LIFESTYLE

A simple act of kindness

By Rev SEIK PITOI
WHEN was the last time you performed an act of kindness to someone?
Or, have you yourself been on the receiving end of an act of kindness? Being kind does not come easy for some people. It is easier being kind to people we know, or those who will one day pay us back.
]In that case, our ‘help’ is really an investment for the future. But a genuine act of kindness stands out when there is no way the recipient will repay the gesture.
There is an excellent series on YouTube I enjoy watching. It is about random acts of kindness that have been caught on camera. Another series is called, “Paying it forward”. This happens when a person has been helped by someone, and in appreciation, does the same thing towards another undeserving person. The idea is that when the act of kindness is passed on every time someone is helped, many more people can be impacted, thus changing the world.
In that series, I was greatly touched by one story. A gentleman stood near the cashier at a supermarket checkout and watched customers as they paid for their shopping. Soon, a woman of colour was served, but he noticed she was struggling to pay for her groceries and the different baby products she got. Seeing this, he quickly offered her some cash to pay for everything, and to keep the change.
The woman stared in disbelief at the kind gentleman for a few moments while it sank in; then she exploded in loud sobs. The man gave her a hug and told her God loved her and that when she was able to, she could help another needy person in the same way. Then he was off! That struggling single mother considered the man heaven-sent.
The most striking thing about this was it was a white gentleman helping a black woman! His simple act of kindness spoke loudly amidst growing racism we see in the world today.

Getting help when I needed it
Closer to home, I recall having such blessings happen to me and my family in our times of need. One instance I remember was over 20 years ago with a Christian couple, the Nasons, who lived along our street. I knew them well, but I didn’t tell them at any time that I was broke for two fortnights while I tried to offset a huge debt I had incurred.
That pay Friday, as I went home with just enough food for two days, I wondered how we would survive for the remainder of the fortnight. With my wife and two small girls at home, I knew the going would be tough but I made up my mind that I would not borrow more money.
Just then, the couple drove up to our driveway and blew the horn. My wife and I went down, only to find them there with a large shopping of groceries they had brought for us. The food looked like it would last two whole weeks! “We felt in God that you needed help so we decided to bless you with this”, the husband Alex said as they drove off. We were really emotional and couldn’t find the right words to express our gratitude to them!
Some time later, after my finances had improved, we decided to pay it forward. We knew some young boys in our street who were trouble makers, took drugs and even joined rascal gangs and held up people. I befriended these boys and often spent time chatting with them. One night, my wife cooked a lovely dinner and we invited three of them to our home. We shared God’s word with them, prayed, and then they dug in, eating to their hearts content!
After an enjoyable evening of fun and laughter, we ended with a prayer and gave them some extra food to take home! We had paid forward the simple act of kindness of the Nasons to these three young men!

Fruit of the Spirit
The Bible says kindness is a character of God. “O praise the LORD, all ye nations…for his merciful kindness is great toward us…” (Psalm 117: 1-2 – KJV). Ephesians 4:32 also admonishes believers to, “be kind and tender-hearted to one another, and forgive one another, as God has forgiven you through Christ”.
We even have kindness listed as a fruit of the Holy Spirit – “But the Spirit produces love, joy, peace, patience, kindness…” (Galatians 5: 22-23). Because kindness is a character of God, His people too are endowed with the same character, which comes from the Holy Spirit. In the Christian family, showing acts of kindness towards a needy brother or sister should be a normal part of life.
But giving to someone outside of God’s family is in itself a powerful testimony to the unbeliever! Maybe not giving lots of money or buying expensive gifts, but just giving something small at the right time, with the right heart, can make a big difference in someone’s life.
I will end this article with a special person whose life story I had the honour of writing about back in 2018. But it was one simple act of kindness by this man that I will talk about now. He was a school teacher sent to another village. He did not know the local language but he had met an uncle who was married to a woman from that village and lived there.
In the course of spending time with his wantok, he soon found out that the uncle’s daughter was scheduled to attend nursing school in another province. He also found out that she didn’t a have a suitcase to put her meagre belongings in. Seeing the need, he hurried home and emptied out his suitcase of all his belongings, bringing the empty case for his cousin to use. The grateful young woman used the suitcase and went off to nursing school, later returning to work as a nurse at the Old Rigo hospital, and later at the general hospital in Port Moresby. She had a distinguished career as a nurse before marrying and leaving work to raise her family.
The young woman was my mother, and her cousin was the late George Kilamelona. Uncle George’s act of kindness was treasured by my mum. She kept the suitcase for many years, and I recall we used it on many occasions when we travelled. She told us, her children, the story of the suitcase.
Mum and dad payed forward Uncle George’s kindness to many people. Over the years, mum did as was done to her as she blessed widows and orphans in need. I grew up with many cousins who lost their father, and my parents housed and clothed them. All have gone their separate ways now. Some acknowledged my parents for all they did for them. Others have forgotten. But my prayer is that they do as the slogan says – that they will pay if forward by helping someone else in need, as they themselves were helped.

Passing of a kind-hearted man
On Jan 9, 2021, Uncle George Kilamelona passed away, aged 87 years! On Friday, Jan 15, a funeral service was held at the Rev Sione Kami Memorial Church (RSKMC) to honour his long and eventful life.
Uncle George lived an exemplary Christian life as a teacher and later as a senior bureaucrat in the Government, and as a church elder. As many tributes of his life were shared that day, the one that stood out clearly in my mind was the kindness he showed many years ago to my mum. I considered how that act of kindness blessed my mother and us as a family. That simple act was talked about and will be remembered throughout the years.
Let me end with my opening question – when was the last time you showed an act of kindness to someone? Maybe you know of a needy person near you. That might be a good place to start today!

• Rev Seik Pitoi is a freelance writer.

Brother’s memories linger on

By JACK NOAH YAMAHA
IT WAS a normal Saturday morning, Nov 9, 2019 at Nikint Street, Morata 2 in the National Capital District. But there was extremely deafening noise from binge party throughout the night that irritated and was too maddening for me and many other non-alcoholics to put up with.
Worse still, the effects of a hazardous heat wave too were felt at an unprecedented level for months and months of long dry spell in Australia.
My wife Lessy and cousin Sally Aipa had woken up earlier at around 4am and were already behind their sewing wheels busy making clothes to sell at their small stall at Waigani market.
I slept late that night doing some designs for Martha and Bertha’s floriculture business then watched some movies to freshen up some of my thoughts and retired to bed at around 2am on that fateful Saturday.
Lessy and Sally’s sewing room was downstairs directly below my bedroom. Noises from sewing machines were unbearable so I woke up and went outside and did my normal chores and strolled around the house and gazed at the sewing room where noises came from.
Then I got back to my workstation, switched on the computer and checked my cell phone to see if someone had sent me some messages, but there was nothing in the inbox.
An hour or so later my phone vibrated only once then stopped and I picked up the phone and realised that it was my cousin Yas Mongea, who was employed as a cook at Hides gas field at Komo in Hela.
I was bit cross that my cousin should call me because he normally got paid a handsome some of money fortnightly and to a mere K3 or even K5 Flex card was just small change or peanuts to him. That was the thought I had. I thought to myself that, if he had any important things to discuss with me, he should buy phone credits and call me.
I didn’t know the real reason behind his intended conversation but it was to confirm the hearsay he heard from his sources.
He was in a state of shock from what he had just heard from somebody.
Some minutes later he called me after realising that I could not return his call. The first question he posed to me was ‘Cousin, are you alright? I replied yes. Then he paused for a while and said okay and said and continued: “I heard that Abel died in Lae and so and I want to confirm this from you.”
Even at that point, I took it as some kind of casual joke or something like that and I wasn’t really moved and we switched to other issues but he was trying to confirm what he had heard with me because I was the late Abel’s elder brother. Naturally, I would have heard any such bad news first rather than him.
Anyhow, at the end of our conversation he reiterated and wanted me to establish some facts and later confirm everything.
Although I had some credits in my phone I preferred not to call or send a text to anyone in Lae but placed my phone in front of my computer and continued with graphic designs.
I wasn’t really bothered by my cousin’s query but was expecting texts or calls from somebody in Lae because I knew we had lengthy conversations earlier in the week and he (the late Abel) was at his prime age of 30 and energetic and healthy young man. I thought my cousin may have been deceived by someone with a hoax message.
Late in the evening of that day Nelson Yakipu called and said; “Have you heard some news from Lae?” I said yes but the news was as yet unconfirmed. Then he insisted and said it was confirmed that Abel Yamaha was speared to death in Lae and that was confirmed by his nephew Jeffery Yakipu in Lae some minutes ago.
After a second confirmation from Nelson, I knew that it was real and my concentration on whatever I had planned for that day was interrupted and I pulled my chair back and sat at the side of the window staring at an empty space into the sky and gazing over the banana patch at the back of my house.
At that moment sorrow rose instantaneously and tears from my eyes rolled at will and with my teary eyes I returned back to my room lay face down and wept.

After some hours toward the evening, few people came to my house, some came to confirm and others to console me and my family of the untimely loss of a young man.
During the weekend I decided to make arrangements to travel to Lae and transport the body home and I only raised K500, just enough for the one-way airfare. A week and a half later I went over to Lae. That was on a Friday, Nov 22, 2019.
Unfortunately, I wasn’t familiar with Lae city therefore I sent word for somebody to wait for me at Nadzab Airport but no one was there to pick me up so I got on one of the PMV buses and communicated with Cain the twin brother of Abel and he picked me up somewhere at Eriku.
As I arrived at Nawae Market where there was a ‘haus sel’ or mourning house was. There was massive clean-up done to the market area and everybody were in their mourning mood.
The next day we transported late Abel’s body from funeral home to the haus sel for public viewing of the body and later in the evening we were planning to travel up the Highlands Highway for his final resting place in the Southern Highlands.
At around 4pm on Saturday, Nov 23, in a convoy of three 25-seater buses and a Land Cruiser station wagon, we bid farewell to everyone at Nawae Block and started the one-and-half-day journey to Pangia in Southern Highlands.
We arrived at Pangia station at around 2pm on Nov 24 and headed for Alia Village, his final resting place. We laid him to rest along the roadside, a few yards away from his elder brother Martin’s cemetery who coincidently died in the same month in 2013, only five days away from date of Abel’s death.
For those who hadn’t encountered such a situation, the deep pain and despair felt by families and friends could not be fully understood. I went through it all at the loss of my brothers in the prime of life in a space of five years. It is just too much to bear.
God gives and takes back life. From the mother’s womb, he has a plan for each one of us. Our lifespans are very short and He alone knows our destiny. Thank God for everything He does which is best for us.