Trish, left, and Meg sorting books before a market
For more than seven years, there’s been one Sunday every month when two members of Ballina Region for Refugees, Trish Antoniacomi and Meg Pickup, both in their 70s, leave home at around 5.15 to set up the BR4R market stall. Having packed their cars to almost overflowing the afternoon before, they arrive at 6am, and with help from other early-rising volunteers, start erecting the market tent and displaying the goods, ready for a 7am start.
“The other day”, Trish laughs, “it was still dark when we got there, and we had to use a torch to locate our spot!”
What drives Meg and Trish to continue working the market year after year?
Meg explains that she has a strong belief in equity, fairness and social justice. “Australia’s treatment of already traumatised people is reprehensible,” she says.
Trish tells of being in India in 1975 with a friend, waiting for a bus. “We thought we were alone,” she says. “But out of the darkness there appeared a trail of refugees escaping undercover from Bangladesh. That vision has stayed with me. Everyone deserves a safe place to call home.”
Market day is the culmination of several other days in the month when Trish and Meg are helped by volunteers to sort the donated clothing, toys, bric a brac, plants (propagated by Meg) and books at the BR4R storage container.
The first BR4R stall was at Ballina Market in December, 2016, where Meg and Trish only sold freshly cooked popcorn and a few plants, and made about a hundred dollars.
But, as the saying goes, from little things, big things grow: by the time the Ballina Market closed down over five years later, the stall was regularly taking well over a thousand dollars in sales, plus regular generous donations.
And when Ballina Market closed in 2022, did these intrepid marketeers give up and go home? No, they looked for another market, and found Lennox Head, where the stall has again been generating a solid monthly income for around 18 months.
But Lennox Market too, is now threatened with closure. Naturally, Meg and Trish are not sitting back, waiting to see if it does, but are actively searching for the next home for their stall. They’re very keen to support BR4R’s focus on refugee family resettlement in our region.