Robyn Jean

VP: Hi there. My name is Vuma Phiri, coming to you from Centre for Stories in Boorloo/Perth 

Today we present to you City of Stirling Backstories at Perth Festival: stories from residents living in the City of Stirling. Here, we showcase local residents sharing their most memorable lived experiences from the neighborhood. What connects them to this place? What connects them to their neighbours and community? 

In partnership with the City of Stirling and Perth Festival, Centre for Stories captured these experiences of connection to community and place on Whadjuk Nyungar boodjar. We pay our respect to Whadjuk Elders, and all Aboriginal people from the beginning, who are the knowledge-keepers and custodians of this place. 

In this episode, you will hear Robyn Jean’s story. Robyn is a Noongar/Yamatji artist and photographer whose work explores cultural identity, resilience, and the healing power of nature. A Curtin University graduate, she creates layered imagery and collaborates on public art projects. This is Robyn. 

RJ: Hi. Tiny bit nervous standing here, but also incredibly excited and I feel really thrilled that I could be a part of this amazing group here tonight to tell stories. We’ve been having a wonderful time learning how to craft these stories, and tonight we get to share them with you, and I’m really thrilled about that. I love Stirling. I’ve been in this area for about 20 years now. I am a Perth person and as I said, I’m Noongar/Yamatji and I’ve lived in different places in Stirling. I tell you; I absolutely love our beaches. They’re just, you know, you go down there and the suns on you, and, at the moment we’ve been enjoying our summer. The sun’s there and you breathe in that salty, warm air. And I love walking down onto the beach, just feeling the sand in my toes, walking down and into the water to have a swim and just feeling so alive just because I’m on one of our beautiful beaches. 

And I just love all the people that come there. They go down there with their children, families, and you see them all having their picnics on the beach and making their sandcastles. And there’s lots of laughter and chitter chatter and you’ll see people surfing, swimming, and it’s just delightful. It’s the beautifulest thing. And every day when I’m down there, I watch, and this is a long time ago, this part of the story, but I would watch as people would finish for the day, pack up, drag the kids back to the car, “come on!” You know, and then the pile in everything. And the surfers would finish and off they would go for dinner and the lovers would finish and off they would go, and all those wonderful things. And, and I’d be sat there on the beach watching as everybody left. And it’d start, it would start to get dark, and I’d be like, crikey. I think, “oh, I better get back to my car now. It’s just a little bit dark for me”. 

And, so, I’d head off and there’d be nobody around, and I’d hop in my car, and I had all these things packed in my car, nice and neat. So that it just looked like I was packed for the beach for the day, you know, but all my things were in there. And I’d sit in the car, and I’d turn the radio on and I’d open up a packet of cheese and crackers that I had there. Have a little munch on it – nothing like a bit of food and a bit of music to make you feel like you’re not so alone. And when it’s the music’s on, I would think, [singing] “Hello, darkness, my old friend, I’ve come to talk with you again”. And I’d sit there, and I’d be having my miseries, you know, I dunno, can you relate to that sometimes when we feel a bit miserable and we just have to have that song and have that feeling, because I was homeless, I guess that’s a word you can tag for it. And a lot of people didn’t know at the time, but I had to leave the home where I lived. That was my home because it just wasn’t safe anymore. Not that it was safe for a long time, but it just wasn’t safe. And I found that energy, that strength in me to find a place. So, my car became my home. Now, after time I started to think “It is a little bit lonely in the car at night, I wonder if anyone would put me up on their couch for a night or two”. So off I went. And wonderful, beautiful people in my life would let me go and have time out on their couch and use their shower and all those kind of cool things that we often take for granted. 

And that’s what I did anyway, this one particular night I was staying with my daughter Emily., and we decided to have a movie night. Now I know we all like movie nights, right? With the, the big screen TV and everything. And she bought in the popcorn, and she had the cool drinks there and we were just like enjoying it. And I said, “Come on, we’ve gotta watch Star Wars. That’s my favourite. We’ve got to have the Star Wars”. So, we put the Star Wars on, and we are really enjoying it. We’re eating the popcorn and we’re yawning about it, and we’re watching the show, and it gets this part. This is one of the, like the first Star Wars, I think. I don’t know if you remember, but all the storm troopers were chasing Luke Skywalker and Princess Leia and that. And so Princess Leia, she’s a pretty deadly chick. She, she fired this gun into the wall and makes a great big hole, and they all fly down into it straight down into this hole, which turns out to be a rubbish dump, right? Maybe you are remembering this part now. So, they’re down there and Chewbacca there and stuff, and it’s a big, messy, messy thing of all kinds of rubbish. And they’re juggling on these bits and they’re trying to figure out what’s going. This big monster whips his arm up when he’s trying to grab them. It’s a whole chaos. It’s a big, big mess. Then the walls start to close in all which ways they’re really freaking out at this stage. Like, how do we get outta here? 

Now, the moment that started to happen, my darling daughter decided to pause the tv. I’m like, “whatcha doing? That’s the best bit?” And she’s like, “no, you’ve put the popcorn mess everywhere and stuff, I need to go get more. We’ve eaten it all”. Off she went, and I was sat there on my own looking at this screen with all these, you know, wonderful characters on the TV trying to get outta this great big mess. And I looked at it and I thought, “I know why I’m so invested in this story. I know why every single time it comes on, I’m just like, ‘get outta there!’ Because I’m in that tip. I’m in the rubbish with Princess Leia”. 

And I realised then that I did not want to be in that tip anymore, that I deserve better, that I could get outta that tip. And so, I did the only thing I could really think of to try and find, you know, money to get rental. I had a mop and a vacuum cleaner. Put an ad on eBay, Gumtree, “I can clean your house, I’m eco-friendly”. And off I went. I did that for a few years. It was hard. Wasn’t easy. And I did, you know, some cool stuff, making products and all kinds of things. The thing is, after a while I was just like, “okay, what’s next?” I sort of moved my way up because I have a belief of never giving up. I have this belief that we can keep going. Even when I’ve been in the garbage tip, I’ve been like, “okay, you’ve got this girl, we can do this”. We’re gonna do this. And so I’ve done it and then I cleaned and then I was like, “okay, what’s next?” Because I have a background in the arts. Before all this, I had lots of things I’d done, but then I found myself in this messy place. So, I was like, “okay, I like art”. And this was around COVID time. I’m like, “what can I do something different? I’ve done this, done that, done this. I know. Photography!” And so I did what most sensible people would do. I went to TAFE, and I studied for a couple of years. And in point I’m still learning, but when I picked up a camera for that first time and looked through it, I found my home and I found my place and my way of being accepted, being a part of the world, being able to find my way back into the world. And so that’s what I did and that’s what I’m still doing. And being in Stirling is amazing because it just seems like I’ve come full circle. 

And just last year I went and entered an art competition here and put in a photograph of my mum. My mum’s a really renowned Aboriginal artist, Norma. And I said, “can I take your photo please? And I wanna do it in this way, this Rembrandt style. I wanna do this and this”. So, bless her, she posts for me and I put that photo in the competition. Now my mob, we said, “let’s go”. We all went along to watch. And when we, when we got there, like, I was standing up the back, I was so proud to show my mum the photo and it was really lovely. And I just felt like I was doing something and achieving. And I was sitting there, and they had the announcements, and they were calling people up and I was right up the back with my family and then they called my name, and I don’t think it registered. And then James said, “oh, it’s, it’s you!” And I was like, “what?!” So, I swam my way back through the crowd that, you know, it was almost like they didn’t recognise that it was me trying to get through. And, like, come on, I gotta get through, it’s my turn. Anyway, I went up on the stage and I had that moment of feeling very surreal and I felt looking out over everybody, like, “oh my goodness, this is me. This is real. I never give up and I’m standing here doing this”. 

That moment again here in Stirling has empowered me so much that it’s given me fuel to keep moving forward. And no matter what we go through in life, I know personally if you never give up, if you keep believing in yourself, you can do anything you believe in, anything you dream about you can do. Now some people say, “you’re old Auntie Robyn”, you know, you go, “nah, look out for this girl ’cause she’s coming there, and she’s doing her thing”. And I’m also encouraging you to do your thing. Never give up. Believe. Thank you for listening. 

VP: This project was funded by the City of Stirling and Perth Festival and produced by Centre for Stories. Centre for Stories is a not-for-profit organisation with charitable status. Our team is small and nimble, and we love what we do. To help us to continue to support diverse storytelling, consider a small donation. You can donate at centerforstories.com. This podcast was produced by Centre for Stories with story training by Vuma Phiri and Sound Engineering by Mason Vellios. Thank you.