Finding a forgotten friend 50 years later
PEOPLE
By DANIEL KUMBON
HOW does one react when you suddenly find a friend after losing contact with him for many years?
My impulse was to contact him immediately when I saw his name in a recent comment he made on an article I published back in 2016 in PNG Attitude.
Funny, he was talking about people I mentioned in the article but not anything about me.
Didn’t he recognise my name on the byline or my picture?
The vivid memories of our first meeting surged through my mind. He was the first ‘whiteman’ who dared to enter our traditional bush material home through the low door into the windowless semi-dark living room.
This young man did not seem to care if there were fleas, cockroaches, smoke, rats or dust in the house. The local people held the view that their homes were unfit for a whiteman but this man didn’t seem to care.
I was in my house during school holidays when this well-built man suddenly appeared in the front yard of our home. He was well tanned too. His presence was over-powering.
But I went outside to receive him and find out who he was. Was he lost?
Soon I had to invite him into our house when I saw rain starting to fall on the Waon Mandaka ridge of Mt Kondo. Somebody must have directed him to my house which was a couple of meters away from the main road because it was going to rain.
They figured I was probably the best person who could talk to this strange man in both English and Tok pisin and keep him company until the rain stopped.
Not many people knew how to speak pidgin in my village in those days except for a few young men who had been to the coast to work on plantations under the Highlands Indentured Labour Scheme.
My own uncle had gone to Wakunai to work on cocoa plantations in what is now the Autonomous Region of Bougainville.
I can’t remember the details of our conversation but when the rain subsided he left but took my school address with him.
The following year, he wrote very long letters when I was back at the University of Technology in Lae.
I always tried to respond to all his letters. I now see that he had influenced me to think and express my thoughts on paper. That helped when I trained to be a journalist at UPNG much later.
Recently, I found this man again, just as suddenly as he had appeared in the front yard of our home at Kondo village in Kandep, Enga province.
This time, I saw his name beside comments he made about people I mentioned in that article I published in 2016.
I wrote to him last Tuesday 5th November as soon as I obtained his email address.
He is John W Gordon-Kirby from Melbourne now aged 83.
At first, he didn’t remember anything about our meeting. I was one of many Papua New Guineans and others from Spain and Morocco he had been corresponding with for many years.
It was hard for him to remember everybody after losing contact for many years, let alone somebody he talked with for a few hours.
I sent him a picture of my village showing him where my house stood, the wooden log bridge he crossed over the Lai River, Kondo mountain and the main road (now sealed) that joins Kandep with Mendi.
Soon he was beginning to recall lost memories and started to exchange information and pictures with ease.
“This correspondence fills me with nostalgic joy. I once corresponded by post with many PNG people whom I had met or sponsored. This continued to a lesser degree when email took over. However with the passing of time, they all dropped out.’
‘Thank you for having made me welcome in your humble home. We must not lose contact again. I am now 83 years old but I enjoy good health and lead an active life.’
John told me about how he had assisted Dr Paul Brennan establish the Enga Cultural Museum in Wabag and how good a choice they had made to recruit Akii Tumu to run it.
I sent him pictures of Akii Tumu who is still the director of the cultural museum, now renamed Enga Take Anda (House of Wisdom).
I also sent a picture of Dr Paul Brennan and the Enga Take Anda itself. It was one of many projects John was actively involved in during his twenty one (21) month contract as a kiap in Wabag.
He was also actively involved in the Highlands Orchid Centre located in Laiagam (now defunct). He helped world renowned botanist, Andre Miller to give a scientific name to the Enga’s provincial flower – Dendrobium Engae.
John said he helped design the provincial flag which showcases the blooming Dendrobium Engae placed in the center with a black and green background divided diagonally in half separating the two colors.
John had indeed lived an active life when he was posted to serve in all regions of Papua New Guinea.
One of his personal contributions to the nation was to sponsor PNG children to receive an education in Australia.
He sent me a picture of Malai from Baluan Island in Manus who had given him full permission to take his son Simeon to Australia to give him an education.
Veteran journalist, late Susuve Laumaea was another of the many Papua New Guineans he helped in their endeavor to pursue an education. But he sadly laments the loss of all those people he had nurtured.
‘As far as I know, I have outlived them all,” John said. ‘The greatest joy is in Susuve’s daughter Annemarie Laumaea who now has an Australian PhD and citizenship.”
He said Annemarie is presently in America furthering her studies into AIDS and Malaria related viruses. She and her mother have often visited John and his wife Doreen in Melbourne.
John has no children of his own from separate marriages to two nurses at different stages in his life.
His first marriage was to Ailsa, a New Zealander who worked as a United Church nurse at Nipa in the Southern Highlands. Ailsa often went out with him on patrols to do her child welfare clinics.
They tied the knot in a bush material church building in 1976 just after PNG got its independence. They left in 1978 and went to New Zealand to settle down on a farm.
But a couple of years later they separated in 1983. But yet remained friends until she passed on in 2018
John married for a second time to another nurse Doreen. They too were unsuccessful in having children. But they’ve lived a most fulfilling life for over 30 years and will continue to do so.
John, like many of us in PNG, is a self-published author. He has written a small book titled The Rise Of The House Of Morford. It is the culmination of his research findings into how his maternal grandfather rose in business from relative poverty as a fisherman’s son to great wealth.
The family has expanded over the decades, and around the world, each successive generation contributing, some outstandingly, and with distinction in their chosen roles and professions in commerce, the military, academia, the arts the church and Civil Service.
John has also published a Life Poem about his experiences around the world. From the time he was born in Spain, his migration to Australia, marriage and work experiences.
He wrote three pieces about his sojourn in PNG from 1961 – 1978 working as a kiap or patrol officer. Before that he was in the British Royal Marines on HMS Birmingham in 1958.
Here is one of his three poems-
SELF GOVERNMENT
then Independence Granted 1975
For two more years we soldier on
“You white fellas go back home”
some radicals and rascals chanted.
From villager:
“O sorri mi no redi yet “Sorry we‘re not ready yet
Yu stap, mi pried You stay, I am afraid
long dispella Indipendens of this Independence.
Yu lukoutim mipella moa.” You look after us more.”
I replied:
“O sorri prend, mi no inap “Sorry friend, I am not able
long halpim yupella nau to help you now.
Bel biloing me i hevi My heart is aching
Gut bai, na tank yu tru, olgeta.” Goodbye, thank you truly.”
With heavy heart
we take our leave
and we depart
to start a life anew –
Over and out.
No, it’s not ‘over and out’ yet for John Gordon Kirby. He still leads an active life and we hope to write to each other for as long time.
John still has the fondest memories of his short time in Enga province.
Equally memorable are his times in other parts of the country in his 14 years in PNG’s “nambis,ailan na hailan” postings.
“I enjoy our interaction, so feel free to contact me as often as you wish’ John told me just now.
I will continue to write to him because the information he has about PNG during the colonial administration period is invaluable.
- Daniel Kumbon is a freelance writer.