Michele became interested in Indonesia when she was studying Engineering and Industrial Relations at the UNSW. In 1990, she took an Indonesian language summer course on a whim, and it changed her life. She now has an Indonesian husband, a PhD in Indonesian labour relations (published as Workers and Intellectuals: NGOs, Trade Unions and the Indonesian Labour Movement) and a house in Tanjung Pinang, the capital city of the Riau Islands. When she is not working on Inside Indonesia, she teaches about Indonesia, social activism and human rights at the University of Sydney or continues her research on labour.