FOSS gamedev and creative worlds

300 kilometres south of Darwin is the town of Katherine. Near there is Nitmuluk Park with a cruise up a very deep gorge and some famous cave paintings. The Lightning Brothers.

I went on a cruise and the Park Ranger was one of the traditional people that still live in the area. It's their art, their culture. He told us the story that his grandfather had taught him:

The Lightning Brothers came one day.

They had big funny heads like a melon, and lightning came out of their heads. This was how they communicated.

They fought each other. They fought for a long time, but no matter how fiercely they fought, neither one managed to hurt the other. This was how you could tell they were brothers.

They came, they fought a lot, they left again.

End of story.

This bloke said that he was very proud of his people because they're the only ones in the world that have had an extraterrestrial visitation like that and didn't make up a heap of religious mumbo jumbo about it.

They just tell you what happened.

Maybe he's right.

Nitmuluk translates as Cicada Gorge.

Most aboriginal peoples have legends about the Lightning Brothers, and some of them are quite fanciful. The park ranger we were speaking to was a descendant of the people that actually witnessed it.

I like his story better than all the others.