More pictures from Drew

Traveling Update

At the beginning of this blog, we are flying across the Pacific at about 3:30 in the morning back in TN. I have had an awesome time in PNG. To think that God gave me this opportunity to come, that I was able to visit with a pilot, and also that two of my closest friends were also able to come. I have learned many things on this trip that will help fine time my long term goals of flying, school, Bible training, etc... in preparation for the mission field if God should call me. But that's another story for another time... Here is a rundown of our return to the states.

On Sunday we had our last service in Kotidonga. It was a bitter-sweet service. We said our "good byes" to everyone that evening because the "plan" was to leave at 5 the next morning for the airstrip so at dawn we could depart. We ate supper with all the Allen's and fellowshipped with them until 9 o'clock that night. 

On Monday, we got up and loaded up in the Kawasaki Mule and then we realized that one of the tires had a massive bulge in it. Not wanting to risk a blowout, we borrowed Bro. Jon's little Toyota. The Toyota fired right up and we loaded everything from the mule into it, and then Bro. Matt turned off the engine. Bad idea!!! Every time that truck got used while I was there, it didn't function properly! They think the fuel filter was clogged up and so Andrew and Matt are laying in the dark with flashlights trying to take apart the fuel filter on the soaking wet ground. Finally we just loaded everything in the back of the little mule (the first one they had in PNG) and took off. There was only one problem, only two people could ride on that mule! So four of us walked. Matt and Connor took the mule and went to preflight the plane and take some fuel out (due to weight restrictions) and Mrs. Becky, the girls, and I walked. Actually it was more like ran! Bro. Jon held the record for "fastest missionary to get to the airstrip walking". I think they said he did it in one hour and 20 minutes. The whole reason I walked instead of Connor was to see if I could beat that record! It seemed that the girls had planned to try to wear me out on the first part by power walking at almost a jog. Hannah (the 11 year old) is VERY competitive and had to make everything that happened a competition with both Connor and me. I just couldn't let myself get beaten by a girl. So I cheated... Sorta! I lagged just enough to make them slow down for me and then on the hill I took off running. Then they ran and we went back and forth; I would run out ahead and then they would run out ahead. I ended up beating Bro. Jon's record by less than 10 minutes! The girls were not far behind. We loaded up in the plane and headed for the coast where we refueled before the leg to Moresby. On the way to Moresby, Matt pointed out a World War II plane that had been crashed in the swamp lands. Once we finally made it into Moresby, we headed to the Mapang guest house. It was a nice, little place that was a LOT cheaper than the hotels! The rest of Monday was spent shopping supplies (mainly groceries) with the Allens. I was shocked at some of the prices of certain foods that in the states I take for granted. I also was surprised by some of the items for sale! We saw lambs heart, assorted fish heads, and a can of pure MSG. I'm not kidding.

Then on Tuesday, Drew flew back in to meet up with us. Now I need to stop here and explain some things for you. Bro. Matt rented a Toyota car. So there are seven people riding around in this Corolla. The four oldest in the back with Matt driving and Mrs. Becky holding Hannah. I thought we were crowded till they told me that they rode in a car the same size with Faith and the three that came on a trip! That had to be tight! So when there are roadblocks, we shuttled people, making two trips tiger us all there. On one of the shuttles or maybe when they went to pick Drew up, I can't remember, Bro. Matt asked me to go with the girls into this grocery store. I thought that was strange but he said he would explain later. I soon found out that it was a very rough area and he wanted me there just in case someone tried to mug us. That wasn't the mostt encouraging thing I had heard that day! Anyways, we were okay and had no problems. After we dropped Drew's bag off at the guest house, we had some pizza and headed for the market. That was a very interesting event. Just imagine a 100 people wanting to well their stuff to you and your two buddies and that's what it was! We had bags and masks and bows and baskets all over the place. We got a few things and then, thankfully, got out of there. After we got back to the Mapang, we left to meet missionary John Gray and a Jim Green for supper. We had a nice time and the food was awesome. We ate in the mall at Port Moresby called Vision City. It was a little pricy but really good. After we left there; we headed back to the house and packed up for today. 

This morning (Wednesday), we left for the airport at around 4:10. Ever sense then we have been in an airport or the air. By the time you read this, we will be on the state-side of the pond with a juicy, greasy, BK whopper!!! No more airplane lamb for us, thank goodness! Once again, I would just like to say thanks to all who have prayed for this trip, to my church that loves missions, and to my God for giving me the desires of my heart! I can't wait to get back and share the stories. God's been good.

I meant to send the previous blog in LAX but the wifi there was terrible. So the next part was written between LAX and Dallas. 

We have had a smooth trip so far. Everybody's bags showed up in LAX so that was good. I was nervous about my bow and arrows coming through. I used about half a role of tape on it and the box I wrapped it in was still holding up so hopefully it'll hold together to Nashville. The one guy that asked me about it didn't seem to have a problem. My cell phone had one bar of battery left on it after being shut off for almost a month so we called our parents for a quick update and to talk with them. After we go up to altitude, Drew pulled out his laptop and we watched some preaching since we missed the services tonight.  Bro. Dick gave him a bunch of Shady Acres Camp Meeting DVDs. Some of the things on them are hilarious! If everything goes right, we will be landing at BNA just after 11:00 to tonight.

-Collin

Pictures from Drew

Pics from Collin (sent while in the Brisbane airport)

 Me in the Kodiak airplane. (Not Matt's plane but a bigger one used by SIL)

 Connor mowing the yard!

Connor crossing the bridge at market.

boys' flight schedule (returning home!)

(All times listed are our local times - CDT)

Tuesday, April 9: 

Leave Port Moresby - 3:15 pm                           

Arrive in Brisbane, Australia - 6:25 pm                           

Leave Australia - 9:25 pm                           

Arrive Auckland, New Zealand - 12:25 am Wednesday morning

Wednesday, April 11: 

Leave New Zealand - 2:40 am (This is the 12 hour flight!)                           

Arrive in Los Angeles - California 2:55 pm                           

Leave Los Angeles - 5:35 pm                           

Arrive Dallas - Texas 8:40 pm                           

Leave Dallas -  9:55 pm                           

Arrive in Nashville, TN -11:40 pm

Leaving for Port Moresby

Today (Monday) we are going to Moresby with the Allen's. We will stay with them in Moresby until Wednesday when we leave for the states. We are going to get to go around the town with them looking at some of the shops as they do their supply run for the next 7 weeks. We are staying in a guest house for missionaries with them while there. Drew will be coming in on Tuesday to meet up with us. I really appreciate the church's love for missions and it's desire to give me the chance to see PNG firsthand. I have learned a lot while here. God has really used this trip in a wonderful way and I can't explain in words how thankful I am for the opportunity. I have missed my family and church and can't wait to see everyone again. Thank you all for the prayers. They have meant so much. The Allen's have been a blessing, along with everyone else. I really do thank God for the privilege to come, and for the things He allowed me to see and learn.

-Collin

An Update from Collin

It is hard to believe that this trip has almost come to a close! We have had a wonderful time and know the remainder will be wonderful as well! I know it is getting close to time leave though, because I am running out of shampoo and soap! I was getting nervous cause it looked like if I did run out, my choices were going to be "dark raspberry vanilla" or "be enchanted"... neither of those I really want to be smelling like!!! Thankfully Connor packed for like year! There are many things that I've learned and lots has happened since I've been here. Hopefully I will get time to put one post about a few of the lessons learned on soon, but right now I just want to give a update of what's going on here.

The last few days have been routine. With Matt trying to get over this sickness, I've been stuck in the ground instead of in the air. That's ok though cause I have gotten to do some very special things because of it. For the majority of this week, Connor and I have been working on the guesthouse. Friday was the first market that Connor and I went to by ourselves. We had to pickup two pineapples for supper for Mrs. Becky. We also stayed for the market preaching that Konos and the preacher boys did. It was neat! That afternoon, I got to play my first game of volleyball in PNG. It was interesting! I did okay but the rules were wild. I had a hard time getting them but after a game or two, I had the major ones figured out. I had a good time and really enjoyed meeting some new people.

Plans have changed and Connor and I aren't going to the coast to visit the newest church plant. I am okay with that but would have enjoyed the trip. I talked with Bro. Will who is going down near there and he said the food was amazing. They are right on the coast and for 10 Kina you can get a big bucket of crab or shrimp! I really hate that we missed that but we are looking forward to spending our last weekend in Kotidonga.

Today we are actually going to be getting ready to leave. I think that I may pack because we leave on Monday for Moresby. We are going in on the Allen's supply run. On Monday we are going to be helping with the supply pickup. I am looking forward to getting an idea of the cost of supplies over here. Then on Tuesday, when Drew gets in, we are going to go check out the markets and the shops. But for today, I am going to take a walk and some pictures of the water systems and the solar hook ups. They have them set up very efficiently and I would like to have the pictures for later. We also may go swimming again. Today it is in the mid-80's. Tomorrow will be our very first service in Kotidonga.

Drew

    Hey y'all. Today was a great day. We went hiking to a new village and witnessed. Then we went to RI class at the high school. I preached on Eglon and Ehud ...What Are You Full Of? God moved and I was able to preach comfortably and without being too nervous. It lasted about 30 minuets. Bro. Dick got up and got them to close their eyes and asked them if anyone want to be save. 13 people raised their hand and then Bro. Dick allowed them to pray. He asked them to stay and 9 stayed and talked to us. So for sure 9 got saved and possibly 13.

-Drew

Seven days and nine fingers left!

Today we have been working on the guest house. It really has come along since we have been here. Our apartment is the only one left that is unfinished. Connor spent the majority of the day working on the ceiling. He is putting up a drop down ceiling using boards cut by the sawmill. Tomorrow it should be finished. While he is doing that, I have been using a router and table saw cutting strips to cover the gaps between the ply board walls. I start by rounding the short side of a 1 by 8 and then ripping it down with the table saw. Well today I had a little "accident". I was ripping on one of the boards and it got into a bind. The board jerked and my thumb went right on the blade. I cut it from from the pad of the thumb all the way over the tip and into the nail. So now it is bandaged up and really throbbing hard! I am having to type out on my iPod with just my pointer finger on my good hand. Mrs. Rachel was working the clinic today so I dropped in for a visit! She cleaned it up and said she would take a look at it tomorrow to see if it looks like we are gonna need stitches. She thinks (and I really hope) that I'm not going to need it. Looks like I've got "7 days and 9 fingers left" on this trip!

Bro. Matt is starting to feel better. Mrs. Lena gave him a antibiotic pack today and he has been on the anti-malaria medicine for a day already. He's still getting the fever and then chills every half hour or so but not nearly as bad. I got to talk with him some this morning while it rained about PNG. He really helped give me an idea about flying cost as well as other major things about living in the jungle.

Well I need to get going. We have church in an hour. Just wanted to give y'all a injury update. Somehow now I have to figure out how to get the blood off the guest house floor...

-Collin

(Don't have a weak stomach? Go look at Collin's thumb here.)

PRAYER REQUEST!

Bro. Matt has malaria. He's been sitting around his house feeling bad for two days, and that's what he says he has. I'm sure he'd appreciate everyone's prayers to be better quickly, because he has flights starting in a couple days.

We are doing fine here (other than Bro. Matt). This Saturday Collin and I are going with Bro. Matt to a coast village where Matt is starting a church. It's a 15 minute flight, and then a two hour truck ride. On Monday we are flying in to pick up Mrs. Becky and the girls and our luggage and then we are flying to Morsbey. We are staying there Monday and Tuesday and then flying out on Wednesday morning. There's a big market there that Bro. Matt says has awesome souvenirs. Then we will fly out Wednesday morning at 6:45 to come home.

~Connor

Update from Drew

Well, we got back from the Mullins a little while ago. We had a great time. On the map it looks like a short trip, but it took us about two hours. They have one main road that will go a long ways. Well, its really the only road. There are a few small ones and the rest is just dirt and mud. Anyway the main road is horrible. It has pot holes about every five feet and a lot of the main road is just broken off with mud replacing it. So it was a miserable 2 hour drive!

Bro. Ted lives at an even higher altitude than Bro Dick with the third highest mountain there. We got there Saturday evening and met some of the church folks then went back to the house and called it a night.
   
Sunday morning, Bro. Dick preached the Sunday School and main service. Bro. Dick is very animated and illustrates a lot when he preaches. For instance in the main service he poured water on his head, laid out on the ground, proposed to a women, and finally drew a picture of a pregnant lady on the chalk board. I won't explain what all he was illustrating that for but it was funny. It really was though a good service and God showed up. It  was a good ending to the revival.

After the service, we all walked down to the creek were a man was baptized. The whole church came down, and Bro. Ted later told us that was a big thing for the man that got baptized because of his influence
and his past.

We woke up Monday morning and some nationals took Bro. Ted, Bro. Dick, and me down to a ridge were we saw a big waterfall that ran down between these two mountains. It was beautiful and we had a good time.

When we got back to the house, Bro. Ted and Bro. Dick got out a map of PNG. Bro. Ted showed me where he used to work down on the coast and told me stories about his ministry there. He told me how there were people way back in the bush he never could reach. They told me the highlands, where they work now, is called the wild west because the people here are so lawless. We also looked at pictures of their work over the past several years. They told me some of their past stories and experiences. We had a great time.  

This Thursday Bo. Dick and me are going to a new area. We are going to go down the house line, witness to the people and invite them outside where Bro. Dick will preach to them. He has never been to this area before so it will be a great opportunity. Maybe someday, a church will be started there.

My luggage has never made it. It got mixed up in Dallas and got stuck in with Southwest luggage. So they are holding it in Dallas until Mount Hagen or Port Moresby airport contacts them. Well, neither of the
PNG airports have called which is not surprising and the woman in Mt. Hagen had to ask what my bag looked like for the one millionth time haha, so I will probably pick up my luggage in Dallas. 

Well I will go, thanks Conerstone, the teens, and everyone else who have been praying, and please pray for the new area we are going to Thursday.

-Drew

"Take me out to the ballgame!"

On this past Sunday, I go the opportunity to go to Aminawa with Andrew and Rachel. Malasi and another Bible student went with us and preached the services. Aminawa is a church plant that Bro. Matt started, and when he went back on furlough last time, Andrew took over the work. Now it is practically run by nationals! When we were there, a little girl asked for someone to talk with her after the message, so while Andrew and Rachel where talking with her, I sat under the tarp (the church is just a blue plastic tarp on wooden poles) and waited. While I waited, I was taking pictures of little kids and the scenery. I started taking pictures of the kids  and then showing them on my camera what they looked like. That really draws the crowds! Everybody wants to do it. After all the picture taking was over with, everybody just sorta left and went about their day. One little 3 or 4 year old boy was left and he walked over to me and just put his hand on my knee. I was surprised at it 'cause no kid has been that out going before! So I decided to see how much this kid would allow. I reached out for him and sure enough he let me pick him up and set him on my knee. We just sat there without saying a word. He was gonna be content to sit with me for the rest of the afternoon, but my leg wasn't going to let that happen! After we all started to leave, Andrew told me we were going to swing by a friends house named Benjamin. Ben is a crippled man about mid-twenties. He lives in a bush hut with his father and two children. He is unable to leave the hut without assistance but rarely does it anyway. He is a very sweet spirited man and Andrew always brings some medicine by for him to sort out for the clinic. It gives him something to do. He has a window by his bedside and when Matt flies over, he wags his wings at him. He was really a blessing to meet.

When we left his place, we had to cross a river to get to the Mule. It wasn't terribly deep, but it was fast!!! I about tripped several times in the water that was so deep I had to take my shoes off and role my pants legs up to my knees!

After we finally made it back, I noticed that there were a lot of kids playing baseball behind the Allen's house. I didn't think much about it until I started to walk to the room. Then I saw that Ariel, Hannah, and Connor where playing and I thought I would go get some pictures of this. Now the funny thing was, in the middle of a baseball game, there were kids running around with bows and arrows shooting at the players!!! They were dull tips but still hurt if you got hit. Then there were other kids with inter tubes, kicking them around the "field". The reason for the quotes is because this was the most interesting field I think I had and will ever play on. First base was only 10 yards away and you had to run up a hill and jump a ditch to get to it! Then you rounded a tree toward second and then it was a 50 yard dash to third! Not your regular diamond. After I changed and got the camera, I took some pictures and then I got drafted by Hannah to play on their team. It was a blast! The kids really were less shy when we got to playing. I had a really good time and really played well . . . 3 of 3, all were home runs! Haha!  We played to 20 and Hannah and my team beat Connor and Ariel's. We played some after that but it was beginning to rain and get dark. The funniest part about the whole day was when I was sitting on the "bleachers" with my team, I started singing "take me out to the ball game" but putting in random words for the lyrics. Well Connor and the Allen girls started laughing and then the national kids started laughing and they had no clue what I was saying so I started making songs up about them as we went.

On Monday, Bro. Matt and I flew one flight down to the coast to pick up Ben and some other Bible students and then he flew one more out to Manyama. When he got back, he was so exhausted that he got out of the plane and just laid on the ground while we unloaded the cargo. When we unloaded the cargo, we got ready to jump in the mule and head home, but we could not find the keys for it! We looked and looked and then we realized that we had given the keys to Nathaniel (the weather man) to hold until we got back, but when we brought Ben back from Kerema he took over the weather job and Nathaniel went home. So Bro. Matt was feeling bad and we couldn't get the mule started. We walked down the runway to where the cell service is better and he sent an email to Mrs. Becky asking her to have Andrew bring the keys back. I had to stand there with the cell phone held as high as I could to get service and Bro. Matt was still laying on the ground. He said to go to his email and check it to see if she had replied and when I did I didn't find an email from her, but I found one from Jason saying that he was gonna be Skype preaching (he got asked to preach a church's Sunday night service via Skype) and letting us know it would be nice if we all could stay off the internet. I looked at the time he was gonna start preaching and realized that it had been 15 minutes ago and he wasn't gonna be done for another hour! Matt looked up and me and just said "can this get any worse?"  Andrew showed up with a key in the next half hour and said Mrs. Becky saw the text and just didn't reply to it. So we loaded up headed back home. I hopped in with Andrew on the mule he brought. About halfway back, the mule's engine shut off and we ended up coasting all the way down a hill before we got it fixed! It was a crazy day and one I was glad to be done with! When Matt finally drove the other mule back, he still wasn't feeling good and he laid down for a few minutes. He thinks now that he is getting malaria. Please pray that is not the case and that he will get to feeling better.

Last night we ate supper with Jason and Cherith Ottesen. It was good and afterwards we played "Monopoly Deal". It was fun and I ended up winning one game. Since they have a little girl, they were the perfect ones to ask about raising a family on the mission field. They had some good advice that could be valuable in the future.

Today I think we are going to help Andrew build on the guest house. This morning though, I am going on a hike with Jason to the top of the mountain that is going to be the site of the radio tower they want to set up to repeat Bro. Brad Well's radio program. It is hard to believe this is my last week here! It seems like the time has flown by.

-Collin