CHAPTER 12—CULTURE SHOCK

I hear we are flying back to the States because our four year term in New Guinea is ending. But we have been in the Ilaga Valley among the Western Dani tribe for just four months! “Why do we have to leave so soon?” I question Dad.

“First term mission workers return after four years, Marlene. Next term we’ll stay five. The Alliance leadership believe we need a year to rest, reorient, and also to share with churches the ministry. I’ll go to school also…and we’ll get to visit with relatives!”

“Well, that’ll be special,” I agreed.

Mom hurries Ro and me through our Calvert Course lessons in second and fourth grade. My biggest assignment is to write an essay. I muse on life…what could I write about? My Dani friends? The war on the airstrip? I choose the latter, work diligently to tell the story. Mom is pleased. “You did a good job,” she smiles.

Mom mails off our work, packs, and Dad finishes one upstairs room on the large tin-roofed frame house across the field that will become our new home. Our belongings are stored in it, we say goodbye to Dani friends, and fly to the coast early one morning.

We cross the Pacific at night, then on to the eastern U.S. I am amazed at how enormous and well-ordered America is. Wide roads, big stores, large houses. A different world from the Ilaga Valley!

After visiting each set of relatives, we settle in Livonia, Michigan across the street from Aunt Christine, Uncle Maxey and cousin Kenny. They have helped furnish a comfortable three bedroom duplex for us which is six blocks from Rosedale School. We are excited to settle in. Dad will attend the University of Michigan to work on his Masters in Linguistics and Anthropology.

Ro and I practice riding our new bicycles up and down the tree lined streets, and we watch the Mickey Mouse Club with Kenny. Visiting the library often, I absorb pioneer stories, adventure books, biographies. I’m told the library limit is ten books at a time…my world expands.

As school begins I am quiet, tentative in fifth grade. It’s my first experience of a normal classroom. Mr. Wright is slim and quiet, encourages my efforts. As I feel safe I become more outgoing, trying to excel.

On Sundays we drive an hour away to attend Central Church in downtown Detroit. On Sunday evenings we often visit a Baptist church near us. I listen attentively—some sermons are interesting, some boring. Once I ask Dad, “Why does the Baptist pastor give altar calls for salvation after most of his sermons? The people who attend Sunday night are Christians that he knows.

“That’s a good question,” Dad answers. “Maybe you should ask him.” I never follow through, but am hungry to learn more of God.

On May 1, 1958, our family celebrates a new member! David is born in Ann Arbor, and we all want to hold him. Tiny, with pinpricks of blond hair, he is so huggable. Danny is now two. Ro and I can help Mom by each caring for one brother.

One day Mom and Dad receive a telegram from Ken Troutman, the New Guinea field chairman. Our new partly finished house in the Ilaga is burned down. So our stored outfit in the one finished room is possibly burned up also! Ro and I enter the house to find Mom and Dad dazed, wondering.

“Did a Dani do it?” I ask.

“Maybe,” Dad replies. “Or spontaneous combustion. We’ll have to raise money and order another outfit. I pray my field notes and the Dani dictionary in the metal drum are saved.” Dad leans forward and puts his face in his hands. “So much work is lost, if they’re burned.”

“And the chime clock and our books might be gone,” I add.

That evening we all pray for the Danis and the salvaging of any of our stored outfit. And for the Lord to provide all the belongings we need for the next five years.

And God provides! During the summer Mom and Dad pack and ship drums of clothes, bedding, books, kitchen supplies. They also prepare Ro and me for change. “There’s a new grade school opening on the north coast in Sentani for all the mission kids,” Mom informs us. “You girls will join others to be in the very first class, and live in a dorm. There’ll be fun activities, and you’ll get to go to the beach sometimes.”

I consider. “How often will be get to come home?”

“Every summer for three months, and a month at Christmas. And Dad and I will fly out to see you in the middle of the school term.”

“It sounds like fun, being with other kids in the dorm, Ro. And we’ll be together…”\

“Yeah, we’ll still be roommates, only with others.”

“Sentani is tropical, like Biak," I add. "Hot, with palm trees, cicadas singing loud in the afternoons.”

Ro nodded. She remembered. Our lives would once again dramatically change.