The Best of Edward Abbey

  When Oodnadatta finally appeared on the horizon, we were glad to disembark for a while. The station master (we had no conductor) said there would be an indefinite delay. We knew what that meant. Catching him alone for a moment, I inquired about the ants. He stared at me. “The ants,” I explained, “they stopped our train.” Were we likely to run into more ants on the way to Alice Springs? He stared at me a moment longer. “I think me phone is ringing,” he said, and disappeared into a back office. I didn’t hear any phone.

  No matter. We had arrived in Oodnadatta, stopping point for many a weary traveler on the epic journey from Adelaide to the Centre (as they call it here). What is there to say about Oodnadatta? Not much, and of that little, nothing good. A bleak town, with a permanent population of some 60 whites and anywhere from 150 to 500 blacks, depending on what, if anything, is happening on a given weekend. When I arrived, the streets were swarming with Aborigines—men, women, and children—hundreds of them, all come to town for the annual race meet. The Transcontinental Bar was the focus of prerace activity, and the talk centered on horses and horse racing. Radiating outward from the jammed entrance to the pub were clusters of the black fellows with their wives and progeny, most squatting in the dust in the meager shade of a few mulga trees. Even as I watched, a battered half-ton Toyota pickup truck pulled in, stopped, and unloaded (I counted carefully) seven adult Abos from the cab and about five times that number from the open bed in back. They piled into the lefthand entrance to the pub, trying with vigor to force their way in. Bottles of sweet wine and cartons of bitter beer passed out over the heads of the crowd, carried along by willing hands. Taking a closer look at the individuals on the outside, I discovered that most were on the way toward a smashing weekend. Beer cans, pop cans, empty wine bottles lay scattered everywhere.

  The main street of Oodnadatta is broad and unpaved. Each passing motor vehicle stirred up lingering clouds of fine, floury, auburn-colored soil—the bulldust. On one side of the main street is the railway station and yards; on the other, the hotel and pub, a general store and petrol station, the town hall, a church-supported medical clinic, and a row of bungalows. The houses are built mostly of corrugated steel or sheet iron, lumber being a scarce commodity in these arid parts. Most of the houses have screened-in verandahs running along two, sometimes all four, sides. Many stand off the ground on blocks or low piers for easier cooling. Although Oodnadatta has its own power plant, there is no air conditioning, nor did I notice any of the evaporative “swamp coolers” common in the American Southwest. The people here rely on cross ventilation and ceiling fans for relief from the heat.

  Except for windmills and water tanks looming against the sky, Oodnadatta does not much resemble what we think of as a Western town. What it does look like is a shantytown, one of those squalid settlements typical of back road areas in our own Deep South. The flies of Alabama would be at home here.

  Did I say something about flies? Have I mentioned the Australian national bird? The subject is unavoidable. The flies are a fact of life here, at all seasons, a basic datum. Outbackers joke about the Australian salute: the right hand brushed repeatedly across the face. In summertime white residents wear fly veils or a row of corks dangling by threads from the brim of the hat. These outback flies are persistent, sticky, maddening; they cling to your skin. Only the Aborigines are indifferent to them.

  A strange people, these Abos, supposedly the most primitive on earth. Scarcely human, according to some Aussies I met. Yet they have, or had, as is now well known, a culture more complex and to me more interesting than anything the white Australians have so far been able to invent on their own. The traditional Aborigines wandered this continent nearly naked, following the game and the weather up and down the transient watercourses, from lake to ephemeral lake. They carried nothing but weapons like the boomerang and the spear, and a leverlike instrument, the woomera, with which to hurl the spear with great velocity and accuracy. They had fire sticks, water skins, and stone tools to grub in the earth with. Nothing more, not even the bow and arrow. No domestic animals but the dog. All they possessed in worldly goods they carried in their hands. Their culture was not material and technological but intellectual, spiritual, esthetic. They carried the world in their minds, with an elaborate mythology as subtle in its way as our own. Our mythology we call history and science—knowledge; so did the Aborigines. They could explain to their children everything in their world as well as we can explain our world to ourselves. Each rock, tree, hill, and stream, each living thing had its history, function, meaning. They invented languages—many languages. They invented their own painting, sculpture, music, dance, ritual, religion, the psychology of dreams and literature. They studied and memorized their land, its climate and weathers, the finest details of the flora and fauna. Without knowledge, there could be no survival. The wisest among them, the old men and old women, knew not only where to find water and game even in the hardest years, but also the whole story of the creation of the human race—the Dream Time.

  Few of us would be willing to exchange our place in European industrial culture for a place in that ancient and primitive society. We feel our world is more open, vast, and free than that of primitive man. Perhaps it is. But what we have gained in depth and breadth we may have lost in immediacy and intensity. For the savage hunter, every day and every night must have been an adventure on the edge of exaltation or despair. We don’t know. How can we know? We do know what life has become most of the time for most Europeans-Aussies-Americans. It has become soap opera. Tragic but tedious.

  But the Aborigine world was destroyed long ago. Except for remnant bands rumored still to be wandering the western deserts, the Abos of today are a sick and sorry lot. They hang about the white man’s towns surviving on federal charity. They buy their suits and dresses at the Good Will store. They drink too much and breed too much—every tribe is stricken with alcoholism, poverty, syphilis, multiplying hordes of unwanted children. Their lands reduced, their mythic culture lost, they exist in the limbo between a vanished past and a new world in which there is no place for them. “Poor fellow, my country,” says the black man.

  A group of them sat in the dust under a tree, drinking wine, telling stories. As I shuffled past one of the men called to me, inviting me to have a drink. I paused. The bloodshot eyes in the black faces stared at me. I stared at them.

  Some of the men had faces like Socrates, others like Darwin and Tolstoy. Prognathous jaws, wide mouths, broad flat noses, the eyes sunk deep beneath primeval brows. The skin not so much black or brown as gray, the color of dust and wood ashes. Some of the children had blond, curly hair, characteristic of certain tribes. The old men had white hair, white beards, a certain dignity and beauty. But the women were poor misshapen creatures with no waists, swollen abdomens, limbs like sticks—like a child’s drawing of a human. Caricatures, deformed by a lifetime of child-bearing and welfare nutrition. Their voices, as they cackled at one another, sounded like the cawing of crows. The flies crawled unheeded over their syphilitic, ravaged faces. One of these scarecrows squawked at me, lifting her skirts to show me the filthiest pair of knickers I’d ever seen south of Soho. The other ladies shrieked with laughter. I blew the old girl a kiss, but squatted down with the men.

  The youngest, a middle-aged chap in a cowboy hat, offered me the wine jug, almost empty. I sensed a trap closing, but took a swallow anyhow and passed it on. “Where you from?” he asked. I told him. “Amedica,” he said, “Amedica.” The accent Oxonian. No doubt he’d had an immigrant teacher. “There are many black fellows in Amedica?” he asked. “About 22 million,” I said. “At last count. Plus the one who lives in Tuba City, Arizona.” He whistled in surprise, then translated my words for our circle of listeners. The old men nodded solemnly. The man in the cowboy hat said, “I am going to Amedica. I am going to marry a blonde Amedican gel and live in Hollywood, New York. But she must be rich. She must have …” He made the appropriate gesture with both hands and spoke a few words to his
mates. The old men laughed and nodded. “You will introduce me to the rich blonde Amedican gel?”

  Of course; I pulled out my notebook and scribbled the names, addresses, and telephone numbers of some lady friends in California and New York; tore off the sheet; and gave it to him. He studied it, folded it with care, and stuck it in his shirt pocket.

  The old men watched us eagerly. The one who looked like Leo Tolstoy handed me the wine jug, upside down, tapping on it and smiling. He said something. My friend in the cowboy hat translated. “He says the bottle is empty.”

  I nodded, and waited for further explanation. The old man spoke again; all the old men stared at me, smiling. “He says there is a grog shop across the street.” I turned my head and read the sign above the doorway of a sheet-iron bungalow: Transcontinental Hotel. My friend in the hat winked, grinning at me. The circle of old men grinned at me. I counted eight grins and twelve teeth. Trapped. I bought the wine.

  Our train was scheduled to depart at two in the afternoon, but when I checked in at the station I found departure time adjusted to six-thirty. I spent the afternoon at the races. I won four Australian dollars on a long-legged filly named Morning Star and lost eight on a camel named Stormy Red. Oh they said it was a horse, but it rather resembled a camel, especially when it went down on its knees in the back stretch. Nobody hurt, not even the horse, I regret to say. I bought a huge beefsteak sandwich for fifty cents. Beef is the one thing in Australia that’s still cheap.

  Back at the station at six, I learned that departure time was now postponed till ten. Apparently the ants were winning. With four more hours to wait I went off to see the walk-in movie. The swift autumn night had already settled in. The walk-in movie was a vacant lot with screen, projector, a few benches, and space for a row of cars at the rear. Most of the patrons brought their own chairs or sat on the ground. The film was an Italian Western starring a Mr. C. Eastwood. Once the moviegoers were hooked on the action, the projectionist walked through the crowd collecting a dollar per head. I left.

  Strolling down the unlighted street, I discovered preparations for a dance under way in the one-room town hall. The front door was open, lights on, bunting on the walls; clusters of balloons, filled with gas, clung to the high ceiling. The one-man orchestra, a man in cowboy costume who looked remarkably like America’s own beloved Buck Owens, was already warming up with his electric guitar and what he called a rhythm box, an amplifying machine that filled the hall with booming vibrations.

  Those Aborigines who could not afford a dollar for the movie were gathering around the doorway, peering in. Folding chairs lined the walls; the wooden floor glistened with a fresh wax job. I took a seat near the musician, out of line of the direct blast from the twin speakers. The musician called himself Dusty Slim. When he paused for a beer, I asked him if he knew any Kristofferson or Willie Nelson. Never heard of them, he said, but he knew the entire repertoire of Johnny Cash, Charlie Pride, and John Denver.

  The hall quickly filled, with most of the girls on one side, boys on the other. Chatting nervously among themselves, each sex stole furtive glances at the other. All were whites, scrubbed, brushed and rosy, blond and beautiful, dressed for Oodnadatta’s big annual Saturday night; many of the girls wore floor-length party dresses, the boys clean cowboy shirts, jackets, pressed jeans. Dusty Slim played a few numbers and gradually the dancing began, led by a handsome couple who turned out later to be Americans, schoolteachers on vacation.

  The Abos crowded outside the door were filtering in now, one by one, first little barefoot kids with wide eyes, staring awestruck at the dancers; then some shoeless teenage girls with bulging pregnant bellies, wearing miniskirts. One of these black girls started to sing along with Dusty Slim in a harsh voice that carried well, despite the mighty rhythm box. The Abo men remained outside, drinking. Two witches crept in, dark shriveled little women with wild woolly electric hair, claws, broomstick legs, splayed and dusty feet. They wore Mother Hubbards that hadn’t been washed since the Year One, so greasy that—as an Aussie would say—your eyes slid off ‘em. The first witch crouched in a corner, among the black children. The second staggered onto the dance floor, drunk as a wallaby, and tottered round and round in dreamy parody of the dancers, eyes shut, arms making rotary motions.

  A big red-haired girl dropped into the chair beside me. “Hi,” she says. “Hi yourself,” I says. “Where you from?” she says. “Winnebago, Wisconsin; how about you?” “I’m from Homer City, Pennsylvania.” After a moment she added, “This is the funniest dance I ever saw in my life.”

  Funny? I thought it the most tragic dance I had ever seen in my life. La Danse Macabre, that’s what I thought it was. The Aborigine lady with the nest of vipers in her hair had now attached herself to one particular couple, mimicking each movement. They whirled, she whirled. They bumped, she bumped, though her timing was off, and some kind of torn gray rag had fallen to her left ankle.

  The young man, red-cheeked as an apple, pretended to ignore the shadow at his side, but his girl friend was exasperated. She kept shouting at the witch, waving her away. What she said was lost in the uproar. It made no difference. The old woman floated high in private ecstasy, looking as if at any moment she would crumple to the floor. A big, beef-fed Aussie rancher emerged from the mob and guided her, gently but firmly, through the mass of jiggling whites and out the door.

  The teenage black girl, still singing along with Dusty, raised a fist and screamed, “Black Power!” The big man threw her out. The second witch began to howl; he threw her out too.

  The dance went on. The floor rocked, the hall shook as outback Aussie cattle growers stamped and stomped to the big beat of the rhythm box, the thin whine of Dusty Slim singing John Denver’s “Country Road.”

  Time for me to check on my train again, though I had little real hope it would leave as promised. As I crossed the street I saw a writhing mass of drunken Abos pushing a Ford Falcon (made in Australia) toward the south edge of town. The car was full of more Abos, laughing and shouting, arms and legs sticking out the windows.

  A white boy stood by watching. I asked him what was going on. He said they were pushing the car out of town to burn it. Why burn it? “Because it won’t run,” he said. He explained the history and evolution of the Aborigines’ understanding of the white man’s proudest toy. When the Abos first began to buy automobiles (he said), nobody bothered to tell them that it was necessary to refuel the things from time to time. The happy new owner would go roaring off into the desert in his first car, keep going until it ran out of gas, and abandon it. The used-car dealer sent somebody out with a can of petrol to recover the car, had it brought back to town, and sold it over again to the next Abo to come along with a pocketful of wages.

  But after a while the Abos caught on to this scam; they learned about gasoline. Then they would buy a car and drive it until something functional went wrong and it refused to run. Again the car was abandoned; again it was recovered, repaired, resold. The Abos were not deceived for long. Now, said my informant, when their cars break down they burn them. “Give them ten more years,” the boy said, “and the bloody blacks will be selling us cars.”

  I found my train actually ready to go. The rust-colored engine stood by the station house, panting. Two phlegmatic engineers stared at me, without interest, from the cab. The station master was not around but a crewman leaning against the wall pointed out the passenger car, about a half mile down the track, still joined to the rear of the train.

  I took my duffel bag and my box of food and beer and my old leather trunk that I use for intercontinental travels out of the waiting room, where I had cached them for the day. Burdened with this awkward load, I struggled down the side of the roadbed—there was no walkway—toward my car. I had nearly reached it when the train gave a grunt, a jolt, and pulled away. I watched it trundle slowly up the tracks and stop again, the passenger car now aligned with the station house, as per regulations. The engineers stared back at me, their faces blank. I struggled up
the roadbed and managed to get gear and myself aboard just as the train began pulling out. I found a compartment, filthy but empty, and settled down for a long journey.

  First, I would kill one of the engine crewmen, chosen by lot; second I would sleep; later, I would open my trunk and begin my study of the selected works of a Mr. H. James. I knew we had 200 miles to go before reaching Alice Springs, the dead epicenter of Australia and my primary destination. I reckoned it would take a day, maybe two or three days, probably no more, to arrive there. Providing, of course, that the bleeding ants gave us no more bloody trouble.

  A Desert Isle

  Isla de la Sombra is a small island off the coast of Mexico. Twenty miles long, five to ten miles wide, with 4,200 feet of vertical relief, it has no human inhabitants whatsoever. Not one. And this for the very good reason that la Sombra, so far as is known, lacks any trace of spring, seep, or surface stream. Except for a few natural stone basins—tinajas—high in the canyons, which may hold water for a time after the rare winter rains, la Sombra is absolutely waterless. It is a true desert isle.

  Naturally we had to go there. Me and Clair Quist, a friend from Green River, Utah. Clair is a professional river guide by trade, a jack-Mormon by religion. He doesn’t talk much, but says a lot when he does. I like that.

  To get us to the island we hired Ike Russell, a veteran bush pilot out of Tucson. There are no recognized landing fields on the island but Ike had landed there a couple of times earlier anyway and thought he could do it again if conditions were favorable. Loaded with twenty gallons of drinking water and other baggage, we took off one morning from Tucson in Ike’s old Cessna 185, a refurbished aircraft fitted with oversize tires, reinforced landing-gear struts, and other special equipment. We rose about thirty feet in the air and dropped back to the runway. Power failure.