Hello. I’m Professor Marie Bashir and I’m going back to school today with Student Edge.
Hi I’m Simon Miraudo and today I’m sitting down with Professor The Honourable
Dame Marie Bashir, AD CVO. Good morning Professor Bashir.
Good morning Simon.
Now, your list of achievements is fairly overwhelming and obviously indicates a lifetime of passion
and study. But you do have to begin somewhere. So I’m curious, early on, were you fairly studious?
Oh well yes. I was fortunate to be the eldest child in a very loving family where education
was highly encouraged and where our forebears – you know, grandparents and cousins – had
also gone on to higher education, particularly in medicine.
So there was that sort of atmosphere of service to the community and the joy that came from
that as well.
What were some of the subjects that you really loved growing up?
At school I really loved history and geography; everything that taught you about the world
and how people lived and achieved. English and English Literature was also a total joy.
I was fortunate enough to be born before the days of television, so there weren’t any
distractions away from one’s books. I think from the age of 7 or 8 I was an avid reader.
Was there a particular favourite at that time?
I loved May Gibbs' books. You know, Snugglepot and Cuddlepie.
Of course.
But then I moved fairly rapidly into Charles Dickens and someone who could portray suffering
and resilience as he could led me into the Russian authors later on; translations.
So I would say after the depth and range of Shakespeare’s treasures, the person I love
most amongst authors is Dostoyevsky. No one portrayed human suffering and resilience as
that man did.
Well you went on to study the violin at the Conservatorium of Music. Was that a career
goal at that point? What were your kind of plans?
No I just loved music. I was, again fortunate enough growing up in Narrandera, to have, again
a culture of music and musical performances.
Even though it was a country town, it was a very happy country town with a good music society
and so forth.
I learned the violin at the Convent there. When I came to Sydney, in the street behind
my grandmother’s – parallel to my grandmother’s street – there was the most wonderful music
teacher there.
In those years, going to primary school on and off in Sydney, I had Ms. McDonald.
Then when I moved into high school she said, “Well, I think you’re good enough to be going on
further and I’d like you to study at the Conservatorium.”
So that was a joy. I had a wonderful teacher there, Ms. McClane. And I also attended Chamber
Music classes and I was a member of the junior symphony orchestra at the Conservatorium.
They were wonderful days of fun but of great enrichment musically.
Tell me a little bit then about your decision then to go on and study your Bachelors of Medicine
and Science.
Yes well I loved music very much, and it was either music or medicine. And one tries to
achieve perfection in music. One also does the best that one can in any profession one chooses.
But I didn’t think I would reach the heights of magnificence in music that one would dream
of doing.
Medicine was not second best, but lying in bed as a child, wondering what would I do
with my life, I used to consider what would it be that you couldn’t wait to get out
of bed the next morning and get on with it. I thought, yes, that would be medicine and
serving the people and looking after children who were sick. That would be very inspirational.
Help them get their lives together again.
Absolutely. Did you have any inspirational teachers or lecturers from that period?
Well I had wonderful teachers in primary. I had superb teachers in high school.
Sydney Girls High was a wonderful experience for me because I was there in the war years of
the Second World War and amongst my dearest friends were a number of refugee children
from Nazi Europe, of Jewish background.
My friendship with those wonderful girls and their families are something that has enriched
my life greatly.
Mental health services are obviously a great passion of yours. Are we doing enough for
young people in Australia on that front?
I think what would be very important would be to build in resilience and prevention early.
What troubles me are the reports I see from time to time on the rate of depression, and
leading in some young men, very often sensitive and talented young men, to suicide.
I don't think we should be complacent about that and accept it as a statistic.
I think that we can get in early, in the prepubertal years, and give young people a sense of their
own self-worth, without shining a spotlight too much on young men, I think young men in
Australia face a lot of challenges. Not just scholastic; friendship, sport, appearing to
be, you know, the typical Aussie male.
That sort of expectation, whilst not necessarily enunciated, still I think remains there.
But I think we’re getting better at inclusiveness. In a genuine way, it’s implicit now
not just explicit.
Before we wrap up, I would love to ask you what it meant to you to be named Governor of New South Wales?
I was stunned when I was asked to consider taking on that role, because there hadn’t
been a woman in that role before. I wondered what I had done to bring attention to me,
because working in mental health, especially with adolescents, one keeps one’s head down,
and certainly is dedicated to confidentiality.
It was an overwhelming honour and certainly one that moved me profoundly.
It meant I could walk amongst all the people and one of my great loves is the culture and legacy of our
Aboriginal people and I like to think that we were able to reach out more.
So if a young person came up to you and said they wanted to follow in your footsteps, although
replicating your achievements might be a fool’s errand. What is a piece of advice you’d
say to them, to keep in the back of their mind as they go through their education?
Well, I would tell them to keep healthy and well, to listen to what other people have
to say, something's up, and to work as hard as one possibly could, enjoy learning for
the sake of learning and what it could do to assist in the lives of others as well as oneself.
and that is really a very inspirational pathway I found in my own life.
Very often it’s those who may be referred to as the little people, the quiet people,
who can teach you more than you could have possibly ever imagined possible.
Where tasks are put before you, do them to the best of your ability.
That’s great advice. Professor Bashir thank you so much for spending time with us today.
My pleasure.
Hey guys, if you enjoyed that video, click here to subscribe to our YouTube channel.
Or find more of our stuff at studentedge.com.au