JE: I’m going to start off on the year of 1957. This is my story. It started off with my father, Tommy Winmaman Edgar, Willie Fong and Alan Turner. These three gentlemen were the cattle truck drivers here in Broome because of the cattle truck time, um, the meat works. But this significant time, there was only Willie Fong and my dad. They had to drive the cattle from Broome to Windjana Gorge. This is 1957. 

While they were there, it was late in the afternoon. They could not get back to Broome. So they camped in a place where they didn’t know, this is Bunuba country. And they camped beside a boab tree, which is the lalgardi tree, somewhere on the road. The bush track. That night, Willie sleeping on that side of the truck, my dad’s sleeping on the other side. Willie Fong gets up in the middle of the night, he hears my dad talking. They get up in the morning and Willie Fong says, “Hey, I bin hear woman, you got a woman there?” And my dad says, “What wrong with you boy? There’s no woman here.” He said, “Yeah, I bin hear a woman talking on the other side.”  

“Nah, you got nobody here.”  

So they came back to Broome. This was about June or July. At that time, my mum, heavily pregnant for me. I was born that year, 1957 in October. In the meantime, this is a story that was told to me. The older people from the Bunuba country had gone back to the place where my father had camped that time, that very special lulgardi tree. And in that tree was a special little girl spirit. They looked at the place and said, it’s not here anymore. Who was the last person that came through here that wasn’t part of the Bunuba country? And he said, “Ah, that man from that side, from Broome. He was the last person, he bin come through here.” 

I was born in October. December – law time. All the different tribes come together at law time. There were two old men from that area. They were all sitting down, I think somewhere here in Broome. They came up to my dad, “Hey, you last man who bin come through here. You, did you…?” And then they saw me on my mum, ’cause it’s hot time, only had napkin on. And in the side of my legs, I was born with a birthmark, the same as the bark of a boab tree. And the two people, the two old men, said to my mum and dad, “Here it is. There she is.” And they call me by the name yilimbirri. I was called that all my life from these two elders. And my family called me yilimbirri. I did not know what it meant.  

So, I’m coming to the story that’s the prelude to the story of why as a child I got to know what the yilimbirri is. I was about between four and six. I can’t tell you the dates. I got very ill. We used to live up on the hill. That was just a place that was belonged to just where Aboriginal people used to live. And I did not know how I ended up in the native hospital. I must have been very feverish, very sick this particular night. It could have been a night like this, how we had this beautiful full moon. I found myself on a bed not understanding. I’m sleeping on a bed in a hospital. Where’s my mum? Where’s my dad? Where’s my brothers? Where’s my sisters? No one. But I could hear the sound ’cause they had louvres of the cows that was right outside. And I can see just faintly, the cows mooing beside me. I’m sleeping on the bed and there’s louvres. 

But as I was watching the cows outside, a head of a snake appears between the louvres. I’m watching it. I am small, I am tiny. I don’t have no [speaks Yawuru – no translation]. I’m just sick on the bed. And it comes sliding through the louvre windows and plops down the side of my bed. The colour is between black and brown. But as it’s coming through the louvres, it plops, it grows and grows and it goes down to the right side of my bed. I am terrified. There is no one in this hospital who’s going to help me, in the distance I can only see an old man, but no one else. As it comes down the side of the bed and grows, it moves to the end of the bed. I followed it to look at it, but it comes to the left side. Then it comes right up to the bed and comes and curls up onto my tiny little tummy. But the pressure is not heavy. There’s a warmness. It’s just very light and looks at me. Then it gently goes down to the right-hand side. And at the back hospital they had these great big wooden doors. And then it slides through the door, the door wasn’t open. How the hell is it going? But it goes through the door and as the last part, the tail goes through the door. 

The door comes open and the nurse comes in and looks at me and says, “Oh, you’re better.” And I’m just terrified. I’m just looking at her like, what are you talking about? And I could not speak for the rest of the night or the day I just watched her. So that was my, I did not realize at the time, until I was about 50 years old, I heard the name yilimbirrigud. It come from Bunuba country. Yilimbirrigud means the snake that lives in Windjana Gorge. So I was in my late fifties that I finally find out I have these two spirits, a little girl and the snake.  

And forever in my life, snakes are my partners. I have so many stories to tell about snakes. I wonder if any of you has ever stood in a bed of snakes? I have. I wonder who’s ever had snakes come and look at you from… like that? Recently. I have. Comes behind me and stands behind me. That was two weeks ago. So snakes are my yadingal, my rayi, and it comes to me all the time. But I have learned to live with it. So now in my house, I have two beautiful snakes. The green snake I have learned not to kill it. It is called Jerry Lewis. And the whip snake that comes through my legs is called… Dean Martin…? Come on you mob!  

So, this is the story of my life. I didn’t wanna tell anything else. I just thought of my creation [story]. Thank you.