Gulf Province

Every province of PNG is different. I have visited several regions now, but when we arrived in Gulf Province with YWAM, it was different again. Big, fast flowing rivers. So much sago and pandanus along the river banks. Few mountains. 

The highest point around.

Zooming about in zodiacs I was able to see the province from its best angle, the water. In the mornings we would head out to deliver the primary health care team to their village for the day. Mist would often still be on the water, the whole environment softened by its presence. Some days it would be raining on us, making the environment sparkle. Often we would see Hornbills flying about, bats as well.

With all the rain, the river was high and ran fast. This meant few mosquitoes, as all their breeding ponds were being flushed out and little mud, as it was all lost beneath the water. We could step straight from the zodiacs to the river bank, or even on to the steps of houses. Houses on stilts would have water the whole way underneath and a canoe tied to the front step. One village we went in to the creek was deep enough for us to  drive the zodiac right into the middle of town. While offloading people and supplies, we were passed by a man standing in his canoe and using his oar as a pole to navigate the small the creek, so very Venice!

Fast flowing river

Another day we were taking dental patients back to their village when they took us on the short cut. Now, ‘local short cut’ often means ‘I’m off on an adventure and I don’t know when I’ll be home’, but in this case it was actually shorter and far more beautiful. The creek was narrow and wound through a pandanus grove, long leaves touching the water on either side of us. Away from the rush of the big river it was peaceful and beautiful.

When we arrived in Gulf it was raining, and we navigated in by GPS and radar, knowing there were river banks nearby, but not seeing them clearly, knowing there were sand banks nearby and planning not to meet them. Towards the end of our time in the province, the river flow had subsided enough for the sand banks to show themselves. When we anchored at high tide, there was water everywhere. At low tide it was clear how treacherous those rivers are, how narrow and twisted the navigable sections.

Space for one more?

When we left it was sunny as we wove our way downstream. The most direct route was not an option, and so we took the safest one. Satellite images from the internet interfaced with data from the survey-zodiac were our map. Alongside us were riverbanks of sago and pandanus. As we exited the river and headed into the gulf, we still had to be wary of sand banks, for the river continued undersea. If we left the path of the river, we could still run aground, even though well offshore.


PNG: land of the unexpected. Where each province is unique, has its own challenges and its own beauty .

A Village Day

I spent one day in a village while with YWAM; the rest of the time I was busy with ship work. This did not bother me, as I have plenty of other opportunities to be in villages and few to be afloat. While the cook was wanting some land time, I was soaking up my ship time. The one day I did go to a village was a location where we knew English comprehension was low and some Tok Pisin help would go a long way. It was fun to go with the group and see what they actually got up to after we dropped them off each day.

Busy with clinics

Firstly, the primary health care (PHC) team met with the leaders and confirmed where they would be working for the day. They then set up a place to wait, a place to register (blood pressure measured and babies weighed) and areas for the doctors to consult, for the pharmacy-in-a-backpack to be used to fill prescriptions and for the nurse to do wound care and other tasks. We drew a crowd, both of medical issues and as the entertainment of the day. Doctor-patient confidentiality takes on a new meaning when half the village is within earshot! Although we tried to reduce the closest crowd to family only, it was with little success. 

Translating the women's talk

After the bulk of the patients had been seen, we broke into two groups for teaching sessions. The women talked about family planning and problem signs in pregnancy. The men spoke about domestic violence, among other things. Translating the women’s talk into Tok Pisin was a challenge. We didn’t exactly cover terms for pregnancy and family planning at orientation! Still, we got the message across…I hope. In another education session earlier in the day we had spoken about the importance of washing hands to prevent germs causing illness, but I wondered how much we really communicated. Here were the outsiders talking of bugs you cannot see which make you sick. Why is that any more believable than spirits you cannot see being the cause of illness? Both rely on a worldview of managing that which is unseen.

Just as we were packing up to leave the village, we found ourselves with two more patients. A mum had returned to her house to find that her husband had got frustrated with the kids, so beat them with a stick and threw them out of the house. Their house was on stilts, so being thrown out involved falling a long way down. I know domestic violence is a huge problem in PNG. It is talked about in the media here as well as at home, but usually it is not staring me in the face. Usually it does not come in the form of two small boys who are clearly concussed and a mother with tears in her eyes.

We did what we could. We provided pain medication for the boys. We convinced the mum to bring the most injured boy to the hospital for observations overnight and guaranteed to bring them back to the village the next day. We let the other boy stay to ‘sleep it off’, because we had no right to do anything else, as much as it went against the medical conscience of the team. We celebrated the next day when the boy who went to hospital was alright. We prayed that the beatings will not continue and that the children will grow up strong and healthy. 


When I looked into the teary eyes of the mother holding her two small boys, with tears in my own eyes, I think then we truly communicated, without the need for any words in any language.

Zoom!

Recently I was able to join the YWAM medical ship Pacific Link for one of their medical outreaches to Gulf Province. It was good to be back afloat, to spend three weeks immersed in another organisation, to see another region of PNG and to participate in a different sort of work within PNG.

hi ho, hi ho, its off to work we go.

We spent 24(ish) hours crossing from Port Moresby to Gulf Province then spent most of the next two weeks anchored by Kikori hospital. We were well upstream from the Gulf in areas which Admiralty charts mark as uncharted, where the zone of confidence diagrams are lacking confidence. We went upstream with a captain who has been that way before and lots of fancy technology. One of the zodiacs (small boats) could be fitted out with GPS, depth sounder, computer and more to survey as it travelled. Each time before we went to a new place, the zodiac would go ahead of us, creating charts which were then interfaced with the ship’s navigation system. Impressive!

Taking the PHC team out.

While we were at Kikori, the river was in flood. Somewhere upstream it must have been raining heavily, for although it was not particularly dry where we were, the body of water flowing by was tremendous. Many trees and large logs floated by, sometimes forming a dam wall between the anchor chain and the bow, always making driving about in the zodiacs just that little bit more exciting. Only in the last few days did the water level drop enough for the rumoured sand banks to be visible, but even then the outflow defeated the tide every day and we always had our bow pointing upstream.

I joined Pacific Link as second mate, stepping back into what felt like a former life. It took awhile for me to be at ease in the role, but although that side of me was fairly well buried, it was not forgotten. This role meant navigational watches when under way, anchor watches in the river and zooming about in zodiacs delivering the health teams to various villages.

Managing traffic at the sea door

Every morning we would take the ophthalmology team to Kikori Haus Sik (Hospital) to spend their day doing eye surgery. We would also take the primary health care (PHC) team to their village-of-the-day where they would set up for immunisations, consulting and training. We would then return to the ship with dental patients from Kikori and the village where we had left the PHC team. During the day there would be lots of back and forth, ferrying dental patients as well as our own people. There were also some longs runs, when a zodiac would go out for the day to collect, and later to return, an ophthalmology patient from their village to the hospital. These people had been referred for surgery during previous outreaches, but needed assistance to reach the hospital. Each day there was also the visit to tomorrow’s village. We would go and meet the leaders, confirm that it was okay to come with the PHC team and discuss if there was any particular concerns that they hoped we could help with.

Dental patients waiting on the aft deck

In the course of two weeks the three zodiacs travelled approximately 2000km and burnt 12 drums of fuel; a combination of unleaded and zoom (oil-unleaded pre-mix). This was the most the zodiacs had ever done in a single outreach. It was also the worst they had behaved. Something was messing with the engines. The original theory was that it was the wrong oil-fuel mix, but it was probably dirty fuel or water in the fuel. The result was an endless series of sparkplug changes, difficulty getting the boats up on the plane and a lot of uncertainty, but we made it.

Another spark plug change

At the end of each day we would do the final trips, returning the final dental patients and welcoming home the teams who had been on land. Once all were back on board, we would stow, clean and re-fuel the zodiacs for another day of zooming about. Then it would be time to share stories from the day, over dinner or over a cuppa, before curling up in bed to sleep deeply to the sound of water rushing past the hull. My favourite lullaby.



For information on volunteering with YWAM, go to www.ywamships.org.au

Sailor Girl

You? A sailor? How did you ever end up at sea?

STV One and All

Well, it just kind of happened. I never planned on a career at sea…

When I was 15 there was a careers expo at school where the sail training ship Leeuwin II had a stand. I thought it looked like a fun adventure, but one that I couldn’t afford. When I found out it was possible to get sponsorship through the Captain’s Fund, I applied. I also got a job at the customer service training agency known as Maccas to pay the rest of the voyage fees. So I had my ten day adventure at sea…which I never planned on as a career, just as an adventure. An adventure I figured was finished when my family and I moved interstate to a land locked country town a few months later.

Then one day Mr Dooley came to school and spoke of sail training and the sponsorship he could help provide. A bunch of us signed up as interested, but I was the only one who followed through on it, so I got sponsored to go to sea a second time! My savings from the service agency paying the remainder of the voyage fees. So I had myself another ten day adventure at sea, this time on the ship from the city I then went to university in, the ship which has been part of my life ever since, the One & All.

Sunset on One and All

Moving to Adelaide for university, I joined One & All’s volunteer crew, slowly learning what I was doing then forgetting half of it before the next chance I had to sail. Maintenance days, day sails, voyages… they all added up and I found that I did indeed know what I was doing. When I graduated university six years later I knew that my long term plan was Bible translation, but I also knew that I was not yet ready to commit to that path. A job as a watch leader on One & All became available, so I took it. That which had started as an adventure, had become a volunteer pastime and was now a full time job!

A few years as a watch leader, including some experience overseas, and I was ready to return to university to start my theology degree and start the journey down the road to translation. I had also reached a point where I was bored with being a watch leader. As I had the sea time, I went to Maritime college and got my Master Class V. This allowed me to keep sailing, but gave me new challenges and responsibilities. It also gave me an income to help pay my way through a theology degree.

With other casual jobs, you can usually juggle them around your study schedule. With sailing, I would miss weeks of classes at a time, always pre-warning my lecturer and getting notes and readings to do so as not to be behind when I returned. Always keeping close tabs on the 80% class attendance requirements. I doubt I ever made it to more than 85% of any subject, but never to less than 80%. Mostly I worked over the summer holidays, often missing the last week of the school year to go to sea, and the first week of the new school year as I’d not yet returned from sea. Somehow, with no real holidays in three years, I managed to not burn out and to pass all my subjects. Thank you to all my lecturers who made it possible for me to juggle study and sailing, as well as to my compassionate and long suffering housemates.

When I left One & All it was as first mate, with a passion for sail training and an unexpected yet successful career at sea. I had also worked as an officer on other traditional sailing vessels, enjoying expanding my accidental career path. When I left Australia to work as a Bible translator, I thought I had given up on sailing. My best hope was that it would be an occasional pastime when home on furlough.

Playing with a telescope on HMB Endeavour

Then the organisation I am part of joined the Wa’a partnership with other organisations working in the Pacific region. They asked for volunteers to help build the partnership, in particular by joining YWAM on their medical ship, Pacific Link, during her annual season in PNG…

…so it was that I found I could bring together my former life at sea with my new life in PNG. The adventure that started in high school and became a career was once again needed, but as part of my translation career. Sure, this was a far cry from sail training, but it was still a chance to bring my lives together and contribute to something worthwhile. A chance I very much enjoyed.

Cultural Leaps

Hand cranked Singers for sale

One day I’m working in the PNG regions, the next having pizza at an air conditioned shopping mall in Port Moresby and the following day sitting in a café on the boulevard in Cairns. Such leaps between localities and cultures can take some adjusting to. Returning to Australia for the first time in fourteen months, I was unsure how much I’d suffer from reverse culture shock. It was not a big problem (thankfully), but I did have some observations along the way.

Before arriving back in Australia I had a day in Port Moresby with a friend who works there. We walked along the foreshore, her boys splashing in the water and dodging the rubbish along the high tide line. We went for lunch at a shopping mall with the first escalator I have seen in PNG. Much of what was available I was not used to seeing in PNG, yet the mall was an odd mix of developed meets developing nation.  Across from the expensive jewellery store was the fabric store with a window full of brand new sewing machines…hand powered Singers for the majority who have no power to plug an electric machine into. Some stores sold skimpy fashionable clothing, other sold cover-all meri blauses.  It was a good way to ease myself out of regional life and prepare myself for a return to ‘the west’.

Some of the things I enjoyed about being back in Australia were the smooth and safe roads, fast internet and all the yummy food (cheese! icecream! chocolate!). It was nice to walk down the street on my own and not be stared at, but I had to remember not to smile at everyone on the street or greet them though. I expect the locals would have thought me a little odd if I did!

Looking at the people around me, it often felt like the women had only got half dressed in the mornings…put a top on and forgot the bottom half. In PNG I am used to wearing long tops over pants or wearing skirts past my knees. On the streets of Aus  I saw ‘dresses’ I’m not sure I’d even wear with trousers here!

Being a tourist on something you do not see in PNG- a train

Public affection also stood out. No more men holding hands to express their friendship, but plenty of couples cuddling up. When a guy friend gave me a welcome hug in public, I was a little stunned. I’ve got so used to shaking hands of even close guy friends and only hugging gal friends that it caught me by surprise. In many villages it is not even appropriate for me as a single woman to look a man in the eyes. When shaking hands with everyone after church, you glance at each other before looking past them while shaking hands. That is as far as friendly physical contact goes. It’s not that people are unfriendly, far from it, it is just that they express it in other ways.

My Cairns budget can probably be split into two main categories; eating out and supply shopping. Eating out is a very rare occurrence for me in PNG, so I enjoyed catching up on all the foods I’ve not had in awhile and the novelty of dining out. Indian, pub meal, cafes, iced coffee, cakes, salads, sushi rolls, kangaroo mince, bacon, wine, cheese, all those yummy deli smallgoods…many of them are things I could buy or make in PNG, but am not willing to spend that much money or that much time to do so.

As for supplies, Spotlight, my credit card and I had a date (or two) which will see me supplied with sewing projects for a while to come. Wandering in and out of stores also supplied me with ideas for what I might like to sew, resulting in a return trip to Spotlight for more supplies. I also restocked with the boring essentials…socks, shoes, underwear, antihistamines, face cleanser.

An old photo but a good summary; books, journal, cafes...

Then there was the item I have resisted for a long time… an e-reader. I like books. I like to read them. I like to borrow them and to loan them. I like to hold the weight of them in my hand. What I do not like is to pay per kg to fly them around PNG. With the rate I read, this can become quite expensive if I am going away for a few weeks and will have little other entertainment in the evenings. So it was that I bought an e-reader and downloaded a pile of free classics. Now I only have to pay to fly a few hundred grams about while carrying a small library in my bilum. When home, I will continue to enjoy ‘real’ books, including that mouldy smell which cannot be avoided here in the tropics.

Stepping back in and out of Aussie culture went well. As my exit from PNG was made easier by an hour or so at the mall, I eased into my return to PNG by joining the YWAM medical ship, Pacific Link. Here we could be quite western on board, but step into PNG village life during the day, but more on that another day.

Pinglish

‘Pinglish’ is a term we use to refer to the mixing of Tok Pisin and English. Often this occurs when I am speaking Tok Pisin and use English instead of Tok Pisin. As the two languages are closely related it is very easily done, particularly when it comes to writing. There are many English cognates in Tok Pisin, so I have to try hard to write them using Tok Pisin spelling rather than the more familiar English.

The Pinglish effect goes the other way too, as Tok Pisin words and phrases prove themselves to be more useful that the English variant. Below are a list of some favourites which are creeping into my English;

raunraun; to go from place to place and eventually return to the start. Raunraun can be with purpose or just an afternoon wander.

daunblo; from ‘down below’ this can be used legitimately in English, but I know I now use it as a description in places I would previously not have described something as daunblo before Tok Pisin influenced my speech.

antap (the opposite of aninit); as with daunblo, it can be legitimately part of English, but it is not a phrase I used very often before learning Tok Pisin.

laik bilong yu; Whatever you decide to do is fine and the consequences are yours to live with. Whatever.

maski; Although most English speakers say there is no English equivalent to maski, in my sailing register there is a close equivalent in ‘belay’. For those of you who are still confused, it means to leave something be and pursue it no further.

ʌ ʌ   ;The gentle raising of both eyebrows in response to a question, meaning ‘yes’. This is a real problem when it slips into my English as people think I’m ignoring them when I’m actually giving an affirmative response.

em tasol; ‘That is everything’. Sometimes used in a clear way, but also used to sum up huge tasks as if they were nothing…’Today I saved the world, em tasol.’

Dedication

PNG is the ‘land of the unexpected,’ a motto well proven one afternoon when we found ourselves late additions to the Bishop’s VIP guest list for the decorative, ceremonial and long dedication ceremony of… a fuel pump. There were tears in the prayer of dedication, long speeches and choral items. As special guests we were ‘flowered’ (that’s what the programme called it) with a necklace of plastic flowers. As the leaders of a Sunday School translation workshop, we found ourselves singing in the vernacular with the choir. We were introduced as the ‘Tiang Translation Team Choir’… nothing like being named on the spot! We were thankful for those who could not come, as it meant less speeches and amused by the fact the longest speech was by the man who started with ‘I have nothing to say’ (that at least seems similar across cultures). Then, after three hours, we were amused by the final item, when the ladies guild and the youth group started line dancing to a praise pop song. I really did not see that one coming!

Decorations, man skirts and an official fuel pump opening

Although the events of the afternoon amused and bemused us, there is more of a story than the surface decorations suggest. The fuel pump was a dream of the late Bishop, a part of his desire that the church circuit become financially independent. I admire their commitment to not relying on outside funding and that they are working with local needs. The tears in the dedication prayer were for the late Bishop, his dreams and that he did not live to see this one realised. He must have been quite a man, as people were genuinely touched by his absence. It is interesting to note that while this church was seeking independence through fuel sales, their equivalent denomination in Australia was pulling all investments out of the oil and gas industry as an expression of their care for creation. Different reasons drive different decisions in different places.

Line dancing mamas and youth

That we were flowered guests even though the Bishop only met us that day is testimony to the generous welcome we receive all over PNG. People appreciate the work we do and so make us most welcome however they can. Singing with the choir was another way we are welcomed and included, for although we had only worked a few days with the Tiang, they claimed us as their own during that event and made sure we were part of things.

As for the line dancing mamas… there is no response but delight to such an unexpected event which everyone was enjoying.