Being in community with Declan increased my sense of international sovereignty and reciprocity

The Fair Trade project put me in conversation with Declan Fry, a critic, writer, poet, essayist, and descendant of the Yorta Yorta who was born on Wongatha country in Kalgoorlie. Through this collaboration, I was able to learn about Declan's poetry and culture and make connections with my own Pacific Islander culture (I am a Chamoru originally from Guam in Micronesia). Being in community with Declan increased my sense of international sovereignty and reciprocity.

While I have worked on collaborative projects in the past, the Fair Trade project was the most engaging, supportive, and fun. I attribute this mainly to the project manager, Anne-Marie Te Whiu. She organized us from beginning to end, offered us invaluable guidance and feedback, and also gave us creative freedom we needed to make this project uniquely our own. This was also the first project I worked on that intentionally brought together indigenous writers from different parts of the world.  

The Fair Trade collaboration process was beneficial to my own practice because it helped me produce new work that is quite different from what I usually write. I attribute this to collaborating with Declan and being inspired by his own poetry and poetics. I had been experiencing "writers' block" before this project, but being in this creative collaboration opened the doors of creativity again in my life.