Some places on this earth face the unique phenomenon of having been frozen in time. Whether it be a small collection of huts deep in the Amazon rainforest, a small town on the great plains of North America, a remote village in Africa, a quaint little country village in Europe, or an isolated village in a remote corner of Papua New Guinea. In these places it seems that at some point in time, for no particular reason, the clock stopped moving. You can go to these places and see what life may have been like decades, or even centuries, ago. Of course it may not seem that way to the inhabitants of those places, but from an outsider’s perspective it feels like you found a key to a time machine. That is certainly the way I felt recently.
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| Kaiam village and airstrip |
Having arrived in PNG in March to work as a pilot with Mission Aviation Fellowship, I had the opportunity to go and live in a remote village for one week as part of my language training and cultural orientation. An MAF volunteer, Samuel Haab, also went with me. We were fortunate to be able to spend the week with the people of Kaiam, which is located northwest of Mount Hagen and on the northern edge of the PNG highlands. On April 12th we flew to the Kaiam airstrip and were greeted by the few families that live in the immediate area. Then we watched with detached fascination, and a little anxiety, as the plane flew off and left us to manage as best we could with our limited understanding of the Tok Pisin language.
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Kaiam airstrip during its building phase
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The story of Kaiam, its people, and its airstrip is certainly an interesting one. The story of the airstrip, from marking it out to its first landing, had taken 15 years of back-breaking toil for the Lutz family and every member of the community. The late Doctor Steve Lutz, Wapenamanda-based Gutnius Lutheran missionary, marked the centre line with his family back in 2000. He sadly never got to see the finished result, so for his wife Julie and son Anton it was an emotional moment on the 10th of February 2015 when an MAF plane made the first landing at Kaiam. Sebastian Kurz, one of the MAF pilots on that first landing, explains just what the new airstrip means to the community; “I knew that it was special for the people in Kaiam to see a fixed wing aeroplane landing for the first time, but I hadn't any idea how extraordinarily special it was for them. I have been there several times now and only slowly do I get a glimpse of what it means for those people to have access to the outside world through this airstrip. They were totally excited and tried to explain bits and pieces of history. Sebastian continues, “They had to travel down the Kaiam and Karawari Rivers if they wanted to go to the next airstrip at Munduku. This journey took them two days and was very exhausting. It was especially critical in medical emergencies. If they wanted to evacuate somebody they had to charter a chopper, which cost them a fortune.” Along with the airstrip there is a small aid post overseen by Yapis Petro, the local MAF agent, and supplied by the Gutnius Lutheran mission at Wapenamanda.
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| Yapis Petro in his garden |
Even with the airstrip, Kaiam and its people are still very isolated. So much so that they do not have any significant avenues with which to earn income. They are forced into subsistence living and taking what they can from the jungle. Whether it’s saksak, a food made from the sago palm, or bananas, or hunting wild pig, all the food they have is taken from the jungle, and if they can’t get food from the jungle then they go hungry. If they can manage to collect some money to buy supplies from Wewak or Mount Hagen, they must still have it flown in, or else travel three days downriver to the nearest road and bring it by canoe. To earn a little money, each family searches for gold in the Kaiam River using a small improvised sluice made from tree bark. However, they work for hours to only find a fraction of a gram of gold. But that gold only has value if they can sell it, which is almost impossible in the middle of the jungle. And so they live virtually disconnected from the outside world.
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| Gold panning in the river |
During our week in Kaiam, Samuel and I had the unique opportunity to see a side of PNG that most people never get to see. We toured the village, talked with the people, ate with the people, worshipped God together at their small church and went on walkabouts into the jungle surrounding the village. We saw how they build houses, grow gardens, and how they pan for gold. The most striking aspect that we witnessed was how grateful they are to have the help of MAF and other missionaries. But also how desperate they are not to be forgotten by the world.
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Sitting and talking with some of the local men
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Even being in a remote corner of PNG, Kaiam and its people are in some ways more connected than hundreds, if not thousands, of other villages, simply because they have an airstrip. Many other villages that do not have airstrips are extremely isolated, and in many ways forgotten by the world. Kaiam, and other villages like it, may be forgotten by the world, but they are not forgotten by Jesus and His church!
Thank you for all you support,
Ryan
More Info:
www.mafc.org
http://maf-papuanewguinea.org/
https://www.facebook.com/groups/281213732064928/
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