How Dangerous is Papua New Guinea Really? 🇵🇬

A day in Port Moresby, built around a theory Harry states out loud at the twelve-minute mark and then goes to test: that Papua New Guinea’s violence is tribal, that it is directed at other tribes rather than at outsiders, and that a tourist is therefore not the target.

The test is to take a local bus across the city to Four Mile — a district he has been warned about — and walk around it. Most of the video is the bus.

Obs: the video carries an eSIM sponsor read at [28:02] and a travel-card affiliate link in the description. Neither provider is recorded here.

Obs: the subtitles are heavily garbled — much of the bus conversation is in Tok Pisin and English at once, and several figures come through unusably. Anything numeric below carries the unverified marker.

Key moments

• [00:00] What he was told before going: cannibals, robbery, one of the most dangerous countries in the world. His counter-position, stated in advance, is that these places are usually not that bad and that there is one way to find out.
• [01:06] The explanation he offers for the reputation: over 700 tribes, each with its own language, customs and grievances, brought into one city.
• [02:10] Independence in 1975.
• [02:40] It is payday, which he is told means drinking, and he asks directly whether payday means riots.
• [03:25] Betel nut, taught to him properly: the nut, then the lime, then the mustard stick dipped into the lime, chewed together. 1 kina. He has tried it before but never swallowed enough to feel it.
• [05:00] The effect arrives, and the bins and pavements are red with it.
• [06:13] A man from Goroka, twenty-odd years in the capital, who says life here is not easy and that he will go back to his village one day — a simple life but a good one.
• [07:22] The rule he travels by here: if someone does something for you or takes you somewhere, it is rude to give nothing back. He carries cigarettes for exactly this.
• [07:59] Nobody is wearing shoes. He offers to buy a man a pair.
• [08:30] What he is told about betel nut and knives: banning the nut would cause riots because it is a way of life, and knives have been restricted in some places because of what they get used for.
• [09:01] Stabbings and robbery described first-hand by the man he’s talking to, who then declines to guarantee his safety in Four Mile — not 100%, I can’t guarantee.
• [10:44] The betel-nut high as the locals describe it: it stimulates the blood, gives you energy, makes you talk.
• [11:14] The shoes go wrong. There are no usable shoes in the shop, so he hands over 100 kina instead. He says immediately afterwards that the money will go on betel nut and beer, that it was his own fault, and that he should have bought the shoes rather than given cash.
• [12:28] The theory, stated: Port Moresby is dangerous because of tribal conflict, not dangerous to tourists — and like any theory it has to be tested.
• [13:31] The statistics he reads out, and the hardest thing on the page: that 50% of women in Papua New Guinea have been raped and 65% of men have admitted to gang rape (from video – unverified — Harry states the figures on camera without a source). His conclusion, in his words: if you’re a woman, don’t come here.
• [14:01] Buses don’t leave until they’re full; he takes a taxi to the bus.
• [14:42] The bus. Eighteen minutes of it, and the best part of the video.
• [15:42] The reassurance he keeps getting, unprompted and from everyone: we are not the enemy, we are your friend, brother from another mother.
• [16:47] He explains what he’s doing — making a video to show that PNG is safe, because the internet says otherwise — and asks the bus whether it is. It is a yes.
• [17:52] Homemade beer, brewed with a pipe and steam, mixed with whatever is around. He’s told it’s 20–30% (from video – unverified) and that badly made batches can hurt people.
• [19:33] A passenger asks why he came alone with no escort. His answer: some people are bad, but he prefers to believe most are good.
• [21:21] An invitation to a village on the coast, with fresh water and salt water and a good view, offered by a man he met twenty minutes earlier.
• [22:25] On tribal friction: rival tribes seeing each other in the city doesn’t start anything by itself — it takes an actual grievance, theft or an insult. Which is exactly the theory he came to test, told back to him.
• [23:27] We are a Christian country, we love foreigners.
• [24:00] The bus never fills, it just keeps absorbing people, and a passenger narrates the route out of the window like a guide.
• [25:43] A bride offered. A woman tells him she’ll give him her sister, they settle on two necklaces in place of a pig, and she then tells him quietly to be careful.
• [28:33] Kinship as address: strangers of your mother’s age are mother, of your father’s age father, then brothers and sisters — you use the terms whether you know the person or not.
• [29:45] Five, six, seven languages each, and the reason: marrying into different villages.
• [30:15] The history lesson he gives from the bus, hedged as he gives it: Papua from a word for frizzy hair, New Guinea from an explorer who thought the people resembled those of Guinea in Africa; British and German halves; Australian administration; independence in 1975 (from video – unverified — he says repeatedly he isn’t sure).
• [32:33] Four Mile, and the city wardens. Community police, approved and funded under the governor, visible everywhere. This is his answer to the question in the title.
• [33:30] He admits the honest version of what he wanted: to show people it’s safe, and also that it would be more fun if something happened.
• [34:07] What people think of the government: education and daytime security have improved; at night, they say, nothing.
• [37:45] Food. He is told people prefer ground food — bananas, coconut, sweet potato — and feel unsatisfied and irritable on rice and noodles.
• [38:21] Wages, garbled and grim: a figure of 350 kina a month, with foreign employers paying as little as 2.50 an hour and sometimes 50 toea (from video – unverified — the numbers contradict each other in the transcript).
• [39:38] Four Mile itself: he doesn’t know what to make of it, and says so.
• [40:00] The answer he’s given on why foreigners feel unsafe: outsiders keep their distance and hire security; be open with people and you don’t need it.
• [41:35] In the bar, a man who has been married eight times and currently lives with two wives.
• [42:46] An amulet of child’s hair kept in the wallet, which its owner says wakes him when enemies are coming, like a needle in the leg. Recorded as what he was told.
• [43:49] What the drinkers make of him being there: coming alone and open is risky, they respect it, and it means he is one of them now.
• [45:00] His own summary, and he flags it himself as sounding harsh: like travelling back 500 years, except with phones, cars and Wi-Fi.
• [46:06] I’ve never seen anybody like this here — a man telling him plainly how rare a visitor is.
• [46:42] The warden team leader at Boroko: 30 wardens under him, the aim is clean streets so women can work without fear and investors will come. Five years ago it was dangerous; now he says it’s fine.
• [48:27] The casino, a win he puts at around 18,000 kina (from video – unverified), and he hands all of it to the man who spent the day with him.

Extracted pages

• Country: Papua New Guinea
• Place: Port Moresby
• Tips: Bring gifts for hosts, Judge a place for yourself, Take the cheapest class