Tyler and Emily in PNG

Here in PNG their is a prepay system for electricity. You pay first for units or credits, then you input a series of digits into the meter. Once the credits you purchased expire, you have no more power until you buy more credits. It makes it impossible for the power company to loose money, you are never indebted to the power company.

Check out this video:

Read Full Post »

The songs titles and lyrics are rolling through my mind…I’m leaving on a jet plane don’t know when I will be back again…I’m coming to America, today…Mama, I’m coming home. Can you name the artist’s?

So yes, one of the longest days of my life will be here this Sunday. It will be 44 hours long. I leave PNG at 6:15 am and arrive Hawaii 45 minutes later after traveling through two countries…hum, I love time travel but I don’t think my body will enjoy it too much.

This last week I am finishing last minute projects that I had going and have meetings with folks about my duties that will be left unattended. Many of the team members already feel my absence and wonder, what we will do when Tyler leaves. Well, I don’t think they will miss me that much and I know they will survive. The year 2012 will be another survival year for the branch here in PNG. I am the sixth and final person to leave on furlough so far this year. The manpower and team members are dwindling.

As I came to work on Monday, I had a odd thing going on with the satellite internet. We could send/receive emails without problem but when we would try to go to a webpage an error came, ‘111 connection refused’. I checked the router/firewall and found the web proxy log has completely full. Over 12 GB of logs, so being a Linux machine I had to reach out to our external consultant for help. He promptly cleared the log but that was not the problem. He found out from a recent change on our external network that someone changed a cable around. The cable was suppose to be plugged into the LAN port but someone moved in to the WAN port thus causing mass confusion on the network. Once this was found, webpages were functioning as normal. I hope the rest of my week is much more calmer and no big problems flare up.

Please pray that my travels will be smooth and all my flights will be on-time. Pray that customs and immigration officers will be pleasant to work with. Pray for strength and health as I travel and prepare the long arduous journey. Continue to pray for the plans that lie ahead and the busy schedule of events once I return to mainland USA.

It has been a great journey so far in PNG and I am leaving with joy in my heart. A joy that God has given me and an assignment to bring God’s word to the people of PNG. I am eager to leave for this period of time but excited for the plans God has ahead of me.

Commit to the LORD whatever you do, and he will establish your plans. Proverbs 16:3 (NIV)

Read Full Post »

The past few weeks I have been reviewing quotes and trying to arrange for a contractor to come and redo my gutters. The old gutters were probably 30 years old and rusty. Some spots had holes 3 feet long so yes, it was definitely past time to replace the gutters.

This was a very important task because this is how I collect water. I have a big water tank under my front porch which collects all the rainwater from the roof. Up until today, most of that rainwater was going straight through my gutters to the ground.

I was getting settled on a quotation which I found through investigative work that PVC/plastic gutters were less expensive than steel/metal gutters. I was pleasantly surprised by this and glad too. I know PVC gutters will never rust. So I got the quote and was expecting a high price which it was. I figured I will buy the materials and they can do the labor. And yes the contractor’s price was about 3x the amount I paid for one 3 meter gutter length. Contractor quoted K120 or $60 per gutter. I found them for K40 or $20 per gutter. It doesn’t take a ‘very smart’ missionary to figure out which is the better deal.

As I was dealing with the contractor and he said, when you buy the materials give me a call. Then he started talking about a plumber. I first thought, he must be talking about his next job or something. But no, he said my gutter job would require a plumber. I said, a plumber? He said, yeah this is a plumber job, it deals with water.

After I told that to our Technical Services (super maintenance man) Bob, he laughed and said, plumber for what? Nonetheless, Bob said he would help me on Monday to put up the gutters if only I would first remove all the old metal gutters.

On Saturday, I climbed up and down the ladder all day to remove the old, rusty gutter in preparation for Bob and his team to come hang the new PVC gutter. Monday at 9 am, the crew showed up to hang and install the new gutter that I provided. All went well and I never knew it would take three ‘plumbers’ to install gutters.

I told Bob, Tech Services guy, if it takes a plumber to install gutters then I guess it takes an electrician to install a septic tank. Go figure.

Read Full Post »