Sunday, September 19, 2010

Goroka Show!

Every year about 100 tribal groups gather in Goroka for a display of many many different types of tribal dance and dress from all over PNG. It has become a huge tourist attraction but we that live here love to go too!








There was a band playing PVC pipes with flip flops. It was quite amazing to watch and it sounded really good too!
We met a couple at the Goroka show that have been traveling all over the world since 1984. They have visited about 160 different countries in their car.

On the sides of their car they painted the years of their travel and all the countries they visited. Crazy!










This is a shot of the field where the singsing dances take place. This was early in the day, there were many more tribes to come!

Friday, September 17, 2010

Cooking classes...

Jacob and I have been teaching cooking classes to the new Interns! It has been really fun! I usually do all the teaching of how to cook. And Jacob teaches them how to eat everything properly and enjoy it. :) Jacob is also the smoothie and juice chef too! The other day we taught them how to make doughnuts, yummy! And we had to have smoothies to go with them.
I was quite impressed with how they turned out!

Rainy season is here and the Muna beatles are flying...

When the rain starts coming the beatles wiggle their way out of the ground. There are hundreds of them flying around at dusk each night. All the national kids love to come to our campus with their bottles and catch as many of them as they can. Then they go home, cook them and eat them. It gives them a bit more protein in their diets. And of course every year I have to make sure that all the interns get a chance to try them too!
First they have to cut off the head and the legs.
Then we fry them up with a little oil and sprinkle a bit of salt on them. Till and Ethan are trying to decide if they look good enough to eat or not. :)
Jacob tried his first muna beatle! And he said it wasn't too bad. It tastes a bit like nuts. :)

New Staff have arrived!!

Drew and Bobbi came from the States with their three children, Gracie, Malachi and Annie. We are so excited to have them here! Drew will be in charge of all the logistics of Interface which involved many different areas of running this place.
Pete and Lesley with their four children, Josh, Jessica, Micah and Kelsey have arrived too!! We are also very excited to have them here! Pete and Lesley worked in Guinea, Africa for 13 years before joining us here. Pete will be working in the shop with Jacob and eventual become the Boss Man. Right now both couples are studying the language and culture full time to help them in their future ministries here. We are very glad they can have this training! But during this time Jacob and I are quite busy keeping up with everything: maintenance, school runs, airport runs, Interface bookkeeping, cooking for groups and snack shop. But we are happy to be exactly where God wants us! We look forward to the time when we can work side by side with the two new families! And we are very happy to have our short term workers here now from Germany and one intern from Liberty University! We have enjoyed getting to know them, giving them orientation and teaching them how to cook!!

The fireplace is finally used...

Our fireplace has been ready to light for the last 3 years! Thank you Sally. :) And when rainy season came, I got really cold one night because we were hanging out at the Interns place outside (65 degrees F) eating and chatting. So when we came home Jacob put shorts on and I light the fire. It was so cozy!!
Nice!

Kuela had a baby boy!

Isn't he cute?! They are still waiting to give him a name. I went to visit Kuela, good friend, in the hut where she had the baby! The baby is only 1 day old in this picture.


She let me hold him... and she took the picture. She hasn't had much practice with cameras before. :)

A couple weeks later, Kuela and the baby came to visit me. The baby is in the bilem, string bag hanging on the post, covered with a blanket. :)

He is sleeping very soundly in this comfy bed. :) Kuela just carries him around like this with the bilem swung onto the top of her head.

The fun of cutting up trees...

Jacob was very sad when the expert tree feller came with three guys. They cut the dead tree down and then cut it up too. Jacob really wanted to use the chainsaw! The same day though, after the experts left... another tree just fell down all on its own.... Jacob was excited... He could still have fun with the chainsaw!

Tobi conquers the tree!

Till conquers the tree with a machete, amazing! :)

Welding...

Jacob really enjoys welding in the shop. He is getting a bit of practice because the nationals bring him their tools to fix.

Supply buying for our conference...

I always enjoying going to the Veggie Market in town to buy all the veggies for the conferences. We usually buy a lot so the ladies are quite happy to see us coming their way. :)
Our vehicle, White Land Cruiser, is the second one in line. Tobi is sitting on top of it waiting for us to bring all totes of veggies back one by one. He helps us pack in the veggies and guard the vehicle at the same time. :)

The Land Cruiser is now very full, 8 totes of veggies on top, 6 coolers of meat and 2 boxes of bread inside. There was just enough space for our two security guards, Kino and Tobi. :) We are all ready for the Strengthening Your Interpersonal Skills Workshop... at least we have the food anyway. :)

Finishing the grass roofs....

After our Interface team left, Jacob and the guys had more time to finish buying 100s of bundles of kunai grass and replace the rest of the grass roofs.
Jacob and Samson hard at work!

Don't they look nice! The guys finished them just an hour before our first good hard rainy season rain! Thanks Tobi for coming over from Germany to help out for two months!!

More Goodbyes...

We had a final meal together with Julie before she headed home to Canada for Home Assignment. She arrives back in PNG at the beginning of January!!
(Daniel, Till, Tobi, Janie, Julie, Beth, Jacob, Ethan and Robert)

 Jacob and Robert played their final chess game just a couple days before we had to say goodbye to Robert and Daniel, two of our German Interns. They are playing on a chess board that Robert and Jan made and gave to Jacob! Very cool!

Robert, Jacob, Daniel and Ethan... waiting at the Bird of Paradise before Robert and Daniel boarded the plane on their way back to German. :(

We also had to say goodbye to Clayton and Cindy and family... due to a breast cancer diagnosis they had to leave for the states. Peter and Rachel and family also had to move out to our NTM Center because Peter has become the new Field Chairman. We appreciate all your prayers for Cindy and her recovery from removing the cancer. We also appreciate your prayers for us as we are very short staffed!!


About Me

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Enjoying life where God has me... currently in Papua New Guinea cooking and loving life with my husband, Jacob, my son, Jonathan and my daughter, Naomi.

Nova Scotia

Nova Scotia
Amazing view from our back porch!