Nancy – Mt Roskill / Sāmoa

“My father came in with a cup of tea and a cake and it was something special, because growing up we didn’t have much, and my dad just doing little things like that showed a lot of things.

The last time I showed someone that I cared about them was um, when I prayed for my father who has done a lot, and just saying I love him. So, growing up with my dad, he’s a patient man and he’s really quiet and humble. Sometimes I cry because people walk all over him, and it’s hard to see that, when a father gets walked over. So my dad, he stays with my sick sister, and she’s mentally ill, so he has to look after her and he doesn’t work. So both my parents are financially unable. My sister has um, she’s schizophrenic, so growing up, I’ve always wanted to look up to her, but it was the other way around; I had to look after her, because we’re the only girls in the family. I think what my sister has it just played some hardship on the family, but it also showed how strong we are as a family. We were able to be strong and be one, in a way.

I’m proud of my dad for staying home and looking after my sister. It kind of changes the social roles as a man. It shows the amount of heart he has as a person to be able to stay home and for my mum to kind of go and chase the bread in a way and growing up it shows how strong both my parents are even though it’s kind of like opposite.

Yeah so Dad; I just want to say, thank you for everything you’ve done for us. Um, even though there are times when we don’t really appreciate how much you do for us, but in our hearts, deep in our hearts we have so much love, and we’re thankful for everything you’ve done as a person, and as a dad.

Well, it’s really hard because she still goes, like she goes walking, and there was a time um, when she went for three days missing, and the police were searching high and low for her, and we were concerned because we just didn’t know what to do anymore. We tried to send her off to clinics or to places where she hopefully can recover – you can never recover from something like that, but it was hard because, personally I wanted a sister to look up to. I wanted to do those girlie things but growing up I had brothers and I needed a sister to kind of look up to and kind of tell me what to do and what not to do kind of thing. I think as a family it just made us stronger and it made us more loving and it showed that we didn’t need all the money in the world to show each other what we have for each other.

We just needed to appreciate what we have, kind of thing. There was one day when my family went out for two days where we couldn’t really buy food and there was $8 left in I think my dad’s bank account, and we went to New World and I know it was a sad moment because on the corner of my eye I was crying, but I was smiling to my parents. I thought to myself, it showed that we were of low social, economic like financially, but we laughed during that time after we brought like those little things that we needed like bread and butter and that was the only thing we could live on for that day, but it showed that we still laughed. We still were happy. We still had each other, and it goes to show that family and the values we have as a human being is much more valuable than an object of, like money. Like, that’s paper. Oh, it’s not paper, but like, you know, you can rip it – the value will be lost once you’ve ripped that piece of note. But family, that’s something that you can pass on to generation. That’s something which goes on for years.”

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