Man, the Australian summer is here and IT'S AWESOME! After years of complaining about the humidity, I actually find myself in love with the sub tropics. I don't think I could live somewhere cold. And, I really love Australia. But there's a lot about us that makes me sad.
Over the New Years period, I'm going to a festival on my own. I'm branching out baby, after 4 years at the
Woodford Folk Festival working on the bar and with the vis arts team. I think the beautiful Tahliana is working on my mate Alex's bar, so she'll be holding the fort! I adore that place. Stinky mud and all. If y'all are going, check out the wish installation on the way to the ampitheatre. I'll leave it a surprise.
I'm getting majorly excited about Peats Ridge, and about checking out this incredible indigenous fella from up arnhem land.
HE'S SINGING IN LANGUAGE! In his language, the language of his people.
I've been thinking a lot about colonialism. The fact that Australia's torrid racial and politcal history has led to so many amazing indigenous languages becoming extinct! I read Crispin's blog recently and listened in awe and wonder to Jill Bolte's presentation on the right and left sides of the brain - the right being the immersion of our being into the energy all around us... we are energy, we are part of it, part of the whole, not separate and alone. Then, the god damned left hand side of the brain, which personally, is my fucking demise. It's the side that says I'm separate from everything, the origin of all this endless mind chatter, and dare I say it, insecurity and fear.
It's a big, generalised call, but I think a lot of indigenous cultures operated from the right hand side of the brain, but our European ancestors had to go on in there and blast off with our overbearing left sided brains.
Now, I listen to Gurrumul and I feel like I'm listening to the spirit of this land I call my home. This land that is, but simultaneously isn't of my blood. I was born here, but I don't come from here. His lyrics are available in english, and are tender and haunting.
I'm reading Come on shore and we will kill and eat you all, which is a solid attempt at history/memoir fusion and which outlines the timeline of colonialism in our sister country, NZ. I am obsessed with Australian and New Zealander indigenous issues, our colonial history. I can't wait to travel Aus and NZ. We've got so much here. So much to learn. I'm inspired by Robyn Davidson, who in her early 20s travelled from Alice Springs to the western coast and wrote a book about what she learnt. Published around 1978, she says after her journey she never quite felt herself again, because"part of me never left the desert".
I feel sad that the old people are dying and with it, their knowledge of the old ways. And what does contemporary, mainstream white culture have to show for it? Obesity, reality TV and peak-hour traffic? Give me a break.
Don't misjudge my passion for negativity. I'm incredibly optimistic, but also incredibly sad.
Pictures now of the Kanyini Womens Camp I attended bout a month ago. I learnt from indigenous aunties from Gumbaggynir Country, which encompasses Coffs Harbour, and Bellingen, halfway between Brisbane and Sydney.
Kanyini is a term that comes from the mob out near Uluru, particularly endorsed by prominent elder, Bob Randall. It is an over-arching philosophy of life; the interconnectedness of all things. It is a four-tiered system of way of life/country (land which a particular tribe comes from, and thus is interconnected with their dreaming); family; custom/lore; spirituality/dreaming.
Even though it comes from the red centre, Kanyini is applicable to a lot of the traditional indigenous Australian way of life. I learnt from two gorgeous old gals, Auntie Jessie and Aunty Em. We made a sacred Kanyini circle around the fire with sawdust, symbolic of the four elements of the philosophy. We entered from the east and exited from the west. We slept round the fire, had welcome to country, and shared as much or as little as we wanted across three sumptious days. When we did a closing ceremony to thank country and each other, we stood in a circle holding hands as the clouds moved overhead among the ridge of the Kalang Valley. Lined with natural quartz crystal, we had to cross a shallow fresh water river to get onto the property. When it was time to leave, Aunty Em and I cried.
On the last day of the camp, this flower blossomed. It only comes out for one day a year, and it came out for us
Aunty Em is a pale skinned, blue eyed Indigenous woman. She's a storyteller, and yarned with us the whole time. I love her ability to laugh at anything, her incredibly tender heart, and the light that shines from her spirit in the face of what sadness she bears. She wasn't allowed to learn of her aboriginality from her indigenous mother, in fear of the government taking her away under as what is now known as the 'Stolen Generation'. So she learnt her language and the ways of the old people when she was older, and has been instrumental in the development of an indigenous centre servicing mob from that country.
Aunty Jessie is a healer. An 87 year old woman who giggles and tells stories of the land. She gave me a healing; pressing her surprising strong hands alll over my head and back. One on my stomach, while the other one on my back, talking to her spirits to heal my spirit through Gumbaggynir language.
"My spirit is broken. It's real sick." I told her, a lump forming in my throat.
She didn't say much. Just nodded her head.
"Oh yes," she croaked. "Broken spirit, that no good. Can't have that."
She rubbed her hands together, making em warm.
She'd done some healings on some other girls - white girls exploring the possibility of their indigenous ancestory, that their black skin had been "bred out" as a form of culturally accepted genocide - and had big yarns to them. And I'm glad she did. That stuff is heavy. But me? I don't have black blood, just a calling of spirit, a fragile heart and a tendency to get horribly lost. I always break my own heart. Besides, what can you say to someone whose spirit is broken? Not much ay, except to get to work. And that she did.
This one, she don't talk much, but what she says is always on the mark. And the way she tells stories is magnificent. Like the Maori author Patricia Grace who once wrote that "there's a way the older people have of telling a story, a way where the beginning is not the beginning, the end is not the end. It starts from the centre and moves away from there in such widening circles that you don't know how you will finally arrive at a point of understand, which becomes itself another core, a new centre."
And me, making dilly bags. And feeling much, much better.
Life is beautiful and precious. Life is everything we've ever wanted it to be, we just don't see it
Over the New Years period, I'm going to a festival on my own. I'm branching out baby, after 4 years at the
Woodford Folk Festival working on the bar and with the vis arts team. I think the beautiful Tahliana is working on my mate Alex's bar, so she'll be holding the fort! I adore that place. Stinky mud and all. If y'all are going, check out the wish installation on the way to the ampitheatre. I'll leave it a surprise.
I'm getting majorly excited about Peats Ridge, and about checking out this incredible indigenous fella from up arnhem land.
HE'S SINGING IN LANGUAGE! In his language, the language of his people.
I've been thinking a lot about colonialism. The fact that Australia's torrid racial and politcal history has led to so many amazing indigenous languages becoming extinct! I read Crispin's blog recently and listened in awe and wonder to Jill Bolte's presentation on the right and left sides of the brain - the right being the immersion of our being into the energy all around us... we are energy, we are part of it, part of the whole, not separate and alone. Then, the god damned left hand side of the brain, which personally, is my fucking demise. It's the side that says I'm separate from everything, the origin of all this endless mind chatter, and dare I say it, insecurity and fear.
It's a big, generalised call, but I think a lot of indigenous cultures operated from the right hand side of the brain, but our European ancestors had to go on in there and blast off with our overbearing left sided brains.
Now, I listen to Gurrumul and I feel like I'm listening to the spirit of this land I call my home. This land that is, but simultaneously isn't of my blood. I was born here, but I don't come from here. His lyrics are available in english, and are tender and haunting.
I'm reading Come on shore and we will kill and eat you all, which is a solid attempt at history/memoir fusion and which outlines the timeline of colonialism in our sister country, NZ. I am obsessed with Australian and New Zealander indigenous issues, our colonial history. I can't wait to travel Aus and NZ. We've got so much here. So much to learn. I'm inspired by Robyn Davidson, who in her early 20s travelled from Alice Springs to the western coast and wrote a book about what she learnt. Published around 1978, she says after her journey she never quite felt herself again, because"part of me never left the desert".
I feel sad that the old people are dying and with it, their knowledge of the old ways. And what does contemporary, mainstream white culture have to show for it? Obesity, reality TV and peak-hour traffic? Give me a break.
Don't misjudge my passion for negativity. I'm incredibly optimistic, but also incredibly sad.
Pictures now of the Kanyini Womens Camp I attended bout a month ago. I learnt from indigenous aunties from Gumbaggynir Country, which encompasses Coffs Harbour, and Bellingen, halfway between Brisbane and Sydney.
Kanyini is a term that comes from the mob out near Uluru, particularly endorsed by prominent elder, Bob Randall. It is an over-arching philosophy of life; the interconnectedness of all things. It is a four-tiered system of way of life/country (land which a particular tribe comes from, and thus is interconnected with their dreaming); family; custom/lore; spirituality/dreaming.
Even though it comes from the red centre, Kanyini is applicable to a lot of the traditional indigenous Australian way of life. I learnt from two gorgeous old gals, Auntie Jessie and Aunty Em. We made a sacred Kanyini circle around the fire with sawdust, symbolic of the four elements of the philosophy. We entered from the east and exited from the west. We slept round the fire, had welcome to country, and shared as much or as little as we wanted across three sumptious days. When we did a closing ceremony to thank country and each other, we stood in a circle holding hands as the clouds moved overhead among the ridge of the Kalang Valley. Lined with natural quartz crystal, we had to cross a shallow fresh water river to get onto the property. When it was time to leave, Aunty Em and I cried.
On the last day of the camp, this flower blossomed. It only comes out for one day a year, and it came out for us
Aunty Em is a pale skinned, blue eyed Indigenous woman. She's a storyteller, and yarned with us the whole time. I love her ability to laugh at anything, her incredibly tender heart, and the light that shines from her spirit in the face of what sadness she bears. She wasn't allowed to learn of her aboriginality from her indigenous mother, in fear of the government taking her away under as what is now known as the 'Stolen Generation'. So she learnt her language and the ways of the old people when she was older, and has been instrumental in the development of an indigenous centre servicing mob from that country.
Aunty Jessie is a healer. An 87 year old woman who giggles and tells stories of the land. She gave me a healing; pressing her surprising strong hands alll over my head and back. One on my stomach, while the other one on my back, talking to her spirits to heal my spirit through Gumbaggynir language.
"My spirit is broken. It's real sick." I told her, a lump forming in my throat.
She didn't say much. Just nodded her head.
"Oh yes," she croaked. "Broken spirit, that no good. Can't have that."
She rubbed her hands together, making em warm.
She'd done some healings on some other girls - white girls exploring the possibility of their indigenous ancestory, that their black skin had been "bred out" as a form of culturally accepted genocide - and had big yarns to them. And I'm glad she did. That stuff is heavy. But me? I don't have black blood, just a calling of spirit, a fragile heart and a tendency to get horribly lost. I always break my own heart. Besides, what can you say to someone whose spirit is broken? Not much ay, except to get to work. And that she did.
This one, she don't talk much, but what she says is always on the mark. And the way she tells stories is magnificent. Like the Maori author Patricia Grace who once wrote that "there's a way the older people have of telling a story, a way where the beginning is not the beginning, the end is not the end. It starts from the centre and moves away from there in such widening circles that you don't know how you will finally arrive at a point of understand, which becomes itself another core, a new centre."
And me, making dilly bags. And feeling much, much better.
Life is beautiful and precious. Life is everything we've ever wanted it to be, we just don't see it
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