New Friend...

Being at home with the kids and working in the Melanesian Field Office with other (English speaking) missionaries has made it a challenge to make new friends among our PNG national neighbors.  One of our first new friends was Meti.  She has been involved with our (stunted) language studies and coming to our house once a week to help with the household & the kids.  She is such a wonderful woman with a heart full of love.  She is on station with a missionary family every day of the week and is involved in her local church and NMI (Nazarene Missions International).

Last week we found out Meti was in the hospital due to a severe allergic reaction.  Randy and the kids had gone to visit her on Monday and on Tuesday he called me at the office to see if I wanted to come along and bring lunch to Meti.  (Each patient at the hospital here has to have a person to bring them food and help take care of them during their stay.) When we got there we found out that someone in her village had died so no one had been able to come to her and her son had to go to his school to pick something up.  Judy had brought her coffee and breakfast before she left for town, but Meti didn't think anyone would be able to bring her any lunch.  She was so excited when we came to her, "Randy, you heard the Spirit of God talk to you. Thank you!"

“So don’t worry about these things, saying, ‘What will we eat? What will we drink? What will we wear?’ These things dominate the thoughts of unbelievers, but your heavenly Father already knows all your needs." Matthew 6:31-32 (NLT)

Some Family Fun

 In the valley behind our house there is a river.  It is a source of sustenance for the local people, providing drinking water, washing water, bathing water....and plenty of entertainment.  One of the popular activities for the teenagers, visitors & guys on station is to float the river on an inner-tube.  My kids are very jealous of all the times Randy has been tubing, but often the river is either moving too fast or too shallow and rocky for it to be safe for the kids.  When we went down to play at the river a little while ago we noticed that the local villagers had created a nice tubing channel on one side of the river so the next day we went back with some tubes and had some great family fun.  Here are the pictures:

Daddy & Lexi

Daddy and Ethan (Look!  They match!)

Daddy & Emma (Notice he still got to go more often than anyone else!  How does he do that?)

Mommy even got a turn! (have you ever tried tubing in a skirt?)

The kids got to go solo in the wading area right next to the tubing run.

Emma's just chillin!

As much fun as our family had playing in the river, I think there might have been even more fun had by all the people watching us...and laughing.  We talked about it on the way home, how they were laughing because we are so much different than what they are used to and how we provided some entertainment and laughter in their day.  Emma decided, "I would be happy to provide them with this kind of entertainment any time!"

Count Your Blessings...

I have had the song Count Your Blessings in my mind lately, so here I go:

1.  We have been adjusting to life in a new culture and climate with minimal stress.  Thank you Lord!

2.  Randy's current work project requires him to run all over the station (about 1km from end to end).  More than once he commented how much easier it would be to do this on a bike instead of walking...our church family heard of this and took a special bike offering.  He now has a great bike that helps him speed all over the station.  Thank you Lord!

3.  We didn't know where the funds for Emma's schooling at the MK school would come from, but they are coming in from unexpected gifts.  Thank you Lord!

4.  We got to get off-station for a trip to Goroka last weekend while Randy attended a Mission Technology Conference.  A great time of learning, sharing & connecting for Randy and a great time of exploring and new experiences for all.  Thank you Lord!

5.  I had the opportunity to go to a Woman's gathering in the Ming district.  What an amazing experience.  Hearing the messages that God had given to Gail Dooley and Kathy Radcliffe to share was great.  Hearing the testimonies of the women who shared the ride home with us was awe inspiring.  Thank you Lord!

6.  We have had some chilly evenings/mornings so I was trying to figure out how to get some extra blankets for the kids.  A gentleman that was here with a Work & Witness team from Missouri sent me an email telling me that he and his wife had made and sent some fleece blankets for the kids.  Thank you Lord!

7.  Randy and I are doing a parenting class with 2 national couples.  It has been a great time to get to know these people and get away for one evening a week.  Three visiting college students took turns watching our kids each week for the past couple of months so we could do this.  Thank you Lord!

8.  The other two missionary families that have kids around the same ages as mine are heading back to the states in December for 4 months of Home Assignment.  I didn't want our first Christmas away from Port Orchard to be lonely for the kids, with no friends or family to celebrate with.  Nana & Papa are arriving on December 18th for a 6 week stay.  Thank you Lord!

9.  We live next to the Guest House on station and we have had a stream of neighbors to get to know and kids for mine to play with.  There are some great people serving in all kinds of different ways here in PNG. Thank you Lord!

10.  God has been true to His promise to meet all of our needs according to His glorious riches in Christ Jesus.  THANK YOU LORD!!!!

There is nothing special about 10, but those came to mind this morning...I could keep going for quite a while but I have to go to town for groceries (thank you Lord for your provision!).  I would encourage you to take a few moments to review and write down some of the blessings in your own life.  It is too easy to miss them.... don't let them slip by with out thanking the One that all good and perfect things come from!

Visit to a Bush Church...

So last week Jim & Kathy Radcliffe invited us to go to a bush church with them on Sunday morning.  This is something that a lot of the missionaries and visitors at Kudjip do on a regular basis and there are plenty in the surrounding area to choose from.  The key is that if you visit a bush church you are expected to share something, if not deliver the morning sermon.  It had been a busy Saturday with Lexi's birthday party at the Highlander Hotel in Mt. Hagen (about an hour away) and the kids were off kilter from lack of naps and excess sugar & sunshine, but we decided that since the Radcliffes and the Deuels were going there would be enough kid backup help.

On Sunday morning we met at 8:30 to head to Banz, about 20-30 minutes away.  Kathy led us in practicing "At Calvary" the song that we would be singing in Pidgin as a group special and asked which of us were going to be sharing a testimony.  Karla Deuel and Joani were the volunteers and we learned that we would share during the sermon that Jim Radcliffe would be bringing.  All the arrangements had been made in time for us to focus on finding the driveway past the EBC church that had a wooden bridge.  Lest you imagine a carefully engineered structure built to withstand 200 times the weight it would ever be called upon to hold...in reality there were two logs across the ditch with half-split logs laying across them.  We made it up the driveway and arrived only a few minutes late to the meeting at the house church of Mr. Baru and his wife Sr. Christina.

Mr. Baru is the Health Administrator at the hospital and Sr. Christina is a nursing supervisor.  They had been feeling the call to start a home church for quite some time and 10 weeks ago it was launched.  The church has already grown to around 60 and has been seeing many people come into the Kingdom.  They are reaching people from drug lifestyles and broken homes and introducing them to life in Christ. 

The service went well.  It was a morning of "God-Incidences" with the songs and message and testimonies flowing together seamlessly.  I had to give Jim a bad time because he used all of the verses I had in my testimony in his sermon!  The kids were a little restless, but the Spirit was sweet and when Jim closed with an alter call some 10 people went forward.  We were basking in the beautiful morning sun, visiting with the church members and gathering at the van when we were asked if some of us would be willing to pray with some people.  They also let us know that they had some fruit and vegetables from their gardens that they wanted to give us so we loaded up heaps of oranges, tangerines, guava, passion fruit, cucumbers, peppers, pineapple, bananas, papaya & even a watermelon.  Everyone had a snack and before long we were on our way. 

Once we were in the car we heard the rest of the story from Jim..."we had a private time of special prayer and counseling for two couples who had come from Catholic background who wanted to really turn their lives and families over to God. They had wanted to pray but did not feel comfortable with coming forward in the evangelical tradition. It was a special time as they prayed to receive Christ into their hearts as Lord and Savior."  WOO-HOOO!  There is a party going on in Heaven tonight! 

I was tired, the kids were tired, there was screaming and complaining and whining and crying, but knowing that 4 lives were forever changed made it all worth while!  This was most definitely a blog worthy day.  Thank you all...for making this adventure possible.

The Choir!

It is actually an "under" house church!

A Beautiful Morning...

It is a beautiful morning here at Kudjip Station.  The sun is up but I cannot see it for the blanket of clouds and mist that is heavy in the sky.  The birds are singing a happy melody from their perches in nearby trees.  My children and husband are sleeping in a little later than usual and I am able to just sit and be.  This does not happen often as life here is constant activity of one kind or another.

Our days are filled with Randy and I juggling who has work that needs to be done and who will stay home and take care of the home-front.  There are meals to prepare, arguments to referee, dishes to wash, laundry to do, walks around station, dishes to wash, trips to the river, floors to sweep, playtime with friends, dishes to wash, owies to kiss, neighbors to greet, and lots of fun and laughter.

The norm is that there is always something different.  This week for example we are going to Barnabas House to have dinner with a visiting Work & Witness team from Missouri on Friday night and we are hosting Jordan and Rachel Thompson for dinner on Saturday as they pack up and prepare to leave PNG for a time.  Yesterday Scot Dooley and Randy took our combined 6 kids down to the river for an afternoon of fun in the sun and water. 

Our work "normal" has changed here as well.  I work at the Melanesia/South Pacific Field Office as the Field Treasurer for these two fields.  I had learned in Port Orchard that as the kids got older it was too difficult to try to do my work at home so when it is my turn to work I walk down the road past 3 or 4 houses to get to the office.  The accounting system we use is on-line which may not seem unusual to the average American, but it has significant implications here in PNG.  Here the power is very unstable and when the national power goes out and the station generator has to kick in, it knocks out the internet everywhere on station except the Field office that has a back-up power supply.  Then there is the internet itself which is brought to us via Satellite, but is the equivalent of dial-up service.  Again, not so bad until you learn that there are some 30 registered users that must all share this service.  You can see how all this complicates trying to do all the accounting on-line!

This is where Randy's job comes in!  His main project right now is fixing the existing station networking and internet infrastructure so that the lower end of the station doesn't end up without any internet for months at at time anymore.  Then he is working on trying to upgrade the service and manage the use of what we do have so that critical processes like e-mail and the online accounting and Facebook (probably not REALLY critical, but when it allows you to keep in touch with the folks back home it sure does seem that way) can happen at all times and things like YouTube, streaming video and uploading massive amounts of pictures has to wait until there is extra bandwidth available.  The most common comment is that the internet is screaming fast at 2 am!

Well, the rest of the family has joined me, and while they are watching Dora instead of enjoying the quiet beauty of the morning, I think I will sign off and spend some time snuggling!

The Kids...

I get a lot of questions about how the kids are adjusting to life at Kudjip Station.  In two words my answer has been, "Very well!"  I will now take the opportunity to expand on that and give everyone (especially the grandparents and cousins!) a glimpse into the new normal for Emma, Lexi and Ethan.

First of all is school.  Emma has gone from 1st grade at Mullenix Elementary School to 1st grade at MK school.  It has been a little bit of adjustment as there are fewer kids and different curriculum, but Emma has been handling like a champ! She has really enjoyed having prayer time and Bible study as part of her school day and she LOVES getting out at noon on Fridays.  I, on the other hand, am not used to this change in schedule and am often met with, "Mom, why are you making my lunch?  It's Friday!"

Emma at her desk

Good-bye party for one of the Tutors from the Swiss Mission

Each afternoon the students have a different focus.  On Monday it is RI (religious instruction) Tuesdays are PE, Wednesdays are Music, Thursdays are Art and Fridays as I mentioned earlier are and early release day.  Here is a picture of the girls in music and Aunt Kathy (the music teacher) singing a song for English lotu (the monthly English church service)

Aunt Kathy and the music class

For Easter the MK school had a little party to celebrate the incredible gift of salvation and the unfathomable grace of God.  Of course there was an egg hunt as well, but this being PNG the kids used bilams instead of baskets.  After the egg hunt the kids delivered eggs filled with gifts to the children staying at the hospital.

Emma passing out Easter eggs at the Hospital

Ethan looking for eggs to put in his bilam

 Lexi has really come into her own here, with several new friends around her age that give us opportunities for play dates and the chance to spread her wings without always having big sister around.  She has to run to the window or door to say "hi" to everyone who walks past our house and often invites people over for dinner without checking with us first!  She has really enjoyed being able to visit Uncle Bill's garden across the drive to have her fill of cherry tomatoes & berries.  She also has taken full advantage of the Cherry Guava tree next to the house.  If we can't find Lexi, chances are she is high up in the tree in our front yard pretending she is a monkey!

Rain Bugs! (Olivia and Lexi)

 A favorite activity that doesn't require any special transportation is a trip to the river in the valley behind our house.  On this particular day it was a full-fledged event with the Dooleys and the Kerr girls, poor Randy and Ethan were severely outnumbered!

Girl Power!

this girl has had mud on at least one part of her body since we arrived!!!

A feat of engineering...building a dam to create a swimming hole in the river

 

The boy has always loved water!

Ethan...we aren't quite sure what has happened to Ethan!  It may have been the radiation from all the security checkpoints along our journey or possibly something in the water, but our little boy has become quite a different little boy.   The rather quiet, somewhat shy little guy that has been known to lay down on the floor and cover up his face so that you can't see him anymore can now be found shaking hands with every stranger he meets, chattering non-stop at people who can't understand him or running down the road yelling what sounds like war cries at the top of his lungs!  Mom & Dad's favorite change of all, hands down, is that he is FINALLY potty trained.  He is still getting used to all the walking we do around the station and in the beginning  when he had had enough he would squat down in the road and say, "I'm too short!"

Here is a picture of Ethan and one of his new friends in the Maintenance department.  Apa was supposed to be mowing the grass in the park down the road, but my kids were a little bit of a distraction!

One afternoon the Dooley girls were up for a visit so they decided to build a fort under the guava tree.  Lucky for them Randy was clearing out the banana grove so there was plenty of available building materials.

Banana leaf fort under the guava tree. 

Emma has been a very popular name for girls around Emma's age and younger in the states.  Little did we know it was a common name here at Kudjip too...

The 3 Kudjip Emmas

One benefit of living at a mission hospital station (besides the obvious of being surrounded by doctors) is that there is a constant stream of visiting doctors and medical students.  One medical student who made a big impression with my kids was Uncle Jordan.  I am thinking that he might have enjoyed them almost as much...we miss you Uncle Jordan!

Emma, Lexi, Uncle Jordan & Ethan

We were told that the neighbors were complaining that it was too quiet after the Riggins family with their 3 small boys moved out, have no fear neighbors...the Goossens Kids are here!  For better or worse the neighborhood will never be the same :)

Life at Kudjip...

 Ok, I realize that we have been here a month and I haven't yet made good on my promise to get better about the frequency of my blog entries.  Let me remind you that it is Easter weekend and a time of renewed focus on forgiveness!

First let me cover some basics...

This is the fabulous view from the back of our house:

This is my fabulous husband headed off on a walk-about:

This is my dishwasher (not so fabulous!!):

Our first package, definitely fabulous that it arrived before Easter since it contained the kid's Easter outfits, candy and plastic eggs! 

We pooled resources with the Kerr family at the Bible College today.  We colored eggs (their contribution) hunted for eggs filled with candy (our contribution) and generally had a great time hanging out together.

I think I have mentioned going to town.  I don't know if I have mentioned that we have a couple of vehicles on station that all the missionaries & doctors share.  We each pay a per kilometer price when we use the vehicle.  Since it is about $60 USD for a trip to Mt. Hagen we try to carpool (and split the cost) as often as possible.  On this particular day Gail was our driver and we took the van so we would have enough room for the 5 of us and the groceries for 3 families:

This is Gail and I at the Mt. Hagen market.  This is probably my favorite and most drastic difference from the states.  What used to cost $40 or more per week for produce now runs somewhere around $10 a week and it is some of the best produce you can imagine. 

Well, it has taken me the better part of the afternoon to get these photos uploaded.  I think I need to take a break and figure out what we are having for dinner at the Goossens house!  I have already picked out some pictures to to a "kid update" for the next blog entry.  Maybe tonight... maybe tomorrow...we will see!

Love from PNG,

The Goossens

11 days out of touch and off the grid- Part 4

Emma has had a fever for the last couple of days. It seems that were are all fighting off something (and losing) as we all feel under the weather. Many of the kids here walk around with a perpetual runny nose. We’re trying to be good about washing hands and limiting exposure but the cultural lack of personal space and continual shaking hands, even with people you may have seen only a half hour before, has made it hard. Doctor Scott from Kudjip loaded us up with some industrial strength first aid supplies including children’s Tylenol and even some general antibiotics if we need them. We can radio for advice if it lasts more then a few days or gets worse.

It got worse...
We now all have gotten the flu except Ethan who had some kind of allergic reaction and is covered in angry looking hives and a rash. On top of it all Joani hurt her back and has been laid up in bed for 2 ½ days. So much for the rest and relaxation part of the trip. We got through it but let’s just say it wasn’t fun.

I treated my first “patient” yesterday. Many doctors have spent time here and they occasionally run a clinic on the front porch. I guess he assumed that I was a doctor too and showed up for treatment. He had a badly infected cut on his finger wrapped in a dirty rag. He came up to the porch, politely introduced himself and attempted some small talk in pidgin. He then showed me his finger and asked if I could help. The best I could do was clean it and give him some Neosporin and a band aid. I told him I wasn’t a doctor but it didn’t matter to him. He then proceeded to ask me about some sores he had in his mouth. After once again letting him know I wasn’t a doctor, I told him that the best I could recommend was to rinse out his mouth with warm salt water three times a day. The oral health of these people is a definite problem and many people are missing the majority of their teeth with swollen gums and lesions. I’m sure their limited diet, ready access to sugar cane and no dental care is a huge factor. I hope things get better for him. It’s amazing what a little medical care would do to improve these people’s lives.

Finally the whole family is well just as we are wrapping up our trip to Dusin. We’ve genuinely made new friends and learned a lot over the last few days. In addition I feel a lot more confident being away from the familiar and much more willing to go rustic and into the bush again. In comparison to what the first missionaries went through in this place, our time has really been easy. I believe it was also a good opportunity to reset our expectations of what the basics of life really are. For the long run it has made me realize how absolutely blessed we are in the US and that there are places in this world where people live their whole lives on a mountaintop without the things we consider a necessity. We look forward to settling into our new lives in Kudjip.

Below are a few picture we took that we really like.  There's more on Joani's Facebook page that you can link to here http://www.facebook.com/#!/profile.php?id=768379851

(There's nothing like looking down on a cloud)

(Yes, I fully intend to live out my Indianna Jones fantasy)

Sitting on "The Stone" high above the valley floor on the edge of nowhere...

11 days out of touch and off the grid- Part 3

We brought a couple of Frisbees, a soccer ball and a Nerf football. All we had to do is open the front door with the balls in our hands and the kids and adults alike were ready for a rugby or soccer match on the grass in front of the house. Sometimes they would play both at the same time with the two games overlapping and some players involved with both games. After about eight days, both balls were completely worn out and destroyed. This is a testimony to how hard their bare feet are from a lifetime of walking in the bush with no shoes.

One of the closest relationships that we have is with Pastor Dixon. He is the local pastor of the church at Dusin. He’s about 5’0 with a huge grinning smile. He speaks English but knows why we are in Dusin so he repeats everything we talk about in Pidgin several times so we can get the hang of it.

(Pastor Dixon is on the left.  Coincidently, one of his sons is named Randy…)

A few people have given us produce from their gardens which is their main and in some cases, only source of food. We got a few bananas and a bunch of hard green fruit we found were a type of passion fruit. At first we could’nt figure out how to eat them since they were full of seeds, until we saw how the local kids ate them. It turns out that they hold them by the stem, break open the rind and slurp out the inside seeds and all. I tried it and it was delicious. Unfortunately my system wasn’t used to it and I got a case of “runny tummy” as my Fijian friend Sam calls it. We also got a pile of the biggest green onions I’ve ever seen which they eat raw for breakfast, a pumpkin (which we don’t know how to prepare into a meal) and some corn.

Ethan has a new favorite game. He loves chasing the chickens while saying here kakaruk, here kakaruk (Pidgin for chicken) I’m still waiting to see what happens when he catches one.

Today I walked around station for half a day in my swim trunks and a t-shirt waiting for the daily rain. Due to a leak in the tank, we went through our supply of water alarmingly fast. We were in full conservation mode since we didn’t want to run out of water with eight or nine days to go. The reason for the swim trunks was to try to get a ‘free shower” without using the household supply. It worked. It’s amazing how a little shampoo in the pouring rain refreshes you. I was able to fix the leaks in the tank’s plumbing a few days later and soon we had all the water we needed. This was good since our alternative was a hike to the river 5 km away and down the side of a mountain about 1000’ feet below.

(That's the river at the bottom of the valley)

11 days out of touch and off the grid- Part 2

The people here are amazing! Here we are a strange family with three little pikininnies (children) and they are so warm and welcoming. Of course we didn’t speak pidgin but a smile and friendly gesturing goes a long way. We had to be careful because some of our common gestures from back home are more friendly then we intend them to be. Winks and raised eyebrows to the wrong person could create quite a scandal.
Our pile of supplies quickly disappeared as some men took it upon themselves to carry our gear to the house which was a few hundred feet from the airstrip. Our flying link to the outside world (ie. Our last chance to chicken out) left and would return for us in 10 or 11 days.

Blessedly we had as fellow travelers Pastor Yambe Seki who was coming for the Middle Ramu District Assembly and Thompson who was from Dusin. Both of them speak very good English, but they had other things to attend to and the point of this trip was not to have personal translators to hold our hands. The idea was to jump into the deep end and figure it out as we go. This isn’t as scary as it sounds since the Nazarene church has been in this area for some time. Still I now know what it’s like to be in the minority. Between our pale complexions and Lexi and Ethan’s blond hair and blue eyes, there was no way we were going to just blend in. Besides there are also very few places where I am the tallest person around.

(This is Pastor Dixon on the left.  He hosted us while at Dusin and basically made sure we didn't die by doing something dumb....)

One of the hardest things to get used to here is always having an audience for everything we do. It’s not rude to stare at someone in this culture if you are interested and there is no concept of personal space. Our house seems to be the accepted hangout for the local kids. The house has a large front porch with windows that look directly into the kitchen. It’s not unusual to have a dozen or more kids staring at you as you’re eating or doing the dishes. I’m just glad the bathroom is at the back of the house with a window eight feet off the ground.

It’s a challenge to get acclimated to this way of living. This trip is mainly about getting to know these wonderful people, learning the language and recuperating from many months of preparation, travel and emotional goodbyes. The driven, goal oriented life that I’m used to doesn’t exist here. I took off my watch a few days ago and only occasionally think about the time. What’s important here are the relationships between people and the basics of life. We see adults head down the mountain at daybreak to tend there gardens but there seems to be plenty of time to sit and just be. Everywhere you see people greeting each other, shaking hands and talking. Except for the clothes they are wearing and a small bag called a bilum, they don’t have much. Yet they seem happy.

We must look like space aliens to them with our digital cameras, ipods, flashlights and a different change of cloths everyday. It’s hard to take pictures of people being “natural” because every time I take out my camera they crowd around me to see the screen on the back. One more example that there’s no such thing as personal space here.

Joani posted a lot more pictures on her face book page so if you haven't sent a friend request yet, she can be found as Joani Goossens.

11 days out of touch and off the grid- Part 1

We’re finally getting settled in our new home at the mission station in Kudjip, PNG. About a week ago we got back from a wonderful place called Dusin that is a bit farther “out in the bush”. Since we had no phone, internet or electricity for that matter, we were keeping an “analog blog” using pencil and paper. So what follows are some of the things that happened while we were there. If anyone wants to hear more, drop me an e-mail and I would love to share in more detail or answer specific questions.
randy.goossens@gmail.com.


-Randy

11 days out of touch and off the grid- Part 1

After being in Papua New Guinea for only two days we boarded a Mission Aviation Fellowship (MAF) plane for Dusin located at 5800 ft elevation, deeper in the highlands. The locals can get there on foot but I’m told it’s nearly impossible for a newbie westerner like me to get there except by bush plane.

Dusin was one of the original Nazarene mission stations established in 1955, in the remote highlands of PNG. It now has a grass airstrip that is somewhere in the neighborhood of 1100’ long with an 11 deg. slope. It’s located on the side of a mountain with one end that drops off sharply to the valley below and the other end terminating at a heavily treed peak that comprises the rest of the mountain. To find out more about the history of the place in the old days, you can read the book “The Edge of Nowhere by Daryl A. Schendel”

Our purpose for coming here was to begin to learn Pidgin and get to know the culture that we are now living in. Except for the pilots that dropped us off, we were the only westerners. Dusin has no roads, no power and no communication with the outside except for the shortwave radio used to report the weather for the bush planes coming in and emergency communication with the mission station at Kudjip. Even so immediate outside help was not an easy option.

The flight from Mt. Hagen only takes about 30 minutes but it takes a healthy national three days of walking and one day in a PMV (the local public transportation) to go from Dusin to Mt. Hagen. They say we have Malo Malo legs (It means soft or mushy, like the runway was) and we wouldn’t make it because there are mountains to climb, rivers to ford and a maze of people speaking one or more of the 800 different languages of Papua New Guinea. I’m glad to say we arrived safe and sound after a bumpier than usual flight. The pilot said that the weather had deteriorated since that morning’s report and we had to do a couple of flybys to find a hole in the clouds. Even so I never saw the runway until we were 30 seconds from landing. I was warned ahead of time that because of the runway’s length and slope, the pilots intentionally stall the plane right before setting down. He told me when you hear the stall alarm, you know you’re doing it right.

We climbed down the ladder from the plane and our feet sank into the soft surface of the airstrip. It seemed that everyone in the area turned out for the arrival of the plane. So there we were, a family of five standing on a mountaintop with 250 lbs of gear as the plane turned around, took off and disappeared into clouds that seemed to be gathering right at the end of the runway.

(Note: This is a slightly smaller plane that came in and left again later in the week.  I didn't get a chance to get a video of ours but it gives a good view of the runway and flight conditions. All together there were two other flights in and out during our time in Dusin, but the planes were too small for our whole family to get out in one trip.)

 

We have a comfortable house to stay in that used to be the home of Verne Ward and his family for eight years. We packed in the food we would need and water came to us courtesy of the almost daily rain showers that filled the tank on the side of the house. “Running” water was provided by the hand pump mounted outside. It’s very nice by local standards but compared to back home, it is best described as “rustic”.

We're on our way...

We are in the last crunch of getting ready to leave.  We fly out Sunday the 13th at noon and after 6 airports and 10,250 miles (give or take) we will arrive at Mt. Hagen, Papua New Guinea on Wednesday the 16th.  For those of you that have been asking, here is our new mailing address.

Randy and Joani Goossens
P.O. Box 456
Mt. Hagen, WHP 281
Papua New Guinea

We will see you on the other side of the world!
The Goossens

Huston...We have a work permit!

We recieved the official word this week that Randy's work permit has been granted!  Thank you, Lord!  It came the night before his last day of work at Jevco...what timing!  I got all the paperwork sent off to the PNG Embassy in Washington DC today for our entry permits and we continue to work long and hard on getting our house ready to rent. 

Thank you for all the support in working on our house and praying for all the "stuff" that needs to happen between now and when we leave for the field.  We appreciate everyone who invests in our lives and ministry so much.  Blessings to each and every one of you!

Suitcases, boxes and bags, Oh My!

We are in the middle of an exercise called being prepared, yet flexible.  This is quite an adventure!  We have suitcases in the corner of the living room that are being packed for the journey to PNG, we have boxes scattered around the house that are being packed with belongings to be stored while we are gone and we are trying to maintain some sort of normalcy for the kids in the midst of it all.

The big change this week is that Randy has gone down to working 3 days a week.  This is a huge help in all of the preparations that still need to be taken care of.  (It is also nice to have him around more!).

Next week is another big step as we move out of our house so we can get it all cleaned up and rented out.  We will be staying with Oma and Opa (aka Randy's parents or Jack and Ingrid) until D-day.  If our careful planning pans out (and the PNG government cooperates) we will be there 2-3 weeks.

Well, I had better get going...the kids are playing and the boxes are calling my name! Happy Saturday to all!

Here we are...

Whirlwind...

I am having difficulty knowing where to even start since my last post.  It has been an amazingly good, amazingly busy time for us. The holidays were a wonderful time with family from near and far. Since then I have been steadily packing up our lives...Randy notices something new that is missing almost every day.  The big accomplishment on the house front is getting the tired, worn out carpet out and installing the new wood laminate floor.  It looks amazing, thanks to my very handy (and handsome) husband!  I have been training my replacement at the daycare and it looks like we have finally found my replacement at the church (thank you, Lord!).  It is a good thing as my hard-drive is running out of space after a training session on my new responsibilities in PNG.  Our paperwork has hit a small bump in the road, so we are playing it by ear as far as getting out of our house and Randy's final day at work.  It may shift from the beginning of February to the middle of the month...we shall see.

I feel a little guilty about the infrequency of my posts, I am hoping that I will be able to get into the swing of things and be more regular with the updates once we have finished with all the chaos of this transition.

We are so thankful for all of the support and prayers of our amazing family and friends.  You guys are gifts from God in our lives!