from Martha

This morning I visited the high school on our center here in Papua New Guinea to find out what we need to know about Sarah attending next year. It was great! Everyone was so helpful and welcoming. When I was introduced to the 10th grade class and they were told another girl was coming to be with them, the girls spontaneously said, “Oh, niiiiiiice!!!!”. Sarah is going to enjoy this amazing place and the great school.

After lunch I logged on to my email to find out that my flight on the mission plane from here to the capital city on Wednesday had been cancelled. There were not enough passengers. They suggested I catch a flight to the coastal town of Madang and overnight there before catching a commercial flight to the capital city.

So, now I am scheduled to leave in the morning on the flight to Madang. It’s actually kind of fun because I will be staying overnight in the place where Tim and I served from 1991-1995 at the Pacific Orientation Course. It’s been about 15 years since we last visited and it will be fun to be back again and see some of our old friends.

On Wednesday, I will fly to Port Moresby, the capital city and overnight in a guesthouse. On Thursday I fly to Brisbane, Australia where I will board a direct flight to Dallas.

Papua New Guinea, Land of the Unexpected, is living up to its reputation!

‘m sitting in the MAF (Mission Aviation Fellowship) hangar in the capital city. My boss and I left the hotel where we were staying about 4 am. Tim is still there for another day of meetings before he travels to Melbourne for meetings on Thursday.

When we arrived in Port Moresby after an hour and half flight from Cairns. A vehicle and driver from the office here picked us up. We were expecting to be taken to the hangar right away for the flight to the highlands where Ukarumpa, the home of SIL in Papua New Guinea is located. But we were told our flight was delayed until this afternoon so we traveled to the SIL office here in Port Moresby.

When we arrived at the office, Jim and MIchelle, the office manager and his wife were preparing to go to the US Embassy to attend an election function. Apparently it was an opportunity to meet with other Americans and watch the results come in. Before they left I had an opportunity to chat with Michelle who handles public relations. It was great to meet her and to learn more about what was happening in the country and offer the help of our Pacific Area office.

I also had the opportunity to meet the office staff. These employees provide services such as finances and PNG visa and work permit applications. I was able to get information on how we will obtain a student visa for Sarah so that she can live and attend school at Ukarumpa next year when we return to the South Pacific.

BTA Director David Gela with his wife Senina

We were planning on meeting with the head of the PNG Bible Translation Association next week, but now that we had time this morning, we took the opportunity to meet with David Gela, director of BTA and Steven Thomas who is responsible for church relations.
Tim and I know David and Steven from the years we lived in PNG and it was delightful to have this opportunity to chat together over mugs of PNG coffee.

Martha and her supervisor Mark with Simon and David from BTA

The topic of our discussion was upcoming meetings in February of 2013 in the Solomon Islands. The Pacific Council of Churches meeting that is held every four years will be hosted in Honiara. This will be an outstanding time for our Bible translation partners in the Pacific to talk to church leaders about the translation work that is being done around the Pacific and the 462 languages in the Pacific that are still without translations.

Solomon Islands Bible Translation and Literacy Programme have requested the opportunity to host these leaders for an evening meal and program designed to educate these church leaders about the remaining needs in the Pacific. We discussed ideas for the venue, program and things that could be given to the church leaders to better equip them to share about the need for Bible translation as they return to their homes scattered across the Pacific.

As we drove around town it was fun to see signs of the recent visit of Prince Charles and Camilla. Apparently Prince Charles included some Tok Pisin in his speech – much to the delight of Papua New Guineans. He announced in Pijin that he is, ‘namba wan pikinini blong Mrs. Kwin’ (number one child of Mrs. Queen). Wish I could have been here to hear the crowd’s response to that!

Now we are at the hangar waiting for the last passenger to arrive so we can board the JAARS flight on a Kodiak which will take us to Ukarumpa. Oh, and our pilot today took me back a few years too.  When we first adopted Emily he was working in the Philippines and we stayed with him and his wife the first 3 nights after picking up Emily. Now he lives and works here in Papua New Guinea. That was a fun re-connect.

Ukarumpa Center from the air.

Saturday Tim and I spent the day exploring Cairns.  It’s a touristy town on the northeast coast of Australia. We walked down to a bus stop and caught a bus into town. We walked along the esplanade.  It was a beautiful sunny day and it was enjoyable to walk the streets and explore a market.  We went to a shopping center so we could buy a few groceries for the weekend.

It’s interesting being in Australia, because you see quite a few Pacific Islanders in stores and on the streets.  I get excited when I see one and start mentally trying to guess where they are from.  We saw a number of families from Papua New Guinea as we walked around and were tempted to interact with them in Pijin as we heard them speaking Tok Pisin of PNG.

On Sunday, we took a special excursion on the Kuranda Scenic Railway.  The rail line runs up the mountain through a rainforest into Kuranda.    We were advised to take the old fashioned slow-moving train up the mountain in the morning when we were fresh, and enjoy the scenic cable car ride back down. Great advice.  It was lovely. We had a wonderful day which I will let you experience through the photos.

no images were found

Sunday night we had a meal with our colleagues who have come in for the same meetings and this morning, we begin the meetings.

Greetings from (more than) half way across the Pacific Ocean. Considering the day that lead up to me being on this airplane, I was thrilled to wake up and find myelf so far along my journey.

After staying up late to finish most of my packing I fell into bed after 1 am. It didn’t take me long to fall asleep, but our dog started barking hysterically at 2:30 am because our cat was outside. It irks me to get up to let the cat in, but in the interest of sleep, I decided to get up and let her in. Back to bed I went until 6:30 when I got up to help Sarah get out the door to school.

With a burst of energy, I pulled the sheets of my bed and through them in the washer, made coffee and sat down at my computer to check email. Suddenly I heard water running. A dash to the kitchen and I could see a rush of water coming out from under the washing machine which soon covered the floor. After turning off the washing machine, I grabbed the mop and started getting the water off the floor. I started the washing machine back to spin cycle and watched as it filled the reservoir into which the washing machine hose flows. By starting and stopping the machine when the hose was on the verge of overflowing, the sheets were spun dry and I threw them in the dryer.

About that time, Tim came up on Skype so I was able to troubleshoot the issue with him. This was not the first time we have had this problem, but it has been a while. Filling up the kitchen sinks with water and then releasing it did not seem to cause any problems. So apparently it was an isolated problem. I found the plumbers snake in the garage and began to try and snake out the hole where the hose drains into the wall. After many attempts, I didn’t seem to be getting anywhere.

Bible study wsa supposed to be held at my house, but I called a freind and the study was scheduled to meet at another home. On the verge of tears, I sat down to try and think through the problem. I briefly considered renting a bigger snake at Home Depot and trying to tackle the problem like that, but decided I didn’t really know what I was doing so it was a better idea to call a friend who is training to become a plumber. Alfredo suggested I call a friend of his who has a camera to determine where the problem is and equipment for snaking out the drain. He charges $100 and would be a good choice. So I called that guy. He was willing, but couldn’t do it until Thursday. I decided that having the plumber come on Thursday was our best bet.

I was running around the house working on packing while trying to determine what to do next. Emily called and I was chatting on the phone with her when I noticed the cat was sitting in the middle of the hall with a dark circle of something. It was a snake coiled up and the cat was kind of playing with it. Yikes. I wanted to run away, but figured I had better do something about the snake before it slithered away in some dark corner. I grabbed a plastic container from the kitchen and plunked it down over the snake. Captured! But of course it was only covered by the container. I found some cardboard and slide it under the container and snake and quickly turned it over and popped the lid on.

My Bible study friend dropped by to pick up the dvds for the study and drop off a bucket she had picked up for me from Walmart. While she was there I asked her if her husband, who is the doctor at our center, could look at the snake. I hated to kill it if is was just a harmless one, but also didn’t want to release if it was dangerous. She took it away and I was thankful it was gone.

About that time, the husband of my friend hosting Bible study was home when the Bible study came. When he heard that I was having plumbing problems, he stopped by our house to see if I needed any help. Freddy is our executive director and travels a lot. He understands how hard it can be for a wife when the husband is traveling – things just seem go wrong! I explained what I had done and he thought I was on the right track. He asked about the toilets, and I said they were fine. But after he left, I thought I had better go check them.

Sure enough the water was low and ‘gunk’ had backed up into the shower and bathtub. The plumbing issues are more serious. Dawn was breaking on the other side of the world and Tim was available on Skype. When he heard about the latest developments, he agreed it was probably the main drain that needed snaking out. We had problems when we first moved in about 3 years ago and it turned out to be tree roots growing into the pipes. Sarah and her ‘babysitter’ would need to sleep somewhere else for the night.

It was time to get serious about finishing the packing. Some glucose tests had been delivered to the house by FedEx last week for the clinic in Papua New Guinea. I got them out of the refrigerator and repacked them in their styrofoam packing case. The suitcase if full of things for other people in Australia and Papua New Guinea. My suitcase should only get lighter as I go.

Oh, and my friend who took the snake to her husband called. He’s pretty sure it is a diamondback rattlesnake. Oh, my goodness. Of course this snake appeared to be young which leads a person to wonder if there is a nest nearby. I am assuming that the cat had carried the snake into the house through the cat door. It looks like the dog and cat will need to spend most of their time inside for the next couple of weeks until we can check around the yard and make sure that we don’t have a nest of snakes somewhere!

As is often the case, it is a relief when you finally take your seat on an airplane. What is done is done and I am on my way. I’m thrilled to have slept the first 7 hours of a 16 hour flight. Overseas travel can be a real adventure and sometimes just getting out the door can be one, too.

I’m thankful for friends who had stepped in to make sure the plumbing gets fixed and the many who have agreed to step in if Sarah needs any help. I am due to arrive in Brisbane around 5 am and catch a flight to Cairns – a city further north on the east coast of Australia. Tim leaves the Solomon Islands on Friday and will meet me in Cairns on Friday night. We are looking forward to spending the weekend together before meetings start on Monday morning. On Wednesday, I leave for Papua New Guinea for meetings there.

PS At last report, the plumbing at the house has not gotten sorted out.

We need to clarify something about recent blog posts.  Tim is actually the one who has been in the Solomon Islands and has written the past few posts.  Because the RSS feed is registered in my email, those of you who get the blogs by email are seeing my email address.

We are both in Australia now.  You can read more about my trip in the next blog post.

Martha