Kids: Our community

At the billabong there is a rainbow goanna. And a ground boulder. The kangaroo spit on the ground and it is a dreaming. When anybody touch it they get a bad cold. The rainbow goanna stays at the billabong. He never move.

At Renyan there is a mermaid and a big snake. The mermaid has long hair, long fin and when he see little boys he sing the song to them, and call them, to go to the waterside and fall in love with them and made them a mermaid. The snake. He belongs to the water. When you jump in, he sucks the water around and makes tornados. On top of the hill there is a big eagle rock. He look exactly like eagle. That's eagle dreaming. He just stay on top. Not a real eagle just a rock eagle. 

At Arlungu has a painting on the rocks. Painting of old people and old stories and hand and fingerprints. And when you walk on the other side you see the rocks shaped like eggs, like dinosaur eggs. They are dreaming of Arlungu. When you throw rocks in the water big rain come with storm and lightening. 

At Bella Glen there is a skeleton, in a little cave. It was a one old lady a long time ago and she want there are died. There is a big mob of crocodile. But they not salt water they are fresh water. But they can bite. Nobody get bitten from the crocodile.     

Story told by Lorenzo and Marcianne 

Mural painted by the Tijimbat Kids - Wet Season 2014

Day 15: Sports Day

Damo checks to see if he got his mark in dodgeball.

Careful Johannen. The 'Cobras' need those points.

Amariah pulls off a stunning double somersault leg-split and earns himself 89.00 points.

The kids retreat.

Gershom is ready for school next week.

Morgan: Scientist, chef and athlete

We chose to break the Tuesday morning blues with some boys versus girls Binball. This is a local dodgeball variant that seems to involve repeatedly being hit in the face by balls gleefully hurled at a seemingly impossible pace by what had previously appeared to be tiny, tiny 10 year-old arms. The morning saw Gunners and I demonstrate a ‘water sucking candle’ that certainly did not suck! Tash and Rita recording the soundtrack for the Tijimbat kids’ upcoming music video, while Georgi and Jason unleashed the kids’ creativity in creating makeshift musical instruments – resulting in some very loud drum kits and some equally impressive nail, plank and elastic band guitars among a litany of imaginative instruments. That afternoon, the rest of the team finally allowed me to unleash all that I have learnt in years wasted playing computer games – letting me run a game of capture the flag. I was unsettled to learn that real-life capture the flag actually involves running and catching people. Furthermore, I found that I in fact have a much greater body mass than a 12 year-old kid, rendering changing direction approximately 9 times harder, and me approximately 30 times as ineffective at capture the flag.

While I do nominally cling to my tattered ideal of economics as a (social…) science, my childhood dreams of being a real scientist (Hi Mum and Dad!) were finally realised on Wednesday when Gunners decided he would prefer to take a back seat for his planned activity in order to pursue his true passion, beading and bracelets. While I was told my white labcoat and safety goggles were unnecessary, being allowed to use a “poisonous substance” was enough for me. I demonstrated to the kids (in a simultaneously skilful and knowledgeable manner) a ‘density stack’ where liquids of different density are poured in sequence into a clear cup, where they separate into different brightly-coloured layers. I was left cursing the refusal of a labcoat as I attempted to clean lamp oil, vegetable oil, hand soap and honey out of my shorts after Seth’s particular enthusiasm in mixing up his cup, but elated at the success of my science skill debut. In the afternoon, I sneakily avoided demonstrating my devastating lack of basketball skills by designating myself scorer in a numeracy/shooting competition, where I witnessed an incredible inversion of skills and scores as the more capable basketballers chose only the most ambitious targets, to their significant detriment. The most extreme example of this was Estherlita, who made ten attempts at the hardest target (worth the most points) landing none of them, and was shocked to find herself in last place in her group.

Today (Thursday) was a focused marathon for Gunners and I, who ushered 32 kids through the process of mixing, kneading and spreading pizza dough, then after lunch, topping their pizzas with a smorgasbord of vegetables and meats of their choosing. Only one vegetarian pizza was sent to the oven, as Tyrone found he was too hungry to wait for his pizza to be cooked before scoffing his salami. We scrambled to cook all these pizzas in our two ovens (one propped closed with an upturned chair) before home-time, where the proud kids all wanted their pizzas wrapped up to share with their brothers and sisters after a satisfying first piece.

With tomorrow’s Sports Day, we will conclude our program – the three weeks have flown past! While our impending departure is sad to consider, I have no doubt that the next few days will be action-packed enough to keep our minds off it.

Day 14: Pizza Madness

Pizza dough time!

Pizza for 30 is a lot.

Pizza bliss!

Albertasha's owl sculpture. 

The kids in awe of their past three weeks.

Say "Teachabout!"

Day 13: Mural Sneak Peak

Friends braiding friendship bracelets.

The pros concentrating.

Mural in progress. The following is just a sneak peak!

Victor showing off his creative side. You think the brolga is impressive? Just wait until you see the rainbow serpent! 

Tasha painting the mermaid that lives at Bella Glen.

Big wet downpour this afternoon!

Day 12: Egg-cellent Kids

 Tyrone or Ringo?

 She has more science than me!

Capture the Flag... like a walk in the park. 

Lilena, Egg Parachute Engineer #1

Gershom, Egg Parachute Engineer #2

Will it bust?

Tash: No roo(M) for mistakes

A crazy-busy weekend finished off a crazy-busy week. On Saturday Rita, Gunners and Georgi abandoned Morgan, Jason & I to ‘do some shopping in Katherine’ (we suspect they just wanted to get out of cleaning). While we scrubbed and swept to make the school sparkle again, Gunners learnt that there is no use crying over spilt milk, even when it’s all over the back of a troopie.

The whole gang was reunited for a Sunday excursion to a local swimming hole, Bella Glen, along with the Riley family young and old, and a few kids we picked up on the way. A bumpy hour later we arrived only to realise we had left all the fishing reels behind! While Robin and the boys drove back to pick them up, the girls had the extremely difficult job of swimming in the beautifully refreshing river and playing with the young ones in the waterfalls.

 

Soon after the boys arrived back with the fishing gear they were off again, this time to shoot a kangaroo. While they were away shooting and missing, Mickayla and Rita showed me how to knead damper, and we tried, in vain, to make little baby Theo like us. Hours and hours (and hours and hours) passed and still nothing from the boys. A little stressed we packed up and headed back to Minyerri in worsening road conditions. With the help of Hamish, Maylene and Mickayla, Rita and I made our way back through the giant mud puddle that was meant to be the road to rescue the boys, leaving Georgi to hold down the fort at school. We found them safe and sound but very disappointed at their lack of roo! Apparently the ‘terrible gun’ was the cause but 50 bullets, dozens of roo sightings and many hours later, we just think the boys were having too much fun!

Special thanks for the day go to Jason who slaved away digging and preparing a bush oven that was never used, and to Rita and Georgi who managed a (completely non-existent) crisis exceedingly well!

Back to activities today certainly not well rested, but enthusiastic as always. Highlights of our last Minyerri Monday were Gunners and Morgan’s See Saw Race (another successful numeracy activity!) and Jason and Georgi’s trip to the billabong for bug collection. In the afternoon the kids used the high powered microscope to look at their samples, which allowed them to see tadpoles’ individual red blood cells moving through capillaries, something they had never seen before!

Day 11: Last Monday!

Hold onto your hats.. It's a word race!

Shuwie colouring in her heart. 

Minyerri Kitchen Rules. 

Tadpole capillaries.

Giant ant attack!

Jason: "Can I see it?"

Today is the end of Teachabout’s second week – time flies when you’re having fun! After cultivating bacteria from dirty hands and feet in agar plates, the kids got a taste of a real laboratory. They were disgusted to see and smell bacteria that grow on us every day. It was a good reminder of why it’s important to wash your hands. It was also an exciting chance to use, some for the first time, a high-powered microscope that allowed them to see what bacteria really look like up close!

This morning, a timely downpour was not enough to extinguish a fiery first day of filming the Teachabout music video. Rita and Tash took the kids to various locations around Minyerri for the busting of moves. Meanwhile, in an activity using English and local Kriol words, Georgi and Morgan found themselves learning just as much as the kids.

What do you think of when I say 5 straws and a ping-pong ball? Watercraft? Exactly! This afternoon, Gunners and I challenged the kids to make a watercraft using only the straws, ping pong ball and tape that would support the weight of a heavy object. Estherlita shone, creating a craft that could carry almost all the weight we had!

The kids were more than slightly keen to go for a swim at the first river crossing on the road out of Minyerri, so we piled into the troopies and headed on our way. First things first: mud fight! It raged on all afternoon, resulting in a lingering, irrepressible fear of a mud ball coming out of nowhere.  The Activity Leaders doubled as platforms for backflips and 5-seater rafts in the flowing waters. Demonstrating impeccable timing, Savannah discovered a mud crab with freshly hatched babies crawling on their mum, and Sage schooled me in the art of capturing tiny fish, effortlessly plucking them from the security of their pylon protected water world.

All in all, two great days in Minyerri, but the highlight of my trip so far is my name upgrade from ‘big man girl hair’ to ‘big horse’!

Day 10: Mud

Anticipation reaching critical levels.

Shuwie wonders whether joining the mud fight is a good idea...

Sage tries out 'Minyerri Mud', potential new beauty product.

Tyrone takes the art of camouflage to the next level.

MUD FIGHT!

Day 9: Scratchy-Word-Scope

Tyrone-osaurus-rex sorting words during the word race.

A, B, C as easy as 1, 2, 3.

"I can see through the fly!"

Asharonah's amazement at her first experience with a microscope. 

Sagie-Boy workin' on his scratch painting.

Day 8: Big Race Day

Challenging 'Speed Bump' boys?

Ring a ring a roses, a picture full of poses. 

Gabriel's delicate touch.

Kelvin and Valerie burying their faces in some baked beans (insert baked beans joke here).