Tuesday
Today was our first day off since Currumbin Wildlife Sanctuary in Australia. The team took full advantage sleeping in until about 9:00am. After a hearty breakfast of scrambled eggs with beef and cheese we got ready for the day. Our hosts Jenny and Ian Memafu had set up a day of swimming on a remote island just off Port Moresby. The team could not contain their excitement as we traveled to a village on the outskirts of Moresby. After getting our truck parked and unloaded it took two trips on a 15 minute banana boat ride to get us all to Manubada Island. It was a beautiful sunny day and the water was pristine clear. The team lathered themselves in sunscreen and swam, hiked and played all day. We spent a good four hours on the island and reluctantly headed back to the village where we loaded the truck and headed back to the church.
The team welcomed their cold showers rinsing the sand off and getting settled for dinner. Jenny Memafu made a traditional dish called “Karamap” which is essentially a mini-mumu. For those of you that don’t know what a mumu is. It is a meal that is that is traditionally prepared and cooked in an underground oven. There is chicken, beef, spinach, sweet potatoes, plantain bananas all soaked in coconut juice and steamed, a mouth watering dish to say the least. During dinner we had a surprise visit from George and Crystal Nita, missionaries to Port Moresby and good friends of the Ila’s and Tabor’s. The Ila family was also visited by Tiana Ila, his wife Grace and their family. Tiana also brought Geoff’s nieces with him Teaghan and Andrea. A good end to a fun day!

Wednesday
Our scheduled performance for 9:00am at Hanuabada was cancelled so we had a much needed worship and prayer time. Since we were only scheduled for one performance today, we had lunch cleaned up, got ready and headed to Vision City Mall where we spent a couple of hours and headed back to the church. Jasmine Mileng’s dad Hughes and her brother John came with a TV and outdoor antenna and set them up for tonight’s festivities. Hughes then took Tayne and Tristen to get pizza for dinner. Henry, Geoff’s brother also brought food, bully beef, coconut rice, stir fry greens and salad, and rotisserie chicken. Needless to say we had a feast for dinner tonight. After dinner we sat down to watch the Super Bowl of rugby league between the Queensland Maroons and the New South Wales Blues. Since having the Bootcamp in Queensland you could tell the team had already been indoctrinated by Samuel Vincent and Geoff to support the Mighty Maroons, and of course the Maroon’s didn’t disappoint with a 52-6 drubbing of the grubby Blues….