My Aka arrived in Darwin late Sunday night, and I felt like a child again, bounding out of the ute’s door to wrap her small frame in mine. She gave me two hugs and I had to remove my glasses because they fogged at the suddenness of leaving air-conditioning for the hot humidity of wet season. I breathed in her smell – Obsession perfume. She is shorter than me, but there are many things of her that are reflected in me – our kuridth hair, our middle name, our glasses, our dark skin and maybe even our anxious mannerisms.
But that night, her smile was as big as mine.
My partner and I took her to her hotel – she was in town for work and so I had a whole week to soak up little moments of time with her. I looked forward to browsing $8 T-shirts in Big W with her, or sitting for cake and tea at Coffee Club like we did on her last visit. I hoped to introduce her to our new puppy. But when my partner and I left her hotel, my heart was heavy. I called my mum, the thick feeling of homesickness stuck to my gums. It’s not exactly a place I was missing, but a people. My people.
I called my mum, the thick feeling of homesickness stuck to my gums
I am a Torres Strait Islander woman who did not grow up on the islands. I grew up in Cairns, but spent the past few years studying and working in Brisbane.
A year ago, my partner and I decided to move to Darwin. The move offered my partner a chance to be close to his family, his Country and to learn more of his mob’s traditional ways of painting. For me, it offered the chance to build up what I found difficult to nurture in the bigger city of Brisbane: my mental health, writing and love of reading. But it also means that for the first time in my life, I am not living close to family.
I have always been connected – physically – to my relations; it is something that has sustained me. So moving to Darwin has been challenging. It’s a process of “splintering” that feels as if I’ve left multiple versions of myself around the country – Brisbane, Cairns, the islands and more.
The places I’ve lived with family have left a mark that lingers in my mind. The frantic turn of the ceiling fan over my bed in Darwin reminds me of Aka’s little house in Cairns. Flannel sheets tangled in sweaty legs, the moon peering through windows striped with duct tape residue from cyclones past. Soft voices of Mum, Aka, aunts and uncles tethering me to myself as I fall asleep. Certain smells also bring to mind other people and places. A whiff of perfume, the smell of just-cooked white rice. Sometimes I can smell a family member without a true reason. Even those long gone.
People in Darwin are more obvious with their racism. I work part-time in retail, and sometimes the customers make fleeting racist comments with a trill of laughter as if everyone agrees with them. They don’t see me, or others like me. But their words are daggers to my eavesdropping ears and homesick heart. I am tired of being the only one – the only First Nations person, more so the only Torres Strait Islander person in workspaces, when many Australians don’t even know where the Torres Strait Islands are, or that they’re a part of Australia.
The author with her Aka. Source: Tanya McGaughey
Still, this stint away from home has given me pause. Time to reflect and learn what it means to be by myself. To learn what it means to appreciate family and familiarity and place. It has given me a fierce passion to find my way back to the islands again. Although I wasn’t born there, I’ve been visiting all my life. But a recent obsession with the dangers of flying has stopped me from visiting the past couple of years.
… this stint away from home… has given me a fierce passion to find my way back to the islands again
I’ve spent time focusing on my mental health, and it has helped me account for some things, especially this yearning for family. My mum lives on Mabuiag in the Torres Strait. Every day, we reach out to one another through the thin connections of our phones. When my partner and I walk along the beaches of Darwin, eyes peeled for those infamous crocs, I wonder how similar it is to the beaches of Mabuiag.
Many things here have been wonderful. Last year, my partner and I visited Alice Springs for and attended the . Although it was a lovely festival, my body ached from the unfamiliarity of things and people. I watched the sun set from the lawns of the Museum and Art Gallery of the Northern Territory and wished to see it from the other side of the country again, where I’d be safe within the folds of those who love me.
For now, I lean into memories of them. I enjoy phone calls and eagerly await their visits. On Aka’s most recent trip, we sat around the table at my home and ate fruitcake and drank Lipton tea. We talked about many things and when I dropped her back to her hotel, I felt renewed with love.
Jasmin McGaughey is a Torres Strait Islander and African American writer and editor.
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