Coming back to Honiara

Tuesday, May 12/Wednesday, May 13

Knew we would be visited with company today as people came by to story with us before we left, but Ezekial, Leonard (the chief), and Walter came by and stayed all morning. Ezekial even stayed for lunch. Just after morning prayer, Janet came by and told us that the house girl scheduled for today was in Honiara, so would it be okay if Skita came today? We hadn't counted on having anybody to help today, so Skita was a delight!

Everything always takes longer than we think it should, and we didn't get to taking inventory of the food and other supplies left in the house until about 7:00 p.m. Several men came to carry our cargo down to await the Bikoi. Soon, we heard rain begin to fall and hoped that somebody had covered all of our boxes waiting on the beach. Katherine went to bed, and Olivia crashed around 8:30. We closed up the house and went down to the beach around 9:30 p.m. to visit with everybody before the ship came. We found that Eileen (Bernadine's grandmother) had covered our things with a big tarp. The Bikoi was scheduled to come around 10:00, but it didn't come until almost midnight! Olivia went back to sleep, and Katherine fell asleep in Skita's arms. The wind was blowing so hard it was cold. But the rain had stopped, and watching the moon fly up in the sky over the ocean was beautiful! The Bikoi finally came, and we all piled into a canoe to meet the ship. The only space left on the boat was on the top deck, so the kids and I piled on two small camping mattresses and admired the stars until we fell asleep. Aaron was a true gentleman and just slept on the deck. We arrived in Honiara around 7:00 a.m. to find the SITAG truck awaiting us and two other translators who had come in from the Western Province.