To wrap our week of Education we bring you this extract from the Musical Dispatch from the Front of 3rd October 2011.

This Dispatch is dedicated to Saraswathi the Hindu goddess of learning, music and wisdom.

I also dedicate it to my Warlpiri friends and neighbours that are the ‘clients’ of ‘service delivery’. They are being ‘serviced’ with the delivery of a boiling frog cultural genocide.
Death by a thousand cuts…..
http://youtu.be/JpXwpzHWBHM

Saraswathi, the goddess of music, was very much in evidence when we drove across to Papunya to see the Black Arm Band. I saw them perform for the second time in as many months.
Without being overtly political or confrontational, their message is very much about Aboriginal suffering, rights and dignity and a celebration of Aboriginal resilience and survival. Their message is also about hope. The children came back…..
http://youtu.be/rpNSrqsU1eI
Worthy disciples of Saraswathi, the Black Arm Band are.

The Papunya concert was concluded by two Papunya Bands. At the end nearly everyone got up and danced, even old codgers like me. Worthy disciples of Saraswathi are we.

Saraswathi, the goddess of wisdom, was very much in evidence at Yuendumu half a century ago, when then Superintendent Ted Egan turned back a couple of large truck bringing with them kit houses. Ted was in the process of organising local people to erect buildings using local materials.

A quarter of a century ago the Yuendumu Housing Association with its modest budget and a 4:1 ratio of Warlpiri to European workforce, was the first Yuendumu organisation to have a Warlpiri person take long service leave (for non-Australians: to earn LSL In Australia you have to be employed by the same employer continuously for ten years). The Yuendumu Housing Association ceased to exist many years ago.

Saraswathi, the goddess of learning, briefly came to Yuendumu last week. Minister for Aboriginal Health Warren Snowdon, flew in (and out) to officially open a residence for visiting medical students. The residence is one of five (so far) erected on Aboriginal communities as part of a joint teaching initiative between ANU (Australian National University) and the Commonwealth (Federal Government).

The residence was delivered on the back of trucks.

I found out about the opening when I was asked to fill an LP-gas cylinder “for the barbeque”, so I went.

Thirty-three people, including one Warlpiri adult, listened to Warren’s speech about the “importance of training future doctors on these places” so they may be inspired to come back to ‘service’ their Warlpiri ‘clients’. Pina-yarntani Yurntumu-kurra …come back to Yuendumu.

Five large trucks travelled all the way from Bendigo in Victoria to deliver Yuendumu’s new Centrelink building. Just what Yuendumu needed …Just when I needed you most….

http://youtu.be/XeeMDGq1FMI

Saraswathi, the goddess of wisdom, has forsaken Yuendumu.

Publisher’s note: Part two of this dispatch will be published next Saturday.