"Mis-Sent To Samarai."

Complaints of a Muddled Mail Service.

“/CITIZEN” writes from Salamaua, and, after describing the various disadvantages of life there, declares that residents there have “the worst mail service in the world.” He says:— “A boat arrived here on December 26, 1937. Needless to say, we were all look ing forward to receiving letters and greetings from friends and families.

Most of us received very few letters and were very downhearted over it. When the next boat arrived, a few weeks later, we received quite a number of letters by it, and we also found why they did not arrive on the previous boat. Most of our letters were endorsed ‘Mis-sent to Samarai’.

“Apparently, the clerks that placed those letters in the Samarai bag in Sydney do not know the difference be tween Salamaua and Samarai.

“Several 'weeks before Christmas, many of us citizens mailed several cards of greetings, letters, etc., to friends over seas. They arrived in Sydney and the letter-sorters placed them in the New

Guinea bag, with the result that we re ceived our mail back again. I myself put it down to just utter carelessness.

We cannot be blamed, as our mail was addressed and endorsed properly, also the right amount of stamps were used.

“We are constantly having trouble with our mail. I have seen complaints in the ‘P.I.M.’ about letters being sent Air-Mail ‘by Papua-New Guinea Air Mail’, being placed in the wrong bag and coming all the way here by boat. I might mention that the same thing still goes on.

“If the officials that are the cause of all this delay came up here and put up with the loneliness that we endure, they would very soon know what it means to receive a letter on time.”