“Joe mentioned Native Title. That he talked with Pop about claiming the land.”
“Couldn’t ever happen—I’ll tell you why—there’s no artifacts. No water in Murrumby, no fish—and fishing would mean Nana, or whoever’s living here, would have a cultural connection to the land to maintain, the…well, ‘resources’—okay? Another thing, there’s no language here. Our people’s language is extinct, no one speaks it any more so they can tick that box on their government form that says ‘loss of cultural connection.’ You see?”
“Poppy taught us some.”
“Heads, Shoulders, Knees, and Toes song? Yeah, he taught me that too. But I mean language that is connected to this place, this landscape.”
“Nana told me last night Poppy was writing a dictionary.”
Aunt Nicki shook her head before she answered. “Even if he was writing it, won’t change anything. They grew up on the Mish, remember, and language wasn’t allowed.”