Wednesday, October 28, 2015
Murdock’s picked us up at 5:30 AM
to take us to the airport. I got 6 hours
sleep the night before, which is a one hour improvement over the last two
nights. I always want to giggle when I
come to an airport so small but they have all these signs up as if you could
get lost there. We took a small prop
plane with about 16 seats, so small I couldn’t hold my backpack or computer
which they had to put in the back of the plane.
The co-pilot, we observed, also acted as the steward and baggage
handler. We landed on a single strip of
pavement and upon reaching the end, turned around to go back and park near the
building. Once again the signs directed
us to either departures or arrivals, because without them we might surely have
lost our way…
Our little plane to Vava’u.
Note the arrival sign on the right, so we don’t get lost at the terminal
building.
On the flight over as we
approached the main island of Vava’u we saw so many islands that one probably
couldn’t count them all. Some were
larger, some were like green dots on top of the water. At a certain height you could see the reef
under the seas, realizing just how massive they are and how treacherous they
might be for larger ships. There was a
map in our room not just all the islands off of this one, but all of them from
the main island also.
Speaking of larger ships, we
think the Hollander was following us!
There it was, parked in a bay, with the little tender launches taking
people around off the big one. Our view
from one of the chapels was of this bay with the Hollander anchored there in
this most beautiful place with islands and all around set in the incredibly
rich color of blue you can imagine. It
is magnificent. And the weather is still
not too hot yet this time of year especially with the nearby ocean breezes. Each time we’d get too warm we’d find a tree
or go towards the ocean to cool off.
The best thing about
our room is that our balcony sits at the edge of the water, otherwise it is way
overpriced.
They checked us into
a room that was quite pretty with nice furniture, but it didn’t have Internet,
there was no soap, and they had the funkiest shower head, but who cares—the
mattress was okay and the air conditioner worked and there was hot water. Also,
we are sitting right on the ocean front at a beautiful bay with boats of every
type sitting on the water. We only felt cheated when we found out the price of
this place---I guess they can get it for the location, but it was really
lacking in some essential things to get that price. The Murdock’s and Ana are staying at a church
housing place but there was no room for us.
They ended up taking us to the main offices where there is also a school
to get WiFi so that we could do our work—a bit slow, but better than nothing. I could see what e-mail I had but could not
for the life of me get open them so I could read them. Oh, well, we can do that when we return
Friday morning to the Nuku’alofa mainland.
We changed vans at these offices
and got in one driven by the 1st counselor to the Stake President,
who took us around to all the project request areas. Some of their water systems were a bit more
advanced in the main part of town, but in others they all have the same
problem—they want motors, engines, sometimes tanks and towers. These are individual projects and cost a lot
more than water projects do in Africa, but then they don’t have as many options
here to get clean water. Ah, but for a
lot of money to get water to these people.
It is endless--we always say, throw a rock in any direction… The problem again is the cost of electricity
compared to fuel for a generator, and solar has proved to be unreliable and
seems to be their only option.
After looking at our first and
major bunch of possible project sites, the Sisters fed us a lunch. They had so many things there, all local food,
that they could have fed a small army with, but due to island culture, most of it
got eaten by all those that were there,
maybe 20-25 people. Some of it was
pretty good. They also had that green
stuff I mentioned before except this time I took a picture of it—also it had
ham in it along with the coconut milk and onions that are cooked in the leaves.
Coconut milk, onions
and ham, baked in leaves inside foil; looks gross but tastes pretty okay—felt a
little like it might be too rich though—it was not that big, but looks like it
in this close-up.
A funny thing happened; we were
waiting for Ana to deliver someone to their home and it seemed to be taking
forever. There was a jam because the
King of Tonga was riding his bike along the road and no one passed him. The funny thing, she said, was watching his
guards or militia trying to keep up with him on foot! Wish we had been there!
This is the view of the
bay from the Chapel where we had lunch.
The pine branches peeking into the picture on the right is a tree that
President Hinckley planted there. They
are very proud of this tree.
Ana and Murdock’s
tried to deliver a wheelchair to someone because hers was broken and was a
little too big. Ours was too small, so
they said that they would refurbish the one she had.
We went to see another site
(another Bishop had heard we were there) and then went to dinner and back to
our hotel completely exhausted once again.
We meet the others at 7:30 AM to go on another boat ride to some islands
where we will see more project requests and the same Stake President will
accompany us.
A new couple, the Edwards’, arrived
here a week ago and they will be in teaching.
They are now over jetlag and very excited to be here. They joined us for dinner also, and wanted to
buy a ticket just to tag along, and so they are also going with us.
Till tomorrow…
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