Living and working in Papua New Guinea has exposed me to a very different and dichotomous culture to our own. Developed versus developing, Sydney versus Goroka and structure versus chaos. Each culture exists as an opposite to the other and I feel like I’m about to travel to a disparate world when boarding that plane at either end.
I have now been here for almost four weeks and although time with family and friends has been excellent – I’m slowly getting the urge to go back. Honestly and despite the jokes I have made about shitty dial-up speeds back in Goroka – it is home at this point in my life. I’m also starting to miss Eli (above all else), our dog “Gelo” and cat “Manam”, plus there is certainly no way I could go on eating like this without turning into a porker – long live Goroka fresh vegies and fruits!!
Here’s a list of 10 Things that have “hit” me on this sojourn Downunder:
1) How quickly the young ones grow up!
2) Despite the rising cost of oil – cars just seem to get shinier, flashier and faster.
3) The uncertainty of the global financial markets has many folks on edge and riddled with angst.
4) Sydney is a very clean town versus PNG towns which are generally filthy as.
5) The hope that Brown, Obama and Rudd initially brought with them when they got elected to the world stage appears to be slowly dissipating.
6) More folks than ever seem to be caught up in a Doomsday/Conspiracy wave with 2012 holding particular significance in the minds for many. Then there’s another crew that just does not seem to care one iota about the state of the planet. In som ways the future is out of our hands but the omens of change are certainly in our faces. In my view… the world in 10 years time will be nothing like what we see and experience today.
7) Technology just seems to be advancing in leaps and bounds. The last couple of years has seen the proliferation and adoption of ADSL2, 3G and the I-Phone. Internet enabled hand-held and mobile devices just seem to be everywhere with many folks now getting beeped on their mobiles anyplace, anywhere and anytime. The way ICT firms were throwing the term “ubiquitous” around a few years back is now making a lot of sense.
8) Compared to PNG – here in Australia – people just eat and eat and eat and… eat! This is certainly no exageration – all you need to do is walk around an Australian City and see for yourself – boys/girls, young/old, rich and poor… obesity just gets bigger and bigger!! I just realised why one doesn’t see many older overweight people – that’s because they never make it to old age – there hearts have packed it in a long time ago!
9) If there’s one word I would use to describe the developed world (and that includes Sydney of course) is excess. Yep… excess. The rate at which folks consume and eat and spend and dispose of and expect the supply of their “goodies” to just continue is unbelievable. The West is basically consuming itself to death – like an addict that is out of control.
10) No security guards at every shop and on every street corner!
Rob
point 8 is true on the surface but what you will not see on casual observation is the thousands of people starving and lucky if they get 1 meal a day. They all rock up to the soup kitchens in the public parks. Sometimes the councils want to be in denail so they tell those that run the kitchens to go into the allyways so that they(homeless/starving) do not have a face.
If you look closely enough you will see them, but as a visitor to your own county you will not recognise them standing up against the wall.
So right!
I think Sydney alone has close 500,000 homeless people. Most of these would be lucky to eat one proper meal a week – let alone per day.
Thank god for the soup kitchens!
R