Amy: Four turkeys in a bush oven

My first ever weekend in Minyerri.

Saturday was spent eating banana bread, planning for the week ahead and getting to know the town better. The afternoon saw the boys participating in a gruelling footy training session with the Alawa Cats, while Rita and I went for a walk to see more of Minyerri and then home to make a pet Grasshead.

On Sunday we went to a place called Blackwater, led by our friend Trevor, his wife Michelle, an older women Mary and 11 assorted kids. On the way we saw many bush turkeys and a few kangaroos. Four bush turkeys ended up on our roof racks. Trevor never wasted a bullet.

Upon arrival at Blackwater the boys removed the feathers from the fowl and began work on the bush oven. After digging a hole in the sand, fire was used to heat up rocks and once the meat was placed in the oven, it was covered by corrugated iron and topped with sand. The meat was left to roast for an hour.

In the meantime, the older kids fished, and the little ones threw rocks into the water. Mary showed Rita and myself how to kneed damper properly so that it would rise when it hit the hot coals. Mary put in a huge effort, making sure all of the 20 people present got their own piece of damper.

We sat and ate the damper and the bush turkey for lunch. The turkey tasted great, more like lamb than chicken. 

As the sun set we packed up and drove back to Minyerri.

Kids: Brolga Storytelling

Kyle and Naomi’s dreaming is the brolga.

The brolga got long legs, and long neck. They got pink head, big wings,  straight beak and big body.

The brolga lives in the bush. And eats ants. They sneak and catch the ants by bobbing their head. There is a big mob, lots of brolga, too many to count. The brolga fight for food. One brolga finds food, and others come and snatch for it. They fight with their beaks. When the food is gone they fly away. 

When little one is hatched, the mummy one goes looks for foods. Them red ones, them honey ants. They taste good.

- Tyrone, Valerie W, Kayleena

Today we ran shared writing sessions.  The Activity Leaders scribed stories the kids had about local animals. We are looking forward to expanding and adding illustrations to these stories next week. 

Day 3: Making music and paper tables

Estherlita concentrating hard on decorating her Tijimbuk cover.

"If you wanna make da word a ba ba ba ten da bah and make a change!"

Football maths with Tyrene, Dixie, Valerie and Kayleena.

How to make a strong paper table, with Lorenzo Charlie.

"That's right Dixie, triangles are more structurally sound than quadrilaterals."

Erin: Enthusiasm, excitement and flat basketballs!

And so the program started. On Wednesday morning, our program kicked off with enthusiasm, excitement and flat basketballs (of course)!

I was last in Minyerri with the Trinity mob in September so it was great to catch up with everyone again. “I’m so… proud to see you!” said one girl who has attended a number of previous programs. Reid (pictured left) has grown into a five year old since I last saw him (and lost some hair!).

There’s one person missing; our friend Mickayla, (and her three-year-old, Josiebeth), who has previously designed and run her own activities. We phoned her in Darwin, begging her to come back to Minyerri before we leave. Fingers crossed!

The past two days we’ve been thinking a lot about our approach to literacy. We had some training sessions with Teach for Australia before we left Melbourne, and we have two teachers-in-training on the activity leader team, so we’re thinking about re-jigging our approach. For me, the reading component of our program is really important. Most kids in Melbourne would be read to, or read, every day in their school holidays. Many of the kids in Minyerri would not read for four weeks in the holidays – that’s already a massive challenge for their reading and literacy skills.

Today we had some downtime before lunch so I opened my book and started reading it outside. One of the kids, Tyrone, was hanging around and seemed intrigued. “You reading that book?”… “do you like reading?” I’d like to think that his experience with books during the program yesterday encouraged him to think about reading as something to enjoy.

This afternoon the kids spent hours designing their new, yellow, Tijimbat t-shirts. They look fantastic! One girl dotted her t-shirt all over, ensuring that the dots were the same colour as her design from yesterday. Looking forward to seeing the shirts on the kids in the coming days!

Day 2: T-Shirt Painting

The Minyerri kids showing off their creativity. 

Lorenzo's t-shirt. 

Estherlita's completed t-shirt.

 The return of Boston the one-eyed dog. (GL this is for you!)

Day 1: Welcome to Tijimbat

The Tijimbat kids modelling this programs t-shirts.

T-shirt designing. 

Who is concentrating the most... Linus, Johannan, Alwyn or Activity Leader Jesse?

Eamon: Chilly Minyerri

“Wanna join us for a run, Romas?” at 8:30am this morning on our way to the airstrip. “Nah. Too cold.” He was right. It must have been 22 degrees Celsius. Bloody freezing.

So began our first morning in Minyerri. Thankfully, the day warmed up and before long we were properly sweating under the blazing sun. Surrounded by kids intent on figuring out which of the Teachabout mob were back again and which were new to Minyerri, we were greeted by an enthusiastic cascade of “what’s your name?” and “my name’s this, no, not that, this!”.  Two years since my last visit to M-town, I was chuffed to have just a few smiling faces who recognized me.

A kid-led wander around the hotspots of Minyerri (billabong, new footy oval, waterpark, B-ball court) gave Daryl and Amy their first taste of the local area and it was certainly enough to get everyone thoroughly parched. It was also a great opportunity to say “G’day” to few old friends who were not rambunctious enough to come looking for us at 9am on our first morning in town.

An afternoon of planning activities, trying to find a jack to change a flat tyre, cleaning boys’ bathrooms, sourcing essential cutlery (a spoon is not the optimal instrument for spreading butter on bread, although it’s probably not the worst) and then checking out the library’s collection filled out the rest of the day.

Our first day of activities tomorrow is gonna be a cracker and the kids are already impatient to see what we’ve got in store for them. If today was chilly, then I hope that the cold snap continues. Although I reckon it’d be hard to find a warmer welcome.

Darwin to Minyerri: Road-trains, 87 kangaroos and the birthplace of Cadel Evans

 The crew (minus Jesse) prior to take off.

 Birthday boy Daryl takes break in Mataranka.

Almost there... The switch to 4WD mode.

Daryl: Bamboo plates and enviro bags

It’s Sunday; Eamon, Rita and my third day in the top end since arriving in Darwin early Friday morning – Erin having landed Friday afternoon and Jesse and Amy on Saturday. The mainly-overcast-but-sometimes-sunny days have been the perfect temperature for our shopping and collecting of supplies, which of course included the essential novelty postcards, rendering it quite comfortable to be in jeans and a shirt (although most everyone else seems to disagree, opting to stick with shorts). Aside from the necessary preparation everyone has been efficiently involved in, last night was spent going out for dinner at Saffron, a fantastic award-winning eco-friendly Indian restaurant – where we dined on an array of dishes on bamboo plates!

The team is busy packing the provisions and loading up the troopies as tomorrow marks our departure to Minyerri, which will be quite a change from our current living situation of a white-tiled spacious apartment! I must admit I am quite nervous about meeting everyone and experiencing everything for the first time, though the excitement is much more overwhelming. I am not, however, looking forward to getting outrun by kids 10 years younger than me, but I’ll do my best to not be too sour.