Mary, John the Baptist and Chris

Ok, I am struggling to find time to write on this blog thing.  I am getting a little exhausted.  I’ve got to find a better way to approach life.  There’s just so many cool things to do in Timor Leste.  One of the highlights was having some great friends visit us from Australia.  We got to climb the highest mountain in Timor – Mt Ramelau.

Driving up I saw some strange hollow logs on farms.  The lid on this one is made from an old wheel barrow.  What is it?  Its a Timorese version of a grain silo, painstakingly hollowed in a special way for storing corn.  The idea is to stop rats eating the corn. 

The town of Hatobuilico – base camp at the foot of the mountain.

On the way up – great views of rugged country although a photo doesn’t do it justice.

This is what hiking up a mountain with a family really looks like.  “Do we have to go any further?”

Lunch on top with Mary and Mary’s keeper (centre back) and his little girl (far right).   They live on this desolate mountain top.  He’s not quite your Ghandi with pearls of wisdom but he’s a lot of fun for a chat.  Mary has a metal strap around her so she doesn’t fall over which is a good thing because it gets very windy up there.  Funny how a mountain top makes you feel a little bit closer to God.

 

Keeping with the mountain top theme, my mate Rob decided to take a group on motor bikes up into the mountains.  The track got very narrow and the mountains got very steep.  Unfortunately, Chris went off the track.  Due to the steepness, he travelled downwards about 10m before making contact with the ground again, or rather with a log which caught him on his downward flight (one of those classic cartoon scenes might help you to picture it, although nothing about it was very funny).  It also happened that the motorbike got caught on the same log which was helpful.  Due to the remoteness, God sent along a horse owned by a man named John the Baptist which was very helpful.
It took a couple of hours on horse back to get to where we could pick him up with a car.  I’ll try to put in a little video in memory of the occasion.

Chris is a great bloke who has done a lot of cool things during his 5 years or so in Timor Leste like improving the rocket stove, making our pizza oven and teaching Serenity how to play the song “Hallelujah” on the guitar.  Thanks Chris, I hope you come good and find your way back to Timor one day.

Sick, sick, sick

Rosina - a girl who lives with Anen's family preparing a meal next door

The video here shows our neighbours laying the foundation to build a beach villa to rent for income - its an investment project that we hope will provide income for this poor family.  We haven't got the money to complete this but we do have some interest in someone investing in it.

This week most of us were sick most of the time. The sickness seems to be some sort of fever that leads to a cough and lung congestion. We all seemed to get this to varying degrees. Israel also got a bad eye infection (the mucus drying on his eyelids and gluing them shut while he slept) as well as a heat rash. Cynthia found this week very hard as she was weak with her sickness and also worried about caring for the kids. On top of this, the blinkers on the truck died (ants got into the flasher unit) and Samuel spent ages going around town looking for the simple replacement part. After 2 days he came home with something that would “make-do” but unfortunately rewired it incorrectly, fried it, melted the battery terminals in the process and spent another couple of days going through the wiring. (God please send a mechanic!) He checked one last dingey spare parts shop and found another “close-enough” part, wired it in and hey presto, it worked! I get pretty frustrated when a 15 minute job takes 4 days but our life and times are in God’s hands. Glory to Him.

a tonne of timber for Los Palos roof

In these times its hard to find the good bits that make you think its worth while but then we think of the projects going on around us - the Los Palos training centre is moving forward and the builder was able to lay most of the foundation; Anen our poor neighbour has started laying the foundation for his beach villa rental project and Maun Je has started a new villa as well with another Aussie investor who has seen our work (very exciting that past work is growing!) plus lots of other stuff - this gives us encouragement to keep going.  In the end though, we give thanks to Jesus for his love.

Our first villa project with Maun Je - back in 2008

Anen in his family begin a new beachside villa

First a holiday!

Well, Samuel really tried hard to do nothing much, and spend lots of time together as a family.  The heat is very oppressive, so we spent the first 2-3 days sleeping, swimming, eating.
We have been swimming at least once a day, often twice.  Its so lovely in the water - I wish we could conduct all our life while floating there! :)  Also our lovely neighbours have been cooking lunch and dinner for us, and sometimes buying us some of the small loaves of bread for breakfast (a child walks around the village selling them in the morning.)  So it has been a pretty decent holiday for us.

The other kids have been a little shy, but gradually they are warming up again, and they love the fact that they can go swimming with us!

Israel was very excited to help the kids cut up the Tali for pig food.  Its a palm tree trunk.  (Dont worry, those large knifes are blunter than butter knives.)

Like I said Samuel really has been relaxing and enjoying himself, but we have had lots of friends to catch up with and each of them have put in requests already!
On our first day, we had a few first aid issues to assist with.  At least 3 members of our family group have had an eye infection.  So Samuel fixed up a bike and rode to a chemist to get some antibiotic eye drops.  While he was out and about, he visited Esperance (Hope in Portuguese) - The christian mission WEC.   He was able to speak a young nurse (who happened to be there), about another neighbour who is suffering from a swollen stomach and feet.  Most likely a damaged liver, as he is an alcoholic. There is not much to be done for him, although increasing his protein intake will assist balance the fluid.
While at Esoerance, Samuel also gave some technical support as they were having trouble with their data projector which they use for their children's program.

He also checked out a few trucks and was happy to find some available for $5000- $9000.

Packing!

OK, so we have now officially packed 1 bag.  Its our largest one, and so far it weighs 22kgs, full of Samuels clothing, medical supplies and 1 set of flippers/snorkel.  We were able to purchase a large metal boxed first aid kit from ALDI (Gotta love their prices!).  So we have added to that to make it an awesome first aid kit, and then we have two other plastic shopping bags full of other stuff - like vitamins and mozzie repellents and sunscreen and all my homeopathic remedy's etc.  Im sure we will use a lot of it on our neighbours, and when we do mountain visits (sometimes while we deliver bibles or on water project trips we get asked to help ease a bad toothache or infected wound).  You may be interested to know that i use isocol (rubbing alcohol) on Serenity and Israels skin as a mozzie repellent.  I also use a bit of Vicks or the cheaper Indonesian versions.  they seem to work really well, and are nicer on their skin then RID etc.  We will arrive after the end of the wet season, so i am hoping the mozzies wont be too bad.

We are generally reluctant to use anti malarial tablets, however  Samuel has bought some Doxycylcin and i am going to firmly "encourage" him to take them daily.  I think his body needs a break from malaria.  Although of course Dengue has no preventative medicine, except perhaps regular doses of paw paw leaf and flowers.

So that is where prayer is really important.  Please pray for protection from serious illnes, and strength of body to resist and heal quickly.

I thought you may like to see this cool rainbow leaf smiley face.  On our recent trip south, we camped by a creek in a state forest, and the kids and me collected lots of different coloured leaves - From a pure deep green, right through to red/purple.  Serenity was inspired to create a face with some seed pod eyes :)

Gods creation is pretty awesome hey?

packing and prayers

Oops, i forget to update on Serenity's passport.... It arrived! (Thanks to God)

Countdown continuing...11 days to go.
Yesterday we purchased lots of medical supplies, both for ourselves and for our first aid kit, which is proving quite large.   I am also starting to make more serious "piles" of what we will take.  I'm feeling more relaxed this time in regards to packing.  I know now what things i can purchase over there easily, such as second hand clothing, and ointments similar to tigar balm and vicks.  It also helps knowing we will be home for 3 weeks in June.  It means i only need to take minimal school items for serenity, and i can restock/exchange books etc when we return.

We had our last Sunday at our church (Grafton Salvation Army) this morning. And Samuel spoke at my mum and dads church (Maclean baptist church) this evening.  It was lovely to hear from so many people that they will pray for us!  What a blessing to be supported in that way by so many.