Lavau Kwalam Nalu

Lavau Kwalam Nalu is a blak Melanesian multi-disciplinary storyteller and Humanitarian from Papua Niugini. Recognised as a leader in the Pacific, Lavau has been involved in innumerable health projects, selflessly devoting his time to improve health outcomes. At present, Lavau work as a youth health educator & executive team member for the PNG Health Project, an organization dedicated to improving health literacy amongst the youth population in PNG. Simultaneously, he serves as the PNG-Australian Liaison & Cultural Advisor to the Bush Dokta Initiative Project Yumi, an Australian charity working to get essential medical resources to rural Papua New Guinea. His interests in Global Health and exploring other cultures has seen him accepted for medical training in Australia, Vietnam and PNG - gaining a greater understanding of his fellow international health workers and affording him opportunities to join global panel discussions- having previously been invited as a delegate to the Australian National University, Asia Pacific Week and awarded the Leading the Pacific Scholarship to One Young World 2021 in Munich, Germany. This year he was awarded a 2021 Kokoda Track Foundation Archers Leadership Award for his work in public health in Papua New Guinea. Beyond the realms of Medicine, Nalu co-founded and curates archiveples - a digital media project that renegotiates the visual narrative and external perception of Papua New Guinea, by documenting visual stories of PNG shared by Papua New Guineans themselves, hereby taking control of the gaze, navigating colonial histories and false assumptions about PNG and the larger Melanesian community.