By Faith and By Love. Beverly E. Williams
the school compound. A large number of villagers helped to pick up the stones before the beginning of rainy season.
Life for farmers, and indeed all residents of the district, revolved around the rainy season. Mabel told her family, “Just learned that Bhamo is no longer cut off from the rest of the world. This year the rains came early, washed out a section of railroad track, and delayed all mail delivery.”
Mabel and Martin had an old car, but it soon cost too much in repairs and petrol (gasoline) for upkeep. When he needed to visit village schools, Martin would ride the commercial truck, used for haling river stones for the church, as far as the end of the paved road at the edge of town. There he would get on a horse and travel to areas on both sides of the Burma-China border. Usually he was gone for a week. Mabel would spend her days caring for their young son, sending the reports that needed to go to Rangoon, and writing long letters to her family.
The “stone truck” makes about five trips a day, hauling river stones for the church you have heard so much about in our letters. The clunk of unloading, and the racing of the noisy old motor delights the baby.
Sometimes, when the temperature in Bhamo was over 100 degrees and the air sticky with humidity, the family would go up to the hills for a few days of vacation. For Mabel, these times away with her husband and son and few interruptions were a treat:
We walked three miles down, down, down to a beautiful waterfall. Amazed to find such a lovely place that near our cabin. A brilliant rainbow in the high spray. We picked some huge yellow raspberries on the way back to the picnic spot, then went wading. Kerplop! I took a half-way swim when I stepped on a slippery rock. It felt so good I was tempted to find another rock.
Love to all, and take care of your sweet selves.
Bhamo, June 27, 1936
Dear Ones,
How does it feel to be twenty-eight? Not a speck older, really. Monday the 22nd was happily and quietly spent.
June, 30, 1936
Yesterday, Martin’s birthday, we followed a good Burma custom when seventy-five of our friends, representing seven races and nationalities, met with us in a service of thanksgiving for our healthy nine-month-old son. Did we tell you he sat up by himself?
Five mornings a week at the school we have sewing, knitting, embroidery and crocheting lessons from daylight to 7:00 a.m. Saturday mornings the students clean dormitories, offices, and the library. Usually the school nurse oversees the clean-up, but she went with Martin to a village on an emergency medical call. So tomorrow I am on duty at 5:15 a.m.
In late August, Martin wrote the weekly news:
Just returned from China. I did twelve miles on pony, nine miles on foot, and seventeen on a bus yesterday to get home. Girl [Mabel] came on the bus to the end of the line to meet me.
From Mabel:
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