Boat vendors often peddle their wares on lakes or rivers in busy places. Bangkok floating markets for instance, or in Srinagar, Kashmir, where I stayed on Dal Lake in an old-style houseboat for a week. Our boat came with traditionally carved furniture and Indian rugs. It was 1989 and we got a special deal because the unrest in Kashmir had scared sensible tourists away. We were too young to know better and survived our stupidity splendidly. Local visitors paddled their boats over, loaded with food or local art, and we’d hang over the railings and bargain our hardest.
Because of the apparent remoteness of many PNG dive sites, I never expected to see so many similar boats paddled across to us. Their industrious owners were determined to make contact. Sometimes they’re just curious villagers from near-by islands. But there are vendors almost everywhere the MV Chertan pulls up anywhere near to land, and occasionally way out to sea.
Before the first dive, there rarely a person in sight, just miles of rainforest clad coastline down to shoreline. The location seems amazing and remote, a true wilderness perhaps. An hour or so later, as we swim back along the underside of the boat to the ladder, there are wooden canoe undersides, babies to the MV Chertan, huddled behind the dive deck. Paddles dip below the surface as they jostle for position and silhouettes of people lean over to watch us on our safety stop.
Anyone nearby with anything to sell has mobilised. An old man with jewellery arranged across a wooden railing and nautilus shells grins as I surface next to him. His untraditional cap says BOY. Bobbing a couple of metres behind him are 2 kids, possibly brother and younger sister with only their curiosity on board. Later when I’m dry and dressed, the old man is still waiting, his goods perfectly balanced considering the swell. It’s hard to believe they haven’t slid into the ocean. He gives me a thumbs up and I do the same, but he has nothing I want to buy.
The MV Chertan has parked at Michelle’s dive site for the first time in ages, and she’s casually tied up to a tree. There’s been a fight between a couple of local tribes over who really owns this beach. For a while, both tribes demanded money to anchor here. A man, dressed in shorts and stand-out, bright yellow shirt gesticulates wildly at our canoe vendors. I wish I understood their sign language, as then I’d know whether he’s saying – this is our territory, leave before I cut your head off, or – hey grand-dad, I’ve not seen you for ages and you just missed New Years celebrations.