Living in Darwin

  Living in Darwin



Living in Darwin was very different.



Darwin has a smell of its own.. partly because it’s very humid in August when we arrived. It’s a smell of damp, mould, mingled with a smell that emanates from everything that has been  hot and sticky from the humidity.  The wind does not blow and the temperature rarely hits the low 20 degrees, hovering about 34 celcius with different degrees of humidity depending on whether it’s the dry or wet season.

All in all, round about is lush, the plants are tropical. The smell of frangipani hangs in the air as if trapped by the humidity. When it rains, the drops are so large, you can get soaked in a couple of seconds.. but it’s still hot.



"Ah well, I 'd better get on with looking for work"

I said to my husband.

I purchased the local paper and spotted a job that sounded something like library work..



That's how my job happened. The universe  led me to working for a Uranium exploration company as a records clerk.

My office was tiny in a shed like building.  I had an antique switchboard to man, which was probably high tech for those times, and a real typewriter, with a ribbon.  I guess that I could say I  was definitely not welcomed in the office.  The current office girls were peeved off with me being employed over one of their friends that they wanted there.  But my boss, the senior geologist had a librarian wife, and was well impressed that I had worked in a library previously.



In those days, Uranium mining was beginning in Jabiru..situated a little out of the boundary of Arnhem Land.. There were a lot of contenders, including the govt who from recollection needed to have a 51% share in everything.. As we were the exploration arm of a Sydney based company, there was a lot of activity with Toyota trucks, auger drills on the back being sent out for drilling anomalies which were the resulting indications of aerial reconnaissance flights.

This was all new to me, and I guess at the time I did not know better.. For me, it was an office job, with keeping records of all the explored and unexplored sites.



In my office, I battled with the sandflies who ate at my legs, the bitchy office girls... and eventually got the hang of the office politics and seniority pecking order.



The weird thing though... there was one toilet for all the staff.. gosh, lots of geologists employed and five other office girls, including those young men that came to and fro for the irregular work of drilling.

Within the rim of the toilet lived the frogs. you know, the bit where the water comes out of when you flush the loo... Well, when you did flush, all these little green frogs would get pushed by the force of the water down and with their sucker feet, they would just accept the regular shower they got, and hang on steadfastedly until they could scramble back into the rim when the water subsided.

Now hang on here.. I felt quite uncomfortable by this new experience... I had never had to share a loo before.. and never with frogs.. ah... but there you are.. you get used to everything when you can’t change it...