Tuesday 9th June

View along the waterfront towards Honiara, rubbish, wrecked freighter

Caesalpinia in flower Mendana Ave Honiara

Had a busy day finally with the inmates from Rove Prison. Well, it’s always a busy day with them, I meant finally a day when I felt like I’d done something.

I had 2 of the guys up at the Nursery again feeding compost through the mulcher, they put through about 2 metres of compost, hopefully it will keep Imelda happy for a while potting. I only have them for 1 ½ hours a at a time, and they work flat out. It was getting close to 11am, and they were due back at Rove at 11, but they decided to finish off the heap first. The 2 wardens didn’t mind, they were busy chatting to Imelda and Dorisse, so it was closer to 11.15 when I dropped them back. David (Prison David) didn’t mind, just so long as we don’t make a habit of it initially while the programme is being trialled.

We tried to mulch some of the coconut husks, but they’ve got really wet sitting in the shade, and the mulcher just clogged up continuously, so it was back to the next compost heap for a good hours workout. The guys back at the prison have got the garden beds ready, we’re waiting on some good farm soil from the prison farm to arrive, then we can plant the area out.

It’s funny walking up to the Nursery with them. They have one warder for each guy, no guns, batons, chains etc, but they walk up holding hands. The warders are about half the size of the inmates, at times I wonder who is leading who in the work party. The guys have no intention of stuffing this trial up, I’m pretty sure they would suffer inside if they stopped it being a permanent exercise.

I’ve been really slack the past few weeks, not having classes doesn’t help, and the work crews are organised, there’s nothing there for me to get involved with. David has the work organised, he’s been doing it long enough to not need me telling him what to do. About all I do is make suggestions about the timing of jobs, so we don’t have the truck running all over Honiara needlessly. If we don’t have the soil arrive at Rove Prison tomorrow, I’ll take David and we’ll go stealing bougainvillea cuttings from around town. I’ve found a lot we don’t have in the nursery double white, double reds, apricot, so Imelda can do cuttings and we can grow them up. The same with the Hibiscus.

I think next year will be interesting politically here, the papers are filling up with a lot of mud slinging, it may get interesting as time goes by. So much wasted money by politicians supporting their wantok, instead of the whole village or constituency. They claim to have found the $10 million from Taiwan, now it’s a bun fight over who is going to get any of it. I’m just curious to know where or how they found it, was it in a briefcase or trunkbox under someones bed?

The humidity has dropped a lot the last week, it’s a lot drier, I don’t feel as though I’m in a sauna all day, another month and it will be a nice time to visit here. David said the fishing improves from now till November, with the tuna and marlin appearing. I’d love to catch one, but I’ll be happy with the kingfish or a good size grouper. There were a few small bluefin tuna at the market Sunday, about 30 kg size, selling for $70 and $90 each. If I could be sure they were reasonably fresh, and kept on ice, I’d be tempted to get one, and have tuna steaks and sashimi and salt cured fillets. I know I’m going to weaken one Sunday morning down there, the fish all look good, well, as good as you would expect at 7 am, before the sun gets onto them. Shirelyta was telling me off the other day for going early to the markets, you get cheaper prices towards the end of the day, the growers don’t want to take produce back. I know this, but I’d prefer to get stuff that is fresher than what it is after all day in the heat and sunshine. The fruit doesn’t get as badly wilted, but the bok choy, lettuce and cabbage all looks wilted by midday.

I’m getting better at bartering, or else they are starting to recognise me there each week, and I’m getting local prices, not the whitefella prices. Giving out prints of the photos I took helps as well.

I’m trying to help put an article together with VSA for publicity in New Zealand, the article isn’t a problem, most of it has been written by Adele, based on my rambling thoughts, trying to get photos sent is a different matter. They need full size jpegs, 4MB size, it takes me an hour to load one pic, then 15 min to send, then I can start uploading the next one. So far this week I’ve managed to send 5 photos starting at 7 am and checking progress every hour or so. I was hopeful gmail would let me send a couple at once, and load quicker than hotmail, but nope, 1 photo at a time, and as slow as hotmail to upload. I get rather frustrated with broadband here. As you may have noticed.

I’m away to Savo, I know, I keep mentioning this, on Thursday, 1 pm from the Visitors Centre. 4 days of not very much to do, collect orchids, go fishing, drink beer and sleep on the beach. I’m taking a lot of spices with me, if I catch any decent fish I’m cooking them myself on the barbque there. The food isn’t much there. Imagine a foreign cook who has been told of European food, but missed a bit in the translation, and everything is almost what you recognise, but not quite. A bit like Arthur Dents cup of tea on the Heart of Gold in Hitchhikers Guide to the Galaxy. It’s almost exactly not what you expect.

They don’t do toast there either, as Rosalee found out. I guess that is too hard to translate into toktok.

I almost feel like suggesting my daughter comes up here for 6 months and teaches them how to cook, but that would probably go down like a lead balloon in Brisbane. I know Sir Alan at Sunset Lodge would welcome the idea. It’s never been particularly well known for the food there, the setting is gorgeous though, and close enough to Honiara to make weekend trips quick and easy.