Remembered By Heart: An Anthology of Indigenous Writing Read Online Free PDF

everything. Then after we’d given her the brush kangaroo, she’d make a beautiful big stew and a damper for those girls that did the hunting for her. She’d bring in that special food at night, because even though she had her own camp outside, she was always locked up in the compound at night.
    Sometimes, too, we used to go across to old Bill Kimberley and old Mary — that was the policeman andhis wife — and they’d have a bit of brush kangaroo or something. The boys’ dormitory was built up high, you could walk right under it and sit down, and that’s where Bill and Mary lived. They just had a few sheets of iron put this way and that, and they’d have their fire out in the open. See, where the girls had Nanna Leyland as a dormitory-mother, the boys were kept in line by one of the trackers.
    Some people liked the trackers and some didn’t. It’s just the same as every other place I suppose. My mate Dorothy didn’t like Bluey, they just couldn’t see eye to eye. He used to stand at the door to the dormitory and usher us girls in, and Dorothy would have a go at him, you know, give him a good stir. So she’d be there stirring him up, and one day he said, ‘Dorothy Nannup, get in that formatory or I’ll hit you over the stick with a head!’ Well, look, we just roared laughing, she didn’t have an answer for that. I tell you, we used to have funny little instances like that. It never used to be running smooth at all.
    That old Bluey had a vegie garden and he used to supply the compound with soup vegetables. The girls used to sneak down, get in there, and pinch a few of these vegies. They’d tie their belts tight and stuff carrots, turnips or whatever they could get down their tops. Then they’d crawl through the fence, get across the river and wash them, then have a good old feed. They’d bring some back to us too, to have in the dormitory when we were locked in at night. See, we were always hungry, but I’d never do anything like that — I just couldn’t.
    Life in Moore River had a real routine to it. Every Saturday morning Sister Stewart would line us all up, boys on one side, and girls on the other. She’d stand at the top of one line and another sister would stand at the other. They’d have these big chemist bottles full of Epsom salts and everyone would get a big glassful. It’d be down with the Epsom and then you’d get a lolly to wash the taste away.
    We hated it, and instead of getting in the front of the line we’d all push to get at the back. But sooner or later it would be your turn, and I tell you, they’d make sure you swallowed it all before you got your lolly.
    We also used to have drill down on the playground. That was just like the aerobics they do today. The playground was just a big sandy area on the flat, behind the church and next to the boob. The boob was the prison. We’d wear the same clothes for that, nothing special, and usually it was the schoolteacher who took us. I don’t know what the big girls did, whether they did drill somewhere else, but this was only for us younger ones.
    We had to play sports too, and I used to like playing boys’ hockey. We never had proper hockey sticks though. We used to go down the river and find crooked sticks, then put them in the fire so they’d tighten up. Sometimes we’d get wire and tie it on the end to make it look like a real hockey stick, and we’d run around having a good old time.
    Doris, Herbert and I were sent to Moore River in August, and the first Christmas we had there was in 1925. I always remember that Christmas morning because thesebeautiful voices were singing, coming down from the church. I woke up and heard these beautiful voices floating down over the compound. ‘Doris, Doris, quick, wake up,’ I said. ‘The angels are coming!’ I really thought it must have been angels to sound like that.
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