The first thing I did this year*

As I lay in bed, sleeping in after supervising a bunch of teenagers on New Year's Eve, I heard the soft knock first and then the dog start barking to let me know I had company. I dragged myself upstairs to find one of my PNG friends on my porch. She came by to charge her and her brother's cell phones and because she wanted me to teach her how to make jello.

We plugged the first phone in and chatted for a few minutes, before making the jello and taking down the (artificial) Christmas tree. Then, in typical PNG fashion, we waited: waited for the first phone to charge, then the second (although after two hours she realized it wasn't plugged in)... waited for the jello to set. When I ran out of things to talk about, I put a movie on as we continued to wait.

The start of another year in PNG...

Happy New Year!

*When I woke up on the morning of January 1, 2010 - not the night before :-)

Merry Christmas!

Merry Christmas everyone! We're almost halfway through Christmas day here.

Here's my Christmas tree this year - it's about three times as big as the one from last year. I'm glad that the people I'm house-sitting for left this tree for me to use :-) It adds some Christmas cheer to my house.
And outside, by the driveway, there is a giant poinsettia bush to add Christmas cheer all year round. This picture only shows a small part of the bush, since I was trying to take a picture of the small green bird in the middle of the picture (a New Guinea white-eye).

While poinsettias are small, potted plants to people in the US, here they are towering bushes that grow year round!

New Britain Survey: Parting Shots

It's almost Christmas, and I'm still milking my New Britain survey trip for blog posts. This is the last one; I promise. (Look for a Christmas post soon.)

Of the south coast villages we visited, we saw (and slept in) a variety of kinds of houses. Some people have houses built with sawn timber and sheet metal roofs; others have traditional-style houses with woven walls and grass roofs. (You can see both kinds in the picture below.) We saw some houses that were unusual - they had sheet metals for the walls and grass roofs!

In many places in PNG, pigs play an important role in traditional culture. While I've seen pigs in almost every village I've visited in PNG, I'd never seen them on the beach before! This struck me as really funny, so I thought I'd share it, but maybe it's more of one of those "you had to be there" moments...

Here's a pig eating (coconut shells) on the beach (above), and another just keeping cool in the sand (below). Hey, when a pig doesn't have mud to wallow in, he might as well use the next best thing... sand.

Papua New Guineans I've met on survey have always been very friendly and hospitable. I thought this sign, above a door at a house we stayed at said it well... (Well Come)

Last, but not least, is this image, taken in a PNG house we slept at:

A clock with no hands captures the essence of PNG so well! PNG culture is very relaxed and relationship (rather than time) oriented. People don't mind waiting or having plans changed. They are very flexible and unaware of time (in the Western sense), just like a clock with no hands.

New Britain Survey: Food

I'm getting close to the end of talking about my New Britain survey, but I just have to talk about the food. It's a question missionaries everywhere can be sure of being asked: what kind of weird food do you eat?

No, I didn't eat any bugs or lizards or anything on the survey; we actually ate really well. The most common food we ate was either rice or root veggies cooked in coconut cream, with a sauce over it, often made with leafy greens, fish, or canned meat (think Spam).

Here's a plate of coconut rice with cooked greens on top:

Along with our normal food, we also had some special treats, like this "tapiok cake" (I believe it's made from cassava plants). We got really excited when our hosts presented us with this delicious snack.

Women use shell scrapers to grate the hard cassava root, which they mix with coconut cream, wrap in banana leaves, and cook over a fire. (In the picture, the cassava cakes are sitting on the banana leaf they were cooked in.) It's crunchy on the outside and chewy on the inside!

Another special treat we had on the survey was good fruit. Laulau is similar to an apple, and the flavor ranges from quite tart to deliciously sweet. They range in size from about one to three inches across, most of them being on the small size. On one small island, I was given a bag of huge, sweet laulau (including the one pictured below) and enjoyed every bite!

(To "pick" laulau, someone climbs a laulau tree and shakes it. Lots of fruit shower down, and people pick up the best looking ones, leaving the small, unripe and bug-eaten ones on the ground.)

Ok, this last picture isn't of food. But it's of something that spends lots more time in peoples' mouths than any food does: betel nut. People of all ages crack open the small hard fruit with their teeth and chew the soft, bitter flesh. When mixed with lime powder (made from sea shells) and leaves from a peppery-tasting tree, the betel nut produces lots of bright red spit in peoples' mouths. Almost everywhere you go in PNG, you find betel nut spit stains like the one below on the ground.

New Britain Survey: Church

Sometimes surveys happen where there are no churches, but it's getting harder and harder to find places without a church. (That's a good thing!) The areas we visited in New Britain were no exception.

Every single village we visited has a church, and most of them were established around WWII! (Although new buildings have been built since then...) Here's the church on Melenglo Island:

And here's the inside of the church on Ayuvet Island...

Most of the churches are very well attended and people are very devout. They are all Catholics. Many people have images of Jesus and Mary, like the ones below, in their homes.

We were in New Britain during the "month of Mary." Every single day people held prayer services for Mary (sometimes twice a day, or all night long!), with singing and prayers. Each village also had shrines like the one you see below. In some villages, each family built their own shrine and the Mary statue would be moved to a different house every day in her procession.

At the end of the month, Mary's procession came to an end at the local parishes (church headquarters over a certain area). We were in Lulakivi village when the Mary from there traveled to Valanguo parish church. Almost every person in the village decorated their canoe with greenery (Mary had a specially decorated one) and paddled to Valanguo, loudly singing local language songs to Mary all the way.

It was quite a sight to see dozens of canoes headed for the island, and then see and hear dozens each from three other nearby villages all headed to the parish church with their Marys too!

New Britain Survey: Travel

One of the biggest unknowns on this survey was travel. I can sum it up by saying God worked it all out. :-)

We didn't know how we were going to travel when we got to New Britain, but just a few days before the survey, our plans for even getting to New Britain fell through. However, our amazing Aviation department came through for us, and we flew from Ukarumpa to New Britain on the Kodiak!

Once we'd reached New Britain, we needed to travel by boat. For the first two weeks, we went by dinghies (with outboard motors).

We had a few rough rides, and spent a night sleeping in the open on a dock, but overall our travel worked out great!

Here we are, life jackets and all. (People weren't familiar with life jackets and asked us if they were a special survey uniform...)

We also traveled some by sailing canoe. This picture was taken after these kids had taken us to church (on another island) and back. A number of times, we also went on the same kind of platform outrigger canoe, but with people paddling rather than using the sail. (These canoes are massive - they can hold all four of us, plus all of our backpacks, and four people to paddle!)

Some villages are located on little islands just off the coast, while the church and school are located just across the water on the mainland. Since Bonnie and I wanted to interview school and church leaders, we would canoe over to the mainland... here we are setting off.

We took turns paddling in the front. As you can see, the canoes are really skinny! Rather than sitting on a seat inside the canoe, you balance on top of the canoe. And that's why you're glad there is an outrigger!

Many of the islands have no fresh water source, so people canoe to the mainland to bathe, wash dishes and clothes, and get drinking water. It was fun and refreshing to paddle to the mainland and wash in the river. The particular time pictured here felt like it was straight out of a movie... as we paddled up a winding river past beautiful, exotic trees!

New Britain Survey: Where We Went

New Britain Island is the largest island in the Bismarck Archipelago - a group of islands off the coast of the PNG "mainland." There are two provinces located on New Britain, aptly named East New Britain and West New Britain (WNB). On the survey, we stayed in WNB, surveying three languages on the South coast (Apalik, Lesing-Gelimi and Avau) and one on the North coast (Bebeli). (Click each language's name for some information about it.)

One thing we wanted to find out on the survey is what the people themselves call their language - many language names around PNG were assigned by early researchers who may or may not have visited the area or asked people what they call their language. As a result of our research, the name Lesing-Gelimi will probably be changed... people living in the "Lesing-Gelimi" villages had never heard of Lesing-Gelimi before!

I made a map that shows all four language areas we visited; the computer is acting up and not let me post it directly here, but you can use the following link to see it.

[Click here to see map]

Making maps of the areas we've surveyed is my favorite part of my job, so the time I put into this map was a labor of love. :-) Maps like these will also be included in the survey report that we will write for each language.

Look for a post about how we traveled next - we went by dinghies with outboard motors, small outrigger canoes, and larger outrigger canoes with sails! On the north coast, we drove around in a pickup truck.

New Britain Survey: Working

So, you know I recently helped to survey four languages on New Britain Island... but do you know what I actually did during the three weeks?

The team and I spent much of time talking to people and waiting for things to happen, but the main objective of our work was doing sociolinguistic research (i.e. to find out about the culture and language of each place we visited).

To do this research, we get a group of people together and ask them questions. On this survey, I did these kind of interviews with groups about their contact with other groups - where and how much do they travel, do people from other areas marry into their village, or people from their village marry to other areas, etc. (I also interviewed church leaders in each village - look for more about this in future posts.)

People are usually very interested in meeting us and talking to us, so it's usually not hard to get a big group of people together (in the early morning). If you're trying to get a group of people together later in the day, it can be hard, because everyone has canoed from the island to work in their gardens on the mainland!

Often when we're talking with groups of people, we draw a huge crowd. Can you see Juliann (my teammate) in this picture? She's in the middle of the group - write down a phonetic wordlist in the Apalik language. (If you look closely, you can see a white arm in the middle of the picture.)

New Britain: Beauty of Creation

While the New Britain survey was work, I also had the pleasure of enjoying some incredible beauty! Here are some snapshots from the trip...

A lovely beach...

Oil palm plantation cover areas of north New Britain. The area under the trees is cool and mossy.

A colorful sunset...

And another, with beautiful purples and pinks

The most beautiful swimming hole I'd even seen... spring-fed and clear deep, deep down.

Last but not least, these plumeria (frangipani) flowers. I've seen them in Zambia and Uganda too, but these were the brightest and most beautiful I'd seen!

New Britain Survey: People

The people of New Britain were extremely hospitable, helpful and friendly. I wanted to share a few pictures of them with you...

Some kids from South New Britain

As we left each island by boat, a huge crowd would gather to say goodbye and wave farewell.

A common sight in PNG: little kids carrying and caring for even smaller kids, often their siblings. I took this picture of a little girl carrying her borther around in Lulakevi village.

Some more South New Britain kids and teenagers - they loved having their picture taken!

Here's a picture of me with my namesake Sara at a village on the North Coast. She and her mother both gave me a necklace, since we shared the same name.

One night I went to take a picture of the breathtaking sunset and of course, had a little group of kids following me. They found it hard to believe that I would want to take a picture of the sunset rather than them :-)

Back from New Britain!

I'm back from the New Britain survey!  Thanks so much for your prayers!  God answered them and greatly blessed us.  We were safe, healthy and experienced great hospitality in the form of food, lodging and companionship.

I'm off to dinner now, but I'll try to post pictures and stories later.

God bless,

Sara

Air travel in PNG - by Nancy

I’ve mentioned before that PNG is a very rural country. There just aren’t many roads. There are only about 19,600 km (12,200 miles) of roads in the whole country according to Wikipedia, and only 686 km (426 miles) of those are paved! Even the capital city, Port Morseby, is not connected to any other major town by a road!


View Larger Map

Basically, air travel is the single most important way to get around in PNG. There are 578 airstrips in the country – and only 21 of those are paved. So to say the least, aviation is very important, especially to the missionaries who need to travel to rural areas. Without the pilots, the aviation mechanics, and the people who build and maintain the airstrips-- the language surveyors, Bible translators, and literacy workers would have an immensely harder time doing their jobs.

The mission agency who provides most of the air service at Ukarumpa has 9 aircraft to meet the need. There are 4 Cessna 206’s, 1 King Air B200, 1 Islander BN-2T, 2 Bell Helicopters, and the newest addition to their fleet, the newly arrived Quest Kodiak. The Kodiak arrived a few days after I left PNG, so sadly I didn’t get to be there for the celebration of its’ arrival. But I did have a chance to fly in 3 of the other types of airplanes while I was there and have a tour of the Aiyura hanger.

This is me next to the King Air. I arrived at Ukarumpa on this plane.


These are the two Bell Helicopters.


Here are Sara and me getting into a Cessna 206 which we flew in to Madang.

(Thanks to Jacob for this photo.)

Remi was our pilot, and yes, I got to wear the headphones but I did not fly the plane!


This is what the airstrip looks like at the Aiyura Airport (near Ukarumpa).


One of the pilots (Christopher) fueling up one of the planes.


Looking back at the hangers at Aiyura.


Now some aerial views of PNG…first, two photos looking down on hillside gardens. The burned areas are where they have either cleared to make new gardens, or just burned for no particular reason.
A rugged valley with a river running thru it.


A view of the missions center at Ukarumpa.


Here is another shot of Ukarumpa, nestled in the beautiful Aiyura Valley.


And finally, the mountains of PNG! This was taken on the flight on my way home - between Ukarumpa and Port Morseby.


And now, I’m going to say good-bye! I’ve enjoyed sharing some of my experiences and photos with you from my trip to visit Sara. I hope you have enjoyed them, too.

Please keep praying for Sara, Bonnie, Juliann, and Jacob as they finish up this survey trip and head back to Ukarumpa. Continue to pray for their safety, health, being able to complete the work they went to do, and traveling mercies. Thank you so much!