Fern Ridge (Safla Rama) Digest

Last week we celebrated the National Book Week. To prepare for the week I spent the weekend reading, my friend, Drusilla Modjeska’s new novel: The Mountain , published by Random House Australia. The novel by one of Australian leading writers is the highly recommended Random House Australian book of the month. Its entire setting is in Port Moresby and Collingwood Bay. The story began in the late 960s and works itself to the present time, mostly around characters associated with the UPNG It is a wonderful story written with such fluidity and excellent narrative style that readers will resist the putting down the book. A book with so much psychological drama to physical dramatization of national events in Papua New Guinea seen through the eyes of the main players in the story.  It is one of the best books on PNG to have come out this year. I will do a full review of the book in a future article. In the National Book Week I was invited by the PNG Paradise High School to share...

At one point I could read 300 pages or more a day. I wish I could return to that period in my life to increase reading up to 500 pages a day. It was the only way I could get through graduate studies in the United States. Serious! No kidding.   So it seems. Even if I am no longer the master of the habit I still read what is required of me to remain alive, intelligent, and above the challenges before me.  I am the master of my habits. The reading habit has been on my report card for sometime now. I need to do something about it. It remains my chief responsibility to direct my reading habit to work for me. I am the master of my own reading habit. No one can tell me that my reading habit has failed to deliver what I need.  It is National Book Week. A time we remind ourselves about the importance of books, literature, reading and writing in our lives. It is a time for us to reflect on our experiences as readers and writers of books. Often in this week schools did ...

Last week I talked about the importance of Asia Pacific Rim. This week I follow up with a discussion on the importance of Pacific Studies in the Asia Pacific region. It took me a while to really understand the three rationales of Pacific Studies that Terence Wesley-Smith, the current Director of the Center for Pacific Islands Studies at the University of Hawaii proposed some time ago. These are the (1) pragmatic rationale, (2) laboratory rationale, and (3) empowerment rationale. The pragmatic rationale is for metropolitan countries to know the places they were dealing with soon after the Second World War. This rationale is still used for funding of Pacific Studies centers in the region and throughout the world: “With the possible exception of Britain, all the imperialist states that formerly colonised the Pacific have established centres of Pacific Studies, according to late Emeritus Professor Ron C Crocombe (1987: 120–121). Both the United States and Australia, after...

Oceania, as we know from Epeli Hau’ofa is not just a sea of islands, it is also home to millions of Indigenous peoples with different cultures, histories, and experiences that define them as a unique group of people occupying an imagined geography known as Oceania.  Movement in and around or outbound are constant and necessary experiences in the lives of Pacific Islanders. Using interconnected networking Islanders are able to move between their homelands and metropolitan centers such as New Zealand, Australia, and USA to participate in global social, political, and economic activities. These movements form new alliances, strengthen existing relationships, and promote peace, goodwill, security, and protection against destabilizing forces. These are best described as imagined geographies and cross-cultural fertilization in Oceania. Rob Wilson, author of Reimagining the American Pacific (2000) offers a striking perspective that reaffirms the observations we have about the...

Anyone can write what they want. Many books can be written by Papua New Guineans. Papua New Guineans are capturing their experiences in the written form. It is important to write books that inspire people, shape societies, and bring about fundamental changes in our communities. The power of the written word to effect changes in our attitudes is never underestimated.  I consider writing as an instrument of social and political change in a postcolonial society like PNG. It had been used as a political instrument during late 1960s and 1970s against colonial rule of PNG. Writing as an instrument of change has currency at this time as well.  A quick look at the different forms of writing people use today reveals that many people are using writing to seek social and political change, but are also using writing to share their experiences. In our daily newspapers many people are using the letters to the editor to speak their mind, offer critique of issues, or even debat...

I voted a day late on June 27 th in the 2012 PNG General Election at the Waigani Primary School in the nation’s capital. I was among the many voters from the UPNG area to cast our votes on Wednesday, rather than on Tuesday as originally scheduled. I was in a good mood to vote on the day I voted. I had a bilum full of betel nuts to help me stay focused on the task at hand. It was an important task; an exercise in celebrating free will to vote in a democratic society. Papua New Guineans exercise every five years this right of citizenry. Everything looked fine without any disturbances at the polling station. There were a few iiregularities. The first problem appeared when a woman used someone else’s name. The election scrutineers were quick to respond to this irregularity, pointing out that the known person of that same name was also in line to vote. The woman with the false name was turned away from voting. The next woman after her was illiterate that on asking someone to h...

Lasitewa Dormitory I was 21 years old when I lived in Lasitewa dormitory during my second year of studies at the University of Papua New Guinea. It was a time I had to decide what I wanted to do in my life. I was struggling with myself to understand whether I should pursue the vocation of Marist Brotherhood as it became clearer that soon my superiors would be asking for me to take my vows of celebacy. It was the most difficult of decisions for a 21-years old, with no family members in Port Moresby that I can talk to about the decision. That was 1985, a year after Pope John Paul’s first visit to Papua New Guinea. That visit was fresh as we had celebrated mass at the Sir Hubert Murray Stadium. I was also struggling to make the decision between studying political science and public administration or to pursue the study of philosophy. I opted for the study of philosophy instead. I found myself developing an interest in the field of literature. As ...