Ambae Ash

These before and after photos we just received this morning really bring home how bad the situation is on Ambae Island where Mount Lombenben is spewing out ash. Plans to declare the area a disaster zone are underway, and partial evacuation of the island is possible. It is not affecting us directly in Vila.

Baptism and BBQ at Blue Water

On Sunday, after our normal service at International Christian Church (ICC), we had a special baptism service followed by a BBQ at Blue Water on the SE coast of Efate. 

On our way we called in to see the Family Care Centre run by Marine Reach from NZ. It is a medical clinic for the Teouma area. We know some of the staff through ICC.

The facility has accommodation as well as treatment areas, for short or long-term volunteers, and they regularly host teams through YWAM (Youth With A Mission).

Nurse Anna showed Gloria a room which will be converted into a dental clinic, where Gloria will come and work sometimes.

 A medical treatment room.

 Cool mural in the foyer, painted by a volunteer.

 Back on the main road again and we passed Macses (pronounced Max's) School, a new school run by PCV, where Gloria has been doing teacher aid work and helping to get them set up with resources. The students are very keen to use whatever Gloria brings for them. They only have a bush toilet at the moment and no water tank yet - the staff bring bottles of water for drinking and hand washing (that is, if any hand washing takes place after visiting the bush toilet!)

Once we turned off the main road at Rentapau River, it was a long, rough dirt road to get to Blue Water, some of which looked like this.

But it was certainly worth it when we got there!

Blue Water has a pond set up where tourists can get close to turtles - one of them must have been about 1 1/2 metres long!

There was plenty of fresh sea water flowing into the pond, but still a shame to see them in captivity.

It is a great spot both for having a BBQ,

and for having full-immersion baptism.

Young Rebecca Rowan was one of ten people who declared that Jesus is their Lord and Saviour! Praise God!

We enjoyed a lovely swim BBQ after the service.

Back in Vila, it was time to clean the PCV truck after that muddy road. What a great day we all had.

RISO, no, RICOH, no, RISO

On Friday, PCV received a generous donation from Ifira Trust of a large copier. Before it arrived, there was talk of this Riso (pronounced ree so) machine coming, and several of us said no, it must be a Ricoh (pronounced ree ko). The staff prepared for a presentation of this machine on Thursday afternoon with a big afternoon tea and some gifts to present to the Chief and Elder who were due to arrive at 3pm. 

We waited and waited, and Ps Allen tried calling one of them to see if they were coming but no reply. He had just decided that we would eat the afternoon tea (lots of fruit which would not keep) when he got a phone call to say the Chief couldn't come, the Elder was on his way, but the copier would not arrive until Friday morning. So we eventually had the presentation without the copier.

Some mats and 2 books with a printed insert saying thanks for the Ricoh copier were handed over by Yvonne and me to Elder Kalpovi. 

The copier duly arrived on Friday morning, and we found out that it really is RISO, it's not a Ricoh at all! It is not a normal photocopier, it prints a stencil of each page which can then be used to run many copies, so it is only suited to large runs, ideal for producing their Assembly papers every year. The printing cost of these papers is enormous, so this gift should save a lot of money for PCV. We willingly apologised for our mistake.

World Oral Health Day

PCV Health and the Vila Central Hospital (VCH) dental team were involved in a joint awareness campaign down at the central market yesterday. I went down to see if I could help out.

There was an opening ceremony, and I started off sitting at the back of a group of chairs with a doctor I met there, called Toki, who comes from Mongolia and is working here for WHO. Then a group of school children arrived and needed the seats we were in, and I found myself ushered into the front row with representatives from Ministry of Health and Education and Dr Toki. Speeches were given, and salusalus (leis) presented,  including one for me! It was made from frangipane and smelled heavenly, but I was rather embarrassed as I didn't deserve it!

Dr Toki at centre front wearing a cap, dental assistant Barkon giving a speech - he was on the same sailing mission as me last year for the survey.

 PCV's Bob giving an impromptu speech.

 Two of my favourite girls from the after-school reading class last year, Leiwia on the left and Jennifer on the right. They were in the school class that came for the oral health promotion.

PCV's Morinda handing out toothbrush/paste packs. (Photo by Daily Post)

After the ceremony, there was fresh fruit for refreshment, then the team got stuck into doing free check-ups and handing out free toothbrushes with samples of Colgate toothpaste. There wasn't anything for me to do, so I went back to the office to work.

Today the rain has come back, after several dry days. We'd just got out of the habit of bringing our umbrellas every day 😏

The volcano on Ambae Island, is getting more active again, spewing ash over the west and south of the island. It is causing significant problems for the people there with food crops and water supplies being contaminated, also animals and people suffering from the fumes in the air. I pray they won't have to be evacuated again like they were last year.

Week 2 and Getting some Work Done

Our week has been partially productive. Martyn eventually got access to the computer files he needed, lost access, and then got it back again. He is still in the process of trying to get the information for 2014 onwards from the bank the bank charges exorbitantly for them!, so will need to resort to Plan "B". 

I have been working on bits and pieces:

• The proposed PWMU Training Hostel plans are underway by the wonderful local Engineer who is doing it for free.
• 2 separate grant applications are underway
• Writing lesson plans for the Village Health Worker (VHW) training course (this was due to start in mid Jan originally but will now start in April most likely). Thought I'd left writing lesson plans behind when I left Wintec 😆.

• I helped out by taking the banking down to the ANZ bank, and sat for an hour waiting to be served, as is common at certain times of the day. Not sure what all the balloons were for that day. I'm happy to go again next time as it is air-conditioned in there!

• I also attended the signing of the contract between Ministry of Health and Korvan for the VHW course. You may remember that I was involved in preparing a tender for this late last year, which we found out had been successful just before we went home. The signing marks a big step forward, and we have to get everything ready quickly now for the course to start, even though we don't have a definite start date yet. If this year's course goes well, there should be more to come in future, which is very exciting to be a part of.

 R - L Pastor Allen, the Minister of Health, and a representative from Australian High Commission. Australian Government are funding the course, as they have been for many years with other organisations delivering it.

 Ps Allen and the Minister of Health Jack Kalmet

 Nicola Young (also working through PCANZ), Iou from Ministry of Health, Elder Jara and me. Elder Richard took the photo. Nicola is a Kiwi nurse with a Masters in Public Health, she will be assisting a local nurse to deliver the training.

Here is the article in Monday morning's Daily Post newspaper.

• I also attended our first Building Committee meeting for the new office project this year. Unfortunately the Chairman and others from outside PCV staff did not attend (we had this problem at least once last year) so we did not manage to progress very far. It is very frustrating.

At the flat, we have a new front fence to keep the dogs off the terrace! Here are before, during and after shots. We are really impressed with what Chris, at Tony's instruction, has built for us 👍

Ignore the red chair and small fridge on the terrace and the black chair in the driveway - they have all been moved. Don, that's the same chair you used to occupy, but in much worse state now.

So no more dogs on the terrace, except the puppies are getting more mobile and adventurous each day! We didn't expect Tony to do this for us, we're blown away.

Cyclone Linda has slipped away without affecting us, and although we still get heavy showers now and then, it is mostly fine and much easier to get washing dry. I washed the mosquito net over our bed the other day, wrestling it a bit at a time into a wash bowl, getting myself quite well-washed at the same time! I won't try doing it when Martyn is at work next time, it's much easier as a 2 person job.

Cooking Class

Annette invited Aida to come around to our flat so that Annette could give Aida some cake baking lessons.  Aida operates a cafe in one of the containers owned by the PCV. Aida previously worked on cruise liners, and spent some time in NZ as a RSE (seasonal worker). There she saved money to enable her to purchase the equipment she needed to set up the cafe. She wanted to learn to bake, and Annette offered to help Aida.  

On Saturday the first cooking lesson.  And Aida did very well, a yummy chocolate cake...... Lesson Nambawan Ticked .

A new tropical cyclone is forming in the region. 

Tropical Cyclone Linda is west of New Caledonia, a high pressure system east of Sydney region with associated ridge over the southwest Pacific. TC Linda is a Cat 1 at this stage.

Cloud associated with TC Linda has extend over central and eastern Solomon Islands.

A trough over Papua New Guinea, another trough north of Samoa, and between Tuvalu and Kiribati.

Commissioning Service for PCV Staff

Monday morning brought a special church service in PMC church, next door to the PCV office, to commission all the office and health staff for the year. 

The Moderator of South Efate Presbytery Ps Kalkot lead the service.

Ps Nippy Aiong gave a sermon.

All the staff wore their PCV uniform shirts, including us, who only received ours this morning.

Almost all the staff of PCV.