Update

Elections
The elections are being held on 6 July, these are the first elections since 2002 and the first to use the preferential voting system. The current voting ballot requires the voter to write the names of the three candidates they will be voting for, an interesting process given that less than half of the people are literate.

A lot of the electioneering is done by candidates driving around in vans with loud speakers, chanting party slogans and policies. My first night here at the college I was awoken at 11pm by a noise that sounded like a group of tribesmen on the warpath, this was quickly followed by a speech, and after my initial fright I realised that the marauding tribesmen was in fact the siren they used to attract attention before they went into the electioneering speech!

There is a lot of disagreement between tribes about candidates which can lead to violence. (This is why the Aus Government recommends that you reconsider travel arrangements to the highlands area during this time. But as I’m located some 20 minutes outside the township in a reasonably secure location it is not considered a problem.) Maggie, the ABV rep here in Mt Hagen, has decided that she is going to get all of the volunteers together and take them away from Mt Hagen a day before the elections and for a couple of days afterwards…just to be on the safe side.

Where I live
I have a small two bedroom house on the grounds of the college called Blue-Bell Cottage. The grounds are lovely and the countryside is beautiful. We are 20 minutes outside of Hagen and I go into town once a week with some of the staff. It is not safe for me to walk around on my own even during the day so someone is always with me wherever I want to go and shop. The market is great. Lots of fresh fruit and vegetables and this week I spent about $5 for everything I needed for a week. The supermarket on the other hand has nearly everything that I buy back home but is a bit more expensive.
The people here are nice they are very friendly and happy and smile a lot. The children stare at me a lot and always have big grins on their faces. I have been learning some Pidgin but I’m not very good (it requires you to use your memory and mine is pretty lousy).
The weather is absolutely perfect. About 25-26 degrees everyday with blue skies and the occasional cloud. It hasn’t rained for about 4 weeks so that’s a small concern as we are all using water tanks….lucky I’m trained in water rationing. At night the temperature drops to about 8 degrees so it’s very comfortable to sleep in the flannelettes!!!

The job
The library here has about 20,000 books and they are going to double the size of the building next year as the college is working towards becoming a university, One of the big things for me to do will be to convince the principal and his wife (who are away at the moment) that the library doesn’t need to keep every book that is donated. The librarian, Samuel, is happy with that concept but apparently the principal’s wife was appalled when the previous librarian tried to discard from the collection. Subsequently the reference collection contains 4 almanacs the newest of which is 1999!!! Samuel and I are going to write a collection management & development policy once we have met with the staff which we hope will convince everyone that not every book is sacred.

I am also teaching Samuel descriptive cataloguing and Dewey. This has been very interesting for me as I haven’t used those skills for many years…..now I remember why I’m not a cataloguer!!