Reflections III: Seeing with the Natives

The picture: Petroglyphs at N'Ghala Gorge. See previous post for more info.


A fresh and unexpected result of Australia Fourteen is my greater sense of Aboriginal culture. I’ve of course been aware of Aboriginals and their history since my first visit in 1985. I even went to a show of Aboriginal art at the state gallery that year. On previous trips I made little effort to explore or learn about Aboriginal culture. I kept looking at art, which resonated in some inchoate way, but I did not reflect on it deeply. I didn’t interact with many Aboriginals. This is a mixture of where I spent most of my time: in remote areas looking at rocks, and my innate natural reticence.

Nonetheless, preFourteen I’d built an impression of Aboriginals, their culture, and their experience. Three strong memories epitomize this. First, in 1987 I went to the Fremantle Markets, probably to buy cheap produce for the field season. There was an Aboriginal sitting at the entrance playing a didgeridoo. He was busking rather successfully. I stopped and watched. At some point we made eye contact. From the glimmer in his eyes, I intuited that I was seeing another human whose life experience and world view were radically unlike than mine. It was a feeling of utter dissimilarity. This profound difference was far greater than I’d ever felt in other places: Indonesia, Japan, South Africa, Costa Rica. The moment was disturbing. It challenged my comprehension of the breadth of humanness.

This experience fit into my evolving appreciation of the Australian land. The outback feels quite different from anywhere else I’ve been. The great age of the deeply weathered red rocks, the acacias of all sizes, the hopping animals, and the frequently harsh conditions create a unique environment. It’s matchlessly beautiful. This man was from a different and separate landscape, which had influenced his distinctive and rich culture. This is what showed in his eyes. I’ve sensed a similar heritage and power of place in the Aboriginal paintings and artwork.

My second experience is uglier. I was visiting friends in Karratha in 1990. At some point we drove through the old town of Roebourne on the Pilbara coast. Roebourne had a wide, arched main street, probably for drainage during cyclones. I though, geez, this town is filthy: the main street gutters seemed to be full of trash. As we got closer, I saw that some of this apparent debris was moving. It was literally piles of drunk and sleeping Aboriginals. This reminded me of seeing inebriated Native Americans in Arizona. Yet there was a sense of conformation here that was different. If I’m right that these were Aboriginals recovering after a drunk, it was like their bodies melded with the ground. They seemed to belong, to fit into the landscape; not or accidentally fallen down. My emotional memory of this scene is this sense of belonging. As with the busker, I felt that these people were of this land in a way that was across a very wide gap from me.

Finally, Newman 2003. In the early 21st century, Aboriginal settlements were established near most of the Pilbara mining towns. I don’t know the politics of this. I am pretty sure that the Aboriginals were the descendants of the pre-white inhabitants of the local areas. I suspect the new settlements are part of the ongoing race reconciliation process through which Australia is going. Many of the mining areas were originally Aboriginal places, taken away by Europeans. Now they’ve been somewhat returned.

We flew into town, and set about the usual assembling of gear for the field season. I was in the town centre shopping area. Newman was originally a one company mining town. Most of the workers were white. The population was a mixture of families and single males. Being the shopping centre felt like entering an excised chunk of Australian suburb: lots of consumer goods, clean people. The new Aboriginal settlement across the highway had changed this. Clusters of Aboriginals wandered the centre. A group of men waited for the liquor store to open, chattering in the local language: rapid, guttural, clearly expressive. I called home; it was hard to hear my parents in America because of another loud Aboriginal conversation going on behind me. There was trash in the streets and on the sidewalk. This seemed to correlate with the density of Aboriginals. I watched white shoppers walk by. Their faces showed distaste, resignation, and even fear.

I was watching a cultural clash in action, certainly. It showed the reverse of what I’d seen before; the unconformation of the Aboriginals to norms of white Australia. At the time, no one seemed happy with this. To be fair, Newman was already changing; the one company town had become a base for a diversity of businesses as the iron ore business expanded. I should note to; the situation did seem more resolved this year.

I didn’t make much effort to understand or integrate these experiences or the many others that took place over the years. The events were transient. Aboriginal culture seemed so far away from my experience. It was not my primary interest about Australia. My eyes and heart were for the rocks and the land. I was content with a cryptic sense of Aboriginals and Aboriginal cultures.

Australia Fourteen was different. Tnorala, which I’ve written about, was the crux. At the crater, my sense of the land aligned with the Dreamtime origin of the place. I could finally sense a bit of what I’d seen in the busker’s eyes back in Fremantle. Uluru and Kata Tjuta had similar although less overt affects. Relaxing and feeling these places was more difficult.

As I wrote this, I realized that Aboriginal art has moved me since I first saw it. This is a gut resonance about place. I didn’t intellectually attempt to figure out the paintings and other works that I saw, but some part of me understood. During Australia Fourteen, Paul was on a quest to buy art in Alice Springs. At some point on this traverse I found a decently sized introduction to Aboriginal art. I read it in the Pilbara. It gave me a basic appreciation for the diversity and breadth of Aboriginal culture and modern art. I don’t pretend to get Aboriginal art, but I do appreciate it more richly. It comes back to place. Fifty centuries have rooted the native culture on this continent. My fifty weeks here have given me appreciation of the land. This is where I can truly meet and understand the people of the place.

Twenty Three Hours at UKT NP

South from Kings Canyon, then west towards Uluru. From the folded and faulted rocks of the MacDonnell Ranges, we gradually descended to a typical Central Australian landscape – a flat largely plain covered with long linear red sand dunes. This isn’t barren by any means. The dunes seem to be largely stabilized, based on the abundance of trees and shrubs growing on and between them. The road made gentle cuts as we traversed west. Just enough change in relief to keep me awake while driving. The density of traffic increased for the first time. More passenger cars and tour buses. We passed signs that read” We Drive on the Right in Australia”.

Uluru-Kata Tjuta National Park is a high profile tourist destination. Who hasn’t heard of Ayers Rock (Uluru)? Aussies have been braving the trip here since Gosse “discovered” it for Europeans in the 19th century. Aboriginals have of course lived in the area for tens of thousands of years. Anyway, the popularity of the site increased proportional to access. Paved roads appeared in the 1950s, and at some point Yulara was created. This community north of the park is hosts an airport, shopping mall, and all of the nearby accommodation – ranging from campground to five star resort. It’s clearly designed for tourists to fly in, spend a couple days hitting the attractions, and spend a lot of money. There were of course a fair number of travelers like us, who were making a loop from Alice. We also saw almost a dozen vehicles towing boats or carrying surf boards. These were people on long journeys – the nearest water was several hundred kilometers away, the nearest surf at least twice that.

Yulara was surreal. It reminded me of Disney World. It felt insulated from the raw outback we’d been in for the previous days. Everything was nicely laid out and well landscaped. The various accommodations blended into the surroundings. There were lights by all the trails. The campground had lots of grass to sleep on. The generator complex was thoughtfully placed near the campground. So much for a quiet night.

Once swags were rolled out, we headed further south to the Park per se. Uluru came clearly into view. It stunned me, this big blob of grooved red rock. It looked flat at first; my eyes took almost an hour to adjust and see it in relief. But then, there it was – steep sides, weathering stains, lots of large rounded cavities and a gently rounded top. Like Tnorala, I had no problem conceiving that it was a potent Aboriginal spiritual symbol.

We went to the sunset viewing area. This is literally a large parking lot on a prime rise north west of Uluru. It’s the only permitted spot within the park to stop and watch sunset. There’s a separate sunrise spot on the other side. We were an hour early; the lot was already half full. After finding a decent perspective, we waited. The lot filled up with every sort of vehicle and every kind of tourist. I think we were the grubbiest. The people to our left set up a table and had mixed drinks. I smelled either clove cigarettes or pot.

As the sun gradually set; the rock progressively glowed. It was hard to photograph with much color accuracy, but fun to try. It was lovely to watch the contrast on Uluru’s grooves increase, the shadows in its cavities darken. It was hard to both absorb the view and take pictures. I wondered if this view meant anything to the local Aboriginals. Almost dark. We left in a traffic jam of vehicles headed back to Yulara.

Kata Tjuta, or the Olgas, are a series of rounded rock domes similar in scale to Uluru, located about 50 kms to the west. The crowds at Uluru had turned all of us off, so in the morning we headed to Kata Tjuta to hike. Like Uluru, the area has much spiritual significance to the Aboriginals, so much of it is closed to visitors. I’d wanted to come here since reading about Kata Tjuta in my first Lonely Planet Guide to Australia (1985).

No worries. The Valley of the Winds trail looked interesting. It seemed more interesting than Uluru, if nothing If Uluru is a stunning blob of sandstone, then Kata Tjuta is its sensuous companion. Its domes are smaller, and composed of conglomerate. The much coarser grain size of this material gives them a mottled appearance. I tried to control my reflexive urge to identify clast types. I gave up when I reached double digits.

The trail meandered around and between domes. This is the sort of landscape that’s easy for me to get lost in. Not physically lost, but engulfed in looking at what’s around me. Many interesting rocks. What to photograph. Would the light improve? The day started cloudy, but got progressively clearer. Which lens to use (stayed with the mega zoom). Trying to feel the place for itself, not compare it to my other deserts.

We progressed slowly. Louis took initiative and went ahead while Paul and I took pictures. We were passed by tour groups; young guides, young tourists. Why was that German kid carrying a football?

Eventually, it seemed like enough walking. It was time to drive east, begin the run back to Alice. We covered maybe a third of the trail.

Twenty three hours – one sunset, one decent hike. A quick stop at the Aboriginal culture center: too full of tourists to absorb much. A final pause for fuel and a few bananas.

Like the rest of the Central Australia loop, I feel like I’ve largely seen the surface of things. I’d come back to Uluru and Kata Tjuta for sure. It’s possible to walk around the Uluru, that would be interesting. This is probably the best opportunity I’d have to see Aboriginal culture in context. More on this in a future post. Having seen the place once it would be easier to deal with the crowds. Most important would be the time to sit and just look at the rocks. Precious and present observation, so hard to achieve.

I write this in Perth. Paul is gone, off south with his girlfriend et al. Louis is on walkabout iso the Natural History Museum (I hope). We’re packed and ready to head to the Pilbara tomorrow. I’ll write while I’m up there, although the work and remoteness (off the tourist trail, lord be praised) will make posting slower.

Time to escape to Kings Park.