#25 Wonders of Papua, Part II

Meet Hans Mandacan and the magical birds of Papua

October 29 - 32, 2022 - Kwau Village, Arfak Mountains - People, Places

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Seven years ago, Hans Mandacan picked up a woman at a hotel in the town Manokwari in the Northern part of Papua.

He took her to Kwau, his native village in the Arfak Mountains, and from the four self-made hiding shelters, they watched the birds of paradise dance.

„Wait about three years and never change your phone number“, the woman told Hans as they parted.

She said she worked for a book called Lonley Planet. Hans didn‘t fully comprehend what that meant.

Then one day, the tourists from around the world started to arrive.

And the rest is history.

Eco-Tourism made by locals

Hans Mandacan belongs to the local Hatta people, one of more than 200 different tribes who have lived in Papua since their ancestors inhabited the island more than 30’000 years ago.

The local communities traditionally live of farming and hunting.

After working with a local NGO on butterfly conservation, Hans started to provide Bird Watching tours together with a tour leader from Manokwari.

He involved the villagers and carefully built a total of 11 hiding places as well as a guesthouse for visitors to stay.

„The government even invited me to Jakarta to speak about our local Eco-Tourism approach. I visited the capital for four days and didn’t like it too much. So many cars, so many houses and people everywhere. And no trees!“, he shared with me over a cup of instant coffee.

Yuanfen and the ritual of mating

Upon our arrival we went to the first hiding shelter and observed the Vogelkop Bowerbird cleaning its nest. The male is known for his extensive care in collecting decoration. Due to the road that is currently built by the government, he now has lots of man-made things in his collection, rather than flowers.

In the evening, we set our alarm to 3:52am for the next morning.

It took us an hour to hike through dense jungle to arrive at the hiding shelter close to the mating ground of the Magnificent Bird of Paradise.

With 3 hours of calling and exposing his feathers, the male raised the awareness of two females for a few minutes. At the end, they flew away uninterested. Well, he tried.

In the afternoon we went to a hiding shelter for the famous Western Parotia.

The male‘s unique mating dance also enchanted Sir David Attenborough in the Netflix Series „Our Planet“.

Jump to 1:14 of the teaser for the real action.

But this time it was also Yuanfen live: This time it was not meant to be.

We waited and waited and. Nothing.

We returned on the second day at 5:30am and luckily saw the Western Parotia dancing for about 10 seconds before he decided to call it a day.

We were obviously:

A) too late in the mating season and

B) not ideally matching his daily routines.

Memories to keep

Bird watching is definitely a very humbling and rewarding version of experiencing the concept of Yuanfen.

When a bird appears after hours of waiting, the sense of happiness and excitement peaks. A moment to remember.

It requires also lots of patience, creativity and lots of mosquito repellent.

Philipp and I managed to find some creative ways to take pictures and videos with our limited gear. A picture with the iPhone through the binoculars. A ridiculously small camera (in comparison to real bird watchers) finally using the magic tripod of my dad (thanks Paps!).

We tried to visually capture these Yuanfen moments.

But there is always an element of unpredictability when nature is involved.

Who would have thought that mosquitos can bite through socks too.

55 itchy bites around both of my ankles were probably the most physically painful memories I took from that adventure.

Oh well.

It is what it is.

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If you want to visit the area, do contact Hans. You find all his contact information here:

Whattsapp: +62 821-9946-9312

E-Mail: hansmandacan@gmail.com

Facebook: Hans Mandacan

Siyo Hans!