Uluru Through Ancient
Eyes
by Erik R. Trinidad
With its hue-shifting
"magic" brought about by the changing conditions of the sun, Uluru—that
famous Australian monolith formerly known as "Ayer's Rock"—has
attracted millions of visitors over the decades. Tourism has
transformed this once pure sector of the Red Center, with many
tours ranging from riding on the back of a camel to riding on the
back of a Harley Davidson. Most of these westernized commercial
tours were a turn-off for me, so during my visit I decided to
spend my tourist dollars on Anangu Tours, the only tour owned and
operated by the Anangu aborigines themselves. I was excited at the
prospect of meeting and interacting with the true owners of Uluru,
to learn the ways of life in the bush under the hot Australian
sun. Surely there was more to the aborigines than what I learned
in that short scene in Crocodile Dundee.
Along with just seven people in the group, I met our Anangu tour
guide at the Aboriginal Cultural Center, not too far from the "The
Rock." Much to my dismay, our aboriginal guide wasn't wearing
traditional aboriginal garb. Instead, he wore the official Anangu
Tours uniform—hiking boots, blue slacks, a green fleece and a
baseball cap—and went by his westernized name, Mark. This was a
man of the bush? He wasn't quite what I had in mind—I imagined the
proverbial shirtless bushman with face paint. Perhaps I have
Hollywood to blame for that.
On the plus
side, Mark spoke only in his native Anangu language, and was
translated by Rhonya, an English woman who had traveled to the
Outback years ago to study the aborigines and ended up working
with the tribal tour company. One thing about the aboriginal
language is that it's very concise; Mark would spew off a just few
syllables in his native tongue, but when Rhonya translated, it'd
turn into a long-winded English paragraph.
Rhonya never
seemed to pause to comprehend Mark's words before interpreting,
and it all seemed a bit rehearsed, like she had merely memorized
her lines for "the act." And with the tribesman in western
costume, it was hard for me to be convinced of the tour's
aboriginal authenticity. For all I knew, Rhonya's real translation
should have been: "Mark thinks Christina Aguilera's songs are
catchy, even though she dresses like a tramp."
 I
kept an open mind as Mark led us on a hike from the cultural
center into the bush. Finally we were out in the wilds of the
Australian Outback, trekking on the same red sand that the
aborigines had walked on for centuries—only to arrive at an
encampment that looked like something built by a set designer of
the reality show Survivor. Using a lighter, Mark started a
campfire before enlightening us with stories of his people in ten
Anangu words or less. At this point, I felt like I was in a Disney
version of the aborigines at some Australian Outback pavilion at
EPCOT Center.
But once the fire was going, so did the realism of the aboriginal
experience. Mark began pounding on tiny spinifex leaves until they
disintegrated into a fine white powder, which he then mixed with
some of his own saliva and fired up on the end of a stick to make
kiti, one of the world's oldest natural glues. Rhonya translated:
"Mark says the aborigines have been using this glue to build
shelter and to create weapons for hundreds of years. It is still
used today." Glue from leaves in a couple of minutes? Perhaps
underneath the baseball cap, there was a real bushman after all. I
mean, if I had needed adhesive in the Outback, I would have only
tried to search for a magical tree that grew duct tape. My initial
doubts of the aboriginal experience started to go up in smoke with
the campfire.
Mark then picked up a spear to demonstrate how he and his
ancestors hunted kangaroos and emus for food. Using a woomera, a
carved out wooden tool that acts as a sort of hand catapult to
give a spear more precision and a little more oompf, he launched
his weapon towards a makeshift target. Whack! If it had been a
real kangaroo, we'd already be on our way to a feast. In a single
throw, my cynical attitude really began to change like the hues of
Uluru at daybreak. Green fleece, blue slacks or not—this guy was
indeed a bushman of the Outback.
The tribesman and his translator continued to lead us on our trek,
to an open area near the base of Uluru. It was here that Mark drew
out some pictograms in the red sand. He sat on a rock with his
stick in hand, like an old wise man about to bequeath wisdom to
his people. And in just a couple of short phrases that could have
fit inside a fortune cookie, Mark told the story of Uluru
according the narrative history of his people. To paraphrase
Rhonya's translation that rivaled the length of War and Peace, it
explained how the Rock represents his ancestors at the time of The
Creation. Uluru is, and always was a sacred place to the Anangu
people, and when I saw people in the distance from the other
commercial tours climbing up to "conquer" it, I couldn't help but
feel like the crying native American from those old public service
announcements from the 1970s.
As our morning with the tribesman in uniform was coming to a
close, Rhonya translated, "Mark asks if there's anyone who would
like to climb Uluru. Mark says he can not stop you; it is your
decision." I shook my head with everyone else in respect of the
aboriginal beliefs. Mark smiled.
"Mark thanks you for respecting the wishes of he and his people.
He thanks you for learning about the process of making kiti. He
thanks you for listening to his stories and learning about spear
throwing. Mark says it is important that his tribal customs are
never lost or forgotten." Behind the color-coordinated uniform,
there was a sincere feeling in Mark's demeanor and I finally
believed Rhonya's translation was as genuine as Mark's spiritual
beliefs as a true man of the bush—that is, until he passed
everyone a business card.
"Mark says you can e-mail him any photos from this tour that you
would like to share. He'd be happy to see them."
I suppose that even in the Australian Outback there is no escape
from the modernization that comes with being in the tourism
business, but I say, as long as a company like Anangu Tours is
around, the native traditions will be always be preserved and
passed down from generation to generation—in as few syllables as
possible of course.
© Erik R. Trinidad
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