Pasikili, our neighbor, came by to visit. After asking how we were doing, how our kids and grandchildren were doing, he finally posed his question. When you leave permanently will you leave your solar system and freezer behind? We have been talking about our final goodbyes with some of the elders in the past weeks.

Marco is turning 64 in May, so an end is coming in sight. We asked some of the elders how we may support them in their tasks in the years to come. We’ll see if there will be an answer some day, maybe not. While talking he came up with the question if Noah was the first human being building a boat. So, we talked about different types of boats through the ages. Last week he came looking for our help. We, being Dutch, would ask bluntly: Would you be so kind to help me with this or that? Well, that is not the Wayana way. One would say: You’re not wanting to help me, are you? I would like to phone such and such a person, but I have no minutes left on my phone. After almost nine years, living with the Wayana is still full of surprises. We love it.

Next week Roy Lytle will teach a Bible school training 5 evenings in a row, while being in the States. He recorded this teaching in 2019 and we will show the videos in church. We hope it will turn out as planned because the electricity in the church isn’t stable, it comes and goes as we found out this week while teaching English language. We had to use our flashlights more than once. Fluctuation in the current is not okay for computers and beamers which we want to use next week. Marco will investigate if he can find what is wrong and if he’s able to fix it these coming days.

In the past weeks we contacted the people we met during our visits to Canada in the past years. We received positive replies on our proposal to visit again with a number of Wayana in 2022. The Wayana also asked us if we still have plans for another trip. We talked with a Canadian ESL teacher, who is a friend of our colleague Pamela Walford, who is willing to help the Wayana with teaching English conversation. Who would have thought that online learning was a possibility in the jungle of Suriname 5 years ago? We certainly did not!

The orange tree next to our house finally had to let go of its dying branches. The weeds that grew from the seeds in the bird droppings act like a parasite. As a result, there were hardly any living branches left. We decided to prune the tree and now we wait for the tree to grow out again.

Again we have plenty of plans and ideas for the coming months in Apetina!