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Monday, 13 August 2007

The sea seen through pawpaw...

Monday 8.12.03: Auki

Auki airstrip - fuelling up the military air charter

I crouch down to look. "Maybe a 9mm", I reply, judging from the size of the hole and tracing the path of the projectile to where it had gone through the wall and rebounded into the refrigerator, where it left a large dent.

Ramo continues: "The man just came in through the door to where the commissioner - he was the retired police commissioner - was eating. He pulled out a 9mm pistol like the police use and shot him. There was blood everywhere."

The killing had taken place during the ethnic tensions, the conflict between the Malaitan Eagle Force (MEF) and the Isatambu Freedom Movement, the militia of the Guales of Guadalcanal. The killing of the retired police commissioner, however, appeared to be more an assassination for reasons other than the conflict.

This island, Malaita, had been the homeland of the MEF. We were soon to head off into the part of the island where the militia had been strongest.

Escaping Honiara

Honiara in the steamy heat of a Sunday afternoon. We arrive at Henderson Field for the mid-afternoon flight to Auki to be met by a discontented-looking bunch of people sitting outside the building. "Plane hem no go long Malaita", a woman tells us. No flight. All too true as we learn from the desk clerk, who assures us there will definitely be a flight tomorrow.

Monday... again we repeat the taxi ride from White River to Henderson for the early afternoon flight. And again... no flight. But, the desk clerk assures us, there will be a flight later in the afternoon. The aircraft is here but, trouble is, the pilot is not. He is on his way from PNG.

We check in, our bags and ourselves are weighed and we sit to wait away the hours. Steve wanders off as Steve often does.

The domestic terminal at Henderson Field is, shall we say... basic. It is an old timber building with a few ceiling fans that do little to relieve the humidity, even when all are working, which is not this afternoon. There is a snack bar but there are no toilets. Correction - there are toilets but they are not working. They are locked. There is a water shortage.

Henderson field had been here since World War Two when Japanese and American forces battled for its possession. It was the Japanese that built it after they overan Tulagi, the old capital that was the administrative base for the British colonial administration. The new airbase would allow their bombers to range even further south and bring the rest of the archipelago under their control. They already had Rabaul and Kavieng on the islands off the PNG north coast and had landed at Buna to make their ill-fated run along the Kokoda Trail towards Port Moresby. Had they succeeded, their control would have extended over a large awath of the South West Pacific, and New Caladonia and Vanuatu would have been at their mercy, as would the sea lanes between Australia and the United States.

Honiara has been here only since the end of World War Two. It offered not only the nearby airfield but a seafront suitable for port facilities. Consequently, it was there that the US military set up their base after they ousted the Japanese. There are still some Nissan huts in Honiara that date from that time, old structures with arched roofs of galvanised iron.

The afternoon drags on. We learn that the aircraft with our pilot has left PNG. It is about a three-hour flight from Port Moresby to Honiara, so the aircraft could not be far away. Finally, the roar of an Air New Guinea jet announces the arrival of the pilot. It is 4.30pm and we are ready to fly.

On the airstrip the reason we had to await a pilot from PNG becomes clear. A Region Air Twin Otter - Region Air is a PNG air service - sits waiting. Solomon Airlines have charted the aircraft and crew to meet the demand for flights in the pre-Christmas period.

By late-2003, Solomon Airlines has only two airworthy Twin Otters left. The ethnic conflict and the collapse of the economy depleted the nation's reserves of foreign exchange, so there was no money with which to buy spares or to get the smaller De Haviland Islander aircraft flying. The remainder of the fleet has been cannibalised and a glance into the nearby hanger reveals the motorless hulk of an Islander.

Auki

The Twin Otter decends towards the mountains that form the high backbone of Malaita island, then turns to make a long, curving approach to an airstrip that ends on the shore of a lagoon. Thirty minutes through the bush by mini-bus and we are in Auki, the administrative centre and entry-point to the island.

As we approached the airstrip the town appeared in the distance as a cluster of shiny iron roofs crowding the coast. Now, having left our bags at the Auki Motel and set out on foot, initial impressions are confirmed... it may be erroneous to describe Auki as beautiful.

Despite this, or because of it, Auki is an interesting enough town. There are a couple streets of trade stores and a reasonable market on the waterfront close to where the ferry from Honiara docks. Beyond, separated by patches of mangrove and clinging to the shoreline, are settlements where leaf houses crowd close together, some raised on stilts over the water's edge.

Inland, steep ridges rise, some with the clearings for bush gardens right to their top. Land so steep would never be cultivated in Australia, but Malaita is not Australia and here agricultural land is at a premium. The island, large though it might be, is facing the increasing pressure of a rapidly-growing population. These steep hills are cultivated to provide food for a population growing at 3.6 per cent a year.

Here in the waterfront market are the betel nut sellers you find all through the Solomons, with their rows of green, oval-shaped palm nuts, pepper leaf and lime. The nut is reputed to be mildly intoxicating and is an appetite-suppressant. It remains in common use even thought the government is attempting to discourage it. The police of the Regional Assistance Mission (RAMSI) closed down Honiara's betel markets following the intervention. The markets have since re-opened and are again trading freely, the police probably realising that they cannot stop such a deeply embedded cultural practice.

"They would do better by clamping down on alcohol", an Australian expatriate had told me in Honiara. "Alcohol is far more damaging and is associated with domestic and street violence. They will never stamp out betel nut". As well as alcohol, marijuana use is increasing in the Solomons, something viewed with concern by the authorities and civilians alike.

Near the entrance to the market we encounter a young man selling cane baskets made in the local style. Fiona is looking for the large trays woven with geometric patterns of the type that she bought on a previous visit. None are to be found. The basket seller tells her that the style of weaving is a dying art because young women no longer want to learn it.

We walk through town. "I had my signwriting business there", Steve says, pointing to the first floor of a nondescript commercial building. "It closed when the ethnic tension started. There was no business". Like so many other businesses, I think, like virtually the whole country. The tensions, as the turmoil, the coup and conflict of 1998 to 2002 are known, bankrupted the country. Only now, with the renewed confidence that has followed the intervention of RAMSI, is there early sign of recovery.

A gregarious Englishman, a couple Czechoslovaks and an Australian red

We are the only diners when we arrive. The restaurant is large, the floor concrete, the roof iron. It nestles up to the mangroves in an isolated location a short walk from town. Ramo had told us about the place and we anticipated a somewhat basic meal. Just the opposite. The meal was plentiful and tasty.

We had just finished eating when a tall blond figure with a bottle of wine tucked under his arm walks in. Must be with RAMSI, I think, although he does not give the impression of being military. Police, perhaps? Doesn't seem to have the bearing. He looks around, sees us sitting in the corner and heads over.

"Can I share my bottle with you? It's an Australian red... I don't know if its a good one or not", says the tall figure with its polished English accent.

"Well, we're just about to go, we've eaten", I reply.

"Stay for a glass anyway", he insists, moving a chair over to our table.

We stay for a little more than one glass and learn that this gregarious Englishman, Nick, loves being in the Solomons. After an end-of-year break in the UK he plans to bring his wife back and find a house where he can make a vegetable garden. Once a chef, he has been to the Solomons before and had crossed Malaita on foot, over the mountains from the east to west coast and had made a near-disastrous open sea voyage in a motor canoe during stormy weather.

I ask him what his business is here. "I'm the travelling magistrate", he tells us. "I'm in Auki to hear two murder cases".

Two more Europeans join us, video documentary makers from the Czech Republic.

"Do you know where we can find people living primitavely?", one of them asks.

"I think you will find that even those Solomon Islanders living in isolated villages are well aware of the twenty-first century", Nick tells them.

This is true - people from isolated villages come and go to Auki and Honiara and are familiar with the modern world. There is, however, a region in Central Malaita where the 'old ways' are followed and people have chosen to live as they once did, minus the cannibalism. Though they live traditionally in their own area they too are in touch with the modern world, coming and going as do other villagers.

As we talk it becomes clear that the Czech documentary makers share a somewhat Rouseauean view of life in the more isolated parts of the Solomons. Nick is skeptical and seems to think them a bit naive, but Steve discovers the Czechs have the same video camera as the aid agency he works for and he soon corners their attention. We learn that they were brought to the restaurant by a local who they had stopped in town and asked about places to eat. He knew a good place, he said, and brought them here, the restaurant where his wife is the cook.

The evening has turned convivial and soon two Australians dressed in jeans and T-shirt wander in, the rifles slung cross their backs the only indication that they are with RAMSI. They are based in Townsville and are in Auki with the Australian Army contingent.

Outside it is dark and the streets of the town are quiet.