Making sago

When I was in the village, two days in a row we went to the bush, next to the river, to make sago. Firstly the men cut down a sago tree and then they smashed the inside of it to make a pulp a bit like wood chips or sawdust.

Next it is the women’s work to process it all to make sago flour. Firstly we put the sago pulp into a pot and add water. Then we squeezed the water out of the pulp and put the pulp in another bowl, and keep the water which is now orange from the sago pulp and repeat the process two more times with the same batch of pulp.

Next we poured the water over a piece of hessian and rubbed the hessian to make the sago flour go through to the basin below.

Here I am rubbing the hessian – it is easy work, but your skin starts to wear out after doing lots of it. There was so much pulp from one tree!

We ended up with a basin full of orange water, but the sago flour settles at the bottom of the basin.

They empty the water and allow the flour to dry out. Here is a photo of the completed product that they gave us.

There are so many different ways of cooking sago. You can mix it with banana or with coconut and fry it or boil it or cook it on the fire or make soup out of it. I had a lot of fun experimenting with it and I haven’t mastered cooking it yet. I hope to play with it a bit more and see if I can make anything really wonderful.

The various kinds of cooked sago that I ate were nice. It is a bit gelatinous (or ‘gooey’) and chewy, but it was definitely edible and not repulsive at all.

Here are two things made out of sago that our family gave us. I tried making the kind that is on the right one time.

Back from village living

We have left our villages now and are back at POC. I had a great time in the village, I absolutely loved it and would be happy to stay there all the time. There is so much I could tell you about my time in the village that it would make one very long blog post!! So I’ll share a little bit now and add more posts about village living over the next few weeks.

Some of the highlights were: making sago, harvesting cocoa, going for a trip up a mountain, making a bilum and being given a local name – Mogom.

In the mornings, I had a bit of a routine of having breakfast then washing my clothes at the tap, then washing the dishes at the tap too. It was an interesting affair – I often had a crowd of children standing watching me. It didn’t really bother me. Lately I had a little girl about 5 years old helping me, which was really sweet.

Washing clothes:


Washing dishes:


Every day was different, so there was only a regular routine in the morning and later afternoon.

At about 4-5pm we washed in the river which is right next to the sea, with a sand bar in between. It was very public – sometimes there would be a man sitting on the shore nearby doing something, or other times, a group of little children would come with us and play in the water around us. I was fully covered when I bathed, so I didn’t mind it at all. In fact, I can’t really think of anything that bothered me when I was in the village.

Here I am about to bathe, fully covered up.


This picture shows me bathing with a bit of the background of where I was:

And with the kids:

After we bathed, we made our dinner using our kerosene stove (Primus). Then after eating dinner sitting on the verandah, some of our ‘family’ came and sat with us and we talked for a little while or made our bilums and then went to bed.

Last blog post for 5 weeks!!

That’s right, I won’t be on the internet for the next 5 weeks! I will be staying in a village called Mus (if you’re on Google Earth, look for Bunabun, that’s where we will be). We’re right at the coast and we have a creek for bathing in, and a nice tap to get our drinking water from! We still have to boil our drinking water though just to be safe. Every family at POC is at a different village along a 27km stretch of coast, so Sara and I are in this village together, just us. We will have a ‘wasfamili’ (foster family) looking out for us there, and they have two teenage girls, so I think that will be good, hopefully we will be able to spend time with them and develop good friendships with them.

Our wasfamili and the village are so excited about us coming that they made an extension to the house we will be staying in. Originally it was a two bedroom house with a large verandah, but now they have closed in the original verandah and made it into an extra two rooms, and put on a new verandah. So now we have a bit of a mansion!

Here’s a picture of our house before the extensions:

This is our wasfamili:

Here’s the tap where we will get our drinking water:

This is our bathing spot:

Lastly, the beach…

If you are praying for me, please pray for good health and good relationships when I am in the village. Thanks! Will get back in touch in 5 or so weeks times and I should have lots of stories.

Three day hike

I survived our three day hike! We left on Monday and came back today, Wednesday. We stayed overnight in two villages. So what was it like? Well, while hiking my shirt was wet all the time with sweat! We had some beautiful views and walked through a rainforest area. I had bandaids on my feet preventing them from getting blisters.

Some of the tracks were steep and slippery, which was hard work when going uphill, but it was even harder going downhill because there’s more risk of falling. Our local guides always told us “Wokabaut isi isi, nogut yu pundaun” (‘Walk slowly. No good you fall down’). Our group’s tally of falls was: 1st day – 3 falls, 2nd day – no falls, 3rd day – 10 falls! We had a good laugh at ourselves when we fell though! Nobody got hurt either, so that was great.

I had a good time when we were in the villages, talking to the people and showing them some photos that I brought with me. They really loved looking at my photos.

Here’s some pictures of our journey.

Hiking along:

Me with a nice view:

Having a rest at a creek and getting my feet wet:

One of the houses we stayed in:

Me with some kids looking at my photos:

Foster families/Selling at the market

Over the past few weeks we have been spending time with foster families. These are local families who have volunteered to be foster families for the students at POC. In Tok Pisin we call them our ‘wasfamili’.

We have visited them in their village and had dinner with them there and last week we stayed overnight too. I started to learn how to make a ‘bilum’ (a string bag) on that visit. Going to the toilet is an event because the toilet is a little house by itself with a hole in the ground.

On Saturday I went to the town market with my foster mother to sell sweet bananas. We set up in an undercover area where we had a table and a seat. Thankfully we weren’t outside in the sun and sitting on the ground, so we were quite comfortable.

I had a great time at the market. I enjoyed sitting there watching everyone pass by and just observing everything. I was also a bit of a novelty – everyone thought it was amusing to see a white person selling food at the market, but they were happy about it too. I think it was also a selling point!

I was out all day and using Tok Pisin in all my interactions. I didn’t find the day stressful at all. I actually felt happy and at peace afterwards because I hadn’t had any time pressures on me. I don’t like rushing around to fit into a time schedule, I like taking my time, so I think I’m going to appreciate the slow pace of PNG life.

Hiking

We have been going on hikes every week and they have been progressively getting harder. Today we went on a big hike all day. We left at 9am and came back at 4:15pm. We had a long break for lunch, plus lots of rest breaks too.

We hike around the top of the mountain and we are blessed with the most beautiful views as you will see in my pictures below.

Next week we have a hike carrying heavy backpacks, and on the week after we have a three day hike, which probably sounds a lot worse than it is. We will only be hiking for about three hours each day and then spending time in a village and sleeping overnight. We’ll have to carry backpacks on the three day hike with all our gear.

Hiking photos:

Me and the view:

Me hiking:

Me and another nice view:

This is me during our lunch break today:

I got sick!!

After dinner on Wednesday night my tummy felt a bit funny and I went to bed with a bucket – ‘just in case’ – but I didn’t really feel like I would vomit at that stage. Well, as I lay in bed, I gradually felt worse and I ended up having three vomiting sessions between 10pm and midnight. Each vomiting session consisted of several vomits. It was really horrible because I had nothing left in my stomach, but my body still wanted to bring something up. My roommate Sharon got up each time and looked after me, which was really nice.

On Thursday morning I had some vegemite on toast for breakfast with some water and about 5 minutes after I finished it, I brought it all back up again! I also had diarrhoea throughout this whole period too. I stayed in bed on Thursday and didn’t eat anything else all day, but I had some sweet drinks and kept them down. I felt a bit weak and miserable most of the day, but by about 6pm I felt a lot better.

I was weak and easily exhausted on Friday, but I was well enough to go to class and enjoy my birthday. On Saturday morning I didn’t feel the greatest, but I managed to struggle through a trip to town. I didn’t really eat much all day until dinner, when I had a small meal. I feel a lot better now, but I think I got hit pretty bad with the virus; others who had it had a quicker recovery.

This virus has affected many of us at POC. It started on Monday last week when several of the kids got sick and were vomiting, then more got sick on Tuesday and a few more on Wednesday. Nearly all the kids got it. Then it started going through the adults beginning on Wednesday. Every day we hear about someone else who has come down with it. Nearly everyone has had it now. Those who haven't are in the minority.