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lady in beige business attire is standing under a picnic hut and has a larged red and colourful macaw perched on her shoulder.","title":null,"link":null,"mobileSrc":"","attribution":"Verena Olesch - Maleny Bird World","quality":60},"mediaPropsSlide":null}]},":type":"teq/components/editorial/editorial-hero-banner"},"spacer":{"spacerType":"whitespace","paddingSize":"xxsmall",":type":"teq/components/spacer"},"editorial_descriptio":{"text":"\u003Cp\u003E‘A city girl like you… you wouldn’t last five minutes’ - Crocodile Dundee\u003C/p\u003E\r\n\u003Cp\u003EVerena Olesch laughs at her own ‘Crocodile Dundee moment’. \u003C/p\u003E\r\n\u003Cp\u003EA city girl jetting in from Frankfurt for a job interview in the Outback Queensland town of Karumba, aka Australia’s ‘Barramundi Capital’ in the Gulf of Carpentaria. Population: 531 people.\u003C/p\u003E\r\n\u003Cp\u003E“I’ve never travelled such a long way for an interview – from Frankfurt via Dubai, Singapore, Brisbane and Cairns into Normanton and then Karumba,” says Verena.\u003C/p\u003E\r\n\u003Cp\u003E“And, you know, there are these tiny little planes that go from Cairns to Karumba. So, I arrived wearing a short dress, lipstick, and slight heels – and I’m sure the community took one look at me and thought ‘how many weeks do we give her… she’ll be out of here in no time!’\u003C/p\u003E\r\n\u003Cp\u003E“But it’s not that easy to get rid of me, and it turned out to be a lot of fun.”\u003C/p\u003E\r\n\u003Cp\u003EA whole lot of fun, indeed. For Verena, not least being witnessing the excitement of tourists who visited the revamped, multi-million dollar \u003Ca href=\"https://www.carpentaria.qld.gov.au/discover/les-wilson-barramundi-discovery-centre\" target=\"_blank\"\u003ELes Wilson Barramundi Discovery Centre\u003C/a\u003E, opened under her watch as Carpentaria Shire Council’s General Manager of Tourism, starting September 2018. \u003C/p\u003E\r\n\u003Cp\u003EA multi award-winning attraction, also renowned as the only barramundi hatchery in the world to breed the Southern Gulf strain of the iconic Australian fish. A fascinating species, with all fish born male, before changing sex to become female around four to eight years of age.\u003C/p\u003E\r\n\u003Cp\u003EA Bikram yoga instructor with an extensive career in hospitality and tourism, Verena knew nothing about barramundi before landing the job. \u003C/p\u003E\r\n\u003Cp\u003E“I think I’d eaten barramundi once or twice in my life, but otherwise I knew absolutely nothing,” she says. Today, she likens the fish to ‘puppy dogs’ after swimming with brood females when cleaning tanks. \u003C/p\u003E\r\n\u003Cp\u003E“You know, they’ll swim around your legs like puppy dogs – they’re not at all aggressive. But the funniest thing on tours is hearing the shriek of the first tourist who gets to hold the squid just above the surface of the water during barramundi feeding sessions.\u003C/p\u003E\r\n\u003Cp\u003E“All of a sudden, this massive mouth appears and grabs the squid, and the amount of screaming that goes on is hilarious. Barramundi have such massive mouths, you think they might just swallow you whole.”\u003C/p\u003E\r\n\u003Cp\u003EIn the space of close to three years, Verena transformed the discovery centre – which breeds barramundi, according to moon cycles and tides, in order to restock Queensland’s northern tropical rivers and dams – into nothing short of an ‘Outback Queensland icon’. \u003C/p\u003E\r\n\u003Cp\u003EShe also implemented the Indigenous Stock Workers and Rodeo Riders displays in Normanton, including a focus on Indigenous female stock workers. Portraits of some of the women (by photographer David Prichard) won the coveted 2021 Taylor Wessing Prize, and today hang in London’s National Portrait Gallery.\u003C/p\u003E\r\n\u003Cp\u003EWhile it was Verena’s first experience ‘living remotely’, she’d already set her heart on calling Queensland ‘home’, after first traveling to Australia from London in 1990. Initially, she worked in Sydney as Australia/NZ marketing manager with Lufthansa before heading north to Townsville, gaining her dive certificate as a ‘kitchen hand’ aboard Mike Ball Dive Expeditions (including Minke Whale trips), and later, co-running a Cairns-based tourism business (Adventure Connection Australia) focused on the German speaking market.\u003C/p\u003E\r\n\u003Cp\u003EAlong the way, she met her former partner (the son of an Australian-born opera singer and Wagner tenor), had two children, then briefly returned to Germany (in late 2016) to work as a Bikram yoga teacher before moving her life to Karumba.\u003C/p\u003E\r\n\u003Cp\u003E“It’s funny, I remember standing at the reception in the yoga studio in Frankfurt, thinking, OK, I need to move back to Australia otherwise I’m going to go crazy if I have to do another winter in Germany.”\u003C/p\u003E\r\n\u003Cp\u003EIn 2021, she moved from Karumba to the Sunshine Coast to take up a new position as General Manager of \u003Ca href=\"https://www.malenybotanicgardens.com.au/\" target=\"_blank\"\u003EMaleny Botanic Gardens and Bird World\u003C/a\u003E, a unique tourist attraction set on 23 acres overlooking the Glass House Mountains, dotted with waterfalls, lakes and walking tracks.\u003C/p\u003E\r\n\u003Cp\u003EFor bird lovers, it offers an immersive and highly interactive aviary experience like no other with 700 native and exotic birds. Think macaws, finches, black cockatoos, African grey parrots, and more.\u003C/p\u003E\r\n\u003Cp\u003E“Most of the birds are rescued or donated, and very tame and chatty,” says Verena. \u003C/p\u003E\r\n\u003Cp\u003E“It’s an incredible experience. I don’t think there’s anything like it… definitely not in Australia, and maybe not even the world. You walk in and birds land on you, and they have a little chat in your ear, and people are completely blown away by it.”\u003C/p\u003E\r\n\u003Cp\u003EUnder Verena’s leadership, the venue is in the process of expanding its Bird World experience to a second aviary, with plans to also launch an interactive farm animal experience before the end of the year.\u003C/p\u003E\r\n\u003Cp\u003EDon’t be surprised to hear resident birds speaking in a German accent.\u003C/p\u003E\r\n\u003Cp\u003EAs Verena explains: “My staff say they’ve noticed some of the birds are starting to sound a bit like me, which is funny and a nice compliment.”\u003C/p\u003E\r\n\u003Cp\u003E \u003C/p\u003E\r\n\u003Cp\u003E\u003Cb\u003E/Ends\u003Cbr\u003E\r\n\u003C/b\u003E\u003C/p\u003E\r\n\u003Cp\u003EWord Count: 828\u003C/p\u003E\r\n\u003Cp\u003EAuthor: Tourism and Events Queensland \u003C/p\u003E\r\n\u003Cp\u003EUp to date as at: January 2023\u003C/p\u003E\r\n\u003Cp\u003EThis Character Profile is supplied courtesy of Tourism and Events Queensland. For more information, please go to \u003Ca href=\"http://www.queensland.com\" target=\"_blank\"\u003Ewww.queensland.com\u003C/a\u003E and for images, please visit \u003Ca href=\"http://www.visuals.queensland.com\" target=\"_blank\"\u003Ewww.visuals.queensland.com\u003C/a\u003E.\u003C/p\u003E\r\n","readMoreHeight":0,"richText":true,":type":"teq/components/editorial/editorial-description"},"spacer_copy_915262880":{"spacerType":"whitespace","paddingSize":"xxsmall",":type":"teq/components/spacer"},"spacer_1679915333":{"spacerType":"line","paddingSize":"medium",":type":"teq/components/spacer"},"card_carousel":{"title":"Looking for more character profiles?","type":"page","componentID":"card-carousel_927317709","cardCount":8,"classification":"/content/dam/teq/content-fragments/public-classifications/corporate/news-and-media/character-profiles","width":"12 column","cta":{"href":"https://teq.queensland.com/au/en/news-and-media/media-resources/character-profiles","label":"Select to see more","target":"_self"},":type":"teq/components/corp/card-carousel"},"spacer_1558440557":{"spacerType":"whitespace","paddingSize":"medium",":type":"teq/components/spacer"}},":itemsOrder":["spacer_copy","editorial_hero_banne_579018590","spacer","editorial_descriptio","spacer_copy_915262880","spacer_1679915333","card_carousel","spacer_1558440557"],":type":"wcm/foundation/components/responsivegrid"},"footer_menu":{"acknowledge":"\u003Cp\u003E\u003Ci\u003ETourism and Events Queensland acknowledges the Traditional Owners of Country and we recognise their continuing connection to land, waters, culture and community. We pay our respect to Elders past and present, and we value and respect Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander cultures in all that we do.\u003C/i\u003E\u003C/p\u003E\r\n","teqLogo":{"src":"/content/dam/teq/consumer/global/logos/corp_white.svg","alt":null,"link":null,"quality":0.0},"richText":true,"menuItemsOne":[{"title":"Contact us","link":{"href":"https://teq.queensland.com/au/en/industry/who-we-are/contact-us","target":"_self"}},{"title":"Disclaimer and privacy","link":{"href":"https://teq.queensland.com/au/en/industry/who-we-are/corporate-governance/disclaimer-and-privacy","target":"_self"}},{"title":"Right to information","link":{"href":"https://teq.queensland.com/au/en/industry/who-we-are/corporate-governance/right-to-information","target":"_self"}},{"title":"Annual reports","link":{"href":"https://teq.queensland.com/au/en/industry/who-we-are/annual-reports","target":"_self"}}],"menuItemsTwo":[{"title":"Need a holiday? 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