It took a total of 80 hours from the time we left our apartment in Alhambra, California, until the time we arrived at our house in Papua New Guinea, but we are finally home. We flew on Qatar Airways from Los Angeles to Doha, Qatar, where we had less than a two-hour layover before getting on another Qatar Airways flight from Doha to Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia. We arrived in Malaysia in the morning and spent most of the day at the hotel inside the international terminal before departing at about 1:30 a.m. to fly to Papua New Guinea. The flight from Kuala Lumpur to Papua New Guinea was a charter flight of the United Nations World Food Program, operated by Malaysia Airlines. For all intents and purposes, it was like flying on any other international flight. As we entered the boarding area, however, the gate agents were taking everyone's temperature, and I got nervous about what would happen if one of us had a fever. Would we be stranded in Malaysia? Thankfully nobody in our family and nobody among the dozens of others from our organization who were traveling with us had a fever, and so we were able to board the plane. After flying to Papua New Guinea and arriving in the capital of Port Moresby, we were taken to a hotel, where we spent the night. The next morning we flew to the Aiyura valley on a Kodiak airplane, which seats ten people. From the airstrip, we were transported to our house in Ukarumpa, where we were quarantined for the next two weeks, even having our property closed off with yellow caution tape to remind people not to get too close to us, and to remind us not to leave our property.
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| Asher visiting at a safe distance with his friend Judah during quarantine |
After three weeks of intense preparations to return to Papua New Guinea, followed by 80 hours of travel, spending two weeks in quarantine didn't sound so bad. Martha and I even tried to view it as a vacation of sorts (even though I resumed working after a few days), and it was nice to have some down time. Of course, coming back to a house that had mostly sat empty for 15 months had its challenges. Our toilet was leaking, our water pump died a few days into quarantine, birds had taken over under the eaves of our house, our stove was barely functional, and of course we had the regular ants, geckos, and roaches—but we know how to get by here in PNG. Quarantine was probably more difficult for the kids, who, after fifteen months of being away, were longing to spend time with their friends again, and not just for a few moments at a distance, separated by yellow caution tape. So when our quarantine ended at precisely 8 a.m. on October 27, we were waiting at the tape, ready to break out. As soon as the clock struck 8, we cut down the tape and enjoyed our newfound freedom.
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| Crossing the tape at precisely 8 a.m. on October 27 |
We are now transitioning back to normal life in Papua New Guinea, which, like everywhere else in the world is not quite so normal because of COVID-19. Nevertheless, for reasons that are not quite known, the death toll from COVID-19 seems to be much lower here in PNG. It is difficult to estimate how rampant the spread of the disease is throughout the country, but, for the most part, the area where we live does not seem to have had any measurable increase in respiratory diseases or deaths. And while the missionary community in which we live is being cautious and seeking to minimize exposure, in many ways life here feels far more "normal" than it did in Los Angeles. Asher is already back in school—in a real classroom! Things are a bit more difficult for Jacob and Bella because they have to wait until the start of the new semester in January to return to the classroom. As a result, they are finishing up their current semester online through NorthStar Academy. I (Adam) have returned to working in a little cubicle, and Martha is preparing to teach an English class at the high school next semester. Due to COVID-19 there is a shortage of teachers, and so Martha has been asked to help.
We continue to make great progress on the translation work, and, Lord willing, we should finish all of our checking requirements for the New Testament by the end of 2021. Please pray for us as we transition back to life in PNG, and please pray that we would continue to make progress on checking the New Testament. Thank you, as always, for your prayers and your partnership with us in this work.
