Photos from Christmas

 

Christmas Taskmaster event

Outdoor Christmas movie

Lights

Ready for Christmas dinner

My contribution! (Two large pavlovas weren't enough last year, so this year I made six smaller ones)

Expat Tales

An article was recently published about me on Stuff...

 The 'Expat Tales' series has an open invitation for Kiwis living overseas to share their stories. There was no harm in me writing in to share my own - and it might make a change from 'I went to London for my OE'.

The Stuff writer got back to me the very next day with a set of questions, and seemed genuinely interested to hear from me. So I responded to each one, determined not to shy away from talking openly about God, Jesus, and Christianity!

Several weeks passed and I wondered if it was going to be published. Then one Sunday morning, my email was running hot and my phone was pinging.

'Would you look at what I see as I browsed Stuff this morning...!'

'Great article and photos in Stuff!'

'I read your stuff article and liked it a lot'

'Famous in NZ, aye'

'What a wonderful article on Stuff! Who knows how the Lord will use it in the lives of the readers and beyond!'

'Good job!'

I was interested to see how much the article had been edited, and to my surprise and delight, it was mostly just formatting. There was only one sentence referring to Jesus' parable about seeking the lost sheep that was removed.

I'm thankful for the opportunity to write about Christian mission work and for it to have been published in a secular arena. So often, we think we can't talk about our faith for fear of offending someone. But if other people can rave about how their lives have been transformed by meditation / yoga / a vegan diet etc., why shouldn't we be able to talk about Jesus in normal, everyday conversation? Especially if the question is 'What inspired you to do this?'

Get-home-itis

‘Moresby, Sierra Delta Papa is holding within five miles of Telefomin below 7000, will call ops normal time 45 or landed.’

I made that radio call at 5:28 pm after a long and challenging day flying store goods and passengers out of Tabubil for various airstrips - Bak, Wobagen, and Eliptamin - and was on my way back ‘home’ to Telefomin. There had been a lot of cloud and rain in the Bak/Wobagen area, so I wasn’t able to fly the most direct route to get there. By the time I was on my way back from Eliptamin, it looked like most of the clouds had rained out, leaving a high overcast layer and the ridges were clear. Maybe I would have some relief at the end of the day!

As I departed Tabubil and climbed over the Hindenburg Wall, the message light on my tracker started flashing.

"Hi BRI, wx is not looking good. Heavy build towards the wall. See if you could approach from TH low point. Heavily raining at the moment. standby on the VHF as well."

"wind blowing the clouds towards Feramin as well. The tip of the crocs tail towards Feramin is still visible as we look through the rain."

I was well in the clear and able to descend towards the Tifalmin (TH) valley, only ten miles from Telefomin. The ‘crocodile tail’ is a low ridge on the opposite side of the valley from Telefomin, and I could see it clearly, so I flew towards it. Only 3 miles away. But I couldn’t see the Telefomin airstrip - or even any of the buildings surrounding it - because of the rain.

There was a clear weather ‘pocket’ along the crocodile tail, so I slowed the aeroplane down and considered my options. Fuel - I had over 2 hours’ on board, so that wasn’t an issue. Daylight was not yet a concern. Weather was my biggest problem, but my previous experience of Telefomin was that rain showers can come and go quite quickly, so there was a chance it might clear up - especially since at my altitude there was a strong 20 knot wind blowing through as well. I decided to wait for 15 minutes or so and informed Moresby of my plan.

‘Get-home-itis’ is a phrase most pilots are familiar with and many have experienced personally. It’s the self-inflicted pressure to push on into bad weather, when you probably shouldn’t, simply because you’re almost at your destination. Statistically, it counts for a significant proportion of fatal accidents. I was conscious of this and decided that if I couldn’t get in, or the weather deteriorated, I would simply turn around, fly back to Tabubil, and spend the night there.

After four or five passes (by this time in radio comms with the base staff on the ground, who told me the rain at the airstrip was lessening) I could see some buildings that I knew would lead me to the runway. Carefully, I flew towards them, ready to turn around at any time if I lost visibility. But thankfully, a few seconds later a pocket opened up where the rain was lighter and I could see more and more buildings, and soon was able to make out the runway itself.

After I landed, I noted the time - 5:36. It had only been 8 minutes since I made the radio call to Moresby, but felt a lot longer!

Flying an aircraft is not just about manipulating the controls or getting from A to B, but also being aware of what’s going on around you and making appropriate decisions. MAF places a strong emphasis on these ‘soft skills’ using scenario-based training, which puts us in good stead when we encounter difficult situations in the real world!

The Telefomin bowl, with the airstrip to the left and Crocodile Tail to the right

My route

A single landing

“How many coffee bags can you take?”

That was the first question asked of me by Kos, the local MAF agent, when he greeted me as I opened the door after landing at Sengapi. I steeled myself for what lay ahead.

You see, I hadn’t landed at Sengapi to pick up coffee bags. The notes attached to my flight programme for this particular leg indicated that I was picking up a young girl as a medical transfer patient, who would require a stretcher.

The airstrip at Sengapi is short, flat and at a high altitude, which means that we are payload-limited for take-off to around 500 kg, or about ten coffee bags. For every passenger on board, that means fewer bags.

I already had three passengers on board whom I had picked up earlier, and of course the patient was my first priority. “Let me check the plane,” I told Kos, “and then I will calculate everything and let you know how many coffee bags I can take.”

When there’s a flurry of activity around the plane, I’ll often deliberately ignore it and go through my routine. Check the tyres, wings, propeller, open the doors. As I did so, I started making a mental list of tasks: Take the seats out so the stretcher could fit. Get the stretcher out of the pod and my patient onto it. Calculate how many coffee bags - five. Actually, the coffee would need to be loaded before the patient. But how would I physically fit five coffee bags in the plane with a stretcher? I decided not to take all five.

“The most important thing about this flight is taking the sick girl,” I told Kos. “So, I will take only two coffee bags this time. I can’t fit any more in, otherwise they might fall on her. I will take the seats out, then put the stretcher harness in, then load the coffee, then load the patient. All right?”

He nodded and I set to work. There were plenty of willing volunteers, but some tasks were easier for me to do myself rather than try to explain how the equipment worked.

With the two coffee bags and my patient on board, I calculated the cost of the fares and freight. Kos handed me the money, mostly in K20 notes and smaller. “This is for the patient and guardian. This is for the other passenger. This is for the coffee.”

I started counting it, but Kos wasn’t finished. “I have fifteen more coffee bags to go to Hagen, one passenger for Madang. Three passengers next week for Goroka. And I want to buy lots of Bibles. How many do you have?” He had seen the Bible box in the cargo pod.

“Kos, you need to not talk to me while I am counting the money,” I said. “Be quiet. Otherwise I have to start again.”

I noticed that the sick girl was getting a bit restless. Knowing that it was going to be a while before we took off, I asked the crowd of people, “Where is the person travelling with her?” A woman came forward. “Can you please come up, sit with her and hold her hand?”

After I had finalised the flight paperwork, I had Kos on one side asking for Bibles and a group of onlookers asking if they could change their money for newer notes. I did the best I could with what I had, and in the blink of an eye, swapped from mobile banking service to Bible distributor. Kos handed me 200 Kina for the ten Tok Pisin Bibles that I had. Other people bought Bible comics. My box was nearly empty.

“When you come back next week, bring twenty more Bibles,” Kos told me. “And can you please give me my commission money now?”

I sighed to myself. I was supposed to be attending a monthly pilots’ meeting at 2 pm, and it was already 1:30. But what was one more delay? I counted out his money and got him to sign the appropriate form.

“All done? Good. I’m going now.” I started closing the doors, told the woman who had been sitting on the floor with the sick girl to sit in the seat closest to her, and helped her put her seat belt on. My other passengers boarded, and I gave a quick safety briefing before praying for the sick girl and our flight to Hagen.

Just before I climbed into the cockpit, Kos had one last thing to tell me. “Remember I have fifteen more coffee bags for Hagen, one passenger for Madang, three for Goroka.”

This was not just one day, but one landing, in the life of a MAF pilot / ticket officer / Bible seller / cargo handler / {insert other roles here}!

Helping another agent at another airstrip with his paperwork

This story was published on the MAF PNG website.

Holiday fauna

Part 1 | Part 2 | Part 3 | Part 4 | Fauna

Here's a collection of photos of some of the different animals we saw on holiday.

Koala at Magnetic Island

'Blue tiger' butterfly at Magnetic Island

Rock wallabies at Magnetic Island

Cockatoo at Palm Bay

Kangaroo at Palm Bay (seen here drinking out of the garden water feature!)

Lace monitors (tree goannas) at Palm Bay

Small wallaby seen on a bush walk

Best above-water photo I got of a turtle

Turtle seen while snorkelling at Palm Bay - highlight of the holiday!

Holiday - part 4

Part 1 | Part 2 | Part 3 | Part 4 | Fauna

Four days at Palm Bay was just the right amount of time. From there we headed to Brisbane for four nights. The plan was to explore some of the bush walks a bit further out of town, since we've both been to Brisbane a number of times before.

On our first day we headed to Springbrook National Park and did a few of the shorter trails, since Raewyn didn't have appropriate footwear to tackle the Warrie Circuit and my toes were still recovering from rubbing on the flippers. Instead, we did the Twin Falls loop walk and visited a few other lookouts (which weren't much to write home about). From there we drove a short distance to the Purling Brook Falls, which were even more impressive. We had just enough time left in the day to drive out to the Natural Bridge.

Twin Falls

Twin Falls from below

The path passes behind the waterfalls

Purling Brook Falls

Natural Bridge...

... where the water goes in the top...

... and out the bottom

On another day we drove down to the Gold Coast. There was a sculpture festival taking place on the beach, so we had a wander around that for a few hours and had lunch. After lunch we drove to Mermaid Beach which had an interesting-sounding mini golf course - I was determined to make the most of things I can't do in PNG.

Sculptures on the beach

Mini golf at Mermaid Beach

Holiday - part 3

Part 1 | Part 2 | Part 3 | Part 4 | Fauna

The next morning we said goodbye to Airlie Beach and took a water taxi out to our island resort - Palm Bay.

I'd read about it on someone's blog where they'd been there for honeymoon and said it was 'paradise'. It offered bush walks, snorkelling, sea kayaking, stand-up-paddleboarding; it had a pool, a day spa, tennis court, and restaurant. Most importantly for us, it wasn't anywhere as expensive as Hamilton Island, and didn't look as crowded as Daydream Island. While the accommodation options were limited (queen bed units - Raewyn brought an airbed mattress to sleep on) it was a small price to pay. An additional advantage was that it was an 'adults only' resort. No offence to families with children - we were all children once - but we did enjoy having a kid-free zone for a few days.

Departing Shute Harbour

Palm Bay

Happy Bay - one of the bush walks, to an abandoned resort

Happy Bay

We also spent quite a bit of time in Palm Bay itself, paddling in the sea kayaks (or on the paddleboard) and snorkelling. In the resort information it said there were reefs on either side of the bay, but we didn't see much on our first 'expedition' - the visibility in the water wasn't great and we didn't really know where we should be going. After that failed attempt we took the kayaks out again to see if we could find the reef that way. The visibility was better and we were moderately successful.

On our last full day we went out snorkelling again, where I was able to take the following pictures. In some places the coral was quite sparse on the sandy sea floor, but in other places it was denser and more similar to the sites we'd been to on the tour.

We actually did one and a half snorkel trips - on the second one, Raewyn took a sea kayak while I snorkelled. She had had enough of snorkelling but wanted to go out on the water, while I was keen to go snorkelling again but wasn't sure if I would have the physical stamina to get out and back. So to have her nearby in a kayak was a welcome safety net! (I did end up hanging onto the back of the kayak when we came in.)

I liked the purple/yellow fish

Pink coral with blue tips

We had seen a few glimpses of turtles... one on the tour, another on our walk to Sandy Bay, and another that popped its head up briefly in Palm Bay. But the best sight I had was to see one just hanging out on the reef shelf, hardly moving despite my repeated duck-dives to take its picture. It was hands-down the best experience I had on this holiday!

Holiday - part 2

Part 1 | Part 2 | Part 3 | Part 4 | Fauna

Since the weather forecast for the following day was still for strong winds, and the tour we had booked required a 6 am departure from our accommodation to meet the necessary bus, we called the company to ask if the tour was still planned to go ahead. They seemed surprised that we would ask (I suppose they hadn't had to work through three cancelled things in less than a week) but said yes, it was still going ahead.

The first (cancelled) tour was supposed to take us to snorkelling locations around the islands of the inner reef, while the second was supposed to take us to the outer reef. We were just happy to be on a tour that wasn't cancelled, so when they told us they'd had to modify the itinerary to visit sites that were more sheltered, we didn't really take much notice.

Our first site was on the lee side of Hook Island, at a place called Cockatoo Point. There is a coral shelf, where you can often get a variety of coral and fish. There weren't many people on the tour - only 6 snorkellers and 11 divers - so it was nice and relaxed. I had bought a camera capable of taking pictures underwater and was keen to try it out!

Raewyn ready to go snorkelling

Part of the coral shelf

We called this 'blue antler coral' (not sure of its real name)

I think I'm getting the hang of this!

Our second location was on the lee side of Border Island. When we arrived someone saw a turtle; I only saw a brown shape in the water and was too slow with the camera to get a picture. Oh well!

Underneath the surface the choppiness wasn't noticeable, but the
anemones (which always remind me of shagpile carpet) were being
pushed back and forth by the currents

The coral colours were a bit more muted, and the fish were bigger

After our second snorkel, we were starting to get a bit cold (in spite of the wetsuits) and tired. But then the crew announced that since we hadn't gone as far as planned (i.e. to the outer reef), we had a bit more time and so they would be taking us to Whitehaven Beach.

We were glad that we didn't miss out after all!

We had about an hour on shore, so Raewyn and I decided to do the 45 minute loop walk up to the lookout.

Fun fact: the sand is white because it is silica with few other elements. As a result, it doesn't absorb the heat from the sun so is not hot to walk on. We found that if you try to walk too quickly (or jump or stomp your foot to make an impression), it makes a squeaking noise!