Saturday, February 14

Aaron made heart shaped pancakes for us to celebrate an abbreviated Valentine's Day.

Market was small because of rain this morning and because many of my neighbors are leaving around 8:00 (Solomon Time!) to go prepare for the ordination of a priest and for the welcoming of the diocese bishop in another village.  Aaron and Sarah will be in the second load of people to go over.  The ride takes about forty minutes, one way.

Our home still had an atmosphere of Valentine festivity because Sarah made simple but beautiful Valentine's for each of us, plus, our family just likes any excuse to celebrate!  Aaron, Sarah, and I walked down the hill to wait for Belza to return, and we visited with Belza's sister, Daisy, for almost an hour before she finally said something to the effect of, "Why don't you just go home and rest.  He won't be here for a while, and then I'll send somebody to come and get you."  By that time, it was nearing lunch, so I got some pumpkin lentil soup cooking to fortify my adventurous travelers while the kids played outside.  Sure enough, about the time the soup was done, Belza was ready to take the next round of people.  So, Sarah and Aaron wolfed down their soup and putt-putted away.

Marulaon is expected, along with the other villages, to make contributions toward to be celebration and ordination tomorrow.  Part of the contribution comes in the form of uncooked food, like root crops, that was delivered yesterday.  Part of the contribution is a pig per village.  Dawa spent the morning killing and preparing the pig, and this afternoon I found several women parceling the bits of pieces of pig.  Listening to them, holding their babies (and being peed on), watching the whole process, what a great way to spend the afternoon!

I love the ingenuity that my neighbors have in using leaves here.  Give them banana leaves and coconut leaves, and they can accomplish almost anything!  Each small parcel of bite sized pig meat was set into a big coconut leaf basket and surrounded by hot stones to slowly cook all night long.  I finally headed back up to the house, and I found a trail of blood leading me to Benjamin's foot.  He had sliced it on the way home from playing, but he did a great job in first aid while his sweet sisters cleaned up the blood.  He was in good enough shape to help me make caramel corn laced with Valentine's M&Ms as a treat and a surprise for Sarah and Aaron whenever they get home late tonight.