Jungle Picnic

After a short, informal church service in Modzaka, an Aka village, Sarah and I got on our bikes to head the four miles back to the hospital. We were planning to stop along the way and enjoy the jungle a bit as a special treat before my last week in Congo.

We rode a little ways, and then turned off onto a trail that Sarah has been wanting to explore. We rode down it until it became rather too narrow for bikes, and then we stopped by a log and had a look around.

Sarah had packed a picnic lunch of trail mix and tomato and cucumber sandwiches, and I'd brought along bananas, water and "street donuts." We had ourselves a nice little picnic on a long in the middle of the beautiful rainforest jungle, accompanied by many ants bees, spiders and other creatures. Despite the fact that I was hot and sweaty and tired, it was a lovely time and will always be a special memory.

Every now and then a guy carrying a load of wood or something else would pass by. It was the same guy several times going back and forth to retrieve stuff, and when he asked us what we were doing we told him we were having a picnic and explained to him what it was. He liked the idea, and told his other three friends about what we were doing. When we were finishing and he passed by again, we invited him to have a seat and take part in our 'picnic.' He was most happy and told his friends when they came along, "come have some of the picnic." We gave him our leftovers of our picnic supplies and the four of them shared it amongst themselves.