I wish i had a digital camera so i could post a picture from where i am.
I have been having incredible adventures on my travels in far norths sa. Despite being a city bred whitefella through and through, I am fortunate to be accepted as kin to a huge Anangu (aboriginal people form central desert region) family because i have cousins whose mother is Yankunytjatjara, and anangu way that means i am a 'big sister' to those two boys, whose father is my mums older brother. I have lived and worked out here before and visit as often as i can and plan to one day return here to work again, once i have done some uni. I can speak language enough to get by and i crave this country when i get stuck in town for too long at a stretch, and i sook like a baby every time i leave. I learn so much in every visit and feel very privileged to have the connection that i do to this place, its people and culture. In less than five days i have eaten camel and malu (kangaroo) cooked proper way by an elder and my aunties and a grandmother insisted on me killing the ngintaka (fucking huge goanna) when we found him wondering across the stuart highway and pulled off into the scrub to go get him. He tastes lovely, a bit like chicken or fish( hahaha just had a vision of jessica simpson out bush). And with the big rains the prospects are looking good for some tjala (honey ants) and maku (witchetty grubs).
I was meant to be home a week ago but i pulled into a station on the APY lands where i have friends to camp for one night on my way back south to coober pedy, and there was a massive droughtbreaking rain that night , eight inches over three nights, that left us surrounded by swampland that was impassable even by four wheel drive for five days. My kingswood aint goin nowhere for a few weeks so i've just been having a great time enjoying seeing the desert as i never have before. There hasn't been proper rain for six years and the land was looking so dry and dusty it was making me sad. Wthin twenty four hours all i could hear was heaps of frogs croaking and other swampy sounds....everything was magically transformed.
Paradise started to sour after five days of twelve of us stuck on our 'desert island' we we're running out of food and all the beer, weed and cigarrettes we're gone. Things got a little tense and we started to think about an emergency drop of food but made a final attempt at getting to Mintabie (an opal mining town 30ks away where i am writing from now) with two four wheel drives and a motorbike, and we made it. We bought up big on beer and smokes (the essentials) and some food and headed back, we have been in and out a bit over the last few days but still need to drive cautiously cos at any moment we could get that sinking feeling, literally, then we all have to pile out, grab shovels and start digging until the whole car is out. We have been bogged five times in as many days and i reckon i must be expert at getting out of them now. all i need to do now is master how to avoid getting bogged in the first place.... but around here i reckon the only way to avoid it is to stay home.
The dams here are full of water and incredibly some silver perch fingerlings that were chucked in them over five years ago have somehow survived the drought and are swimming around happily so we have ordered fishing lines to be sent up from Adelaide.
If you don't here from me here for a while you'll know where i am......... I've GONE FISHIN'in the desert!!!
I have been having incredible adventures on my travels in far norths sa. Despite being a city bred whitefella through and through, I am fortunate to be accepted as kin to a huge Anangu (aboriginal people form central desert region) family because i have cousins whose mother is Yankunytjatjara, and anangu way that means i am a 'big sister' to those two boys, whose father is my mums older brother. I have lived and worked out here before and visit as often as i can and plan to one day return here to work again, once i have done some uni. I can speak language enough to get by and i crave this country when i get stuck in town for too long at a stretch, and i sook like a baby every time i leave. I learn so much in every visit and feel very privileged to have the connection that i do to this place, its people and culture. In less than five days i have eaten camel and malu (kangaroo) cooked proper way by an elder and my aunties and a grandmother insisted on me killing the ngintaka (fucking huge goanna) when we found him wondering across the stuart highway and pulled off into the scrub to go get him. He tastes lovely, a bit like chicken or fish( hahaha just had a vision of jessica simpson out bush). And with the big rains the prospects are looking good for some tjala (honey ants) and maku (witchetty grubs).
I was meant to be home a week ago but i pulled into a station on the APY lands where i have friends to camp for one night on my way back south to coober pedy, and there was a massive droughtbreaking rain that night , eight inches over three nights, that left us surrounded by swampland that was impassable even by four wheel drive for five days. My kingswood aint goin nowhere for a few weeks so i've just been having a great time enjoying seeing the desert as i never have before. There hasn't been proper rain for six years and the land was looking so dry and dusty it was making me sad. Wthin twenty four hours all i could hear was heaps of frogs croaking and other swampy sounds....everything was magically transformed.
Paradise started to sour after five days of twelve of us stuck on our 'desert island' we we're running out of food and all the beer, weed and cigarrettes we're gone. Things got a little tense and we started to think about an emergency drop of food but made a final attempt at getting to Mintabie (an opal mining town 30ks away where i am writing from now) with two four wheel drives and a motorbike, and we made it. We bought up big on beer and smokes (the essentials) and some food and headed back, we have been in and out a bit over the last few days but still need to drive cautiously cos at any moment we could get that sinking feeling, literally, then we all have to pile out, grab shovels and start digging until the whole car is out. We have been bogged five times in as many days and i reckon i must be expert at getting out of them now. all i need to do now is master how to avoid getting bogged in the first place.... but around here i reckon the only way to avoid it is to stay home.
The dams here are full of water and incredibly some silver perch fingerlings that were chucked in them over five years ago have somehow survived the drought and are swimming around happily so we have ordered fishing lines to be sent up from Adelaide.
If you don't here from me here for a while you'll know where i am......... I've GONE FISHIN'in the desert!!!
Wish I was doing the same.
Cheers
A