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on the novel, then by mixing with all these brilliant Aboriginal people I hadall of these characters and I started re-writing Wild Cat Falling. Naturallyit's changed now but what would have happened if an Aboriginal had shota policeman like he had, he would end up in gaol for so many years, sonaturally I didn't end up in gaol for so many years, so this is not allautobiographical, but bits and pieces are like say the treatment I received atClontarf.Q At or about the time of Wild Cat Falling, you accepted the Buddhismphilosophy as your own, to the extent of spending seven years in India, andbecame a monk. How have your beliefs contributed to Colin Johnson, thewriter, the man, and the Aboriginal?MN Well I regard Buddhism, as I have said before, as the sort of backbone ofmy personality, of my life, and so it is of the utmost importance to me. Thisis one of the reasons why I went to India and South East Asia, to understandthe real Buddhism and then again, Buddhism preaches a great degree oftolerance towards every other faith and so I accept this, but it does not teachyou to accept intolerance.Q Does being a Buddhist conflict in any way with your traditional Aboriginalbeliefs and Aboriginal culture.MN Well, the area around Perth we know as Rainbow Serpent Country, or WoggleCountry, and Buddhism comes over the top of any indigenous belief so itdoesn't interfere, it's a way of salvation or a WErj of life and it does not interferewith any indigenous belief at all, so there is no conflict.Q During your seven years in India how and where did you live?MN Well I lived in Calcutta and then from Calcutta I went to Darjeeling andI had a Tibetan teacher just outside Darjeeling - Caliru Potchei and I spentsome time there and then I went across to Dare Salaam and Dalhousie onthe other side of the Himalayas where as you know Darjeeling is the easternside of the Himalayas and the western side is Dalhousie and also Dare Salaamwhere the Dalai Llama has his government in exile. So I spent some timethere and in my last year in India I was at Sirriup where Buddha preachedhis first sermon and that was next to Banaris.Q Could you give us any insight of the life in a Buddhist monastery in India?MN Well, being a Buddhist Monk is not that strict. It relies on yourself, and youcan make that as strict as you want to or as loose as you want to. But itdoes give you opportunity to live a Buddhist life like a monk, so you canunderstand that aspect of Buddhism, and then you have time to study andtime to meditate, and these things are very important in Buddhism. So youlearn all these things and then by begging in the streets, you understand youhave reliance on other people, that you are not really separated from society,but you have to rely on society to support you and so you can't really doanything wrong because you are becoming a hypocrite, seeing that you arenot repaying society in the proper way.QWhat were some of the problems you had to confront in India, particularlyin relation to the change of life style, cultural values and social structure?MN The one thing about India and that of the position of an Aboriginal inAustralia is really not that much difference in life style. That if you were bornan Aboriginal in Australia at that time, in the I 960s, and went to a placelike India, the sort of level of poverty was more or less similar and againbeing institutionalised in Clontarf and Freo and so on and learning how tofit into such places, there wasn't that much cultural shock and so it was veryeasy. One thing about Indian Society too is that they are segregated into castesand subcastes and so on, so for a person to enter Indian society it is veryWESTERLY, No.2, JUNE, 1989 85