On our off days we’ve been enjoying the beach and James of course has been getting the local guys to bring him fishing. Here’s a great fishing spot. They walk halfway into the sea and cast their lines. It’s really cool to watch. Sophie and I trekked 15 mins thru the jungle with one of the local girls to get to the spot to join them. Serious jungle. I’m a real city girl, halfway carrying Sophie I almost died and the local had to take over and put her on her shoulders.

The boys caught about 5 small fishes and we had it for dinner. So yummy! Fresh fish! I can get used to this!

Sophie played on the beach a little and started eating a coconut that the guys helped crack open. She absolutely loved it. I’m so thankful our little one is quite experiential. She’ll ask "What’s that?" and wants to try. Sometimes she doesn’t like it and will junk it but i’m glad she is willing to give it a little try.

P/s More updates soon! Guess what???? We managed to secure unlimited internet usage and bandwidth for the whole time we’re here for a good price!!! Woo hoo!!!

Yeh! I finally got some photos loaded on the flickr site. Here’s one of Sophie with her new friends at the local free playschool that meets under a banyan tree. We’ll be there tomorrow again to play and teach.

More photos soon!

- When she is able to walk barefooted on rocks and stones
- When she uses the stalk of a flower to scratch her neck
- When she walks around the village and people that she doesn’t even know calls her name each time she walks past – Sophie! Sophie! Sophie fee fee!
- When she sits in the sand pit and plays, ignoring the huge dog that is sitting right in the pit with her.
- When she is washes her own clothes in her bathe
- When she plays with marbles and think they are the most precious thing in the world
 

P/s Sorry I can’t seem to get my photos uploaded. Check James’ facebook account for photo uploads ya?

Praying for the people of Vanuatu
- That they will see value in children. Some parents will leave their young children and go to work with no one to take care of them or even provide food for them. Some are as young as 4 years old.
- There is a DTS going on on the base. There are about 9 students, mostly locals. Pray that they will grow in the Lord. This week a speaker cancelled last minute and they have no speaker. Pray that we can bless the DTS students and staff. Many of them are in their twenties.
- There is much to love about Vanuatu – the people are so friendly and open. Pray that they will remain open to the Lord and grow.
- Most are church goers but there is a great need for discipleship. Pray for effective discipleship in the churches.

Praying for our team
- I’ve been getting migraines and James’ got a throat infection. The weather has been very humid and hot and we really need to drink a lot more than we have been. Pls pray for good health and for us to adapt quickly.
- Pray for sensitivity to the local culture and love for the people.
- Pray that we will be able to share the heart of God with the people and bless them.
- Hygiene is a big worry because the kiddos are so young and some put their hands into their mouth. We need to be careful yet not paranoid. Pls pray that we will trust the Lord to protect us and the kids.
- Pray for good communication in our team (remember we come from 3 different nations!) and also with the leaders of the base here.
- Pray for strength and tenacity in the midst of settling our kids and also as ministry begins.

What we will be doing
- Teaching parenting to some of parents of the village. Their kids go to a free preschool run by a local lady with a heart for children.
- Next week we’ll be going to the help out at the preschool and teach at another village on marriage and parenting. We also plan to spend time at the local "community" hang out place near the beach and get to know the villagers.
 

Dearest Sophie,

Oh our little darling girl. Someone commented that you are like a little 2 year old turning 10. It’s amazing to see how much you grow each month, not just physically but emotionally, spiritually and intellectually.

We’ve just arrived in Vanuatu a week ago and it seems like you’ve settled in pretty well. You are eating well, actually much better than back in NZ, maybe coz the food is similar to what you get back in Singapore e.g rice/root vegetables with dishes plus lotsa fruits. You are sleeping relatively ok, sometimes you get up in the night either with a nightmare or sometimes you are just feeling itchy. It’s been really hot and it’s so hard to keep you clean all the time. But still, we are really proud of how you are adjusting.

We have been really tickled at how you are picking up the Bislama language and making the locals laugh at your attempts to speak it and also how you are willing to sit in the pram which happens to be in a terrible condition and be dragged in it over potholes and mud.

Oh it’s really so hard to keep you clean and prim and proper in the village but thank you for showing us how to live and be content in every situation.

Thank you for being our wonderful little girl and thank you for being so loving and willing to share (ok at least 50% of the time, hiak!) with the little ones around. We are so proud of you and we love you no matter what!

Love
Mommy

We’re in Vanuatu! We’ve been here since Monday.

We took the 7.30am flight from Auckland to Vanuatu. It was a 3 and a half hour flight. The kids all did really well, even the babies. It was quite a tiring trip because we left the base at 2.30am in order to get to Auckland in time for our flight. We all hardly slept, a little here and there.
 

Sophie was so hyped up that she was talking and singing all the way from the base to the Auckland airport. Ya! At 3am! Singing! She only fell asleep in the last half hour!
 

When we got on the plane, she was also very pleased to watch TV and subsequently fell asleep while watching Winnie the Pooh. Woo hoo!
 

When we got to the Vanuatu airport, we were greeted a group of live band and singers. Immediately we could feel the jive of island life! So happening! Tourism is the bread and butter of the island, especially in the recent years.
 

The base leaders came to pick us up at the airport and gave us a tour of the Pango village where the YWAM base is. We are located about a 10 mins walk from the beach and within a local village.
 

The base setup is real rural and basic. We have a tiny room to ourselves and sleep on the floor on mattresses. Sophie sleeps in her own Baby Bjorn portable cot which btw has been the best buy of 2008. We’ve used that for our Aussie trip, the past three mths in NZ and now, in Vanuatu.
 

We all share common bathing and toilet facilities and it is unisex. There is no hot water for baths but not a problem really coz the weather is similiar to Singapore – tropical and humid. Very grateful for sitting toilet bowls.
 

As with normal village life, there are animals everywhere – dogs, cats, chickens. Fruit trees are everywhere and fruit is a big part of the diet. That’s really great because the diet is simple. So far, we’ve been served bananas, passionfruit, coconuts and papayas.

More updates and photos in a bit when I figure out uploading photos from iphoto to flickr! Meanwhile, James has uploaded some pictures of our village life on his Facebook. Check it out!

We’ve finished 3 months of school, 1 research paper, 7 hours of homework per week, 1 oral presentation and 1 exam! Woo hoo! We had our graduation last nite.

It’s been a great run. We really enjoyed the school and God has done tremendous things in our lives.

We have one more week of outreach preparation on the base and then we’re off to the lovely pacific island of Vanuatu on the 19th of April. We’ll be there for a whole month. We’ll be living on the YWAM base and working with the local churches to conduct marriage seminars and parenting courses. It’ll be quite an interesting outreach because our team has 3 couples and we have 6 children ranging from 1 – 12 years old between us! That really means 6 adults and 6 kids! Woo hoo! Sounds more like a family holiday than outreach. This is my very first time on a family outreach and I’m not very sure what to expect. But I’m sure it’ll be good.

Please do keep us in prayer.

Prayer requests

1. Effective teaching and outreach

2. Wisdom and Holy Spirit guidance

3. Sensitivity to the culture and ability to transend language (Languages: Bislama, English, French and over 100 local languages)

4. Love for the people

5. Health for all of us

I’m really looking forward to this. It’s been a while since I’ve been on a mission trip! The last one I did was a local outreach in Feb 06! It’s so cool to be able to do this with Sophie. I’m really really excited. I’m also looking forward to a bit of beach, sand and sea, without the cool chilly wind. Hiak hiak…

A few weeks ago, our school held a Cultural Nite where all of us had to bring a dish and present something about our country.

Guess what we made? The wonderful Prima taste Singaporean Chili Crab gravy using crabstick (!! No real crab lah!) and served with prawn crackers from the Chinese fast food place in town. Just for a dip and a taste of Singapore food.

Ok they loved the prawn crackers. We had the gravy for breakfast with bread for the rest of the week. BUT IT WAS OOOOHHH SO GOOD! I can’t wait to be back to eat yummy Singapore food.

We received a lovely surprise gift from Perth last week!

It’s this beautiful handmade skirt that Sophie is so happy to wear. Once she opened up the gift, she immediately put it on, on top of everything she was already wearing! Thanks Pris!

P/s Thank you to everyone who have sent lovely presents to us while we’ve been here. Esp Mama and Yeye, Sophie loves all the books and puzzles you sent! And a shout out to Grace for the lovely bento box! It’s been such a blessing to receive snail mail. Thank you for your love and thoughtfulness.

We’ve just finished the last week of lessons for us. So fast three months have passed! I’m sorry for the silence.

We’ve been so busy with the research papers. We’ve finally all done and have submitted. I’ve written a paper on how motherhood affects our spiritual life and James wrote about how marriage and fatherhood changed his life.

This coming week is the final week for the course. We’ve got exams tomorrow morning and also oral presentations for our papers. And we graduate on Wednesday! I promise more updates when we’re done with the exams tomorrow! Now back to studying!