Hidup dan Kematian - Life and Death

sprinkle donuts!

(Just spotted this! It looks like this one never got posted so although old from February, I will post it anyway!)
Where to start? When one is on the roller coaster, start and finish seem to blur, thus my question here! Life certainly feels like a roller coaster, with ups and downs coming at breakneck speed. It feels like I’ve had more downs than ups these last couple of weeks but one "feel good day" can outweigh a few of the others so far.
SO for a re-cap of one of those "up" days.
I went another village on the back of Berti’s bike - a ride of just over an hour through lovely lush green lined roads, and through a very crowded market lining the sides of the road - it might have been a village - hard to tell as things seem to blend together the first time I experience them. Big trucks laden with vegetables, bags of rice and fruit and trucks loaded with people in the back; others with their goods to sell at market such as wooden beds and other furniture of regular household variety. It is amazing how much can be stuffed onto the back of a truck! and these are ric

rice separator

kety rusted out vehicles usually. So, at times we crawled along behind, waiting for our opportunity to scoot past on our little Suzuki.
By the time we arrived at the village office my back and behind were feeling the strain of sitting on the back and the very rough road into the village. I was introduced to the village secretary and administrator, saw their data on the village population all charted hanging on the wall and another chart of very detailed information on pregnant women in the village, their location, date of expected term and any other information needed as part of ther “Alert Villages” programme to be ready to assist with blood bank - a call goes out for fresh blood at the moment it is needed and they know who to look for; transportation to hospital - who will be called as most do not have a vehicle; and how much money might be needed for any related costs like transportation and medication.  All neatly recorded on little yellow stickie notes but very official and impressive!
Then on to meet a woman who is the local facilitator for the Alert programme - she encourages women to go to hospital vs. staying at home and having a local midwife  - this has reduced maternal deaths to the point that there are no deaths from childbirth in this last year - quite an impressive statistic as this was not the case in the past, when local remedies and limited supports were available when complications arose.

rice transport

Her family were there to greet us - right down from grandmother to great granddaughter who was turning one the next day. We were invited to stay for lunch and also to see their garden of herbs and various fruit trees - they sent us home with fresh limes and bananas. They very much appreciated my interest in the garden and I’m sure they didn’t realize what a treat it was for me to walk around it and learn how they used some of their herbs for healing and cooking and the names of their trees. Felt like home.

Food is cooked in a separate small buiding at the back of their house. A lovely, warm welcoming family. Berti warned me not to eat too much as we would be fed at every stop and you never know how many stops there will be! Then on to the next woman who also is influential in the village. Her husband runs a rice cleaning business - removing the husks, separating rice from the shell - which has been a huge success in this area of rice growing. Local people come to him rather than treck their bags a greater distance and then the separated rice back! Some of it to sell, some to eat themselves. People bring huge bags of dried rice right out from the fields on the motor bike -- quite the sight.

Here we received fresh roasted peanuts, sweet rice goodies wrapped in banana leaf and if you can believe it - sprinkle topped donuts!!! Yes, Western food has reached Timor! How sad.
Berti learned most people were out in the fields this day as it was rice planting time and it’s all hands on deck for this manual work. Google and read up on it, it’s fascinating! I’m sure most of us could not put in this kind of day, morning to dark, and they have everyone able out there from the adult community right up to grandparents well into 70’s and 80’s.

tree pruning Timor style out my kitchen window

So we started to head out as we wanted to be home before dark but as we started a small group of people were coming toward us from the rice field and Berti learned they needed to head home early as their father had died at noon and they just received the word - SMS is great! So Berti felt she needed to pay her respects so around we turned and followed these people home, where they washed up to go to grandpa’s house where the wake would be held for 2-3 days. We were told he was prepared already, tarps had been erected in the outdoors of the home so there would be places under cover of rain and sun for visitors. Before going, we were served lovely warm watermelon. The usual sweet tea accompanies most food.

Then we all set off on foot up a long hill - it was hot! And went in to pay our respects and grandfather was laid out in his full traditional village garb of colorful sarong, head wrap and sandals and shirt. He looked very peaceful and not what I expected. I was quite prepared for I don’t know what, but was ready to be shocked. Not at all!
Sat and visited for the proper amount of time then off we headed home. By the time I arrived, my back was screaming - must work on those stomach muscles!! (that will be my next Blog story)
Well friends and family, it is February and I’m still standing - rode my motor bike to work 4 days in a row but not venturing too far from home yet. One step at a time - one day at a time!
Thanks for reading!!!