ABORIGINAL CULTURE

                 A Fascinating Culture

       Aborigines, one of oldest civilizations on earth, are the indigenous people of Australia and have inhabited the continent for over 30,000 years. The word aborigine, in Latin, means from the beginning.         On both trips Down Under I had the good fortune to meet and talk to some of the indigenous people.                   One was more interested in telling about his experiences of which he was justifiably proud, but we wanted to learn about the culture. The second time the couple was most accommodating and freely explained their culture and answered questions.

     There were a wide variety of lifestyles among the aborigines. Hundreds of tribes had their own territory, language, and customs, developing their culture free from outside influences. Many were hunters and nomadic, living in temporary mud dwellings.

    The boomerang originally was meant as a throwing stick for hunting, fighting, making fire, or stoking coals when cooking.

    These people mastered the challenges of living in a harsh environment. They passed on their spiritual practices, planted crops, diverted streams, dug native wells, and maintained grasslands by deliberate burning to attract game for food. The population continually increased over the last 3000 years and across the continent the different tribes traded with each other. Among the exchanged items were shells, ochre, and wood.

     During colonization, aboriginal life changed dramatically. Unfamiliar diseases killed thousands. Arbitrarily displaced from the most fertile areas, many were confined to reserves in the misguided effort to overcome widespread poverty. They presently make up 2% of the country’s population, with about 90% living in the cities.  Many of the cultural groups, similar to tribes or clans, are still present today, with over 50 languages surviving. Walpiri is the largest spoken language.

    The Outback was home to many of the native peoples. The area is dry and can go years without rain. It is an area of red rock, ochre plains, purple mountains, and brilliant blue skies. Still today, towns with only basic facilities are few and far apart.

   In the aboriginal culture there is men’s business and women’s business and neither touches the business belonging to the opposite gender. This was made very clear.

   Men’s business includes playing the didgeridoo which is a long small hollow log-type instrument making a very deep sound when blown into. Men’s work also included walking, hunting, spearing game, and making spears.

   Women’s business includes concerns about human rights, providing food (the more wives, the better a man ate), digging for yams, digging for honey, grinding flour, and digging for grubs under the witchery tree.

   Common law does not recognize aboriginal law. Each tribe has a law person. Respect for the elders is very important. Traditionally teaching was verbal in the form of storytelling. Aborigines are returning to this today. Songs tell the story of Dreamtime. Tribal boundaries are crossed only by invitation.  Breaches of aboriginal law bring severe penalties.

   One is born into a skin name group. Names beginning with the same letter, such as N are for women, and those with another letter are for men. This is done for identity purposes and to avoid incest. Extended families are large, and sex between family members is forbidden.

   Men are polygamous with many wives, but the women can only have one husband. A male is not a man until he takes a wife. In the old days marriages were arranged, and it was common for a girl to be promised when about 13. Aborigine women had children at a young age. Because aborigines had little in worldly goods, the number of wives a man had proved his wealth, the more the wealthier.

       Boys used to be taken on a walk-about for two years, but only go for six weeks now, to learn lessons and culture. Then he was promised a wife; In-laws do not fight, particularly a son and his mother-in-law. Avoidance is a show of respect.

      Aborigines were not allowed to vote until 1962, and were not allowed to own land until 1976, when a land council was established to negotiate with the government. Now where rights have been established, the land cannot be altered in any way. In 1979 aborigines were granted title to 144 former reserves.

       In the 1970s the art world started to take aboriginal art seriously. Their art depicts religious and daily life. The carpet in the Sydney airport is in an aboriginal print as is the carpet in the Ayers Rock Hotel. Each has a different design.  Dances communicate with their ancestors.

       Men wear headbands made of hair. After eating kangaroo, the remains are covered with dirt and a burial is held. Yet, aboriginal children learn to endure pain at an early age. When death occurs, men show their grief by cutting themselves. Widows hit themselves on the head or are beaten by another woman because it is believed she caused the death. The mourning continues for three days to a week. All such mourning is done in the respective men’s or women’s camp.

      It was an interesting evening and we all enjoyed learning about this unique culture.

ALICE SPRINGS, AUSTRALIA

                                    The Isolated Outback

      Alice Springs in the far-off outback is a small community but held several wonderful interesting visits. We rode the overnight Ghan Train for the long trip. Afghani camel-trains, carrying supplies, made the long 970-mile trek between Adelaide and Alice Springs for many years, thus the name Ghan Train.

     A paved road between the two cities did not exist until 1980. The train traveled over level ground in the center of the country. After the wheat fields of the Flinders Range, it was flat expanses of salt bush. Flat, flat, flat!  

    After the really nice hotels we’d been accustomed to, the very basic hotel here was a bit of a surprise, but was about the best the city offered. It was clean and adequate. We then wandered around the city---all five blocks of it--before visiting the small mall. Not being very big, it held our interest for only a short while. We studied some aboriginal art which is an interesting art form before lunch.

     When I asked for a cup of tea and a glass of ice the waitress said, “We have iced tea.” That made this Texan’s day!

    The city was originally named Stuart after an explorer but renamed Alice Springs after Alice Todd, the wife of the telegraph station building project foreman. In 1939 the population was 700, today the population is 26,000, and the city is the center for Aboriginal artworks, and the base camp for Outback travelers.

     Alice Springs started as a cattle town, and as late as the 1970s the city still had a wild west image. It now survives on the tourist trade. In the Northern Territory, twice the size of Texas, the 178,000 people are outnumbered by sheep and rivaled by kangaroos, dingoes and Afghan camels. There are 1600 Americans living in Alice Springs, most are involved in the NASA tracking station at Pine Gap.  Aborigines account for 20% of the city’s population.

     At the 1792 overland telegraph station a guide took us around the grounds and buildings. The telegraph station was set up in Alice Springs as headquarters for a communication system.  The system consisted of 12 relay stations, one located every 250 miles from the station to Darwin. The site, three miles from the present city, was set up at what was thought to be a watering hole, but which turned out to be runoff from the river. Supplies came once a year via camel. Talk about isolation.

     The station had several well-preserved buildings. In one of the homes was a piano that arrived by camel. For the trip it was balanced with water and had to be unloaded each night and reloaded each morning.

     We ended our stay in Alice Springs with an early morning balloon ride over the outback. In the clear dawn we saw mobs of kangaroos hopping around as well as cattle and wild horses moving about.

     We were too distant for my camera to capture the mounds of tan that was spinifex, a mounded beach grass that covers a lot of the bush country. The 30 varieties survive on little water by developing rolled, sharp blades with cactus tip barbs.

     We did all the traditional things of helping to get the balloon ready for flight and having a champagne breakfast afterward. A delightful memory of this small outback city.

You may want to visit A Unique School 10-5-11  and Flying Docs 5-15-15

SYDNEY continued

                    More on Sydney

     We eventually made our way to the Harbor Bridge after lunch. I  contemplated of perhaps  climbing the bridge, not realizing it was such a popular attraction. We found the 200 steps leading up to the bridge level.  Walking to the second pylon we had a wonderful view of Sydney Harbor and the city. The Bridge was a

monumental engineering feat when completed in 1932. The arch spans 503 meters. It is 134 meters up to the top of the 1149-meter long, 49-meter wide arch. After getting a good view of what lay ahead we were only minimally disappointed to learn there were no openings to climb to the top of the bridge. After seeing the steep  steps, we agreed it would be a really tough climb. Looking up to the top the tethered walkers were dwarfed to the size of tiny people, but we clearly heard the occasional screams.

     Policemen in shorts and knee-high socks, as seen in Bermuda, were a common sight. I like the look!

The Nurses Walk was only a block from our hotel. We learned the colony’s first hospital was established in this area.  Many of the first settlers suffered dysentery, smallpox, scurvy, and typhoid after the long voyage. A few days after landing Governor Phillips set up a tent hospital to care for the worst cases.  When the second fleet arrived in 1790, a quarter of its convicts had died and many others were critically ill on arrival. The Second Fleet carried a prefabricated hospital, which was quickly erected, and immediately filled with patients.

     The city’s largest church, a Catholic one, burned twice, and it was vowed that it would be burned whenever it was finished. Today the church stands with its two towers unfinished! 
      During World War II many a service man knew and visited Harry’s. The establishment moved twice and at one point it was ordered to be disposed of, but a petition with 90,000 signatures from all over the world was presented to the legislature who then decided to save and preserve it. Harry’s, now a national landmark, is still in business at its waterfront location.

     Paddington is an old residential area with a New Orleans flair. Decorative wrought iron grillwork is prevalent. Originally the grillwork was created from ships’ iron ballast—a nice contrast from the sandstone facades in the Rocks. New South Wales has little timber for building so most homes were brick or stucco with tile roofs. Apparently there is a big termite problem so these construction materials serve their owners well.

     It is 179 miles around Sydney’s deep harbor. The city boasts 34 beaches, perhaps the most famous is Bondi because it’s an optional topless beach. The sand was powder fine. The inland side of the street is lined with various shops—typical beach décor.

     The rolling parkland of the Royal Botanical Gardens forms the eastern boundary of the city. A farm garden in 1816, now the Gardens have duck ponds, groves of palm trees, a cactus garden, and acres of lawn and pathways. It also houses Mrs. Macquarie’s large sandstone chair that was carved by convicts. She used to go and sit in her chair overlooking the harbor, and there are two stories as to why. One that she was homesick for England and longed to return, the other that she contemplated on how she could help her husband, the governor, solve the many problems he faced. The chair is large enough for two to sit in and it still seemed to swallow us.

      Sydney Tower, top of the Centerpoint shopping complex is the highest vantage-point in the city. It actually is the highest public building in the Southern Hemisphere. Besides the viewing area for a spectacular view any time of day, it also houses two revolving restaurants.

     We enjoyed quite a lot of sidewalk entertainment throughout the city. A couple of the mimes, one the Statue of Liberty, were exceptionally good.

     On one of our excursions out of town our driver told us, “In the 1970s the government began redeveloping The Rocks while keeping its heritage intact. The blend of history and culture mingled among tropical palm trees, flower gardens, ponds, and grassy lawn areas all blends to give the area a distinctive personality. The preserved sandstone colonial architecture provides facades for many shops and restaurants. The many architectural styles include colonial convict, colonial military, colonial Georgian, contemporary expressionism, early colonial, modern expressionism, Victorian, and Victorian lace.”

     It seemed to me that is an excellent summary of this large city. I have not mentioned the famous Sydney Opera House as I described the fabulous building in an 11/ 2010 post. It should be on every visitor’s list to tour with a docent. Truly a not to miss facility.

SYDNEY, AUSTRALIA

                                         Bit about the Big City

      Stretching 60 miles north to south and 35 miles east to west Sydney is Australia's largest city. The harbor divides the city into its north and south sections. After an eight month voyage from England Captain Arthur Phillip established a penal colony in 1788. The flotilla of eleven ships carried a thousand convicts. Forty of the original passengers died during the 250-day voyage from England. They landed on a sandstone peninsular known as The Rocks. After 1776, the English could no longer send their prisoners to the United States, so they sent them to barren and isolated Australia.

      Because of a lack of soil, some of the original settlers migrated several miles inland to farm. Later soil was imported into The Rocks. Home now to 3 ½ million people, the city is hilly reminding me a great deal of San Francisco. The streets are narrow. The city has subway and monorail systems. The downtown monorail makes a loop of the area every six minutes. Sydney is the capital of New South Wales. Natives call themselves Sydneysiders. The southeast part of Sydney is parkland, greenbelt, and sporting area.

      During the 1838 plague, the city was burned to the ground, then was rebuilt. In years past hangings took place at sunrise or sunset because the spirit rises at that time. Sydney’s famous Harbor Bridge, built in 1932-34, is the longest single span steel bridge in the world. Paul  Hogan was working on the bridge when the movie industry discovered him.

     The first crude wood huts erected by the convicts were followed with simple houses made of mud bricks cemented together with a mixture of sheep’s wool and mud. Rain soon washed the mortar away and no buildings in The Rocks survived the earliest period of convict settlement. There were no permanent buildings before 1816. Much restoration on historic colonial buildings has taken place in recent years.

      Cadman’s Cottage, a small two-story yellow sandstone building built in 1816 is the oldest surviving house in Sydney.  John Cadman was sentenced for stealing a horse. He eventually married Elizabeth who had stolen a hairbrush and a knife. Cadman became superintendent of government boats and was allowed to live in the upper story of the cottage. Originally the cottage was at the water’s edge, but because a fair amount of reclaimed land, the cottage now sits back 100 feet or so from the water. The original seawall still stands in front of the cottage.

     The waterfront of this thriving port was once lined with warehouses backed by a row of tradesmen’s shops, banks, and taverns. Above them rose cobblestone alleyways to the cottages of seamen and wharf laborers.

Garrison Church

      The very walkable inner city is best seen on foot.  British and Colonial Regiments once worshiped at Holy Trinity Church, built in 1840, and is also known as the Garrison Church. The oldest church in the country has a distinctive ‘wine glass’ shaped pulpit. The Visitor Center occupies the Sydney Sailors’ Home, 1859. The Argyle stores date to the 1800s, and Susannah Place, an example of a typical dwelling occupied by working class families from the mid 1840s, is now a museum.

     Sydney became a notorious port full of taverns and brothels. The old west image of bars, brawls, amd brothels is long gone. Prostitution, once outlawed, became legal again in Sydney in mid 1999. Sydney is surrounded by sprawling suburbs. With three-quarters of the country desert, 86% of the population lives in urban areas, with the majority of those in Sydney and Melbourne. All of the large cities are on the coast. The harbor officially titled Port Jackson, but commonly called Sydney Harbor, has 150 miles of waterfront, and the harbor area is basically downtown. The Lord Nelson, built in 1836 as a Brewery Hotel, still brews its own beer on the premises. Large aging vats are visible from the dining area. It is the oldest remaining hotel in the city. We enjoyed a very good lunch here in the historic ‘brew house’.

Tomorrow more on Sydney

ROYAL FLYING DOCTORS

                                          What a great Service!

A docent met us in the lobby of The Royal Flying Doctor Service and led us into a small auditorium where we saw a fantastic film of the Service in action.

The service started in 1928 with one plane. Today, in Alice Springs, the service operates with six doctors, six nurses, six pilots, three planes, and three engineers providing free service to the public. The goal is to do three clinics a day or 1000 a year in the Outback. Everyone works twelve-hour shifts for two days, has one day off and repeats the cycle.

Tourists account for 18% of the business; many of the calls are at Ayers Rock. The annual budget is $9 million. Planes cost $4.5 million each. Like everywhere else government funds have been recently cut.

A drug box containing 100 drugs, packaged by number not name, is kept at numerous outposts around the country. Much prescribing can be done by phone. The service in Alice Springs covers an area 70 kilometers in diameter from the city. The population in this area, excluding the city, is 16,000. The pilots have access to over 150 airstrips.

Today the service is in the hands of six mainland sections each having one or more radio control stations. There are 16 base locations around the country from which Flying Doctors operate. In total the Service employs 27 doctors, 58 nurses, 65 pilots, 34 engineers, 51 administrative staff, 46 mechanics and other staff and nine general hands.

No other service in the world operates over such a vast territory, providing such a comprehensive health care service. They are not merely an aerial ambulance, but a remote area health care provider. The Alice Springs service averages five evacuations a day. They are no longer than two hours away from any location.  The entire service covers 2.3 million square kilometers.

Wireless, wings, and stethoscope. What an interesting visit! As a healthcare professional in my other life I was fascinated, and wished I were younger.