The big day 6/27

Today was a big day! As the women came back from Malam just two days ago and the entire village will be returning to Malam to head to Wim in just a few days, we had only a few days to do a few big community events. And since events keep the village from doing other important work, we fit them all on the same day. 

First up was the much anticipated anti-violence march, followed by a celebration of Diwa Nägäm, Wäli Wäziag, Dipa Nägäm, and Mangkol Sobam, the first Ende pastors and the stars of the documentary, Ende Tän e Indrang, then the closing of the technology class, which made this documentary, then some goodbye words for me, and finally the premiere showing of the movie. 

The anti-violence march accomplished exactly what it set out and thus was a success I think. Mostly I wanted a forum in which I could tell the entire community exactly what I think about the domestic violence in Limol, support the women, and not enrage the men but push them to do better. I wanted this for two reasons - first, I did it because people listen to me because I’m white and maybe because I’m educated and I didn’t want to waste an opportunity to inspire some change for something so important. Second, I would have had a guilty conscience having seen so much terrible violence and not doing something, anything, about it. I worried that it would backfire, or upset men that are already prone to violence... but by including the entire community and inviting some men in the church to support us, I think we avoided such a reaction. The march was surprising! Mostly because it was an actual march! The women dressed in national uniforms, dresses and blouses with the PNG flag, formed three lines, held handmade signs admonishing violence and professing love to women, and then Wagiba marched the company, left, right style, around  village and back to the community hall where the rest of the village waited! I gave a speech in Ende before the march and encouraged some men to join. The village applauded us, some pastors supported us, we took some pictures and then it was over! I was proud of my speech which included gems such as, “don’t burn your wife like you would burn a pot” and “when you hit your wife in the face, you hit god in the face”. I was proud of the women who dressed up for the march and for the men who marched with us. And I was proud of the community who supported us. 

The celebration of the first Ende pastors was also pretty emotional. Of course I’ve been entrenched in their heartbreaking tale of bravery and sacrifice to bring the word of god to the Ende tribe. But hearing them tell their stories again in front of the two villages and then witnessing the men and women who came forward to thank them for the light they brought to Ende people was really moving. I’m happy that this movie that we made not only represents a big step in the technology skills of the community, but also an important history. Mostly I hope that watching the film tonight will bring these four souls some happiness and peace that their story will continue to be told for generations. 

As the program was already getting quite late and the food getting cold, my goodbye words from the community were short and sweet - just the way I like my goodbyes! Warama, John, Yugui, Mewato, and Matthew said some nice words and thanks to me for the work I did. John represented the technology class and especially thanked me for the fact that I taught the class for free! It never even occurred to me to charge anyone and I’m glad that these classes which were so easy for me to do were such a blessing for people here.

Then we feasted! I had some delicious banana cake from Jenny for my birthday (yet another community event that was to be checked off today!) and a nice piece of fish. The feasts are truly spectacular here in that people really do feast! Each person gets a bowl of food larger than their head! There’s no room for moderation.

Finally after a short clean up, rest, worship service, and sermon, we were ready to watch the movie. Although I tested the projector beforehand, something strange happened and I wasn’t able to play the movie that we saved yesterday but only the one we saved two days ago. Luckily it was deemed good enough at that stage, but there were plenty of edits that we made yesterday (including adding everyone’s names in the credits) that would have been really nice to see. All in all though, I’m glad that it was the movie that had hiccups and not the march or the feast! People seemed to enjoy the movie and I’m proud of it. We will try to fix the problem and show the finalized version tomorrow. 

Time for sleep!

Kate