October, 2011

I indicated by local sign language that I would stay where I was and that he should pass me, a signal involving a closed fist and one or two up and down movements of the wrist ‘I’m staying here’. I should have realised of course that this signal wouldn’t work cross-culturally and that only when I saw the police officer drive up to my window and start abusing me did I realise that this local signal had no currency with the constabulary. He protested I was being offensive and in between the yelling I attempted to somehow explain the intricacies of Bininj sign language. I realised it was a lost cause. It still is.

Earlier this week I drove out to the west coast of the NT’s Gulf of Carpentaria for work. On the first morning out bush I was lucky enough to be up before dawn and wandered down to the foreshore to see what might wander past and into my camera. I’d seen a pair of adult [...]

Nigel Adlam’s award as NT Journalist of the Year was unsurprising and – in light of the three minor gongs awarded for solid work – deserved. But there were more than a few mutterings that it might have been better for him to leave the field to the many younger, and no less deserving, early career journalists who might appreciate the the nice cheque and trip to Brisbane for the Walkley Awards in a few weeks as much as he will.

AMSANT noted in its submission that it: “…note[d] that the many threats to environmental and public health that have been largely eliminated in the rest of the nation over the past century still blight many of our communities: urban, regional and remote. To this extent, the capacity of comprehensive primary health care to meet the needs of Aboriginal Territorians—to Close the Gap—will continue to be frustrated in environments in which fundamental public health protections are not available or unmet.” AMSANT was concerned at the parlous state of environmental health of many of the communities that its members serve, where: “Poor environmental health conditions in remote communities and town camps include inadequate sanitation, water supply, rubbish disposal and grossly overcrowded housing. Basic infrastructure in many remote communities is either absent, inadequate and/or poorly maintained.”

The male bird floats effortlessly in broad and lazy circles before me, the black terminal tail band stark against the soft creaminess and coppery…nankeen…colours of his underwing plumage. As he crosses before the sun these colours glow backlit and glorious. Does he see me?

The call of the Coucal Pheasant is an iconic sound of summer across the Top End – a bubbling, ventriloqual, quickening and falling “boop, boop, boop” that booms through the thick scrub where these birds are typically found.