Speaker 1: My name is Mark Mariana. I'm a storyteller on Find
Speaker 1: and Tell. I'm Filipino and live on direc Land. I'd
Speaker 1: like to recognize the traditional custodians of this continent whose
Speaker 1: land was stolen nearly two hundred and fifty years ago,
Speaker 1: in particular the Cama, Eagle and Ruanderie people whose land
Speaker 1: this podcast was recorded on. And we extend our respect
Speaker 1: to all Aboriginal and Torrest Street Islander peoples. The rich
Speaker 1: storytelling history of the world's oldest living culture is what
Speaker 1: we pay homage to when we tell our stories on
Speaker 1: Find and Tell.
Speaker 2: Hello, I'm Jamilla Risby and this is Find and Tell,
Speaker 2: the search for the next generation of Australian storytellers. Today
Speaker 2: we are going to say goodbye to two of our storytellers.
Speaker 2: When I first met Mark, Naan, Ben and Kate, they
Speaker 2: were full of ideas and excitement and a lot of nerves.
Speaker 2: But since then they have each made some genuinely excellent stories.
Speaker 2: And all this from four people who had never made
Speaker 2: an audio story before. Mark is a writer, Naan works
Speaker 2: in TV news, Kate's a visual artist and Ben Well.
Speaker 2: Ben told me that before this his only experience making
Speaker 2: anything was when he posted selfies on Instagram. A huge
Speaker 2: congratulations to each of them and props to their willingness
Speaker 2: to listen and to learn, guided by the producers here
Speaker 2: at iHeart Australia. But we have not finished yet. Mark
Speaker 2: and Ben each have a story still to share, so
Speaker 2: let's not wait any longer. Today's theme is odd one Out.
Speaker 2: Let's hear from Mark, knowing this could be his final story. Mark,
Speaker 2: welcome back to find and tell.
Speaker 1: Hi, how are you?
Speaker 2: It's good to have you today. Today your theme is
Speaker 2: odd one Out?
Speaker 3: For you?
Speaker 2: Was this one where you had to go away and reflect?
Speaker 2: Or did you know immediately the story you were going
Speaker 2: to tell?
Speaker 3: Oh?
Speaker 1: I definitely knew. Like going into it, I was like, yeap,
Speaker 1: being an odd one out is about being an outsider.
Speaker 1: And you know, I've sat outside of so many so
Speaker 1: outside of so many communities, thankfully outside so that I
Speaker 1: can enter new ones. But you know, as someone who's Filipino,
Speaker 1: as someone who is big bodied and body positive and
Speaker 1: someone who's queer, I sit outside of so many communities,
Speaker 1: but relish in the ones that I do have and
Speaker 1: can create, And so I definitely wanted to approach that
Speaker 1: and use that approach in this episode. I'm hoping it
Speaker 1: came through.
Speaker 2: This could be we don't know yet. This could be
Speaker 2: your final story. It's the third one you've created for
Speaker 2: us so far. Does How does that feel when you
Speaker 2: sort of look back at the journey so far?
Speaker 1: It has been so incredibly fun. Like I signed up
Speaker 1: for this project to really challenge myself, to really push
Speaker 1: myself outside of my comfort zone, and I did the
Speaker 1: exactly that. The point where I wouldn't change a thing,
Speaker 1: I wouldn't change a thing, whatever fumble, whatever mistake, whatever
Speaker 1: missed up I took throughout this whole process with these
Speaker 1: three episodes, I'm going to accept them as they are,
Speaker 1: and I'm excited. I'm so excited.
Speaker 2: I'm excited too. Let's hear it. This is your third
Speaker 2: contribution to Find and Tell, and it's around the theme
Speaker 2: of odd one Out.
Speaker 3: Hi.
Speaker 1: I just wanted a double check. What was the largest
Speaker 1: size you had in this shirt? I think extra large
Speaker 1: was the largest. Sickon Farmers said, I double check. As
Speaker 1: a big boy, my fashion options are mind the pun
Speaker 1: pretty thin.
Speaker 4: Yeah, it is the largest size.
Speaker 1: Okay, cool, all good? Well I was after two X,
Speaker 1: but if that's not available, I'm often relegated to Low's
Speaker 1: or Kmart's big boy section, which usually means I have
Speaker 1: two choices. Hawaiian shirt or vintage American motorway. Don't get
Speaker 1: me wrong, loses fab but sixty trucky jest isn't my
Speaker 1: personal asthetic, at least not yet. I've been chubbing my
Speaker 1: whole life. I'm convinced my baby fat is still floating
Speaker 1: around somewhere, perhaps in my left fly. When I grew
Speaker 1: out of the larger size most stores carried, I abandoned
Speaker 1: in store shopping altogether. I also got really tired of
Speaker 1: only being able to buy bracelets and bags whenever I
Speaker 1: went to the mall with my friends. I will acknowledge
Speaker 1: that online shopping has opened up a whole new world
Speaker 1: for me, and my options are expanding. But what about
Speaker 1: when something I thought was my size doesn't fit right?
Speaker 1: Or what if it looks a certain way in the
Speaker 1: muddle but completely different on me, Or what if I
Speaker 1: don't feel like contributing to tons of phost fashion waste.
Speaker 1: I know the solution isn't always clear, but there's at
Speaker 1: least one thing we can always rely on, and that's community.
Speaker 1: I'm gonna handle this, Mike, Let's see if it's I
Speaker 1: think it's all set on properly. Look good here, Oh gorgeous,
Speaker 1: thank you, that's nice and clear. Enter Radically Soft, founded
Speaker 1: by Fatty duo Tests and Cribs. Radically Soft is Sydney's
Speaker 1: very first plus size clothing collective. This revolutionary movement aims
Speaker 1: to serve the many fatties who struggle to find fashionable,
Speaker 1: affordable and sustainable clothing. They run thrift markets exclusively seeking
Speaker 1: and selling secondhand clothing sized sixteen to thirty and up.
Speaker 1: As a society, we're at a stage where we can
Speaker 1: both start and continue plus size clothing cycles and lifetimes.
Speaker 1: And radically Soft is here to host and help for Tests.
Speaker 1: Their motive and their purpose was crystal clear.
Speaker 4: I think we just saw that there wasn't anything here
Speaker 4: like that and we wanted to be able to shop
Speaker 4: as fat people and have fat community.
Speaker 1: Community is at the core of this venture, and for
Speaker 1: co founder Cribs, this defiant movement was also an act
Speaker 1: of self love to create a space that didn't exist
Speaker 1: for her and people like her.
Speaker 5: Yeah, I've been wanting just to find a place where
Speaker 5: I could find clothes irl like in person, I mean,
Speaker 5: it was probably a little bit selfish of me, but
Speaker 5: also I was like, why don't we try and build
Speaker 5: on the community that is here now and contribute to that.
Speaker 1: I've been to one of their markets and the second
Speaker 1: I entered, an immediate wave of relief came over me.
Speaker 1: I was overwhelmed by choice, a feeling I've never experienced
Speaker 1: before in a regular store. There were racks upon racks
Speaker 1: of CUE clothing, all in my size, Like can you believe?
Speaker 1: Like is this real? Radically Soft have made that shopping
Speaker 1: experience a little bit more safe, easier, and more comfortable
Speaker 1: for fat bodies. Co founder Test wants Radically Soft to
Speaker 1: be more than just a market movement and a declaration,
Speaker 1: one that celebrates and empowers bodies that sit outside the
Speaker 1: fashion norm.
Speaker 4: With radically Solved, I think that all fat bodies are
Speaker 4: radically solved. I think that in a world that actively
Speaker 4: encourages anti fat bias and fat phobia, like just existing
Speaker 4: in a fat body, like wow, we're existing, Like we're
Speaker 4: really doing that. And I think to see I fat
Speaker 4: people be joyful is just really like a real big
Speaker 4: fuck you to the mainstream.
Speaker 5: Really just the act of wanting to create this project
Speaker 5: was I think an act of radicalism in itself and
Speaker 5: wanting to carve out this space for us.
Speaker 1: For the longest time, fat and fashionable were two very
Speaker 1: mutually exclusive terms. In the early two thousands, supermodel Kate
Speaker 1: Moss's mantra nothing tastes as good as skinny feels mirror
Speaker 1: the heroin cheek fashion era of that time with a
Speaker 1: zembic cheek. Right now in the thinness remains at the
Speaker 1: center of each fashion trend, and in this raging war
Speaker 1: of weight, the very fashionable test is on the front line,
Speaker 1: challenging and changing perceptions of fatness and fashion.
Speaker 4: I feel like fashion to me is a way to
Speaker 4: express who I am, but it also leans most likely
Speaker 4: always being the best stress of the room and know
Speaker 4: what acknowledging you. And I don't think that people that
Speaker 4: aren't fat understand the experience of like trawling through oline stores,
Speaker 4: trying to go in person and not being able to
Speaker 4: find your size. There are so many levels to trying
Speaker 4: to find fashion as a plus sized person, and I
Speaker 4: think people should put some respects on us when we
Speaker 4: are very fashionable.
Speaker 1: Not to toot my own horn, but I think I
Speaker 1: can throw it together a pretty mean fit myself. But
Speaker 1: when you're dealing with mainstream markets that don't acknowledge body diversity,
Speaker 1: it just becomes harder and harder to shop.
Speaker 5: Don't even get me started on shopping online. For some reason,
Speaker 5: you have to go to like the specific curve section
Speaker 5: to find the fat clothing, because.
Speaker 1: Like why, what should be an empowering and fun experience
Speaker 1: soon becomes one of degradation and heartbreak.
Speaker 5: I just feel like that's also isolating, Like I just
Speaker 5: don't understand why they all can't be together.
Speaker 6: Why do?
Speaker 5: I also kind of feels like it's hidden, and I'm like,
Speaker 5: this is what we're talking about.
Speaker 1: For Tess, who grew up in the States, the traumatic
Speaker 1: fat shopping experience is one they still carry even today.
Speaker 4: You go to the department store, you go to jas Pennies,
Speaker 4: and there's always like when you're a kid, you go
Speaker 4: into like the kids section, but because I was a
Speaker 4: fat kid, I had to go into the junior section
Speaker 4: even when I was like ten years old, and my
Speaker 4: mom would take me and then I would be looking
Speaker 4: at the stuf and be like, hey, all of this,
Speaker 4: I hate all of it. It's like business attire for
Speaker 4: fourteen year olds and I'm like ten, and my mom
Speaker 4: would like pick things for me, give them to me,
Speaker 4: and that I'd be like, they don't fit, and then
Speaker 4: she'd be like, oh, okay, I'm gonna go get the
Speaker 4: other size. And I think that those experiences as a kid,
Speaker 4: even when I'm at the markets now, I am like,
Speaker 4: I can't shop here. We made this for fat people
Speaker 4: to shop, and I am like looking around and I'm like,
Speaker 4: I still can't get anything because of that lifelong trauma
Speaker 4: of having to go places of being like, is my
Speaker 4: size here? Even though I'm in a space that I
Speaker 4: know my size is gonna be, I'm like, I can't shop.
Speaker 4: And I think that that is just so telling of
Speaker 4: the fat experience, especially when you've like grown up fat. Yeah,
Speaker 4: it's very isolating.
Speaker 1: It's a bit of an odd thing to say, but
Speaker 1: there's some comfort in knowing I'm not the only one
Speaker 1: feeling left out. There's still such a long way to go,
Speaker 1: and as fatties, we never feel one hundred percent comfortable
Speaker 1: in store are on site. However, in the meantime, here
Speaker 1: are three ways you can be radically soft with yourself.
Speaker 1: Number one, redefining what the word fat means and reworking
Speaker 1: the concept of fatness in your head makes a massive
Speaker 1: difference to how you approach your style and your fashion.
Speaker 4: I feel like my fatness is in a place now
Speaker 4: where I am so joyful and being fat. I know
Speaker 4: that there's a lot of things that society puts on
Speaker 4: us that is negative about being fat, but now in
Speaker 4: my life, I am like, I love floating, I love
Speaker 4: being in the water. I love being able to give
Speaker 4: warm hugs to my friends, and like embracing my friends
Speaker 4: in that joyful way, Like I just see fatness as
Speaker 4: being so beautiful and so sacred.
Speaker 1: Number two, surround yourself with fat babes, whether that be
Speaker 1: in real life or online. Fill your feeds with people
Speaker 1: with a diverse range of body types and shapes. Where
Speaker 1: no shortage of fat fashionistas on TikTok and Instagram. I
Speaker 1: know it's easy to get lost in the standards set
Speaker 1: by outdated esthetic decision makers, so you must turn to
Speaker 1: community to break free of them.
Speaker 5: I don't want to say I'm like at full like
Speaker 5: fat joy acceptance, but just being able to like be
Speaker 5: soft and kind with myself as I go through all
Speaker 5: these ebbs and flows of the way that I feel
Speaker 5: about my body. But I know that when I'm around
Speaker 5: beautiful fat people, I feel it. I feel so much
Speaker 5: joy and love in my heart that I'm like, why
Speaker 5: would I ever think this way? You know, if you
Speaker 5: want to be surrounded by people who just love being
Speaker 5: themselves and loving their body and acknowledge your fatness and
Speaker 5: pretend like it doesn't exist.
Speaker 1: When you surround yourself with community and have open conversations
Speaker 1: with others who have experienced the darkness that comes with
Speaker 1: living in a fat phobic world, that shared struggle soon
Speaker 1: becomes a silver lining, an uplifting joy that is sacred,
Speaker 1: a little silly, but overall very wholesome.
Speaker 4: That body is like that, I want to show my
Speaker 4: belly button, but I want to show in a way
Speaker 4: that's sexy. I don't want to like have like my
Speaker 4: whole belly.
Speaker 1: Out, you know, Like I want to show my belly
Speaker 1: button my crack, and you.
Speaker 4: Can't show one without the other.
Speaker 5: Unfortunately, it's a real Sophie's choice.
Speaker 1: Number three and this one's just from me. Don't get
Speaker 1: caught up in the numbers for some reason. A two
Speaker 1: excel in one brand is a four excel in another.
Speaker 1: What is the sixteen to some is a ten to others.
Speaker 1: So you must go with your gun. Literally, go with
Speaker 1: your gun. There's nothing wrong with going up a digit,
Speaker 1: especially when it concerns your comfort. Before I let you go,
Speaker 1: I want to do a little exercise. No, not that time,
Speaker 1: cheeky together. I want us to make an act of
Speaker 1: reclamation of a word that, in twenty twenty four is
Speaker 1: still so emotionally charged. Fat is just fat. That isn't ugly,
Speaker 1: that isn't repulsive, that isn't evil, that isn't bad. Is
Speaker 1: just fat. Stay it with me. Three to one fat? Wow,
Speaker 1: you killed that one more time. I'm a three to
Speaker 1: one fat. Oh how does that feel like a weight?
Speaker 1: It's been lifted off your shoulder and it's huh beautiful.
Speaker 1: Thank you so much for doing that with me. Trust
Speaker 1: me when I say there is nothing to be afraid of.
Speaker 1: So from one chunky babe to another, I'm wishing you
Speaker 1: all the best with your next shop. I know this
Speaker 1: might feel like an isolating experience, but you're not alone.
Speaker 7: I got your babe, Ditto, Mark.
Speaker 2: I want to know when you were creating this episode,
Speaker 2: who the audience was in your.
Speaker 1: Mind's eye, Other fat babes. Yeah, definitely other fat babes.
Speaker 1: I think I think every fat person would relate to this,
Speaker 1: or at least most fat people would relate to this,
Speaker 1: Just this experience of like going to a store not
Speaker 1: finding something in their size, and like not being able
Speaker 1: to like accurately put together a fit that you had
Speaker 1: in your mind just because a store doesn't have this
Speaker 1: thing in your size and in stock. Also, going into this,
Speaker 1: you know, I wanted to put fat joy in a
Speaker 1: positive light. I think, you know, fat people in general,
Speaker 1: as depicted in mainstream media is so one sided and
Speaker 1: so like they're the sidekick, they're the supporting character, And
Speaker 1: I wanted to put fat people at the front in
Speaker 1: this episode to really just celebrate who we are, our
Speaker 1: physical selves and our inward selves as well. But I
Speaker 1: think a larger message mind the pun, a larger message
Speaker 1: being that, like you know, buddies are beautiful, we will
Speaker 1: experience different body insecurities, and you know, we're getting into
Speaker 1: a world and into a stage where we can directly
Speaker 1: combat it and fight it together. So I'm happy. I'm
Speaker 1: so happy with this episode.
Speaker 2: Mark, what are you most proud of? Is there one
Speaker 2: of the stories that you've told, one of the moments
Speaker 2: that you had in an interview. What do you look
Speaker 2: back on and think, Yeah, that I did that.
Speaker 1: I think with this last episode in particular, I strongly
Speaker 1: believe that self love is a journey and not a destination.
Speaker 1: I myself am on a tumultuous self love journey. There
Speaker 1: are days where I like, I love my body, I
Speaker 1: love my fatness, I love what it provides for other people.
Speaker 1: And then other days where I'm just so down in
Speaker 1: the dumps and just so like incredibly, just like deep
Speaker 1: in this, like, oh my goodness, I hate myself.
Speaker 3: It.
Speaker 1: So what I loved and what I was most proud
Speaker 1: of was just being able to connect one on one
Speaker 1: with chosen family, with community members who knew exactly how
Speaker 1: I felt, and I was able to have sort of
Speaker 1: critical dialogue with them. It wasn't just like this silly
Speaker 1: I feel this way. I feel this way. We had
Speaker 1: some deep, deep thoughts, which is not readily accessible. It's
Speaker 1: not something that we can find every day, finding people
Speaker 1: who are willing to be vulnerable with you. And so
Speaker 1: I'm truly just not proud of I'm proud of myself.
Speaker 1: I'm so proud of myself. But I'm also so proud
Speaker 1: of the people that came onto these episodes and bore
Speaker 1: their soul out for everyone in the public to see.
Speaker 1: It is such a hard thing, so I'm so proud
Speaker 1: of them.
Speaker 2: Mark, you should be proud of yourself. You have shared
Speaker 2: some really fantastic stories with us. You've got such warmth
Speaker 2: and character and energy. I have loved getting to know
Speaker 2: you and listening to your stories. This could be your
Speaker 2: final story for the show. We're going to find out
Speaker 2: just a little bit later. But congratulations on everything you've
Speaker 2: done so far. I'm looking forward to seeing whatever it
Speaker 2: is you do next. Well.
Speaker 1: Thank you.
Speaker 2: This is Fine and Tell and this week's theme is
Speaker 2: odd one Out. We are so close to hearing who
Speaker 2: our find and Tel finalists are going to be. But
Speaker 2: before that, Ben has one more story to share. Ben,
Speaker 2: welcome back. You must be feeling pretty good about yourself
Speaker 2: winning your last two episodes.
Speaker 6: Yes, thanks again for having me. I'm happy to be here.
Speaker 6: And yeah, two in the bag and one more to go.
Speaker 6: Let's get it done.
Speaker 2: Take me back to the beginning when you were just
Speaker 2: sitting out on the process. Was there a point where
Speaker 2: the work felt impossible, like you weren't going to get
Speaker 2: it all done because it is like it is a
Speaker 2: big workload that we've set you all.
Speaker 6: Yeah, I think I think I went into it first off,
Speaker 6: in the back of my mind, I thought five to
Speaker 6: ten minutes an episode, three episodes, easy, right? Absolutely not? No,
Speaker 6: it was so much different work kind of going back
Speaker 6: and forth. And you know, unfortunately, as we'll hear, sometimes
Speaker 6: things don't always go to plants. So when you kind
Speaker 6: of hit those speed bumps throughout, I guess chasing a
Speaker 6: certain episode, can I e. A take the l or
Speaker 6: you can roll with the punches?
Speaker 2: Well, I want to hear about some of these speed bumps.
Speaker 2: So let's get to the story. This is your third
Speaker 2: contribution to find and tell odd one out.
Speaker 6: Actually, in the very beginning, I thought it was going
Speaker 6: to be pretty easy. I thought, yeah, three short stories,
Speaker 6: how hard can it be? But everyone's looking at me
Speaker 6: really fucking weir because I've got a microphone on my face.
Speaker 2: Here we go, Hello, how you doing?
Speaker 6: Do you mind if I pick a ear for a
Speaker 6: second for a podcast? What I wasn't ready for was
Speaker 6: just how many times I was going to get told no, no.
Speaker 7: No, no, no, no no no, yeah.
Speaker 4: Absolutely not.
Speaker 6: Cut to the middle of week two, and I've only
Speaker 6: got one story in the bag, one interview that didn't
Speaker 6: pan out, and another one that's canceled on me. I
Speaker 6: don't think I'm going to be able to get this
Speaker 6: done in time, so I start to go into a
Speaker 6: little bit of panic mode. I go through my phone
Speaker 6: contacts alphabetically. I'm posting Instagram stories and Facebook statuses in
Speaker 6: the hopes of a long lost uncle or a childhood
Speaker 6: friend would have a juicy topic for me to follow
Speaker 6: up on, and still nothing. I start to get up
Speaker 6: in my own head about it. I'm critiquing my ideas
Speaker 6: before anyone else has even heard them. Now that sounds shit.
Speaker 6: No one's going to want to listen to that. I
Speaker 6: don't think I'm going to be able.
Speaker 3: To do this.
Speaker 6: I nearly quit a few times during this, just because,
Speaker 6: you know, I just doubt dubated myself. But then, like
Speaker 6: a sign from the heavens, a text from a friend
Speaker 6: I hadn't heard from it in a while. Have you
Speaker 6: heard of the Weed Church of Newcastle? I immediately hop online
Speaker 6: and search we Church of Newcastle and there it is
Speaker 6: the first search result, the Church of Umbuntu. At first glance,
Speaker 6: it looks like an ordinary church website, but with one
Speaker 6: curious difference. At the top of the homepage, the church
Speaker 6: logo a dove with its wings in full flight holding
Speaker 6: a cannabis leaf in its mouth.
Speaker 3: Too, wellness, clinic, can you hold the line please?
Speaker 6: Yet not a problem. Just to clarify, the voice you're
Speaker 6: hearing at the moment isn't the reception. It's a reenactment
Speaker 6: with a voice actor.
Speaker 3: Good afternoon, Ubuntu, Wellness, This is Carol. How can I
Speaker 3: help you?
Speaker 2: Hi?
Speaker 3: Carol? My name is Ben.
Speaker 6: I was wondering if Karen Burge was available, Uh, not.
Speaker 3: Right at this moment? Can I leave a message for there? Yeah?
Speaker 6: Can you just let her know that Ben called guard now.
Speaker 6: If I'm being honest, I didn't expect either response, but
Speaker 6: to my surprise, Hi, Ben, this is Karen.
Speaker 3: From the Church of Mbantu. I had a message to
Speaker 3: contact you.
Speaker 6: Yes, Hi Karen, how are you?
Speaker 3: I'm Glord, how are you going good? Thank you?
Speaker 6: I was contacting you in regard to doing a story
Speaker 6: on the church.
Speaker 3: Yeah. Absolutely, I'd been more than happy to sit down
Speaker 3: and talk with you. Does tomorrow around two o'clock fit you?
Speaker 1: Yeah?
Speaker 6: Yeah, definitely tomorrow at two sounds great. I'll come out
Speaker 6: to the church and see then.
Speaker 3: Okay, thanks Ben, look forward to it.
Speaker 6: See you then, Thanks Karen, Thank you boy.
Speaker 1: I was excited.
Speaker 6: I was practicing reading my questions to my partner and
Speaker 6: in the mirror to myself as well. The day of
Speaker 6: the interview, I jump in my car and drive an
Speaker 6: hour into Newcastle. I'm ten minutes away from the church
Speaker 6: and my phone rings, Hello Ben speaking, Hi Ben, This
Speaker 6: is Karen from the church. Oh, hi Karen, how are you.
Speaker 3: I don't think I'm going to be able to do
Speaker 3: the interview today.
Speaker 6: Oh really? Okay, yeah, it's not a complete show that
Speaker 6: they've pulled out last minute. Just a quick Google search
Speaker 6: and you'll find a lot of criticism and controversy surrounding
Speaker 6: the church. My guess is they're worried it'll bring too
Speaker 6: much heat. Right, Okay, but I'm only ten minutes away.
Speaker 6: I'd figure if I could just get face to face
Speaker 6: with Karen, I might be able to get her to
Speaker 6: change your mind. Well, I'm just around the corner on
Speaker 6: my way in to see you. Is there any possibility
Speaker 6: that maybe I could just sit down and have a
Speaker 6: chat with you, and I'll just leave the recording equipment
Speaker 6: in the car, and yeah, maybe we could just have
Speaker 6: a chat and maybe go from there.
Speaker 3: Is it? Okay?
Speaker 5: Yeah, sure if you want to come in and I could,
Speaker 5: I could make you a cup of tea and I
Speaker 5: mean we can just chat.
Speaker 6: Excellent, Okay, Well, yeah, I'm not too far away, so
Speaker 6: I should be there in a couple of minutes and
Speaker 6: I'll see you then.
Speaker 3: Thanks Karen, All right, thanks, thanks Ben, Thanks boy.
Speaker 6: I arrive at the church. The front is boarded off,
Speaker 6: so I go through the side entrance into their wellness center.
Speaker 6: A step inside. Yep, this place smells like weed, hemp oils,
Speaker 6: hemp creams, hemp soaps, hemp honeys, hempalm, hemp nectar for dogs.
Speaker 6: The list goes on. Karen introduces herself as the vice
Speaker 6: president of the church and the manager of the health clinic.
Speaker 6: We sit down and chat over a cup of tea. Immediately,
Speaker 6: I feel like I'm being treated with suspicion. Why are
Speaker 6: you doing this? Who are you here for? What do
Speaker 6: you want to know? What's the story about? After forty
Speaker 6: five minutes of interrogation, Karen agrees to be interviewed the
Speaker 6: following week, but only if she receives a copy of
Speaker 6: the questions beforehand a bit of a red flag. But
Speaker 6: if that's what it takes to get this story over
Speaker 6: the line, I'll do it. So the day of the
Speaker 6: interviews here, Karen's received my questions, and after breaking the
Speaker 6: ice of her last week, I'm feeling confident about going
Speaker 6: into today until no, no, no, not again, Hi Ben, Sorry,
Speaker 6: I won't be able to have the interview today. It's
Speaker 6: just not the right time. Apologies Karen, the audacity, the
Speaker 6: indecency that Hi Ben. Is it possible to do two
Speaker 6: pm Wednesday instead? Nikki another one of the founders, can
Speaker 6: be here too, Carrot huh hy caring. Yes, it works
Speaker 6: for me. Thank you so much for your response. I'll
Speaker 6: see you two pm Wednesday. Con regards Ben, and straight
Speaker 6: away I was just back to cloud nine again. I
Speaker 6: was like yes, I was like, they've changed their mind. Hello, Ben,
Speaker 6: I've had a meeting with our management team and I
Speaker 6: feel as though we are not in a position to
Speaker 6: talk on any of these questions right now. Sorry to
Speaker 6: miss you around. We would be in a better position
Speaker 6: to talk in a month or so if you'd like
Speaker 6: to try again. Then that was like the moment where
Speaker 6: I wanted to flip flip the table. If there was
Speaker 6: a table, I would have flipped it. Yeah, it was
Speaker 6: a yes, So then I no, and then yes. I'd
Speaker 6: put myself out there. I'd cold called. I'd created rapport
Speaker 6: of strangers even after I was told no. The first time,
Speaker 6: I managed to salvage a sliver of hope, only to
Speaker 6: have it crash and burn in the eleventh hour. I
Speaker 6: told my producer what happened. He called me up and said,
Speaker 6: you've got two options. Either start from scratch on a
Speaker 6: whole new story. We'll try and find a story within this. No,
Speaker 6: I don't think so. Men, you know who's going to
Speaker 6: want to hear me talk about my problems? This is
Speaker 6: me talking through the idea of my producer. You know,
Speaker 6: we've all gone through struggles these last couple of weeks,
Speaker 6: and everyone else pulled out stories out of their hat,
Speaker 6: whereas me, What am I going to talk about? I'm
Speaker 6: going to talk about my failure. But I'll be honest,
Speaker 6: like I'm I'm I'm worried about releasing all of these stories,
Speaker 6: you know, because I've been burnt in the past by
Speaker 6: you know, people who just want to bring you down,
Speaker 6: and if you try something new, and you step outside
Speaker 6: of your comfort zone and you try to be creative,
Speaker 6: and then someone shits on it and they bring you down.
Speaker 6: I'm scared to kind of be on the receiving end
Speaker 6: of all that sort of stuff. But if people are
Speaker 6: going to judge me for it, and if people are
Speaker 6: going to have something to say about it, fuck them.
Speaker 6: I liked the idea of being able to bring a
Speaker 6: realness to storytelling and explain that things don't always go
Speaker 6: to plan, you know, just like in life. And I
Speaker 6: think I've got to give myself a little bit of
Speaker 6: credit because I've never done anything like this before as well,
Speaker 6: so you know, what's the saying out of the frying
Speaker 6: pan into the furnace. I would love to be a
Speaker 6: voice for somebody who's going to do this in the future,
Speaker 6: Like if there's a season two Will Find and Tell
Speaker 6: and someone wants to listen to this episode, you know
Speaker 6: it's going to give them a bit of an idea
Speaker 6: to say, oh, actually no, this this is a normal feeling.
Speaker 6: This is not abnormal. This is the process. Like anybody
Speaker 6: else that wants to do this in the future, if
Speaker 6: you feel like I did, someone that's like, hey, I've
Speaker 6: got no idea, what I'm doing, what you're feeling. Trust me,
Speaker 6: You're not alone because this is what I did. This
Speaker 6: is how I failed, and this is how we still
Speaker 6: created something with it.
Speaker 2: Ben, you went through a whole rollercoaster of emotions making
Speaker 2: that one, didn't you?
Speaker 7: I did?
Speaker 6: Yeah?
Speaker 2: What were you afraid of happening if you didn't get
Speaker 2: it done?
Speaker 6: Failure?
Speaker 7: Yeah?
Speaker 6: I yeah, I did this. I did this not to win.
Speaker 6: I did this because I wanted to prove to myself
Speaker 6: that I could do it. It's been a very long
Speaker 6: time since I've put myself outside of my comfort zone
Speaker 6: and I've really tried to focus on something that I
Speaker 6: wanted to do well. I've never really been a competitive person,
Speaker 6: but I've always been somebody who wanted to make myself proud,
Speaker 6: and not being able to finish was my biggest fear,
Speaker 6: because I wouldn't be proud of myself if I didn't.
Speaker 2: This week's theme was odd one Out. I'm not gonna
Speaker 2: put my own thoughts on it. I need to yours.
Speaker 2: Why was this one the odd one out?
Speaker 6: I think with this one, I think I'm reflecting on
Speaker 6: myself as being the odd one out of not actually
Speaker 6: having a completed story to submit for the episode. I
Speaker 6: think that in a way I had the idea of
Speaker 6: obviously the church and the Angle and what I wanted
Speaker 6: to do with it, and then for it to fall through.
Speaker 6: To be the odd one out from these episodes is
Speaker 6: to submit an episode of my own failure and my
Speaker 6: own struggle to complete a podcast episode as well.
Speaker 2: Now I like it. I feel like, you know, even
Speaker 2: if the essence of the episode itself and the story
Speaker 2: you were telling us wasn't necessarily within the theme clearly
Speaker 2: of odd one Out, it's the odd one out in
Speaker 2: your three podcasts, right, Yeah, it doesn't quite sit the
Speaker 2: same way as the other two, But in one way
Speaker 2: it's not. Because I keep thinking about there is a
Speaker 2: bit of a common thread between your three in that
Speaker 2: it feels a little bit like you were attempting a
Speaker 2: love letter to regional Australia, Like this is such a
Speaker 2: strong sense of place in each episode. Was that something
Speaker 2: intentional or is that just part of who you are
Speaker 2: and where you've grown up.
Speaker 6: I feel as though there's so many unheard stories in
Speaker 6: regional Australia because they get looked over. Something as simple
Speaker 6: as someone put in Teddy Bears and trees can turn
Speaker 6: into like a beautiful story of somebody just trying to
Speaker 6: make everyone else feel good. Yeah, and you're growing up
Speaker 6: in the Ilaurora, you know, having so much different inspiration
Speaker 6: that you can kind of draw off from down there
Speaker 6: as well.
Speaker 2: Ben, congratulations, I think it's a huge achievement.
Speaker 6: Thank you so much, thanks for listening.
Speaker 2: So who found and told the best odd one out story?
Speaker 2: And who will become our Find and Tel finalists? Find
Speaker 2: out in just a moment. This is Find and Tell
Speaker 2: and the theme this week was odd one Out. Now
Speaker 2: Mark absolutely found his podcasting voice and greove this episode.
Speaker 2: I thought it was a great choice of subject and
Speaker 2: it showed us for a podcast that is all about inclusion,
Speaker 2: that inclusion moves beyond race and gender. Mark's Oprah style
Speaker 2: pet talk at the end was the most thoughtful combination
Speaker 2: of motivation and empathy and recognition plus some information. Honestly,
Speaker 2: I think he could have his own talk show. After
Speaker 2: hearing that the episode introduction was also brilliant, he conveyed
Speaker 2: how tense that situation was for him. Well done now,
Speaker 2: Ben clearly had a real challenge getting this episode completed
Speaker 2: on time, and so big props to him that he
Speaker 2: got it done. I'm sure he won't be surprised to
Speaker 2: hear that probably wasn't his strongest contribution. Ben's done a
Speaker 2: really solid job with the audio he had, and he's
Speaker 2: injected some fun into the hope and the disappointment of
Speaker 2: landing and then losing an interview opportunity. I was most
Speaker 2: impressed by Ben's moments of vulnerability, particularly in that monologue
Speaker 2: at the end where he kind of unpacks his fear
Speaker 2: of judgment. So, after hearing both stories, I've decided on
Speaker 2: this week's winner, and hey, Mark, it's going to be you. Congratulations.
Speaker 1: Oh that's so sick. Oh my god.
Speaker 2: Yeah. Oh it was honestly just the most stunning piece
Speaker 2: of work. I feel like we've got such a strong
Speaker 2: sense of who you are as a storyteller, but also like,
Speaker 2: quite possibly as a future oprah.
Speaker 1: Oh, thank you so much, Thank you so much. You
Speaker 1: get a car, Thank you car a car.
Speaker 2: So the time has come to decide which of our
Speaker 2: four storytellers will we going through to the finals, and
Speaker 2: who we have to say goodbye to Naon, Mark, Ben
Speaker 2: and Kate have all brought such unique perspectives to this series,
Speaker 2: and I hope they are all incredibly proud of the
Speaker 2: stories they've shared with me and with all of you
Speaker 2: the audience. Each episode, two of our storytellers went head
Speaker 2: to head, and each episode's winner received one point. Those
Speaker 2: points have been tallied. Ben finished on two points, Naon
Speaker 2: finished on one point, Kate finished on one point as well,
Speaker 2: and Mark, who won today's episode, also finished on two points,
Speaker 2: which means I'm not great at maths, folks, but i
Speaker 2: can do the ones and twos. It means Mark and Ben, congratulations,
Speaker 2: you are our finalists.
Speaker 1: Oh my goodness, look at you, Look at us.
Speaker 2: Well, we are well on the road. Now everyone to
Speaker 2: crown our first ever winner of Find and Tell, so
Speaker 2: that you both know you worked very very hard. You
Speaker 2: told three incredible stories. You each earned two very important points.
Speaker 2: But now none of that matters. Absolutely none of it matters.
Speaker 2: The slate is wiped clean. We are going head to
Speaker 2: head with our final story, and that is all that matters.
Speaker 2: You're both going to be given the same theme, and
Speaker 2: you'll have an entire episode to tell your story. That's
Speaker 2: a whole lot more storytelling time. The theme is lost
Speaker 2: in translation. I'm going to let you to think some more.
Speaker 2: I'm going to let those cogs turn. Good luck. We
Speaker 2: are going to hear from you very soon. I feel
Speaker 2: really sad saying goodbye to Nayan and Kate because I
Speaker 2: have loved working with them, and even more I have
Speaker 2: loved listening to the stories that they told. Both of
Speaker 2: them have improved so much across the series and they've
Speaker 2: definitely surely inspired a few more future storytellers amongst all
Speaker 2: of you listening right now. Ben and Mark are our
Speaker 2: final two storytellers, and in our next couple of episodes,
Speaker 2: they will battle it out to be crowned Australia's first
Speaker 2: ever Find and Tell champion. You are not going to
Speaker 2: want to miss this press follow in whichever podcast app
Speaker 2: you're listening on and I will see you at the finale.
Speaker 2: A big thank you to our show partners Afters and
Speaker 2: Road Australia. Find and Tell is a co production between
Speaker 2: iHeart Australia and the black Cast podcast network. Black Cast
Speaker 2: empowers First Nations people and people of color to reclaim
Speaker 2: their narratives, strengthen cultural identity, and contribute to a more
Speaker 2: inclusive Australia by showcasing exciting emerging talent from Australian communities,