LAST Friday, Kombo was laid to rest; no fan fare, no great speeches; no nothing.
Family and friends gathered for a somber low key funeral service in a secluded part of town and the great Kombo was finally laid to rest.
Many of this generation will know Paul Kombonari, or Kombo as his teammates knew him. He is a legend of rugby league in his own right, often starring in the rugby league arena in Goroka, all over the Highlands provinces and around PNG in local and representative matches in the 1970s and early 1980s.
He died last week after a long illness.
It was through the code of rugby league that I came to know Kombo.
Sometimes, when a friend you have only known in a short time during a passing phase in your life, passes away, your brain scrambles to put the face to the name after the news is broken?
That phase of life in this case being the latter part of the 1970s when you were just adapting to a life of a working professional.
And when the final piece comes together, the face that is amplified before you is even bigger than life and flood gates open of the fond memories that you shared with the dearly departed over that stretch of time and you suddenly miss him.
And that is despite the 30-year span that separated us since our last meeting.
When that phone call through came from Sukope Iko last Wednesday informing me that Kombo had passed away, my mind scrambled to register our association and it was long moments before I could piece together the fleeting moments that that we shared as a team.
I was posted to Goroka as the resident journalist with Radio Goroka, Karai bilong Kumul in 1975, the year of Independence.
Being young and single and having nothing constructive to do on weekends, I strolled down to the local leagues ground to watch the games.
The old leagues ground was at the showgrounds - now the National Sports Institute.
It was not new to me as I had seen my uncle Sape, a highway driver, play on the field during my primary school holidays in Goroka.
The difference between my uncle’s playing days and the post independence era of Kombo and I was White Men.
There were many of them running around the paddock in my uncle’s playing days as compared to one of two in our playing days.
But the games were just as fast and tough, a standard that was set by the white men and continued by Kombo and company in the post-independent years.
Goroka’s domination of Highlands representative matches during that era attested to its superior brand of football and it wasn’t unusual for Goroka to dominate selections for the Highlands Zone rep sides.
Kombo was part of that era.
He played for Goroka Brothers Rugby League Club – a star-studded club that boasted highly talented local footballers in the likes of the Sabumei brothers Uve and Fred, the Landu brothers Martin and Paul, Peter Bananga, Linus Geni, Himony Lapiso, Tony Borle and David Bane among others, whose names have slipped through the mists of time. But the calibre of the team was such that they dominated the local competition for the best part of the 1970s and beyond.
Kombo, playing centre for the team was a shining light. He was the goal kicker as well and, standing higher than most highlanders, the lanky centre had the speed to match, when he tore the turf on those try-scoring sprints down the sideline or the midfield when the opportunity presented itself.
For the first couple of weeks that I had the opportunity to watch the action, it emerged that the game to watch was Rongo Tigers and Brothers – a contest that would often attract a fullhouse of spectators, they’d come from far and wide to watch – and it was worth all the money you parted with at the gate.
These were the two heavies of Goroka Rugby League and to me, something of a family affair, having the Sabumeis and Landus and company in the Brothers line-up battling the Gihenos (John and Frazer) in the Rongo Tigers line-up.
The games often went down to the wire, and Kombo stuck to my mind because on two separate occasion when these two heavyweights locked horns and fought to a standstill, it was Kombo’s boots that finally broke the deadlock and earned for Brothers a step towards the grandfinal and eventually, the spoils of a great year of football.
I also had the opportunity to play rugby league at the time and whilst presented with a choice of Brothers, Rongo Tigers, Ex-High School (later Magani), Royals, Asaro Hawks, United and Gulf-West, I was eventually “coerced” into joining Ex-High School RLFC because of some of my ex-schoolmates from Sogeri National High School were playing for the club.
You can well guess the disappointment that my wantoks at Gulf-West felt and their on-field attitude towards me at times, were not a surprise to all those who knew.
But playing the actual game pitted me against the cream of Goroka rugby league – against ones such as Kombo and lifted me onto a plane that demanded nothing short of excellence.
Of all the players that I had the opportunity to rub shoulders with, Kombo, to my mind, was the fairest; a gentle giant.
In the years of football that I’ve enjoyed, I noted that Kombo’s greatest asset on the pitch was his speed. You had to catch him before he revved up.
I was playing lock at the time, where cover defence was your mission statement above all else, and I can tell you most emphatically, it was always a daunting task to go after Kombo when he broke clear of the first line of defence.
I had gotten to know that rugby league in the Highlands was all about brute and brawn. They make them rough, tough and aggressive up there and a coastal like me had to adapt real quick-like to be able to really enjoy and appreciate the game.
Kombo was quite the opposite of that perception. He was well built, lanky and tough but he did not display the aggression and the brute force that many of his colleagues exhibited or were noted for.
I guess that part of his character came from his education abroad.
I was privileged in later years to be with Kombo in the same team – the Highlands Zone and the PNG Kumuls in 1976 and 77.
These were the years that the Highlands Zone broke the dominance of Southern Zone in inter-zone rugby league and the Kumuls scaled new heights with victories over the Northern Division of New South Wales and France in the first-ever Test match played in post independent Papua New Guinea.
There was also the quest for the Pacific Cup in New Zealand.
Those achievements are themselves milestones in one’s pathway through life.
In your solemn state after the sad news, you are thankful that those achievements were achieved as a result of everyone working as a team.
It reflects what rugby league is all about – a team game. It’s all teamwork and Kombo had been part and parcel of that united effort in the course of our – his teammates – lives.
We’ve had our good times (winning, flying to Rabaul for the Zone championships aboard a DC3, drinking Barcadi and kulau on the way back from the Lae Zone championship, etc) and bad times (losses, often the ones that could be helped) but we’d always drank a beer or 10 afterwards and have a laugh.
Kombo has made a line break in life and touched down for all eternity.
I say this on behalf of all of us who were privileged to have played football and shared our time with you, thank you, Kombo, for the memories.
Perhaps, in that timeframe when our paths crossed, you played a part in the whole design of things that God planned for each of us.
As the Wise Counsellor says: “Every life needs a purpose to which it can give the energies of its mind and the enthusiasm of its heart ... ” and we know you did just that.
May you rest in eternal peace, bro.

 

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