I was so interested to receive news of Bougainville by email via Warwick and Vesna Cuneo today. My husband, Dietrich Jager (Dieter) and I, Beverly, lived and worked in Bougainville from 1971- 1975. We lived in Arawa and travelled to Panguna each day to work. Our son, Paul was born in 1973 while we were there. We have kept in touch with a number of friends who were there at that time - the Cuneos, Colleen and Graham Hoskins and family, Elaine Devereux, Henry and Rosemary Pearson, to name a few. My brother and his family holidayed with us and my late mother also came and stayed after the death of my father. Sadly my husband, Dieter, died on 14 September, 2011 from cancer. He had just turned 80 in May 2011.
After Bougainville in 1975 we returned to live in Adelaide South Australia. Dieter worked for many years at Moomba Gas Fields where he flew in and out. After that his work as a maintenance planner took him all over Australia. I am now living in Llantwit Major, Vale of Glamorgan Wales since Easter this year and am to be married again on 13 July 2013 to a man, John Rowley, whom I met in 1966 while living and working in London. I returned to Australia from UK at the end 1967 and Dieter and I met up and married in 1970. We had met some time earlier before I went to UK in the 60s but at that stage were just acquaintances. Three weeks before he died Dieter said 'you should look up that chap you knew in London'. This I eventually did after having no contact for 46 years and found that my future husband's wife had died 5 days before my husband. It is very special as I feel I have Dieter's blessing - a very kind man.
Dieter loved his time in Bougainville. He was very adventurous - loved to go boating, times at Loloho, enjoyed his work and made good friends. Our time there was very interesting and enjoyable, although a culture shock for me initially with Arawa still in process of being constructed - no supermarket, church, hospital or made roads - big boulders and mud and slush everywhere. Dietrich would have found this web site very interesting and nostalgic and I would like him to be included in the web's 'Honour Roll' and 'The Big Copper Mine in the Sky'.
I enclose some old photos and scanned slides; all others are still in Adelaide.
Beverly Jager
email bevjager[AT]iinet.net.au
Dieter & Beverly, Bovo River 1971
Dieter with good catch
Arawa Market
Arawa under construction;
the Jager's house; Dieter in foreground
Colleen Hoskins on Arovo Island
Graham Hoskins with the day's catch
