Mazin Grace

by Dylan Coleman

  ‘’Cause he wants somewhere for us to stay, to get us off the Mission.’

  ‘Why aren’t we stayin’ there now?’

  ‘’Cause when Council found out he bought it for Nyunga mooga they gave ’im back ’is bunda. Said no blacks ’lowed to own land or live on land bought for ’em, they ’ave ta live on the Nyunga Missions and Reserves.’

  I lie there quiet-way then, and think about that. That’s not nice for Council to do that. Just ’cause we’re Nyunga. Then I think ’bout how walbiya mooga treat us in town. They must think we like biggy ngunchu in a pigsty that we can’t ’ave the same flash things as them, that we can’t live in town like them with flashy wada mooga hangin’ in their windows. Why they like that for? Whitefellas got funny ways sometimes. Old Rod, he good fella, though. He bought us a place to stay. Why he different from them other fellas?

  I think again ’bout that special block of land that Old Rod bought us. When we minya, Eva and me use to go down to the church tank and get water in our billy can for Ada to make cuppa tea and for washin’ and cookin’. Lotsa Nyunga mooga would come to our camp and sit ’round the campfire at night. We’d make our campfire real big and while we sittin’ ’round gubarlie mooga were tellin’ us minya ones ’bout our Seven Sisters, our weena mooga Ancestors and the big giant man, our wadi Ancestor, sparklin’ up there in the sky. Sometimes there’d be a corroboree ’round the campfire. When the men doin’ their corroboree us weena mooga and kids ’ave to cover ourselves under the blanketie. That’s men’s business, we not allowed to see what they doin’. Under the blanketie, I smell campfire and dust, and hear the men singin’, and clappin’ their boomerangs and jibin, together. It was real excitin’ and minya bit scary too, for a minya wunyi like me. The sound and feel of the Nyunga mooga gu jinna, thumping on the munda real close-way, make me ngulu but I wanna see what’s happenin’ so I find a minya hole in the blanketie and peek through and start singin’ make-up words to join in. ‘Yudi, yumba, yarni. Yudi, yumba, yarni.’

  I remember Ada slap me then and pull the blanketie up so I can’t see no more.

  ‘You naughty minya wunyi. Don’t be so cheeky,’ she growl me quiet-way. ‘That men’s jooju ingin. You wanna get in trouble?’ she tellin’ me wild-way. ‘That’s imin. You wanna get sick, girl?’

  ‘Nooo. I don’t wanna get sick, Ada,’ I whisper grabbin’ my jinna.

  I was only minya wunyi. I didn’t understand them sorta things back then.

  Anyway, it’s real warm in our bedroom ’cause the fire bucket’s still glowin’ bright.

  ‘Ada, why Old Rod buy us that block to live on?’ I got to work this old man out so my gugga can rest when I go ungu later. ‘He just ’nother walbiya, indie?’

  Ada start kickin’ me with ’er jinna.

  ‘Don’t be so cheeky, Grace. He does a lot for you. He feed you and clothe you.’

  I pull my jinna ’way so she won’t kick me and pull the blanketie over my gugga. Two of my minya sisters, Lil-Lil and Sarah start to cry. I musta woke them up when I moved my jinna.

  ‘He’s not just ’nother walbiya,’ Ada yells. ‘He’s a bloody decent man to us.’ She stopped kickin’ me then. ‘If it wasn’t for ’im we’d be starvin’, Grace. You remember that before you open that big cheeky mouth of yours.’

  I lie there sobbin’ but my minya sisters’ cryin’ drowns me out.

  ‘Now, look what you’ve done. You woke up your sisters,’ Ada says nasty-way.

  Squeezin’ my guru mooga tight I try to disappear into the dark. I push the back of my murra into my teeth and bite as hard as I can ’til I taste blood in my mouth. Then I let go and float up into the sky. I don’t care if mumoo get me. I don’t care if I never come back again. I fall into deep sleep. Then, out of the dark I see Old Rod’s face glowin’ like our fire bucket, all warm.

  ‘Who are you old man?’ I ask ’im.

  He don’t say nothin’. He just holds ’is murra moogas out to me.

  ‘Why no one want to tell me ’bout you?’ I ask again. ‘It’s like you one big secret.’

  He open ’is mouth to talk.

  ‘Grace, you bloody goomboo minyi.’

  Why he callin’ me goomboo minyi?

  And I wake up then, wet, cold and miserable, and not one more clue for the riddle, only Eva screamin’ at me.

  ‘Eva,’ I yell back, ‘you just woke me up from a real important dream.’

  That’s when I thought of it again. Why don’t I ask Old Rod the questions?

  9

  Walbiya gu minga: white man’s sickness

  On Sundays everyone on the Mission go to church and listen to Pastor talk from the Bible. That church bin there long time, it’s older than me. Mumma Jenna say, her father, Granny Jimmy bin show the Pastor the right place to put the Mission long, long time ago and that’s where we live now.

  This Sunday, Pastor preaches to us ’bout how the devil can sneak up on you through gubby, gamblin’ and what he says is bein’ ‘immoral’. I don’t know what that flash word means, s’pose it means bein’ a sinner.

  That bloody devil must be everywhere then. He must be like a minya mumoo, sneakin’ ’round, jumpin’ in through people’s windows and runnin’ amuck on the Mission and nothin’ Pastor can do ’bout it, ’cause all them adults just tell lies to ’im when he asks. Maybe the devil makin’ ’em do it, whisperin’ in their yuree. Anyways, I reckon them Ten Commandments just one big joke. Nyunga mooga must think they’re to be broken.

  I think ’bout how Old Rod and Ada give us girls gubby to drink to ’elp us go ungu some nights. And I wonder if the devil makin’ them do that too, and are we sinners for drinkin’ the gubby, even if the grown-ups give it to us? I don’t even like the taste anyways, it burns when it goes down my throat and into my djuda. They bin doin’ that since me and Eva minya girls, three or four years old. Sometimes when we park the moodigee at night and Old Rod and Ada sneak off together, it’s real scary. Everythin’ is quiet and black outside. I’m shakin’ in my skin, so scared mumoo or jinardoo’s gonna get me. You can ’ear the minya djita mooga when they get woken up by somethin’ walkin’ past their nests, they scared too. But then the gubby starts to make me real tired and I nod off to sleep. I don’t like it when I wake up though, ’cause I need drink of water and my yudda feels like it’s got cotton wool in it and my gugga hurt real bad. Why grown-ups wanna drink when they feel like that next day?

  Just the other day, some uncles snuck into the Mission six bottles of wine in hollowed-out loaves of bread from town. And a weena brought new pack of cards in baby’s nappy, had to wash them though, ’cause baby done a goona before they got ’ome. And other weena mooga met with some walbiya farmers, bullocky mooga, out past the back paddock so they can get more gubby for cards night comin’ up soon. And poor old Pastor don’t even know nothin’ ’bout any of it, ’cause when he ask, everyone real polite-way tell ’im lies, straight to ’is face. Make me feel sorry for ’im. He think he’s doin’ a good job for God and Jesus, but nothin’.

  Only trouble is, gubby means big fights and I hate it when people start fightin’. I get so scared but there’s nowhere to hide where I feel safe. My minya sisters get real scared too. It’s like all the old arguments the grown-ups had with each other, that are gone, come up again, oozin’ up like a big red boil ready to pop. And look out when it does, ’cause it’s real rotten. There’s screamin’, big punch-ups and sometimes people bleedin’ and gotta go to ’ospital. It’s real scary. When you minya wunyi you feel like you can’t do nothin’. It’s like the devil bin send this big fight and Jesus and God not there to protect us. When you look and see someone gonna get hit in the gugga with big bunda you want to tell ’em to stop. But you can’t go there to tell ’em ’cause you too frighten, screamin’ your head off and with your murra mooga over your yuree hopin’ to make it go away.

  Sometimes, A
da run away with us, take us to Old Rod’s farm, where it’s safe.

  Sometimes Pastor and Superintendent come and try and break up the fightin’ and call the wultja mooga. If the wultja mooga don’t come straight ’way, they come next day to look for them fellas who bin fightin’ to take ’em to jail but our mob real cunnin’ ’cause they tell ’em wrong way to go to look for someone when we all know they bin went the other way. Then wultja mooga give up and no-one gets put in jail.

  When I see the grown-ups playin’ cards, I decide to use old pack of Mumma’s cards that I pinch when she not lookin’. Then I set up card game with the kids. Whoever’s got minya bit of bunda can play, we only play a penny a go. Most of the kids’re real stupid though, so I win lotta money, enough for a good feed of lollies, anyway. If Papa catch us he’d give us good beltin’ for gamblin’ but he don’t growl the grown-ups. ’Im, the Uncles and other men on the Mission, got a special spot in the bush, out the back of our oval where they play two-up. I hide in the bushes and watch ’em sometimes. They get real excited over two minya pennies bein’ thrown up in the air. I don’t know why they get so excited for.

  Doesn’t matter who wins, no matter what sorta gamblin’, cause the money always get shared back ’round anyway. That’s how things work on the Mission with Nyunga mooga. If someone’s starvin’ and ’nother person’s got enough food to go ’round, they share. ’Cept for me. When I win my bunda, I sneak off to the shop and buy lollies and hide them in my secret hidin’ place so I don’t ever ’ave to go hungry. Only sometimes my stash runs out, ’specially if I get in real generous mood and decide to share it with my sisters and brothers, Nyunga-way, but that’s hardly ever.

  ‘Where you get these lollies from?’ Eva ask me.

  I tell ’er I found ’em. I just don’t tell ’er where I found ’em, in the fireplace in my secret hidin’ spot, otherwise she raid them next time and I won’t ’ave any for myself.

  Mumma tells me that sometimes when Superintendent catches Nyunga mooga gamblin’ he call the wultja mooga, ’specially if they bin given warnin’s before. Then, they gotta go to court and get big fine and if they don’t pay, they go to jail. Stuff that. So when I play with the other kids we do it real sly-way and get one of the minya ones to look out for us. If anyone’s comin’ they whistle and we quick-way put the cards away and hide our bunda.

  Card night the worst night, old Hetty Clare come over to play but she bin gubbyngarl all afternoon, so she already mouthy when she gets here. She lose all ’er money and Ada cleanin’ up with royal flush. Hetty real bad sport and start cursin’ Ada. Us kids walkin’ round the house, and playin’ chasie out the back in the dark but when we hear Hetty start screamin’ we cut it inside and hide under the bed ’cause we know trouble comin’. I can see ’er through the bedroom door.

  ‘You think you so good, Ada Oldman, don’t you? You just walbiya gu burru. That’s all you are.’ She stand up then and sway on ’er jinna. ‘You just a big bloody shame job, that’s all you are. Your own father so shame of you he flog you while you joonie thuda with that first bastard kid of yours.’

  Ada hang ’er ’ead shame-way. Then Hetty jump forward and grab Ada’s ’air, yankin’ real hard-way with one murra and hittin’ ’er in the face with the other. Ada screamin’ an’ thrownin’ punches at ’er to let go.

  I’m so scared hidin’ under the bed there, with my sisters and brothers, I curl up into a minya ball and start punchin’ my yuree to try to make the screamin’ stop. My minya sisters screamin’ too, clingin’ to me when they hear Ada bein’ hurt, cryin’ out in pain. I just wanna run out there and make it all stop, but I’m so scared, I can’t move except for the shakin’. I can ’ear things bein’ thrown in the kitchen, sound like Mumma’s big pot, then glass smash. I hate it here on the Mission, I just wanna run a million miles away and take my minya sisters away too, so we safe.

  Mumma Jenna jump up then and grab Hetty by scruff of ’er neck and throw ’er towards the door.

  ‘And us decent Nyunga mooga didn’t want you ’ere either,’ screams Hetty. ‘That’s why we threw bunda mooga at you when you came back with your bastard kid,’ she yell out over ’er shoulder.

  As Mumma boot ’er out the door, Hetty take a swipe at Mumma but Mumma grab Hetty’s murra and send ’er flyin’ through the door instead.

  ‘Go ’ome or I’ll get the crowbar onto you Hetty,’ Mumma tell ’er. ‘You can’t come ’ere carrying on at my family like that.’

  ‘Ahh,’ Hetty Clare scream, stumblin’ out the backyard. ‘You all just a bloody mob of bastards, especially your arse’ole kids.’

  Ada run off to our room cryin’ then. I’m so glad she all right. She start grabbin’ our clothes and blanketie and shovin’ them into a sugar bag.

  ‘Come on, you kids’, she yell at us hidin’ under the bed. ‘Get outa there, we goin’ to Old Rod’s place.’

  We walk for long time in the dark. Me and Eva helpin’ Ada, carryin’ our minya sisters. They whingein’, complainin’, they tired and hungry.

  ‘We’ll be right once we get to Old Rod’s,’ I tell ’em. ‘He’ll give us good feed.’

  In the darkness ahead I can ’ear Ada sobbin’. I feel real sorry for ’er. Hetty can be real nasty weena, ’specially when she’s drunk. Was it true what she said ’bout Papa beltin’ Ada when she got joonie thuda for Eva, ’cause he’s shame of her? And surely, Mission mob wouldn’t be so mean as to throw bunda at ’er and minya guling. I wanna ask Ada if that’s true but I know better. She might give me a floggin’.

  As we walkin’ along in the blackness, I look for our Seven Sisters in the sky, and think about everythin’ that people ’ave bin wonganyi lately. If it’s true what Hetty sayin’, where was our father when this was happenin’? I think again, about when Eva say we don’t ’ave one, ’cause he’s not allowed to be our father. What’s that mean? He should be ’ere to look after Ada, ’elp ’er look after us kids, to stick up for ’er. I get real angry thinkin’ ’bout that and decide I’m gonna be more ’elpful to Ada from now on and not so cheeky. And just wait if I ever find out who our father is, I’m gonna give ’im a mouthful.

  As we walkin’ along I think about the time that some of us girls were minya. Me, Eva, Janie Burns, Raylene and some others left the Mission and cut it to Uncle Jerry and Aunty Dianna’s place at Loffenhauser’s farm. It was a real long way past the Mission on the way to Koonibba siding, where some Nyunga men worked on the railway line. When we got there they gave us cuppa tea and some bread but when we got ’ome me and Eva got a beltin’ from Ada and all the adults were yellin’ at us and tellin’ us off about how dangerous it is for minya wunyi mooga to go wanderin’ off like that without a grown-up. But I reckon walkin’ behind Ada now with all the minya ones is far more dangerous. What if wild dogs get us? Ada must be real upset to do this, put us in danger like this.

  When we get there, Old Rod’s a real arse’ole to Ada. ‘Why have you come here this hour of the night?’ he yells at her.

  Can’t he see Ada’s upset and got marks on ’er face from that ugly old battle-axe, Hetty Clare? Poor Ada got ’er gugga down like she always do when he growl ’er.

  ‘Where am I going to put you and the girls tonight?’ he yells. ‘You need to give me warning, Ada, so I can arrange things.’

  ‘I’m sick of all the fightin’,’ Ada say. ‘Sick of livin’ on the Mission, Rod. I wanna move off there.’ She sobbin’ then. She look so sad, like ’er ’eart breakin’ in two.

  Stuff tryin’ to find out clues ’bout why Old Rod’s different from other walbiya mooga and why he treat us nice-way, I think, lookin’ at ’im walkin’ up and down real moogada-way. He’s just like them other walbiya mooga, mean, nasty old arse’ole.

  After a while, he calms down and finds a place in the old caravan in the big shed for us to stay and then he brings us some bread and burru for a feed.

  I
never seen that side of Old Rod, he acted real mean. But at least he let us stay and we had a good sleep.

  Next day, when Old Rod drops us back off at the Mission, my leg start achin’ again. I’m thinkin’ it’s because of the big walk over to Old Rod’s farm last night. Not long after, I’m curled up on our bed in pain again. Uncle Murdi come in and play ’is guitar to me, but it’s still really sore. Mumma come in and shakes ’er gugga. Ada looks worried.

  Mission Nursin’ Sister come to see my leg when she find out. She move ’er murra over my jinna different-way to Mumma. ’Er hands are cold and stiff and she poke at my jinna like it’s a piece of burru that she’s tryin’ to work out if it’s fresh enough to eat. She sniff and fold ’er arms.

  ‘It’s not broken but I think it’s best to get Doctor to have a look at it.’

  Mumma and Ada both noddin’.

  ‘You need to feed her more, Ada, she’s far too skinny.’

  I turn my gugga and look down at the munda, movin’ my mouth from one side to the other. I hate it when walbiya mooga come into our cottage. They always so rude and bossy over us.

  Ada and Mumma nod again. They don’t tell Sister ’bout Jumoo, the nunkerie comin’ to look at my leg, ’cause she won’t understand, she don’t nyindi Nyunga ways. She might even growl them for not puttin’ their faith in the Good Lord and the walbiya doctor. But Mumma doesn’t trust walbiya nurses and doctors ever since one of ’er grannies come ’ome with maggots in ’er ears, cause Sister didn’t wash ’em properly. Mumma’s a good midwife, she’s delivered hundreds of babies, and she nyindi when a baby’s not bein’ looked after properly when they born.

  They got funny ways them walbiya mooga sometimes, they treat us like booba mooga. Once when I was real minya, ’bout four, Ada sent me to get nyarni burru that the Nyunga butchers were cuttin’ up over at the shed. She gave me bunda and said, ‘Go get kuka for us and ask for nice pieces, you know, like chops. In this part,’ she pointin’ to ’er jinna.