The title of this recording is "Carole Hicks". It was recorded in Wellington Town Hall, 101 Wakefield Street, Wellington on the 16th March 2011. Carole Hicks is being interviewed by Gareth Watkins.  Their names are spelt correctly but may appear incorrectly spelt later in the document. The duration of the recording is 13 minutes. A list of correctly spelt content keywords and tags can be found at the end of this document. A brief description of the recording is: In this podcast Carole Hicks from New Zealand talks about volunteering at the human rights conference. The content in the recording covers the decades 1980s through to the 2010s. A brief summary of the recording is: In a recorded interview from Wellington Town Hall, Carole Hicks discusses their role as a volunteer at a human rights conference, reflecting on the experiences and challenges faced. The interview, conducted on March 16, 2011, by Gareth Watkins, spans over 13 minutes and provides insights into the meticulous planning, execution, and vibrant atmosphere of the conference. Hicks was a part of the organizing committee for over a year, tasked with various logistical responsibilities, including liaising with the facility's staff and proofreading materials. Despite the extensive preparation, no significant logistical issues arose, thanks in part to the cooperation of the conference center staff. The conference had over 300 delegates in attendance, filling the venue to capacity. Describing the encounter with the international community at the event, Hicks notes not being able to attend presentations due to other duties but found value in the diversity of interactions and the chance to engage with attendees from around the world. Although nothing came as a surprise, instances of attendees showing up without prior registration did occur, but the organizers accommodated them flexibly. Hicks' decision to contribute significantly to the committee stemmed from prior expertise in organizing events through trade union activity and involvement in the sport of archery. This experience also fueled a desire to give back to the lesbian and gay community. An essential factor for a successful conference highlighted by Hicks is thorough planning and a preparedness for potential issues. This strategic organization extended to the coordination of a team of volunteers, numbering between four and eight each day, whose dedication greatly contributed to the conference's smooth operation. While discussing the mood and compare past conferences, Hicks noted a positive and empowering energy amongst the delegates, despite not being able to easily compare the atmosphere with smaller past events. Talks ranged from technical legal discussions to practical challenges faced by those with disabilities. There was a pronounced sense of progress, especially in comparison to the social and legal landscape for the LGBTQ+ community over the past 25 years. Moreover, inclusivity was a recurring theme, demonstrated through high-level, engaging presentations that catered to a diverse audience, including members of the police force in uniform. Commenting on cultural differences observed while traveling for sports, Hicks cited resistance to inclusive language and gender equity in international settings, contrasting it with more progressive attitudes in New Zealand. Although organizing the conference was fulfilling, Hicks expressed realistic expectations about the likelihood of hosting such events in Wellington frequently, hoping other New Zealand cities might take on the challenge. In terms of the demanding commitment required from the organizers, Hicks revealed that it varied, ranging from intense work to more moderate efforts. Finally, Hicks hoped the conference's legacy would be a deeper understanding of LGBTQ+ history and lasting change implemented from the discussions held during the event. In conclusion, Carole Hicks' reflections offer a rare behind-the-scenes glimpse into the organization of a human rights conference, highlighting the importance of comprehensive planning, volunteer support, and maintaining an inclusive environment that celebrates the advancement of LGBTQ+ rights. This historical interview serves as a testament to the dedication of individuals like Hicks to fostering dialogue and community within the framework of human rights advocacy. The full transcription of the recording follows.  It includes timestamps every thirty seconds in the format [HH:MM:SS].  The transcription begins:  I've been a member of the organising committee for the conference for I don't know, 15 months or 18 months. However long it's been, it seems like forever. And, um, I have done mostly sort of logistical type things. Um, I've proofread some stuff. Um, and I've been with dawn the liaison person for all of the facilities here. What have some of the issues been with the logistics? Well, courtesy of some very, [00:00:30] very cooperative staff here at the, um, um, conference Centre and through multimedia, there have been very few. Let's be their their cooperation, their willingness to fall over themselves, to be helpful, has been absolutely amazing. They've been terrific, because how many delegates are there At the moment? We have a little over 300 delegates registered, Um, and looking at how full the islet has been because it holds 302 people, [00:01:00] we've had pretty much all of them here. Can you describe some of the because we are a day and a half in? Can you describe some of the things that you've encountered so far? Well, what I've not encountered is any of the presentations, which would have been nice, but you know, when you're on the organising committee, you don't get to you don't get to do the good stuff. Um, we've we've had It's been very interesting sitting here outside the theatre. Um, with all the people coming by, um, there's been a lot of opportunity [00:01:30] to interact with various people, um, locals, people from all parts of the world, all parts of our region. Really? And that is always is interesting. Have there been any surprises? Um, I don't think so. Um, a few people who just materialised. And, um, one person came to the United States of America and just assumed they could walk in. And since we were already overbooked, um, that got a bit tricky, but, you [00:02:00] know, one can always stretch a seat here or there. So why did you want to become involved and become quite an integral part of the organising committee? I've got a lot of experience, um, professionally in organising, um, conferences, um, through my earlier work, uh, in the trade union movement. And, um, also through my involvement with the sport of archery. So organising conferences and tournaments [00:02:30] and things is something I have a fair amount of expertise in. And, um, I thought it was more than enough time before I put something back into the lesbian and gay community. What are the keys to a good conference? Thorough organisation Before you start? You, You, you, you I can't emphasise that you have to think about all of the things that could possibly go wrong and then organise to prevent them happening where possible, [00:03:00] but also to know that there are enough people on the ground with enough information to be able to pick up pieces should they drop. So how many volunteers have you got on on every day? Uh, it's a bit of a moveable feast, but, um, we've got somewhere between four and eight around about half a dozen on the whole. And that's just fantastic. These people are here, You know, I don't know whether they've had to take time off work or or whatever, [00:03:30] but, um, they're here. They're willing. Happy to do anything you ask them to do. Their cooperation has been outstanding. Has there been a hardship in getting volunteers? I don't know. You'd have to ask Sarah that. I know she was pushed at one stage and we didn't appear to have very many for the conference. Um, I, I don't know about the sporting ones because I wasn't involved in that for for much of the time. So your role at the moment is what, Director of traffic? Mostly, [00:04:00] um, sitting here outside the islet, um, people keep coming past me. So they want to know, How do I get to such and such a place? What time is the next session starting? Where do I get morning tea? All of those sorts of things just sort of, you know, general information. Can you describe the vibe, the feeling of the conference? That's a bit difficult for me? Because, um, I haven't been to a lesbian and gay et cetera. Type conference, [00:04:30] um, of any size before, um, back in the 19 eighties and nineties, um, through glee, gays and lesbians everywhere in education, which we started here in Wellington. And we ran, um, a couple of national conferences and we ran an international conference. Um, but it was much smaller. So it's a bit too hard to relate in terms of, um, in terms of atmosphere. But certainly, you know, you just see two guys walking past [00:05:00] now they're smiling. Everybody seems to be, seems to be quite comfortable with what's going on. And we had very good feedback about yesterday's, um, sessions. Um, people are saying how much they're enjoying it, and in fact, the duty manager here today, um, he had to go off site and and in general terms, I was just saying, You know, thanks very much again for all the cooperation and he said, This is the most fantastic conference we've had here He said, I am really enjoying [00:05:30] this conference and I hope you can do another one next year. Well, he's stiff out of luck on that part. But, you know, for the duty manager of a conference centre to say how much they're enjoying this, I think is is a great credit to all of the people who are here. All of the delegates, the presenters, everybody, certainly I've found that there seems to be a lot of very, um, empowering energy. You know, a lot of positive energy and certainly the people I've talked to um, just the fact of [00:06:00] being in amongst 300 really positive forward thinking people is is is something Yes. I mean, just looking at the abstracts of some of these, um, some of these presentations. They are outstanding. They are of such a high level, and yet they are inclusive. You know, we've got all sorts of people here, um, going through the full range of, um, highly, highly technical, legal stuff. Um, through to Well, if [00:06:30] you're in a wheelchair, you have these sorts of problems, but here are ways we can get around them, you know? So we've got such an amazing range. Um, of of very technical stuff in the various aspects. Um, we've got a lot of, um, practical stuff for people who are in the the learning sector. The education sector. We've got, um, an interesting section on on work on and how to protect yourself, I guess, um, while [00:07:00] at work. And certainly if you're out at work, Um, it was amazing to have in in that stream to have a presentation by some lesbians from the police, you know, And to have these lesbians here participating fully wearing their police uniform is absolutely fabulous When you think of how far we've come in 25 years, I was just reflecting on that last night. I thought Gosh, this is It's It's incredible. Oh, it is. And, um, whilst it [00:07:30] hasn't been such a problem, well, it hasn't been such a legal problem. Um, for for lesbians as it has been for gay guys, obviously, thanks to Queen Victoria, we were never illegal. Bless her cotton socks. Um, but yeah, I mean, just having been part of of that, um, campaign so many years ago and just looking where we are now, it's absolutely mind blowing. And I do a lot of trouble because of the sports, um, that I'm involved in and [00:08:00] you go out of New Zealand and it's like going into the Dark Ages as a woman, Never mind as a lesbian, Um, it's just and I spend a lot of time in Europe or with a lot of Europeans. Um, and they they just don't behave like we used to. People behaving here, it's just quite remarkable. Do you have examples of that? Oh, I mean, in some respects, something that's quite simple and straightforward that, [00:08:30] um, the international organisation, uh, sporting organisation that I'm relatively senior member of, um I persuaded them five years ago to have all of the Constitution rules in gender inclusive language or if that wasn't possible to at least use. And in the last 18 months they've gone back to using heat in everything but things like that. I mean, it's like that all of the time. And, [00:09:00] um, there is an assumption that you'll do it. The bloke, the bloke's way, the straight in general terms. It's the older white male way. I'm sorry I'm talking to you, but you know how it is. Say that talking to you. But that's how it is. And whilst that's still like that to a degree in this country, nothing like the the extent to which is it is. That's the basis that's all there is. What do you mean, there some other [00:09:30] way, you know, whereas here, whilst we still run into those problems, they're nowhere near as bad. So you mentioned just earlier that the possibility of a conference well, certainly not next year. But do you think there will be, uh, a repeat or another conference like this in New Zealand? That's really hard to, um, to gauge Gareth. Um, we had, [00:10:00] um, a few few a few guys here in Wellington who decided that you know. OK, we would take a turn at running the out games. Um, I can't see us wanting to do that again in another couple of years time. You know, um, there is a limit to how much time people can spend, um, in in, in in that sort of, um, activity. Um, but I think it wouldn't hurt. I mean, this is something that we keep doing in Wellington. [00:10:30] Um, to be perfectly honest, it's about a time Auckland did something, um, with glee. We couldn't get Auckland to do anything. Christchurch did, um, did a conference. Um, but Auckland just they don't seem to be able to organise themselves. So, um, whether they can be persuaded to run a conference, who would know? But I think having started one now, um, I think it would be a pity if we lost the [00:11:00] impetus you just mentioned before about the the time involved in actually organising something like this. Could you just give me some idea as to how much time the organisers have have have committed to the to this conference and the out games? Barry? A large chunk of his life. He has been superb. He's been absolutely brilliant. And the amount of work that man's put into this has been phenomenal. Um, I don't know. I mean, it fluctuates a bit. Um, there's sort of a rush [00:11:30] of activity, and you might spend, um, 45 hours in a week. Um and then nothing much for a little while. The stream convenor probably had a larger, more ongoing, um, exercise. And I think you should be talking to some of the stream convenor because they've had to put together all of the presentations. You know, they once we got the, um, the presentations that accepted, um, they then had to work with the presenters [00:12:00] and sort all that sort of thing out. Find chairperson facilitators. And so they would have They would have probably spent a lot more time over a period of time than I have. Um, Dawn and I, to a large degree, have spent mostly this year, um, doing things in a few hours a week, I suppose, Um, maybe 10 hours a week, sometimes. Maybe less. Now, if somebody in 30 years time is listening back to this, what would you say to them? [00:12:30] I hope it has been useful. Um, I'm not sure that you would have got much history of where we came from to get to this place Now, which in itself is said, um, because some of the younger I don't know about the guys, but certainly some of the younger women coming through have no concept of what it used to be even 20 years ago, let alone 50 years ago, that I can go back to, um [00:13:00] so no hoping that we can have some basis of knowledge of how we've got to where we are, Um, and that if they can look at some of the things that we have done at this conference, um, some of the presentations that have been made, some of the ideas for moving forward that we hope will have been implemented and that they can at least trace that much. The full transcription of the recording ends. A list of keywords/tags describing the recording follow. These tags contain the correct spellings of names and places which may have been incorrectly spelt earlier in the document. The tags are seperated by a semi-colon: 1980s ; 2010s ; Asia Pacific Outgames ; Asia Pacific Outgames (2011) ; Auckland ; Carole Hicks ; Christchurch ; Europe ; Pacific ; People ; Stuff ; United States of America ; Wellington ; Wellington Town Hall ; community ; conference ; education ; energy ; exercise ; gay ; gender ; history ; hope ; human rights ; inclusive language ; knowledge ; language ; lesbian ; listening ; logistics ; love ; march ; opportunity ; other ; police ; queen ; running ; sad ; smiling ; sport ; straight ; time ; travel ; walking ; women ; work. The original recording can be heard at this website https://www.pridenz.com/apog_carole_hicks.html. The master recording is also archived at the Alexander Turnbull Library in Wellington, New Zealand.  For more details visit their website https://tiaki.natlib.govt.nz/#details=ecatalogue.1089441. Carole Hicks also features audibly in the following recordings: "LILAC - the Lesbian Information, Library and Archives Centre" and "Mia Farlane". Please note that this document may contain errors or omissions - you should always refer back to the original recording to confirm content.