chapter 5
Visiting Nan
sophie was glad when she and Simon finally got to Nan’s house.
SAMPLE
For a week after his court appearance, Simon had come home straight from school and joined Sophie at the kitchen table to do his homework.
He’d even helped make the dinner, so it was waiting on the table when Mum walked through the door.
But then he started to get home later and later. Sophie threatened to tell their mother and Simon came straight home for the next few days. Then he slipped back into his habit of hanging out at the shopping centre with Brandon.
Two days before the school holidays, Sophie told their mother. Simon wouldn’t speak to her, especially after their mother yelled at him and took two days off work to make sure he came in the door by half past three.
“It’s not my fault,” Sophie had protested. “I’m not the one doing what Mum doesn’t like. And I got into trouble for lying for you last time. I’d rather have you mad at me than have Mum mad at me.”
By the time they took the train to Dubbo, Simon had finally stopped giving her dirty looks. When their grandmother met them at the station, he even cracked a smile. Nan drove them to her home in Narromine, just under an hour away.
Sophie loved her grandmother’s house. It was full of photographs, glass vases, souvenirs and old books.
“Who’s this, Nan?” Sophie would ask, looking at the people in the black and white photos. And Nan would tell her yarns about them. She was full of stories. The house was musty and dusty but full of memories. Sophie liked the smell and
she liked how there was always something new to discover.
The house had a large back porch with two old couches on it. This was Sophie and Simon’s favourite place to sleep. They would take one couch each and cover themselves in blankets. Sophie liked to think that they were camping out—without the hassle of bad weather or creepy-crawlies. When they were younger, they’d make up ghost stories to try to scare each other. They would talk into the night and, if they made too much noise, their Nan would come out and tell them in her sharpest voice to get back to sleep. They would giggle and begin to whisper and tell their stories again.
SAMPLE
Nan was in a good mood when she picked them up from the station. She asked them about school and how their mother was and then she talked about what she’d been doing. Nan was the chair of the local Land Council, volunteered at the local school and knew everyone in town. When they walked
down the street, she would stop and talk to almost everyone. Any gossip in the town, Nan knew it.
When they got to her place, she told Sophie and Simon to unpack their bags and call their mother. By the time they’d done that, Nan had made them each a spider—soft drinks with a scoop of ice cream in them. Sophie watched the soft drink foam up as the ice cream dropped into it, and she attacked the ice cream with her spoon as it slowly started to disintegrate.
It wasn’t until they were almost at the bottom of their glasses that Nan became serious.
“It was very hard on your mother when your father died. I know it was hard on you two as well —very hard—but imagine being left to look after two kids. Most of the time I don’t worry about your mother because I know that you’re a great comfort to her. But when you let her down, well, then I start to really worry. And at my age, I don’t need anything more to worry about.”
Sophie looked across at Simon. Although Nan wasn’t looking at him, he kept his eyes down, stirring the foam in his glass with his spoon.
chapter 6
Times of change
later that night, as Sophie and Simon settled down on their couches, Nan came out to join them. She sat on the end of Sophie’s couch, lifting her granddaughter’s feet and placing them in her lap. She looked out into the darkness of her backyard.
“When I was a young girl, we lived down by the riverbank,” she said. “That’s where most of the Blacks lived. We lived in what were basically tents. Back then I could never have imagined living in a house with comforts like a microwave, or even a stove or hot water. Some of those mornings were really cold and I always hated it when it rained.”
Sophie and Simon had been taught that at times like this, when Nan wanted to talk, it was respectful to be quiet and just listen.
“Over my lifetime, there have been so many advances made on protecting the rights of Black people. When I was born, Aboriginal children were still being taken from their families and placed into homes or adopted into White families so they could grow up like White people. When we were sick, we weren’t allowed into the hospitals. If we were treated by a doctor at all, it was on the back verandah. And Aboriginal children weren’t encouraged to finish school. We just didn’t have the chances that you have.
“So you can imagine how hard it is for someone like me to see young people who have those chances throw them away. Breaks my old heart.”
Simon rustled uncomfortably in his blankets, but as usual said nothing.
“So I want to tell you a story,” Nan continued. “Back in the time that your mother was young, life was tough for Blacks. Even though it was
better than when I was a girl, there was still so much discrimination. In some country towns, Aboriginal people weren’t allowed to use the swimming pool and had to sit in separate parts of the movie theatre.
“But in the 1960s there was a change. Us Black people got more and more upset about the conditions we were living in. And there was an Aboriginal man named Charlie Perkins. He was the first Aboriginal man to graduate with a degree from a university and he organised with some other students to get on a bus and drive out to some of those towns to protest about the way Blacks were treated. They called it the Freedom Rides.
“Well, the people in those country towns were none too impressed with kids from the city coming in and criticising them. They threw things at them and spat at them. Told them to get back to the city and mind their own business.
“But us Blacks, we were really touched that people cared about how we were being treated. And I think
it’s only right that people everywhere care when there’s an injustice going on somewhere.
“And these young people were just one small part of the Australian community who started to feel that it wasn’t right that Blacks should be treated different. Back in the city, where lots of Blacks lived, they also began to get more vocal about the injustices. And so they started to demand land rights. People thought that if we could get our land back, we could take back control of our own lives.”
SAMPLE
There was a long silence. Sophie and Simon knew better than to interrupt. They waited for Nan to speak again.
“And the other thing that happened that made a big difference was that the government made it illegal to discriminate against Blacks,” Nan said. “It became against the law. So in places like Dubbo where White people didn’t want to rent houses to Blacks, they could be punished if they acted in a racist way.
“Now, these things didn’t solve everything but they were important steps. And each of those
steps means that it will be easier for you than it was for your mother and father, and easier for them than it was for me.
“And you know what we believe as Aboriginal people? We have our own laws too, just like Whitefellas do. And our laws tell us that we have to have respect for our country and look after it. They tell us that we’re all connected with each other. Whatever you do has an impact on the people and the environment around you and, in the same way, what others do can affect you too. When you give something, it has an effect on other people. Usually a good one. And when you steal something, it has an effect on people. Usually a bad one.”
Sophie and Simon didn’t tell each other stories that night. In the quiet of the night, Sophie wondered about Kate. More than anything, she wanted to be like her, helping other people and keeping young people like Simon from making big mistakes.