Making String/ Cruising with Crocs

  Kakadu National Park, Northern Territory, Australia
Monday, September 15, 2008

I had never before considered the background to a piece of string but after spending a morning with Violet I will marvel every time I use one!  Violet is one of the aboriginal women from Kakadu, employed by the National Parks authority to facilitate 'culture sessions' for 'white fella' visitors such as myself, passing on elements of the traditional way of life which has endured in this region of Australia for thousands of years.  She has adapted to the changes resulting from the building of a bitumen road through the park, the provision of convenience food at  the supermarket, and the influx of tourists, but still maintains many of the old ways, such as collecting 'bush tucker' from the forest and river to cook in a ground pit, and weaving her own baskets and mats from natures resources.
 
It was the string weaving session which had brought us here to sit under the trees with Violet for the morning - sure I did a bit of weaving at school when I was a kid, it's not exactly difficult... oh, how wrong I was!  When your starting materials consist of simply a fan of leaves from a pandanus palm, things get a little trickier...
 
With the ease and dexterity of many years honing her skills, Violet showed us how to pull off a leaf, bend it near the tip, and rub it repeatedly till it split, allowing the individual thin fibres to be stripped off, which she then began to roll together.   Adding more at intervals until the thickness grew, she then separated it into two strands which, with a deft back-and-fore twisting motion, combined to create a perfect length of very strong string.  I then attempted to follow suit and spent about fifteen minutes rubbing my finger and thumb raw on the leaf without even managing to release one single fibre!  So much for participation... I decided I would learn more from observation!  
 

dyed pandanus

The dull neutral colour of the new string was not what was required for Violet's design, so the next step was to prepare a dye.  Using a sharp stone, she sat and chipped off the bark from the branch of a particular tree, revealing a rich orange interior, and placed the pieces in a billy can of water, adding ash produced from burning a branch of a different variety of tree.  After bubbling on the fire for a while, alongside dough balls that were cooking into some tasty damper, the brew became a rich red colour which turned the string into a gorgeous deep earthy orange, once it had hung from a tree to dry in the sun.  Only now was the weaving ready to begin.  It gave me a whole new appreciation of the depth of knowledge and skill required to create the intricately patterned baskets I had seen in the visitor centre.
 

at Nourlangie

Nourlangie rock art

The morning with Violet was just one of Kakadu's pleasures.  We had climbed up to the pools  above the waterfall site at Gunlom (not running in the dry season) and looked down across the tree covered plain below; swum in the cool waters of the pool below the falls at Maguk; looked at fantastic examples of rock art, both ancient and modern, at Ubirr and Nourlangie;  and night-cruised down the billabong at Muirella with a huge yellow full moon above.  My favourite, though, was

Yellow Waters at sunrise

kingfisher

  the magical boat trip on Yellow Waters, watching the sunrise change the expanse of wetlands from an other-worldly, mist-shrouded place of mystery to a brightly-lit wildlife haven where we spotted eagles high in trees, vividly coloured kingfishers settled on branches, egrets stepping though the long grass, a golden tree snake curled round a branch, a jabiru dipping its

Jabiru

long beak into the water before taking flight, and of course the infamous crocodiles.  There can't be many creatures with absolutely no redeeming features but the croc is just that, as it glides through the water, menacing and sinister, it's watchful eyes assessing its prey.  The wild pigs on the river bank were quick enough to escape before   the croc cruising towards them had chance to lunge out at them, so we didn't get to see  a  death-roll, but seeing the cruel jaws close as one crunched a fish sent shivers down my  spine , and witnessing a brief territorial spat between two rival crocs emphasised their vicious nature.

fat croc!

The boat guide pointed out a huge lump of a male near the riverbank with a petite (in comparison!) female close by, telling us that she had pursued him about the river for a few weeks before succeeding.  He was foul: had he been human he would have been cursing offensively in a dirty wife-beater vest stretched over his beer belly, and adorned in too much gold jewelery - it seems that in the animal realm as well as the human, some women just have no taste!