ABOUT 500 women stripped for a sacred dance on Sunday to try to bring rain
to the drought-ravaged Mallee.
Naked, topless or clad in candy-pink sarongs, a sea of female flesh
gathered in Ouyen to summon the clouds.
But according to the weather bureau, Sunday's patchy rain - and even some
snow - across the state was not enough to break the drought.
About 12mm of snow fell at Mt Buller and 27mm of rain in some parts of
Melbourne but our water supplies continue to fall.
The women were fired up for the rain dance, which began about 11.30am at a
secret location outside Ouyen.
"Take your bras off, girls and hang them from out the window," yelled one
dancer as 14 packed buses did a lap of honour of the Ouyen trotting track
before being escorted by police to the ceremony site.
The women giggled and whooped like 12-year-olds at a pyjama party. They had
come from all across Victoria - and some from South Australia and New South
Wales.
Entertainer Denise Drysdale was among the dancers and female reporters were
allowed -- as long as they disrobed. They were asked to keep certain
aspects of the ceremony secret because it was a women-only rite.
The buses arrived at the property of Norma Gniel, where members of the
Spirits of Earth Medicine Society had made a sacred stone circle, called a
medicine wheel, on the ground.
Women undressed in the buses and in the large tractor sheds that formed a
protective perimeter around the circle.
The crowd assembled around the medicine wheel clacking bamboo sticks as 40
dancers spiralled within the sacred circle.
Ceremony leader Deborah Pezet said the women had showed spirit.
"This is the biggest ceremony I've been in," Ms Pezet said.
Ouyen sheep and wheat farmer Helen McKay said she had had "a wonderful time".
"I've never done anything like this before. Not in public anyway," she said.
Despite scattered rain at the weekend, Victoria's reservoirs are only 48
per cent full.
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