1964 - Naringel Primary School
Naringel Primary School was my first posting after graduation from my E Course in Rabaul. The course was only 6 months long but the lecturers were very experienced teachers or administrators (one was a educational psychologist and primary teacher lecturer from Sydney) so we did not lack expertise on the staffing side.
I was picked up at Momote Airport by Mr Percy Jensen who was the Education Officer for Manus District (as it was called then) and driven to Lorengau where I would stay with Mr Jensen until the next day. After breakfast, the next day Mr Jensen drove me to Kim Foon and Sons where I set up a monthly account to dinau food and supplies until my pay came through. Because there was no electricity at the school, I bought a kerosene pressure lamp, a primus kerosene stove (there was only a wood stove at the house in Naringel at that time) , a kerosene iron and a new wick for the kerosene refrigerator! Every seemed to run on kerosene. Then Eski and some freezer (meat), tinned food, tea, coffee, sugar powdered milk etc.
I was feeling quite tentative at being dropped by Mr Percy Jensen at the school with only a few personal items and some hastily bought cooking utensils (two from Mr Jensen himself). The committee chairman was there to greet us (Masipal or Mesipal?)-three of his children went to the school.
One of the teachers unlocked the door for us and I installed my goods. The chairman suggested someone as a possible person to work as my Hausboi, his name was Ronnie. He walked with a limp but was energetic and looked after me the whole time I was at Naringel.
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| Ronnie Paniu |
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| Mespal |
The children were good and we had 3 double classes between 3 teachers. Myself, I took Standard 4 & 5, another teacher took 2 & 3 while the third took Prep and 1.
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| The Two Teachers' Houses |
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| Road to the Beach |
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| The School Building from the Road |
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| Cleaning Our School |
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| No Motor Mowers |
I have forgotten many names in the years between and I hope that those two teachers and the others I taught with will forgive my lack of memory! Also for my forgetting some of the students' names. A photocopier to copy class lists would have been a great help. Unfortunately , even though photocopiers were invented in1937, they were not commonly available in offices until 1975!
However my mother has come to the rescue. When I sent photos to her of my school at Naringel, I included the names of the children in my class on the back. After my mother died I found the photos 40 years later and am able to update the names of my students to the photos!
Plus I have enlarged the photos so that the students faces can be see better!
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| Ilom Mespal |
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| Ivan Ngahan |
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| Big Smile-Nicky Bohu |
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| Solokai |
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| Is This John? No its' Tommy. |
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| L to R Tommy, Hikalon, Spirit Kerrul, Bernard, Ivan, Mary Sopihi |
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| L to R Solokai, Ilom, Margaret, Charles, Roma, Nicky |
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| L to R Kanawi, Billy, Judas (a teacher's son), Joseph, Papi (John), Mary Nalin |
I obtained a puppy which I called Lumos because his coat was so light. With the dog and the company of Ronnie and another two school students who accompanied me often in my explorations of the surrounding beach and took me fishing, I was reasonably content.
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| Lumos |
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| Myself 1964 |
My Pidgin English was quite poor at that stage. I suggested in my first Parents and Citizens meeting that we "paint the wall with ourselves" instead of "bai mipla paintim wall" it was something like "mipla paintim wall long mipla" (writing in Pidgin I am still unsure of spelling).
Students and I went into the bush to make sago and for me to learn what their environment was like. The students played soccer, volleyball, softball etc and even the student, who had been stricken by polio, leapt about the soccer pitch like all the other students. It opened my eyes to the way students in PNG accepted those physically less fortunate than themselves, a lesson my people in Australia did not learn until many years after.
The six months passed quickly and sadly I had to leave Naringel. However, I had learned some Pidgin English and some words of the local Naringel language. "Ipia a tam" meant I think, good afternoon, "mundorung a tam" good morning.
Copyright © John Charles Groat 2020
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Comments
Nicky died in 2013.
I was shared this story via whatsapp and saw dad's photo...he looks like my late elder brother Johnny.