The Ballad of Billy The Kidney

Jimmy Little - A Great Figure in Transplant / Non-Transplant History

Jimmy Little, AO, Hon.D.Mus., is an indigenous Australian country singer, actor, teacher and philantrophist.  He received a kidney transplant in 2006 following 2 years of home dialysis.

A Yorta Yorta man, he began his singing career in the 1950s.  His stated musical influences included Nat "King" Cole and Jim Reeves.

He is best known to wider audiences for his interpretation of Danny Boy (1959) and for his song Royal Telephone (1963).

Jimmy Little also developed a parallel acting career from the 1960s, working with such diverse directors and producers as Wim Wenders and the Rev. Billy Graham.

He continued releasing popular music until at least 1974. Through his teaching and touring activities, Jimmy Little continues to provide mentoring and positive influence to a new generation of Australian indigenous musical performers – including Archie Roach, Mandawuy Yunupingu, and the bands Yothu Yindi and The Warumpi Band.

He was awarded the title of NAIDOC Aboriginal of the year in 1999, and is an Officer of the Order of Australia.  He has been inducted into the ARIA Hall of Fame.  He has also received an honorary Doctorate of Music.

Following his kidney transplant in 2006, he set up the Jimmy Little Foundation.  The aim of this Foundation is to promote good health and nutrition in rural and remote aboriginal communities, and to develop renal health facilities in these areas.

Items about Jimmy Little on the WWW include the following.

Articles

• Ailments no barrier for Jimmy Little, 702 ABC Radio Sydney.  Posted 30th October 2009
• Jimmy Little gives Annies [sic] voice the "thumbs up"... . 783 ABC radio Alice Springs, 29th October 2009.
• Wikipedia article

Web pages

• Authorised biographical details on the Jimmy Little Foundation website
• Official website (appears not to have been updated in a while)
• MySpace page

The Jimmy Little Foundation

• Official website
• Facebook page

Video

• Live performance on episode # 6 of Rockwiz (SBS1 TV) - Solo - Duet with Sophie Koh
• Interview telecast on Stateline - ABC [Australia] TV, 29th October 2009.  Uploaded on Youtube by jaybeesoz.

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• The image at the top of this page is from The Black Arm Band.

World Transplant Games 2009 > Day 8 and Closing Ceremony

This post is subject to further update after initial publication.

Here is a general round-up of how the last day of competition in the World Transplant Games 2009 was reported in the world's media and blogosphere.

Impressions of the closing ceremony are also included.

As with my previous posts on the Games, I have sought to guide readers as to how to make your own choices in locating material in the WWW. This, after all, is the power of Web 2.0 !

For more information you might like to search as follows.

• For news items: world transplant games on Google News
• For blog posts: world transplant games on Technorati or Google Blog Search
• For tweets: world transplant games on Twitter
• For video: world transplant games on YouTube or Google Videos (latter is not really recommended, based on my experience over the last week)
• For phlogs (phone blogs): world transplant games or wtg on ipadio

To get a rough interpretation into (or out of) the English language, try Google Translate or Yahoo! BabelFish. The translations that follow are from Google Translate (so please allow for that). If you happen to be proficient in any of the non-English languages that follow, and would like to suggest a translation, you are most welcome to do so.

Before I move to this list, may I conclude this section of this post with a phone-blog from a commentator at the Games.  I think she best expressed the philosophy of these Games.

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Also folks, please bear in mind that what follows is not an exhaustive list.  Rummage around the WWW using some of these ideas, and see what you come up with!

World Transplant Games 2009 > Day 7

Today I thought we might see how the World Transplant Games are being reported on in the Twitter-sphere.

I'm taking a thematic approach to this topic because I realise that its hard to get a continuous update of results in the way that you would get, say, a continuous update from the Olympic Games in the mainstream media.

Rather, Web 2.0 gives you the chance to pick your own results or follow your own interests.  And it also gives you a result to add your own perspective based on your own preference / interest / bias /whatever.

Twitter is a particularly good medium for this type of reporting because you can in theory blog in from a mobile phone (and not even via the internet on a 3G phone - you can blog in via text messaging).  This means that those using it can be very close to the action, and with immediacy (without having to find a computer).

Now let's see how this translates into action!

World Transplant Games 2009 > Day 6

This post is subject to further update after publication

Here is a selection of World Transplant Games videos recently posted, mostly,  on YouTube.  (Google Video was no help at all.) I have tried to concentrate on action from the Gold Coast, but in some instances I have gone to the meta-story (the story behind the story).  And in some instances its because I cannot understand the Dutch language.

World Transplant Games 2009 > Day 5

As the World Transplant Games continue on the Gold Coast in the sunny State of Queensland, a quick surf of the WWW has revealed these highlights:

• John Paul O'Neill of Ireland has won a silver medal in the squash competition on Tuesday.
• In rowing, Bas van den Hoven of The Netherlands won a gold medal in the skiff competition, and Martijn Watervliet & Bas van den Hoven of The Netherlands won silver medals in the "double two".  (No I don't know what that means.) (Original Dutch language web page.)
• Damon Danieli of Team USA (the picture at the head of this post is from his blog) the 3rd highest time in his team for the 5 kilometre cycling time trial, but unfortunately did not qualify for a medal.

I have also uncovered some more Transplant Games blogs, and have added them to the list in yesterday's post.

A guide to the World Transplant Games on the WWW

This post is subject to updates after publication.

One of the advantages of Web 2.0 is that events that get overlooked by the mainstream media can be covered in a fairly broad way by ordinary folk on the ground - often armed with no more than a 3G mobile phone.

The World Transplant Games is one such event.  Its mostly being sidestepped by the mainstream media, apart from a number of local newspapers with stories about local residents off to the Games.

But there's plenty to still get your interest if you hunt the WWW a little bit.

World Transplant Games 2009 > Day 3

The World Transplant Games continue on the Gold Coast of Queensland today.

A guest of honour at the Opening Ceremony last Sunday was Mr Frank Vig.  At 93 years old and having responsibility for a transplanted kidney since 1974, he is Australia's oldest living donor recipient.

Also on Day 1 of competition, Irish competitor Tony Gartland kicked off his team's competition in a big way by picking up a silver medal in the 5km road race.

Unfortunately I am at this moment having trouble accessing the World Transplant Games website to access the medal standings.  You might like to try it for yourself.

More updates as I am able to access them!

• Image Credit: from the Opening Ceremony of the World Transplant Games.

Let the games begin!

Today sees the launch of the World Transplant Games on the Gold Coast, in the Australian State of Queensland.

The Games, held every 2 years since 1978, promote exercise and fitness as a means of managing organ transplantation.  A fit patient means a probable longer-lasting organ transplant.

Exercise is a key method of managing an organ transplant for the long haul.  Its not the only method, of cousre, but it is extremely important.

World and national Transplant Games represents an opportunity for transplantees to have a specific goal whilst managing their valuable and life-giving resource.

This blog is, alas, about 1,000 km away from the action of the World Transplant Games.  But we will try to keep our readers attuned as to what's happening up there on the sunny Gold Coast (especially with Team Ireland!).

The Games run to August 30.

This YouTube video of the 5 kilometre road race was uploaded by 15hoyukai

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• Image credit: The Alfred Transplant Family

Cead mile fealte!

The Ireland team arrives in Australia today for the World Transplant Games on the Gold Coast of Queensland!

Cead mile fealte, Éire!  (A hundred thousand welcomes to Ireland!)

The team even has its own very impressive website.

More on this event on Sunday (Opening Day of competition).

• Media release announcing team selection [Microsoft Word document]

• Image Credit: From the Transplant Team Ireland website.

Road trip!

I am on vacation for much of July, followed in short order by the headless-chook-ness of Week 1 of the news College term.

So this blog will also be on vacation until early August.

Thanks for reading so far - and I do hope that you'll come back!

• The picture of Mr Bean at Bondi Beach (Sydney) is from the news service Chinaview.cn