Yara Ma Yha Who: Fairy Tale Flip Ep 19

Interactive Transcript

spk_0 Welcome, welcome to Fairy Tail Flip, the what a month are we in September episode.

spk_0 And we are talking about Yor Mah Yahu.

spk_0 I'm Vanessa Y. Rogers and my co-host is Donna Lee Field and every month we come together

spk_0 to talk about fairy tales and flip them on their heads and understand their underpinnings,

spk_0 understand their historical context and what makes them mean something to our society today.

spk_0 Why have they stuck around for so long?

spk_0 There's a reason that these stories have continuously been told through the generations and that's

spk_0 what we're really getting at today.

spk_0 We're diving into a very out of our comfort level story today and we're going to talk about

spk_0 that a little bit.

spk_0 It's the Yor Mah Yahu, if you've never heard of this story, definitely you're going to want

spk_0 to stick around because this is a fascinating story from the Aboriginal Australia mythology.

spk_0 So you're going to want to hear this.

spk_0 And Donna is going to give us the summary of the story.

spk_0 Yeah, and I love this Vanessa.

spk_0 I love how you're saying that we're going to explore why these stories last so long,

spk_0 especially this one, the Yor Mah Yahu.

spk_0 It's from, it's so cultural, it's so tied to the culture and so what we're going to do in this story

spk_0 and you all can tell us if we do it well or not.

spk_0 We think that we've researched it pretty clearly is show what I'm going to do.

spk_0 I don't think we talk about this Vanessa.

spk_0 I'm going to show how in the European tradition culture is not as tied to the story as in the

spk_0 Aboriginal culture in different ways.

spk_0 I'll say in different ways and we're going to talk about whether you believe that or not,

spk_0 whether you're, you're not.

spk_0 And also we want to say, Vanessa and I both have this experience as we're typing it in

spk_0 research and we both wrote, wrote, aborigines and both of us got our computers saying,

spk_0 no, no, no, you mustn't say that anymore.

spk_0 It's Aboriginal and so apparently the politically correct term is that

spk_0 originals and so we're going to try to be as respectful as possible and if we cross line,

spk_0 we apologize in advance because I've spent the last six, more than six decades saying

spk_0 Aboriginal.

spk_0 Let's talk about the summary of this story and again, it's very hard to get the actual story.

spk_0 You can get the history of it, but the story itself Vanessa finally found and you can find

spk_0 that on her YouTube channel.

spk_0 I have the history of it that I thought was really fun.

spk_0 This is a quick summary.

spk_0 The Yarmaya Hu is a very nasty, nasty, toothless vampire.

spk_0 He looks like a small red man with enormous head and activist like suckers for fingers has no teeth

spk_0 again.

spk_0 It's a toothless vampire that may sound harmless but beware.

spk_0 His gums are deadly.

spk_0 If you ever sit beneath an Australian fig tree, be very careful.

spk_0 The Yarmaya Hu is likely to jump on top of you, suck all your blood out and then

spk_0 eat you.

spk_0 But wait, it gets a little more interesting.

spk_0 As soon as he's eating you, he goes to sleep and then vomit you up again.

spk_0 His victims are miraculously reborn but each time they're a little shorter and a little

spk_0 redder and actually eventually they turn into a Yarmaya Hu themselves.

spk_0 So that is the story.

spk_0 It's a crazy story.

spk_0 Now you are the one who originally found this story.

spk_0 Where did you find it and what drew you to it, Donna?

spk_0 What drew me to it?

spk_0 That's a scary question because I'm not really sure but what I was just looking for

spk_0 in different cultural fairy tales because you know we are I'm so drawn to the northern

spk_0 European tradition.

spk_0 I think you are too but I tried to branch out and I love different cultures and I just found

spk_0 this and there are a lot of different monsters in the Aboriginal mythology but this is one

spk_0 that I just found was kind of interesting.

spk_0 So the more I studied it, the more I thought wow I'm like every going to understand this.

spk_0 So if an asset of I have tried hopefully we're going to succeed.

spk_0 And you know I don't know if you did any Google searches for images but if you look up images

spk_0 they are so widespread.

spk_0 I mean knowing can seem to really like hone in on what this creature is supposed to look like.

spk_0 There are just so many different images of what the Yarmahat, the Yarmaya who looks like.

spk_0 There's descriptions of it but there's different descriptions in different regions

spk_0 and it's just a bizarre looking creature.

spk_0 Yeah it's very bubbly, very bubbly.

spk_0 And so we're going to talk about the story but this is also one thing that I told Vanessa right

spk_0 off the bat.

spk_0 This is kind of out of my comfort zone because what I love doing with Vanessa on this podcast

spk_0 is digging into the story and looking at the details and trying to figure out the symbology

spk_0 of the motifs and the themes and all that sort of thing but it's such a short story

spk_0 that what we needed to do was really dig into the culture behind it and talk about those

spk_0 sort of themes.

spk_0 Right off the bat Vanessa have you ever been to Australia and what do you know about Australia?

spk_0 I was asking you the same question.

spk_0 I have been to Australia and so I want to hear your experience because I've never been.

spk_0 I've met a lot of Australians.

spk_0 I love the Australian cultures that I have come across.

spk_0 A lot of the people that I've come across are very laid back.

spk_0 You know they use lots of fun language and sort of sunglasses.

spk_0 They say sunnies.

spk_0 They have a very at least I met a lot of people while traveling and so a lot of those people were

spk_0 partying quite a bit but I've heard that in Australia there's quite a party culture at

spk_0 least within certain groups of people.

spk_0 The first thing that comes to mind Donna when I think of Australia however is that everything

spk_0 is out to kill you.

spk_0 I used to love to watch all those Discovery Channel episodes and it would be like the dead

spk_0 tin deadlies animals and like seven of the tin deadlies animals came from Australia and it

spk_0 it was it's partially because it's so isolated but there are just so many creatures in Australia

spk_0 that are extremely venomous and extremely dangerous and I think primarily most of those are found

spk_0 in the desert areas because Australia is the driest inhabited continent in the world.

spk_0 I think 50% of Australia receives less than 12 inches of rain per year and they have extreme

spk_0 evaporation rates sometimes higher than the amount of water that they actually receive and so

spk_0 it creates this extreme dryness and so possibly because of that they have

spk_0 really interesting wildlife that just has developed to kill you.

spk_0 I don't know what has your experience been in Australia and what took you there?

spk_0 We're going to go right back to the water idea because that is really fascinating.

spk_0 It's in this mythology and it has to do with Australia also.

spk_0 When I was in my late 20s I decided to hitchhike around the world and you could do this then.

spk_0 I bought a plane ticket around the world and hitchhiked and the second place I went was Australia.

spk_0 The first place was New Zealand and New Zealand they say is kind of a very British atmosphere and

spk_0 Australia is very more free and freewheeling sort of American idea.

spk_0 Then we hitchhiked across the outback into the middle and then south.

spk_0 We didn't go to the western part of Australia but Australia is just what you're saying.

spk_0 It's 45% desert.

spk_0 It's just but it's absolutely gorgeous.

spk_0 I mean red red desert is very unusual but there's not much vegetation.

spk_0 Although the ab originals probably would not agree with me.

spk_0 I mean I grew up in the northeast when we're vegetation is just bountiful and it's a different

spk_0 type of vegetation.

spk_0 So yes they're really venomous creatures in Australia and you need to be very careful.

spk_0 But what I think that these monsters come out of is the very importance of

spk_0 warning children to be careful when they go out by themselves or with their friends because

spk_0 they need to know what's out there.

spk_0 So the stories we both did with this research on different monsters in aboriginal mythology, right?

spk_0 And we have these really scary creatures some hideout in the water, some hideout in trees,

spk_0 some hideout and you know who knows in mountains it's very intentional so that children are warned

spk_0 not to go to these certain areas and I've seen movies on aboriginals and there.

spk_0 I guess what we need to get what I'd like to get into is their they're inextricable connection

spk_0 to the earth because that has to do the story.

spk_0 So tell me if that's where you want to go right now.

spk_0 Yes I just wanted to throw out a few facts because I find it's really interesting.

spk_0 Australia is actually relatively the same size as the continental 48 states of America.

spk_0 So if you put Australia on top of America the 48 states not Australia not Alaska and Hawaii

spk_0 is almost the same exact size but the population is so drastically different because of the

spk_0 the dryness of the the desert. So there's 28 million people in Australia.

spk_0 3% of those are aboriginal people. There's 340 million Americans in the United States and

spk_0 2.0% of our population are native tribes.

spk_0 I thought that was really interesting when you're looking at the landmass and the population

spk_0 is so drastically different. Also another fun fact about Australia is that it was a penal colony.

spk_0 I think most people know about that. That it was colonized by the Dutch

spk_0 originally and then the British just decided to use it as a giant jail system and they just sent

spk_0 a bunch of people there and said here you go. Here's a really dry continent. Have fun.

spk_0 We're just going to send you away. Yeah it wasn't very nice for the aboriginals.

spk_0 No and the other thing that's really important I'm really glad you brought this whole thing up

spk_0 is that the population also is really evenly it's not evenly distributed at all. It's only on the

spk_0 east coast and on the west coast there is some population in the middle but just think of the

spk_0 United States and think about how we are fairly distributed evenly across the United States.

spk_0 But in Australia this is some 60,000, 70,000 years later when we have humans on that

spk_0 island slash continent and really the population is only on the two sides because as you're saying

spk_0 it's very isolated for most of the world. Australia is a very far away and you have to really

spk_0 want to go there if you want to live there. So there are huge farms you know thousands and

spk_0 thousands of acre farms in the middle of the outback but the population are on the two extremes.

spk_0 So what kind of farming do they are they like is it like a ranching farm or are they growing

spk_0 vegetation? Okay so they're positive again. So we were talking about the outback and what's going

spk_0 on in the middle of the outback and you know it's not really nice because it's taking over the

spk_0 aboriginals lands that's basically it and white people. That's where so awfully good at doing

spk_0 we trample on the indigenous lands and so what happened is the British came over and other people

spk_0 came over and started farming camels for instance or now they have cattle and they're doing you

spk_0 know industrial things but for our purposes what they did was they to control over the land where

spk_0 the aboriginals you have a big question. Okay so I had a lot of questions. I was like why are they

spk_0 farming camels? Are they shipping camels across the sea? What do they do? I that was where my brain was.

spk_0 Oh I just saw a documentary on it and I felt so badly because they're taking these beautiful camels

spk_0 who were free and all of a sudden they're you know I have a problem with locking animals up

spk_0 you know the vegan I believe in freedom and and all of a sudden these free camels were now in farms

spk_0 or doing work or whatever anyway that's my story about camels but it's all animals. We don't

spk_0 have to go there but I was going to ask you what what do you in your research of looking into the

spk_0 aboriginal people of Australia what did you find the most striking? My research of the aboriginals

spk_0 I think that there's no way to go past the fact that they believe that the land is alive that

spk_0 it's a living being and so they are stewards of the land and so what they're doing is they're

spk_0 sort of conduit for energy coming down into earth and the earth itself is a living being and all

spk_0 of the plants are part of an expression of this living being and their existence has to do with

spk_0 making her life easier. Their life has not been made easier and so what there's this tremendous

spk_0 angst about not being able to be out on the land and be out there as they want to be and so

spk_0 these stories are before they lost a lot of that freedom these stories are eternal.

spk_0 The aboriginals are thought to be the oldest tribes in the human history even older than a

spk_0 lot of the African tribes and so their religious beliefs their beliefs are about dreaming,

spk_0 dream time about the eternal perspective of life not just this timeline and so I was working on

spk_0 the aboriginals idea of eternity of everything has to do with eternity and for instance European

spk_0 European fairytales which have timelines which has a past, present, and future and so I was going

spk_0 there and the only you tell me this because you're such a master of researching and all different

spk_0 cultures of fairytales the only one that I could really think of that doesn't treat time as

spk_0 linear was more the Irish a time is very is very mystical and you can have people captured by

spk_0 fairies and stay in the past or go into the future and there's sort of a feeling of nebulousness

spk_0 what would you say and I know we didn't talk about that so a little bit on the spot.

spk_0 I did a little bit of research on that topic because that really challenged me to be honest the

spk_0 western timeline is very linear whereas the dream time timeline is called ever win it's vertical

spk_0 or a circular relationship and the events of creation and ancestors and dreaming is always accessible

spk_0 always continuously shaping the when we as westerners generally talk about things we talk about the past

spk_0 we talk about the present we talk about the future but for them is all kind of combined which

spk_0 in actuality if you talk to physics physicists I think that they would probably agree more

spk_0 in line with this concept but it kind of for our mindset it kind of blows our mind and it's hard

spk_0 to picture that it because of the way that we've been raised in our culture and that was something

spk_0 that really challenged me when I was thinking about the Aboriginal culture there were a lot of

spk_0 things that challenged me when thinking about this particular Aboriginal culture but that in particular

spk_0 I find hard to grasp onto I find the line really easy I'm really into time I really like understanding

spk_0 where I am at what time and scheduling my day out specifically my husband is the opposite he's

spk_0 very bad at time I think that's part of being ADHD is you have a harder time because I think your

spk_0 brain just works very differently but I like timelines and so it's hard for me to to picture it

spk_0 in this circular relationship where past and future are happening simultaneously

spk_0 now those are my thoughts no no that's perfect because we are taught it's so societal we are

spk_0 taught that for instance I'm from the East Coast and time is very important time is inflexible when

spk_0 someone tells you that you need to be somewhere 11 o'clock you need to be there at 11 o'clock or

spk_0 you were fending that person then I lived in New Mexico and there's a big Latino and fluency

spk_0 and it's like you know you can be the 11 10 11 15 don't worry about it but I realized one time my

spk_0 sister visited me in New Mexico and I said all right let's we'll meet at 11 o'clock and I was leaving

spk_0 my house at 11 and now all of a sudden I realized oh my god to her that is not acceptable I need to be

spk_0 there when I said I'd be there not you know there's this lead do not and these coasts generally have

spk_0 flexible concept of time but then what we're talking about is the past present future we're not

spk_0 that's not part of our society it's not part of Western society it's more of a control thing

spk_0 teaching you from very very young there is a definite past you're living in the present and you

spk_0 need to think about the future and that's not what you ever do and one of the reasons why this is

spk_0 difficult I'm out of my comfort zone is because I didn't grow up with that and to understand these

spk_0 stories I think it's very important to have a perspective of what creation is according to the

spk_0 Aboriginal this whole idea of eternity yeah and I definitely want to hear all about the research

spk_0 that you did I want to talk a little bit about you touched on their migration but I wanted to talk

spk_0 a little bit more in depth about it because I found that really fascinating so I so evidently

spk_0 homo sapiens have been around for about 300,000 years they've been migrating outside of Africa

spk_0 for about 80,000 years and Australia is one of the very first places that they migrated to so the

spk_0 Aboriginal Australians have effectively been on their inner country as long as modern human

spk_0 populations have been outside of Africa they migrated out into the Middle East and into Asia

spk_0 and in this particular group migrated across land bridges and then on some very short sea crossings

spk_0 and this was back when the earth looked very different than it does today back in the time

spk_0 here that they're migrating Australia Tasmania and New Guinea are all connected as a singular

spk_0 landmass about 10,000 to 12,000 years ago the water started to rise and separated them into their

spk_0 own individual islands and so they became much more isolated genetically and and so that I found

spk_0 extremely interesting that they have one of the oldest populations anywhere so just to give

spk_0 some perspective Native American tribes in the Americas that's north and south started migrating

spk_0 to the Americas 15 to 20,000 years ago and we're and they found evidence that the originals have been

spk_0 there 50 to 70,000 years ago in the Australian Oceania continent so that's extremely different

spk_0 there's tens of thousands of years different in how long they've been there now was another thing

spk_0 that came up for me is the concept of time did this come up for you?

spk_0 Well we're talking about when the Aboriginal first started walking on the planet you mean?

spk_0 Yeah yeah well there's such an old

spk_0 yeah I mean the problem for Americans old is like Ablink and log cabin that's like 200 years old

spk_0 that's old for us but we're talking tens of thousands of years is totally totally different

spk_0 you asked me a question it's a little dangerous because we might get off on a really

spk_0 really sort of eutern tangent because the answer to that is that we are controlled with what

spk_0 we were taught when we're young and we're taught that the Aboriginal for instance

spk_0 Aboriginal have been around for 300 more than 300,000 300,000 doesn't is not a drop in the bucket

spk_0 we are given information so that governments can control us a little more carefully the

spk_0 Aboriginal have been around for millions of years really I mean in my belief what I know what

spk_0 what I believe I should say is that human humanoids have been on the planet for millions and

spk_0 millions of years millions and millions but it's threatening for governments to let us believe

spk_0 that or make that general knowledge because they don't have control over that kind of information

spk_0 so you know when we talk about time again if your the government is really big on time because it's

spk_0 easier to control us if they have an inflexible timeline but the truth is that there's a lot more

spk_0 discrepancy than we might be comfortable thinking about so I would just encourage all of our listeners

spk_0 and you and I both I would encourage us to be a little more flexible about what we believe about

spk_0 what we've been told how's that okay yes okay yeah let's hear that you're the mythology that you've

spk_0 gone into well let's see let's talk about let's see all right let's talk about the outback because

spk_0 what I really wanted what I really saw is the australian outback is absolutely gorgeous and it

spk_0 has to do with their mythology so a lot of their monsters sort of blend into the colors of the outback

spk_0 and that's really interesting because in northern european fairy tales colors are also very important

spk_0 even though we may not even think about it there's brown and there's maybe some yellow and there's

spk_0 white there's always white but black is not a natural color in nature actually and red is not a

spk_0 natural color in in nature in the european and western countries and so if you have black and red

spk_0 in a story you know snow white black is what is it black is her hair and red is is her lips something

spk_0 like that that it's very it's very important it's very it's a very important motif in australia

spk_0 this little monster the yaramahua kuya is red and at first I thought ah red red is really an

spk_0 important color because it's not normal it's not natural and yet australia if you go look at pictures

spk_0 and I was there I can tell you the desert is red it's an unbelievably beautiful color red and so

spk_0 this monster isn't so much out of the norm as much as it's what can I say just be be careful

spk_0 about distinguishing the red of the desert from this little monster sitting in a fig tree how's that

spk_0 you know we have dark forests in northern fairy in northern european fairy tales forest for instance

spk_0 is very important and so there's all different types of trees that are in the forest and when you go

spk_0 through a forest it's a paradigm change for instance in the aboriginal culture we don't there

spk_0 are no forests and so you wouldn't have a monster living in a forest you have a monster sitting in

spk_0 a fig tree which is what the yaramah yaku does so what when I say so for instance vegetation in

spk_0 european stories what do you think of because we're talking about australia being a desert and the

spk_0 vegetation is is very specific what do you think about that your face do they not have forests though

spk_0 do they not have forests along the coastal sides because I was under the impression that the coast had

spk_0 more fig the story that I came across had fig grows so they had large areas of forests that were

spk_0 native to australia so I was reading it at least the one from the south eastern australia was more

spk_0 forested okay really well done because I'm looking now and there are extensive natural forests

spk_0 they're eucalyptus eucalyptus forests covering 131.5 million hectares in in australia and as you

spk_0 said they're more on the coast it's a different type of forest it's a little more open it's not as

spk_0 dark the sun comes through so isn't that canopy that covers the forest as much so again to me it's

spk_0 very different there are some rainforests which do have a very strong canopy but it's only 3% of the

spk_0 whole country and I will say the yaramah yahu is said to stay hang out in fig trees which confused me

spk_0 because the only fig tree that I'm familiar with is bushy it's not really a thick tree but when I

spk_0 was looking up fig trees in australia it's very different looking than the fig tree that I'm

spk_0 familiar with do you have fig trees around where you grew up or where you live you know it's really

spk_0 interesting I'm living on this land with every kind of tree but not fig trees well yeah I'm not

spk_0 seeing someone explain the sacredness of fig trees to the aboriginal people and I can talk about that

spk_0 a little bit more but it had a very thick trunk the fig tree that I have growing in my backyard

spk_0 has like a tiny like it just kind of has like little branches that grow up and then grow up

spk_0 tall but it's nothing that someone could sit into and so I was having a hard time imagining

spk_0 something sitting in a fig tree but it's just a different breed of trees so it's it's very much

spk_0 a much taller tree and much dirtier branches than what I had been picturing in my brain

spk_0 interesting okay so how does that sort of add or detract from the story if you have a more

spk_0 barren fig tree with a red little bubbly monster sitting in it right I was thinking like how can

spk_0 this thing hide in this tree but I will you can I just say that the sacredness of the fig trees

spk_0 is important to the story because it highlights the connection between the people and the natural

spk_0 settings it is considered a natural gathering place so there's a story about having women having

spk_0 their newborns leaning against the trunk of the tree and offering the tree the placenta by

spk_0 bearing it under the roots and placing the tree the baby the newborn baby within the grooves

spk_0 of the fig tree roots to to wash the baby and and there's an ancestral connection because it's

spk_0 believed that these fig trees house spirits that link to the dream time which is part of the

spk_0 aboriginal mythology that we're going to talk about and the tree itself represents resilience

spk_0 and interconnectedness so the fig tree is is not by accident in this story yeah I can't

spk_0 imagine that it is but again what you're describing is another way for the the aboriginals to show

spk_0 the connection to nature and the trees are living spirits and each tree has a spirit it's

spk_0 own spirit living in silence so you're offering the baby to the fig tree as if saying here's

spk_0 another steward for you we are we are inextricably connected to you and we were you know we honor you

spk_0 we are here for you and so here's another new baby for you that will take care of you

spk_0 and so all I can you know all that comes up for me is that because they need to be very diligent

spk_0 about what's going on above them below them to the left and to right of them they need to

spk_0 create this little monster sitting in a fig tree to make sure that you know a venomous snake is

spk_0 not up there about to fall on them which could very well happen for a spider friends yeah yeah

spk_0 so I wanted to talk about the water a little bit because one of these one of the elements of the

spk_0 story is if the maria who gets a little impatient about falling a victim it will go to the tribes and

spk_0 drink all the water out of the well and I thought that was kind of interesting because it's very

spk_0 specific in Australia living in a desert water is survival so water is very literal in this story

spk_0 I don't know if I I love making things into deeper meaning and in this case I can just say that

spk_0 it's very literal whereas again in European fairy tales water has many different meetings is water

spk_0 is more abundant is more abundant in the United States more abundant in Europe and so it's not

spk_0 necessarily as a motif for survival water in European fairy tales can be for instance to purify

spk_0 there was a there's an illustrator that you and I know very well Gustave Dore will

spk_0 illustrate a lot of pro stories and for him water represents feminine purity and also pain

spk_0 and if we go to the Greek myth with narcissists water is a mirror and it can represent truth or can

spk_0 represent what you want it to say you know it could also be a portal to something else so I thought

spk_0 that was really interesting again getting to my comfort zone of playing with one one motif in

spk_0 the story of water and how different it is in different cultures so did you come up with that?

spk_0 It also made me think yeah it made me think of I didn't think about water in that way but there's

spk_0 a story that I read to my kids and the it's the old woman who made rice dumplings and it's this

spk_0 little Japanese folktale where this woman is escaping from Onis at the end they're just like

spk_0 these giant monsters and in order to stop her from escaping on a boat they drink up all of the water

spk_0 just like the Yama Yahu so I feel like this is a setting that is seen throughout different folktales

spk_0 where creatures will drink up all of the water to prevent someone from escaping in that version

spk_0 that you were talking about where the the Yama Yahu will drink up all the nearby wells and the

spk_0 watering holes it's in order to make the human go to the tree to drink up the tree sap so that they

spk_0 will more likely be re-attacked by the Yama Yahu. Ah nice detail you found there okay sort of you

spk_0 seducing them into it's it's a it's a place of criminal activity yeah yeah it's forcing them

spk_0 towards the trees again all right and so what did you get about blood because this is also first

spk_0 the Yama Yahu will suck all the blood out of its victim and then set the person into it and it's

spk_0 to it's a very being and then regurgitate it all so it's it can walk around but what did you

spk_0 do? How did blood be so interesting? So when I initially think about blood my initial reaction is

spk_0 bad right we think about blood being on the ground if one of my children is bleeding

spk_0 bad right if a vampire is sucking your blood bad but really blood is so crucial it's our life

spk_0 force it's it represents vitality and when we don't have blood that's bad right and so it's

spk_0 it's interesting that my initial my initial reaction is blood bad but really it's the draining of

spk_0 blood the lack of blood is really what I am having that reaction to and the the Yama Yahu

spk_0 instead of being a vampire like we think in European fairy tales or not fairy tales folk folklore

spk_0 the vampires use fangs right and then they they suck up the blood using the mouth instead the

spk_0 Yama Yahu has suckers and so these suckers have yeah no teeth they have suckers on their hands

spk_0 and their feet and they can cut into the flesh and then from their hands and feet they suck

spk_0 up the blood but they leave just enough to keep the person alive so that they can run away and be

spk_0 swallowed by the version that I found and told my youtube channel is the queen comes and she

spk_0 swallows the person whole after the colony has already drained a lot of the blood and then she's

spk_0 the one who's regurgitating him back out by the water but I think that the similarity between

spk_0 the European vampire and the Yama Yahu is interesting because both victims can be transformed

spk_0 into the same creature that attacks them to initially right because when a vampire can turn

spk_0 its prey into a vampire by performing specific rituals to turn it into a vampire the same is true

spk_0 for the Yama Yahu if you were swallowed enough times and attacked enough times you turn into the

spk_0 predatory creature that you were initially afraid of and so it really is this representation of

spk_0 respecting spiritual and social rules in in Europe it's more about this religious symbolism

spk_0 and gothic horror whereas in the aboriginal tribes it has more to do with the being respectful of

spk_0 the land around you and what is out there to be afraid of interesting all right and there's also one

spk_0 of I didn't I never read anything about the queen and the colony sucking the blood out I was always

spk_0 just one little bubbly red man but there's also one other part of it and it's that once he

spk_0 sucks on blood and regurgitates the victim then the Yama Yahu will walk away and if the person

spk_0 who has been regurgitated moves and jump back on them and and eat them again but if the person learns

spk_0 to play dead and not move then the Yama Yahu walks further away but it's a long process it walks

spk_0 further away and then it spends a half a day looking at the victim and walked a little further spend

spk_0 another half a day and to me all that means is that it's to teach the children about discipline

spk_0 being really careful about what animals are seen by them because they need to be

spk_0 stone still and so they won't be a victim that's what I got yeah that's really interesting so I

spk_0 I found something else on that because there's this really there's this variation that I came across

spk_0 that is not found in all of them and this variation is about the Yama Yahu not doing its ritual

spk_0 of checking on its victim just right so there's this pacing away and returning and poking with

spk_0 the stick and tickling under the arms that the Yama Yahu is supposed to perform exactly as

spk_0 prescribed and if it doesn't the fig tree will mumble into its ear mysteriously some sort of secret

spk_0 message and it transforms the Yama Yahu into a glowing luminous mushroom that is sticks to the

spk_0 fig tree and that that is a form of spiritual repatriation or not performing the ritual as it's

spk_0 intended to go which that's the first I had seen that and I thought that was really interesting and

spk_0 it was really representational of how important ritual is to the aboriginal people and that was

spk_0 something that challenged me as well did you come across the importance of ritual and that when

spk_0 you were looking into the aboriginal teacher yeah I mean that's just an integral part of them the

spk_0 ritual is fundamental to their belief system in their lives so even those those aboriginalists

spk_0 that were captured hit kidnapped as young children and brought into western societies still follow

spk_0 the rituals and and if you want to go so far as that they were still able to telepathically

spk_0 communicate with their elders they were still taught as much as they needed to know so that when

spk_0 they finally were freed some of them were they could go back to the outback and continue the rituals

spk_0 is that some of the things you found so I kind of looked into the importance of ritual because when

spk_0 I think of ritual I was trying to think like of what ritual is important for me and I did like a

spk_0 quick search for like western ritual and there's this huge difference between the western as a

spk_0 symbol or tradition not as a process that literally has to be maintained to maintain the world's

spk_0 order or personal well-being but in aboriginal society it's very spiritually oriented and every day

spk_0 life log land kinship community it's all infused with this spiritual meaning and the ritual is

spk_0 the means by which the people actively participate in and sustain that order and so while in the

spk_0 western world we come part mentalized ritual and we see it as optional even people who are

spk_0 of a religious nature who go to church regularly you know the catholic church specifically is

spk_0 extremely ritual oriented it's not a requirement there's a lot of ritual in the catholic church but if

spk_0 you don't perform it there's nothing really that's going to occur that is bad that happens to you but

spk_0 in aboriginal society it is very important that these rituals are maintained for their social order

spk_0 for their ecological balance and their spiritual law and for me and I was kind of thinking about

spk_0 that and for me I'm not a person who really likes a lot of structure I like Lucy Goosey structure

spk_0 so ritual for me would be really hard yeah I love that you said the ritual has to do with the

spk_0 practice not necessarily the belief system and I think that's true although I think that one of

spk_0 the problems we have in the United States and again this may be controversial is that we don't

spk_0 have enough rituals or that the rituals are spiritual necessarily I mean we can have a ritual

spk_0 of going to Chinese food every Sunday that's a ritual you know our family likes to go to Chinese food

spk_0 every Sunday or ritual is sitting down and watching TV with the bowl of popcorn that's a ritual

spk_0 you know it's not necessarily a belief system and I think that we had more sort of dates rituals

spk_0 based on spiritual beliefs we'd be a happier community or a happier population and I think that

spk_0 we have become a very superficial culture if we ever were deep if we ever were but I think it's

spk_0 becoming individual so for instance meditation is ritual for me now I meditate twice a day and

spk_0 that becomes a ritual now it's challenging because I did not grow up that way and that's not part

spk_0 of the Western society to make meditation a part of your daily life but so for me it's more in the

spk_0 Aboriginal perspective that that is absolutely fundamental practice meditation am I being kind of clear

spk_0 so yeah you know superficial medit rituals and deep-seated rituals and I think that we both are

spk_0 seeing is that the aboriginals have deep-seated belief system in the rituals and they're trying to

spk_0 teach their children the importance of continuing the practice of those rituals I agree yeah yeah

spk_0 and there's just one other thing Vanessa I wanted to just go back very briefly just very

spk_0 briefly to the whole blood topic in the story where the Yama Yahoo success the blood and I

spk_0 maybe you know this there's a story I read when I was young I do not know what it was and I wish

spk_0 I remembered where there was some character who was who was isolated out in the desert and he

spk_0 explained that he he drained some of the blood from his wrists and heated it over a fire and

spk_0 drank heated blood and that's what kept him alive so it's not it doesn't his own blood his own blood

spk_0 he's own blood he didn't have water he didn't have food he kept alive by drinking his own blood

spk_0 which I found fascinating it just brings and he boiled it he boiled it for some reason if I

spk_0 knew which story it was I could remember why he boiled it that's crazy that's a really interesting

spk_0 story so another blood is important many different levels I wanted to talk a little bit about

spk_0 the thoughts some there's some theories two main theories about the origin of the story I've

spk_0 mentioned I think when we were talking about the Persephone and Hades story about mythic memory or

spk_0 folk memory and I use the Noah's Ark example as a time you know Noah's Ark is a story that's

spk_0 in the Old Testament but it's not just found in the Old Testament it's found in stories and cultures

spk_0 all over the world which indicates to a lot of people the Old Testament has the story of Noah's

spk_0 Ark but it's found the story of an epic flood is found in stories across cultures and so it's

spk_0 thought that this is a story that it holds meaning it's based on a natural phenomena or a true

spk_0 event a Trojan War is an example that I recently found as well it's found in Homer's Iliad of this

spk_0 10-year epic saga and for centuries people thought it was just a story but they've recently archaeologists

spk_0 recently found in excavations that there is some geographical descriptions of Troy that match

spk_0 a some findings that they found in Turk in modern day Turkey to indicate that this the city of Troy

spk_0 might have actually existed and so all of that to say is that there's two main theories of what

spk_0 the Yaramaya who might be based upon because there's no actual creature that

spk_0 scientists or anyone has currently seen with their eyes that is alive that matched those

spk_0 the description did you come across anything like that or how many dots

spk_0 no no I mean of all the mythological figures figures that are associated with Aboriginal

spk_0 mythology no scientist has ever seen any of them I mean some of them right they might have seen an

spk_0 animal that have been like abnormal but nothing like the actual mythology yeah so the two main

spk_0 theories that exist is one is melee settlers so people from Malaysia came with their stories of

spk_0 the Tarziar this is a creature that you probably are not very familiar with they have like giant

spk_0 eyes they're really tiny they have suckers on their hands they're carnivorous they're purely

spk_0 carnivorous they jump out of fig trees and they jump onto people out of fig trees they don't I don't

spk_0 think they actually intend to attack people but they have jumped onto people and so it's very scary

spk_0 Yoda is actually based off of this actual animal they have um and so they can jump sometimes over

spk_0 five meters and so there's some people who believe that the melee settlers stories of this creature

spk_0 mixed with the original story of the Yarmaya who to kind of make it what it is in modern day

spk_0 and in the second theory is this extinct Australian lion called the Thile,

spk_0 Cello, Carnivix it's an Australian marsupial lion and it's a carnivorous marsupial that lived

spk_0 46,000 years ago and it would drop on its victims from fig trees and it was a very formidable

spk_0 powerful tree dwelling creature that would be have been very frightening but neither one of these

spk_0 are reptilian and we in the Yarmaya who story is described as a frog like although there are some

spk_0 versions where there is hair on the creature so there it's more ape-like maybe no no I love it

spk_0 because and I'd love our listeners to really look at these the images of these animals because

spk_0 there's some that are real as you're saying and their bizarre they're bizarre looking because

spk_0 they're so different from what we're used to and the northern hemisphere and so the

spk_0 aboriginals have a lot of time we're sitting around the fire to make a lot of stories about

spk_0 these unusual characteristics I do want to touch on one other part of this is religious beliefs and

spk_0 I don't think that the aboriginals we can call their beliefs religious because religion has

spk_0 oh maybe you can depending on what your definition of religion is when I say religion I think of

spk_0 church and temple and and a structure and dogma you were talking about practice the practice the

spk_0 ritual I say dogma which says a little bit of a negative connotation but their stories are infused

spk_0 with their beliefs and we can say they're infused with their religious beliefs if you want to use

spk_0 that word or not and European stories are a little bit different I think it's more societal I think

spk_0 it's a little more about magic I think it's more about wishes and dreams and I'm interested to

spk_0 hearing if you agree with this Hans Christian Anderson had a lot of religious motifs in his stories

spk_0 and actually I sometimes find it a little uncomfortable because I love the story I love the plot

spk_0 I'm not that comfortable with the Christian motifs and but it's not completely common in all

spk_0 northern European fairy tales so what do you think about using religious motifs and stories how do

spk_0 you think it adds and may subtract from the effect of the story I think a lot of these stories are

spk_0 intended to provide structure and provide an understanding of the wider world and I think that

spk_0 that this story does just that right it it's told to children to keep them out of areas that will

spk_0 definitely provide harm to them right there's lots of dangerous things in Australia that will hurt you

spk_0 in in any wilderness area right there are lots of things that can hurt you when you leave the

spk_0 comfort of your community and so wandering alone is always in almost all of these stories across the

spk_0 board across cultures almost always warn individuals against wandering alone wandering away from the

spk_0 the culture straying off of the path and so this story in particular is used to help to keep

spk_0 its children safe we talked about La Yorona several episodes back and how it's told today to children

spk_0 is a very frightening story right it's but it's told to children to keep them away from water to keep

spk_0 them from accidentally falling into water and drowning because if you're afraid of the weeping woman

spk_0 who might grab you from the water you're less likely to just go into the water on your own without

spk_0 an adult right and so these stories are intended to help set guidelines and this one is very much

spk_0 within those lines I agree with almost everything you're saying and I love how you put it and also

spk_0 love me saying don't stray off the path because it's so important and fairy tales and again it's

spk_0 about controls don't stray off the path do what the rest of the society is doing which is what most

spk_0 fairy tales are trying to teach you what is what is acceptable in different societies in different

spk_0 nor the norms of different societies but I've studied and sort of seen different perspectives of

spk_0 Northern European fairy tales so much that I see empowerment in going in by yourself so think of

spk_0 the donkey skin where the princess left place her castle her home her father where it should have been

spk_0 her her safe place to be and it was not it was a terrifying place to be and she went off alone and

spk_0 she found her her inner strength if you think of red riding hood she finds a wolf that eats her

spk_0 her own mother but you know if you look at it from the female from the feminine perspective she

spk_0 was a pretty kind of she was a strong woman she was a strong little girl and I could go through each

spk_0 of them so I guess we need to hold in a balance what the fairy tales are saying to be practical and

spk_0 safe and the other one is find your inner being and find your inner strength especially if you're

spk_0 female in a scoring believe in yourself if you're in your Australia and you're under a fig tree

spk_0 be careful but you know if you want to wander off for yourself and you have to be female you

spk_0 have as good a chance as a man wandering off by yourself that's what I have to say about that yeah

spk_0 and did you want to talk a little bit about the Aboriginal like dreaming or the dream time

spk_0 I know that you were saying that you had done some research on it I've done a little bit of research

spk_0 but it's one of those things if you'd like to talk about I really would I've encouraged you to do so

spk_0 I have not even if I researched it for a month it would not do it justice if I did it for a year maybe

spk_0 I could do it justice and so I don't want to rely any of their belief systems so why don't you tell us

spk_0 what we can find if we go online and find out what dream time is yeah it's it's basically their

spk_0 origin story of how the world came into being and as you were saying before it's

spk_0 it is encompassed by everyone eternal time concept and so basically the idea is that the supreme

spk_0 creators from the dreaming are responsible for creating the land and the people and the laws

spk_0 and the culture and then once they finished creating the world in which we currently live in

spk_0 they imbued the land and the landscape and the trees and the mountains and on the animals

spk_0 with their life force their beings and so that is strikingly different than the Christian viewpoint

spk_0 of this omnipresent omnipotent god who created it from far away and then is from up high looking down

spk_0 whereas the aboriginals see divinity in spirituality in the land and for me that was a really striking

spk_0 point in in the mythology because the Christian dogma especially there's more conservative ones

spk_0 that have this idea in which humans are intended to be dominant over nature it's intended to be

spk_0 tamed and controlled and one of the stories that came up for me while I was thinking about this was

spk_0 Walt Whitman has some poetry that he was writing in the 1850s and a lot of the people who were coming

spk_0 over are very fearful of the woods and of you know the natural order and they're trying to tame it

spk_0 and he's saying no we need to be respectful of nature we we can live in harmony we need to be

spk_0 see it as a spiritual democracy basically and it's very contrast to this Christian philosophy of

spk_0 taking control of nature and making it exploiting it and taking everything of value from it

spk_0 so that we can use it for utility purposes and um anyway so I that was striking for me

spk_0 no and I love the brought up Walt Whitman because he had he was very very deeply spiritual most of us

spk_0 don't know that about him and I studied his poetry because I was a poetry major in college

spk_0 and it never comes up I mean it doesn't come up how he was misstep he was a misstep and so

spk_0 in deep spiritual beliefs if you go into some of the poetry that is not so well known he's very

spk_0 prolific about his um deeper beliefs so yes he saw the land and probably much of the same way

spk_0 the aboriginal said that it's a living being and we don't need to be fearful of it we need to

spk_0 respect it and understand it as much as possible and that's not what we do I mean especially when he

spk_0 was here he's just taking control over it yeah yeah and and you know putting myself into the mindset

spk_0 of the pilgrims I can understand that fear right I can understand why they would be scared

spk_0 of the natural world because there's a lot of things that are dangerous in the natural world

spk_0 so I have a respect for both viewpoints because wandering into the woods there are lots of things

spk_0 that can hurt you so you can have a love and a respect for them at the same time just like

spk_0 when you're approaching any wild animal you can be respect you can love it from a distance

spk_0 and have respect for it but not necessarily go up and pet it right because it will probably

spk_0 bite your hand off or attack you um so I I try and remember that they're coming into this world

spk_0 that is so drastically different from what they are they know and they've experienced and so

spk_0 I see where they would have this deep grain fear right and I just say you know then be educated

spk_0 and talk to the indigenous people and find out what they know about it but

spk_0 let's I'm wondering if there are any other details you want to talk about the story because otherwise

spk_0 I'd love to wrap this up and talk about what now that we've could we've talked about this what

spk_0 your highlights of our conversation has been yeah highlights what are your highlights

spk_0 what are your highlights yeah no no go ahead put me on the spot it's good because I just did it

spk_0 and I think that I've been sucked into a different it comes such a different culture that it's

spk_0 definitely pushed me off of out of my comfort zone and I got angry I got angry about it and I got

spk_0 a little nervous about it and then when I just finally realized what I could do was when we learned

spk_0 something new a fact is that we learn it we learn it and assimilate it much more easily when we hold

spk_0 it next to something we already know that's a fact yeah when you learn a language you learn a

spk_0 language by learning the same word and in the language you're comfortable with etc etc and so

spk_0 when you're learning new concept you wrap it around something you already know and then twist it

spk_0 into something new so basically what I've done with this and with your you know with your

spk_0 cooperation is take this story that made me a little bit uncomfortable more than a little

spk_0 because it had to do with such a vibrant intensely spiritual culture and

spk_0 make ties to what I'm more familiar with western european societies and cultures and find

spk_0 new respect for both how's that yeah I I had I didn't have the anger that you were describing

spk_0 but I didn't really had discomfort because there were a lot of elements the Aboriginal culture

spk_0 that really threw me really were so drastically different than elements that I am familiar with

spk_0 so for instance the fact that they had no written language kind of threw me I you know they the

spk_0 Australia was discovered by the Europeans the Dutch travelers in the 1700s and the Aboriginal

spk_0 society had been there for tens of thousands of years in in Australia and they were they have

spk_0 tons of traditional knowledge and lots and lots of rich culture in their storytelling and their

spk_0 music and all sorts of elements but they have no written they have no writing system and so I had

spk_0 to kind of back my brain up in my bias against cultures and communities that don't develop a writing

spk_0 system because that's so ingrained in our society you know we you know it's so important for us to

spk_0 be able to teach our children how to read and to write because that's how we pass on our story we

spk_0 think about the Viking culture didn't really have much of a writing system the Inca empire the

spk_0 Mesoamerican cultures they didn't have writing systems like we do like with an alphabet but they had

spk_0 large populations and complex governments without that written language and so

spk_0 their society was not lesser than ours just because they didn't have a written form it's just

spk_0 but it's so hard to conceptualize a society that bases its entire traditions and knowledge and

spk_0 stories in oral transmission that's something that I really struggled with because when we were

spk_0 talking about sleeping beauty last time we could see how the story transformed throughout all of

spk_0 the different writings but we don't have this we don't have that in this Yarmaya Housh story because

spk_0 it's based off of like very small gatherings of stories of of a few elders right and I would just

spk_0 say that again you're accepting the fact that a culture can be pretty sophisticated even without

spk_0 writing and there's a lot more in the Aboriginal culture that we don't know that they're hints of

spk_0 for instance with the Aboriginal's if they talk about directions they don't say right left

spk_0 straight or backwards they say north-south-eastern-west and so but this is so ingrained in them

spk_0 that anytime you take an Aboriginal out of Australia and ask them which way to go they will know

spk_0 exactly where north-south-eastern-west is it's just in in-nate it's a nate and they're being so

spk_0 they're not using their fingers to write things down they're tuning into the rhythm the vibration

spk_0 of the earth itself and so instead of focusing on writing down words they're focusing on penetrating

spk_0 those vibrations and again being stewards to protect the earth as much as is possible and being

spk_0 part of the cosmic multiverse it's so it's so different than how we were brought up and now I find

spk_0 it fast it is very different so it's hard to rewire our brain to think of it and you know we

spk_0 can't really think of it in terms that they think of it as but we can like you were saying try and

spk_0 conceptualize it to the best of our ability by attaching it to things that we're familiar with

spk_0 that's right so I think we have done pretty well for this topic two people who did not

spk_0 open up Australia and are not Aboriginal we've been incredibly respectful because we both

spk_0 respect enormously this this culture and we probably would love to know more about it and so

spk_0 I'm really glad that we got to share this with our listeners and next week we're next month

spk_0 we're going back to a northern European story I think yes and I would like because it's October

spk_0 I would like to ask to do find a creepy story of sorts maybe a ghost story we'll we've done

spk_0 La Yarona for and then we also did the fairy the girl who danced with fairies I think there's

spk_0 were our October picks in the past so I think that's how we got into Yama Yahu I think that's how

spk_0 I found it gory monsters oh really it's supposed to be October of 2024 and so a year later we're

spk_0 doing it now you ask you ask me how I found it that's maybe okay well maybe we'll find the

spk_0 original list of stories that we were looking at for that October okay perfect all right close us

spk_0 up how you do it so well Vanessa thanks so much for listening if you know more about this Yama Yahu

spk_0 story if you have thoughts that came to you while you were thinking or challenges that you came

spk_0 across when trying to re-wire your brain into conceptualizing the aboriginal culture or this particular

spk_0 story we would love to hear from you keep the fairy tail alive and until next time

spk_0 bye everyone thank you

spk_0 you

Yara Ma Yha Who: Fairy Tale Flip Ep 19

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