Appendix Gallery

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Appendix

Here are some pictures I took at a cultural display in Port Moresby in 1969:

I have been let down

I phone Dave Smith on Tuesday and ask him what’s happened to my car. It’s ok he says, I phoned PNG Motors and they towed the car to their workshop with my instructions to them to strip the engine.

My very first car in Australia, now ruined.

A week later when I return to Port Moresby and go to PNG Motors, I find the car at the back in their yard. I ask the manager what they have done to it. Nothing, he says. He saya he was not told to strip the motor to prevent it from rusting… When they finally attempt to do something about the car, it is really too late. They clean the car up as well as they can but it has lost its value. Of course it isn’t insured. Willy’s Ute is the same. Although it is a much older car and not as valuable, he too has lost his transport.

My car is ruined but I am reunited with the love of my Life, My Diane.

THE END

I get into trouble

Monday morning I reluctantly take a cab to the airport and leave for Lae. I just hope Dave will do what he promised and have my car towed to PNG Motors with my instructions to strip the engine.

In Lae, I’m being met by Peter Fidder, the sheetmetal worker who has already installed some of the ductwork. It is a self-contained unit already piped up and only needs ductwork connected and the control wiring, so no need for a refrigeration mechanic. Peter has already hired a local native lad to help him install the ductwork and the unit is already positioned on a concrete plinth, about a metre from the external building with the ductwork going up the side and turning into the ceiling space.

OTC Building Lae

I install a steel conduit between the unit and into the wall for the control wiring. There are lots of wires in the conduit and I have to struggle to get them all in and it takes me some time. The conduit is about a half metre above ground. I hope nobody stands on that I think, or it’ll snap off. I grab a large piece of chipboard and write in big letters DO NOT STAND ON THIS CONDUIT.

In the meantime I hear Peter up in the ceiling blowing his top. He later tells me, the ceiling space is very tight and him and his temporary boy are lying on either side of the duct run. Peter joins his side of the duct and drills the screws in his side to fasten the joint. He then says, your turn, Tommy. No response. Your turn, Tommy!, still no response. He looks under the duct and there is Tommy, fast asleep. That’s when I hear Peter blowing his top.

I’m in the building, starting to install the control panel when I hear the snap just outside the wall at the unit. When I get there, I see this pair of black feet climbing up the wall. Of course my conduit has snapped off clearly shearing the wires clean off at the elbow into the wall.

That’s when I blow loose my cool. I call the native a black *!$@^%  so and so, useless git. I have to start all over again, pull out the wires cut and thread new conduit and pull in new wires, all the time stewing, swearing and cursing. I’m still swearing and cursing when the white police inspector accompanied by a couple of native constables with the black git who stood on the conduit in tow, appear next to me.

'Is this the masta who abused you', the inspector asks the black fellow. 'Yes, masta'.  ‘Did you insult this man?’, the inspector turns to me. ‘Yes I did, officer’, I reply. ‘Any reason’, he continues.

‘Yes, of course there is a reason’, I snap. I explain the trouble I had with the conduit, getting all the wires in and point to the large sign that’s still on the wall.

‘Is that true’, the inspector asks of the black fellow. 'Well, yes, I did stand on it. I thought it would be all right’ the boy replies.

The inspector walks away back to the car, with the black constables following. ‘Serves you right’, he says to the black git, ‘I would have done the same’.


Next - I have been let me down.

My lovely car goes for a swim

Over the coming weeks, Diane and I see quite a lot of each other. She is a teacher at the Korobosea Primary School and as Christmas draws near, she informs me she’ll be going home to her parents in Sydney over the Christmas break.

It’s a Saturday when she leaves and we all go to the airport to see her off. After the plane takes off, we head for the bar at the Gateway Hotel and stay well into the afternoon. Willie, Werner and Phil are not in Port Moresby so I have the flat to myself. I get home and have a snooze after the pub visit.

I wake up with an enormous deluge which must have gone on for some time before I finally realise its pouring down rain. I get up and walk to the door of the flat and see the water is about 5 centimeters below the floor of the flat. The flat is about a metre off the ground. I’m instantly sober. My car! Willie’s car! They are both outside the flat. I wade down the stairs and out through the gate just to see Willie’s ute disappearing in the distance and sinking into the creek next door. I wade over to my own car just as it takes off too. I try desperately to hang on but the car is much too heavy and floats away too. It too disappears into the creek.

My Ford Falcon just before it gets washed away in the flood

As fast as the flood came up, it drops down and within an hour, the water has all but disappeared. It’s now dark and I grab a torch and walk over to where our cars are. Willie’s ute is on the bottom, and my Falcon is half on the creek bank and half on top of Willie’s ute (pick-up). Great! I’m still paying my car off. 


It’s Friday. On Monday I’m due to fly to Lae to start working on an OTC building, what can I to do? Nothing, I have to rely on others.

On Sunday, I phone Dave Smith and tell him what happened. I ask him to call PNG Motors first thing Monday Morning to pick up the car and take it to their workshop and strip the engine down to prevent it from rusting. He assures me that’s what he will do. He also promises to send a telegram to Willie who works in Madang, to let him know what happened to his his ute.

Next - Dave lets us down

I meet Diane

I've been hearing a lot about this Diane. Kerrie's friend whom I haven't met yet.

A few weeks later, I have an opportunity. Ann Tussle, Carrier’s Secretary, and her husband Tim have invited everyone to a party at her house. Naturally all Carrier staff are going as is Kerry, Willie’s girlfriend and Diane Speakman, they are already there when I arrive and I join them. It doesn’t take me long before I sit next to Diane and find her very interesting. She’s well tanned, has great legs but doesn’t smoke and doesn’t drink. I realise I won’t be able to get her drunk so I have to apply my personal charm.

It is a typical Port Moresby party in the back garden of Tom and Ann's government house. There is a keg of beer which is surrounded by the single men. A few tables where the married couples are sitting. On one of those tables are Willie and Kerry and Diane and I. 

Also at the party are Fred and Wendy who have brought Brian and Sandra. Brian is the Public Solicitor working at the Public Trustee’s Office and Sandra his voluptuous wife is the centre of every male’s attention at the party. She’s wearing a low cut dress displaying her feminine assets.

Tom, the host, is very quiet as usual occasionally being bossed around by Ann, his wife, to change the Bert Kaempfert or James Last records.

It is a great party and we have quite a bit to drink. I ask Diane, who came with Kerry, if I can give her a lift home and she says yes.  At the end of the night we leave in my Falcon and I have to concentrate very hard on my driving. It's the 60s and DUI is unheard of. But maybe I should have called a cab anyhow. I drop Diane at the top of her driveway and head home to our flat. I like that young lady, I wonder if she likes me too.


Next - My lovely car goes for a swim

I nearly end up as minced meat

Dave calls me in the office and wants me to drive to the Rouna Hydro-electric power station in the hills of Port Moresby, and service the underground ventilation system.

The steel plate gets sucked into the fan

Metu and I grab the new filter roll, which has to be replaced at the same time. The roll is fairly heavy and has two large quarter inch wheels, one at each end, holding the filter material into place. We remove the old roll while the fan is running and put two ladders in the conditioner and start lifting the new roll into position. But just as I lift the roll past the one metre diameter tube that supplies the air to the one metre diameter fan that pumps the air underground, the suction of the fan sucks the large quarter inch wheel at the end of the roll into the duct. I hesitate to crawl after it but decide not to. Just as well, by now the plate has reached the fan and there is this almighty mechanical noise as the fan and the plate meet.

I turn the fan off and make my way downstairs to the fan and when I open the access hatch, I find the plate all mangled and chewed up and the fan blades all twisted and bent. Needless to say, that was a very bad mistake.

We return to the office and I put the mangled mess on Dave’s desk. Oh, my God, what happened he asks. I tell him and he orders a new fan and tells me …don’t do that again!


Next - I meet Diane

At the Goroka Show

           Willie comes home all excited one day and declares, ‘I’m going to the Goroka Show’. ‘What’s a Goroka Show?’ I ask. He tells us that every two years up in the highlands, in Goroka they hold this Eastern Highlands Cultural Show which is simply called the Goroka Show and it is held over a weekend. He tells us that there is a charter fight being organized that will fly from Port Moresby to Goroka early on Sunday morning and return late in the afternoon and they have empty seats.

Werner and I agree to go as well. So, come Sunday morning we go to the airport and are guided to an old DC3, also known as a ‘Gooney Bird’. ‘Is this thing safe?’ I ask the pilot, who is ushering us up the stairs into the bowl of this old flyer. ‘Safe as houses’, he smiles, ‘you’ll be right’. Inside the plane there are canvas seats along both walls, and hanging straps mounted from the ceiling for people to stand. At the back of the cabin, there is an old oil drum full of ice, beer and soft drinks. No flight attendants.  The seats are already taken, so we have to hang on to ceiling straps and stand for the two hour flight to Goroka, helping ourselves to cold beer every now and again.

Tribal  Dancers at the 1968 Goroka Show

        When we land, the ice and water in the drum splashes all over the floor of the plane. We disembark and are pointed in the direction to the show-ground, opposite the Main Market, where we can hear the singing and dancing of the various groups. It’s a short walk and when we get there we are fascinated with the sight awaiting us. There are dozens of tribes, all dressed up in their native costumes, doing their dances to entertain the visitors who have come here from all around the world to see this spectacle. Tribes that are normally warring with each other are gathered here for peaceful festivities. 

I have brought my 16mm movie camera and a supply of films and am in my element shooting the event. Of course whenever I film someone, they then hold out their hands and want to be paid, but it is worth every cent. There are no seats for the visitors, everybody just mingles on the ground, visitors and dancers together. Whenever a group is ready to perform, They just get into formation and start up wherever they are and visitors just give them space to perform. So, me and my camera are right in the middle of the performances.

I get plenty of close-ups in my film

I ask one of the organisers of the event about the origin of the show. He tells me that the show started in 1957 and was introduced and organised by Australian Kiaps from each district. Dancers and singers proudly display the cultures of their districts. These days the Goroka Show is partly a tourist event and brings people from all over the globe to see this event. I spot several television crews speaking various languages.

I am so glad, Willie had heard about this event and that we were able to go on this charter flight We spend a wonderful day up in Goroka before boarding our flight back to Port Moresby, tired and excited. We are lucky, we got seats on the way home.

Me and my Boys

               One of the Australian Administration buildings in Konedobu, is without air conditioning, we get the call early one morning. I attend and find the mechanical switchboard had burned out during the night in one of the many thunderstorms we experience in Port Moresby.

             We can't have the building without air conditioning for very long. The staff, mostly european, cannot cope too well working in these extremely high temperatures and humidity levels

             I get Metu and Tom to remove the burnt out components, head back to the office and order replacement materials. I need to hurry and get back to the job quickly. The boys need to be supervised constantly or they spend hours trying to unscrew bolts that hold the components in place the screwdriver the wrong way. They need to be reminded, 'Wrong way, Tommy'.

              While I am in the plant room, I also check the rest of the refrigeration machinery. Konedobu is the area in Port Moresby where most of the Administration Buildings are situated. During the week, there are hundreds of european office workers going hither and dither from buildings to buildings, all air conditioned by Carrier Air Conditioning.

            Weekends the place is deserted. Europeans gather for sporting activities or hold parties or drive to some of the beaches for relaxation.

Big Plans are afoot

We are now four people living in Barlow’s flat, three Swiss and a South African. Willie (from Basel), Werner (from Winterthur) and myself (from Thun). We sit and talk every night, drinking beer. We consume a carton of beer every night during these planning sessions between the three of us. I know, because every third day it’s my turn to buy a carton of beer. The empty bottles threaten to take over the stairs to our flat.

We plan a trip by VW bus from Singapore to Switzerland through Asia, the Middle East. Most nights we plan and scheme and drink a carton of beer. Some nights Willie, who has found a girlfriend called Kerrie, is out with her and only Werner and I continue planning the trip.

Werner tells me that while I was on the other side of the island, that upon his return from Lae,  he sometimes went out with Willie and Kerrie and Diane Speakman, Kerrie’s friend. Everyone tells me about Diane who I haven’t met yet.

Will the Morobe District really disappear?

For some time there have been rumours going around that a big earthquake is about to destroy the Morobe District. Lae is the capital of the Morobe District. This earthquake has been forecast by some American female medium appearing on American TV. There are many expat people who live in Morobe Districte who believe that and have booked their holidays and are leaving the region for Australia, but not us. Phil and I stay in Lae and take our chances. I can't imagine Dave allowing us to leave Lae just because some nutter forecasts an earthquake.

Click on map to enlarge it

It’s Saturday night and Phil and I go to the movies. When we return to the hostel I climb into bed and start reading my book, when suddenly the room starts shaking madly. OMG, the earthquake. It’s true, we’re going to die. Everyone jumps out of their beds and runs outside. The earth rumbles and shakes, fortunately not violently. It lasts for about five minutes, then everything is calm again. We go back to bed.

Next day, the newspaper’s front page reads, EARTHQUAKE – WE’RE ISOLATED. Apparently the Seacom cable that links Australia to Asia and Europe and passes trough Lae, was damaged by the earthquake. So this woman was partially right. There was an earthquake but it didn’t quite destroy the District, just a vital link.

We stay another few weeks in Lae and it’s been over three months since we’ve been away from Port Moresby, and we’re glad to be home, when we land at the airport in Port Moresby.

A thermohydrograph takes a walk

Dave sends me a letter and a thermohydrograph an instrument that records temperature and humidity and plots them onto a long strip of graph paper, from Port Moresby. He wants me to fly to Goroka. Carriers have installed a new system some months earlier in the operating theatre of the new hospital and apparently it’s not performing well. Phil continues the service work in Lae by himself. I book a flight and head for the hills. It’s much colder in Goroka and I hire a car and find a Chinese shop, of which there are many throughout the Territory. I need to buy a jumper (sweater), it gets quite cold at night up there. I book into a motel and drive to the hospital.

The sister in charge won’t let me in until I put on a theatre gown, theatre hat clean white theatre wellingtons and wash my hands. I set up the instrument and tell her I’ll be back the next day to pick it up. It will have by then recorded the temperature and humidity over a twenty-four hour period. Just what Dave had ordered.

Thermohydrograph gets stolen

I have the rest of the day and next day to go sight seeing. There is not much to see in Goroka, except once every two years on a long weekend, when the Goroka Show takes place. On these days, Natives come from far and near all dressed up in their native dresses and paints. So do thousands of tourists and the media from all around the world. During those days, Goroka doubles its population, but unfortunately now is nothing on in Goroka, so I stay in the motel and read. The next day I return back to the hospital, get into a gown and scrub up again and retrieve the instrument and put it back into it’s specially designed wooden box, all painted and Carrier Air Conditioning written all over.

At the motel I leave the box in the car and get a big surprise the next morning when I find the car had been broken into and the thermohygrograph has been stolen. Nothing else has gone, well; nothing else was in the car. I phone Dave in Port Moresby who first tells me go to the Police to report the theft and ads …don’t do that again. As if if it was my fault the car got broken into last night.

I report the theft to the local Police Inspector, a white fellow and he tells me the instrument is probably ending up in some straw hut being revered as a religious symbol.


I  have a couple of hours to wait for my flight back to Lae, so I wander over to the Main Market at Goroka, it's not far from the airport. People come from near and far to try to sell their produce, mainly fruit and vegetables. They walk for days to get to the market, then walk back to their villages.

They present some colourful pictures with a lot of them in their native costumes at the market stands which are provided by the local government council on market days.

I drop back the hire car and fly back to Lae to continue the rest of the service visits with Phil. Werner goes  back to Port Moresby, he’s finished his job in Lae.

Werner and I start a business

One weekend, Werner and I are having a beer in the old Hotel Cecil near the airport. It’s a run down pub that had seen better days, run by an elderly lady, whose family has owned the hotel for a long time. A couple of natives come to the door of the Saloon bar with some carved wooden statues. I don’t take much notice at first, but when I see another patron of the bar bring one of those statues to his table, I have a closer look. It’s a statue of a ‘meri’ (native girl), wearing a grass skirt. It looks quite good. It wears a short grass skirt and when you lift the skirt, the statue reveals it is anatomically correct. ‘How much did you pay for that’. I ask. ‘Ten bucks’, he replies. The statues are carved from pine wood and are painted with original pigments such as crushed charcoal for the black parts, crushed chalk for the whites and ochre for the facial pigmentation. All the colours rub off real easily, so we'll need to be careful.

My '' boystatue
I bought in Lae. 

I go outside just as the natives walk away. ‘Hey you’, I call out. ‘Yes, masta’?

‘You got any more of these’? I ask, pointing to the bar.

‘No, but we can make’, he says.

‘How long’, I ask,

‘Day after tomorrow’, he answers.

‘I’ll have one’, I say

‘Me too’, Werner says, beside me.

‘Ok, masta. Two days’. 

A couple of days later, Werner and I go back to the Cecil and wait. As promised, the native chap is back with two statuesques, a mary (girl) and a boy. They look great. We both give him ten dollars each and take the two new artefacts to the car, me with the boy and Werner with the mary, our two new artefacts.

I tell Werner about the Belgian fellow I had met in Wewak and how he comes to the Territory to buy artefacts twice a year. We should do that he says. ‘That’s what I reckon’ I reply. ‘Well we already have some stock’, he laughs.

Bulolo and Wau

We need to hire a second car after all. Phil and I have to drive up into the mountains to Bulolo and Wau, where we have to service the air conditioning units in the telephone exchanges. Werner needs a car in Lae. We hire a small Daihatsu and drive up to Wau. It’s a three hour drive up there.

It’s an unsealed road all the way up but not too bad. About half-way up to Bulolo, we come to a settlement and realise that most cars parked at the European’s houses are Volvos, just about every house has one standing in their driveways and we also pass a lot driving by. Very strange, that.

Me, posing with the gold miners

From Bulolo, it’s another hour drive to Wau. About 30 minutes into the drive, we see people down in the creek to the left working at  mining gold. We stop the car and climb down to watch. They have set up a trough and are washing the gravel as it passes over the trough to find gold. An old European prospector runs the outfit and I have a chat with him. He seems to make a decent living, paying the natives cash every day so they come back.

Back on the road and a little later we arrive in Wau, another mining settlement. It has the Gold Mine and a pub and that’s about it. We book into the pub and have a shower after the long drive on the dirt road up from Lae. A few beers, dinner and we’re calling it a day.

Next morning, after breakfast, we drive up the road to the telephone exchange to replace the bearings to all the air conditioning motors. When we walk in, the operator of the exchange says, ‘It’s about time, you guys come to fix the airconditioning, it hasn’t worked for over a week’.  I find the switchboard has burnt out, what a mess. I asked the technician if there was an electrician in town who could sell me some cables. No such luck, but he tells me to try the Wau Gold Mine. They might be able to help. Their maintenance bloke takes me to his supply store. They have everything we needed and are willing to lend it to me provided we will send the stuff up from Port Moresby to replace what we borrowed, they have cables, contactors etc.

I work out it will take me about four days to re-wire the entire switchboard. Back at the exchange, I ask the technician for a phone line to phone our office in Port Moresby but he tells me he has no lines but can let me have the emergency line if I am quick. 

I’m on the phone to Dave Smith in Port Moresby and it goes like this:

'G’Day Dave, listen I can’t talk long, I’m on the emergency line phoning from the Wau telephone Exchange, can you hear me'?

'Yes, I can'.

'Listen Dave, I’ve found the switchboard burnt out. I can get all the stuff from the Gold Mine. It’ll take me four days to rewire the board, Do you want me to do it'?

'Mmm, eh, mmmm',

'Dave',

'Yes'?

'Do you want me to do it'?

'Mmm, eh, mmmm',

'Dave',

Yes'?

I’m phoning on the emergency line, do you want me to do it'?

'Mmm, eh, mmmm',

That's when I lose it, slam the phone down and thank the technician for letting me use the emergency line and we drive back to Lae. What’s wrong with this bloke? Why does he have to be so indecisive?

Back in Lae, there is a telegram waiting for me at the hostel it says:

YES STOP PROCEED WITH REPAIR TO SWITCHBOARD IMMEDIATELY STOP

Too late, mate, we’re back in Lae. I phone Dave and tell him we’re back in Lae and he’ll have to send someone else. I can’t understand some people. I had it all organised, had all the materials, was on site and could have fixed the switchboard there and then. Some people should not be managers.


         

Time to say Goodbye to Madang

I’m sad to say good-bye to Madang I love it here. But we must go on with our trip and when we land in Lae, Werner Utzinger who is up from Port Moresby, working here, greets us. He already has a hire car so we don’t need another one. Werner drives us to Barclay’s hostel where we move into our rooms.

No troubles here with the bearings, they await us at the wharf. We take Werner to his job site in the mornings before taking off to do our service work. A very unique phenomenon in Lae is that it rains every afternoon. You can set your clock by it, on the dot of 2 o’clock, down comes the rain for about an hour or so. The end result is Lae is extremely green. The golf club near the airport looks lush with deep green fairways and bushy trees.

While having a drink at the Outrigger bar of the 'Melanesian Hotel' in town, we hear the boss talking Swiss-German to another hotel employee. I’m with Werner and we call out to them in Swiss-German. They look surprised and come over for a chat. It turns out that Walter Gschwind is the hotel manager and Hanspeter is his chef. They invite us for a game of Jass, the Swiss national card game for the following Saturday and we accept. Small world.

Füfzg, Ass mit de Stöck

Saturday before lunch we front up and are taken to Walter’s private rooms. We play cards all day and night and drink quite a bit. On the house, of course.

Come back tomorrow morning; they say when we leave way after midnight. We will, we say.

Sunday morning we’re back at the hotel and get stuck into some serious drinking and playing Jass. I wonder who’s cooking for the hotel guests. My sou-chef, I’m being told, don’t worry, he knows what to do.

It’s a long weekend and on Monday morning we’re back again. We haven’t had a decent meal or sleep since Friday and I’m starting to feel it. By Monday night I’m totally out of it. Three days of solid drinking has taken its toll. I’m sick as a dog and crash in an empty hotel room. I don’t wake up until Tuesday morning when Phil calls to see if we are going to work.

I thank Walter and Hanspeter, for their hospitality and Phil drives us to work. I totally enjoyed this weekend.

I acquire a valuable native carving

The MV Koro takes us from Bogia to Madang

The skipper of the MV Koroi, the larger boat that takes us back to Madang is European. There are four more passengers on board for this fourteen-hour trip. A European doctor and his wife and two teenage kids, who are leaving the medical station at Bogia after having served there for some years.  It’s on dusk when we sail away from the Bogia jetty. Soon we are all sitting around a large table in the galley the six passengers and the white skipper and are served a meal by the native cook. Phil and I tuck in, we’re starving, we haven’t eaten since we left Madang early in the morning. The food is good and the skipper offers us a beer from his own supply.

We have a chat for a while then disappear with the other passengers into our respective cabins. The sea is fairly calm and I soon drift off and am woken up early in the morning with the boats activities.

I get dressed and start exploring the boat. On the upper deck I find lots of native artefacts of all kinds. Similar to the stuff I had seen at the Catholic Mission in Wewak, but better and more interesting.

I make my way back down to the galley where Phil and the others are already sitting waiting for breakfast. During breakfast I ask the skipper about the artefacts. The doctor answers, 'They’re ours'. He explains that during his stay in Bogia he had been given these items from time to time by patients for medical services. I ask him if he wants to sell any.

'No', he says.

'Not even one', I ask.

'Certainly not', he insists.

'Shame', I say.

After breakfast, I go back up on the upper deck and have another look at the artefacts. There is one particular large mask that fascinates me. I pick it up and have a close look at it, when the doctor stands beside me. 'I told you, they’re not for sale', he says. 'I just love this one', I answer, 'it’s fascinating. I’ll give you twenty bucks for it'. 'Put it down', he says.

He goes back below deck and I enter the wheel house where the captain and a Native steer the boat towards Madang. The captain points out a landmass in the distance and tells me that’s where Madang is, another four hours and we’ll we there, he says.

New Guinea Mask I bought on the boat

When we disembark in Madang, the doctor and his family are trying to get all their luggage and artefacts into a taxi. Phil and I grab our toolboxes and get off the boat. The doctor has no success getting everything into this taxi and his wife tells him, 'I told you not to bring so much stuff with you'.

I am watching with amusement. There is no way he can get all this stuff into one car. The doctor looks at me and I say, 'I told you, I’ll give you twenty bucks for it'.

He picks it up and hands it to me. I give him twenty dollars and Phil stands there with his mouth open. He wasn’t with me when I had the conversation with the doctor on the boat.

I know I have a great mask with much greater value than twenty dollars. 

Manam Island

One of the remote places we have to go to change the bearings is a place called Manam Island it’s a volcano off the coast half way between Madang and Wewak.

We have been told by Dave in Port Moresby that the trip to Manam Island would be organised for us by the New Guinea Administration. We go to their office and find the chap who is supposed to get people like us to this remote island. The chap consults time tables, makes some phone calls and advises us we can leave in a couple of days but he can only get us a boat back not to get there. Don’t worry, he says, I’ll just hire you a plane to get you there, then you can take the boat back to Madang. It is like being on yet another holiday.

Manam Island is a volcano

 

A couple of days later we get to Madang airport where a Piper Cherokee airplane is awaiting us to take us to this place called Bogia. 


It’s a tiny native fishing village and from there we take a boat out to the volcano. it’s a couple of hours by boat and we are the only passengers. The skipper is a native and has a large hole in his earlobe a typical New Guinea feature. It looks funny standing behind him and watching the volcano in the distance through his hole in his earlobe. I take a picture of that. The boat brings the supplies out to the Catholic Mission Station on Manam Island. 

The people are coming to greet us at Manam Island

When we get close to the island, we see just about the entire population at the beach, madly waving at us. Of course our boat is too big to get close and Phil and I and our toolboxes and bearings get transferred to lakatois which are small canoe type boats with outriggers to stop them from toppling over.

The children help with the transfer and carry the cases up the beach. They are very excited and chatter and cackle and surround us full of excitement. 

The Catholic father, a native himself tells us to pick some of the lads to carry our cases up to the volcanological observatory half way up the island. We pick a half dozen lads and make off up the mountain. We don’t have much time. The boat waits for us off the coast. This boat only comes to the island once a week and we don’t fancy spending a week on this island.

It takes us about an hour to climb up the steep volcano to the observatory. It’s very hot and humid. Just as well we have the boys carrying the toolboxes and bearings.

The observatory is just a small building consisting of a control room which houses a lot of instruments, seismographs I assume and electronic telecommunications equipment I assume must transmit the seismograph’s activities to the mainland. There is no staff there, the whole observatory is run and observed via this telecommunications equipment. There is a door and a set of stairs leading downstairs into a cellar where a huge concrete block stands in the middle of the floor. On it are more instruments spread all over this concrete block. sensors, I assume.

The air conditioning is purely there to keep the equipment conditioned, and the humidity low.

We turn the air conditioning off and start stripping down the motors. Now here is a place where that should never be attempted. There is only grass and dirt all around the building and nowhere really for us to strip a motor in a clean area. There is absolutely nothing wrong with the old bearings and I consider leaving them in the motors and write in the report we had changed them but I decide what the hell, we are contracted to change them so change them we will whether they get dirt in them or not. Not my problem. Let the silly desk pusher in Canberra come up here later on to fix the air conditioning if it breaks down because a bearing has grass or dirt in it.

We work hard and fast to strip the three motors of the air conditioning, all the time surrounded by lots of children from the island who cackle and chatter non stop and observe what we are doing.

We start up the system again and descend from the mountain and climb onto the lakatois who take us back to the boat. The skipper is happy to see us and tells us we’ll just make it back to Bogia in time for us to meet the larger boat that would take us back to Madang. 

Will Vodka do the trick?

At the local telephone exchange we find a problem with one of the compressors. It has stopped working and Phil diagnoses that the compressor cannot be fixed and needs to be replaced. We phone Port Moresby and Dave ask us to try to find one in town, otherwise they will have to send one up from Port Moresby but that would take a few weeks.

The chap at the telephone exchange tells us of this local refrigeration bloke who has a small shop who might be able to help.

Two bottles of Vodka do the trick

Alex, is a short fat Russian with a heavy accent. ’Of  course I have a spare compressor here, I veel sell it to yooh’, he says. We agree on a price but he insists he wants a bottle of vodka as well. He has drunk all the vodka in Madang, there is none left.

I phone Dave and tell him to send a cheque and a couple of bottle of vodka or there is no compressor.

Two days later, the cheque and the vodka arrive and Alex is over the moon. ‘You veel help me drienk a biottle of vodka’, he insists. By the time we have finished one of the bottles, we are unable to lift the compressor into the hire car. We drive home to the motel and go to bed.

Next morning, Phil and I are feeling terrible but when we get to Alex’s shop, he is in full swing, not a sign of what happened last night. Russians must be used to it. We pick up the compressor and are on our way. I am seriously considering going into the import business. Importing vodka to Madang. I’d make a fortune.

Could I Be in Love?

Back at the Smugglers Inn, there are a lot of new guests; all the rooms are full to the delight of John and Marcia. There is a tour up from Australia in their own charter plane, an Ansett tour complete with captain and three hostesses. The staff is setting the dining room for the tour group and a large table on the verandah for the airline crew and Phil and me. There is not enough room in the dining room so Marcia sits us with the crew. We don’t mind.

Having a chat with an Ansett Hostie

I sit next to an Ansett hostess from Tasmania. She lives in Launceston but has been transferred to Papua New Guinea for a while. She is very nice and we get along fine. I find out that she hasn’t got a boyfriend and when she asks me I tell her that I haven’t got a girlfriend either. Gradually the others disappear to their rooms and we stay and chat on the verandah overlooking the lagoon until the early morning.

When they leave the next day, we exchange addresses and she asks me to visit her in Tasmania one day. Of course I will, I promise.

Another Adventure

I am in charge of this trip so I have to do the expense sheets every week for the company. I have to send them down to Port Moresby to Dave Scott for approval. One week, I make a mistake of 5 cents in our favour. I wasn’t aware of this until I get a letter from Dave telling me I made a mistake of 5 cents in our favour and asks me to correct the mistake next week. The letter has a 7-cent stamp on it. I’m beginning to wonder! Of course, next week I forget and the expense sheet still shows 5 cents in our favour. I get another letter from Dave with another 7-cent stamp on it telling me I still had a mistake of 5 cents in our favour, he wants me to fix the problem and adds …don’t do that again. Maybe I should enclose two 7-cent stamps with my next expense report for his troubles.

We’re at the bar one evening and John is telling some other guests that he is organising a trip to a native village and a walk in the jungle. He asks Phil and myself if we want to come too. Of course we agree. Saturday morning we’re in John’s Landrover, six of us driving out of town into the hills of New Guinea. We’re parking by the side and start walking up into the mountains, for about an hour when we come to a village amongst the coconut trees.

Village near Madang

It’s different from the village we visited in New Britain near Rabaul. This one is much larger and in front of most of the huts, there are native women engaged in making pottery. They are making all sorts of pots, vases and things. John explains they work for the Madang tourist shops, selling these items to visitors, mainly Americans passing through on boats.

The huts are about a meter off the ground on bamboo poles, the roofs are made with banana leaves and the windows are just holes in the walls. Each hut has a set of timber stairs to get down. The huts are built all around the village square

There are lots of children in the village gathering around us, chattering and showing off. Typical of children everywhere in the world. The mothers are in their huts keeping an eye out for the children. There is a large village square and it looks very clean.

We continue up the hill to a lookout from where we have the most glorious view over Madang in the distance and over the ocean. But what amazes me the most is all the little seashells everywhere on the ground. I point it out to the others and nobody has an explanation of how these millions of seashells got on top of this mountain, not even our host John Barlow. Most of them are crushed but there are still lots of them intact. An incredible sight.

Women making pottery for American Tourists

I am intrigued by this. We ponder the question for some time. The only solution we derive at is that at some time in the past, the mountain must have been formed by a volcano, lifting the landmass up high similar to that small island in Rabaul harbour that came up out of the water in 24 hours as many local people tell you.

We return back to the village and the other visitors buy some pots from the native women and finally walk back to the Landrover and drive into Madang again, it was another great day.

Am I going to drown?

We love it here at the Smuggler's Inn, in Madang. It’s a great place and we’re becoming very friendly with the two barmaids at the Smuggler's Motel. One day to escape the heat, we decide to go swimming with the two girls. They want to go to the town’s swimming pool, but I suggest we go for a swim right here in the lagoon. Phil says, No way, it’s too rough. The girls agree but I say, come on, it looks great. And climb down the rocks into the water. It is great. I have a mask and snorkel with me and look down into the water. The corals are fabulous and the coloured fish look beautiful up close. The other three are up on the verandah and don’t join me.

Beautiful corals ad fish everywhere

I am enjoying myself in the water and when I look up again, I am about 50 metres from the shore. I think it’s time to swim back to the motel but I am not moving at all. In fact I am being swept out further and further. I start to panic and swim as hard as I can towards the shore but no success. I am still the same distance and am not moving forward at all. I try harder and am still not moving. What’s happening? Why am I not moving?

By now, there is a small gathering of people on the verandah in the distance. I can see John Barlow talking to his native boys I guess, urging them to come to my rescue, but I can see them shaking their heads.

I am doomed. I’ve come half way around the world. I’m twenty-five years old, and I’m going to drown off the coast of Madang. This is terrible. I’m not ready to depart this world, I don’t want to die.

I remember having read somewhere that if you’re in situations like this, not to panic and swim under the waves to stop being pulled out to sea.

I tread water for a while to calm down and relax. It works. I try again, swimming towards the shore and every time a wave comes back I dive under it. When a wave comes behind me I really swim hard. The method works. I am getting closer to shore. There are a couple of policemen now on the verandah, including a white Officer. Everyone is urging me on.

I keep on doing the same and am now only about twenty metres from the rocks. The sea is still very rough, and as I am only a few metres off the rocks, a very strong wave smashes me against the rocks.

The policemen drag me up the rocks; I am covered in blood from being smashed against the rocks. The white police inspector abuses me for being so foolish as to go out into the bay in such rough conditions. He says ‘Who the hell do you think you are, Tarzan, or something’. I don’t mind being abused I have never been so glad to be abused by coppers. All to try to impress a girl. Phil just shakes his head.

Next day, we finally hear from the wharf, our bearings have come back from a round trip to Singapore. They forgot to unload them on the way from Australia. I hope the bearings enjoyed the trip. Good-bye holidays, we’re finally back at work.