Find some new pictures at: http://gallery.me.com/jamesdchristian#100053
The first thing you will notice in the photos I have added for the great pig hunt is that there is no pig. I think this was a blessing, but listen to the story and decide for yourself.
I was cooped up in the parsonage for days working on lessons and stuff. I only lasted that long because of Dani’s patient company while she did patchwork sewing.
“I need to go hiking,” I said.
“So go.” She secretly wanted to spend a day in a personal retreat — which I know means God instead of me, but hey, I understand, “better is one day in your courts than a thousand with your husband.”
Remember the Lost Boys from Peter Pan? Well, we found ‘em. They all moved into the fellowship hall next to our house. Six live here, but about 25 show up each afternoon to live off the mango trees, howl in laughter, lift weights, play volleyball, harass passing girls and even yell cock-a-doodle-do much like Pan’s crowd. For entertainment, we only have to pull open a curtain and see what face is there and ask about the antics they are hatching.
I grabbed hold of four unemployed Lost Boys and said, “Come on, you are going to show me Fiji.”
They were happy to oblige. “We’ll hunt wild pigs,” they grinned.
I wanted to see how Fijians would provide so I brought no lunch, transportation, or map. First they pushed a single flower bloom behind one ear: white plumaria, red hibiscus or a blue morning. After a bus and pick-up truck ride into the hills, the Lost Boys B-lined for wild mango, guava and pawpaw (papaya) trees and collected a bag of lunch. Using a machete, they hacked a stick into a carrying tool and we started hiking.
Before long there were new varieties of mangos to sample, rivers to swim, young ladies to evangelize (go figure), more mangos and alas, steep mountains that were difficult for the old men in the group (me). I’m guessing we covered 10 miles at a rate of 7.5/MPM (that is mangos per mile) for a total of 75 mangos. Half of the boys wore no shoes and I could barely keep up with them.
There were also waterhole cliffs to jump from and a hot spring to lounge in. I got all proud and cocky when I was the first to discover fresh boar tracks. We followed them for a half-mile and I demonstrated my uncanny outdoor skills. The pigs turned out to be four goats bleating from high on a rock. They were not even wild goats.
That was the crescendo of the big pig hunt. Embarrassed as I was that I couldn’t tell a pig print from a goat print, I was, nevertheless, glad we did not find the beasts. The Lost Boys only had two machetes and a box of matches. I assume the idea was to find wood and roast a boar, but beating a pig to death with those big knives was not something I was looking forward to. I prefer my meat shrink-wrapped and frozen, thank you.
The boys surprised me when they pulled out a loaf of bread and tuna. We put them together with the wild fruit and had a great lunch. Drinking water was abundant from the outdoor faucet of a farmhouse.
The ancient volcano was quiet as we read Scripture and worshiped above the pale-blue sea. The Lost Boys asked me about matters of spiritual formation and drank up the replies, because, you see, these Lost Boys are not really lost at all, but found in a way most can never understand. They know Jesus, intimately, and they know it is he who provides so abundantly for them.
After another swim in another river, we had to wait out a torrential downpour under a tin porch. Blam! Lightening flashed with instantaneous thunder that made everyone jump. The rolling boom was returned by our own uproarious laughter. The machetes hacked open coconuts and the juice and white meat helped to pass the time. Ten silvery waterfalls formed on the jagged peaks from which we had descended.
After the worst of the storm passed, we shivered in the drizzle for hour at the side of a dirt road until a bus bumped and rattled us down to the main highway; Then another bus got us back to our side of the Island.
When I came into the parsonage sunburned, sore and soggy, Dani was in the same chair sewing, but she had a new glow on her face from her time with the Lord — as did I.
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