Lovely Obano

Before Grace and I went to Obano to start our duty, we went to the traditional market in Enarotali to shop our daily needs. We chose to shop in Enarotali because the price was cheaper than in Obano. We bought kerosene stove, plates, bowls, glasses, forks, spoons, knife, scissor, bucket, broom, a sack of rice (10 kg), a pack of egg, 5 liters vegetable oil, 5 liters kerosene, 1 kg sugar, 200 g salt, 1 pack of tea, 1 pack of milk, ¼ kg onion, ¼ kg shallot, ¼ kg garlic and ¼ kg chili. Gosh… I really started a new life in Papua. Hahahaha… 

It was Sunday 11 AM, Grace, Victor (dentist) and I went to the Aikai harbor to catch a motor boat to Obano. We had to pay 20.000 rupiah (2 USD) to cross the lake. Obano is located across the Paniai Lake. It took about 1-2 hours to cross the lake, it depended on the power of the machine and the load of the passengers.

For the first time, I ever rode this kinda boat. The boat moved so fast because there were just me, Grace, Victor, the boat driver and his assistant. I was really amazed by the view around the lake. It was super duper amazing. I held my breath for a few second. “I can’t believe that I’m here”, I said it to myself. And guess what… there were waves on the lake. The waves were about more than 50 cm and the wind blew so fast. Every time the boat hits the wave I said, “Wow… am I in Dufan right now?” (Dufan is an amusement place in north Jakarta where you can play the artificial rafting and get splashed by the water). Sometimes the water of the lake splashed right on my face and my body. As we went further, much water splashed into our boat and I was so scared that the rice would get wet. I had to make sure that the rice was still dry. This sack of rice was so important for us and it was so expensive. 

After less than 1 hour, we finally arrived in Obano Harbor. It was so silent there, not many people there. I saw few men with motor cycle. I thought they were ojek (some kind of taxi but we change the car with motor cycle). They were not ojek. They came from another village to see Paniai Lake. Then we asked them to take us to Puskesmas (Public Health Center) in Obano.  

Our house was located right behind Puskesmas Obano. There were 5 houses there. The first  house was the biggest house belongs to the head of Puskesmas. The second house was our house. The third house was empty. The fourth house was a machine house. There was a generator and a drum of gasoline for electricity. The fifth house was Anton’s house. We had a nice floating wooden house with a permanent toilet. I guess we had the best toilet in the village ;-)  

Wow our house in Obano was also in pink. I thought… people really love pink or maybe it was the cheapest paint color. Huahahaha…  By the way, we had 2 bedrooms, 1 living room, 1 kitchen, 1 shower room and very big front yard and back yard.

As you can see in the picture, my bedroom without bed. Just a plastic carpet, rubber carpet, pillows and sleeping bag. Ok please notice at the wall and you will see unused cigarette packs were hanging on the wall. Those were the spots of signal or internet connection and it was directed to the Telkomsel tower in Enarotali. We made phone calls, sms, and open emails or facebook by mobile phone from those spots. And here is the tips if we wanted to make phone calls, we don’t have to stick our ears to the wall. Just use the earphone and then we can talk while lying on the carpet or sleeping bag. Lazy mode on :D

 At the shower room, you can see that we had a semi modern toilet with good tiles. It was so different compare to the outsiders’ or natives’ toilet. Hey look… we got LOréal, The Body Shop and Watson products imported from Jakarta. Hahahaha… Women!!!

The typical house in Obano was floating wooden house and non floating wooden house. It all depended on the ground. Honai was a traditional Papuan house in circular form with no partitions inside, so it only had one space, but it was not easy to find honai because most people built square wooden house. Lately, they already built a house with partitions so they have living room and bedrooms. For kitchen, they have separate kitchen about 1-2 meters from the house. They built an independent small room square form about 2 x 2 meters. Most activities happened in the kitchen, they were not only cooking but also talking and sleeping in the kitchen. I guess it was because the temperature were cold enough at night around 10° C so they kept to light the fire until tomorrow morning. Sometimes they slept too well so they didn’t realize that they got burn injury. For toilet, they built toilet near the river if they lived on the river side, or they built a nomad toilet around their house. 

The people in Obano consist of native Papuan from Ekari tribe and some immigrant form Sulawesi, Java, Sumatera, Moluccas, etc (I call them the outsiders). The situation in Obano was fine but there was a rumor that some native like to get drunk. It’s hard to find liquor or any alcoholic drink in Paniai (including Obano of course). The Puskesmas staff told me that some people stole the 70% alcohol to mix it with coca cola or fanta and get drunk with it. “Wow… should I try it???” So the only alcohol that left in Puskesmas was alcohol swab. Of course it’s gonna be hard to get drunk with alcohol swab. LOL…

About the water, we used rain water for shower and spring water for drinking and cooking. We had a spring water on the back yard of our house but too bad the water wasn’t good enough for drinking. It tasted like iron and it turned my white t-shirt look like rusty. I guessed the water contains too much minerals, so we used it for cleaning the vegetables, washing the dishes and clothes. There was a nice spring water in Yebadoba about 1 km from our house. We used to walk to Yebadoba and came back to our house with carrying 5 liters water on the right hand and 5 liters water on the left hand. We did it every 2 days. We were strong women. Hahahaha…

In Obano we only had one traditional market and there were not much seller on the market. I guess arround 5-8 people who sell vegetables, fruits, fishes, and some kinda small lobster which we called ‘udang selingkuh’ (Cherax albertisii). You could also meet this Cherax albertisii  in Baliem river, Wamena Regency.  This traditional market only in the morning so if we came late then it was already gone.  On the way to the traditional market, we will meet many small stores or kios. They sold rice, sugar, coffee, vegetable oil, milk, soap, shampoo, candies, biscuits, etc.