Heartsick for Country

by Sally Morgan

  The way forward

  I am hoping I won’t be alive to see what governments and multi-national companies will do to the world. If they have their way, they will destroy all the beautiful natural things and it will all be in the name of the dollar. So how are we going to protect Australia? How are we going to protect the people and the country? What will happen to the babies and children when the world is turned into a giant nuclear dump? Will it be the beginning of the end? Is there nothing we can do about it? All over the world there are already unsolvable problems with nuclear waste, and now governments are talking about creating even more. Let the people who advocate this live next door to the reactors and the waste dumps with their own families. What will they think about it then? Will they feel safe? Or will they be terrified about the effect it is having on their children and grandchildren? Children are the heritage of Australia, and they are the ones who will be dying of cancer and other diseases if all this rubbish isn’t stopped.

  I look back on my own experiences and there are two things that give me hope. The first is that our people have always had their own protocols when it came to caring for country. I can explain this best by sharing a story. There was an old lady I knew who went through the Law when she was young. In those days, you were given a role to play and you were also given a tract of land to look after. Her tract was hard to look after because it was at Meekatharra and there was a lot of mining in the area. Though the miners were there, she still thought of it as her tract of land and she felt responsible for looking after it. When I went walking with her, it was like walking through her own garden. She would show me this tree and that plant and tell me where the water comes in the winter and it was just magic to listen to all the things she knew about that land. She had the ownership, she felt the responsibility, she did her job caring for it as best she could. It hit me, then, that if you multiplied that many thousands of times over across Australia, then that was how this continent and all its flora and fauna got looked after in a very particular way. Everybody had a job, everybody had a role to play. It’s the same to day. We all have to be responsible for what happens. (Image 12.4)

  Image 12.4: A visit to the Emu Farm when it was operating outside of Wiluna, c. 1986 Courtesy Joan Winch

  The other thing I think about is a woman’s Dreaming site in the Perth area, which is called the Butterfly Dreaming, and it is tied to the beautiful blue and black butterfly. The butterfly lays its eggs in ants’ nests near a small shrub we call a bacon-and-egg plant. The ants carry the larvae up to get the nectar from the shrub. Then they carry the larvae back down again at night and the larvae exude this nectar, which the ants collect for food. This is a symbiotic relationship, where what is good for one is good for the other. That’s how we have to think about the natural world, because in the long run, when everything is in balance, what is good for the earth will be good for us as human beings too. Life is dynamic, we need to harness it positively, not negatively. If we don’t all work together to find a way to do that, then at some time in the future there will be no safe place left for anyone’s children.

  JOE BOOLGAR COLLARD

  is a Nyungar from the South-West region of Western Australia. He is an associate lecturer in the Indigenous Community Management and Development Program at Curtin University. (Image 13.1)

  Image 13.1

  A Strength that Can’t be Broken

  Ngany Deman Gaa Maanga Moort Baalup Ngany Ang Ngientj Collard—a Koonyart, Bennell—a Koonyart, Thorne—a Koonyart, Garlett—a Konnyart, Winmar—a Koonyart, Bilya, Derbarl, Moorda, Ngany Boodjar Gaa Ngany Djurit. Ngany Koort Djerb Kartinjin Nidja. In my Nyungar language, this means my grandmother and grandfather’s family, they are with me. I am a descendant of the Collard, Bennell, Garlett and Winmar families. The rivers, the estuaries, the hills and valleys—are all my land, my tracks. My heart is happy knowing this. My name is Joe Boolgar Collard and I was born on Moroo Boodjar country, which is the Perth area; they are the kangaroo totem people. I am a freshwater Nyungar and a Bibbelman man on my mother’s side from the Nyungar nation. If I was to explain to someone who my people were, then I would say ‘I am from the land of the grey kangaroo, yonga; land of the grasstree balga; land of the long trees. We are a proud and fierce people. My skin name is Nagarnook and my moiety is the wardong or black crow.’

  I have always had a special affiliation with the black crow and right from an early age my Pop, Rod Collard, called me ‘Joe the black crow from Popo’. Popo was short for the town of Popanyinning. I spent a lot of time with my Pop when I was young, we were very close to each other and he taught me many things, so it was deeply hurtful for me when he passed away. When it comes to crows, though, right to this very day they are still with me. Red-eye crows are from here and blue-eye crows are from Wongi country, in the Goldfields area. They will talk to me two or three times a day and sometimes it is a sign or message for me. I just can’t get away from them. I can just be standing on my front porch and a couple of them will even land next to me and start talking. I don’t even need an alarm clock to get up in the morning, because the crows will turn up early and say ‘It’s time for you to wake up!’ They have been coming to me for a long time now, and there is something very special about them.

  I have a lot of respect for the older people who have shared cultural knowledge with me right from when I was a young fella, especially my family Elders. I have learnt a great deal by listening to them talk at home and around the camp fire. I am still fairly young and I have many years ahead of me before I become an Elder myself, but in the meantime I make it my business to learn as much as I can. I want to be knowledgeable enough to be able to teach others and pass my culture on to my children, my grandchildren and other Nyungar people. When kids are grounded in culture and country, then they have a positive way forward because they have something special to offer the world. This gives them the confidence to make good choices for themselves, and hopefully it will generate in them a strength that can’t be broken. I take this seriously and I work hard to achieve it. (Image 13.2)

  Image 13.2

  Creating positive change

  I have always had a desire to make things better for my people and because of this I have deliberately developed a mentality of being part of the solution, rather than being part of the problem. I am all for creating positive change and this is what I try to do in my work with the environment and also culturally, so I am always learning. There is a lot that can be learnt from my Nyungar culture, especially when it comes to looking after the land. I believe that if we all work together, then it is possible to create a better place for future generations. As Nyungar people, we know from our ancestors that a detailed knowledge of our land has always sustained us. We actually excel at having an intimate relation with the land, including its spirit and the songs, dances and rituals. In the past, every landmark had a name and there were stories and meanings connected to those landmarks. Many of them still survive today. Special places often required a ritual that had to occur in order for people to be able pass through that particular spot safely and in the right way. In the old days, our people often travelled vast distances. Walking the songlines was an important part of our life, because it continually connected us to our beliefs and to the land through story and art, song and dance. These travels also helped us to understand the creation in our country and why we should protect it.

  Nyungar country

  The South-West region of Western Australia is home to over 30,000 Nyungar people and it is considered by many to be the most fertile land in Western Australia. This land, which our people occupied for thousands of years, was where the British came in 1829 in order to establish the Swan River Colony. They settled on the banks of the Swan River, or the Derbal Yerrigan as we call it, and over the years this settlement has grown into the city of Perth that we know today. There was plenty of food and fresh water and other natural resources, so it was a good place for family groups to live. For thousands and thousands of years, Nyung
ar people had lived, hunted, traded and travelled all through the Perth area, so you can appreciate that it would have been a very puzzling event when the new arrivals first came to our country. There is a story that has been passed down from our Bennell relations about those early days, when the wadjelas (white people) first sailed along the river towards our people who were living in the Kings Park area. Nyungars thought their big rafts had clouds on the top and when the newcomers, dressed in their red coats, climbed onto horses, they thought they were riding on large dogs. This was because our people were seeing things they weren’t used to seeing and they were trying to make sense of them. Our old people would have talked about this event for many years to come, and that is how this story would have been handed down through our family over the generations.

  It is true to say that the invasion of Nyungar country deeply affected our people, and its ripple effects are still being felt to this day. Following that first contact, the relationships between Nyungar and wadjellas quickly deteriorated into violence and mistrust. While a lot of the killing is unrecorded, reports of much of it have been passed down orally through families like mine. For example, there are many stories about how our people had to hide in the rushes and among the paperbark trees around Lake Monger in order to protect themselves from attack. In Karragullen, up in the Hills, there were massacres that our family have talked about, and in York, the fighting was horrendous and went on for many years. Members of my own family were among the victims of the Pinjarra Massacre of 1834, when Governor Stirling led a dawn raid against a group of Nyungar people who were objecting to the invasion of their lands and to the destruction of the bush, which had sustained our families over the generations.

  The Kings Park area is a very special place to Nyungar people for many reasons. In my own family, we have always been told that our relations are from this area; and I know personally that every time I go there and sit down I get a spiritual high. You can only feel it strongly like that when you know you are from that area. That knowledge makes it very strong, because you know your old people are there. This is why, when I sit up at Kings Park, I don’t see the skyscrapers and all the cars going back and forth across the Narrows Bridge to the city. Instead I see the old people. I see the campfires, I see the smoke from a long way away that belongs to another family group, and I see the other large extended family groups who would have travelled throughout the whole of the Swan coastal plan before the white people came. This makes it an important place for me. It’s good that the Kings Park area has the protection of being a park, because it is rich in plants and wildlife, but it is also an important Waugal site.

  The Waugul is the greatest of all the creator rainbow spirit serpents; he is the main spirit being for Nyungar people. He played a major role in the creation stories for Nyungar people and while there are many Dreaming creation stories of epic battles between different spirit animals, the Waugal is always revered and honoured. He formed many of the landmarks that we still see today and traditionally he controlled every aspect of Nyungar life. My old people have taught me that we shouldn’t talk about the Waugal too much, not unless we really need to, because he is very special and dear to us. In order to show respect, we talk softly and humbly about the Waugal. He created the valleys and the hills and the rivers that flowed through him. Even today, we can still see his tracks along the rivers because when he went through the country he shed his skin and in so doing he left marks and other things behind. Sometimes today, people are confused thinking that they are just shells on the sides of the riverbank, when really they are actually the scales of the Waugal that came off as he travelled along on his journey. Also, as Nyungar people, when we look at the different colours in the landscape, we see the Waugals colours, because when he went through country, he left his colours in the environment.

  There are many stories about the Waugal. Different people from different parts of the country tell different stories and they are all important. For example, if there was a dry season in the old days then sometimes our people used to sing and cry out to the Waugal that they needed rain to replenish the land so they didn’t die out. They would even do a certain ceremony and sing and do the right ritual to bring the water. This was a very significant thing. All the stories about the Waugal are significant, because he is the chief of all the totems. He is the punisher. If anyone disobeyed, he would punish people to keep things in balance. This made him the judge, jury and executioner. Because the Waugal is so important, we get very sad when things are destroyed or damaged. I am thinking now of some of the special landmarks that used to be here, such as the Waugal’s eggs and holes and the many freshwater springs that have been destroyed through either ignorance or redevelopment. Even today, the Waugal has a role to play, because we are now learning different ways. Also, things are going to happen in the world. In fifty to one hundred years’ time we may actually have to go back to the old ways, because the oils and the different resources that we have come to depend on for modern living are going to dry up. When that happens, then we will need the old wisdom and knowledge to help us survive.

  Legacy of the past

  The damage to the environment has made it hard for everyone and now we are in a situation where there needs to be some healing. Some of the destruction has occurred because the land was seen as a means of gaining wealth, so people didn’t think too much about the long-term consequences of what they were doing. But there has also been a lot of damage done through ignorance, too. For example, traditional fire burning techniques have always been important in the maintenance, use and care of our country. Burning-off was carried out as a necessary part of the cycle of life. It had a number of purposes, some of which included helping with regeneration and regrowth, attracting game and encouraging the development of desirable food plants. The fires were skilfully managed, they were fairly low in strength and did not needlessly damage or destroy large areas of country. However, in 1840, traditional burning techniques were banned. Any Nyungar people who were caught were publicly flogged. This happened because the burning was seen as an act of hostility against the new arrivals. They didn’t understand that it was a land management practice that we had been carrying out for thousands of years, or that our own laws protected the plants and animals so that our way of life was sustainable for future generations. Every family group had its own special totem that protected their people, and there was a very strict law that determined if and when a family could hunt or gather their special totem. Nothing was ever hunted to extinction or needlessly destroyed, so the way our families lived supported the cycle of life.

  Sometimes, things were destroyed simply because it made things more convenient for the oppressors. For example, in the 1860s the mouth of the Swan River was blown up by the invaders who had come to Nyungar country. My old people have told me that this was a very upsetting thing to have happened, because the area had a lot of cultural significance. The ocean and the mouth of the river and the spiritual stories to do with the Waugal and our ancestral spirits that were associated with it, were very important. Then later, another law was passed which caused further devastation because it allowed for the destruction of all the fish traps on the river simply because they interfered with boating traffic. These kinds of things greatly affected Nyungar people at the time, because they had an impact on our spiritual beliefs and interfered with our way of life.

  We followed the cycle of the six seasons. This meant our families went to specific places in the right season and at the right time. The seasons put things in perspective for us and dictated what our focus was. For example, in Maggoro, which is June/July the cobbler fish were plentiful. In Dilbar, which is August/September, the potatoes along the river were plentiful. Then there is the moonja tree, or the Christmas tree as many people call it today, which was very special to us as well. It blossomed in the season of gambarang, which was October/November, and it signified a new season coming into being. The moodja tree, though, is also special to us spiritually, because when s
omeone dies our people say their spirit goes to the moodja tree. After that it goes on its journey to Karranup, which is over the sea. In traditional times, when they buried someone, they buried them in a certain way so that their spirit would travel through the country following the moodja trees.

  The seasons determined how our families interacted, and they were part of our social and cultural calendar, which also included our own festivals and ceremonies. In Kings Park, we had the kangaroo festival, because that area was a good hunting ground for kangaroos. Then at South Perth, near where the Narrows Bridge is now, we had the honey festival. The honey came from the flower of the banksia tree and they used to put it in the water where it would ferment. In the old days there was a big lake there, but it has been filled in now. The fish traps were important too, for high tides and low tides we had certain techniques for catching cobblers and all the other types of fish that venture through these waters.