PNG Echo

PNG ECHO
FIRST EDITION
FEATURING
Sheppard
rocks Scotland
MASERATIS IN PNG:
MAKING LEMONADE
OUT OF LEMONS
INDEPENDENCE FOR
BOUGAINVILLE:
IS IT A PIPE
DREAM?
FIJI’S PLANTATION
ISLAND RESORT:
A TROPICAL IDYLL
WITH A SOCIAL
CONSCIENCE
And so
much more
inside...

CONTRIBUTORS
CHRIS BARIA
BORN in the Kieta District of Central
Bougainville, Papua New Guinea, Chris
is old enough to have survived the civil
war of the 1990s on Bougainville.
He was working at the Copper mine,
Panguna, when it was sabotaged by
disgruntle landowners provoking civil
war between the landowners/people
of Bougainville and the government of
Papua New Guinea.
At the cessation of hostilities, he
worked closely with ANZAC and Pacific
peace monitors to effect a ceasefire and
peace agreement.
For seven years prior to his recent
retirement Chris worked as a Press
Officer in a government ministry in Port
Moresby. He currently resides in Arawa,
Central Bougainville where he is writing
a book about his lifetime experiences.
ELLA HALL
FORMER food/travel blogger has
lived in PNG for 10 years, where she
has attempted to “single-handedly
change the Internet’s opinion of Lae.”
She is actively involved in women’s
issues and was the President of the Lae
Lioness Club for five years. Married,
she is owned by two cats, six dogs
and a green tree snake called Kevin.
Her goal in life is to go a day in Lae
without a power blackout.
GREG SHEPPARD
A practising lawyer based in Port
Moresby, Papua New Guinea where he
has resided for thirty years.
He was born and educated in Perth
at Guildford Grammar School and the
University of Western Australia.
He is married with three children and
apart from law and poetry, his interests
include music – classical and pop.
He began to write poetry as selftherapy
and takes inspiration from
many styles including the seers, the
nonsense rhymers and Dr Seuss.
DR KEVIN
PONDIKOU
KEVIN is half Manus and half Simbu by
birth. He is 40yrs old and has been working
at Rumginae Rural Hospital for five years.
He was admitted to Laloki Psychiatric
Hospital for two months in 2013 which
proved to be a life-changing experience
for him.
He is currently on medication for Bipolar
Disorder and uses writing as a catharsis and
also to record the untold stories of remote
communities.
ALSO:
• REBECCA RUNDUALI
• SUSAN MERRELL
• LYDIA KAILAP
• JUSTICE GEORGE
MIKE JONES
IT consultant, writer and grandfather,
Mike has been meditating since the
late 1970s. He is a student of the
Western tradition of Buddhism. He
has found that mindfulness meditation
helps him to travel a kinder, more
nourishing pathway.
RITA
RITA (surname unknown) started
writing on the advice of her therapist
who suggested it as a salve for her
(ever so slight) drinking problem
and her more disagreeable social
tendencies. Rita will be regularly
featured in ‘PNG Echo’ and will be
a boon to the team – mainly because
she’s handy (she lives downstairs from
our editor.)
TANYA LLOYD
A published author and professional
writer who is involved in a wide range
of committees and organisations
within the local community. She is an
Australian expat currently enjoying life
and culture in PNG.
MANUHU CSM
PNG ECHO SEPTEMBER 2019
EDITOR
Dr Susan Merrell
E: susanmerrell13@gmail.com
PUBLISHER
Dr Susan Merrell
E: susanmerrell13@gmail.com
PROPRIETOR
Pacific Perspectives P/L
Suite 3, 571 Military Road
Mosman NSW 2088
Australia
ONLINE EDITION
www.pngecho.com
COVER PHOTOGRAPH
Chugg Entertainment
DESIGNER
Magazines byDesign
www.bydesigngraphics.com.au
www.facebook.com/PNGEcho1
© Copyright 2019. Pacific Perspectives P/L’
All rights reserved.
No part of this publication may be reproduced or
transmitted in whole or in part without the written
permission of the publisher.
Whilst every care has been taken in the
preparation of this publication, the publisher
nor any of its employees, subcontractors or
contributors assume any responsibility or liability
for any loss or damage which may result from any
inaccuracy or omission in the publication.
Opinions expressed are those of the respective
authors and not necessarily the publisher.
2 PNG ECHO

EDITOR’S
NOTE
DR SUSAN MERRELL
Everything changes – and so have we.
After more than six years as a blog
specialising in political commentary, we
have decided to spread our wings and
to add more voices figuring that there
is more to life than politics and/or a single opinion
and that a magazine is so much more satisfying to
read than a blog.
We’ve added travel, food, short stories, reviews,
humour and poetry to the mix - and that’s just
for starters.
Read it online – at www. pngecho.com
Happy reading. Don’t be a stranger. •
In this edition we are featuring super-group
‘Sheppard’ whose musical influences date back to
their early years growing up in Papua New Guinea.
This is my Scottish encounter with Amy George
and Emma - in concert, in Glasgow.
At PNG Echo, we love a little humour and who
better to supply it than our official reviewer: meet
the reluctant (read lazy) and irreverent
‘Rita’? Here you’ll find Rita’s thoughts on those
controversial Maseratis and her brilliant (ginsoaked?)
solution: an annual ‘Independence
Boulevarde 300’.
*Remember you heard it here first. (No, it’s
not one of the Governor’s “million ideas,” he’s
hampered by sobriety!)
Got a little time on your hands? Our travel
feature takes us to Fiji and Plantation Island and
explores the concept of eco-friendly tourism while
Mike Jones, one of the most popular writers of
Australian ABC’s unleashed, takes our minds for a
walk and into a state of ‘mindfulness’.
Along with Mike, yet more exceptional writers
have contributed to this edition (and we are always
looking out for more - so, get in touch):
Dr Kevin Pondikou – tells of the hardships of
being a doctor in a remote area of PNG while
Rebecca Runduali reminds us that we’re not doing
enough to protect our orphans.
Tanya Lloyd writes of how she’s getting used to
life in PNG as an expat, Lydia Kailap has a recipe
for lamb flaps and Ella Hall, will make you smile
with her tale of being introduced to a Western
Highland’s culinary delicacy.
Chris Baria catches a Sailfish – his detailed and
colourful description inspires me to want to give it a
shot … and not having forsaken politics completely
and with the Bougainville vote for independence
imminent, Chris has also contributed a personal
account of the ‘taim bepo’ when Bougainville
squandered its chances at independence – hoping it
won’t happen again.
I would also like to introduce you to our two
regular features:
Greg Sheppard will be commenting on life in
rhyming verse in ‘Concerning Greg’. Beware, he
can make you laugh out loud or make you cry at
whim – but he’ll always leave you thoughtful.
And last but not least, Justice George Manuhu will
be the first guest to adorn our last-page spot
‘My Job’ where, in each edition, a new job and a
new special guest will give their insights into the job
that they do. So, if you aspire to the National or
Supreme Court Bench, read about his Honour’s
personal journey to get there.
CONTENTS
11 20
04
IN REVIEW
4 To Maserati or not?
08
COVER STORY
8 Sheppard in Glasgow
FOOD
11 Lamb Flaps
12
LIFE’S ECHOES
12 The Sailfish
14 Concerning Greg
15 What goes around comes around
16 No cheese on the pizza
18
HEALTH & WELLBEING
18 Collagen
19 Mindfulness
SPIRIT OF THE NATION
20 Independence for Bougainville
23 Tears on the last page of Papua
New Guinea
24 Orphans
26
TRAVEL
26 Plantation Island
30
MY JOB
30 Justice George Manuhu CSM
PNG ECHO
3

in review
4 PNG ECHO

Somewhere in POM
TO MASERATI
or not?
by RITA (THE RELUCTANT REVIEWER)
The reporter in her second-best jeans
want me to do what?”
I asked incredulously of ‘Er Upstairs – (otherwise known as
our esteemed editor whom I call that because we live in the
same apartment building and, in a context where ‘floor envy’
“You
is a real thing, she lives many floors above.)
She wanted me to review the ultra prestige car, the Maserati Quattroporte (the
name sounds posh but just means ‘four-door’ in Italian) for a magazine to be
published in Papua New Guinea.
I’m thinking, she’s finally taken leave of her senses, all the rarefied air up there
where she lives will do that to you. Nevertheless, I go ahead and state the bleeping
obvious:
“Papua New Guinea is a developing country, surely, there wouldn’t be a market
for them there?”
“That’s all you know,” she replied adding, “it’s why I’m the editor and you’re not.”
She’s got a point there, so I just gave in and just said “OK.”
But she wasn’t finished, oh no - on her way out she said, “…and before you start -
try Googling PNG and Maserati,” as if she needed to tell ME how to suck eggs.
So I did.
And speaking of sucking eggs, I don’t need to tell you lot about the 40 Maseratis
(and three Bentleys) airfreighted to PNG on specially commissioned 747 cargo jets
late last year to be used specifically for the APEC week, do I?
Neither do I have to remind you of the government’s assurance that they were
variously either “pre sold” or selling “like hotcakes” afterwards. Nor indeed to
inform you that, as I write, they are still on a wharf or in a warehouse in Port
Moresby, unused, gathering dust (save for two Maseratis and a Bentley that
have been sold and another Bentley that is now used as the Governor General’s
official car.)
Recently, the APEC Minister has told PNG that the reason they’ve remained
unsold is because the tender process only solicited a few ridiculously low offers
and after that people lost interest. (What happened to ‘pre-sold” and ‘hotcakes” I
wonder? Empty hyperbole?)
The intention of ‘Er Upstairs had now become apparent. She’s a troublemaker
that one.
I’m the fall guy. Oh well, there are worse jobs. Here goes.
PNG ECHO 5

in review
A VISIT TO THE SHOWROOM
After lunch last Saturday, fortified by spaghetti and prosecco, I found myself
outside the very swish showrooms of Maserati and Ferrari in Sydney’s
inner suburbs.
In I went, full of bravado, entering this haven of the rich and powerful (everyone
except me).
I easily located the Maserati Quattroporte (that it was labelled as such was the
clue I needed) and was taking some photographs when a voice from a partitioned
room boomed,
“If you’re looking for some good-looking blokes to be in your photos….”
I walked towards the “good-looking blokes” who were leaning on a bar that
served, cakes, pastries, finger sandwiches and coffee (from a real barista’s coffee
machine).
I’d been in a car showroom like this before; they ply you full of goodies to keep
you there and keep you occupied until you buy a car. So, would I like a cup of
coffee? No. I would not – I’m not falling for that one twice.
What could they do for me?
“I’m interested in the Quattroporte,” I said. (It wasn’t a lie - I never mentioned
buying it.)
Alas, they were ‘Ferrari’ men; they’d have to get (let’s call him) Charles.
HALLO CHARLES…
Charles arrived…he wasn’t happy.
Even wearing my second-best jeans, I clearly didn’t look sartorially splendid
enough to be a real customer (all this attitude from someone who was wearing a
baby-blue knitted vest too!)
Charles answered my questions - albeit briefly and with an air of incredulity that
I didn’t already know the answers.
I learned that the starting price for the base model was a whopping quarter of
a million Australian dollars, (according to Charles – I didn’t tell him that I knew
where to get one cheaper) and that it was a performance car – “…a real driver’s
car,” he said.
“So why would people buy it if they had a chauffeur?” I asked. (All you people in
APEC Land can see where I was going with that one, can’t you?)
He spluttered a bit and said, “Because it’s a Maserati!”
“What does that mean?” I asked, “is it about image?”
He claimed not to know what I meant by “image”…so I helped him out.
“Well what sort of person buys a Maserati,” I asked?
“Successful business men,” he said without missing a beat. (He may have said
“business person” but I don’t think so – he certainly didn’t mention women.)
There was no stopping me now, I was on a roll:
“What do they find attractive about it?’ I asked.
“It’s a Maserati,” he answered once again shaking his head in disbelief. Stupid
question, apparently. And there were more where that one came from.
“So, how does it handle potholes?” I asked. (Still with me?)
“Potholes?” he repeated, as if I was talking Swahili.
“And what about if you lived in the Pacific – in a country such as…well… Fiji?” I
said, trying to steer him off the scent of the controversial PNG Maseratis.
“Where could you get it serviced?” (Are you keeping up?)
“We have a service centre here,” he proffered. Yeah, but not much use to Port
Moresby buyers, hey?
Other than that, he didn’t have a clue. The nearest Maserati dealership to Port
Moresby is in Brisbane - FYI, I left it at that – he was becoming visibly anxious.
ACCORDING TO THE BROCHURE AND IN RETROSPECT
The brochure tells me that the Maserati was designed to take advantage of the vast
network of motorways in Europe. In Italy, home country of Maserati, there are
4,200 miles of motorway alone, with Spain topping the bill at 10,500 miles (I’ll leave
you to convert that to kilometres.)
It maybe makes sense then for someone who is driving large numbers of miles, and
has more money than s/he knows what to do with, to drive a car that can perform
at speed on a made road (the Maserati can do between 270- 310 KPH.). Still, with
speed limits now at 130kph (tops) on these roads, does it really make sense?
In PNG, there are no roads to speak and of the few that exist, they are normally in
a state of ill repair – both in the capital, Port Moresby and elsewhere. Potholes are a
fact of life.
With the sporty Maserati having a chassis close to the ground. I’m wondering how
long it would last driving from the airport at Nazdab into Lae?
However, in Port Moresby, they do have a lovely new road named ‘Independence
Boulevarde’ but dubbed by you folk, very wittily, as the ‘Road to Nowhere’ because
from APEC House, it leads…well… nowhere. It was built by the Chinese at great
expense and is variously reported as being either one kilometre long or 300 metres
- with six lanes.
At 300 KPH – this road would, at 300 metres, take the Maserati only 3.5 seconds to
travel its distance, or, at one kilometre, it would take about 11 seconds.
On the bright side: driving those distances, I guess it wouldn’t use much petrol.
But hang on: I hear the PNG Maseratis are diesel models with the pollutant factor
too great for Australian omission laws. A bit of impediment if Minister APEC’s
target market for the cars was ex-pats who’d import them into Australia.
So to my question: “Who buys Maseratis?”
Does the answer begin with ‘w’ end in ‘rs’ and have ‘nk’ in the centre? Just asking!
Oh, and does PNG have 40 of them?
Ok, Boss, is this what you were looking for? •
JUST SAYING...
Someone should have organised drag races down the length of
Independence Boulevarde as entertainment during APEC. They
had the cars and the track.
What’s more, there’s a birds’ eye view from up there at APEC
House and the splendid sidewalks would have made good
viewing platforms for the public too.
Port Moresby could have held the Inaugural Port Moresby,
Maserati, Independence 300. And why stop at APEC? It could
become an annual fixture of national life - like the Monte Carlo
Rally did in Monaco. Whoo hoo!
6 PNG ECHO

7

cover story
SHEPPARD IN GLASGOW:
On the Edge
of the Night
Facebook reminded me this morning that it’s two years to the day (as I write) that I
was in Glasgow, Scotland to attend a ‘Sheppard’ concert.
by SUSAN MERRELL
8 PNG ECHO

I’m sure I neither have to introduce the
Sheppard family nor Sheppard the band to
anyone in Papua New Guinea. Sheppard
siblings Amy, George and Emma, grew up and
attended school in Papua New Guinea and
cite PNG musicians as some of their early influences,
especially music teacher Buruka Tau who taught them
at primary school and still mentors them to this day.
Over the two years, since that Scottish concert,
new hits have managed to eclipse the mega popular
‘Geronimo’ proving they are not just a one-hit
wonder with songs like, ‘Coming Home’, ‘Edge of
the Night’ and ‘Keep Me Crazy’ that have gained
popularity in such far flung places as The Netherlands
and Kazakhstan. Their latest album ‘Watching the
Sky’ debuted at No 1 on the Australian Aria charts
and in 2018 and 2019 the band were nominated for
three Aria awards.
What’s more, when Australia was looking for acts
to represent them in the Eurovision song contest
(Sheppard now reside in Brisbane, Australia)
Sheppard was one of ten acts chosen to compete for
the role. While Kate Miller-Heidke won the Australian
‘heats’ and it was she that ended up representing
Australia, the grand prize winner of Eurovision was
Duncan Lawrence of The Netherlands who was
support act for Sheppard in their Amsterdam concert
at the end of last year. Ironic, hey?
BUCKING OR SETTING THE TREND?
I’ve seen Sheppard described as Indie Pop/Rock and
while I’m not claiming to have a definitive description
of the term, for me it conjures up dark, edgy
subversive and grunting of the sort that every mother
of an acne-inflicted, angst-ridden teenager recognises.
Well, Amy, George and Emma are the antipathy of
this. (So sorry guys if I’ve spoilt the image). No, nicer
more articulate people you could not wish to meet –
and I did meet them, maybe a year or more prior to
the Glasgow gig. On that occasion, I joined the family
for dinner at their home in Brisbane at the invitation
of Greg and Linda (Mama and Papa Sheppard) whom
I had met through Papua New Guinean connections.
It was after their winning of an Aria award but, at that
stage, I knew little of the group.
Geronimo!
Post our very genial get together and on subsequently
seeking out Sheppard music, I developed what has
been labelled Baader-Meinhoff syndrome – i.e. I was
hearing Geronimo everywhere. I even found myself
singing along to it on the ‘Muzak’ system in a Paris
department store. Thrilled; I said to the saleslady,
while pointing upwards at the speakers, “Ils sont
mes amis (they are my friends). She replied
“Vraiment?” (Really?) – She was clearly impressed.
In Italy, on the shores of Lake Como, television
was airing a documentary on some woman – I don’t
speak Italian and I don’t know who she was, but she
was clearly a blonde bombshell in her day, a bit like
Bridget Bardot, (but not her). A while into the show
there popped up, to my surprise, Sheppard singing…
what else… Geronimo. I asked the Sheppards what
that was all about but they didn’t know.
What is clear, is that Sheppard music is infiltrating
the popular psyche. I mean, how many times have
you heard ‘Coming Home’ lately? It’s everywhere –
advertisers particularly like using the riff.
SCOTLAND THE BRAVE
It had been pure serendipity that I was on the
same side of the world when Sheppard was touring
Britain two years ago. They were there mainly
as a support act for Little Mix but it was a solo
concert in Glasgow on a date that was just before
my scheduled departure from my Provençal idyll:
destination Sydney, that had me setting off a few
days early and detouring through Scotland in order
to attend.
Touching down in beautiful Edinburgh, I stayed in
a Georgian apartment with high ceilings and huge
windows on the edge of the city. It was heavenly.
Glasgow was different.
I took the train there the next day in preparation
for the concert. My hotel room resembled a cell –
with a bed jammed between the two walls and the
bathroom a cubicle, resembling an alien spaceship,
filling the rest of the space. Never mind, I was
looking forward to the concert. Little did I know it
was a portent of things to come.
I don’t know what I was expecting – but what I
found wasn’t it.
It was one of those dark, grungy, venues with an
‘underground’ vibe where…come to think of it…I
would once have expected to find my previous idea
of an Indie Pop/Rock group performing.
It was very dark, there were no seats, the floor was
sticky and they served alcohol in plastic cups – not
a venue any act would get too excited about.
Thinking the band would sing a few songs and
leave quickly while breathing a sigh of relief – how
PNG ECHO 9

cover story
Sheppard music is infiltrating
the popular psyche
wrong I was. They performed as if they were doing a gig in Madison Square Garden to
thousands even though they were singing in a grunge pit from hell to less than a hundred.
They sang all the perennial favourites and debuted quite a few of their songs off the then new,
as yet unreleased album. It was here that I first heard the mega hit ‘Coming Home’.
In spite of the surroundings, I must admit, the audience was enthusiastic and Sheppard
rewarded them – not just by their presence on stage, but also by availing themselves afterwards
for autographs and photos. They’re nice. That’s just how they roll.
AMY’S CAMPAIGN
And if you’re not yet convinced of what great guys these are (as well as demonstrably talented
musicians), Amy Sheppard has recently taken up the issue of ‘body shaming’: doing something
to counteract the pressure young people feel to have perfect bodies.
In the public spotlight, nevertheless, she has been posting photos on Instagram and Facebook
without any filters. The attendant caption reads ‘Kiss my fat ass’. That’s so brave in an era where
everyone knows how to Photoshop – and does.
She’s following this up with a song called…yes, you guessed it…’Kiss my fat ass’. As I write, it
is being recorded and should be available by the time we go to press.
Bravo Sheppard…and you’re right: – ‘The Best Is Yet To Come’, I’m sure! •
10 PNG ECHO

LAMP FLAPS
by SUSAN MERRELL
Sticky lamp flaps (ribs)
by LYDIA KAILAP
INGREDIENTS
• 2 lamb flaps
• I teaspoon salt
• I cup dark soy sauce
• Half a cup jam (any flavour)
• 2 cloves garlic, crushed
• 1 inch piece ginger chopped finely
• I small chilli – or to taste
• Watercress to garnish
METHOD
Bring a saucepan of salted water (1 teaspoon of salt) to the boil that is large enough to fit the lamb flaps.
Simmer gently until the meat is soft but not yet falling off the bone (around 45 minutes).
Allow to cool.
In the meantime
Mix together the soy sauce, jam, garlic,
ginger and chilli to form a marinade.
Marinate the meat for at least an hour.
Barbecue or grill until the meat is
glazed and sticky.
Garnish with watercress
*The recipe also works well with other cuts of lamb
but if you are using less fatty cuts of lamb, they do
not need to be boiled first.
As seen in the Victoria Market,
Melbourne, Australia.
A lamb flap by any other name…
The popularity in of lamb flaps in PNG
is hardly surprising: they’re cheap, a
good source of protein and utterly
delicious.
It’s the fat content that makes them
so chin-drippingly delectable (any chef will tell
you that the fat is where the flavour lies) - but it
is the high fat content that fuels the controversy
over the importation of lamb flaps into the Pacific
from New Zealand and Australia.
With problematic and significant levels of
obesity in most Pacific Islands and considering the
calorie content of lamb flaps, Fiji banned their sale
in 2000.
Fiji has the highest death rate from obesitylinked
Type II Diabetes in the world at 188 deaths
per 100,000 people. In major Fijian hospitals there
are three amputations per day (usually lower
limbs) caused by the effects of diabetes. The
population of PNG also has significant levels of
obesity resulting in diabetes.
But is it really the fault of the lamb flap?
Fiji’s incidence of diabetes has not abated
since they banned the controversial meat but is,
conversely, increasing.
It’s generally believed that Australians and New
Zealanders do not eat lamb flaps: that they are fed
only to the animals – well that’s what they think.
Really, the very name is enough to turn you off
the product isn’t it? Anything with ‘flap’ in the
name does not sound delicious …or even edible.
And so, in some quite up-market Sydney and
Melbourne restaurants ‘Lamb ribs’ have been
making an appearance on the menus. A lamb flap
by any other name… And what’s more, the doner
kebab beloved of late night revellers is almost
pure lamb flap.
IT’S ALL IN THE PREPARATION
I’m told by our guest chef, Lydia Kailap of Ziah’s
Cafe in Kimbe, West New Britain and previously
of Ricochet Café in Port Moresby, that rendering
the fat in the cooking is a way to minimize the
calories. Here’s her recipe for lamb flaps (it works
well with other cuts of lamb too, she tells me.)
And remember, there is no ‘bad’ food – everything
is good in moderation. •
PNG ECHO 11

life’s echoes
Beautiful Southern Bougainville
The Sailfish
A SHORT STORY FROM BOUGAINVILLE
by CHRIS BARIA
When Kuruma arrived at the beach,
the familiar smell of salt and sea
hit his nostrils as he looked up
and down the shoreline. There
was no one around but there were
footprints and drag marks made by canoes on the
sand leading to the waters edge.
Looking out across the bay, he could make out the
canoes even though the sky was overcast. From where
he stood, they looked like chess pieces on a vast
chessboard.
Going by the sun, barely visible through the grey
clouds, Kuruma estimated it was about 3 o’clock. He
had thirty minutes to paddle to the spot where he had
seen a turtle surface last time and two hours to fish.
Kuruma turned around and walked up the stretch
of sand sloping from the waters edge to the edge
of the bushes where he kept his canoe under the
coconut trees.
His canoe was under a sheet of roofing iron exactly
where he’d left it. He lifted the roofing iron, set it
aside and looked into the dugout hull of the canoe
to make sure all his equipment was there. With both
hands, he picked up the canoe by the outrigger and
dragged it out of the bushes onto the beach.
In his tote bag, he took out a 20-pound line
rolled around a 7-inch round and buoyant piece of
softwood and proceeded to fashion a ‘jig rig’. This
was a multi-hooked line for bottom fishing, usually
for baitfish although also ideal for when fish were in
a feeding frenzy.
Next he made a trawling jig, placing it towards the
back of the canoe and the trawling line towards the
front to avoid them getting tangled.
He had been careful to check the four pegs
driven into the outrigger attaching it to the canoe,
remembering another time when he hadn’t checked
and the loose pegs had come off, detaching the
12 PNG ECHO

outrigger and leaving him to swim five kilometres
to shore.
Then, with one foot inside, he pushed the canoe into
the water with the other before bringing that foot
inside the canoe too. Picking up the paddle from the
outrigger, he dipped it deep in the water and with one
stroke, sent the small six-metre craft over the crest
of the incoming wave and out into the calmer waters
beyond the break.
Kuruma steadied himself by locking his legs against
the narrow mouth of the canoe before, moving
forward, towards the outrigger frame. He bent over
and reached down into the bottom of the dugout and
brought up the line he had prepared for trawling.
He let out the line as he paddled and once he was
satisfied that there was enough distance between the
lure and the canoe, he stopped and let the string out.
Using three reference points, Kuruma located the
position he was looking for before dropping the
anchor. When the anchor reached the bottom he
moved to the prow of the canoe and fastened the rope
to a 4-inch nail driven into the prow.
BOTTOM FISHING
Satisfied with his position, he dropped the jig rig down
the side of the canoe.
Holding the roll of string with the left hand, he
felt the weight of rod taking the jig down, until, all
of sudden the string became light. Either something
had snapped the line or there was fish swimming
around with the jig. He quickly gathered up the string
dropping it in a heap in the dugout - there were two
small, silver trevally caught on two hooks on the jig.
Bottom fishing had yielded him two excellent baitfish.
He unhooked the fish and dropped the jig down
again until the sinker rod hit the bottom. He jerked it
a couple of times and the line went taut, biting into his
fingers – he had hooked something. Kuruma played
with the fish at the other end of the line by pulling and
letting go of the line until the fish got tired and gave
up. He’d caught a large red emperor. It seemed that
he had interrupted a feeding frenzy.
Unhooking his catch, he dropped the jig back down
quickly to take advantage of the situation. When it
reached the bottom he jerked it up once, twice and
bingo! His hand dropped as the lined straightened with
a powerful tug from the deep. This time it was a trevally
just about the same size as the red emperor. He had
caught enough fish this way and he was ready to trawl.
TRAWLING FOR SAILFISH
Kuruma took an 80-pound line out of his bag with a
large hook attached. He took one of the two small
silver trevally out of the canoe and slipped the large
hook through its gill and into the flesh near the tail.
After more preparations, Kuruma pulled up anchor
before dropping the trawling rig in the water and
letting out a length of the string. When he was
satisfied all was well, he paddled out to stretch the line
slowly, keeping a close watch before setting the line
when he felt that there was enough distance between
the bait and the canoe.
Paddling towards the reef, he felt a nibble on the
line. Three minutes passed before he felt a tug. This
time it hit the line hard and, as if on auto unwind,
the line sped out of the roll as Kuruma dropped the
paddle and grabbed for it.
And then it happened - a twelve-foot long, slim fish
lifted out of the water – a magnificent silver streak
against a setting sun - the fabled sailfish.
As soon as the sailfish re-entered the water, Kuruma
turned the canoe as the old man from the village had
instructed him to do, keeping the line out from under
the outrigger so as to stop the fish from overturning
the canoe.
And there it was again – out of the water, standing
on on its tail with its long sharp spike extending from
it upper lips, pointing to the heavens as if prodding
for deliverance from above – a deliverance that never
came. Its fate had been sealed.
The sailfish continued to pull on the line dragging
the canoe hither and thither before its energy was
finally sapped. As it came alongside the canoe,
measuring its length along the side of the boat,
Kuruma drove the spear straight into the sailfish’s
large head. Kuruma needed all his strength to wrestle
the large fish into the dugout.
Proud and satisfied with his afternoon’s work,
Kuruma turned the canoe homeward, towards the
beach where his wife and eldest son were waiting.
“My dear husband you have killed the boss of the
sea”, his wife said.
He smiled proudly,
“I didn’t know if I could do it but now that I have
done it, I know how to get them.” •
A beach on Bougainville
The fabled sailfish
PNG ECHO 13

Concerning Greg…
PNG Echo’s poet laureate Greg Sheppard (also known to some as
eminent legal counsel) counts the seers, nonsense rhymers and Dr
Seuss as some of his main influences. His poems will sometimes
make you laugh, may even make you cry – but will always make you
thoughtful as he comments on life in rhyming stanzas.
THE FAN
A teary eyed fan meets her pop idol
(looking very much like George
Sheppard)
by GREG SHEPPARD
She lived all alone
in her one bedroom flat,
on the fringe of an uncaring city,
and worked for the folks
at St Vincent de Paul,
who had hired her out of pure pity.
She had toiled in that shop
since her mother passed.
There was nowhere else she could go.
She longed to be
accepted by the others,
but they said she was too fat and slow.
In her bedroom at night,
she took some solace,
with music and her little cat.
Her iPhone, her headphones,
and a YouTube account,
she didn’t want much more than that.
Her favourite band
were top of the pops,
and she tapped her toes to their beat.
Their music made her happy
like nothing else did,
and she played them all night on repeat
One day she heard
on the radio at work,
her idols were coming to town.
She bought a “meet ‘n’ greet”
ticket online,
and counted all the days down.
.On the day of the gig,
she set her alarm,
and jumped out of bed around five,
then caught an Uber
out to the airport
and waited for them to arrive.
The band’s private jet
touched down on time,
but security was tight as a drum.
Her idols were bussed
to their hotel unseen.
She might as well never have come.
She caught a cab,
to the stadium gate,
and stood in the line there all day,
enduring the casual taunts
of the punters,
who lined up behind her to wait.
Inside, she suffered
the supporting acts,
as they proudly strutted their stuff,
but she longed to see
her idols on stage
and felt she had waited enough.
When at last, her band
took to the stage,
she jumped from her seat and screamed.
The drummer pointed
right at her and waved,
She felt she was one of ‘the team’.
As the first loud strains
of their popular hits
belted out through enormous speakers,
her joy was unbridled,
she danced where she stood,
and kicked off her grubby old sneakers.
For about 90 minutes
of glorious fun,
She “belonged’ in the midst of the crowd.
United by the words
of every song,
and she sang along, right out loud.
When the last encore
was finally done,
She rushed to the “meet ‘n’ greet”,
and stood in a line
with her piece of their merch,
while the others trod on her feet.
She wanted to be really cool
when she met them,
and God knows how hard she tried.
When the singer kissed her
and hugged her, she trembled
Then broke down and cried.
He smiled and said
"It's all OK,"
and held her shaking hands,
"I hope your tears
are only for us"
and not for some other bands
She laughed and he gave her
a poster he's signed,
and took a selfie he said he would keep.
"Thanks for coming out, Darling,"
"We love you."
"See you in Sydney next week."
When at last she returned
to her flat late that night,
she laid out his poster on her bed.
And remembered how wonderful
he made her feel
with gesture and some kindly words said
14 PNG ECHO

WHAT GOES AROUND
comes around
by ELLA HALL
NOT FOR THE
SQUEAMISH
A Kalifunga culinary delicacy.
My children will tell you I’m a bit of
an obsessive – a fanatic, if you like.
I have been described by various
fruits of my loins as ‘the manners
fanatic’, ‘the grammar fanatic’, ‘the
‘food fanatic’ and, indeed, the second youngest
once described me as ‘the everything fanatic’.
I am perfectly ok with all of that, but it’s my
reputation as a food fanatic that I want to focus on.
SOME WEIRD STUFF
I admit, I eat some weird stuff: chicken’s feet, duck
tongue, jellyfish, my mother’s chicken casserole. I’ve
eaten snake, bull’s penis, deep fried pigs ears, just to
name a few things I have willingly put in my mouth.
Which is not to say I serve this sort of stuff to my
family - I don’t. But, the rule in my house is that
you don’t have to like something, but you do have
to try it.
Everyone is treated the same and that includes
Vop – my adopted daughter who hails from
Kalifunga in the Western Highlands Province. I
cook dinner and she eats it. If she doesn’t like what
I have served, she will be offered an alternative, but
only after she’s actually tasted it.
It’s been lovely to watch her tentatively approach
everything from sausages to jelly cups and watch
her eyes widen with pleasure as she realizes that
just because something looks different to what she’s
used to, it doesn’t mean it doesn’t taste good.
THAT FATEFUL INVITATION
While the husband was up in Hagen, I invited a
friend around to keep Vop and I company. Roslyn
is a local woman, who knows Vop well, Indeed
she’s from the same village and was instrumental in
helping us get Vop in the first place.
So Roz turns up the other day toting a plastic
bag, in which, she declares, she has a present for
Vop. And indeed she does. A lovely big plastic bag
of boiled chicken heads.
Would you like a few moments to re-read that and
compose yourselves?
Ever-thoughtful Roz has cooked these delights up
at home, poured the entire disgusting mass into a
plastic shopping bag and walked for at least half an
hour in 90-degree heat to our door.
And Vop fell on these culinary horrors as if she
was starving.
These critters still had beaks and freaky little
boiled eyelids, People!
And Vop grabs one of these things and starts
sucking on it like an icy pole.
And then, Vop, with juicy boiled chicken brain
goodness dribbling down her chin, grabs one of
these zombie pops and offers it to me, muttering
“Here, Mumma, you eat this one, it’s good.
Very tasty”
Can I get a resounding, “please, NO?”
There is no way on goat’s green earth that I am
putting a whole boiled chicken freaky all-day
sucker in my gob. I swear, its mouth was open and
that little zombie critter was smiling at me.
Yes, I’ve eaten some weird stuff, but I have
never eaten the entire head of any other creature,
especially not one that has been steeped in a
cauldron of salmonella with a side order of staph.
I back away from this horror, with my hands
outstretched and a look of pure disgust on my
face, which, by the way, was a perfectly reasonable
response, I feel.
And Vop says to me, over the sound of her
crunching through skull (breaking the number one
food commandment of never talking with your
mouth full)
“You must try it, Mumma. You don’t have to like
it, but you have to try it”
Hoist by my own petard! What goes around,
surely comes around!
Thinking quickly and with years of children’s
excuses to draw on, I declared that I wasn’t hungry
right NOW, but I’d LOVE to have one for my
dinner later.
There’s a whole plate of the freaky boiled critters
in the ‘fridge. I can hear them laughing at me, and
waiting for me to go to sleep before they summon
their zombie energy and march on their sautéed
neck stumps, up the stairs, to peck me to death in
my sleep. Aaarrrrgggghhh! •
PNG ECHO 15

life’s echoes
The view from Port Moresby
Royal Papua New Guinea Yacht Club.
NO CHEESE ON THE PIZZA
but much love on the plate.
PNG can be a tricky country to navigate as an
expat. Many find it quite challenging but some of
us come and fall in love with the place and never
want to leave.
Port Moresby from high on a hill
Road travel PNG Style.
by TANYA LLOYD
There are many reasons for embarking on the expat life in PNG: it’s an
adventure, you need a change of scenery, or maybe it was a decision
made for you by your employer.
Whatever be the case, as an expat, I’ve found one of the key things
that’s needed in PNG to successfully navigate life here is flexibility - and
I don’t mean changing dinner plans occasionally either - it’s the flexibility to be able
to conduct everything that you would normally do in your life in a different way.
Expectations tend to get in the way.
If you expect that a planned meeting at a specific time will commence at the
prescribed time, for instance – you’ll likely be disappointed. If you expect that the
agreed on arrangements will be ready as planned – they won’t be.
Want to cook a favourite meal that reminds you of home? By the time you’ve
searched the shelves of the fifth supermarket looking for that vital ingredient it’s
guaranteed you’ll be exhausted and, what’s more, empty handed!
Are you craving a Hawaiian pizza? How do you feel about Hawaiian without the
pineapple? Or even better, pizza without cheese? With stomach grumbling, salivating
16 PNG ECHO

Clearing the road for passing traffic.
like a hound, you open the box at home to find the vital
ingredients missing. Oh well.
When you change your attitude into flexible mode
and just ‘go with the flow’ you’ll find that these little
things are just petty annoyances that just prove to
encourage your own creativity and problem solving
skills. For instance, for times like this you will always
have a contingency plan like a fresh pineapple and
some grated cheese in the refrigerator at home.
And isn’t ‘going with the flow’ so necessary on the
roads of Port Moresby (POM)? Patience is a must.
Being in a hurry in POM will provoke the inevitability
of two cars travelling side by side up the Poreporena
Freeway somewhere in the range of 20 kilometres per
hour (kph), each one alternating speeding up to 25kph
then dropping back to 20kph as soon as you’ve changed
lanes. At least one of them will have a shattered
windscreen and be blowing heavy black smoke.
With this very small attitude adjustment, after very
little time you’ll find you’ve become quite practised
at switching to internal air and whispering words of
encouragement to those people trying to get their cars
up that hill: “Come on, you can do it, just a little bit
further.” They usually do make it - making me think
there could be power in my whisperings - a power that
the horn of a car, however loud and often it’s tooted,
doesn’t have.
I’m also told and encouraged by the media
and well-meaning friends that by lowering rigid
expectations and embracing flexibility, I will reap
benefits in increased physical and mental well-being
and perhaps even gain a more peaceful existence.
Certainly, anxiety about turning up late is a thing of
the past for me … everyone else is doing it so it must
be okay?
And very soon you’ll see that you’re assimilating
without even trying!
LOOK FOR THE GOOD
I truly believe that what you put out into the
universe is what you’ll get back. Look for the good
and that’s what you’ll see.
“This would never happen in Australia!”
I once heard someone complain loudly to a
beautifully polite young woman serving at a wellknown
eatery. Well guess what mate? You’re not in
Look for the good and that’s
what you’ll see.
Australia, best you face up to that fact so we can all
get on with living our care free expat lives.
We are blessed to be invited into this diverse
country and even more fortunate to still be young
enough at heart to learn new tricks, no matter what
our age. Embrace your flexibility even when you’re
feeling a little rigid and above all practice kindness
the same kindness that is given to you by the people
of PNG. •
PNG ECHO 17

health
Collagen
IS IT THE FOUNTAIN OF YOUTH?
It’s the next best thing to sliced bread, according
to the hype – or at least the next big thing after
the discovery of the benefits of omega 3 fatty
acids.
We’re talking hydrolysed, ingestible collagen
that is essentially a beauty treatment (but not only)
that works from the inside out, effectively slowing
(and repairing) the effects of aging.
Collagen is a protein made of amino acids that
naturally occur in our bodies. It makes up 30-40% of
all our bodily proteins and is responsible, in the main,
for the production of connective tissue: Skin, nails,
hair, gut health, joints, tendons, ligaments and muscle
are all dependent on bodily supplies of collagen.
At around the age of 25, our body’s production of
collagen dwindles by around 1% per year. It explains
the visible signs of aging like wrinkles, thinning hair,
brittle nails and also the not so visible signs like joint
pain and lack of joint flexibility.
For many years, the beauty industry has produced
topical skin creams in their skin-care ranges that
contain collagen, although scientific studies concluded
that the molecules in the creams were too large to
penetrate to the desired level of the skin to be truly
effective and suggested that the perceived efficacy
of topical collagen likely came from the other
ingredients in the cream.
Enter ingestible collagen.
COLLAGEN AND ME
Firstly let me be clear: I am not a bio-anything.
Neither am I trained in any science, including
medicine. What’s more, I have inherited fine Celtic
skin (that I largely take for granted).
A saleslady at a beauty bar once grabbed my hand
on which to demonstrate one of her creams:
“Your hands are so soft,” she exclaimed incredulously,
unnecessarily adding
“I guess you don’t spend too much time in the
kitchen.”
What’s more, I have more hair on my head per
square inch than most, albeit fine.
Nevertheless, I have self-prescribed between 10-20
grams of hydrolysed marine collagen per day and
here’s why.
It seems that however genetically blessed we are,
age will always catch us up eventually. Me, I had been
noticing red blotches appearing under the skin on my
forearms. They seemed to appear when I had been
carrying heavy bags – so they’re bruises – but they
aren’t blue - they look like raspberries.
They did not bother me too much until, one day,
I accidentally scratched the surface of one of these
‘raspberries ‘ (the skin on top of these bruises is very
fragile) and it bled as if I nicked my jugular vein. It
was alarming.
And so, as is my wont, Google was consulted. And
so it was that ‘Wiki’ came to the rescue:
Solar purpura …is a skin condition characterized by
large, sharply outlined, 1- to 5-cm, dark purplish-red
ecchymoses appearing on the dorsa of the forearms
and less often the hands. [The accompanying picture
was convincing – they looked like mine]
The condition is most common in elderly people of
European descent. [Oh thanks for that!] It is caused
by sun-induced damage to the connective tissue of the
skin… The lesions typically fade over a period of up to
3 weeks.
It fit perfectly, for although not a sun lover, my
forearms are the part of me most often exposed to
incidental sunshine. I was relieved it wasn’t terminal.
The next Google task was what to do about it.
And so I happened on the link between collagen and
connective tissue and the consumption of hydrolysed
collagen to boost flagging bodily supplies of the
protein to the benefit of skin, nails, hair and all other
functions relying on collagen. The theory is that it will
strengthen the skin on my arms made fragile by sun
damage and depleted collagen supplies.
On the minus side, there have not been extensive
studies – so the jury is out amongst the sceptical.
However, the one study that was quoted many times on
Google sites had had positive results with the sample
finding a 20% improvement in skin tone. What’s more,
the science, from a non-scientists viewpoint, sounded
credible and logical. If lack of collagen was the cause –
boosting collagen was the answer.
The burning questions:
• What form did it take?
• What dosage?
• Where could I buy it?
• Were there any side effects?
Collagen supplements come from two sources –
marine and bovine. It seems that marine collagen is
more bioavailable – meaning easier for the body to
absorb but is more likely to cause allergies (not to the
collagen but to the marine sources) and marine collagen
can also cause hypercalcemia or too much calcium. Once
again this is not the collagen itself but from the source,
especially if the supplement comes from shellfish or
shark’s cartilage – that are both high in calcium.
I chose marine collagen because I have no allergies
to fish and I figured that the calcium would be a bonus
as I also have a vitamin D deficiency (the vitamin you
get from the sun) that contributes to the reduction of
bone density and the onset of osteoporosis. (I find it
ironic that I get enough sun to damage the connective
tissues in my arms but not enough to fulfil my vitamin
D requirements.)
The collagen supplement, in various forms, liquids,
powder and pills, was not hard to find – on the
Internet. It proved more difficult to find in the small
town where I was staying at the time.
But I did find it, in pill form, in a pharmacy. The
chemist assistant kept asking me if I wanted it for
“articulation,” or joints. She looked puzzled when I
told her my reason. Nevertheless, I bought them.
That was a mistake.
The recommended dose, if there are no issues (like
bleeding solar purpura) was 5-10 grams per day
and up to 30 grams if you were aiming to combat a
problem. These HUGE pills contained only 750 mgs.
I’d need a bucketful of them to get the daily dose.
However, I have since found sources of supply at
large chemist outlets in Australia in boxes of 5 gm
powdered sachets and also 100 ml bottles of liquid
collagen that contain 10gms of collagen per bottle.
So, before you buy, check on the amount of collagen
per serve. Some manufacturers simply deal in ‘daily
doses’ not explaining what those doses contain. I’m
led to believe that any amount under 5 grams a day is
not likely to have much effect.
Apart from the side effects already mentioned – that
are, at best, low-risk possibilities and easily avoided if
you’re aware of your allergies, there doesn’t seem to
be any.
With all of this newly-found knowledge, I thought
“why not’?
THE RESULTS:
They told me that it would take at least six weeks
until I noticed any effect – it has now been 10 weeks.
In that time I have only had one raspberry bruise on
my forearm and it faded a lot quicker than the others.
Before I was taking the collagen my arms were never
completely free of them. Hopefully the collagen is
repairing the connective tissue and thickening the
skin on my arms.
My hair is shining – and that’s not easy when your
hair is blond. My nails are also noticeably stronger.
As for my wrinkles – I have noticed that the wrinkles
under my eyes, while having not disappeared, are
noticeable shallower. The skin on my hands, is still
soft – but that’s clearly due to the fact I spend so little
time in the kitchen – just ask that sales assistant!
I intend to persevere with taking the collagen
supplements because it has, so far, improved my
problem of raspberry bruises – any incidental benefits
are pure serendipity. •
18 PNG ECHO

MINDFULNESS:
being in your present
writes MIKE JONES
It’s a lovely sunny day. You are walking through
a beautiful park but you are not happy.
Tomorrow you face a trip to the dentist and
you are worried that it will be painful. You
have a knot in the pit of your stomach, maybe
your teeth are clenched and you generally feel very
tense. You remember the last time you had root canal
therapy you fainted because of the pain.
You are re-living the past and rehearsing for the future.
In the meantime, you have been completely
oblivious to the lovely day. You have completely
missed the present because your mind was somewhere
else, colouring your day black.
We can do better than this.
ACCORDING TO BUDDHA
About 2,500 years ago, the man who was later to
become the Buddha realised there was a difference
between pain and suffering: Pain, he said, is an
inevitable part of life, but suffering is not. He found
that there was a way to deal with suffering by being
aware of what our mind is doing, through regular
meditation - not only when we are experiencing pain,
but with regular practice.
In the early 1970s, Jon Kabat-Zinn (now Emeritus
Professor) of the University of Massachusetts
University Hospital, began to explore a secular use
of the practice of mindful meditation to help patients
with intractable chronic pain that was not benefitting
from conventional analgesics. He taught patients how
to refocus their attention away from the pain and to
look for tiny islands of stillness when they perceived
no pain.
Since that time, many other proponents of
mindfulness have brought elements of Buddhist
teaching to the West, not only to assist patients but
to help people become more conscious of what is
happening in the present. That is, to minimise re-living
a past that we cannot change and to stop rehearsing
for a future that may never happen.
Anyone can do it. Mindful meditation is based
on simply sitting quietly, often with eyes closed,
preferably in a peaceful place and concentrating the
mind on monitoring one’s own breath in order to
anchor us in the present – our breath.
So find yourself a pleasant peaceful place to sit.
Close your eyes. Breathe naturally and count your
breaths. Gently let go of any thoughts and be in the
present - your present.
THE PRACTICALITIES
Some meditators silently count breaths – say counting
to ten and then starting back at one. There is no hard
and fast rule about how long a meditation ‘sit’ should
That is, to minimise
re-living a past that we
cannot change and to stop
rehearsing for a future that
may never happen.
be. It’s best that whatever time one can reserve for
mediation, one should sit daily. Many people prefer to
start their day with a 20-minute silent sit – alone or in
the company of others. •
CAUTION: While there are undoubtedly
significant bodily and mental health benefits
in mindful meditating; in creating islands of
peace in our increasingly hectic lives, few if
any meditation proponents would argue that
meditation is a panacea. Most would describe
meditation as being beneficial in supporting
other forms of therapy.
PNG ECHO 19

Spirit of the Nation
Children waving goodbye to the Buka ferry
Independence
for Bougainville
The Papua New Guinean government has been given
more than fifteen years to convince Bougainvilleans not
to break away. To this date, its efforts have been dismal.
The move towards independence with the referendum
vote soon to be taken has reached the point of no return.
Bougainville will be independent whatever it takes.
writes CHRIS BARIA
The first time I heard the word ‘referendum’
was back in 1968 through my maternal
uncle who was spending his holidays with
us. I was eight years old at the time.
Uncle James Rutana was the one after
my mother in a family of six; they were close. My father
was also fond of his well-educated brother-in-law with
whom he liked discussing issues of the day.
It was one of those nights, by the light of kerosene
lamp, that my uncle explained to us what a referendum
was. And he knew what he was talking about.
I later learnt that my uncle had been a member of a
group of Bougainvillean tertiary students from Port
Moresby (and maybe other centres as well) who had
formed themselves into a quasi-political movement
called Mungkas Association.
On September 8, 1968, soon after CRA* announced
that there was an estimated 900 million tons of low
grade copper at Panguna, two out of the three members
of the Papua New Guinea House of Assembly and 22
students met in Port Moresby to discuss a referendum
to choose whether Bougainville should remain part
of Papua New Guinea, secede or become part of
the British Solomon Islands Protectorate (now the
Solomon Islands – an independent nation-state).
To effect their goal, and on a purely volunteer basis,
the students used their Christmas break to raise
awareness on the referendum vote that had been
discussed in Port Moresby.
As they started to move around the communities in
Kieta District, a pro-Australian ex-serviceman [named]
who had served with the Coastwatcher Paul Mason
during World War II heard about what the students
were doing. He was one of a small group who had been
advised by Australian missionaries and government
officers that Bougainville ought not to break away from
Papua New Guinea.
The Australian reported the students to the
Australian government – a government that was pro a
political status quo where Bougainville was politically
governed by Port Moresby. As a result, all activities in
preparation for possible independence were stifled by
the Papua New Guinea government.
That was how the first attempt at staging a
referendum ended – the battle was lost, but the war
wasn’t over (both metaphorically and actually).
OF SQUANDERED OPPORTUNITIES…
The failure of this referendum spawned a couple
more unilateral declarations of independence. One on
September 1, 1975 just two weeks before Papua New
Guinea’s independence on September 16, 1975, and
again during the Bougainville conflict on May 17, 1990.
At the start of the conflict in 1990, I, and many others,
believed that had the Bougainville Revolutionary
Army (BRA) gotten their act together they may have
effectively taken independence for Bougainville then.
The Papua New Guinea government had withdrawn
from the island totally, leaving an opportunity for the
BRA to step into the breach.
By then, the Papua New Guinean cause had lost the
sympathy of the Bougainville population when the
security forces started to take out their frustrations
on the civilians when they failed to apprehend the
BRA ‘rebels’. From this, the independence movement,
triggered by the war over the mine at Panguna
and prosecuted by the BRA, gained wide support
throughout Bougainville: from north to south and east
to west.
However, eventually, this support was sorely tested
when, finding there was no enemy to fight some of the
BRA started to mistreat their own people, settling old
scores using the power they had acquired through the
barrel of the gun.
As the young, post-crisis writer Leonard Fong Roka
wrote in 2014:
“The problem with these political manoeuvres was
that the politicians had no power over the reckless
BRA men who, over time, had carved their own minispheres
of influence as they pursued a lawless grab for
the spoils of war gains and the opportunity to remedy
past grievances.”
Independence, at that time, was a rare opportunity
that we were unable to harness. But this was a war
that was not fought by an institutionalized army
with a proper chain of command. This was far more
anarchical with all the attendant risks that flow from
an armed force with a lack of hierarchical authority:
The power of the gun was available to be abused and
it was.
Had independence happened then, by now, we
would have built up an indigenous-based system of
government and organised an economy based on a
wide range of resources and innovations.
In reality, we had our first taste of effective
independence (if not actual) when the PNG
government imposed an economic blockade on the
island during the war. With supples blocked, people
became innovative; they reinvented hydro power: they
used coconut oil as substitute for diesel fuel: villagers
traded with each other in whatever way they could
either using cash or bartering items and goods.
As the war deepened and the Papua New Guinea
Defence Force (PNGDF) came back to Bougainville
to fight and regardless of the rogue antics of some
of the BRA, media personnel and some government
officials in Bougainville stated that all of the people
with whom they had spoken wanted secession and
independence. There was no question of the unity and
total support for the call to independence, they said
And it seems that the word on the street (and
elsewhere) is that things have not changed for this
upcoming independence vote.
Speaking on ABC Radio Australia recently,
Vanuatu-based Australian photojournalist, Ben
Bohane, who was awarded the Bougainville Mission,
Pacific Journalism Grant, said that all Bougainvilleans
20 PNG ECHO

with whom he had spoken told him that
they would vote for independence in the
forthcoming referendum.
I believe that the only thing that can stymie
the Bougainvillean march to independence is
lack of registered voters due to their names
not being on the electoral roll and/or a poor
turnout of voters.
However, I am heartened by reports of how
the level of voter enrolment is proceeding
throughout the region and also in the rest of
PNG, Solomon Islands and Australia.
IN RETROSPECT
Looking back at those times when a
referendum was illegal; students worked
without funds to raise awareness and educate
their mostly illiterate people on the finer
points of a referendum.
They walked on foot over the mountains
and valleys and along the beaches to bring to
their people the message of a referendum and
the hope of independence – a hope that has
remained with us to this day.
If, before we became disoriented and
disunited due to abuse of power by some of our
fighting men, we were able to stand together
against what we perceived as a common enemy,
then what better reason is there for us to
huddle together once more than the hope of
independence: a hope past generations have
instilled in us and a reality that this generation
has the power to effect - in their honour.
A significant ‘yes’ vote for independence is
going to be very hard for Papua New Guinea
government to ignore. •
(*Cozinc Riotinto of Australia Ltd. was
renamed CRA in 1980 before becoming Rio
Tinto Group)
Kieta - once a thriving harbour
An eerie mist falls over Panguna
PNG ECHO 21

INDEPENDENCE FOR
BOUGAINVILLE FROM A
WOMAN’S PERSPECTIVE
by CHRIS BARIA
Mrs Lucy Madoi is a resident of
Arawa. This former capital of
Bougainville is more like a village
today with many, displaced by the
conflict, living and occupying houses
left vacant by mine employees and public servants.
Mrs. Madoi is a widowed mother of three who lived
through the war and moved to Arawa with her now
late husband Steven Madoi when the crisis ended.
“It has not been easy to plan for the future in
Bougainville,” she tells me, “but since my husband
died I have kept myself busy with volunteer work
providing charity work for the needy.”
“I am now the President of ‘Bougainville
Women’s Federation’, which is a voice for women in
Bougainville. Our main activities are mentoring and
grooming younger women to take our place
as leaders in their community.”
It is recognised that women’s groups in
Bougainville were integral to the peace process and
the development of the peace agreement
that brought the war to an end.
And they continue to be influential.
In the 2017 Autonomous Bougainville Government
elections, six women from the Bougainville
Women’s Federation were appointed to be election
observers and in the upcoming vote for Bougainville
independence, the Bougainville Women’s
Federation has undertaken an extensive programme
of voter education, including educating the women
of Bougainville about their participation rights.
Of the upcoming vote Mrs Madoi advises:
“Lobbying should be intensified in the National
Parliament by our members to get support from
other members of parliament - like the New Guinea
Islands who understand our plight. We should also
be lobbying for support with our Pacific Island
neighbours to speak out for us.”
“We must all speak with one voice and leave no
one behind, as we move forward to achieve what
our older people had dreamt about for so long - that
is total independence of Bougainville.” •
BOUGAINVILLE
WOMEN AND
GOVERNMENT
by SUSAN MERRELL
E
xcept for a few districts, Bougainville is
a matrilineal society where ownership
of land is passed down through the female
inheritance line.
Although matrilineal, Bougainville society
is not matriarchal, men still dominate public
life – but women are vocal.
Nevertheless, Bougainville leads the
way when it comes to women’s political
participation and advancement in Papua
New Guinea.
For, unlike the National Parliament of
Papua New Guinea, which currently has
no female members and reserves no seats
for them, the Autonomous Bougainville
Government reserves three of its 33 seats for
women with one of the three awarded
a cabinet position.
Women are free to contest the other seats
but, as I write, there is only one woman,
who has currently won a non-reserved seat,
indicating the prevailing dominance of men
in public life.
The Autonomous Bougainville Government
is addressing this with legislation such as
the ‘Bougainville Community Government
Act’ of 2016 where, at the local level, each
municipal ward must have one female and
one male member and the awarding of the
‘Chair’ must alternate and rotate between
the genders. • Sohano Island, Buka
22 PNG ECHO

View from the hospital to the living quarters.
Tears on the last page
of Papua New Guinea
by KEVIN PONDIKOU
The world is a book. And those who have not
travelled have only read one page.
One day, if you’re searching for a different
perspective on life I would recommend
spending some time in a little hospital
far away from the concrete and fast-paced urban
surroundings of
surburbia.
Turn the page with
me as you leave
the urban scenery,
where everyone
has a phone and
the world happens
only as it’s updated
on a social media.
Leave the plush,
air-conditioned
surrounds of the
plane as you travel
from Kiunga Airport
through the searing heat along the only sealed road in
town and onto the Kiunga-Tabubil Highway, through
a forest of sago palms, rubber trees and trees that are
home to various Birds of Paradise.
As you wipe the sweat from your brow from the
tropical humidity of the plains of North Fly District,
I’m writing this down for
memories sake as something to
read in years to come about the
trials and tribulations of delivering
health care to the citizens of
remote Papua New Guinea.
Dr Pondikou
and his healthy
patient.
you have entered an alternate reality.
If you’re still willing to turn more pages, then come
along with me as we step off the PMV bus with
groceries purchased from Kiunga town - 28 km away -
as here, there are no shops, only the school canteen and
small village canteens.
Here, we are in an
unstable reality. It is a
place where time stands
still one moment and takes
a huge leap forward the
next as traditional culture
is mixed with modern
conveniences, lifestyles and
attitudes.
Here on the last page of
Papua New Guinea, you’ll
find that there are Papua
New Guineans living their
lives the best way they
know how. We move along
with our hurts and insecurities and mistakes from the
past, present and future.
Take a closer look at the cards that were dealt to
our citizens here in remote, rural Papua New Guinea.
There are teardrops on the last page of Papua New
Guinea. •
OPERATING
IN THE DARK
It was a rainy day, just like any
other rainy day at Rumingae
District Hospital in Kiunga, Western
Province. There were ward rounds
to do, patients to be discharged, calls
to be made to outposts to deal with
any new cases or emergencies - and
arrangements to be made if there
were.
It had been a full day and I was
heading home, but not before I
checked in with a woman in labour
who had given birth to large babies
previously (one resulting in a
caesarean section) and who was past
her due date.
Earlier in the morning, after the
first ward round, I had called an
obstetrician colleague concerning her
case. Being past her due date, she needed a delivery plan
and I was happy when an agreed one was put into place.
Already, the woman was in considerable pain and
was asking for a caesarean section but, in Papua New
Guinea, there are rules we have to abide by when it
comes to doing this operation and one is that there must
be a good clinical reason for it and there didn’t seem to
be one - even though she was a high-risk mother.
At that stage, there was nothing to be done but to wait
and see how things progressed, so I left for home, asking
the staff to keep me updated on her condition.
At 7 pm I got a “please call me” from the ward (my
radio has been dead and as a result staff are calling me
on my phone: - I hope to get a new radio in the near
future) - it was about the woman in labour. I went to the
ward fully expecting to operate.
However, after doing a clinical review I opted to give
her at least two more hours in order to give her the
best chance of delivering naturally. I decided that if she
hadn’t delivered by 10pm then it was likely she would
need the operation.
We prepared to do the caesarean section as time ticked
by with no result.
It was late and it was raining, nevertheless, when
I called Muba and Sister Kamura and sent Bob our
security guard to check Sister and Mr Dusi as well
as Tommy and Frank, the medical students, they
came quickly.
We had no anaesthesia, so doing a spinal block was my
only option. It’s a very tricky and precise procedure and
I was not confident that my first attempt had hit the right
spot, so I did a second one and this achieved the level of
numbness required for the operation.
Then came the blackout!
Electricity supply is always unreliable here but
thankfully Tommy had his phone torch with him
so I could see to administer the bupivacaine spinal
anaesthetic.
Because of the off again, on again electricity here, staff
routinely carry torches and all of our torches went on
providing the light I used to begin the caesarean section.
Sister Parila had a big torch and she stood on a stool to
shine it onto our operating field.
Our blood pressure machine was operating on its
battery while Sister Kamura got the foot pump suction
machine working by pedalling. When we didn’t need it,
we would tell her to stop pedalling and she would only
start again when we needed it.
My two operating assistants were Muba and Frank.
As luck would have it, just as I was about to incise the
uterus, the power came on. It was not a moment too
soon as, thanks to the good light, I was able to get the
baby out before I needed to deal with the complication
of a placental cord snapping.
I’m so glad that Sister Dusi had prayed before we
started operating under torchlight. We had delivered a
healthy 3kg baby girl.
So all’s well that ends well thanks to the dedicated
effort of our staff and students (Medical and CHW)
who work in this remote place in such dire and trying
circumstances. •
PNG ECHO 23

Some children are forced to forage on rubbish tips
Orphans
There is no accurate data for orphans in Port Moresby. Despite
the Melanesian culture of ‘taking care of our own,’ thousands of
children still walk the streets begging for food and money, whilst
some sell stuff on the roadsides to make a living. The country has
no working social network systems in place and no orphanages,
though there are a few safe homes and outreach centres who give
food and clothes to orphans. The plight of these children continues
to go unheard. Here is just one of their stories.
24 PNG ECHO

y REBECCA RUNDUALI
It was raining on that morning, 16 years ago,
when my mother died from Tuberculosis (TB)
in the Port Moresby General Hospital TB ward.
My father had long deserted us, I didn’t know
what to do. I was only 15 years old then. The
doctor helped me fill out the papers and gave me the
death certificate. They put her lifeless body into the
morgue - I had no money to pay for a car to bring her
body home to pay our last respects.
I walked in the rain from Three Mile to our home
in Konedobu. When I arrived, my younger siblings
were sitting outside our little tin house collecting
water from the raindrops with pots. Their faces
looked tired and hungry. They ran to me hoping I
was bringing food.
With a heavy heart, I hugged them to me and
told them that Mama had died. I told them not to
cry as we needed to work together and find money
to bury her.
My twin sisters were nine years old then and our
baby brother was seven: they were small for their
age. I told the three of them to stay by the house as
I had to go look for our father. He was a policeman
at the Port Moresby Police Station. I set out to walk
from Konedobu to downtown Port Moresby for the
second time.
When I turned up at the Police Station, his new wife
was there, she swore at me and told me to leave but
some of the officers brought me in to the precinct to
see my Dad, anyway.
I told my father that Mama had died expecting that
he’d help us but he told me to leave his office, that it
was none of his business and that she was not his wife
nor were we his children.
I wanted to scream, to argue, but I couldn’t
because I knew if I did, I would cry and I wasn’t
going to cry in front of him and his new wife who
had followed me in. I had far too much pride for
that. I walked back home alone that afternoon, just
as it was getting dark.
AFTER WE BURIED MAMA
It took the four of us two months to raise the
money (by selling fish and empty tins and bottles
that we collected) to buy a coffin and another
month to raise money to pay for the land at Kilakila
to bury our mother.
The settlement we lived in was kind to us,
one of our neighbors transported us in his truck
and another women gave us a nice ‘Meri blouse’
for our mother to wear. We buried her on a
Saturday morning.
Her family did not bother to come; they had disowned
her many years before when she married my father.
A month later, my father turned up with his new
wife and took our baby brother away. I fought him,
but he beat me and left with little Johnny, I never saw
him again.
It was just the three of us left. We carried on what our
mother used to do and sold doughnuts and fried fish in
downtown Port Moresby to survive.
While I sold the fried fish and doughnuts, the twins
would collect the empty bottles and tins discarded by
the city residents.
Life was good; at least we had a roof over our heads
and food to eat at the end of the day.
I promised them that, the next year, I’d put them in
school and they were so excited. We used the profit
from our food sales to buy our food to eat and saved
the money from the sales of empty cans and bottles for
their schooling.
TB STRIKES AGAIN
After a year, one of my sisters started getting sick,
she lost a lot of weight so we took her to the clinic
and were told that she had TB – the disease our
mother had died from. Later that month, my other
sister also went down with TB.
I couldn’t let the twins die, they were all I had: they
were my family. The nurse said they had to eat good
food and take their six months’ supply of medicine in
order to get better.
I did the best I could, but within two months, they
had both died.
They died a day apart, first Barbie then Nancy. Though
I begged Nancy to not leave me, she said she was so tired
and that her twin and her Mama were waiting for her, so
I told her to close her eyes and go to them.
I left them in the morgue and walked home.
The next day I woke up covered in my own sweat
and I knew I too had TB. I slept all day, praying for
death to take me - it had already taken my mama and
my two beautiful sisters - it had left me with nothing.
I lay on the floor of our tin house the whole week,
too weak and sick to move.
Before that week was out, a man from the
settlement, during a drunken binge, broke into
our little tin house and raped me, I was too weak
to fight, too weak to scream for help, and just laid
there as he raped me, beat me up and pulled me out
into the darkness.
He thought I was dead. He’d pushed me into
the drain that ran at the back of the settlement.
Eventually, I was discovered by a ‘white’ couple who
called an ambulance to take me to the hospital.
It took me three weeks to recover during which
time I was too sick to do anything. My father was
a police officer but I could not go to him - he had
already rejected me twice.
I couldn’t pay the admission fee or the ward fee but
the nurse was kind enough and let me go without any
payment.
I went back home, determined to bury my little
sisters, so I, once again, started selling fried fish and
collecting empty tins and bottles to sell.
It took me almost eight months to save enough
(adding it to the money the twins had saved for
school) but when I went back to the morgue, it was
too late - they were not there.
I was told that the unclaimed bodies had all been
buried in an unmarked grave at Nine Mile Cemetery
two months previously. I cried for what was an
eternity, my mind screamed, I couldn’t accept that
their little bodies, were dumped into one big hole
with so many others. The pain was unbearable.
I returned to my tin house at the edge of the
settlement, and continued, as before, selling fish and
collecting empty bottles and tins to sell.
LIFE THESE DAYS
I’ve been selling fried fish ever since and I continue
to search for my little brother because he is my only
family. I heard a couple of years ago that my father
had retired and moved back to his former home in
Morobe. And one day, when I have saved enough,
maybe I’ll go to Morobe and look for my little
brother - but perhaps this is just wishful thinking.
I still pray for him, every night before I go to sleep.
I hope he’s okay, I hope he went to school, and I
hope he’s working, I also sometimes pray that he
would come back and search for me.
Anyway, these days, I have many friends, other
women who have similar stories to me - some sell
food and goods on the roadside to survive as do I,
while others sell their bodies – but not me - I know
my mother and sisters are watching down from
Heaven and might be ashamed of me if I did that. •
The character in the story is now 31 years old and still lives in the tin house she used to share with her mother
and three siblings. She tells me that she started a rumor around the settlement that she was infected with
HIV & Aids so no one bothers her, not even the drunkards.
PNG ECHO 25

travel
PLANTATION ISLAND RESORT
taking corporate
responsibility seriously.
Planting coral on the
artificial reef
I met the genial Alex Wilson while he was Manager at the Grand Pacific Hotel in Port Moresby. He’s now
moved on and is managing Plantation Island Resort in Fiji where he loves to welcome visits from Papua
New Guineans and people he met during his time in PNG. I have been one of those lucky people. This is
what I found.
writes SUSAN MERRELL
I
arrived at Plantation Island on a one-hour ferry ride from Port Denarau
in Nadi - windblown but relaxed.
There was a welcoming party on the jetty: singing troubadours with shell
necklaces to greet us, the newest arrivals.
In the achingly blue waters, not far from the beach, was the children’s
water playground: a series of floating and fixed obstacles for the children to
climb over, swim to and to dive off. It looked like fun. I wondered: were adults
allowed to play too? Shoals of fish were swimming under and around the pylons
of the jetty – and yes, the palm trees were swaying. Heavenly!
I was staying at the adult’s-only ‘Lomani’ part of the island and my room was
a cool oasis with a lawn at the back that led directly to the beach. It was perfect
– the epitome of a tropical idyll but with all the mod cons (including a backyard
Jacuzzi) and a welcome bottle of ice-cold white wine to greet me.
This is some of the beneficial effects of tourism - along with boosting the
economy and providing local employment, it also gives us the comfort
of modern living to enhance the tropical experience. Did I mention the
swimming pools?
But industry has its detrimental effects - and so too tourism. In particular I am
talking about environmental concerns and the how the influx of tourists affects
local life, habits and customs, sometimes for the better but too often for the worse.
Plantation Island Resort management is tackling these things in its own
quiet way.
26 PNG ECHO

A friendly local with
the children’s water
park in view
Did you know that the
presence of stingrays
ensures a clean shoreline by
keeping down the seaweed?
A sandbar lunch
REEF REGENERATION
The effects of climate change and human
encroachment are nowhere as evident as in the
Pacific. Reports of rising seas, dying coral reefs and
the depletion of fish stocks are becoming too familiar.
What’s more, sometimes, in our enthusiasm
to experience the unfamiliar and the exotic, we
inadvertently do damage to those things that
fascinate and attract us.
Manager, Alex Wilson tells of the how the daily
feeding of the trigger fish – an activity beloved of the
guests - was found to be having a detrimental affect
on the surrounding coral reef. As a result of the feeding,
the trigger fish no longer ate their traditional food –
sea snails - and the sea snails, without their natural
predators, were increasing and decimating the coral.
However, in spite of this little hiccup, it hasn’t
stopped Alex harnessing the enthusiasm of his
guests to participate in the ecological well-being of
the local environment. (Although, he has stopped
feeding the trigger fish).
The island management has a well-established reef
regeneration program whereby the guests can plant
a piece of coral and map its progress on subsequent
visits and Alex encourages them to participate in the
plantings with enticements such as a picnic on the
sandbar in the middle of the lagoon afterwards. He
does likewise with the regular clean-up-the-beach
days. Picking up a bit of rubbish or planting a coral
seems a small price for such a delightful reward and
the enhanced community spirit and camaraderie is its
own reward too.
The children especially like being involved and
there is a venue where they can make a fish house
out of sand, stone and cement to plant on the reef.
These fish houses are somewhere that fish can
hide to get away from predators - a necessity of a
balanced ecology.
Did you know that the presence of stingrays ensures
a clean shoreline by keeping down the seaweed?
Plantation Island is also planting sea grapes in the
ocean, (known as sea caviar, because it pops in your
mouth, similar to the fish eggs). Alex tells me it is a
super food. Sea grapes are a seaweed packed with
vitamins and minerals. Considered a good source of
vitamins A and C, calcium, zinc and iron, they also
PNG ECHO 27

Making fish houses
contain a high level of vegetable protein per calorie
and a good amount of omega 3 fatty acids too.
Which leads us to Plantation Island’s other
corporate concerns…
…THE WELL-BEING OF THE LOCAL
EMPLOYEES ON PLANTATION ISLAND
Diabetes Type II is rife in Fiji (and many other
Pacific countries, such as PNG, are not far behind
statistically). Plantation Island resort has three staff
members with lower-limb amputation as a result of
the disease.
Out of concern for the health of his staff – of
which there are 280 – Alex set up a health check.
He was alarmed at the results. Generally, his staff
was overweight and sedentary and their health
check indicated this with the inherent diabetic
warning signs.
He noticed that it was usual for his staff to eat a
big meal late at night that was often refined, fatty,
convenience foods and that they did little exercise.
He also noticed how alarmingly young many of them
were when they passed away.
Leading the way by example, Alex now walks every
Monday morning (at 6 am) with all staff that are
present and on duty. He doesn’t take “no” for an
answer. He says he’s noticed an enormous change.
While I was on the Island, he was also playing host
to celebrated New Zealand chef, Colin Chung and
hospitality trainer, Greg Cornwall of Pacific Islands
Resort Consultants who were conducting staff
training on how to use and serve local ingredients in
new and modern ways.
28 PNG ECHO

Chung believes that local ingredients have been ignored in favour of imported
goods due to an erroneous belief that the local product is not good enough.
“It’s just a case of knowing how to use them,” says Chung, who rightly points out
that the nutritional value of the local products surpasses that of refined imports.
Indeed, using local ingredients, as opposed to imports, has many benefits - for
the economy, for employment and also for health generally. Chung tells me, for
instance, that bitter gourd - widely available in Fiji - has properties that lowers
blood sugar.
I interrupted the training in the middle of Chung overseeing the preparation of
food for a Manager’s cocktail party that evening on the beach, which I happily
attended.
The food was innovative and delicious and most of the recipes can be found in
Chung’s cook book, Kana Vinaka,Contemporary Island Cuisine.
My favourite was the smoked fish pate – simple to make and delicious. (see
recipe)
Kudos to the management of Plantation Island Resort for taking the lead in
addressing environmental and health concerns on their small patch. •
Kana Vinaka is published by Pacific Islands Resort Consultants and you can
find out more detail on its availability from www.colinskitchen.co.nz
The beach at the end of my garden
PNG ECHO 29

my job
MY JOB
Sharing his employment
experiences this month is...
Justice
George Manuhu CSM
Q | What is your job title?
Judge of Supreme and National Courts
Q | What qualifications do you need for this job?
Five years of experience as a lawyer
Q | Where and how did you obtain yours?
I was a lawyer with the Public Solicitors Office for four years and I was a District
Court Magistrate for 11 years.
Q | Was this a
true vocation
for you or did
you fall into it
accidentally?
I always wanted to
be a lawyer and after
I became a lawyer I
wanted to be a Judge.
“When I was a child,
I wanted to be a radio
announcer because I
love music.”
Q | What type of personality would you recommend to follow
this line of work?
Someone who is patient, is a good listener, is compassionate but fair, courageous
and firm in his decisions.
Q | What are your main duties?
In the National Court, I deal with criminal cases. I preside over all criminal cases
from a simple assault to wilful murder. In the Supreme Court, I preside over
appeals, reviews and constitutional matters.
Q | Who are you currently working for?
As a Judge, I work for the Independent State of Papua New Guinea.
Q | Did your job entail a long training period and an arduous
climb up the corporate ladder after you completed your studies
or not?
Yes. I was Chief Magistrate of Papua New Guinea before I was appointed as Acting
Judge and subsequently as Judge.
Q | What and where are opportunities for people with your
qualifications?
A lawyer can become a Magistrate, a Judge, a politician, a diplomat, a consultant, a
CEO or a businessman.
Q | What attracted
you to the job?
My sense of justice, fairness and
compassion for others, especially those who come into conflict with the law.
Q | What did you want to be when you
were a child?
When I was a child, I wanted to be a radio announcer because I love music.
Q | What is the best part of your job?
When I make a good decision.
Q | The worse part?
When I am asked to impose the death penalty.
Q | If you could, today, change course and be and do
something else, would you?
Yes
Q | …and what would that be?
I want to be a preacher.
30 PNG ECHO

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TTTeeeeeeeellllllll:: +6611 2 9999660 44411444444
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PACIFIC
PERSPECTIVES
PUBLISHERS OF
PNG ECHO &
REDEEMING MOTI
WITH
DR SUSAN MERRELL