°to tve

Will The "Kanaka" Become A "Boong"?

Or Incidents in the Life of a Depthless Dog

By Judy Tudor

What’s in a name, said Shakespeare—a rose by any other name would smell as sweet.

ACCORDING to the Army, the New Guinea native is-not a coon, a kanaka, a Papuan or a Melanesian —but a “Boong.” How this came about no one seems to know-although we certninlv should like to find out But one look at the word-somehow flavoured inexplicably with Australian aboriginal—is sufficient to convince me that it is just one of those Australianraise the hackles of all Territorians One such (December PIM ), has already described it as agonising and insulting.

Papuan - residents have always been hyper-sensitive on the question of names Pre-war, it not considered ethical there or even nice to call a native Papuan a kanaka and most certainly nc £ . . .. . , _®ut P l 6 bar J ar l J a J l s °7 er border in TNG favoured both forms of address when the spirit moved them, and kanaka, at least, was a recognised part of Pidgin. The term, ‘bush kanaka true,” was used by indentured labourers to indicate their brethren who were not prepared to sample the dignities and beauties of labour.

T>UT here, in the land of Pidginese, MJ many things were called other than their given names. Natives who, in their own village, acknowledged an appellation running into or seven syllables, answered in the region of their master s house-cook or labour-line to Paw-Paw, or Geko, or Kapok, or something easier to get the European tongue around; and things animate and inanimate were called by names which Sited nowhere except where they touched.

Thus, half the joy of Pidgmeermg.

Witness our partner in crime who, ?, a , vir l g °£ ce J? a 9 ustoms clerk a ‘ Master Cus-Cus, ’ as is everyone concerned with an office—was stuck with the name for evermore, even when he had forsaken the job for the profession of miner, recruiter and everything incidental to a life in the “elemental jungle.” Then, his dog, too, by a long, tortuous process and association of ideas, also became Cus- Cus. In native reference, man was distinguished from beast by prefixing “Master.”

C TT „ _, TTO , , . ~, .

US-CUS, the pup, was big and black and gangling, with large awkward feet that pranced, and an all-over shape that was vaguely “Pointer.” He had a heart as deep as a well, and loved everyone; and an appetite that, like the babbling brook, went on and on for ever, getting bigger and better all the time and, in a land of perpetual meat-rationing, providing a perpetual challenge to ingenuity.

In appetising tit-bits and hors d’oeuvres he progressed from the grass floor-mats, through sox and shoes, took in a lone false tooth of his master’s (apparently parked on a bed-side box at night) and reached culmination with 14 pennyweights of gold, carelessly placed on the floor in a prospecting dish pending weighing operations one evening—the day’s taking from the team down-river.

We had been having one of those inexplicable lean breaks, characteristic of New Guinea mining. To recover the gold—and quick—seemed imperative. We

called Cus-Cus to us and discussed ways a nd means.

Castor oil? No one was keen—our logical minds sought some less com plicated procedure Trade-salt was de °n „ as , the Q™£est. and, on «| e least messy method . agnation, it *5, °“ ur . ‘|“ t J lt ,™g ht trouble and inconvenience if Cus-Cus

nfm atam

alf the mght ’ wlth a snovel ana a dlsn mHE pup, true to form, had opened his 1 huge jaws wide when we indicated we had some thing he might eat, and we bad b ttle d ifft cu it y i n ramming handfuls of coarse salt down his gullet and c i amp ing his teeth shut. It slid into his nether ? eg ions, and a slightly be wildered look came into his eyes. His tail, normally swished violently to show his approval of anything edible, moved feebly, as a sort of reflex action to swallowing, nothing more.

We petted him> prodded his be n y , smoothed his coat, and endearingly told him to be a “good dog” and to “heave up » But C us-Cus heaved nothing; what he had he was determined to hold. He took a p the attention we were willing to give, drank gallons of water, and raised a

°to tve

So aAd go to bed During what remained of the night the emetic worked belatedly and, in the morning, pools of half-digested rice and tinned meat lay at intervals from the front path to the back vegetable gar den. and> j n some 0 f them, were thin lines of go i d> f anned ou t i n crescent shape as neatly as gold dust in a dish, it was gathered up and taken down to the creek to be washe d. Cus-Cus, following behind, and planting his splay foot j n the stream, his nose near the dish, indicated in a fixed, determined, dog-look, his personal interest in what wa g going on.

Result: five pennyweights of fine gold, what became of the rest remained the pup > s secret. The men consoled them selves on the principle of the indestruc tibility of matter; when we came to wor k the terrace on which the house s t oo d, as in time we must, we should recover there then the nine missing ’weights. For me, I felt that the gold had behaved as is its wont; that is, it had <‘ Simk to bottom” and remained per manently in Cus-Cus’s depthless maw, to be dislodged by nothing short of a miracle, or an upheaval on an un precedented scale, * * * T XT . t . .. „ arXT more than by the new word “Boong, Territorians now are moved by wonder as to whether the native himself has not been irrevocably changed, along with his name, Nor ls . the resident, or ex-resident, of Melanesia alone in this wonder. Prom Fiji and from Polynesia come doubts as Jo the permanent effect of war condi tions, and the presence of large numbers °t European troops in these small tropical territories, on the na tivte in habitants. It is hard to believe that the y old will not be changed for the new. a A d no J a Jways n So 18 ™ o uf things; but the South Islander, be be Polynesian, Melanesian or Micro

(Continued on Page 30)

nesian, has an infinite capacity for for getting, and a facility for returning and picking up the loose ends of an existence seemingly buried beneath a thick layer of civilisation and sophistication.

The Territorian’s agitation is under standable enough. Anyone who, in the days of peace, experienced the stay of a cruise-ship in an island port—the sudden decanting of hundreds of hot, perspiring, Europeans, products of their environment and oozing suburbia, into a world self-coloured by their preconceived ideas of “glamour” in the tropics and of the Islander himself—realises that the sudden arrival of thousands of service men as semi-permanent residents in these Territories must have reper cussions.

As for New Guinea, the whole position is perhaps best summarised by the old timer who came out of the Territory only towards the end of last year, and who has again returned to somewhere in the north. His observation of the natives working in Port Moresby who must have taken the full brunt of soldier-native contact, lead him to the belief that their attitude to Territorians, or those whom they had reason to re spect, was unchanged; and that their insolence, pig-headedness, stubborness and other forms of irritation, at which the Melanesian is past-master when in the mood, was saved exclusively for those who knew nothing of the workings of the Melanesian mind and less of his

background and pre-war place in the scheme of things.

Whether the old Papuan—native, kanaka or coon—is to turn permanently into a “Fuzzy Wuzzy” or a “Boong,” depends, not so much on the military rank and file, as on that nucleus who are men of ANGAU in these days, but who will be the men of the Adminis trations in the immediate post-war years.

They, by their specialised knowledge of the country and people, and by their own bearing and significance in the eyes of the Melanesian (who admires strength, moral, physical or mental, above all) will lead the native, bewildered now, maybe, back along the path, not to the old way of things, but to some half-way house, where in normal peace time surroundings and circumstances, he can be assisted to develop along the lines which suit him best.