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Ngoolngany - A Wife's Story

Tommy Bung Bung painted this story about alcohol abuse because he was a drinker himself before, and he has seen what the grog can do to people.

This painting shows the story of how an Aboriginal man and woman's lives are changed by grog. In the early days the Aboriginal husband and wife had a good life, but when the white man came and sold grog to Aboriginal people their lives changed, and those people started to become vicious, angry and jealous at each other. So in that story the man and woman get jealous and argue with each other when they are drinking, and that wife starts to back cheek that man. That man gets really angry because a woman is supposed to listen to her husband; and a man is supposed to listen to his wife. Man and woman are supposed to look after one another.

So that man hits the woman with a stick and she cries out for help and reaches up her hand to get up. That man bin pull her up, but he was hiding that stick behind his back with the other hand. And when she got up again, then whack-straight across the hand. He bin kill her like a kangaroo. So that family for that girl look around for that man, but he had taken off into the bush.

In the end that man came back into town for his rations, and then all the family for that woman bin grab that man and stand him out on the flat, and he bin get his punishment there, right in the middle. Spears bin stuck in him everywhere. When he bin go through that thing, well he became a free man. That's the law. If another man don't punish you then that country will get you.

Written by Tommy Bung Bung.