Fern Ridge (Safla Rama) Digest

  It is challenging to write fiction, based on actual history, than on pure imagination. The challenge is to be as close to history, but aided with literary license to reconstruct a storyline that maps out the narrative. The technique known as fictionalizing history is taken on board to plough the field of history and fiction to make something grow out of it. Land Echoes (2014) is my first novel based on my grandfather, Holonia Jilaka, whose life inspired this book. Although not a biography the novel’s timeline is based on the part of my grandfather’s history. I recorded my grandfather’s story on tape when I was a UPNG student many years ago. The part that I was interested in was the part where he went to the Highlands of Papua New Guinea in 1933 as a shepherd boy with the Catholic missionaries. He spent three years (1933-1935) in Simbu area before being discharged as a mission boy. He then joined the police force, taking his training in Rabaul depot under the instructio

Dear Readers, I have been absent from my blog for over a year. I will return to the blog as of this year 2015. Several reasons have made it difficult for me to be consistent. The most important of all is the accessibility to the internet at where I am located. I think this problem is now solved. I will have full access to the internet this year. I have a year of articles that I will post on this blog. I thank you for visiting the blog as regularly as you have been. I promise to post new exciting and stimulating articles for your consumption in the next few days and onwards. I hope you will spread the news that I am back on the blog. Invite your friends, colleagues, acquaintances, and other internet beings to visit this exciting blog. I have decided to change the name of the blog to Land Echoes. I am not sure if you like that. If not please leave a comment for me to consider. I value your visits to the blog. I hope to link up with you again soon. Have a productive 2015 ye

First publlished in Steven's Window, The National Newspaper early this year. Thanks. A death happened in the hamlet right after ours in the village. That was soon after Christmas that the relatives had to set up the ‘house cry’ right up the first week of New Year 2014. The deceased was a woman of standing in the community that when her body arrived on Monday afternoon a lot of the surrounding community members paid their last respects that evening. The night went smoothly for most of the mourners until the morning when a commotion began with some of the relatives accusing others of using sorcery.  The problem was that instead of participating in the laments and mourning in the night some of the youths decided to drink ‘steam’ in the night. My father who had gone over early for the burial returned dismayed that there was a fight early in the morning.  He asked me if I can help him with some money to sort out the customary restrictions that the relatives of the deceased

This article was first published in the Stevens' Winduo, The National newspaper earlier this year! A death happened in the hamlet right after ours in the village. That was soon after Christmas that the relatives had to set up the ‘house cry’ right up the first week of New Year 2014. The deceased was a woman of standing in the community that when her body arrived on Monday afternoon a lot of the surrounding community members paid their last respects that evening. The night went smoothly for most of the mourners until the morning when a commotion began with some of the relatives accusing others of using sorcery.   The problem was that instead of participating in the laments and mourning in the night some of the youths decided to drink ‘steam’ in the night. My father who had gone over early for the burial returned dismayed that there was a fight early in the morning.   He asked me if I can help him with some money to sort out the customary restrictions that the relatives

Papua New Guinea has contributed to the world knowledge in science, literature, anthropology, medicine, law, and music, arts, and culture. So often we are slow in acknowledging our intellectual and knowledge contributions to the world, perhaps because we ourselves have been slow in saying so or we just don’t care. In so far as I am concern we need to acknowledge the contributions our societies and people have made to world knowledge and development of our understanding of the world, as we know it today. As a Papua New Guinean writer I have such a responsibility to tell the world about Papua New Guinea, its people, its social and cultural way of life, and its knowledge systems. With it comes also the responsibility to make Papua New Guineans become aware of the importance of their own societies and the contributions each society has made to the world. It is often said that Papua New Guinean societies have been ‘overwritten’ or ‘over-described’ in the books, analogues, a