Sept 3

Our “wasfemili” (host family) came to visit on Thursday night. We enjoyed meeting them and getting to know them a bit. We’ll be spending time with them about once a week for the next few weeks. And at one point we’ll spend a night at their house.

Our “waspapa” (host papa) and “wasmama” (host mama) have 5 kids:
Norlyne (girl) age 12
Loraine (girl) age 10
Douglas (boy) age 6
Demien (boy) age 4
Julius (boy) age 8 months

Each team here at POC was assigned a “wasfemili”. A team consists of 2-3 people. James and I are a team (duh?). Anyway, Thursday night all of the “wasfemilis” came to meet us and have dinner with us. We didn’t have to make our own food this time. The kitchen prepared food for us (stew – potatoes, carrots, and meat served over rice, sweet tea and banana cake for dessert). Next time our “wasfemili” comes to visit here (which I believe will be in about a month) we’ll have to prepare the food ourselves and serve them in our “haus kuk” (temporary outdoor kitchen).

We cleared all of the desks and chairs out of the classroom and took mats from our rooms over to put on the floor where we would host our “wasfemili”. Our mat was about 5′ x 3′. There were 10-12 groups. So imagine 10-12 mats spread out on a classroom floor with the plan to host anywhere from 2-10 people per mat. The room was definitely full once everyone arrived.

The “wasfemilis” were told to arrive “as the sun was going down”. I would say sunset is between 6 and 7 and it’s very dark by 7:30. Most people arrived around 7 p.m. Mikayla and Laurel are used to going to bed at 7 p.m. but we wanted our “wasfemili” to get to meet them. Our “wasfemili” arrived just before 7 p.m. Laurel was sleeping in a “bilum” (string bag) which we were able to hang just a few feet away from our mat in the classroom. Mikayla was tired, but enjoyed meeting our “wasfemili” and hung out with all of us until about 7:45 p.m. when she was just way too tired and I took her back to our room to go to sleep.

Mikayla really enjoyed our “wasfemili” and took to them right away. She was sitting on our wasmama’s lap within minutes of all of us sitting down around the mat. Laurel woke up about 10 minutes after they got there and Nolene wanted to hold her as soon as I got her out of the “bilum”.

At about 7:30 the kitchen brought our pot of rice and our pot of stew out. They set it in between me and our “wasmama”. Both of us were holding babies, but in PNG culture it is customary for the women to serve food to the men and children. The kitchen lady (Sue) who brought out our food offered to take Laurel for me and our wasmama handed her baby to our waspapa. Once the food was served it was time for me to take Mikayla and put her to bed. As soon as she was in bed, Sue brought Laurel to me so I was able to put her to bed too and then go back to our “wasfemili” while someone else kept an ear open to hear if either of the girls woke up. They both slept great all night.

James and I showed our “wasfemili” pictures from our family calendars. They really enjoyed seeing the pictures of our family and we talked about all sorts of things from family relationships (how do you say cousin, uncle, brother-in-law etc.), to baseball, to hiking, and on and on and on. We were communicating almost exclusively in Tok Pisin so I had been nervous that we wouldn’t be able to talk about much, but we actually talked about a lot of things and they were here for about 3 hours. Our “wasfemili” was the last to leave which was surprising to both of us.

At one point our “wasmama” asked if Grandpa and Grandma Farnell have a caregiver or any children who take care of them. I was trying to explain in Tok Pisin that Aunt Marilyn lives close to them, but I actually told them “Their daughter’s toilet is not very far away”. LOL. Oh well, they didn’t mind and with James’ help I was able to clarify what I was actually trying to say.

All in all it was a lot of fun and it was very good practice for us to use Tok Pisin so much.