Kavieng aboard the Febrina, Topside and People

Captain Jack, Manager/Chef Chrissy, dive masters Elsie and Lucas, and the rest of the Febrina crew hosted us as we dove Kavieng, just north-east of the main island of Papua New Guinea. Onboard were Dave Patchen, Doug Ebersole, and Lucien Schmidlin, friends of mine from dive trips in the past.

I met Dave, Doug, and Lucien in Port Moresby, and we spent the evening with two ex-pat Australians who drove us to the Holiday Inn and then to the Yacht Club for dinner. Unfortunately, the couple were rather paranoid and said things like, "the darker [Papua New Guineans] are, the more violent they are" -- really offensive, racist stuff. There is no doubt that Port Moresby is not a safe city, but sweeping generalizations like that were not welcome. The Holiday Inn has two sets of metal gates and is surrounded by razorwire. The inner gate is patrolled by security armed with mangy guard dogs, and during our return trip from the Yacht Club (which apparently housed every colonial-looking dude in the city), we were stopped by a roadblock on the street. Even with security, the Holiday Inn has been robbed before, and the day before my return to Port Moresby someone had been killed while leaving the hotel.

One interesting this: after getting used to Papua New Guinea and spending some time around Tari, Port Moresby took on a new light. In particular, I remember thinking, "this isn't so bad...". But who knows -- I don't have enough perspective to make those sorts of judgments.