Journey from Badu to the AFL continues

AUSSIE RULES “KEEP going, don’t give up.”

Timakoi Bowie hears the words echoing all the way down from the Torres Strait. They drive him forward, even as the goalposts he worked tirelessly towards for almost five years have moved.

Timakoi, 19, is studying towards a Bachelor of Business at Bond University on a Blue Sky Alternative Investments Indigenous Scholarship. Originally from Badu Island, 60km north of Thursday Island, he moved to Cairns at the age of five.

Rugby league was always a passion, but Timakoi caught the eye of a rival code after moving to AFL Cape York House, a boarding facility and mentoring program for indigenous boys while they complete high school in Cairns.

“I got into AFL after a footy camp with the Cape York Crusaders,” he said. “I was benched a lot at the start but got better and better and in my first year I ended up being chosen for the Queensland Under 16 AFL team. It was pretty weird going from one sport to the other and then being picked for a state team.”

State selection put Timakoi on the Gold Coast Suns’ radar but, as he approached Year 12 at St Andrew’s Catholic College in Cairns, he was also thinking about his academic future.

“One of the other boys (from AFL Cape York House) had been to Bond and he had a little chat with me. He said it had a really strong indigenous program.”

Timakoi enrolled in a Diploma of Business at Bond University College, which put him on a pathway to the bachelor program.

His football career was also on a fast-track. He joined the Suns’ Under 18 Academy and was taken under the wing of Suns star and fellow north Queenslander, Jarrod Harbrow.

Timakoi aimed to make the AFL draft at the end of last year – but it was not to be. That’s when the words came to him.

“Whenever I go back to Badu, my family tells me, ‘keep going, don’t give up’,” he said.