RESIDENTS and visitors to the region may see Robbo the Didgeridoo Man around the streets of the Nambucca Valley, busking and carrying out sound healings with his didgeridoo.

“What I do in the community here is share my culture through the didgeridoo playing at Woolworths and the streets and Macksville and places like that,” he said.

Robbo recently played in a hugely successful gig at the reopening of the Bowraville Theatre with other Gumbaynggirr artists.

He is hoping that a concert like this will be able to happen again soon.

“My journey is about me connecting back to Country down here because my mother was stolen from down here, so for me to come back to this community it is very hard for me to fit in.

Robbo grew up in Brisbane with his siblings, sometimes at home with his father and other times in foster care when his father was unwell.

When he was in his early 40s, Robbo decided it was time to come back to the Nambucca Valley, where his Gumbayggirr mum was born.

“I feel like the last eight years that I’ve been down here I’m still on the other side of the fence, that I don’t belong here even though my whole family from my mother’s side is descended from where we are standing right now right through Gumbaynggirr country.

“Now for me, being 50 years old, still trying to find connection to Country is a daily struggle in some ways.

“It is very important that people who are here on Country should welcome people back to Country by showing them around.

“How do you connect back to Country from your mother being stolen from down here?” Robbo said.

“Mum was the eldest of Victor Buchanan and Daphne Robinson.

“She was taken with her siblings, my mum was about ten or eleven years old and taken to Brisbane.

“My grandfather was a Gumbaynggirr man, he walked from here to Brisbane to go and get his children back.
“He was denied his children back, so he had to walk all the way back here, he was a broken man.”

Robbo is planning to hold an open mic concert called One Tribe at Morgo St Park Urunga 3 July 2021, the day before the official NAIDOC Week begins.

He wants to make this a day of celebration, to celebrate everyone coming together.

National Sorry Day is on Wednesday 26 May, followed by National Reconciliation Week from 27 May – 3 June 2021.

NAIDOC Week will be held from 4 – 11 July 2021.

 

By: Rachel MCGREGOR-ALLEN