What have we been up to?

Hello. I wanted to write to you before any more time passed and let you know what we have been up to. We had a great opportunity on Friday to go to a place called Kali Biru. I sent you pictures and put some on the blog as well. Kali Biru means Blue River and I tell you, it was beautiful. There was a waterfall along with an awesome bridge to jump off of into the “raging” waters below. There were places that the kids could not swim on their own because of the current so we did have to be quite careful. Jumping off the bridge was about a 12-15 foot jump, and then there were some boards up even higher that Garth and Wyatt jumped off of that were about 20 feet up. I had fun doing the bridge jump but not the boards. It was a little too high for me. The kids had a great time and tried some daring, new feats. I was very proud of how brave they were. We took a bunch of other kids and made a wonderful day of the adventure.

On Sunday we went up to MacArthur hill. We have been there a bunch of times before but this time there was a man there that gave us information. He said that in 1944 the Japanese were taking over Indonesia from Aceh to Papua and they were killing everyone but women. He said that one morning at Tanahmerah Bay-which is the beach we swim at, Depapre-That one morning the people woke up and there were about 10,000 ships all along the Pacific Coast. He said that they couldn’t see the water. It was General MacArthur and the troops coming to attack the Japanese and save the Indonesians. He said that if it wasn’t for the Americans and General MacArthur there would be no Papuans. Now, Indonesians are not very good with their numbers so I am not sure if all of that info is correct, but they did have some amazing pictures up of the whole event that were neat to see.

We have a few more days left until the dorm kids all come back. School starts on January 19^th and the kids come back the 18^th. We have no snow, no wind chill factor, no cold…doesn’t feel like January. Pack extra mittens and hats in your car in case you get stuck somewhere, o.k.? And drive careful. I don’t want to hear about any of you getting hurt.

Love you all-

Rachel