February 7, 2012
by Marcus Priaulx
Alzira Conlon is Cherbourg’s little-known world traveller but she says her amazing life all stemmed from school.
Her education allowed her to crush social barriers, live an exotic life travelling the globe and take up opportunities as they came her way.
The quietly spoken Cherbourg community health worker exudes a gentle strength that has taken her to what many today would now regard as no-go zones.
She’s been to Afghanistan, Israel, Iran, Pakistan, India, Hong Kong, and much of south-east Asia. Germany. France, Greece and Italy have all felt her presence over the decades, too.
But she’s keen to tell children that none of it would have been possible if she did not go to school or receive a further education.
Ms Conlon was born in Cherbourg in 1950 before moving to Hivesville with her mother and siblings at the age of eight to be closer to her father Willie, who worked on a station at Proston.
Four years later she found herself in Toowoomba and went to high school until she was 16 years old.
At the age of 23 Ms Conlon decided to finish her education at a business college in Brisbane.
It proved to be a fateful move as that year of study took Ms Conlon down avenues women had only just begun tread during the 1970s.
She got a job with the then-Department of Aboriginal Affairs in Canberra in 1975 and met a Swiss researcher named Andre who worked with the CSIRO.
A romance blossomed, so they packed their bags and sojourned around the world.
They stopped in Indonesia for three months before heading to the rest of South-East Asia.
Other destinations included Afghanistan (two years before the Russians invaded) and Iran (before the Shah was executed and it lost its liberal lifestyle).
She also went to Burma, Thailand, Hong Kong, Turkey, Greece, Italy, Switzerland and many other countries over an eight-month period.
With her long service leave at the end of last year, Alzira travelled back to Israel and then on to Switzerland to visit Andre and his family.
She and Andre then returned to India and stayed in Hyderabad with friends before revisiting New Delhi and the Taj Mahal at Agra, which they had seen on their trek 35 years before.
Ms Conlon also made a second trip to Israel with a church group, having first visited that country in 2008.
“There’s been a lot of change there,” she said.
“For instance, the border between Israel and Syria was bombed one week after we were there. There were soldiers everywhere and the border controls were very strict.”
“But I enjoyed this trip just as much as when I went overseas in 1977.
“Most of the countries were multicultural and it was nice going back and retracing my steps again.”
A major highlight of her first trip was seeing Gandhi’s tomb. Ms Conlon admired him and his fight for civil rights.
“But I still saw the poverty and it made me appreciate what I had back home and still do,” Ms Conlon said.
She returned to her Cherbourg birthplace to live 17 years ago.
The highlight this time was Israel as Ms Conlon was raised with Christian beliefs and its historical sites brought the Bible alive.
But none of what she’s done would have been possible without her education and Ms Conlon tells children that.
“An adventurous spirit also helps,” she said.
“There’s no point having an education and being too afraid to go out your back door. You can’t just wish for things to happen. You have to make them happen.
“Whenever I get a chance to visit our Cherbourg State School I tell the students education is an important tool and with it, comes freedom. Attending school and attaining education can be a path to greater happiness.
“You can do anything if you’re prepared to work for it and I urge all parents to encourage their children to use school to chase their dreams.”
