The Full Moon

The beautiful flowers on the cactus plant in our garden opened themselves to the glow of the full moon Friday night. We had come home after our usual Chinese dinner followed by a few G&Ts at the country club to find Kopi’s truck parked outside our gate. 'Kopi' is a copra buyer who left Australia years ago to volunteer in PNG. He was standing on our veranda with a blood soaked towel wrapped around his hand. The gin in my body was quickly replaced by adrenaline. My mind started racing. Oh god, he has been held up and he has come to our house. We’ve got to get in the gate quick; they may be coming back for him. I hope we can stop the bleeding till we get him to one of the many international research doctors here in Madang. Wait, how did 'Kopi' get into the gate anyway? Where is the family? Why aren’t the dogs barking?

Okay Mom, Dad, before you have a heart attack…..it turned out to be that Kopi had cut his hand at home and came over to get help stitching it. But it did highlight the fact that someone very easily drove right to our gate, jumped the fence and stood on our veranda for 10 minutes shouting our names without anyone taking notice.

Jolanda, the only one of us with a medical background, took care of Kopi’s hand. Soon our minds were absent of adrenaline and gin. We lingered on the veranda and admired the moon flowers.

The next morning I convinced Jolanda, who is always on the move, that we should take our time through the market. All morning we had pillaged in the heat of the second-hand clothes shops so we needed to quench our thirsts. Coconuts in hand, we walked along the market’s edge looking for shelter from the sun and the rascals. We found a tree near an area where women were selling pink, green and blue rice bags on one side and heaps of tobacco leaves on the other. I had my eye on a bag that had “Greetings from Beautiful Madang, Yu naispela tru ya!” hand painted next to a picture of a flying fox and the Coastwatcher’s Lighthouse. I was thinking, There is nothing like the taste of fresh coconut juice on a hot day. In the corner of my eye I could see an old man with two teeth pushed along by the expanse of the Saturday crowd. I noticed him because he too was enjoying kulau. He was enjoying his kulau so much it had dribbled down the front of his shirt. He then noticed me, with a huge smile across my face enjoying the nostalgic moment.
“Yu Australia aye?” the old man asked.
“Nogat, mi bilong America.”
“Aye-oh. Americas, em nispela tru. Long Chinese, em no nispela tumas.”
(For your sake and mine, I’ll continue this conversation in English)
“Aye-oh. Americans, they are nice people, but the Chinese, they are not very nice.
I smiled and looked at Jolanda. She obviously preferred not to have to explain that Holland is a Country in Europe. The old man continued. We drank our kulau.
“The Japanese, they are good. They have a right to come. They have blood on our land.”
Oh no, I thought. It’s going to be one of these conversations.
“I fought in the war. I was crazy then. I fought with the Australians because I did not know.” At that moment, he unexpectantly raised his arms, a coconut in one hand while the other hand had a finger extended and thumb raised. He began to shoot all the women selling their pink, green and blue rice bags. He continued shooting his finger gun and spit rounds of ammunition from between his two teeth.
“Tttttttttt, Tttttttttt, Ttttttt!”
I looked at Jolanda. She continued to suck at the small hole in her coconut.
“The Chinese, they do not have blood on our land. Do you hear me?”
“Yes sir, I hear you. Aye, very sorry.” I could feel the eyes of the market women watching us.
He continued. “The Japanese, they have a reason to come here. They have blood, lots of blood.” His eyes seemed to drift to the past as he spat more rounds of ammunition towards the women selling heaps of tobacco leaves.
“ttttttt, ttttttt, tttttttt!”
There was a pause.
“America, you are good.” And with that he reached out to shake my hand, the same hand that just shot down all the market women around us, and left.

Jolanda and I finished our kulau and walked over and bought the “Greetings from Beautiful Madang” bag. “Yu nicpla ya!” That is, unless you are Chinese and are in PNG at the moment.

The next afternoon while cutting Marleen’s hair on the veranda, a PMV bus pulled up to the gate. I was concentrating to ‘not make her hair look too American’ as she watched the Sunday traffic. Her favorite pastime; watching cars pass. Marleen said, “I think more people have come to stay with us.” We watched Emily grab her things from the Highlands bus and hug her mother. In July Emily had returned to her family in Simbu, now she has come back and the number of our extended family in PNG has grown to 13.

In Zambia, the full moon nights bring dancing and drumming. In America, some may believe that full moons bring out werewolves. From my experience here in PNG, the full moon brings moon flowers, bleeding copra buyers, toothless war fighters, and a daughter to her mother.