Roebourne Lab - The Beginning

I write this blog post on a sunny afternoon in Roebourne, a small town of about 1,000 people tucked into the North-West corner of Australia. We’ve settled in, excited about our next month here.

The landscape around Roebourne

Peter, Shakthi & I started our journey on Monday, flying from Sydney to Perth, then Perth to Karratha. It was a long but exciting trip, as we discussed possibilities for our four weeks in Roebourne.

Shakthi, Peter and Elias waiting for departure. This was just our hand luggage.

In Karratha we were met by Jan Kapetas from the Shire of Roebourne Community Development Council. She generously lent us a car and led us out of town to Roebourne.

The entrance to the Roebourne basket ball courts

It’s a thirty minute drive through a barren and gorgeous landscape into town, where we met Andrew and Sharmila who have been kind enough to let us stay in their home! Andrew works for the Ngarluma Resource Centre, focusing on the issues of the traditional owners of the land and the preservation of their language. Sharmila works at the Roebourne Art Centre with the extremely active and productive local artists.

The following day we checked out the Ngarluma Resource Centre and met with local community youth workers. In the afternoon we visited the Juluwarlu Resource Centre, run by the Yindjibarndi people. They have their own broadcast television station there, Ngarda TV, and are hoping to attract young people to it. We certainly hope to help train some local kids and show them how to make content for broadcast!

Ngarluma Aboriginal Resource Centre

This morning we met Kai at the local hall, the 50 Cent Hall (much to our surprise it is named after its shape rather than the rapper) for breakfast with the local kids. Around 20 kids turned up for breakfast, riding bikes and playing tip. We got to know many of the kids by joining in on the games and introduced them to the video cameras which they had an absolute ball playing with.

Upon their insistence we followed them to the Youth Centre, a bustling building with over 30 kids running around, relaxing, playing pool, computer games and Playstation. Here with eight young boys we made another installment of our “ball game video” series. After the exhausting but fun shoot in the searing sun (I can’t believe it’s winter!) I helped three of the boys edit the video they had just shot. Shakthi shared some further still and video camera skills while Peter discussed ideas for further video with the girls and helped to find the right music for the “ball game video”.

Peter, Bill and Mike on the Camera

Cliff the camera man on his first day!

Once the video was finally finished we unplugged the Playstation from the projector (without a fight, I’m still reeling from the shock) and displayed the video for all the kids in the Youth Centre to see. The reception to the piece was amazing, we had to replay it five times before the kids would stop demanding “Again! Again!” We’re all looking forward to making more work tomorrow!

An awesome start to our stay here in Roebourne!