Uluru (“Giant Pebble”) -- an immense red sandstone formation located in
the middle of the Red Centre, Australia’s interior desert (or outback) – is
thought to be about 550 million years old.
It stands 1,142 feet high and has a circumference of 5.8 miles. It is the single largest monolith rock in the
world. But like an iceberg, most of is
bulk is underground. A striking
characteristic of this rock is how the red/orange hue (from the iron deposits
located within the rock) shifts fluidly throughout the day. In the evening, as the sun sets, Uluru
appears to glow from within. It will
also glow red at dawn. It is located
about 300 miles from Alice Springs.
In geology, Uluru is called a bornhardt – a big dome-shaped, steep-sided,
bald rock formation, usually made up of granite, but can also be limestone or
sandstone. The material from which the Uluru
was formed was once part of the Petermann Ranges formed 500 million years ago
when large crustal blocks merged together to create Australia. Although similar in size to the French Alps
and Himalayas, the Petermann Ranges had no plant cover to stop it from eroding. During this erosion, the sandstone that today
makes up Uluru was dumped at the bottom of the mountain range. This area of Australia then became an inland
sea, followed by a phase of deposition of limestone, sand, and mud in what is today
known as the Amadeus Basin, thus burying the sandstone that would become Uluru
rock. Over the next 400 million years,
the pressure of the sand and mud changed the sediment into rock. At the same time another phase of mountain
building began (known as the Alice Springs Orogeny). After another phase of erosion, Uluru
eventually emerged from the softer rocks.
The red color of the sandstone that you see today is the result of the
oxidation of the iron minerals within the rock.
The rock is homogeneous, and as a result there is no soil on it. It is full of caves, canyons, cracks, water
holes and other natural formations, as well as ancient paintings and carvings
from the Aboriginal tribes.
Although for a lot of Australians, climbing Uluru rock has been on
their bucket list, come October 2019 that will no longer be allowed. Since 1993 when the name Ayers Rock was
officially returned to its native name Uluru, more and more people have become
aware of the sacred, spiritual, and culture nature of the rock to the
indigenous Aboriginal tribes. For the
Anangu tribe, the official caretakers of the rock (since it was given back to
them in 1985 by the Australian government), this rock represents not only birth
but also death – the ancestral tie to Mother Earth. To them this is the rock from which they came
and it is the rock to which they will return.
It is here that they perform ritual ceremonies, many of them thousands
of years old. Today tourists, instead of
climbing the rock, have the opportunity to learn of the culture that is over
60,000 years old. The Ayers Rock Resort,
located near Uluru, is a place where the Aboriginal people can explain the
importance and history of this rock to their daily lives through storytelling
and indigenous craft demonstrations that are open to all people staying at the
resort. Any member of an indigenous
tribe is guaranteed training and a job at the resort, and today they make up
about 40% of the staff.
Perhaps now is a good time to give a little history of the Aborigines. Aborigines have the oldest continual culture
in the world. It is believed that the
Aborigines arrived in Australia 45,000 to 60,000 years ago, mostly like from
Timor in the Indonesian Archipelago.
Once in Australia, they then spread out, populating the continent and
living in more extreme climates and landscapes (wettest rain forests to driest
deserts) than any other people of the world.
Most early European settlers and explorers to Australia considered the
Aborigines to be subhuman, unfortunately a notion that existed into the 20th
century. It wasn’t until 1967 that they
were even counted in the national census.
It was estimated that at the beginning of the British settlement of
Australia, there were about 1 million aborigines, but by the beginning of the
20th century, there were only 50-60,000. Like most native populations of other
countries, they had no resistance to the diseases (especially smallpox) brought
by the Europeans. And like our own
native Indians, many were ruthlessly and wantonly slaughtered by the
settlers.
From 1910 – 1970, in a period known as the Stolen Generation, anywhere
from 1/10 to 1/3 of all aborigine children were taken from their parents and
placed in foster homes or state training centers. The idea was that this would better prepare
them for life among the white population.
And because, until the 1960’s, Aborigine parents did not have legal
custody of their children (the state had legal custody), there was nothing the
parents could do. Many children and
parents, bothers and sisters never saw each other again. This project was an utter failure. The Aborigines people have been inexorably
tied to the land and the children could not adapt to western culture.
Things began to change for the better after the 1960's and the
government has tried to right some of these wrongs. In 1962 the Aborigines were granted the right
to vote, and the 1967 referendum finally included Aborigines in census counts
to determine electoral representation.
In 1976, the Aborigines of the Northern Territory were granted the right
to claim land if they could prove traditional association with the land. And in 1992, the previous legal concept of terra nullius (nobody’s land), which
essentially said that Australia had been nobody’s land prior to the British
settlement and therefore no concept of native title existed in Australian law,
was ruled invalid. This ruling legally
recognized certain land claims by the Aborigines. In addition to the return of land to the
Aborigines and the return of Uluru to their control, money has been spent on
schools, clinics, and community projects to help small businesses. But for the Aborigines, change and integration
into Australia’s society has come slowly.
For many of the younger generation there is a sense of hopelessness;
there are no real job opportunities and alcoholism is very prevalent. Cattle ranches have taken over their land and
the source of their food supply – namely kangaroo. Without guns, the aborigines are unable to
hunt for their food, and most cannot obtain a gun permit because they have
committed some small infraction of the law.
Many of these laws were enacted with the sole purpose of keeping the
aborigines from being able to own guns.
The white politicians were afraid that if the aborigines were armed, they
would try and overthrow the “white” government.
With only a small welfare check each month, they are unable to eat the
foods they have survived on for thousands of years. Kangaroo in the supermarket goes for about
$30/pound for a kangaroo tail. Diabetes
has become a big medical problem for the indigenous people as their systems
cannot process the sugar found in many of the cheaper, processed foods they can
afford to buy. In many areas it is like
the Aborigine is not there – sometimes seen but not really part of the
community or the country. The government
has now started working with individual communities to provide assistance is
certain criteria are met. For example,
in one West Australia community, eye disease among children is very severe. The government will fund the purchase of
petrol bowsers to start a business only if the children are washed twice a
day. The hope is that as more and more
Aborigines become successful (e.g. the tennis player Yvonne Goolagong), they
will become role models for the younger generation and help the children to
find pride in their Aboriginal heritage.
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