I’m interviewing John Ward in front of a roaring fire at the beautiful Conference Centre at the foothills of the Great Dividing Range in Victoria’s Yarra Valley, which he runs with wife Louise. Forty years ago, in his 20s, he was a priest, living in a remote mountainous region of Papua New Guinea. And when I say remote, I mean, only accessible by plane, and even then only when the fog lifts.
Missionaries began to ‘open up’ Papua New Guinea in the 1960s, but it wasn’t for the faint hearted. The regions they traversed were cut off from the world, the indigenous locals were cannibals and their religious practices, witchcraft. At this time, the infant mortality rate in remote areas was as high as 80%. Yet missionaries, like Father Jean Besson, gave their lives (quite literally in an air crash) to found the Kanabea mission, determined to bring Christianity to the region.
At this time, John Ward was a part time Chaplain with the Royal Australian Air Force in Victoria, Australia. He recalls he only learned to fly light air craft so that he could one day fly to Kanabea in the remote mountains of the Gulf Province, where his Seminary was affiliated with a church. His first trip there was in 1969, before PNG had gained independence from Australia. Independence was declared in 1975 and just six years later John went to Kanabea to live and work on a mission with the Kamea tribe for three years.
He worked closely with the Bishops and leaders, establishing a school and makeshift hospital, picking up bits of the Kamea language and speaking Pidgin with the people. In those three years, the bonds he made were profound and lasting. John left the priesthood and PNG in 1983 at the age of 36, and on returning to Australia he married and started a family. But his involvement with the Kamea people continued and as a pilot, he was able to fly back to see them. The need was so great for him to keep returning that he set up PNG Corporate Mission, a charitable organisation, close to both his and wife Louise’s heart. Thirty years after leaving his home in PNG, John pilots at least two trips a year back to Kanabea, taking with him medical supplies, food and a volunteer medical team, in the Conference Centre’s light aircraft.
How does the future look?
The PNG mission has ambitious goals. John wants to develop Kanabea’s hospital, school and road. Only 20% of kids go to school in PNG. Of those, a mere 5-10% go on to secondary education. The majority of the 20,000 Kamea who live in this remote mountainous region are full time subsistence farmers. Their diets are lacking in protein, consisting mainly of taro and greens steamed in bamboo. They are addicted to betel and chew it with lime, causing untold oral complications. Their region is still only accessible only by air, and many of the locals will walk for three days through treacherous bush to come to one of John’s medical clinics. Knowing the people are making such an effort to come, John puts on sports days for the children, to combine some fun with the inoculations and essential everyday medical treatment the kids need to receive, which would be otherwise unavailable to them.
In 2010, John drew up plans for a new hydroelectric system for Kanabea to replace a 50 year old antiquated system that had not been operational for several years. Power will make such a difference to the infrastructure and the people. Currently, when one of the volunteer doctors performs surgery, they wear a head torch, so that if/when the power goes out, they can continue to operate! As if a salient reminder of the need for improved medical facilities, John recently learned of the death of Bishop Tavel with whom he spoke face-to-face just last week in PNG. They had worked closely with each other over the years. Tavel died of malaria; to us in the first world, an easily preventable disease, to the Kamea people, an every day killer.
In addition to the new hydroelectric system, he aims to sponsor a full time doctor at Kanabea, renovate the dilapidated buildings, purchase a new turbine aircraft for the community and build a road to the main ports of Lea to the north and Kerema in the South. But with all progress and intervention, comes risk. When the road is built and Kanabea is more accessible, it will be exposed to the risks that plague the rest of the country: AIDS, violence and corruption. John is well aware of this and continues to lobby governments both home and abroad, governments he feels have let down this remote area of PNG.
Their plans will require considerable more corporate funding and involvement.
How is PNG Corporate Mission funded?
Melbourne Overseas Mission sponsors the mission and John and Louise donate their time and skill. Much of the remaining funding for the mission’s work comes from donations made through visitors staying at the Yarra Valley Conference Centre which they own and run. It plays a central role in the mission’s structure. Each group who stay at the conference centre hear of their vital work in PNG, and often make corporate donations and sponsorship as a result. John is also always on the look out for volunteers to offer their expertise and is heartened when guests are moved to do so having heard about the mission’s work. He is a constant letter writer – looking for ways to involve the corporate sector – and spends much of his time canvassing for funding. In the future, plans are afoot to fly corporate volunteers and sponsors out to PNG, or youngsters who have saved up part of the trip money. It would be a life changing experience.
It’s hard to put a figure on how much the PNG Corporate Mission has raised over the years, or how much John, Louise and the Conference Centre have ‘invested’. John supplies the aircraft ($300,000) and each trip alone costs in the region of $20,000 with fuel and running costs, not to mention his and Louise’s time. When you’re running two, sometimes three, trips a year, it soon mounts up.
Charities closer to home
Incredibly, John and Louise are heavily committed to two other charities as well, one of which came to them in the form of a terrifying bushfire. In 2009, the horrendous bushfires now known as Black Saturday destroyed 90% of John and Louise’s business, the Yarra Valley Conference Centre. They were well prepared but more than anything they were lucky, when the extreme bushfire that was to kill 171 people swept through their property. With help from one of their children and his friends, they managed to defend their 20-year-old purpose-built timber conference centre but were unable to save their sheds, machinery, equipment, hay and 120 acres of fencing.
Lucky to escape themselves, and with a mammoth recovery effort of their own ahead of them, they typically set about helping others who had suffered so much more. When they heard about the couple who had lost their Wildlife Shelter in the fires, they donated five acres of their property to them and so Babbajin Wildlife Shelter was born. Open only to guests from the Conference Centre, they get the unique opportunity to visit the wildlife shelter and learn about the care the rescued injured animals receive. Without the Wards’ generosity and promotion of this shelter, Babbajin would never have happened.
Charities helping charities
The third charity the couple are involved with is the longest running. Moira Kelly AO has been friends with John and Louise for years. She has literally dedicated her life to helping hundreds of children in need the world over. 13 years ago John and Louise were one of several founding members of Moira Kelly’s Children First Foundation, to fund Moira’s charitable works. John is an active member of the board and works with the foundation to evacuate children from PNG who need critical medical attention that can only be given in the developed world. Louise has assisted Moira on numerous trips overseas to Albania, Somalia and Iraq. She helped Moira to bring two Iraqi children Ahmed and Emmanuel to Australia; Ahmed is now a Paralympic swimmer and Emmanuel is following his dream of becoming a singer appearing on the X-factor last year.
No time like now
John is very much his own man. He’s quietly unconventional often choosing to look outside the square. Louise is a multi tasker, always juggling multiple events and groups on the go at once. Between them they are a dynamic pair, often flying in the face of convention, taking on bigger challenges, rarely going with the general flow, always to the benefit of others.
As we finish the interview, I ask John if the dichotomy between their lives and ours ever gets to him? He laughs gently as he recalls flying a young boy and his mother out of PNG for medical treatment in Australia. After taking off from Kanabea they had to stop within PNG in a tiny two-shack fishing village on the way and the small boy, who’d never been in a plane let alone left the country, asked ‘Is this Port Moresby?’
John and Louise are truly changing peoples lives and rely on local volunteers, corporate sponsorship and donations to enable them to carry out their essential work – John can be contacted on jward@yarravalleyconference.com.au
Article via Just Words.
