Checking In...

Our training continues. Currently, we are planning meals and packing the food for our 5 weeks of village living. Oh! By the way, we found out the name of our village and our wasfamili's name this week! We are going to be on the coast close to Madang (town). If we want to get into town, it will be a 45 minute walk to the road where we can catch a PMV ride. The road leading into our village is not passable by truck. There is a rickety looking bridge that we will not likely cross by truck. Instead, we will have to stop at the one side of the river and everyone will help us carry our things to our house.

I am not going to write the name of our village, but I will share our wasfamili's names so you can be praying for them and their family. Our Waspapa's name is Gim Irape. Wasmama is Geru. They have an older daughter in school and then two young boys. They have graciously given up there home for our time there. We will live in a village house like the one in the pictures earlier. This one will have three bedrooms and an open veranda. We would appreciate any and all prayers for our time with this family. We really do not know what it will be like to live this communally for 5 straight weeks! But, we know that God will equip us when the time comes, so we are excited and anxious about getting to this phase of training. (By the way, if you remember me talking before, this is the part where we will cook all of our meals over a fire, bathe in a river (men with men and women with women), our very own bathroom has been made for us....and more). Please don't read sarcasm into this..!
..we really are excited about meeting our new wasfamili and learning more of this country and the people.

So, the other day I planned all our meals for the 5 weeks and today we shopped at the store "on campus". Tomorrow we will go into town. In case you care, here is a breakdown of our meal plan:

Weeks 1,3 & 5:
Sunday: Coffee Cake, Macaroni and Cheese, Dinner with Wasfamili
Monday: Cereal & Fresh Fruit, Pizza, Corned Beef Spaghetti
Tuesday: Oatmeal, Cabbage Salad, Beef Stroganoff
Wednesday: Eggs, Tuna Fish Sandwiches, Pumpkin or Corn Chowder Coup
Thursday: Oatmeal, Grilled Fruit & Cheese Sandwiches, Pancakes
Friday: Cereal & Fresh Fruit, Peanut Butter and Jelly Sandwiches, Village Tacos
Saturday: Fried Plantains, Potato Soup, Fried Rice

Weeks 2 & 4:
Sunday: Cinnamon Rolls, Macaroni & Cheese, Dinner with Wasfamil
Monday: Cereal & Fruit, Pizza or Deli Roll Up, Alfredo Pasta
Tuesday: Oatmeal, Cabbage Salad, Chicken Curry
Wednesday: Eggs, Tuna Fish Sandwiches, Viggie Chili or French Onion Soup
Thursday: Oatmeal, Ham & Cheese Sandwiches, Biscuits & Gravy
Friday: Cereal & Fruit, Peanut Butter & Jelly Sandwiches, Cheese Quesadillas
Saturday: Fried Plantains, Potato Bar (Roast Kau Kau), Japanese Stir Fry

I hope to make brownies, cinnamon popcorn and other goodies. We will have trail mix, crackers and cheese and beef jerky for snacks. I think I will have to make some form of bread around 4-5 days each week. Keep in mind, this entire menu is possible WITHOUT refrigeration. Isn't that crazy?? I know some translators here who plan for months at a time knowing they will not have access to refrigeration. We will be bringing some dehydrated fruits, veggies and meat. This is what they do on a regular basis.

So, tomorrow, we head to town to pick up the remaining things. I find myself getting stressed out, "What if we forget this?" and "What if we forget that?" etc, etc. But, town is accessible. So, I am trying not to worry too much about it.

In other "news", the first of two groups left for their three day hike today. We will leave on Thursday. Ben will stay with our friends Carl and Carol who have attended now over 14 weeks of training with us. Ben calls them "Uncle" and "Aunt". I know it is going to be hard to leave him, but he is in really good hands. All the staff with be looking out after him while we are gone. Oh....and Carl is a family doctor. Like I said, the Lord has blessed us with their friendship in more ways than one.

We were given the "route" that we will take for the three day hike. It reads like this:

"Day 1- Leave training campus in the morning and head down the road for a little ways. Follow the trail to Damaipa and head straight down the mountain. The area you will hike through is a wildlife reserve, so make sure you stop and look around, ask your guide for the whole story. You will cross a few streams and then climb up a short incline till you reach the village of Amron. You will spend your first night here. The hike will take about 3 hours.

Day 2- Leave Amron and head down a trail through the bush. Again, you will cross a few streams and walk through some gardens until you reach Gamoi. From Gamoi follow the road to Lehun. Nangoi is the Papa bilong graun and used to work at the training center, make sure you stop and shake hands. Keep hiking through the bush crossing a few streams. After some more hiking, river crossing, ditch jumping and "raunim" gardens you will come to Gataba. You will spend the night here with Levy. The day will be about 5 hours of hiking.

Day 3- This day you will hike back to the training center. Follow a wide trail out of Gataba and through a cillage called Bagi. You will climb a little ways up until you get to some abandoned buildings that were part of a Revival Camp. The next section of trail is in "bus tru" so watch out for vines. ….It will take about 5 hours."

So, as you can tell, it is not very specific. We will be hiking with packs, but spending a good amount of time in villages meeting new people and learning about their culture. Can't wait to share more about it when we finish it!!

I guess that is about it for now. Last Saturday ("Sarare I go pinis"), our wasfamili came to our hauk kuk. The weather was BEAUTIFUL. Thanks for your prayers. We had a wonderful night. I wish the stir fry had more sauce and that the custard had more time to set, but all in all, it went really well. Caleb actually managed to go into town that Saturday morning and played in a soccer game with other Papua New Guineans. He may have the opportunity to do this every Saturday when we are in village living. He bought cheap cleats in town (about 10 US dollars). His team was actually really good. They won the league last season. They started him. He played the first 15 minutes and almost got a goal. Then, he took a break. He didn't realize that they play like the pro's in that once you come off the field, you don't go back in all game. Oooops! He coughed it up to a cultural blunder and learned his lesson. All in all, it was a great week-end for us all.

Benjamin is doing much better is nursery and is a happy little boy again. We are coughing up his "crying fit" for the medicine he was on and the fact that a new little girl joined the class who was having a bit of separation anxiety that week. Things are much better now and we thank you all for your thoughts and prayers.

We miss you all. Please know that on Thursday, March 25th, we leave for our village allocation. I am going to try and write a letter half-way through and ask a staff member to post it to this blog. We'll see it that happens. But, we will not be taking our computers with us to the village for obvious reasons- mainly no electricity. Hang in there....when village life is over, we will be on our way to our long term house where we will have much better e-mail connection and the ability to post pictures and respond to e-mails regularly. We will have our cell phones with us, so if you want to give us a call, it is free for us to receive them from you! Of course, I have no idea what your international rates are. Just send us an e-mail if you would like to talk by phone while we are away and we can set it up before next week.