Expat life in Papua New Guinea?

March 19, 2008 11:33 PM

In finer detail than simply "dangerous," what would it be like to be an Anglo expat in Papua New Guinea? What would the daily grind of an expat or a non-raskol native be in Port Moresby? What jobs and lifestyle would be available to someone who was willing and able to perform white collar work in an unfamiliar land?

I'm not asking for myself (the price of a plane ticket alone is a little prohibitive); I'm researching a story.

posted by Sticherbeast to travel & transportation (10 comments total)

Only second-hand, but I used to know a bloke who worked for ANZ in Port Moresby. He lived with other expats in a secure compound, and found the whole place deathly dull.
posted by pompomtom at 11:41 PM on March 19, 2008

The biggest threat would be disease. USAAF units operating in PNG in 1943 had a hospitalization rate of 772 per thousand per year for debilitating tropical diseases.
posted by Class Goat at 12:10 AM on March 20, 2008

The two second-hand contributions I can make are from
1) a Korean-American who worked for the State Department, and and the experience pompomtom describes: sort of secluded lifestyle with lots of other expats, not a lot going on with the locals. She summarized her time there as being worth the fun she had on the round-the-world ticket that was the cheapest way to get there.
2) a blond-haired-blue-eyed Australian who grew up there because her father was a rural doctor (see Class Goat's comment about disease!). She had a great experience and mingled a lot with the locals, and still knows a lot of creole (or pidgin? I don't remember). Despite having a more local experience, she did attend an international school, since she eventually had to re-integrate with Australia's system.
posted by whatzit at 12:41 AM on March 20, 2008

Islands in the Clouds is an account of travelling in the New Guinea Highlands - maybe it might make some good background reading.
posted by plep at 12:46 AM on March 20, 2008

There are lots of ex-pats in the mining industry in PNG, but they don't usually spend much time in Moresby. Otherwise it's service industries (such as banks) and teaching, etc. When is your story set? There were lots of Aussies there when it was an Australian colony, and fewer now (especially working in govt departments).

As for daily life - my partner was born and raised in Moresby, but his parents were doctors who were off doctoring a lot of of the time. His dad was something of a pillar of the community - he chaired the PNG Rugby League Club and was friends with the Governor-General and stuff, so those were the kind of social circles they moved in. They lived in a large compound with staff, which he says he didn't leave much apart from school (he went - was bussed - to the local Catholic primary school then to a Catholic boys' boarding school in Australia for high school). He watched a lot of TV (PNG got cable before Australia did, he says he watched a lot of MTV) and became a computer nerd. His parents ended up leaving (after my f-i-l had lived there for more than 50 years) as they couldn't get the specialist care they needed for their youngest son (who has Asperger's and was very aggressive when he was younger), but say they would've stayed otherwise.
posted by goo at 1:09 AM on March 20, 2008

And with whatzit's comment - my boyfriend's first language is Tok Pisin, English is his second, and his whole family is fluent in Pisin.
posted by goo at 1:11 AM on March 20, 2008

And for a point of authenticity - they pronounce 'PNG' as one word, kind of 'pinji'.
posted by goo at 1:16 AM on March 20, 2008

A friend of mine works for the Australian diplomatic service. Apart from the razor-wired compounds and houses with panic rooms, they also refer to Port Moresby as "Operation Deadmeat".
posted by outlier at 1:18 AM on March 20, 2008

A friend of mine did VSO in PNG, though away from Port Moresby, supposedly teaching, he seemed to spend an inordinate amount of time drinking beer by the pool, with some painting of the school thrown in, as the local bad uns had declared a strike and the schools were closed for teaching. He didn't report feeling threatened much.
posted by biffa at 6:32 AM on March 20, 2008

I talked to the boyfriend a bit more. There was (there may be more now) one large supermarket, one Chinese restaurant and the Yacht Club and Travelodge for meals out. His parents also got a lot of food in exchange for medical services (chickens, pigs, veges etc) but I don't think that'd be normal for someone working in, say, a bank. Visiting the "housegirls"' families and villages was a very fun thing, as was swimming in waterholes.

Despite the razorwire-and-broken-glass-topped wall they lived behind, he/his family were only threatened once, in an attempted carjacking by raskols with homemade guns, but they made so much noise it brought the neighbours out and the baddies were scared away. He also said that it was a very community-minded/nosy place - unexpected loud noises would bring people out to investigate, food would be brought for you if you were ill etc - and that the housegirls maintained this to ex-pat communities.
posted by goo at 9:29 AM on March 27, 2008