In this latest series, I will be going through all the countries I’ve travelled to on my mission to visit every single country in the world. In this article, we will be covering country #22: Papua New Guinea. If you haven’t gotten a chance already, read this story first to find out why I’m trying to visit all 193 UN-recognized countries.
VIDEO – Country #22: Papua New Guinea
Blog post on Papua New Guinea
- Papua New Guinea: Randomly Attending the FIFA Women’s U-20 World Cup Finals
- Papua New Guinea: I Somehow Ended Up in a Yacht full of Port Moresby Expats
- Complete Hong Kong, Papua New Guinea, and Australia Spending Breakdown
- Papua New Guinea: The 5 Benefits of Staying in an Air BnB in Port Moresby
- Papua New Guinea: Visiting the Port Moresby Adventure Park and War Cemetery
Arriving in Papua New Guinea
I flew from Brisbane, Australia to Port Moresby to visit my friend, Daniel, who lives there. We met from Chris Guillebeau’s World Domination Summit and he invited me to visit his hometown. Normally, no one goes here cause it’s far, expensive, and dangerous. Since I was travelling for one year, I figured, this is a great time to pop by and visit. I used my Avios points to fly to Port Moresby round trip which cost me roughly $200 CAD.
When I arrived at Port Moresby, I didn’t realize that I needed to show the immigration staff my exit ticket. I did have an exit ticket, I just didn’t have it printed. Luckily, she was okay with me not presenting it. She promptly gave me a free Visa on arrival and off I went to the airport lobby to wait for pickup from my friend’s parents.
Meeting my friend’s parents
Daniel was going to arrive in Papua New Guinea in two days time. He was still at Cairns Australia at the time entertaining his fiance’s parents.
Daniel’s parents and I hit it off right away and they took me to a local Chinese restaurant to get some lunch. They also encouraged me to take lots of sunset photos because of the amazing view that Port Moresby has to offer.
In the evening, one of Daniel’s friend picked me up and took me to the FIFA Women’s U-20 World Cup Finals soccer game.
FIFA Women’s U-20 World Cup Finals
I normally don’t like soccer. But, I soon found out that I actually enjoy watching it live. The finals were between North Korea and France.
In the first part of the game, France was the aggressor and was dominating the North Koreans. But they ran out of steam after their initial push. North Korea was relentless throughout the entire game. People were joking that if they don’t win, they’ll probably get shot. Somehow, I feel that it’s more true than a joke.
Grim thoughts aside, the North Koreans won this amazing battle against the French. The fans in the stadium erupted as the fantastic game ended.
Yacht
I hated this day the most. Daniel’s friend decided to take me to a yacht full of Papua New Guinea expats. Little did I know how pretentious and unfriendly many of them are.
The yacht ride started with a long ride towards this island off the coast of Port Moresby. I attempted to mingle with these obnoxiously fake individuals but to no avail. Some of them were friendly but most of them were not.
I definitely did not like this crowd.
When we got to the island, I did some minor exploring before calling it quits and heading back to the boat. I just wanted out, I can’t stand being around this group of people anymore.
Not that there’s anything wrong with them. It’s a classic case of personality clash and I’m not meant to hang out with this group of people. At least the view of the ocean during the boat ride was nice.
City trip with my friend
Finally, Daniel arrived in Papua New Guinea and I no longer have to suffer hanging out with those other people. He took me to some local Chinese restaurant and ate some delicious food. (Seems like Papua New Guinea has lots of really good Chinese food)
Next, we visited a local place to play some bowling.
The following few days were pretty neat. Daniel took me to one of his parent’s factories and I got to see the locals do their thing. It seems like there’s a lot of crime in Port Moresby because of the rampant poverty in the country. At one point, we went for a walk outside briefly which is normally something you would never do. But, it was near government buildings where Daniel was running some errands for his dad so for that short walk, it was okay.
Since I was backpacking at the time, we got a chance to just hang out and play some video games also. This, I sorely missed. When you are backpacking long term, you start to miss some of the normal things you do at home.
Adventure Park
One one of the days, we checked out the newly built Adventure Park. It seems many of the expats who live in Port Moresby get bored because there’s not much to do in the city. So this adventure park is the perfect place to go on picnics and take your family for a day trip.
There are tons of endemic animals that are housed here which were fun to see.
War Cemetary
One of the grim places we visited is the war cemetery. This is where many were buried who died fighting the Japanese in World War 2.
It’s funded by the Australian government which is probably why it’s in such good shape.
Papua New Guinea Harbour
On my last two days in Papua New Guinea, we checked out the harbour to get some food and to see the view. I’ve got to say that the port is very beautiful. It almost makes you think that the country is safe.
Before long, I said my goodbyes to Daniel as I left Papua New Guinea to fly back to Australia.
Conclusion
At a much later time, one of the Port Moresby expats threatened to sue me because of the article I wrote about them. She definitely has a thin skin and can’t handle being called shallow and pretentious. She said if I don’t take down photos that has her in them, she would sue me. How is she going to sue me when I live in Canada and she lives in Papua New Guinea? She’s not just pretentious, she’s also pretty stupid.
Regardless, I actually like Papua New Guinea and would love to visit again one day. The next time I visit, I’ll want to see the island of Rabaul and also to go to the autonomous region of Bougainville. In the future, Bougaineville might be the newest country in the world as they did a referendum and won a landslide victory towards voting for independence.
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