Greetings to all from PNG.

I've tried to post earlier but I was sending the emails to
the wrong address. Oops

So far my time here has been good. Last week we started
working with our language helpers. My helpers name is
Bunais. She is really nice. I'm learning a lot from her.

I had a good weekend. On saturday we went on a hike to a
ridge in the plains. It's hard to describe. It took about
an hour to get there. I took the car back because I was
too tired. My asthma was bothering me a little bit too. We
stop at a village called New Camp along the way. There we
picked up a few kids. They just followed us on the hike.
It was fun.

Sunday I went to the village and visited with some of
the ladies. Our directors wife and 2 year old daughter,
Emma, came too. I met a lapun meri (old lady). They say
she's the oldest in the village. Emma calls her grandma in
pidgin. Emma blew bubbles with her. It was really neat to
see how they interacted.

Yesterday (monday) we went to the village with our
language helpers. They made a fire and showed us how to
cook kaukau (sweet potatoe) and strongpela bananas
(cooking bananas). Then we got to eat them. The kaukau was
good but the banana really did not have any taste. I
learned quite a bit more Tok Pisin though. It's funny, I
can understand a lot more Tok Pisin than I can speak. I
know some phrases but I forget them when I want to talk to
the ladies. Please pray that I can learn quickly.

This morning we once again watch them make kaukau, because
the camera crew wanted to film it. We've had this crew
following us, they're making a new interface promo video.

Today was market day in the closest village. I bought a
bilum (knitted bag), along with some items for my family.
There was a wide variety of things to buy. It was really
cool.