This was a fun entrance into Padang International Airport. I waited for my suitcase to come through the opening in the wall and it did not arrive. I guess it was my fault as I went to sleep outside the boarding gate and go to go into the boarding area and I forgot to get my boarding pass. I was supposed to have gotten my boarding pass, way up the concourse at least one hour prior to plane leaving for baggage to be put on the plane. So when we got to the hotel, I asked John to pick up some blood pressure medicine for me. I found out that they are quite inexpensive there. In the states it cost $8 for a 30-day generic prescription and here the same thing cost $1.50 for 30 days.

Well, we go back to Siobon again. I now have an interpreter named Jolly. Jolly is a Christian and is a guide for visitors that visit the Mentawai Islands. Most of the visitors come from Australia and some come from European countries but not many from America. Jolly was a special person in that he would take my written Bible study and rewrite it into Indonesian so he would not have a problem when I spoke words that he did not know. Jolly had not gone to any English school but did very well.

The villages we went to were Sao, Sagici (they did not want a medical clinic), and Nemnemlelu and ran out of medicine again. Oh the need for funds to purchase more medicines is real every time we go into the field.

This trip did not have very many high points of happenings to remember. Jolly did a good interpreting my bible studies. I did have a problem in keeping him busy at the clinics as he would wonder off. Being he was a guide he was leader oriented and did not like being the “co-captain”, as I had explained to him a couple of times.

Before we had even arrived in Padang on the trip there from the states, Huise had hired a young man to do the logistics of getting the travel tickets to and from the islands. He did not do a good job and we almost did not have sleeping births for the trip over. On the way back he was too late. But Jolly, on the way from Malepet to Traupejet, he talked to the captain of the boat. He talked the captain into allowing John, the two cooks, and myself into a room where the ships crew usually slept. It cost a little more but that was good for the trip from Traupejet to Padang was over night. The young man that Huise had hired took the credit until we got to Padang and then I found out the truth. Sorry to say but the young man lost his job.

When we returned to Padang I asked Jolly to go with me, as I wanted him to go to the house where Khairini lived to see if she would come to the end of the block and see me. I still wanted to find out what I did so wrong to cause so much pain in her life and hate in her father’s life. We took a taxi to the corner where she lived a couple of houses down. I sent him to her front door. I sent a note without my name but knowing she would recognize who it was from. She chose not to see me. When Jolly returned we talked to a young girl and sent her back and had her tell Khairini that I was waiting at the store at the corner. We waited about a half-hour. So then we left. We did talk on the phone later. She was upset that I did not come to the door and embarrassed her in front of the neighborhood as I sat at the corner store for about an hour waiting for her. I told her that if I had come to her door, her father would have probably gotten very mad again and put me in jail. She agreed but she told me that she had “Proof.”

No truce was found and no reason for the problem was acknowledged. She just said she had proof. Proof! What proof? Proof about what? In the Quran it is said many times Islamic believes are told to seek out those who know the scriptures, the evangel, injil, gospels, or the Torah. But the Christians have to show the truth with the proof of any difference between the Bible and the Quran. From what I can understand, the scriptures come from either the Old Testament (the Torah) or the New Testament. The evangel probably is the New Testament, and the injil is the teachings of Jesus (the 1^st 4 books of the New Testament.) I may be wrong but it will not be the first time. But I did not find out what caused the problem.