With all the “fun” that’s been going on around here, I’ve neglected to write about the other things that have gone on.
Last weekend we hosted two girls from a training program designed to help Papuans. It is similar to the program that my English students are in. This program however, is one year and the students stay in a dormitory. They are taught English and Math along with other important skills and are discipled along the way. Some of the students who’ve graduated from the one year program stay on and learn to make musical instruments. They’ve made violins and guitars and are learning to play them. It’s pretty neat! So we had two girls for the weekend. One wishes to be a chef and the other wants to work for an embassy or consulate. They were delightful girls and helped me prepare a lot of food and therefore learned a lot about Western food. They had previously not eaten much Western food so they were quite interested. We made pizza on Friday night and on Saturday we had another family over who was also hosting two girls and we did a big barbeque with chicken and shrimp and vegetable kebabs (I made some rice because I knew they were totally missing it!). Then we played a fun game together.
Thursday was my last day teaching my English students. Their semester is now done and they will go to their practical stage. We had a slightly shorter lesson and I had them all share their plans for the future. A good many of them hope to become missionary pilots. There’s a program in Wamena run by a former MAF pilot that most of them hope to go through. This program has already had two guys go to America and successfully achieve their private pilots licenses. Another guy hopes to be a pastor and another a teacher in his village. After the lesson we had lunch and then watched Facing the Giants. They loved the movie! Afterwards a few of them spoke and expressed their appreciation to me. Then they sang me a song written by some alumni of the program called The Jungle Blessing. There may or may not have been a few tears shed. Then they prayed for myself and my family. I was moved and humbled incredibly. It was such a treat to get to know these guys!
That sounds an interesting program. It must have been helpful to the girls to stay with a Christian family for a short time. I imagine that they don’t get too much fellowship with “foreigners” to see how we really live.