ASIANOVERLAND.NET SYDNEY TO LONDON DAY 361/13: NORTHAM, NOONGAR COUNTRY

Noongar people have been occupying the south west of Australia, including Devil’s Lair, Margaret River, for at least 42,000 years. Their ancient history, and the extinct megafauna they lived with, recorded on cave walls, and dined on, are unarguable.

Noongar and other Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander peoples observe the position of the stars in the sky and follow water, plant and animal cycles to identify different seasons. The seasonal calendars of different Aboriginal groups demonstrate an understanding of the interdependence among living things, including themselves. For tens of thousands of years, they have predicted seasonal changes and weather patterns to predict the availability of particular resources, and determine the timing of journeys in their country.

For "modern" westerners who have never personally obtained their own food except in a supermarket, this classifies Aboriginal people as mere nomadic hunters and gatherers. But for most of human history over the past 60,000 years, the Australian Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander peoples were at the top of the food chain.

Today, the Noongar are represented by the South West Aboriginal Land and Sea Council, which includes five cultural groups. Matrilineal clans and Patrilineal descent groups include Amangu, Yued, Whadjuk, Binjareb, Wardandi, Ganeang and Wilmen.

Northam is an important place in my Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy, as it is the town where Corrie and I were hitchhiking as part of the final leg of our London to Sydney return overland in late 1981. We’d run out of money after nearly two years on the overland roads, so hitchhiking across the Nullabor was the only option back from Perth to the east coast. Corrie managed to pick up a truck ride from Peter the truck driver, with me jumping out of the spinifex and sand dunes after he’d stopped his truck. Peter drove us all the way to Victoria, with me filling in as relief truck driver while Peter took a well-earned nap. Of course, I’m not recommending hitchhiking, as I’ve been told the world is a more dangerous place now than it was 42 years ago.

The Rabbit Proof Fence was built in 1907 to keep the rabbits, which were introduced by Europeans into Eastern Australia, out of Western Australia.

Rabbit-Proof Fence is a 2002 Australian drama film based on the 1996 book Follow the Rabbit-Proof Fence by Doris Pilkington Garimara. It is based on a true story from the 1930’s concerning the author's mother Molly, and two other Aboriginal girls, Daisy Kadibil and Gracie, who escaped from the Moore River Native Settlement, Western Australia, to return to their Aboriginal families. The film follows the Aboriginal girls as they walk for nine weeks along 2,400 km of the rabbit-proof fence to return to their community at Jigalong in the Kimberley, pursued by white law enforcement authorities and an Aboriginal tracker. 

The film is an example of the official genocide and child removal policy that existed in Australia until 1967, when the aboriginal people of Australia were finally recognised as human beings, instead of animals ("flora and fauna"), who should be eradicated. Its victims are called the "Stolen Generations".

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