Wednesday, 23 October 2024

Close encounters of many kinds



Ormiston Gorge, Northern Territory

Well, I have been setting blogs aside, having other fish to fry : renovations of my old house in the centre of France - a never-ending, long-winded process -  followed by ongoing summer preoccupations like aperitifs with friends, picking fruit in the orchard and making jam, growing courgettes, aubergines and herbs, mowing the bloody lawn, welcoming visitors and swimming in the river down the gorge. But, lately, images from those first weeks in Australia kept drifting into my mind, encounters were clamouring to be celebrated and remembered. So here goes...

It's a short (and blissfully cheap) flight from Bali to Darwin in the Northern Territory. So, there I was again at the end of September 2023, on the first sweltering signs of the wet season, clouds gathering and scudding away, humidity rising in this tropical palm-fringed coast. 




When I first visited Australia, in 2019, I had a strong feeling of weirdness. I finally put my finger on it : this big island-continent was another, different planet where British spaceships had landed. There was a baffling sense of displacement between the population and the land. There were animals with furry pockets and there was Typhoo tea. There were trees with peeling bark that gave little shade and there were mince pies. There was a wide baking land under immense skies and towns called St George and Davenport, where one would expect to spy rows of semi-detached brick houses huddling against a steady drizzle. 



And, as my flight approaches Alice Springs, it hits me : this is Mars I'm spying through the window, at a budding stage of terraformation. White buildings are scattered in the shade of barren hills, a green fuzz covers the red earth, bisected by straight dirt roads towards infinity....


Hence the title of this blog, if you ever heard of the Steven Spielberg film.





Arriving by plane gives another perspective, less ecological but more comfy than my fist contact with  Alice in 2019, for a Soul motion dance workshop, dazed after 22 hours rattling on a bus from Darwin. No, I didn't get any richer since, quite the opposite but this time, I'm blessed to have a son-in-law who's a pilot and so brings staff travel benefits. This is a Godsend, and so is he. Business class, cooked breakfast, freshly pressed napkin and a seat that could fit two of me. My gratitude has no bounds and I wouldn't have minded if the flight had lasted the whole day.



But I run ahead of myself. Soooo, Darwin. Entering by way of the Northern territory feels like sneaking into Australia through the back door, so to speak.


This is still a wild land, the size of France and a half for a population of a quarter of a million people, most of them in Darwin, the rest in Alice or in one-horse-towns and cattle stations in the middle of nowhere and a string of villages, fruit and sugar cane plantations along the coast.  Whether it could sustain a larger population is debatable.



Elinor welcomes me again in the suburb of Nightcliff. Her house is still filled with her paintings and mosaics and her beagles still sleep in the shade by the swimming-pool. 


In Bali, I had not stayed more than 4 days in one location and I aspire to nothing else but taking the time to land, to get a feel of what it's like to be a local here and take the pulse of Australia after 4 years away. Not 'do' but just 'be' : smell the frangipani flowers ; go and join the table-tennis group with Elinor ; wander along the alleys of Parap market, its stalls of far-eastern foods, Thai massage and Tarot readers and its art exhibition of first nations super heroes ; sit at the Greenhouse café in Nightcliff and listen to covers of John Mayal on the weekly jam session or sip a moka there and chat with other customers while birds hop between tables ; walk the puppies to the waterfront ; share dinner around the table by the pool with Elinor's family...all encounters of the most easy-going, sociable kind.







Darwin post-covid is pretty much the same as Darwin pre-Covid. There was one case recorded and with travel forbidden, nothing more could have happened there with the Timor sea ahead and the desert behind. Just confined by geography, lucky guys. Still, like everywhere else, prices have shot up and I have to watch the pennies.


On my first day, Elinor and I take a stroll along the coast, by Casuarina picnic grounds. Beaches are deserted. 'You'd be very unlucky to meet a croc there if you went swimming', Elinot declares. Ah, but, the next day, the Northern Territory News, or such local newspaper, shows a drone photo of a croc with a turtle gripped between its teeth, closely followed by a shark, off the nearby Dundee beach... Hum... close encounters I'm very grateful to have missed.


No swimming on those loverly beaches if you're ever so slightly risk-averse.




But not everybody is, risk-averse that is, and there's a story.... In 1995, Val Plumwood, an environmental philosopher, was canoeing on a channel of the East Alligator river in Kakadu National Park, in the north-east of the  Northern Territory. Now, who, in their right mind, would use such a flimsy skiff to paddle there, I wonder? Anyway, she lived to tell the tale after being snapped under and surviving no less than three 'rolls of death', a technique used by crocs to drown their prey. She just about lost her leg after an 11hour-trip to Darwin hospital, spent a month in intensive care and another month of skin grafts. 

Kakadu national park. And one day, I will go...

To close the crocodile chapter, on my last day in Darwin, I relented and did the touristy thing by visiting Crocosaurus cove, where children -it's school holiday time- were staring, mouth agape at those beasts -who haven't evolved much since dinosaurs roamed the earth -swimming malevolently behind thick glass. There's Burt, who starred in Crocodile Dundee 1 - healthy respect on my part to the actors- and William who was caught stomping on Mindil beach, trying to catch little dogs for dinner. And no, Mindil Beach is not located in a far-flung suburb or out there in the boondocks, it's pretty central, lined with fancy hotels and close to the busy Sunset Market. A dog-walkers' encounter of the most sobering kind.



I find Australian art galleries and museums fascinating, all curated in innovative ways and replete with art that is rarely seen in Europe. The MAGNT (Museum and Art Gallery of the Northern Territory) is no exception and also hosts, every year, the Telstra National Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islanders Art exhibition, now in its 41st year and running at the moment until January 2025. I stand, stunned with awe at the pieces on display. The legends and stories that have inspired these works are, in themselves, little jewels, evocative of cultures alien to detached, rational western ways. 


https://northernterritory.com/darwin-and-surrounds/events/the-2024-telstra-national-aboriginal-and-torres-strait-islander-art-awards


Dust Storm by Rachael Lionel





It was an art day with Elinor, as we first stepped into Paul Johnstone gallery showing vibrant paintings of Aileen Napaljari Long. 

https://pauljohnstonegallery.com.au/aileen-napaljarri-long-solo-exhibition/


On Daly street street, stands the Art Warehouse, owned by Carol, the most prolific artist I have ever seen. Her shop is full of her own creations, paintings and crafts of all sorts and all styles. She's also a death doula. Ah, now, I had never heard of such a thing. Yes, I heard of doulas, pretty popular in the US of A for support during pregnancy and childbirth, and starting to appear in France too. But then again, Carol says, 'a doula can be there when entering life and when leaving it'. She's got enough joy and boundless energy to offer support at any stage of life, I dare say.

All encounters of the most inspiring kind!!

https://www.singulart.com/en/art-galleries/australia/northern-territory/darwin/art-warehouse-14331?srsltid=AfmBOop1gWWErn89V8C6DUGXM3zy8n7H9F1BmfECt5p5Q63fQCOOq-1X



Now, for bits of national and local politics. One cannot be French and ignore politics for very long. It is in the genes.

Three local young ladies knock at Elinor's door one morning. They are canvassing for the referendum that had to be voted on October 14th 2023. An encounter of the most hopeful kind.

This public consultation aimed to add into the constitution the recognition of the first people of Australia by establishing a body called the Aboriginal and Torres Strait Island Voice. I heard so many enthusiastic pros but also reservations about it over the following weeks : doubtful : 'It's not clear enough' ; dismissive : 'Most abos are not even aware of it' or 'it's just politics' ; concerned : 'What are the practical implications?'. I don't pretend to have any understanding of Australian home affairs but I just wondered at the time how a 'no' vote would be received by Australia's first nations. And sadly, this is what happened on October 14th... a most fair and momentous proposal it was. Imagine a similar move from the government of the USA? Hum....

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/2023_Australian_Indigenous_Voice_referendum


Australia is not perceived from abroad as a nation with a strong ecological leaning, though there can be vigorous actions, in a very Australian, no-nonsense way.  Just before I left for Alice, it was reported in the evening news that Natasha Fyles, then labour Northern Territory Chief Minister had had a pancake shoved in her face, as a protest against her pro-fracking comments in the media. A gesture of hilarious truculence. There are worst fates... after all the pancake was cream-covered.  Hopefully, it was, for the poor woman, an encounter of the most soul-searching kind. 


One cannot be in the Northern Territory without being pursued by shades of Crocodile Dundee. Among the many beers offered by the Alice Springs Brewing Company, one is called, 'That's not a knife' and another, 'This is a knife', famous lines known  to all
who've watched the film. And if you haven't, do. You'll enjoy the quiet tarzanesque humour. I won a pint of 'This is a knife' at the brewery weekly quiz night, for answering a very French bonus question.  It was immediately shared in shot glasses with the other members of our multinational team, altogether an evening of the most good-natured and entertaining kind. 

https://www.alicespringsbrewingco.com.au/?srsltid=AfmBOoraQZEvUoMwoeBgogutIB5K4rullCTrzzMakJb6WTAyYWbc854h



I'm welcomed with a big smile and a bottle of champagne in Christopher's Alice home. We met years ago at the aforementioned soul motion dance workshop. He's got lodgers so I'll be glamping in a wide tent with carpets, a double-bed, incense sticks and a Ganesha to guard the entrance. It's pegged in the garden under a lemon tree heavy with fruit and buzzing with birdsong.  I couldn't be happier. 

This is also the day when friends and neighbours will all happen to drop by at the same time and, suddenly, after a joyful cooking kerfuffle in the kitchen, there will miraculously be enough on the table as more people keep dropping in. It was, that night, on the back verandah, a gathering of the most alternative kind.

Christopher, writer and teller of tales, composer of meditative pieces on the classical guitar, producer of educative videos, son of an English gipsy, is a host of a most creative and philosophical kind. 'When you're far from everywhere, you're closer to yourself and to others', he declares at the quiz night. 




His home is open to all but even his hospitality can be stretched. There are people sleeping everywhere in swags, on the verandah, in the garden. This might not be the best time to linger longer and a couple of us decide to leave him and his lodgers with some breathing space and leg it to the nearby youth hostel, Alice's secret Traveller's Backpacker Inn.




It is quirky, clean, cheap, well-organised, has a garden strewn with tables, chairs, hammocks and ... a pool! ah but, BEWARE....

https://www.asecret.com.au/



There congregates, on a long stay, the usual international bevy of youths on a working visa, seeking adventure and finding it.  This young Scottish lady, tall, blond and willowy doesn't look as if she could tackle anything strenuous but tackle she does. She just spent 6 months on a station in the outback. She thought she could ride until she had to spend days mustering cattle on horseback, hat firmly planted on her head, face covered by a bandana against the flies. She now works nights behind the bar at the Todd tavern, where drunken fisticuffs are not uncommon. She's not fazed. An encounter of the bravest kind.


And then, there is Klaus who lives at the hostel. Small, wiry, sun-burnished and soft-spoken, he arrived in Australia from Germany in the 1960s, to offer his talents as a mechanic. Since then, he's cycled all over Australia... CYCLED!! and he still does... Now 75 years old, he's just returned from a small jolly to Cape York, all the way up there, a round trip of more than 6000 kms. That's why he likes to be in Alice, plumb in the centre : 'it retuces ze tistances'. Klaus is an unsung hero of the most humbling kind.



Imagine cycling on roads like this, for miles after miles after miles...



And then, there are those, like me, who're just passing through, for a few days, weeks.



I bump into Eileen. After 50 years in Australia, she still has a Scottish west coast accent. You'd never believe what this retired hospital orderly and grandma gets up to when she leaves Perth... She just walked the Larapinta trail, that starts west of Alice along the Mac Donnel Ranges. 'Not quite all of it' she says. Still... Even though it is only 223kms, this is a most isolated, rocky and rugged undertaking, compared to which the camino de Santiago is a walk in the park. Extreme weather, heavy rucksack, tent, water, food, water-purifying tablets, compressive bandages against snake bites and epirb for emergency. And she looks fresh as a daisy. I knew the Scots were tough cookies.


The tough cookie



Together, we rent a car for a road trip west into the desert, all the way to Ormiston Gorge and return to Alice after a detour to Elery Creek Big Hole, both surprising oases with cool fresh water. Beaches in the centre of Australia! We cross the Finke river (Larapinta river in Arrernte), waterless at that spot, the oldest in the world, and return by way of Stanley chasm before sunset. A mineral landscape under immense skies, scrubby bushes, twisted ghost gums, silence...

But there is more to Eileen : she tells me she organises retreats in the desert : sweat lodges and vision quests... ah, if only I stayed longer... an encounter of the most determined and spiritual kind. 

    Stanley chasm



Naumai hovers on the edge of the hostel's quiet hubbub. I like to hear people's stories and hers is remarkable. She's in Alice for a rest after spending 3 months in the Gibson desert, in Kiwirrkurra, a Pintupi settlement where she worked as a community developper. 'Now, the Pintupi', she tells me, 'came out of the desert in 1984, their first contact with the modern world. They thought cars were monsters.' The Gibson is 800 km west of Alice, in Western Australia. I'm flabbergasted. It was only 40 years ago... millennia of culture shock... the tribe has suffered terribly from western illnesses due a change of diet.





'For Aborigines, a good health is a question of sovereignty, of finding a way of life and foods that make strong and healthy people'... thus spoke one of the healers at a conference of both traditional and conventional practitioners that took place during the Desert Festival in Olive Pink Botanical garden. There sat also a Mexican healer who explained how traditional ways have been included in the Mexican healthcare system. Just then, as I stood in the balmy night, I realised I'd just finished to read 'Secrets of Aboriginal Healing', by Gary Holz, quite serendipitous...

Naumai used to work as a lecturer with her tribe in North island, New Zealand. 'There are no maori gathering without music' she winks at me, picking up her guitar. On my last afternoon in Alice, we sit in the garden and sing 'E hara i te mea'... and suddenly I'm miles away on a Pacific island, palm trees swaying in the breeze and soft waves lapping the beach. Naumai, an encounter of the most gentle and dedicated kind.


A word about Olive Pink Botanical garden. It's the only botanical garden of desert plants in Australia, where 600 different species are represented. Olive Pink - one can not invent a name like that - was an illustrator, botanist and an activist for aboriginal rights. She battled for 20 years with almost non-existent funding to create this garden, living in a tent and then a hut. She died in 1975, aged 91. A legend.

One day, I climb at dawn the hill in the garden to see the sun rise above the desert, gold and soft amber... 


I'm told that if you see water in the Todd river, you'll come back to Alice. Well, I did and I'm back. I met people who came here for two months and still haven't left 30 years later. There's always work for a young, transient, international population. Though it has a reputation of violence and criminality - I have been advised not to walk alone at night - it's a hub of the most surprising kind, with a strong sense of community. The more I stay, the deeper I feel that here is a crucible for transformation, with a clean, pure energy, at the heart of Australia. 

If I wanted another science-fiction analogy, I'd say the force is strong here...



It is in the Botanical garden that the aforementioned Desert Festival takes place every year. Desert divas are performing on its last evening and I discover Casii Williams who sings in a powerful, soulful voice a variety of her own songs and some covers. Fairy lights strewn in the trees dance in the night. An evening of the most magical kind.




Casii Williams is from Hermannsburg and this is where I'm heading off the next day. There are no galleries in Australia that do not exhibit creations of the Hermannsburg potters. In 2019, I had driven into the desert to visit them but, alas, they were in Tasmania... so, second time lucky! Same as last time, Christopher lends me Pegasus, his valiant roadster with snorkel and kangaroo bars and I'm off to the west. Good roads and only 120 kms. 


Hermannsburg started as a Lutheran mission in 1877 - I visited the simple and austere buildings in the mission precinct years back - and it is rather an artistic hub. Albert Namatjira, the famous arrernte painter, was born there and is considered as one of the most notable Australian artists.

I have booked at the tourist office this time and I'm supposed to stay only 15 minutes there. It will be closer to 2 hours.






After a quick hello, I sit outside at the table to eat my picnic and share my sandwich and nuts with Regina, a  local police woman. 'What a great artist Casii Williams is!' 'oh yeah, she's my cousin!' It's a small world. There are a few men working as potters too. I chat with Andrew who proudly shows me some of his pieces and I'm taught how to greet people in Arrernte 'Hunta mara? 'Are you well?'.








When I return into the women's workshop, I'm asked to introduce myself to the elders, as I'm coming from so far away. So, at least, I know how to greet them in their language. I tell them about my country, about my first attempt to visit them - they smile -and  how they make Country alive through their craft. An encounter of the most moving kind.

 https://hermannsburg.com.au/stories/hermannsburg-potters





Yes, 'Country', a proper noun, capitalised, is not just the land, it is, according to commonground.com.au, 'a term used by first nations peoples to refers to the lands, waters and skies to which they are connected through ancestral ties and family origins'. It also 'encompasses relationships, relationships with plants, relationships with animals and relationships with ancestors'.



'Many trees', by Betty Mula, Araluen Art Centre Alice Springs


And I guess it's a concept that Chris Barns, nicknamed Brolga, an Aborigine name for a long-legged bird (Chris is very tall) or Kangaroo Dundee (of course) understands very well. 

https://kangaroosanctuary.com

He created a Kangaroo sanctuary a few kms away from Alice and, on my last day, I go on a sunset tour, not aware I was going to meet an Australian legend.  Why a kangaroo sanctuary? Since dingos have been eradicated in cattle and sheep country, kangaroos have multiplied so much that professional hunters are sent to kill no less than 5 millions of them every year. There are 25 million people in Australia, double that for kangaroos...





Ah... but there are still dingos in Central Australia. No need for professional hunters there. And many road kills. The roos (they are red kangaroos in that part of the world) go out in the evening to graze by the roads. The grass is always greener there because of the condensation from car fumes. And a baby can stay alive in its mother's pouch for as long as three days after her death. So, Chris never drives around without a pillow-case in his car and always stops at roadkills. He saves the babies. An encounter of the most caring kind.

All of us, 10  or so visitors, will pass around between us, a pouch where little Qantas huddles contentedly. A close encounter of the most heart-melting kind.





Kangaroo factoids : 

They can smell water as deep as 2 metres and dig for it. Aborigines use those spots to build wells. Local tribes also hunt red kangaroos but not wallaroos who live on rocky hills and have tougher flesh.

An alpha male can stand to a height of 1m 90. The standing position is one of aggresivity so a standing human can be mistaken for taking an aggressive stance. Chris Barns had to be stitched a few times because of that.

It's forbidden to own a pet kangaroo. The aim of the sanctuary is to release them into the wild. 



Here is Roger, who died in 2018, a kangaroo Schwarzenegger, raised by Chris Barns




As the sun is setting, a flight of galahs scatters into the sky, frightened by a hovering eagle. 



Good bye Northern Territory. I'll be back one day.....