10 August 2006 - Vanuatu

Today, Thursday, has been the sunniest day so far. Amazing to have a whole week of rainy weather in the "dry" season. It's not usually like this. The other night was quite cold at about 20 degrees, with wind and rain. This is the coldest weather they get here all year round. We've been averaging about 25 degrees most of the time. Very comfortable, temperature wise, but plenty of wet. In fact, the water supply is the small stream, so there's a motto here: "If you don't use it, you're wasting water", because it just flows into the ocean if it's not used. I took a Bible class today, basically an intro the Bible, it's authors, diversity, historical facts and use. Then took another English class. The people are keen to learn, and often walk 1 hour each way for the lessons!

Monday was a worthwhile day. I developed a small survey involving radio, health, and Bible classes. After visiting about 14 villages, we found that there are very few radios around, and that nearly everyone is wanting to learn more about health, and attend Bible classes. These people are very keen to learn. They were all willing to walk up to half an hour each way for classes. So there is plenty of work that can be done here. John, one of the locals, came with me and translated between English and Bislama. Bislama is the national language, and is very similar to English (more so than German). You can sometimes work out what they are saying, and many of them speak a certain amount of English anyway, but John's help was very helpful and needed.

Tuesday a group of people came around to the place here "Small Water Bungalo", and Dr Mark took a health class. About 16 locals came and we learned about the muscular system and massage. Mark said he felt a mild earthquake that day, but I didn't feel it. We heard from others that it may have been a 6 or 7 magnitude earthquake nearby. Thankfully it did not affect us. As of 6pm Thursday, we're all ok!

There's a stinging plant here called "nungalot", which is similar to stinging nettle. I got "bitten" by it last Friday, and it is itchy, but your skin shows no signs of soreness. When you rub it, it is itchy, and stays that way a few days. Hot water is not really in the vocabulary here. All showers have been cold, but the weather is warmer so it's not quite so bad. Washing up is also done in cold water. We do have gas here, so we could use it to heat hot water, but gas is limited.

Yesterday was an interesting day. It was actually my 23rd birthday, and it was nice to have it here on Gaua Island. We rode in the boat up to the church (1 hour walk, or 15 minutes in the boat). We were going to help out with the church building there. Plans were changed. I helped a group of local people with some English while we were there. I pulled a muscle while towing the boat out to deeper water, and it didn't really bother me, but as the day wore on, I could barely turn my head, and had to have it constantly facing left to avoid pain. Walking was a difficulty. Showering was interesting. Sleeping, not so good. But today it has slowly improved throughout the day. Still awkward, but hopefully by Sabbath it will be good.

Something about feet over here. Toenails grow a lot faster! I don't know if it is the warmer weather, the wetter feet, the lack of shoes, or dietary changes or what it is, but that's the fact. Also, the local people have much larger spread out toes. I'm pretty sure it's because they don't wear shoes as much (though a lot of them wear thongs, which they call "slippers" because they slip off your feet!).

Coconuts are very common. When the wind blows, I recommend you avoid standing under them. I met someone what got hit once, but he's still ok, but I wouldn't say you should try it out. Consequences could be interesting. Also, they don't have a grapevine over here. They have "coconut news". A lot of local news comes via the coconut palms :-) In case you're interested, the co-ordinates for Gaua are 167 deg 30 min East, and 14 deg 15 min South.

The ships are vital to the "developed" parts of the islands. Anything that can not be "made" or "grown" on the island comes on these ships. There are about 4 of them, and they come up from Santo, the second largest centre in Vanuatu. They bring benzin (petrol), gas, food, tools, clothes, cleaning products and pretty much anything you need. Often the ships are irregular or not on time. So many things we are waiting for are "in the shipment". Rough weather often causes delays, and to get between islands here, many people are "stranded" or unable to get back home due to the intermittent nature of the ships. Semi-trailer trucks just don't make it to the island.

"One-talk" is the native language a persons speaks. There are many (hundreds) of native languages in Vanuatu. In fact, on this island alone, there are 12 native languages, which are all quite distinct. But, to avoid being unable to communicate, they all speak Bislama, a form of pijin English. On top of their native language and Bislama, many of them speak at least some English, or maybe French. English and French are the other common languages on the island. It's not uncommon for someone to speak 3 languages fluently.

Gaua is an island in the Banks Islands. Merig (smaller and to the east), Mere Lava (further east), Vanua Lava (large and to the north), Mota (north), Mota Lava (north) and Ureparapara (north), all form the Banks Islands. There are also some other smaller or even "tidal" islands. They range between 20 km across to maybe 1 km. Some islands are very steep. They cover less than 100 km in length, and are basically volcanos which are pushed above the water level. The Torres Islands are a group of 4 main islands (all smaller than Gaua), which are to the north north west of the Banks Islands. Torres Islands are some of the most remote parts of Vanuatu. Together, TORres and BAnks form the TORBA province in northern Vanuatu. This is the northern limit of Vanuatu. After than is the Solomon Islands.

Tomorrow I'll spend time preparing for preaching on Sabbath. Philip, the volunteer pastor for the Gaua SDA church, asked me to preach. I pray God gives me the words to say. Sabbath we'll be at the church. We'll be able to ride the boat to church then, rather than walk, like we did last week. Early next week we might be going to "Dorrig", a village about 5 hours walk south on the south-eastern edge of Gaua, to do medical work and mission work. Then we'll be doing health, Bible, and English classes in the later part of the week. Hope to maybe climb up to the waterfall (apparently very large) and maybe the smokey volcano part, about 800 m above sea level where we are now. It's an all day event.