Mijts Blog

Maria and I have just got back from a 10 day trip to Kokopo. Whilst there we stayed at Rapopo Resort. 

On one of the days we went out to Stephanie’s village and had a great day out there. Whilst there we took part in end of year closing for the small village school. Maria and I presented prizes for academic and other awards.

Below are some photos from our trip.

Maria and I started this blog as a way of documenting our time in Kokopo, East New Britain, PNG and to share with our friends. As I no longer work in PNG it is unlikely that this blog will get any further updates. It just remains a record of our time there.

I truly enjoyed my six and half years with Open Bay Timber.

Some photos below from the farewell put on by Stephanie and her village in July 2015.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Some photos from my farewell at Kokopo Beach Bungalow with the Kokopo Office staff from Open Bay Timber. These taken end July 2015.

 

Maria and I pay for our haus meri’s two kids, Toshi and Kayline to attend one of the better schools here in Kokopo. Today (13th September 2013) the school celebrated PNG’s Independance Day, officially next Monday 16th September, with the children dressing up in their traditional attire. So Kayline, whose mother Stephanie comes from Pomio area was dressed as a Pomio meri and Toshi, whose father Chris comes from the Duke of York group of Islands represented that area.

As usual it was a very colorful display and these are some of the photos I took.

In this photo Kayline and Toshi having some refreshment before the events.

The company I work for here in PNG celebrated 40 years in PNG on 24th August 2013. We flew from Kokopo to Open Bay by helicopter. As we came into Open Bay the schools kids had made a welcome sign on the school oval.

The festivities went on for a number of hours and involved a number of dance groups representative of the region. I’ll have to ask someone at Open Bay to let me know which groups represent which region. But in the meantime I’ll put up a number of photos that try to capture the colour and sounds of the celebration.

View of the Open Bay camp site with the log pond area in the foreground.

School kids marching as we arrived.

And we also had to march around to the official dais where the flag raising ceremony took place.

Some of the children greeting the guests with flowers.

Then at the end of the day the view from the guest house of the setting sun is also special.

Some recent photos of Simone. Always looks so happy.

This is Susan, she lives on site at the office with her Mum and Dad. Her dad, Tau, is the office driver. She comes in every now and then and checks out if I’ve put up any new photos on my filing cabinet. The photos brighten up the office.

Went diving last weekend in Rabaul Harbour. The volcano is still showing low levels of activity as these photos show.

We spent Christmas 2012 in San Francisco with Ben, Sarah and Simone. Had a wonderful time including a few days up at Tahoe just before Christmas day. The snow came down and was just great, particularly for someone who spends most of his time just few degrees south of the Equator.

While there we took lots of photos and these are some of my favourites with Simone. Simone was bit over 5 months old when these were taken.

But I’m now back in Kokopo and Maria is in Brisbane. I’m having to get re-acclimatised to the heat and humidity. Seem to be using the air conditioner here a lot more.

And now bit of added interest with volcano showing some activity although this is not expected to last.

This is my favourite photo. Was taken up in Tahoe, snow had been falling all day and night – you can see it just reaching the bottom of the window behind me.

Been a while since I’ve posted anything.

But Tavurver has started up again although it is only expected to last a few days. The attached photo shows how it was on the morning of Tuesday 22nd January. The only hassle is that Air Niugini have already suspended flights in and out of Tokua although the airport remains officially open and other airlines flying in and out.

Its now a day later and looks to be largely over, just the occasional ash plume. But Air Niugini have suspended flights until 27th when they will reconsider.