Aboriginal community leader and trailblazer Aunty Fay Carter has been farewelled in a state funeral service in Bendigo.
A Yorta Yorta and Dja Dja Wurrung elder, Aunty Fay died in June, aged 89.
Before the state funeral service, a smoking ceremony was held in front of the Ulumbarra Theatre in Bendigo.
Dja Dja Wurrung and Yorta Yorta man Trent Nelson underlined the importance of the ceremony as he spoke at the funeral service.
“Aunt’s on a journey at the moment, she’s on a journey from this lifetime into her next lifetime,” he said.
“It’s time Aunt and you’re ready … that smoke that’s there, you will follow that smoke back home.”
Mr Nelson said Aunty Fay served as the matriarch of their family and was an integral linking piece in the community.
“She’d sit down with mob and look at them and she’d tell them ‘who’s your mother, who’s your father’ and she’d know where they’re connected,” he said.
Yorta Yorta and Dja Dja Wurrung artist Tiriki Onus said Aunty Fay was a “force of nature” who wasn’t afraid to speak her mind.
“There are those Aunties that do that, that cuddle you in and then give you a gentle slapping,” he said.
“In so many ways, Aunty Fifi was the quintessential Black matriarch, she was the essence of an Aunty.”
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Aunty Fay was born in 1935 on Yorta Yorta country.
She lived at the Cummeragunja Mission in New South Wales until the age of four, when her family took part in a historic walk-off in protest against its mismanagement, settling on the flats along the Goulburn River outside Mooroopna with other families who also left.
Aunty Fay spent much of her life advocating for the Indigenous community, serving with the Aborigines Advancement League, NAIDOC and the Aboriginal Child Care Agency.
She was instrumental in the founding of the Aboriginal Community Elders Service, a not-for-profit Aboriginal controlled age care centre, and served as its first chief executive.
Premier Jacinta Allan spoke at the state funeral service, and lauded the magnitude of Aunty Fay’s accomplishments throughout her life.
“Aunty Fay changed lives, she saved lives, and she gave countless young Aboriginal kids the chance to live their lives,” Ms Allan said.
Aunty Fay was awarded an Order of Australia Medal in 2019 for her contributions to the Aboriginal community.
In 2013, she was involved in negotiations that achieved a landmark native title settlement which formally recognised the Dja Dja Wurrung People as the Traditional Owners of the lands in central Victoria.
Ms Allan called it one of the most significant agreements of its kind in Victorian history, and said it had led to increased visibility and understanding of Dja Dja Wurring culture.
“It’s that kind of progress that that little girl from Mooroopna could have only dreamed of.”
