Monday is what in missionary lingo we refer to as P-day or preparation day or our day off from normal labor. It's the day when the young missionaries write home, do laundry and shopping and try to see the local sights. We try and facilitate that day for them as much as we can. Yesterday, after letters and shopping, we piled them all in the truck and went exploring. We had heard that one north/south road in town, if followed for a ways, take us to the ocean. Well, it didn't. It took us through interesting country--much of it primitive, but it became rougher and rougher, then a footpath, then less than that and finally ended up at an awfully wide river over which we had no hope of crossing. We retraced our steps--going off on a another wild goose (or actually crocodile) chase or two before deciding to use the last couple of hours of the day to take the real road to Zalala beach.
When we got to the river we found how the locals traversed was in these dug-out canoes, which seemed to have had plenty of use and wear over the years. Not all were sea-worthy.
On the way out we discovered this project underway. It looks to me that one will have to be pretty skinny to fit in this canoe--and I worry a bit about the center of gravity.
You are a good friend to the missionaries to facilitate touring on P-Day. This trip sounds most interesting. It must be fun to see the actual life of these people-away from towns and whites. We are gearing up for Christmas and think of you daily. I was hoping you would have your Portuguese song book by now....it is in the packages we sent the first part of Dec. ggh
ReplyDeleteI am assuming that after this mission you will be making all of your canoes by hand...
ReplyDeleteI found my boy--in your picture of all the Elders on the beach--cool. I really miss him. Kamren's mom
ReplyDelete