A couple of years before that, I was in year 11 but I left when I got my first assignment for the year. When the first assignment came up, I went and worked in an Indigenous employment program in Bunbury.
It was government funded, and it was good work. We did lawn mowing and polishing cars and maintenance work, and a lot of my cousins were also involved.
But then in 2007 Clontarf College opened in Bunbury. They started Clontarf in Perth and it’s helped a lot of Indigenous kids to stay at school.
You can’t play footy unless you go to school, so you stick at school.
So anyway, when the Clontarf Football Academy opened in Bunbury, all of my little brothers and cousins asked me to come back to school.
So me and Neville Jetta, who’s now playing at Melbourne, and a couple of my other cousins, we had a chat with each other and decided we would all come back to school, it could be fun. We thought it could be a bit weird, because we were so old, but as soon as we went back we were chucked in the leadership group at the school because of our age.
It was pretty good and we got a couple more boys to come along and other kids came to our school, we got a lot of boys over and it was good to see.
So I finished off year 11 and 12, and I’m pretty glad, I can brag about it now. Me and Neville and a few other kids, Clinton Garlett who’s now at Swan Districts, and Corinne Yarran, she’s a basketballer, we all graduated together in 2008 and we were the first six Indigenous kids in Bunbury to graduate.
At the end of the day I was very happy I did that.
This week it’s Indigenous Round, and there’s a lot of Indigenous players I’ve loved to watch over the years. Nicky Winmar was a favourite. He’s related to me and I used to be told that I looked exactly like him.
I always wore the number seven that Nicky wore at St Kilda. My cousins and I would fight over it, but I always got it.
I liked Byron Pickett too because he looks like my brother. I have a lot of cousins playing in the AFL, including Josh Hill and Brennan Stack who are in the Bulldogs and we played against them last week. I had a chat to Hilly after the game.
The funny thing is, I didn’t really like Goodesy when they beat the West Coast Eagles in the grand final, but now I am here in Sydney, I reckon he is the best guy I have ever met!
This weekend’s match between the Sydney Swans and Fremantle Dockers is proudly supported by the Australian Government and the Learn.Earn.Legend! campaign. This initiative encourages young indigenous Australians to pursue training and education, to pursue a career and become a ‘legend’ by supporting themselves and their community.
