Jan Loquet Westlake's eulogy for Eli

Let me tell you a little about those days at Macdonald Valley Public School.... Whilst it was officially a
"1 teacher school", there were many, many helpers... wonderful people such as Suzie Startin,
Rikke Hansen, Heidi Saxby , Lyn Lahag Savage, Lyn Streckfus, Jill Hayes, Mark Myers, Halifax Hayes,
Greg Donovan, Sylvia Harper & Louky Gibb....creative and energetic individuals creating a rich, varied and very original curriculum that included art camps, environmental initiatives, cultural festivals, astronomy nights, mini olympics and the list goes on.

During this wonderful era in the Macdonald Valley, Eli was welcomed lovingly into his friend's homes.
Many, perhaps all of these families are here today and we thank you for your many acts of caring and kindness shown to our boys.
Many of us who reside here fondly call this valley "BOY HEAVEN" ... playing in the sandy river, making cubby houses and climbing up to the ridges, expeditions down the river & those endless weekends digging at the bike track.

We decided to move to Sydney for the high school years.
Eli was learning cello at the time with his great Aunt Dorothy, piano from Helen Edwards and percussion from Peter Jacob and he was offered a place the The NSW Conservatorium of Music High School, otherwise known as "the Con High".

He was there 2 years and enjoyed being part of this small school of talented and often eccentric teenagers.
During ths time he studied cello with Georg Pedersen.
He liked it at there, but then he gave up playing the cello and classical music in general. Continuing at the specialist classical music High School was no longer appropriate.

Thus began a continued longing for a school that would suit Eli.
This proved very challenging, as he was the quintessential "round peg in a square hole"
and in the next 2 years he went to 3 different schools, including Knox Grammar, Gleneon and Ku-ring-gai Creative Arts High School.
The upshot of going to so many schools is that you make many, many friends.

When Eli left school he started a boat building apprenticeship.
He did well in his first year, but found working with fiberglass did not agree with him.

He changed courses and completed a TAFE certificate in radio broadcasting.
During this time he was a regular volunteer on Maya Jupiter's Triple J radio show and also ran a program for FBi radio station.
Some 3 years ago he got a job at Riverside Theatre in Parramatta, working both front of house and back stage under the management of Bob Peet & Col Peet.
He loved the variety of the work there... the full range of performing arts from international touring shows, music, through to community events.
He also loved the visual arts, graffiti art in particular.
He had a great sense of style and loved beauty and good design to be imbued into the material world.
He enjoyed DJ - ing and played a number of gigs at clubs and parties.

Eli loved to travel. Our holidays included several trips to Indonesia, sailing the Great Barrier Reef, ski holidays and going bush with our aboriginal friend & colleague David Hudson.

He made several trips to Melbourne in the past few years visiting cousins and our dear family friends, the Leak family.

When he was 14 he arranged with our friend Wendy Gray to meet her in Indonesia and go backpacking in Bali and Java.
He readily made friends with people of many varied backgrounds.

With a love of the sea, at 16, Eli signed up to participate in a voyage on the Young Endeavour.
This program trains it's youth crew to a point where they can take command of the ship.
The youth crew vote in their youth commanding officers.
Despite being one of the youngest on board, Eli was voted 2nd in command, and as chance had it, took over the ship in a 50 knot gale, and he LOVED it... Totally invigorated by the experience.

Two years ago he saved up and travelled to London to visit us, as we were based there working on a film.
It didn't take him long to sus out the clubs and where to get the best selection of hip hop vinyl records.

He continued at Riverside Theatres until last September, when he started with Chameleon Lighting Systems.
At Chameleon he worked with several of the lads from the Macdonald Valley, including John Streckfus, Jhett Slattery
& Ryan Rothenbury. He was very happy to be part of this extended valley family once again.
Not only do they work together but they also hang out together on their days off.

Now we suddenly come to the abrupt end of this story.... an end that none of us could have ever imagined.

The improbability & circumstances of his death lead us to a void of immense proportions.

We miss him terribly. We are so much worse off without him, and we can only hope and pray that his energy is absorbed into our hearts and that he can inspire us with his creative and caring spirit.
Whilst the pain we now suffer is at times unbearable, we feel blessed to have had him come into our family.

It is SO much better to have loved and lost, than to have never loved at all.

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