B & G in PNG

Our time is winding down.  The high school has completed their 2022-2023 year and the elementary students only have one week remaining of the school year.  We have year-end testing and some fun planned for the kids before the week is completed. The most recent excitement was an end-of-school party where the students, teachers, and families were invited to another nearby town, Minj, where there was a pool party and lunch to celebrate the students’ successful year.  This also included two sad farewells for the 1 st grade teacher and the high school teacher.  Both will be leaving this June after being here over 2 years each. We recently celebrated the one high school senior, David, who graduated last Thursday.  They had a wonderful graduation party attended by all of us as well as several nationals that included speeches, reminiscing the past few years and enjoying lots of treats. He will be returning back to Figi to live with other family members as he pursues his education. His paren

  We arrived at the Kudjip Hospital station on a Thursday afternoon.  We were coming out of a 76 hour stretch with 5 hours sleep and little more that short naps during that remaining time span.  The next 8 to 10 days seemed like our heads were in a fog and we always wanted to sleep partially due to the 14 hour time difference from Michigan.  But I was in school Monday morning at 8:00 to shadow the parent who had been doing the teaching and had been eagerly looking forward to our arrival. As Monday passed and then Tuesday, I was worked into more and more of the teaching and on my own from Wednesday on.  I’m sure there are still things I don’t remember or know from those couple days of orientation.  Yet, we still have all the students, and they are learning in spite of me. Our day starts with all the students together for a half hour of devotions at 8:00.  We have a selection of songs on the computer that can be projected on the wall to sing along with.  Typically, we start with one

We’ve had a couple requests and questions about our home here in PNG so here is a tour …. When we began preparing to come to PNG, we did not know what to anticipate for our living arrangements.  We were overwhelmed by the accommodations that we were welcomed by. So here is a narrative tour along with pictures so you can see how we are blessed! Our home is a two- bedroom duplex which is located on the south end of the station area.  We enjoy the eastern sunrise into the front of our home which is the living room, kitchen and dining room and do not enjoy the western sunset on the bedroom side of our home.  It gets very hot in the afternoon and early evening with the sunshine steaming in. Our yard is covered by a large shade tree in front, with many bushes and flowers around the house and parameter of our individual yard.  We have been blessed by a “Garden Meri” (there are House Meri’s who also do work within the house, though we haven’t had one).  Gayle had a national come to the doo

Last week we had a cool experience.  We tagged along with two of the hospital doctors and their families to a nearby bush church, Marangle Church of the Nazarene.  Dr. Ben Radcliffe and his four oldest children, Dr. Jake Morris, his wife, Genea and their six children (including the almost one year old twins in a carrier on their parents’ backs), and Bob walked just over 5 kilometers to the village of Marangle.  Gayle rode with Katherine, and her two-year-old over what amounts to a two track with a scary log bridge and joined the rest of the group at church. We passed the Kudjip Church of the Nazarene, a Lutheran Church, and a Seventh Day Adventist Church on our way to Marangle.  The trip went through some beautiful landscape with lots of interesting architecture to see.  We have been asked if we were staying in grass huts.  We are not, but we saw several on our walk.  Those huts make up a large percentage of the housing for PNG nationals.  It is amazing to see how much time and skill