Wednesday 24th June

Kukum Market

Kukum Market

The saga of the Police commissioner and the “lady” just gets more extreme each day. I had it wrong a bit yesterday, it was after the Queens Birthday celebrations, not the football, but other than that, the facts have changed a lot more.

In todays Solomon Star News, the Commissioner was with 6 other police officers, having a few drinks in a secluded spot, when a group of masked and armed men held them up, raped a female police officer, and took their uniforms. And also trashed their car. Luckily they had civilian clothing to put on, it is a very confusing story, I’ll stick with the one I heard a week ago just after it happened before it spread out of control. That he was with a female junior officer when her wantok arrived and dealt to the car and him.

http://www.solomonstarnews.com/

It is proving to be an interesting thing to follow in the paper anyway, along with all the other bits and pieces. More letters in there today about the sewage enhanced fish in the markets, asking why it is allowed to carry on instead of protecting the health of everyone. At the levels of contamination, the fish would have had to be caught in a sewage pond, 7,000ppm E-coli is high by any standards. Then there is the continuing saga of the electricity blackouts. SIEA (Solomon Island Electricity Authority) are saying that their highly skilled and trained technicians are working around the clock to repair the #3 generator, and as soon as the parts, which have been coming by boat arrive finally, after 4 months, from Japan, it will all be well again. The best they can offer is that it will be all restored by the end of July.

I sent Jennifer and Imelda out with the truck today, to get as many cuttings of Bougainvillea as they could find around the town. I’ve found several we don’t have and gave them directions to find where they are. Hopefully in a couple of months we’ll have a bigger range instead of the dwarf purple, standard purple, and orange. Somehow they lost the mother plant for the variegated pink, and the other colours.

Mendana Ave is slowly getting back to pothole alley. Another month and it will be almost as bad as it was before they patched the holes. And this is without a lot of rain. All the roading machinery was destroyed in the troubles, so if it can’t be done with a road grader and a roller, then it will just be a patch up job. All they do is scrape the surface with the grader, then roll over it, spray tar and spread road gravel. No compaction or base course, it goes straight onto the coral. Again it comes down to the cost, too many fingers getting back handers along the way to leave anything for the actual job.

Tiffany and I both feel like a holiday already, she’s been nearly 3 years without a break, I’ve only been 6 months without doing anything. I think that is what is getting me so depressed all the time, waiting to actually do what I’m here for. All I can do is find fill in stuff to keep me occupied, and it has to be something that doesn’t cost anything because we haven’t the funds for anything. Totally frustrating and pointless.

I’ve measured all the tracks in the Gardens now, 4.6 kilometres in total, which will help the schools when they do the next crosscountry, we can work out some really good routes for them.

101 uses for dental floss

#1 Repairing sandals when the stitching comes apart.

#2 Replacing the eyelet binding on the top of my surfcaster when the tip gets damaged.

#3 Rethreading one of my shell money necklaces when it breaks. And it’s not as easy to get the pattern right as you’d think.

More to come

Further to the post on Sunday about the shell money paid as blood money in the murder feud. It is worth $100 per metre for plain, if there are patterns, or groups of other shells in it, it can go to $200 per metre equivalent. A heap of shell money is usually 10 metres in length, so the 45 heaps given as reparation and reconciliation would be worth a minimum of $45,000 in Solomon Dollars, about NZ$9,000, AUD$7,500, US$6,000, €4,200

And would probably take 1 person 2 –3 days to make each heap. A lot of families on Malaita start making shell money lengths as soon as their son is born, so they will have enough to pay bride price when he is old enough.

We heard back from the Japanese consul today, they have accepted our application, now it goes for translating, then forwarded to Japan for approval. Hopefully by the end of September we’ll know and be able to start doing something.

Tuesday 23rd June

David and Solomon boa

Solomon boa

I finally got my pictures of a snake. Some of the crew were clearing weeds along the river track when they found one asleep in the undergrowth. Beautiful dusty brown Solomon boa, about 3’ long, and well feed by the look of it. I think it’s close to shedding its skin, it had that dry dull look on the back, while the stomach was all brightly coloured and patches of skin were still peeling off in places.

David picked it up, we had people clustered back on the track while I was taking photos, none of them were prepared to come near us. I presumed it was a boa, from the shape of the head and the colour and pattern it looked like the pics I’ve seen of them, so I took the chance it wasn’t poisonous. It was very slow moving, I suppose being woken up in the hot daylight does that.

I took it down to the lily pond and let it go into the ginger and helliconia shrubbery, it’ll be safer there than near the track. And it’s got more food with the frogs there, plus shelter and water.

Other than that, it’s been a quiet day. We cleaned out the garage area, Forestry want to store their fuel drums in it as well, so we had a bit of rearranging to do. I found a lot of ropes, all with knotted ends instead of splices and ends, so spent a while with Andrew showing him how to back splice, join and make loop splices in it. Plus a few knots, bowline etc instead of the usual Solomon convoluted knot that is impossible to untie without using a bushknife.

David has given me the Town Ground roundabout to design and landscape. I will try and get it done with the next class, that way I’m not taking any of the crew away from what they are meant to be doing.

The papers here are warning against a drought happening this year, already the rainfall has dropped, there is a good el nino pattern forming, which brings dry winds here. I’ve noticed already how dry it is, the plants along the road are drying out in a couple of days which has David and a few others out every night with the water truck. Coupled with Solomon Islands Water authority, things are looking dry for a few months till November when the rains come back hopefully.

The Police Commissioner got caught a week ago with a “lady” friend parked up at Henderson, by the airport, presumably by family of the “lady”, and his car was trashed. It was hushed up till today, when the Solomon Star published a front page story about him being suspended pending a full inquiry. His story is that he was out with other officers having a few drinks after the celebrations in town following the football. Unofficially, he was caught with a “lady” in a compromising position. Needless to say, his wife isn’t too impressed.

The fish sellers are still thriving in Central Market, and the roadside fish stalls. You’d have to be stupid to be buying fish from them, but I guess if it’s what you’re used to, then your system can cope with it. I’m just waiting for a cholera outbreak in town soon, with the lack of water, no sewage system, and the general state of the squatter settlements around Honiara. I’ll go through Central Market with the camera on Saturday morning, I wish I had some good rat traps to put in my shoulder bag to catch the fingers of the bloody pick pockets.

Hi Dave in Maryland, good to see you catch up with me again. It’s been a while, Hi to Caleb too.

Monday 22nd June

Rove Prison planting out
Grasshopper on Helliconia leaf

I wish Bill Gates would get all the bugs out of stuff before MSN dump systems on people. IE8 is full of little quirks that really bug you if you have a lot of things you do online, copy/paste is only one of many. I’ve removed IE8, left IE7 on the HD, and installed Firefox. Once I get used to Firefox I’ll take IE7 off completely, do a big cleanup on the HD, I’ve got 45GB used already, ok, 30GB of it is music, and the other 10 is all the pictures gradually filling up the space.

Just got my copy of the VSA magazine, if anyone is interested http://www.vsa.org.nz/ will open the home page, and the magazine is online there. Plus you can read about VSA Volunteers and what everyone else is achieving while I’m here beating my head against the wall.

I’ve been trading emails most of the day, trying to convince people that laying off staff, and expecting the ones left to do the same amount of work is not going to work. If we had machinery it might be possible, but we rely on people power, even the road sweeping is done with brooms and shovels, not a powered road sweeper. It takes the crew 4 ½ days to sweep from Town ground, through Honiara and along the Prince Phillip Highway to King GeorgeVI School. About 12 miles I think. All done with brooms and a shovel and wheelbarrow.

I’m pleased I had the work at Rove Prison to keep me occupied, the guys are having a weeks break, and it’s only Monday and I’ve been trying to find things to do already. I’ve got one more side of the Gardens to walk the track on tomorrow with the Measuring Wheel, then draw a nice map with the distances marked and get it copied onto the Visitors Map Board.

My little corner shop is getting a lot more of my trade, I had a couple of hours off this afternoon, another power cut from 3pm till 5pm, so we called an early day, well I did anyway, Tiffany was going to wait in the Nursery for the truck to come back. I went into Wings, the “supermarket” checked the prices, and also into Ausmart. My corner shop is $2.50 cheaper for milk, $1 a kilo cheaper for rice, margarine, tinned stuff, even coffee is $15 per 250gram packet cheaper. If I shopped around a bit more I could probably do better, but I hate dragging around shops just to save $1 and ending up with several shopping bags half full of stuff.

We’re giving the two night security guys a months notice this week, with Forestry taking over the building we’re getting a container as a temporary home till the Nursery building is completed, and Forestry can take care of the security. One of them has been given a few written warnings anyway, arriving for work drunk, smashing the doors open because he forgot his keys, not turning up for work, all in all, he’s been the architect of his own problems.

I’ve got 2 weeks break coming up at the end of July, my 6 month get out of area break, and I’m totally undecided where to go. I could just about afford to get to Sydney, or Brisbane, Sydney would be good. If Louise Scott and Zambezi have a spare bit of floor, I could just about settle back into Bondi again. Last time I lived there was in 1970, I’ve been back a few times since, it has certainly changed from the seedy surfer full of kiwis lifestyle.
In all probability I’ll end up going to Gizo or maybe Rennel/Bellona. Ren/Bel would be good, I can visit Tiffany and Davids family there, and get really used to the Island lifestyle there. And it’s almost as far from Honiara as you can be in the Solomons, apart from Temotu. 18 hours on the ferry, then two main islands, Rennel, and Bellona, with a smattering of smaller ones around the edges. Rennel has the largest fresh water lagoon in the world, it’s now a World Heritage Listing, or is on the list to be made one, news travels slowly here. Tiffany says the Bellona is the better of the two islands, David argues for Rennel, so it’s easy to figure out where they come from.

Monday 22nd June

For some reason copy/paste isn't working yet in here. 2 pics of the cuscus to go on with while I sort the problem out.

Sorted, IE8 has a glitch that won't let you copy/paste, I'm downloading Firefox and swapping over. Removed IE8 and gone back to IE7 in the meantime till I get used to Firefox.

Friday 19th June

Another week over with, and still no further with what I’m actually meant to be doing. Tiffany and I took the final copy of the proposal for Japanese Grass Roots funding into the Japanese Consul this afternoon. If it’s accepted here, it then gets translated, and sent to Japan for approval, which could take 3 months from today. Then we can start working on the Nursery improvements.

I’ll have been here 9 months filling in time with other things, watching the time go by and getting totally frustrated. Everything we’ve done so far was all meant to have been finalised before I arrived, but the insistence on a truck being part of the funding cancelled any hope of the original proposal going through. And now that we have to have a building as part of it, both from our own necessity, and the Japanese insistence, a lot of the nursery equipment has had to be sacrificed to allow for the cost of the building. I still get the irrigation system though, and most of the security fence. So it’s not all bad.

We’re still being pushed to cut the wages down to $17,000 per month, and lay off staff. I’m going to wear the wages bit, I can be a bit bolshy about that, but if we get told to lay off staff I’ll be re-evaluating the role VSA should have with the SEB. We’re meant to be building self sufficiency and self determination, job skills etc, and putting people out of work doesn’t come into the equation.

I’ll go through the work book again Monday, sort out the contract work we get paid for, and all the unpaid work, thankfully it’s all on spreadsheet, so there’s not a lot to do, and we’ll go to a minimum work week, do the paid work only and any other work up to the wage limit, then stop. Keithie can’t grasp the concept that people still get paid, even if the work we do isn’t part of any contract. And the number of people on the crew is the minimum we need to cover all of the work. Ok, there are a couple we can get rid of and we’re working through the dismissal process with them, but if the crew get below 18 people, we won’t be able to cope with the paid work.

There’s a nice big editorial in the Solomon Star today, almost exactly what I wrote yesterday in here, about the fishmarket. Asking why it isn’t closed down, the threat to everyones health from the E-coli count, warning about typhoid, cholera etc, and putting peoples incomes before the majorities health. As Tiffany said, everything here is upside down, the fishmarket people are telling the Government and Health Authorities what to do, instead of following what the law says.

It’s a strange country to get used to. On Makira, there is no power now, because the land owners where the power generator is, have got a dispute with the power company over payment for the use of the land and river for the hydro generator. So they cut off the water supply to the dynamo. And because a lot of their wantok work for the ferry boat, they haven’t allowed any diesel to be delivered to run the diesel generators. Which cuts out the tourist places there till it’s all settled.

The guys who put the water flow meter into the stream at the Gardens ran into the same problem. All they put in is a pipe about 400mm diameter, about 2m high, into the stream bed. They can’t get to a few rivers because the land owners wanted SBD$1 million a year in rental for the use of the stream. About NZ$200K, AUD$175K, €100K, US$125K.



Sunday 21st June.

It’s Sunday evening, I’ve got over my anger about the Friday meeting, almost. Steve called in Saturday afternoon, I was in one of my anger displacement moods, the washing machine was going, I had bread rising, the floors were mopped, the music was on LOUD, Jonny Lang and early Jefferson Aiplane.

It took about 2 hours to get it to sound rational, I’m convinced now that SEB is not what VSA should be involved with. I’m meant to be doing all the catch phrase stuff, capacity building, promoting independence, strengthening employment, self determination, put the rest in whatever.

Instead, we have a situation where the person in charge, for all the good work that has been done, still considers the locals to be slightly deficient in ability, and totally incapable of being left on their own without the benevolent guiding hand of a white fella to keep it all under control. Oh for the days of Empire, when Britain ruled and the cute little fuzzy wuzzies were happy little children. I’ve been stewing all weekend over it, trying to write out something to give Steve for VSA.

I’ve got a work meeting in the morning, to let everyone know the current situation, by Friday I’ll have next months work roster drawn up, no free work, unless we have enough to cover the hours.

I’m trying to be positive about it all, caught up with David at work this morning, I know, it’s Sunday, but we both go in at weekends unpaid anyway, and told him again to talk about forming his own company with Tiffany and taking over the contracts next year when they come up.

On a more positive note, the scout camp at the gardens the weekend went well, they caught a small cuscus and kept it for me till this morning, so I finally got some pics of one. Very similar to a NZ possum, but with a log naked tail. Cute little thing, if it hadn’t bitten me as I was putting it back in the breadfruit tree I’d probably have liked it a lot more.

Another tourist got robbed in the Central Markets again last week, well, not in the Market proper, but the thieves ran into the Market, and when she caught up with them, they just laughed at her and walked away. Her watch and bag had been long disposed of or passed around before she caught up with them, so the Police couldn’t do anything without any real evidence. American student here doing a wild bird study for Dept of Conservation. Needless to say, there is another nail in the coffin of the fledgling tourist industry here.

The beggars and petty thefts are getting worse lately. I had another beggar track me for 3 days till he found my house. I’d seen him at the corner shop about Wednesday evening on my way home, then Thursday he was at the top corner of the road, waiting to see which way I turned I guess, then Friday he was further up the road at the Ba’hai turnoff, and Saturday he was doorknocking on my house asking for money for his sons school fees. With the usual story about how the last white person that lived here used to give him the money for carvings etc, and wanting $700 for this terms fees. I finally got rid of him, but he’s not convinced I’m here on volunteers income, and not RAMSI or Consultants wages. It’s becoming worse in town now, I try to get my shopping done and get out as fast as possible. Too many people just standing around watching where your wallet gets put, what goes into your bags etc. The good thing is being without a haircut for six months, I don’t look like any of the RAMSI or Consultants, and there are a few people I recognise on the streets as well. Still doesn’t feel safe though, especially Central Market.

To counter that though, the ANZ hole in the wall swallowed my card on Saturday morning, and refused to give it back, after hitting all the buttons, and saying a few choice words in pijin and english, with a bit of the gaelige thrown in, I walked off, got the truck and for some reason went back to see if by chance it had regurgitated my card. About 5 – 10 minutes I guess. I got there, and a woman who had been in the que came up, with my card, and said it had spat it out a little while after I left, and if I hadn’t come back, she was going to drop it into the bank on Monday. Restored my faith in everything again.

Steve feels it is only a matter of time before it all turns upside down again, next years elections may be the catalyst, or it may happen sooner. Unemployment in Honiara is 80% for the people under 25, no one has done a survey on the older people, the schools track pupils for some time after they leave, then it all get lost in the paperwork. Having continual power cuts, a dodgy water supply that isn’t always available, no real infrastructure, roads etc, and a lot of misused or ill advised aid provinces away from Honiara. It’s a lot safer out there than in this dysfunctional town.

If anyone reads the Solomon Star, www.solomonstarnews.com there is a good front page story about what happens here with intertribal murders for Saturdays edition. There was a man killed in Kabia Heights in Honiara last month, kwaso related, and the two families have been feuding ever since. It’s been settled with the payment of 45 heaps of shell money, and $20,000 cash from the Manafiu tribe on Malaita, to the Saena’a tribe of Kwara’ae as blood money to buy the debt of the murder. The person who killed the man is still in Rove Prison awaiting trial, but the feuding has stopped without anyone else being killed.

There’s a good pic of the heaps of shell money in the paper, I have no idea about the $ value, I’ll ask at work what each heap would be worth or could buy on Malaita. I know bride price can get to 100 heaps of shell money and over $30,000 in cash.. Weddings there if they are tribal, have “red” money payments. The Solomon $100 dollar note is red, and they get pinned up around the feast area for the wantok members to help themselves to, as a gift from the grooms family. The last wedding I heard about, about 2 months back, cost the groom $30,000, in “red” money alone for the feast, as well as the bride price paid to start with.

We had a group of Temotuan people go missing early this month. Eight of them, a couple of priests, and others sailing a traditional catamaran from Utuapa to Anuta when they lost a steering oar, and drifted under sail to Vanuatu. Good sized catamaran though, sleeping and cooking room on board, so they were reasonably ok for 15 days till they arrived in Vanuatu yesterday. It’s always funny to read about it here, it’s such a common occurrence, that there isn’t much written about it, no headlines screaming “Survivors of Ordeal” “15 days Lost At Sea Victims” etc. When you see the distances they sail or paddle in dugout canoes and the totally casual way of life here, they could be missing for months and still not get more than a slap from their partners for being late home with the fish.

I noticed on Savo how easy it is to sail to the other islands here. Although the islands proper are mostly below the horizon, even more so at sea level in a canoe, there is always a tall cumulous cloud over each bit of land, no matter the size. It’s just a matter of heading in the general direction using the current or wind, and you’ll strike land eventually

Thursday 18th June

Further to yesterdays fish and E-coli story. The fish sellers are now asking the Council and Government to provide them with other work, or let them carry on selling the fish as they won’t be able to support their families otherwise. Anywhere else I’ve lived, if anywhere had E-coli counts similar to what they found in Central Market, it would be closed and the proprietors hauled into court fairly quickly. Needless to say, the fish market is still flourishing, no signs up anywhere, and no evidence of a clean up.

But! Everyone is wearing face masks in Honiara because there might be a flu case in the hospital. Talk about panic scare tactics, it’s the flu, just a variant on the usual one, which kills about 10% of people anyway. It’s going to spread rapidly here though, everyone spits, shares cigarettes, betel nut, hygiene is noticeable by its absence.

I’d be more worried about cholera and typhoid spreading here than flu.

All the letters in the Solomon Star this week have been about the possible flu case, and how poorly prepared the Government are, and full of hearsay statements. One person was writing about the 100 people who have died in New Zealand from swine flu, and the hundreds in hospital in Australia, and the thousands killed by it so far. And there is no checking any “facts” given in the letters, so everyone here now thinks it is going to wipe out civilisation as we know it, and the stories get taller each day.

The initial description of it when it first broke out was that it was a combination of swine fever, avian flu and human flu, which makes me think someone with too much time on their hands in a lab somewhere decided to have a play with a petri dish and combined all 3 to see what would happen.

As Arthur Dent said, you could put a big red button in the deepest most remote mine shaft, seal the entrance, paint a huge red sign with “Danger, Pressing this Button Will Cause the End of the World” and the paint wouldn’t have a chance to dry before some idiot was pressing it. Or it may have been Ford Prefect, I haven’t got a copy of Hitchhikers Guide here.

I remember when SARS was the big scare, I flew out of Heathrow back to NZ in 2003, had a shower in Heathrow before leaving, got back to NZ 30 hours later with a bit of a temp. Finally went to the Doc 2 days later, and got quarantined at home for 2 weeks. It wasn’t SARS, they figured it was most likely Legionnaires Disease from the water or the airconditioning in the bathrooms at Heathrow. And I felt like death warmed up at the time.

I’m up to the bored and depressed stage again with everything here. Despite all the good intentions, the Rove Prison Garden still isn’t finished, due to a dispute between the people at Rove, and the ones at the Prison Farm in Tetere. Rove has a mix of people from every province, and somehow the Prison Farm has ended up with only Gualies (people from Guadacanal) there. And there is still a bit of a feud going on. Trying to get soil for the gardens at Rove is turning into a lesson in Island politics. We can’t send up anyone that isn’t a Gualie, Guard or prisoner, and David is trying to juggle staff and trusted prisoners around to get up there. Another day of waiting, I’m getting used to it slowly. I’d like to get the front garden finished finally, so the guys can have a week off, and I can get back to my own work. It’s been a good job, interesting and funny, and talking to the inmates has been interesting.

The power cuts are still happening, more sporadically this week, no set times, or length. There was a letter in the Solomon Star today about a UN Aid Meeting with some overseas investors at King Solomon Hotel. All set up, projectors, computers, all set for a 2 hour power point session, when the power went off. One of the locals was asked if this was common. He had to answer and say it was everyday, for unspecified times, and had been like this for a couple of months now. Needless to say, the investors will be having second thoughts about any business set up here.

The power went off at work at 12 today, till 2.30 pm, then off again at 4 pm. I’d hate to have any manufacturing business here, you’d have the staff just standing around for half the work day.

I need to find more positive stuff to write about! Reading back over the last few weeks it sounds like a whole lot of gripes.

The weather is still good, hot, dryish mostly, a few showers, but not the heavy torrential stuff from a month or so back. It’s dusty and dry through town, the guys have been out with the water tank on the truck 3 times at night this week, watering the tubs. Our bamboo climbing frames for the bougainvillea have been a bit depleted, we’ve lost 4 so far this week.

Wednesday 17th June

No motor, they paddled about 4 miles to get back to Savo

I should really get used to deadlines and schedules meaning different things here. The soil never arrived for the Rove Prison Garden, the power kept going off for an hour at a time every hour, so we haven’t managed to get the Japanese proposal readjusted. The truck had a flat tyre, and of course its the front, and we don’t have a spare for it since the last one was stolen.

Maelyn and I walked into work this morning, sent the work truck back to collect the wheel and get it repaired, which took all day as the tyre was split, and the only similar size was at the other end of the island.

If I’ve been sceptical about buying fish at the markets, I’m even more so now. The Health Dept here finally went through the fish sellers area, testing for bacteria. The average E-coli count on the fish was 7,000ppm and up to 8,000ppm, the water in the ice bins was over 10,000ppm, on the tables it was about 8,000ppm. It would be safer to get fish out of the toilet bowl than from there, add in the constant 30*C temperature and it’s a wonder we don’t have more typhoid and cholera cases in Honiara. And being typical Solomon Islands bureaucracy they haven’t closed the fish sellers, just issued a warning about cooking the fish as they don’t want the market people to lose any money.

It wasn’t just the fresh fish, the cooked smoked fish, and a lot of the other prepared food there was the same.

I’m waiting for a sea water test to be done on the beaches around Honiara next. There isn’t any sewage treatment here, it’s septic tanks and the overflow goes into the streams, then into the sea. And some of the poorer squatter settlements don’t have septic tanks, just straight pipes into the river or seashore.

But we have enough development money for a bloody rugby stadium, 3 new shopping malls being completed now, and plans for high rise retail and office blocks in the centre. Which highlights the problem when countries want their development money to go into what they think we want here, with the Japanese it’s buildings, and the bigger the better, the Chinese are the same, millions of dollars going into retail shops and offices, not into stuff we really need like a water supply that isn’t contaminated, sewage treatment, and rubbish collection and disposal.

A really good earthquake is what we really need, so we can start all over from scratch again.

Rove Prison Garden is looking good, the part we have planted so far. All the Duranta are still standing up, not wilting. In another month or so it will gradually fill out and be really good. I have no idea what colour the hibiscus will be. Going off the leaves, there are a few rosa sinensis, which should come out red, possibly a couple of yellow, and a white in the others. I’ll be making a few changes once the nursery gets upgraded, we need to have the hibiscus and the bougainvillea sorted so we know where each cutting is taken from, and also work out what variety we have of each.

The next Level 2 Class starts next month, I’m going to spend the next 2 weeks rewriting all the class handouts, and adding a lot more information. Provided I can get internet access for downloading more info.

Tuesday 16th June

Weaving pattern around post Savo Island
Dolphin jumping

Boy with dugout canoe Savo Island

Boy with coconuts Savo Island

Monday 15th June

Quiet weekend on Savo, the fishing wasn’t all that good, well, not for me anyway. I had the place to myself for Thursday. Alan wasn’t there, he was back in Honiara with the official Government function for Queens Birthday weekend here, so consequently the orchid collecting didn’t happen. Never mind, another reason to go back next month, although I’ll have to watch the budget a lot better till then.

Saturday Eileen and David arrived, retired couple from Australia, Eileen is English, David is pure Australian. Originally from Melbourne, settled just back of the Gold Coast on their farm now. Nice couple, interesting to talk to. They met in Italy 40 something years ago, in a hostel, then David arrived on Eileens doorstep in England a couple of months later, and they were married a short time later. Eileen writes travel articles, they won the trip to the Solomons from an article she wrote.

Remind me never to invite an Australian along fishing. David and I went out Friday afternoon, rather choppy sea, we travelled around the whole island, before we spotted a few frigate birds circling, dropped the lines over, and David hooked up with a good sized Bonito straightaway. It must have been the only fish out travelling that day, I never got a nibble, and David was in the same position. They went on the short volcano walk Saturday morning as well, and the boat boy decided to borrow one of the villagers from there for Sunday to be the fishing guide.

It got a bit full at the Lodge Saturday, 2 ladies from the UN Aids Council, travelling the Solomons trying to ascertain the level of involvement and what is needed here, and Woody, originally from the Ozarks, more lately from New Orleans, travelling around looking for somewhere. Nice guy, he put up with the GWB jokes, and gave as good as he got. David and I tried explaining AFL (Australian Rules) to him, till we decided he was totally confused, so we had a few more beers.

Went out again Saturday, spent 5 or 6 hours drifting the north coast, in 120 – 150 metre water. I never got a single nibble, our village guide pulled up a few red emperor, golden snapper, and coral trout, till I decided it was time to call it a day. I was a tad sunburnt by then as well, about time I got some sun on me anyway, it’s already gone to my usual dark brownish colour finally. Another few days at the beach on this side and it might last me a while.

Sunday we all had a lazy beach day, the 2 girls from the UN went to see the megapod bird nests, David, Eileen and I spent the afternoon making a bit of a space in the SolBrew bottles.

The dolphins put on a display for us early this morning. I was down by the water about 6 am with my morning coffee and cigarette, when the whole pod came close into shore and started jumping and chasing the small school fish. I got a few good pics.

Saturday night had the most terrific thunderstorm right over Savo. It was like having a train coming across in stereo, a long low rumble, then an almighty crack right over head, followed by a slow rumble fading away to the north. It was loud enough to rattle the beds and door frames. From about 1 am till 4 am. The lightning was spectacular from the top balcony over the sea and the Russel Islands.

Tuesday 16th June

I have little recollection of writing the above. I know I wrote it, but I don’t remember. I crashed asleep about 8 pm last night, gave up waiting for a shower, no water as usual in the evening till late. The guys at the prison had the garden beds all ready yesterday, so I spent most of Monday there getting them to re-dig some of the patches where they had only just scraped the soil a bit, and not broken the hardpan underneath. As they found out today when it came to planting, they had to get the iron bar out to break up the hard pan to set the plants in deep enough. Only in one bed, the one I left for them to do on Friday. Now they know what I meant about digging the soil over to start with. Still it was good, it really mixed the compost and farm soil through.

We planted the Gardenias, Hibiscus and Duranta today, all the holes were dug yesterday, and a trench made for the Duranta border, so it went quite fast for planting. David (Prison Supervisor) is really pleased with it, and the guys are more than happy with the result. David is pleased because now he can get some of the younger juvenile prisoners out on work release to the Kukum SICCHE training centre during the afternoon when it is free.

As I said to him today, we’ll end up with people trying to get into Rove Prison soon so they can go on training courses.

We’re getting a lot of secondary school kids up at the Gardens lately, midyear exams are coming up, and they are being sent up to us for information because the schools have no text books, or internet access. I’ve had questions from common weeds to propagating native plants, and geology/soil makeup, ecology, pollution effects on the gardens. I’ll have something to do when I get back to New Zealand if VSA want me to, go around to all the schools and ask for old text books to send here. The few books I bought with me are always out being used lately, the magazines Rose sent are being passed around and read by everyone, which leads to more questions about what other countries look like. Then everyone wants to go visit or work in them.
I’m pleased I put all my pics onto disc and bought them here, everyone now knows what Ireland, Australia, parts of Virginia and Alaska look like, plus a lot of New Zealand. It’s a good way of keeping everyones attention for a couple of hours.

I’ll have to start working on a set of pictures of the schools here to use for presentations.


Tiffany and I took the Japanese Grass Roots Funding application back in today. Tiffany has spent a huge amount of time on it as usual, and we’ve still got more to alter again in it. Because the building has been altered to take an office and classroom, it pushed the cost over the limit, so now it’s a matter of going through, taking out everything we can make do without, just to keep the building. We’ll go through it all tomorrow morning, and try to have it back to them by Thursday. There’s a meeting with Keithie on Friday, and she’ll be wanting us to get the UN Funding application started straightaway. As well as asking why we haven’t got the British High Commission application done and in. It would be nice if that was all we were working on, but the normal work still has to get done inbetween all the running around getting quotes and invoices.

This wasn’t posted yesterday, I couldn’t get internet access all day, when I was in the office, so hopefully it will improve tomorrow morning. If you’re reading this then I had success.