1. During summer, you were always made to go outdoors and you'd spend all day at the beach/creek/pool.
2. And, of course, you and your cousins dared each other to jump into the water from the highest point.
3. When it was too hot to play outside, you dragged your foam mattress into the lounge to watch TV and movies.
4. You can be sure your house had a stockpile of foam mattresses.
5. When your mum told you your aunty was coming to stay, it really meant the whole extended family was coming.
6. You loved that your cousins were your best friends.
7. But it also meant probably giving your bed up for family members (lucky there was that stockpile of foam mattresses).
#GrowingUpBlack when you and all your cousin spend the night at granny house😭
And the eldest always got the most comfy mattress.
8. When you said you were going for a walk down the street, you could be sure your mum was watching you from the window.
9. A lunchtime meal consisted of devon (or polony in WA) and sauce sandwiches.
10. In fact, you still have tomato sauce on everything.
11. And chicken salt too.
It tastes like chicken.
12. You'd open the cupboard for a snack and all you'd find is this.
13. Dinner was always sorted by lunchtime because your aunty reckoned she made the best curry/stew/cornbeef.
when your aunt think she fly cause everyone loved her potato salad at the cookout ||
Same goes for curry.
14. And the best part of a family dinner was raiding the fridge for leftovers.
15. Lollies in your household consisted of either salty plums (for Murris) or raw lemon (for Kooris).
16. The kettle in your house would always be boiling.
17. And when your mum and aunties got their tea, they'd ask you to go fetch the mirror and tweezers.
18. You'd try and listen in on your mum and aunties' conversation in the kitchen, but they'd tell you to go 'way.
19. You had the job of being the family babysitter.
20. When going down town with your cousins to the shop, you had to add on an extra five minutes for the security guards who would follow you and check your bags.
21. Add another 5 minutes for seeing your friends down town.
22. If you ran into an enemy down town, you knew how to handle it.
23. And if you bumped into a blackfella you didn't know, the conversation would start with “who you belong too?” or “who your mother?” or "who your mob?"
24. No matter where you were, people would always know who your family were, so you couldn’t be cheeky or you’d get flogged.
25. You’d never muck up anyway because it meant having to face the wrath of Nana.
26. In the afternoon that music would be playing and you'd realize you knew all the words to Charlie Pride songs or Bob Marley songs or both.
27. When that one song came on and that one aunty had to get all emotional and cry.
I mean "Kiss An Angel Good Morning" is good... but not that good Aunt.
28. And then someone would bring up that Yothu Yindi had the best pop song of the '90s.
View this video on YouTube
To be fair, it is a deadly song.
30. To get you to behave at family gatherings, the elders would tell you scary dreaming stories of monsters coming to get you.
31. It’s probably why most of us loved watching scary movies from a young age.
32. You'd try to explain to whitefellas how your uncle and aunty are related even though they’re not your uncle and aunty.
33. Then you'd try and explain why all these kids (and some adults) call you Uncle or Aunty.
34. You'd finally get your license and become the town taxi, being forced to give lifts to everyone.
35. And although you wanted a new car, for your uncle there was no car too old or too broken to fix.
36. As a teenager, you asked your family about your crush’s family to suss out that you weren't related.
37. And one thing is for sure, you know you got the best mob in the whole world.
