For Nyoongar people in the south-west of Western Australia, it begins when the Earth is flat.

It doesn’t have any features and is in total darkness.

The sky is a dark mass that sits on the ground.

There is no wind.

This time becomes known as nyetting — when it was freezing cold.

The first animal, plant and human spirits wander in the dim light.

They have to decide who will be the carers of everything.

Humans are chosen.

A spirit woman walks across the land and as she walks she collects spirit children that had been placed in the landscape.

She puts them in her Djoondal-Djoomba, or long bright shimmering hair.

The spirit woman is then lifted into the sky and turns into the milky way.

She makes a karla (fire), gathering the children around it.

She decides she’ll send them back to Earth because they have won the right to be the carers of everything.

When the spirit children reach the Earth they transform into spirit adults.

They dream their language.

Their language is in the land and always returns to the land through ceremony when they die.

They also dream there will be six seasons, and that during each season there will be six basic diets.

The people are now ready to adopt their sole purpose of being — to care for everything.