Week 49 in Tarawa

 

We had a fairly unusual week this week.  The Moroni High School students had mid-year exams all week, and our ITEP teacher/students had their final exam in EDU 312.  We're happy to report that our teacher/students all passed.  I can't say the same for the MHS students.                                

 

On Monday, August 17th, the piano I ordered from Australia arrived.  We're donating this piano to the Seminary and Institute classroom in Teaoraereke.  Once again, as with the piano we donated last March, I built a simple wooden stand for the piano and a footplate for the sustain pedal to keep the pedal from sliding out from under foot.  We hope the pianos will encourage the Kiribati members to take lessons and learn to play.  Music is a wonderful gift the Lord has given the Kiribati people.  Their singing is amazing to hear.

 

On Wednesday, August 19th, we had a zone conference with all the missionaries on Tarawa.  Sister Sumner, Sister Weir, and Sister Alldredge decided to cook "mountain man breakfast" and pancakes for the elders and sisters for lunch.  We left the pancakes on the dash of the truck during the morning conference so they would be piping hot by the time we served them for lunch.  "Mountain man breakfast", consisting of potatoes, bacon, eggs, cheese, and onions, is a dish we learned to cook from the McEachern's, although they always made it in a Dutch oven.  Lacking Dutch ovens, we found that crockpots worked quite nicely.

Sister Alldredge, our mission nurse, did a presentation on how to care for the water filtration systems the church provides for each missionary apartment.  She decided to do this after discovering that some missionaries were not changing their filters when they were supposed to.  Some of the filters were black, slimy, and disgusting.

 

The elders and sisters really chowed down on the pancakes and mountain man breakfast.  Many had seconds and thirds.  Having eaten a fair sized helping myself, I can attest to its delectability.

We had to twist President Weir's arm to get a group photo.  He's on the far left, and Sister Weir is on the far right.  Between them are 20 of the 22 elders and sisters serving on Tarawa.

On that same Wednesday evening, we were invited to the YM/YW activity to help them learn how to waltz.  They are planning on performing at Youth Conference next week, where we will be chaperoning.  Dancing while actually touching a dance partner is very foreign to I-Kiribati (people native to Kiribati).  We thought their shyness was very cute and very welcome.

On Thursday evening, while I was giving SLEP (Second Language English Proficiency) tests to students in the TALL (Technology Assisted Language Learning) lab, Sister Sumner was out on the basketball court helping with another waltz practice session.

While we have no pictures to prove it, we were very busy Saturday with cleaning, cooking and laundry.  I vacuumed and did 3 loads of laundry while Sister Sumner cleaned the bathroom, made banana bread, three loaves of white bread, and started the lasagna for our Sunday dinner with guests from Australia.  Keith and Rosemary Eastwood are working and volunteering as an epidemiologist and as a nurse for 2 months on Kiribati.  We also spent time Saturday working in the office on our lessons for SCED 401, and went with Sister Alldredge later in the afternoon to rescue the sister missionaries whose car had been side swiped by a drunk driver.  While they were unhurt, they were still pretty shaken up.  The car will need a new front bumper and headlight.  This morning, while slicing the three loaves of bread she cooked yesterday, I found 2 little black bugs baked into the bread.  We decided we had better sift all the rest of our white flour.  We a few dozen black bugs, some still alive, along with a few larvae.  In the U.S., we would have probably thrown out the flour and the bread, but in Kiribati, we just get a little more insect protein in our diet.  I guess that makes us official veterans of living in a third world country.