by Jake Avila
Sura looked up from her tablet and smiled. ‘It’s so good to get your advice, Rob. Normally I just read scripts and present.’
Given their massive budget, it seemed strange they hadn’t bothered to bring a professional director or writer along, but he nodded politely.
‘Of course, the story will be shaped by how far we penetrate, and what we discover. I’m optimistic we’re going to get some amazing footage. But in an uncharted cave like the Hoosenbeck, our expectations need to fall within the limits of our equipment and experience.’
Sura looked up from her tablet. ‘You’re talking about Jaap, aren’t you?’
‘I’m afraid he’s out of his depth.’
‘He means well, Rob. And he’s very brave and strong.’
‘Unfortunately, that means little in an underwater cave. Caution born of experience and training, and a comprehensive understanding of physiology and psychology, are what keep you alive.’
Looking pensive, she twirled her empty bottle around.
‘You do need a second camera, though, don’t you?’
‘Yes. Jaap will be essential for establishing shots, ferrying gear, and setting up lights for key scenes, but he needs to understand I’m not interested in having a chest-beating competition every time I make a decision.’
‘I quite understand.’ She blinked slowly before focusing on him. ‘Don’t worry, Rob, I shall make Jaap clear about his role.’
‘And Goki?’ Here he watched her carefully. ‘Where does he fit in to all of this?’
‘Goki?’ She seemed puzzled. ‘Our producer is a man of few words, but he writes the cheques, so we have to work with him as best we can.’
The answer was defensive, and Nash got the feeling he’d pushed her far enough for one night.
‘Fair enough.’ He flipped open a pad and picked up the pen. ‘Shall we begin?’
They worked for two hours until Nash was reasonably satisfied that they had a basic plan for the penetration, but he still couldn’t reconcile Sura’s lack of preparation. Beyond taking a whole bunch of footage and stringing a story together later, he figured they’d had no plan whatsoever.
‘Your problem is you think the rest of the world cares about details as much as you do,’ Douglas advised over a beer afterwards. ‘Don’t overthink it.’ He gave a low chuckle. ‘Tell me, do you think Sura prefers it on top with big ol’ Boerman? Because she sure as hell wears the pants.’
Chapter 14
Mia clutched her bags as the border settlement loomed into view. It had been a tense forty minute journey from Jayapura; the young Indonesian driver seemed hell-bent on pushing his decrepit minivan to the limit on the many hairpin bends, and although there was no tail to speak of, she was unable to shake the feeling of being watched.
They squealed to a halt at the border post complex, and Mia stepped out into simmering midday heat. Thankfully, it was busy; a large crowd of day trippers from PNG were eagerly buying up Indonesian goods at a road market – mostly cheap plastics – and Mia gratefully merged with the garrulous throng. Her long blond hair was hidden by a green bandana, a large pair of sunglasses and a wide-brimmed straw hat covered most of her face. Baggy grey hiking pants, heavy boots and a long khaki shirt helped disguise her figure.
Approaching the Kantor Immigrasi, her pulse was elevated, and her mouth bone-dry.
Calm down, she told herself. Even if they suspect where you’re going, they cant stop you.
When it was her turn, a bored-looking officer merely glanced at her passport and waved her through without even checking his computer screen. Feeling slightly stupid, she walked on wobbly knees across a no-man’s-land of mown grass to the Papua New Guinea checkpoint. Here a group of customs agents with brightly coloured bird of paradise shoulder patches waited beside a battered plastic table.
A plump man with a shock of frizzy white hair took her passport and scanned the details of her brand-new tourist visa. Fortunately, the clerk at the PNG embassy in Jayapura had accepted a hundred-dollar bribe to expedite it, saving her a week-long wait.
‘What is the nature of your business in PNG?’ The agent’s eyes were fixed on her chest as he spoke.
‘I’m going to visit Wewak,’ she replied. ‘And take a cruise on the Sepik.’
‘A woman travelling alone is very dangerous.’ The man wet his lips as the other two agents placed everything from her bags on the table, including her underwear. He made a great show of pointing out that her tourist visa was single entry. ‘Wouldn’t a repeat be prudent?’
Mia paid a small sum for the unnecessary stamp, to be quickly on her way.
‘Have a nice trip.’ He flashed an expensive gold-toothed smile.
Such corruption had shocked her when she first came to Papua, but Paul had put it in perspective in his inimitable way.
‘My dear Mia, you earn more in half an hour than most people here do in a month. Why not embrace it as a harmless visitor tax?’
Remembering his common-sense approach to life, she smiled. Paul had made her a better doctor in so many ways. As she’d tried to explain to her mom and dad, both general practitioners in Connecticut, it went beyond diagnosis and treatment. Paul’s patients loved him because he really listened and cared about them beyond the duration of their appointments, and it was a major contributor to their health outcomes.
Mia made her way through the customs building to a car park framed by thick palm trees. An assortment of dilapidated cars and utes, known locally as PMVs – public motor vehicles – were waiting to ferry people to the coastal town of Vanimo, an hour away.
She rejected more modern air-conditioned 4WDs because of the way their drivers stared at her, and found a dilapidated van with several women and children already on board. The elderly driver quoted fifteen kina, a little under five US dollars. After stowing her large bag in the cargo bay, she climbed in and found two empty seats in the middle.
A little boy sitting in front of her turned around to peer shyly with big brown eyes. He was a cutie, with a shock of wiry red-brown hair and big round cheeks.
Mia raised one eyebrow. ‘Husat nem bilong yu?’
He giggled, and his mother, resplendent in a bright yellow T-shirt, turned around with a big smile.
‘Dispela nem, Joseph.’
‘Joseph, namba wan!’
Mia offered him a high five, which he smacked with delight.
The boy’s mother introduced herself as Mandy. Impressed with Mia’s pidgin, she offered her a banana.
‘Tenku tumas.’
In truth, Pidgin was easy to learn, although its limited vocabulary could be frustrating when trying to explain complex conditions to patients. Paul had taught her how to use metaphors and analogies. Her favourite was for rheumatoid arthritis: Bun paia bilong yu pait bodi. ‘Bone fire is your body fighting itself.’ The next challenge was to persuade them it was no one else’s fault!
It was a relief to get underway, for the humidity and redolent stench of durian fruit inside the cargo bay was suffocating. From her open window, Mia stared out at the vista unfolding. On her left sparkling blue water lapped at deserted idyllic palm-fringed sandy beaches, bisected by rocky headlands topped in lush tropical jungle, while on her right was a mysterious bulwark of green, the edge of a great forest that had once stretched almost unbroken for 1000 kilometres to the southern shore of the island. Now logging, mostly from Malaysian interests, was steadily reducing the great forests to a patchwork.
Nonetheless, the contrast with chilly, congested and completely tamed Connecticut was profound. New Guinea was a steamy, fecund world where physical geography still dominated, where people were more alive. You could see it in their body language and open expressions, their take-it-or-leave it approach to structured time. Mia knew her attraction to this place was partly a grass-is-greener paean to Rousseau’s noble savage, that desire to get back to nature, which so many burned-out Westerners pined for at some point in their holidays. But reality here was often brutal and cruel. At least as a
doctor, she had a valid reason to stay.
The van slowed suddenly for a crude roadblock comprised of a single palm trunk and two rusty oil drums. It was manned by a handful of men in rough patched uniforms. Parked on the verge was their battered-looking truck.
It seemed an odd place for a checkpoint.
‘Soldia?’ Mia asked.
Mandy pulled her son in tightly.
‘Nogut soldia.’
A grim-looking man with a thick beard and a shell necklace approached the driver’s window.
‘Halo, bos.’ The old driver nodded obsequiously.
Mia slipped down in her seat as the bearded man scanned them with ganja-clouded eyes. His wide flat nose and flared nostrils enhanced his aggressive appearance.
‘Westap bilong yu taksi pemit?’ he demanded.
The driver handed over his taxi licence and the bearded man made a show of examining it.
‘Pemit nogut,’ he announced. ‘Olgeta offim. Dispela oda.’
Nobody on the van made a move to comply. The driver protested his licence was current and offered ten kina, then twenty, and finally thirty. The bearded man flatly rejected this, and his men muttered as their knuckles grew white on machete handles. Mia hastily tapped Mandy on the shoulder and passed her two fifty-kina notes.
‘Plis givim draiva.’
Mandy leaned forward to slip it to the driver, who quickly thrust it through the window. Clearly this was the kind of bribe the men were after, but with their blood up, would they accept it? Tense seconds passed before the leader shrugged and waved at his men.
‘Orait. Koan, hariap!’
All smiles, the men lifted the barrier and let them proceed. Everyone began to chat again inside the van.
It was a reminder of how quickly moods changed here.
At Vanimo, Mia went straight to the airport and bought a ticket for the furthest destination possible up the Sepik that week – the small village of Timbunke, some 300 kilometres distant. It wasn’t anywhere near the border, but she knew small tourist cruise ships called in, and there were always fishermen with motorised canoes.
It was stinking hot in the crowded Cessna Caravan. Wedged in between a young Italian nun and an old woman carrying a live chicken, Mia undid her bandana and opened the top of her shirt. The roar of the single prop made conversation impossible, and she fell into a stupor. In fact, she did not wake until they were bumping across Timbunke’s grass airstrip.
‘Are you all right?’ the nun asked when at last the engine shut down. ‘You were calling out in your sleep.’
‘It must have been a dream,’ Mia apologised. ‘I’ve come a long way.’
Outside, a large group of men was waiting to meet the plane. The nun turned to Mia with concerned grey eyes.
‘There is no hotel in town. Where will you stay?’
Mia gratefully accepted Sister Sofia’s invitation to stay the night at the Catholic mission where she worked.
Kevin, the middle-aged Australian mission manager who picked them up, was less welcoming, and muttered something about tourists. After heaving Mia’s luggage into the back of the old green Land Rover, he drove them down a muddy track. Children playing in flanking palm groves waved cheerfully and Sister Sofia waved back.
‘So innocent, so sweet,’ she sighed, making Mia wonder if she was hankering for children of her own.
‘I caught that one in the petrol store last week,’ muttered Kevin, nodding at a tall boy in tight shorts. ‘If he’s innocent, then I’m a bloody saint.’
A compound of corrugated iron buildings surrounded by razor wire fencing came into view. In contrast to the leafy open grandeur of the Ford Mission, it looked depressingly under siege.
‘Can’t be too careful around here,’ Kevin said, pulling up in front of high steel gates festooned with more razor wire. ‘There’s a reason temptation’s in the Lord’s Prayer.’
‘And forgiveness, Kevin,’ said Sofia gently. ‘Don’t forget that.’
While Kevin unlocked the gates, she explained the mission’s purpose was both educational – running a local primary school – and pastoral, working to strengthen the community. There were eight nuns in residence, all local women except Sofia, and the mother superior, Agnes, who was Kevin’s sister.
She was on the veranda, snipping basil from a pot, when they pulled up beside the main building. An austere-looking woman with short grey hair, her blue eyes were clear and kind, and straightaway, Mia felt that she could trust her.
A few of the other nuns came out to welcome them, and they sat down to hot sweet tea and oat cake. Mia had begun explaining that she was heading upriver to Papua when Kevin cut in loudly.
‘But you can’t just wander around sightseeing on your own. It’s asking for bloody trouble.’
‘I appreciate your concern, Kevin, but I’m not a tourist.’
When she explained her purpose and destination, Agnes’ eyes lit up.
‘The Ford Mission?’ Placing a calloused hand over Mia’s, she looked around the table. ‘It’s one of the oldest surviving church organisations in Papua. Oh, bless you, Doctor Carter. Of course, we’ll do all we can to help a fellow traveller.’
The epithet made Mia feel only mildly embarrassed. Most white people here were missionaries, and shared faith was a common assumption.
Agnes looked at her brother. ‘We have a boat, don’t we, Kevin?’
‘But it’s more than 300 kilometres to the border.’ Wilting under her stare, Kevin thought for a moment. ‘There are no cruise boats due for a couple of days. I suppose I could run you up to Pagwi – it’s about seventy kilometres upriver.’
Agnes nodded enthusiastically. ‘There’s a hospital there, and we’re good friends with Jean-Bernard, the director. I’ll give him a call. They might be able to fly you to one of the villages near the border.’
A surge of relief widened Mia’s smile. ‘Oh, that would be wonderful! Thank you so much. I could find my own way from there.’
‘Not without an escort,’ Kevin told her sternly.
Agnes patted Mia’s hand. ‘I’m sure Jean-Bernard will be able to help with that, too.’
After a rustic dinner of sweet potato and chicken stew, Mia helped the nuns wash up. Everything at the mission was simple, clean and spartan, and in no time it was back in its proper place. Most of the nuns left for bed, as they liked to start early to beat the heat. Mia was curious about the challenges of long-term commitment, and asked Agnes to share her experiences.
Agnes explained that they had been there for a little over ten years, trying to address the endemic poverty and domestic violence by educating the children, and of course, building the Kingdom of God.
‘Sometimes it’s thankless,’ she admitted, ‘but in your darkest moments just a single act of kindness can make sense of it all.’ Closing her eyes for a moment, she opened them again and smiled. ‘I expect that sounds like a missionary cliché!’
‘No, not at all.’
Mia was hugely impressed by Agnes’ and the nuns’ work ethic, but the evangelical subtext had always bothered her. Was it really a free service if you were looking for souls in return?
‘Well, I had better make that call.’
While Agnes went to the office, Sofia came in with a pot of sleepy herb tea.
‘You have someone?’ She was looking shyly at the slim platinum ring on Mia’s finger.
Mia thought of Brad, the oncologist she had dated for the past couple of years. A handsome, successful and driven man, inevitably his priorities had become alien to hers.
‘No,’ she smiled. ‘I’m far too busy for a husband.’
Sofia’s eyes sparkled. ‘That’s what I told my papa.’
‘You don’t feel you’re missing out?’
Sofia looked at her thoughtfully. ‘Do you?’
There were times Mia wondered. Security, comfort – and most of all children – were appealing, but at 35 she still didn’t feel ready. Perhaps her anxiety at the state of the world was a conceit rathe
r than a reason. Brad had certainly thought so.
‘Jean-Bernard is still on the ward,’ Agnes reported when she returned, ‘but his wife is expecting you tomorrow morning. It will take a few hours to get up there.’
The screen door banged and Kevin came in, scratching mosquito bites on his sun-bleached freckled arms.
‘I’ve fuelled the tinnie. We’ll head off by eight, if it’s OK with you.’
Mia was given a small bedroom inside the main building. Getting undressed, she admired the beautiful Melanesian patterns adorning the stand of a hand-carved crucifix. A humble cot with ironed sheets was calling and, sliding gratefully inside, she slept a wonderful dreamless sleep.
They said a communal prayer for her safe travels over breakfast, and after seeing the old tinnie on the trailer, Mia figured she might need it. The aluminium boat was comically small for such a long trip, and she hoped gruff Kevin would not regret his kindness. He introduced her to Keso, a shy older man with two missing front teeth, who was travelling with them.
Clasping her hands, he said, ‘God bleth.’
They drove down to the closest launching point, an earthen ramp a few hundred metres from the wharf upon which a dozen or so men were fishing. On the still river, tendrils of mist drifted across its surface. A few canoes drifted in the distance. After reversing the trailer in, Kevin sat behind the wheel, not trusting the vehicle’s handbrake on the slippery mud. Mia helped Keso by unwinding the winch while he steadied the boat in knee-deep water. Then Kevin went and parked at the top of the ramp, spending several minutes attaching chains to the trailer and its wheels.
‘Righto,’ he said cheerfully, plonking a battered Akubra hat on his head. ‘Let’s be off, then.’