Reconciliation in the Park embraces online transition

THIS year Reconciliation in the Park is using lockdown as an opportunity to innovate, holding a week of virtual events to provide participants with a new experience.

Reconciliation in the Park is held across Reconciliation Week (May 27 to June 3).

One Fire has partnered with Wadawurrung Traditional Owners and broader Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander community of Geelong in bringing Reconciliation in the Park to the community for the past 11 years.

The event was initiated in 2010 by the Uncle David Tournier and organised by the Ron Milligan, who both wanted to help locals learn more about Djillong history and culture while also engaging the broader community in reconciliation activities.

The event quickly gained popularity, and in 2016 was the winner of the Community Organisation category at the annual HART (Helping Achieve Reconciliation Together) Awards.

President of Geelong One Fire Vicky Grosser said while this year will be very different she was optimistic it would be a great event.

“It’s looking very exciting. It’s very accessible to everyone,” said Ms Grosser.

“This is our 11th year and we’ve got very creative because we’ve got the strong relationships. It’s very much a long standing partnership of Wadawurrung, broader community and ourselves from On Fire over many years.”

Ms Grosser said moving the event online will help make it available to a wider range of people.

“It’s a well-respected event, it always gets an enormous turnout when we are actually in Johnstone Park, so we’ve been able to shift with our relationships and the technical skills we have to move it online. ”

Reconciliation in the Park will be held as a series of video activities.

Ms Grosser said they have managed to secure a diverse collection of people artists to host the event’s activities.

“It will include a very new style Welcome to Country on the first day from Nikki McKenzie, who is a Wadawurrung woman. Then there is Johnny Cake making, so you can actually see someone making it with the recipe and everything, there’s Dillybag making, there’s quite a lot of didgeridoo players playing different pieces which will be great, Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander players which are quite different styles. And there’ll be the Indegenous Hip Hop Project, they’ve got a couple of videos that they have contribute, and there will be information about Reconciliation Week, and some artwork and some ochre paint, some of the youngsters are doing ochre face painting.”

The activities and videos for Reconciliation in the Park can be found by heading to the Reconciliation in the Park Facebook page or geelongonefire.org.au.