Back to civilisation!

Well I returned from Goodenough Island yesterday! I wonder who gave it that name because it was certainly more than good enough!

In typical PNG style the boat didn't leave for Goodenough until an hour and a half after it's departure time and the lovely ladies at the ticket office failed to mention that the boat would infact take 30 hours to reach it's destination, not the 8-10 that most people had me believe. Which, meant spending a hot and noisy night anchored in a bay off Fergusson Island, where i was eaten alive by mosquitos and constantly rolled on by a small child who was sleeping beside me during the night. Luckily some locals, who ofcourse were well prepared for an infinite amount of delay, took pity on me and shared there kai kai with me and I ate fresh fish, sago and yams and drank from coconuts.

We arrived at Wataluma early the next morning, after a connecting dinghy ride from Boyama, where we were met by the sister in charge (sister as in nun sister) an Indian by the name of Irene, who i dont think understood a single word i spoke to her the whole time i was there. I also learned from the other staff during my two weeks that she took to pulling peoples ears if they sufficiently displeased her. I made sure i smiled sweetly whenever i saw her!

Watuluma is a catholic mission which comprises the BJM Hospital, Santa Maria Highschool and a technical college and has an amazing community spirit. It is run by 5 nuns and a resident priest, whose name i couldnt quite work out but i think was father Dong. So, devotion was held every morning at 7am, and there was mass at least 5 times a week. It took about 3 days for sister Irene to realise that I didn't seem to know any hymns and that i didn't join in with the hail maries to ask me, "Gareee... are you not catholic?!".

I was shown around the hospital, which was built in 1991 by an Italian missionary and is very modern, well equiped and in contrast to the rest of PNG spotlessly clean. There are no resident doctors, but luckily there were two from Alotau on rural rotation which meant i didn't have to take on too much responsibility!

The first week I accompanied Dr James and Sister Ponah (nurse sister not nun sister)to undertake child health clinics in the rural villages. The people welcomed us so warmly and we were treated with such respect everywhere we went. The morning would be spent weighing and checking children and the afternoon was vaccination time... which somehow the kids new was coming and would conveniently disappear into the bush after lunch and virtually have to be poked down from coconut trees by their parents with large sticks (jeez those coconut trees are high and the kids scamper up them like monkeys!) Witchcraft, sourcery and herbal medicine is still very much a part of rural life in PNG and Dr James gave a talk about the fact that disease was caused by bacteria and viruses not by hocus pocus and the fact that your neighbour caught you stealing a mango from their tree in the middle of the night. Somehow i'm not sure the message got through though.

I spent the second week in the hospital where I saw case after case of malaria and TB. There was also somebody admitted to the hospital with Leprosy.

I was lucky enough to be there when the High School celebrated it's annual Santa Maria feast day and i got involved with the choir and decorating the church for the proccession of "mama mary". The music was amazing and the people are such good singers. The feast was held on friday and i was invited as a special guest to both the Village feast and the High school feast. I was treated like royalty which was extremely embarassing and really i just wanted to sit on the grass with everyone else and eat yams from palm leaves. Instead i sat with the sisters and the priest, ate specially prepared food and was stared at by every child who was in eye line. In fact the whole time i was there i seemed to be followed around by my creche of about 10 kids who would intently watch my every move and run screaming and laughing if i so much as looked in there direction. Privacy is not something that is part of native life here so there would be rows of little faces pressed constantly against my windows watching me! This number would quadruple the minute i took out my camera and kids (and adults) seemed to appear from the woodwork to have me "snap" them!

The highlight of the two weeks was teaching everyone how to ceilidh dance! Oh what a laugh! One of the nurses i was working with asked if i could teach them scottish dancing to present at the feast day as she had seen it on a video once. So i held dance classes everynight that went on way after the power had gone off and sister Irene would scold us for making so much noise late at night. Unfortunately, no scottish music could be found, so we danced the Gay Gordons and Strip the Willow to some PNG music with interesting results! By the end of the week, most of the hospital, patients included, would gather round to watch the chaos that unfolded on the lawn and the kids would be waiting outside my door striaght after tea calling, "Dr Gary, Dr Gary can we do Scottish Dance yet?"! One boy, called Joel, would hang around all day waiting! He was being treated for TB in the hospital, which i found out after i had invited him in for a cup of tea one evening, much to Dr James' disgust who went on to throw out most of the cups...woops. They performed spectacularly on feast night with the whole crowd whooping and laughing!!! so much fun! I've promised them i'll send them some music so they can dance properly. To say thank you they presented my with a traditional clay cooking pot (god knows how i'm gonna get that one home), a straw sleeping mat and my very own bilum (a colourful bag that everyone carries around) I was so touched and was very sad to leave.

So my last week in PNG before heading to Oz! Looking forward to seeing Naomi and to have a proper exam celebration drink! woop!

Island adventures....

Just a short note to say I'm heading out to Goodenough Island tomorrow for two weeks and seeing as they have neither electricity or telephones I doubt very much they will have internet. So unfortunately i will be out of contact until I return :(

Bye bye

x