In Australia they have a term, “walkabout,” which at present means to take a short, occasional interruption from regular work. The term originated with the Aborigines and was the word applied to a rite of passage in which adolescent males went into the wilderness for as long as six months. On this spiritual journey-of-discovery, the young men would trace their ancestors’ pathways of life, called songlines. The young teens would reenact many of the heroic deeds attributed to these precursors. Continued to this day, the walkabout is misunderstood by the white employers who saw it as an “aboriginal thing” in which suddenly without notice, a young man would disappear, reappearing just as suddenly weeks later. To the Aboriginal youth, it was an important spiritual matter for which his employer, from his lack of understanding, would not grant a leave of absence, so they just left when the need came upon them.
