NAIDOC 

Budda! Hello! All Saints’ School were so blessed to have the opportunity to work in collaboration with our local Ngarigo community and NSW Landcare representatives for our most recent whole-school excursion to the Ngarigo Culture Reserve.  It was an absolute delight to visit and explore this area of spiritual and cultural significance.

As Uncle Craig explained, this Murray Crossing Road site is known locally as “Five Ways” because it marked the convergence of five main Indigenous song lines or walking tracks. It was a place where Ngarigo mobs would come for corroborees, yarning, dance and trade.

All Saints’ children learned so much! About the bora circle where dances could tell stories; About how turtles were a popular food choice and how their shells were used for a variety of uses, including carrying things and for fashioning items of jewellery. They learned that the Bogong moth was a delicacy, often reserved for older women and that its fatty contents could cause diarrhoea, which would not have been fun without toilet paper. Our local indigenous people cared for the area by only taking what they needed and ensuring the conservation of local animals and plants. 

Our students had fun shaking seeds from native trees and grinding them to resemble flour. They were in awe of the fact that it would have taken days of this process to gather enough flour to make biscuits. 

Our senior boys are probably feeling grateful that they don’t have to experience the rite of passage where their cheeks would be flicked by older males until their eye tooth would fall out. But they now understand how important so many traditions were to our local Ngarigo people. 

We encourage all families to take a moment to visit this very special area.  Our local Ngarigo community and Jo Scobie from our local Landcare office have many developments in the works for the future of this space. 

Thanks to Uncle Craig, Jo Scobie, Jenna and friends for an amazing day. 

This was just a small part of our NAIDOC week celebrations which saw our classes involved in a variety of activities every day of the week.