Anthea Matley—part two

Returning to Port Moresby in 2018

Bomana War Cemetery, Port Moresby

During dinner that evening in Port Moresby, the hotel manager, an Australian, approached us. Average height, with grey curly hair and wearing a grey uniform of a short-sleeved shirt and skirt, she wanted to know if we enjoyed our meal and whether the wait staff had been helpful. Her smile was strained as if it was something she wasn’t used to. The staff kept well clear, I noticed. We assured her we were very satisfied with our wait staff, which seemed to relax her as her shoulders dropped a little and she became almost chatty.

‘What brings you to Port Moresby?’

‘A holiday,’ we replied.

She gave a humourless laugh, more a snort really and looked incredulous. ‘No one comes here for a holiday. There’s nothing to do.’ She laughed. ‘My contract finishes at the end of the year, and I’m looking forward to going back to Australia.’

She was right about there being nothing for visitors to do. There were no boats to hire for a day trip to any of the shimmeringly, inviting nearby islands, the museum was closed for an upgrade, and it seemed there were no public parks nearby.

Unbeknownst to us, one of the hotel desk staff arranged for a car and driver to take us for a tour of the city the next day. Ben was short, looked about 40 with thick wiry hair and he was full of energy and enthusiasm. He had stuck the Mt Hagen flag prominently on the bonnet of his dilapidated Toyota to show how proud he was of his region. Ben showed us the local markets, downtown city, and suburban shopping centres, all of which were doing a brisk trade. He pointed out all the high-security fences surrounding almost every building in the downtown area. They were mainly hotels, banks, businesses and offices. He then drove us to the suburb of Waigani to visit Parliament House, adjacent to the Supreme Court Buildings. It’s a stunningly beautiful building with its modern architecture blended with ancient tribal designs.

A four-lane, one-kilometre long bitumen road for use by government officials only led to the entrance. Ben laughed as we shook our heads: ‘This Government is pretending we’re a first-world country when really, we are a third-world country.’

We felt safe and comfortable in Moresby, just as I had done when growing up, but we didn’t risk going out after dark. We sat on the hotel’s balcony each evening, overlooking the harbour and the street below. We watched the sun setting behind the hills and mountains, lighting the edges of rain-promising clouds. The lights from the surrounding buildings and streetlights splashed their reflections on the calm harbour.

On the fourth day, our driver and vehicle arrived at the hotel with a flash four-wheel-drive, the type used in Australian cities by parents ferrying their children to school. Not quite the robust vehicle I knew we would need to tackle those expected and often washed-out roads, but it would have to do. We were running out of time.

‘I’m Graham,’ announced the 183-centimetre, broad-shouldered, bald man, holding out his hand and smiling widely. His dark skin gleamed against his black suit, white shirt, and company tie. Despite the heat, I didn’t doubt the heavy jacket also concealed a small handgun. We shook hands with Graham, introduced ourselves, and he invited me to sit in the front of the air-conditioned vehicle to get the best view. Graham was interested in why we had come to Port Moresby and keen to see a part of his country he hadn’t yet visited. We drove through an ever-expanding city. The suburbs were now overtaking what was once the countryside.

The Sogeri road begins at the 9 Mile settlement, northeast of Moresby along the Hubert Murray Highway, and is accessed by taking a right-hand exit at the big roundabout. So much had changed. Major settlements bordered the road and the streets teemed with people. This is the road that in the Second World War, soldiers from engineering, ordnance, signals, survey, transport, medical and convalescent units, travelled on and camped beside. Around three kilometres from here, we could see in the distance the Hombrom and Wariarata bluffs of the Owen Stanley Range.

The Bomana War Cemetery was close by, and we took a short break to wander through this beautiful and immaculately kept cemetery. Many of those who died fighting in Papua and Bougainville were brought here to be buried. Local staff maintain it and the garden, which is financed by the Office of Australian War Graves in Canberra. We took a contemplative walk through simple wrought-iron gates onto a grass forecourt and climbed a short flight of steps to the Stone of Remembrance, an altar of pink stone. Just beyond, on gentle slopes were the graves, marked by rows and rows of white marble headstones that stand stark against the bright green of the lawns. In the centre, the focus of the whole cemetery, stood the Cross of Sacrifice, made from the same stone as the altar. We were the only ones visiting that morning. The tropical plants and magnificent rainforest trees added to the peaceful setting.

We continued our drive on a well-made bitumen road passing through a mixture of scrubby-looking trees: cycads, eucalypts and tall, blade-like grasses. Though now sealed, it was still the narrow road I remembered. A red dirt road back then, it was regularly washed out during torrential and seasonal monsoon rains.

The road from Bomana to Rouna Falls was dubbed the ‘Snake Road’ by Second World War soldiers as it has a few steep S bends. We travelled along the Laloki Valley, which rises and narrows at its peak, ending at the base of the Rouna Falls where two familiar massive bluffs dominate—Hombrom and Wariarata. One is a spur, and the other is the point where the 30-kilometre-long Astrolabe Range terminates. As we climbed the valley the trees increased in size and pockets of rainforest trees appeared dominated by high green grass. The familiar large, black volcanic boulders appeared, scattered throughout the landscape as we approached the Devil’s Elbow, the first of the S-bends. The road twisted around the mountainside until we reached the falls.

Graham parked the car, and we took a two-minute walk down to the lookout to view the falls cascading to a rock pool below. From here we could see tropical rainforest descending from the escarpments on both sides of the valley into the deep shadowed gullies. Other pockets of rainforest were surrounded by small trees and grassland, almost as if they had been deliberately landscaped. The thunderous noise from the falls blocked out all other sounds. The sky was overcast with low, rain-filled clouds, and though it was cooler up here, it was still hot and muggy.

Travelling a little further on to the Kokoda Trail Monument, we passed the turnoff to the Varirata National Park, but we didn’t have time to visit it. Soon we reached the Laloki River and the third bridge that spans it. Early in the war, engineers built a low-level steel and concrete structure that remains today. This was the site of Ian Loudon’s accident. On crossing this bridge, we stopped to view the Kokoda Trail Monument, a simple stone cairn, then bumped and wound our way through undulating hills, lightly wooded with small trees and banksias, to Owers’ Corner. Most of the once thickly forested hills I remembered had been cleared over the years for communal gardens. People grow a wide range of tropical fruits and vegetables for themselves and to sell at village markets.

We drove on through Sogeri, a formerly thriving town that used to host agricultural shows, sports events, and gymkhanas. Now, apart from the primary school, we could only see a couple of roadside stalls selling tropical fruits and vegetables. There were other buildings, but our limited time prevented further exploration. Graham was only familiar with the road to Sogeri but with the help of a detailed map, we guided him onto a narrow, dirt track with deep potholes and washouts. I thought it was more like a creek bed than a road. Graham was gripping the steering wheel and saying at frequent intervals: ‘We’ll have to turn back; the road is too bad.’

The four-wheel drive was barely managing the huge potholes. If it had been raining, the unsealed road without a four-wheel drive would have been impassable. During the plantation days, the managers kept this road graded and in good condition. Repairs were constant due to the regular heavy rains washing it out.

‘It’s not far,’ we encouraged him. ‘Let’s go a little further.’

Around gentle, twisting bends of the open grassland, we drove the route I used to travel every day to primary school.

‘Do you remember this?’ Graham kept asking and looking at me to see my reaction. I did, and I didn’t. It felt and looked familiar, yet strange at times. There were more houses now, and the landscape looked open and less covered than the landscape of my memories.

We passed the old Mororo plantation on the left, and I could just see a house on a hill in the distance. Perhaps it was the same one my father had built, but I couldn’t be sure. A few kilometres on, we approached Eilogo. It had taken us about an hour to get here. We could see the tops of the rubber trees through the thick jungle plants that had reclaimed the land. Apart from a fruit seller at Sogeri, we hadn’t seen any other people or vehicles.

On reaching Eilogo homestead, Graham parked the car and a young couple appeared with half a dozen children. Graham spoke to them in Motu, explaining why we were there, and asked if it was all right for us to look around and take photos. The couple were extremely welcoming and happy to show me around. The children looked unsure and hung back but still seemed keen to find out what was happening. The terraced gardens my mother had planted and tended were long gone and replaced with long grass. I had expected this from social media posts of other expats who had gone back to their childhood homes and reported what they’d seen.

But everything about the house felt familiar. The dining room had been portioned off with tin sheeting to create an extra room. I couldn’t see into the bedrooms as they had been rented out and had locks on them. The concrete floor surrounding a central courtyard where we used to ride our bikes, still looked freshly polished. The teak pillars holding the roof seemed sturdy enough to last a hundred years.

The courtyard, still open to the sky, used to have a garden full of ferns and orchids. During heavy storms and torrential rain, those concrete floors would become small rivers as the rain pelted down in centimetres. The kitchen, now a shell, still had the remnants of the wood stove my mother cooked on. The tub and toilet in the bathroom were still in place, but no longer in use as the room was being used for storage.

Memories flooded back. I remembered one evening when my sister locked the door, and she, my brother and I (who all shared the bath) slid across the concrete floor on our bare bums, getting up and running back to the tub to push off and repeat it. It was fun until my mother insisted the door be unlocked. I also remembered coming off my bike and hitting my head on the corner of a concrete plinth. The gash needed stitches but because we were so far from a hospital, my mother spent the night holding the two pieces of skin together until they knitted.

This is where I was born and raised and though the sense of familiarity was strong, the house no longer had any sense of home. I left feeling contented and grateful for the opportunity to revisit the centre of so many of my childhood memories. 

Editor’s Note:

This article is included in the back of Anthea Matley’s book, Planting Memories A Settler’s Life on the Sogeri Plateau, and continues from Part One, published in the December 2024 issue of PNG Kundu.

Part ONE can be found HERE