Tropicalities
pp. 31-33 · Read in the full issue
For Michael Somare, leader of the Pangu Pati in the P-NG House of Assembly, it was a long, hard week. Between Septem ber 13 and September 21, he spoke to hundreds of people in Sydney, Melbourne and Canberra; he shook scores of hands and did a lot of smiling.
>Y the middle of that week, when Somare spoke to students at i'dney University, he admitted that ; was looking forward to going home ►r a rest. Nonetheless, he gave a re xed talk, and his message, by and rge, was the same as it had been rlier, when he gave the Sir Hubert urray Memorial Lecture at the liversity, and earlier still when he oke in Melbourne. The message, iefly; • New Guineans must be given are say in how the money raised the territory is spent. The present uation, with Australia doing most the saying and the spending, can t lead New Guineans to political iturity. • Australians should do more to acate New Guineans to political ponsibility. Education is No. 1 ority. • P-NG needs more skilled help m overseas to open up the country 1 help New Guineans to help mselves. This is where Australian iduales can do a lot. • The Ministerial system, though 4ep in the right direction, is not lly effective. Ministers should have >ay in moulding policy—and not merely as an advisory body. • The Pangu Pati hopes for home 5 within 5-10 years and independ e within 20.
Jichael Somare’s speech at Sydney iversity was met with mild lause from the students, some of n wearing Pangu Pati T-shirts, ) later asked questions which e, on the whole, as reasonable lis address. ►ne or two of the students, how ", seemed a little disappointed, y had come to hear a radical, but man wasn’t one. his disappointment was apparent [uestions which touched on “black ed of whites” and “police and y power”. lichael Somare replied that “black ed of whites” played no part in
Michael Somare
Talks To The
Australians
P-NG politics and that the police and army were in P-NG to serve the gov ernment—and that is how it should be.
The students who had invited Somare to speak—the Racial Activity Committee of the Students for a Democratic Society-seemed to find this pretty tame stuff. We spoke to SDS chairman Mike Jones about his organisation’s reaction to Michael Somare. Was Somare too conserv ative for their tastes?
Jones wasn’t sure. On the one hand, he said, Somare could genuinely be a mild politician; on the other, he could have been putting on a diplo matic front. “After all,” said Jones, you can’t be a student all your life.”
No longer naked
and unashamed
TO the European population of Mount Hagen, in New Guinea’s Western Highlands, the sight of bare brown bosoms and buttocks is com monplace.
But it seems that some people draw a firm line between that area of nudity and the exposure of more intimate parts of the indigenous anatomy even when such immodesty involves only carved wooden figures!
The entrance to a Mount Hagen tourist agency is flanked by two native-carved men. Until recently, the two wooden gentlemen stood there naked and unashamed.
Then somebody compained that the two gents were exposing more than was required in the interests of decency. Result is that now one wooden gentleman hides his shame
under a bunch of feathers, and the other sports a fibre drape.
Is it only one’s imagination that detects a change in their expression of impassive pride? Surely they are not really blushing when the wind ruffles their substitutes for the fig leaf?
The wind does blow pretty strong in Mount Hagen, and perhaps they ought to be issued with trousers.
Back to the BSIP
to count heads
T™ arrival in mid-August at A Honiara of a former Coast watcher has meant the start of pre parations for the Solomons first-ever 1969 census — set for December, Britain has held a census in the Solomons every 10-odd years since 1930, but always it has been a sampling , or has been based largely on estimates. 1969’s count will be a head count and a computer will VoTn% OCess - V* st count ’ in 1959 > was 1Z4,076 people and an estimated figure in 1966 was 142,740.
For the former Coastwatcher Mr D, (Dick) C. Horton—his return to Honiara was personally significant because it was his first look at the protectorate in 25 years and a far cry from his grim months spent on a tiny island in the New Georgia Group spying on Japanese Zeros and rescuing American sailors. spent seven years in the BSIP directly before World War ? S , a District Officer at Tulagi, Ysabel, Malaita and Guadalcanal In 1965 he published a book on his experiences. The Happy Isles ■ A Diary of the Solomons.
For the past 11 years he has been
Michael Somare.
a science schoolteacher at Sussex, England, but early this year Britain asked him to organise and conduct the Solomons census.
With his previous Solomons ex perience, and census work behind him in Malaya in 1947, Mr. Horton seems a likely person to help count 150,000-odd Solomon Islanders living in 10 main clusters of islands and dozens of other small outliers.
He told us recently he hoped to recruit about 500 people in the Solomons, particularly Solomon Islands schoolteachers, to count the people in their districts.
Professional help and advice will come from Dr. H. F. Zwart, a South Pacific Commission demographer, Dr. Norma McArthur, a Professorial Fellow at the Australian National University, Canberra, and Mr. T, E.
Smith, of the Institute of Common wealth Affairs, London University.
Mr. Horton said he didn’t expect any more trouble like the kind got from Malaita, San Cristoval and some Guadalcanal Islanders in 1949 when the census failed because of opposition or non-co-operation. The “Marching Rule” movement, was at that time strong.
Preliminary results of next year’s census will be available in early 1970 but the report on the census will not be published until 1971.
Meanwhile Mr. Horton hopes to bring out another book—not on the census but on wartime experiences in the Solomons.
“Revolution” comes
to West Samoa
WHAT is probably the first authentic Samoan drama ever written was produced in Apia re cently as part of the Apia Repertory Society’s school drama festival.
Entitled “Comes the Revolution”, it was written by Albert Wendt, a Samoan college teacher whose grand father was German.
The simple, one-act play deals with a group of four Samoan village youths playing at war. In their play world army they drill and plan for an imaginary rebellion against their parents, village elders, and the entire adult population of the world.
With the unthinking cruelty of youth, they choose the village idiot as the future “king” of their revolu tionary state, and make him the butt of their savage and irreverent fun.
The climax is tragic. Just as the boys finish a mock crowning of the idiot, an elderly chief on a stroll around the village comes upon the scene.
He chases the boys away, brandish
ing a stick. The idiot “king” seeing his beloved “field marshal” being attacked, savagely kills the old chief with his own stick as his “subjects” look on in horror.
As his friends flee, the idot lugs the dead body to a grave and stands sadly contemplating it, applauding his own action as the curtain falls.
The script is full of the impatience of youth, rejection of the Establish ment and scorn for authority. It could have been the product of Hippieland anywhere. It does not truly represent the present-day at titudes of Samoan youth, but may be a valid prophecy of things to come, considering the rapid sophistica tion of Samoan society.
Quality of the ten plays presented by various colleges during the festival
was surprisingly high. Costuming au sets were imaginative and charactei isations well portrayed. The Samoan displayed a flair for the dramatic.
However, dialogue, all in Englisl was weak; many lines were forgotte and cues missed; unavoidable flaw stemming from the use of an iir perfectly learned second language.
It’s their
cup of tea
THE people of Wurup are wise aboi tea. And in the P-NG Depar ment of Agriculture it’s said thj the people of Wurup grow better te than some expatriate tea growers i the district.
Dr. D. P. Sinha, an anthropologi from the Research School of Pacif Studies at the Australian Nation; University, has just completed year’s fieldwork in P-NG, and 1 has some theories about the Wuru tea growers. According to Dr. Sinh the Wurup people have made a sw cess of tea because: • The whole community pa ticipates in tea growing. • The growers use tradition ground and traditional methods < reclaiming land. • The Department of Distri Administration at Mt. Hagen h; been ever ready with assistance.
Dr. Sinha feels that the Wurup t< project should be held up as a mod for indigenous economic develo ment in the territory.
They drew out the
wrong marble
A SUDDEN ban by Fiji police September on bingo—which h been a fixture in Suva for at lea 15 years—brought consternation fro loyal adherents and puzzlement fro the rest of the Fiji populace.
Why all the fuss, people wonders Lotteries are not illegal in Fiji, pr viding they’re conducted under ; official permit.
Wasn’t it rather late in the day discover that the regulations were worded that the playing of bin; wasn’t permissible and that t lottery permit held by bingo orga isers shouldn’t have been issued the first place?
News of the ban was a disappoii ment to many Suva housewives, f whom bingo is their big night o each week. The organisers we
oncerned because money raised trough bingo goes to worthy causes ike education and the maintenance and of the St. John Ambulance Irigade. The Stella Maris Primary chool was able to tarseal its road, t a cost of £1,300, with the pro eeds of bingo evenings.
But two weeks later the law had een amended and bingo now had :gal approval—and a minor crisis as averted.
The amendment provides that a >ciety properly registered can rganise a lottery which “takes the )rm of the game commonly known > bingo, tombola or housey-housey.” rganisers of bingo games are ex npted from complying with certain iquirements which relate to lotteries id which were never intended to iply to bingo.
'rom out of
he past
iUR request last month for infor ' mation about the whereabouts of e piece of machinery connected ith the ill-fated de Ray’s expedition New Ireland (the machinery was ctured on p. 51 alongside a letter om Mrs. Nari Watkins) has brought prompt reply from reader Bill dl, of Lambom, New Ireland. The achinery is in the middle of Lambom Hage, and here is his photograph prove it. Lambom is on a small and opposite the colony which had ch a short and tragic history in e 1880’s.
Bill Pell says that it was brought the village before World War I, der the direction of the then chief, aranganu, and was secretly placed the entrance of the men’s house, ne of the women and children of : village being permitted to see it ing set up.
According to Bill, by the time rs. Watkin’s picture was taken the 1 men’s house had fallen down, new one was erected on a site rther from the prying eyes and rs of womenfolk, but the “iron”, the machinery is known locally, nained where it was.
The old men of the village reject ; suggestion that the “iron” ever I mark a chief’s grave. The village lay is slowly encroaching on the toric piece of equipment because :re is little other room for ex nsion.
In Bill Pell’s picture, one of iranganu’s direct descendants is nding beside the “iron”. Bill adds: The supports for this iron, and the
mill wheel which is now in Rabaul, are still to be found at the site of the de Rays colony. Perhaps one day they can all be re-erected in Rabaul.”
We certainly concur with Bill Pell’s suggestion, which is also what Mrs. Watkins wanted: Here’s a chance for a piece of New Guinea history to be restored and displayed.
Burns comma-less
Philp & Go.
BURNS PHILP is as much a part of life in the South Seas as the palm tree. But have you ever noticed how the company spells its name?
The question is prompted by a reader who has been noticing the commercial headlines in some of the metropolitan newspapers lately, where the company is spelt Burns, Philp. That comma has seemed most aggressive when set in half-inch type, and the reader has pointed out, ac cusingly, that PIM doesn’t use the comma.
That’s true, we don’t. And we re main unrepentant.
James Burns and Robert Philp were trading independently in Aus tralia in 1877 when that year they entered into a partnership which eventually, on April 1, 1883, resulted in the registration of Burns, Philp and Co. Ltd., complete with comma.
Philp himself retired in 1892, but the company went on to expand and register other companies.
Its prosperous and oft-quoted sub sidiary, Burns Philp (South Sea) Co.
Ltd., has no comma (and note also it has no final “s” in Sea). Nor is there a comma in Burns Philp Trustee Co. Ltd., or Bums Philp (New Guinea) Ltd., or Burns Philp (New Hebrides) Ltd.
But the European company, Bums, Philp and Co. Ltd., of London, does
have a comma. The American com pany backed away from the dilemma altogether by registering itself as Burns-Philp Co. of San Francisco Inc.
So what? So “Beeps” (as we say in the Islands) can register itself any way it likes, but PlM’s printers and sub-editors have long since called their own truce, and as far as we are concerned it’s a comma-less Burns Philp, or simply BP’s, in our pages.
It may be sloppy journalism, but boy, it’s simple!
They’re getting
the big ones
AN increasing number of big fish records are being broken with whoppers caught in Fiji waters. And visitors are hauling in a fair share of them.
One of the most recent to go was the Fiji women’s record for an 80 lb test line, when Melbourne visitor Mrs.
E. H. B. Neill boated a 137 lb sail fish and 60 lb wahoo off Qalito Island in the Mamanucas.
Mrs. Neill, wife of Colonel E. H.
B. Neill (who is chairman of direc tors of the Melbourne Age), was fishing from Mr. Graham Wallace’s Sere-ni-Wai.
Another visitor, New Zealander Mr. Bob Doig, went out in the Sere-ni-Wai in mid-September and hooked a 258 lb striped marlin— believed to be the first of its kind to be caught in Fiji waters.
Mr. Doig, who was on a five-day fishing trip in Fiji with five other NZ anglers, owns and operates his own big-game fishing launch, the Diomedia, from the Bay of Islands, Russell, NZ. He hooked the marlin with an 80 lb Dacron line on the southern side of Beqa Reef.
One of Chief Maran ganu's descendants stands beside the "iron" in Lambom, New Ireland. See "From out of the past".