Helping handfuls: Mark Gellie with the tools of his trade. Picture: Tommy Ritchie 57981
Andrew Mathieson
FOR YOUTH pastor Mark Gellie, preaching his gospel comes in many forms.
Sometimes it’s a sermon standing in front of Christian parishioners.
At others it’s barking out team tactics in a footy locker room.
And for two weeks a year, handfuls of red frog lollies seem to work wonders.
Mark is the leader of the Red Frogs program behind the chewy raspberry favourites keeping thousands of infamous schoolies on the straight and narrow at Lorne and Torquay in the past nine years.
More than 250 kilos of the freebies have been transported on pallets to the coast every year since the manufacturer jumped on board the program.
“The red frogs idea was just an icebreaker with the schoolies,” Mark reveals.
“Handing them out actually helped when we first started but now we’re pretty much recognised around the place. We can now just rock into schoolies parties and people no longer ask who we are.”
A chance meeting at Barrabool Hills Baptist Church in 2001 inspired the then-young uni student to join the Red Frogs program.
Mark tells how a concerned helper walked into a Gold Coast corner store, rolled out several notes from his wallet and bought an entire large box of the frogs. He then offered the sweet treats to a group of schoolies partying on a balcony in exchange for an ear and some words of advice.
Since then the Red Frog Schoolies Chaplaincy has grown to more than 100 volunteers patrolling Surf Coast beaches, pubs and motel rooms to prevent excessive drinking, drug overdoses, unwanted sexual advances and violence.
“To be honest, the schoolies have always reacted well to us,” Mark says.
“Our guys are now there to cook pancakes and also hand out the frogs.
“I mean, everyone loves free stuff.”
The volunteers tried handing out soft chocolates, hard-boiled lollies, even green frogs but nothing – except perhaps Mark – connected with teens like red frogs.
He takes time to speak to nearly all students at Geelong schools before the end-of-year celebrations, giving them warnings to look after their mates, keep room bonds, drink heaps of water and respect the community.
“One of the roles we play really well is just putting positive role models in environments where risky behaviour can cause damage,” he says.
As a typical alpha young male, Mark experienced all the highs and lows of adolescence.
But he can recall the moment of clarity in his life when he quit his stable PE teaching job and joined Barrabool Hills Baptist Church.
“I was always around that footy lifestyle and lived that lifestyle pretty hard,” Mark explains.
“At 23 or 24 I arrived as a young dad and I saw the damage to a lot of people of my age and the path they were going down, so I decided to make a decision to really get my life right and make some better choices.
“Some of the decisions I made in the past weren’t wise.”
An unwanted legacy out of his control was the family’s dodgy knees. His dad, Graham Gellie, coached St Kilda for two and a half seasons in the mid-1980s after being forced to retire aged 28 after just 33 league games in six seasons.
As the 1978 club best and fairest winner in his debut season, Graham’s courage was only matched by pain.
His career was cut short by no less than 12 knee operations.
Mark, through gritted teeth, bares the same scars.
“It’s hereditary, I think,” he broods.
“I’ve only had three knee reconstructions.
“Obviously it’s a genetic thing.”
But after playing his last footy game at 26, Mark is wise beyond his years.
The 33-year-old coached Geelong Falcons’ under-15s for four years, was its under-18s runner and now works with Geelong’s VFL side.
“I felt a real calling to be a role model for others,” he says.
“You have that in football clubs because, for me, football clubs can be a fantastic place for young men, but so is the church.”
