Lets Catch Up

Since there is not enough hours in the day (even here in PNG) for us to keep up the blog with all the happenings in our family, we are going to give a summary of highlights from the last few months. We are about to go unplugged for 6 weeks at POC (Pacific Orientation Course) until March 7th, so we thought we should get this out there before that.

Babysitting

Meliah was asked in November to help put together a “nursery” type thing for the video service that happens each Sunday before the main church service (like a Sunday school). So she has been recruiting other teenagers to help her each week and made a schedule.  The ages of kids has been 1 ½ to 3yrs.  She has done a great job! And the best part is that mom hasn’t had to be a part of it!  As of the last week or so she has gotten a babysitting job, 3x a week for a toddler and an infant while the mom coaches soccer.  The kids love Miss Meliah! 

CTS Bung (Party)

Every year each department here in Ukarumpa has some sort of Christmas Bung (a pidgin word pronounced boong and means party). Well since Chad is the manager of the CTS department (Communications and Technical Services) , this was his responsibility to plan and organize it.  He has made quite a few friends within his department, he is manager over 11 nationals, and 9 expatriates. So the nationals wanted to do a mumu (pronounced moo moo). A mumu is like a big bbq with pig and or chicken cooked in the ground with lots of vegetables and cooked bananas. They all were happy to do the mumu at our house!  So the planning started and Ruth wasn’t so sure about all these men planning something this big.  Well long story short, Chad went and got a live pig from a farm about 3 hrs away.  And he was very excited about all the happenings of this.  The pig was whacked in the head with the back of an axe and then cut up and put in the ground to cook and then later some chicken was killed and then cooked in another mumu pit next to the pig.  Chad was enjoying each step of this whole process which was about 36 hrs long! Lots of pictures were taken.  It was an honor that the nationals wanted and did the mumu for the whole department.  It was a great opportunity for all the folks in the department to bond, and celebrate the birth of our Lord Jesus Christ together.

POC

Before Christmas we were approached about going to POC (Pacific Orientation Course) for 6 weeks starting in January.  After much prayer and talking and throwing temper tantrums (on Ruth’s part) we decided we needed to take the course.  We feel God is leading us to be here until Meliah graduates in June of 2014 (not sure about after that, we will see where He wants us).  The POC course is very valuable and beneficial to both of us and for the people we interact with.  So Chad informed his work that he needed to take a 6 week leave of absence from his managerial role.  Which the department he works with is already very short staffed due to furloughs by several and a lack of people to do computer and technical work.  Anyway, he got someone to cover the manager role.  And so we leave on Monday Jan. 23rd.

ECP Hostel

About the same time the POC talk started we were approached at renting an old children’s hostel since it was closing down and not expected to re-open. This is mainly due to a lack of need. This place has shrunk to half what it once was. There is still tons of work to do, but people just aren’t here. Over the years they have gone from 5 hostels full of kids who’s parents are translators and often in the village, to just 2 hostels.

So, since we can’t seem to do anything one at a time, we prayed and prayed for about a month and eventually felt at peace about it. We moved in right after Christmas, before New Years.  We love our new home and the space it offers.  When we return from POC we look forward to hosting more things and being more open to let this be a “teen hang out”.

Christmas in PNG

Christmas here was so different but so nice at the same time.  The weather and the lack of media hype made it harder to get into the Christmas spirit.  But it was so nice not to be exhausted from all the things that HAD to get done by Christmas. Anna played her trumpet in the beginning band concert and did a duet with a friend.  Anna and Kiery both sang at church with their Sunday school classes on December 10th.  Meliah had her first “finals” here at Ukarumpa during the first part of December.  I think we were all relived when those were over.   She did well, especially for a much tougher school academically and the adjustment factor.  The girls were done with school for the term on Dec.13th.   We were able to enjoy Christmas Eve with some friends and go to the Christmas Eve service.  Then Christmas day we enjoyed a nice family day.  Playing in the sun and having a water gun/balloon fight… weird.

Birthday Girls

With Kiery’s birthday Dec. 20th and Anna’s Jan. 6th we have always struggled at where to fit in their birthdays and yet make them feel special.  This year was no different.  But we decided to do a combination birthday party, on a weekend of December, of water slide fun!!!  Yes, a water slide in December… remember where we live.  All had a blast including dad and big sister Meliah. We even had a neighbor (actually the hostel dad where Meliah will be for 6 weeks while we are at POC) come over with some of the teen boys. He has a huge water balloon catapult type thing and launched water balloons from 200 ft away at the girls and Chad. It was awesome! Rest assured, the girls got their revenge!

 Cairns Australia

On Jan. 6th we flew to Cairns Australia for a week “holiday” (what they call vacation here).  It was a great family time and wonderful to be in a 1st world/western culture again. But we were so ready to come back after the week (the checking account said it before we left).  It was wonderful to see how the girls were shocked at the clothing attire (or should we say lack of attire) and how they are really embracing the modesty issues.  It’s great to be able to have open dialogue of “worldly” issues, etc.  We took shopping till you drop to another new level.  We hit 2 different malls both very good sized, and lots of other stores. We had a list and we CONQURED it!!!  We did do 1 tourist thing which was a day on the Kuranda Trail, which started as a train ride up which was very beautiful, and then we went to a butterfly sanctuary, and saw many different types of butterflies (Kiery enjoyed reading all the plaques to us and trying to answer the questions). And then we went to a bird exhibit. The birds were just flying around in this area and as we walked in a bird found Chad’s shoulder and enjoyed gnawing on his sunglasses that was around his neck.  It took the girls bribing the bird with food to get the bird off his shoulder and then the bird grabbed the snack and got right back on his shoulder.  Then another bird came upon his shoulder and the first bird wasn’t happy about that.  Before we walked out of there the birds finally decided to leave.  Then we were off to the “Cuddle a Koala” area.  All 3 girls were very excited about this stop.  Anna and Meliah got to hold a Koala and Kiery enjoyed petting him.  Then we went over and fed kangaroos that were so well fed they let the food hit them in the nose and didn’t respond at all.  One did finally get up and hop around some. We also saw some wallabies.  Then we made our way back to the terminal and took a sky rail down the mountain.  If you know Ruth at all, you know she doesn’t do heights!!!  So this was a challenge for her, Kiery wasn’t all that excited either.  But we made it down (Ruth’s eyes were closed ¾ of the way down).  The sky rail is like a Gondola (in Spokane or at Silver Mountain).  It was a very enjoyable day by everyone!  The girls will never forget mom holding onto dad’s shirt and closing her eyes so tightly. 

While in Cairns we stayed at a place that housed missionaries for Wycliffe, Mission Avaition Fellowship and other mission associations.  Missionaries are able to use this facility at a cheaper cost for holiday, for medical reasons (this is where people get med-evac’d for medical emergencies) and to have a baby (you are not allowed to give birth while in PNG- due to lack of appropriate health facilities).  So we were able to visit with a couple different families from Ukarumpa (2 have had babies and 1 on a medical reason) They were all able to give us advice and directions to get around town. 

Village Lotu (pronounced like low-too, means church)

We got back to Ukarumpa on a Friday and went to a village church service on that Sunday.  WOW!!!  What an experience….there was another “white skin” family with us and they honored us with songs, dance, a parade, a bilum (pronounced beelum) for each of us (like a bag/purse hand made with stitches) and a mumu. We will probably not see many of these people again until heaven.  To sing with them and worship with them while here on earth and then in heaven being able to clearly understand what they are saying what an awesome experience to know we are all in God’s family.  

Upcoming Adventures

Now as we are preparing to go to POC we are wondering how God will stretch us even further out of our comfort zones.  Ruth feels like Elastic Girl from Incredibles with being so stretched.  Meliah will be staying in Ukarumpa while we are down in Madang @ POC.  With Meliah being in high school she needs to stay here to get her credits.  So she will be in a Children’s home/boarding/hostel while we are gone.  She is looking forward to being away from this crazy family and making her own memories.  She is also nervous which is to be expected. We are leaving her in great hands and we know they will love her like we do.  This is their calling to do this work with teenagers and be there hostel parents while mom and dad are away (in a village, at POC, or anywhere else).  Anna and Kiery will be going to POC with us and have their own schooling while Chad and I are in classes.  They are excited to do field trips, hikes and learn the language.  Anna will be the oldest child there so that means she gets to help the teacher with the younger kids.  Yes, she can’t wait!!!  Kiery wants to “help” with the babies and toddlers too. 

Lukim Yu Bihain (pronounced loo-keem you bee-hine)

Thank you for your continued prayers and support as we are on this amazing God adventure!!! Consider in your own heart what God has asked you to do in His word, and also seek His direction in your individual life. As radical as it might seem at first, you will never regret obeying Him. This world is not all there is. 1 Cor. 13:14 says that we only see a poor reflection of God’s creation (paraphrase). In this life, He calls us to important work with eternal consequences. But we need to keep that eternal perspective and know that the most important thing we can do with the gift of life we’ve been given, is to bring pleasure to our Father in Heaven (1 Thes 4:1 for example) and live for His glory.

We shocked a lot of people, including ourselves, when we responded to what we believed God was calling us to do. But now that we are living in obedience to His will, we can hardly believe the blessings he pours out, not in the material world where moth and rust destroy, but in the increase in our eternal relationship our brothers and sisters in Christ, and with the one true God.

We will be back online after March 7th.  We will post pictures of our new home and of our adventures in POC then.