When we travel around I get lots of questions about what life is like in PNG. In response, I usually give cursory descriptions of food or housing that probably don’t communicate a whole lot to the asker. I’m not trying to be rude, but I assume people are just being polite by feigning interest; I don’t want to tax them with unnecessary details.

Before I went to PNG the first time I remember getting so frustrated at the people who had gone before me. I was curious about life there and wanting desperately to better prepare myself, but every time I had a chance to talk to a veteran missionary they seemed to not want to talk about it. Now I wonder if they were doing the same thing I do by trying to spare me the details. I wanted details!

This post is for anyone who has received a less than impressive answer from me about what life is like in PNG. It’s still far from comprehensive, but it’s a start. I have listed out the top six things I never thought would happen to me, but have happened because of the life I chose. I’ll post three this week and three next week.

6. I never thought I would fail at laundering my clothes. I’m a bit of a neat freak. I got that from my beautiful mother. She kept our house spotless and trained my sister and me to do the same. She didn’t limit herself to the house, though; our clothes were in a state of readiness at all times. I like to think of myself as being a fairly capable person that was given the tendency to like life clean. Those two things combined gave me the impression that I would never have trouble washing clothes. Then I went to PNG.

In town we have access to a washing machine and line dry everything. It’s normally so hot that clothes will dry very fast. I do have to add to my loading/unloading/folding routine the ability to predict the weather, but it’s doable. Out in the village it’s an entirely different story. I wash our clothes in the creek with a bar of soap called Klina. It smells delicious and I do feel quite clean when I’m done. However, there’s a method to wringing and beating clothes on rocks when you’re cleaning them in a river that I just can’t get the hang of. I got to the point where I would sneak out of our house and try to make it to the washing spot when no one was around in order to avoid embarrassing myself. The women never outright told me that I was a dirty person, but I knew they thought it. Oh, I knew.

5. I never thought I would enjoy bathing in a creek. Hot showers have become a luxury. As have temperature controlled rooms, mattresses, and bathrooms inside the house (more on that next week). I have bathed in small creeks, deltas, under pipes coming out of the side of a mountain, under waterfalls, and in glorified mud pits. They are all surreal and mostly beautiful. Just like washing clothes there’s a method to body washing that I haven’t perfected, but I have learned to tie rope around my soap to keep it from taking a trip down the river.

When we visit our PNG family in their village, we wash in a small creek. They’re preferred body washing method is to take a small bucket with them, sit in the water, and use the bucket to dump water over their heads. I prefer to lie back in the water so I know that every part of me is getting wet. For a good while they tried to fix my method, but I held firm to it. Now they just laugh and say I’m “sleeping in the water.” I do love a good shower, but I have come to enjoy bathing in the outdoors.

4. I never thought I would eat crocodile and sea turtle meat. Yep. Done and done. Eating crocodile isn’t all that impressive considering many Americans enjoy a good alligator meal, but sea turtle meat? Brian tells me it was a cross between fatty dark meat chicken and pork. I swallowed one tiny bite whole, so I couldn’t really say. Being the committed carnivore in the family, I trust his ability to describe meat.

There are still a few delicacies out there that we haven’t encountered yet: sago grubs, dog, cat… to name a few. It’s very regional, so you’ll find some Papua New Guineans more than ready to eat dog while others get squeamish. I had one lady try to convince me that in order to truly learn about PNG and be like them I needed to eat cat. I told her that I would eat cat during a meal where she also ate cat. I never had to eat cat. I will trust to my wily picky-eater abilities to continue avoiding sago grubs, dogs, and cats. If that fails me, I married the committed carnivore and whatever I can’t eat I can deftly plop on his plate!

Continued next week…