TO AUSTRALIA, WITH LOVE FROM AFGHANISTAN

THE ABORIGINAL – AFGHAN CONNECTION

The connection between Australia and Afghanistan goes back to the 1860s when the first Afghan cameleers were brought to Australia, with their camels, to provide transport through the central desert at the heart of the continent. This story has been told many times, and most recently by Fahim Hashimy, an Afghan migrant, and filmmaker now living in Australia. Fahim’s film has been screened on NITV, SBS, and BBC and also screened on all the major TV networks in Afghanistan. 

Some of the Afghan cameleers married European women in Australia, and some of them married Aboriginal women. Fahim spent time filming with the Aboriginal/Afghan community in Marree, Alice Spring and port Augusta, SA and established strong friendly connections with many of the cameleers’ descendants.

There he learned a story that has not yet been told. He discovered that many of the cameleers eventually returned home to Afghanistan and that some of those who married Aboriginal women took their families back to Afghanistan in the early part of the 20th century.

 

Their Aboriginal descendants are very keen to make contact with their long-lost relatives – one woman poignantly said that when she sees film of Afghan refugees arriving in Australia she always waves at the TV in case they are relatives.

And it was when the film was screened in Afghanistan that Fahim started receiving emails from people who claimed to be descendants of those Aboriginal women now living in Afghanistan and longed to meet their Aboriginal relatives.