The Versatile Palm

BY “AWAKE!” CORRESPONDENT IN PAPUA

IT WAS hot and humid, and there was the usual casual atmosphere in the native market. People arrived early from villages along the coast and inland. Vendors were sitting on the grass beside their goods, chewing betel nut and using the opportunity to talk over local events.

I noted that many were selling large blocks of a brown-colored substance that the buyers eagerly sought. Turning to Laea, my native companion, I asked what this was.

“Why, that’s our main food,” he replied. “In our language we call it ‘poi,’ but in English it is usually called ‘sago.’”

Upon closer examination I found it to be brown on the outside only because it had dried in the sun; inside it was a creamy color.

“We make it from the pith in the trunk of the sago palms, which grow abundantly in the swamplands here in the Gulf District of Papua,” continued Laea, breaking off a small piece and kneading it between his fingers.

“What are these palms like?” I asked.

“The tree attains a height of up to thirty feet in about fifteen years,” he explained. “The trunk is very thick, and just before reaching maturity it becomes gorged with starch. It is then that we fell the palm and strip off the wooden shell, which is about an inch thick, exposing the soft starchy pith. This pith is grated into a meal. The meal then must be washed several times, and strained. The starch passes through the strainer, while the stringy fibers are discarded.”

“How much meal can you make from one palm?” I inquired with increasing interest.

“Some palms may yield from 250 to 300 pounds,” he answered. “However, if we wait too long before cutting down the tree, all of this starchy core material passes into the developing fruit and leaves the trunk a hollow shell, which then dies.”

I was very interested in knowing how they cooked their sago, so I asked Laea to explain this to me. “Come to my house,” he invited; “my wife will be cooking some for our noon meal.”

Methods of Cooking

Laea’s house was neatly made from bush materials built on posts about six feet from the ground. Along one side of the house was built a small veranda, onto which two bedrooms opened. His wife’s name was Meta. She was sitting cross-legged in the kitchen before a small hearth on which a fire was burning. The kitchen was a separate structure joined to the main house by a raised walk. She had a large block of sago, such as I had seen in the market, and with her right hand she was working the meal into a long palm leaf that she held in her left hand.

“Meta, John is interested in knowing how you cook the sago for us. Would you like to explain it to him?” asked Laea with a broad smile.

“Certainly,” she replied. “Wrapping it in a leaf and roasting it in the fire, as I am doing now, is the quickest and most convenient way, because it is easy to carry with us when we go to the garden or out fishing. Sometimes I mix coconut with it; then we call it ‘La’a Poi.’”

“I like ‘A’i Poi’ the best,” interrupted Laea. “That is what we call it when shellfish is roasted in with the sago. Sometimes we boil it together with sweet potatoes, taro or bananas, and all the family enjoy it very much.”

“Here, try some of this. It is ready to eat now,” said Meta, breaking off a piece and offering it to me.

It was soft, spongy and quite pleasant to the taste.

“You are really a Papuan now,” they laughed.

Other Uses

“The sago palm is very useful to us in other ways,” Laea noted. “For example, this woven material I have used on the walls of my house is made from the branch of the sago palm.”

Looking closely at it, I noticed that an interesting pattern had been woven into each sheet.

“We strip the hard layer from the stem of the palm branch and then weave the strips together as you see here.”

“How long does it take to make one of these sheets?”

“A large one, perhaps six feet wide and eight feet long, would require one day to cut the branches, strip them and then weave the strips by hand. However, looms are being made now that enable a man to weave about five times as much as he can do by hand. Some of the village people are using this material, ‘sero,’ as we call it, to line the inside of their houses.”

Laea next drew my attention to the thatched roof of his neighbor’s house. “There is another use we make of the sago palm,” he said. “We fold the leaves over a strip of bamboo and lay them on the roof. This forms a rainproof thatch, which also keeps our houses cool inside even when the sun is very hot. Sometimes a man may build the walls and roof of his house entirely from sago-palm leaves.”

“Even the flooring of our houses can be made from the hard wooden shell from the trunk of the sago palm,” continued Laea. “So you can see that it is useful to us in many ways.”

Meta interrupted, and we looked around to see her standing in the doorway wearing a brightly colored fiber skirt.

“Do you like my skirt?” she asked. “I do indeed,” I replied.

“Most people call this a grass skirt,” she explained. “However, this too I have made from sago-palm leaves. We pick young leaves, dry and then shred them and dye them different colors. Finally we knot them together to form a skirt.”

When I asked Laea about the brown-colored blocks sold in the market that morning, I had not realized they held such a fascinating story, nor that the lives of these friendly people were so closely involved with their versatile sago palm.