Author Koh Lin ◦
No matter how you view it… events in your life cross and overlap… if it wasn’t for this, that would not have happened… do we call it fate… or was it meant to be…
The beginning… well not quite the beginning, there are many stories before this trip, so I am going to jump into the future, or should I say the past… 😊
We had been exploring our backyard (Australia) over the years, enjoying the different scenery and landscapes… and it is one of these trips that I would often think about… it was when we were travelling through Kanku-Breakaways Conservation Park, a beautiful part of South Australia. The expansive landscape and the colours, gave us a sense of awe and liberation… I certainly have a different take on the what it means when you hear the phrase the “arid heart” of Australia…
Sometimes I can get blinded by scenic beauty… admiring the whole and miss seeing the detail… but my partner pointed it out. I didn’t notice at first, as I was observing the horizon and the tree stump perfectly positioned from where I stood. My partner told me to look again…
It was that WOW moment…!! The thrill and excitement… a goanna, in beautiful symmetry with the tree stump. It was a large goanna… I love seeing wildlife in their natural habitat. The year was 2003, this was before the modern mobile phones, with their in-built cameras, but I had my pocket camera. Click, click click. The goanna on the tree stump is one of our favourite photographs…
The spectacular landscape and scenery of Kanku, is the traditional land of the Antakirinja Matu-Yankunytjatjara people. It is a place of profound spiritual significance to the traditional owners, and is about 25 km north of Coober Pedy.
Now, fast forward and here I sit in Alice Springs… reminiscing on the past. We had left the old life in Sydney behind and made the big journey, thinking that we were going to travel around Australia and then end up in Tasmania to live. So it was kind of ironic, that as we were passing through Alice Springs in early 2006… we stopped!
Central Australia has given us much pleasure, whether it is the wide open space, the waterholes and gorges, the “caterpillar dreaming story” depicted in the ranges… or just the simple pleasure of seeing a dingo walking up the highway on a cloudy day.
By 4-wheel drive, by air or even on a local tour bus, there is so much to see and do in the region, that changes through year, providing a different perspective…
and after rain, the excitement of the changing landscape… who can forget witnessing the Todd River flow or seeing hundreds of frogs in Simpson Gap.
It was on the trip through South Australia, that we met a lovely couple, Alan and Helen, who were also on the road around Australia. They travelled at their own pace, and we shared parts of the journey.
We did part company with Alan and Helen, doing our own thing, to meet up again in Alice Springs. Alan and Helen did tours around the local attractions and Alan gave me this great photo of a dingo at the Boggy Hole in the Finke Gorge National Park.
Another time, I remember Alan being excited and wanting to introduce me to an Aboriginal artist Trephina Sultan who he had met. We bought a beautiful bush tucker painting staight away, which I gave to my father.
Trephina was living in Alice Springs at that time, so we met her many times and became friends. Over time we bought more paintings from her, then one day, I showed her the photo of the goanna on the tree stump at the Breakaways. Trephina got really excited and said that the “goanna was calling for rain”. It was one of their dreaming stories. I asked if she could do a painting based on the photo and the dreaming…
The ‘Old People’ say when you see a goanna climbing up a tree or old log, it is calling for rain, to bring life back to the land, calling to the spirits who may be willing to listen and send rain.
Source: Trephina Sultan Thanguwa
We had started on our travel… an intrepid journey, that was going to be more then a holiday and having decided to leave behind the old life, we were starting anew… found a new home, where there is beauty and there is wide open space… and our journey through life continues… who knows what tomorrow will bring.
PS I had to share this. Did you know that there is a a cluster of 12 meteor craters here, that were formed some 4,700 years (Henbury Meteorites Conservation Reserve)… and Trephina painted this amazing dreaming story titled Kulu…
Check out other blogs by Koh Lin.
