Cassie’s Story
1. I need to talk to someone. Anyone. Anyone who’ll listen. I’ve just come from a community meeting and all hell broke loose. I can’t stand what’s happening. It feels like it’s all happening again.  In the end Auntie Ev had a real bad fit, she was so upset. Ambulance came and took her.  Her diabetes is playin’ up. But she wasn’t the only one crying. Uncle Mervin was full on in tears and he just kept saying, “Why don’t they ever ask us? They never ask us!” That just started up the others then…the ones who had been moved before… on the trucks…way back. And everyone started wailing and crying and shouting until all the kids started and then in the end we was all crying just sitting in the hall, crying… Thing is… we like our homes and now they want to move us to the other side of town… Funny thing is we were moved here from another part of town… then all the whitefellas came for work and they spread out and didn’t want us in their backyards, so they moved us along… Uncle says that is what they did there three times on the mish too. Just kept moving us… moving us on. Herding us up and moving us on. One of the Aunts got feisty after a while stood up and said; “We need to fight this… no one’s gonna make me leave!” She yelled, “I like living here”.  That’s when someone… don’t know who that was yelled back, “They’ll make us you know… they just give us two weeks’ notice and board up the houses just like they did last time. What choice you got heh? Them council fellas and property developers don’t care about what you want.” Cassie? Cassie! Yeah? Coming! 2 See there’s a bit more too it… It’s not just moving us.  It is the breaking down of things that keep us together.  Like the safe house for the mums and kids and the community centre where I use to do homework… Where we met for the meeting today… they have a computer in there and all. Us kids used it for homework… But even the old Uncles and Aunts get in there sometimes and have a go and some mob type up job applications and things for Centre Link and the courts there too… They also did the handouts for bubba boy’s funeral on that computer. It looked real flash with a photo of him and all. His was the fourth death in three weeks. He just got out of juvie. Don’t know what happened in there but something happened to him…something real bad…  they found him hanging off his father’s verandah. His brother had to cut him down… now everyone’s worried about him cause the other two before bubba boy came so close together …they was related too. It happens in patterns in family. When the mental health workers came in they called it ‘generational trauma’. Goes back to them that was stolen too. Still the old Aunts cry about that − most of those never came back… we never knew what happened to them. Sometimes one will be found or we’ll find them … but it is always hard and the coming back is hard for everyone… …even those that stayed behind. That’s why this moving gets people so upset. It reminds the ones who lived on the mish how it happened. Mobs being herded up in the middle of the night… Children being given to Aunts and Uncles, thinking they’d all be going to the one place but then, in the light of day, realising that didn’t happen and wouldn’t happen. They never saw some of ‘em ever again. Thought they were dead of something. Sometimes they got told that. Nana Clara used to talk to me about it… “That wailing at night when that happened,” she said, “used to disturb the spirits.” Nan was taught by an old law woman, a magic woman who picked her out of the group of girls. She saved the old Aunt from falling into the fire one night, when the old Aunt was lighting her little pipe, and from then on she showed her things.  First, she said, “It was small things like bush tucker where the yams and flowers were.” Then it was the medicines, how to prepare them, and what words to say.” Got to get some sleep now.  Big day tomorrow.  I gotta go to court. I wish I had a job to go to instead of court. I’m sick of it really. It’s just a bond I broke when I got caught stealing some things from the local shops. Don’t know why I did it really for all the hassle it got me in. The Elders gave me a good talkin’ to. “Cassie,” they said, if you don’t wake up to yerself, you are heading for the big house, my girl, and we got too many of our people in their already.  ‘Bout time you made something of yerself. Maybe got yerself an education or something; did some work for the CDEP or helped with the Community Centre… you need to do something to make your mother proud. You know how hard it is for her. How is what you are doing helpin’ her?” Those Elders are harder to face than any old mate judge I can tell you and I got to see ‘em every day. Don’t know what is going to happen today – mum is real worried I’ll end up in juvie like my brother and my cousin. She says, “Cassie you got to pull yerself together and get out of here. Get out of this town.”  She wants to send me to live with my Uncle. I don’t like the idea of moving… moving anywhere. I’d miss my mob too much… miss my friends… I’d miss mum. Mum is my rock. She’s not good. Her health’s bad. Her sugars play up and she’s tired all the time and she keeps going when she should rest…she works real hard… then she’s worried about my brother… he’s not coping being locked up… and he’s real angry… and sometimes he takes it out on her. I hear her crying some nights. One of my friends is thinking of going to Uni she says. She reckons she’s going to do Early Childhood and work with the kids.  She stayed at school see, not like me… I was off in Year 8… just couldn’t cope with it… I felt out of place… too black… for all ‘em white fellas.  She says you can go to Uni if you go do Year 12 at TAFE or you’re older.  I just turned 17 see. Rhonda, my friend, she’s been working in the childcare centre next to the community centre and she says it is really good what they do there. They teach the kids, cook for them and feed them. And, they have great play equipment and books. Things we never had.  She said, “You should do it Cassie.” She reckons I’d be good at it. But I don’t know.  She kinda looks out for me…don’t know what I’d do without her really… Maybe I’ll talk with the social worker…  For a gubba she’s okay. She says I got great skills and all I need to do is develop ‘em.  Don’t know what she means half the time though. She says some counseling would be good for me but… I am too shame to do that.  Anyway, I don’t like digging up the past too much. Mum says I got to look good for court. “Respectable,” she says.  I hope it turns out ok. I’m packin’ it really. I wish I never took those coloured pencils; Don’t know… just wanted to give ‘em to the twins next door – things are hard for ‘em with the all the drinking that goes on there. It’s all gone bad… Real bad… They bulldozed the safe house today. They boarded up the community centre. Now they talk like they are gonna move the child care centre into town… It’s won some award… Rhonda’s been crying too… One of the old Uncles got some papers in the mail this morning that says he has to move in two weeks to this other part of town.  If he don’t they’ll evict him. He cried, Rhonda told me, when he got them papers. She said, “He doesn’t know anyone over there.” Mum’s crying. She’s having a lie down. Court went ok but we have to find some money for another bond. We don’t have any money, but. So looks like I’ll have to go into juvie for a while. Maybe it will be good for me. Who knows? I suppose things will get better. After Rhonda and I had a good cry, we had a good laugh too. One thing about us mob… bad things have happened so much you have to laugh… But things don’t change really. Just the same thing and a different day. TIPS it does ask you to produce a paper which focuses on the discussion prompts. Another way to present this assignment would be to use the discussion prompts within the assignment task and put your responses beneath each one. Either will be acceptable. Please note that this is an  academic paper so the language needs to be written at that level current references such as within the last 5 years. Seminal works or government documents may be older and this is acceptable. The emphasis is in referencing according to APA guidelines.
Cassie’s Story
Presentation: Length: 2000 words Margin :2.5 cm Space :Double line Font   :12pt Font type:Times New Roman                                                          TIPS     it does ask you to produce a paper which focuses on the discussion prompts. Another way to present this assignment would be to use the discussion prompts within the assignment task and put your responses beneath each one. Either will be acceptable. Please note that this is an  academic paper so the language needs to be written at that level   current references such as within the last 5 years. Seminal works or government documents may be older and this is acceptable. The emphasis is in referencing according to APA guidelines.