Papua New Guinea 1974: School trip to Madang

Start here for my introductory blog about our experiences in PNG.

Whilst at Mt Hagen High School, I was fortunate to be asked to go with a group of students from the Highlands as part of an exchange with students from Tusbab High School in Madang.

There being, in 1974, only one road down to the coast at Lae. Madang is further west and not connected by road to Lae either. A DC 3 was chartered and a plane load of students used to the cooler climes of the Highlands headed to the hot and humid climate of Madang.

The students stayed in the hostel at Tusbab (spaces being made by Tusbab students going on the return DC 3 flight to Mt Hagen). One important check that was made was for signs of malaria each morning at the hostel. Mt Hagen is too "cold" for mosquitoes and malaria was almost unheard of there.

Mt Hagen students in Madang

The coastal road north from Madang

Several trips along the coast to visit several villages so that we could compare Coastal life to Highlands life were most memorable.

Coastal haus

Side view

Coastal village

Another coastal village

In the Highlands the main cash crops were tea and coffee as well as vegetables for the local market. Cocoa and coconut plantations provided a good comparison of what grows in a different climate.

Cocoa pods

Local tea and coffee could be bought in Mt Hagen, but alas no local chocolate was available in Madang.

Developing coconuts

Swimming, north of Madang

A new experience was to be able to swim in the warm seas west of Madang.

Karkar Island in the background

Karkar Island is an active volcano which erupted recently (around Dec 2017). It was steaming away gently when we went swimming here.

Yabob village haus.

The women in some villages along there coastal road from Madang made their own cooking pots such as the one in the photo here.

Cooking pots, Yabob village

Another visit was to take some Mt Hagen and Tusbab students to see a new industry to utilise the tropical forests. I was horrified to see the larger areas cleared of trees to be turned into wood chips and exported to Japan. It was not my idea of progress in 1974 and is even less so now.