Story Factory 10th Birthday
13 Oct 2022
Below is a speech given by an alumni student Adinda (Bindi) Mutiar at the Story Factory 10th Birthday in September 2022.
The world can sometimes be dark and often inhumane, and one of the most beautiful ways to combat these complexities is to write. Language has always been a difficult thing for me to understand but has always comforted me, especially in the darkest of times. And it has, for a lot of us, it’s something that unites us, right? And that’s what Story Factory did for me.
I had always struggled with understanding language, thinking that my fantasies and dreams were just figments of my imagination, nothing that was relevant to the “real world”, but when I came to Story Factory, I fell in love with language. I fell in love with the beauty and complexity of it. I fell in love with feeling all the emotions and being able to pen them down. I fell in love with ideas, even ones I still had not been able to understand. I fell in love with myself again, because that’s what writing brings to me. It brings joy, continuity, and stability when things sometimes seem to be unreachable. I cannot even explain the surge of joy that I get when I receive a message from a friend, acquaintance, or perhaps a stranger, telling me that my piece has brought them comfort or joy.
It is the best feeling in the world to know that you were able to guide someone and bring happiness into their lives, and these moments would not have happened if it wasn’t for Story Factory coming into my classroom and giving me a chance. The best part was that I was able to pen down the craziest, most delirious ideas that came to my mind, openly convey them to the tutors, and not feel like I was delirious, as they were always incredibly supportive. I felt heard, supported and cared for.
The people at Story Factory are just some of the most wonderful, uplifting, and golden people you will come across, and I will always be extremely grateful for the opportunities that have been bestowed on me because of them. And once again, as I have said this before to Markus Zusak in Year 9 during a writing workshop in Redfern for Story Factory, I feel like a thesaurus now. Thank you.
By Adinda (Bindi) Mutiara, September 2022.