Njunjul the Sun

by Meme McDonald

  ‘Soon, you’ll learn your own design from the old fullas up home. For now, you use this one here like mine.’

  I’m trying to get a look at the new me in the tiny square of mirror. The fulla I see peering back out looks like he got a few thousand years of clothes on him. He’s not naked no more. His mother earth is keeping him warm, shielding and protecting his spirit.

  I’ve grown, true. I’ll be the one ducking m’head under the basketball ring now.

  ‘This yikki-yikki, he’s magic fulla.’ Uncle passes me his didjeridoo. ‘When you play, you are its breath. This fulla here, he take your breath and he says things these fullas here never heard before. Takes them places they never been.’

  My uncle, he sounds like one of those old fullas now. ‘You’ll meet people and have amazing stories to tell in your life because of this here, this magic stick, this yikki-yikki. Today, you do warrima, dance. Tomorrow, you start to play this here.’

  There’s a hundred sets of eyes’re staring straight at me. Most of them never seen a blackfulla before, I bet. I never seen this blackfulla before, neither. Not dressed like this. My feet don’t feel like they’re touching the floor.

  I stand off to one side, holding my uncle’s yikki-yikki. Talk rustles round the hall of kids like they’re leaves with a no-good wind shaking them up, making them wriggle and call out. Teachers’re shooshing them.

  My uncle, he takes control.

  ‘Okay, everybody, give yourself a hug. Teachers too.’

  Eh, look-out, everybody’s hugging up, true.

  ‘Then turn to the person next to you and give them a real big hug.’

  That sends them off, rolling round the floor laughing and gammin’ hugging and looking like they don’t know what the hell’s going on.

  ‘No kissing. I didn’t say anything about kissing!’

  Now everyone’s pushing and shoving each other, trying to get away. The whole place is alive. They got the message this could be fun.

  Now Uncle gets serious, his voice strong and deep.

  ‘I hope the spirits of the land that we are on today welcome me and my stories, songs and dances. Us fullas,’ he’s talking about me too, now, ‘we’re Bummah Murri. Bummah means people. Murri means from our area up home, up north Queensland. This fulla here, my nephew and me, we Kunggandji. You say that now. Kunggandji.’

  Big mob of kids call out our name. Sends shivers up m’spine.

  Uncle carries on. ‘We’re saltwater people ‘cause we’re on the coast. Aboriginal people inland there, they’re freshwater people.’

  I look around. Everyone’s listening. No fulla’s moving, or chucking off at what m’uncle’s got to say, or nothing.

  ‘A lot of people think us blackfullas are all the same, but we’re not. There are about five hundred groups across the country with about two hundred and fifty different languages, and that’s not counting all the dialects. We don’t all speak the same, do the same dances, tell the same stories, sing the same songs. We don’t all play this magic stick here, either.’

  If they think Uncle Garth’s real deadly from his talking, they heard nothing yet. Wait till he starts to play that yikki-yikki. He starts up, the drone settling the whole hall, closing us in tight.

  The kids go real quiet, drawn into the sound, sucked into that hollow stick, and then into the air, way back somewhere. Me too, I’m in there, same. Don’t know where I’m going but it’s somewhere good.

  Now Uncle Garth’s talking about respect for all that’s living and breathing. Plants, trees, the whole lot. He’s telling about the crocodile and the boy that didn’t listen. He’s telling the kids if you don’t listen properly you become lost and the only things that will find you are the bad things. In this story, it’s the crocodile.

  ‘The crocodile, he can be many things. He’s even here today outside the school in your neighbourhood.’

  Kids go all big-eyed. ‘Where?’

  Looking around the room. ‘We’ve never seen crocodiles around here.’

  Asking each other. ‘Crocodiles down here?’

  ‘If you listen properly, you’ll never get to see him. You see, in this dance, this boy he never listened properly and he died. He got eaten up by the crocodile.’

  ‘Wow!’ The kids are in the palm of his hand, hanging on every word.

  ‘He wears lots of disguises, this fulla crocodile. Could be drugs, could be alcohol, could be the big truck going down the road you don’t see. He knocks into you, hurts you. Knowing what you’re supposed to do and where you’re supposed to be by listening properly means you never have to face that crocodile.’

  I’m the wide-eyed one now.

  ‘You don’t listen, we got a name we call you. Binna-gurri. Binna, this one here,’ Uncle’s pulling his ear, ‘means ear. Gurri means nothing in there. We call this boy that don’t listen, Binna-gurri, deaf. Well, he’s not really deaf, he can hear. But he only hears what he wants to hear not what he’s supposed to.’

  Uncle turns to me. ‘My nephew here, he’s going to play the boy, okay? And me, I’ll be that crocodile.’

  Uncle’s grinning up at me. He knows there’s no way out for me but to play being that boy. I’m thinking, he’s thinking I won’t be needing to act.

  He’s asking the kids, ‘Guess who wins?’

  The kids are yelling out, ‘The crocodile!’ Stamping their feet, clapping their hands, whistling.

  Uncle guides me through the story. I’m playing a binna-gurri hard-head boy-with-attitude real well. Uncle grabs me at the end and tumbles me on the ground like a hungry-fulla crocodile. The both of us is wrestling on the floor, laughing, shiakking, knowing that binna-gurri boy don’t need to follow me no more. He can stay back there in the story.

  Then Uncle, as the crocodile, and me as the boy, jump up and dance together, warrima, shake-a-leg. Shows respect of crocodile for boy, and same, the boy’s respect for crocodile.

  Uncle gets a group of kids to have a go at doing the Crocodile Dance. They go wongy, grabbing each other, eating each other up.

  Then the whole mob of us is up there dancing. Seems we only started the performance. Already we’re up to the last dance, but. Migaloo kids all around, dancing. Me learning along with the rest of them. We’re doing shake-a-leg, kite hawk, kangaroo, goanna, crocodile . . .

  Those imbala wings carry me back home. The home deep inside, no matter where I am. I’m feeling my cheeks damp with tears. I’m leaving them be, not wanting the warrima to ever stop. I’m hearing my girragundji voice chanting those old words to the songs. I’m happy just to be hearing.

  I don’t know when Uncle stopped clapping those boomerangs. Sometime I musta sat down with the rest of them. Part of me stays out there, dancing, but.

  Then I hear this little voice next to me. I feel this tugging at my red cloth, pulling me back to where I am. I open m’eyes and look down. I’m back in the classroom, next to this little fulla tugging on m’judda-jah.

  ‘Psst, psst.’ He’s smiling up at me. ‘You just got this one piece on, eh?’

  I look down. His bungy next to him’s got his hand over his mouth giggling.

  ‘Got any jocks on?’

  ‘Ah . . . no . . .’ I shake m’head.

  ‘Well, how do you stop everything from flopping out?’ The boy next to him is bursting his sides, rolling round the floor, giggling. ‘Don’t ask him that!’

  ‘But I want to. I want to know how he stops everything from escaping.’

  I make up something about it being secret men’s business how that all works. They go all wide-eyed wishing they had some of those kind of secrets.

  After, kids’re wanting my autograph. I haven’t even played in the NBA yet! Lot of kids want to know about stuff to do with my culture. They ask me some things I never even heard of. If they were asking me about three-pointers I’d feel on safer ground.

  ‘Are you a traditional Aboriginal?’

  ‘Have you been initiated?’

  I’m slow with my answering. ‘Y
eah . . . sort of . . .’ Not! ‘I can’t tell you how ‘cause it’s sacred.’ Gammin’!

  They ask me what the drawings on the didjeridoo are. What the gecko means to my people? Is it my totem?

  Things I don’t know, I keep telling them are sacred so I can get me some space to think. Same time, I’m laughing up. My Aunty Lillian, she paints real good. She painted this stick, this yikki-yikki of Uncle’s. Beautiful geckos all over it. Truth is, she hates geckos. Curses them doing goona all over her nice, clean bathroom.

  These migaloo fullas seem to think you can’t paint a kangaroo without it meaning something. Sometimes, those Story creatures, their story’s real sacred, for teaching you what you need to do. Sometimes, but, kangaroo is just a kangaroo.

  One red-haired kid asks me to speak my language. Others join in. ‘Yeah, say something, like “hello”.’

  My heart’s hurting. I’m trying to scrounge round for some words. I’m trying not to go dry in the mouth, panic, or want to hit out at who it was took my words away. I’m wanting to be sitting down with those old fullas. Asking if there’s any language left for me to learn.

  Little girl, she’s holding m’hand real tight, helping me through. She looks up, big eyes, voice thin as a whisp of smoke coming off a small camp fire. ‘How long you been black?’

  I’m looking up at m’uncle. He’s laughing, listening for my reply.

  ‘I reckon I was born black.’ I’m looking back down into that fire burning in her eyes. ‘I’m glad you asked me that, but, ‘cause I reckon it’s taken me a long while, maybe right up till now, to know that.’

  That little girl gives me a long hard look, checking to see if I’m gammin’ or not. I’m not. Then her look turns wise and old. She nods like she understands the lot of it and more.

  Teachers ask us along to the staffroom. They’re making cups of tea, waiting on us, asking how many sugars.

  ‘Standard Murri-fulla,’ I say. ‘Milk and two, thanks.’

  One teacher’s telling Uncle Garth her whole family history, trying to find where she fits with it, like Uncle’s got the lost map. Uncle’s got that look on his face like he needs to find a big shady tree to lay down under and sleep. I’m there with him. There’s a lot to take in for one morning.

  The head teacher sees us out to the front door. Little fulla with a big heart. He’s thanking us for what we’ve given to the kids and the teachers. I’m thinking he’s meaning Uncle.

  ‘And you too, young man.’ He shakes my hand. ‘You’ve given these kids a lot. They obviously loved you.’

  ‘I loved them,’ I hear myself say, not knowing where those words came from.

  Back in the car, we don’t talk. I’m not even thinking how flash I’m looking, paint still on, sunnies, and cruisin’ in the Merc. More I’m sorting through the treasures I got in my heart. All the things the kids were asking. I’m not sure what I might have given them. I know what they’ve given me, but. They’ve given me back a part of myself.

  10

  By the end of the week, we’ve done about five more shows. All over Sydney. Little kids, big kids, even teenagers as old as me. Each time I get surer of myself, stronger at knowing my place, backing up m’uncle. He even got me introducing dances, telling some of the stories. I’m hearing m’voice little and squeaky at first, then getting stronger.

  Friday night, Aunty Em’s gone out on the town with a mob of teachers. Uncle and I are doing the dishes, laughing about all the different kids we met. Some of the questions them fullas asked and some of the things they did were real wongy.

  One little girl, she wanted to know, ‘Was Captain Cook a nice bloke?’

  Eh, look-out, my uncle’s not that old, I’m thinking.

  Uncle reckons, ‘I should have told her me and the Captain used to hang out up the Cape, fishing. We decided to name that place Cooktown after him ‘cause he was such a nice fulla. Like us Murris never had names for places till them whitefullas come along!’

  Then we get laughing about this little blackfulla at one school. Grade Six. I’m looking at myself and I’m thinking I’m pretty black. But this fulla, he was blue-black. My uncle started explaining the Honey Dance, the dance about searching for honey. That native bee don’t sting, see. When that European bee come along, the one that stings, that jarred us Murri-fullas up.

  Uncle needed someone to play his brother in the Honey Dance, and another fulla to be the tree. Uncle picked out this blue-black blackfulla. No-good, when that fulla come out, he stood up and looked m’uncle in the face.

  ‘You’re a racist,’ he said. ‘You only picked me ‘cause I’m black.’ He had a real grumpy face too.

  ‘I jarred him up real good, but,’ Uncle’s reckons. ‘I told him, “No I didn’t. I picked you ‘cause you was talking to your bungy there and you weren’t listening to the story I was telling. You binna-gurri, in one ear out the other. Now you gotta listen up ‘cause you gotta be the story.” Did you see him, eh? See his face looking at me all serious, grumbling. “Well, that’s okay then.”’

  Uncle yakais real loud, ‘Can’t be that easy!’

  Washing up water’s flying all directions. Uncle’s cacking himself. I’m twirling the tea towel in the air, shiakking.

  Uncle sits me down at the table, serious now. He’s wiped and polished it till you can see your own face. He goes and gets his wallet. Doesn’t say nothing. Just starts placing fifty dollar notes down in front of me. Six of them. All in a row. Three hundred bucks.

  My eyes are big as full moons, watching.

  ‘No, leave ‘im.’

  No way I’m about to touch ‘im, that junga.

  ‘Keep having a good hard look. That’s yours there. You earned it.’

  ‘Eh, look-out.’ That takes m’breath away that does. I earned all that? I’m looking up at Uncle, make sure he’s not jiving me.

  ‘But before you touch ‘im, you remember all those people that fought really hard so you could have that now. Your mum and all your aunties and their aunties and uncles for long time.’

  I’m thinking of them and I’m thanking them and I’m listening to my uncle.

  ‘See, that’s how it is now. We can earn whitefullas’ gold using the power of blackfullas’ stories. That’s what we gotta do. You earned this money teaching about your culture. That culture’s like medicine. It can heal you. It can heal all these other fullas living here now, not knowing where they belong. For healing, we need whitefullas to hear about our culture. We need whitefullas to heal first so that we can heal. We gotta keep these stories going if we gonna keep ourselves alive.’

  ‘Thanks, Uncle. Thanks for teaching me everything you know.’

  My uncle grins. ‘No, boy, I’m teaching you everything you know. There’s a difference.’

  The kettle boils. Uncle makes us a cuppa, proper tealeaves in a pot. We settle into the couch, dunking biscuits, sipping sweet tea, lapping up that quiet between us.

  ‘There’s a lot more to learn. And it’s the same for me too.’

  We get back to talking b’ball, laughing about the brothers down the court, remembering how Leaping Leroy goes off and Richie Rich stirs him real bad. My uncle reckons he never seen no one go off at the Guru, but.

  ‘I know it’s only a game but if you love it with your heart it loves you back and will take you to many safe places on your journey.’

  I’m feeling like I’m m’uncle’s son, knowing he’s enjoying having someone to yarn up to. And I’m feeling like he’s m’dad I miss.

  ‘I know there’s lots of razzamatazz about wearing your hat backwards, and trash talk, and big money for those that make it. That’s what lots of kids love best about it, especially you. That’s what makes it fun. For me, I reckon you probably call that the window-dressing.’

  We both stretch out now, feet up. We could be laying back home on the beach with the stars above and all night to shoot the breeze.

  ‘You look at that American coach, Phil Jackson. He’s a winner, eh?’

  ‘Recko
n!’

  ‘When he was playing, he won a championship, then he goes on and coaches the greatest basketballer of all time, the mighty Michael Jordan, and takes him and his team to two three-peats – two times they won three-in-a-row championship rings.

  ‘Then the coach continues on his journey with the L.A. Lakers, Shack O’Neil and Coby Bryant. And goes back to back. Two more championships. Now people are asking, how can this man do all this in amongst the glitz and glamour and money? How can he see through the window with all that window-dressing? You know how he does that?’

  ‘Cause he’s smart, I’m thinking. ‘Cause he works hard? ‘Cause he was good at school? ‘Cause he trained hard, put in two hundred percent and never slacked off?

  I’m grabbing at answers, all the ones I’m thinking I should be thinking. I’m saying nothing, but, ‘cause to tell you the truth, I don’t know.

  Uncle Garth keeps on a roll. ‘Phil, he goes back to basics, to the original people of the land he’s in. The Lakota, American Indians. He uses the first people’s wisdom for survival.’

  I’m seeing the gleam of pride in m’uncle’s eye and I’m feeling it too. I’m imagining us mob and the secrets we’ve got.

  ‘And he works with all the other teachings that have come his way. Yoga, that same stuff Aunty Em does, meditation, and he tells stories he’s been given and teachings he’s been taught. He listens and learns from many people to bring greatness and togetherness to the court, and make basketball players not only become winners of the game but winners in life.’

  I never was thinking that stuff my popeye, my grandad, and my aunties are always wanting to teach me about the old ways could help me be a great play-maker on a basketball court.

  ‘All I can say is, those teachings are something money can’t buy.’ Uncle’s voice has gone all smoky, dust kicking up from those old-fulla feet stamping into the ground behind each word. ‘Work on yourself first. Put yourself in the right state of mind, then good things will find you.’

  I don’t remember when our talking stops and that bed comes and carries me off to sleep.