I'm Dreaming of a white Christmas...

Hi everyone. Well, its bin awhile since we have had a chance to catch up with our blog. We had a great time in New Zealand, and now we are in Papua New Guini.
We left New Zealand on Monday morning, and flew to Sydney where we spent the day touring around. We took a ferry through the port to a beach, explored around the Opera house, and rested. On Tuesday morning we flew to Cairns, then to Port Morsby and then to Lae, where Ian and Nadia Wildeboer picked us up from the Airport. This begins our adventure in Lae, Papua New Guini!
Andrew and Natalie Vanderheide live in the same compound as the Wildeboers so we have seen them lots as well. On Tuesday night we just hung out with everyone, caught up, and opened presents.
On Wednesday we had an opportunity to walk through a village near one the Reformed churches with Rev.Andrew. This is an area where they are doing a VBS program next week. So as we walked through we stopped and talked to a lot of people, who helped us learn a little Pidgeon (spelling?). It was a very nice walk which right away introduced us to the way of life in this country.
On Thursday Karen and I began our building project at S.I.L (Summer Institute of Linguistics)(Wycliffe) visitors house. This is a beautiful compound that houses visiting missionaries and workers. They asked us to build them a dog kennel, which would house the visitors' dogs when they came. So, thats what we did on thursday and Friday. We still have about one more days work to finish it off. That has been a fun project. On thusday night we went to a Bible study at Tent City, but the electricity was out, so it was cancelled. Just another of the variables that you have to deal with here.
Saturday was filled with odds and ends - going to the Market, more shopping, cleaning, cooking, swimming, and running, finishing off with a Settlers game in which we let Nadia win. Actually she destroyed us all.
Today we had another beautiful day. We worshipped at the Reformed church in Tent City. Rev. Ian preached on Matt 1:1, how Jesus Christ was the son of David, the son of Abraham, and the Son of God! It was a beautiful worship service. It was nice because the service was in Pidgeon but we could understand a lot, as you could pick out a lot of the words. Anyway, beautiful singing, fellowship, and it was nice to listen to Ian open the Word for us again.
This afternoon a bunch of us guys went to explore an old cave in the mountain behind the compound. We brought with us rope, flashlights, and knife, and our camera, and where ready to explore. The cave was an old japanese hide-out during the war, and most of the locals would never go in. So we decided it would be fun to try. So we went in. The cave went in about 50 metres before it was blocked off with a cave-in. So we couldn't go any further. We tried another entrance and it had the same result. But it was fun none-the-less. After that we climbed that mountain which was quite the work out- i definately need to get in shape.

Well, its kinda weird being in the hot during this Christmas time. We are definately dreaming of snow, and skating, and sipping hot chocolate by the fire place. But instead its really hot and humid. But we are not complaining. We are excited to spend Christmas with the Wildeboers and the Vanderheides. And to the Dejonge's who are doing their gift exchange today, or yesterday, i can't remember what time it is in Canada right now - but save us some food, you can take one gift out of our room, and make sure you write us a poem!

We love you all. Let us know how you are doing, and keep sending those prayer requests!
Have a most blessed Christmas Season!