“We will be back in three hours,” our motor canoe driver assured us as we quickly locked our house. We had awakened at first light and raced through our morning routine to be able to get on the river before the sun became blisteringly hot. We were making a quick hour-and-a-half trip to the village of Arai to rent a large motor canoe to take to town the following week.

When we arrived at Arai we climbed 10 feet up the muddy riverbank to the house of the motor canoe owner only to find that he and almost the entire village population of men were attending a funeral upriver. Only the man’s three wives were home. So we sat down under their little store on stilts and waited. We had been very busy for days focusing on mission projects, and the abruptness of sudden idleness felt drastic. We had nothing to do but look at the river and make small talk with the women for three hours.

We had been told we could stop by anytime and take the rental canoe home. However we discovered that the heavy canoe was being dried under the owner’s house far from the water. It was impossible for us to move it by ourselves. We had to wait for the men to return to drag it to the water.

The jungle news line at last informed the men upriver that we were waiting. Upon their return they cut small tree trunks to act as rollers, and we all got together and pulled the heavy dugout canoe to the high riverbank and slowly lowered it into the water.

By the time we tied the two canoes together and motored home it was nearly sunset. We had not completed our to-do list for the day, but we had made some friends in Arai.

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