Old Salamaua cemetery a relic of a bygone era

The old Salamaua cemetery (pictured) is a relic of a bygone era of the 1920s and 1930s when fevered gold miners from all over the world converged on this idyllic part of the world.
To visit the old Salamaua cemetery is to step back in time, to rip-roaring period when gold fever struck men from around the globe.
The discovery of gold at Edie Creek above Wau in 1926 sparked off a gold rush of massive proportions, which led to the development of Salamaua as the capital of the then Morobe District.
Thousands of Europeans flocked to the jungles of Salamaua and Wau in search of gold in the ‘20s and ‘30s.
Their legacy lives on today through the infamous Black Cat Trail, later to become scene of some of the bloodiest fighting of WW11.
In those days, foreigners were regarded as insane by the village people because of the joy the strange yellow dust brought to them and the trouble they went to get it
Gold-fevered foreigners from all around the globe were landing at Salamaua!
The goldfields lay eight days walk through thick leech-infested jungle and steep razorback ridges.
There was a real threat of being attacked by hostile warriors.
And when they got to the fields, they were faced with the prospect of dysentery, a variety of ‘jungle’ diseases, and pneumonia brought on by the extremes of temperature between day and night.
Blackwater fever, a potent tropical disease akin to malaria, claimed the lives of unaccustomed European gold miners by the score.
Gold Dust and Ashes, the 1933 classic by Australian writer Ion Idriess, tells the fascinating yarn of the gold fields and of the trials and tribulations faced by the miners.
Idriess, in his book – which remains a bestseller to this day – also writes of many of the colorful characters that now lie on a hill overlooking the sea in the old Salamaua cemetery.
It provides probably the best insight into the history of the development of the Morobe goldfields, and is a must- read for students of colonial history.
Today the old Salamaua cemetery, or what remains of it, is well tended to by the local villagers.
The graves are mute testimony to the days when European man, running a high gold fever, was claimed by a fever of a different kind.

Clansmen admit to wrongdoing in hideous sorcery-related killings

By ELIAS LARI in The National (Papua New Guinea’s leading daily newspaper)

 

MEMBERS of a clan living near Mt Hagen, Western Highlands province, yesterday admitted they were wrong to murder a father and his son whom they suspected of sorcery.

Members of the Moge Kimnika clan, peace mediators and relatives of the deceased met in Mt Hagen as members of the clan expressed remorse in last February killing of two of their own.

Plak Doa and his son Anis were attacked and tied up, placed inside their own house and burnt to death last Feb 8 at Ban village.

Clansmen had accused them for the death of community leader Pora Mel through sorcery.

Police said the clansmen had tied them up and burnt them because that was the only way to remove the “evil spirit” in them.

At the time, police were prevented from entering the village by heavily armed men.

More than two months after the gruesome killing, the Moge Kimnika clansmen admitted they were wrong, and publicly apologised to the relatives of the deceased.

They said they had no evidence that the two had used sorcery to cause the death of Mel.

The village leaders said they attacked and killed their own tribesmen based on rumours and gossips.

Anis Tipi, one of the family members of the two deceased, said Doa and his son lost their lives for nothing.

Provincial peace mediator Thomas Berum said even though people believed in sorcery, it did not exist and many innocent and defenseless people had been accused and put to death.

Mr Berum said this was a mentality in the Highlands region presently that needed to be discarded.

Community policing officer Snr Const Kolo Traota praised the two parties for coming together to resolve the matter peacefully.

However, Mr Traota told the leaders that police would not release the two suspects that had been detained in connection with the killings.

A date is yet to be set by the Moge Kimnika clansmen to pay compensation to the family members of the deceased.

Bomana War Cemetery

ANZAC Day falls next Saturday, April 25, and in recognition of this, this blog will run a series of articles about WW11 icons in Papua New Guinea over the next couple of days. We start with the Bomana War Cemetery (pictured above) outside Port Moresby...

Port Moresby (Bomana) War Cemetery is about 19 kilometres north of Port Moresby on the road to Nine-Mile, and is approached from the main road by a short side road called Pilgrims Way.

Those who died in the fighting in Papua and Bougainville are buried in Bomana War Cemetery, their graves brought in by the Australian Army Graves Service from burial grounds in the areas where the fighting had taken place.

The unidentified soldiers of the United Kingdom forces were all from the Royal Artillery, captured by the Japanese at the fall of Singapore; they died in captivity and were buried on the island of Bailale in the Solomons.

These men were later re-buried in a temporary war cemetery at Torokina on Bougainville Island before being transferred to their permanent resting place at Port Moresby.

The cemetery contains 3,819 Commonwealth burials of the Second World War, 702 of them unidentified.

The Port Moresby Memorial stands behind the cemetery and commemorates almost 750 men of the Australian Army (including Papua and New Guinea local forces), the Australian Merchant Navy and the Royal Australian Air Force who lost their lives in the operations in Papua and who have no known graves.

Men of the Royal Australian Navy who died in the south-west Pacific region, and have no known grave but the sea, are commemorated on the Plymouth Naval Memorial in England, along with many of their comrades of the Royal Navy and of other Commonwealth Naval Forces.

Bougainville casualties who have no known graves are commemorated on a memorial at Suva, Fiji.

Many Papua New Guineans are living below the poverty line

By NALAU BINGEDING

Dear All,

An Australian contracted by National Research Institute to do a population study in Port Moresby in 2007 has redefined poverty.

He mentioned that rural poverty is not equivalent to urban poverty.

The two are distinct and should be looked at separately.

If you live in an urban setting but have no access to basic services such as water, sanitation, telephone, electricity, gas and others, you are in fact living under the poverty line.

In the case of rural poverty, those basic services mentioned for urban poverty are not considered.

Other factors define rural poverty.

Many public servants in Port Moresby who attended the seminar presented by the Australian were surprised to find that most of them were living below the poverty line.

Many of them lived at Kaugere, Sabama, Badilli and Koki, but lacked the basic services provided by National Capital District Commission and Eda Ranu.

In fact most of them were upset because they could not afford to rent decent housing, due to the K7.00 housing allowance given to them.

Deputy Prime Minister Puka Temu has been trying to reason out things with the trade unions about the increase in housing allowance for MPs, and the K128 million jet for Air Niugini.

But the Somare government is keeping quiet, while thousands of public servants living in urban areas live in poverty.

It is not the rural people that are living under the poverty line, but city and town dwellers as well.

Wake up Papua New Guinea.

This country is headed for anarchy!

Lae’s new tower

Pictured is an artistic impression of the proposed new IPI Building to be constructed in Second Street, Lae, in place of its iconic predecessor.
Pacific Architects Consortium (PNG) Limited is the architects and designers of the project for Nambawan Super Limited along with many other new developments in Papua New Guinea.
The building consists of a secure semi-basement car parking for all tenants plus separate off-street visitor parking.
“It is anticipated that there will be over 1, 000 square metres ground floor retail area with four floors of commercial space at 750 square metres per level of net lettable area,” said PAC associate director/senior projects manager Gary Hallard.
“The remaining top two penthouse floors contain a mixture of two and three-bedroom boutique apartments, totalling 10, that have unsurpassed views to the Huon Gulf and Salamaua.
“The entire building has been carefully designed to latest technology while being
environmentally-friendly and robust to meet the harsh and diverse climate conditions
experienced in Lae.
“The building will be a landmark building for Lae and Nambawan Super Limited.”

The times they are a changin'

They times they are a changin’…at least in the Eastern Highlands province of Papua New Guinea as a result of climate change.

The mango tree in this picture has never borne fruit before, given the cool highlands climate, however, has done so recently in something reminiscent of warmer, coastal climates.

The people in the photo are mother Joan Kume with baby Jonathan Thurston (named after the Aussie rugby league star?), husband Derek Kume and daughter Martha. 

They are from Modia village in Kere, Chimbu province, but are long-term residents at Fruitgate in Asaro.

This picture was taken in February 2009.

 

Pacific Adventist University to celebrate 25th Anniversary

The Pacific Adventist University, which the God-given mission of “Educate to Serve”, this year celebrates its 25^th Anniversary.

Celebrations will take place at PAU’s Koiari Park Campus outside Port Moresby, Papua New Guinea, from Friday, August 28 to Sunday, August 30.

PAU is a tertiary institution located 21 kilometres outside Port Moresby and operated by the South Pacific Division of the Seventh-day Adventist Church.

Both the faculty and the student body are international in composition.

While most students come from Papua New Guinea and other Pacific Island nations such as Tonga, Fiji, Samoa, Vanuatu and the Solomon Islands, others have come from Africa, Australia, Pakistan, China, the Philippines, and the United States.

The institution was established as Pacific Adventist College, a college of higher education in 1983 and given a charter as a university by the Papua New Guinea government in 1997.

Currently bachelor's and (some) masters degrees are offered in Business, Education, Science, Health Science (Nursing), Theology and Humanities.