Staying Plugged In

It's our job, and moreover our dream, to move out of town and into the village. We'll pick a language group we want to work with full-time and move into where the people live.

Where they speak.

We'll learn their language. 

But we'll learn who they are as people. 

What their needs are.

What their wants are.  

What their fears are. 

What they long for. 

And then we'll translate the Scripture with the hopes that their true need becomes apparent to them as they read its pages. 

But as beautiful as this sounds. There are some problems. 

Namely, we aren't used to living in the jungle. 

We've done it before but it's not really how we live our day-to-day in and out. 

Without the modern conveniences we're used to, life's a lot harder. 

Where's your laundry room? How caught up on laundry are you right now?

What if you had to haul all your laundry 10 minutes down a muddy incline to a river and hand wash them and then haul wet laundry 10 minutes up a muddy incline? And then hang it? And then pull it off the line if it starts to rain? 

How are the state of dishes in your home? What if you had to hand-wash them?

What if you had to hand wash them down at that river I mentioned before?

How's the water coming out of your tap? What if you had no tap? 

What if you had to walk to that same river to get everything you need for drinking and cooking and then filter said water?

How's the fridge doing? Keeping things cold? Can you store leftovers? Does a loaf of bread last more than a couple days before going moldy?

Everything has to be cooked from scratch in the jungle because those staple ingredients won't go bad. Salt, sugar, flour, eggs, oil? Practically immortal. And woe to you if you need to use flour because you've just tacked a good 10 minutes on prep time as you sift out the weevils. 

Now add all the normal components of your life sans modern conveniences. 

So after doing the laundry and the dishes at the river and hauling water back, you also have babies who's diapers need to be changed and need to nurse or have food made for them (more dishes!), you have a spouse who deserves a little attention at least throughout the day, and you have a full-time job. 

Speaking of that full-time job, how do you do Bible Translation and Literacy Work without electricity?

How can I manage my language learning data?

How can I access my translation helps?

How can we format books and stories for printing?

How can we even type a draft up?

There's the old school method: analog.

Write everything by hand and enter it in the computer later. Hope you don't lose anything between those times. Spend a ton of money on buying every single commentary you'll need and have it shipped over and flown in. 

This is a space, money, and time intensive method. And it means I'd be repeating work in town instead of helping other language groups with their projects. 

But there's an alternative. 

Solar power.
The initial set-up is a bit pricey but it's an investment that will pay off quickly in work efficiency. 

And I am overjoyed to say that The Rising Church has hooked. us. up!

A former translator in our branch worked with solar panel systems a lot and gave me a list of things I would need in order to get up and running and a website to buy it all from. 

The Rising told me to put everything I needed in the shopping cart and they would cover it!

Our solar panel system had been sitting at a JAARS export station in North Carolina and just departed for it's international journey (that the Rising is also covering) here!

!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Isn't that awesome!?!?!


This is the thank you video we made for the Rising when they initially made the purchase earlier this year. 

Gotta Get That Highlands Kaikai

The food that grows down in Madang is what we call bush food.

Taro, kaukau, and other tubers that are all sweet tasting potatoes.

Not to be confused with sweet potatoes which they also grow.

Greens like pumpkin greens and aibica are … better than collards...

But tulip (pronounced two leap), not to be confused with tulip, which is a lovely flower, is GROSS.

Waxy leaves, growing two to a stem (hence the name. two leaf, tulip. Get it? Yeah!). Like most lowland's greens, they have to be boiled to death before consumption, but tulip never loses its waxy leafiness.

Imagine eating a big bowl of magnolia leaves.

Yuk.

Throw it together boil it in water. DON'T ADD SEASONING!

PNG kai.

We didn't come to PNG for the cuisine.

But the Highlands!

Oh the highlands!

The altitude gives them weather akin to ours, meaning they grow the food of the home land.

Broccoli

Avocados

Onions

Idaho Potatoes

Garlic

Tomatoes

Lettuce

These things often make it down to Madang from those who choose to sell their wares (instead of eat them themselves), but a little beaten and bruised from the journey.

But one thing that never makes it down?

BERRIES!

STRAWBERRIES

BLACKBERRIES

OTHER BERRIES?

I DON'T KNOW BUT I'M SO EXCITED!

photo credit: Tyler  Hewitt

Our main agenda is canning. We've found reason to hesitate on buying a pressure canner so we're focusing on things that can use the hot water bath. Salsa, jam, and pickling. We were accompanied by some friends with great canning experience to learn us in the ways of bush storage.

Without a refrigerator and the power to run it, all of our food options for the months we stay in the bush need a very long shelf life. From dehydrating to canning, we're trying to find ways to keep ourselves well-fed and not resentful (meals are powerful things and to have a good one after a long hard day is beautiful whereas to have a bad one is a gasket waiting to blow.)

Dang, man's looking good!

Ukarumpa was cool, the strawberries were sweet, and our traveling companions were pleasurable. It was a good trip, but with all the canning and dehydrating and freezing (which is preservation for in town not the bush), despite the insistence by our co-workers, it was by no means a vacation!

But it was delicious!

Good Regina!

Regina only makes us more anxious to allocate in the bush soon.

She is clearly an inside dog. But PBT policy is strict. No dogs in the house. But they have no such restrictions on the houses in the bush.
She wants to lie down at our feet. She wants to be near us all the time. She wants to cuddle. But instead, she's set outside and most of the times we come out, we're laden with laundry or headed out to the car. (Yeah! You thought your washer was in an inconvenient location! We have to go outside and down the stairs and woe is us if it's raining! (we call it the presoak cycle).)
The result? SHE IS SO HAPPY TO SEE US!
But Jacob doesn't appreciate being jumped on while taking out stinky trash that has developed a drip. Or the compost with writhing little maggots inside. That could be disastrous.
And James doesn't appreciate being jumped on ever. And he doesn't understand as of yet that if he would just start petting her she would immediately stop shoving her body and nose into him. SHE JUST WANTS THE LOVE!
I think if they had more time to be mellow together they would get along great, but for that we must allocate.

Her work as a guard dog is a curious thing to try to evaluate at this point. We have another dog in the yard who's been known to cry wolf (or LOOK THERE'S A DOG ON THE STREET!) and Regina barks significantly less than he does. But is she just more discerning? It's hard to say that she's able to identify threats when we haven't had any threats for her to identify. So we hope and pray that when the moment arises that you really want a guard dog on the property, Regina will rise to that occasion admirably.
And looking at her lineage, she should, but luckily we've had no reason to find out.
(We have heard her bark and she sounds three times her size and vicious. Good Regina!)

She had worms when we first got her. The breeder tried to get her some dewormer before he shipped her over but we live in PNG and not everything is readily available. So we got some albendazole in her when she arrived and she's putting on weight admirably. Her mother was 110lbs and while the breeder doesn't anticipate she'll be quite as big, she'll definitely be a big girl.

All in all, she's a sweet girl and we're thankful to have her. Jacob and I will go out and sit on the porch in the evening and she'll saddle up for some petting and finally crawl into Jacob's lap. She's been known to play fetch but only for my verbal praises, the hunt is of secondary importance.

Shes a good girl, a quick learner, and a solid investment!