can't stop looking........

sunrise

                                  

 and sunset....................................

A belated happy mothers day to everyone, PNG-style. 

These flowers were put together by one of the Lihirian women as Ed's first (excellent) mothers day effort. They've lasted all week.

In the last couple of weeks we've finished setting up the house and at the moment we're getting into finding some loot at the local markets. Ed has been exploring the new world of solids and swimming. Lots of squeals of excitement.

This is Deka, who has started working with us at home. She's so lovely, and it hasn't taken long for Ed to get comfortable with her. Unfortunately her husband is sick, so she has had to travel to Port Moresby for a couple of weeks while he has treatment. 

Last Wednesday we took part in our first 'haus krai', which was basically a march in support of violence against women, a major social problem here. It took place across the whole country, with marches in every province and city. Recently there have been quite a few cases of violence throughout the country, including the beheading of a woman in Bougainville, the gang rape of an American researcher in Madang and the killing and mutiliation of three women in Goroka. So a national day was organised in support of the cause. 

At least a couple of hundred of locals, and some expats marched and converged into the main town of the Lihir for a rally/meeting. Ed and I went along for the march, listening to the singing along the way and trying to read the placards written in pigeon that people were holding up. It was a really uplifting experience, and particularly moving when one of the women made a speech about all her close family members who had been affected by violence in their own homes. Particularly as at the beginning of the speech she mentioned that she wasn't speaking about all of them, annd had to choose which stories to mention. 

It was great to be part of something that seems to affect too many families here.

It might have been a one-off, but on our first market trip with Deka we found an awesome pumpkin that has kept us going for a while.

then we got our hands on the essential PNG kitchen implement... a coconut scraper

and so far we've put it in thai curry and a mango and coconut ice cream (yes, mangoes from the market too). 

actually we've got a big mango tree in our yard, and it's got some fruit on it. apparently once they look ready you put a bag of salt under the tree so it drops the mangoes. 

We'll keep you posted on more finds and equatorial culinary adventures.

surrounded by cardboard.....

so our container arrived one morning last week. delivered by a giant crane truck, planted in our front yard. sitting there closed for a few days, teasing us with its' presence.

and then an army of fellas turned up last saturday morning to unload it. everyone from the gardener at the managers house to the local maintenance crew.

and then we started opening cardboard box after box. i think we went through 2 box cutters and their blades.

until the container was full again. of empty boxes. 

sick of the sight of 'kent' labelled cardboard, that's for sure.

meanwhile ed turned 4 months. so we gave him a spoon. which he contemplated on for a while.

and now he has got stuck into the solids thing. who knew rice cereal could induce so much arm flapping excitement?