January / February 2019
First of all, I need to be honest, PNG experience, this land, country whatever you call it, was different from everything, marked this word, different.
While I’m here right now in front of my computer, I get struggled to find the right words to express this journey that I had in Papua New Guinea.
Now you are my children, my family.
Didn’t pass one hour since we were landed on this remoted land, far thousands of miles from our homeland and this is the first sentence that we heard.
We were greeted by a king’s feast and big hugs.
This beautiful family belongs to a big Messianic Judaism community, I stayed in PNG (Papua New Guinea) for 30 days, through all journey I have stayed with the Messianic Judaism community in PNG that called “Aliyah Raising Israel”.
Ever since I was a little girl I dreamed about PNG and my visit there, the name PNG reached my ears when I was a little girl, and from some reason, I knew from the first minute that ill visit there, I been so passionate about this island, 832 different languages, cultures, thousands of tribes, thousands of customs.
If you consider yourself as Cultural seeker, this is the place for you. All I can say that I really hope to visit this island again ASAP.
Early morning in the capital Port Moresby, we just landed, 8 lovely people from “Aliyah Raising Israel” are waiting for us with a big smile on their faces, it’s really hard to convey the feeling to you, and they took us to their house and treat us like we are one of them.
In the first hours it was mentally very hard for me to figure it out, what is going on in here, and why they are so happy to see us why they adore us so much? It’s felt like I do not belong to there, to this special treatment, I was so embarrassed I felt so confused.
After a few minutes while we are eating, the question “from which tribe are you?” popped into the air, and I didn’t knew how to react to this question, they meant, from which tribe of the 12 tribes I’m from, I guessed that I probably from Judah tribe, like most of the Israelis these days, this question popped up in a few situations through my journey, “Aliyah Raising Israel” community believe that they are one of the 10 lost tribes.
On our first evening we went to the shore of Port Moresby to meet some locals before we are leaving to more remoted places, Port Moresby called after an English officer called john Moresby, he was the first European that explored PNG.
We were met there a lot of children’s that played under the nice weather of night, they play basketball and they wave to us to join, all of them are so happy full of joy, it was nice to see what they like to do on their free time in the evening and to feel the atmosphere in there.
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After we were visited the port and we got a hall of sunset we went back to our house. Oswald (our host) friends heard about the Israelis that arrived in PNG , we ate dinner together and we sang together some songs, they ask us a lot about our life in Israel and our military service, yep in Israel, all of us, men on women need to serve.
After this too long day, I felt that I need some quiet time to myself, to rest, I felt overwhelmed.
After a perfect sleeping we woke up in the early morning to take our first domestic flight, we were told that it’s better to order early morning flights in PNG because there is a risk of cancellation and its always better to be on the first flight.
Oro Province, located on the other side of the island, we cross a beautiful mountain range and a wild nature exposed to our eyes. We were told that there are two men who are waiting for us out of the airport, Levi, and Trever, this is all we knew about this destination.
We are approaching landing and all I can see it’s a deep jungle I wandering what will happen in the next days and sending a smile to my partner Tomer, it will be ok, yea its will be good.
6 steps and we are out of the airport, a massive humid wave hit us so badly, some person is coming to our direction with a big smile and asked us, where are your bags? I’m Levi, Welcome, we are shaking hands and we are stepping up to our jeep to our first destination, Kokoda maybe you heard about Kokoda Trail.
We have a very hard road heading us, the roads are not easy at all, we knew that on the way we will stop if a few places to meet Levi friends, we visited 3 places on our way, they served us fresh coconut juice, and we were told that this is the cleanest water that we will find in the jungle, remember this.
They gave me a few gifts, necklaces and Bilum, Bilum is a string bag made by hand and everyone got this, they wear the Bilum on their necks.
After a few hours of driving, we stopped next to a small path, we arrived they said. But I’m wondering where are we, next to the jeep a small child who covered by a local customs is waiting, especially for us, next to him there are more people from the community, they are caring for our hospitality and they are taking our bags immediately.
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We keep walking on that a small path, and suddenly 3 wood gates are in front of us, behind the gated dozens of people wearing the local tribe costumes.
They are singing for us songs of Israel, and local’s songs as well, a big Israel flag rise up, we are struggling with the tears.
Drums in the air, it’s so intense, I’m not sure who is more exciting and emotional at this moment, I am or them?
They put a flower crown on our heads and they gave me a local neckless. In those cultures it’s pretty common to treat guests in very well of hospitality, this is so important, but if to be honest to this forward act I didn’t expect at all, while we are sitting in front of the people Levi is whispering to me “they built this stage for you guys, they expect that you will talk to them, now they will wash your feet to show their hostility and respect to you” I raised my eyebrows, does it necessary?
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All of those actions seem to me a bit wired, I told him I don’t deserve all of this I’m just a simple person.
After this strong experience after we met all the people that came, the local Pastor who named Sarah, showed me my room for the night, this is the only wooden house in this filed, me and Pastor Sarah will sleep in there and she showed me the toilet that they were built, 50 meters away and I asked her where can I take a shower? And she pointed to a small creek down the hill, I got covered by a local garment and I went down to the creek. I was so grateful of this creek, it was so relaxing after this humid day, I felt so good, this is a pure nature, everything is so natural and wild, it fits for me.
In the evening we were sitting together, we ate the local food, what that you got in your garden, this is what you have to eat, root vegetables and local fruits served, papaya trees, pineapple shrubs, a local potato called taro, sweet potatoes, bananas, and coconut.
This is our cuisine in the next 30 days, who doesn’t love fresh fruits?
But I got struggled with the bananas!
Cooked bananas, sweet bananas, grilled bananas, bananas in a stone oven, banana with coconut cream, banana pie and so on, oh.
On the third morning, Friday morning and the community is keeping the Shabbat, it means that on Saturday they do not work, only worship, so we need to prepare everything in advance before sunset.
Me and Pastor Sarah went to the local market to get what we didn’t get from our garden in the lasts days when we arrived to the market, I noticed that this is only a few carpets with fruits, people are selling their extra grain.
The locals out of the community were cruised about me and they ask Pastor Sarah about me, one of the locals gave me 1 watermelon as a gift.
On the way back to our place, we met the sweet local children who waited for me yesterday on the small path, today he is wearing a dress, and his grandma is telling me that he loves different kinds of customs, he is so sweet and their open mind filled my heart.
After we arrived to our place, Levi told me let’s go, we are going to do some rafting in the closest river, the water is rushing and we were attached to rafts a lot of fruits to send to the next village on the way down the stream.
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This is unbelievable how many fruits trees there are around us, the locals lead the rafting and its amazing to see their experience in the rivers, their muscles are so tight while they navigate in the strong stream, they control the river in every muscle in their body.
After crazy rafting we reached a safe land, and we were enjoyed a little bit more from the river before we left.
At noon after we took a shower and get refreshed they showed us a traditional cooking method under hot rocks overnight this method called Momo and this is a long cooking method, usually in this method you cook a roots vegetables under hot rocks and leaves.
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After our first weekend, in early Sunday morning, we went to Kokoda trail, only for the first part (96 KM in total).
I did some trekking in my life, in the Himalayas and so, but this is nothing like what I used to, the humid in here is changing the rules, and making this so hard, the first day of Kokoda trail (this one that we did) includes nice views but the climbing is very stiff and due to the humid the ground is so muddy and slippery.
Through our climbing, our friends collected roots, and they did some magic over there if to be honest after we were reached the highest point that we meant to conquered we stopped and we rested with an amazing view.
Our local friends were started to do more magic’s, all of the things that they collected on the way up, suddenly became our lunch
I took sugar cane, the energy snack of nature and I said to myself, “Wow it’s so worth that, after 3 hours of climbing I realized how amazing is that, this simple way of life, they are so happy, they got everything”
This is our last night in Kokoda, we were singing some local songs, in the local language, Binandere.
This is the sixth day of our visit in PNG, we were woke up at 5 am because in 6am some vehicle “supposed” to cross the road.
In PNG it’s almost impossible to plan, there is no schedule, we were realized that we need to find another way another vehicle, but we were failed, it’s pretty rare to find vehicles in this area, after 6 hours, around 12:30pm some car arrived and we were paid 300 Kina to the next village Hamara.
All I heard about Hamara it’s that the only way to reach the village it’s to cross a wide river, after 2 hours of driving we met the people that will take us through the jungle to Hamara, after a long walking we reached some river, and I said myself, oh it’s not that bad, not that wide, I can do it.
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But after we crossed it Levi told me, Lital, this is just a small river, it’s not the river that we are heading for, and then a strong noise reached my ears, and In my head all I could think about was please that this is not the river that we need to cross. Divone river, yep this crazy river separating me from my bed for tonight.
After 20 minutes of crossing of our crew, my time arrived, I did it, one of my feet finger is bleeding but… yea we did it.
After all of that we left more 45 minutes walking in the jungle, the trail is so amazing, in both of our sides there are coconut trees and on my left side I can see a natural spring and lady who is washing her children under the big tree.
The last climbing, we reached the village for the next few days.
Group of people is coming to us and they are surrounding us, their eyes are sparkling and they are so happy to see us, then they heard that we came from Israel and they are so glad to welcome us.
All of us got tears, it’s hard to explain to you, try to imagine that, you are actually in the middle of nowhere after a very long time that you away from home and someone is so happy to see you, thousands of miles from home.
the hospitality is so warming.
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The people that were waiting for us covered by local costumes and the drum sounds are in the air, they signed to us to follow them, a few ladies are dancing and they are topless, they held a traditional spear that made from the black palm tree.
One of the local teachers came to us and explained to us that he is the best English speaker around so he will explain to us a bit about the community.
Trever and Levi our travel mates are also new in this area.
While the teacher is speaking they have welcomed us in the traditional way, they washed our legs.
After we got rest from the hard way they showed me the bucket, this is our shower, or you can choose the other way to go down to the river it’s less them kilometer from here but the sun is almost down so I chose the first option, then a few ladies watched me, While I’m trying to take a privet shower, but probably this is not an option in here, and they all watching me (of course that was covered).
At night we sat in the community house and talked with the olds from this village they were telling us about Israel, about what that they heard and, it was amazing how much they know about Israel history.
On daily there is no an electricity in this village, they got a generator that they use sometimes because we are here as their guests they turned it on, and the light is on, suddenly we were noticed that there is around the lamp tones of mosquitos and Levi our local friend went to bring some leaves, he said that this is a method to push them away and he add that tomorrow will be very hot weather, according to his experience with this amount of mosquitos while it’s rainy.
And of course that he was right.
Good morning, cooked bananas with coconut creamed, potatoes and root vegetables are our breakfast, not as you use to right?
In the first part of the day, they were taught us some methods that useful in the jungle, like how to make a shelter and to light a fire. As Levi said it’s very hot today, so we went to the river to enjoy from cold water, the stream is strong but the different of the heights made a natural pool and the children are playing with some fruits that they call “jungle ball” they throw it to the strong stream and the first one who catch the ball he is the winner.
After a few hours in the river, when the weather is getting better we went back to the village to rest a bit.
In the afternoon we went back to the jungle to seek after the famous bird, paradise bird, the national symbol of Papua New Guinea.
We look for that special bird more than an hour for and then we recognize the special sounds that this bird do, on one of the treetops we can recognize that amazing bird, we were trying to approach to a better position, we didn’t want to afraid this sensitive bird, this is a female and not the beautiful male so we decided to keep looking for the other half :), but then the clouds came and the skies became dark, we have to go back.
On the way back someone came to us with a few sugar cane as a gift for our way back 🙂
After a few days in this village we went back to that crazy river that we need to cross, after we cross safely we waited to some vehicle to continue our way to the next destination, but after a long time of waiting on the bridge we went down to the river to get cool until some vehicle will cross our way, on the other side of the river some lady cleaned her dishes with her children.
After an hour some vehicle cross our way, we stopped in some village before our flight back to the capital tomorrow morning, and we stayed for lunch with some locals, after lunch when we needed to go they gave us a big Oro banana cluster as respect.
But.. This cluster weight is 40KG! And we need to catch a flight tomorrow haha
Levi told us that those bananas are so special and we have to take them back to the capital and to give to our hosts, well, in the end, we took it..
In the last night in ORO province we slept in some of the guesthouses around, there is only 2 in town, after this long hard time in the jungles we felt like we own in survival or something like that, it was so great.
At our last night in ORO province I felt a little bit sad to say goodbye to Trever and Levi after all this time, and we told them to come back to our hostel at night, and we will eat the last dinner together, when they arrived back they came with their families and it was so nice.
Me and Tomer my travel mate said to them everything on us today, order whatever you want, and then Trever smile like a child and asked us if we know what Pizza is, and we laughed, of course, that this is not the pizza that I got at home, but it was so nice after tones of bananas.
We landed in Port Moresby the capital, we will stay here to weekend and we are planning to cook dinner for our hosts, so we stopped at the big market to buy everything, but of course, in PNG it’s very hard to plan something after we start to cook at their house on the stoves, there was a Power outage so we found ourselves cooking on fire at the balcony…
In early Sunday morning, we went to the airport to catch a flight to the mountains to mount Hagan the biggest town in this region, of course, that our flight was delayed in a few hours but its matter of time 🙂
Heavy rain catch us when we were arrived to mount Hagan, we met there Betty our host for the next few days. A big family met us in her house and also Joshua who will be with us through all of our journey in the mountains.
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In the next morning we decided to take the local transportation the PMV and to go to ENGA province, while we were waiting to the PMV on one of the garbage hills that colored by the strong red color of the betel nut Joshua tried a new pair of shoes, let’s say that he decided on one leg 😉
finally, the PMV arrived but the bus is so full so we wait to the next one, also full so let’s go, after a long driving we arrived to nowhere and we had to wait until more people will come (some drop off) and then to continue to our final destination, in the end, we arrived to Wabag the main town of ENGA province, from there we need to take another bus to Sirunki to some local farm, meanwhile, we bought a tuna can and we set the tuna on fire to get a smoked flavor, this action caused a crazy situation, all the people around came to see what we are doing.. Until the police came and get involved.
Still the bus is not here and its already late, suddenly someone who called Samul came to us and offer us to join him to his house for the night.
Samuel’s house located in one of the villages around Wabag, Lamington village, we were joined to him and his daughter and we took the bus to Lamington.
Lamington village located on a point where two rivers or streams meet, when we arrived to the village we met Samuel friend, Pepe and we went together to the local market to buy some vegetables for dinner, before we were left the market Samuel called to his sister to meet us, sister gave us another banana cluster to cook at night.
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We just arrived to Sam house, this is a traditional house the internal shape of the house is like the C letter and we all sat together, in the middle of the C there is a fire and I can see the bananas getting burned.
We are talking and greeting Sam for hosting us, Sam replied, I can’t believe it, where did you came from? This is like a miracle for me. You are like 2 gifts for me from god.
Its dinner time, some bananas, rice and vegetables Sam is asking us where do we want to go tomorrow and we said we don’t care we trust you, you are familiar with this area, not us 🙂
Good morning beautiful stunning rivers, oh, who needs more than that?
Sam sister cut for us a magnificent pineapple for breakfast and we are ready to go for that farm that we planned to visit from the beginning, this is some small farm who is growing potatoes and strawberries, the farmer told us that there is a great honey place around, that some lady prudence and ask us if we want to taste it.
It was the tastiest honey that I ever tasted, you can feel how natural and fresh is that, you can’t deny which food is from some factory and which one was born from nature, it’s so amazing, you can’t deny your taste buds.
On our way back from sirunki farm, Pepe, Sam’s friend told us that tomorrow is planning to go down the mountains to Jiwaka province, and he asked us if we want to catch a ride with him.
We jumped into the back of the van, because this is our best option due to the “great” transportation around, on the way to Jiwaka we stopped to buy some food, and we took a small family a ride, we found ourselves 6 people on the back of the van huddling together 🙂
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Suddenly on the side of the road Goldi tribe who heard from Pepe that we are coming welcomed us on the traditional way. The men are necked under the leaves and the ladies are holding some fighting Tools.
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It’s was easy to recognize who is the Chef of this tribe, he has a special corona from parrot beak.
The leader called us to follow him and he took us to the community house next to 30 people of the village, none of them speaks English but we can understand each other, who said that we need to speak the same language?
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They gave me a bamboo with water to drink, I don’t want to tell you what happened after I drunk it but that water was a shit! Haha
Pepe told us that this tribe never met tourist, and they are happy to host us, they burned for us some corn and serve us pineapples as well.
I want to tell you some sensitive issue, after PNG trip It really hard to enjoy from a pineapple, they are not good enough, the pineapples in PNG are the best!
The sun raised up and Joshua is taking us to some lady who called Gertrude, she hosted some Israelis before and they gave her an Jewish name Ruthi, before we were left Goldi tribe a few boys and girls called me and they shouted the sign of the tribe to me and I were smiled to them and I shouted it back, they were so proud and one of the chef ladies came to me she removed her bracelet from her hand and passed it to mine.
Gertrude or Ruthi is so impressive woman, its hard not to admire her, she inspired me and gave me peace.
Gertrude area served as a college for mechanic and nurse and more subjects, but her college converted to be a shelter for a lot of people after a hard earthquake hit the neighbor province, she hosted dozens of children’s for more than 8 months in there, this lady is an angel.
In Gertrude land there is a lot of different vegetables and fruits, she showed us her new lands and she told us her plans for the future.
At noon we took the bus to the main town in Jiwaka, after a few seconds we realized that something is going on, a lot of people huddling together, and I’m getting curious about that, the big competition of the province, Darts, and the prize is not less than…. Wait for that…… bottle of cock! I told you already that you need to forget everything that you use to while you are in PNG?
At noon after we traveled around the town we came back to Ruthi house, she cooked for us dinner, we sat together and talked about her family, I miss her so much!.
On Saturday morning we went around the village and we met some watermelon sellers, children who were played basketball and just next to them the olds of the area were talked and we noticed that they got tattoos on their faces, they told us that those tattoos are before they accepted Christianity to their life and the tattoos are part of an old pagan ceremony that they did when they were a child
On Sunday morning we decided that we want to go to Chimbu Province, we tried to catch some ride, after a long time we got a ride, And we said goodbye and many thanks to lovely Ruthi.
The way from Jiwaka to Chimbu is changing in front of my eyes, the traditional houses on the side of the road getting a different shape and the flora as well, Chimbu province is the highest province in the mountains.
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Kon!,kon! They are calling to us, and me and Tomer my Partner looking to each other and wondering what is the meaning of it, our local Brother! Joshua is explaining to us that the meaning of Kon is white. Yep, its true…
The people of Chimbu province are more familiar with tourists, the highest mountain in PNG is located in Chimbu, mount William.
Joshua told us that some lady that called Dayan is waiting for us and she want to host us in her house.
After a short rest, Dayan friend took us to a ride around the hills, and he told us some local legends, one of them tells that King Solomon use to live in here and he point to us on one of the mountains, the legend tells that in this mountain King Solomon and his 1000 wives use to live, there are more than 1000 rooms in the rocks in there, of course that we can’t check it, but ok.. we will take it.
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In the next morning, Joshua was telling us that he knows some really cool cave in this area, this cave used to belong to the Skelton tribe, Skelton tribe use to hide in those caves.
Around the caves according to the name you can guess that there are a lot of skulls, while the Skelton tribe used to hide there they were killing every foreign that get too close to the cave and who didn’t belong to the tribe.
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On the way back we stopped in the market to buy some vegetables and eggs, our plans for tonight are to cook an Israeli dinner to Dayan family.
It was a success!
After a few days in Dayan house we went to Gorka Province, and we visited there some Coffee factories and an amazing museum about the local tribes, I have to admit it was wired to see everything in a museum after this crazy month!
While we were walking in the street it was hard to avoid the big circle that huddle together, in the center of the circle standing Christianity preacher, this view is pretty familiar view in PNG in the last few decades.
Joshua village, Joshua who was next to us in the last two weeks, who is almost our brother to us asked us if we want to stay a few nights in his village, Ein Gigi,
Ein Gigi village is a remoted village, after too many hours that we wait that the local bus will be full and that we will depart to our way, it happened we arrived to nowhere and now we have to walk more 30 minutes to his village, dozens of kids who just came back from school are waving to us, and they running to us with a big smile on their faces.
Last night was an amazing night, we and Joshua’s family sang all together at the community house which serves also as school sometimes.
But nothing prepared me to this wired day, me and Tomer split today, he stayed in Ein Gigi while me and Joshua went to his friend funeral, im a culture seeker and I thought to myself that if I want to start to understand a bit about PNG I have to go and to experience a funeral.
Dozens of people are seating on chairs and on the mud while 5 or 6 women are crying, those ladies are the wives of the husband who died. I went to the wives’ direction and I hugged them, it was so wired, I chose a sit and then it’s became even weirder.
Does it a stand up or a funeral?
Some person is holding a mic and he is talking about the deceased in the local language that of course I can’t understand, all the people around are laughing and I wandering how is legitimate in this event, but this is the beauty about different cultures.
In those funerals they are collecting in this way money to the grieving family, especially if ladies left without their husband, in this culture the men he is the hunter, he provides the food and the protection without the man it’s almost impossible to continue.
After a few minutes, a big fat pig transferred into the funeral yard. the pigs in PNG are highly impotent, pigs are more important than money, this is the way to get married or to end disputes between tribes.
And now that the ladies are alone, different families from the community are donating to them their pigs, to give them a new fresh beginning.
Impotent to know –
- Malaria issue – there is a lot of mosquitos in PNG, take something against mosquitos, if you want to go on the safe side.
- The local currency is Kina 1$- 3.42 kina
- Local sim, there are two options in the airport the better one is Digicel
- In most of the area, there is a weak signal
- While you walking on the streets, be aware and take care to your luggage