Bits and Bites...

*Last Friday we celebrated Aidan’s upcoming birthday with his class at the pool. I’m so thankful that we have a place nearby to host 13 grade one kids so that they don’t have to all be in my house…. Tomorrow, the 29th, is his actual birthday and he’ll be 7.
*The other day one of the archaic fire engines from the City of Sentani was put to good use; watering the new medians down the middle of the main drag…
*I asked Ice last week if she took the malaria medication I had given her and she replied,”Yes (they answer every question with “yes”…) I only have 5 pills left.” Envision me hitting my hand to my forehead with frustration… I explained to her that she should have no pills left had she followed the schedule I had written out for her. If you don’t follow the schedule, I explained, the medicine will not kill the malaria in your body and you will get sick again quickly…. She just wanted to save some for the next time she gets sick…. Next time I will do a different schedule that allows me to watch her take the pills instead of leaving it up to her.
*There is a young man from an interior tribe staying in Sentani right now to learn a bit about dentistry. The western couple that lives in his village brought him along on their regular Sentani visit to stock up on supplies and touch base with their fellow workers here. A Papuan woman is teaching this young man, Paulus, about dental hygiene. So she showed him a picture of a big tooth with little bad guys with forks attacking the tooth. He says, yes that is how we get a sore tooth. If we walk too close to a sacred place the bad spirits will make our tooth hurt. That is what the people of his tribe believe causes tooth aches. The animism is still so incredibly strong there. So the Papuan woman showed Paulus some malaria parasites under a microscope so he could see for himself that there are tiny little things that we can’t see with our eyes but can make us very sick or make holes in our teeth. He was quite impressed with it all. In the future I will write more about this very interesting tribe and their traditions and beliefs. This particular tribe has resisted change the most of all other tribes and continues to live in houses up high in the trees. There are also very few of them who can read and write. Paulus himself is illiterate.
*I find I have to remind myself that the people here aren’t stupid or dumb, they are just undereducated. The education system here, if you can call it a system, does not encourage problem solving or thinking for oneself. Everything is learned by rote. Most of the people here have no idea that Papua is actually a big island with water all around it and that the earth itself is actually made up of large “islands” with water all around. If you show them a globe it means absolutely nothing to them. We in the West are taught to read from left to right and top to bottom but if you are never taught this you have no boundaries, anything is possible.
* Someone told me that many of the people that come to our house to get drinking water think that we have a machine in our houses that boils the water that comes out of the taps. That is also a very typical Papuan thing to think. The water that is available in their area is actually from the same place as ours and we don’t treat ours. However, Ice told me that the people up on the mountain often turn off the water flow so they have to bathe in the river but as the river running throughout her “subdivision” is really gross, ie there are lots of pig stalls along the sides and garbage floating in it, they have to go to a different river.

Friday was also track and field day at the school. Aidan is pictured at left proudly showing off his third place ribbon. He couldn't remember what he won it for, but it was for running... Mikah and Christiaan also did very well. It helps that the school is small and that girls only ran against members of the same gender and likewise for boys... But they had a great day and all slept rather well that night! Pictured at right is Brynnie, having removed her bathing suit, and donned a spiderman motorcycle helmet...