Black Soil Termite Mound: Ngardan
Bush Medicine

Ngardan, the earth mound created by the black soil termite namulu is great medicine. Eaten straight it helps with arthritis and all your joints. Lying down on a heated mound earth bed covered with straw and a little water to create steam is a wonderful healer for your whole body. The black soil termite carries the healing song and leaves it in the earth mound when he makes it. Jarralu ngarban jarraling........the black soil termite cures the sickness.

Related Links:   Burial Law: Ants    
Grasshopper 1
Ngangkari healers: 60,000 years of traditional Aboriginal methods

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Transcript

jarrulu ngarban jarralang    black soil termite will cure the sickness.
jarrulu   black soil termite mound

ngarban     sick, dehydrated

jarralang   cure, relieve

jarrulu ngarban jarralang    black soil termite will cure the sickness.


Now, here I am...sitting in this Golorog-ya country...
Diamond Dove Dreaming area, up top...
that’s still in the Menngen land...
Now see this termite (mound).
People looking at it just say termite.
But, this termite (mound) has
a lot of...good medicine inside it.
The little black (soil) ants make it...
they used for all sorts different things.
...I’m going to open him up here, on the side...
Now with them...see those little funnels?
That’s where the ants goes and live,
and you can see some of them walking around there.
They’re the important little ants...
their the one's that make a nest...put a song on it,
and then it cure everything.
If you have a stomach problem,
you eat this, and that will fix all the pain.
If you got arthritis, this one will fix it.
If you got...in your pelvis, bone joined to the hips, from your back,
this one is a real number one for it.
... You can eat it straight..a little bit to fix it.
Or you can get a big lot,
put him on the fire and heat it up.
This one holds a lot heat too.
You can spread him out and you can lay on it,
with a little straw and you wet it.
When you wet it, all the steam come up.
The steam from the termite (mound),
will go right through your system,
in your body, and...clean all your body inside.
I will eat a little bit of this...
I’ll put him in my mouth. I'll eat some more later,
see this little black one...
It doesn’t kill you or affect you.
This earth, because it's got..all the termite fertilizer,
from the ants, who put everything together on place.
How they do this because they've sing a song for it.
And this way the song go for it,
for the little termite.
There is a great big termite...there the two the best ones.
But all of them anyway.
But this is a song for them.

jarrulu ngarban jarralang    black soil termite will cure the sickness.

There's the song that all the termites sings
and they put all the song and the spit
and everything together,
to hold this strength...
doesn't matter how much rain can come,
he can’t wash them off,
because he's got like a wax from his spit...
put in this termite, this ngardan (mound).
...this is a great little ngardan.
The one that does all the curing...
for all the...infected body you got inside...
We haven't tried it on cancer,
but I reckon this one will fix the cancer too, might be, you never know,
because this one will work...he work on all the other stuff.
This one usually pull everything out...
with this termite here, called ngardan.
I’ll take it out a bit more.
All those little pockets there, look!
Little grooves...like a pipe with a air.
Doesn't matter how close it is,
they got a air here, they got to breathe it.
That's how all these little ants can live here.
Now...I’m just breaking him up...that one there...big piece see
...fix my belly up.

jarrulu ngarban jarralang    black soil termite will cure the sickness.

That’s the song for all the termites...
dancing and everything inside.
They all throw the spit and they've got spit like a wax.
Glue every bit of this termite (mound).
See where I've been cutting him with the axe.
That's a job...to cut it see
And it leave the mark, like a wood.
This one here, they don't have any straw much
They just have got a spit on it...
with a song...Yarrindi we call it.
Yarrindi song goes in there.
And that's where they keep everything tight.
Well packed it is from the spit.
At the same time they made all these
little grooves so they can go all around,
in and out, in and out...
Later they pop out, they go back again.
If it is wet, they rebuilt this, make it go a little bit bigger.
...in another two years time it be this high.
...as soon as the rain comes, they wet it, they work on it.
They're just collecting...earth from there with the spit.
They all come...millions.
And they all build it up there.
And they are all going inside
and they seal the wall up
so nothing can see them.
They all live here, inside.
They don't walk around...
They live there, eat this earth again, they're regenerating...
You can see them all listening too here,
big mob of them.

jarrulu ngarban jarralang    black soil termite will cure the sickness.

Return to Black Soil Termites: Bush University Chapter
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