February 21, 2011

Dear Friends, Brethren and Family

Where has the time gone
It is hard to believe that 40 years ago Kathy and I were in Okinawa and Kathy had just given birth to a healthy, bald headed, baby girl who we named Terasa. She, of course, is now married, has a full head of hair (unlike her father who is now bald headed) and had 6 children of her own. Happy birthday darling!

Rain Rain Rain still
We continue to be rained upon. This past month we have had over 474 mm (19 inches) of rain. In the past week we have had several times when we received over 4 inches in less than 30 minutes. This is the season for low pressure systems slow moving over the islands. The weather people here said last month that we should be free from cyclones until the end of the season in April. However they don't control the weather and several cyclones have developed but have spared the Fiji land mass. Cyclone Atu developed Saturday just to the Northeast of Vanuatu and is expected to be West of us out to sea early tomorrow morning. We are expecting some heavy rains from the outer rings but not a lot of wind.

With the rain of course we have flooding in our yard. After many, many e-mails to those in charge they finally came out to see what the drainage problem was and just this morning there is a backhoe digging out the drain behind our yard all the way to a (stopped up, hidden in the brush) drain culvert under the train tracks to the ocean side. Hurrah! That parable about persistence really works. This should allow us better sleeping at night when the rain is falling hard and we expect the water to come in the house while we are asleep.

We have been keeping up with all the snow and ice in the USA. We note that many times services had to be called off or modified because of the ice and snow. We have the same problem here when it rains. The place we have been meeting the past three years is in a flood plain. The family who live there, Bola and Lowata, moved out in December and have not returned so we have held services at Joshua's house, our house and another member who lives further into Sabeto down a gravel road. There have been a couple of weeks (like yesterday) that we all have stayed in our homes because of rain and road flooding.

Visitor from close
Goman Mesa and some of his family have returned from Vanuatu to Papua New Guinea to work. Goman wrote saying that he was having problems with his son's, Seselo, passport getting stuck in PNG immigrations so he could not travel with them back to PNG in January. Seselo was the only family member who had not taken out Vanuatu citizenship and was travelling on a PNG passport. Since they could not get it straight he was to travel on "papers only" and the Australian government would not allow him to travel through Australia so he had to come through Fiji - Solomon Islands - PNG. We met Seselo at Nadi airport coming from Vanuatu, after services on Sunday morning, Jan 30th, and put him on his flight the next day to the Solomon Islands and then on to Port Moresby so he could be united with his family. One of his sisters and one brother still live in Port Vila, Vanuatu where they have jobs. Goman and his family did great work with the church while in Vanuatu and they expect to return in the future to Port Vila.

Vehicle Fun
Since we bought our little car in 2007 was have been pleased with it. I was returning home from a grocery/mail check in Lautoka on a Saturday afternoon last month. It was raining hard. All of a sudden I smelled something like rubber burning (which is common with people burning rubbish alongside the roads), a smack-smack and the alternator light came on. The driving of the car was not affected so I kept going. I knew that the cooling fan was electrical and not belt driven so I didn't expect the car to overheat. It was about 5 miles on home, the temperature pointer was creeping into the red zone so I slowed down and stayed in a higher gear but when I drove through the gate at home and stopped the car it did overheat. After it had cooled off I checked under the hood and found the belt which drives the alternator had broken. A fuse has blown and the electrical to the horn and cooling fan had not been working. That's okay this can be fixed even though we are 15 miles from any auto parts store. I called the dealership, for the car, in Lautoka and found out the normal here, "sorry we don't stock alternator belts for that model." By then it was after 5 pm and everyone was closed. Saturday morning I was able to borrow a vehicle from the manager of the marina and went to the dealership in Nadi, 15 miles away. (I was going to talk a bus in but she offered her vehicle.) The dealership said they bought their parts at a place in Nadi, so I went there and bought a couple of belts that looked like the right size compared to the old chewed up belt. I went back home, and you guessed it, neither belt fit, they were too small. I had bought two thinking one would be a spare! I was having so much fun trying to fit my hands into and alongside an engine that fit into the car like a foot into a sock. What kind of miniature person works on cars like this? The back of my right hand looks like a bobcat scratched it.

So I borrowed the car again and went to Lautoka, 12 miles the other direction. I went to the dealership just to find the size of the original belt and they sort of laughed when I asked if they had any belts at all. They had a service book for the car but it did not list the size of the belt either. (I even e-mailed the company in Indonesia and it took them 3 weeks to send me the belt size which doesn't correspond to the belt sizes here in Fiji.) The dealership gave me a place to go check in Lautoka (a bearing shop) but they didn't have the size either. The belt is actually just like a washing machine belt so I even went to a appliance repair shop with the old belt but they did not have a match either. I went to three different shops (two auto parts, one hydraulic hose shop) and ended up buying three different size belts (trying to match against the old belt). I went home and one of the three fit. I also replaced the air conditioning belt which was on the same pulley. It was showing a bit of wear also. The car was fixed (so we thought).

Fiji Cancer Society
Since 2008 Kathy has been working with the Fiji Cancer Society group here at Vuda Point. In February they had their annual AGM in Nadi so we attended. (This was a couple of weeks after the belt replacement.)

It was a normal AGM with over 30 people in attendance including the President of the Fiji Cancer Society and other members from Suva, member from Lautoka, Nadi and of course Vuda. After a couple of short talks about cancer subjects from cancer experts, Dr Fred Mercher and Dr Reber, two medical insurance companies were allowed to present what their companies offered in medical insurance packages for cancer patients. The insurance representative made it very clear that pre-existing medical conditions were not covered. They talked about overseas treatment etc, etc. At this point it became very heated when it was brought to the group's attention and the insurance company's representative, by several ladies in attendance, that one insurance company ceased medical coverage of the payee at the age of 65 (FijiCare) even if the person had been paying for many years with no claims. The other company (Colonial) hedged on their age limit.

At this point I felt that some clarity needed to be brought to the meeting and I was given the floor to speak. First and foremost I explained that the insurance companies were not in business to help us the customer. Insurance companies only provide a service for people who could afford to hedge a bet that they might need help with expenses in the future whether those expenses be life, auto, medical or household. But the bottom line was profits and that is why the insurance companies charged what they did and if a patient needed medical overseas treatment but could not raise the excess funds (20%) for treatment overseas and they died before they could get treatment, so be it! I pointed out that over 98% of Fijians cannot afford medical insurance. I also pointed out that my wife and I could not qualify nor afford medical insurance either. At 62 years old I have many pre-existing conditions as you can imagine. Both my wife and I have had some form of cancer treated in the past as well.

So what are we to do in Fiji if people need medical treatment for cancer? I answered by saying that I thought it was high time the Fiji government took seriously the high incident of cancer in Fiji as well and the need for better awareness programmes and especially for treatment programmes. Fiji is no different than many other island nations here in Oceania where it seems that it is cheaper to let people die than to provide prevention and treatment programmes. When we lived in PNG in the 1970's the government provided spraying and pills for malaria prevention but then quit spraying (when funds were short) and the number of deaths because of malaria have continued to climb and many young children die every week. Too often cancer in Fiji is not treatable because by the time patients are diagnosed they are too far along to be treated. Hospitals should be seen as places for treatment and recovery and not just the last place to go die!

In 2008 a group of women at Vuda Point in Fiji, where we live, were looking at a way to assist the Oncology unit at Lautoka Hospital. They painted the rooms, made new curtains and donated two lazyboy chairs for the treatment room. I built a new wooden cupboard and mixing table as well as ten new red benches for the treatment room. The Nadi Cancer Society donated two air conditioners, a microwave, a TV and DVD player. Ten boxes of donated linens for the unit are awaiting shipment from the USA. There are plans to refurbish a shower, toilet and hand basin for the patient's use rather than having to use the men's facilities on the same ward. I told the meeting that I have contacts for containers of new and used medical equipment and medical linens that would be donated to Fiji, stuff that American hospitals either replace, update and throw away, which was available if we could find the shipping costs.
I said it was high time the treatment of cancer was taken seriously and something was provided in Fiji. The incidences of cervical cancer in Melanesia is only second behind Central America It is treatable. Breast and prostate cancers are treatable if diagnosed early. Why don't we have a sister-hospital system with Oncology, Heart, etc programmes overseas? Aid donors would come forward if the need is really projected in the Fiji media.

Like always it is just whatever is the "flavour" of the day gets exposure. Cancer awareness and treatment options needs to be kept on the front burner. Fiji needs to show we care about cancer and that it can be a curable disease by providing quick and efficient cancer treatment here in Fiji. Golly we might even get patients from other islands - medical tourists! If we care we will get serious about this need.  It is about time we showed people that we care about them and their health and that it is not right to have an attitude that "it is cheaper for some people to just die!"

When I finished and sat down several attendees clapped and after the meeting closed said they appreciated what I had to say. The insurance presenters kind of slunk out of the meeting. I guess that is one way to get involved.

After the meeting as Kathy and got in the car to go home I noticed the temperature pointer in the over hot position and heard the over flow bottle blowing off steam under the bonnet (hood). We were about 6 miles from home, it was raining so I drove slow but steady. We did get home and the engine was not knocking so I felt I had spared it damage. The next morning I opened the bonnet and found there was no water in the system. As I was filling it up I found the hole which had developed in the metal pipe going into the engine. We do not have or use anti-freeze here so it is not uncommon for the metal pipes to corrode. Obviously when it over heated before it had put pressure on the spot and it finally corroded through. The pipe is not replaceable without a huge cost so I patched it with metal tape and a clamp and put a bottle of ground black pepper in the system to stop any other small leaks we might have. That's right, black pepper is usable as a radiator stop leak agent since we don't have radiator stop leak in Fiji either.

Land for Bible School
We have a lead on 10 acres of land for the school. We thought we were going to talk with the owner last week but the local village had a ceremonial burial of their chief who had been the President of Fiji for a number of years. It pretty much shut down the area for a week with all the custom/ceremonial things going on. (In the immediate village all the animals and young children were taken out so there would be no noise during the week.) The land that we had been given before is 2 acres up the coast along the beach area. We cannot do anything with until the land owners, who live in Auckland, can come up and get it leased through the Native Land board and she cannot do that until June. This 10 acres is just up the road from where we live and the owner had been approached by Malika who is one of the Christian sisters who worships with us. He has tentatively agreed to F$2000 an acre which is a fair price for the lease of land here. That would be US$11,000, for a 99 year lease, which is all we have right now in the account but at least we can start something (clearing and planting crops). Pray for this with us! Just need $150,000 more to get the essential buildings built.

I just came back from viewing the land and as you can see an acre has already been leased and it looks like they have encroached on some of the other 9 acres. More later!

Waiting on the Lord
It has been hard to wait on the Lord but we are trying. Like last month and the month before because of all the wet weather and everything being on Fiji time I have spent most of the time at home working in the office (except when flood proofing the house) and catching up on my reading and research. I am still working on courses for CIBS by writing new ones and proofing the ones I have already written. We have new requests coming in for the Extension Bible Correspondence courses and grading of current students.

Vanuatu Trip
I just finished a new course on marriage called "Christian Marriage and Family Life." It is 286 full size pages dealing with marriage and family life in the Melanesian culture. I was asked by Stephen Felix and the Vanuatu brethren to come and talk to them about this subject. Kathy and I will be flying out tomorrow morning (cyclone willing) to spend two weeks in Vanuatu with the brethren.

Again we appreciate and thank all of you who make it possible for us to be here and assist in the workings of the Kingdom of God here in the South Pacific. Your prayers and support are a God-send in times we feel we are but spinning our wheels.

Your seed sowing workers in the Kingdom.

Tobey & Kathy