Understanding the world through it's people

We were told not to leave too late. I was half asleep when our car’s engine rumbled; I had to slightly tilt my head to have a look at the clock in the wall of the market through the vibrating rearview mirror. The time was 16:45 and something in my gut told me that we should have listened.
Paul, the driver, shouted something in his language, and the rest of the crew that were still buying some betel nuts to chew on the way came walking calmly as if they didn’t know we were late. I heard about ‘papua new guinean time’ before, but it was starting to get on my nerves.
The problem is not the distance, Paul said, is the road. I could hardly hear him because of the noise in the back of the car. Yu pasim maus! he yelled again but now in Pidgin and everybody shut up, this time I understood. Then he calmly continued: You know, these big companies are going to export gas to Australia, and huge trucks are coming and going all day through this road and they are ruining it. Every time we hit a bump he would look at me like expecting a complaint. I’m really sorry, he said when we hit a big one. I told him that he didn’t need to apologize, that it wasn’t his fault. Paul smiled.
Suddenly I saw these beautiful foggy hills and really wanted to film them so I asked Paul to stop but he wasn’t too keen about doing it there. I insisted. Immediately after I got out and set up my camera I realized that a bunch of locals, men, most of them in their twenties, were staring at me whispering to each other.
Just a few seconds later my assistant tapped me on my shoulder, we have to go, he said while taking my camera and started to run. I ran after him and as soon as we got in Paul started the car. I’m really sorry, he said, these people aren’t happy with us there. Once again I told him not to worry because it wasn’t his fault but now I noticed that he was wearing an anxious half smile.
I asked my assistant to give me the camera when abruptly I heard a strong blast coming from the back of the car and I felt shattered glass falling all over me, I could only hear people screaming outside while hitting the car with what seemed to be machetes. Paul drove without saying a word for about half an hour and then he stopped to check the damages in the car. Then, one of the crew said: It’s always like this during election times, they attacked us because this car belongs to a politician. I looked at Paul and he said to me with a straight face: Politicians are not my fault, I won’t apologize for them.