Have you passed away recently?

[Deleted member 29185]

I'm not sure this belongs in "the playground" but there is bugger all options for this topic.

I'm currently sitting pretty in my home on the Gold Coast. I have a lot of acquaintances......perhaps even, friends, who live in an entirely different world. A world were death is common place and expected, Christianity rules supreme.......except where witchcraft supersedes it and the rule of the jungle wins........unequivocally.

I'm currently looking out the window at the full moon (yesterday perhaps, but still full) and I'm filled with not just the joy of a full moon...but with the dread of losing a friend. One of my friends in the PNG highlands was cursed with death due to jealousy, some weeks ago. The curse was that he would die at the next full moon (there were alternate details of course, but they will remain hidden for the moment).

He (circa 30 something) is steadfast in his resolve that he will die.....even to the point of resigning from a fairly lucrative position so he could return to his village to die, which we (his national friends and I) dissuaded him to do. There was a cure....a witchdoctor with the answer....that had already cured (apparently), liver cancer that was not curable by western medicine. This cure, if effective, will only be known to me when I return in a couple of weeks, but I can be honest, in knowing the "point the bone" effectiveness, I'm very unsettled for the wellbeing of a bright young lad that I like immensely.

Working in PNG has many highs......but also the lows to complement. It's a very strange working environment.

 

[JohnK]

Very deep thoughts swanning_it.

Death haunts me.

 

[Deleted member 29185]

Very deep thoughts swanning_it.

Death haunts me.

It doesn't haunt me.........but it's hard it fob off with such staunch belief. I hope no end, to return to PNG and see him smiling happily, declaring he beat it (as I expect)..........but...

 

[opusman]

I have some friends who spent quite a few weeks in PNG last year working on the Pacific Games. It sounds a very strange place indeed.

 

[Deleted member 29185]

I have some friends who spent quite a few weeks in PNG last year working on the Pacific Games. It sounds a very strange place indeed.

opusman, The "games" were in POM, which is very tame....comparatively. PNG has 21?(...22 if you count the autonomous government of Bougainville) provinces which are all very different and very territorial. I find PNG to be at the very least "a very strange place indeed", but I do absolutely love it. The PNG nationals are very friendly (well sometimes, but sometimes very lethal) and a wealth of knowledge.....perhaps not what we immediately recognise as important, but absolutely intriguing regardless...and, and, well if you can imagine a spinning top....that's as close as I can come to describing PNG. It's eclectic, it's eccentric, it's disturbing, it's cruel, it's beautiful, it's corrupt, it's puritan, it's moral, it's immoral, it's pristine.......shall I continue? PNG is very, very different to what we in Oz are used to, but very uncomplex at the same time.

Visit if you like contrast.......don't visit if don't like challenge. Don't arrive unprepared.