“I was born in the highlands of Papua New Guinea in the Simbu Provence back in the 80’s. My parents were both teachers there. My Mum is from the Gulf Provence in an area called Kerema. We are river people, crocodile country, that’s my totem. I guess that’s why I’m attracted to rivers and waterways. My bilological father is Australian but I don’t know much about him.
I spent most of my childhood around Mt Hagen which was up the highway from the Simbu Provence. I started school there and we moved after a pretty hectic accident that happened to my Mum. Mum was attacked in broad daylight at the market. There was a jail break and the thieves that broke out needed a car to flee. They spotted Mum and as she was married to a white man she had a nicer car so they attacked her so violently she nearly died. PNG doesn’t have medical services like we do here so it was pretty touch and go. I was about 11 at the time and it was a dangerous period. There was a lot of violence happening up there at the time and my folks decided to leave and move to Goroka. Dad was working at the time as a Lawyer in Hagen but bought a law practice in Goroka later on.
We spent most of our time living in a village further out of town because Dad would get death threats working as a Lawyer. There’s 2 types of law in PNG and one is tribal law. You could be right in the justice system and then other people would say, No! I’m gonna burn your village down. It’s just the way it is there. So we were in a coffee plantation which is where I was first exposed to it. One of my earliest memories is before the berries come onto the trees they flower. I remember the whole area turns white from the flowers and they smell divine. It’s freezing in the highlands so the first time I saw it I thought it was snow.
Just by default being mixed race I lived this kind of hybrid life. I think it was a privilege being able to live in two worlds, being brought up in the village life, getting out into the bush, learning how to do all kinds of stuff we probably take for granted now like making bow and arrows, learning how to make a fire from nothing and fishing.
I consider Goroka my home town pretty much. That’s where I went to primary school and my parents were established there. We actually go there now on our coffee trips. Goroka is the gateway to the coast so it’s like a melting pot town. It’s really beautiful with huge mountain ranges, feels like it’s Spring all year round. It rains at 4pm every day, perfect for growing coffee. Most of our holidays were spent in Madang on the coast of PNG. It’s a tropical paradise with big volcanoes in the distance, coral reefs and turquoise water. Through my early teen years I helped Dad build a house on some land we were given in Madang as long as we bought them a new outboard motor every few years. That’s PNG style. I learnt a lot including being a good fisherman.
My Mum was married 3 times and my stepdad now has had 2 other wives so I have a big family. There’s 9 of us in the family but I’m not blood related to any of my siblings including some who live in Manchester. My Mum’s first husband rocked up with a baby to the village and Mum’s like that’s not my child but ended up raising him. I’ve got 3 Dads but I consider my Stepdad my father. His name is Tony Prike.
Marrying 3 times is a normal thing to do in PNG. The more wives you have the more status you have, in the tribal sense. They all live together and all the kids call the mother’s Mum. I always found it weird but people say, well you have 3 dads and 2 mums as well (laughs). Tony kept me on the straight and narrow and was a good influence in my life.
I started high school in Goroka until year 8 then my parents had enough money to send me to boarding school. I ended up at one of the fancier boarding schools on the Gold Coast. I had to skip Year 9 which was a disadvantage to me so I struggled a bit academically. I became one of the first foundation Prefects and House Captains from PNG or an Indigenous background which was a big thing. It broke the tradition of all the family names in the private school. I didn’t want it as I didn’t feel like a leader but my headmaster talked me into accepting it. I just didn’t feel worthy.
I’d go home school holidays, get Dad’s car, drive to Madang and scuba dive and fish. The flights were really dear and my folks couldn’t afford to fly me home so the flipside was I got to hang out at some my mates from boarding school’s properties. I’d never been on country in Australia wrangling cattle and putting up fences. That was so nice to see the contrast here. Soon as I finished school I went back to PNG and finished the house with Dad then moved to Australia in 2000.
My adopted brother was already living here so I stayed with him. I lived in Redfern which was wild. I got attacked in Redfern twice by the same man. Can you imagine me, brown man, walking down the street? I guess I had a mobile phone…it was pretty bad. A junkie kind of character wanted my mobile and my wallet. I thought Sydney would be safe because you wouldn’t walk around at night in PNG. I was surprised but 2 months later the same thing happened so I chased him down to the block and felt uneasy there too.
I ended up moving to Kingswood but I had to find work first. I saw an ad for coffee school in the paper. I thought what the hell is this coffee school shit? I thought, I know coffee, I grew up in a plantation so I went along. It was called the Cubby House in Glebe and it was actually a Barista course. I’d never seen all these machines with steam coming out. At the course I met the couple who owned Michel’s Patisserie and they were about to open a Jamaica Blue in Penrith. Being a brown boy they said, this guy will fit in Jamaica Blue, he’s dark and an Islander…they were just being racist, clearly (laughs). I took the job not knowing it was an hour away. I also worked in Michel’s Patisserie. They exploited the shit out of me. They paid me really poorly and no super. At that stage my girlfriend at the time’s father guided me after he saw my payslip. I found other work at a cafe near Town Hall. The guys from Jamaica Blue had to pay me out so I ended up with a lump sum.
The first homeowners grant was happening and my lease was up so long story short. I was 19 years old, had my lump sum, was turned down for loans but ended up finding a Broker through the a guy at the Real Estate who believed I could do it. I bought this apartment in Kingswood which was probably the last place under $100k. I didn’t really know how to pay a mortgage but I got the first homeowners grant, partied hard. you can imagine, young bloke in Sydney (laughs).
I ran into a friend from PNG who saw me at an Espresso Bar I was working at. He was a Hotel manager in Darling Harbour and offered me a job. I liked where I was but he gave me hours at the hotel too I was working the 2 jobs to pay off my mortgage and that’s where I met Mel. Mel was gearing up to do a big trip to Iran but found out her housemate hadn’t been paying her rent for 2 months and the the real estate sent an eviction notice. She would have been black listed as well if she didn’t pay the flatmate’s share off as well. That stopped her trip to Iran. I thought she was super cool and I asked her if she wanted to come to PNG with me and she was like …Yeah!! I thought I’m gonna marry this girl (laughs). Nah! I wasn’t that smart. Back home in PNG though everyone treated us like we were married and Mel was given wedding gifts from everyone. That trip was awesome. Taking Mel out on the water, no-one around, dolphins jumping, turtles on the reef, swimming in aqua water. It was super romantic and a beautiful beginning to our relationship.
When we got back there was sadness as my older brother was killed and I had to tell my parents who were on holiday at the time in Cairns. We flew up to be with them just after the news. My brother had already lost his wife so they left behind 2 children who ended up being adopted by my parents. It was big. I don’t think I realised how depressed I was through that.
We shared houses with some crazy people with crazy neighbours. We had the guy upstairs screaming down the road and we were having a few beers on a Sunday arvo on our verandah. The guys across the road are threatening him with baseball bats so the guy grabs this big knife and jumped off his balcony, he see’s me sitting on my deck and took a lunge on me so we pulled the door closed and he’s stabbing the door. He’s saying you’re the one who tells me to shut up and I said, well you play death metal at 2 in the morning full blast. This big scene is on the street, people screaming, cops are everywhere . I ended up having to make a report at the cop station and I was a bit high (laughs).
In 2009 we went on the big trip Mel talked about in her story. I wanted to see Mel’s motherland. That was so amazing that trip. When we got back Mel was looking at Uni and she wanted to go. I didn’t want to stand in her way but I didn’t know what I was going to do. I loved that about her and I wanted her to go so I went back home. I was really home sick after being in Latin America. When I got home Mum and Dad had moved from Goroka to Lae and Lae can be a difficult place and I didn’t feel at home so I went to Madang and the mining had really started to ruin the place. I was feeling displaced. Mel was like, I’m going to Lismore! I got a car and came up with Mel so she could get around up here. I still had my mortgage and needed job security and a plan. We weren’t really on the same page. It was a hard time but also a much needed time apart. We don’t know what we want in our 20’s.
I entered this competition to win a holiday in PNG so I called her and needed a photo of us together. I sent this pic of us in Cairns being all tanned and touristy with the caption ‘The land of the unexpected’ and we won. I called Mel. We weren’t even together. Mel’s up here being a Byron babe and I’m losing my mind in Sydney (laughs). We flew with a world class photographer David Kirkland to PNG and we were the talent for tourism. He didn’t know I was from PNG so it worked out so great. They took us all around the islands and something sparked again with Mel and I. The nicest part was they took us to the area where my brother is buried. That was cool.
Later on that year we decided to find where we wanted to live so we went to Cairns. Big floods were happening then and as soon as we landed in Cairns, Cyclone Yasi came. The biggest cyclone and the biggest floods in Australia..we were there, what’s next? We were in Palm Cove having beer and Pizza and I said, maybe we should get married. I enjoy hanging out with you, so we got married. That was 10 years ago.
Long story short we ended up back in Sydney and found a shop cheaper than in Cairns in Surry Hills and opened Kwila. It was nice to connect again with family and friends.
As Mel said in her interview we decided to live in Lismore and set up our cafe. Lismore and Bundjalung in general has always had a strong pull for both of us. It’s the only part of Australia after living up and down the coast that I’ve felt more at home in. Whether it’s the mountains and the rivers or the ocean and the people. It’s probably the combination of all of it that’s always felt like the place that we would land at some point. Having that opportunity to start this space and be a part of this community is really special and I don’t think I could be any happier. It’s just a building and we have stuff in here to offer but it’s the people who come here that make it.”
