Connection to Country: Blue Mountains Healing

On our Sydney trip Parks NSW took us on some 4x4 tracks through the Blue Mountains to some key traditional sites, with the senior Lore women of Ngurra Country, Dharug and Gundungurra peoples — whom specially invited to us to show and share about their key sites and dreaming stories. 

This was an emotional time for the women from Ngurra country, as many of their stories have been lost or fractured from colonial captain cook times, as many of their peoples were decimated and displaced during massacres and forced removals from their families and tribes.

During this harrowing period, culture was banned, and their people were killed for speaking language — a story that stretches over this entire continent, but is certainly a concentrated experience of annihilation for east coast mob as that was the first point of landing.

It was a pivotal meeting, as the women from the APY lands have such strong culture and story engrained in them, growing up in strongholds within the central desert — that they are able to assist in pulling the lost pieces back together for the Dharug Mob. They also have the vision to see the story, playing out on country and express and share it very articulately. 

These connections and meetings were nothing short of moving, the sheer meaning was utterly palpable as these women strive to keep their culture alive.