DISCOVERY: Part 3 - The Trip ( Korombaro, E.H.P)
We’ve arrived at the base of the mountain in the Watabung district and it’s raining. There’s some bustling going on around us and I’m unaware of what’s going on as I can’t understand the language (s) unless they speak in Tok Pisin. It’s starting raining even more and some of the locals express worry about us ascending the mountain. They’ve kindly put us in someone’s hut near the roadside to keep dry and suddenly a church pastor emerges to pray for our journey. I’m thinking - ‘ok so we need prayers now ? How hard is this mountain going to be?’. My mother relays to us that it is necessary as the mountain has a life of its own and it can make it extremely difficult and somewhat teacherous for newcomers to climb. Following the pastor, a few men emerged with freshly cut walking sticks which they handed to us to support us through the journey. I’m quite often impressed at the swiftness of word of mouth as a legitimate mode of communication in PNG, especially in the Highlands.
This goes back thousands of years with our people being able to do the Highlands yodel from mountain to mountain (my mother’s birth was announced to the village this way apparently). There’s not so much yodelling in these modern times especially with the introduction of mobile phones ( I say yodelling but it’s more of a highly audible and skilful throwing of one’s voice over a significantly great distance) but Highlanders are still masters of the art of word of mouth. It seemed news of our arrival travelled up no differently. Up these rugged mountains it travelled and the news was that their prodigal daughter Miriam Ese Murphy nee Gatau (my mother) was bringing her ‘kids’ back to the mountain - ready the way, clean the graves of our ancestors and tell everyone at the very top of Wenamo.
***
When there seemed a break in the rain, we were ushered out of our borrowed shelter. It felt that we’d been there for an hour or so, probably less as time moves very slow when you’re not connected to your phone. There is no reception up there so our only source of entertainment were card games and if that got tedious, staring into the distance of that dark hut listening for any changes in outside noises like footsteps heading towards us, the arrival of a new voice that might have more information about our trip or the rain easing up. All three of those things eventually occurred and before we knew it, we were on our way.
Not long into it, I’m already panting like a hound and though we had all started together, the group starts to separate out and the agile ones move ahead while us slower ones hang back and try to mask to our spotters how deeply devastated our bodies feel at what we’re putting them through.
***
Just as I am about to die my first death of many on that climb, I am relieved from my demise by the slowing down of the procession. There’s a bottle neck at a small clearing in the grass off the trail and two men who I am told are somehow related to my mum are standing in the middle of the clearing like they are waiting to be transmitted to another dimension. One is holding a live chicken under his arm and the other what looked like a few blades of kunai grass (a grass quite prevalent all over PNG). When everyone had caught up, the man with the kunai grass began to yammer off in language towards someone that no one could see. It became clear via whispers being passed around like classified in-class notes that he was speaking to some sort of spiritual entity and so we grew quiet. It was almost like we were at an official check point where, just like any other check point in any other country, the appropriate protocols need to be established with the gatekeepers before one can proceed. In this case, the gatekeepers were of the metaphysical realm and through the generations, the Kemanimo people (my tribe) have always recognised these specific points along the mountain as having spiritual occupants that must be shown the right amount of respect. And you definitely don’t want to be showing any less than the right amount.
***
After the appropriate announcements to the ‘residents’ are made, our human cavalcade recommences and I’m quietly relieved that the chicken is still alive though it’s hardly making a sound as if it knows something I don’t know.
The hike is slow and long though I imagine like most trips would seem the opposite if you’d travelled it before. But in this situation, there is nothing familiar about these landmarks that I can hang my hope of near arrival on and my mind is in a constant torment of ‘are we there yet?’s. Thankfully it is overcast and we are assisted by a few local young men who help with our gear and make sure we don’t fall off the side of a cliff.
I’m not sure what time it is when we arrive at our first summit but it’s definitely in the afternoon and it’s in the village of Korombaro. As usual, there’s commotion upon our arrival and many sighs of “that wasn’t so bad!” are heard between our crew as unbeknownst to us this was just where we were going to rest for the night and then continue the next morning. Our gear is piled into another hut, one belonging to another relative I’d only met on this trip and our hiking sticks leaned up against a tree ready for tomorrow’s leg.
My Dedi Da and the man with the blades of kunai grass who had completed our first spiritual protocol made a few announcements to the village about our purpose for coming. And then without warning (as it got lost in translation I suppose) that cute alive (quietly terrified) chicken along with another one were beheaded in front of us all as a sacrifice to a new community of unfleshly dwellers. Blood sprayed all over their white feathers and onto the orange earth as they convulsed in the hands of the executers, their butchered heads still gasping for air somewhere on the dirt floor where they had become detached from their bodies; flies started to circle and a mongrel village dog tries to intercept the sacrifice of the day. With a few last kicks of life, the chickens surrender to death and are further dismembered and placed somewhere secret on the mountain where the unseen can partake of them and be satisfied.
***
The temperature has dropped as the afternoon wares on and so we retire early to the hut we have been kindly loaned for the night. There we can huddle around a fire together and find warmth. It’s been a HUGE day. Everyone is tired and all the senses are weary.
As it was in Lisimo when we first arrived in Goroka a few days prior, separate sleeping quarters where one would hope to disappear to sort reprieve is a luxury. Here, you sit together, eat together, sleep together, talk together and you listen. And even though the hut was full, more family would trickle in to greet us, some smiling and some wailing because of the shock of seeing my mother not a girl anymore. Karuka nuts were thrown on the fire as well as a full kettle of tea. At one point some old men broke out into a chant (I wish I still had that footage because it was staggering to say the least) but for the most part we sat non verbal as we listened to that low drawl of language being exchanged. It became almost meditative, at least for me.
(Photos by Dan Segal & Emele Ugavule)