Arabana Ngura 2025

The annual Arabana Ngura was held at Finniss Springs Station over the weekend of July 11-14. Over 100 Arabana nharla attended. People arrived on Friday evening, for an introduction to the camp and a community dinner - a hearty curry! On Saturday morning after breakfast, people headed over to the school room for activities run by Camp Leaders Veronica Arbon and Tina Raye, to learn wangka Arabana. Kids and adults alike played language games, participated in language learning activities, and spoke Arabana to one another. After lunch, language activities continued, while other Arabana got busy doing malka malka (painting) or karpanda (woodworking) activities led by Lionel Dodd. On Saturday night, before a BBQ dinner prepared by Head Ranger Zaaheer McKenzie and Camp Leader Leonie Warren, a raffle was held for eight substantial gift hampers being given away as part of NAIDOC week celebrations. After the raffle, all camp attendees received their Arabana Ngura 2025 beanie. 

The following day, on Sunday, everyone headed out on wadlhu on a fieldtrip led by the Arabana Rangers, to Gosse and McLaughlin kutha ngarrawa (mound springs) on the edge of Kati Thanda. There wasn't any kutha in the southern part of the lake yet, but everyone could sense it coming and even made a wadni, song about it! After getting back to Finniss Springs, there were more activities in the schoolroom such as malka malka and singing. Many attendees observed a family of warrukathi (emus) listening in, while others heard madla yapa (dingoes) singing out at night.

In addition to the schoolroom activities, throughout the entire camp, Elijah and Matt from the rap group DEM MOB, hailing from the APY Lands, and Dylan from the Centre of Aboriginal Studies at The University of Adelaide, had the 'Gig Rig' set up at camp. The Gig Rig is a giant van containing a mobile recording studio. Building off projects being coordinated by Veronica and Tina, Elijah, Matt, and Dylan, spent most of the camp recording Arabana kids and adults singing songs in wangka Arabana. In total, four songs have been recorded. A number of the songs are based on semi-tones within the traditional Arabana song 'birdsong', inherited from Ularaka and sung by senior Arabana elder Syd Strangways a few months ago in Alice Springs. Many Arabana singers added their personal twist to the songs, which we look forward to hearing. Currently, DEM MOB are mixing and finalising the songs.

The camp was a huge achievement. Thank you to all Arabana nharla who attended, for being respectful to each other, and engaging in activities - wangka Arabana and the Arabana wathili (family) is stronger as a result. And thank you to the Arabana Rangers (Zaaheer, Hayden, Phil, Tristan, Stanley) and Camp Leaders and Assistants (Veronica, Tina, Leonie, Lionel, Dennis, James, Kristy, Zariah, and Neil) who helped ensure the ngura went smoothly (except for a small septic issue!). As Veronica Arbon explains:

“Beautiful weather during the day, cold at night, what more could you want at an Arabana camp. Language learning and art around four songs Finniss-inga, Warrukathi, Wobma Wobma and Arru Arru. Lots of fun, learning, singing and recording in the school house with Tina and Veronica and the GIG RIG (recording studio on wheels) with Elijah and Matt from DEM MOB and Dylan from CASM, Adelaide University. All those who got involved made the camp a huge success”

There's lots more information to come about the camp on the Arabana Facebook page so keep an eye out. The AAC will be creating a shareable link for community members to access photos of the camp; we will be making a post for people to provide feedback on the camp; we will share stories about the camp; and, when the mixing is complete, we will share the four Arabana songs with the community.

Longer term, keep an eye out on the FB page for notification of next year's camp, which will likely be held at a similar time (July 2026). We would love to see you there!

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