Honiara, SI

I forgot to mention another contributing factor to the ‘corruption’ aspect in Cambodia. When the Vietnamese guy I was working with came to Siem Reap from Hanoi, he was standing in the queue at immigration holding his Vietnamese passport. An immigration official approached him and offered to fast-track his processing. Which he actually did, and then he asked for “some money for a coffee”. They seem avoid trying this gambit with visitors who may not be used to such behaviour, but obviously a Vietnamese person would know how things actually ‘work’ in Asia.

Here’s another brief tale about the street kids that were being offered free hospitality training in Cambodia. The school director was telling me that they would measure the kids for their free uniforms after they were accepted into the program. However - when they came to wear them a few weeks later they were often too tight because, possibly for the first time in their lives, the kids were eating regular meals. Also, I guess they were growing teenagers!

The taxi driver from home to the airport was an Aussie - now that’s unusual! Within minutes, he’d told me he was divorced, drank a bottle of wine a night and was lonely (no real surprise there!). And we were swapping medical tales as he went on about his assorted prostate examinations and colonoscopies.

And so: back to Perth airport, but this time to the domestic terminal, where I had not been for a few years. The complex had been changed considerably and extended dramatically, a reflection of the ongoing mining boom in the north of Western Australia. The mining workers are usually employed on a fly-in-fly-out basis; one glance around the bustling complex and one could easily pick them out from their attire. The Qantas check-in was totally automated - on a small machine which read the bar code or booking reference issued a boarding card and printed out a destination label for luggage - you attach the label, and then deposit the bags in another machine, enter some details on the screen - and it eats your luggage.

This next volunteer assignment started off with an almost five hour flight diagonally across Australia from, basically, Perth in the lower south-west corner to Brisbane near the top north-east corner, at nearly 1,000kms per hour. WHY does air travel have to be so dammed uncomfortable? Of course, with the government ultimately paying; us humble volunteers hurtle through the sky, herded down the back in ‘cattle class’.

I stayed overnight in Brisbane and headed back to the airport next morning to fly Solomon Airlines to Honiara. The aircraft took off but there was loud, disconcerting and continuous noise that sounded like a labouring electric motor (a bit like the noise the landing gear makes going up and down). I was thinking of going up to the pointy end and asking if the flight deck were aware of the noise. Then I noticed the clouds moving oddly and the captain made an announcement that there was a mechanical problem and we were returning to Brisbane. We flew around for a while, with the landing gear down, ‘to use up more fuel’ and landed an hour and a half after we had taken off. We stayed on board for another hour while mechanics fiddled around and we took off again. Oddly, the noise was still there for about 30-minutes, and then it went away, to return just before we landed in Honiara.

Even the landing was ‘interesting’: we were descending on approach to the airport when the pilot suddenly applied power, we ascended steeply and went around for a second attempt - he claimed that there was a sudden rain shower that obstructed their view of the landing strip. All I could think of through these episodes was that, if I had to be in an aircraft with mechanical problems: I would rather it was a Qantas aircraft over flat Aussie terra firma than in a chartered Solomon Air plane (it had ‘Strategic’ painted in large letters on the fuselage) over the wet Pacific Ocean!! A week later the same aircraft was the headline story in the local newspaper as it landed among fire engines and ambulances with ‘smoke coming from the cargo hold’.

This next assignment was for a quick two-weeks, entitled a ‘Housekeeping Seminar’, for several ‘clients’: two hotels, a college and the Governor General’s office. The format was: a day and a half of a classroom component, followed by visits to each client’s place of business for hands-on mentoring with their staff.

As predicted in advance: I’d presented my PowerPoint housekeeping presentation by ‘morning-tea-time’ and then got into showing several of my other presentations to elucidate and explain assorted hospitality related situations. But, at least we got morning tea, lunch and afternoon tea. I’d had lunch on the flight to Brisbane; then a belated lunch (sandwich) on the flight to Honiara (because of the flight delay) and that had been my total food consumption for two days. I’d been booked into a complex of apartments that was on a ridge, away from any food outlets and they did not have a restaurant…just a kitchenette in the room (and me with zero food).

The seminar went OK - it was held in a small conference room in a new up-market hotel in central Honiara. I was essentially addressing managers and supervisors and it was later explained to me that the actual housekeepers were basically illiterate. When I met them, I saw that they were mostly in the 30s. Apparently, when they were of school age, girls were usually denied an education as their place was ‘in the home’ - the situation is different now.

Isn’t it strange, the range of expressions you get inflicted with in different cultures? In the Solomon Islands, you don’t refer to a ‘memory stick’, because that infers a certain exclusively male element of anatomy, a more acceptable expression is: ‘flash drive’!

I was staying in a small complex of new apartments which were comfortable enough - just required some foraging to self-cater in the small kitchen. Also staying at the same apartments were a couple and a guy also with the same volunteer organisation. I’d met the couple (Chris and Libby) in Vientiane and we were amazed when Chris deduced that we had mutual close friends living in England. Chris was working on a new IT system for the college, Libby was helping an International School, and the other guy (Brian) was a food technologist advising an ice cream manufacturer. The apartments were located relatively close to where I was staying previously and to one of my former clients at a tiny cooperatively owned store.

The second day of the seminar was a half-day and I went ‘home’ and did some work designing forms for one of my clients at the further education college before meandering - in the high heat/humidity - to the former client’s store. So, I wandered into the tiny store in a remote village in the Solomon Islands I’d not been in since mid-2008 to be greeted by the gal behind the counter with a look of intense incredulity, followed by a huge smile and a hesitant: “Is it really ….. Mr Bevan?”

She told me that they were still using the linked Excel spreadsheets I had custom-designed for them to track their sales and purchases and automatically calculate their profit/loss. I was asked to go behind the counter into the office to have a look at their accounts. I was told independently that there were now financially successful.

I then walked to the hotel where I had been staying - I had a second client at the time that was another cooperatively-owned store on a palm oil plantation that was somewhat lax in actually being ‘cooperative’, so, I did some free work designing systems for the hotel. I strolled into the reception and was aware of a face peering at me through a window in sheer amazement. He then rushed out with a broad smile, hand extended to shake and saying: “So, it IS you, Bevan.”

Isn’t it funny the little episodes like that that gives you a brief buzz? I can now wander into assorted hotels and businesses throughout various Pacific islands and South-East Asia to a (hopefullyJ?) similar reaction….

One of my clients was the Chester Rest House - I thought it may have been named after someone called ‘Chester’ - but it was actually after Chester in England. The funding came from a church there and the building was opened, and blessed, by the Bishop of Chester.

The Solomon Islands College of Higher Education (SICHE) facility had 1,500 students taking a variety of courses. As they had only a limited interest in the ‘housekeeping’ element of my assignment; my task with them somehow evolved by osmosis (or some other mystical process) into a review of all the services and environment offered by the student welfare division.

SO: I churned out a ‘tell-it-as-it-is’ 20-page document following discussions with a few of the 600 resident students and several staff. In fact, I felt that I had to be totally frank and blunt and told them how bad the complex had become. The campus grounds and buildings were really in a disgraceful condition and I described the primary kitchen as ‘a disaster waiting to happen’. They offered me lunch and I really was concerned that I was to be fed from THAT kitchen. Then we adjoined to the welfare offices and my hopes rose by imagining that some takeaway food was to be delivered from another source. As it was, we had a tiny plastic cup of an indeterminate breed of cordial and a couple of biscuits - still, I was saved from the possibility of health endangerment.

Like many of these volunteer assignments, one tends to get side-tracked into other endeavours; this one including assessing a site for new self-catering accommodation complex that had an amazing view over the pacific (for now) Pacific. So, I compiled a short report on research, design of the complex, services, etc….including a comment that I considered that his other endeavour was built entirely the wrong way around and had lost an amazing view for the residents. Although, I did wonder if that was done deliberately as protection against potential cyclones.

I was overnight in Brisbane and caught up with some dear friends (Trevor and Lyndal - I met in Papua New Guinea and do not see enough of) for breakfast. It’s great to chat to people who understand PNG and are well-travelled. It was my birthday and as Trevor parked the car we looked up and a sky-writer had written ‘live’ on a clear blue sky. They claimed it was for my birthday! Then, as we walked along the street, church bells started ringing - once again: for me. Believe that and you you’ll believe anything.

SO - home for four days and back to the airport….this time to be of assistance a woman in Dili, East Timor, who helps hundreds of malnourished children in a hospital-type scenario … I’m not doing too badly for a 71-year old, eh?