A Mondyeunung Cyclone
An intense southern cyclone is winding up off the south west coast of W.A. tonight. Big rain coming tomorrow - this gif was created from BoM satellite loop for 1200-1500UTC 25/11/06 .
Mondyeunung is the Noongar name of the season (the two moons approxiamately) from late October to January. A good time to canoe or sail around the harbours or the sound at Albany as long as your back before noon. By then the easterly sea breeze driven by the deepening west coast trough starts spanking in. Sailing ships were often trapped for days or even weeks at time in Princess Royal Harbour/Mammangart because the entrance is a keyhole to the east into the sound and the winds show no mercy.
Tonight the Madjet is wagging his tail and bringing rain. It's midnight, dead calm and the humidity is 99% outside - everything is quiet. The calm before the storm...
posted by Kyan gadac at 11:52 pm
1 Comments:
Bob,
These threads of cloud look like the coils of an unfolding snake, or the spiral of a snail's shell or a giant twirling willy-willy bearing down - I know you're a linguist and a lover of the Noongar tongue, and one wonders what things made up of words and sounds must entertain you. Your description of the winds beyond your window and the movement of tides and lunar entanglements articulate something of great beauty. From my window, I sometimes peer from a room with a view. The plain trees beyond the night jasmin hedge stand semi-bare covered in emerald green shoots of spring. Closer to the window, an evergreen coral tree stands immobile, leaf like hands wait to embrace, or applaud the wind. My window sometimes moves with the foray of birdlife, mainly the high energy marauding rainbow lorikeet. Occasionally, magpies navigate their way through the green beyond, seemingly oblivious to my watching. And, like you, I am searching for the billion plus words of Noongar mai description - calm, how does one describe an airless, windless calm -
maar-birt - wind without - perhaps.
Kedalak, I know this word of Cliff's describes this time of dusk at 6.04pm. And the sun - ngaalaa ngaarngk, baalaa nookert ngoorndiny, wodern daarabiny - yeyi daabakarn baalaa dirrn yaarragata yaarkiny, boordu baalaa djindang boolaarang yaarkaalanginy - nyarni-waarngkiny! Whispering their way into being, these stars, above our heads, beyond the heads of clouds even and beyond our earth, this beautiful place, blue orb of wonder, now in peril. Minditjabiny yarn nidja? How is it possible that such things could come into being? Nyittiyang booy borlaa-boolsbininy minditj nyanginy, nirnamin djoolanginy - like a leech, I suspect, and yet still she spins, twirling like the willy willy, spiralling enchanting, this earth - this beautiful being, life giver, regardless of our folly - and meanwhile, there are those like you who map the movements of the wind, who speak so insightful of the moon and whisper so wise to the movements of the tide - well done, do not stop - you give us hope!
Tim McCabe
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