Muluwurri Magpies take a blue-sky morning barge ride from Melville Island to Bathurst Island. The young players barely consider a four-metre crocodile yawning by the jetty.Bigger threats loom. They are about to meet the reigning premiership Tuyu Buffaloes in the Tiwi Islands Football League season opener.“A grand final rematch,” spruiks coach Cecil Black. “We want revenge.”I meet the Muluwurri boys in a tree’s shade near the playing ground forward pocket. Someone tosses me a black and white striped jumper with number five on its back. A boy snickers because I’m wearing the colours and number of Collingwood’s captain. “Nathan Buckley. Ha ha.”
My travelling companion Digger Dooley is handed jumper number twenty. “Chris Tarrant. He he.” I pull my jumper on and my belly looks ridiculously white compared to my new teammates, of rich, sweat-glistening darkness. We’re suddenly a long way from suburban Melbourne, where we kick around on frosty fields of winter.It’s hot. The sun is rearing like a stung brumby and it may yet burn me to death on a football oval resembling a sand stone grill. The team shuffles on to the playing surface.I count more potholes than grass blades, dust washing over my boots. A player beside me has no boots.Fear catches me.
I think playing a game of football in a remote community is a ridiculous fantasy .Too late. Together we stand gazing at a grandstand with a large tree growing through it, observing a minute silence no one explains. And the apprehension leaves me in the middle of the ground with players from both teams, who will teach me about raw speed and skill. I gain comfort from looking at their faces. It’s the football I live for now. Just like them.
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WE MET Tiwi Islands character Brenton Toy the day before and he chaperoned us on a ferry from Darwin.
Brenton was once recruited to play football in the South Australian state league but injury crippled him and he returned to the top end.
His knee may have never recovered but he matured quicker than others and became a sports development officer.
At 27, he is a leader of the Tiwi community.
We arrived at Bathurst Island looking sideways for a croc we were told had been menacing children.
A spindly kid called Kenny spotted us and walked over bouncing an empty coke bottle from hand to foot.
We tossed him our footy and he drilled it back, firstly with his right foot. Then left.
We couldn’t tell if the ten-year-old had a preferred side, such was his skill.
A mega-fit woman bounced along.
My first thought, for some reason, was that she could bench press me if dared.
It was Brenton’s mother Alice Williams, Bathurst’s sports and recreation manager.
She was grumbling she couldn’t find more hard workers to maintain the grounds.
“People ‘round ‘ere either work under a commonwealth program for 18 hours a week or they get the dole, which pays about forty bucks less than the work,” Alice explained.
“I’ve only got one good worker. The rest just sit around. But I don’t think twice about dockin’ their pay.”
Brentan’s father Billy Toy turned up and mentioned the Tiwi Island Football League was meeting for trade talks.
“Less than a day before the season?”
“Yeah, and they’re doin’ the tribunal from last year,”
Billy chuckled.
We rushed to the boardroom but missed the tribunal suspend five players for five years on umpire bashing offences.
Seven of the league’s eight football clubs were discussing player trades for a couple of hundred bucks apiece (Tuyu didn’t turn up because it didn’t want to trade).
The players weren’t given any money and weren’t aware they were being sold. They would find out the morning of the first game.
Trade papers were simple.
As clubs in Melbourne were swapping Rawlings, Hay and Cole for golden sums a man in Bathurst Island wrote:
I Gideon Pangiraminni coach of Imalu Tigers allow Dominic Brown to transfer to Muluwurri also Freddie Puruntatameri to Ranku and Rondeny Tipungwuti don’t know where he going and don’t care. Signed Gideon Paniraminni.
I wondered whether other clubs would nibble at the maligned Tipungwati when a club official asked me which AFL team I supported back home.
“Collingwood.”
“Good,” he whispered. “We are the Muluwurri Magpies from Melville Island. You will play for us.”
I was told earlier Digger and I would play for the struggling Nguiu Lions but the Magpie chief made the announcement to the room and there were no counter bids.
I’d been traded.
WE START on the interchange bench with nerves.
Umpire Clancy Puruntatameri, a Tiwi Islander, holds the ball above his head for the siren.
Clancy believes his destiny lies in the AFL.
“It’s my dream to take the spirit down to the MCG. I will make it happen for my career.”
As play takes off Clancy taps his behind as if to tell the other umpire he has control, just like officials do in the big league.
But his colleague is just a kid and probably wonders why Clancy is slapping his bum as he runs.
Digger gets the nod and runs to the wing, giving a cute handball.
I’m toey. I give coach Cecil Black a look that means: “ I’m ready to start playing.”
“How d’ ya like the heat?” says a concerned Cecil.
“No worries. I love it,” I lie.
“Okay. You’re on.”
I stride to my favourite half back flank but I feel out of place. The players are talking to each other in their rollicking Tiwi language.
The tempo is quick and hard to predict.
Not like Melbourne footy. Kick. Mark. Kick. Pack. Kick. Handball. Tackle. Ball-up. Kick. Mark. Kick. Pack. Kick.
This is different. Tap on. Tap on. Swerve. Left step. Right step. Kick. Mark. Run. Paddle. Grasp. Swerve. Dummy. Handball. Tap on. Paddle. Run. Run.
There are more working parts.
I try to snaffle a young chap carrying the red leather. He eludes me.
At 30, my speed is all but gone. I think I can leave my mark on a few physical contests.
These guys are fast but not so big … I’ll muscle them … they don’t like it tough …
Then a player tries to smother an opponent’s kicking boot with his head and a young player is spun into space, landing like limp, road-smattered kangaroo.
He bounces to his feet.
I’m rethinking my physicality theory when the ball accidentally lands in my hands.
I’m on … I’ll go left … no … I’ll go right …
Whack. A thin-armed-rover hugs me and throws me into the rock deck.
Here comes the runner.
“Paul, go into the ruck.”
At six foot one and without a vertical leap, I face an opponent with bare soles and a grin. I imagine him standing on my head.
FROM THE trade table I wandered into the main street of Bathurst Island.
The houses were basic. The school grounds were clean.
Then I came to a game being played between two portables.
Instant (a card game) is Bathurst’s full time hobby, between football and four o’clock drinks.
“The highest wins,” a man said to me.
But the cards were going in all directions and I still hadn’t a clue.
There were men and teenagers in the circle. An old fellow in a wheelchair couldn’t reach the cards or cash so he instructed a woman to operate his hand.
One of the players was grey and looked to have given up multiple facial expressions. He settled on looking mildly disinterested.
The youngest player at the game was a chap who won the TIFL best and fairest last season.
Alice Williams complained locals gambled fanatically on Bathurst. All day. Every day. Until four o’clock. When beer flowed up the street.
DIGGER collects the ball on the wing and passes to me roaming through centre-half-forward.
I bomb the goal square, causing a delectable crumb for a hungry small man, who goals and I finally feel part of the contest.
The next half hour is a struggle between attacking teams.
The Buffaloes are quick all over. The Magpies sizzle near goal.
I see snippets of Michael Long everywhere, players paddling the ball end over end in back-arching sprints.
Long, Maurice Rioli and David Cantilla are stars from the Tiwi Island.
Indigenous football is laced with seemingly freakish talent, once misdiagnosed “black magic”.
But it is skilful spontaneous improvisation.
And it is all around me.
Volleyball spikes. Basketball fakes. Head smothers.
I stand and watch. Then the heat tackles me.
I start to boil. The oval is like a microwave, only I cook from the inside out.
Digger snaps a goal.
I am buoyed by his success and wonder whether this is how Aboriginal brothers Jim and Phil Krakouer felt, rejoicing in each other’s small victories on Victorian fields throughout the 1980s; two men competing in a different race.
But I am not taunted like the Krakouers were.
It is better for indigenous players now. Racism – at least the jibes – has been banished from the AFL.
I notice Adam Kerinauia watching from the boundary.
He played three games for the Brisbane Bears before quitting in 1992.
“I regret it. I shoulda’ stayed. Daryl White was my roommate.”
Kerinauia is an NT legend but what if he had his time again? Maybe Australia would know him.
The ball spills into the centre and I dive on it like I would a cold can of Solo. My opponent rolls me over.
At once I am a stranded, wriggling turtle in a dust cloud. Clancy pings me.
“Holding the ball.”
The spectators cackle. They love a mishap as much as a daring dash.
WE FOLLOWED the islanders to the pub at four o’clock to see them drink the joint dry.
A beer sales rep told us Bathurst Island’s Nguiu Club sold the most beer per head in the state. A hundred kegs a week.
There were only 2500 people on the island.
Everyone bought grog in glasses. A heavy pot $3.50.
The pub has opened for three hours, five days a week since the land council decided restricted drinking was better than a ban or free-for-all.
The plan brought evening binges but no broken bottles or staggering daytime street boozers.
I pondered the likeliness of a fight breaking out around me but there wasn’t a nudge or scowl in sight, just beer and smiles.
The ladies’ poolroom exploded with laughter.
Most were pleased we were there. They wanted to shake our hands and ask us which AFL club we preferred.
“Who do you barrack for?”
A fellow Magpie lover became my pub tour guide, introducing me to all of the other Collingwood fans in the pub.
Everyone had a team.
Some chose club colours. Others picked favourite players. And some named themselves after famous players.
I met Peter Daicos and took no prize for guessing which mob his mate Tim Watson barracked for.
“Bbbrrriiinnnnggg”
A siren signalled the end of multiple glass shouts. It also meant the bell for last drinks would soon toll.
The drinkers became like motorists filling up before a fuel strike.
I didn’t find the last minutes of the pub grog-on ugly. Most people were vacant-eyed happy.
“It had a good vibe tonight,” a worker conceded. “But it’s not always like this.”
Alice Williams had an opinion on this too. She said the council should shorten the bar’s hours.
“Stop the flow.”
Sports and recreation manager for just six weeks, Alice had returned to the Tiwis after decades in Darwin.
Her concerns were motivated by her devotion to the island’s children, who she believed were being left neglected and hungry.
AT THREE-quarter-time my teammates lie under the forward pocket tree, beads dripping from brows.
It lifts me knowing 36 degrees is hot for them too.
Coach Cecil implores us too to hang on for a win, which looks probable.
In the final term a player misses a goal he should have kicked or passed to someone in better position.
“Greedy. Greedy,” opponents taunt.
It is the only mean spirited words I hear.
Then a Magpie soars high on to a Buffalo’s shoulders, flips and lands on his neck.
“Water. Water.”
I think he may be dead but he staggers to his feet and I wonder whether they doused him with magic H2O.
THERE HAD to be 300 of them, raising hell and plotting disasters, inside a large tin wasteland on the edge of town.
It was like war had broken out or a bomb raid, children scattering but not leaving. Just going beserk.
Alice Williams was running a children’s wonderland in her recreational hall. Scheduled so the kids wouldn’t be home when mum and came home sauced up.
I watched a backward baseball cap kid drain three pointers. He mates gave him the ball after each successful shot, so he could go again.
Other boys sweated on each other coughing up small footballs whizzing through the mild night air.
Then Alice took the balls away and the crowd gathered to watch girls dance like they were in music videos.
A tiny toddler grabbed my eyes.
Someone had stuck lights to his sandals and his feet became fireflies to the rap melodies.
I was entranced.
The kids didn’t look sad at that moment. It was a Wonka’s garden without sweets … just chocolate-coloured, running, grinning souls.
I didn’t want them to grow up.
Another short fella sat beside me on the floor. He brushed my arm. I learned quickly that Tiwi children liked cuddling.
I held my hand out for a high five. It was all I could think to do, not being comfortable hugging strangers.
Maybe I could have, back when I wore lights on my sandals.
My six or seven-year-old mate rocked back as if taking in the scene before him.
Perhaps he saw me do the same thing.
I thought: “ I’ve never seen a place with so much life. There is so much life here. Life.”
I turned and said: “Do you like this place? Are you happy.”
He nodded.
“Why.”
“‘Cause this is my land.”
IN THE FINAL minutes I take it in.
I feel I’ve captured the heart of Aussie Rules and hung on for a few beats being tossed aside. Exhausted.
When it’s done, the Muluwurri Magpies don’t sing a victory song, respecting their adversaries.
Instead they ride a barge home to Melville, keeping an eye out for the croc, now submerged.
The next game is played on the same ground and Imalu beats Ranku. A third clash is forfeited, bringing the fourth game forward.
Brenton Toy, bung knee and all, plays for Tapalinga. He’s been an Auskick organiser, scorekeeper, timekeeper and siren sounder in one day.
He heads down to his mother’s office to grab his tools for one more job before sunset.
“It’s alright,” he grins, picking up a pair of football boots. “I’ll go straight to full forward.”
Alice Williams drives to our plane.
We have to return to work in Melbourne.
On the way, she points out some Pukumani poles, woodcarvings offered to dead spirits at funerals, lying on the ground.
Pukumani signifies passing of time and traditions between generations of Tiwi Islanders.
“They are important for the children,” Alice says.
“ We need to start getting people to stand the Pukumani up again. Not leave them lying on the ground.”
“The average man died in his forties here. The government talks about self-determination but this is self-preservation here.
“ I always say winner don’t need luck but we need some here.”
And then she hurries back to town. The footy will soon finish, adults will hit the pub and someone has to look after the kids.
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