These days I work in communications in the World Bank’s East Asia & Pacific region, based in Washington DC. It’s a fascinating place to work with so much going on at any one time and so many smart people to bump into in the corridors. I started out in the communications field as a fledgling journalist in my native Australia. When I started, people were only just coming to terms with the idea of writing a story on a computer (we called them video display terminals then). Things have obviously moved pretty quickly since then. Eventually, I found my way to a large Sunday newspaper in Sydney where I became the environment correspondent. It was the late 1980s when people in Sydney were starting to object to swimming in sewage at their beaches. I wrote a few stories about the issue that upset a few people in Government but things really started to improve after that. (I never think about poo anymore when I dive under the waves at Bondi Beach.) Ever since then, I have been fairly preoccupied by all things green, working for different periods of time at Greenpeace (in London) and World Wide Fund for Nature (WWF) in Fiji. I’ve also spent time working with the Australian Government on indigenous land issues. Everywhere I’ve worked my challenge has been to help the organization reach out to people – to get beyond just talking to each other in the safe confines of the office. That’s why I like this blog.