Mijts Blog

Just over a year ago, Maria started volunteer work in a local Secondary girls’ school – OLSH. She quickly realized that they were very under-resourced and, in particular, only had a few computers for over 700 students.

Nick discussed this with a staff member at Suncorp – where he had previously worked. After several emails Nick contacted Chris Whiteford, Executive Manager BT Services, Suncorp Brisbane. Chris readily agreed to assist and rallied his staff to participate in a project which resulted in 25 computers for us to distribute to schools in the local area.

These second hand computers are normally sold off by Suncorp to the public. Instead, the staff of the Brisbane Suncorp Business Technology Group raised the money and purchased them as part of their ‘charity’ program. Dell arranged the packaging for shipment and Microsoft donated sufficient MS Office software to run on all of them. Chris has been the key person in coordinating the project, organising Dell and Microsoft contributions.

In March of this year the computers were shipped by Rotary from Brisbane through to Rabaul. There was one little hiccup when the container went to the Solomon Islands (and we received theirs!) but it was all sorted by our Rotary friend, Anne, and finally the computers arrived in July.

We went over to Anne’s place at Rabaul to help unpack the container. Students and a teacher from one of the receiving schools (Maltech) assisted to unpack the container. The boys are boarding students at the school.

We were all excited when we finally found the computer boxes at the back of the container.

We loaded our ute with computers to take to our house in Kokopo and stored the rest of the computers in Anne’s house until we could come back to collect them at the weekend.

Our HouseMary (Stephanie) helped Nick carry the boxes up the stairs at our house – she happily assisted Nick to move the computers into the house and again helped load them when they were ready to take to the schools. (I LOVE how she always carries heavy items on her head. She is only a slight build but carries quite heavy items this way).

The computers were stacked in the hallway at our place and for over a week Nick spent each evening after work checking each computer and loading software onto them.

Because we received more computers than at first anticipated we were able to give them to three schools.

OLSH received 16 and now have a small computer lab of over 20 computers as well as four computers in their Library.

At a special assembly we presented the 16 computers. The staff and students were very excited and grateful and even sang a hymn of thanks for us which was quite moving – they all sing so beautifully!

This is where Maria Volunteers and along with the Principal, Maria spoke at the assembly explaining fully how the donation of computers evolved. The school currently has a young Japanese volunteer working in IT at the school and with the donation of 16 computers to supplement the few they already had, they have set up a small computer lab. This is a huge asset to the school’s curriculum.

This photo/article appeared in the local newspaper outlining the project.

Two of the computers will go to Kerevat Primary school (soon to be delivered – when our holiday finishes). This will be their first computers!
Seven of the computers went to a secondary school in Rabaul – Malaguna Technical School (Maltech). Since the conception of this project, this school has had three of its buildings burnt down losing their Library and all of the computers they had.

We spent a Sunday afternoon at the school, installing the computers and talking to the Principal and a teacher and it was apparent that they have been quite devastated by this loss as there is no replacement of these buildings or resources as might occur in Australia.

Maltech also held a special assembly for the presentation of their computers.

It is difficult to describe just how VERY grateful the staff and students were for the donation. We would dearly love in the future to be able to source more computers for this school. We are also trying to source books from Brisbane schools for their Library.

These two photos show students at Maltech enjoying access to the new computers.

Finally got time to finish posting about the Mask Festival. We are in Brisbane for a break at the moment and the time is flying by!

On the Saturday morning Nick and I went up to the Mask Festival. We watched three different cultural performances.
The first performance was by the West New Britain Patogrety Cultural Group. This was the only group to include their women in the performance. The women and girls dressed and prepared outside the ‘fenced off’ area – as this was a sacred area for men only.

The women ranged in age from young girls to older ladies and wore costumes that were very colourful and made from beads, feathers, leaves etc.

Some of them were also tatooed.

The women then came onto the oval and sang and clapped – ‘calling’ the masked group of men to come out and perform. Their singing was beautifully harmonised. A couple of men on drums accompanied the women.

When the men came out, it was obvious that their masks had several differences to the Tolai Duk-Duk.

The head-dress was taller and colourfully woven, they had seeds/nuts (similar to gumnuts) around their ankles and these made a significant noise. They also carried ‘whips’ woven from a string-like material and they made a loud whiplike noise when used during their dance.

The dance obviously told a story with the men and women dancing together, the whips cracking seemingly to bring the women to order, and at the end dancing in harmony with each woman/girl partnering a masked man – this is my interpretation of the dance and I am not sure how accurate it is! Either way it was very interesting and different to any others I had seen.

The next performance was by the Asaro Mudmen.

The Mudmen come from Asaro – just outside the town of Goroka in the Eastern Highlands Province of Papua New Guinea. They were the first of two mainland groups which we saw perform.
Legend has it that the mudmen were defeated by an opposing tribe and forced to flee into the Asaro River. They waited until dusk before attempting to escape. The enemy saw them emerge from the muddy banks covered in mud and thought they were spirits. Most tribes in Papua New Guinea are very scared of spirits, so the enemy fled in fear, and the Asaro Mudmen were victorious. On their way home they ran into another tribe. By then the mud was all dry and cracked and they must have looked frightening. The other warriors got scared and fled. After that episode, aware of the fearful impression it had made, the warriors of Asaro always covered themselves with mud before going to war, keeping the illusion alive.
This performance was held in silence – no music, clapping etc. The Mudmen crept out with their bow and arrows and stealthily and agilely performed for us.

Today they perform in a peaceful manner with no warlike sounds or moves. I actually found them quite cute and even a little bit cheeky! – although some local children ran away in fear when the mudmen came close to them.

This masked character also performed with the mudmen – not sure of its significance!

At the end of their performance, the mudmen removed their (obviously heavy!) masks. It was apparent these men were not all young which I found quite remarkable given their very lean and fit build and the agility they showed during their performance.

They also demonstrated traditional fire-making – accompanied by a couple of flute-like instruments.

The mudmen were my favourite performers!

The last performance we watched was by the East Sepik Mask Cultural group. This group also came from the mainland (East Sepik Province -the Sepik River area). Rather than perform out on the oval, they performed in a small defined area in one corner of the grounds – probably due to the fact that the very elaborate mask had no holes to see through – thus denying the wearer any means of sight! An ‘assistant’ aided the masked man in his movements around the defined space.

Those are cassowary feathers around the assistant’s head!

There are mask-making villages all along the Sepik. The villagers keep small gardens and the women fish. They trade fish to the inland Sawos people for sago flour, the starchy pith of the sago palm, which is the main staple of the Sepik diet. There is a small cash economy along the Sepik and the people sell fish, as well as carvings for cash. The middle Sepiks have a common ancestry, but each village is independent and this is reflected in their art, including their masks. Every village carves in a distinctive style.
The men carve masks from soft wood, although some are made of clay over-modeled onto turtle or coconut shell. They mix paints from earth pigments and charcoal. The masks are decorated with shells, pig tusks, and cassowary feathers.

Few masks are worn directly over the face, which explains the lack of holes for eyes. Some are fastened onto a large cone-shaped wicker framework for a dance costume called a tumbuan. Raffia is knotted into the bottom hoop for skirting and flowers, fruit and leaves added on for color and power at the time of the ceremony. Other masks are made only for display, most often in the men’s Haus, to attract powerful and useful spirits.
We were amazed by the detail and decorativeness of these masks.

Check out the huge shell!!

I also thought this little carved stool was worthy of a photo! The masked tibuan sat on it as part of the performance!

The mask Festival was a wonderful cultural experience which we thoroughly enjoyed.