Travel

See Jungle

Traversing the Bowels of Papua New Guinea

By Ian Booth

A Komiupa Mama group performs a traditional sing-sing ceremony (basically a song-and-dance celebration) for onlookers and tourists.

Last year I took an extended photography trip “away from civilization.” After months of research and planning, I decided on Papua New Guinea. Given the island’s weird medley of modern and primitive traditions, cultures, and scenery, I couldn’t think of a better place to escape the tedium of everyday life.

Before visiting, most information I had read about the country came from guidebooks, census records, and fact sheets. It mostly covered stuff I already knew: Humans have been there as long as just about anywhere on earth (approximately 60,000 years); it’s one of the few places left that has yet to be fully indoctrinated by the Western world; throughout history, more than 800 languages have been spoken on the island; and there are still tales of cannibals living deep in the jungle who will boil you alive. While I didn’t venture into these overgrown and perilous areas (which are only accessible via commissioned planes), I did hear about an incident in which a father ate the face of his newborn daughter in front of a crowd of onlookers because God told him to “eat the baby” before the baby ate him.

One of my curiosities about Papua New Guinea was how the ongoing urbanization of the country was affecting its tribal culture. From what I could tell, most of the changes involved the uptick of raskols (criminals) around the sprawling city areas.

Besides petty crime, those who make extended visits to the country face other difficulties. First of all, there’s the unofficial 6 PM curfew, which cut my work day in half. Then there’s the lack of public transportation, unfamiliarity with the concept of organization, bribes required to obtain basic necessities, intense humidity, constant clouds of mosquitoes, and high cost of living.

After eight months, some of which were spent working for the National, a local newspaper, I realized that my “Are you fucking serious?” phase was actually the nation’s perpetual state of being. The country’s tourism slogan is “The land of the unexpected.” I have no shame in wholeheartedly backing this corny motto, and I present the following photographs as proof of my otherworldly adventures in and around Bougainville Island, East New Britain Island, Goroka, Madang, Morobe, Port Moresby, and the Sepik River.