Day 44 - 2/27 – Rabaul, Papua New Guinea

Rabaul has an active volcano. The last major eruption was in 1994, where it buried the city in ash. It has spewed ash continuously for over 14 years and is doing so today. We sailed past it at 6:00am this morning, and could see the ash. Last year the wind was blowing such that ash got into the ship’s ventilation system. This year we were fortunate to have the wind blowing away from the dock.

There is still ash everywhere. The main road out of town has sections that are buried under as much as 25 feet of ash and ash-mud slides. These sections of road are heavily pitted…with ruts as much as 3 feet deep and a foot wide snaking along the road edges. Cars just drive on the flattest part of the road. It makes no sense to scrape off the road so long as the volcano is spewing new ash.

New Guinea is one of 10 countries in the world that are considered to be “fourth world”…meaning they need to improve their economy in order to improve themselves into third-world status.

There are 715 distinct languages (not just dialects, but languages) spoken in Papua New Guinea. English is used in schools.

Many of the natives take “Betel-nut.” This is a fruit with a nut in it. You chew it along with a pepper dipped into ground up coral. You chew them together. This creates a chemical reaction (a strong acid with a strong base) that rots their teeth, makes the inside of their mouths and lips bright red, and gives a high. It is also addictive. You see them giving Betel-nut to children 2 to 6 years old. One person tried it and said within 30 seconds his arms were perspiring profusely and he had a major high that lasted 10 minutes. (He also said he thought he was going to die, so this is probably not a good idea to try.) Our guide said that she had just kicked the betel-nut habit, but that some people just do it repeatedly. In the summer season when betel-nut is not readily available, they suffer horrible withdrawal.

They have a local currency called the kina that is worth about 40 cents. However, they also use “shell money.” These are strings of shells cut into disks about 3/8” in diameter and 1/16” thick. These are not used in major stores, but are used as trade in local open-air market areas. Shell money is important to have for the ceremonial events. These are given away by the host in weddings. You may need it to pay off a fine if you are reported to have said something derogatory about another tribe. If a person has a regular job that pays in kina, he or she will buy some goods to trade for shell money because without any shell money they would not be able to participate in social events.

There were lots of war relics on the island. There are many caves built for the Japanese using forced labor by locals and POW’s that were used to shelter boats and supplies from allied bombing. We saw the bunker used by Admiral Yamamoto for his command center for the war. We also visited two war museums.