The Joy of Cooking—Ukarumpa Style

I don’t generally enjoy cooking—a typical week of cooking usually looks like me making a large pot of soup or a hotdish that I eat pretty much all week. Of course, that means the pickins get mighty slim by Friday…but that’s what biscuits and peanut butter are for, right?!

My dislike of cooking is compounded by the fact that there are few “convenience foods” available—and if the store does, by chance, have one of these convenience foods, it is outrageously expensive. Or, depending on when the last shipment from Australia or the States arrived, what you are looking for may simply be out of stock.

You Know You're a Missionary Teacher When...

·         You thought you knew the alphabet, then your kids informed you differently—H is not H, it’s pronounced hay-ch, and Z is zed

·         The power goes on and off randomly throughout the day; you (and your students) hardly even notice anymore

·         Telling a child that they have to wear shoes at recess induces ridiculous amounts of whining and complaining

Veggie Tales

One thing I enjoy most about Papua New Guinea is the availability of fresh produce at the market. Papua New Guineans from all over the Aiyura Valley bring fresh fruits and vegetables from their gardens to sell at the Ukarumpa market. The market is outside with long wooden tables set up where the vendors can display their produce.

The market

Market runs from 6:30-8:00 am, every Monday, Wednesday, and Friday, so one morning a week (Fridays this term) I haul myself out of bed (which gets harder and harder as the end of the school year approaches), throw on my “market clothes” (aka a skirt and sweatshirt over my pyjamas and my gum boots), grab some kina, my keys, and my lowlands string bilum, and head out the door. Since the fire-mapartment is so close to the market (down the driveway, past the store, and around the Teen Centre), I don’t have far to walk.

What Did You Say?!

For your reading enjoyment: the second installment of Kids Say the Darndest Things.

1.       My first graders during Sunday School:

Kid 1: “Why are all the teachers girls?”

Kid 2: “Because girls like little kids more than boys do!”

U is for Umbrella

While it is true that all men are created equal, the same cannot be said of the umbrella. Before I moved to Papua New Guinea (PNG), I had a cute little fold-up umbrella that was more than adequate for a short jaunt to the car or to run into Target. In fact, I rarely used it—it was just too much of a hassle to deal with—up, down, in, out, drip, drip, drip.

Then I moved halfway around the world to a country that has two seasons—rainy and dry. In the rainy season, it rains pretty much every day, at about the same time each day. In the dry season…well, it rains pretty much every day, randomly throughout the day. So with all the rain around here, one needs a good umbrella. But what constitutes a good umbrella?

Kids Say the Darndest Things

I’m always amazed at the things kids say—the things that pop out of their mouths when they aren’t even trying to be funny. Since I’m at school all day, and therefore around kids all day, I decided to compile a list of things that some of the kids say.

1. One of my second graders started a sentence by saying, “When I was a kid…” (Um, when was that, last week?!)
2. Two older boys walked passed my room, one was talking and the other, presumably, had been listening until he said, “I’m tuned out…” (I almost fell off my chair from laughing so hard when I heard this one—the non-listener was totally deadpan when he said that!)
   

To Town, You Say?

Kainantu-see the little bit of pavement on the right side
of the picture?

About a week and a half ago, I had the opportunity to go to Kainantu with several other ladies to do some shopping. We piled into the old firetruck and headed out bright and early (okay, so 7:30 isn’t really that early…but it was school break!). The roads here in Papua New Guinea (PNG) are very interesting (read: full of potholes), and the dirt road right out the front gate of Ukarumpa is among the worst (at least on the way to Kainantu). You can’t really dodge the potholes because they are EVERYWHERE, so you just look for the part of the road that has the least, or the potholes that look the least likely to eat your vehicle.