By Petra Franks This was my first year involved in the Walama Muru Volunteering Program run in partnership with Arc and Nura Gili. Without a doubt, it was one of my best experiences I’ve had so far in my two years at university. The year began with fundraising, with chocolate boxes selling like crazy in our 9am classes, baking endless treats for bake sales and a successful trivia night at the Roundhouse! The program ended with an impromptu outdoors dance party in Uncle Ralph’s backyard after a week of hard work. This year Walama Muru returned to the beautiful rural town of Gilgandra with a population of 2700. Gilgandra is situated amongst three Aboriginal nations: Gamilaraay to the northeast, Wiradjuri to the south and Wayilwan to the west. The projects we set out to do over the week were selected by the community in discussion with Mick and Cheryl, who are of course are Wiradjuri themselves. These included sanding and re-painting the local basketball court and building and planting seating in ‘The Pines’. At Uncle Ralph’s, who uses his property to work with local kids and teach them about respect, we built seats and a big wide screen for a backdrop of his stage where he performs traditional dances with his family. We left it plain and we can’t wait to see the mural that they will design and paint! At the local Barnados pre-school we built a Veggie Patch, complete with cute sign and plenty of seedlings and a shade over the sand pit that the volunteers built last year. Each of these projects we completed came with a whole new set of skills, experiences and a new group within the community to get to know! At the basketball courts it was pretty common to see volunteers and kids shooting hoops together and at Uncle Ralphs you can’t leave without him and his family making the most delicious fried scones for you! It’s really rewarding seeing the amazing things going on in a community hours from the dense congestion and urban landscape of Sydney: ranging from the hospitality of the family running the local caravan park where we stayed to the wonderful work of the Barnados staff. It makes you feel good if you can contribute anything at all, and to let them know that their work is noticed. Knowing that families can now enjoy fresh veggies from the garden, and how chuffed the local aspiring athletes will be with a professional court to practice on makes all the heavy-lifting, blisters and early starts worth it! One of the most beautiful things about Walama is the people, the volunteers in particular. The program brings Indigenous and non-Indigenous students, from all different backgrounds and degrees together into the same mini-bus, all wearing the same green t-shirt. Our coordinator this year, Denise Goldman was a constant inspiration and one of our own Nura Gili student’s Quinton Vea Vea, won the Arc Outstanding Volunteer Award for his endless contribution to the fundraising and projects. It was certainly a very rewarding experience and I have come away with new friends, a new love for a faraway town and decent knowledge of cement mixing.
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