she adds with a laugh. While Martijn and Fleur have travelled to more than 30 countries separately and together, PNG was a whole new experience. “We were warned about the dangers of PNG beforehand,” they said, “but what everyone failed to mention was the hospitality of the Papua New Guineans! Every community welcomed our YWAM team with such warmth and open arms. In some there was even a welcome ceremony where we all received crowns made of palm leaves and the whole community came to welcome us and shake our hands.” For these remote villages medical aid is often far away if it’s there at all. Where in the Netherlands, for example, there are 54 eye surgeons per one million inhabitants, in Papua New Guinea there is only one to serve the same number of people. It is slightly better in Fiji where Martijn and Fleur travelled to next on a second outreach mission, where there are eight per million people. One thing that made the PNG trip unique for the couple was the cultural diversity made up of Germans, Americans, Canadians, New Zealanders, Swiss, Brazilians and Peruvians – and the Papua New Guineans they worked alongside. of both their own volunteer team –
Stilt homes at Korak village
Some of the Korak children who took part in the YWAM team’s games
water bottle, she was amazed to learn that their best and most unexpected use by local women is as a cradle for babies and infants, carrying them hands-free with the bilum strap resting across their forehead. How inventive! Fleur said she hopes one day she may do the same with a baby of her own. “But surely the Dutch will look at me twice!”
A drone shot of the river at Korak used as a bathing spot
VOLUME 40 2024
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