A couple more pics.

Here are a few more pics from Hoskins that didn't make it in the last post.

Luke likes his new home.

Our first team Pizza & Movie night.

The boys just kicking back.

It is pretty hard to believe, but we did make it to Hoskins. Our mission base is less than a mile from the airport, so we were “home” rather quickly. For the nest few days we got settled in to our new, but still temporary home here on Hoskins Center. This is where we will do our orientation and Pidgin Language Study. Believe it or not, we have already starting talking and thinking about what language group we will move into and when to begin our survey into that tribe. Exciting days ahead for us. The adjustment to this new life is certainly not been without its struggles. We have seen the reality of culture shock and how it can affect us. Thanks so much to all of you have prayed us thru this journey and continue to pray for our adjustment to life in PNG. A few pics for you to see of Hoskins Center:

Our crates that we shipped back in August.

Our house.

The boys having a snack with Ethan.

The entrance to our house.

The MK School.

The store on center where we buy a lot of our food and supplies.

The Lujan's house.

Entering the NTM Center in Hoskins.

A different view of the center.

The playground where the kids like to play.

[Sanford News] Hello again

Well it has been a few weeks since our last report, so I thought I would take a few minutes and let you know what is going on with us.  We have been busy in language and culture lately, doing our best to learn to speak Tok Pisin and becoming more acquainted with our new home here in PNG.  It really has been fun and we are learning – slowly but surely.  It has been fun to make new friends and really start to appreciate the PNG people.  Actually next week we have our first language evaluation in Tok Pisin.  We will sit down with consultants and a national language helper and we will be evaluated on our ability to communicate certain things in the language.  Pray that it goes well and we can have clear minds (those of you who know me know how BIG of request that is!).

 

We have been trying to plan and move ahead in our plans to move into a tribe sometime in the next months.  One big step we made was purchasing our solar electric system that we will use to provide power to our tribal house.  Thanks to the generosity of one of our sending churches, we were able to buy the entire system and get it designed and ready to ship over to us on a container in the next few months.  This was a huge hurdle to jump over and a major answer to prayer.  We feel like this is just another affirmation from the Lord that He wants to get us in the tribe and get the Good News to another unreached group of people.

 

Another big project that we are moving ahead on is the purchase of a boat and motor for our team to use in transporting both ourselves and our supplies in and out of the tribe.  It is a pretty big project and we hope to keep moving on it so that it will be available to us to use when we start house building, etc.  We do have more detailed information about the project, if you are interested; drop us an email and we can fill you in more. 

 

It looks like there is a chance that we will be going into the bush with the Lujans for our bush orientation next week.  We would be gone for 3-4 weeks and be spending our time learning how to live in the bush.  We aren’t sure yet, but it looks like this might happen, so we are trying to plan a bit for that and get ready to go in.  If we do plan on going next week, I will send another update and give you a little more info about what “bush orientation” is and what we will be doing. 

 

Thanks again for your prayers and support.  More to come…  

 

Lane Sanford
New Tribes Mission - Papua New Guinea
email:   lane_sanford@ntm.org
web:     www.lksanford.blogspot.com

 

Travelling into PNG

We had a great couple days in Cairns Australia, but the day finally came for us to head into the “Land of the Unexpected” – Papua New Guinea. We found their motto to be quite true as we landed in the capital city of Port Moresby. In good PNG fashion, our flight was delayed and we couldn’t make our connection to Hoskins, our final destination. So with all our luggage and kids in tow, we got hauled off to the hotel in Moresby. Lucky for us our government rep was there to meet us and he got them to put us up in the nicest hotel in the city – the Crowne Plaza Hotel. Not only was the stay free, but it included a full buffet dinner too. Not too shabby, even for PNG! The next morning we got to the airport at 5:30 AM to catch our flight to Hoskins. After all the hassles of moving luggage and the kids, we made it and arrived safely in Hoskins. Believe it or not, we made with all of our luggage and without paying any overweight charges at all! God was abundantly gracious to us.

Had to stay overnight in Port Moresby - Kade was happy about it.

The boys in the Port Moresby airport.

On our way to the hotel.

Lane & Chris working on our tickets to get us to Hoskins.

Waiting to catch our flight to Hoskins.

[Sanford News] Of Earthquakes and Oil Palms...

In one 24 hour period, we have experienced the most mundane and exciting aspects of life here in PNG.  Last week we visited a family that lives about a mile away from the base; their names are Robert and Rita Nali.  Immediately both us and Lujans connected with them and they proved to be overly accommodating hosts to us.  They live about 20 feet from the ocean on a nice little plot of land and the Nali’s make their income by working their oil palm block located a few miles away.  They offered to take us with them to harvest oil palm and experience this part of PNG culture with them.  We planned and looked forward to going with them today to the block.  More on that later…

 

Last night around 9:30, Kar and I were standing in the kitchen and getting some things ready for me to take on my trip to the oil palm block when out of nowhere we felt the house start to shake.  We knew it wasn’t just the wind blowing when stuff started falling off the shelves.  It really began to shake intensely, so we ran into the rooms and grabbed the boys in case we needed to run out of the house.  After a few seconds it stopped – the earthquake that is; the house on the other hand kept swaying back and forth.  Talk about a nerve wracking feeling!  It literally felt like we were in a boat; just a nice steady fading back and forth.  It was quite the event and it wasn’t done yet.  Once we finally felt like our feet (and house) were on steady ground, we went to bed.  Believe it or not, we were woken up around 4 AM again to another quake.  This time I looked out our window and our huge water tank (2,000 gallon) was swaying back and forth on the ground.  Crazy!  So we have officially been orientated to PNG life here in the Islands – earthquakes and all. 

 

Well I woke up early and got ready to meet up with Chris so we could get Robert and Rita and go to the oil palm block.  We left around 8 AM and drove to the block.  We then followed Robert and Rita as they showed us around their block and how they grow and harvest the oil palm.  Oil palm is unique kind of palm that produces clusters of palm nuts on a steady basis, these nuts are then taken to a refinery where they are pressed for their oil.  This oil is used in many things from cooking oils to soaps.  The hard part of the process is what Robert and Rita do – harvest those clusters.  They have to maintain and grow the oil palms and then systematically go thru the trees (250 trees total) and cut off the ripe clusters and leave the unripe ones.  This is all done by hand and takes time and work, especially in the heat and humidity.  We worked all morning and gathered about 500 lbs. of clusters.  Robert said that this would be worth about 75 Kina – equivalent to $25 US; a whole lot of work for very little money. 

 

It was a great experience for Chris and I and we learned much about their lives and their language.  We got to see how they work the oil palm and recorded much of the language that is used throughout the process.  We will use this language information later as a stepping stone to gain further understanding and fluency in the language.  This is only the beginning of many more adventures in the lives and language of the people of PNG.  Thanks so much for praying us along and taking us before the Throne Room of Grace. 

 

We’ll try to bring another update tomorrow after Kade’s birthday party.  Hopefully this one will be a little less intense.  For all those already worried about Kade’s birthday cake, don’t worry – Kar’s foot is all better, cake’s on her this time…. 

 

Lane Sanford
New Tribes Mission - Papua New Guinea
email:   lane_sanford@ntm.org
web:     www.lksanford.blogspot.com

 

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