PNG- News # 13 (April 26, 2004 ) Brother Pat, the elder and mediator who worked in the Bougainville crisis, told me about a man who wanted to train with him. “But you are known in the community to beat your wife,” suggested Brother Pat. His answer: “She is not my wife, she is my girlfriend." Domestic violence and rape are rampant throughout the country -it’s out of control. In fact, all women are encouraged to wear black every Thursday to indicate our stand on violence against women. The power of the community of men is so strong that it just [View Full Entry]

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PNG- News # 12 (April 7, 2004) Have you ever woken up in a beautiful lodge in the mountains in a foreign tropical rainforest, with large cinnamon trees and found that you were surrounded by people half your age? And you wonder to yourself, why do I feel so culturally maladjusted? That was Saturday. By dinnertime I felt myself up until I ate the turtle egg. Soft boiled the eggshell felt like a soft ping pong ball and tasted like it had dry specs of shell already formed! I do not recommend the diet here of kaukau mixed with a [View Full Entry]

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PNG News #11: Bougainville Crisis explained Some of the instructors that I work with blame the current failing economy on the Bougainville crisis. Both the closing of the profitable foreign owned copper mine and the national funds required to help establish law and order have cost the country dearly. Bougainville people are distinctive looking. Many consider other Papua New Guineans brown skinned not black like themselves and would like to establish an independent nation. Some of my colleagues believe that this will lead to other provinces wanting the same and the dissolution of the n [View Full Entry]

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PNG - News #10 - Melting ice cubes (February 17, 2004) How long does it take for my ice cubes to melt? Less time than it takes to play two hands of bridge. And that is after the sun has set. Yes, I have finally found four other whites to play bridge: A New Zealander who has us each take back our card and position it as a winning trick= vertical or losing= horizontal A cautious Australian who once startled out of her conservatism can really play the game. A Polish woman who was playing within 20 minutes of being shown. [View Full Entry]

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PNG News #9: Papua New Guinea- The Land of the Unexpected (January 26, 2004) For the same reason that Sheryl (a church volunteer and the president’s secretary) was advised not to give strands of her hair to a fellow soccer player, new students to the university don’t want to give you their names. If you don’t know my name, it means you don’t know me, and therefore you could cause harm to me. If someone has Sheryl’s hair, they could put a spell on her and again cause her harm. Imagine me a foreigner walking around with a bold name tag: [View Full Entry]

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PNG - News #8: Snakes and Ladders In this life of snakes and ladders I am definitely on a ladder. LADDERS Last Monday night I went by boat with the Hash Harriers* to Kranket bearing candy for the island children’s Xmas. The island is a community of thatched sago huts on stilts with a circle of outhouses in the sea as there is no water. The perfectly groomed lawns, and never ending numbers of children that made it seem like a suburb. I will go back to Kranket Island for a New Years Eve party. Tuesday was a bike ride to [View Full Entry]

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PNG News #7 - Democracy As you read my news, especially this email, dear reader, please remember that the name Papua New Guinea and the unification of the nation is a colonial construct. I can’t get PNG’S interpretation of democracy out of my head. Some contradictions are revealed in a recent documentary about the 2002 elections in Enga a remote province in the highlands. The video is called Tanim (pidgin for change) and you can learn more about it at the website www.tanim.cc. You would expect the PNG people to incorporate their traditions like bride price, Sanga [View Full Entry]

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PNG - News #6 Impressions of work & garden ‘Our impressions of human life are picked up one by one by one, and remain for most of us loose and disorganized." Northrop Frye*, Educated Imagination p. 63-64 I am searching for things that will suddenly coordinate and bring into focus a great many impressions. So far I only scratch the surface of the life in Papua New Guinea (PNG). My job for example. Attending the opening of an AusAid funded project for the Lutheran School of Nursing (LSON) included a singsing where two hundred people were drummed into the new bui [View Full Entry]

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PNG - News #5 - Package tour "There are two types of tourists: those who go on packages and those who package the tour as they go." Maquerite The tour is packaging me. Last weekend Valia (my previous housemate see PNG News # 3 and now we are neighbours) returned from Port Moresby. She met the ‘who’s who’ in PNG media. 8:07 am She shows up at my door to say we are hiking Mt. Nobanob. Martjn a VSO volunteer from the Netherlands arranged the trip. 8:15 am I am in the back of Tibo’s 4 wheel pickup truck with Giselle [View Full Entry]

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PNG- News #4: If you want a story without animals, DON’T READ THIS. Brandy in the heat is different than on the Queen Charlottes Islands. The fire it creates in your belly just extends to the outside atmosphere and melts all around you. It is raining, lightening and thundering tonight (a real treat) and one of the neighbour’s sick child is crying non stop (not a treat at all). You can hear the crying because all the windows are wide open all the time. I heard about two cases of malaria today. One, an eleven year old boy died. I know [View Full Entry]

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