I APOLOGISE for not keeping my word on
posting the poems … I will try to fix that up.
A few things have occupied my mind over the
past few weeks – including polishing the novel/novella I am working on, trying
to renew my passport, working 10 hours daily, thinking about other
responsibilities with two other organisations I am a member of, etc.
Today (as on two other days in the last three
weeks), I waited on a line for about three hours to lodge an application for
the renewal of my passport.
While waiting, I read something in the
newspaper about the problems that secondary school students in Port Moresby and
Lae (the two cities in PNG) are facing – drinking, causing nuisance, fighting, etc.
A particular report caught my attention; it is
of a teenage girl who went out with her friends for a night two weeks ago – and
was killed.
That bothered me.
Why should teenage girls go out at night with
friends to places that are dangerous?
When I arrived back at the office, I thought
about the incident and wanted to do my own research into the death (and
possibly come up with something/literature to help others - the teenagers in
school, as well as the parents).
At about 1.30pm, I thought about a handywoman
we have here (I will call her Yan). I just had this funny feeling that she may
know something about the killing.
(I did not know why I thought of Yan - but I
did. I must also make the point that in the media report, nothing was mentioned
about where the girl lived or where she was originally from.)
Now here is the interesting thing.
Thirsty minutes later, Yan came over to see the
other male colleague, who is seated on the opposite side of my desk, and told him
that she was going to attend the funeral of the girl who was killed two weeks
ago.
When Yan was done talking, I called her over
and told her about my “gut feeling” – about the possibility of her knowing
something about the death of the girl.
She smiled and said: “After the funeral service,
I will come and tell you what happened.”
About a minute after Yan left for her desk, I
realised that I should have asked her for a photo of the dead girl.
“Anyway, I will ask her when she returns from
the funeral service,” I thought and went back to work.
Three minutes later, in passing out to attend
the funeral service, Yan dropped by at my desk and left the funeral programme on my
desk and said: “You may want a copy of this.”
I looked at the cover of the programme and
saw the face of a beautiful teenage girl. (It was as if Yan was reading my mind
today.)
While looking at the face of the high school girl on the
funeral programme, I was bogged by this question: “Why did she have to die?”
I may inform you more on this later.
Take care.
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