Speaker 1: We'd like to acknowledge that traditional custodians of the land
Speaker 1: on which this podcast was produced, the Gellighl people of
Speaker 1: the urination. We pay our respects to Elder's past and present.
Speaker 2: It's the late nineties and Mahmud Fazao is growing up
Speaker 2: in the southeastern suburbs of Melbourne. His parents settled here
Speaker 2: after fleeing the Soviet War in Afghanistan, and for my
Speaker 2: Mood is a calm and loving childhood. Weekends are spent
Speaker 2: with Dad at work in the dandinglong markets, and at
Speaker 2: home his mum cooks delicious delicacies to keep the memories
Speaker 2: of their homeland alive. They're a loving family and life
Speaker 2: in Australia is good.
Speaker 3: That is until two thousand and one, when.
Speaker 2: Everything changes, not just for Ma Mood but for all
Speaker 2: Afghans all around the world. Until now, no one knew
Speaker 2: much about their homeland. Now it's a country everyone is
Speaker 2: aware of. Mamood is just starting high school and kids
Speaker 2: are crueled in a country he once felt at home.
Speaker 2: He is completely outed nine eleven, shakes his sense of
Speaker 2: belonging and changes life in Australia forever. This lack of
Speaker 2: belonging the feeling of being an outsider will lead him
Speaker 2: to become deeply embedded in one of Australia's most violent gangs.
Speaker 2: I'm Att Middleton and this is head Game Today. How
Speaker 2: Mahmoud Fazzau became a sergeant at arms for the Mongol's
Speaker 2: Bikey Gang and the lessons in resilience, reinvention and redemption.
Speaker 2: Mahmood Fuzz, thank you so much for coming on my
Speaker 2: podcast head Game Now.
Speaker 3: You've got quite a fascinating story. Where were you born? Mahmoud?
Speaker 4: I was born here in Melbourne in the southeast in
Speaker 4: nineteen ninety. So my parents moved here from Afghanistan. They've
Speaker 4: fled the Soviet invasion and my father's uncle sponsored him
Speaker 4: to come over here roughly around eighty eight. And yeah,
Speaker 4: two years later I arrived him.
Speaker 3: Two years later you were born, Mamood? And what was
Speaker 3: your household?
Speaker 2: Like?
Speaker 3: What was it was it?
Speaker 2: Was it quite Australian or were you still quite traditional
Speaker 2: with your afghan roots and the ways of the Middle East?
Speaker 3: Shall we say?
Speaker 4: Yeah, Well, my parents were definitely still trying to figure
Speaker 4: out this land in which they had arrived and they
Speaker 4: you know, they spoke Pashto at home. I grew up
Speaker 4: in an Afghan household that was very much time locked
Speaker 4: to pre Soviet invasion Afghanistan, which was quite you know,
Speaker 4: unique in that it was conservative, but there were progressive
Speaker 4: elements of the country as well. You know, women were
Speaker 4: going to university that was American records you could readily access.
Speaker 4: There was a big music culture and a big poetry culture.
Speaker 4: So I grew up in a household that very much
Speaker 4: celebrated that kind of Afghan heritage, and Pascheda was my
Speaker 4: first language. But otherwise I was very much encouraged to
Speaker 4: be an Australian. You know, my parents were barracked for
Speaker 4: the Australian cricket team. You know, we were very much
Speaker 4: part of this culture and very much my parents encouraged
Speaker 4: me to be as Australian as I could be, and
Speaker 4: I was welcomed at school, in primary school and in
Speaker 4: my community as an Australian for well until nine to
Speaker 4: eleven pretty much.
Speaker 2: So did you see yourself as Australian or did you
Speaker 2: see yourself as Afghani?
Speaker 4: There wasn't really a confusion. I think I merged the
Speaker 4: two to yeah, and I very much felt Australian and
Speaker 4: Afghan at the same time. And at school, I remember,
Speaker 4: you know, kids being kind of fascinated by this exotic,
Speaker 4: kind of strange place that no one had heard of
Speaker 4: back then, particularly in suburban, working class suburban Melbourne. This
Speaker 4: place Afghanistan. It was just kind of like a tongue
Speaker 4: twister that they would you know, joke about in the
Speaker 4: school yard, but no one actually knew where this strange
Speaker 4: place was. And yeah, I mean I never felt like
Speaker 4: an outsider really. I was definitely one of the boys
Speaker 4: on the school yard. And yeah, very much part of
Speaker 4: the community and very much an Australian. I didn't really
Speaker 4: know what it meant to be an Afghan outside of
Speaker 4: my home. You know, there wasn't much of an Afghan
Speaker 4: community back then either, so my experience of Afghanistan was
Speaker 4: very limited to my specific household. I think back then
Speaker 4: our community was only like a hundred people in the
Speaker 4: whole of Victoria, so and there were a lot of
Speaker 4: my family members.
Speaker 2: So primary school, you mentioned primary school, was that quite
Speaker 2: a comfortable living, quite a good way of living. You
Speaker 2: were very sort of integrated, You loved it, and you
Speaker 2: mentioned there that things changed after obviously nine eleven, huge
Speaker 2: event global event that happened, but just taught me prior
Speaker 2: prior to that, were you a fun loving kid and
Speaker 2: just happy, go lucky and loving life.
Speaker 4: I was very much happy you got lucky. You know.
Speaker 4: I listened to powder Finger, I did all the things
Speaker 4: young Australian kids did. I was probably edging on being
Speaker 4: like a Bogain like I was, you know, I was
Speaker 4: into VLS. I was just yeah, I played cricket, wanted
Speaker 4: to be like Brettley, you know all that stuff. And
Speaker 4: then yeah, around grade five, things started shifting. You know.
Speaker 4: I had a bit of a kind of a traumatic
Speaker 4: event that happened in grade five, and then the following
Speaker 4: year was nine to eleven, when I was in grade six,
Speaker 4: and there was this real shift where I felt like
Speaker 4: I was this part of the community, but from a
Speaker 4: strange land, but I wasn't one of the boys. To
Speaker 4: suddenly everyone feeling as though they actually knew the real me,
Speaker 4: you know, they began to understand what Afghanistan was, and
Speaker 4: who the people from Afghanistan were and what they represented
Speaker 4: and what they really wanted to do to the West. Well,
Speaker 4: that was how I felt, you know, I felt like
Speaker 4: I'd kind of been stained with this brush that, you know,
Speaker 4: the media kind of propelled.
Speaker 2: Yeah, I know exactly what you're talking about. So it
Speaker 2: was a knock on of effects really from grade five
Speaker 2: and then grade six, nine eleven happens.
Speaker 3: Do you remember that day?
Speaker 4: I remember the morning quite vividly, like seeing my father
Speaker 4: on the couch kind of watching the planes flying over
Speaker 4: and over again, juxtaposed with these images of bearded men
Speaker 4: in these caves and then the mountains of Afghanistan, like
Speaker 4: just over and and over again, and my dad kind
Speaker 4: of seemed worried. I think it was one of the
Speaker 4: only times i'd really seen my dad kind of concerned
Speaker 4: and worried, which was odd. I knew something weird was
Speaker 4: going on. And then I remember being at school and
Speaker 4: it was this kind of strange panic. Even in the classroom.
Speaker 4: Everyone seemed confused, and we're talking about it. And we
Speaker 4: were like eleven years old, you know, so it's kind
Speaker 4: of weird. But people, the teachers were obviously concerned and
Speaker 4: the kids were talking about it, and I remember one
Speaker 4: of the girls looking over at me and saying, isn't
Speaker 4: that where you're from? And said, yeah, you know, And
Speaker 4: it was this really profound moment where I suddenly realized
Speaker 4: that I wasn't part of the group. I might be,
Speaker 4: I might belong to something else, and I kind of
Speaker 4: had to understand that and learn about that and reckon
Speaker 4: with what that meant.
Speaker 2: So when when that happened, did you no longer sort
Speaker 2: of see yourself as Australian? Did it flip straight over
Speaker 2: to right? People are looking at me now, looking at
Speaker 2: my home country. This event has just happened. Did you
Speaker 2: sort of go back into your Afghanistan heritage because obviously
Speaker 2: you were pushed into that way, or was it a
Speaker 2: conscious decision of you know, wow, this is happening in
Speaker 2: my homeland.
Speaker 4: Well, the following year nine to eleven happened towards in September, obviously,
Speaker 4: and then the following year was my first year of
Speaker 4: high school. So there's already all this this flood of
Speaker 4: emotions and you're trying to reckon with all of that stuff,
Speaker 4: and suddenly you go from being the oldest kids yard
Speaker 4: to the youngest kid in the school yard. Yeah, and
Speaker 4: there was this odd thing where all these people that
Speaker 4: you grew up with, that you had relationships with, suddenly
Speaker 4: didn't want to hang out with you and associate with you.
Speaker 4: In the high school yard, and so you gravitate towards
Speaker 4: the handful of other kids that kind of get you.
Speaker 4: And I was lucky enough. I had a couple of
Speaker 4: cousins at the school that I went to, and we
Speaker 4: just kind of clicked together. And I was like, did you.
Speaker 3: Feel like that you had to click together?
Speaker 2: Did you feel like that you were pushed towards that
Speaker 2: and you naturally gravitated towards that because of the situation.
Speaker 4: I think it was obvious that we felt excluded.
Speaker 3: And it was an obvious exclusion.
Speaker 4: Yeah, and there was you know, a lot of school
Speaker 4: yard jokes around, you know, terrorists and you know, and
Speaker 4: when you're young and your naive, you kind of play
Speaker 4: along with all that stuff because you want to be accepted,
Speaker 4: you know. And so but then you know, there was
Speaker 4: a few very stern conversations you know, I had with
Speaker 4: my cousins. Wo, we decide we're not going to cop
Speaker 4: it anymore. And yeah, like I said, there was maybe
Speaker 4: four or five of us. Even some of the Arabs
Speaker 4: that were hanging out with us. They were like Christian
Speaker 4: Palestinian kids, like they were Christians, but they still got
Speaker 4: you know.
Speaker 3: Yeah, they still got excluded too of it.
Speaker 4: Yeah, yeah, yeah, they were still seen as kind of
Speaker 4: these terrorists Middle Eastern kids, these terrorist Arabs. So yeah,
Speaker 4: it wasn't just us, but there was maybe maybe five
Speaker 4: or six of us. They just stuck together. And very early,
Speaker 4: maybe halfway through that first year, one of my cousins
Speaker 4: was at the school. She used to wear a hijab
Speaker 4: and she got like, I remember, she got like an
Speaker 4: orange pegged at her head, you know, and the white hijab,
Speaker 4: you know, there was just bits of orange all over it.
Speaker 4: And it was a kind of breaking point where my cousin.
Speaker 4: My cousin was a lot more aggressive than I was,
Speaker 4: and he said, you know, I'm not copping that anymore.
Speaker 4: And this was a much older kid too that did it.
Speaker 4: It was in year lefton or something, year twelve, and yeah,
Speaker 4: it was we went to his locker bain and we.
Speaker 3: Just pushed a breaking point really yeah.
Speaker 4: Yeah, and pretty much pretty much, I mean, we knew
Speaker 4: that if we don't do anything, we're just going to
Speaker 4: keep copying this for the next for the rest of
Speaker 4: our lives in high school. Yeah yeah. And so then
Speaker 4: when we did that, people started respecting us. It really
Speaker 4: confused us because we used violence in a very aggressive
Speaker 4: way and we got respect for it and people didn't
Speaker 4: fuck with us. And so in our very young minds,
Speaker 4: we thought, well that's the answer, you know, and then it.
Speaker 2: Works, right, It's like it works, we get in respect.
Speaker 2: Was our mindset shift there as well, Manmoud? Was there
Speaker 2: mindset shift of actually, you know you've pushed me out,
Speaker 2: you know, fuck you lot, We're going to stick together.
Speaker 3: It's us again.
Speaker 2: Was it divisive like that or was it just a case, Yeah,
Speaker 2: it was make you feel angry.
Speaker 4: Yeah, we were very angry, very We felt betrayed by
Speaker 4: the people that we loved, you know, in the community
Speaker 4: that we love that estranged us, and so we suddenly
Speaker 4: I remember borrowing books about Afghanistan from the school library,
Speaker 4: like literally having to learn because my parents were like
Speaker 4: my dad was kind of a literally never went to
Speaker 4: school and stuff, so we couldn't like mind him for
Speaker 4: the history of our country. Everything he knew was kind
Speaker 4: of third or fourth hand, and so I just remember
Speaker 4: like literally trying to learn about who I was in
Speaker 4: these strange texts at the school library and suddenly having
Speaker 4: to face the fact that, you know, I'm never going
Speaker 4: to be seen as an AUSSI. None of these kids
Speaker 4: will ever believe that I'm an Aussi. So I've got
Speaker 4: to actually figure out who the fuck I am in
Speaker 4: this in this strange environment.
Speaker 2: Did you try and say I was born here, I'm
Speaker 2: just as Australian as you are.
Speaker 3: And was there was there a fight with that?
Speaker 2: Did you use the will to fight that fight or
Speaker 2: was it just a case of the segregation was too
Speaker 2: obviously divided. You stick to your group, their stick to
Speaker 2: their group, and we need to just to stick together.
Speaker 4: I think everyone's mind at that point was already made
Speaker 4: up that, you know, it really is a war of
Speaker 4: us against them, the West, against these people in the
Speaker 4: Middle East. And if you know, you believe in any
Speaker 4: of things that these people in the Middle East believe,
Speaker 4: you're not part of us. And we were Muslims, you know,
Speaker 4: so it was we very much believed that, you know,
Speaker 4: we probably are not part of this group anymore. And
Speaker 4: so it was very confusing, and we definitely had to
Speaker 4: basically seek out a new identity or constructing new identity,
Speaker 4: and it was very much, you know, it was very
Speaker 4: disorientating that it was Also the main problem was that
Speaker 4: we began to use violence that got results, and then
Speaker 4: that kind of intoxicated us further. And yeah, it was
Speaker 4: all It was just a kind of slippery slope that
Speaker 4: made us make a lot of bad decisions.
Speaker 2: And what path of destruction if it was a path
Speaker 2: of destruction or violence, did that lead you down? From
Speaker 2: that moment onwards.
Speaker 4: Well, we kind of shifted into like we in the beginning,
Speaker 4: it was like reactionary. You know, we thought, you know,
Speaker 4: these people are going to be picking on us, so
Speaker 4: we're going to get them back. But then we just started,
Speaker 4: you know, we thought, well, actually, let's addressed upon him
Speaker 4: before it starts, and just started you know, almost like
Speaker 4: terrorizing the other kids in the on the school yard,
Speaker 4: you know, and just being really awful people. But it
Speaker 4: was a it protected us, and it was a very
Speaker 4: early lesson in that, you know, I began to learn
Speaker 4: that sometimes the most aggressive and violent and unpredictable people
Speaker 4: are often the most scared and the most vulnerable, and
Speaker 4: that's why they lash out the way they do. And
Speaker 4: so yeah, but that's what happened. And then we started,
Speaker 4: you know, meeting other kids from other neighborhoods that were
Speaker 4: the same as us, and then we just started hustling
Speaker 4: and you know, yeah, getting up to no good and
Speaker 4: clicking up with other kids who also viewed themselves as
Speaker 4: outsiders and were forming little groups. And then we'd all
Speaker 4: hang out after school and you know, it kind of
Speaker 4: erupted out of the school environment onto the streets, and
Speaker 4: you know, that's that's how it happens when you're young.
Speaker 4: You know, you're just you're not going to go to school.
Speaker 4: You don't feel like the system is playing in your favor,
Speaker 4: and so you're going to do what all the other
Speaker 4: kids on the street are doing, who also feel rejected
Speaker 4: and neglected by that system. So you start, you start,
Speaker 4: you know, falling off.
Speaker 2: And did you start to sort of completely push away
Speaker 2: your Australian identity.
Speaker 4: Yeah, I just I was just angry. I was just
Speaker 4: like angry at it because I was like, you know, overnight,
Speaker 4: you know, you feel like you've part, you've done, You've
Speaker 4: made all the sacrifices to assimilate and to integrate into
Speaker 4: this culture for all to be thrown away at the
Speaker 4: drop of the hat. You know, I was just furious.
Speaker 4: And then there was this kind of campaign in the media,
Speaker 4: well what felt like to us as a campaign where
Speaker 4: there's all these stories on the front page of the
Speaker 4: tabloid press about you know, young, violent, many most of
Speaker 4: the time Muslim men, and it constructed this kind of
Speaker 4: image in the zeitgeist about who we were and what
Speaker 4: we represented. So you had the you know, you had
Speaker 4: the the scaff rape trials. You know, you had you know,
Speaker 4: the boat, the people smugglers, you had the Cronulla, you
Speaker 4: had the Iraq War. You know, you had these guys,
Speaker 4: the Taliban, you had Isis. You had all of these
Speaker 4: images that weren't There was nothing to There was no
Speaker 4: other media representation that kind of balanced the books. Really,
Speaker 4: you know that the only time you saw young Middle
Speaker 4: Eastern men on screen, they were up to no good,
Speaker 4: you know, and.
Speaker 2: Of course I don't know favors. And also you you
Speaker 2: sort of play up to that, don't you, Especially when
Speaker 2: you're young and you're naive and and you said it's
Speaker 2: spilled out onto the streets. How what do you mean
Speaker 2: when you say it's spilt out onto the streets?
Speaker 4: Yeah, I mean, like back then, when you're young and
Speaker 4: you're just like drinking with your maids and smoking with
Speaker 4: your mates after school, you don't really you don't sit
Speaker 4: down together and call yourselves a gang and like start
Speaker 4: you know, like making t shirts and stuff. You just
Speaker 4: hanging around. But back then it was all like it
Speaker 4: revolved around your Neighborhood's kind of like there's a whole
Speaker 4: postcode thing now. Back back in suburban Melbourne, it was
Speaker 4: all it all gravitated around like train stations, because kids
Speaker 4: would hang out at train stations and they could they
Speaker 4: could be mobile or through train stations and go different ways.
Speaker 4: So each train station kind of had its own little
Speaker 4: crew of people. It was.
Speaker 2: Yeah, because it's postcodes now, isn't it. So yeah, that's interesting.
Speaker 4: And so people would like if you had drama with
Speaker 4: someone else and he you always had drama with someone
Speaker 4: from a different kind of train station, and you get
Speaker 4: on the trains and run to the go go through
Speaker 4: their train station and they do the same. So that's
Speaker 4: that's kind of what the culture was like in Melbourne.
Speaker 4: And they were like, you know, kids started going a
Speaker 4: juvie and kids are getting stabbed all of a sudden,
Speaker 4: and then you know, people are moving pills and people
Speaker 4: were smoking weed and selling weed. And then there's like
Speaker 4: the older you start hearing about the older boys and
Speaker 4: then they become like these mythic kind of war heroes
Speaker 4: that have you know, dunstints in jail, they're driving you know, amgs.
Speaker 4: And that's when it really glorified.
Speaker 3: Everything's glorified, isn't it.
Speaker 2: And like you say, you almost want to uphold that reputation,
Speaker 2: you know, and and do do you know your your team?
Speaker 4: Proud?
Speaker 3: Shall we see?
Speaker 4: Yeah? But it's also it goes back to this other
Speaker 4: thing where there were no other positive role models back
Speaker 4: then to counterbalance that. So in the neighborhoods that we
Speaker 4: were kicking it at, the only people who looked like
Speaker 4: they had money and were successful were drug dealers. That's
Speaker 4: all there was, Like they were everybody knew they were
Speaker 4: drug dealers. They might have had a panel beating shop,
Speaker 4: they might have had a little, you know, a little
Speaker 4: side trust somewhere yeah, yeah, little you know, a pizza
Speaker 4: shop where they would wash their money, but they were
Speaker 4: all drug dealers. And so when you grew up in
Speaker 4: an environment like that, you think, well, the only way
Speaker 4: out for me is to do what these guys are doing,
Speaker 4: and so.
Speaker 3: Make my money, yeah, and then yeah, away we go.
Speaker 4: Yeah. And so my parents, my parents could seem that
Speaker 4: I was really you know, falling off the track here
Speaker 4: and I'm getting up to no good and you know,
Speaker 4: I got got arrested a couple of times, and you know,
Speaker 4: my parents finding weapons on me and weapons in my
Speaker 4: room and stuff like that, and they knew that it
Speaker 4: was it was getting really wild, so they they sent
Speaker 4: me off to like a posh school.
Speaker 3: You know, when did you know that it was getting
Speaker 3: really wild?
Speaker 4: I didn't really have that moment. I can see it
Speaker 4: in hindsight, but at the time, it wasn't like this
Speaker 4: awakening inside me that motivated me and inspired me to
Speaker 4: do better. It wasn't. But yeah, one of my best
Speaker 4: friends there was like, what these kinds of career they're
Speaker 4: kind of like these big events where all these different
Speaker 4: high schools go to and they put the universities present
Speaker 4: like career prospects and they kind of yeah, yeah, like
Speaker 4: career opportunities and like pathways to different universities and stuff
Speaker 4: like that. And one of my best mates got into
Speaker 4: it with guys from a different area and ended up,
Speaker 4: you know, stabbing up a couple of people at this
Speaker 4: kind of high school event thing, and he got locked
Speaker 4: up and went away for a couple of years. So
Speaker 4: that was that was one of the real kind of
Speaker 4: pivotal moments in my childhood where I thought, oh, it's
Speaker 4: getting you know, pretty serious, like he could have killed
Speaker 4: those kids or whatever. And ironically the kids he stabbed
Speaker 4: were Afghans, so they were Hazara kids who had just
Speaker 4: come in the second wave. So there was another wave
Speaker 4: of Afghans in Melbourne that came after the invasion. So
Speaker 4: but yeah, and so my parents wanted to get me
Speaker 4: away from the environment that I was in, and they
Speaker 4: did that by putting me in school and suddenly I
Speaker 4: lost contact with and my mate went to jail and
Speaker 4: Julie and so suddenly I was kind of in this
Speaker 4: new environment and yeah, wow.
Speaker 2: And so your parents are seeing this, this fall of grace,
Speaker 2: shall we say, are they?
Speaker 3: Are they super concerned for you? Do they pull you
Speaker 3: aside at any point?
Speaker 2: And is there a moment where you know they pull
Speaker 2: you to one side and says this has to stop?
Speaker 4: You have to oh yeah, many times, many times, but
Speaker 4: you kind of don't. It's hard to explain because you
Speaker 4: know that there's that duality, like you mentioned that there's
Speaker 4: the person you are at home and then there's a
Speaker 4: person you are outside, and you feel like they're two
Speaker 4: dope split personalities, like they're two different people. And when
Speaker 4: they start pulling you up on who you are on
Speaker 4: the outside, you kind of get mad at them because
Speaker 4: you're like, you don't know what it's like for me,
Speaker 4: in a very fucking teenage angsty way, you know, like
Speaker 4: you don't know what it's like for them. But they
Speaker 4: really didn't. They really believed in the Australian dream that
Speaker 4: you know, this is a meritocracy and you know it's
Speaker 4: not you're fucking up is you know, it's because you're
Speaker 4: fucking up. You know, you've got every opportunity here. They
Speaker 4: came from Candahart and the farms in rural Candahar, you
Speaker 4: know what I mean. They thought, you know, we've got
Speaker 4: every opportunity here, why are you throwing it away? And
Speaker 4: there was all this kind of complex socio political stuff
Speaker 4: swirling around us that they couldn't comprehend, and neither could we.
Speaker 4: But yeah, I think we knew that they couldn't understand
Speaker 4: something that was happening to us, and so every time
Speaker 4: they pulled us up where it was just like, you know,
Speaker 4: I fucking get it.
Speaker 3: Eventually, Were you part of a biker gain as well.
Speaker 4: Yeah, so that happened af So I went to school,
Speaker 4: and when I went to that posh school, I went
Speaker 4: to art school. I really was inspired to read. I
Speaker 4: had a few very influential teachers at that school that
Speaker 4: really inspired me to find h reconfigure this my moral
Speaker 4: compass through actually reading. And I became quite a voracious
Speaker 4: and obsessive reader. And then I went to art school,
Speaker 4: got out of Art school and couldn't get a job
Speaker 4: and stuff, and then I found myself back at square one.
Speaker 4: So I was waxing with those same kids that I
Speaker 4: grew up with, and one thing led to another, except
Speaker 4: that they hadn't had that moment where they they left
Speaker 4: and came back. They had just graduated on and on
Speaker 4: to bigger and bigger things on the streets. And so
Speaker 4: by the time I linked up with them after art school,
Speaker 4: they were all already kind of making big moves in
Speaker 4: the suburbs. And you know, they had big runs, and
Speaker 4: you know they were pretty serious serious.
Speaker 2: And when you say making big moves, obviously there's a
Speaker 2: there's a ranking system within these organizations where they making
Speaker 2: their way up the ranks, are earning more money.
Speaker 3: Was that the case there and new thought, right.
Speaker 4: Job, they were just like looking out for me because
Speaker 4: they could see that I didn't have any money or
Speaker 4: anything like that, and I didn't have a job, and
Speaker 4: no one was hiring people that looked like us back
Speaker 4: then with names like ma Mud, and so they were
Speaker 4: just like chopping me in to what they were doing.
Speaker 4: And I guess I started helping them like I brought,
Speaker 4: you know, I kind of helped them strategize and helped
Speaker 4: them think of new ways of applying new new kind
Speaker 4: of business models or applying new kind of logistical strategies
Speaker 4: in what they were already doing, because I could offer
Speaker 4: them a fresh way of thinking about crime, organized crime.
Speaker 4: And I was very resourceful and so very quickly it
Speaker 4: was noticed by specific people back then, and I climbed
Speaker 4: the ranks very quickly. And then Yeah, there was a
Speaker 4: guy in prison who was kind of a father figure
Speaker 4: to the Muslims in jail, who was very influential, and
Speaker 4: he was being patched into an outlaw motorcycle club and
Speaker 4: I was part of a group of people that were
Speaker 4: representing him on the outside. And then we went to
Speaker 4: the outlaw motorcycle club and eventually became members.
Speaker 2: Wow, and this when you became members. Was it a
Speaker 2: mixture of all religions or was it just Muslims or
Speaker 2: how did that work?
Speaker 4: No, it was it was back then it was a
Speaker 4: club called the Pinx, but then it patched into another
Speaker 4: international motorcycle club called the Mongols well known. Yeah, but
Speaker 4: back it was it was outlaw. Motorcycle culture is unique
Speaker 4: and as you probably know, it was born out of
Speaker 4: returning Vietnam vets who felt ostracized by their communities, who
Speaker 4: bounded together and found that adrenaline rush or found that
Speaker 4: freedom and the place to express themselves in these kind
Speaker 4: of subcultures, and they formed these brotherhoods, you know, and
Speaker 4: they were all mixed, you know, they were they were
Speaker 4: people from different backgrounds that just felt like outsiders that boundery.
Speaker 4: Were literally blood related by colors, by the colors of
Speaker 4: their vests and by the patches that they were and
Speaker 4: it's kind of like you wear an oath to belong
Speaker 4: to each other. And so yeah, it was refreshing to
Speaker 4: see that these this is another group that is also
Speaker 4: that gets what's happened to us and understands and that
Speaker 4: they'll accept us because they are in the same vein
Speaker 4: of that you know, outside of culture or counterculture or whatever.
Speaker 3: And was there Australians in this bike organization.
Speaker 4: Yeah, yeah, definitely, probably a majority were Australians. I mean,
Speaker 4: the Phinx was a very kind of Anglo Australian club
Speaker 4: that originated in Adelaide. So yeah, there definitely was that
Speaker 4: the heritage of that old white, traditional, classic outlaw biker,
Speaker 4: big bearded kind of you know, tattered up a lot
Speaker 4: of Nazi kind of symbolism in the air. There was
Speaker 4: a lot of that stuff going on. But by the
Speaker 4: time we got involved, there was a shift in outlaw
Speaker 4: motorcycle culture in Australia where different clubs were vying for
Speaker 4: power by basically recruiting people who were influential on the streets.
Speaker 4: And the people at that time who were influential on
Speaker 4: the streets were all from different backgrounds, and majority of
Speaker 4: them Middle Easterners, mainly in Sydney and then in Melbourne.
Speaker 4: And I think a lot of that has got to
Speaker 4: do with a lot of these problems in which, you know,
Speaker 4: after nine to eleven and after all that stuff, the
Speaker 4: kids began running a MUK on the street. They some
Speaker 4: of them did very well and built really hectic reputations
Speaker 4: for themselves and then they got kind of drafted these
Speaker 4: by these clubs.
Speaker 3: Was what was you know, that bikey life, Like I.
Speaker 4: Mean it, it can be whatever you want to make it.
Speaker 4: You know, it is very much a club that is
Speaker 4: full of people who really die hard motorcycle enthusiasts that
Speaker 4: love the culture. And I'm just gonna disclaimer here is
Speaker 4: that you know, I'm talking about a club seven or
Speaker 4: eight years ago, you know, and I'm talking about a
Speaker 4: very specific chapter of a club that's not you know,
Speaker 4: I'm not I'm not saying like this is how every
Speaker 4: club in Australia works, and I don't know how clubs
Speaker 4: work now even so I'm just I'm just giving my
Speaker 4: own personal perspective from that time. Yeah, yeah, and so yeah,
Speaker 4: back then, there was people who loved who would die
Speaker 4: hard motorcycle and enthusiasts. There were people who are obviously traumatized,
Speaker 4: were people who felt lonely, and there were there was
Speaker 4: you know, drug dealers, there were thugs. There was a
Speaker 4: bit of everyone because it was a place that accepted
Speaker 4: you no matter what your background was.
Speaker 3: Outlaws, right, yeah, yeah, of course, it.
Speaker 4: Was just whatever corner of the world you came from.
Speaker 4: You could be accepted as long as you subscribe to
Speaker 4: this code and to this, to this brand or whatever.
Speaker 4: And so it wasn't like Sons of anarchy where people
Speaker 4: sit around at the table and you've got the fucking
Speaker 4: president talent everyone like, you've got to move these guns
Speaker 4: from Sydney to you know, the Northern territory and you know,
Speaker 4: what's the what are the Cinelons up to this weekend?
Speaker 4: And you know, like that, there's nothing that doesn't exist.
Speaker 4: I mean, I'm sure it does exist, but it doesn't
Speaker 4: exist in that way. Everything is very much on a
Speaker 4: need to know basis. And if you want to do
Speaker 4: something and there's people at that club that can assist
Speaker 4: you in doing so, you might get up to something
Speaker 4: like that, but there's no way the entire club would know,
Speaker 4: and it would be it'd kind of be the same
Speaker 4: way as if you were in a football club, you know,
Speaker 4: and you and you a couple of people at your
Speaker 4: footage club that you know, do a few things and
Speaker 4: you start connecting and connecting the dots, you know. The
Speaker 4: only difference is because you're in this environment that attracts
Speaker 4: people from all walks of life, their connections are far
Speaker 4: deeper and potentially wilder than you know, the boys you
Speaker 4: meet a footy club and so you can you potentially
Speaker 4: get up to a lot graver. Yeah, such deeper, deeper thing,
Speaker 4: yeah yeah yeah.
Speaker 2: And how desensitized at this stage in your life, so
Speaker 2: you know you've patched in, you live in that full
Speaker 2: outlaw life. How desensitized to violence and drugs and to
Speaker 2: the normal life are you? Yeah?
Speaker 4: I guess I think I don't actually know how you
Speaker 4: could be dissensitized advanced. I mean, you would probably be
Speaker 4: a better person to answer that question. I would. I mean,
Speaker 4: for me, every time I sawance, it was shocking. You know,
Speaker 4: I never got really used to it. And it's always
Speaker 4: you know, odd, and it's not as you would imagine
Speaker 4: it to be, and it unfolds in a very grotesque
Speaker 4: and crudal way. And it's always a little bit different,
Speaker 4: you know, like the way people fall, you know, the
Speaker 4: way people bleed out. Sometimes they don't bleed, you know,
Speaker 4: you know what knocks people out, the way they have
Speaker 4: fits on the ground, and some people, you know, just
Speaker 4: get back up and don't remember what they were doing.
Speaker 4: You know, it's always very odd, and.
Speaker 3: It's always different. Isn't it.
Speaker 2: It's like you said, you know, just how people feel,
Speaker 2: how people react, how people you know, it's not like
Speaker 2: it is in the movies.
Speaker 4: No, and the sounds are all it's very different. Yeah, yeah,
Speaker 4: because you're hardwired to think it's going to be like
Speaker 4: the movies. But then when you see it and you
Speaker 4: see how cold it is and the way that you know,
Speaker 4: when it happens, you expect something, someone to intervene or something,
Speaker 4: and then they don't, and it's suddenly like one of
Speaker 4: the craziest things. I remember hearing from someone who committed
Speaker 4: you know, being a prison for for for murder, and
Speaker 4: I remember hearing this thing that they said that the
Speaker 4: scariest thing was like they woke up the next day
Speaker 4: and they were the same person, you know, like they
Speaker 4: were just they were just doing the same shit, like
Speaker 4: they were just going to the coffee shop, and that
Speaker 4: was the like they even they expected for something to
Speaker 4: happen and it didn't.
Speaker 3: When did you think, you know, enough is enough? And
Speaker 3: how did that happen?
Speaker 4: For me? It was like a cumulative effect. And I
Speaker 4: will say, like again, just say that I know people
Speaker 4: might be listening to this and say, you know, Australia.
Speaker 4: It's not that, you know, it's not that dangerous, it's
Speaker 4: not that you know, scary. I mean, it's not Chicago,
Speaker 4: it's not Canada. But I think you have to really
Speaker 4: imagine crime around the world as a kind of Bell
Speaker 4: curve in different countries, and you know, at the top end,
Speaker 4: when you're at the deepest and at deepest levels, it's
Speaker 4: as bad as it is everywhere else in the world.
Speaker 4: If you fuck up, you're going to get shot, You're
Speaker 4: going to get killed. Like that's just the way it is.
Speaker 3: So over all remains the same, doesn't it.
Speaker 4: Yeah, that middle, of course, Melbourne is not a crazy
Speaker 4: violent place in that middle section of the Bell curve,
Speaker 4: but at the end it's the same everywhere else. It's
Speaker 4: the same as any other country. You rob the wrong person,
Speaker 4: one person gets paranoid thinking you're going to knock them,
Speaker 4: They're going to come after you, like, and there's you know,
Speaker 4: these people do not count to ten. It's you know,
Speaker 4: it's they're going to just they're going to do yeah.
Speaker 4: And so there was like a cumulative effect where in
Speaker 4: the space of maybe two or three years, it was
Speaker 4: probably five or six people that I knew intimately were killed,
Speaker 4: and you know, I couldn't handle that. I've met commandos
Speaker 4: and sas guys and stuff like that, and I mean
Speaker 4: they didn't even lose five of their mates in one
Speaker 4: or two years, like they lost a lot of mates.
Speaker 4: But it really messes with your head and you hit
Speaker 4: a point where you're like, you know, my one of
Speaker 4: my best friends was mishandling a firearm and you know
Speaker 4: he was you know, I was I had to bury him,
Speaker 4: you know, like he was. And then you're standing over
Speaker 4: this grave and you're you know, they're lowering the coffin
Speaker 4: and you're throwing doing it, and you're thinking, what the
Speaker 4: fuck is this about? What is this about? Like we're
Speaker 4: in our twenties, like, well, why have I been to
Speaker 4: so many of these funerals? Like what are we doing?
Speaker 4: And what is this thing that we're kind of enchanted by,
Speaker 4: a spellbound by or obsessed with and revealed itself to
Speaker 4: me that this is all just smoking mirror. It's like
Speaker 4: this code doesn't exist, like nobody actually believed Yeah, yeah,
Speaker 4: nobody believes in that shit, Like it's it's just the
Speaker 4: crash dummies that believe in it, Like the that there's
Speaker 4: honor among thieves that all this stuff, you know, never
Speaker 4: talk to police, you know, you do your time and
Speaker 4: all this stuff, and then they all you find out
Speaker 4: they're all talking to police. The people, they're all the
Speaker 4: people that are you know, chatting and saying I wouldn't
Speaker 4: cop that. I wouldn't you know, when when you've been
Speaker 4: slighted or someone's wrong, they're trying to motivate you and
Speaker 4: do something. They say I wouldn't cop that. Fucking course
Speaker 4: you would cop that. You cop whatever whatever you know
Speaker 4: we tell you to do, you'd cop that. And here
Speaker 4: you are telling this guy to do something, and then
Speaker 4: of course they do it and do ten years in jail.
Speaker 4: And that the book that was chirping away in his ears,
Speaker 4: not even there to visit him or put money in
Speaker 4: his bank account, you know what I mean.
Speaker 3: So it's like, get your head out your ass, you.
Speaker 4: Know, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, And so but that that
Speaker 4: really damaged me, and yeah, I had to I had
Speaker 4: to help it. It all kind of crashed on me,
Speaker 4: and I had this moment of realization where I was like,
Speaker 4: I actually don't Oh, it's anyone to do anything in
Speaker 4: this and I don't have to be part of this
Speaker 4: anymore that I don't, I can just stop. I don't
Speaker 4: have to be with these people. But I knew I
Speaker 4: had to make a radical move and actually cut contact.
Speaker 4: You can't be one foot in, like you have to
Speaker 4: be kind of one yeah, exactly. Yeah, it's either you're
Speaker 4: in or you're out. And it was really cold because
Speaker 4: there was a lot of people I loved in that
Speaker 4: in that world that I had to cut ties with.
Speaker 4: And even those people they're dead now, like do you
Speaker 4: know what I mean? Like, or they're doing really long
Speaker 4: bids in jail.
Speaker 2: And it's it's also one of those as well. It's
Speaker 2: not not just change that was that's needed. It's drastic change,
Speaker 2: you know, in a situation like that, it's got to
Speaker 2: be drastic. And when I mean drastic to the point
Speaker 2: of maybe moving location off to everyone that's in that
Speaker 2: organization or that that's around, even if you love them
Speaker 2: and if you're great friends with them, it's like, no,
Speaker 2: drastic change needs to happen in order for something good
Speaker 2: to come of it.
Speaker 4: I got to the point where I was like, would
Speaker 4: you be happy being that young boy on that school
Speaker 4: yard being bullied, having oranges thrown at your head? Or whatever.
Speaker 4: Fucking ies. I'd rather be that boy than do this
Speaker 4: shit and you know, drag my mates through hell.
Speaker 3: And there's the Australian Yeah.
Speaker 4: Yeah, yeah, do you know what I mean? Like like
Speaker 4: I would rather be that that kid than you know,
Speaker 4: create these kind of cycles of destruction and you know,
Speaker 4: recidivism and like just dragging all my people, because it's
Speaker 4: my people that go down with me. It's not just me,
Speaker 4: Like I'm dragging my cousins in. I'll drag Like if
Speaker 4: someone's got a drum with me, they've got to go
Speaker 4: to my family's house. They're going to do this, do
Speaker 4: you know what I mean? Like it's I had to
Speaker 4: shoulder that and it was already too late, Like I
Speaker 4: came to that realization too late.
Speaker 2: And so you make this drategic change and it's quite
Speaker 2: the segue.
Speaker 3: How did that feel?
Speaker 4: Yeah? Well, initially I wanted to I studied psychology and
Speaker 4: wanted to literally work as kind of a counselor and
Speaker 4: in prisons and to try and actually help rehabilitate people
Speaker 4: so that they don't go back to that life when
Speaker 4: they leave, because the receiptivism rates are so high, and
Speaker 4: I thought that would be something purposeful that I could
Speaker 4: actually commit my life to. But then I got I
Speaker 4: met a bunch of editors and stuff through this friend
Speaker 4: of mine, and I began writing and got into journalism,
Speaker 4: and I actually thought, well, actually, no, it's about presenting
Speaker 4: this world for what it is, bare knuckles, and telling
Speaker 4: these young kids that it's not. It's not what's in
Speaker 4: the music videos and if your favorite app music video,
Speaker 4: it's not. You know, they're giving you, you know, they're
Speaker 4: giving you the shallow venier of the kind of porcelain
Speaker 4: veneer of what this lifestyle actually does. It actually just
Speaker 4: you know, people robbing, Yeah, your mates robbing, Yeah, your
Speaker 4: mates tell them ONNYA. You know, you can't trust anyone.
Speaker 4: People are going to get Yeah, you're going to get bashed,
Speaker 4: You're going to get shot, you know, and you're on
Speaker 4: your own. So you're better off on your own just
Speaker 4: actually partaking your life and contributing to society rather than
Speaker 4: being another statistic which is a cliche. But you know,
Speaker 4: if you want, if it's a double sided coin and
Speaker 4: the option is you know, being in the streets forever
Speaker 4: or choosing life. I know what I'm going to be
Speaker 4: doing on choosing life.
Speaker 2: Every single time now that you're you do all this,
Speaker 2: how interesting is it to be an investigated journalist? And
Speaker 2: if anyone can tell that story and get in and
Speaker 2: show people, actually, this is how bad it is and
Speaker 2: you know, do not get involved, it's you.
Speaker 4: Well, it was two things. It was that, but it
Speaker 4: was also about showing the public that these people that
Speaker 4: you're reading about are not just you know, they're not
Speaker 4: just the criminals that they made out to be. That
Speaker 4: actually they've lived whole lives and there's a lot of
Speaker 4: decisions that led up to that they made throughout their life,
Speaker 4: and a lot of kind of social fractures around them
Speaker 4: that led to their decision making that made them commit
Speaker 4: the crime. Like, my whole thing was don't understand and
Speaker 4: trying to illustrate the criminal by the crime that they've committed.
Speaker 4: Try to understand them for everything that they've done up
Speaker 4: until the point that's led them to the crime. And
Speaker 4: it was really about empathizing with people, not sanitizing what
Speaker 4: they've done. And so I felt like again like I
Speaker 4: go back to like media representation in the way that
Speaker 4: people are perceived. I think what I really wanted to
Speaker 4: do was I felt like journal crime reporters had been
Speaker 4: captured by police narratives because they were relying on police
Speaker 4: because criminals wouldn't talk to them. And the one thing
Speaker 4: that I could do was actually get some criminals to
Speaker 4: talk and actually explain the rationale and that things are
Speaker 4: a lot more complex than they're they're they're let to believe.
Speaker 4: And so yeah, that's.
Speaker 3: What it is as well.
Speaker 2: The things are a lot more complex than than what
Speaker 2: the media portray and what the you know, the media
Speaker 2: put out there.
Speaker 4: Well, you wouldn't know this firsthand. You know, you experienced
Speaker 4: them and like you there you had, you had all
Speaker 4: those reports written about you, and you didn't have an
Speaker 4: opportunity or you do have an opportunity now, but think about.
Speaker 2: All, do you, because well you do, But you know
Speaker 2: it's only because I'm persistent, like yourself, really, you know,
Speaker 2: getting getting the message out there and educating people in
Speaker 2: that way.
Speaker 3: But it's hard.
Speaker 2: It's hard to you know, once once the media portray
Speaker 2: you a certain way or you know, like you said,
Speaker 2: the complexity of what actually happens underneath, people swallow that
Speaker 2: stuff up, don't they. They go, well, they brand you
Speaker 2: with it, and like you said, they tire you with
Speaker 2: that brush and all of a sudden, and sometimes I'm
Speaker 2: similar Sometimes I think, but I might as well just
Speaker 2: be that person, even though I'm not that person exactly,
Speaker 2: I might.
Speaker 3: As well just be it.
Speaker 4: But again, that's why it's dangerous. That's why that reporting
Speaker 4: is dangerous. It's not it's not actually just the theory,
Speaker 4: like we're not actually talking about things in theory that
Speaker 4: this has real life consequences. I've seen people shoot each
Speaker 4: other over stuff they've read in the papers that wasn't
Speaker 4: necessarily true.
Speaker 3: And also take their lives.
Speaker 2: Exactly in the UK, they have taken their lives because
Speaker 2: you know, they've been tarnished trial by media. Nothing formal
Speaker 2: or nothing legal has come out of it, but it's
Speaker 2: just trial by media. They've read a bit of paper,
Speaker 2: all of a sudden, the whole world's against you, and
Speaker 2: it's too much for people.
Speaker 3: It's too much.
Speaker 4: You have this crazy thing in Australia where journalists are
Speaker 4: crying about defamation laws, and I agree, you know, defamation
Speaker 4: laws might be slightly lenient to super powerful people, but
Speaker 4: what they never fucking talk about is all of the
Speaker 4: people who don't have access to litigation and lawyers that
Speaker 4: they can talk about hook line and sinker and who
Speaker 4: never get an opportunity, those working class people, the crooks,
Speaker 4: the criminals, people who've been wrongly accused. They can't afford
Speaker 4: fifty thousand dollars a day in litigation, so they just
Speaker 4: have to swallow this image that's being portrayed.
Speaker 2: It's one sided image because they haven't haven't got the
Speaker 2: facilities or they know how to tell their to teil
Speaker 2: their side or it tends to get it out to
Speaker 2: the masses.
Speaker 4: And sometimes it's just the charge if they don't even
Speaker 4: follow it up to sentencing. So you have someone who's
Speaker 4: been charged with an offense who gets front page treatment
Speaker 4: and then he beats the charges and sentencing and he
Speaker 4: gets nothing.
Speaker 2: So, you know, and then you're working towards that you
Speaker 2: is that one of your is that you say, that's
Speaker 2: my ambition.
Speaker 3: Motivations to in why you do what you do?
Speaker 4: Now, definitely, I think that's what inspires me is to
Speaker 4: kind of reef. I think the thing that I can
Speaker 4: contribute is to reimagine crime reporting and in doing so,
Speaker 4: I mean, this is very idealistic, but in doing so,
Speaker 4: maybe it changes the public perception and maybe influences policy.
Speaker 4: And they reframe the way that they look at, you know,
Speaker 4: punishing people rather than actually rehabilitating them and trying to
Speaker 4: figure out what the kind of social issues are that
Speaker 4: are inspiring these crimes, rather than you know, just locking
Speaker 4: people up. Like why kids joining our motorcycle groups? Why
Speaker 4: are these outlaw motorcycle groups? You know, where are they
Speaker 4: coming from in society? What's what's actually generating these kinds
Speaker 4: of organized have.
Speaker 3: Been drawn to it?
Speaker 4: You know, yeah, yeah, yeah, And how can we think
Speaker 4: about those issues and disentangle that and kind of measures
Speaker 4: in place that move kids away from that. I think
Speaker 4: that that's the most interesting thing in the most you know,
Speaker 4: if I'm balancing your books, it's the thing that I
Speaker 4: hope to contribute in some idealistic social justice warrior kind
Speaker 4: of fashion.
Speaker 2: That you certainly know, mate, And adjusting to such a
Speaker 2: different way of life, how has that been.
Speaker 4: In that world? I was somebody, you know, and then
Speaker 4: you kind of nobody, and you feel you have to
Speaker 4: adjust around the way that people can disrespect yours things
Speaker 4: that you perceive to be disrespect You just kind of
Speaker 4: have to wear all that kind of stuff, and that
Speaker 4: takes a bit of adjusting to, and you know, obviously
Speaker 4: you're making a certain amount of money, you're partying, you're
Speaker 4: having fun, you feel like a rock star, or you're
Speaker 4: imitating this kind of rock star lifestyle. That's actually, like
Speaker 4: you said, it's actually just a master's hiding all this
Speaker 4: other stuff that you're dealing with inside your head. But
Speaker 4: sometimes you miss you miss all that. But I would
Speaker 4: never I would never have it any other way. You know.
Speaker 4: I'm so happy for where I'm at in my life
Speaker 4: right now, and I feel good every morning I wake
Speaker 4: up and I don't have to look behind my shoulder.
Speaker 4: I can go to any restaurant or any any bar,
Speaker 4: or any club that I want to go to without thinking, oh, man,
Speaker 4: is it going to get a bit tense here? Who's
Speaker 4: going to be you know? Do you know what I mean?
Speaker 4: I don't have to really, I don't have to work. Yeah, yeah,
Speaker 4: you don't have to. You don't have to second guess
Speaker 4: the police are tap my phone, all this sort of stuff.
Speaker 4: You don't, you know, they're bugs in my car, all
Speaker 4: of this stuff. You can just be free, you can
Speaker 4: just be you just do your bit and be happy
Speaker 4: and you know, look after the ones that will be
Speaker 4: there for you to the end.
Speaker 2: And have you re established or refound your identity you know,
Speaker 2: who is mamood.
Speaker 4: I think it's like this, you know, because of what
Speaker 4: might have happened, what happened to me when I was young.
Speaker 4: I think I'm just constantly reconstructing and diverting and becoming
Speaker 4: this different person. And I think that's a way that
Speaker 4: helps me deal with who I was in the past
Speaker 4: and kind of suppressed that in some way. I haven't
Speaker 4: reverted back to any identity. I think I'm just constantly
Speaker 4: constructing your identities and kind of distracting myself with lots
Speaker 4: of work and trying to contribute in the most positive way.
Speaker 2: And going back to head game. Final question for you, Malud,
Speaker 2: what has your experience taught you about resilience.
Speaker 4: I think you just have to back yourself in. I
Speaker 4: think that's all it's taught me is always like believing
Speaker 4: in yourself and knowing that no matter how how much
Speaker 4: noise there is, you can always the decisions, always yours,
Speaker 4: and you can just walk away. I think that's the
Speaker 4: most powerful thing for me in terms of resilience, is
Speaker 4: that you are the owner of your decisions and how
Speaker 4: much noise there is and how much bullshit. There is
Speaker 4: out there of people saying you have to do this,
Speaker 4: you have you actually don't have to do nothing. You
Speaker 4: just be yourself and make your own decisions and that's
Speaker 4: that and that's it. You know, No, I've done that.
Speaker 4: It's worked for me, mate.
Speaker 2: I've loved this conversation. Loads of common ground, loads in
Speaker 2: common from two people that had two completely separate careers.
Speaker 3: Yeah, it's been fascinating, mate.
Speaker 2: Thank you for coming on Risk gentlemen, may keep doing
Speaker 2: what you're doing. Thanks so much for joining me on Headgame.
Speaker 2: If you enjoyed this episode, make sure you're subscribed so
Speaker 2: you don't miss any of our incredible stories and leave
Speaker 2: me a review wherever you're listening, I'm at Middleton.
Speaker 3: Catch you again next time.