The end of our epic journey...

A couple days ago we reached the end of our epic journey "home" when we landed at Jayapura International Airport. (located in Sentani and rarely receives and international flight...) Going back a bit to Jakarta, we were able to purchase a new generator and arrange for shipping, yippee... Then we wondered how we should send half of our totes from Jakarta to Sentani. International travellers are allowed 2 23 kg pieces of luggage but once you are in Indonesia, you are only allowed 1 20kg piece. I called the MAF lady in Jakarta and she arranged for us to meet "Yogi" at the airport hotel and he would take half our totes off our hands and air-cargo them for us. The taxi arrived at the guest house and whipped us to the airport in record time as it was night time already. We picked up our stuff from the storage place without incident and made our way up to the hotel where a man immediately walked up to us and introduced himself as "Yogi". We gave him our 7 lightest totes (cheaper!) and he had a couple guys pushing the luggage carts and off they went. A little disconcerting to leave your luggage with a complete stranger! This whole process of getting to the airport and then retrieving our luggage and handing it off, took far less time than we had anticipated. We decided to see if we could check in as there is airconditioning past the security posts... check-in went smoothly and because I am a Garuda Frequent Flyer Silver card holder, I'm allowed 5 kg's extra luggage allowance... whoot whoot!! We then made our way to the gate area where we were very pleased to find that the Fifa game of Holland vs Brazil was on. We settled in to watch. Afterwards we had to go down the stairs to a bus which then brought us to another part of the airport where we exited the bus and went up another stairs and through a different gate into a brand new Garuda airplane sporting individual tv's!! For a moment I forgot I was in Indonesia and then I was offered a candy by the flight attendant and came crashing back to reality... They still offer candies before the flights on Garuda. Our plane left just after midnight and we stopped twice on our way to Papua; in Makassar and then in Biak. So it was a loooonngg flight. We arrived at about 9:30 am and exited the plane to a blast of humid air hitting us full force. Met by 2 MAF colleagues, we quickly made our way to the brand new "arrival hall" which is very spacious and air conditioned! Our luggage came and off we went home!
It's been really great to see our local friends again. The majority of our Western friends are not here right now so we'll have to wait to see them. Ritha is actually on the other side of the island for a church function so she isn't here either. Her sister is however, and is sporting a lovely round tummy! So exciting for her and her husband! Sadly, Awi's biological mother came and pretended to be her actual parent and took Awi from school and brought her to her home on the other side of the island without communicating with Ritha about it. Unbelievable really... Thankfully, Ritha was able to say good-bye to her. Rode is staying with Ritha's sister for now and came over to play with Marc and Brynne today. I was worried how Brynne would react as she has forgotten a lot about Papua, but she was excited to see Rode and they played nicely. Ice has started helping me again. She was very anxious to get back to work. She's been very healthy and looks really good! Yokben had been in a motorcycle accident and has a pretty big wound on his half-foot. They don't understand that you need to cover up wounds in order for them to heal. So I bought him bandaids and antiseptic ointment that day.
Today our other totes arrived safely from Jakarta. Yogi is a trust-worthy guy after all!
Tomorrow Hugo starts work again. Let's hope we have a jet-lag-free night!
Thankful again for God's care and protection of us on this very long journey back home!