Part 2 of 6 - Tuesday

Tuesday was a 10-landing day. In the past 5+ years I’ve only had 10 landings in a day three other times. So this was an unusual day. My route was:

Nyankunde-Bunia-Aru-Nebo-Isiro-Banda-Dungu-Isiro-Mungbere-Bunia-Nyankunde

In Bunia, I picked up eight passengers. Two ladies were going to Aru, three people to Nebo, and three people to Isiro. One of the Aru ladies was old and suffering from paralysis. Her husband, when he was still living, had been a church leader in Congo many years ago.

The plan had been that I would get 200 liters of fuel in Isiro and 400 liters of fuel in Dungu. However, while I was on the way to Aru, I received a radio call saying that there was actually only 200 liters available in Dungu, so I asked them to contact our agent in Isiro to bring 400 liters instead of 200.

In Aru, the two ladies disembarked and their places were taken by a German missionary couple. They also had over 300 pounds of baggage and supplies coming with them. The village where they work is quite remote, so they typically need to bring quite a lot of supplies whenever they can.

After Aru we headed for Nebo. On the way we flew right over one of my favorite spots in all of Congo. It is a cathedral in a tiny village in the middle of nowhere. I am told that years ago there was a coffee plantation there and the owner had built the church. But now there is just a tiny community with a huge church. (Photo by Luanne Cadd)

We were to drop off five passengers and pick up three others who would go with me to Bunia. In Nebo we were met at the airplane by another missionary couple. Last week I had a little extra time and was able to sit and have a cup of coffee with them. Today there was no time. All was going well until I saw the passenger manifest for the Nebo passengers. There were four passengers listed instead of three. Thankfully, there was still enough room for him on the flight, but it did take a bit more time to sort out, and time was something I was quickly running out of.

One of the four passengers was Sabato, our MAF IT guy. The VSAT (internet system) in Nebo had been having problems, so the week before I had flown Sabato to Nebo and left him there to get their internet going again. He had been successful and was now ready to go back to Bunia. Another passenger was Dr. Jean Claude. He is originally from Nebo, went away for a time to get training as a doctor, and has since returned to Nebo to work in the hospital there.

Just before we loaded the baggage, I spotted a blue and white striped plastic bag that seemed to be squirming. As I looked closer at it, it looked like there was about two inches of water in the bag with what appeared to be small fish (about the size of my thumb) swimming in it. “Jean Claude, are those fish in that bag?” I asked. “No,” he answered, “They are maggots. They come out of the palm trees.” I later heard that they are quite a tasty treat—either boiled or fried. Ugh!

The flight to Isiro only took about 10 minutes. Our agent in Isiro was expecting that I would not need fuel until I returned to Isiro the second time, so there was a few minutes delay in getting started putting the fuel in the airplane. After refueling, I took off for Banda leaving the passengers in Isiro to wait for my return later that afternoon. It also happened to be lunch time, so I ate on my way to Banda.

Have you heard small towns referred to as “a wide spot in the road?” Well, the airstrip in Banda is literally a wide spot in a dirt road. Before I landed I flew overhead and saw a guy pedaling his bicycle down the road/runway. He started pedaling really fast and made it off the runway well before I landed.

The eleven Banda passengers were mostly pastors who had been attending a conference on how to help people and do development work in a way that equips people for the long term rather than just meeting their short term need and creating dependence. At the airstrip I also got to chat with friends that used to live near us in Bunia. Their kids were also at the airstrip and remembered me as, “the guy who’s house they had gone to for the Easter egg hunt last year.”

I had a couple of issues getting the plane loaded, and by the time I left Banda I was a full 40 minutes behind schedule for the day. Not good since I didn’t have 40 minutes to spare. We stopped in Dungu to drop off eight of the pastors and also to refuel the airplane. Things in Dungu went quickly and by the time we were airborne I was only 30 minutes behind. Isiro also went quickly and I gained back another 10 minutes. I asked all of the passengers to please stay in their seats in Mungbere so that we could quickly drop off the one passenger there and be on our way again. It worked, and by the end of the day I was only 15 minutes behind what I had planned at the start of the day. Not too bad all things considered.

And the icing on the cake was that I made it home at the end of the day to see Dorothy and Hannah's new paper dolls, play with Levi, eat Kathleen’s great cooking, and sleep in my own bed.