Market day

Today is my last day here. I'm sad to leave this wonderful place. The diving was so nice and the people were friendly and welcoming. But, on to my next travels back to Australia. Tomorrow is my travel day - morning flight to Port Moresby, a fairly long layover, and then a flight to Cairns, Queensland.

Today I spent the morning in downtown Kimbe to see the market. I went with Lao who is in charge of the kitchen here at Walindi. She had a large list of produce to buy. I wanted to take a look at the market and people. It was incredibly hot under the tin roof and even with a nice breeze coming in I was sweating quite a bit. After walking around and sampling some peanuts I took my camera out and asked many of the sellers if I could take their picture. First of all, I should tell you that I was the only person with light skin in the entire place (probably 200-300 people there). So I stood out like a sore thumb. I had men and women staring at me and kids following me. I took my camera out and (after asking nicely) started taking pictures. Adults and kids loved it and I showed them the pictures I took of them.

All smiles - this group was very excited to have their picture taken


A very happy, drooling baby


I liked this man's hat

Selling icies

On the way back we stopped in at K-mart - yep, that's right, there's a K-mart here. Actually it's Kimbe Mart but apparently the owner decided to be funny.


The rest of the day was spent packing up my dive gear and enjoying the lovely day reading. I would recommend Walindi Plantation resort to any divers out there. It was truly a great two weeks and I hope to come back (anyone with me?).

I'm off to Queensland tomorrow and will probably not have internet for a while. When I do, I'll send an update, but until then, happy December and I look forward to seeing at least a few of you at the end of the month!

Locals in the water

Lunch break and surface intervals

Bungelow #1 post-tree-felling

200! (no, not the prequel to 300)

Today was a momentous day! I made it to 200 dives (lifetime total)! When I had hit 100 in Egypt I looked ahead to 200 and thought - boy, this is going to be a great dive. Interestingly enough, today could have gone a whole lot better for my 200th dive. The first dive of the day was going to be my 200th and I had it all set up to video. As I descended and began looking into the view finder I was not greeted with beautiful coral reefs but with a 'condensation' error. "Couldn't be!" I screamed silently to myself before swimming right back to the boat (slowly, mind you). Because the dive had begun I gave my camera to the dive crew and asked them to dry it off and keep it covered for me. I continued with the dive.

It's funny how dependent I've become on my camera. I am determined to capture the wonder and beauty of every dive. Yes, my filming has gotten much better, but I do feel determined to keep working on it. It also gives me something to do on a dive - I like to work, I like to keep busy. Being camera happy is quite easy underwater especially since there are a myriad of animals to film. So I set off on that 200th dive with out my camera and it was, of course, one of the prettiest dives I've done here. After about 20 minutes of wishing I had my camera I finally realized that I was spoiling the dive for myself. I wasn't relaxed, I wasn't enjoying it, and I wasn't looking at the reef. I stopped, took a deep, pressurized breathe, and enjoyed the rest of the dive. Lesson learned? Maybe... I sill wish I had my camera to film on that dive, but I did indeed enjoy the dive immensely and am thrilled to have had a such a beautiful dive for my 200th.

Plus, there were two more dives that day.
I got my camera sorted out (hopefully for good!) during the hour surface interval and we hoped in at a new dive site. This site was the Zero wreck of a Japanese fighter pilot just off the beach in a near by cove. Visibility was horrible but we could explore the small wreck thoroughly.
Our second dive, after a lunch on the boat, was to Lumu reef - a nice dive but again the visibility was lacking. All in all the day was nice especially since it remained sunny all day!

Below Zero

all things great and small

Had a lovely morning out on the water today. Walindi woke to sunshine this morning and, looking at the weather forecast, this week should be quite pleasent. This morning we went diving! We have another guest here staying - a Japanese man who speaks very very little English. This doesn't appear to be a problem because he is quite happy to sit and laugh at (with?) us at the bar, during dinner, and on the boat. He chats happily away in Japanese and I repsond happily in English. But underwater there is no need to worry about language barriers. Divers around the world have very similar signs for pretty much everything from "are you okay?" and "where is the boat?" to "get out of the way, you're ruining my picture" or "wow, look at that shark behind you."

Talking about sharks, saw a few on today's dives. The dives were lovely - the water relatively clear and with just enough current to get the fish out of their little hiding places. The first dive was fantastic - dropped down to about 35 meters to a swim-through in the reef. Unfortunately my camera had fogged up or something and I tried in vain to capture the beauty of that dive. The reefs here in Kimbe Bay are probably the healthiest, most beautiful reefs I have ever seen. I've tried to film all things great and small and I hope my pictures have shown just how splendid the reefs are. To share a few more, these two were taken by one of my new british friends, Nigel Holder:

Gray Shark

Pygmy seahorse - about the size of your pinky finger nail

Our second dive today was to Susan's reef were the Pygmy seahorses like to hang out. I got a few pictures but Nigel's is much better.

We got back just in time for some lunch and just in time for the rain to start again. It's been pouring for a few hours now but it's still lovely to sit under the thatched roof with a cup of tea and a book.

Weedy sea dragon

This is an image British photographer Alex Mustard took of me looking at a beautiful weedy sea dragon in Shelley Beach, Sydney about two weeks ago. Thanks, Alex!

lessons learned

Luckily the day was nice enough to still hold the woman in conservation graduation at Mahonia. I arrived early to help and was sent to the kitchen to peel cucumbers and slice papaya (by the way, PNG is home to the best papaya I have ever tasted). I also continued to learn pidgin phrases and can now say "hello, my name is Brenna, I am from America, where are you from?" I can also talk about kitchen utensils although most of the pidgin vocabulary is the same with English (knife is knife).

The graduation was small but very nice. Held at Mahonia, we started with a few speeches. I was most impressed by the talk Analise, one of the main women at Mahonia, gave to the group. An excerpt:

"Today we are able to stand in front of a male dominated society what we couldn’t do most probably just ten years ago and talk about issues that clearly effect us. For myself, being a young educated woman trying to take up the role in educating people in our society about conservation and good resource management is very challenging especially one of my duties is to run a training... I am running a meeting and there are 20 males. I often ask myself and I often ask the group ‘where are the females?' And the most likely answer would probably be 'oh, they’ve gone to the garden… they have to take care of the kids...’ which is the typical answer for most of the trainings that I’ve run...Many times the other half of the population always underestimates our capabilities. But today I strongly want to encourage the graduating class that do not ever ever think that you cannot do anything in this world. Always believe that where there is a will and a heart to do the work, then there is always a way. I encourage you to use the knowledge that you have acquired as a tool in your work of conservation especially in our rapidly changing society. Knowledge is power to use so use it wisely and let’s all try to make a change in this culturally difficult society of ours. Let’s stand up and take the lead and start making changes for the better of our children, the society, and our country"

This inspirational talk concluded with the handing of certificates to the women of the program.

Analise talking

Graduating

The first graduating class of the woman in conservation group

I have one more week here in Walindi and today I was struck by the thought that it is just not enough time to get to know the Mahonia program, the staff, or the students. Today I met a young Australian woman who is volunteering for a year here (through a program called Live and Learn) and I found myself to be a bit jealous of her life here. She confessed the first three months (she has been here four) were extraordinarily difficult mostly due to cultural differences and that it is difficult to be a young, single, white woman in Papua New Guinea (same in Mexico, Egypt, and other places when one is strikingly different from the native people). Over the past 5 years I have had a glimpse of life as an international volunteer in a developing country. Yet I never stay long enough to actually do any good or become a part of the community. While I still believe learning and interacting even for a week is better than no interaction at all, I felt strongly today that I wish I could participate more.

There is so much that needs to be done here - yet the same is true anywhere in the world including the States. Or, for example - I thoroughly enjoyed meeting the community conservation group near Sydney. Based on the same idea as Mahonia - a group of concerned citizens get together, become better educated on marine conservation, and then go out to their local communities to continue education efforts. What is the difference between such a group in developed Australia or the States versus the group here in Papua New Guinea? Does Mahonia deserve extra attention, money, and time simply because PNG is not as developed as Australia? My social conscience screams yes. Yet I know that when I begin my new career as a PhD student in the states (I hope next fall!) I will be faced with my own new local community with conservation needs. How do I, an educated biologist, put my skills to best use? I struggle with the need to help my own country (boy do we need it) and help other countries. Can I do both? Will I ever have a "peace corps" experience where I live in one place long enough to really get to know the people? I hope so. I actually hope to participate in a peace corps program perhaps after graduate school but by then I'll be ancient (over 30!) and ready to settle down for a bit. So we'll see. But I felt empowered today as I listened to Analise talk and watched the women step forward to their hard-earned certificate. While I know I must leave this part of the world and continue with scholarship duties, I look forward to coming back and learning what more they have accomplished.

In the meantime, I encourage anyone who is interested to see:
www.mahonia.org

Rain

The cyclone. Go north from Australia to find PNG then a bit right to that first yellow ball of rain - that's West New Britain. Hopefully that's moving north

The wet season here is about two months early. Global warming?Climate change? Bad luck? Teddy bears names Mohammad? Whatever the reason the rain hasn't been too bad so far. In fact yesterday I went out with James Cook University graduate student Vanessa and Nature Conservancy worker, Shannon, out to Vanessa's patch reef site. As we got closer (by small dinghy), we saw huge rain clouds hanging over the island we were approaching. We scrambled on rain jackets and rash gaurds and kept going. Vanessa and I had a lovely long dive collecting species of corals and moving them to her patch reefs. When we surfaced, Shannon had speared to trevallis for lunch and he was smoking them using palm leaves. We kept getting rained on but were happy with the delicous, fresh fish.

Back to rain - due to heavy rain and floods a few flights have been cancelled leaving guests stranded here as well as guests waiting to come to dive. Today is clear so the planes will land but it makes me think about next week when I leave. Perhaps i'll leave a day early just to make sure I get back to Queensland!

Last night we had a massive storm starting from 11pm-4am. It kept me awake most of the night just waiting for a huge tree to fall down on my bungelow. One didn't but bungelow #1 wasn't so lucky but no one was hurt and the roof managed to stop the massive tree.

No diving today while everything gets cleaned up but I wasn't planning on it anyway - today there is a Mahonia graduation! Luckily it's not raining and perhaps the sun will come out too.

The damage

Some images from today's three dives

Spa, Papua New Guinea style

It's been a just about a week since I've been in Walindi and I feel more settled in. It is a very pleasant, small resort, with a friendly (and hard working) staff and divers from around the world. British, Australian, Irish, American, and Japanese right now.

Life is easy at Walindi

The creek

As with all international travels I find I adopt well to new cultures, people, and situations. Indeed, it is a necessary and quite a considerate thing to do in order to be more immersed than simply a tourist. I find I adjust my ethics to each culture, place, and situation. A good example of this is that I have eaten meat quite a few times these past months. It has been hard to be a pure vegetarian on the road and I would rather eat any food than no food at all but I also do not like to be rude outside of my own country. I will not ask to be a special exception to the kitchen nor on the dive boat. I am happy to taste the local cuisine including cattle from the next door ranch. I would much rather support the local farmers here than agro-industrial complex we have created in the States. I still don't quite care for the meat I am eating but at least I do not go hungry.

I also do not like to impose my own views, culture, or opinions. Discussions and healthy (sometimes heated) debates naturally occur but I never make assumptions based on cultures. Walindi sees visitors come and go every week. This means you never quite know who is going to be on the dive boat or at dinner that night. This also means that as a single person staying for a bit longer than usual, the friends who I meet tend to move on before I do, leaving me to meet new people. I am quite used to this. While there are lonely times during my year I do find I am able to meet friendly people and share a bit of lives even just for a short time and traveling alone internationally has given me a lot of perspective. I find other Americans are the hardest to talk to - mostly because they tend to be self-involved, loud, and rude - and I do not talk just of tee. It's really one of the hardest things I've learned this year - that the American stereotype is quite true. I have had much better conversations and have made more friends with the English and Australians here. Americans just aren't open to involving themselves in the culture around them. When I first got to Walindi, I quickly made friends with four British divers. Perhaps to have some entertainment or perhaps they actually liked me - they didn't seem to mind me hanging around, diving, and eating with them. Despite their constant sarcasm and making fun of my Americanism, we got along quite well. They left today leaving me to go out on the boat with the three other Americans here. I had a headache before we even got wet for the first dive due to the amazingly loud 30-something male American whose goal in life, it seems, is to talk about himself. I'm not sure if I would prefer him or the late-20s, asian-american woman, who barely looks at me unless it's to make some strange face or tell me that my mask should not be soaking in the fresh water reserved for cameras. You'd think we'd all share in our Americanism but I find this is rarely the case. The "nice" Americans I meet on the road (and yes, there are such things) tend to resemble expats and have had significant international traveling experience especially alone.

I do realize, of course, that I am creating my own stereotype of Americans but I cannot ignore my first hand observations. I prefer to share my lives with others on the road even though I know I will most likely never see them again. What is the point in not being friendly? You never know who you will meet.

I did have a lovely day today in the water - three wonderful dives in which we saw sharks, moray eels, and beautiful fish. Yesterday was quite nice as well - it was the last day for the British group who decided to spend their off-gassing day (you need to spend at least 12-24 hours out of the water before flying) visiting a hot springs. Rather than being stuck with the American divers, I decided to check out a part of the Island I had not seen.

After a long drive through oil palm plantations and making so many right and left turns I lost track, we drove straight into the forest to come to a beautiful, secluded river. Papua New Guinea is a volcanic island with many active volcanoes near by. This river is about 35C and has wonderful, healing red mud that you smother on your skin to soak. We only spent about an hour there as it was almost too hot with very little relief from the sun.

On the way to the springs

Me and my adopted, not quite as modest, British family
Mary, me, Nigel, Nigel, and Chris

Getting beautified

A local school group came this morning for a class at Mahonia Na Dari. They arrived at about 9:30am on a bus provided by the Walindi center. After a brief introduction to the center, Lorna introduced me and her other assistant, Christine, a native to this area who also volunteers at the center.

Mahonia's main office building

This morning's class concentrated on coral biology, coral reef systems, their importance, threats, and also food webs and the flora and fauna of Kimbe Bay. About 30 students attended accompanied by a few teachers and parents. The whole class was taught in a mixture of English and the local pidgin language. Papua New Guinea is home to the greatest number of distinct languages in one country. Each area has it's own local language, and children are brought up with this, english, as well as , I believe, a more nationally spoken version of pidgin. So it was certainly an interesting lecture to listen to as Lorna's English would be broken up by words I couldn't understand at all. However, thanks to context, I managed to pick up a few vocabulary words here and there. I have also learned how to say "see you later" which, in pidgin, sounds an awful lot like "look at your behind."

Lorna teaching about food webs

The class

Creating a foodweb

It was a good class and most of the students were enthusiastic. They were all between the ages of 12 and 15 so a lot of them were quite shy. We played a food web game to demonstrate the complexity of the 'who-eats-who' in the sea before letting them out to play in the sunshine.

Me, Lorna, and Christine, unraveling the food web after class

This class and it's structure was highly reminiscent of those that I used to teach at both the Seacoast Science Center and at the New England Aquarium in Boston. It is clear that the skills I learned in education while working at these two places has helped me understand and processes other classes I observe. It is wonderful to see an internationally-recognized method of teaching - learn by doing!

The walk back to the Walindi resort