I did not see them and only heard about the ‘koneakali’, the red skinned men, who had come to other parts of Kandep.

Based on information provided by my parents, I calculate that I was between three and five years old in 1958, when the first census was conducted by Australian colonial government kiaps (patrol officers) at Kalimanga village.

My people - the Korotep and Aimbarep tribesmen – were assembled at Kalimanga to record their names.

Much later, I was told that it took about three days to record the details of all our tribesmen, who live from the base of Kondo Kana all the way up to Last Wert in the foothills of the Mt Sugarloaf range.

We numbered more than 14 council wards in the Mariant local government area. When I began going to school, I discovered there were many other tribes in Kandep.

The people were divided into three distinct cultural groups: Mariant, Lai and Wage – and they were the census divisions.

Although we speak the same Enga language, pronunciation, traditional dress and other aspects of culture were different.

We Mariant people had cultural ties with people in the Western Highlands and Mendi in the Southern Highlands.

The Wage people spoke the Huli language and dressed like Huli wigmen of Hela Province. The people in the Lai census division were more like people from Laiagam, with their mushroom shaped human-hair wigs and all.

In 1972, when I attended St Paul’s Lutheran High School at Pausa, I discovered that students from Wapenamanda, Wabag and Kompiam spoke the Enga language as everybody else did but our pronunciations of particular words differed much like Americans and British speaking English.

And I observed that students from Porgera spoke and acted the same way as people from Wage in Kandep.

In that same year, I saw much more cultural diversity at the world-famous Mt Hagen Cultural Show.

I kept close to where the Kandep people camped in case I got lost in the crowd.

It was in Mt Hagen that I first saw, and touched, the thick hide of an elephant, whose name was Jumbo. I was amazed at its enormous strength when it pulled huge logs across the main arena.

In 1974, after two years at Pausa, I transferred to Lae Technical College.

There I saw students from virtually every corner of Papua New Guinea. Jet black students from Bougainville, light skinned students from Central, blonde-haired students from Rabaul, very tall students from Kerema and Daru, the stocky highlanders and other kinds of students.

The Morobe Agricultural Show presented more cultural diversity. It was here the first time I saw local cowboys on horseback.

The following year, 1975, we students who took the electrical trade subjects were transferred to Port Moresby Technical College. But we had no technical instructors.

Nevertheless I was exposed to more of my country’s cultural diversity – at the college, on the streets of Port Moresby and at the cultural show at Moitaka near the police training college at Bomana.

The delicately clad Mekeo dancers and Milne Bay tapioka dancers were my favourite groups to watch.

What I hadn’t seen in Mt Hagen, Lae or in Port Moresby, however, was the diversity of PNG’s cultural beliefs and practices: the different rituals, ways of preparing food, courting sessions, marriage ceremonies and youth initiation ceremonies.

I began to read about our cultural practices. In our 1975 school yearbook, I read about one such ritual, a painful youth initiation ceremony in the Sepik.

I still have my copy of this yearbook from 50 years ago. I hope that the Form 4 student who wrote it, Thomas Kapai, or his children, could read about the ritual which I reproduce here.

‘The Initiation’ is the title of Thomas Kapai’s article. He was from somewhere in the Sepik and I didn’t know him but we graduated together in 1975.

I reproduce this article with one of my own classmates in mind. The late Martin Trei, from East Sepik Province, had died from heart disease. The evening before, he’d been running around the playing field when he vomited blood. Martin was taken to hospital but died some days later.

Five of us from our class went to Port Moresby General Hospital to wrap his body in sheets we brought with us. We placed our friend’s body in the morgue before it was taken home to the Sepik for burial.

Anyway, here is the article by Thomas Kapai.

Papua New Guinea is composed of hundreds of villages. Almost every village has its own customs. A number of villages speak the same language and these villages have the same customs in common, as in my area’s case, which I would like to discuss.

In my area there are about forty villages which speak the same language and most of our customs are very similar. We have a custom which is entirely different from all of the villages in PNG.

It is an initiation ceremony, unlike all initiation ceremonies conducted in this country. In this ceremony it is the duty of the boy’s uncles to look after the well-being of the boys.

Before the boys can be taken into the haus tambaran or spirit home, permission must be obtained from the boy’s fathers because this ceremony involves lots of hard work and these days, lots of money.

When the permission is given the boys can be taken into the haus tambaran. Inside the boys are then laid on their stomachs on the bottom of canoes.

Then two poles are put on each boy, one across his neck and one across his legs and four men sit on each end of the poles. This is to prevent the boys from jumping up and down while the initiation is carried on.

When the boys are firmly held, the initiation starts by shaving the boy’s hair off. Then the real thing begins with three to four men at a boy with brand new razor blades.

These men must have at least two packets of razor blades because they have to change the blades every now and then. In the olden days, they used sharp pieces of bamboo.

The maximum depth of the cuts is about one and a half centimeters and the length one centimeter. The men who do the job usually put their blades three times in the same place so that when the sore dries up the mark will be very firm, like the breast of a very young girl.

While the cutting is going on all the people inside the haus tambaran make tremendous noises to drown the cries of the boys.

If anybody dies during the ceremony it will be a very big secret until the day they are released. On that day of release the first boy in the line will carry the unfortunate one’s head on a tray.

By the time the dreadful business is over the boys are almost dead. They lie there like logs covered with sticky blood. The cutting normally goes on for thirty to forty minutes.

Then the boys are lifted onto their uncles’ shoulders and are carried to a creek or a river. When the boys are being carried to the water, the women and uninitiated are forbidden to see them. If anyone is caught spying, he or she will be in serious trouble.

When the boys hit the water, they come to life again. The blood is then thoroughly washed away and the boys are taken back to the haus tambaran where they stay awake all night.

For a couple of days, the boys do not eat very much but after a week they are expected to eat as much as they like.

The miraculous thing is that the sore usually dries up in about two weeks. Some of you might think that some sort of medicine is being used to cure the sore but nothing is used except red clay and a black liquid that comes out of a certain tree.

They do not release the boys as soon as their sores are dry. They usually keep them for another three weeks or so. In the olden days they usually kept them for up to two years.

From the time the boys enter the haus tambaran until about three months after, the boys are not allowed to sleep on their backs. Every morning the boys are inspected to see that no boys have slept on their backs.

During the initiation period the boys wear nothing, they walk naked, sleep naked. From the day the boys enter the haus tambaran, they are in the custody of their uncles until the day they are released.

When the boys are released, they can get married anytime they want to. Now they are regarded as men and not boys anymore.

In conclusion, I would like to say that readers might say that this is more than an initiation, but to us it’s just the same as any other initiation. It is also another way of finding out who is brave and who is a coward and also the only way we can prove that we are men and not boys.

– Written by Thomas Kapai, 4F, Port Moresby Technical College, 1975

Papua New Guinea was initiated on 1 December 1973 for self-government and declared a man on 16 September 1975.

How the country has conducted itself is reflected on the living conditions of our people. If we have suffered, let it be like the scars on the bodies of the young men who underwent the bloody, painful and dangerous initiation ritual.

If tribal warfare, deep-rooted corruption in government, sorcery related killings and other such menaces have been like the sharp razor blades that cut deep into the skins of the young initiates, let us all, our political leaders included, change our mindsets, make amends, be thankful to the fertile soil on which we stand on, breath in the fresh air and make decisions for ourselves, our women and children and for our country to prosper in peace and unity in the next fifty years and beyond.

Footnote

If you’ve enjoyed this special independence story, watch for more articles from the past recorded in four books, copies of which I still have – the Pomtech 1975 Yearbook, Faces and Voices of Papua New Guinea, Shaping the Future and the UPNG Enga Students Association Yearbooks.