And for something completely different . . .

Gavin here.  I've been meaning to write for quite a while about some of what I've been doing when at work.  Hopefully I'll be a bit more regular in sharing some of my experiences.  Warning: this blog post will have no pictures of the quints.  Sorry.

I find it hard to believe that we've been back in PNG for only six months.  It seems like it's been a year what with all that has happened and just the daily grind of raising six children.  After a few weeks of settling into the house, I headed back to work at Aviation.  It took quite some time to jump through the different hoops needed to get re-certified in PNG, especially after having been gone so long.  The task was more difficult due to the fact that we had no other helicopter flight instructors in our organization, thus requiring me to use an experienced pilot from another commercial company in a nearby city.

I've been back in the air for several months now and have had quite a few good and interesting experiences already.  It's been SO good to be flying again over such an incredibly beautiful and rugged country.  It amazes me over and over how completely isolated so many people are in this part of the world.  The immense jungles, mountains, and swamps throughout PNG along with the regular heavy rains make it such a ground transportation nightmare.  Aviation is really the backbone of transport to any remote areas and even some that are not so remote.

Just last week I had the pleasure of dropping off several men in a remote area of the West Sepik Province, quite close the Indonesian border.  Two expatriate men and four Papua New Guinean men were splitting into two groups in order to hike to 40 different villages over the course of two weeks.  Their plan is to invite them to come to our Regional Center in Wewak to join in a Bible Storytelling Course as well as to gauge the strength of the individual languages and their desire for Bible translation.  As stories and storytelling are very vital parts of the cultures here in PNG, they hope to raise an interest in the Scriptures and possibly ignite the desire for Bible translation programs in their own tok ples (language of their village).

Before taking the guys to drop them off in the bush

The guys and some local villager before heading off on their two week trek

The men have a lot of ground to cover in the two weeks through the mountains and jungles, so we pray that they stay safe and that the Holy Spirit will fill them with the right words and lead them to the right contacts.

After dropping them off, I continued on and picked up a couple from their village where they've been allocated for almost 25 years and returned them and another single woman involved in another translation back home to Ukarumpa.

Often times I have been told after picking people up that after so many weeks in the bush (heat, mosquitoes, cross-cultural challenges, limited or no electricity, etc.) the sound of the helicopter arriving is music to their ears.

Before leaving Baiberi, Carol asked to show pictures of our 5 kids to the people in the village.  They had a hard time believing the story previously, so the pictures sure were a hit.

At a fuel stop on our way back from the West Sepik.  The mighty Sepik River in the background.

Often times I have been told after picking people up that after so many weeks in the bush (heat, mosquitoes, cross-cultural challenges, limited or no electricity, etc.) the sound of the helicopter arriving is music to their ears.

Starkly contrasting green with the black water of the lakes near the Sepik River.

Massive amounts of water fall all over PNG and the rivers and lakes of the swampland overflow often.  This area is full of crocodiles.