Update on nambawan Wan De Joj

When Karl got out to the site yesterday he found that the guy who is developing this area (yeah, a land developer out in the bush!) has been busy this week. Road ways have been cleared with an excavator, and lots have been flagged with numbers.

Down side… it is now also abundantly evident that the building lines are not far enough away from the property lines. The whole thing needs to be moved back and over.

The church people are philosophical about the whole thing and say they will be out there first thing Sunday morning digging holes for uprights. They will be ready for Karl to inspect and supervise pouring concrete around the posts by Sunday afternoon.

Photo camments:

The white showing in the roadway is where they have scraped through to coral.

Find the post inside the building lines...marking where the corner of the building is to be moved to.

Site looks peaceful, complete with cows grazing!

Meet some of the crew.. KS, Noel, a Beverly Hills church member, Thomas.  Noel has been working with Karl all week. They are standing beside his house where the components for the church were delivered.  Thomas just joined the group on Friday. He worked his way through high school and college doing construction.  He is now a pastor on the island of Tanna.  He will be working with the crew all this week so he can be a mover and shaker in erecting the six chruches scheduled for that island. 

Fruit 3

Fruit of the day: sweetsop, or sugar-apple, or custard-apple...

When this fruit is ripe, it falls apart in your hand. Each hard bump on the outside has a soft section attached to it, custard around a large smooth seed. It just melts in your mouth. Needless to say, I do not buy these in the ripe stage and haul them home in my day pack! They are like knobby croquet balls when I toss them in my pack, but three days later…yum! We first had these when working in the Caribbean and were thrilled to find them here, too. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sugar-apple

guesthouse door swings, again

The door swung out in the pre-dawn light this morning and we lost our house mates. We will miss them...

Barry Gane has been here two weeks, and has been a wonderful fount of information and moral support. He is the director of leadership and professional development for the South Pacific Division. Allan Walsh is a professor in the seminary at Andrews University. Both men travel a great deal of the time, doing what they did here…continuing education for people in leadership. Barry is a real "kidder" and also a talker... one of those reasons is probably why he is not smiling in the photo!

casual Friday

What do you know… the concept of “casual Fridays” lives in the Pacific, too!  They only work at the mission office ½ day on Fridays and everyone is wearing t-shirts and relaxed wear! I had to look twice to recognize our IT guy, Graham, this morning. He is always dressed so crisp and sharp and he looked like a student when he came to the door this morning wearing his “Fulton College” golf shirt!

nambawan Wan De Joj

Did you get the Bislama title? (#1 One Day Church) It is a little like reading vanity license plates.

First thing this morning ...

the truck came by to pick up the components for Beverly Hills church.

Karl has been working with the Union office to get us service so we can email, use skype and/or magicjack, Since the Union IT guy was on the line, Karl had to stay by and work with him, which means he didn’t get out to the site until mid-day.

Church #1 or "nambawan joj"

The decision has been made as to which site will get the first One Day Church...

Beverly Hills.  Yes, you read that correctly.  This group really wasn't in the running until it was discovered that they were seriously getting their plot ready.  When Karl and Damien made the scouting tour on Sunday, they were surprised to see the church members out putting in some action.  It made an impression.  On Tuesday it was decided that since they had their site ready, they would jump from 5th or 6th place to "nambawan" as they say in Bislama.

This site is about 2.3 miles NNE of where we are living (as the crow flies).  From the road pictures you saw on an earlier post, you know there is no speed involved in getting to any of these places.  The building components will be delivered to the Beverly Hills site tomorrow.  Karl plans to spend the day out there, checking their layout and fine tuning things.  Then on Sunday he will make sure the uprights are correctly placed and perpendicular as they get placed in their holes and have concrete poured around them.  Then the team can start building next week.

Sort of sorted out

The components for each of the churches for the island of Efate are separated out  The crew are in the process of counting out the component and loading shipping pallets for the island of Santo (7).  Needing more pallets has brought them to a stand still for now, but tomorrow they will be busy at the Beverly Hills site, so it all works out.

Fruit 2

Fruit for today: Pawpaw, also known as ...

papaya.  Our housemates love red pawpaw.  However, what is most readily available at the market are the yellow ones.  This was one of the first thing Alan started talking about when he flew in from Michigan last Sunday night, he needed a red pawpaw "fix".  Monday he walked next door to buy some coconut cream (apparently, red pawpaw is at its best when covered with this, in his book) and started cruising through the market in the evening asking for red pawpaws.  He actually came up with one.  Someone at the market said that they were called Hawaiian pawpaws.  The day following his big search I noticed two or three pawpaws in the market with "red" written on them!  I had to smile.  Today, one of the pastors came in with an extra large red pawpaw...his only request was that they save the seeds, so he could plant his own tree.  The guys cut into it at noon (and were gracious enough to share) and half of it was eaten before I thought to take a photo. Oh, well... this is what the half that is left looks like.  The other red pawpaws  (and yellow ones, too) have been between 8 and 10 inches long, this one is photo worthy with its original 18" length, before we started eating away at it.

simple joys

Asanath is the name of one of my new friends.  Part of her job at the mission office

is to service the two guest facilities - change and wash all the linens, wash the floor and clean the bathrooms.  Yea, I know.  I'm really roughing it!  Asanath brings fresh flowers from her own yard for the office and always has fresh ones on our table, too.  Don't know the name of the yellow ones she brought today, (she said she didn't know either) but the room holds a light fragrance since they came in the door.  Very nice!   I will have to get her to let me take her photo so you can meet her.  Wife of a teacher, mother of 4 adult children (all either a teacher, married to a teacher, or in the university preparing to be a teacher!) and grandmother of 2.  Boy, do her eyes sparkle when her "gran-ies" get mentioned!   

an unpredictable day

It has been an interesting day.
I wash a load of laundry...it promptly rains. I get all the wet cloths laid out to dry indoors with a fan blowing on them...the sun comes out. I take off on my walk to the market.... it starts raining again. Shopping completed, I head home with a nice cloud cover...the sun comes out again....I literally steam up the hill.

I got busy answering emails after I'd stood in front of the fan for a little cooling by evaporation. I'm all ready to post on facebook when the electricity goes down. My battery doesn't last real long, so I decided to post then close down. Okay, I'm slow, I forgot that if the power is down the wireless router is down. Therefore, nothing happened, so I just shut down. Six hours later, when the power comes back on, my facebook post (which I thought just went away when I shut down and rebooted) went out saying my power just went out. Hilarious.

The little boys next door asked me to come over and play table games with them when they got out of school at 2:30. By the time we finished we had acquired 2 other neighbor boys and had a great time! I'm lousy at games, so wasn't much competition, and the boys loved that!

revolving door...

We have a revolving door here at the mission guest house...

Maury left on Friday, Alan came on Sunday, Marveni left today. New ones coming are fun, but having new friends leave...not!  Marveni Kaufononga is the youth director for the union (I referred to in my April 25 post). He has been organizing a union wide Pathfinder camporee which will be hosted in Vanuatu and held in December. He's had several planning sessions at our dining table over the last 5 days... discussion of programing, events, safety factors, etc. Yea, Pathfinders!

finding my groove...

Ah.  Much better.  I went out for my walk a bit earlier today.  The farmers' market is about a mile away, so with my little day pack on my back I accomplished two tasks in one event. 

Shopping, exercising, breakfast and quiet time all before 8:30 am.  Compared to the local population, who rise at around 5, this doesn't sound too impressive... but hey, I'm getting there!

Fruit

Fruit for today: Pomelo or pommelo or pummelo or... Readily available, tastes amazingly familiar.  No surpriser there, it is a genetic component of the hybrid we call grapefruit http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pomelo

project update #2

Today Karl, Damien and Brendon went for site visits to where a few of the churches will be built.  I'll have to see if I can get Karl to caption the photos for you....

No luck, you are getting the information second hand, Karl is busy elsewhere.  In the foreground is the current meeting place for the congregation.  If you are sharp-eyed you will see 4 guys standing where the corner posts of the new church will go.  This will be the first site to get a church. 

 This is the land donor for the second church they plan to erect.  This man moved his whole family(village)  from a more southern island called Tanna.  He has a master plan for his new village which is drawn on the black board.  It includes three classroom shelters, a "medical center" and the place for the new One Day Church.  Only one of the buildings is currently there.  A newly completed shelter that will be used as a school (classes to start next week) during the week, and a church until their new one is built.

 Looks rather nice, doesn't it?  Too bad the life span will be only about 10 years due to termites, and less if there is a cyclone.  Across the road, another new village is about to be built.  The residents of a small atoll have out grown the space it provides.  The government will be moving the whole group (usually an extended family makes up a village) to the new village site across the road.  The man-with-the-plan says that when they send their children to the new school and use the new medical center (still to be built), he is confident they will also become a part of their church.

This is the road that they will share with the new village and will be the avenue materials and builders will need to use!  You can see why Karl put this  2nd on the list.  In a few weeks we should be into dry(er) season and things will have had a chance to firm up a bit.  The church will be built in the middle of the green area you see in the photo.  I've got to share some more road photos, they are just too good.

Pretty crazy, huh?

project update

Friday brought us a group of men to help sort out the One Day Church parts.  They didn't get too far, but it was a start.  If you click on "read more" where I've put some photos, you will see

back on line

Internet down for a day+ so am just getting back on.
We had a restful Sabbath. One of our housemates, Marveni, was the guest speaker at the church located on the mission compound, so we got the sermon in English! Marveni, a native Tongan, is the youth director of the Union (Vanuatu, Fiji, Tonga, Solomons, Cooks, and several other far flung small islands) headquartered in Fiji.

The singing was also all in English, congregational and specials. The ni-Van surly can sing… the a cappella harmony is amazing. However, everything else was pretty much in Bilslama (pigeon English). Occasionally there would be whole sentences in English (very colored by local accent) so I caught maybe 10%. Poor Karl caught virtually zero. The acoustics have sound bouncing all over the place and those hearing aids are worth zilch.

We went down to one of the black sand beaches in the afternoon with Damien and Leisha Rice (our point persons at the mission). Their 3 kids enjoyed the sand and water, the guys swam and Leisha and I continued to get to know each other better. Barry, our other housemate, also came along and used the time for a long walk along the beach. Barry, also an Aussie, is from the Division office and is here for two weeks, doing training with pastors and leaders. This group of ni-Van in for training are from outer islands.  For lodging they are tucked away here and there about campus. There are no classes today, so there is a little competition for space on the lines to "peg" out laundry! So far we have all fit our stuff on the lines, in and around each other! Which reminds me, it is time I go check the shirts, they are probably dry. Be back later.

to market, to market...

Our primary contact here has been one of the directors, who is Australian.  His sweet wife, Leisha, has been very helpful to me.  Last night she had several of us over for tea (you know, that meal that is at 5 o'clock, or so). Today, she invited me to tag along with her to the farmer's market. Really big help. I learned how to tell the difference between a "bus" and a "taxi". They may be the same make and model of mini van, but the "bus" always charges VU150, whereas the "taxi" charges whatever he feels like! For the return trip, I just have to tell the driver, "zone 2, SDA church" and that will get me home.

The market! The set up is very similar to what we had in Haiti... but infinitely cleaner! Fly situation nearly nonexistent. Though open sided, the floor is finished with white tile. Due to the nearly ever present moist earth (no time to dry between rain showers), there are all kinds of muddy tracks on the floor where the customers walk, but none of the garbage and downright sewage we've had dealt with in other countries.

The growers/sellers bring their produce in, be it one type or several, and set it on plywood "tables". The price is written on a small piece of torn corrugated cardboard and is placed next to pile of item to be sold. They stay until it is all sold, then go home. As a result, the market is open 'round the clock, except on Sundays. You often see them lying down behind their produce, napping between customers.

IT glitch

Have discovered that all the emails I have sent since arrival are sitting in my out box.  Ouch!  Karl messed about with stuff yesterday, but no luck.  Hopefully, the IT guy for the mission will be able to help us today.  Thankfully, I'm having no problem receiving.

where things got interesting following entry (or the rest of the story)

So, things got interesting after we cleared customs and immigration, yesterday. We headed out to the curb to see if we could find whoever had been sent to get us. After looking around for 20 minutes, a very casually dressed, heavily French accented man came up to me and asked if I was…. actually, I'm not real sure what he said, but it started with an "S" so I answer back saying, "Schwinn?" he answers back this name that starts with an "S" and I repeated, "Schwinn?"…. several more times.

We found ourselves being loaded up into a taxi. An absolute example of miscommunication which led us to the wrong place with the wrong person. When we were delivered to a backpackers' rest house, the man's obvious surprise at our amount of luggage became amazingly clear! The error did have an up side. Karl pulled out his contact info for the mission and the same taxi driver talked via cell to the mission office, got directions and delivered us without further ado. There we were greeted with smiles and handshakes and, "Oh, that was today, wasn't it?" Yes, apologies were made, but hey,… welcome to the islands! If things had not worked that way, we may have been at the airport a lot longer, waiting a proper time to not be obnoxiously "ugly American" impatient, and would have had the added fun of changing currency, using pay phone, etc. to find out why no one was there to pick us up.  In the long run, we came out ahead… but what about that backpacker left waiting at the airport?…mmmmm. Hope things turned out okay for her, too.

final leg of journey completed

Here safe and sound.

Arrived in Vila, Vanuatu on schedule yesterday afternoon.  Walked through light showers from plane to terminal. A small percussion and string band welcomed visitors with live music in the Vanuatu Immigration/Customs reception area. All tools, etc. cleared customs in a blink and then things got a little interesting. More on that later.

As I got up and about this morning, the sounds of predominately male voices singing a cappella, "When We All Get to Heaven" set a jewel in the new day, as the mission staff held morning worship in the room next to us.

Got to get some breakfast. Back later…..

2nd Leg of journey complete

Second leg of the journey is completed and we have a six hour wait between it and the 3rd and final leg. Auckland is awake and the sun has burned off the cloud cover that muted dawn. It is mid-autumn here and rather closer to the pole than where we are bound. Temp before dawn was in the 50's.


Okay, I've now got a new battery in and have reset my computer to time/date for this side of the world.

It is really quiet at the airport, except for the PA. This professional, almost mechanical female voice with interesting pauses common to most PA announcers, gives a play by play for nearly every flight. This time of the morning there seems to be about 4-5/hour. She starts off with "Flight #------ is now ready for departure. You must go immediately to gate #---. This is the final call. " A little later we have heard "paging the 15 remaining passengers for flight #---, you must go immediately to gate #--- . Your flight is ready for departure and all other passengers are waiting for you." Do you think they intend to lay a guilt trip on the slow pokes?! It apparently doesn't work all that well, because there are a few flights that we have head a regular count down - "the remaining 8 passengers", then "the remaining 5 passengers," then finally they name names "paging flight # -- passengers so and so, so and so, and so and so.  Please go immediately to gate #---. Your aircraft is ready to depart and all other passengers are waiting for you." I love it.

Karl just read this over and said that he heard The Voice say, "paging flight #---  remaining 5 passengers  will you please stop gossiping and go immediately to gate #---. Your flight is ready to leave and all other passengers are waiting on you." What can I say, we are easily entertained.

really being in the dark

Well, we made it through the extra long night.  The sun went down in LA at the normal time a couple hours before take off.  When we came to a time zone that showed midnight and the beginning of Tuesday April 20 we were somewhere south west of Hawaii. When we flew over the International Dateline the current time was 3:30 am +/- Wednesday, April 21. It is over 13 hours since we left LA and it is still dark!


Our flight had been booked with over 100 passengers that were to be coming out of London… obviously they were not able to make the flight… that left the majority of passengers with a full bank of seats to themselves and there were more people horizontal across the seats than not most of the hours mid-flight.

Battery getting low, more later.

First leg of journey completed

Sitting in LAX waiting to board Air New Zealand. Our layover was spent eating! Ready to go. kj

First leg of journey begins

Our bags are packed, we are ready to go.  It is time to put the computer in its case, then we are out of here.  Catch up with you later.

So long, farewell

Our good-byes are all said.  Konrad and Starr just left to head home to Tucson. 

A weekend of good-byes on several levels.  Yesterday was spent with parents and sibs at church and then to a memorial service for family friend, Ervin Stabel.  Yes, of the Shattuck Stabels.  Though all his adult life was spent away from Oklahoma, the old SDA cemetery outside Shattuck will be his last stop here on earth.  (Since both Karl and I have family members of four generations buried there, we totally "get it".)

Then an afternoon and evening just hangin' with family and of course, eating.  Mom and Dad bailed early.. it had been a long day for them.  Cousin Vince and wife Terri came up from Tempe for the evening so we had a little revolving door action going.  George had to get home due to early morning report for work, and Susan and Robbie left shortly after to run a few errands on their way home.  But Kelly Sue stayed and helped us discuss mice and men until we knew we could not postpone saying our good-byes any longer.  It is hard to say good-bye, but the alternative is worse.

Konrad and Starr arrived today about mid-morning.  They'd had a group of teens out camping and canoeing down the Rio Verde yesterday.  The group was pretty tired and sunburned and ready to pack it up first thing this morning.  Not having to participate in teen transport, they stopped by on their way home to spend a few hours with us, arriving about 5 hours earlier than we expected to see them.........Hey, we aren't complaining!
First order of business was showers (including the dog), the next was aloe vera for those spots sunscreen had failed to protect!   Kara wearing a life vest is just too good not to share, thus the photos.  Laundry and early bedtime beckoned them.  So, after emptying the fridge of perishables we won't be able to eat in the next 24 hours and adding a stuffed cooler chest to their car already stuffed with camping gear... we waved them good-bye. 

Now it is just the two of us...finishing up last minute things that have just gotten put off and rounding up the final items to be packed.  We are emotionally ready to stop saying good-byes.  It is just time to get this show on the road...

Hurray for Alexander Graham Bell

Karl was able to connect via telephone with our contact person in Vanuatu yesterday.  By the time I got home from Scottsdale last evening, he was bursting to share his info and release some of his feelings of finally getting some answers to little nagging questions, having a better picture of what their expectations were and what provisions they had set in place.

Surprise

I woke yesterday morning to find an email from Kit.  He is in his final two weeks of internship at NASA's Glenn Research Center in Cleveland, OH.  His summer internship at Schott doesn't start until late May.  The email?...

It's been awhile since we've been issued...

Paper tickets!!!! When was the last time you flew with paper tickets?  I mean, that is like carrying cash instead of ...

Phoenix homestead project

As we await departure… life goes on. The optimistic 3 days to redo our roof ...

Airline Tickets: check

We've got a departure date!

Tickets purchased today. Departure from Phoenix Sky Harbor is 5:15 pm on Monday, April 19.

Arrival in Vanuatu (VIla) is 2:10 pm on April 21 (via LA and Auckland, NZ).

Sounds worse than it is….. remember we cross the international date line. So it is really 11:15 am Tuesday in Vanuatu when we leave PHX. Oh, and we sit in LA for 3 hours and Auckland for 6 hours. By the time we get to Vanuatu, it will be Tuesday 8:10pm in AZ.

So, are we confused, yet?

departure date....?

I know, I know...we should have a departure date by this time.  Yesterday was set for ticket purchase and then... another glitch appeared.  I decide to post info, then find Karl is expecting more information in the next few hours, so I put it off thinking I will have some real news to impart if I wait, only to have the cycle repeat itself.  At this point I am just waiting... and waiting... and waiting...

Will keep you posted.

Volcano!

Yep, they've got 'em!  To quote the handy-dandy guide book, "Vanuatu...