geez, those machines are so effective.  My stiff neck and sore shoulders have gone completely in a very short time.  I definitely need a membership of a gym after I get out.  Villawood is a nuisance, always costly.  Last time when I got out, I could not go back to the lifestyle without a bath thanks to VIDC which had baths for children in detention.  But the Australian Human Rights Commission did not include in the recommended compensation the sum of the difference of rents between a unit with a bath and a unit without a bath.  I thi...

The Chinese girl who does not speak a word of English and whom I tried to communicate with by writing Chinese characters (and dismally failed) turned to be a chatterbox!  She is very talkative and speaks to everyone.  Everyone listened to her with big smile and nods!  It looks as if everyone understood what the girls said.  But they came to me after the girl had left and told me that they could not understand what she said at all.  Sooo-oh funny! I went to the induction to the Gym today.  Every year, they require users to sign a medical consent afresh.  There were two Asian older men in the session.  Both look to me Chinese but it seems that they came from different countries since they did not speak each other.  The medical consent form does not have a translation.  Those two men do not speak English at all.  So the trainer started trying to translate it into kind of a sign language (?!).  I should not have laughed but I ...

I met the flirtatious hairdresser this morning!  He has not been sacked after all.  The source of the false information was one of my good friends.  His nickname is 'Professor' because he is very arrogant but often what he says is completely wrong.  Ha ha ha.  Real professors will be most annoyed if they noticed how they are perceived by the general public.   Anyway, it's good to have the hairdresser back since if my lazy judge takes long to write up a judgment, I will have my hair trimmed next month again. Today, I went to the knitting class again to learn the latest topics in the detention centre.  Girls told me that a new policy on food was introduced today and now a visitor was allowed to bring food in for detainees.  After the knitting class, I asked about the new food policy to a detainee who collected everyone's signature to put the ABF on notice that we would institute a class action if the current food ban policy was not changed...

I heard a rumour.  A very, very disturbing rumour.  Serco's contract is terminated.  Well, that's not disturbing at all.  But the ABF is taking over the operation of Villawood!  It's so disturbing.  I even became feeling sick.  If it happens, then VIDC will be like 2006!  No way.  I gotta get out quick... I roughly finished my final submissions to the Court.  So I knocked off pending chores today.  I had my complaints here piling up so I wrote half a dozen of complaint forms in one go.  I had to push the lawyers in the Attorney-General's Department who have been making an excuse one after the other to postpone making a decision on my petition.  So I emailed them to let them know that I would file a judicial review application with the Federal Court seeking mandamus directed to the Attorney-General and withhold the service on him to see whether they would keep the promise to make a decision by the end of February....

One girl got a broken bone in her arm, I think, today.  I heard there had been a fight in the shop since one of the girls pushed the other's back.  The one who, I heard, caused the injury is one of my former roommates.  She was quiet, neat, tidy, calm and pleasant, in my impression....  The one who got a broken bone lives in a couple doors away from my room.  She is a quiet, well-groomed, intelligent and elegant girl, in my impression.  I cannot believe that there was a fight between those two....  I think both are Kiwi, but I am not sure. According to one of my friends (guy/gay), one of the centre managers said that the girls' compound (Lima) had more problems than the male compounds.  I often hear guards talking to each other about who was sent to Lima.  So it seems, my building is the place where the guards are scared to work.  Mmmmm...   Today, I went to Charity Walk, women's knitting class and Personal Circuit at ...

This morning was not so hot as yesterday so I went to Charity Walk.  By participating in it in order to donate to a charity, I got paid.  One day, I will figure out why.... or maybe it's a forever mystery....  The money will be used to buy postage stamps sold at the shop.  A one-dollar stamp costs me 91 cents.  I have not found out why... but my guessing is that there is no GST taxed to the shop as it is not business.  My friend said to me that it was the ten percent return and hence was a good investment.  Well,,, investment sounds as if I used my capital to get the profit.  That's not quite what happened.  I paid nothing. This evening, I went to the Medical Centre to see whether my anti-depressant had arrived.  It arrived, surprisingly.  Not only that, a nurse gave me a webster pack (a medication pack for a week).  I don't know why.  It's convenient for me to have the pack but IHMS did not allow me to ...

I slept well last night for a change.  I got up afresh.  Then I went to the Charity Walk again.  Since I have been flashing around my certificate and recommending everyone to participate, the number of participants in this activity is growing.  It helps them in the tribunal and simultaneously helps the charity organisation, Can-teen.  And most importantly (?!), I am thanked by other detainees, which will make my life here easier.  Triple win situation! The start of the day was brilliant but after that was downwards.  I didn't feel like doing anything.  The depressed mood was triggered by one email.   One of my Japanese friends emailed me to tell me that she is wishing that I can get back to the previous life.  Oh no.  No way.  I don't want to go back to the previous life, namely the life below the poverty line.  No thank you.  Friends here pointed out a few days ago that getting a job and making money are to...

It's Boxing day.  Freezing cold.  It's odd to be so cold at this time of the year.  Christmas day was cold, too.  I was told yesterday that it was 23 degree although Christmas eve was 37 degree.  And I am not living in Melbourne!  Too odd!  I don't know whether that is the reason or not, we didn't have an event called Boxing Day Cricket whatever it was supposed to be.  It was the last Christmas event so the festive season here has finished.  Boring... Today I had a relatively quiet day because I started writing my final submission which I call the draft judgment.  I didn't make much progress.  It is my habit to take a lot of time fiddling with a structure at the start of writing but once I settle the structure, it will be quick to go through to the end. There was not much else today.  Oh, I learned the rule of Backgammon.  I didn't play though.  It didn't look like an interesting game.  Why has that game...

Finally, I got back to my normal routine in Villawood.  I still have a few things to get back from the centre though.   Before going to Brisbane, I had two extra bed sheets, one extra bath towel, one extra blanket and one extra locker key, all beyond the rules of the centre.  Don't misunderstand.  All of them were given to me lawfully.  None of them were smuggled into my room.  I left them here when leaving for Brisbane.  Since I came back here the day before yesterday, I had to collect them again (beyond the rules!).  I got my extra locker back last night and currently am waiting for other stuff to be returned to me except for an excess blanket which I do not want to keep it in my room anymore. Before leaving for Brisbane, I requested a plumber to be sent to repair the half-blocked basin in front of my room.  When I came back, it was repaired.  But instead, I found the toilet seat and lid have gone!!!  I don't know wh...

A busy week started.  The last few days in Villawood.  I still don't know when to travel but I suspect it is 20th.  So I have to wind up everything tomorrow and the day after tomorrow.  It seems that the Immigration does not tell me the date and the time of travel in advance.  However, according to a guard who does escort, since I will go interstate, the custody has to be transferred from Serco NSW to Serco QLD which means that I should be able to take all my belongings with me.  I hope that is correct. Today, I organised my court papers.  I also printed out the last documents that I might hand up to the judge.  Other than those bits and pieces, I read cases and had fun.  The Immigration never stop surprising the court (and the readers of the judgments like me).  They are astoundingly talented! Tomorrow, I will introduce my quiet kind Tamil friend here to my caring friend in Sydney when she visits me.  The day after tomorro...

It's Day 40 today.  Time goes so quickly when you keep eating constantly...  I feel as if haven't done anything else these days.  So I decided to have a bit of a change today. I went to the hairdresser in the Community.  I had a hairdo by a 42 year old VERY FLIRTATIOUS Lebanese hairdresser who wants to see me in Brisbane.  Ha ha ha.  Since I called him a spring chicken, he kept asking me for my vintage.  I told him that I had repealed my birthday decades ago!   Then I went to the coffee shop next door to the hairdresser.  The barista of the coffee shop is, unlike the hairdresser, a detainee.  He is to be deported finally on Thursday.  He was supposed to be deported 'in a few weeks' for the last few months so we no longer believed he would really be going.  But it seems, at last, he may.  I am now worried whether my coffee vouchers that my Japanese friends left for me can be used up....  The coffee shop mi...

Today, I tried Milo, as far as I remember, for the first time in my life.  Milo was sold a lot in Japan, too.  But my Mum never bought it  for me so it was not in my drink menu.  When I lived in a college at a uni in Queensland , I saw many students stirring Milo in a  cup every morning but I have never tried.  But yesterday, a shop clerk  told me that I have 60 cents or so left so that I should buy a  Cadbury's chocolate frog, what is the name??,,, or a sachet of Milo to  use up this week's 35 dollars.  So I decided to try Milo.  Well, it's  an experience for the first and probably the last in my life. I tried another experience today.  Joining a so-called 'activity'.   There is a charity walk twice a week here.  It is interesting because  if a detainee joins the charity walk, the donation  goes to Can-teen, a  charity to support teenage cancer sufferers.  But the detainee al...