mike.andrewartha

2008 Tue 7th Oct Over the weekend...

Posted by Mike on 7 October 2008. There are 125 comments.

Tags:

Day 2 - 4, I am now in Santa Teresa and loving it! No cell coverage as my phone doesn't support the cellphone connection here but there has been lots happening so will blog about as much as I can as to what has been happening over the past few days over here. Contact me via email for the time being till further notice.

Sat 4/10/08 - Saw the sites of Melbourne with some of the community members that I am staying with, which included going on a mission to buy a drum bag (as my drum has a little chip from travelling over here so I really don't want to happen again), visiting the Melbourne Museum (which is just across the road) and walking down the Yarra river... it was a beautiful day! Then in the evening, I went to a club in the city and got in contact with a couple of friends from Wellington who are now living here and met up with them in the club and did a bit of dancing! Very Niiice!

Sun 5/10/08 - Woke up early for my flight and as it was daylight savings change over (again) I lost another hour of sleep so was a bit annoyed about that... and did a bit of packing before realising that my ride had not awoken and I didn't know where his room was in the large house :-( Woke up one of the other residents and they showed me his room, then woke him up and we proceed to the airport. Got there and I tried to book in but missed the final call argh!!! (I sooo didn't need this...) Proceeded to the information desk and after a stern warning from the lady at the desk regarding missing flights (i.e. I could have had to pay for another ticket), was put on the next flight which happened to be direct to Alice Springs (score!). Ended up beating my original flight to Alice which was awesome, however at first didn't find Brother Laurie at the airport who was picking me up so waited for a little while before he approached me and asked if I was Michael.

Movie on the plane: The Incredible Hulk.

The ride to Santa Teresa was a bit long and bumpy, the road was unsealed, stoney and sooo orange (the sand our here gets on and in everything)... however good company, a long chat with Laurie made it go sooo much quicker! Once there, was introduced to the other brothers Tony (T.J.), Gonz and Red who also live in the community. I was shown to my room, talked to the brothers for a while and then was invited out to the community races which were held on a race track out of town. We took the landrover and along the way picked up a few kids heading to the track. The kids are awesome, so friendly and inquisitive "whats your name, where are you from" is what they have been saying and they usually come up to you and tell you random stuff (like kids usually do), while the adults tend to keep to themselves but when approached and introduced are friendly.

Some of my pics that I took show the racecourse, it was definitely an epic event on the community calendar, it happens every year around the time of St Teresas feast day and the whole town + some people (mostly family) from around the area turn out to watch the races. Mostly locals sat or stood around and watched the kids dancing or talked to themselves and this seems to be a big thing at community events. Now this event is kinda hard to explain, but one thing you have to know is that time goes out the window... I was at the event for about 3 - 4 hrs I guess but there were only 2 races, you could be standing around for ages wonder whats going to happen but its no use asking as no one seemed to know? However no one worried about it and the kids entertained themselves so there wasn't any problems. The racing was very dangerous, the horses are mostly wild horses from around the area and one rider even fell off in one race. Other highlights were a big thunder storm which hit the course while a race was on, around here they don't get much rain so it was certainly an experience (inside another experience lol). The orange sand turned a deep orange/red colour and I wasn't worried about it cause it was soooo hot... it was such a weird feeling to go from one extreme to another so quickly.

At the races I had the opportunity to meet quite a few locals so quickly which I think has helped a bit to settle in here, but still there is a lot to get used to. Later that night they had the prizegiving for the races, its a big deal as the top prize is $1000 and the whole community was at "the club" (a big hall in the centre of town with hoops, pool tables and other sport equipment). We turned up and there was a disagreement happening so we left and came back later, as its mainly due to how disagreements are handled in aborigional culture. It could be different for each community but for this one, all arguements are usually vocal and in the open and they don't like us "Whities" interferring or trying to break them up as we could be involved in it also. When we arrived, things seemed back to normal. Dancing and more waiting was to be had till the winners were announced. It was all done in english as some of the out of towners family probably wouldn't understand the local language (as each aborigional area has its own language and dialects), however I still couldn't understand what was being said (could have been due to the accent or even the microphone) except for one of the elders saying "look everybody, give him a hand" in a sharp auzzie accent after each prize winner. I found out later that because of the storms that the main race couldn't be held so all the minor prizes and ribbons were handed out, the main race was delayed to tomorrow.

Monday 6/10/08 - First day of school! Introduced to a few staff and Tom (Ned) who is to be the class teacher that I will be helping with. However he doesn't need too much help at the moment as he already has one aborigional teacher aide and two visiting teachers who will be planning half day sessions for three weeks for the class. The kids call Tom "Ned" as Tom is a name of a recently deceased member of the community. This is whats called "Avoidance practice", read about it more here, hovever if he didn't have a nickname then he would be called "Kuminjay". After a quick maths and english lesson revolved around what they had been up to in the holidays, the whole school piled into the bus and a few vans and then headed back out to the racecourse for the final race. This would never happen in the city... most schools would never stop for a race so it was a interesting experience. From what the school was told, the race would start around 10ish but when we arrived, we were the first group there lol so a call was made to the organisers and slowly the rest of the community made its way out to the racecourse. The main race ended up taking place before 12pm and as the horses were called over for the presentations, the same elder said "look everybody, give him a hand". Then got a ride back on the bus to school and they gave out lunch and told the kids to come back at 1:30pm while the staff had lunch. I managed to get a bit burnt at the racecourse but other then that the day was "great success".

In the afternoon it was religion and preparing the kids for their confirmation which is happening next week with the Bishop coming to town from Darwin. The schools have heaps of students enrolled but a big problem for the school is that students just don't appear for class regulary, one day they arrive and the next they don't. Today there was more teachers and helpers then students which was kinda strange. I got to play with the classes virtual whiteboard, its so awesome!!!! The whiteboard is touch sensitive and a projector displays the image on the board. You can write what you want on the board, touch the whiteboard and then select the word that you wrote. Then the written word changes to a text font and you can move them around or bring up a keyboard and type more if you want, so much fun!

After doing some odd jobs after school I went home but there wasn't much peace once I sat down as groups of kids would knock on the door and ask for a ride from the brothers, however the answer was no as they had missed the bus and the brothers were tired from a long days work. Ok now to sleep, will blog in another couple of days or so, hope all is well at home. m