Berowra Waters Car ferry

The ferry runs 24 hours a day except between noon and 2.30pm on the second Tuesday of the month.

Crossing the river shown in yesterday's photo.

Berowra Waters

View from the road down to Berowra Waters and the free car ferry across Berowra Creek, an anabranch of the Hawkesbury River.

Guest Workers In Australia

Update 18 Dec 2007: It was reported in today's Sydney Morning Herald that Mr Gong and Mr Huang reached a settlement with their former employer and will now be free to return to their families in China, with financial security. The terms of the settlement were not disclosed, but were believed to cover all of what they were owed.

Meet Mr Huang Jianzhing, and behind to the right Mr Gong Wei.

They each paid $ 12 000 to a recruitment agent in China to come to work in Australia under the Australian government's 457 workers' visa program. This allows Australian companies to employ overseas workers for a limited period of time. Their families remain in China. Like many guest workers, they were lead to believe they would be paid a fair wage, and would be able to help their families at home.

Mr Huang and Mr Gong told us through the translator that when they arrived in Australia they were paid $50 a week, and forced to work up to 17 hours straight, in sometimes dangerous conditions. They are currently homeless, having been fired when they complained.

The Construction Union is housing them and assisting them with a legal case to try to cover back pay.

Other workers facing a similar situation have been deported before they can attempt to get back pay owed.

A rally was held today outside the Sydney office of Australian prime Minister, John Howard, to protest about the exploitation of these and other workers like them.

Ben Chifley

A steel sculptural image of former Labor party Prime Minister (1945-49) Ben Chifley stands in Chifley Square. On the grid of cabbage palms, this replaces one of the trees. The image is cut from two flat sheets of stainless steel, narrowly separated by a truss. It is like a 2-D pop art image.

Swimming enclosure, Brooklyn

Brooklyn is possibly the northerly most suburb of Sydney, on the southern shore of the Hawkesbury River. A great place for a picnic, a dig in the sand, or a swim, or to hire a houseboat for a time. You can get there by suburban train from central Sydney in 55 minutes.

No Diving or Jumping

Tomorrow, I'll show you where not to dive or jump.

Wedding photos

A quiet spot for wedding pics at Shortland Brush in the Mirambeena Regional Park at Lansdowne.

Chess in Hyde Park

I can't quite work out what the wheelbarrow was for, unless it was one of the park gardeners stopping for a look. The man with the arm crutch was very adept at using it to move his pieces.

Post Boxes, Sydney City

These brass letter boxes are in the wall of the old General Post Office in Martin Place, Sydney. The post office these days is reduced to a mere shadow of its former self; most of it is now the shell for a posh hotel. There used to be many more of the brass letterboxes. They were removed, but public clamour caused some of them to be reinstated.

Exercise in the park

One of the fashionable things to do nowadays is to have a personal trainer take you through your paces in a public park or on a beach. So, if a strolling photographer wanders past, be prepared! Here's some late afternoon torture in Hyde Park.