Return to Australia. Our cultural materials are finding their way back to their us. Through many circuitous routes, whispered stories, unlikely connections, and longstanding struggles, they are on many different journeys. On their way. Maybe in some intangible ways, they were always with the communities they were taken from. Exerting their connections across inconceivable distances. The western museum loves a good metaphor about its sleepy sepulchral nature, and the redemptive power of objects being re-enlivened or re-awakened. But just because it sought to lay these objects to rest, does not mean they slept. Perhaps they did quiet, unseen work. The return or repatriation of cultural objects is being held up as a testament to the museum’s expanding ethical post- or de-colonial credentials. And indeed, this is long overdue. But these processes of return are as complex as the colonial contexts in which they are still firmly embedded – speaking to a multitude of on-going struggles and cultural practices that seek to revitalise and maintain culture, community, language, and custodianship of country. This research hopes to trace some of the many stories of objects as they journey along many routes of return, creating many ripples within institutions and communities.