Troicalities

Magazine Section

With Music Extra

“ A ND what’s the price of beer in A Panpptp nnw?” wp inmiirpH of a recent visitor mc l uired “Well, at what timer was the rather puzzling reply.

“You see,” he continued, “it’s 25 francs a bottle until the music starts—then it goes to 35 francs, And the music starts at 8 pm Saturday and Sunday—so advise them to get the serious drinking in before then!”

Golf On Wheels

TT ak :rZr r i d y en a tS SenL E Dl s: H. Secretary of Fijian Affairs) have mechanised their golf at Manly, NSW, and so have made the newspaper headlines.

With a third friend (a retired NSW Deputy Commissioner of Taxation) who has a mechanical caddy (a golf bag with a pneumatic wheel) they all admit to over 70 years, and have been playing golf together for many years.

The Baker and Monckton bicycles are fitted with a steel carrying rack at the front for the golf bag and swinging arms at the side which prop the bikes up when their owners are playing. Between shots the bicycling golfers mount their bikes and their friend trundles his

caddy. (The Manly course on which they play is very flat).

Granny Herald—Best Smoke

Paper

THERE’S a big trade in old news papers from Sydney and Auck land. Maybe the shippers think they are being used to wrap paresis there. Perhaps some are; but on Fiji’s outer islands a Sydney Morn ing Herald is worth a penny per sheet to-day to the Fijian smokers of twist tobacco.

Other papers have varying values on the smokers’ market. The yellowish, rather fragile type is only used as a last resort; and the ex pensive, glossy finishes don’t get a look in. That’s what a Buca Bay trader reported in in July on one of his rare visits to town. (The SMH has always been top-favourite as smoke-paper among New Guinea natives).

Wanted—Whales’ Teeth

WITH a Royal visit in the offing, tabua, the ceremonial whales’ teeth which Fijians use for presentation on important occasions, are likely to be in short supply.

A Sydney paper reported recently that Fiji was in the market for anything up to 500 of them and that an official was looking through New Zealand museums with a view to

easing the current shortage.

Since that paragraph appeared, however, Fiji possibly now wants only 460 tabua —as a sort of wish fulfilment on a grand scale, a 57-ft sperm whale, from which the teeth come, was stranded on Wakaya Island a few weeks ago and Fijians working there were able to extract 40 teeth from it!

Tabua are now more or less pro hibited exports from Fiji but it was not always so and a campaign in Australia and New Zealand would likely unearth many of these large teeth—probably from peopla who have small idea what they represent or even what they are.

A year or so ago the writer of this paragraph saw two healthy looking specimens in the surgery of a Sydney dentist. Apart from the fact that he may have thought they were good ornaments for the workshop of one of his craft, this dentist had no affiliations with Fiji.

He said that they had been given to him by a missionary who had lived in Fiji long years ago.

Unrehearsed

Sightseers in Lautoka, western Fiji, had an unre hearsed thrill on Coronation Night. An athletic Fijian, burst ing with goodwill, climbed 85 feet, to the top of the framework which supported the set-pieces for the fireworks. When the display com menced the Fijian, to the horror of the spectators, began to sing and dance, amid the sparks and the rockets. His favourite song appar ently was “God Save the Queen”.

After the distressed organisers had howled themselves hoarse, order ing him away, he climbed quietly back to the street. The law had its talons out—but no one had the heart to arrest him. (Over)

Viennese Motu

A PORT MORESBY resident tells us that Dr. Stefan Wurm, a lecturer at the Vienna University, who was in London at Coronation time, astounded the native members of the P-NG Royal Constabulary Contingent by talking fluent and pure Motu and excellent Pidgin, although he had never visited Papua and New Guinea.

In talking with them he further disclosed his close academic know ledge of the Territory by naming the local district of each member as he gave his home district.

The natives were so impressed by his fluency that both Motu and New Guinea members asked how he could know their language so well when he had never been in their country.

It is believed that in the early post-war years, Dr. Wurm applied for a position with the Adminis tration as a native language expert, but the salary offered was too low.

Menace To Navigation

A SUVA POINT resident tells an amusing tale of a little Fijian odd-job boy and the RNZAF.

Like boys everywhere, this one loved flying kites. But some of the Suva kites are works of art, feather light, beautifully finished, and the pride and joy of their owners. Some time ago, shortly after the boy had finished his morning chores, the RNZAF Lauthala Bay fire-tender was heard roaring down the road.

The lady of the house was surprised when it came to a screaming stand still at the front gate and an aggressive looking sergeant jumped off and sprang to the door.

“Madam!” he barked, “is that your kite?”

Amused at the sergeant’s aggressive manner, the lady had a mind to say that she was beyond the kite stage, but it was evident that this was no time for flippancy.

She admitted that it might belong to the house boy.

“Then it must come down in stantly, madam. That Catalina up there is endangered by the thing.

The control officer insists that it be immediately grounded.” So there was a general movement to the back yard where the offending obstruction was secured to the branch of a tree. It was certainly flying at a great height.

The sergeant leaped to the cord, then a look of dumbfounded amazement came over his face. He had obviously expected at least string, possibly even some very heavy wire. But all that was hold ing this little work of art was ordinary machine cotton. For a moment he hesitated. No, orders were to ground the thing. There would be watchers at the control tower, so down it came, hand over fist, the delicate cotton a hopeless tangle on the ground—and the kite

itself, when finally landed, no larger than two hands, and as harmless as a moth.

Duty done, the sergeant roared off in his juggernaut—looking slightly red and just a little guilty —and the Catalina made a final circuit and came in. The little boy, sighting the descent of his kite from afar, and hurrying to the scene, was obviously very, very puzzled—and annoyed. The action

cost six new reels of cotton.-

J.P.S.

A Brett Hilder drawing of James Murray Joyes of Iwi and Kekere plantations, Bougainville. Mr. Joyes has been in New Guinea since 1921, when he arrived at Rabaul to work under the late C. I. H.

Campbell at the Commonwealth Bank. In 1927 he bought Iwi plantation from the Ex-Pro. Board, and later took over Kekere as well.

In 1937 Jimmie Joyes married Irmgard, elder daughter of Dr. Kroening, of Bougainville, who had been Doctor and District Officer there for the German Government until 1914.

During the Second War Jimmie joined the Australian Army, and was loaned to the US forces on Bougainville, with the rank of Captain, piloting ground patrols through the country he knew so well, and he was responsible also for native

intelligence. After the war he passed through ANGAU on his way back to plantation life, and *n 1950, to overcome the inefficiency of local shipping, he joined a syndicate of local planters in the Bougainville Company Ltd. An English coastal firm supplied the m.v. “Pollurlan”, which has developed an excellent service between Rabaul and Bougainville, and most of the management has lately been in the capable hands of the subject for this month’s drawing.