Aged 95, Kevin Waters is the last surviving Gomeroi man born at the Old Toomelah Aboriginal mission. His life's purpose now is to ensure his family remains connected to a culture they were once forced to forget."We're just loading up here now, and about to head down to you," he says, with his phone on speaker.Ron taps the phone, looks up and smiles.This is a special day for the family.
After leaving an Aboriginal mission in the 1930s, Kevin's father brought his family of 10 to this tiny township."We lived down near the river," Kevin says. "We had hessian divisions for the rooms." The next stop is Euraba, one of the old Aboriginal reserves where the Waters family lived, near the tiny town of Boomi.But it holds special significance for the family because it was here, on the banks of the nearby Whalan Creek, that Kevin's father Don was born.The convoy pulls up, and as everyone casts their eyes about, it's clear no-one's quite sure where the settlement used to be.Everyone gets out and starts walking around, eyes scanning the ground.
The vehicles turn right, drive through a gate, and come to a stop at a fenced-off area scattered with trees.Kevin leads a procession line of his family through the long grass to a cemetery not far inside the fence.Another of his grandsons, Joey, asks about the headstones."And his wife was called the Queen, too.""The white man trying to plant the importance of a king and queen onto Aboriginal people," Kevin explains.
"And then they'd see the schoolteachers coming, and someone would whisper, 'Missionary coming', and then they'd start talking in English," he recalls."My father, I don't know if it was the English blood in him, but he hated the control of the government over their lives," Kevin says.This time to a site on the Macintyre River, south-east of Goondiwindi, that's still called Toomelah.
To a whitefella, it's a mark on a tree. To the Gomeroi, it's a living link to an ancient culture deep within.His head is down, and he becomes emotional.Kevin grabs his walker and slowly makes his way back to the car. His son Gavin walks with him and pats him on the back.The Waters family has been connected to this land for tens of thousands of years, and there's something ongoing and powerful about places like this.
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