Selling Water

In Ukarumpa, we have a training center that offers courses throughout the year to nationals who want to gain skills in areas such as computers, English, grammar, translation software, linguistics, and so on. Each year, they hold a 6-week course called Initial Skills, which I have been helping with since early October. The object is for students to gain “initial skills” in English, research methods, critical thinking, and computers. Most of these students are involved in translation projects as national translators, and they need to improve their skills in each of these areas.

Critical thinking is a fairly uncommon concept in Papua New Guinea. They love to ask questions like “where are you going?” and “what are you doing?” When we lived in a village, we had to answer the question, “Where are you going?” about a dozen times every time we walked somewhere. But, the question “why” is hardly ever asked. In fact, in our pre-village training, our teacher told us it is better to make observations that might lead people to give more information about something rather than asking “why” outright, e.g. “I saw you went into town today” instead of “why did you go to town today?” Thinking critically is important to Bible translators, though, as they think about the meaning of what they are translating and how to most accurately convey it in their language.

One morning in critical thinking class, the teacher asked me to role play a saleswoman trying to sell “Sikaut” (sick out), a “new, good medicine” from China that looks like water but is “special water that gets rid of sickness.” After I gave my sales pitch, students came up with questions to ask me to decide whether it was a wise decision to buy my medicine. I didn’t know I was going to be put on the spot and have to answer questions! One student asked why the name was in Tok Pisin if it is from China. I told her it was a translation of the Chinese word. Then they wanted to know the Chinese word! So, I pretended to lose my voice. (Then, of course, I took a sip from the Sikaut in my water bottle to heal my throat.)

Another student wanted to know if I had records of the kinds of sicknesses that had been healed with Sikaut. In the sales pitch I had read, it mentioned a man who had drunk the medicine and been healed of a fever, so I told him that. Then I added that it had just healed my throat. The students thought that was hilarious! They had a lot of fun asking questions, and I had fun answering. No one decided to buy my “medicine,” so they are putting their critical thinking skills to work!