Strange days & Sorry business

It's an interesting thing up here (or any small community) - you cant hide from anything - the layers fall away and for good and bad, you are left fairly stripped bare.  At the same time you feel like you are savouring more of life than in a city where there are so many layers and anonymity - you can get away from it all.

Sean has been on an incredible journey for the last 16 months and should be writing this himself but doesnt feel he can at present.  His closest work partner - the man representing the farmers of Hope Vale - lost his battle with pancreatic cancer last week having been diagnosed in May. It is a huge loss for Sean as he was the entree and conduit to all families and warring clans of Hope Vale and was a true gentleman and fighter for what he believed in. The bitter sweet of anything like this has been the other friendships Sean has made since Eddie became sick and he is very close to all Eddie's family, brothers and sisters.

So it was a great honour bestowed on Sean last week when he was asked to help the family write the eulogy and then to help the men prepare the body for burial. Aboriginal people up here prepare and bury their own - that is the tradition and Sean found himself on Thursday morning at the Cooktown hospital facing the body of his good friend and mentor, Eddie. Needless to say it was all a 'full-on' experience for the day as they washed and prepared the body, dressed him in his working clothes of shorts and cut off short that Eddie always wore, and placed him in the coffin.

Camping...Cape York style

The funeral (known as Sorry business) was held yesterday in Hope Vale at the Lutheran church which is a lovely weatherboard building with open windows and fans. The first part of the service was an open casket viewing and families were able to say goodbye to Eddie. Unfair when he was only 59. The rest of the service was the dour claptrap of the Lutheran Pastor (sorry for any great believers out there) and the more i listen to this kind of %*?! the less I am a believer. Maybe its because I have sat and listened to a total of 6 hrs of Lutheran sermons in the last 3 months - more than I have been to church in years - and as life takes me along I really question what its all about.  As Sean says if you are going to go to church at least enjoy it - he wants to bring in some gospel singers and liven up the dirges sung by the Lutherans. Not likely I imagine seeing they banned the local Guugu Yimithirr peoples of Hope Vale and region from singing and dancing in the middle of the century, effectively losing much of their cultural heritage, which is passed on that way.



Isabella Falls


Anyway Eddie was buried by his own and every one helped until his grave was filled in and lots of flowers placed on top. Sean BBQ'd a couple of cows (it looked like that much meat) and the community came together to eat and celebrate the life of Eddie. We left and headed up to Normanby station for the night after a bathe in the local Isabella Falls - to wash away the red dust of Hope Vale and the reality that is life....death.



Cooling off



Work in Cooktown

Late afternoon sun is glowing across the Endeavour River, I am stumbling through the back of my house, tripping over piles of leaves gathered by the Brush turkeys and crawling over rocks and through bushes.....all to get to a meeting with the Mayor. It does make me laugh, as I wander along in my thongs, about the dress code and style of meetings in Cooktown as opposed to the big city. Shorts and thongs are ok and if you havent got a tattoo you dont really fit in!


Quandong



The rest of my time at the moment is spent driving 40 kms to a glorious place called Home Rule which sits on Wallaby Creek, a clear fast flowing creek that tumbles over granite rocks...and is crocodile free! Surrounded by the most magnificent wet tropics rainforest with towering trees and vines we see lots of wallaby's, the occassional tree kangaroo and many butterflies and birds.

Native nutmeg

Out there I am still working with the Kuku Nyungkal Rangers and learning heaps about their bubu (country) and their flora and fauna. I find it so difficult to pronounce the words they try and teach me - there is just some way they annunciate things that I dont think any westerner will ever be able to mimic. In return I am doing plans for them regarding Visitor Management and Tourism which is so interesting. 

They take me to sacred sites and show me all the trees that are scar trees where the tribes have in the past cut bark from trees to make shields, bowls, and other weapons, leaving scars on the trees.

Sean came home two days ago with a woomerah to go with his spear, given to him by Neville. He just has to learn how to use it! And catch a mullet!



Sean Creek one of the rangers