Our Dispatch today was first published on 22 April 2011.  The racist Intervention continues with white Australia’s complicity, the deliberate destruction of language is ongoing.

Estimados amigos,

Back from a Magical Mystery Tour
http://youtu.be/Hnrsqf33MXA

As we sat in a restaurant in Palomar, my childhood friend, Robi, (that I hadn’t seen in 55 years, and “found” on Facebook some time ago) pointed across to a building “esa es la escuela numero 51” (“that is state school no.51”). You know what? That is the first school I ever went to in 1949! In amongst my parents’ photograph collection there are me and my brother Ted wearing bright white starched “dustcoat” school uniforms. We looked like a swarm of butterflies as we took our first steps on the road to literacy and numeracy, multilingualism and adulthood.

The palm tree in the park that my brother set on fire (leaving a tall black stump that later magically sprouted new green fronds) is no longer there, neither is the magnolia tree. Robi’s older brother and I had tried to make magnolia perfume, a miserable failure. We lived in la Avenida Colegio Militar it’s since been renamed la Avenida de los Geranios. It was in front of Robi’s house that Ted and Robi had strung a rope across the Avenida Colegio Militar and made Herr Fischbach fall off his bycicle. Robi now tells me he copped a hiding from his father for that.

There is a Spanish word añoranzas which describes a feeling of yearning for a past that no longer exists.

Añoranzas has no exact equivalent in the English language.

It is a feeling I occasionally get for my childhood in Argentina.

…despreciaron la chacarera por otra danza importada….
http://youtu.be/cYei_BKOOGE

El bien perdido (“the good lost”- yet another inadequate translation)
http://youtu.be/Agu63R4C2CM

The two most important words in Portuguese are obrigado (thank you) and saudades.

Wikipedia: Saudade (singular) or saudades (plural) is a Portuguese language word difficult to translate adequately, which describes a deep emotional state of nostalgic longing for something or someone that one was fond of and which is lost.
http://youtu.be/9kkiGJOJaUs
http://youtu.be/E_7BV-IuyKI

“Above all, let us permit native children to keep their own languages, – those beautiful and expressive tongues, rich in true Australian imagery, charged with poetry and with love for all that is great, ancient and eternal in the continent. There is no need to fear that their own languages will interfere with the learning of English as the common medium of expression for all Australians. In most areas of Australia the natives have been bilingual, probably from time immemorial. Today white Australians are among the few remaining civilized people who still think that knowledge of one language is the normal limit of linguistic achievement.” – T.G.H Strelow,1958.

Every language is precious. I’ve said it before: to deny children the opportunity to grow up multilingual and multi-literate when the circumstances exist to make this possible, is nothing less than a crime.
http://youtu.be/EHtZJC_4YmE

In case you didn’t know, the Warlpiri language has an almost exact equivalent of saudade, it is yirraru.

Ngula juku
Jungarrayi