As promised, here is a brief report on the other wonderful missionary couples we work with. The couple called to Vanuatu is from Germany. They arrived on the island nation of Vanuatu on Monday, March 9, 2015. Just four days later, Cyclone Pam hit the islands of Tanna and Efate on Friday, March 13th with 180 mph winds. Our couple have been up to their eyebrows with the recovery on the two islands receiving the most damage. Many people question why it is taking so long to rebuild. The answer: This is a complicated, large dollar project. The humanitarian project provides materials and training for those who's homes/shelters were damaged so they will be able to rebuild a stronger, safer family shelter. Some of the homes are totally gone. Those people will receive basic training and material to help rebuild a safer structure. Others will get supplies to make repairs. Teaching people to "help themselves" and become self-reliant is a big part of the project. Our couple has been visiting and making assessments of all the homes that are in need of repair. This has been done on both islands. There are no street addresses, so a local person has to go with them to help locate the people and do the assessments. It has been an arduous task. The assessments are now complete and technical specialists have helped to streamline the project with a few changes here and there. Several "model" shelters have been built and it looks like things are starting to move forward. Needless to say, they have not had a lot of time to think of anything but the Cyclone Pam rebuild.
We actually have two couples doing humanitarian work in Fiji, a missionary cople from Switzerland and couple from Calgary, Canada. When we were there in August we visited a village which wanted help improving their community hall. This community building was also use to hold church meetings. A humanitarian project was approved and the before and after pictures tell the story. Local people did the work themselves.
In Samoa we had a couple from Redlands, California. They helped to provide clean water to many communities. They were also instrumental in distributing used school furniture shipped from New Zealand to needy schools in Samoa. They also helped build a walkway so children could more safely cross a stream to get to school. This couple finished their mission the end of January. Our new missionary couple replacing them are currently on the job. They are from Las Vegas, Nevada and have just arrived in Samoa after a few days of training in New Zealand.
On the tiny island nation of Kiribati (Tarawa) we have a couple from Kaysville, Utah. Since Tarawa is a very flat atoll (a coral island) there is always a problem with flooding. This missionary couple have helped several villages build seawalls to protect village families from flooding; a constant threat.
In the Solomon Islands, our couple does double duty as self-reliance and humanitarian missionaries. They have been helping people to secure and install rain-water catchment tanks as well as helping teach dental hygiene and assisting the young women to assemble maternity packs for new mothers. They were also able to help provide local schools some needed badly needed sports equipment.
In addition, we also have two couples who operate the Church humanitarian dental clinics on the islands of Tonga and Samoa. They are retired dentists who have been called to serve for 18 to 23 months managing the dental clinics and helping improve community dental hygiene. Their wives help in the clinics as well as with community training. The couple in Tonga is from West Viriginia and the couple in Samoa are from Calgary, Canada. The clinics are on the campus of the Church run schools and the services are free. Originally the clinics were started so that the young missionaries turning in their mission application papers would get a "real" checkup prior to their mission. The dental services are on a first-come, first-served basis and serve the entire community of both Church members and friends of other faiths. Their objective is to improve dental health and to help the local dental community increase their skills and expand their services.
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