It's Really Official Now

Sean shared on his blog that he finally got his Indonesian float plane license.  He's flown a few operational flights solo already!

I got a call yesterday informing me that the guys at MAF were ready to "baptize" Sean according to tradition - a good shove into the river.  They had waited a little longer to attempt this feat because they knew Sean would expect it...and quite honestly, Sean is about double in size of most of the guys so they were a little afraid that Sean would take them into the river with him. (And he would have if they hadn't caught him by surprise.)

 Jason, our teammate, though, was less fearful (he's also bigger than the Indonesian staff) and he devised a plan that would get Sean into the water with minimum collateral damage.

So, we were invited to the fun...but we had to stay hidden in the office so Sean wouldn't realize something was up.  Sorry the pictures aren't great. I am not the photographer.  And some of the pictures were taken from hiding while holding Paige in one arm so she wouldn't run down to meet Daddy!

Sean docks the airplane...all seems normal.

 Jason found his opportunity when Sean bent over to check the float (part of a normal post-flight check).  The guys had all sorts of sneaky plans but Sean made it too easy and they didn't even have to try.  (Sorry, super-blurry picture...but it happened so fast!)

Hee, hee!  

Here, Agus lends a helping hand.

The girls were thinking this was pretty awesome ;-)  Brooklyn was especially looking forward to this and spent the whole afternoon asking me if it was time to go shove Daddy into the river yet.

Our Indonesian staff congratulate Sean.

Good thing he had a drive home on the motorbike to dry off a little.  Can you believe he didn't lose his hat or his sunglasses in the river?  Jason was careful to make sure he knew where Sean's cell phone was before he shoved him in too...thankfully, Sean made that easy because he's pretty paranoid about falling into the river anyway and never carries important things on his person when flying ;-)

Congratulations, Sean!  I'm so proud of you!