It all starts with a conversation
08 August 2011
NAIDOC (National Aborigines and Islanders Day Observance Committee) celebrations are held around Australia in July each year to celebrate the history, culture and achievements of Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander peoples.
Students from Sacred Heart College, Adelaide, local students from Port Augusta, Russell Smith from Building Bridges and the band Brolga Boys, fellow band member Lee Sonnyboy Morgan, Mal Holt, sound engineer, and AVI's Anthea Edmunds at Davenport Community NAIDOC celebration, Port Augusta.
During NAIDOC week 2011, AVI Project Coordinator for PACTAM Anthea Edmunds joined Russell Smith through his organisation Building Bridges to take eighteen Grade 11 students and four teachers from Sacred Heart College in Adelaide to Davenport Community, Port Augusta, where Russell grew up on Umeewarra Mission.
Russell’s connection with AVI began through his work on Children of the Rainbow Serpent; the documentary following four Aboriginal youths who volunteered in a remote Indian community in 2008. The project was made possible by a collaboration between AVI, SPW (now Restless Development) Volunteering SA and NT, and Youth Challenge Australia.
The students and teachers from Adelaide's Sacred Heart College who went to Port Augusta are an exceptional group of individuals. They are part of an extracurricular group called Remar, involved in social justice education and action, community work, personal and spiritual development. Sacred Heart College has an ongoing relationship with Russell, engaging him in running Aboriginal cultural awareness workshops for the school.
Anthea's involvement was a personal one, and started through a conversation with Russell earlier in the year, where he told her "you haven't seen Australia until you have been to community".
Anthea also screened the Children of the Rainbow Serpent documentary on behalf of AVI for the Sacred Heart students, a number of whom will be travelling to India later this year.
During the week, the group stayed at the Uniting Church hall courtesy of the Church's Minister Uncle Jo Matthews, and his wife Aunty Dawn, an amazing Maori couple with 10 children who have also fostered 15 Aboriginal children.
Uncle Jo and Aunty Dawn's daughter-in-law Lavene Ngatokorua, chairwoman of the Umeewarra Nguraritja, organised the main NAIDOC celebrations on the Tuesday.
The event opened with traditional Aboriginal dancing, followed by workshops including boomerang throwing, Torres Strait Islander dancing, and food including Kangaroo tails and Aunty Elsie's damper twisties.
Other events through the week included cultural awareness sessions, artist in conversation events, the students attending the NAIDOC week ball with fellow students from Port Augusta, and the group assisting the Wama Kata Old Folks home with their Elders Luncheon.
This is a positive example of how collaborative relationships can work. The week built connections between the Umeewarra Mission family, Davenport community, Sacred Heart College Adelaide, and AVI, through Building Bridges.
The collaboration aimed to improve understanding and relations between Indigenous and Non-Indigenous Australians, and to develop better insights into ourselves, our country and our cultures.