- Pastor Cario, wife Mavis and family – the cockroach is the bug of the day, not part of the family!
Monday, Carina had invited the Senior Pastor and his wife to dinner, this would be a bit of work in any culture but this process was something else! First Carina, Mason and I, went to the open market to hunt down lettuce, tomatoes and other produce for a salad; we also were hoping to find fruit. When I say ‘hope’ it is because this is brought in every day by many people who have gardens in various areas and have to travel by a public motor vehicle to even bring this to market. We wandered through rows and rows of mats and tables until we could locate enough lettuce for one salad and tomatoes that were in good shape, we bought two lemons from one man and then a few rows over found a couple more. All our purchases are put carefully in a belum that Carina and I are carrying, by Mason who shops alongside of his mother every time they go to Market. When we are done Carina tells me that we have to rush through two more stores because all of this produce will completely wilt in the car in the intense Madang heat. She had do go shopping in the order that she did because the produce is the cheapest to lose to the heat. We then go quickly through to more stores one to buy meat and one to buy cheese. We were making Salad and pizza for them, which would be a treat for someone from PNG because it is very expensive to buy already made pizza. When I say stores these are sparsely stocked shelves with items that would look old and worn to us, and are all guarded with security guards that check you going in and out of the building. Then we rushed home so we wouldn’t lose anything in the tropical heat.
When we arrive home we find out that the water is off and there is no water for unknown reasons. Now in most North American homes we probably would have called our guests and rescheduled dinner, but here losing your water is a way of life so Carina and Paul sprung into action. They ran back to a store to get a few big bottles of water, and some paper plates. While I stayed home to cook the meat for the pizza’s and watch the boys.
They returned and Carina washed carefully all the vegetables with a portion of the bottled water and we prepared the salad. Then she made all the pizza dough and pizzas while I cleaned up with a little bit of water we had in a bucket. We also prepared fruit and dessert as well, all without water so this was quite a challenge.
Before our guests arrived we cleaned ourselves up with a wet washcloth that we managed to wet with a little of the left over water. We tried to cool off because now the house was really hot with the oven on and the hot afternoon tropical sun. By the time our guests arrived the table was set, dinner was cooked and everything cleaned up all with what would amount to a big bucket of water.
I stood positively amazed again at the calm, peaceful way Paul and Carina handled this situation with grace and joy for their guests to come to their home. We had a delightful evening with the family only briefly even mentioning the water but mostly enjoying the fellowship.
The next day we still had no water until the late afternoon, but we determined to go joyfully go about our day, while I was silently praying for bit of cold water for some relief from the heat.
I am learning a lot about grace and gratefulness and the true meaning of what a cup of cold water would mean to someone on a hot day.
Bug of the Day….We came home to a dead cockroach in the living room. Carina says it is creepy to pick them up because they are so large and crunchy.
