Thriving in Two Worlds

Yarlalu Nanmurr Thomas’s country is on the edge of the Western Desert in a place called Mijijimaya. He is a Nyangumarta man named after a hill in the Great Sandy Desert, where his grandfather was born.

Yarlalu left Warralong, a small indigenous community 120kms southeast of Port Hedland and 50 kilometres north of Marble Bar, to study at Scotch College in Perth, on a MADALAH scholarship. He is currently at the University of Sydney on a tertiary scholarship, where he is studying a double degree in medicine and a bachelor of medical science. He is the first member of his community to go to university and plans to take his knowledge back to his own and other rural indigenous communities, to improve the standard of indigenous health.

Over the university summer break, Yarlalu spent a month in the bush going through tribal law. He is a young man with high aspirations, and we are very proud of him.