'Culture has a home here': Muladha Gamara on NAIDOC, closing the gap and reconciliation

While this is their most public appearance, what they do, and indeed their entire culture, is far more than just dance.

"People think the dance is all there is to culture, but it is so much deeper than that," one of the group's founders Adam Nye said.

The group was started in December 2021 by a quartet of Yuin locals - Adam Nye, Tayla Nye, Michael Withers and Jordan Nye - who saw a gap in cultural representation in society.

They are pioneers and role models within their community; no one in their family has owned a business - nor a house - before, and they are determined to be change makers, showcasing the depth and richness of Indigenous culture to the community.

"The culture wasn't out there enough," Jordan said "We needed to make it more prominent.

"Tourists think they have to go to central Australia to see culture because there is no culture here. That is false."

The group runs school education programs, tourism learning workshops and performs traditional ceremonies as well as being a community of mentorship and consultancy.

Since their inception, they have quickly become commonplace within the Eurobodalla, and the group are excited about the possibilities growing interest and understanding in Indigenous culture presents.

"We are starting to send tidal waves through the Eurobodalla," Jordan said.

The group is dancing, teaching and performing ceremonies on five days during NAIDOC week, hoping to teach the community that Indigenous knowledge applies to more than just one week of the year.

Indigenous songlines, dances and stories pass down wisdom orally from generation to generation. Muladha Gamara means 'Wise Woman, Wise Man' in Dhurga and the group believe contemporary culture has so much to learn from the 80,000-year-old living and breathing library of Indigenous understanding of the land.

They hope through providing tourism tours and mentorships, they will harbour a greater admiration in the community for the Indigenous culture, and the land.

"These aren't just trees for wood, they are dentists, they are calendars," Adam said.

"Once you get that new appreciation, you get a love for country."

One such story passed down for hundreds of years tells that pregnant women shouldn't eat fish because the fins will spike the baby and create deformities in the infant.

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"Then a scientist comes along to tell you the mercury in a fish will cause deformities in babies." Adam said. "It is the stories - our oral history - that has that knowledge."

He would like to see the essence of the traditional totem system reintroduced in society as a way of caring for country.

The totem system intimately connected people with their land and gave them a responsibility to protect it for the future. Each person would carry a totem, which they had to protect and were forbidden from killing or eating. The system balanced ecosystems.

"If every town had a totem and they had to sculpt their environment to suit that animal or plant species, we wouldn't have extinctions," Adam said. "We would be in balance."

Moruya could hold the black swan; Mogo the swift parrot. It would create the balance Adam sees as lacking in how humans interact with their native environment.

"We all have a little part to play in the world," he said. "The cockatoos are doing their bit. Humans are the only ones mucking it up."

Muladha Gamara aim to demonstrate a connection with culture benefits everyone - Indigenous and non-Indigenous alike - and to empower people with knowledge, understanding and appreciation for their culture.

The group identified Indigenous youth are struggling with an identity crisis, caught between two worlds, two cultures and ways of thinking.

"A lot of our mob today deep down don't really know their true identity as an Aboriginal person," Jordan said.

When the founders were growing up, they had no opportunities to learn their culture - no ceremonies to practice their native dances. They want to give culture to the next generation - including providing opportunities for young people to say they have danced their traditional dance.

"We want to give people a sense of what home means - a sense of belonging," Jordan said.

Muladha Gamara want to give their culture to Indigenous youth, but they hold is freely available to everyone and they see participation in all forms of culture as a key component to reconciliation.

One of Adam's main frustrations with reconciliation is politicking over 'closing the gap' without taking action.

"We are stuck in this rut of constantly closing the gap, but it never closes," he said.

So what would it take to close the gap?

Muladha Gamara believe participation spawns relationships, which closes the gap.

"When you talk about reconciliation, that means reconciling the relationship that's already been built," Jordan said. "But there's been no relationship. We are trying to build that relationship. We want to make it easier for people to participate.

"I encourage my non-indigenous brothers and sisters, it if there's ever an opportunity to be a part of it, take it."

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When they perform a public ceremony, Muladha Gamara always invites onlookers to join in their Birribaan dance.

"That dance - the Birribaan - is enough to shift someone's mindset in a massive way - you can experience culture and just feel this big high," Jordan said.

Participation creates a new sense of respect and appreciation. No longer will that person watch a dance and see people imitating animals, they will search for the deeper story, the lesson within the dance.

The group want everyone to participate.

"People think it is Indigenous culture, but really it is Australian culture," Adam said. "We are all Australians.

"You can't find our culture on Google. It has to be passed on."

He laments that many in society feel only Indigenous people are allowed to embrace culture and participate. He wants everyone to feel welcome and included.

"Come and participate - really!" he said.

In the eight months since their inception, the group have been inundated with positive feedback. Often people burst in to tears after a cultural tour or moment of teaching.

"It is because we gave them such a deep connection to their country," Jordan said.

"We gave them an understanding they crave for but don't know how to get."

The group hopes to create a bush school where people can learn culture, live on the land and learn to connect with country. They hope to run workshops to equip people with knowledge and stories of wisdom. They hope their bush camp would further their goal of helping immerse people in culture, and feel culture in their spirit.

"We hold knowledge," Jordan said. "We want to pass it on.

"We have to give it away to keep it. By giving culture to you, we are then keeping it. Then each person will hold it.

"Now is the time. There is a change happening."