Day 4 Pictures

Here are a couple of photos for my first few days at home:

Visiting Grandma :-)

The newest member of the family, Laura's basset hound Ruby

Becoming Ruby's chin rest

Look! It's Ruby!

Day 4 Update

After getting back to the US late Tuesday night, I'm starting my fourth day here. The summary so far is that I like it. It's kind of like one big vacation so far, enjoying family and friends, eating good food, spending time outdoors walking and kayaking. (I saw a bald eagle yesterday!)

Unfortunately my "vacation" isn't going to last forever, as I'm headed down to North Carolina and starting my course on Thursday. Even though I won't spend my days relaxing there, I'll still get to enjoy freedom, independence and feeling safe. :-)

I don't think I've had much, if any, reverse culture shock so far. One thing is that letter-size paper looks fat to me, since A4 (longer and skinnier than letter) is our standard in PNG, but that's about it.

Laura and I are going shopping today - to Walmart, the mall, etc. and out to eat - so today will probably be a good test of if I'm going to have reverse culture shock or not. If it doesn't happen today, maybe it won't happen at all...

PS If you're trying to email me, use my Gmail address, as the other ones aren't working at the moment. (They should be working again by next week.)

I'm back

After 52 hours in transit, I got to the Scranton airport last night around 10:15. Yay! I was met my family, complete with a "welcome home" sign (thanks Mom!). :-)

I slept through the night last night, which was pretty good considering that my body thought it was 10am to 8pm. I have a few things to do today - most importantly, going to visiting my grandma! Hopefully I can stay awake all day and get another good night's sleep. Maybe jet lag won't be too bad after all...

Thanks for your prayers for my trip - everything went really smoothly!

I'm on my way!

Right now I'm sitting in a hotel in Hong Kong. My trip started about 17 hours ago when I left the Ukarumpa Guest House for the airstrip. Our flight was delayed a bit waiting for a passenger, so we flew out of Ukarumpa around 11, arriving in PNG's capital, Port Moresby, around noon.

Around 5, I flew out of Port Moresby, headed for Hong Kong (my first stop over) and 6 and a half hours later - here I am! I'll be here until around noon tomorrow and then have a 14-hour flight to Chicago. I'll be there about 6 hours and then take the final leg of my trip to Scranton, getting in after 10pm.

Everything has gone incredibly well so far! I've had no trouble with my two big suitcases, or customs and immigration, or anything. :-) Yay!

People

I just wrote about "stuff," which is relatively quite unimportant. People, on the other hand, are the whole reason for missions, and people have been the best part of my last two years in PNG.

Today after our lunchtime Bible study, I invited some of the ladies over to my house. We had fun looking at some pictures from Pennsylvania, and I gave them each a little parting gift.

Saiki and me

I was really encouraged as they expressed their appreciation for my work in the Bible study, and Carol prayed for me. I feel like I've learned more from them and been more blessed by them than they have from me! This Bible study was one of the most meaningful things I did this term.

Carol

Aside from Bible study I've gotten to know the lovely ladies of LCORE and some other people through work. Siva has worked as a gardener on and off for me over the last year. His wife Anna and one of their adult daughters have both attended Bible study with me.

Siva and Anna

While there are some things I won't miss, I will getting to see these friends and encouraging each other in the faith.

Stuff

With less than a week to go, I'm finishing up the sorting, selling, giving and packing that comes with leaving a place I've lived for two years and moving to another country. I'm condensing a house partly full of stuff into two airline approved size suitcases, so I've been dealing with a lot of stuff.

The living room set up with give-away stuff

Some things are easy to part with - secondhand clothes, half-used sunscreen and already-read magazines. I've been surprised at how emotional parting with other things can be though - a pencil sharpener sent to me by my sister, pretty potholders that I've used for the past two years, and a dress I brought from home (even though its in bad shape now!).

Some books and DVDs - sad to see them go, but books are heavy!

I think part of the difficulty is having to make so many decisions and parting from so many things at once. I have been reminding myself though - it's just stuff. To be honest, I probably won't miss most of it, and can replace pretty much anything if I need it. I think the separating is harder than actually being without the stuff.

From L to R: stationary, magazines, candy, toys, food, toiletries

Plus it's been a blessing to me to bless others with my stuff. I had a number of other missionaries over to look through and take what they wanted, and then over lunch today, all of the LCORE office ladies came in and took the rest. I'm so glad that they will use the stuff they took and really appreciate it. Rather than traveling across the ocean to sit in my pretty-much-full closet, those clothes will be worn and appreciated for a long time. :-)

LCORE ladies pausing for a group shot after their "shopping" spree

Changes, Part 3

I've already talked about some superficial things that have become my "new normal." I want to tell you about two other ways my life has changed that are a little more personal.

A section of "the fence"

1. Security - Here we take security very seriously and with good reason - break-ins are all too common. There is a fence all the way around Ukarumpa and we have a security company who patrols day and night. My thinking on security has changed, because it had to change for me to be safe.

I'm more aware of my surroundings and take precautions to make me less likely as a victim. Every night before I go to bed, I turn on my outside lights, lock and deadbolt the front door, use a piece of wood to brace it shut, and lock my bedroom door and brace that with wood. (The wood braces against the bottom of the doors are to make it harder for someone to use a pry bar to open them.)

I keep pepper spray, a screwdriver, a long, sharp piece of wood (all for self defense) and a phone within arm's reach of my bed. I've gotten used to hiding my computer when I'm not home and it not being a good idea for me to be outside at night.

Designed to keep some people out, it keeps others in

2. Freedom - Freedom is tied closely to security. It's for security's sake that I can't go outside the Ukarumpa fence by myself, and it's for safety's sake that I can't be outside by myself at night. While I understand why these limitation exist, they can still be hard to deal with and make me feel a bit trapped.

Looking out

When I vacationed in Australia last year, it was like a breath of fresh air to feel safe and be free to go places, even at night. I adjusted to having more freedom pretty quickly, but it took me a few days to feel safe at night behind a door that wasn't dead bolted or braced and with windows that didn't have bars or security mesh over them.

I know my transition home will be hard because of all the transitions and adjustments I will have to make. Pray for me as I deal with many changes - both superficial and emotional. Thanks.

Changes, Part 2

All the changes I wrote about last time were about food... That wasn't intentional, but food is a big difference here. There are no restaurants, and you make pretty much everything from scratch.

My "normal" has changed in some ways that don't revolve around food. Here are a few more of them:

1. Water - Clean water is a precious resource. Each home in Ukarumpa has a water tank or two that collects rain water from their roof. During the rainy season, it fills up, hopefully with enough water to get through dry season. During dry season (which is now), you're always conscious of how much water is in your tank, and do your best to conserve, so you don't run out.

That means shorter showers and using river water for your laundry. (The river water is pumped to houses, but can be really dirty at times. It's still a shock when my laundry comes out dirtier than when I put it in!)

The twin-tub washer that uses river water

Hot water can also be a precious commodity during dry season. Why? Because its always cloudy and there isn't enough sun hitting the solar panels to heat the water up. I've learned to pay attention to the weather, so I will know if I can have a hot shower or not!

"The tank is overflowing! Quick, take a shower!"

2. Driving - People drive on the left side of the road here. Driving around Ukarumpa is easy because there are few cars on the road, and the gravel roads are bad enough that you can't drive very fast. Out on the real PNG roads, driving can be a dangerous game; you have to dodge people, animals, other vehicles, and car-eating potholes that are in your lane.

The main (and only) highway between Madang (on the coast) and the Highlands (where I live)

Although the actual driving here is very different from home, how much I actually drive or even ride in cars is more of a difference. At home, we use our cars every day; here I ride in a car only about once a week.

I can walk everywhere I need to go - work, the store, post office, church, library, friends' houses, etc. Ukarumpa is less than a square mile of land inside the fence, so I can walk anywhere I am allowed to go and back again.

Ukarumpa

3. Internet - We have an internet connection here (as evident by me writing this blog :-) ). While it has its problems occasionally, overall it's pretty good. The big difference between here and home that has changed my habits is in cost. Where at home there is a monthly fee, here I pay around $.20 per MB of my internet use (any page I open, anything I download or upload).

So I surf without loading pictures, don't watch videos or download files. Before downloading anything, I think about how much it will cost me and if it's worth it. (A 6MB song would be $3.20 for the download, on top of the cost of the song. A 100MB album is about $20 in download fees, more than the cost of the album itself.)

I'm looking forward to getting back to the "land of free internet" as we call it around here, but I know it will be an adjustment to surf the internet with pictures turned on and not feel wasteful.

4. Clothes - To be culturally appropriate in PNG, women need to disguise the outline of their thighs. The easiest way to do this is by wearing a skirt, but a long top or shorter skirt over jeans also works. After dressing this way for two years, I'm going to have to get used to the fact that wearing jeans (without a skirt over them) in public is not indecent!

Yes, this outfit looks weird, but without the skirt, it's immodest.

Changes

I'm excited about coming home, but I am trying to be realistic and remember that things have changed there. One of my favorite local restaurants is closed, new babies have been born, people have moved away.

But I'm also trying to remember that it's not just home that's changed - I've changed too.

For example, when was the last time you opened a carton of eggs and were surprised by their color? The last time I bought eggs... they were white! I was shocked - It's the first time for two years that I've seen white eggs, and apparently that change sunk in a little deeper than I thought.

Another silly example is when I was deciding when to arrive at my new apartment for my course this fall. I was going to get there on a weekend, but I decided against it - I would need to get there in time to go to the grocery store before it closes, Friday afternoon at 4.

Why in the world would a person think that? Well, the only grocery store I've gone to for the past two years is only open Monday through Friday, 8:30 to 4. My normal thought process about grocery shopping has changed from it being an any-time activity to one that you can only do on weekdays during limited hours.

The number of choices we have in America can be overwhelming to people coming home from overseas. Here, there is usually one or two choices for each kind of product...

If you want skim milk, there is just one size (a box) and usually one or sometimes two brands. If you want toothpaste, there might be a few different kinds to choose from, but nothing like the towering toothpaste aisles of America. If you want a pastry, you have one choice... a cream bun.

They're ok, not great, but at least the choice is easy :-)

The eggs, store hours and cream bun are just some funny examples of changes in my lifestyle and thoughts, and ones that are apparent to me already. I'm sure as I transition back to life in the US, I'll realize many more ways - some superficial, some deeper - that I've been changed by spending my last two years in PNG.

Last Day at Work

Yesterday was my last official day at work. Since arriving at Ukarumpa, my main work has been at the LCORE office, the center for language resources.

LCORE is an acronym that gives you an idea of what we do.

My main work in LCORE was in the sociolinguistics and language survey section, where I spent most of my time writing academic reports of survey fieldwork that the team did. We spent a month or two a year in the field, but most of my time was spent analyzing data and writing.

In May this year, I added another job title - LCORE Manager. Since then I've been working as the office manager, managing my PNG employees, doing some financial things, and seeing that the grounds, buildings and equipment is maintained, as well as continuing in my survey work.

I even have my own office now!

I'll be back at the office on Monday morning for a meeting and to finish up a few odds and ends. Other than that, I'm done with my work here. It's hard to believe that! And it's hard to believe I'll be headed home in a little less than 2 weeks!