Sunday, May 20, 2018

The power went out during the night so we woke up early to blackness.  Our internal clocks are still out of sync so everyone was awake really early.   Using candles and flashlights in the kitchen we heated water on the gas stove and poured it over the coffee grounds in the coffee maker to make drip coffee.  The electricity came on at 6 a.m. about the same time the sky started getting light.  This morning 5 of our team joined Tim and Karla Deuel and missionary Dr. Susan and Jeff Myers to go to a bush church.  The rest of us walked outside the station to the church just across the street.  It was quite emotional to me as the sign on the church wall said “Sydney Knox Memorial Church”.   I am so excited to be here where Nazarene Mission history is so strong.  Men were on one side of the sanctuary and women on the other.  The entire front of the church was covered in flowers.  Pastor Philip told us afterward that he had placed all the flowers the night before.  “There are many flowers here”.  It was beautiful.  There music and sermon were both in Pidgen.   After lunch we had a walking tour of a portion of the mission station.  The whole station is approximately 2 km by 2 km but the main area is about a mile long.  Part of our tour included a fairly comprehensive tour of the current hospital and a brief walk-by of the old hospital which will be eventually torn down and replaced by new hospital buildings.  The whole station is so different from what I had imagined.  It’s actually a small town with its own power plant, trash pickup, schools, an ATM, hospital, tennis court, nursing school, and multiple houses, both for missionaries and national staff.  There are approximately 1000 people who live on station consisting of 15 missionary families and the rest nationals who work on station.  It is amazing.  Tim told us the weather is like eternal spring with some months rainier than others.  Flowers are everywhere.   After our tour those who wanted to grabbed large inner tubes and went to the canal between the river and the hydro station to raft down the canal.  Charity said it is the best lazy river ride.  Today is Jeff’s birthday so we had fresh banana cake for dessert to celebrate.  This was a long but relaxing and rewarding day.