This past week has been busy. I spent three days of it camped out at the construction site near Momi Bay working with the local Fijians. It was a good but trying experience. The first day we were eating lunch--I had been eating mostly Fijian food--and they brought out some food in a basket that I thought at first was some large brown vegetables. When they brought it out I realized it was a pigs head. They had it leftover from a feast the previous weekend. Once they brought it out they cut it down the middle, started pulling pieces off and enthusiastically handing them to me for me to eat. Since it is rude to refuse food, and I have a hard time saying "no" anyway, I had to eat it. It was terrible. I mean, the taste probably wasn't too bad--it was pork--but, there was this pig skull staring at me with furry pig skin laying around it, and it hadn't been refrigerated for a couple of days. I will just say that I am lucky that I am not sick right now.
So it wasn't the best start of the week. However, the Fijians are so kind and generous, they welcomed me right in. And to them the pigs head is like a delicacy, so they were just being generous to me. The work there went alright. More laying bricks and building forms for cement. We have had some problems. There is no electricity there yet and our generator broke down. Two of the cement beams that had been molded collapsed, and some of the Fijians have been sick with respiratory illness for a couple of weeks. We need prayer that everything that needs to be finished before the Students International teams from the U.S. come gets completed. It has been a good experience for me to be by myself with just Fijians. I am starting to learn some of their language. They speak English too, but while I was there they mostly spoke in Fijian. Overall I have enjoyed working with them. Next week I will be making bunk beds for the site. I have to make 24 of them, and I don't know what tools I will have access to so it may take a while.
This weekend has been great. I was able to go out with Ray (the director) and some other people in a boat to a small island to go fishing and snorkeling. We are possibly going to bring the teams out their for an adventure day. It was wonderful to be able to see that side of Fiji as well. It is such a beautiful country. I am so blessed to be able to work here for my summer. I still miss Sarah so much, but she will be out here in 2 weeks. I am not sure where we will be staying yet. That is another project I have for this week. Apparently there is a house nearby the site at Momi that we have access to, but it has been overrun by goats for the past 2 years and may not be livable. I have to check it out and see if it can be cleaned and fixed, and if so, do that before she comes, otherwise we may be able to rig something up at the site. I guess we'll see. Ray and Laura and their girls Eden and Elani and I will be gong to church tomorrow here in Nadi. Hopefully we will be able to relax the rest of the day. It has been a busy week and next week will probably be just as busy if not more since the first team comes in 10 days.
