By Emily Hinebauch

Day in the life of Emily wearing her  buyer-shipper (person who takes orders from teams living in the village, runs around town to buy items, and ships them off via plane, helicopter, boat, or car)hat.

(7:30 a.m.) I had it all planned out. I was going to go into the office early put all the items to send out to Samban on the table ready to load, boss the radio sked, run to the Chemist for the last minute medicine order, send an office colleague to the market for the big market order and make the last dash to the store for eggs and bread.  No biggie.

All items on the table ready to load-check- (8:00 a.m.).

Boss radio sked,-check- but while bossing radio sked I learn that my loading for the flight going to Samban is contingent upon the expiry dates on the fuel, the person in the bush is going to check the dates and send an email with them before the flight is due to depart from Madang-check-(8:30 a.m.).

Send a colleague to the market, check, she is sent off (8:30 a.m.).

Run to Chemist-check- quick and painless, actually easier than normal (8:45 a.m.).

Return, discover I need to ready some food for a patient who is in town for a treatment because my colleague hasn’t returned from the market to do this-done- (9 a.m.).

The office colleague returns with the news that the major market is closed down.  Still need to find K40 of potatoes.  Brainstorm, okay let go check out two other markets outside of town, still have a bit of time before the flight (9:15 a.m.).

Get in the car and drive out to other markets, no luck.  Drive back to town and discover a lady on the side of the major market selling potatoes.  Okay, acquired K40 of potatoes (10:00 a.m.).

Now to find some onions, run to the closest store (a block away) to check, none.  Remember I need bread and eggs, run to other store for bread and eggs and check for onions there (10:30 a.m.).

On my way to the store I get a phone call from logistics saying, ‘you need to come back now, plane is ready to load we need to get to the hangar.’ Okay, arrange to have the other truck start loading the cargo I had previously set out for loading and grab the eggs and bread from the store.  Hurry back to the office; check my email to see if we received any news on the expiry dates, no news.  Load 384kg of cargo in the truck, thankful for teammate’s major help in this as I finish packing up the eggs and bread and grab the cargo list, knowing I will have to take some kilos off because we didn’t have confirmed expiry dates.  Off to the hangar we go (11:00 a.m.).

Arrive at the hanger; pilot says 375 kilos can go.  Great, only have to take off 8 kilos, easy.  Phew.  Get everything situated on the cart to load into the plane, than the pilot comes back saying that we have to take off 53 more kilos because we were not able to get the expiry dates.  Alright, rearrange some things pull of more boxes, 323 kilos ready to go to Samban (12:00 p.m.).

All in all, it went relatively closed to the plan.  Didn’t for see the market closure or the need for expiry dates on the fuel drums in Samban.

Emily serves as the Scripture Use Specialist along with many other areas of ministry.