MIPELA GO ANTAP LONG MAUNTAIN WANTAIM DOMANIC NA GIDEON

29th April 2008

We had a quiet day on Saturday getting over the near evacuation. We had resigned ourselves to the situation of being evacuated, even though we felt that the judgement was premature, and not based on hard facts. Hard facts are difficult to come by here, where the newspaper says one thing one day then refutes it the next, often the story in the National will be the exact opposite of the Post Courier,these being the two daily papers, one Murdoch the other Korean owned, and every person you meet has a different set of 'facts'.

Evidently the hospital now has enough oxygen and medical supplies, so we were given a choice to stay put or evacuate to Madang. We stayed. We'll see how the situation pans out, but at the moment, we certainly feel perfectly safe.

Not so sure I'm safe though! She's better! Heaven help me!!

If anyone has any doubts as to the fact that Jacquie is recovering, then today should remove them all. Sunday morning dawned and Jac is up at six am making coffee, I should have known there was something afoot, as that is usually my job.I was looking forward to a much needed Sunday lie in (Jac had been up at the crack of dawn most mornings last week to ring the children, only to find on most occasions that the line was 'baggerup'), and then she says 'John, are you awake?' I snort. 'Would you like a cup of coffee?' I try ignoring. 'Shall we go for a walk up the mountain?' 'Oh god', I think.Bear in mind that we live right next to this 'mauntain' and she has been here for 10 weeks and has not been well enough yet to even venture the lower slopes. So humour her I think, we can go up part way, and when she gets tired we can stop and come back down. I did try the old chestnut, that it had been raining in the night and the track would be slippery, not a lie; the clay here packs down underfoot and is treacherous when wet. But no stopping her. We pack a little water and a couple of bananas, thinking we would be back for a late breakfast, I should know better by now, especially when she insists we pack the camera and binoculars!

We set of at a gentle stroll, the track is fine, no too wet, uphill but not too steep, lots of people heading down as we head up, on their way to church or market and all very cheerful, these are the villagers who have had the compensation payout, and some of the cheerfulness was alcohol induced, even at this early hour. Everyone asks 'Yu go antap long mauntain?' and when we say we will try, there are big smiles all round. Anyway, Jac stops to take a picture of a rather run down house, which was the size of a garden shed and which disgorged about 12 people - I think these people turn into bats at night and hang from the rafters!As I walk on, I see a Grade 10 pupil from school (Dominic) sitting on this elaborate gravestone with a roof and he sees me and comes over and starts to chat. The grave is that of his grandfather, who was a big man in the village and worked with the original Lutheran missionary and helped set up the Lutheran Church, which supports the school. We are joined by Jac and Gideon, his brother and continue to walk up the track, talking about school, their village and the payout. We mistakenly tell them we are heading 'antap' and they say they will guide us. Even though we explain I had been half way up the mountain on a previous walk, they just attached themselves to us and as we reached the single file track, they take up their positions, one in the lead and one behind. So off we go on the steep upward track.

I am sure you have all been up a 'mauntain' like this one, seems reasonable and not too high and the top seems only 400 or 500 metres away and then when you get there, oh no!!, there is another summit about the same distance away. What made this worse was there were children from around 4 or 5 years of age to old women with bilums (bags) on their backs and heavy sacks on their heads, even an old woman who was knitting, making a bilum as she walked up the mountain, all going past us, as if we were standing still, which quite often we were. We frequently stopped, ostensibly to look at the scenery, but really to rest and get our breath back. We were sweating buckets, red in the face and panting like dogs and to my suggestion that we turn back, guess what, Jac says, 'No way, I'm getting to the top if it's the last thing I do!'The two boys were brilliant, always there to help with a hand if we slipped or to talk while we rested, they were patience personified.

Everyone who passed us seemed delighted we were going up 'their mauntain', and they were all either going to their village or the church, which was 'antap'. We even met the headteacher of the primary school we had visited in Kundiawa, on his way to church, with his two young sons. He told us he had done the journey down from his village to his school and back every day for 5 years, a journey of some 4-5 kilometres down and up seriously steep slopes on the homeward trek. The boys were happy to point out, at one stage, that there is no flat land in PNG, I think we already knew that.

The views were worth the climb and some, but when we thought we'd made it, the boys headed off towards another knoll, which we had to go round to get to the other side.It was through vegetation and Jac remembered being told about leeches that lurk in the bush, so she promptly unrolled her trousers to cover her legs and Dominic reassured us there were no big snakes in the bush, only small ones and they're the lethal ones! The way down was a bit easier to start with, but we were tiring quickly with the heat and the downward journey was much longer.We eventually arrived home around 1.30pm, so the stroll took some 6+ hours. Not bad for a Sunday morning wander!

We had left with no breakfast and we shared our bananas 'antap' with the boys, so we were starving when we got back and in discussion with the boys, we discovered that they don't 'do' breakfast here.They just have a drink of water for breakfast and then eat only once a day and that is mainly garden vegetables, sweet potatoes, taro, kumu and other green veg. boiled in coconut milk, very little protein, other than occasional kakarul (chicken), carried back from the market live and then boiled with the veg, they do kill them first! So when Jac offered to do pancakes for breakfast, we got puzzled looks, as they don't know what they are, but after they had eaten three each (I only had 2 - much to my consternation and deeply resentful glares) with lots of lemon juice and sugar, they decided that pancakes are OK. It's amazing - there is not one fat student in the school!That's obviously the answer to the obesity problem, no food all day, boiled veg for supper and definitely no pudding!

The final treat for the boys was to watch a video on the laptop of their province, Simbu, which another volunteer had recorded. They were absolutely gobsmacked to see their countryside and hear people speaking their language. No chance these guys will spend their life in front of computer games, these two have not had a chance to use a computer at school, and at home with no electricity, a computer would be useless. It really is a case of one foot in the 21st century and one still firmly planted in the bush house, with no running water, (the boys wash in the stream), no electricity and no jobs to speak of. This really is such a country of contrasts, the people are friendly, proud of their land and villages, even their 'mauntains', and so happy to share them with us .

Oh no!Jac's already got her eye on another mountain - help!!I'm hiding her shoes!

Love to you all

xxx