Rainy Season Arrives

September 2011

October 2011

There are two seasons in Papua New Guinea - rainy and dry.  Although, the weather has been so inconsistent in recent years that it's hard to distinguish the seasons anymore.  During dry season the people in our area get busy burning their fields and gardens for two reasons that I know of - it's a great alternative to "mowing the lawn," and it helps replenish the ground for their gardens.  A few weeks ago our valley was filled with the smoke of these fires, occasionally burning right up to our fence line. You can hear the crackling of the flames like they're next door.  It's a mystery to me how they control the fires, but they rarely get out of hand.  One day we were driving into town and noticed a fire burning on either side of the road, which was odd since they're usually more controlled than that.  A couple days later one of our language helpers came to work sheepishly saying that she had gone to burn some garbage a couple days earlier and the fire got out of hand and wiped out the entire area where she was living and jumped the road.  Thankfully her house wasn't touched and not too much damage was done that couldn't grow back and she was able laugh about it.