Yugambeh Nation

29/05/2026

I believe this protest is still going ahead on Sunday - https://www.facebook.com/events/2027999931125654/

UPDATE:
I see a bunch of man-babies in the comments having a sook that people have been exercising their democratic right to peaceful protest, so I thought I'd highlight a few points...

1. Before the 2024 Queensland state election, Premier David Crissafulli promised REPEATEDLY that he would not build Olympic stadiums in Barrambin/Victoria Park. He promised it like five different times in different media interviews and pre-election debates. Then shortly after the election, he broke that promise.

If people DON'T protest when politicians break major election promises, we're just rewarding those politicians for misleading the public.

2. The premier still doesn't actually know for sure how much it will cost to build these new Olympic stadiums. There's no business case or detailed design (just a couple pretty pictures a graphic designer knocked up). We can be pretty confident that his initial $4 billion estimate is gonna turn out to be way too low and that this project (IF it goes ahead) will suffer major cost blowouts.

How is the Premier proposing to pay for that cost blowout? In large part, through asset sales...

Across Queensland, the LNP are selling off government-owned land which was earmarked either for public/affordable housing, or for parkland. So they're building over Brisbane's largest inner-city park, AND selling off other chunks of current/future parkland in places like Woolloongabba and West End to pay for it. But those asset sales still won't cover the full cost.

Ultimately, to pay for these stadiums, the LNP are gonna have to reduce funding for stuff like schools, hospitals, regional road repairs, homelessness support services etc.

Basically they're telling us "Sorry, we can't afford to help Queenslanders keep a roof over their heads, but we CAN afford to write a blank cheque to build Olympic stadiums, which, by the way, also means there will be less construction workforce capacity for other stuff we actually need like housing."

3. For people saying stuff like "No-one ever mentioned this was a significant Aboriginal site back when it was a golf course!" that's actually just bu****it. Aboriginal people have been identifying that this is a historically and culturally significant area for generations - there are plenty of articles, stories etc about it. Just because you never heard about it, doesn't mean it didn't happen.

When you think about it, it makes perfect sense that while the site was just being used as a golf course/park, no-one kicked up too much of a fuss. People are protesting now because the level of destruction that the stadiums will cause is far greater than those previous land uses... cutting down 150-year-old trees, digging up an underground natural spring... damage like that can't be reversed or offset once it's done.

4. People who are like "The Olympic stadiums have to happen - just get out of their way!" seem to be forgetting that the way the Olympics is currently structured in terms of contractual agreements with the International Olympics Committee etc, the economic benefits overwhelmingly flow to big corporations and mega-wealthy elites. Big developers/construction companies profit off the lucrative blank cheque construction projects... Major media corporations profit off the lucrative advertising contracts... Parasitic business models like Airbnb profit off the conversion of homes into hotel rooms... I could go on all day.

The point is: You've been sold a lie. You're told hosting the Olympics is 'good for the economy' but in reality it's good for multinational corporations and bad for locals.

And don't spin me that nonsense about how even though it's a huge waste of money the Olympics is still ok because "it creates jobs" If a government spends $5 billion or $10 billion on ANYTHING it's gonna create a lot of jobs. But I'd rather they created jobs building housing for the homeless or improving energy security than this nonsense.

Right now, major party politicians and business elites are manipulating you into thinking the Olympics is a good deal for Queenslanders when actually it's a hospital pass that will cause serious long-term economic harm to the state.

I'm glad people have been protesting, and I'm glad people will continue protesting over the coming years.

The government signed us up to host the Olympics without asking Queenslanders if we even wanted it. Then they committed billions towards building stadiums we don't actually need after they promised not to.

If we don't protest when they screw over ordinary people like this, when WILL we step up and demand change?

ONE MORE LITTLE ADDENDUM COS MULTIPLE PEOPLE ARE BRINGING THIS UP:
I have a lot of contempt for the modern Labor party. I think they've done heaps of terrible things for this state and the country as a whole and have generally led us in the wrong direction.

But the factual reality is that the original proponents of Brisbane hosting the Olympics were the Liberal National Party lord mayor and councillors of Brisbane City Council. The LNP started strongly pushing a Brisbane Olympics almost a decade ago. QLD Labor was initially resistant, but then LNP Mayor Adrian Schrinner and former LNP Mayor Graham Quirk got Liberal Prime Minister Scott Morrison on board.
Both the LNP-controlled Brisbane City Council and the Liberal federal government started pressuring Queensland Labor to back the Olympics and eventually Palaszczuk signed us up for it. That was a terrible decision and she deserves to be criticised for it. But all this LNP spin that "Labor got us into this mess" is ignoring the fact that the LNP were calling for a Brisbane Olympics first and drove the bid to host.

By all means be angry at Labor, but don't let the LNP off the hook.

Signing up for the Olympics was a big mistake, and both the major parties are equally to blame.

ORIGINAL POST:
Apparently police are trying to forcibly move on Aboriginal people from their campsite in the next few hours (even though the premier previously suggested this wouldn't happen until next week)

26/04/2026

Some local Yugambeh history 🦅👣

Each day, my mum, Joyce Frater (Byerley), sits beside the river she has called home for most of her 94 years, the Broadwater at Southport.

This is the place where she played, learned, and grew up alongside many other First Nations families. She once lived on a houseboat at Macintosh Island with her husband, where they fished and passed down important cultural skills to their children, from fishing, to gathering oysters from the rocks, to picking berries.

Every day, she shares stories of this Country, the changes she has witnessed, the growth of the Gold Coast, and the deep connections with families from the Gold Coast and Tweed River. She tells these stories to her children, Trish, Geoff, Erica, and Linda, who still live on Country. Ann is in Perth, and Jocelyn continues to stay connected to culture while advocating for Mob in Evans Head.

Joyce grew up in Southport on Ferry Road with her mum, Lena Byerley (Bostock), and her brothers and sisters. She is the only one who remained in Southport. Her sister Margaret moved to North Queensland with her husband Lennard Graham, where they raised their children John, Peter, and Judith in Ayr. Shirley moved to Brisbane and had three children, Cheryl, Shane, and Jason. William moved to Sydney, Tom to Adelaide (his children Diane and Corina reconnected with family a few years ago), and Uncle Kenny returned to northern New South Wales, staying connected with family there while always travelling back home with his children Dion, Dwyane, Megan, and Tammy.

Mum may not be as quick on her feet as she once was, but her mind is strong, and her love for sharing stories remains as powerful as ever.

These stories, this history, this connection to Country, they live on through her.

- by Aunty Erica Eurell

02/03/2026

The Heritage Double Standard: Coins vs. Culture 🪙👣

In Europe, if a construction crew finds a single Roman coin or a fragment of a medieval wall, the project often stops. Immediately. Under strict archaeological protection laws (like the Valletta Convention), civil works can be delayed for years while experts meticulously excavate and preserve the site. The history is considered a non-renewable resource belonging to the public. 👨🏽‍🏫

In Australia, the story is often very different.
Despite being home to the oldest living culture on Earth, our "heritage" is frequently treated as a hurdle to be cleared rather than a legacy to be protected. 🙈🙉🙊

●The Juukan Gorge: 46,000 years of human history were legally blasted into rubble for iron ore.
● The Djab Wurrung Trees: Sacred birthing and directions trees, hundreds of years old, were bulldozed for a highway bypass to save a few minutes of travel time.

● The "Private Land" Myth: Too often, Traditional Owners are told that "private property" trumps thousands of years of spiritual and historical connection.

European heritage is often seen as "tangible" (stone and metal), making it easier for Western law to quantify. Indigenous heritage, like a Scar Tree, is a living part of the landscape.

When we poison a tree or bulldoze a site, we aren't just clearing land; we are burning a library that has stood since the last Ice Age.

It’s time we stopped "managing the destruction" of our history and started actually protecting it. 🌳✊🏾

22/02/2026

🛑 THE "EMPTY LAND" MYTH: HOW MANY YUGAMBEH PEOPLE WERE REALLY HERE?

Most people are taught that before 1788, Aboriginal groups were tiny—maybe a few groups of 150 people wandering a vast area here and there.

But the data says otherwise.

If we look at the historical records through a lens of science and statistics, we find a society that was far larger, denser, and more complex than the history books suggest.

📍 The Survivor Snapshot

In the 1860s, settlers recorded three local clans meeting with 600 people (about 200 per clan).
In the 1850s, Gresty, a Park Ranger, estimated 2,500 people living across the Logan, Albert, Coomera, Nerang and Tweed river systems.

But here is the truth: These weren’t "starting" numbers. They were "survivor" numbers.
By 1850, Yugambeh Country had already endured 70 years of a biological apocalypse that moved faster than the frontier itself.

📉 The Math of a Massacre (Inverse Modeling)
To have 2,500 people left in 1850 after decades of "Ghost Epidemics," the original population had to be massive. Let’s look at the stages of decline:
● 1840s–50s: The Frontier War (+40% pop.)
Direct colonial violence and being pushed off traditional food sources caused immediate spikes in mortality.
● 1829–31: The Second Smallpox Wave (+50% pop.)
A massive outbreak swept through Eastern Australia. In "virgin soil" populations, smallpox has a 50–90% fatality rate.
● 1790s–1820s: The Fertility Gap (+20% pop.)
The introduction of European diseases like syphilis meant fewer babies were born and fewer survived. The population wasn't just dying; it was being prevented from renewing.
● 1789: The First Great Pox (+50% pop.)
Smallpox hit Sydney in 1789 and traveled down Indigenous trade routes to the Gold Coast decades before the first white settler arrived.

🌿 The Reality: 9,000 to 15,000 People
When you work the math backward, the evidence is clear:

The resource-rich Yugambeh river systems—some of the most fertile land on earth—didn't support small groups of a few dozen people. They supported upwards of 15,000.

We aren't talking about the loss of a few "bands" of hunters. We are talking about the collapse of a dense, thriving nation.

Because when we realise how many people were actually here, we realise the true scale of what was taken—and the incredible strength of the descendants who are still here today.

21/02/2026

🌏 Why "Continuous" is the most important word in our history

We often hear that Aboriginal Australian cultures are the oldest living continuous cultures on Earth. But let’s have a proper look at what that actually means, because it’s a bit of a "brain bender" for some. 🧠

People sometimes reckon, "If we all started in Africa, wouldn't they have the oldest culture?" While it's true that the human journey began there, most of the world’s history is a story of interruption. If you dig a hole in Europe, the Middle East, and even Africa, the archaeological layers look like a mismatched stack of books. 📚

● You might find a layer of Celtic remains, but then the Romans move in and overwrite it. Then the Germanic tribes sweep through, followed by the Vikings or the Normans.
● Each layer shows a new group of people with different languages, different religions, and different ways of living, often completely replacing the mob that was there before them. The "chain" of culture gets snapped and restarted over and over again.

When we look at our own sites here on Yugambeh Country, the story is totally different. When archaeologists look at the record, they don’t see "replacements." They see the same people in the same place for tens of thousands of years. 📜

Through ice ages, rising sea levels, and massive environmental shifts, our ancestors didn't pack up and disappear. They adapted. 🧊 🌊 🌎

● Instead of a stack of different books, our history is one single, epic story. The tools changed and the tech evolved, but the bloodlines, the Songlines, and the spiritual connection to this specific patch of dirt remained constant.

This isn't just a "neat fact." It’s proof of a level of social resilience and sustainability that the rest of the world is only just starting to wrap their heads around. To keep a culture "continuous" for over 60,000 years takes more than just luck—it takes a sophisticated understanding of Law, Land, and Community.👣

When we talk about "Oldest Continuous Culture," we’re talking about a record of survival that is unmatched anywhere else on the planet.

Always was, always will be. 🖤💛❤️

16/02/2026

A proud Mununjali man of the Yugambeh nation born and raised in Cherbourg, Uncle Lionel became one of Australia's most-recognised poets and a long-standing figure in the Land Rights movement and the fight against Black deaths in custody. ❤️‍🔥🦅

WARNING: Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander readers are advised the following article contains the name and image of an Indigenous person who has died.Last Thursday, award-winning Yugambeh poet, au...

13/02/2026

Vale Uncle Lionel Fogarty: A Mununjali Giant (1957 – 2026) 🖤

Yugambeh Nation pauses in deep "Gijeri" (sorrow) to honour the life and legacy of a true legend of our Jagun (Country) who passed yesterday —Uncle Lionel Fogarty. 🙏🏽

A world-renowned Mununjali poet, a fierce activist, and a warrior for our people, Uncle Lionel was "proper famous" not just for his books, but for the fire he carried in his soul. Born at Barambah (Cherbourg) and always connected to the Beaudesert region, he didn't just write poetry; he used the English language as a tool to dismantle the systems that tried to hold us down.

Uncle Lionel was a pioneer of "guerrilla poetry." He broke every rule of the coloniser's language to make sure our Murri truth was heard loud and clear. From his tireless fight for justice regarding Deaths in Custody to his international literary acclaim, he remained a man of the grassroots.🌱

● Warrior: He carried the memory of his brother Daniel Yock and all our fallen kin in every verse.
● Poet: He showed the world that our Black words are sacred, raw, and revolutionary.
● Legend: He travelled the globe but his heart never left the scrub and the community.

"I am the language you couldn't kill."

We walk taller today because Uncle Lionel paved the way. He showed us that being a Black man in this country means being a poet, a fighter, and a protector of culture all at once. 👣

Bawgal Wanyi (Thank you), Uncle. Your song remains in the wind, your fire lives in our hearts, and your words are our inheritance.❤️‍🔥

Rest in Power. Rest in Peace. ✊🏾🙏🏽

13/02/2026

On National Sorry Day, we reflect on the healing needed for the Stolen Generations. But what does it actually mean to be sorry? In Yugambeh culture, "sorry" isn't just something you say—it’s something you feel in your very center. 🙇‍♂️

The Seat of Emotion: The Gijara
In Yugambeh language, many of our deepest emotions are tied to the body. While Western culture often points to the heart as the home of feelings, for us, sorrow and regret live in the Gijara (the stomach). 🫁🫀

This is why the word for sorry is Gijeri. When we say we are sorry, we are acknowledging a heaviness or a "sickness" in the gut caused by our actions or the pain of others.

The Old People always knew what modern science is only just "discovering." You’ve probably heard people talk about having a "gut feeling" or an action "not sitting right in their stomach."

Science now backs this up through the study of the Enteric Nervous System (ENS). The ENS is a vast network of roughly 100 million neurons lining your gastrointestinal tract. While it doesn't write poetry or solve math problems, it communicates constantly with the brain. Scientists literally call it the "Second Brain" because it can operate independently and significantly influences our moods and emotions. 🧠

When we recognise the connection between the Gijara and Gijeri, an apology changes:

● It’s Physical: Real regret should "twinge" in your gut.

● It’s Intuitive: If something feels wrong in your stomach, it usually is.

● It’s Grounded: A gut-level apology isn’t just words; it’s a commitment to change so that the "sickness" in the stomach can be healed.

Today, we acknowledge the pain of the past and look toward a future where we listen to our "second brains"—ensuring our actions always "sit right" with our spirits and our Gijara. ❤️‍🔥

11/02/2026

If 1842 was the year the "fences went up," then Uncle Bullum (John Allen)—born just eight years later in 1850—was the generation that had to navigate the narrow gaps between them. 👣🦅

🌅 Uncle Bullum was of the Wangerriburra people (the "Pretty-faced Wallaby people"), whose Country encompasses the heights of Mt Tamborine and the valley of the Albert River.

His life is a powerful study in the complexity of survival. Orphaned as a child following attacks by the Native Police—the brutal enforcement arm of the "free settlement" era—he was raised by members of his family thereafter. At around 10, he was employed by the Collins family of Mundoolun. By age 11, he was already working the stock routes, eventually becoming a legendary drover and explorer.

📜 In 1913, Uncle Bullum performed an act of immense cultural resistance. Alongside John Lane, he compiled a grammar and vocabulary of the Yugambeh language. He also mapped the Yugambeh clans.

While the colonial administration of the time often viewed such work as "recording a dying race," for us today, it is a foundation stone. Because of Bullum’s dedication to his mother tongue, the Wangerriburra dialect remains etched in the historical record, a gift to every descendant reclaiming their voice today. 🗣️📖

🐎 From Mail Runner to Legend
Bullum wasn’t just a "survivor"; he was a force of nature-
● The Explorer: He accompanied Robert Collins into the West, where "Allen’s Hole" near Boulia still bears his name. Here he met and formed relationships with the Pitta Pitta Nation on the frontier, having a Pitta Pitta wife and daughter at Boulia.

● The Entrepreneur: At one point, he was earning £1,000 a year running mail between Boulia and Winton—a staggering sum for the era that speaks to his unparalleled skill and reliability.

● The Builder: He helped physically build the Jimboomba State School, leaving a literal mark on the infrastructure of the region.

🦯 Colonial obituaries in 1931 called him the "last survivor" of the Wangerriburra. But history told through a Yugambeh lens says otherwise.
He spent his later years at Tamrookum, living among the Williams family. Our Elders born in the 1920s don’t remember him as a "relic of the past"—they remember him as a grandfather figure.

They recall with a laugh how, as cheeky children, they would "steal his cane," playing at the feet of a man who carried the entire weight of the 19th century in his memory. 🔥

Uncle Bullum (John Allen) proves that while the 1842 proclamation sought to "open" the land by "closing" a culture, the spirit of the Wangerriburra and other Yugambeh clans was never truly contained. 🦘

He was the bridge. He was born in a dark time but carried the light of our language through to the other side. 🕯️

Still here. Still Wangerriburra. Still Yugambeh.🖤💛❤️

09/02/2026

Today, we remember a date that fundamentally altered the landscape of our Country.🌆

On February 10th, 1842—exactly 184 years ago—Governor Gipps issued the proclamation opening Moreton Bay for "free settlement." While colonial history often celebrates this as the birth of local industry, for the Yugambeh Nation, it was the formal onset of an era of profound loss, displacement, and survival. 👣🐾

The frontier moved with devastating speed. As the ink dried on the proclamation, the pastoralists followed, carving out the massive stations seen on this map—Nindooimbah, Tamborine, Jimboomba, and Beaudesert. Simultaneously, the cedar-getters pushed into the Gold Coast and Tweed regions, felling the ancient giants of our forests to clear the way for further occupation. ⚒️🪓

This was not a peaceful transition of land. It was a rapid, systematic incursion that reduced our population from an estimated 9,000 to just ~150 by the time of Federation. 📉

In the work of truth-telling and Nation Building, remembering matters:

● The Map as a Weapon: These pastoral boundaries were not just farm lines; they were tools of exclusion. By gazetting "Stations," the colonial government attempted to turn our ancestral hunting grounds and ceremonial sites into private property, criminalising our people for simply walking their own Country.

● The Cost of Industry: Behind every log of cedar taken from the Coast and every head of cattle grazed on the rivers, there is a story of environmental upheaval. The "opening" of the land meant the closing of ancient food sources and the destruction of sacred groves that had been managed by our families for millennia.

● Resilience Against Erasure: Despite the decades of turmoil, disease, and warfare that followed 1842, the Yugambeh and neighbouring people were never erased. From a remnant of 150 survivors, the Yugambeh have grown back to over 5,000 today. Our kinship systems and cultural responsibilities outlasted the original pastoral leases.

As we mark 184 anno incursi (years of Invasion), we honour our Ŋajaŋgali (Ancestors). They saw the moonless night begin, they felt the fences go up, and they ensured that we would be here today to tell the truth of it. 👨🏽‍🏫

We are still here. Our connection to this Country remains.

Always was. Always will be. 🖤💛❤️
May the Yugambeh forever soar like Eagles 👣🦅