2025 ABC Heywire competition: National winners share their stories of trauma and loss

A Casino farmer and a Coffs Harbour child trafficking survivor are among 38 winners in the 2025 Heywire competition. Here are their incredible stories. Warning: Readers are advised this story discusses genocide, rape and child sex trafficking.

Mayada from the Mid Coast, left, and Blake from the Northern Rivers are among 38 National winners in the 2025 ABC Heywire competition.

A Northern Rivers farmer and a Coffs Harbour child traffic survivor are among 38 winners in the annual ABC Heywire competition.

The inspiring youths were chosen after demonstrating incredible determination, grit and commitment to inspiring change in their communities through their stories.

Hundreds of Australians aged 16 to 22 from regional, rural, and remote areas entered the national competition by speaking openly about life beyond our major cities, through written stories, photos, videos, or audio recordings.

Blake from Casino is one of 38 national winners in the 2025 ABC Heywire competition. Picture: ABC’s Leah White

The 2025 ABC Heywire cohort includes Blake from Casino who has gone through drought and believes that no matter what, he has the ability to get through tough times.

He said the bush allowed him to understand the highs and lows of life.

“It connects people like myself and other young people across our vast country with little contemporary issues and very large issues, and allows us to understand and acknowledge each other,” Blake said.

“My story is about the two sides of the bush. How it’s, you know, stressful, and it can also be a happy place where it’s tranquil.

“But it’s also about how I experienced the bush growing up and learning stuff and increasing my knowledge and understanding.”

The young man said the competition was his chance to “express feelings and knowledge” on something others may not understand.

“The seasons changed and summer arrived in an unhappy mood,” Blake wrote in his entry.

“The sun would lash at the ground, opening cracks, big ones.

“It was the peak of the drought.

“Natural disasters can make or break farmers.

“For us, the toughest time was during the drought.

“This farm, I’ve lived here my whole life”.

He described the agony of watching something he loved so dearly practically disappear.

“It was worse in the afternoon, when the wind would pick up, and the dust and grit would fill my lungs and scratch my eyes,” he wrote.

He said the drought “changed everything his family did” from managing their time, money, and themselves.

Blake’s prose describes how he listens to the intricate sounds of the world that surrounded him, soothing his anxiety and stress.

“The knowledge I found was that the bush is both stressful and tranquil,” he wrote.

Mayada from Coffs Harbour has plans to become a human rights lawyer and author. Picture: ABC’s Leah White

Mayada, from Coffs Harbour, escaped child slavery and saved two other girls after being captured by ISIS in the Yazidi genocide.

She tells the harrowing story of being an 11 year-old child, locked inside her parents kitchen in her village, Kojo (Kocho).

ISIS had invaded their village, separated the men, women and children.

“They tied the men’s hands and put them in cars. After the cars drove away we heard gunshots. Everyone started to cry and scream,” Mayada wrote in her entry.

Her siblings and mother were taken to Tel Afar, in Iraq, where Mayada was then separated from her family and taken to Syria.

She was 12 years old when a man sexually assaulted her and after 18 months she was sold to another pedophile.

But the courageous girl found a way to contact her uncle using the man’s computer and escaped with two other girls under threat of death.

“I came to Australia by plane,” she wrote. “First when I escaped, my uncle, told me I can write my name with UN, and then after that every couple of months we do an interview to come to Australia.”

At the end of 2018 Mayada had her last interview. She did a health check and came to Australia.

She has lived with her uncle since her escape and her two brothers are now in Australia.

“I always wanted to share my story but I didn’t get an opportunity like this. So when I heard about this through teachers at school I was so happy when I applied,” Mayada said.

“I was school captain and volleyball captain at Orara High School and now I work as a translator for Kurdish and Arabic speakers.

“I want people to learn that what happened to all the Yazidi girls and women – and what happened in general and what ISIS did and to learn from it.

“It doesn’t matter how bad your situation is – there is always a way when you try your hardest.”

She said appreciating what you have is important.

“I feel like respecting your mum and dad, appreciate them – because you never know when you’re going to lose them,” she said.

The stories from this year’s 38 ABC Heywire winners highlight Australia’s rich diversity and provide an insight into the lives and communities of young Australians living in the regions.

With stories spanning from King Island to Alice Springs, winners have shared tales of becoming a world-class musician in outback Queensland, fleeing war-torn Ukraine, surviving a rare childhood cancer, pursuing heptathlon Olympic dreams and raising awareness about climate issues.

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