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From The Mountains Of Panguna To The Coastal Markets Of Arawa

They trudged in the darkness of night, to sell to us at 5am. And we complained about getting up early!

Maria Rattray
3 min readDec 1, 2022
A market place selling fresh produce
Photo by Jacopo Maia on Unsplash

One of the biggest shocks I had when we first arrived on Bougainville Island was the paucity of food in the supermarket.

I could see nothing to buy. Not joking!

I was told not to worry, that the boats came in every three weeks or so, and we could buy up big then.

All well and good, but we like to eat every day.

Besides, when that boat actually came in, the fresh food was no longer so fresh.

Then someone else told me about the markets on the side of the road.

About the avocados that were huge, compared to ours in Australia. They were not wrong. Huge and delicious.

And the pineapples, the likes of which we had never tasted. Again, they were spot on. I no longer buy pineapple. Not after tasting those ones.

And the red pawpaw…not the yellow one, the red. Oh my goodness, that was a heavenly treat.

And the finger bananas.

In time, a very short time, I became super-reliant on these small stalls.

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Maria Rattray
Maria Rattray

Written by Maria Rattray

Writer, author, teacher, fun-loving poet. Trying valiantly to make the world a better place. Helping you to guide the future. Find me at: https://ponmyword.com

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