The power of sport to draw people of different ages, interests and cultures together and touch a common spirit was in abundant evidence in the Western Desert recently.

You could see it in everyone’s eyes.
The brilliance and sparkle that equally lights up like beacons the deep dark or powder blue eyes of men, women and children when they’re having fun, feeling good, and parking their cares for another day. There was fun everywhere. These were Very Good Days. The first weekend-long Parnngurr (Cotton Creek) Sports Carnival was on, and everyone had come to play. Some of them, a fair distance - the small community of Parnngurr is located about 650km east of Port Hedland. Young, teenage and adolescent girls and boys and their families from Punmu and Parnngurr joined together in playing or watching football or softball games, little athletics, or handball competitions, or the creative face-painting work of Natasha Wood, or following the amazing antics of Andy the Clown, or dancing to the live local rock band, or performing traditional corroborees.

There was much interest and support for the carnival from many quarters: The Department of Sport and Recreation’s Coordinator of Indigenous Sports, Clem Rodney, brought with him former Fremantle Docker and Saint Kilda AFL player Gavin Mitchell, and twin-Olympic Gold Medal hockey player Liane Tooth. They all helped out with umpiring the sports and giving impromptu coaching clinics. Pilbara TAFE Lecturer Janelle Cockayne, and two of her trainees undertaking a Hospitality course at the South Hedland campus, travelled hundreds of kilometres and worked tirelessly in preparing and serving quality food for hundreds of hungry tummies throughout the weekend.

The West Australian reporter Griffin Longley and photographer Astrid Volzke captured the event for the wider world to see (the results of their work were featured in The West on Saturday July 22). And, all the while, working often at feverish pace, but with little fuss, to ensure the massive logistics of the exercise were taken care of leading up to and during the weekend, was Community Relations Superintendent Leon van Erp and his non-stop assistant, Colin Tincknell. They, too, can be well pleased with their endeavours. For those working, playing, chasing, and watching - for everyone - the days were long, and the nights longer than normal. But, it seemed to everyone, the exhaustion was overwhelmed by a sense of satisfaction in having been a participant, and playing a part, in a thoroughly good example of what good men and women can do for each other.