THE CHALLENGE OF KOKODA 02

 

PART 2 - A YOUNG JOURNO'S TREK 

by LEIAO GEREGA

Charlie’s reveille musical piece would always sound at 4:30 am, awakening us sometimes into either a grumpy or a happy mood, depending on whether one had restful night sometimes in jungles, besides flowing creeks or on mountain range overlooking valleys.

At the end of our second day at Ofi creek campsite after a 15km walk under a drizzling rain, our eldest trekker Derrick Quinto a member of the RSL club celebrated his 72nd birthday, marked by hot soup served ahead of everyone with a cheerful birthday song.

Derrick was a former clerk who served during the Vietnam war and now has six kids and an only grandchild. When he returns home he looks forward to playing golf and spending time with his wife.

At Ofi Creek I spoke to all the porters, who at least wanted to give an account on the state of hospitals and schools along the trail and what they expect from the industry.

Most want basic services, muttering in agreement when I began asking. They revealed the hospitals lacked manpower, medicines and high rates of malaria while the schools have no teachers or are either too far away to have their kids go to school.

As found out later, there is not one single training carried out to train young people to be teachers so that they remain within their own communities to teach.

“If the management wants sustainable programs this is one they need to look at,” my porter said.

At each village, beginning with Vaule, Ioribaiwa, Nauro Menari, Kagi, Efogi, I met up with mothers selling plain wool bilums with no actual design of the Kokoda trail and appalling of all was that at each points they would sell can drinks and twisties, a practice my fellow trekkers noted with surprise and amusement.

Major Lynn tells me they remind him of beggars who sit beside the road, watching trekkers pass by uncaring whether or not their bilums and their foods get sold.

“nogat local kaikai,” I asked my porter several days later, frustrated to see no local cooked food (aside from fruits)being sold and he’d responded that with wet season most villagers harvest less crops and therefore rely on selling drinks and sweets which they bring by aircrafts costing k6-per kilo and K450 for an individual.

“It’s very expensive,” a porter complained when interviewed.

The aircrafts that land seldom comes depending on passengers and the cargoes, otherwise most (if with family) would walk two to three days to reach Owers corner and Port Moresby with their bags of peanuts, cabbages and fresh fruits.

I asked a one of the female trekker at the beginning of the walk in Vaule if she’d cared to buy a bilum and she’d responded it was expensive. “But what if it came with Kokoda designs and words that say 2019 kokoda adventure or something along those lines would you buy?,” I asked and her face lit up, “I would certainly buy.”

“Has any management authority come here to establish projects for mothers to teach you how to make money, cook food, sewing, hygiene, literacy etc…” these questions asked across every village visited came back with a negative response, sometimes mothers would smile at the question as if it bore no significance to what they’re currently making.

I spoke with the bilum seller at Vaulo, an 18 year old mother with one child who told me she left school at age fifteen because the only nearby school (Nauro) is more than 10 kilometers away and she’s been selling bilums since then.

Feeling a little sad of the mother, I moved on to speak with the campsite owner Reuben Gairo who told me he makes about K300-K200 a night from trekkers.

“It’s a shared business, the money is split between families, helpers who build the toilet and showers.” I asked if he’d cared to see his business flourish and he’d nodded before breaking into a grin. Similar sentiments would later be raised by campsite owner in Ioribaiwa village, Aulo Avu whose campsite reflects a much better management.

But after all everything comes with management, says Charlie. Even my porter finally came to see the two sides of the coin.

For trekkers, there is very little emphasis on their needs where those interviewed have spent between K12, 000 to almost K30, 000 for the whole Kokoda experience.

Half of the money goes through the authority for the management of the track and Major Lynn says it’s a huge disappointment to note that over those years despite so much emphasis, there is nothing yet done to support trekker needs nor any creation of sustainable livelihood programs for villages.

Having a proper management system in place can go far to make those experiences more memorable says Major Lynn, thus glaring factors that affect the track including toilets between each resting points, proper campsites with clean toilets, campsite booking systems, shelters, hygiene, disposal of rubbish, track clearing, lack of local food sold and more are things that needs to be looked at.

My porter (name withheld) brought up questions as to why organisations who use the name Kokoda to create an emotional appeal for donors have not given anything back to the communities. He said even when they do, the initiatives lack land owner agreement and no sustainability.

 “The name Kokoda belongs to my people and those who think they can use the name for charity purposes should think twice because the young porters you see carrying packs of 18kg would have made it far to grade 12’s but they’ve had no one to help pay their school fees further, the fathers you see are making money for their kids at school…trekking season is our money,” he said.

And he was right. Most porters have worked for Kokoda adventure for more than 10-15 years, each year getting an income of K1500 per trekking and around K6000 if they were to do it six times annually.

“I save them for my children and my brothers children’s school fees,” said Jimmy, an Oro kaiva man who’s worked for years with KA. Some like Kelly Asi from Sogeri says they save-up but admits family expectations usually wins over.

Whilst the trekking season can bring money to every village, the life of a porter is one that is hard but fun, a claim I assumed comes from having to eat, laugh and sleep the best depending on the kind of tour operator you work for.

My porter revealed not all operators are genuine, some porters can carry weights between 25kg-30kg, don’t have sleeping bags, are poorly paid and their welfare overlooked.

 “one thing we you can see here is that it forms a bond amongst all the sixty porters each from the three areas of Kokoda, Mt Koiari and Sogeri who enjoys the hard jokes shared beside the fire with huge rice of plates, plenty of tea and a warm sleeping bag,” I was told by doctor boi, the medical expert for trekkers and who has been with KA for almost ten years.

The Kokoda Trail now run as a government agency is said to have attracted 40,000 trekkers in the past few decades, generating millions in the country’s revenue and bringing some form of economy into villages along the trek.

However, observations along the track reveal that very little has been done to help locals make money from a trek that generates millions annually.