Days 12 and 13 - Git 'er Done

Our list of places was down to one. Dangal, Sumaris, Bukandu, Bubuparum, Wawas, Madzim/Babuaf, Marauna, Bencheng/Tsile Tsile, Dungutung/Wampan, Onom, Uruf, Singono, and now Mafanazo. It’s always fun to say the names of places we’ve been. Bubuparum was perhaps my favorite from this trip, though the language name of Onom – mpubunum (the p is prenazalized) – was a lot of fun too.

Janell had been suffering from a stomach bug for several days by day 12, and was heroically struggling on. As we waited for a canoe to take us to Mafanazo, she sat on a log, head on arms, just wanting space. Of course right about then the PNG response to suffering kicked in, and another lady went and sat with her. Hurray for working cross-culturally.

A canoe, this one shorter than the last one and powered by a motor, took us down to the Mafanazo market, perched on the river’s edge. The Watut is carving itself a new channel constantly, and we heard the banks collapsing every once in a while into the river with a big splash. On this trip I had the brilliant idea to sit facing backward. This meant I didn’t see the logs sticking up everywhere or wonder whether that little ripple in the river was hiding a sandbank we were going to run aground on. The wind wasn’t in my face, and the water splashed my legs instead of my chest and face. I had a very peaceful experience, watching the skipper in mirrored sunglasses guide us downriver, seeing the mountains give way to flatland, watching the birds, enjoying the breeze.

From the Mafanazo market we walked about ten minutes to the village. On this final working-day of the survey we were eager to get our tools done, but the community was less anxious. We sat around and waited. And sat around and waited. There just didn’t seem many men around who’d qualify as leaders of the community – judging by age, that is – though we noted that the local government village leader was quite young. Finally we just decided to start, big men or no big men, and some of them showed up. They treated our tools rather unusually. Whereas in many of the other villages they’d been extremely organized in laying place names on the ground, here they tossed them carelessly into a pile. We didn’t really figure out what this meant, but we did get the work done, the information recorded, and celebrated with a last wash under a standpipe.

This last night turned out to be one of our most sleepless. Most other nights I’d slept great, doubtless aided by the physical exertion required in the earlier parts of the survey. This night, however, we had a friend. A little furry friend with a tail and scratchy little claws.

During village living (that was way back in Oct/Nov 2010, when we first arrived in PNG and were being trained), Janell had the wonderful experience of waking up to find a rat walking on her. She grabbed and threw it… but being inside a mosquito net, it didn’t go far. I’ve no doubt that would have been hilarious to watch, but not much fun for Janell. None of us wanted that experience, and she didn’t want a repeat, so we kept waking up to its noises and trying to find it without much luck. Between that, the roosters, and the dogs, there seemed to be more waking up than sleeping.

The sun finally rose and we packed up our stuff. A surveyor who’s not an expert packer is doomed to be left behind, especially if it’s the last day and you’re ready to be home. We went back to the riverside market where, miracle of miracles, our skipper from the previous day showed up almost exactly on time, and we started the 1:30 hour ride down the last curvy stretches of the Watut River, into the muddy Markham, and to the ‘dock’ near 40-Mile on the Highlands Highway. We were on schedule to arrive at 40-Mile with time to spare for our pickup. The two men who’d volunteered to fetch us, however, had some adventures of their own.

They’d gone to Lae to do some shopping, but in driving down a side road had been accosted by some raskols (trouble-makers who often resort to highway – or in-town – robbery). Our pickup man is a big believer in the ‘don’t stop for raskols’ policy, so he sped up when he saw them. A gun was waved though not fired, but a rock from a slingshot found the front windshield and made a beautiful spider-web crack near the top. Beautiful, that is, except for those who had to pay for it.

Between this little adventure (not all that terribly unusual here) and the fact that they were already running late, they forgot to top up the tank before leaving town, so by the time they picked us up they were nearly empty. We had to go 40 minutes out of our way to get gas (there aren’t gas stations just anywhere in PNG), which was rather frustrating for the rest of us, but we reached home by suppertime and took long, hot showers after dumping our gear to be dealt with later.

The Silisili survey, with its vertical beginnings and it’s many villages, was the most adventurous of any I’ve been on. We were each grateful to our Father for watching out for us, for those of you who heard of our adventures and thought of us, and for excellent teammates and teamwork that brought us through some challenging situations.

Since our arrival in 2010 we Carters have now participated in three survey trips and are only two days away from beginning a fourth. We’ve surveyed nine languages and helped to write five survey reports. The regional director who requested the Silisili survey said that if we found vital languages he would make it a priority to send someone to translate there. We hope he does, and that the good news will be written clearly for the Watut Valley communities, and speak to their hearts.

Please remember us as we are on survey 24 Apr to 17 May in East New Britain. All three of us are going.