Yesterday I went out to a village to visit with people with whom I’ve been working for a few months. I took some pictures along the way. It’s a bit of a wild ride out to the mountains between Madang and the Ramu Valley. The road dates back to a trail that went alongside the first power lines. It’s twisty and very rough for much of its length. Maybe you’ll see something interesting. Here is a shot about twenty clicks out of town just as you are coming up on the mountains:
Road from Madang
The road here is pretty flat and stays in relatively good shape. Here is a ford that is right before you start up into the mountains. You can see the first steep hill on the other side. It’s a 20%+ slope:
The Ford at the start of the Mountains
That means a long slog in 1st gear, even in my diesel 4WD truck. I can remember when we first started driving to the highlands in 1981. There were 21 rivers that had no bridges. If the water was too high to get across, we had to either wait for it to go down or drive back to town. I was driving a Suzuki 4WD jeep across a river similar to this when it fell into a hole and went floating (mostly) downstream. Fortunately I had a long rope laying on the passenger’s seat. I jumped out into the water and hooked the rope around a bumper while the Suzuki tip-toed over the rocks. I swam over to the side and threw the other end of the rope around a tree. Fortunately the rope held. After retrieving the car from the water it took several hours to get everything dried out enough to get it started.
Bailey Bridge
This is a Bailey bridge. You find them all over the world in difficult, out-of-the-way places. A Bailey bridge is a portable pre-fabricated truss bridge, which can be carried by a few trucks and erected with simple equipment. The only problem with them is that old ones tend to sag quite a bit in the middle and do not inspire confidence. This one has a steel road bed. I have been on a couple of them which had wood plank beds and most of the wood had been pilfered. We once crossed one by carrying the remaining planks from the other side to our side, laying them down in front of the truck, driving the truck to the end of the last planks and then moving the planks from behind the truck to the front. It made me think of an inchworm creeping along a branch.
A Market along the road
A market on the way to Usino Station. This is near where the meeting was.
Woman carrying Betel Nut
The Woman has a bag of betel nut on her head. I had a little chat with her about the evils of buai (the Tok Pisin word for betel nut). She just kept laughing at me. At first I couldn’t figure out why. Then I noticed that she was looking at my hair, which I had braided Indian-style. I don’t think that she had ever seen a man with braided hair. I was happy to give her a few minutes of fun.
A Group of Children at the Market
Here is a mob of kids that were hanging around the market. When kids see a camera they automatically line up for the photographer. How convenient: I kept trying to get them to look at me, but they were too fascinated by the woman with the bag on her head who was still laughing at me.
Jan on a Bamboo Couch
I asked one of the fellows to take a photo of me, since that hardly ever happens. I don’t know why those bamboo ‘couches’ are considered high-style. It is extremely uncomfortable. I’d rather sit on the ground. However, if you are (for the moment, at least) a VIP, you can’t sit on the ground; they won’t let you. I have been to several villages in which there was exactly one chair and they would always drag it out for me to sit on. This is a holdover from the days of the Kiap or Patrol Officer who was like a travelling sheriff, judge, census taker and general overseer of the Australian Administration. I believe that people did not understand that white people were capable of sitting on the ground.
Erustas Otairobo Teaching the Leaders
Note from Eunice: Jan and Erustas Otairobo (our consultant from the Salomon Islands) in a meeting with village leaders talking about what the Bible says about sorcery. This is a big problem in this area. Jan has wanted to do this kind of work for many years and now has the opportunity to do it. He is very happy with the results of his two meetings with the Sumau Garia language group leaders.