Natasha Kim
It was good, a good feeling all around

I moved to Minto from Armidale when I was 13. I am a Dungadi woman and have lots of family living in Minto so I fitted in straight away.

I believe Minto is a very friendly place and my neighbours look out for me. I have just had a little boy, Blake Stephen. The Aboriginal nurses who visited me when I was learning to cope with the new baby were fantastic… I don’t think I would have got through what I got through.

I relax by painting colourful pictures of animals and landscapes using traditional dot painting styles but in glorious technicolour.

I am also a dancer and played the lead role in Sarah Redfern School’s historic Rock Eisteddfod victory in 1994. The Rock Eisteddfod is a nationwide music and arts competition so this was big news round Minto way — especially because the subject matter was itself controversial. The theme was Aboriginal deaths in custody. They wanted to cut the first scene out when Kevin was hanging himself — and we thought that’s the whole theory to the dance so you can’t cut that out. And it started a ruckus in Sydney and in New South Wales, but we ended up doing the dance… from the start and we had all of Minto behind us so it was good. Just the fact that people did actually travel from Minto all the way into town to watch us at the Entertainment Centre. It was good. We had Channels 9, 7 and 10 coming out and interviewing us. It sort of put us on the map, so people were walking around saying how proud they were of the kids at the school so you know it was good, a good feeling all around.

I am passing on my skills to the young ones in school now. Last year I went up to the school for multicultural day. I taught the Aboriginal kids dance and figured out their costumes and their moves and they danced at the Deadly concert.

My ambitions are to raise my little boy to do the right thing. I just want to show him a different life. You know, I can see that he’s smart now and he should grow up and be that way. You know, get a good job and do the right thing, stay in school.