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Topsy turvy. Parkour athlete Michael Khedoori is just 19 but is one of the top Parkour athletes in the country. After graduating high school Michael hoped to travel abroad to pursue his ambitions - plans which have been on hold since the pandemic struck. Credit:Brook Mitchell
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People relax at Thornton Park, Balmain, as Sydney Harbour is blanketed in a smoke haze from hazard reduction burns - leading to poor air quality readings in parts of the city.Credit:Kate Geraghty
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Jean Dubourdieu and Cristina Andrei. Story about HomeShare which pairs older homeowners living alone with young people struggling with housing affordability in Darling Point. She describes the arrangement as a "win-win" because it enables Mr Dubourdieu to retain some independence and keep him out of a nursing home, and provides her with much-needed support at minimal cost. "I really miss my family," Ms Andrei said. "I've made a few good friends, but it’s not the same. I think Jean substitutes a bit of that."Credit:Rhett Wyman
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St Paul Church Drive through COVID-19 testing clinic, Guildford during Sydney's lockdown. Credit:Louise Kennerley
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Cloud formations sitting off the coast are pictured over Oran Park in Sydney's South west. Credit:Dean Sewell
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Shova Magar spends time in the sunshine with her daughter Sharon Shrestha during a picnic with friends at Tasker Park in Campsie.Credit:Kate Geraghty
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The National Gallery of Australia has acquired the most expensive work of art in its history, commissioning a monumental $14 million stainless-steel sculpture that it hopes will set a new standard for Australian public art. Australian artist Lindy Lee’s Ouroboros will be a 13 tonne, 4 metre-high torus of reflective recycled metal that will be installed in the gallery’s garden in 2024.Credit:Paul Harris
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Vince Lam, a recent graduate in Marketing and Design, has managed to secure a job related to his degree, because of his university's work experience programs and industry partnerships. Close to 40 per cent of recent university graduates say they are not making full use of their qualifications, but those who attend institutions with business partnerships are getting an edge when it comes to finding jobs. The University of Sydney and the University of Melbourne were on Thursday named among the world’s top ten for graduate employability.Credit:Janie Barrett
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Hazard reduction burning at Congwong Beach, La Perouse. Credit:Louise Kennerley
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Maria Moschetti (left) plays with her 6 year old autistic daughter Lily Thomson (right) in the front yard of their home in Fairfield during the COVID-19 lockdown. Maria says that the community support has been the one thing that's helped them get through the lockdown. Credit:Kate Geraghty
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Balmain. A hazy Sydney afternoon from hazard reduction burns - leading to poor air quality readings in parts of the city.Credit:Kate Geraghty
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Police at Sydney Park, Alexandria in anticipation of anti- lockdown protests.Credit:James Brickwood
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If musician Ben Lee suddenly seems more locally visible than he has in decades, it’s intentional. After spending the better part of two decades in the US, since his 1993 breakout with Noise Addict earned the attention of the Beastie Boys’ Mike D, Australian singer songwriter Ben Lee, 43, has returned home, rejuvenated from various spells of relative anonymity, ready to reclaim his platform as local pop’s prime eccentric.Credit:James Brickwood
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Rainbow lorikeets in front of their namesake as fast moving showers and storms race along the NSW coast. The Rainbow Lorikeet are named after their unmistakable bright red beak and colourful plumage. Both sexes look alike, with a blue/mauve head and belly, green wings, tail and back, and an orange/yellow breast. They are often seen in loud and fast-moving flocks, enjoying nectar of flowering gum trees, or in communal roosts at dusk. Credit:Nick Moir
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Former Helensburgh Fire and Rescue captain Jim Powell spent 41 years saving people’s lives, but he couldn’t protect his other great love and obsession from the 2001 Christmas Day bushfires. He returned home to blackness, his collection of 1100 rare camellias largely destroyed. “My house was saved, and the camellias saved it. There were 860 in the front garden, and their fleshy leaves absorbed the heat,” said the retired firefighter. After that blaze, Mr Powell co-founded Australia’s first Camellia Ark to identify and preserve rare and endangered camellias – many are threatened around the world with some considered sacred or symbolic – that could never be replaced. These include a 190-year-old bush, the Camellia japonica anemoniflora, said to resemble the Australian waratah, which still flowers at John Macarthur’s Camden Park.Credit:Wolter Peeters
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Kate Munn has diagnosed PTSD from a car accident and, separately, from an abusive relationship. PTSD doesn't just affect war veterans and police and emergency workers - car accidents are the most common cause and women are twice as likely to experience it because of the higher risk of violence. Credit:James Brickwood
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A rainy picnic at Centennial Park.Credit:Steven Siewert
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Daily life in Cabramatta. Housing is an issue in the Federal seat of Fowler. Credit:Kate Geraghty
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Actor Heather Mitchell, 62, and cinematographer Martin McGrath, 65, met on a film set in Broken Hill in 1989. Heather: In early 1989, I saw a clairvoyant who told me I was about to meet my guardian angel and that I’d be surrounded by silver. Shortly after, I flew to Broken Hill [in far west NSW] to do a short film, The Water Trolley. Marty picked me up at the airport. I thought, “Your face is red. You should wear a hat.” Martin: I remember seeing Heather step off the plane in Broken Hill in 1989. Her red hair was backlit and she looked amazing. The next night a big group of us went out to dinner. Afterwards, she and I got talking and in the blink of an eye we were the last people left at the pub. We went back to my room at the hotel and, while we were making love, there was a huge thunderstorm. It was remarkable. I thought, “She’s the most extraordinary person I’ve ever met.”Credit:Louise Kennerley
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Debut author Diana Reid whose novel 'Love and Virtue' releases Sep 29. Credit:Wolter Peeters
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Rachel Chappell with her daughters Ella (on swing) and Scarlett playing in their backyard on their new tyre swing. Parents have been urged to switch off screens and encourage children to take up outdoor activities as Sydney’s ongoing lockdown limits families’ options for the second consecutive school holidays. Garry Falloon, professor of STEM education at Macquarie University, said it was important for parents to differentiate learning from home activities from holiday activities. “It’s important that children do not spend all their holidays on devices,” he said. “As learning from home has greatly increased children’s screen time, holidays should be seen as an opportunity to do other things.”Credit:Janie Barrett
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For almost two years, Hussain Ramazani did his best to escape the cruel reality of life inside Nauru detention centre. He was sent there in 2010 after fleeing Afghanistan to seek asylum in Australia having travelled by boat. A Hazara man, Ramazani faced persecution from the Taliban insurgents near his home of Mazar-i-Sharif, where his father had been killed years earlier. However, he arrived in Australia to indefinite detention amid uncertainty around his refugee status.Credit:Nick Moir
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Daily life in Guildford which is the Cumberland LGA.Credit:Louise Kennerley
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Shameela Karunakaran and Julian Rayappu had their three children, ages 5, 3 and 1 month from the one round of IVF. They had the three embryos implanted at different times, in Sydney. The success rate for women trying to have a baby from IVF has jumped almost 20 per cent in a decade, with more women every year using frozen embryos to screen for genetic abnormalities. The number of twins and triplets born in Australia to women who undergo IVF has plummeted to a record low in the past ten years, the latest analysis from the Australian and New Zealand Assisted reproductive database (ANZARD) shows, while the live birth rate continues to climb particularly when using frozen embryos.Credit:Janie Barrett
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Patricia Graham of Minto with her 6 year old daughter Ellectra. Patricia is an essential worker and has struggled during lockdown trying to juggle work and home schooling duties as a single mother with two daughters.Credit:Dean Sewell
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Personal trainer Ben Savva and Kylie Javier Ashton sparring in front of St Mary's Cathedral. Ms Ashton, a restaurant manager from Darlinghurst, said boxing training was difficult but fun and demanded discipline, determination and resilience. “I love the way it forces you to be completely in the moment,” she said. “I guarantee your mind cannot wander when someone is trying to punch you in the face.” There has been a welcome rise in boxing during lockdowns with the increasing popularity of women's boxing. Credit:Edwina Pickles
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Ella and Scarlett Chappell playing on their new inflatable gymnastics mat, a lockdown present they will be utilising in their backyard during school holidays bound by Sydney's current Covid-19 restrictions.Credit:Janie Barrett
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Dylan Nguyen Ton, 14, became one of the first people in Australia to receive the Moderna vaccine, given by pharmacist Quinn On at Cabramatta Priceline Pharmacy, in Cabramatta. “I just want to get back to school and see my friends,” Dylan said, adding he will be looking for a part-time job in the next year and expects vaccination will be a requirement.Credit:Kate Geraghty
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Bruce Dowd, 63, returned to nursing at a major Sydney hospital last month after retiring from a 38-year career in intensive care in 2018. Tens of thousands of retired doctors, nurses, psychologists and dentists have been asked to bolster the pandemic frontline as surging hospitalisations stretch health systems and staff shortages hit critical workforces.Credit:Rhett Wyman
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Opposition Leader Anthony Albanese at Hawke's Brewery Co in front of a Scottie Marsh mural with a vaccination.Credit:Dominic Lorrimer
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James and Olivia Roberts and their children, who currently renting in Newport, have just bought a house in Avalon, where school zones have seen some of the strongest house price growth in the Sydney.Credit:Peter Rae
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A group of kids race along dirt jumps in Rushcutters Bay Park. Young people aged 5-17 make up 12% of the population in Woollahra LGA. However there is a distinct lack of recreation facilities for this age group in the local area. Many families in the local area live in apartments, or in houses with very small backyards, meaning young people have limited opportunities to be active at home. With statistics indicating one in five children and adolescents in Australia are either overweight or obese, opportunities to get active are growing in importance. Credit:Rhett Wyman
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As a teenager, Michelle Ring was regularly sexually abused by the leader of the cult to which she belonged. The cult, Kenja, is one of only two organisations not to have signed up to the national redress scheme for victims of sexual abuse.Credit:James Brickwood
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French Ambassdor to Australia Jean-Pierre Thebault at his residence in Canberra.Credit:Alex Ellinghausen
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Parkour athlete Michael Khedoori practices within his 5km radius. At just 19 Michael is one of the top Parkour athletes in Australia. After graduating high school Michael planned to travel abroad to pursue his ambitions - plans which have been on hold since the pandemic struck. For now he continues to hone his passion close to home. Parkour is the practice of traversing obstacles in a man-made or natural environment through the use of running, vaulting, jumping, climbing, rolling, and other movements in order to travel from one point to another in the quickest and most efficient way possible without the use of equipment. The discipline was developed in France beginning in the late 1980s and quickly spread across the globe.Credit:Brook Mitchell
