Ian Kiernan

The next two names on the list, after Kiernan, are Jewish people, so I'm wondering if Kiernan is Jewish too. I think I added a handful of Jewish people at once.

I guess I shall go see.....

Well, I did a quick glance of Lord Wiki's information. I see no mention of Jewishness...at least not yet.

Kiernan is an environmentalist.

Baby Ian was born 4 October 1940. His birthday is tomorrow (Australia time); but by the time I post this his birthday will be several days in the past.

He was born in Sydney. For school, he went to The Scots College which is located in the eastern suburbs, and he also went to The Armidale School. I think someone else I researched went there.

No, never mind. I just did a search of my blog. I found no mention of Armidale. I must be thinking of another school.

Well, I just looked on Google Maps. Armidale is right near Tamworth. I know I mentioned that recently. So I think I DID mention Armidale. It's just that post hasn't been posted yet. By the time I have posted this post, that post will be posted as well. This all gets very confusing.

I'm not sure if the Kiernan family all moved to Armidale, or if Ian was simply sent there for boarding school. Maybe I'll find that out later.

Kiernan went to Sydney Technical College which is now called Sydney Institute of TAFE. There, Kiernan studied building.

He is into the whole yacht thing. I wonder if he has done the Sydney to Hobart Race. I also wonder how he feels about Jessica Watson. Does he support her journey, or not?

Well, I don't see a mention of the Sydney to Hobart race. I can't imagine that he has never done that, though. He has done his own solo around the world voyage. This is part of a race called the BOC Challenge. Kiernan represented Australia in the 1986-1987 race. It was during this race that he saw way too much rubbish in the ocean.

In January 1989, he organized a mass cleanup of Sydney Harbour. Forty thousand people showed up to help. That's awesome.

I REALLY need to get my ass up and help out with something like that. I pick up things here and there. But it would be great to slip on some plastic gloves and start filling up a trash bag.

A year after the Sydney Harbour event, there was a mass all-around-Australia event.

In 1993, it expanded to all over the world.

We have a local one in Fort Worth. I wonder if it was inspired by Kiernan.

In 2007, Kiernan was voted in Readers Digest as being the fourth most trustworthy Australian. If I remember correctly...Fiona Woods was the MOST trusted Australian.

I have to look at this list for myself. Here's the 2009 one. Kiernan is still at number four, and Woods holds her place as well. Hugh Jackman is at number six. Yeah. I get the sense that Jackman is a super decent guy. I'm glad I'm not alone in that feeling. But wouldn't that be funny if he was fooling us all?

Well, I'm done with Lord Wiki. Where should I go next?

Here's the Clean Up the World website. Their little URL icon is the continent of Australia. I guess that's so we remember to give credit where credit is due. Otherwise, America will probably try to claim that it was their idea. Some Americans like to believe that all good and important stuff originated in America.

Well, this sucks. We missed the Clean Up the World weekend. I guess we'll just have to clean up on our own.

The website has Kiernan's story. It talks about how he became disillusioned on his around-the-world yacht race. He expected to see beauty. Instead he saw diapers, bottles, discarded shoes, and other crap.

It's great that he turned his disappointment into something so positive.

I think Kiernan is lucky though. He ended up passionate about something in which people truly CAN make a huge difference. It's easy to go out and clean up litter. I think it's much harder to be someone like Helen Caldicott. Fighting something like nuclear energy is much more challenging because it's all dependent on getting powerful people to listen. And that's close to impossible sometimes.

Here's an article about Kiernan in the Yahoo Lifestyle website.

He says he'll go up to people who drop their cigarette butt on the ground. He'll remind them that this litter will end up in the Sydney Harbour. Good on him for being confrontational like that. I saw someone throw their cigarette on the ground when I was in Sydney. I kept quiet. I wasn't brave enough to speak up.

He has two children.

He was Australian of the year in 1994.

The article is about his house, and how it's green.

They have a system in which they utilize their roof water. That's awesome.

They use tap water instead of bottled water. Bottled water is VERY bad for the environment. We've greatly cut down our use of bottled water. But we don't get it straight from the tap...at least not in Fort Worth. The water tastes bad here. We use a filter.

Kiernan takes two-minute showers. WOW. I am so impressed. And I'm SO not there.

I found a fairly recent article about Jessica Watson. Kiernan DOES speak out in support of her. He says, It is good for the community to have these examples of courage and adventure. It can help others lift their standards and ambitions. So I support adventurism.

I totally agree. That article is several weeks old though, and came before the recent developments about Watson. There has been some evidence to show that Watson might not be fully knowledgeable and ready for troubles she may encounter. Hopefully, she won't let her ego get in the way of her safety. Maybe she'll hold off on the journey, or at least do some further research and preparation.

Here's a promotional video about the Clean Up the World Campaign. Pretty awesome......

2 comments:

  1. I tried to participate in a Clean Up Australia Day once, but it was highly organised and you had to work as part of a team. Too much bother, so I went out on my own and picked up rubbish.

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  2. Andrew,

    Yeah. You're probably right. It probably is easier to just go and do it alone.

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