E03 - Alpha Cheng & Changing the Headline

“I started… to think maybe I can also use my story on my own terms to spread positive messages and speak out against hate, and potentially prevent or reduce the risk of similar things happening again.”

In this episode Scarlet speaks with Churchill Fellow Alpha Cheng about how he found his voice for advocacy after the sudden and violent loss of his father. Alpha’s father Curtis Cheng was killed in a terrorist attack in 2015. Alpha shares with us how he chooses to messages of hope over hate, full in the knowledge that his, and stories like his, have the power to change communities and policies.

Drawing from his experiences abroad in UK, Norway, Denmark, France and Israel, Alpha aims to promote harmony, unity, hope, as a way of speaking out against prejudice and hate. Through this stance Alpha has been able to use his voice to promote change for issues such as gun laws, xenophobia and multicultural diversity. Alpha was a finalist in the 2016 Young Australian of the Year for his advocacy work.

Visit Alpha Cheng’s Churchill Trust Project Page here.

Listen to more episodes Podcast Partner S01E03: Transcript - Alpha Cheng

Yellow Edge: Yellow Edge, in association with the Winston Churchill Trust, proudly presents the Wayfinder Podcast. In this series, we ask high-performing individuals, how they plotted the path to success. Our guests are all Churchill fellows, having been provided the opportunity by the Churchill Trust to research their chosen field internationally. The Wayfinder explores the often-winding parts of how these fellows came to their professions and catalogues the trials and tribulations faced along the way, and now your host Scarlet Bennett.

Scarlet Bennett: Alpha Cheng’s life was changed forever when his father Curtis Chang was tragically killed by a terrorist attack on October the 2nd 2015.

I'm Scarlet Bennett, thank you for joining me on the Wayfinder podcast, Alpha.

Alpha Cheng: Thank you, Scarlet. Really happy to be here today.

Scarlet Bennett: Thank you. I wonder, just to kick off Alpha, give us a sense of who your father was, what sort of man was he?

Alpha Cheng: Sometimes it's so hard to capture like someone that's so, so important in your life, so quickly, but I think one thing that described dad was a really gentle really kind person. I think one thing that really stuck with me with dad, is that he's such an incredible family man. Like I think he really kind of works everything for the family- providing my sister and I every opportunity he could afford us, he spends a lot of time with us, helping us and also just even a lot of leisure time as well. Like he would try to like to understand our interests. He'll play like video games with us. He will come play sports with us, whatever we were choosing to do. So someone that's really sort of just dedicated to family and us and yeah, just someone-he's also extremely sort of hardworking sometimes like soft-spoken and yeah, really sort of loved by his, his friends just like in a very, very sort of like loving and doting dad, as I say this, all I can think is how much I miss his presence every day.

Scarlet Bennett: Yes, I'm sure. I'm sure you do. It sounds like he was a really, really great dad and a good man in many, many respects. Alpha tell us what happened on the 2nd of October, 2015.

Alpha Cheng: Well, from where I was on the 2nd of October, I was actually in South Australia, in McLaren Vale on holidays with a couple of friends. And I remember we, we were walking into a pizza place for dinner. And then my friend was like I got an alert on his phone and he was like ‘oh, there's been a shooting outside the New South Wales Police Headquarters.’

And my instant thought was like ‘oh, well dad works there.’ So well maybe we'll sit down, and I'll give him a call see what's happening.

And I remember then we ordered, and then I kind of stepped out and gave him a call and I remember going, like, it went straight to voicemail. And then I was like going that’s, that's kind of odd.

So I called, I called mum and she picked her up. She was, she sounded worried, and I was like, oh, did you hear what's happening? She's like, ‘yes, I I've been trying to contact, contact your dad for a while, but not getting through.’ And then I was just kind of reassured her. I was like, oh, well probably they've just kind of like blocked all communications. Like I'm sure everything will work out and we'll hear what's happening soon.

And then I remember it was probably not even that much longer, probably only about 15, 20 minutes later when I got a call from my sister and I could hear that she was in tears. And I think I sort of knew what was happening. And then my sister was like, ‘have you heard what's happened?’ And she was like, ‘well, the, the police has called me and has formally told me that the person that was shot was dad.’ And that was when I sort of like found out what has happened on that day. And from… what happened was that dad was leaving work on a Friday afternoon as he normally would--

Scarlet Bennett: --he wasn't a police officer, was he? Sorry, he worked adjacent?

Alpha Cheng: No. So he worked, he was part of the he was a civilian sort of a public servant for the police force. So he worked in the in the finance department with New South Wales Police. And yeah, so he, yeah worked at the New South Wales Police Headquarters in, in Parramatta.

And yeah, as he was walking out of the building a 15-year-old boy kind of walked up behind him… and shot him in the back of the head in a terrorist act. And that, from what we've been told and killed him instantly and the 15-year-old boy then turned his attention to the front of the building kind of fired shots that alerted two special constables in the police headquarters. They came out and in the exchange of fire the 15-year-old boy was, was shot dead at the scene as well. And I always kind of say that it's not just one sort of tragedy that was, that was two as well. What as it is for, for myself, it's horrific, but it's, it's also kind of going, what, what brings a 15 year old to, to believe that such an act is in a way a solution to anything. And that, that was an incredibly hard, hard day. I couldn't get out of Adelaide that night.

And the next day I flew back to Sydney and went back to our family home. And there were police there. There were a couple of family friends that were there… And it was just one of the most devastating I guess scenes that you could imagine. It's just like mum was just absolutely inconsolable, and you just kind of felt a bit I knew I was a bit numb about like what even to do. I'm still trying to process everything. There's lots going on. There's lots of people around. Then we needed to get briefed by our family liaison officer who was a really amazing sort of police detective, who kind of like talked us through what was going on and what we are expecting to happen over the next sort of like days or so. There's a lot of things happening, we still had to even formally sort of like identify the body and things like that. So it was yeah, thinking back on it's all a bit of a like…like a blur now…

Scarlet Bennett: Cause you're in shock.

Alpha Cheng: Definitely, as I said in one of those things-- in terms of moments that kind of fundamentally change your life and sort of trajectory-- this has to be, this has to be one of those.

Scarlet Bennett: You don't expect that. Do you? Your dad goes to work in the morning, just like he normally does, and then he doesn't come home.

What did you subsequently find out about his killer and the reason for the attack Alpha?

Alpha Cheng: What we found out was this is a 15 year old boy who had… I think some history of challenges in terms of at school, mental health, support, and was-- I guess you could say like targeted, and I guess you could say brainwashed and sort of like radicalised by a couple of, I guess criminals, thugs. Who are already sort of being watched by police have previous criminal records and they wanted to commit a terrorist act. And they, I guess, targeted someone who was vulnerable, someone that wasn't on the radar to commit like a heinous act.

I know that those also like, the perpetrator’s sister that I think a couple of days prior to the shooting, boarded a plane and went over to Syria to be a foreign fighter or, as they say, like sort of like an ISIS sort of bride, so to say. So there was like a lot of things going on. I think we will probably never fully, I guess, understand what was going on behind sort of it all. And I know and hopefully we still haven't had it yet, but a coronial inquest that should be coming up some, some point into the future. And hopefully we may find out a bit more. But I'm not, I guess I'm not sort of like dying to find out more of those sort of details.

Scarlet Bennett: Well, it won’t bring your father back will it?

Alpha Cheng: No, exactly.

Scarlet Bennett: And you know, what was the aftermath like for you and your family as all this sort of information unfolded?

Alpha Cheng: Yeah, it was… the aftermath, I think, as I said, it was just, it would just hit so hard, but it also was so public as well. And I remember like, even like the, the first day or two afterwards, I think we were kind of asked, it's like going, ‘you need to put out like a media release from a family's perspective.’ And maybe even like a picture of your father that you want to share with the media. This was sort of my first dealings with, I guess, with media and the public and had to learn very quickly, like what to do, how to respond, what to say, what message do we want to provide. And that was, I guess, a bit of like as the cliche goes, like a baptism of fire—

Scarlet Bennett: I could imagine.

Alpha Cheng: yeah, exactly. And then also trying to balance-- trying to support mum-- but also I managed like a lot of the things that were happening because it is also like a criminal investigation, and then also family and friends that were also trying to support-- and people that were flying in from overseas and things like that, like family and things like that. So there was lots going on and I just remembered, not even having time to kind of process it for myself, like dealing with everything. And it's been, it's been incredibly hard the months sort of went by. I think it it's taken mum quite a long time to really to sort of, I guess, pick up the pieces and to find herself again.

I've had to take sort of some time off work as well to sort of process and deal with what's happening. And so, yeah it does sort of have like a fundamental impact. I think my mental health and my resilience has definitely not been as strong as it used to be as well. But we continue to push through and to rebuild and to potentially even hopefully find some positives from it in terms of my some of the advocacy work that I do in terms of since 2015, but there's definitely a sense emptiness sometimes in terms of reflecting a family that it's like, dad's not, not here and has been kind of like being sort of almost taken away from us in a way we had absolutely no control over.

Scarlet Bennett: And I guess at times like this at this time of year, you know, we're recording just in the lead up to Christmas and birthdays, anniversaries, those sorts of things. It's always particularly hard too, isn’t it?

Alpha Cheng: Yeah, absolutely. I think in even like every year, I think when October 2nd comes around, it really does kind of does loom large as well. And also like our National Police Remembrance Day, I think it's normally late September as well, so that we get invited to that and that's sort of like amplifies that because that but the, those two events sort of coinciding in quite close sort of dates.

Scarlet Bennett: The last thing on your mind when you were preparing your eulogy for your father's funeral would have been public attention… but it got quite a lot of it, didn't it? Tell us about that.

Alpha Cheng: Yeah, I think, I'll, like walk back a couple of steps in terms of like, I through some of the press media release and things that we were doing, it kind of led me to realise how what I say really has a big influence on sort of like the mood or sentiment.

And I remember when we were going through the original media release that the police media gave us a draft and me and a couple of friends, we kind of sat through and did some of our own edits. We added in some sort of personal touches and things to it. But I remember there was a sentence in there that we, that we changed. The sentence was it was a kind of like a quote it's like ‘we are shocked’ by whatever that's happening. And I remember us changing the word ‘shocked’ to the words ‘heart broken.’ So ‘we are heart broken by the loss of our father or Curtis.’ And I remember when we made that edit, we sent it off and within like, I think 20 or 40 minutes, like the headlines were already up, it says like ‘family heartbroken.’ And that made me kind of go like, wow, if that was the word that was changed. So if it meant that if it wasn't changing the headlines would have been ‘family shocked.’ And I think that creates that sense of very sort of different sort of tone and message.

So when I was preparing for the eulogy, I was very highly aware of what type of impact what I said was and I think given like the sentiment and the sensitivities, I always sort of say it's that, and there was no control-- no one was trying to control what I was trying to say as, as well, like no one was doing that. So if anything, I could have started-- I always said that I could have started a riot if I wanted to. I could have been extremely angry. I could've said what I wanted. I could've unleashed a lot of negative feelings and rightfully so, but I made a very distinct choice not to, because I reflected and I go-- this is exactly what the, the extremists, the terrorists, the forces that seek to sort of hurt us in our society, wants us to do, they want us to sow greater seeds of hate or resentment to kind of fuel that rhetoric.

So I kind of went, no, we're not going, I am not going to give into that. So I crafted a eulogy that really was not really about what's happened externally, but kind of refocused on sort of the things that really matter: how important dad was in our life, how kind and gentle he was as a person, and what that means to us as a society. We kept it short and sweet and focusing on those elements and not being carried by the waves of negative sort of rhetoric that was really kind of starting to, to manifests itself at that point. I did not realise how far it was going to go or, or how the message was received, but it was absolutely received in a in an extremely positive way.

I think all I have to say in terms of the eulogy is really made an active choice to not let the events sort of lead me to a path of anger and resentment—

Scarlet Bennett: --and revenge and destruction.

Alpha Cheng: Because I reflected back on dad as a person, and I don't think that's what he would have wanted as well.

Scarlet Bennett: Yeah, and certainly, you know, the media around the eulogy was very much that you had taken the higher road.

Alpha Cheng: Thank you. And I did not like sort of intend to sort of elevate myself in any way. But as I said, like, I think by doing that, it kind of is sort of my act of defiance against those that have inflicted such sort of hurt and pain on dad, on us as a family, and on us as a society as well.

Scarlet Bennett: There was a turning point for you I understand in December of 2015/January 2016, that led to some changes. Can you tell us a little bit about that?

Alpha Cheng: Sure. I think after the eulogy, after all the sort of the really sort of public sort of engagements that we needed to go through as part of dad's funeral and some of the proceedings around that I think I was like going, okay… maybe just kind of by kind of stay private, not sort of try to ruffle any feathers. And so yeah, I had a lot of sort of requests for media interviews and things like that to share stories or to talk things, and we've kind of politely declined a lot of things as well. And in December 2015/January 2016, I went to Israel on a Holocaust education sort of study tour, which I applied for and got a few months before dad’s tragic death. And a lot of people were saying, ‘oh no, Alpha, don't go. You've had a very like tough sort of couple of months and I think like five weeks of learning about the Holocaust, isn't going to necessarily cheer you up.’

(laughter)

Scarlet Bennett: Not the thing to lift your spirits, is it?

Alpha Cheng: (laughter) No, no, but and also sort of being in a region where… just a higher risk of—perceived risk of terrorism attacks. And then it's like all yeah, like, think about your mother. You don't want her to worry about these things, but I, again, I was like going, I don't want to let this act change how I live my life and what I think is important.

So I went over to Israel and through this study trip we talked to and met with a lot of Holocaust survivors. Survivors that have been through sort of Auschwitz, death marches, hidden in orphanages, smuggled out of Eastern Europe and all sorts of amazing, inspirational and sort of heartbreaking and tragic stories. And all of them who have gone through trauma, which I think are almost many times more than I've experienced were talking about the concept of ‘never again.’ In terms of like and also not using hate and revenge to sort of cloud their stories is that they want to promote harmony, unity, hope, like sort of speaking out against prejudice and hate.

And I think those stories and those messages, I think really hit home for me and kind of go like, if you have an ability to, and a potential platform to be able to do so-- to spread these messages-- you should. And it was sort of after I came back from Israel, and having heard all these survivors talk about their stories in such a positive way, that I was started to be… to think maybe I can also use my story on my own terms to sort of spread positive messages and speak out against hate and potentially prevent or reduce the risk of similar things happening again.

Scarlet Bennett: And where did that lead you to, Alpha?

Alpha Cheng: It led me firstly to, I guess, to have the confidence to accept request for interviews to be on panels. And I never intended it to be, but it sort of like you open one door…

Scarlet Bennett: And another opens…

Alpha Cheng: and it kind of opens, because I remember like I did one with Channel Nine called ‘In Conversation’ and then that opened the door to, and then 60 Minutes was like going, oh, you've done this one... Like I, and then, so when I did that one, then that was quite influential as well. Speaking with Liz Hayes who was an amazing interviewer as well. And then, yeah, as I said, it led to more doors, more people at different publications or podcasts and events started wanting to speak to me, and it's kind of led to an interesting couple of ways: I was invited on Insight to talk about gun control, because from my understanding, dad was sort of-- the gun that was used was sort of on the grey/black market, and being part of that led to me to lend my voice in advocacy in gun control, and sort of me getting more confident in that.

And then there was a lot of political sort of discussions about Muslims and especially Muslim immigration. And my dad's sort of tragic death was kind of pulled into it. It's like going well, if we don't want this to happen again, like this is what happens when we let sort of essentially paraphrasing, this is what happens when we let Muslims in. And then I just could not sort of sit back and hear and let that happen. And it sort of like goes back to what I was I learned when I was in Israel is to, when you see something that you don't agree with in terms of hate and prejudice, you speak up. And so I wrote an op-ed speaking out against it.

I guess I did not intend it to be, but it also became like a little bit viral at that stage. It got a lot of tractions and it sort of like helped dampen the escalating rhetoric from there as well. And then the things just kept sort of like progressing, and I was very humbled when I got, what was the finalist for young Australian of the Year. I think this was in 2017/2018. For recognition of some of my work in, in sort of the advocacy and speaking out against sort of hate and division, and that's just continue to open more doors speaking to more people, getting invited to more events and interestingly a lot of these events starting people started asking me questions about, ‘oh, what should the government do to prevent this? Do you have any policy ideas or things to in terms of what you're talking about?’

And that's when I start kind of like going, oh, I actually don't have a lot of answers to these. I can talk about from a personal experience, but I'm no expert in government policy, and yes, I've been able to sort of use sort of my platform as a high school teacher at this stage to kind of spread a lot of messages and I think it helped amplify it because I was a teacher of humanities. And yeah, this is just kind of like, I don't think I've fully planned up a path since 2015, but it's as I said, it's just, sometimes you. You open one door and it sort of leads to another.

Scarlet Bennett: And tell us how the Churchill Fellowship fitted into that, Alpha?

Alpha Cheng: Yeah. And as I was just mentioning and being sort of roped into sort of potential like policy discussions. And I kind of went, I really don't know much about policy and how policy works. And I really wanted to find out more and a couple of friends were like going ‘Alpha, have you thought about applying for a Churchill Fellowship? Because it's perfect for someone like you. Who's got a bit of a passion and a sort of a really strong sort of backstory to want to do like a passion research project.’ And I did some research and I applied, I just said that this is my story. This is what I'm interested in finding out more. I want to see what governments or organisations, or communities are doing in, in different parts of the world to address sort of extremism to prevent young people becoming sort of at risk or radicalised. And also get a better understand of what is my role as someone who's been a victim or a person affected by extremism and terrorism.

And I applied because I went to in Churchill information session and they were like, ‘oh yeah, you should apply, normally people don't get it, like the first time around…’ and so I just thought-- okay, do you know what? This might happen later down the track, but I'm just going to throw one in. Just to like get practice of applying and I applied. They gave me an interview, and I was already like going, wow, I've got an interview. And then I did the interview and I was like, oh, that was really great experience. I now know what to do next time I apply. And then they were like ‘congratulations Alpha you've got a Churchill fellowship.’ Go to your go do your research. And I was, I was almost unprepared for it as well. And they obviously thought I had something to add to this field, and I'm tremendously grateful for the opportunity that the Churchill fellowship has given me because as part of my project, I was able to travel to the UK, Norway, Denmark, and France, to go to conferences, to talk to academics, to talk to community groups, and also government departments, program leads and things like that. And it was, yeah, something that I would not have been able to do out of my own accord like the networks and the doors that the Churchill fellowship name can open is just it's just incredible.

Scarlet Bennett: What were your key findings? Like in a nutshell, you know, what are the key things you discovered or learnt on your travels, Alpha?

Alpha Cheng: Yeah, that's it's so hard sometimes to consolidate like so many meetings and conferences into, into a couple of points, but I think the one that some of the key things to me is that:

- one is if we're trying to address like violent or extremists issues is it's focusing on, it's more like a risk based and a behaviour-based approach is better. Is looking at risk behaviours, as opposed to looking at risk groups, especially demographic group. And I think certain countries or jurisdictions have found out very quickly that inadvertently sometimes not even explicitly, but inadvertently targeting demographics of certain groups potentially by race, by religion ends up actually sort of even like exacerbating the situation more than it than it needs to.

- I think community engagement and community buy-in is extremely important. If you don't bring the community with you in terms of what government, what law enforcements are doing, that's going to be a challenge.

- Another major finding that was of interest to me is how the power of affected voices in this field can be so-- affected being someone who's a victim or has experienced sort of extremism and terrorism-- those voices can be used very powerfully in terms of shaping narratives, in terms of working with communities. And I found sort of meeting other victims and survivors and affected people of extremism and terrorism on my journey, on my Churchill fellowship, I think really empowered me that I do have a voice and I can make a difference in this area.

Scarlet Bennett: Six years on, Alpha, how has this changed you?

Alpha Cheng: Six years on that's. I think it's, it's changed me in so many ways. I think if I, six years ago, if you kind of go, ‘oh, this is what you would have done and achieving, this is where you will be.’ I don't think I could have pictured that. I think. It's kind of got me to realise that sometimes I also, I need to prioritise my mental health as well.

That's been something that I've come to realise in the past couple of years that I need to be kind to myself, slow down a bit. That's really, probably at the same time, a bit of career trajectory as well. I was very happy being a high school teacher. And I think with everything that's happened with a lot of discussions and involvement in terms of policy work that has led me to pursue a potential career in policy. So I have in the past couple of years, I joined the public service and learning a lot and seeing where I could influence or shape sort of advice or decisions… and so that's definitely changed. The biggest change of course is, picking up the pieces of the pain that the past sort of five, six years have been inflicted on us. It's been a huge, like journey, sort of helping mum through all of this. And I think we're with just coming out of the-- we're just probably coming out in, in a lot of positivity, mum recently got a dog which has absolutely transformed her life, and we didn't realise that it was going to make such a big difference.

Scarlet Bennett: That's lovely.

Alpha Cheng: But yes, and as you said, like every year when those sorts of times when you do get together as a family, like sort of those like sort of like milestone dates, like birthdays, anniversaries, or like festival dates. Like you do kind of going, like, there is sort of that, that emptiness or that missing person that we’re missing very much.

We're doing, I think, the best we can. As a family I think we've really tried to like shine a light. We've tried to pursue our lives as, as best as we can. A lot of the times in honour or in memory of my father and like my sister has done really well. Like she's just recently graduated from university and she's doing really great things as a dentist out in sort of like a regional community. Who knows where the next six years will bring, but everything we do in the next six years, I think dad will always be there with us.

Scarlet Bennett: That's lovely. Alpha thank you very much indeed for joining us on the Wayfinder, it's been fascinating to hear your story, and I'm just so sorry that it came out of such difficult circumstances.

Alpha Cheng: Thank you, thank you very much for having me.

Scarlet Bennett: Thanks.

Yellow Edge: Thank you for listening to the Wayfinder Podcast. For more information on Yellow Edge and our services, including professional development, coaching, strategic support, mediation, and venue, visit yellowedge.com.au. For more information on the Winston Churchill Trust visit ChurchillTrust.com.au.