The Chinese migrated to regional Victoria in the late 1800s in search of gold. Instead they often found persecution and violence. Today, Bendigo is a city of contrasts and one that is trying to reconcile its past. The few descendants of those early Chinese settlers that remain in the town are each trying to rediscover a side of their history that was too often seen as shameful. For Michael Hing, the experience is a personal one. His ancestors settled in regional New South Wales, but they just as easily could have called Bendigo home.
Hing travels to the town of Woolgoolga, a town with a population of around 4500 people, but it is home to the largest regional settlement of Sikhs in Australia. Woolgoolga’s Sikh community are now blueberry barons: 75% of Australia’s blueberries are grown here. The community that was founded before Federation by a handful of migrant banana farmers from India has now grown to half the population.
In regional Queensland, one community has made a very big impression in a very short time. Fleeing decades of war and unrest, Toowoomba’s South Sudanese community started nearly 20 years ago with just three families. It has since grown rapidly, but has struggled to find a place as media drum up fear of ‘African youth’ in Australia. The Sudanese community in Toowoomba is fighting to reclaim a positive image
Michael meets with the Italian families that overcame racism and World War II internment to become the beating heart of a Far North Queensland town.
Michael investigates the impact of decades of regional migration on Katanning, a West Australian town of four thousand people and more than 40 different nationalities.
Michael looks at the forgotten history of the German speaking refugees of the Barossa Valley, and their fight to save a language that has been passed down for nearly 200 years.
Michael meets with the Assyrians of Fairfield, a people without a nation that have made a new homeland in the suburbs of Western Sydney.
Michael starts his journey in Brisbane, home to one of the largest Vietnamese communities in the country, some surviving the trauma of the Vietnam war to thrive in the city’s south western suburbs. Their exodus from Vietnam may have coined the term ‘boat people’, but more than 40 years later, they’ve reclaimed it as a reminder of their strength, resilience, and gratitude to a country that took them in when they had nowhere else to go.
Michael visits the 100-year-old Greek community in Darwin - a group wiped out by economic ruin and devastating natural disasters in their hometowns. He looks at how they rebuilt and became stronger in a new city that soon formed a part of their identity.
In Wollongong, New South Wales, Michael unearths the Serbian history of a steel city. Generations of migrants from the former Yugoslavia have made a home in this picturesque seaside destination. From steel working priests to Balkans war survivors, this is a community constantly striving to balance its complicated cultural history with their Australian future.
Michael's journey ends in Shepparton, a city with four mosques, thirty different nationalities, and an Islamic history that stretches back over a century. He chats to Dinny Adem, the son of an Albanian Muslim migrant who went on to become Mayor of Shepparton.
