What Happens Next?

This was the question asked in our last blog posting in November. The answer has come sooner than expected:

We go back to Vanuatu in 2018, for another 6 month stint. 

We had been praying about it and seeking what God wants for us to do, and the answer came pretty clearly this time, and was soon confirmed. Thanks to anyone who was praying for us to know His will. We are clear now that we are meant to be there for next year, whatever the year holds. 

Once again, Martyn will be working with PCV staff to get on top of the accounts, and I'm not sure yet what I will be doing, but there are possible projects simmering. We are leaving in early March, so enjoying R&R with family and friends for now. 

We wish everyone a very Merry Christmas, may you experience God's love for you this season.

Last Few Days in the Tropics - Monday 13th & Tuesday 14th Nov

One of our last tasks at PCV was to give a report on what we have achieved throughout the year, as did every staff member. This process took so long that it had to be split into 3 separate sessions (about 3 hours each), so everyone could give their own report, and allow time for discussion and positive suggestions for going forward for each staff member. We were both warmly thanked again for our work during the year.

With our desks cleared and the last few documents handed over, we made our sad goodbyes to the staff at the office. Many of them have become good friends and were very sad to see us go, telling us to come back next year!

While clearing out the flat, we had a visit from Grek, one of the boys from the after-school reading class. We gave him a pencil case and a poster with the times tables on it. He was with his little sister Lisa.

We also had a visit from Elder Jonathan and his family, to say goodbye as he wasn't in the office on our last day at work. Martyn and Jonathan worked side by side, and gave each other lots of cheek!

On our last evening in Vanuatu, we went out for dinner with our landlords Tony and Mary, Chris and Mahana. It was lovely spending our final evening with them, they have been so good to us the whole time. Mahana wouldn't smile (she usually has a lovely smile) , but she put her arm around me for the photos.

 5.00am on the 15th and we were ready to say goodbye to the flat,

and to Barty. He's a bit blurry because he wouldn't sit still, he kept wanting to get closer to Martyn.

Neville and Gloria gave us a ride to the airport, very convenient as their son Ray was flying home on the same flight as us. Tank yu tumas Neville and Gloria, lukem yu.

 All aboard Air Vanuatu, farewell to the Friendly Isles. What a wonderful time of challenge and blessing - Praise the Name of the Lord!

So what's next? That is in His hands 🙏 and this is possibly our last blog post. For the time being, we will be at home in Hamilton, looking for some contract work, and spending time with our parents.

Thank you to everyone who has taken an interest in our adventure, and especially to those who prayed for us and sent messages of encouragement. Please continue to pray for the people of  Vanuatu.

Last Few Days in the Tropics - Sunday 12th Nov

We had our last service at ICC (International Christian Church) in the morning. As always it was a lovely uplifting service. A few tears were shed by me (Annette).

Pastor Dave Wood speaking on a few different things that Faith is made from.

On Sunday evening, there was a free showing at ICC of the movie 'The Case for Christ', a true story about part of the life of Lee Strobel as he grappled with evidence around the death and resurrection of Jesus back in the 1970's. We highly recommend you watch it - it's a really good movie, very real, not preachy. Lee went on to write several books which have been recommended to us.

Last Few Days in the Tropics - Saturday 11th Nov

On Saturday night, we had a celebration dinner with all the staff at PCV. We had spent all afternoon at the trial, and had to do a very quick turn-around to get cleaned up and prettied up for an evening out, but we made it to the Harbour View restaurant only about 10 minutes after the start time, and several other staff were later than us 😉

Before the meal, there were speeches to thank the partners (PCANZ volunteers Neville, Gloria and us), farewell Elder Cyrilline Bani from her role as President of the PWMU, and to thank all staff for a good year's work and wish them all Merry Christmas.  

L-R: Neville and Gloria Jones, Cyrilline and her husband Elder Jara Bani, Martyn and me.

We were presented with frangipani leis (or salusalus) which some of the female staff had made that afternoon - the scent was heavenly!

Then we were given gifts - this photo shows us receiving a basket with Tanna coffee inside, presented by Pastor Allen Nafuki.  There were other gifts too: a sarong, a jar of Vanuatu shells collected and prepared by Yvonne our receptionist, along with bead and shell bracelets she had made and a framed picture of us with the PCV motto on it. We also gave some small gifts back to PCV.

There were thank you speeches, this one from Neville and Gloria who are returning next year for what will be their 4th year of service to PCV.

Then we all enjoyed the meal. What a lovely evening!

This will be our last post for a few days.  We have a lot of news to load,  which we will do when we get back to New Zealand,  We have many days to catch up on for our blog

Vanuatu Trials Championship

Saturday 11 November 2017

The second round of the Vanuatu Trials Championship was run.  Brett Harris is the Vanuatu Trials champion for 2017.

Here are the days results and overall championship results over two trials

Days results

Overall Championship Results

The 8 riders

Brett Harris (on the right) receiving the winners trophy

A few sections

Then the obeservor

Looking at a hill for a section ( we just moved the log into a suitable position for part of the section

Quick Update on Projects

I was able to be present at the opening of the tenders for the health care training course for next year, along with Elders Jara and Richard. There were 3 tenders and ours was opened last. It looked the best in its spiral binding, and we had the lowest tender price. We have since been informed that ours is the preferred tender, so that's great news. 

Another great piece of news is that the plans for the PWMU Hostel/Training Centre are underway. It has taken 7 months and there is no indication how much longer it might take, but still it is progress, and I am praising God for answering the prayers of many women, mine included, for this project to progress. 

Fun Time with Kirsty

We've been having lots of fun showing Kirsty some of our favourite places over the last few days, and exploring some new ones we hadn't been to previously.
But one of her highlights has to be her visit to Mt Yasur on Tanna Island which she did on her own. As a geologist it was a very special experience for her.

We visited Secret Garden, a cafe and garden complex with lots of cultural static displays. The cafe is jungle-themed, very cool, very quirky. They have a swimming pool and some bungalows for hire out the back. They do a kastom demonstration too, but we didn't get to see it that day.

Martyn got a tamtam from Ambrym for his birthday, not as big as ones we saw at the garden.

A new place for us was the Activ Centre, a very dynamic French woman's initiative to provide product development and a market for local produce, particularly cacao, spices, coconut oil, carvings and basketry. She works with local growers and artisans to bring their products to the attention of the world. One cacao grower has just been to Paris to compete in an international competition because he won an award for his product being ranked in the top 50 in the world.

We did a tour of their chocolate factory, which involved significant sampling of very nice chocolate!
Here the beans are being husked, powered by what looks like a commercial vacuum cleaner.

 The beans are partly dried in an oven and partly outdoors.

 Aelan is Island in Bislama. (ae sounds like I, not A, same as in Maori). Of course we had to buy some of their chocolate! It was very soft by the time we got it home and it's in the fridge now. It should be available in NZ soon in Oxfam stores.

Here a lady is scraping coconut with a motorised grinder, so the oil or coconut milk can be extracted for culinary or cosmetic uses.

 Next stop was the Reef -Vanuatu Zoological, where we have taken several visitors before. Here Kirsty gets to touch a green turtle - yes it was green with slime because it has been floating too much, but that's not why they are called green turtles. Actually I don't know why they're called green turtles, will have to find out. She is carrying the very colourful bag she bought at the Mamas' Market earlier.



These Fijian iguanas are very friendly.

 This Giant Petrel has been blown off-course, he should be down in NZ waters. If he is released here, someone will catch and eat him, but it is too expensive for The Reef to transport him home, they are only just getting their enterprise established. Ian the owner has dubbed him Happy Feet as whenever Ian approaches his cage, the bird gets very excited and slaps his feet on the perch.

Hideaway Island is one our top spots. The snorkelling wasn't that great that day, but the Mango Tango mocktails were perfect!

In the evening it was Fire Dance time at Mele Beach Bar. The sunset was beautiful and Kirsty really enjoyed the performance.

We went to Cascades the next morning and had a lovely cool swim in a natural rock pool. Unfortunately the only photos of Kirsty enjoying the waterfall and pool are on her camera back in NZ now, but here we are at the lookout over Port Vila Harbour.

That evening we went out to the Melanesian Resort for a combined birthday dinner for Martyn and me - we had a lovely meal, sorry no photos.

On Sunday afternoon, we went with Tony, Mary, Chris, Mahana, 2 of Chris's friends and the family's pigeon to Eton Beach for a swim and beach BBQ. As you do. The pigeon has been raised in captivity, along with 4 siblings which successively died, and young Chris has been saying for a while that it should be released. We agreed, although whether it can fend for itself is a moot point. Here is Martyn with said pigeon, Chris touching it and Grek just behind. Grek is one of the boys from the after-school reading class, so we know him well.

We tried releasing the pigeon on the roadside out of town, but there were too many other people around there, and also it couldn't fly well. We tried again at Eton Beach, and left it sitting on a branch across the road from where all the people were, but where we could see it. It seemed completely overwhelmed and just stayed on the branch. So it ended up coming back to the flat with us. Oh well, we tried. 

Monday involved devotions at work in the morning, where Kirsty was officially welcomed to Vanuatu by Pastor Allen. We had a swim at the Grand in the afternoon, and played Uno in the evening.

On Tuesday I took Kirsty to the home of Marie, one of the women I got to know on the oral health survey. She showed us how to cook simboro, one version of laplap. We got stuck in and grated the manioc, rolled it into small parcels wrapped it in island cabbage leaves, and Kirsty had a go at scraping the coconut flesh out of the shells to make fresh coconut milk with. Marie steamed it in a pot on the gas burner, and we had a small feast along with fresh pawpaw. Yum! Once again all the photos are on Kirsty's camera 😏Kirsty really enjoyed the morning - it was a special time sharing an everyday task with Marie and her sister, somethings most tourists don't get to experience.

All too soon her time was up, and off she flew back home. Not too sad for us as we will see her in just 1 week!

PCV Finance Manual Approved

This afternoon the PCV Finance Manual was reviewed and approved by the PCV Finance Committee.  I explained to the committee that this is only the starting point.  There will be other procedures to add, and to make changes to the current manual.  Any manual is a living document and should be under constant review and update. Tank yu tumas to all PCV staff.

Left to right, Serah Obed, Elder Jara Bani (Chairman), yours truly, Elder Jonny Albert and Elder Meto Nganga ( Financial Secretary). 

Two New Projects for Annette

After settling back into Port Vila life again, I was wondering what would fill my days now that the high seas adventure was over. It didn't take too long to find out.

Project 1: Assist a team of elders to prepare a tender.

A Tender I thought. No problem, that's what this Tigger does best! Pooh agreed and suggested that they find Piglet and Eeyore and have some hunny.  However, it's not for a construction project, it's to run a medical training course for the Ministry of Health (MOH). That's a bit removed from the tenders I am used to, but how hard can it be? It's surprising how similar the Conditions of Contract are to construction projects.  

I know almost nothing about the contents of the course, which is to train Village Health Care Workers to work in their isolated villages to help promote good health and provide basic first aid. There is a considerable amount of logistics involved though in getting people from all over the country to Port Vila, accommodation, catering etc for 8 weeks, plus a 2 week placement in various rural clinics around Vanuatu, so I have been tackling it much the same as I would a construction tender. 

Fortunately I had a great team to work with (Elder Jara - Korvan Training School Manager, Elder Jonathan - PCV Education, and Elder Richard - PCV Health), and they have run training courses for MOH before, so they know all the stuff I don't, I'm just helping put it all together. It was due to be submitted on 30th Oct - Martyn's birthday - and unfortunately I was working right up to the wire 😵. This was not helped by the print shop closing for lunch when the deadline was 2.00pm!

Here I am working on it with Jonathan, Jara, Donald (a retired nurse) and Tracey (the nurse who is going to be delivering the course should our tender be successful). Jara and I got it submitted in the nick of time 😅.

Project 2: Assist a team to determine what alterations are possible to the exiting PCV Office Building.
In light of there being a lack of motivation (and finances) to commit to the big flash 4 storey design,  we are looking at alternatives. Apparently the existing structure is strong enough to take another storey on top, however to be on the safe side we are proposing the addition of new columns on new footings around the exterior to support the upper floor load. There is also space to extend outwards along one side and one end, so it looks quite promising, and at significantly less cost than the new building. Still lots of questions and things to consider.

Kirsty has Arrived

Kirsty, our eldest daughter arrived very early Friday morning (midnight) for a 2 week visit. We had a lazy day just having a walk around Vila and buying fruit at the market e.g. red mangoes! They are not stringy like the green ones, but more expensive. Mmmm, mangoes 😋

Then on Saturday we took her around the island. It wasn't a very nice day, but we still had a paddle at Eton Beach and checked out the rocks (of course, she's a geologist!) and the coral.

We called in to visit Rongdal School, and Max the headmaster and instigator of the school showed us all around. He has done a lot of work since the last time we visited, even though he just survives on donations and the produce from the family farm which the children's parents help work on in payment of school fees that they have no money for.

On the way back from Havannah Harbour, we noticed a screw in one of the rear tyres, so Martyn took it to get repaired when we got back to Vila. Turns out there was a nail in a front tyre as well doing a very slow leak. So all good now and ready to go.

On Sunday afternoon we went to visit Cindy and the children. Samuel left for a conference in Paris just the morning Kirsty arrived, so she missed seeing him, but we had a nice swim down at Pango with Vita, William and Christopher, and got to see their house,

and the recently-completed cookhouse which was just a frame last time Martyn and I saw it.

They have got it very well set up.

 Vits is now 14, William 11 and Christopher 4. Ariv who is 6 lives with his grandmother down on Tanna. Cindy and Samuel now have their niece Lisa, approx 18 months, living with them as their daughter. This is quite common among Ni-Vanuatu families and throughout the Pacific. Unfortunately she was having a big afternoon nap when we visited so Kirsty didn't get to meet her, but Martyn and I saw her when we went out for dinner with Samuel and Cindy and all the children last week before Sam went away. She is a real cutie, and we realised afterwards that we forgot to take any photos!

On Monday it was Martyn's birthday, so on Sunday evening Kirsty and I cooked him a chocolate cake - not sure what she's looking so worried about, maybe the fact we can't tell what temperature the oven is at, or weigh any ingredients as we don't have any scales  😅 It still turned out okay.

Here is the birthday boy with his tamtam (slit drum carving) which we chose together, some cards and fresh flowers from the market.

Early on Tuesday morning, Kirsty set off for Tanna Island on a domestic flight, to go and see Mt Yasur, the most easily accessible, active volcano in the world. (well it is if you ignore the 90 minute trip from Hamilton to Auckland by road, 90 minute wait after the check in wait time, 3 hour flight to Port Vila, arriving at midnight, then a few days later a 30 minute flight to Tanna from Vila, a 90 minute drive from the accommodation to Mt Yasur, which includes driving across the ash field of Mt Yasur, and then the final easy bit a 10 minute walk up the final part of Mt Yasur from where the truck stops) She is very excited.