Giveaway

I found this beautiful shell necklace in Honiara's Central Market yesterday, and I wanted to take advantage of the beautiful model to wear it. The necklace also has matching earrings that I forgot to have my mother wear for the picture. If you would like to own them, please leave a comment by midnight CST, Sunday, January 2. May God bless you richly in the coming year!

Marulaon Welcome

Sunday morning, December 12, must have been the day that everybody in Honiara decided to travel out to the Western Solomons. After waiting for an hour on a standing-room-only Bikoi, all of the passengers headed to the Russell Islands (including Aaron, Katherine, and my parents) were moved off of the Bikoi and onto the newly acquired Bikoi Express. What a gift from the Lord! We were surprised to see the Express pull into Marulaon a little early (I had just finished cleaning the kitchen - whew!). This was the welcoming party that met my parents.

Monday, after our guests had settled in, we took them on a tour of the village. I was thankful Mama brought her camera along.

Olivia with some of her friends

Choate kids in a frangipanni tree


Sweet sisters

Some of the guys just hanging out on the beach with the canoes

Barnabas making me crack up

One of our neighbors relaxing in a hammock (makes you want to come visit, doesn't it?)

Katherine checking my hair for lice just for fun (she learned from her neighbors)

Mama whacking a coconut, and she's really good at it!

Fresh eyes in the Solomon Islands

I always enjoy viewing our home through other people's eyes, especially when it's the first time. My parents arrived in Honiara on December 7 and met Aaron and Katherine as they stepped off the Bikoi. Mama took lots of pictures during their time in Honiara as they waited to go to the Russell Islands.

Stepping on Solomon Islands soil for the first time

Bringing Nanny flowers

Choosing a papaya at Central Market

Buying tickets at the Bikoi office

Sharing coffee ice cream at Frangipanni Ice

Bounty

"Let them give thanks to the Lord for his unfailing love and his wonderful deeds for men, for he satifies the thirsty and fills the hungry with good things. Ps. 107:8-9

This time of year, fresh fruits and veggies are abundant in Marulaon. Pineapples mature in December, and we've planted more than 30 tops in our garden already! Melon, beans, papaya, greens, tomatoes, eggplant -- we love this time of year. We stay healthier this time of year, too, usually March and April brings fewer variety and less abundance and more sickness for us. We are so thankful for the bounty God has provided for us.

Through Karen's Lens

Auntie Caroline swimming with the Choate kids

Auntie Karen checking in with SITAG during the radio sked

Sunrise on the beach

Everybody working together in my garden to plant ubikola (cassava)

Caroline found a visitor in my ubikola patch!

We're Back!

We arrived safely in Honiara yesterday morning about 2 a.m. Thanks for your prayers! My parents continue to enjoy their stay in the Solomons, and they will return to the States on Tuesday. It's nice to be back in the land of e-mail and internet again.

Through Karen’s Lens 2

This was taken with Karen’s underwater lens while we were looking for kalimeta.

Through Karen’s Lens

On December 5th, two precious friends came for a short visit to Marulaon: Karen, who works with SITAG, and Caroline, who was a great Pijin tutor for me when we fist came to the Solomons.  Their visit through Karen's lens.  First, on the Bikoi.

Translation Workshop in Hae

Aaron spent November 28-December 1 in Hae (Central Russells)teaching his first Translation Principles workshop.  This workshop precedes the selection of translators early next year.  He came home with a
froggy voice from teaching morning, afternoon, and evening, but it
was so nice to have him home again!

Hae workshop.JPG

Choate Update

Dear Friends of the Choates,

I am happy to report that we are having more success with our HF radio email.  I know that the Choates have been able to send and receive emails for most of this week.  However, I’ve been told that all attempts to update their blog have been unsuccessful.  Here is an update as of yesterday’s radio sked:

 

They are doing well.  They continue to get rain that is keeping their drinking tanks filled.  Sarah's sores are healing.  Joanna is busy showing her parents "village life".  They dove for shell fish the other day and have plans to go out to their garden for some work there.  Eventually they will also make cassava pudding together. 

 

Prayer Requests:

~~ Joanna's dad isn't sleeping well.  He has been having leg cramps at night.  Please pray that everyone will get good sleep.

~~Please pray for Aaron as he is preaching this Sunday and he hasn't felt led to speak on any certain thing up to this point.

 

If you want to respond directly to the Choates via email that has a good chance of going through.  If you would rather not take the chance than you can feel free to email me your message and I will relay it via the radio.  As usual, my email is deputy.solomon.islands@sil.org

 

Sincerely,

Andy

Beginning to Look a lot Like Christmas

Aaron again,
Hard to believe Christmas is two weeks away. With poor contact with colder places over the past several weeks, it makes it even harder to remember that some of you are working hard to stay warm. Lots of days we are still wondering if the deodorant will give out after 30 minutes or only 20.
Thanks for all the prayers about our computer troubles. A colleague who works on computers all the time said he thinks it is a simple job of resetting the computer's memory. So, since I have not time or tools to try anything here, I will attempt my second computer surgery when I get back to Marulaon. The first was with the same machine, a keyboard transplant. The first procedure was 100% successful, no lasting complications. :)
We wish everyone a great Christmas and we are very much looking forward to catching up with everyone when we get back to Honiara shortly after Christmas. See you then
Aaron for all of us

Guest writer

Hi all,
Aaron here. Katherine and I are safely back in Honiara for a couple of days meeting up with Joanna's folks who are here for a visit. We are very excited to have a touch of "home" for the holidays. So far they are settling in well and we are getting everything ready for our return to the village on Sunday. Our village e-mail system is still not working well. Many man hours have been spent on various sides of the oceans to try to figure out our problems. Nothing certain yet. Thank you all for your prayers for the communication, please keep it up. The lack of communication with the outside world is becoming a serious stress for our village teams, so thanks ahead of time for the continued prayers, and thank God with us too for the right solution.

One other update. Joanna has diligently been keeping blog posts going through these weeks in Marulaon even though the connections have been so bad. She saves the articles and photos in our computer. The other day we were trying to send e-mail from the village and the computer suddenly stopped responding. We have tried several things to get something to happen, but we are very concerned. Please pray for us to have wisdom about getting the computer fixed, and we also pray that the articles and photos for November can be retrieved, as this is our family's fay of recording our time here is SI. Thank you all.

In case we don't get to do it again, Merry Christmas to everyone. Blessings on the new year. We look forward to catching up again after Christmas.
Aaron

Translation Committee workshop update

Dear friends,

As promised I'm passing along the information that I received from Aaron concerning the Translation Committee workshop that he just returned from.  Here is a summary of what he told me:

 

Aaron was happy with the outcome of his Translation Committee workshop.  He was a little disappointed that only 6 out of the 15 members showed up.  Those that came left with a clear picture of how Aaron envisions the translation process will look for their project.  They all worked on translating things into language.  Aaron has challenged them to say things in language and to not rely on borrowing words.  The committee members went home with homework and with instructions to have meetings in their villages to describe what a translator 'looks like' to the people.  Then the people can nominate someone to be a translator who fits that criteria.  The committee will then meet to whittle the nominees down to 4 translators. 

 

A brief look at the future of the project is as follows.  In December the committee members will start fundraising for the project (or at least coming up with ideas as to what fundraising will look like.)  They will also start earnestly praying over the translator selection process.  In January the committee will meet.  They will fill in the members who didn't attend this workshop as well as focus on prayer as a committee.  The plan is that translators will be chosen before the Choates go out to the village in March of next year.

 

Next year Aaron is looking to host two workshops for the translators, two workshops for the entire translation committee, and two to three general workshops on literacy to discuss some orthography issues that came up in Aaron's recent workshop.  Please pray that he'll be able to prepare well for these as it is hard to teach and run logistics for workshops at the same time. 

 

Thanks for your prayers for the Choate family during the last couple of weeks as Aaron has been at these two workshops.  As always, if you have any message that you'd like passed on via radio please let me know at the following email address: deputy.solomon.islands@sil.org. 

That is all for today.

sincerely,

Andy Pierce