Canoe Trip

While waiting for my passengers to complete their business, I saw a canoe tied up to the same dock as my airplane and asked if I could take it for a paddle.  The owner quickly obliged, although he thought I was crazy since he didn't have his motor installed in it.  Why would anyone want to paddle for fun?!  The river current quickly took me downstream, and it took me a while to learn how to paddle the long canoe and I eventually fought my way upstream for about 30 minutes.

As I finally arrived on the side of my airplane I snapped a quick picture.  I couldn't put the paddle down for too long because I was already going backwards.

On my way back downstream, trying to get back to my airplane before a torrent of rain began again, I took one more picture.  It didn't take long to realize how hard it was to paddle a canoe against the current and why almost all canoes now have motors attached to them.  Living interior is HARD!  Once I arrived back at my airplane I laid down inside and took a nap.  Nothing like a rain shower and the rocking waves to put you right to sleep.  Shortly thereafter, my Javanese pastors arrived back at the airplane and we flew one hour back to PalangkaRaya.  It sounds like their time was successful and we will potentially be seeing a lot more of each other as we, MAF, continue to serve the interior church.

Woman Black and White

Just as with the older men, there were plenty of older women sitting around socializing.  I'm sure most of their morning work was already done, and they were just catching up before finishing the rest of their chores.  These women are tough and work really hard.

Men Black and White

As I strolled through town, there were lots of older men just sitting on the front porch.  All were very cordial towards me, and enjoyed seeing their picture on the back of my camera.  I often feel like I am living in a different world and time when I visit the interior villages.  Nothing seems to be moving very fast.

Black and White Kids

Once again, kids at the border of their world, the front door.  They rarely venture past it, unless accompanied by an adult or a friend.

This little tike was being held in by this home made rail.  It helps to keep the babies in the house and the dogs out of the house.

Domestic Duties

Life in third world countries is always a little harder than what we are used to compared to life in the USA.  However, life interior is even harder.  No body likes laundry, and no sooner was this put out to dry than it started to rain...HARD!  I guess there is always tomorrow.

Most houses interior are built on stilts, ranging from a few feet off of the ground to over 10 feet.  Most have a similar look to the house above.  Depending on the income of the family you will also see windows, doors, and paint.

Flora

One of the things I enjoy about walking around in a village or it's surrounding jungle are all of the pretty flowers you can see on any given day.  I have to remind myself it is November.  It feels like July.

Life Cycle

I always feels sorry for all the little kids I see interior.  They always look so bored.  Many children seem to just lurk in the doorways of their houses as though there is an invisible barrier to venturing out any farther.

This girl was a little braver, and made it all the way out to the porch.  She still had that mad/bored look about her.

I heard there was a young man that had died the day before.  Sure enough, as I walked through Kunyi, his casket was being built.  No sooner was it finished and his corpse put in it and he was taken to the cemetery to be buried. Just like in the Wild West.   Usually in 24 hours or less, a corpse is buried.  No such thing as a mortuary and embalming here.

Supporting the Church

This past Friday I had the privilege of taking three Javanese pastors from the Assemblies of God to an interior village called Kunyi.  Their purpose was to meet with the local pastor in Kunyi and talk about partnering to build a church together.  While they met and toured the potential building sites, I also had a fun time walking around the village, paddling around in a canoe, eating at a village "diner" and taking a nap in my airplane.  Over the next several days I'll show a little of what I saw through pictures.  Stay tuned...

This is the current church building.  It looked to be in an okay state to me, but I think they want to build something bigger in a new location.  It's a good thing my passengers had a lot of "business" to conduct because those dark clouds in the background "let loose" about 45 minutes after I landed and kept me on the ground for almost 4 hours until they had rained themselves out.

A Favorite Passenger

Yesterday since I had light loading, one of my favorite little people got to come along with me, Brooklyn.  She seemed to have a good time, and said her favorite part was the takeoff...I have to agree (landings are pretty fun too!).

On the way home, she wouldn't stop talking.  Asking me about all of my instruments and everything she saw out of the window made our 1 hour flight go by quickly.  She was a joy to have along, and I look forward to showing the rest of my family where I "work" someday.

Poor Ogasto

No sooner had I written a short post about how great our team of national employees are here in PalangkaRaya had 4 out of the 5 of them returned from a disastrous weekend.  One has gout so bad he can barely walk.  Another hit his hand so hard that it become too swollen to bend.  Another's wife became so sick with apparent food poisoning that she spent the weekend in the ER.  And last but not least, Ogasto, pictured above.  He and his buddy were hunting monkeys in the jungle (yes to eat) and the last one he shot wouldn't fall from the tree.  So, he scampered up there, some 30 feet, and tried to free the dead monkey and drop it to the ground.  It turns out that the only one dropping to the ground was him.  His friend said he was unconscious for a few minutes and then woke up.  After only missing one day of work, Ogasto was back at the hangar, although he moved REALLY slow.  I guess his left buttock is cut up as well, but I didn't care to see that, I just took his word for it.  These dudes are tough!

MAF PalangkaRaya Team

I have the privilege of serving in PalangkaRaya with a great group of men.  All of us bring a different set of skills and assets to the team and when one is missing, we really feel it.  Since I serve at a small base, it is critical to be surrounded by people that pull their weight, and contribute to the successful completion of flights, maintenance, and above all, showing the love of Jesus in all their everyday tasks.  I look forward to serving with these guys as long as the Lord will allow it.

Proverbs 22:6

"Train up a child in the way he (she) should go, and when he (she) is old, he (she) will not depart from it." 

The propaganda has already begun, Paige thinks airplanes are "aasome" and she already runs outside to see the airplanes taking off and landing.  Ah, a girl after my own heart!  

From the Logbook...Another Ride Along

 After a long trip last week from Eastern Borneo to Central Borneo, I am gearing up to fly the floatplane again.  Before I just jump in the airplane after having not flown for about 3 months I rode along yesterday as a passenger.  The girls above kept jumping into the water as I tried to take their picture.  It was pretty funny.

 This is one of my favorite places, Naan.  Quite, clean, and still full of virgin rain forest   

Another shot of Naan.  After a little practice, I should be on my own again this week serving the people with a floatplane.  Should be fun!

MAF Tarakan pt.2

A few more pics from my ride along a few days ago...

While getting "the tour" of MAF ops in Eastern Kalimantan we visited a number of airstrips that the MAF team serves.  The airstrip pictured above is a "sporty" one with a maximum of 23% slope.  It made for a thrilling takeoff!

One of the fun things about flying around in a wheel airplane again was seeing all the people.  I still interact with plenty of people while flying float planes, but being able to walk around on the airstrip instead of being restricted to a river dock enabled me to see how some of the people in Eastern Kalimantan live a little better.

This weekend we will travel back to PalangkaRaya, Central Kalimantan.  I look forward to getting back in the floatplane and serving the people of Central Kalimantan...plus all this language school stuff has made me groundsick...I NEED to go flying.

MAF Tarakan pt.1

Last week we finished language school on the Indonesian island of Java and 2 days later we left for the island of Borneo, where we will be living.  But, instead of flying directly to our home base in the city of PalangkaRaya we flew instead to another MAF base in the city of Tarakan, Eastern Borneo.  We are here for a week to meet the rest of our MAF Kalimantan (Borneo) team and get familiar with how things are done here.  

One of my days here I got to ride along with a long time MAF friend who is based in Tarakan.  We spent the majority of the day flying all over Eastern Kalimantan in the hot rod Quest Kodiak pictured above.  It is an impressive aircraft!

As with most anywhere MAF flies, children soon arrive at the airstrip shortly after we do.  They are always a pleasure to joke around with and are almost always full of laughs and smiles.  

Dirt Diver and Friends

It's amazing watching our two oldest grow.  They are great friends (usually) and they love to strut their independence and walk as far ahead as possible, all the while talking non-stop.

And then there is poor little runt sister, aka Dirt Diver.  She is always trying to keep up and one day she will not only keep up but will presumably instill fear in her older sisters.  She's not afraid of a thing and she has a quick 2 year old temper that will set you straight.  

Again, while exploring with the girls a few days ago, we came across this scene of a cute little church, lined with palm trees, rice paddy in front and mountains in the background.  Central Java is really beautiful.

A Different Kind of Farm

While exploring with the girls (see previous post) we found rice paddies in various stages of growth.  The one above had certain sections all ready to harvest and others that were newly planted.

We have seen on numerous occasions now the above scene; a man herding a group of ducks while either running or riding a bike.  It's a comical seen for someone like me that had never seen this before moving to Indonesia.  All those webbed feet running for their lives looks really funny.

Exploring Partners

Since we have all had the past week off from school due to a big national holiday, me and the two oldest set off together to find some pretty landscapes complete with swamps, rice paddies, and volcanoes.  We had a good time exploring Central Java together.

Mt. Merbabu Evening

A few days ago I drove to nearby Mt. Merbabu to get some evening photos.  In my search of a new photo vantage point I found some small villages that likely have had few Westerners visit them.  It was funny to watch all the people come out of the woodwork just to watch the foreigner drive through their village.

Sun Dry

With dry season in full swing on the island of Java, on any given day you can see a number of things being dried in the sun like chilies, fish, rattan, and rice.  Indonesians do like to put a spicy twist on most of their food dishes and the little peppers above will light you up if eaten plain.

Idul Fitri Celebrations

Ramadan concluded today and because of the importance of Idul Fitri we have had the whole week off from school.  One of the local traditions on the morning of Idul Fitri is to ignite homemade fireworks.  

These homemade firecrackers are about the size of a roll of toilet paper and are filled with gunpowder.  The young man above is using his cigarette to light the fuse on his firecracker.

When the homemade device explodes it is VERY loud, louder in fact than anything I have ever heard in the USA.  Because they are made of paper, the street quickly becomes littered with paper shrapnel.

After all the fireworks are over, everyone walks home, having survived another year of loud, "hope you don't blow your hand off", entertainment.  

Back in Java

We arrived back on the island of Java this weekend and it feels like we are in a different country.  The smells, the temperature, the topography, the twist on food dishes...it all seems so foreign...and so familiar.  It was only 4 months ago that we left.

Becca and I went exploring today after we put the girls in school and found ourselves at a small lake.  Lots of fishing and harvesting of marsh plants going on.

After some coaxing, I convinced Becca that we needed to pay a few dollars to use a local man's boat and paddle around the lake a little bit.  We spend about 30 minutes looking like fools, but we had a great time.

Even the wife of my youth dawned a traditional hat to help keep the sun's rays off of her.  Despite the nice sunshine, the overall temperature here is a LOT cooler than the middle of Borneo.  It feels like Fall to us...it is great!

From the Logbook...A View from the Floats

While waiting for my passengers to arrive earlier this week at an interior village,  I took the time to just watch what was happening around me while I was tied up to the dock.  This above shot is life on the other side of the river.  The river provides many things here, food for the table, water to wash clothes, body and dishes with, and the foundation of their floating house.

Looking immediately to the rear of the airplane, there was another house with "normal" life unfolding before my lens.  I have a hard time imagining what life is like to live on the river and never stop bobbing.  It will be a few more months now until I get some more pictures from the airplane floats.  This weekend we are returning to the island of Java to complete our language school curriculum.  We should be back in PalangkaRaya mid-October.  In the meantime, I'll keep my camera busy capturing life in Java until we return to Borneo.

From the Logbook...And the Winner is?

On Wednesday of this week we didn't schedule any flights so we could have a party instead.  Well, it wasn't really a party but a lot of people came to our location on PalangkaRaya.  We had invited almost every pastor and ministry leader in and around town.  About 50 people showed up.  Our purpose was to simply remind them that we are here to help and serve the Church in any way we can.  After we a short time together of worship and encouragement, we gave away a door prize...5 free seats on the airplane.  The above photo are my five passengers that I was able to fly for about 15 minutes around PalangkaRaya.  Four of them had never been on a small airplane.  It was a good time.

When we returned, we all gathered together and got a group picture.  It was a good time to bring so many denominations together and remember that we are all part of the same family.