Today we spent the whole day in Bunbury attending school presentations, a City reception and tree planting plus an interview by television station GWN 7.
Bunbury is one of Western Australia’s largest regional cities. The greater city area houses a total of 65,000 residents. It is a very fast growing and progressive city with many modern and innovative buildings and parkland areas.
Our first visit was to St Mary’s Catholic Primary School where we were greeted by the very enthusiastic assistant principal Helen Brown.
The school is very modern and has a huge recreation area where we gave the presentation.
We were very lucky to hear a rendition of ‘We are the world’ by the students and teachers before we moved outside to plant and dedicate the peace Tree, a red bottle-brush.
Helen is a real hands-on person – she took control of the tree de-potting like an experienced gardener and with the help of three students placed the tree safely in its resting place.
The Peace Runners then led the all the students for a run around their school oval.
After a short break at one of the local cafes ...
... we headed to Djidi Djidi, an Aboriginal School on the outskirts of Bunbury.
This is a most tastefully designed school, capturing the essence of the Australian outback, born of a deep respect to their culture.
Deputy principal Sam Goodlad has spent many years working in aboriginal education here and in the Northern Territory.
The school children were very responsive with the guessing game, surprising us with the accuracy of their answers.
They loved singing the World Harmony song ...
... and holding the Peace Torch as it was passed around.
Gemma and Jaymen received the Certificate of Appreciation and "World-Harmony" artwork.
Again we enjoyed running with the children around the local oval before departing the school.
It was now lunchtime so we visited the Farmers Market, a new fruit and vegetable plus condiments store nearby. After a feed from the in house bakery and a freshly made juice we stocked up on the top quality produce before moving on to our next destination.
We arrived early at Cooinda Primary School which has the largest student population out of all the schools previously visited on this run (360).
The students gathered in their covered assembly area and we were greeted with a loud and rousing welcome as we ran in.
Teacher Georgina Eiberger had organised quite a presentation for us.
After we had done our introductions and sung our theme song ...
... children reciprocated by singing a ‘happy’ song in Japanese ...
... then reading out some of their peace pledges.
Next a selection of students from different countries said ‘Peace’ in their languages.
A group of children were also chosen to run with the Peace Torch.
Another nice Peace Tree was planted next to their recreation area.
Georgina said she knew of Sri Chinmoy from a concert she went to a few years ago in Busselton, ‘Music of the Heart’. This was a concert of Sri Chinmoy’s peaceful music played by a variety of international musicians. She said the experience was her best ever!
Straight after Cooinda School, we travelled a short distance to Queens Gardens, near the City centre of Bunbury to meet the film crew of GWN 7, one of the regional television stations.
They had arranged to meet us to take footage of the runners plus conduct a couple of interviews. We are hoping to see it on the news tomorrow night.
As we did a few takes with the television crew, members from the City of Bunbury council arrived for the Peace Tree dedication including the Mayor Cr. Gary Brennan
who came into office shortly after the Peace Run visited in 2013.
Gary introduced us and thanked us for bringing the message of peace to Bunbury.
The peace tree that was dedicated is one of many trees that were recently planted along a pathway through Friendship Park.
Here is Sean Smith, Bunbury's Youth Mayor, with the Council E.O. Juaini Taylor on the right.
After everyone had a chance to hold the torch and introduce themselves to the runners, we travelled a short distance to the City Council’s Function Centre where the runners were treated to refreshments.
A short drive and we arrived back at our accommodation place. Ben and his wife and young daughter Lola were waiting for us to inaugurate a Peace Tree in their cabin park.
Amanda had chosen a beautiful ornamental cherry tree to be planted and young Lola helped her dad to do the planting.
Many years ago we installed a street sign in the name of the Peace Run Founder Sri Chinmoy. The Peace Tree is now in this street.
