Returning to your former hometown, revisiting childhood memories, and catching up with school friends is a unique and different experience for everyone: some people resist it, while others relish it.
Luckily for Wee Waa, international lawyer Gavin Ingram was beyond excited to hit the road, leave the big smoke and head back to the wide-open plains of the Northwest region to officially open the town’s 88th show on August 25, catching up with old mates in the place he once (and often still) fondly calls home.
“It was wonderful to return to Wee Waa and see so many familiar faces from my childhood and to receive such a warm welcome,” Gavin told the The Courier.
“It was like I had never left.”
It’s clear the Wee Waa region and its people hold a special place in Gavin’s heart; their kindness, companionship and guidance are qualities he’s never forgotten even when working as a lawyer around the world for large companies such as BlueScope Steel and Global Blue.
And it’s a grounded message that Gavin, a Wee Waa High School graduate, wanted to share with local students.
“It is a big world beyond the levee bank but also a great community contained within,” he said.
“Wherever life takes you, remember Wee Waa and the people whom you met and grew up with.
“The delight in having someone remember your name after 30 years and welcoming you home is the greatest feeling anyone can have.
“I could not be prouder of my connections to Wee Waa and I hope I will return for many years to come.”
The Ingram family are well-known and respected former farmers of the Spring Plains and Wee Waa area, with Gavin’s father Barry growing cotton and wheat, and Gavin’s mother Jenny an active community member for nearly 30 years before the couple retired to the Sunshine Coast in 2009.
The family moved to the Wee Waa district in 1983 when Gavin was 10 years old, and he certainly made his mark – striving and thriving in many aspects of school life.
A popular student, Gavin took on the role of school captain at Wee Waa Central School in 1985 and WWHS in 1991.
He also excelled academically: awarded dux of his year and selected, as one of six students from around Australia, to receive a full tuition scholarship to study Law and Commerce at Bond University in 1992.
An amazing achievement for a student coming from a small country high school with only 11 classmates in his final year, Gavin is living proof students from a rural town can go on to conquer and fulfil their dreams.
“Growing up in a rural community teaches you the importance of resilience, adaptability and independence, but most importantly, the values of integrity and respect,” said Gavin.
“With these skills you will always be noticed and valued.
“Never let anyone tell you it can’t be done. Find those people who will help you get it done.
“There is a world of endless opportunity and possibility so long as you have the courage and determination to find it, chase it and grasp it – nothing is impossible, and you can do anything when you put your mind to it.”
Of course, it also takes the support of remarkable family, friends, and teachers to recognise and nurture a student’s strengths, and it was Gavin’s keen interest and talent as a public speaker that led him to a career in law.
He recalled the support of one such teacher, former WWHS principal Allan Grocott, who once commented, “I have never known a student who so relishes the public speaking scene or so enjoys the use of a microphone”.
Showing his sense of humour, Gavin shared a snippet of what his WWHS Year 12 adviser Peter Carrett wrote in the 1991 Yearbook: “And finally I come to that long streak of utterly miserable humanity known as Gavin
‘I’ve got the verbal diarrhoea’ Ingram.
“What will school legend and a memory dimmed by time make of this young man?
“In years to come, when our honour board is old and yellowed, how many will point out his name and say he went here.”
Peter and his wife Jenny Carrett were two of the locals Gavin caught up with during his trip, and his professional and personal accomplishments came as little surprise.
“It was a real highlight for Jenny and I to catch-up with Gavin,” said Peter.
“When Gavin was in Year 12 I asked him what he wanted him to be and he told me he wanted to be a Queen’s Counsel.
“As his former teacher I’m not surprised he’s achieved everything he has.
Gavin Ingram returned to Wee Waa recently to open the show, he is pictured here at the show with, Sue Smith, Anna Baird, Pat and John Kiem. Gavin said he was very grateful to all the locals for their kindness and hospitality during his trip.
“I really do think he’s an inspiration for our students – he is a kid who lived not far from Wee Waa out on the Spring Plains Road, he was in the band, he had very supportive parents, he got the most out of school he could, he was heavily involved.
“He was in a great year; I was privileged to have this amazing class where all of these kids have gone on to achieve the most brilliant things.
“They loved being at school, they loved being in the band – they were a great year.”
There’s no doubt law was the right career choice for Gavin, he continued to do well at university completing his law degree with First Class Honours in Law being the highest level of academic achievement.
After receiving multiple employment offers from some of Australia’s biggest law firms, Gavin elected to work as a corporate lawyer, joining a law firm with over 1500 lawyers.
Just two years into his legal career, Gavin was selected to be sent to Harvard University to further develop and sharpen his skills as a legal negotiator and advocate.
No other lawyer at the firm had been awarded this honour so early in their career.
Suffice to say, Gavin quickly earned the respect of his colleagues and clients; however, he didn’t let the stellar success and accolades go to his head.
Always proud of his country roots, Gavin was the only lawyer to drive to work in a much-travelled Subaru Brumby ute purchased from AqQuip in 1990.
“It never looked out of place (in the car park) among the BMWs and Porsches, and it was many years before I upgraded to a vehicle more fitting,” he said.
Gavin continued as a private practice lawyer for eight years before deciding to move to an in-house role working as a lawyer for Australia’s largest company BHP, joining BHP Steel in 2003 at a time when it was investing billions of dollars building steel plants across Asia.
His role as an in-house lawyer would require him to travel frequently and extensively and provide legal advice on a range of complex legal matters.
This would be the beginning of Gavin’s international career, which would see him travel across the world for the next 25 years, working extensively throughout the Asia-Pacific and across Europe.
In the last 10 years alone, Gavin has taken 480 international flights and worked in 36 different countries, clocking up the miles, and hopefully frequent flyer points, Gavin said his flight tracking app shows he has travelled more than 2 million kilometres by plane (the equivalent of going to the Moon 5.27 times) and spent 2,700 hours in the air.
However, one stand-out work journey was a trip Gavin made to Vietnam in 2004, in fact, it turned out to be life-changing because its where he met the love of his life, and now wife Sally.
Gavin was in Vietnam for work, and Sally was on holiday from Sydney.
The couple are now happily married with three children: Harry (13), Sam (11) and Grace (9).
In order to be closer to his work in the Asia-Pacific region and to reduce the time spent on planes, Gavin and Sally moved from Sydney to Singapore in 2007, where they lived for 14 years.
In his role with BHP Steel in Singapore, now called BlueScope Steel, Gavin was named the Leading In-House Counsel across the Asia Pacific, acknowledging his outstanding legal and compliance work in the region.
Between 2008 and 2010, Gavin furthered his education by completing a Masters of Business Administration at the University of Chicago, Booth School of Business.
The University of Chicago’s MBA degree is considered a very rigorous and challenging program and often takes the top spot in the world rankings for MBA programs.
Gavin graduated with honours in 2010 and was inducted as a Member of Beta Gamma Sigma; the international business honour society for honours students from the world’s top business schools.
For the last nine years, Gavin has continued his work as an international lawyer working for Swiss-based company Global Blue.
Global Blue is listed on the New York Stock Exchange and operates in over 55 countries worldwide.
In late 2020, the beauty of the Australian lifestyle beckoned as well as the desire to be closer to extended family so Gavin, Sally and their three children returned to live in Sydney.
After 32 years of travelling and telling the world where Wee Waa is, Gavin said it was a great privilege to return home to open the 88th Wee Waa Show.
“The Wee Waa Show was a wonderful reminder that our rural communities really are the best places in Australia to live and grow up where everyone knows each other, supports each other and understands the value of community,” he said.
“I also had the chance to meet up with old school friends where it was like we had only seen each other yesterday; yet 30 years had passed.
“It confirms there is something so special about the people you went to school with, and that strong bond continues for a lifetime no matter where your life takes you and how infrequently you may catch up.
“It was wonderful to drive the streets of Wee Waa where I took many photos of the places that I remember from my childhood.
“Even for those shops and places that no longer exist or sit empty, I could still picture myself walking through the doors of Prices buying a Slush Puppy or enjoying some chips and gravy from Olympia Café.”
Gavin said he still shows interest in the local scene, reading the Wee Waa News and school newsletters, sharing comments and commending students.
“I really enjoyed visiting Wee Waa Public School during my visit where so much remains the same yet so much as changed,” said Gavin.
“It was such a joy to stand next to the honour board and see my name that was added 38 years ago and simply to walk the playground and corridors where it all began.”
“I will always have a very close connection with the school as my time there really evokes such happy memories for me and it’s great to connect with the current students who will in the future be proud to say, ‘I grew up in Wee Waa’.”
Gavin Ingram and with his three children, Harry (13), Samuel (11) and Grace (9) and parents Jenny and Barry in Sydney recently. Gavin’s wife Sally captured this great photo.
