a favourite place ........

 The 'club' pool. Kind of reminds me of one of those daggy 'resort parks' from the early 1990's.

Ed and I have been spending many an afternoon laying on the lawn, blowing bubbles and eating leaves (not me, Ed).

                                     

             

The lik lik beach

This is the little beach under the escarpment where we live. It's called the 'lik lik' (little beach) for obvious reasons. 



To get down to it is a walk along the escarpment, 



then a bit of a stair climb to get down to the water,



and a stroll to the beach part.



There are plenty of treasures (and trash) to be found along the way- coconuts and mangroves that have washed up from somewhere else and decided to sprout and plant themselves wherever they land. Driftwood galore (Stu is making a bit of a collection). A cacophony of coral. And unfortunately a bit of modern life paraphernalia that has made it's way across the ocean to Lihir Island (I wonder if anything from Fuskishima will eventually make it's long-winded way here?).



Can't wait until Ed can sit himself up in the rock pools (although I guess that equates to me being on 'mouth watch' at the same time).

happy bougainville autonomous day......

Yesterday we were treated to a 'sing sing' (kind of a local version of a cultural concert of singing and dancing) to celebrate bougainville autonomous day. There's quite a few bougainvilleans who live and work on Lihir Island (there are quite a lot of people from all provinces around the country who either fly in and out or live here to work at the mine or various other businesses), so they shared their celebration and put on a show and a barbie.

For a bit of background on Bougainville , it is an independent region of Papua New Guinea. It is named after the French navigator Louis Antoine de Bougainville(whose name has also been lent to the creeping tropical flowering vines that you're probably familiar with). It consists of a few islands, and Bougainville is the largest of those. It also includes the island of Buka, where some of the local haus maris are from, and lots of other outlying islands including the Caterets. There are about 175, 000 people who live in the region. They are reknowned through the rest of PNG for their particularly dark skin (one of the guys who works with Stu once told him you can draw a white line on a Bukan in charcoal!). You've probably heard of Bogainville before because of the independence conflict from 1990 to 1997. Because the island is rich in copper and gold, a large mine was established in the early 1970s by Rio Tinto. Due to disputes over the environmental impact, financial benefits and social change brought by the mine, a secessionist movement grew in the region, and the Bougainville Revolutionary Army (BRA) drove a rebellion from the late 1980's. From 1990, PNG ordered the Papua New Guinea Defence Force to put down the rebellion, but the conflict escalated into a civil war which claimed an estimated 20,000 lives. In 1996, the PNG prime minister Sir Julius Chan employd a private miliary/ mercenary company 'Sandline' to put down the rebellion. The conflict finally ended in 1997, after negotiations. My tok pisin (pidgeon) teacher and one of our neighbours, Clara, a Bougainvillean woman, was involved in these negotiations. A peace agreement was finalised in 2000 and disarmament provided for the establishment of an Autonomous Bougainville Government, and for a referendum in the future on whether the island should become politically independent, which was successful for the establishment of Bougainville. Hence autonomous day. And our Saturday afternoon of entertainment this weekend!

Even though the dancers weren't in traditional dress (which is reportedly spectacular), the sing sing was fantastic. Those Bougainvillean ladies sure know how to shake their booties. Notice the tall guy in the blue shirt in the background, who was doing some kind of impressive and comedic bird dance around all the girls.

Ed had a top time with a couple of his biggest fans nursing him and his little girlfriend Tahlou. Wow he looks particularly pale here!

You'll have to excuse my lack of commitment to adding to this blog over the last couple of weeks. Too much of the below (coffee and hammock) at various times during the day. Luckily the local coffee beans are being kind to us so far, so we can feel like we've got a touch of the Melbourne lifestyle happening here (fortunately not the current climate south of the border though).  

Speaking of generous elements of one's lifestyle, the other day we were the lucky recipients of a home delivery of a different kind. But the kind that is making it seem like this is a special place to live.

8kg of these little critters, fresh from a nearby island. I don't think we'll ever be paying $60 for 8kg of crayfish again! Thank you's go to the 'wantok' system, that we're getting to know up here. Basically it's all about taking care of your 'wantok' (family, friends, colleagues, boss) in PNG. 

But if the crayfish run low, we can always head to the supermarkets in town for an endless supply of......

tinned meat. In many wonderful flavours. I never realised how many flavours. Luckily both supermarkets have their own dedication to the glory of the tinned meat with a whole supermarket aisle to browse down (next to the tinned mackeral aisles).

                                 

the only problem is that Ed gets mobbed everytime we head into any commercial venue. A few weeks ago as we went up and down the aisles, calls of 'hello baby' were the familiar sound. But now it's 'hello Edward' and it seems to be taking longer and longer to get the shopping done as the supermarket employees of Lihir island line up for their weekly greeting/handshake/cuddle. Ed loves it.

Any trip to town is incomplete without a visit to the markets. Just to pop in and see if you'll get lucky with some of the stuff that isn't there all the time. There is never a shortage of sweet potatoes (kau kau), coconuts or bananas to be found here. Ten kina (five dollars) for a big bunch of the sweetest bananas you'll ever try. I'm really addicted and dreading the week that they aren't to be found in any of the stalls. Plenty of local greens to try too, some of which don't look a thing like but have a striking similarity in taste to things like rocket and coriander. But if you're lucky, you'll come across a pumpkin or pineapple. And most of the time you'll find mangoes, eggplant, spring onion, taro, lemongrass and plenty of cucumbers. Not quite the variety of South Melbourne, but I think I'm appreciating special finds even more than I would usually because of that.

And for a little bit of an Ed update, he's very much into grabbing onto anything in reach, and he seems to have suddenly grown out of a whole heap of clothes (which isn't such an issue in a climate where the baby equivalent of the wife beater and stubbies is staple wear). And remember that photo of him as a newborn lying at the end of his cot? Well he's taking up a bit more space these days. Those long legs.

Anyhow, we'll keep you posted with further updates soon. Funny to be living in another country and to be pleasantly reminded of the  one advantage of the Queen also being the head of state here- a long weekend! Happy birthday Lizzy.

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?