An Australian vet nurse who works at a South African rhinoceros orphanage has shared a heart-warming video of a baby rhino snuggling into her.
“Really, I’m just his pillow,” wrote Laura Ellison when she posted the cute video on Instagram.
The baby rhino, who is named Kabelo, can be seen flicking his ears as he lays his head on Laura’s stomach. He then leans back and puts his head beside hers.
Laura wants to encourage other people to care about the critically endangered animals.
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However, she has also cautioned that rhinos are wild animals.
“While I want you all to experience the gentleness of rhinos, to fall in love with them as I have and inspire the same desperation I have to save them, I must stress the relationship I have with our rhinos that allow these experiences,” she wrote.
“I have been with Kabelo since his arrival to the orphanage and we have developed such a strong bond.
“While Kabelo is so comfortable with me, he is not with many others. Please appreciate that he is still a wild animal… But also with the capacity to love so forgivingly.
“Humans took his mother and for him to trust me the way he does is incredibly bittersweet. Rhinos deserve a life with their mothers without human interference. Please help me fight to secure it.”
Laura also posts pictures of her life as a vet nurse in South Africa. You can follow her here.
The men had competed in the 38th Intercollegiate Mining Games in Montana where they were representing Curtin University’s WA School of Mines, The Guardian reports.
However, the pair traveled to New Orleans for a private holiday.
Both men, who police have said are aged 21 and 23, are currently in hospital and a reportedly in a stable condition.
They had taken a taxi to the Algiers area, which is one of the city’s oldest neighbourhoods to meet with a drug dealer around 4:15am on Wednesday.
It was during the meeting that one of the students was shot in the stomach while the other was shot in the chest.
In a statement, New Orleans police said:
“According to the victims, ages 21 and 23, they were inside of a bar in the 500 block of Bourbon Street when they approached an unknown black male and requested to purchase drugs from him. The victims told detectives that they then left the bar and followed the subject to a four door dark-colored sedan, where an unknown male driver was waiting inside.”
“The driver took the two victims toward Algiers and along the way, he told them that it would cost several hundred dollars to purchase drugs. The victims told the driver they did not have the money available. When they arrived at LB Landry Avenue and Shepard Street, the pair said they exited the vehicle and were approached by another unknown male who demanded their money. When they told him they didn’t have it, the unknown male shot them both and then jumped in the vehicle with the unknown driver and fled the scene.”
“Based on the initial investigation, detectives believe a total of three suspects were involved in the incident.”
The families of the two students are travelling to the US to be with them.
“The University is providing support and assistance to the injured students and their families,” Curtin Vice-Chancellor Deborah Terry said in a statement.
“Support is also being provided to the others in the group who were not in the vicinity of the shooting and are unharmed.”
A second chance? Ben and Jen have reportedly put their divorce on hold.
In June last year, Jennifer Garner and Ben Affleck – who share children Violet, 10, Seraphina, seven, and Sam, four, together – announced their plans to divorce just one day after their 10th wedding anniversary.
Their split has been tumultuous to say the least, what with those cheating nanny rumours and constant media scrutiny, but all in all, Jen and Ben have both remained courteous on the high road, speaking nothing but nice things about one another.
Insiders have confirmed to Us Weekly that the estranged spouses will be packing their bags and heading over to London with their three children, while the Batman v. Superman actor films Justice League.
While insiders originally claimed that the pair were planning to purchase a home in North London, new sources now reveal to the US publication that the exes will indeed be renting for the month of May.
A source close to the mother-of-three says that the Suddenly 30 actress will look after the kids while her ex works on set of his new highly-anticipated superhero film, which is set to release next year.
Doing it for the kids: Jen and Ben put their family first.
“It’s what they’ve always done, married or separated, for the kids,” the insider reveals to Us Weekly.
“Ben is filming Justice League, and they always bring the kids to where they are when they are working.”
“Ben did the same thing when she was filming in Atlanta. They take turns bringing the kids to where the other is on location and just renting a house while they are there.”
See Jen reveal how she’s “making it work” in the video player below! Post continues after video…
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It’s no secret that the former flames, although both admitting to the tough nature of divorce, have created an amicable and positive environment when it comes to their working and family lives.
“Ben and Jennifer are a very strong cohesive unit. They have created a new normal, which will continue while they are living in London,” a source told The Sun.
“Ben wants his family close when he’s working, and staying together in a new country will be a great experience, despite himself and Jennifer being no longer a couple.”
Jen and Ben pictured just two months before their split was announced.
After the dust had settled from the big news in June of 2015, both parties have since addressed the dissolution of their 10-year marriage in separate interviews.
“I didn’t marry the big fat movie star; I married him,” Jen revealed in a telling interview with Vanity Fair in February. “And I would go back and remake that decision.”
“He’s still the only person who really knows the truth about things. And I’m still the only person that knows some of his truths,” she continued.
“It was a real marriage. It wasn’t for the cameras. And it was a huge priority for me to stay in it. And that did not work.”
And it appears that the feeling is mutual, with Ben opening up on his utmost respect for his former wife in The New York Times last month, saying: “Jen’s great. She’s a great person. We’re on great terms. I just saw her this morning, so that’s the reality that I live in.”
From a happier time! The couple pictured together in 2003.
60 Minutes reporter [Tara Brown and her crew have been detained in Lebanon](http://www.aww.com.au/latest-news/news-stories/60-minutes-reporter-tara-brown-detained-in-lebanon-1-26580 | target=”_blank”) while shooting a segment in the country’s capital, Beirut, Nine Network has confirmed.
“We are working with authorities to get them released and home as soon as possible,” Nine Network’s statement read.
Tara and the crew were trying to film the recovery of two Australian children who had been taken to Beirut from their mother in Brisbane by their Lebanese father.
According to the Department of Foreign Affairs and Trade’s (DFAT), Australia has “friendly bilateral relations with Lebanon”.
Last year, The Weekly sat down with the influential reporter to talk about the risks of her work.
The mum-of-two has travelled to the Syrian frontline twice in the past six months to report on female freedom fighters and admits those assignments take on a different complexion when there are two kids waiting at home.
“I don’t ever think I’m gung-ho about it,” she told us at the time. “You stop yourself thinking about the worst consequences because then you wouldn’t do anything.”
In the interview with The Weekly’s Susan Horsburgh, Tara spoke at length about her job’s emotional toll, her kids’ guilt trips and the father she hasn’t spoken to for almost 40 years.
Read the full story below:
In an age when attention-seekers are lionised and self-promotion is an essential life skill, humility is apparently for losers – and yet the 47-year-old 60 Minutes reporter is on a professional high, thanks to old-school qualities like talent, intelligence and a punishing work ethic.
Tara has plugged away on the country’s slickest current affairs program for almost 15 years, but she appears to have taken it up a notch in recent times, nailing a string of big stories in her poised, signature style.
Just in the past year or so, she has covered the capture of notorious paedophile Peter Scully in the Philippines, chronicled the heartbreaking disappearance of Daniel Morcombe and the hunt for his murderer, and grilled the much-maligned ex-mistress of wife killer Gerard Baden-Clay.
In June, it was disgraced “wellness” entrepreneur Belle Gibson, and a clearly fed-up Tara seemed to win more social media plaudits with every withering look she shot the cancer fraud. “Tara calls BS,” typed one tweeter. Another posted a picture with Tara’s face superimposed on Tony Abbott’s body, and the words: “TARA BROWN FOR PM.”
In that interview, Tara was exasperated with Gibson’s doublespeak and she showed it – just like earlier this year when she quizzed wife beater Steve, who claimed his spouse had brought out the worst in him and she called him out for blaming his victim. Moments like those make for compelling television and give viewers a tantalising glimpse of the woman behind the journalist.
The audience, it seems, can sense she’s a good egg and an afternoon in her company would suggest they’ve got it right.
Tara Brown on working at 60 Minutes
Tara Brown is as unassuming as the 60 Minutes HQ – what looks to be a fibro shack under Nine’s old Sydney transmission tower.
At the network’s Willoughby compound, Tara shares an office with reporter Michael Usher at the back of the program’s dilapidated cottage, which hasn’t been refurbished since George Negus and Ian Leslie first walked its halls 36 years ago.
Today, looking model-thin in a fitted jacket and pencil skirt, Tara has just taped the studio intro to her Gibson story, due to air five days later, as well as an interview for the website’s “Extra Minutes”. According to producer Stephen Taylor, she was here working on the script until midnight on Saturday and then back at nine on Sunday morning.
Like most journalists, she would prefer to be the one posing the questions – and, despite fronting 60 Minutes for so long, almost nothing has been written about her.
Still, sitting at her desk, surrounded by a photo of her beautiful boys, six-year-old Jack and four-year-old Tom, and shots on the job with AC/DC and Powderfinger, Tara is warm and accommodating – even if she does spend half the chat torturing a screwed-up tissue in her hands as she talks.
She may seem a picture of calm on screen, but she isn’t completely devoid of neuroses. “Tara frets over interviews,” says 60 Minutes’ Executive Producer, Tom Malone, “because she knows, if the interview doesn’t fly, then the story isn’t going to fly.”
Tara is known for her forensic approach and nowhere was that more evident, says Tom, than in her interview last year with baby Gammy’s father, David Farnell, a convicted child sex offender who abandoned his son with Down syndrome in Thailand with the child’s surrogate mother.
“She got the tone right, and it’s a hard thing to do because you can’t just go in and beat someone up,” says Tom. “You know you’ve got Australia riding on your back, wanting you to ask the tough questions, but you’ve got to do it delicately and in a manner that is as objective as it can be.”
It would be naïve, however, to think that total objectivity is possible. Since becoming a mother, Tara says, she has become more prone to tears and more strident in matters involving the mistreatment of children. “As a journalist, you try to go into these things open-minded, but I think the truth of it is, you still come with a bias,” she says.
In her recent “Baby Bling” story, she met a mother who fake-tanned her toddler and put the child on stage to hip-thrust in a Hooters costume. “As a mother, I probably go into it much more judgmental because I do think it’s a form of child abuse,” she says. “I don’t understand why women would do that to children.”
On growing up
Tara spent her own childhood riding horses and devouring Enid Blyton books. In the early years, she grew up with her two younger brothers on a property outside the small NSW-Queensland border town of Wallangarra, in a house built by her father, a stonemason.
When she was about nine, though, her parents divorced.
“It was a very bitter split,” recalls Tara, “and I haven’t seen him since shortly after that time.”
Tara believes her father is still alive, but hasn’t tried to contact him for almost 40 years.
“[The separation] was abrupt and felt traumatic at the time,” she says. “I will never understand how a parent can choose to have nothing to do with their children, especially after having my own, but it’s a decision my father made and so I’ve always felt it should be his choice to be in touch with me if he ever had a change of heart.”
Asked how she has coped with the loss, Tara replies, “I’m not sure. I just do. I think it’s sad, but it hasn’t been crippling – as much as I can tell. After all, I really don’t have an option but to accept the reality for what it is.”
After the split, Tara moved to Sydney with her mother, who pre-trained racehorses and later married a businessman with two younger children.
Although reluctant to psychoanalyse herself, Tara says her parents’ divorce – “like all experiences” – has shaped her.
“I guess I learned early of the impermanence of things,” she says, “and the fragility of what we might take for granted.”
Close friend Kate Rouse suspects it helped mould Tara into the strong, independent teenager she met in 1987.
The pair “clicked” in their first year at Bathurst’s Charles Sturt University, where Tara was studying for a communications degree. “At a time when everyone is trying to work out who they are, she was just who she was,” recalls Kate, a primary school teacher.
“Just so genuine – never looking over her shoulder to see if there was anyone better to talk to. You felt you could really trust her.”
Kate describes her friend as unflappable, even amid the chaos of two small kids. “If she’s ever flustered or frustrated, I can never tell,” says Kate. “She talks so nicely to the boys, she’s beautiful to them.”
On motherhood
A relative latecomer to motherhood – her boys were born when she was 40 and 42 – Tara has apparently taken to it with gusto, relishing trips to the park, colouring-in sessions and living-room concerts.
Jack and Tom, she says, are “gorgeous boys” – sensitive and determined. “Jack is probably more of a worry wart,” says Tara. “Tom’s a bit more of a free spirit. And they’re both really articulate and happy to tell you what they think.”
Especially when Mum is going away. “They can be quite vocal about not liking the idea … and sometimes that’s really difficult to walk away from,” she says, “but sometimes they don’t raise an eyebrow at all. I bribe them with presents – I’m terrible.”
Tara may have one of the most coveted jobs in Australian journalism, but it takes a brutal toll on family life, demanding at least six months on the road every year, often with no warning.
She might be helping with homework in the kitchen one day and donning a flak jacket in Western Kurdistan the next.
She has travelled to the Syrian frontline twice in the past six months to report on female freedom fighters and admits those assignments take on a different complexion when there are two kids waiting at home.
The risks, though, are calculated. “I don’t ever think I’m gung-ho about it,” she says, “but you stop yourself thinking about the worst consequences because then you wouldn’t do anything.”
Earlier this year, she travelled to the Philippines to cover the manhunt for depraved paedophile-murderer Peter Scully. It was one of the most emotionally wearing stories she has done.
“Our shoot started with the exhumation of a little girl’s body,” says Tara. “Every step of that story was incredibly harrowing. And depressing – just depressing that there was such evil and there were so many people exposed to that.”
At the end of each day, the team talks about their disturbing experiences – sort of like group therapy – but Tara says she has never sought professional help. After each extraordinary work assignment, she just re-enters ordinary suburban life. “They are very different existences, but I can’t tell you how grateful I am for the two kids coming into my bed or my friends who stick by me, despite not hearing from me for a long time,” she says, “because that is real life and it’s not mundane at all. It’s exciting and challenging and busy and guilt-ridden … but I’m very grateful for both.”
Without family support, Tara relies on a nanny and her husband of 15 years, TV producer John McAvoy. “I think he finds it frustrating at times,” says Tara, who limits her work trips to no longer than two weeks. “Life would be much more simple if I had a nine-to-five job, but … to me it’s swings and roundabouts – I do a lot of swimming lessons and birthday party drop-offs when I’m home.”
What she sacrifices most is personal space – some guilt-free time to take a walk, perhaps, or read that neglected Tim Winton or Ian McEwan novel. “A sense of your own person maybe,” says Tara.
The travel actually isn’t such a hardship. “I’m sad to be saying goodbye to my boys and missing things that are important to them, but I’d be dishonest if I said I hated the travel,” she says. “I don’t. I’m still excited by the adventure of this job.” Tara has wanted to be a journalist since she was 14. After university, she did her cadetship at WIN Television in Wollongong and went on to join Nine’s Nightline in 1992. She scored her lucky break that summer, when she filled in on A Current Affair and filed a gotcha story about a union official extorting a builder. “I was very, very lucky,” says Tara, “and that story exposed me to some people around the network.”
She joined ACA in 1993 and graduated to 60 Minutes in January 2001. And then her children arrived at the 11th hour. If you believe Tara, her life has unfolded almost beyond her control. “I was incredibly lucky,” she says. “Maybe, in a way, I’ve been very immature in how I’ve lived my life because it’s been a lot more reactionary than planned. My big plan was to be a journalist. Full stop.”
If she could advise her 16-year-old self, she would tell young Tara not to let self-consciousness hold her back. Although she still considers herself shy, she feels less so as she gets older. “I’ve also learned to push myself,” she says. “When I was 16, there’s no way I would have thought I’d be in this job because I just wasn’t confident enough. So the journey has been terrific … because I have grown into that person.”
It is dark now and Tara is due at another work meeting, yet she takes the time to ricochet from one Nine entrance to the other, trying to find the cab she has called for The Weekly. As she races up and down stairs, leading her visitor through the labyrinth that is the Nine Network, she apologises for not giving a more riveting interview. Of course, there’s no apology necessary.
Nine-year-old reporter and self-publisher of Orange Street News has hit back at critics who say she is too young to report on grevious news such as murder.
Washington Post reports Hilde Kate Lysiak followed a tip on Saturday morning of heavy police activity in her neighbourhood.
She spoke to neighbours and authorities before reporting the exclusive: “Murder on ninth street”.
She beat all major news outlets to the story and posted a video from the scene.
In the wake of the story she has received angry letters from readers who claim she is too young to be a reporter and should instead be playing with friends.
In response Hilde shared a video on YouTube.
She said: “If you want me to stop covering news, then you get off your computer and do something about that news.”
A man is facing up to six years in prison in the US for leaving his nine-month-old baby girl in the car while he went into a strip club.
Los Angeles district attorney Jackie Lacey said the 24-year-old father had been charged with child abuse,
AAP reports that employees at the strip club and neighbouring businesses rescued the baby after hearing her cries, and then called police.
Local news reports said he was in the middle of a lap dance when the club’s manager informed him that his child had been found.
The baby appeared disoriented and was taken to a nearby hospital, suffering from mild dehydration, authorities said.
The man has pleaded not guilty in the case.
In other news overnight, a naked woman armed with a knife and pushing a four-year-old boy in a trolley was tasered by police in a bizarre altercation in WA’s South West region.
Police say the 43-year-old woman refused repeated requests to put the knife down before she was tasered and taken to Bunbury Regional Hospital on Wednesday afternoon.
The child was not injured and is being cared for by family.
Mother & Baby helps you get out and about with your little one with the Family Friendly Guide, our pick of the best parks, family-friendly restaurants and more… Here we’ve rounded up the best playgrounds that you and your little one can enjoy together.
NEW SOUTH WALES
Darling Quarter Kids Playground, Sydney
This spectacular space features oversized equipment your tot will love, such as the big slide, jumbo swings, tangled web, sand diggers and pump station.
Pirrama Park, Pyrmont
The sprinklers and fountains will be a huge hit with your kids on a hot day, plus they’ll also love the big sand pit, slippery dips and adventure playground.
Lizard Log playground, Western Sydney Parklands
Located among a natural bushland setting, there are awesome activities for kids, and you can pre-book one of the 20 picnic shelters for a family fun day.
VICTORIA
St Kilda Adventure Playground, Melbourne
Mini Melburnians can explore this playground made from recycled goods, while having a ball on the trampolines, go-kart path, pirate ship and more.
Funfields, Whittlesea
Drive 66 kilometres from Melbourne’s CBD and you’ll discover a waterpark for the whole family – from thrill-seeker rides for big kids and fun fountains for the littlies.
QUEENSLAND
The Strand Water Park, Townsville
Free to enter, and located right next to the sea so a cool breeze is guaranteed, the kids can enjoy the slides, fountains and big water buckets.
Muddy’s playground, Cairns
Open every day of the year, Muddy’s includes water play areas, sound chimes, slides, play houses, puzzle games and story-telling areas.
SOUTH AUSTRALIA
Burnside Adventure Park, Adelaide
This award-winning playground inspires stimulating and imaginative play thanks to an array of features including stepping logs, rockers and climbing structures.
Bonython Park, Adelaide
Nestled among a natural setting, your little one will love the huge sand pit with bones to discover, a climbing net, swings and water pumps.
TASMANIA
Caldew Park playground, West Hobart
If your little ones love trains, you need to take them here. There’s a train bridge and a play train, as well as swings and a tricycle track.
Princes Park, Battery Point
Located opposite the CSIRO, this playground offers a slide, climbing frame, hammock and plenty of sand to build castles.
WESTERN AUSTRALIA
Escarpment Park, Alkimos
Swings, climbing ropes, a slide and cubby house are all built on soft sand, with a nearby cafe for mum and dad to fuel up.
Whiteman Park, Whiteman
Go bush in Whiteman Park and check out the numerous playgrounds, children’s forest, mini water playground and wildlife park, as well as bird-flying displays.
NORTHERN TERRITORY
Anula Regional Playground, Anula
This fun adventure-themed playground features a sand base, sun shade and lots of fun play equipment for the kids.
Australian women in sport have just made history – the Commonwealth Bank Southern Stars will be the highest paid women’s team sport in the country.
Many of the players – who recently lost to the West Indies in the World Twenty20 final in India – will now be able to earn in excess of $100,000 per contracted season, almost double the salaries in some cases.
Cricket Australia announced the news this afternoon, and in all, they’re committing a sum of $4.23 million to elite female cricketers, up from $2.36 million.
Aligning with Australian Cricketers’ Association (ACA), the board will be improving travel and accommodation benefits and health insurance, an updated policy surrounding pregnancy, restricted weekday hours to support players who work or study, and reduced commercial restrictions for WNCL and WBBL players seeking external sponsorship deals.
Maximum retainers for the Southern Star players have gone up from $49,000 to $65,000, with the Women’s Big Bash players facing an increase as well. The payments for players on the Women’s National Cricket League will be hiked up from $7,000 to $11,000, with top cricketers earning $26,000.
“Cricket is a sport for all Australians and Cricket Australia will continue to invest heavily in the women’s game in the coming years,” they said in a statement.
“We have worked constructively with the Australian Cricketers’ Association to reach this point and will continue to do so in our ongoing efforts to improve wages and workplace conditions for all elite female cricketers.”
They continued: “The Commonwealth Bank Southern Stars have achieved great success on the world stage, including making it through to the recent final of the ICC World T20 in India, and are great role models for the next generation of Australia’s aspiring female cricketers. The Women’s Big Bash League has created a revolution with outstanding ratings that make it the most popular women’s team sport in the country.”
“Of the more than 1.2 million people of all ages currently playing cricket in Australia, almost a quarter of them are women and girls. That number continues to grow rapidly and we will continue to support females playing the game from backyard to baggy green.”
Last night, viewers were left shocked with Jono Pitman’s harsh reaction to meeting Clare Verrall. But has the tradie already moved on with a new woman?
It certainly wasn’t the fairytale beginning the Married At First Sight matchmakers were hoping for.
As the effervescent Clare walked down the aisle, a horrified Jono couldn’t quite come to terms with what he was seeing.
“Ahh sh–!” He cried.
“She’s basically the opposite of what I expected to walk down the aisle. She’s not what I ordered,” the 28-year-old fumed, before adding his type is “small” and “brunette.”
Although Jono spent the evening of their wedding getting to know Clare and admitted “she is really funny”, it appears the reality star has already moved on with a new love interest.
In an Instagram photo obtained by The Daily Mail Australia, the self-proclaimed “man’s man” cuddles up to Melbourne resident Rachael Baxter.
“You annoy the absolute s–t out of me, but there’s no one else I could imagine waking up next to every morning #soppypost #mrperfect #thanksforbeingyou,” Rachel reportedly penned alongside the photo, which had Instagram user @JonoPitman19 tagged.
Watch Jono’s harsh reaction below. Post continues after the video!
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In a telling sign, the cosy image – which was uploaded on March 12 – has since been deleted.
The polarising dating show was filmed in November last year. Jono and Channel Nine are yet to comment on the claims.
Meanwhile Jono’s match Clare has spoken out over his controversial comments, telling TV Week she was disappointed by his reaction.
“It’s not a case of getting what you order. I am what I am and I’m not a McDonald’s meal.”
“He wanted a short brunette, athletic person and in rocks a giant feminist blonde,” the 31-year-old explained.
Is this Jono’s new squeeze? Last month, Rachael Baxter uploaded a cosy couple shot with Jono on her Instagram page. The photo has since been deleted.
