Ever since I arrived in the area last month, people everywhere have been talking about a little girl in a village who has been healing people. The village is located right in the middle of the area which saw a lot of conflict in recent years.
It all started in January this year. The little girl’s mother was sick, some say with cancer. One version of the story is that a man in white appeared to the girl one day on her way home from school and told her how to heal her mother. She went home and did it and then began to heal others too. Word soon got out and people began arriving from all over the island and from other parts of the country. Some are said to have come from as far away as Singapore.
The little village has been flooded with people, most of whom camp in the village square. There’s a short video being passed around that someone filmed in March, interviewing some folk who said they had been healed. Several were young people reported to have been deaf and dumb, some from birth. They say that stacks of crutches and wheelchairs are now piling up from people who were healed. Although the girl is Christian and says that the healings are by the power of Jesus, people say that far more Muslims are being healed than Christians.
There is no charge for the healings. But not everyone is healed. It has been reported that some people are told to go and make restitution, or they are told that because of some certain sin they can’t be healed. Others seem to have partial healing. Some say it is a process and that depending on your faith it will become more complete later. Some say that if you start disbelieving the healing is reversed. (The one person I personally know who went and got healed, died three weeks later.) Although a large number of those who go are elderly, it has also been reported that some are told they should not expect healing because they are already old and everyone has to die. But other elderly come back able to walk a little after years of using canes or wheelchairs.
The healings are now “organized” so that Friday is the day. People travel up on Thursday and spend all day Friday hoping to get healed. One eyewitness I talked to had gone and taken her grandmother. She said that the person is asked three times (by the girl’s mother or a preacher) if they believe Jesus heals. You are supposed to answer yes. Then you are told to sing “God is powerful”, a song that is sung over and over and over by everybody up there. Then you are told to walk or talk or whatever, depending on your ailment. People are encouraged to pray according to their own practices, (ie Christian or Muslim) and to believe.
The “power” seems to have moved from the little girl now to her mother. She was reported to be worried that her daughter can’t lead a normal life what with people starting to follow her around and touch her all the time. So somehow the mother took over, it is said.
It is quite controversial, many people pro, many others think it is a fraud. One thing for sure, it is providing hours of conversation…
Tuesday, May 22, 2007
Floods
Monday May 7, 2007
Today it looked like more rain so I hurried and put on my soggy shoes and went into town as I had several errands to run. I left my computer at a friend’s house and then headed off to meet somebody I needed to see. When I got to that part of town there were police everywhere, traffic was crawling, and lots of people were standing out on the road. I wondered if there had been another bombing! When I got to the office I asked what had happened and they said that the neighborhood between there and the river were flooding. As I crossed the bridge on the way to the next stop I was apalled at how huge the river had become. I have never seen it that full. It was near the top of the concrete retaining walls that were built a few years ago. Apparently the tide was coming in at the same time the river was carrying all that water from the previous days’ rain. Downstream from the bridge towards the sea there were giant waves like you’d see in the sea. Police were on the bridge waving traffic on and telling people not to stop. The sidewalks were full of gawkers. The little mosque on the river’s edge on the other side was just about to flood. When I crossed back again a couple of hours later, about noon, there was water filling the street just before the bridge, you had to pass through it to get to the bridge. The concrete retaining walls were only a few inches above the water and were breaking in several places, you could see water pouring over the broken places.
Later I heard that my friend’s house - which had never flooded before - was thigh deep in water. The water had started coming up about 6:30 in the morning as she was getting the kids off to school and getting herself ready to go off to teach. She texted her brother to come to town and help, so he went to town with his car. He had to park it on the main road but they were able to wade out and load up some things to take to a niece’s house. Other things they stuck up above the ceiling. He said there were other houses flooded much deeper. He saw all kinds of debris being carried along including motorcycles, refrigerators, and even a wardrobe tumbling along in the current. The police tied 3 ropes across a place with a particularly strong current so that any people being carried away could grab the rope, if they missed it there was a second and a third rope they could try for. Meanwhile police were on standby with a boat and rubber inner tubes to help rescue people. (I was impressed to hear that they actually were doing something useful for a change!) People were saying what a good thing it happened in the daytime and not at night. And also a mercy that the sky cleared up and it didn’t rain anymore.
Unfortunately my friend put her cellphone in her pocket and then forgot about it as she was in and out of waist deep water salvaging their things. So the cellphone is now ruined.
The nearby Salvation Army office was putting up a tent and getting organized to cook rice and noodles for lunch for flood victims. Some of their staff were busy helping people rescue their things, or accompanying any injured to the nearby hospital. They expect the water to be high for a couple of days and then there will be a huge mess to clean up. One lady I talked to said rather heartlessly that it wasn’t really a humanitarian crisis, that those people shouldn’t have built their houses so close to the river. Maybe so, but on the other hand this IS the worst flood ever. Many of those places have never flooded before. I suppose all the chopping down of forest up stream also contributed significantly.
Today it looked like more rain so I hurried and put on my soggy shoes and went into town as I had several errands to run. I left my computer at a friend’s house and then headed off to meet somebody I needed to see. When I got to that part of town there were police everywhere, traffic was crawling, and lots of people were standing out on the road. I wondered if there had been another bombing! When I got to the office I asked what had happened and they said that the neighborhood between there and the river were flooding. As I crossed the bridge on the way to the next stop I was apalled at how huge the river had become. I have never seen it that full. It was near the top of the concrete retaining walls that were built a few years ago. Apparently the tide was coming in at the same time the river was carrying all that water from the previous days’ rain. Downstream from the bridge towards the sea there were giant waves like you’d see in the sea. Police were on the bridge waving traffic on and telling people not to stop. The sidewalks were full of gawkers. The little mosque on the river’s edge on the other side was just about to flood. When I crossed back again a couple of hours later, about noon, there was water filling the street just before the bridge, you had to pass through it to get to the bridge. The concrete retaining walls were only a few inches above the water and were breaking in several places, you could see water pouring over the broken places.
Later I heard that my friend’s house - which had never flooded before - was thigh deep in water. The water had started coming up about 6:30 in the morning as she was getting the kids off to school and getting herself ready to go off to teach. She texted her brother to come to town and help, so he went to town with his car. He had to park it on the main road but they were able to wade out and load up some things to take to a niece’s house. Other things they stuck up above the ceiling. He said there were other houses flooded much deeper. He saw all kinds of debris being carried along including motorcycles, refrigerators, and even a wardrobe tumbling along in the current. The police tied 3 ropes across a place with a particularly strong current so that any people being carried away could grab the rope, if they missed it there was a second and a third rope they could try for. Meanwhile police were on standby with a boat and rubber inner tubes to help rescue people. (I was impressed to hear that they actually were doing something useful for a change!) People were saying what a good thing it happened in the daytime and not at night. And also a mercy that the sky cleared up and it didn’t rain anymore.
Unfortunately my friend put her cellphone in her pocket and then forgot about it as she was in and out of waist deep water salvaging their things. So the cellphone is now ruined.
The nearby Salvation Army office was putting up a tent and getting organized to cook rice and noodles for lunch for flood victims. Some of their staff were busy helping people rescue their things, or accompanying any injured to the nearby hospital. They expect the water to be high for a couple of days and then there will be a huge mess to clean up. One lady I talked to said rather heartlessly that it wasn’t really a humanitarian crisis, that those people shouldn’t have built their houses so close to the river. Maybe so, but on the other hand this IS the worst flood ever. Many of those places have never flooded before. I suppose all the chopping down of forest up stream also contributed significantly.
More Rain
(for Sunday May-6)
Today we went on my motorbike up the mountains to visit some folk in another village. The thing I especially like about driving a motorbike is that I can sit up stright! I can also enjoy the scenery better because you have a pretty unlimited range of vision. Amazingly, none of the folk I wanted to see were there. Some seemed to have gone off to a wedding in a remote area, and others???? We had planned to go to another village too but it started raining and the clouds were hanging low, completely covering the mountains. It looked like it was going to rain all day so we decided to just head back home. There’s a stretch of hairpin curves that is especially prone to landslides so it seemed better to not wait, because the more it rained, the more likely a landslide would be. It rained hard the entire way back, I had to stop several times to clean the fog from my goggles. We had rain ponchos but they don’t cover your legs and so eventually the water soaks its way up your pant legs. Since I was driving and got the rain pelting in my face (no windshield), the water also drips down the front of your neck and inside the poncho so eventually you are wet all over. Arriving home in the valley it was raining hard there too and was unusually cool. In fact I was getting down right cold what with the wet clothes and all. It rained all that afternoon and night and since the power went off at sunset everybody just went to bed.
Today we went on my motorbike up the mountains to visit some folk in another village. The thing I especially like about driving a motorbike is that I can sit up stright! I can also enjoy the scenery better because you have a pretty unlimited range of vision. Amazingly, none of the folk I wanted to see were there. Some seemed to have gone off to a wedding in a remote area, and others???? We had planned to go to another village too but it started raining and the clouds were hanging low, completely covering the mountains. It looked like it was going to rain all day so we decided to just head back home. There’s a stretch of hairpin curves that is especially prone to landslides so it seemed better to not wait, because the more it rained, the more likely a landslide would be. It rained hard the entire way back, I had to stop several times to clean the fog from my goggles. We had rain ponchos but they don’t cover your legs and so eventually the water soaks its way up your pant legs. Since I was driving and got the rain pelting in my face (no windshield), the water also drips down the front of your neck and inside the poncho so eventually you are wet all over. Arriving home in the valley it was raining hard there too and was unusually cool. In fact I was getting down right cold what with the wet clothes and all. It rained all that afternoon and night and since the power went off at sunset everybody just went to bed.
Why travel is so exciting
Wednesday May 2, 2007
We finished last night so today I prepared to leave. There are only 5 cars servicing the area and three of them were still trapped on the other side of the landslide further up the road. Since the other two were down in the city, there would be no vehicles going down that day. So my computer, my bag and me were loaded on a motorbike which someone else drove. It stopped raining that morning for awhile and the sun came out. I didn’t have a helmet to wear so I just tied a scarf on my head. (To hold my brains in in case we crashed???) It took an hour and a half to get to the next town where there were cars available and during that time the sun shone brightly. Unfortunately, a scarf isn’t much good at providing shade so my face became quite, uh, ultra-violetly challenged.
Arriving in that town we stopped first at the agent to buy a ticket. We were told the car would leave at 2 or 3 or something and would pick me up. Didn’t sound too iminant so we went to a friend’s house to wait and hopefully eat something. Unfortunately the mini-bus actually came at 2 shortly after we arrived so I literally only got a bite before I got in the car. My seat was in the very back and I couldn’t sit up straight because the seat was high and the roof low. (The front seat, which was lower and had more head room, had already been booked so I was kind of stuck.) Fortunately I was by the window so I focussed on breathing and looking at the scenery and avoided thinking about claustrophobic topics. The mini-bus puttered around the town picking up passengers for about another hour and we finally left. It started raining again about then which at least kept it cool. We passed through several places with evidence of a recently cleared landslides. About an hour down the road the gal next to me got car sick so she flung herself over me to get to the window. We traded places – just in time. It wasn’t so bad cuz I could lean forward or use one of two other methods of scrunching to avoid my head whacking the roof on the bumpy road. (Method 1: sit back and hunch your upper back. Method 2: scoot forward and sit on your tailbone and scrunch your lower back.) The driver stopped from 5:15-6pm to eat and so I was able to sit on a sack of cacao beans on the floor by the door where I had plenty of head room to sit straight and rest my back. We then started the last hour and a half of the trip. Once again my neighbor got car sick so we did a quick switcheroo. Though by this time my back was starting to cramp, I managed to get out at my stop without help :-) and have since been reflecting on the advantages of motorbikes.
We finished last night so today I prepared to leave. There are only 5 cars servicing the area and three of them were still trapped on the other side of the landslide further up the road. Since the other two were down in the city, there would be no vehicles going down that day. So my computer, my bag and me were loaded on a motorbike which someone else drove. It stopped raining that morning for awhile and the sun came out. I didn’t have a helmet to wear so I just tied a scarf on my head. (To hold my brains in in case we crashed???) It took an hour and a half to get to the next town where there were cars available and during that time the sun shone brightly. Unfortunately, a scarf isn’t much good at providing shade so my face became quite, uh, ultra-violetly challenged.
Arriving in that town we stopped first at the agent to buy a ticket. We were told the car would leave at 2 or 3 or something and would pick me up. Didn’t sound too iminant so we went to a friend’s house to wait and hopefully eat something. Unfortunately the mini-bus actually came at 2 shortly after we arrived so I literally only got a bite before I got in the car. My seat was in the very back and I couldn’t sit up straight because the seat was high and the roof low. (The front seat, which was lower and had more head room, had already been booked so I was kind of stuck.) Fortunately I was by the window so I focussed on breathing and looking at the scenery and avoided thinking about claustrophobic topics. The mini-bus puttered around the town picking up passengers for about another hour and we finally left. It started raining again about then which at least kept it cool. We passed through several places with evidence of a recently cleared landslides. About an hour down the road the gal next to me got car sick so she flung herself over me to get to the window. We traded places – just in time. It wasn’t so bad cuz I could lean forward or use one of two other methods of scrunching to avoid my head whacking the roof on the bumpy road. (Method 1: sit back and hunch your upper back. Method 2: scoot forward and sit on your tailbone and scrunch your lower back.) The driver stopped from 5:15-6pm to eat and so I was able to sit on a sack of cacao beans on the floor by the door where I had plenty of head room to sit straight and rest my back. We then started the last hour and a half of the trip. Once again my neighbor got car sick so we did a quick switcheroo. Though by this time my back was starting to cramp, I managed to get out at my stop without help :-) and have since been reflecting on the advantages of motorbikes.
Snake tales
Of course in places where electricity is limited and TV does not yet control life, there are many alternative means of entertainment. One of these is the telling of stories. Today the topic was snakes.
There is a kind of rattlesnake that can be deadly poisonous, causing bleeding. It is the most beautiful snake, they say, having blue and white rings. They say its tail stinks and it attracts flies which it then catches and eats. The tail makes a noise. One way to kill this snake is to tie a lit cigarette on the end of a long pole. Touch the cigarette to its tail and it will then bite itself (and presumably die from its own bite?)
There is also a black snake which is perhaps even more feared. It can be 3 meters long or more and is poisonous. What makes it scarey is that unlike other snakes, it doesn’t move away when people come across it, instead it is aggressive and will come after you.
The most, uh, incredible snake is the one that supposedly turns into a chicken or a bird when you come close to it. So you don’t really ever see it. In fact, the teller of the story admitted that he hadn’t heard of anyone who had ever actually seen this type of snake. But he still believes it really exists.
There is a kind of rattlesnake that can be deadly poisonous, causing bleeding. It is the most beautiful snake, they say, having blue and white rings. They say its tail stinks and it attracts flies which it then catches and eats. The tail makes a noise. One way to kill this snake is to tie a lit cigarette on the end of a long pole. Touch the cigarette to its tail and it will then bite itself (and presumably die from its own bite?)
There is also a black snake which is perhaps even more feared. It can be 3 meters long or more and is poisonous. What makes it scarey is that unlike other snakes, it doesn’t move away when people come across it, instead it is aggressive and will come after you.
The most, uh, incredible snake is the one that supposedly turns into a chicken or a bird when you come close to it. So you don’t really ever see it. In fact, the teller of the story admitted that he hadn’t heard of anyone who had ever actually seen this type of snake. But he still believes it really exists.
Sunday
Sunday April 29
As expected, there was a church service this morning. They easily spent more time collecting offerings (four all together) and reporting on finances than anything else. In addition, before the service they had an auction. It is common in this area for people to donate agricultural products and then auction them off as a way to make money for the church. Today there was rice, coffee, lots of chilies, some squash and cucumbers, and even a couple of chickens. But despite all the money matters there was a very nice sermon and lovely singing.
I noticed a huge number of of infants in church. I was told that there had been a population explosion the past year. Apparently the entire batch of a commonly used injectable contraceptive was defective. They didn’t know it was defective until, well, nearly everyone using it got pregnant....
It was raining again this morning but stopped by 9am. Started again by 5:45pm. A huge crack appeared in the road going out of here. Very deep, you can step across it but the small car tires here will probably get stuck. (Somebody later on chopped up a banana tree and filled the crack.)
There was a big landslide on the road between here and the town at the end of the road so cars can’t get thru. They will probably need a bulldozer to clear this one, not just a bunch of guys with shovels. If it takes awhile, what they do is cars come to the landslide and pick up passengers there. There may be cars stuck on the other side of the landslide to bring people to the landslide, then they walk and haul all their stuff across. This landslide is bigger than most - they said it took 6 people to carry a motorcycle across it whereas it usually takes 4. Maybe they had to really lift it high.
As expected, there was a church service this morning. They easily spent more time collecting offerings (four all together) and reporting on finances than anything else. In addition, before the service they had an auction. It is common in this area for people to donate agricultural products and then auction them off as a way to make money for the church. Today there was rice, coffee, lots of chilies, some squash and cucumbers, and even a couple of chickens. But despite all the money matters there was a very nice sermon and lovely singing.
I noticed a huge number of of infants in church. I was told that there had been a population explosion the past year. Apparently the entire batch of a commonly used injectable contraceptive was defective. They didn’t know it was defective until, well, nearly everyone using it got pregnant....
It was raining again this morning but stopped by 9am. Started again by 5:45pm. A huge crack appeared in the road going out of here. Very deep, you can step across it but the small car tires here will probably get stuck. (Somebody later on chopped up a banana tree and filled the crack.)
There was a big landslide on the road between here and the town at the end of the road so cars can’t get thru. They will probably need a bulldozer to clear this one, not just a bunch of guys with shovels. If it takes awhile, what they do is cars come to the landslide and pick up passengers there. There may be cars stuck on the other side of the landslide to bring people to the landslide, then they walk and haul all their stuff across. This landslide is bigger than most - they said it took 6 people to carry a motorcycle across it whereas it usually takes 4. Maybe they had to really lift it high.
Rain
28-April 07
Went to a home service this afternoon. (They have them on Saturday afternoons to get ready for Sunday.) Rural houses can have some pretty interesting decore. Like this house – pictures of Jesus alternating with pictures of sweet young chesty things on all four walls of the living room. We as guests sat in aqua plastic arm chairs with garish flower pattern in the plastic. There weren’t enough fancy chairs for everyone so others sat on wood benches or on regular plastic stacking chairs borrowed for the occasion.
It continues to rain heavily every day, most every afternoon and evening. When it rains a lot the water gets cloudy. The bath water today looked like coffee with milk. Even the drinking water (which is boiled to sanitize it) looked like weak tea. (Maybe that’s why people here drink so much coffee? Aside from the fact that they grow it themselves!) It has been overcast and seems dark all the time. This village has power every evening from 6pm-12pm but I am usually so tired I can only benefit from about three hours of light
Went to a home service this afternoon. (They have them on Saturday afternoons to get ready for Sunday.) Rural houses can have some pretty interesting decore. Like this house – pictures of Jesus alternating with pictures of sweet young chesty things on all four walls of the living room. We as guests sat in aqua plastic arm chairs with garish flower pattern in the plastic. There weren’t enough fancy chairs for everyone so others sat on wood benches or on regular plastic stacking chairs borrowed for the occasion.
It continues to rain heavily every day, most every afternoon and evening. When it rains a lot the water gets cloudy. The bath water today looked like coffee with milk. Even the drinking water (which is boiled to sanitize it) looked like weak tea. (Maybe that’s why people here drink so much coffee? Aside from the fact that they grow it themselves!) It has been overcast and seems dark all the time. This village has power every evening from 6pm-12pm but I am usually so tired I can only benefit from about three hours of light
Monday, May 21, 2007
Landslide
4-24
I did finally get picked up on Monday at almost 6pm after waiting at the same place about 2 hours again. The trip was an adventure. We didn't get going until almost sunset so much of the trip was in the dark. Way past the farthest village I usually go to we had to stop because the road had become a raging river with big stones and all. We backed up about 1/4 mile to a dry spot and waited about 45 minutes to see if the water would go down. It did, we saw a couple of vehicles coming from the opposite direction so the driver knew it was passable. He paid a couple of guys about 15 cents to trot ahead of us so the driver could judge deepness and more or less which way to go, avoiding the biggest rocks. (This in a 4-wheel drive vehicle). About an hour later we came to a landslide in the middle of the forest. We were parked about an hour when the driver came back and said it would be awhile yet. I was just trying to get myself psyched up to maybe have to spend the night sitting in the car holding my computer. We were in the middle of the forest with no houses nearby, and it was raining. All of a sudden I heard somebody call my name. It was two guys from the village I was heading to!! They had driven down from their village and parked on the other side of the landslide. They helped carry my bag and computer. I felt a bit like being miraculously and unexpectedly led out of prison in the middle of the night as I bid my travelling companions good bye and we slogged barefoot through the mud of the landslide. I could see then that it was going to take a LONG time to clear They had cleared enough for a motorcycle to go through and that was still mid-calf deep in mud. The rest was nearly waist deep. On the other side we climbed into a small pick up and began the last hour of the journey. My feet were coated in mud halfway to my knees but as it dried it was like wearing boots- kept my feet warm. So a bit after 1am, I finally arrived. (The car I had been travelling in didn't get through the landslide until about 9am the next morning! Did I mention that it was carrying several jerrycans of gas and the fumes were a wee bit strong? Was feeling a bit toxic already.)
It has rained heavily parts of every day. It's cool but not frigid. You can easily wear your clothes 2 days in a row without smelling :-) But my feet are rotting from being wet all the time. The checking is going well and we should be able to finish on Wednesday. SO I should be able to leave on Thursday. Hopefully the return trip will be less adventurous than the going trip.
I did finally get picked up on Monday at almost 6pm after waiting at the same place about 2 hours again. The trip was an adventure. We didn't get going until almost sunset so much of the trip was in the dark. Way past the farthest village I usually go to we had to stop because the road had become a raging river with big stones and all. We backed up about 1/4 mile to a dry spot and waited about 45 minutes to see if the water would go down. It did, we saw a couple of vehicles coming from the opposite direction so the driver knew it was passable. He paid a couple of guys about 15 cents to trot ahead of us so the driver could judge deepness and more or less which way to go, avoiding the biggest rocks. (This in a 4-wheel drive vehicle). About an hour later we came to a landslide in the middle of the forest. We were parked about an hour when the driver came back and said it would be awhile yet. I was just trying to get myself psyched up to maybe have to spend the night sitting in the car holding my computer. We were in the middle of the forest with no houses nearby, and it was raining. All of a sudden I heard somebody call my name. It was two guys from the village I was heading to!! They had driven down from their village and parked on the other side of the landslide. They helped carry my bag and computer. I felt a bit like being miraculously and unexpectedly led out of prison in the middle of the night as I bid my travelling companions good bye and we slogged barefoot through the mud of the landslide. I could see then that it was going to take a LONG time to clear They had cleared enough for a motorcycle to go through and that was still mid-calf deep in mud. The rest was nearly waist deep. On the other side we climbed into a small pick up and began the last hour of the journey. My feet were coated in mud halfway to my knees but as it dried it was like wearing boots- kept my feet warm. So a bit after 1am, I finally arrived. (The car I had been travelling in didn't get through the landslide until about 9am the next morning! Did I mention that it was carrying several jerrycans of gas and the fumes were a wee bit strong? Was feeling a bit toxic already.)
It has rained heavily parts of every day. It's cool but not frigid. You can easily wear your clothes 2 days in a row without smelling :-) But my feet are rotting from being wet all the time. The checking is going well and we should be able to finish on Wednesday. SO I should be able to leave on Thursday. Hopefully the return trip will be less adventurous than the going trip.
Another funeral - the 100 day commemoration
Have been off the net for awhile so am posting some stuff I wrote already
4-22-07
Well here I still am. Yesterday a neighbor and three others took me to the pick up spot for my trip up to the remote mountains. But by 5pm (sunset is at 6pm) no one had showed up and everybody figured that nobody would show up that late. It's about a 5-hour trip and the last three hours are mostly through forest so most of the trip would be in the dark. Generally people don't like to travel in the dark because there could be a landslide or a tree down or some other problem that is more difficult to deal with in the dark.
Fortunately I had the cellphone number of a student in town who is from the area so I texted him and by 8pm he had arranged with another driver who is going up tomorrow to pick me up at the same pick up spot around 2:00pm today. Sigh! I hope it happens. 2pm is a hot time of day to be hanging around a rural intersection... That spot is abut 5 km from my village.
Meanwhile the 100-day funeral is gearing up. The main event will be at 3pm today so I will just barely miss it. But last night I was able to hang around and talk with a bunch of the folk here. There are dozens of relatives from outside the area here to help. But of course they all have to be fed too so some ladies have been making cake for three days now - for coffee breaks and for newly arriving folk. They killed two cows so lots of local ladies were here during the evening and night helping cut up meat. The men did the butchering. The lights went out shortly before dark. We had two new fancy emergency lights with LED bulbs and that helped. There were also two kerosene pressure lamps. Somebody went and borrowed a small gasoline generator that cranked out 1300 watts. They just plugged it into the wall and it ran everything except the water pump. Since the dishwashers eventually ran out of water, somebody had to go around and unscrewed half the lights so that the pump could be turned on.
Many of the relatives are from cooler mountain areas so they just spread some big mats out on the floor in the house and on the terrace and in a couple of open huts. Quite a few few chose to sleep out in the open where it was cooler.
Kids. I remember as a kid at family gatherings how much fun we had running around with our cousins, more or less unsupervised by adults who were all busy. Well they do here too only there are a lot more of them! Adults generally ignore them until somebody cries, or, like yesterday, several preschoolers decided to have a screeching contest inside the house to see who could hurt the others' ears the most. Some adult quickly intervened :-)
This morning there’s a group putting little chunks of meat (beef) on skewers and sticking the ends of several skewers into pieces of banana tree trunk to be grilled. Others are preparing chickens. Another group is grating coconut to use to get the oily milk used in cooking. Others are still cutting up meat. Some ladies are peeling and cutting papayas, agar cubes (like jello), young coconut to make a fruit salad. Still others have cut up some vegetables and ground spices. Others are getting the giant rice pots going on the long fire. Some guys are putting up a tarp “fence” out front to keep the dust down this afternoon when the wind starts up. It’s a busy, smokey semi chaos. The kids aren’t going at full speed yet, probably because they haven’t eaten yet.
Just got another text confirming I will be met at 2pm by a blue car with a driver named Pila. (Short for Pilatus!)
4-22-07
Well here I still am. Yesterday a neighbor and three others took me to the pick up spot for my trip up to the remote mountains. But by 5pm (sunset is at 6pm) no one had showed up and everybody figured that nobody would show up that late. It's about a 5-hour trip and the last three hours are mostly through forest so most of the trip would be in the dark. Generally people don't like to travel in the dark because there could be a landslide or a tree down or some other problem that is more difficult to deal with in the dark.
Fortunately I had the cellphone number of a student in town who is from the area so I texted him and by 8pm he had arranged with another driver who is going up tomorrow to pick me up at the same pick up spot around 2:00pm today. Sigh! I hope it happens. 2pm is a hot time of day to be hanging around a rural intersection... That spot is abut 5 km from my village.
Meanwhile the 100-day funeral is gearing up. The main event will be at 3pm today so I will just barely miss it. But last night I was able to hang around and talk with a bunch of the folk here. There are dozens of relatives from outside the area here to help. But of course they all have to be fed too so some ladies have been making cake for three days now - for coffee breaks and for newly arriving folk. They killed two cows so lots of local ladies were here during the evening and night helping cut up meat. The men did the butchering. The lights went out shortly before dark. We had two new fancy emergency lights with LED bulbs and that helped. There were also two kerosene pressure lamps. Somebody went and borrowed a small gasoline generator that cranked out 1300 watts. They just plugged it into the wall and it ran everything except the water pump. Since the dishwashers eventually ran out of water, somebody had to go around and unscrewed half the lights so that the pump could be turned on.
Many of the relatives are from cooler mountain areas so they just spread some big mats out on the floor in the house and on the terrace and in a couple of open huts. Quite a few few chose to sleep out in the open where it was cooler.
Kids. I remember as a kid at family gatherings how much fun we had running around with our cousins, more or less unsupervised by adults who were all busy. Well they do here too only there are a lot more of them! Adults generally ignore them until somebody cries, or, like yesterday, several preschoolers decided to have a screeching contest inside the house to see who could hurt the others' ears the most. Some adult quickly intervened :-)
This morning there’s a group putting little chunks of meat (beef) on skewers and sticking the ends of several skewers into pieces of banana tree trunk to be grilled. Others are preparing chickens. Another group is grating coconut to use to get the oily milk used in cooking. Others are still cutting up meat. Some ladies are peeling and cutting papayas, agar cubes (like jello), young coconut to make a fruit salad. Still others have cut up some vegetables and ground spices. Others are getting the giant rice pots going on the long fire. Some guys are putting up a tarp “fence” out front to keep the dust down this afternoon when the wind starts up. It’s a busy, smokey semi chaos. The kids aren’t going at full speed yet, probably because they haven’t eaten yet.
Just got another text confirming I will be met at 2pm by a blue car with a driver named Pila. (Short for Pilatus!)
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