Camouflage Clay: Gorndon
Yidumduma shares his traditional knowledge on gorndon, camouflage clay. Wardaman people sang in pairs as they rubbed each other all over to take away their human smell for hunting. The clay was also used to make a weapon, lordo, for hunting and for Law business by the boundary watcher Barragbarrag (cormorant) Law Man. The clay was sung and placed in this Gorndon Site in the Creation Time Buwarraja.
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Transcript
Camouflage Gorndon Song Gujingga
Ngaging bulola ?
We rub ourselves with the clay
Ngajing guerre ?
We do it together in pairs
a little lordo (round one)
You know, we used to play with (as) a kid.
Roll it like this.
Don't want it a little bit too dry.
There... You look all the sawdust hey,
but you put them together, like this first.
Make a little lordo, we used to make it...
...there you go.
They used to use this... Barragbarrag Man (Law Man) used it.
And that's one they used.
So, this is called ? Gorndon...
Now...with this gorndon,
the Boundary Watcher (Law) Ma n used it, for walking around...like that.
But it was put together with the straw and everything to keep it firm.
Now, on the end of it,
they had a little spike, like a bullet.
This is a spike of echidna, that one there, one there , one here , one here.
We used to come here to this gorndon area ,
and pick up ...all this clay.
And...you take all the clothes off and camouflage yourself.
When you camouflage yourself,
you'd be walking around like this...
You'll be colour as that, see,
when you get dry on your body.
You see, be colour as that now, walking around. Like that.
Kangaroo can't ... recognise you
and you don't smell
and way you go.
And a kangaroo can be looking at you,
you stand , and he looking the other way,
you walk a bit closer , and he look around again,
he won't smell you,
because this one take all the human smell away.
Now, you have a thing like this...to throw at him ,
and of course, really,
this is only to show you a sample,
and...when you throw it,
we call it a little warrimi see,
and when you throw it,
it goes...very fast...you can hear it go whistling go...
With those little prong, it latch on him and grabs.
And he gets paralysed there...
He don't get away and he's jumping around ther e...
trying to get it out.
But he got so many little spike there ... like a bindi-eye...
He take one out, another one kept digging in,
the more you move, the more he goes down.
Of course you can race up there and get him straight away.
And that's that clay that they use,
to rub ourselves, and take all human smell away.
