Sad times - Nick Crawley's response

All,

Quite often I receive a very entertaining response to my sad notes. Going forward I will share more of these with you

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From: Nick Crawley <crawley.n@xtra.co.nz>

Sent: Saturday, 15 August 2015 2:33 PM

To: Info@johndavidson.com.au

Subject: Fwd: Sad times.

Good afternoon, John and Chrissie,

A sad week to be sure, all brings back memories.

Corinne and I remember Photene well, helped us out of a serious embarrassment I might add. Please bear with me a tad.

Paul and Gabby went south to plant some rellie, and Mark, Danya and Petra were staying at our place in their absence.

At the time we also had an aged Dachshund / heeler cross called Meg who we inherited in the Western Highlands.

Young Mark was about 4 yrs old and had a generous disposition towards Meg to the extent he offered her a piece of toast from his mouth.

Totally overcome by this extraordinary show of benevolence, Meg lunged forward to gratefully gobble the tasty morsel offered.

In her excitement, Meg unfortunately also mouthed Marks chin along with the toast, which subsequently required medical attention.

The NS Medical Foundation was not around at that time, either the govt hausik or Photene who had a clinic under her house in Section 19.

It was a Saturday morning as I recall and we all toddled off at great speed to visit rudely interrupted Photene who was also eating her breakfast toast.

Mark was not what you'd call a co-operative patient, he was belligerent, in pain, bleeding and put succinctly, most out of sorts with everything and everyone.

It required a mass of very able bodied grown ups to hold him in a supine position so Photene could administer the local into his chin, marvellous performance.

The ensuing commotion was quite frightening and I had to rush outside a couple of times to have a quick smoke to calm my shattered composure.

Ended up a beautiful job done by Photene, only thing remaining was for me to explain how it happened to Gabby, and get the stitches out in due course.

Paul and Gabby were excellent at the news, Gabby actually suggested that Mark could classify the subsequent scar as a duelling mishap in his later years.

I distinctly remember making sure I was at Mananau when the 5 stitches were due to come out!

Martin Atobu was a very loyal member of the NS Agricultural Foundation who together with his wife Mary, did a marvellous job of managing the

28,000 bird layer project.

This became increasingly difficult when the troubles started to interrupt all BCL activities from Birempa to Empress Augusta Bay, and our Mananau facilities were very open.

The PNG Defence forces were located at Camp 10 and Kawerong/Karoona Haus, and not at all interested in putting a section in at our project for support.

We soldiered on there with Martin running the show, with all our workforce, until the PNGDF ordered us to decamp and move to Panguna with 24hrs notice.

I got 14 girls into Kawerong Haus, and they loved it - great tucker, 2 to a room and hot showers. The 8 men went into Karoona.

I had Martin, Mary and their 2 children plus the abattoir foreman and his wife and 1 child and they all moved into my place for a few days until we got accom. fixed.

I don't know how Mary did it, but the household was total harmony, kids well behaved, everyone fed and peace reigned - my Piggery supervisor lived 300 metres down the road in his house, and he came up the river bank to my place every night for a rum and coke with me. Martin was a man of God and settled for the coke, fine with me, grog was very hard to come by in those times. I showed concern about Pius coming in, but he ensured me the PNGDF up never showed after curfew unless in a large group, and then very noisy. All my Mananau staff were B'villeans except the abattoir man, and they had very little regard, respect or support for the Defence Force, police or army.

We all flew down in Horst's big chopper, subsequently fire bombed, to work each morning, and back mid afternoon, making work schedules with livestock very trying.

Pig carcasses were flown out every Monday to Panguna and the trucked down to Arawa - as pork demand lessened from SHRM, we were able to 'export' more to Lae.

Martin was shot through his LandCruiser door in the right ankle with a dum dum 12 gauge round which caused major damage, and he never regained full use of the limb.

The senior staff were all finally repatriated out of B'ville of course, leaving a lot of very fine BCL people to the tender mercies of some quite bad people.

Martin Atobu was a fine man, dedicated to his job, well respected by all and with the typical B'villean sense of humour - his wife Mary (a Chimbu, studied at Vudal with Martin) was an exceptional person in spite many hardships she had to endure, no doubt helped by her very devout adherence to the Catholic Church.

Davo, I digress as usual, appreciate your patience.

I recall both Trevor and Paul, both part of the great comradie we had on B'ville which we did not appreciate until we all left!

My best regards to you both,

Nick and Corinne.

All,

This was close to the end and I was required to visit Panguna and Arawa regularly to ensure that new hires were receiving the most up to date information as to what was happening on-the-ground there. I remember dining at Haus Fragnito and Haus Crawley in those distant days. One topic that dominated conversation at Crawley`s was around the quality of Nick`s rum. I picked up that he is more than handy in the kitchen. There is a variance from the above prose in that Nick`s utility was reinforced with steel plate and that it was Nick who "ran the gauntlet" to ensure that pig and chicken food made it through to Mananau.

Josie, thanks for your input.

Davo

My story - Ride to Conquer Cancer

My Ride to Conquer Cancer effort came to a sudden stop at around the 75 km mark, some 25 kms from Canungra. On Saturday, just prior to mid-day, I was negotiating a downhill stretch at a speed that, perhaps, was beyond me. There was a significant depression in the surface of the bitumen and I was thrown over the handle bars. There was no call for stitches and, so far, we have found no broken bones. However I will not be returning to the dance floor any time soon. 

I have had an opportunity to view, at close quarters, an extremely professional organization. I was just starting to get to know the event staff and some of the other participants. Event Director, Kat Coppins, was nearby when I fell. She gathered myself and my bike and ferried me to the Canungra camp-site. There I was placed into the hands of Tim and his medical group. In late afternoon one of Kat`s staff, Bianca Swapshire transported me back to St Lucia.  Bianca, I apologise for my bad manners in nodding off on the trip home.  Also at the accident scene was a participant, Justin, who is a Surgeon.  He also checked me over for any broken bones. Thanks Justin, I was very much in need of your reassurance.

Thank you, one and all, you run an excellent operation. I look forward to the 2016 ride.

This is the third time that I have spent time in Canungra.  It is difficult for me to think of this place without feel some twinges of pain. In November, 1966 I was traveling to Canungra in a train that was a troop train with some carriages reserved for civilians.  Prior to boarding the train, in Sydney we stocked up on beer for the journey. It was my 21^st Birthday. The pain commenced several kms north of Gloucester, around midnight, when I recovered consciousness next to the track.  The train was speeding North, through the NSW countryside. By the look of my uniform I realised that I had lost significant blood.  I could hear poultry in the distance and I set off in this direction. I had second thoughts around this plan and returned to the track. In due course I found that I was walking towards Gloucester. To reach town from the North I was obliged to negotiate several large gullies.  I eventually knocked on the door of a house on the outskirts of the town. It was early morning and the lady who came to door was the local hairdresser. By the look on her face I must have been a frightful sight. She immediately screamed out to her husband to call the ambulance. There were twin nursing sisters on duty and I recall the name, Knox. They completed their night shift and then stayed on to pick all the gravel and other foreign objects from my face and forehead. I was in Gloucester for 5 days and at midnight, on the same train, I departed for Queensland and Canungra.  The doctor gathered me to the train. Conversation was minimal but I do remember him saying that I should, “drop in again sometime”.   This undeserving little wretch, that I was,  received 2 lovely birthday cakes, one from the staff at the hairdressers and the other from the hospital staff.  The story pf my little mishap (including a photo of my very bruised face) filled the front page of the Sydney Daily Herald. Many years later, with my wife and infant children, i returned to Gloucester to seek out and thank people for their kindness.  The only person that I could locate was the Hospital Matron, from those times, Sister Casson. We stopped by for a cuppa and a chat.

Our Army unit, 7 RAR were not aware that I was missing until breakfast was being served at South Grafton. I then was obliged to take a phone call from our Adjutant, Captain Peter Leeson.  I can only say that I have participated in more enjoyable calls. Peter was also dealing with another 3 from our Company who went AWOL, in Sydney.  When I reached Canungra my mates were mid-way through their Jungle Training Courses. I was bedded down in the RAP until they figured out what they should do with me. I had sustained a knee injury that was slow to heal. I was shipped by train back to Puckapunyal, Victoria. I was sent back to Canungra about 3 months later. On the 20 April, 1967 I boarded HMAS, Sydney for Vietnam.