LORD’S WORK
This gallery was about the teaching of laws, and the punishments exacted when they were broken.”
Sab Lord points up at the rock face painted with elongated spirit figures. The warm air smells of vegetation and wood smoke, as it would have 50,000 years ago, when the powerful Mimi spirit figures were daubed using a mixture of fat, charcoal and red ochre.
Lord turns to the lad beside him: “How old are you, Harry?”
“Fourteen,” says Harry. “Fifteen soon.”
“Well, unfortunately for you, you’re at the right age for ceremony. That’s when you’d be taken away and taught the lessons of life. The sap from the milkwood tree would be used to glue feathers onto your body and you’d be taught the songline until you were sick of hearing it. And let me tell you, I’ve had some ceremony” – he makes cutting motions in the air – “and parts of it are not pretty.”
I’m hoping our 24-hour safari with Lord will be a chance for my
