On the leaf of the bamboo tree

Fireflies are flying,
Fireflies are lighting in the forest quietly,
On the good root’s smell they are staying,
Aligning on the leaf of the bamboo tree,
Among children flying.
When I was tiny,
Young and brave before marrying
Whatever people said - good things of eagles and fireflies -
To be their friend again, I am not willing.

-excerpt from Dingguk-Dingguk, Wehean song, translated from Wehean to Indonesian by Ledjie Taq; from Indonesian to English by Ratih Karnelia Kusumawardhani, with modifications in structure by Hugh Trenchard

The excerpt above is from a poem in which Pungguk anguishes over being unable to see his wife again. In the story that precedes the poem in the sequence of mythical events, Pungguk’s wife, Bulan, gives birth to a fish. Pungguk blames Bulan for this and becomes abusive toward Bulan, who flees her husband. Pungguk chases her wherever she goes; she even attempts to flee beneath the water. Pungguk seeks the assistance of the Fish King and the Crocodile King to help him to chase Bulan beneath the water. Unable to escape Pungguk beneath the water, Bulan prays to God, who allows her to flee to the sky, where she becomes the moon. Pungguk tries to chase her there, but cannot chase her so far into the sky, though he becomes a bird which forever after calls out to her only during nights of the full moon.

In the excerpt above, Pungguk has found no one to help him reunite with his wife, and he is left to watch the full moon alone and despair. Though their marriage was at first very good, Pungguk blames his wife for an event that was not in her power to cause or to change; he becomes abusive and loses her love, as forgiving as she may have been for a long time. The poem is beautiful in its symbolism of the universal human capacity for people to fail to accept things they cannot change and to blame others for them, and to suffer the consequences of lost love. The excerpt above indicates Pungguk is both sad and bitter, and one could interpret his bitterness to reflect his continuing propensity to blame others. Without truly recognizing his role in Bulan’s absence, and by suggesting her absence is partially the fault of those who could bring him good news or could help him chase her, it is his destiny to forever wonder why she will remain inaccessible to him, and to call out in despair on nights of the full moon.

I’ve had the opportunity to type out the Wehean story, Donggeng Pungguk Dan Bulan, and the poem excerpted above, Dingguk-Dingguk. My homestay host father, and leader of the Adat (customary) law in Nehas village, had recorded them in handwritten form, but nowhere have they been typed or recorded electronically. Ledjie Taq had translated the original Wehean versions into Indonesian, and I offered to type them out. While the students were in the Wehea Forest these last few days, one of our translators, Ratih Kusumawardhani, translated the Indonesian versions into English.

Because the original Wehean version has a rhyme scheme which Ratih did not reflect in her translation, I made some modifications to the syntax to bring the English version of the poem, Dingguk-Dingguk, a little closer to the original Wehean rhyme scheme, though I was only partially successful at doing so. I do like the result of our combined efforts, however, with credit mostly to Ratih of course.

In making these modifications, I found it an interesting exercise to balance my intention not to change the meaning of Ratih’s translation while seeking to understand the intentions of the story tellers and while also seeking to align the translation more closely with the poetic characteristics of the original Wehean poem. This was less an issue with the story, as it did not appear to exhibit any particular poetic characteristics, although it was still necessary to understand the essence of the story itself in modifying Ratih’s translation to read more smoothly in English, which in more than one instance required some interpretation on my part.

It is not clear whether the Pungguk bird is strictly mythical or whether it actually exists. One forest ranger I asked thought that it represented a real bird, perhaps a Doja crow (or something similar – unfortunately I did not have my notebook when I acquired this information and did not record it before I forgot it and have not since asked again about it), while another ranger I asked thought it was strictly mythical, and there is no bird known only to call out during the full moon.

On that note, we arrived back from the Wehea Forest (Hutan Wehea) yesterday. The forest experience was wonderful, from the Red Langur sightings, to the haunting forest sounds, the firetower, Will’s rig to the treetops to view the forest canopy, the morning/evening surveys, our forest ranger hosts, and my student colleagues and our instructors, and the dark nights full of stars. I’ll update that more fully in a subsequent blog.

The Daily Routine

Before we head into Wehea forest tomorrow for a week, I thought it would be helpful to describe my general routine a little more. So, for something different, here is an overview of my day yesterday:

I awoke at about 5:45 when the light was creeping through my bedroom window. Because power on weekday mornings lasts until 7am (generator-power), I like to check emails and internet, as slow as it is by flash drive, right away. Because internet is slow, just to check an email or two can drag out for half an hour or more, if I am lucky enough to gain a connection.

At about 6:15 I was off for a run, and chose to take a route on which I had checked once before but went only about 3km or so before returning. So, I went a little farther this time. The route took me through Nehas village for a couple of km and onto a main highway for three km or so then onto some back roads containing a few steep-ish hills, which was nice since it is generally very flat in the region immediately surrounding the village of Nehas Liah Bing. Running through a village I’ve not yet visited, Wahau Baru, and enjoying the excitement of a new discovery, I came to a clay/gravel road that went up quite a steep hill (10% approx) for a couple hundred metres to a overhead gateway structure. Going through it I popped out back on the main road at a high point in the geography, overlooking palm trees as far as the eye could see, among other patches of various vegetation. Quite a sight, since one gets so used to the flat vantage points around here.

Cruising back to the village down the main road, total run was 56 minutes.

After returning home, I hopped in for a shower which occurs by pouring buckets of water over oneself, had a cup of Kopi with the Kepala Adat (my host “father”), though we exchanged few words, then travelled the 150m or so to the TNC (Nature Conservancy) for breaky, consisting of rice and some bean type things. I purchased my own eggs the other day, 12 for about $1.80, just to ensure I am getting sufficient protein. Generally we eat well, but sometimes protein is lacking and pork rinds with slivers of meat generally don't cut it, though I will eat them if there is enough meat to make it worth the effort required to separate the meat from the fat. I also tend to avoid the bony fishy things with the eyes and guts, but that’s just a matter of personal preference!

I’ve been working on a carving, which is now essentially finished, having been introduced to a local carving group through Jamre, son of my homestay hosts. A good chunk of time was spent on that today. The carving is not specifically course-related – just something fun to work on while here.

I’ve also been preparing a village map, which is course related, and so I worked on inking over my map with a pen (was still in pencil before that) for a while after lunch, and though the configuration is complete, there are still some points of reference I would like to note on the map. Andrew, who is working on a project related to the agricultural practices of the villagers, came by and we discussed my map for a short bit along with the Kepala Adat, who was home from work (he is a school principal, in addition to his role as the leader of the Adat customary law here).

Then I had a short nap, and then conducted one of my last interviews (this time in relation to the ethno course (anthropology)) regarding traditional Wehean harvesting songs, with Ratih translating. That took me to dinner, and after socializing, I’m back at home working up a blog post.

That’s a pretty good example of the daily routine here: run, carve, eat, do interviews, have classes to discuss readings and update results, write some, scratch mosquito bites on my feet, work on my map, go to eraus (celebrations, or parties of various kinds) for short periods (some attend them into the wee hours of the morning, which I have avoided doing myself), nap. Oh, I’ve also offered to type out a few songs/stories the Kapela has handwritten in a book. A similar book was lost in a fire in 2010, so it will be good for the community to have the songs/stories in electronic form. This also allows us to get them translated into English.

Generally I try to get to bed before 10, since the days begin so early.
Signing off for now!

River Voices

And once again, when the river had just increased its flow in the rainy
season and made a powerful noise, then said Siddhartha: 'Isn't it so,
oh friend, the river has many voices, very many voices? Hasn't it the
voice of a king, and of a warrior, and of a bull, and of a bird of the
night, and of a woman giving birth, and of a sighing man, and a thousand
other voices more?'
- Siddhartha, by Hermann Hesse

Drifting into the twilight zone of sleep the other night, outside echoed the punctuating sound of some bird unknown to me, whose call is a series of bursts of increasing frequency: “thork…......thork…..thork…thork..thork.thork.tho.th…” - the audible equivalent of a pebble skipping across a pond. Ringing through the paneless windows of my room, that sound mingled among the Indonesian or Wehean chatter next door I cannot translate, the intermittent bass-baritone moo of the cow nearby, gheckos’ cheeps, the incessant chirping of crickets and, in the absence of soundproofing in this house, the echoes of a sleeping occupant of the house and every turn on her mattress, as if she were in my room beside me.

Then the half-consciousness conjured briefly the memory of my stopping in the mid-day heat on a clay-gravel road, with Ulin wood houses lining the riverside, to sketch a village road configuration. With the sound of light footsteps behind I turned to look into the darkly freckled face of a man whose piercing eyes and subtly mischievous smile startled me. But at that point I noted nothing else remarkable about him, and I put aside my initial start when he stopped to look at the map I was drawing, as others also had done. Awkwardly I gestured to indicate my task. Then he uttered something in Indonesian, smiled wryly, and raised before me a weighty and bloody brown pig’s head, which he held by the long stiff hairs of its forehead, and walked on.

In that vivid moment, cacophonous and hypnogogic, I stood at an open window covered with a diaphanous curtain, looking out into a dark night, when the curtain was drawn aside by an invisible hand revealing a sky dotted faintly with stars, the silhouettes of enormous banana and palm trees. Then I perceived the whole course of the lives of a thousand people here, from birth to death, and felt a wonderful strangeness to this place I have not experienced in any place before. In that moment I perceived deeply that these people are different from those who have populated my life experience. Of course they are fellow human beings who share all that is commonly human, yes it is true, but their perceptions of the world have been shaped by traditions, beliefs and a physical environment fundamentally different from my own.

Perhaps some might say that I glimpsed the spirit world of the people of Nehas. I would be interested to know if the experience might be described as a spiritual initiation, or, in a western Judeo-Christian description, a kind of religious experience. From my rational-scientific perspective, it was merely a hypnogogic dream, but I give it significance because the sensation was profound and quite unlike any I have previously experienced, and it lingers with me. Still, it was brief, and in the morning the village seemed only as different as it did the morning of the day before, as seen through the eyes of a man born on the Canadian prairies and whose adult life has been spent among the comforts of west coast British Columbia.

And by contrast, in the mornings the school-children are smartly dressed in uniforms and may be heard to repeat in English “the father, the son, and the holy spirit”, while televisions, cell-phones are abundant, computers available, and western pop music is frequently heard among the teenagers. Popular American, European and Asian influences do not seem overwhelming here, but they are apparent, and it seems to me the youth are growing into a globalized world that is alien to their grandparents. Here is a village at the cross-roads between shifting its physical location upriver, the loss of the elders’ connection to their ancestral homes, and a new village in a new location, and a new order that may arise in the face of the realities of globalization. Village leaders have devised plans to move villagers in stages, beginning as early as 2012 if resources allow, upriver to an area of higher ground. Some villagers have started their preparations. What will be lost if that happens and what will begin anew? What voices of the river will be swept under its rapid current and disappear among the floods?

- Liah Linyai Lediu (we have all be given adopted names, this is mine)

Brief research update

The village of Nehas Liah Bing in East Kalimantan (Borneo), I am learning, is under imminent threat of being lost almost entirely in its current physical configuration.

Siti Lung, resident of a home located a few metres from the bank of the Wehea River, told me (translation by English teacher, Adih) that prior to the palm oil plantations, the river’s edge was “far away.” A road on the other (west) side of the river crossed over to the Nehas side for which no bridge was required because people would simply walk across it (in the low season, apparently). The river was once so low that children would swing across it on banana tree branches.

The 2011 rainy season has passed, and the current width of the Wehea River appears to be about 100 - 150 metres. It is deep enough for kids to jump from bridges and not worry about hurting themselves by hitting the bottom. The story emerging from my interviews with people here and discussions with instructors and colleagues, is that prior to 1997, floods from the Wehea River occurred as intermittently as once every two to three years, or as frequently as once a year, depending on who you ask, and probably dependent somewhat on how people define the severity of the floods. However, in 1998, a year after vast tracts of land were cleared for palm oil plantations, the number of floods increased tenfold to ten to 12 a year. Siti Lung said that since palm oil plantations, all the houses on the other side of the river vanished as the banks were undercut and overwhelmed with the increasing size of the river, as did many houses on the Nehas (east side). Another nearby resident woman, Yak, put the loss of houses on the Nehas side to be about 30 houses.

A ten-fold increase in the number of floods so soon after palm oil plantations is a correlation that cannot be denied. The reason is apparent: land clear-cut for palm oil plantations could not absorb rainfall and river water volumes rose immediately, carrying topsoil with it. While deforestation preceded this in the 1970s without similar adverse flooding effects, it is apparent that during deforestation, logging companies cut trees selectively and left undergrowth in place. The remaining trees and undergrowth were apparently sufficient to absorb the rains and prevent the massive increase in river water volumes that occurred as a result of palm oil plantations. When palm oil companies cleared all the vegetation away in order to plant palm trees, rain water flowed freely into the river carrying topsoil, turning the river brown. The soil, although it appears to float in the water as it is stirred by turbulence, inevitably falls to the river bottom and causes the bed to rise. While the river volumes may not be continuing to increase beyond the immediate increases seen in the years following 1997, I can see plainly, along with anyone here, that the river is brown, when we are told it once was clear. It is no stretch to conclude that the riverbed continues to rise. This means that floods will continue to occur more frequently to the point at which the river simply overwhelms the current banks and permanently flows over the area over which most of Nehas Liah Bing currently exists.

....
More later on the history of other disturbances to Nehas, and some personal notes/observations.

Cicadas, kasava, cock-fights, pig-sacrifice, and rice wrapped in banana leaves

I built my house of barley rice, green pepper walls, and water ice – Cat Stevens

Yesterday my house was built of cicadas, kasava, cock-fights and rice wrapped in banana leaves. Today, it was built of pig sacrifices, river navigations, and healing ceremonies. Constructed upon these things, my last two days have been vastly different from my ordinary frames of reference. Immersed here in the throngs of bird, insect and animal sounds; the songs and recitatives of children and Muslim melodies by loudspeaker; the rich traditions and the hot sun and the roaring thundershowers, I am acutely aware of the profound difference between my own experiences and those of the people here. There is little that is familiar to me here, save for the river, so much reminiscent of the one by which my parents raised my siblings and I for three years.

But all things exist or happen on a different scale in Nehas Liah Bing. The size of the cicada surprised me, a fly about the size of a hummingbird, if not larger, like the bees here too; the centipedes are like small snakes; the heat and intensity of the sun are multiples of what we know in Victoria, the thundershowers are harder, but duration of the rains are shorter, and the milky way is rich and thick, and half the night sky contains configurations of stars alien to me; the village is small and traversable in minutes, but the geography is flat, and the river winds almost back upon itself and nearly encircles it, like an island.

But there are bridges to the other side, and today I walked over the swing bridge, frequented by people on motorcycles, but no cars and few pedestrians, and when I stood at the best vantage point, I could see the long cargo boats that betrayed the area’s connection to the outside world. The contrast was poignant, since although everywhere in the village people are ready to exchange a smile, it is apparent to me that the experiences of these rice and fruit farmers, largely illiterate, remote, relaxed and welcoming and largely driven by ancient traditions, have over the course of their lives, developed fundamentally different world views from mine.

For example, the people’s connection here to the lives of other species is presently mysterious to me. While cock-fighting is illegal, it occurs here. Pig sacrifices are frequent, I learned today after seeing one; mangy looking cats and dogs roam the clay rocky streets untouched, albeit very cute and tame, but not friendly, and seemingly generally abandoned, while healthy cows look into your eyes like only people can, with a very real sense of acknowledgement and connection, and even - I am not afraid to say - like they know you.

While it might be safe to argue for the stereotypical notion that traditions of sacrifice reflect a reverence for life, and that sacrifices are done as part of a special honor and tradition, when I saw men laugh and play with pig blood as it spurted from the hole they had gored into its chest, I was not convinced that “reverence” was the appropriate term. And, prior to the sacrifice, the Roman Catholic nun who uttered a prayer before a village elder scattered a handful of flowers and bones (I gather) onto the moistened neck of the pig, was a religious cocktail of David Lynch proportions. Yet the tradition is obviously entrenched, and it is only because it is entrenched, it seems to me, that men can play with warm pig blood like boys fighting with water balloons. But the question I have is whether this is simply a tradition and something that is done, or whether it reflects any genuine deep reverence for the lives of the pigs or the lives of the people for whom the sacrifices are performed (they were performed as birthday celebrations today), or something else altogether.

Yesterday, while standing atop a mound of dirt with an excellent vantage point, I was beckoned to ringside while men demonstrated, it seemed, how their cock fighter was best, beckoning me to place money on their participant. I declined, and indicated I was there only to watch by making my thumbs and forefingers into rings, placing them around my eyes and pointing to the ring where the cocks would be released to fight. Across the ditch and road, my student colleagues and instructors drank Tuok (palm wine) and danced with the locals. Then I saw men tie three-inch shanks to the legs of their prized cocks, allow their respective fighters to peck at their opponents to warm them up for the fight, encircle the fighters and let them go, the circle shifting with the movements of the cocks, to leave a moving centre for them in which to fight. The fight was over when one bird was bloodied and incapacitated, though still alive. Then there were flared tempers, and bills changing hands among serious looking men, many likely not from Nehas, but from one or other of the surrounding trans-migrant villages, the “SPs”.

As a final note on this for now, for my part, I have more to learn about the nature of the villagers’ relationship with other animals, as there seem to be conflicting indications. And that may simply be the way it is: inconsistency among motivations for action is, I would bet, is not confined to the West.
………

On another note, I’ve decided to change my resilience study project. Previously I was to work with Andrew to research the effects of government policies on land tenure and harvesting yields among the Nehas Liah Bing farming community. My part specifically was to look at rice yields. However, two days ago, when working on a sketch map of the village (there are no such maps in existence), I realized I had the makings of a more productive project in which I could map the village and roughly sketch surrounding areas, and see if there are correlations in the physical changes to the geographical/physical layout of the village and deforestation, trans-migration and palm plantations. So I ran it by Sheryl Gruber, a course instructor, who approved a change in project direction.

Now, after a meeting with Chris Djoka of the Nature Conservancy, I’ve obtained some very helpful background information that does suggest major changes in village layout occurred as a result of the deforestation in particular. For example, government policies assisted logging companies in forcing villagers to live only in the village with rice plots near or in the village, meaning villagers could not live outside on their rice plots seasonally. Also, landslides, possibly triggered by deforestation changed the locations of river tributaries through the village, and buried the apparent village centre, which is causing disputes today. Others possible connections will, I’m sure, become more evident as I continue my research. To counter this, however, today I learned that landslides in the 1940s or 50s, predating deforestation, triggered a substantial change to the village configuration.

Also, I may not have mentioned earlier that my ethno-ecological study is now about documenting food-gathering songs from villagers. So, between the two projects, I have a ton of work ahead, as do we all. Many interviews and information organization to be done.

Of passing days, palm wine and beetlenut

Days are passing quickly here. The roosters begin their yodels at 3:00 am and continue with the shrieks of pigs and the clucks of hens through the call to prayer around 5:00 am, and people stir. And if I rise for a run around 5:30, which has occurred twice now, there will already be people up and active, sweeping their porches and preparing for the day. The sun rises and, after evening thunderstorms, days warm quickly, wet things dry, and the air is thick with moisture. At the TNC office (Nature Conservancy), where the students and instructors meet, Mamma David serves up a nutritious breakfast of white rice and beans and greens or eggs and fishy things, and the students of the ethno-ecological study gather around the kitchen that looks out to the Wehea river, and we say “salamat pagi”, good morning, and those with more refined knowledge of Bahasa Indonesian exchange a few more words. Coffee is eagerly consumed, a fine powder that is stirred into hot water with white sugar.

The biodiversity students left yesterday with Brent for the Wehea forest, leaving behind the ethno-ecological (anthropology) students to remain in the village.

The home where I am staying sees Letdje Tag, the elementary school principal and the Adat (customary law) leader of the region, smoking cigarettes before work at his desk near the kitchen table, and if I see him before he departs, he offers me a drink of Teh or Kopi. The house has no ceiling and the roof rafters rise to 18 feet or so, and the Ulin wood floor is dense darkwood, is not slippery in the rain, and dries quickly. In Wehean, a local dialect distinct from Bahasa Indonesian that is spoken generally throughout Indonesia, Ulin wood is “Welen” wood, I learned today.

There is nothing in the Tag living room, save for framed photos of the the Kepela Adat (Ledje Tag) shaking hands with important-looking white men and others who appear perhaps to be more local, evidence of his illustrious reputation as an esteemed Adat leader. There is little need for living room furniture here, where people are comfortable sitting on the floors, which are pristine. Shoes are not permitted on the floors. Some people do have chairs and couches, but apparently they are rarely used.

As I write, I see a heat rash developing on my hands, and the ants - many no bigger than a pencil dot and some like fire ants, the diameter of a dime – seem to like my feet, which are now peppered with red dots. Aside from that I am healthy, and the plantar facsiitis of my right foot seems to be faring well in the heat, and I am optimistic that I can continue to run, and that when I depart from Borneo, all that ails me will be cured. Granted, my own plumbing system was plugged for a few days, but I gladly report that things have been working regularly for two days now.
Later, near the ceremonial square and the football field, I joined a game of volleyball, while Paul and Mick joined in a football (soccer) game. Given the tenuous state of my foot, volleyball seemed a safer selection. Before that,as I attempted to study a little on the Ulin steps of the town ceremony building, replete with its intricately carved massive wooden pillars, a group of 10ish year old boys playing football came to sit with me and recounted their names with a famous footballer's name as their second name, and taught me how to say "this is my book" in Indonesian.

At the going down of the sun, after dinner, we joined at the Shaman's house; encircled his kitchen floor for palm wine and beetlenut. In the dim fluorescent light and the old woman near with earlobes opened by circlets and dropping to her clavicles, I found myself eager to try beetlenut, after having been told that it enhances endurance and opens the air passages. I have saved a little beetlenut to test on my run tomorrow morning :-) Indeed, days are passing quickly here.

___________________

On a historical note, today staff from the TNC recounted the history of Wehea forest, beginning in the 1965, when there were no logging regulations to limit massive deforestation that occurred through the 70s in Borneo; through to the granting of logging concessions in the 80s that empowered logging companies to log in Borneo without consideration for land tenure among indigenous communities; through to trans-migration 1993-1998 of people from Java to Borneo to alleviate overcrowding, many of whom came to the Wehea region and established new communities; to Suharto’s “cronyism” in granting no-interest loans to parties willing to invest in logging concessions; to the fall of Suharto, in 1998; to post-Suharto laws that allowed people the right to claim 100 Ha of land, but many of which rights were sold to logging companies; to 2003/4 when the government divided land in Wehea for industrial uses for which claims could be made, when many tribes made claims over the land; to the 2004 Adat meeting at which many diverse interests sought permits to use Wehea forest, the result of which was Adat and regional protection of Wehea forest, and logging concessions were revoked; to the present status in which national protection status is still being sought, disputes remain about border areas, and other administrative issues are stalling national protection status for the Wehea forest (my notes are not necessarily accurate).

Arrival in Nehes

The 17 hour drive into the Nehes Liah Bing over rough and windy roads, some parts dirt and some parts paved, was at first targeted to be longer than anticipated. But when our drivers and leaders learned another, faster route was open, the trip was actually truncated by a couple of hours. It was a harrowing ride, though, given the fearless drivers, residents of Nehes, and the multiple near head-on-collisions. Granted, the drivers are not only fearless, but they are highly skilled, and if vehicles share a lane in the opposite directions, generally someone slows down before the worst occurs.
Along the way we passed miles of deforested land containing spindly trees, scrub bushes and grass, although there remain patches of richer, more diverse vegetation. The soil here is apparently not conducive to rich regrowth, which I can vouch for in a sense, now that I’ve now had the pleasure to run on the clay surfaces here, a great running surface, but not the best for the vegetation, I must say.
We arrived at 10:30 pm. Some stayed up for the villager’s welcome, while others went straight to bed, myself included. I laid out my air mattress on the upstairs floor of the Nature Conservancy building at which we are staying for a night or two, before we are re-located to our home-stays for the duration of our visit. At 4:50 am, I could hear again the haunting Muslim call to prayer, which I had heard for the first time in Balikpapan, the first real indication to me that I was in a very different country; different from the similar climates of Mexico and Costa Rica where the people even are physically similar in appearance, it seems to me. The call-to-prayer is a beautiful piece of music, which I may like to learn at some point simply for the pleasure of repeating its haunting melody. That said, I’m told the population of Nehes is predominantly Roman Catholic.
This morning was breakfast downstairs with a view to the muddy waters of the Wehea River, once pristine, a stone’s throw away, where villagers bathe and do their laundry. The rivers were once clear, apparently, prior to deforestation in the 70s, and now are nearly perpetually murky as soil is easily carried off and sent unceremoniously to travel for miles of river waters. Where they end up, I am uncertain. I had some clothes to wash, so I joined them for a short time. It seemed necessary to wash my feet and my Doggers rubber shoes too, though I have yet to try the bucket shower and outhouse method – a pending inevitability.
It sounds like I may be able to organize a small group of runners to join myself and Sheryl, the two runners in our group. I would like to acquire a bicycle soon too. It sounds like I may be able to.
Now, for a group tour of the town…