Ndjébbana

Wúrdayak Nga-nabélbala KónaWhen I was a little child

A text in the Ndjébbana language of central coastal Arnhem Land, for use in the Ndjébbana bilingual program at Maningrida Community Education Centre.

Story told by Monica WiltonIllustrations by Robert Williams

© 1992, 2005 NT Government, Department of Employment, Education and Training, Maningrida Community Education Centre.

First printed March 1992.Revised and reprinted June 2005.

Produced with assistance from the Schools Commission and the Aboriginal Arts Unit of the Australia Council.

Produced at Maningrida Literature Production CentreManingrida CECPrivate Mail Bag 67Winnellie NT 0822

ISBN 0 86783 305 X

Wúrdayak nga_nabélbala kóna

Ka-bbínjbiniba Monica Wilton

Ka-bbórbana Robert Williams

2

Wúrdayak nga-nabélbala kóna, nga-béna barra-náwarrkala barra-róddjiba nga-rlerrebína yibérra. Njarra-rawáyaniba njarrúka-na waléykkarra.

3

4

Yaláwa narlakkárla njarra-béna, kúrla njarra-kkónjdjanga. Na-kkódda njarra-bbóna, njarra-rawéra njarrúka-na.

5

6

Nganéyabba njarra-wákkana. Njarra-ngódjbana mudíkkang.

7

8

Yaláwa njanarra-wúna-yána ka-béna, bákki baníkkin.

9

10

Njarra-béna njarra-róddjiba njarra-nána manbírndi na-kkáyala ka-kkóya, karrówa. Yaláwa njarra-módjanga njarrúka-na.

11

12

Yaláwa nga-béna nga-rlurrbína yibérra barra-náwarrkala barra-róddjiba, yaláwa kúrla barra-ngódjbana mudíkkang, barra-rawáyaniba barrúka-na.

13

14

Yaláwa njarra-rlerrebína njarra-béna na-lakórrbbiba, njarra-rawáyaniba njarra-renjdjína mudíkkang.

15

16

Nganéyabba njarra-rawáyaniba njarrúka-na. Njarra-múyuwana, njarra-wákkana yaláwa wíbbara.

17

18

English TranslationWhen I Was a Little Child

2. When I was a little child, I went with the other children. We were playing marbles.

4. Then we went to the bush and cut trees. We took off the bark and threw it away.

6. We went back and made spear shafts.

8. A boy gave us a tobacco tin each.

10. We children saw a lot of nails lying around on the ground. So we picked them up.

12. I joined the other children, who had finished attaching the wooden shafts, and were playing.

14. Then we went onto the road and played with the trucks we had made.

16 When we had finished playing we all went back home.

19

Glossarybákki . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . tobaccobaníkkin . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . tin, containerbarra-náwarrkala . . . . . . . they–other, othersbarra-ngódjbana . . . . . . . they made it–Malebarra-rawáyaniba . . . . . . they playedbarra-róddjiba . . . . . . . . . they–childrenbarrúka-na . . . . . . . . . . . . they sat, they wereka-béna . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . he wentka-kkóya . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . he or it–Male lay, he or it–Male

waskarrówa . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . lots, many–Malekóna . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . I was, I satkúrla . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . stick, treemanbírndi . . . . . . . . . . . . . nailmudíkkang . . . . . . . . . . . . car, vehiclena-kkáyala . . . . . . . . . . . . . on the groundna-kkódda . . . . . . . . . . . . . barkna-kkódda njarra-bbóna . we took off the barkna-lakórrbbiba . . . . . . . . . on the roadnarlakkárla . . . . . . . . . . . . out bushnga-béna . . . . . . . . . . . . . . I wentnga-nabélbala . . . . . . . . . I–small, I–littlenganéyabba . . . . . . . . . . . there, that’s where/whennga-rlerrebína . . . . . . . . . . I arrived, I came to (somewhere /

someone)

nga-rlurrbína . . . . . . . . . . . I went out njanarra-wúna-yána . . . . he gave it to us

njarra-bbóna . . . . . . . . . . . we (not including you) hit itna-kkódda njarra-bbóna . we took off the barknjarra-béna . . . . . . . . . . . . we (not including you) wentnjarra-kkónjdjanga . . . . . we (not including you) cut itnjarra-módjanga . . . . . . . we (not including you) picked some-

thing up from the groundnjarra-múyuwana . . . . . . . we (not including you) finished doing

somethingnjarra-nána . . . . . . . . . . . . we (not including you) saw itnjarra-ngódjbana . . . . . . . we (not including you) made itnjarra-rawáyaniba . . . . . . we (not including you) playednjarra-rawéra . . . . . . . . . . we (not including you) threw it (away)njarra-renjdjína . . . . . . . . we (not including you) stood, we werenjarra-rlerrebína . . . . . . . we (not including you) arrived, we came

to (somewhere / someone)

njarra-róddjiba . . . . . . . . . we –childrennjarra-wákkana . . . . . . . . we (not including you) returned, we

went backnjarrúka-na . . . . . . . . . . . . we (not including you) sat, we werewaléykkarra . . . . . . . . . . . rock, stone, marblewíbbara . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . home; at or to homewúrdayak . . . . . . . . . . . . . a long time agoyaláwa . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . so, then, finally, the endyibérra . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . to them, for them

Printed by Maningrida CEC’s Literature Production Centre

www.cdu.edu.au/laal Tel: (08) 8946 6876 livingarchive@cdu.edu.au

This work is from the Living Archive of Aboriginal Languages www.cdu.edu.au/laal.

If you have any questions or wish to access information concerning this work, please contact us at

livingarchive@cdu.edu.au.

Use of this work is subject to the User License Agreement available at

http://www.cdu.edu.au/laal/permissions/

This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution Non-

commercial No Derivs 3.0 Licence Australia which appears as follows:

This licence allows users to share, copy and redistribute the work in any medium or format provided they:

(i) give appropriate credit, provide a link to the licence, and indicate if any changes were made to the work.

Users may do so in any reasonable manner, but not in any way that suggests that we endorse the user or

their use;

(ii) do not use the work for commercial purposes;

(iii) do not distribute the modified work if they remix, transform or build upon the work, and

(iv) do not apply legal terms or technological measures that legally restrict others from doing anything that the

licence permits.

The full terms of the licence can be found at http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/3.0/au/legalcode.

The creators of this work assert their moral rights to:

• be identified and named as the creators of this work. This means that if you reproduce the work, you must

identify these creators;

• take action if this work is falsely attributed as being someone else’s work; and

• take action if this work is distorted or treated in a way that is harmful to their honour or reputation. This

means that the creators of this work have the right to object to distortion, mutilation or other modification

of, or derogatory action in relation to the work.

If you share this work, you must identify the creators named in this work and on the Living Archive

of Aboriginal Languages website and abide with all other attribution requirements under the

Creative Commons licence.

Note that any action that is in breach of the moral rights of the author will give rise to a right of the creators to take

legal action under the Copyright Act 1968 (Cth).

Do not remove this notice