Kirsty Sword Gusmão
| Kirsty Sword Gusmão, AO | |
|---|---|
Sword Gusmão accepting a plaque aboard the USS Reuben James (FFG-57) in 2010
|
|
| First Lady of East Timor | |
|
In office 20 May 2002 – 20 May 2007 |
|
| Preceded by | Position created |
| Succeeded by | Ana Pessoa Pinto ? |
| Personal details | |
| Born |
Kirsty Sword 19 April 1966 Melbourne, Victoria, Australia |
| Nationality |
Australian East Timorese |
| Spouse(s) | Xanana Gusmão (2000–2015 [separated]) |
| Children | 3 sons |
| Parents | Brian Sword, Rosalie Sword |
| Education |
Eaglehawk Primary Golden Square Secondary |
| Alma mater |
University of Melbourne (BA Hons) Monash University (DipEd) Victoria University (DUniv) |
| Occupation | Administrative secretary, teacher, researcher, interpreter, political activist, spy |
| Known for | First Lady of East Timor |
| Religion | Protestant |
| Awards | Officer of the Order of Australia |
Kirsty Sword Gusmão AO (born Kirsty Sword; 19 April 1966) is an Australian-East Timorese activist who served as the First Lady of East Timor from 2002 until 2007. She is married to Xanana Gusmão, former Prime Minister and President of East Timor. She is the founding director of the Alola Foundation, which seeks to improve the lives of women in Timor-Leste, a nation with one of the world's lowest per capita GDPs.
Sword was born in 1966 in Melbourne, Australia, to schoolteachers Brian and Rosalie Sword, and was raised there and in Bendigo. She attended Eaglehawk Primary School, where her father was the principal and her mother a music teacher in the 1970s. She was taught her first Indonesian words by her father when she was four years old. She was a promising ballet dancer, but decided not to pursue it as a career. As a teen, Sword travelled to Bali and Jakarta with her father and brother. After Golden Square Secondary College, she attended Monash University and the University of Melbourne in the 1980s where she completed a Bachelor of Arts (Honours) degree, majoring in Indonesian and Italian, and a Diploma of Education. In 1985, while studying Indonesian at Monash, Sword met Timor-Leste students and took up their struggle for independence. Her father Brian died in 1998.
Sword worked as an administrative secretary with the Overseas Service Bureau (now Australian Volunteers International) until 1991, when she joined the Refugee Studies Program at Oxford University in England as assistant to the development coordinator. Later that year, she travelled to East Timor as a researcher and interpreter for a Yorkshire Television documentary film called In Cold Blood: The massacre of East Timor about political and social developments in the territory.
...
Wikipedia