Another week in Pohnpei

March 4, 2009 Wed.
I am taking a break from the studying and lesson preparation to type an update. We finally have the house pretty well fixed up and tight enough to keep most bugs, rats, and lizards out. We have screens and also have grating on two windows to keep the rats from chewing through the screens.
Actually we haven’t had a lizard or a cockroach, or a centipede in the house in over a week! We do have the little geckos from time to time, but they don’t bother us much. I just hate cleaning up their droppings on the table or counter or on the wall. Yuck! But they are sort of cute little creatures.
One of the landlord’s dogs had a litter of pups. All but one died. But we are having fun watching the little guy grow up. He is really cute. But all the dogs here have lots of fleas, so we keep our distance.
Last Sunday one of the landlord’s hogs got loose. The dogs chased it up the hill. We called the landlord to tell him and he brought a guy out to help him and they got the hog penned again. But the next morning he got out again. He is a large hog, about 2 yrs old. He came walking onto our veranda and tried to eat Chuck’s shoe that he had left out there. Dumb pig!
We have been busy with Seminary and Institute classes. We have had fun helping them learn how to dig into the scriptures and find principles and teachings. Chuck has used local visual aids, taken directly from the jungle around our house, to teach the concept of the Gentiles being GRAFTED into the House of Israel. We have been told that grafting is done here with the lemon trees, so it wasn’t a new concept for some of them. We are also teaching Temple Preparation classes at Kitti, Sapwalap, Uh, and Nett. In Nett, very few understand English, so teaching always requires a translator. That makes it hard to teach, and makes the lessons very long. Plus, we have no way of knowing if our teaching are understood.
We are on the District Speaking schedule now, so we speak in a different Branch on the 4th Sunday of each month.
So far, I am REALLY enjoying all the studying and lesson preparation. Plus the language study. It is so nice to be able to spend hours and hours everyday studying, the gospel, the scriptures, the language.
The temperatures do not vary much here. When we get up it is usually about 81 degrees. During the day it might get up to 88-89 degrees. When we go to bed, it is usually around 82-83 degrees. The rain is wonderful. We both love it. Sometimes it rains 8-12 times in one day. Other times we can go 3 days with no rain. Sometimes it just rains, and sometimes it is a storm, wind and all. Some rains are light and soft, but often the rain comes down with great velocity! Like we are under a waterfall! It is just amazing to us that so much rain can fall in such a short time. It drains away very quickly. Two days ago I (Sue) was driving home from Kolonia and the rain was coming down so hard that my windshield wipers just could not keep up with it, even on their fastest speed. I simply could not see anything. So I drove VERY slowly. Of course, here on the island, everyone drives very slowly. The road is narrow and windy, and there are people (LOTS of people) and dogs and chickens and sometimes pigs on the road all the time. In some places the road is only wide enough for one vehicle to get through.
We leave the windows open at home all the time. So we can hear the jungle noises. I love hearing the birds. There are no snakes here. And no predators. So we feel very safe, even when we went out exploring in the jungle.
The people here are wonderful. Very loving and kind and patient. And they are a happy people. The children are well-loved and well cared for. They all seem healthy and happy. Of course, just as in the states, there is poverty. But the jungle provides so many good things to eat that even the poorer folks can eat well.

ENGLISH??

One of the challenges of living here is buying groceries and such that are made in a foreign country. We bought a box of plastic wrap, but it was a foreign brand. Here are the instructions on the box: "Please press designation postition, open box the cover pulls up the length needed. To compress tightly a cover, cover cling film to side along the box last the teeth of a saw tears off. The usage pleases cover a cover behind." I'd love to know what nationality translated that to English. Can anyone tell me what that means??? By the way, the teeth do NOT cut the film AT ALL!!! We use scissors.

My third try seems to have let me post it. I really hope it is worth it to have it on here.

Sue wanted me to post this shot of me of my birthday gifts. I got a new Pohnpeian shirt, shorts and a machette. Then she wanted to take a picture. I tried to post it on the 19th but we lost our connection while I was up loading the picture so all I got was the date. So I will try again today; which is Sunday evening, 9 pm.
We had a very good Sabbath today. We attended the Sapwalap Branch. We were the only speakers in Sacrament Meeting there. We had been assigned to speak on Home Teaching and Visiting Teaching, which we did. Then we stayed and attended Sunday School and Priesthood and Relief Society, which were all in Pohnpeian. We have been working very hard on the language and found that we could understand a small amount of what was said. That made us happy!
We drove home and had 10 minutes for a quick sandwich, and then we drove to Uh…about a 10 minute drive. We were supposed to teach a Temple Preparation class there at 2 pm, but no one came except the missionaries who came to translate for us. So they worked with us on the language for about an hour. Then we drove home.
We ate a couple of cookies and headed out again, driving back down to Sapwalap to teach Temple Prep. We had 6 people there at the class. Five actively participated in the reading and asking questions. It was a very good class, but ran too long, as we had to wait while the English speaking locals explained the things we were teaching to the ones who could not understand us.
We got back home at 7 pm and had a light supper and worked on the lesson for this week’s Institute class. Then we spent a little time reading the Family sites, e-mail, and our blog. Now it is bedtime. Tomorrow we must go in to Kolonia to join with all the missionaries on the island to clean and vacuum and wax our vehicles in preparation for Zone conf which is Thurs. We will also do our shopping and pick up our mail while in town.

Monday February 16, 2009

It is Monday evening. It’s been a good day. We shopped in town and found real, fresh TOMATOES and LETTUCE!! BIG surprise! So we bought one tomato and a head of lettuce. Came home and had real, American HAMBURGERS for lunch! Man! That tasted SOOOO GOOD! Even had some potato chips with our burgers (some foreign kind called Oishi, cheese flavored, not too bad) and fresh homemade lemonade. Man, it is sooo nice to eat something that familiar! Of course, we had no ketchup or mustard, but used Thousand Island dressing instead. And we had no hamburger buns, so used bread instead. Then we studied for a while. While I was studying in the office, I noticed a medium-sized lizard on the wall. I called Chuck in and we tried to chase it toward the air conditioner, hoping it would go out through the wall there, but instead it ran behind the dresser. So we gave up. Later I saw him again. This time Chuck brought the net in and attempted to grab him. He got hold of the lizard’s tail, which promptly came right off!! Poor lizard! Chuck caught him and headed to the door to release him outside. As he headed out he asked me to go get the tail. So I returned to the office and there on the floor was the tail….MOVING all over the place!! Wiggling and jumping around! I about died! We laughed. Chuck came back in and got the “still alive” tail and took it out with the lizard. I still can’t get over how funny that tail looked moving all over the place, unattached to the lizard! WEIRD!!Then we ate a light supper, since our lunch was so late. Had canned peaches and bread and butter and Chuck had a glass of milk. Then we each had two cookies. We worked on our language flashcards for a while. I got all 71 right, Chuck got 55 right. Now Chuck is making up more Permethrin to kill bugs and I am here typing. Today I got my talk ready for Sunday, and my institute lesson ready for Tuesday. Now I need to get started on the Seminary lesson for this week. Sometimes it is kinda confusing to be teaching institute from Galations and Seminary from Romans. Two weeks later we are again teaching Galations, but this time to the Seminary classes. It is hard to keep it all straight in our heads. Seminary goes straight through the New Testament, but Institute jumps around in no particular order. It just teaches concepts and principles and uses New Testament scriptures, as well as Book of Mormon scriptures and D&C too.Man! It has really rained today. Just started again…probably the 12th time it has rained today. And it really pours down HARD! We love it. The natives take it all in stride. They have lived with it all their lives. Tomorrow we will put up metal grating on two of our living room windows so we can keep them open at night and rats won’t get in. That sure will help cool down the house at night!

Today, after over 2 weeks on the island we got the internet at our home on a dial-up connection. Our home is about 30 minutes from Kolonia on the East side of the island. We live between Uh and Sapwalap. Previous to today, we had to drive to town to connect to the internet.
We have had a mission car some and a Records Preservation car for other times, but so far not one assigned to us. So far it has just been a loaned car from someone that didn’t need it as badly as we did. They are working on something better for the future.
This Pohnpeian Island is absolutely beautiful. The amount of growth is staggering to a Wyoming Cowboy and his wife. Everything is green on both sides of very narrow roads and most of the time it is green over head while we are driving.
We are teaching 5 90-minute classes of Institute and Seminary each week and Temple Preparation Classes as well for 4 different Branches. We have loved being in their Branches on Sundays. We have attended 4 Branches for part of the Block each. They have no organ or piano, but sing the songs of Zion in Pohnpeian. We match our vowels to theirs and sing with them. They love it and so do we. They sing so beautifully.
We are learning the language as we go. We can say many things now and Sister Duncan is much better than I am already. The Sister Missionaries gave us about 150 flash cards to practice learning words and phrases.
We are very happy that we are here in Madolenihmw, Pohnpei and for the wonderful experiences we are having.