This is Peter Buingi and his fellow tribesman.  Among other locals, we met them at the Mount Hagen Cultural Show in Papua New Guinea in August of last year.  After a few minutes of sharing stories with Peter, he asked if he could be our 'pal friend'.  We weren't exactly sure what he meant at first, but taking into consideration the scribbling motion he was making with his hand, we finally realized that he was asking if he could be our 'pen pal'.  I told Peter I would give him my address and would promise to return a letter should I receive one from him. 

It wasn't long after our return to the States that we received a well-worn package from a remote post office in PNG.  It was from our new 'pal friend' Peter Buingi.  Inside the package was a hand made hat, a hand woven billum (purse), a photograph of himself unmasked, and a most touching personal two-page letter.  It was obvious that Peter had spent a lot of time and devotion to writing a letter to us in OUR native language.  We were deeply moved.  When we noticed the postage time stamp, we also realized that Peter must have immediately gone and started working on the letter soon after meeting us.  It was postage stamped two days after we had met him.  He had worked hard on this letter.

We have since put together a return package for Peter, but a challenged with what to send a man from the bush of Papua New Guinea.  After much deliberation, we decided that we would send him a head lamp, a P-38 can opener, a carabineer, photographs that we took, like the one above and finally, some turkey jerky  You know, the turkey has got to be an amazingly intriguing bird if you've never laid eyes on one.  Not only tasty, but the cultural significance of  turkey and America run deep.  It's a symbol of friendship and sharing. 

The last thing we dropped into our package was a personal letter to Peter....if only we had the ability to write our return letter  to him in HIS native language.

We hope to continue our relationship with our new 'pal friend' for many years to come.

Read Peter's Hand Written Letter Here....