A pretty hectic achievement

 Kaydee Kyle-Taylor

My grandmother always made sure that my sister and I knew that we were Blak growing up. She was a single mother who raised nine kids, which is a pretty hectic achievement especially considering how poor they were.But being the staunch Blak woman she is, she absolutely powered through. During my childhood, Mum would tell me stories about her siblings and their life during school. They faced a lot of blatant racism and mob were treated as second-class citizens. I believe she shared these stories to prepare me and my sister Teigan for what to expect as visibly Blak women, who were raised to be proud of our culture.

Our cultural identities growing up mostly revolved around our Aboriginal side. My mum’s family is Lama Lama, Birri Gubba and Wakka Wakka, which extends from Cape York down to Palm Island—which is called ‘Bwgcolman’ meaning ‘many tribes’ because a lot of Indigenous communities from Queensland were segregated and displaced onto Palm Island. And the Wakka Wakka tribe is from the Cherbourg Mission, which is where my grandmother was born and raised.

My dad’s been in Australia since he was 16, so I think he has a bit of an identity crisis having grown up around my mum’s crazy family. He thinks he’s a black fella half the time, but his side of the family are Māori, Ngāti Porou and Ngāti Kahungunu which is along the Eastern cape and coast of the North Island of Aotearoa, also known as Gisborne. Dad was Whāngai (adopted) to the other half of the family and grew up in Masterton, a little town over the hills from Wellington.

Despite spending a lot of my childhood around my Aboriginal side of the family in the Northern suburbs of Brisbane, we were fortunate enough to fly home every year to New Zealand to be with my dad’s family. Every time I visit, I find the contrast between New Zealand and Australia to be interesting and confronting at the same time. Because of Te Tiriti o Waitangi (The Treaty of Waitangi), Māori culture and traditions are so heavily embedded within NZ society and Māori people are represented with pride across the nation. The Māori way of living is considered normal and my family owns their land and can practice their cultural traditions freely. Simple but important things are in place, like having the names of states and suburbs written in Te Reo (Māori language), and Māori customs, language and heritage taught in the school curriculum.

Here in Australia, it’s the opposite. It has been 250-plus years since colonisation and there is little recognition for Blak history, and First Nations people as the traditional owners of this land. Because of that, there is so much intergenerational trauma to unpack—the bare minimum hasn’t even been acknowledged.

Something that brings us all together though, is community. Our spiritual connection and ability to go home to country means everything to us. But there are also many reasons why we can’t always live on or return to country often. Many of us are from remote areas, where resources aren’t easily accessible, or where remnants of historical events make places too traumatic to spend time in. That is the case for a lot of the areas where the missions were throughout Australia. So a lot of us have become very homesick.

Being surrounded by your mob, on your land, is the biggest thing any black fella can relate to, especially for healing and connection. A lot of my inner circle of friends—who are living away from home, living and working in Naarm (Melbourne), and some who live interstate—can all relate to how I feel being so far from family and country. Which is why we have created our own little community and family down here. As I’ve gotten older, I’ve noticed going home has become more and more important to me and my family. My parents instilled that ‘tradition’ by making sure we went home regularly to either Queensland or New Zealand, and my sister and I have carried that on into our adulthood. Especially seeing our elders growing older, the importance of keeping in touch with them and making sure we spend as much time together is a priority for us right now.

My family dynamic could be perceived as odd, humorous, or with pure envy. We are extremely close and open with each other. I think that’s because my parents were raised in poverty. They were exposed to a lot of unfortunate situations and witnessed family members struggling with drug and alcohol addiction, and the ripple effect that had on their surrounding relatives. When they started a family, they knew that was something they would never want their children to be exposed to.

I often talk about how privileged my upbringing has been. Teigan and I are well-travelled, privately educated, and have always had the safety net of my parents to return to if we are ever faced with a traumatic situation or just in need of someone to confide in. My dad refers to our family as ‘a unit’, meaning we are always one and always have each other’s backs. My parents have worked tirelessly to break the cycles of their family’s history and solidify a successful life plan for us. They moved from Queensland to Victoria, to build intergenerational wealth for my sister and I, which is something that we will strive to continue.