lost friends - the Russian Princess

I always thought of Ludmilla as  the Russian Princess, although she probably thought of herself  more as a humble  gardener. We met in Tennant Creek in 1988, in a shade house where we were propagating vegetable seedlings. We were volunteers with a local Aboriginal organisation that helped people return to their  traditional homelands.

Ludi and I and the rest of the our raggle taggle crew went out to remote Aboriginal communities with  our seedlings and set up vegetable gardens. Under the guidance of our intrepid leader. We planted windbreaks and mango trees and installed watering systems. We banged star pickets into the ground, struggled with fencing wire  and hauled things around in the midday sun. Like mad dogs and Englishmen.

The Central Australian sun in a dry and cloudless sky, a dark blue sky,  a dark red earth. I was surprised to learn that the desert sand is fertile, full of minerals. Just needs water. I also discovered out there in that  dreamy empty heat-shimmering land that planting trees feels like one of the few really good, pure  acts. 

Much cleaner than the school-teaching I did in the N.T, which was always an uncomfortable job, trying  to impose a whitefella  template over someone elses culture. 

A big difference was that we had been invited by the communities to come out and do the land management work. As it was called. When you thought about how long Aboriginal people had lived as nomads, it was not surprising that they needed some clues from us on how to live the ‘settled’ existence now imposed on them. 

So we - Ludmilla and I and a couple of German WOOFAs, a French guy, and assorted hippy types from Northern NSW sweated happily in the midday sun. Slept in swags around campfires - nights were cold. We star-gazed and drank billie tea and smoked rollies.

Back in town we cooked up big meals in the wok, and sat around and got stoned. Tennant Creek was a hard, gritty town. The telegraph poles were all metal  because there were no big trees for miles around. And if there had been, the termites would have reduced them to dust. I never cried a single tear in Tennant - it would have felt like wasting water. 

Ludmilla had been growing things for a long time. Her home was in the rainforest in Northern NSW. Her hands held the plants tenderly, firmly . She said a little blessing while patting down the earth around newly planted baby trees.

A year or so later, when we had both left the Territory I visited her in her  secret place of rainforest and waterfalls and clear pools, nestled under a misty  blue escarpment. I was on the run from...oh it’s a long story, but anyway, I found refuge in the forest with Ludmilla for a few weeks.

She and a former partner had been seventies refugees from the city.  They bought their big piece of  land for a song, with a group of friends.  Then hacked away acres of  lantana, gathered recycled timber, old windows, bathtubs, and doorknobs, and cobbled together an airy homemade tree-house and a simple life close to nature. They smoked dope, raised a child, and regenerated the rainforest felled by earlier generations of farmers.

Ludmilla spoke softly, trod lightly, sat reading by candlelight inside a mosquito net. There was no electricity. When I returned to Melbourne after this I was struck by just how huge my ( what we now call) carbon footprint was. So much energy used, keeping warm, staying up late, sloshing around hot water. 

Ludi was in her garden paradise every day and I was her willing apprentice, planting pawpaws, weeding the vegies. She’d been an early convert to permaculture and was old mates with Bill Mollison, who lived nearby. She knew all the gossip, but was discreet.

She  had a teenaged or early twenties son, who I met once or twice. He came and went and seemed a bit lost. She never spoke of his father except to say that he was “no longer in this world” 

Later, she lived in Melbourne for a while, studying ceramics, and earning some money. She worked at a residential facility for people with mental illness, a tough job. I drove from the other side of town to see her. Ludmilla  looked lacklustre and vulnerable in the city, away from her natural habitat. 

We went for a holiday together, to Tasmania, hitchhiking and bushwalking. Cradle Mountain, Lake StClair, camping on freezing cold earth. Warm climate girls, marvelling at the strange Tasmanian plants. She dreamed of one day returning to find her ancestors in Russia. I could picture her in  a tinkling sleigh, in snow. She was a nature - spirit with  the face of a Russian aristocrat.

When did we lose touch? Must be fifteen years ago  or more now. She went back to her Garden of Eden. I continued  my inner city life in Melbourne. I still have a ceramic bowl she gave me, with her name - Ludi - signed on the base