When I was a young girl my grandparents teach me everything. That’s why I know all the bush plants, but they only teach me the important plants, they never teach me about all the other shrubs, only the name and if it has flowers and things like that. They say, ‘Don’t teach that one, that’s just the shrubs, that’s just the plant and thing, not good for anything else.’
When I first going with them I used to worry. I was frightened of them because they growl too much. You got to get used to them, nobody else around. Nothing I could do, when Mum and Dad say you staying with the grandparents, you stay, whether you crying or not. You stay! My cousins, sisters and brothers never used to be left with the old grandparents, only me. Mum and Dad say to me, ‘You stay. That’s where you learn. You stay right here.’ If I still want to run and chase Mum and Dad when they leaving, they get off and give me a hiding and send me back. So I couldn’t do nothing, I had to learn.
My grandparents reckoned I was the chosen one for them, to learn all these things, because I was the first grandchild. I went through all that, like you go to high school, you know. I never been to school, but they teaching me proper. They got to give you mark for it just like you going to high school. They give me top mark because I know everything about the bush and everything. That’s only my knowledge, to learn all them things. I have that special skill.
My name, my Aborigine name, is Ngamingu; I was born at Rocklea Station, in the station just at the back, on 12 February 1942. I was the first child. Then was Nicholas, my sister Doris (Minga) and Colin. My dad passed away after that and Mum remarried. Then she had Kevin, Brian and Aquinas. Nicholas and Doris were born at Cobor, outstation from Rocklea, Colin was born on Kooline Station. Kevin, Brian and Aquinas were born in Onslow Hospital.
My dad’s name was Cookie; Cook, they called him. His Aborigine name is Kurubungu. He was born in Hamersley Station. My son Rodney named after him now. My mum’s name is Dora. Her Aborigine name is Mithakunti; she was born in Mithakunti – Sandy Creek, they call it. My mother and my grandparents are from Rocklea. My stepdad’s name is Dan, Danny Gilba.
Mum was Kurrama, my dad Panyjima, and I follow the Yinawangka way. I never followed the two parents; I followed the grandfather, Yinawangka. I don’t know how that comes about. I was the oldest and the grandparents teach me all the culture things and I have to follow my grandparents. My grandmother was Kurrama. I should have followed the grandmother, but too late now. I speak a mixture of Panyjima and Kurrama, but not Yinawangka. We never used to speak Yinawangka and now Yinawangka is nearly all gone.
Some of my growing up was on Rocklea Station and some on Juna Downs Station. We was up and down to Juna Downs, because my father was a horse breaker and he used to break in horses on every station. Juna Downs was the place he used to stay most of the time; just come back to Rocklea to visit all the family, my grandmothers and everyone. We used to come visit only on the holiday; in those days they call holidays pink eye. We travel by horse, horseback riding, or sometimes in a cart, horse and cart. Those days they used to have their own horses, packhorses.
Good life, growing up in the bush – free, nice and wild. Horseback riding all the time. We had no cars anyway; they only had few cars around those days. Dad taught us how to ride. Falling off the horse, that’s nothing. Get on again, because we have to – Dad tell us to get on again. We used to go riding all the time when there was two of us. Brother Nick would ride with Dad and I used to ride behind Mum on her horse. We used to go everywhere. Take a packhorse, go dogging in the back country, catch a fish, whatever you want. A good free life.
When Mum start having the other one – sister we lost now, Doris – we never used to go anywhere any more. Dad reckoned three is too many to go around everywhere. He left Mum and us in Cobor with Auntie Alice and Uncle Jack Smith while he went dogging and working on the stations nearby.
We went down to Mulga Downs Station with Dad and all the old people there used to give us some dry bread, save it for us in a white bag. No time to cook when we moving, just chew on that dry bread, or soak him in the tea to soften him up.
Sometimes when we were camping, Mum used to make some Johnny cakes. Is like a damper, just cook it on top on the coals. You mix it like a damper, but is a quick one. You just chuck it on the coals and turn him over again. All on top.
No sweets; we don’t know sweets, don’t know lollies. Only time we have a lolly was when we come back to Rocklea with Dad, maybe come back to do some breaking in horses or come in for the rations. The station owner, Walter Smith, every time he see us coming he used to line us up and ask who want a lolly. He had them big long hard-boiled lollies you used to get in the old days, all colours. You got to hit it with a rock, break it. Brother Nick and cousin what we lost, Des Smith, we used to fight over it, and Des used to say, ‘Well we got to share it.’ He’d go and get a rock and break it all up and give us little bit each.
We used to be on the move all the time, but when we in Juna Downs we set – good, you know, time to play around. We never used to have toys, nothing to play with, just us, play one with other one. We used to play around with big horses. Dad used to break them in quiet for us. If Mum and Dad sleeping it off after dinner we used to get on that horse and go. We jump on him bareback, no bridle, because that horse was so quiet. We used to pull his mane down when we want him to come down, then jump all over him. He was a very old white horse, a mare, call him Ladybird. Doesn’t matter that we small; we used to jump on that horse to go around hunting, go around gathering the bush tucker, get all the wild fruits and things, then come back.
We used to bring a live lizard back and chuck it on Mum when she was asleep. She used to scream and chase us away. We were really good with a rock to get a goanna or anything. Hit him on the head, cook him. Come back and surprise Mum and Dad, tell them, ‘We got something to eat.’
They used to ask us, ‘Where you fellas got that?’
‘Out there in the bush, where else?’
We never know to talk English then, we used to talk our own language.
When I was an early age we got back to Rocklea and Dad went to one of the stations. He was getting sick then. He had ulcers in his stomach and every camp we used to go he used to dig a little hole and spit blood into that hole. One time he got up and got really angry with himself and we went and get this bush medicine, yajiri (native mustard). Boil that up in the pot and drink it while it’s hot. Just how you drinking hot tea, just enough to be drinkable, drink it down while it’s hot. That fix him right up, finish, never spat blood again.
Long way after, we all moved down to Onslow because Dad was getting sicker. We stayed in town, where Bindi Bindi is now, in a tent. No house there then, just a little bush and a big tree. There was a little well there for water, not far from the hospital. Everybody used to come in there, washing and everything. Put a bucket down with a rope, get the water.
Dad went to Port Hedland Hospital on the doctor plane and Mum didn’t know what to do. My sister was just a baby, sitting up, and Mum thought, Oh well, no one going to feed us. She sat down and talked to us kids: ‘We got no more Dad here – we have to earn our own living now.’ It was hard because we used to the bush, we not used to living in town. No Aborigine people were there when we went down to Onslow. Dad had a couple of Malay friends, the Ahmats; they used to run the bakery there. I worked in the bakery. I might have been about ten years old. Not used to living in town and didn’t know work, you know.
Mrs Ahmat give me a job greasing the bread tins and sweeping out the bakery and watering all the trees. Nick was little bit smaller than me and he went to work in the butcher shop. He used to go out with old Jack Whittaker the butcher man, shaking along the road in the little sulky. His job was cleaning the blocks, so he could bring some meat home for us. I used to bring home bread, Nick some meat. Didn’t get wages; they give me bread and clothing. Mrs Ahmat used to sew some clothes for me – silky, with puffed up sleeves and tie a belt behind. We don’t know what nice clothes is, because in the old days we only used to have those little things like a little strap coming down in front. Mum would find a job cleaning the house for white ladies, washing and ironing and things. She worked that way. My sister would go with her, sit out on the verandah waiting for Mum to finish work; if she tired, Mum would put her to sleep.
We stayed in Onslow about four or five months and my uncle, Jack Smith, come then. He know his brother gone to Port Hedland. I think Dad got in touch with him somehow and told him to go and look for the family belong to him. Jack Smith was a kangaroo shooter then, all around Rocklea and Cobor. He come down to Onslow there and he was buying a new truck, ordered a Morris truck coming in the boat. Come down there and pick us up then.
He find a job for Mum in Ashburton Downs Station. Mum was cooking there; she was a good cook. Me and Nick had to work at the station, and that’s where we really, really learnt to work. It was tougher than where we start in Onslow. Nick used to work in the yard gardening, like a yardman, watering lawn and everything. That station had a lot of dogs and he used to take all the dogs for a walk. Old lady on the station had ten dogs in a kennel.
That old lady, white lady, used to be really rough. Her name was Olga, Mrs Kelly. Used to grab us, whip us in the corner with them little bamboo sticks. Used to whip me if I’m not doing any job, or if I don’t listen sometimes. I lived in the station because I had to get up early, and not far for me to get up, have a shower and go to work; just there. I had a room, toilet, bathroom, like a little cottage. Sometimes my grandmother sleep there with me, when she want to. Mum used to come to work early from their camp not far away.
I was in the station more than the other kids and sometimes I get carried away and want to talk and play with these kids, my mates. They singing out, ‘We going down the creek swimming’, or something like that. I can’t do that, I have to stay and work. Only on a Sunday I used to go. Lot of those old people that are here now, my aunties, they never used to work. I used to say to other young girls going along, ‘Why me, only me?’ Other young girls used to come and tell Mum they want a dinner; they cut the lunch, get a drink and everything, then go down the creek swimming all day. I used to hate it, I want to go too, but I can’t – must stay and work.
I was the one with the little white cap on and big white apron and them big long dresses. You got to have shoes on all the time, got to be clean to come to work. I was the house girl cleaning and polishing the wooden floor. You got to go down on your knees – no mop those days. You got to shine it up and nearly see your face in it. If you don’t do that, you got to go back and do it again. Old white woman used to give us a hiding if we don’t do the job. Scrub it first, then run the polish over, then rub the polish off. Really hard! My knee used to be finished. Had to clean the silver, set the table up and things like that. Got to be spotless for that woman.
I’m the one used to wait on them when they having a feed. I used to sit in the corner waiting on the people eating. You know when the whitefellas have a dinner they have the soup first, so I bring the soup in, then get the tray and get all the dishes when they finish, take them to the kitchen. Then bring the dinner and sit down waiting in the corner until they finish. That was really, really hard, and I was learning a lot of different things all the time. I had to do all those things.
Mr and Mrs Kelly changed the old ways the Aborigine people lived at the station. We had to know how to dress, keep clean and eat at the table. They teach us to eat at the table. They change the house and all, made a big dining room thing for the blackfellas, no more having our meals in the woodheap, like the other stations. That’s why, sort of, they change our lives, you know.
Had to keep clean and know how to dress and things like that. In early days old people never used to have pants and them things. That lady now used to order all the clothes: pants and petticoats, bras and everything. Old people used to say, ‘I feel uncomfortable with this cockrag on.’ They used to call pants a cockrag.
We used to have fun dressing the old girls, laugh and everything. We have a good laugh when we put that bra on Auntie Mabel and them. They say, ‘What this! Is too tight, hurting my piwi and everything.’ They have the biggest laugh about it. Mrs Kelly tell them, ‘You have to wear them, this is different now. Grab all the old clothes and chuck them in the bin.’ Then she make them old people wear them things, petticoat, pants and bra, and she come with a bamboo stick, lift their dress up when they not looking, you know, checking if they got pants on. They say, ‘Aah, what all having a look at my thumpu’ [backside], and all that. They used to get shame, yeah. She used to be really strict, check it if they got pants on, because when they get home they chuck it away, feel free again.
All the old people, when they get the calico material, used to sew pants and things for us little kids, but they never used to have it, you know. ‘I don’t know why that woman maybe worrying about our thumpu – we born with nothing’, they say, you know. The other old girls used to them things, Mum and them. Them hard corset thing, they used to put it on Mum, because my Mum was big, put the stomach down, you know. When they have a party or something, I used to put my foot on Mum’s tummy and push it back and somebody used to lace that thing straight away, you know, lace it up zigzag and tie him up. We used to have the biggest laugh. ‘Walk straight,’ they tell us. We had some fun all right.
Dad got better and worked at Munda Station. He never come back. The doctor in Port Hedland was trying him out, keeping an eye on him, Munda not far from Port Hedland Hospital, you know. Anyway, we stayed at Ashburton Downs. Long time later, Dad died, but I don’t remember when that was.
No men around, so me and my brother used to go and kill a sheep for the station. It’s no trouble for us to ride a horse to go get one, we already know them things. You got to go out and get the sheep, bring them in and put them in the yard, then put them in the pen when they settle down. Whenever you want to kill them, kill them. Mum’s brother, Stanley Delaporte, he used to teach us how to grab them and how to sit on them and all that. Lucky we learning as we going. We had to learn tough ways, that’s the only way to learn how to work.
We used to grab him, cut his throat. I’m the one used to cut the throat. Sound like a murderer! Boy, did we make a mess of that sheep, skinning it. We had to skin it rough ways at first, not properly; then you got really used to it, you know. You got to learn how to do it. We had to put it up on a hook and it used to drop down on the ground. Try to put it up again with Nick down the back trying to put the weight on the pole to lift it up. We used to sing out for one old fellow, one old grandfather. He used to come and help us. Then get the sheep down and cut him up in the meat house.
Anyway, I worked there, and this Mission time coming up now. Mum took Nick and my sister to Carnarvon Mission to go to school then. They never sent them to Onslow, sent them straight to the Mission. Mum come back to work again, leave those two in the Mission, and the Inspector, Mr Geer, come look for me then. Asked Mum, ‘You got another older daughter somewhere?’ They had it in the paper, they was looking for me. Mum said, ‘Yes.’ Dobbed me in!
That white woman, Mrs Kelly, she didn’t want me to go; she hide me away, tell me to go bush till the Inspector go away. She used to tell me, ‘Inspector coming looking for you, to take you to school. You got to saddle up your horse and go.’ We sit down and watch from the hill, seen the stranger car coming, dust coming, you know. Soon as he’s coming closer, I gone. I’d saddle the horse up and go down the creek, hiding. Stop all day while the Inspector there looking for all the kids. I didn’t want to go.
If something different going to happen to you, might be Inspectors and things like that, you be touchy – what going to come at you next time? I was thinking that bush life was good in the early days, but when we first moved into Onslow all these different things happen, and job getting more and more tougher as we grew. I didn’t know what was going to happen to me if they sent me to the Mission. That woman said, ‘Oh, she not here.’ She used to cover for me as I’m the last one to work there. Anyway, they went away, didn’t find me. I stayed at the station. I was fourteen then. Been long time there now, working.
Abridged from Lola Young: Medicine Woman and Teacher
Lola Young with Anna Vitenbergs, 2007.