Wedding cake in the village

We know it is Western, but we made a wedding cake for Jimmy and Perin.

We didn't really know how foreign it was to the Dani workers until Koiles asked me what sort of seeds did he neeed to plant to grow the cake. I did a double-take and thought he was kidding, but he asked again, "What sort of seeds do you plant to get this?" pointing to the cake-bread part.

So, we told them a lot about wheat and grains and cake mix and they seemed satisfied with the answer.

Perin and Jimmy Wedding pics 2

Jimmy and Perin's wedding 1 - Oct 2010

I just realized I never posted their wedding pics. Both are serving with me in Danowage, a remote interior village, focusing on trying to educate the youth. Several orphans live with them.

A gecko hunt

Now, Alethea is even proficient.

I am the Broom-man, I go first and sweep the little gecko guys off the walls.

Then the kids look and listen for the characteristic gecko plop and then grab them while they are stunned.

Noah is training Alethea. For the slower moving ones, he doesn't grab them but defers to Alethea.

Eating out, and a beautiful sunset

Leaving the village

Note: Yulianus is under the wing. Also, in the distance you can see the blue roofs of new housing, a community development project arranged by Yulianus.

Got a cassowary

Well, wahdya know, the dogs ran down a cassowary and we ate good that night.

I didn't go on this hunt, but I am glad my guests did. I got to eat their bounty. Not bad for their first time in the jungle (although the dogs and the locals did do all the work - though the locals did credit my guests with giving them good luck).

An early morning hunt for tired guests

Talking with Paulus

We are discussing plans to fit him with a prosthetic foot in April. Thanks to supporters like you.

The inhabitant of the local croc farm

He is small now, but he will get lots bigger. This village is farming crocs for sale and will use the profits to help education and community development.

Flying into an interior village

Me and two guests flew into an interior village along the M River in order to teach, see village progress and let the guests see the interior.

Swimming with my peeps

Swimming at the lower falls

Alethea was in rare form.

Two great mountain pics

Eating with friends, and another beautiful sunset

Checking out a fish-pond on the coast

Fish-ponds are often a good micro-enterprise by which local people can earn a living and by which one can aid in community development. I know of several started in West J, one with funds from my supporters. There might be occasion here as well to start one.

p.s. a friend snapped this awesome sunset.

Harun Treido

Two years ago Harun was saved.

Before that he attended church and trusted in his church attendance and church membership to save him, even though he never personally owned his faith.

Yulianus, a friend of mine, was so incensed that someone could so long attend a church and not clearly hear the Gospel that he, that very night after talking to Harun, rushed over to the pastor's house. Yulianus then explained the Gospel clearly that Sunday and following Sundays to the congregation there, making sure that others did not also sit in church and trust in their cultural Christianity or a mere external identity.

Now Harun is in Bible school, being supported by Yulianus' scholarship fund. He has received a laptop, has finished his first year well, is president of his class, and promises to return to the area where he grew up and serve there, in the interior, after graduation. The "brain drain" is huge in interior villages and once young people get an education, few return, but Harun speaks of a calling to return and help those who are interior and lack access.