Volume 6; No.7                                                 July 1983

Dear Brethren;

Greetings in the name of the Lord!

ALMOST HOME
During the month of June we did our final traveling prior to returning home to Papua New Guinea. We spent five days with our sponsoring congregation in Jeffersonville Indiana. From there we drove through Nashville and spent the night in Memphis visiting with Joe and Rosabelle Cannon and the Larry McKenzies. We then drove to West Plains where we dropped our car off with Dennis Willard who is trying to sell it for us. Kathy's dad and her brother Tim, who had just returned from mission work in Argentina met us there and drove us back to Joplin. Our last month in the states we only drove 1800 miles, in all we traveled just over 18,000 miles during our (LEAVE)?

ON THE BIG BIRD HOME
We spent Saturday night June 17 in Tulsa so as to board our return flight on Sunday morning at 7:OOAM. We flew from Tulsa via Los Angeles to Taipei Taiwan where China airlines put us up in the Manderin Hotel for the night. We flew on to Okinawa, Japan the next day where we spent 7 days.

RETURN OF THE EX-G.I.
Kathy and I had spent 30 months on Okinawa during my sojourn in the Air Force. Terasa had been born there but was only 6 months old when we left. We were in for a shock ?(very mildly put my man) First and foremost the congregation doesn't even meet close to where it used to. The congregation used to be located in Ojana and with hardly any development around it.

NOW it meets close to Kadena Airbase in Chibana. The old location really became crowded. In payment for the old location a contractor built the congregation a new 2-story building with air conditioning and parking lot near Kadena AB. The brethren moved into the new building last October. The old building is still standing because a dispute over the ownership of the ground is still being kicked around. Part of the original deed has been misplaced. Any of the former Ojana members from 1969-73 who might help please contact me and I will get with the brethren there on Okinawa. One of the former elders had part of the deed in his scrap book but has since returned it. Here is the real kicker- guess what they plan to build on the old location, McDonalds. Blew my mind (I know, what little I have left).

All you former Okinawaites that's not all! Okinawa of course reverted back to Japan control so they drive on the left hand side of the road. There is a ban on US cars so you see very, very few big cars anymore. The police are a lot tighter on rustbuckets also. No more taped over rust holes which most of us drove around. There are 6 lanes of traffic (at least) from Naha to Kadena circle. The island is overrun with A&W, McDonalds, DQ, Pizza Hut, Shakee's. Things are really tough there now. There is even a four lane toll road from Kadena to Nago, look out! There are hardly any Army troops there now, the marines have taken over. Buckner no longer exists it is Camp Butler. Hamby Airfield is no longer there either. We did drive down into the neighborhood we used to live in and the house we rented was still there. I thought that by now they would have made a shrine there or a dump.

We really had a good time there with the military brethren. The number in attendance is around 120-150 which is way down from the time when we were there in 1969-1971.

As we were leaving Okinawa we had a very good chat with a Christian woman who works for Japan airlines. The chat occurred as she was charging us $164. overweight charges. We mentioned we were on our way back to PNG and she asked if we knew Joe Cannon as she had been in one of his University classes. She then asked if we knew Gerald Carpenter, an ex-G.I. who had also taught her class. We knew them both. Her name was Y. Taba. We still had to pay overweight charges.

BACK THRU TAIPEI ON TO HONG KONG
From Okinawa we flew back thru Taipei and on to Hong Kong. After clearing customs in Hong Kong we went upstairs and checked 6 of our 8 bags in transit baggage so that we wouldn't have to cart them all over HK. While at the counter my brother Greg met us. He had come into HK the day before and had already checked into the YWCA where we were booked also.

We took a taxi to the YWCA where we booked in for the 5 days we were going to stay there in HK. Lots of things happened while we were there in HK but time does not permit me to ... oh, it does OK here goes.

We spent time almost every day shopping in the alleyways over on HK island. We stayed in Kowloon which is on the mainland and took the Star Ferry over to the Hong Kong side. In these alleyways they sell everything, even the Brooklyn Bridge, which I would have bought but the guy would only sell it in a package deal with the NY Yankees. This was Greg's first time in HK and he had a ball shopping. One afternoon we took the Outer Islands Ferry out to Lantau Island and spent the night there. This was where we had the Asian Missionary Workshop in November. This time though we stayed in the newly completed hotel on the beach. Being in HK also gave us the opportunity to try Chinese cooking at its best. During one Chinese meal my brother was instructed no less than two times on the proper way to eat rice. A school teacher eating at another table came over once and talked to him and then after a while she came back and re-instructed him. Mom always said the only thing shorter then Greg's memory is his height. (Did I say that ?) The lady told him the art of eating rice with a chopstick is to shovel it in your mouth. Also you are never suppose to put your hands in your lap, they are to always be kept on the table. Another lady from the same table came over as they were leaving and apologized for the way her friend had acted. She said, "she can't help herself she's a schoolmarm."
We worshiped with the church there in HK. It was a bilingual service, in English and Chinese. Also in attendance was a 25 person tour group from Texas & Okla (also one lady from Illinois). The tour group was on its way to Bangkok. The congregation hit a record attendance that day.

By the end of the 5th day there in HK we were ready to get "on the road again". From the time we prepared to leave Hong Kong it was nothing but "Good news & Bad news".

GOODNEWS/BADNEWS
Good News: Upon our arrival in PNG we were able to clear customs without paying the 83.5% customs duty on the Xerox Memorywriter that we had feared we would have to pay. But the Badnews was; As we checked our baggage for the final flight to Papua New Guinea from Hong Kong we had to again pay overweight charges. This time Air Niugini got us for $1368.72 American dollars.

GN: We are getting a better exchange rate for our dollars now, almost 80¢ their currency per $1. BN- Everything has gotten more expensive. Electricity cost approx. 30¢ per kilowatt as compared to 5¢ per KW in Joplin MO.

MAIL WAITING FOR US
When we got back here in Goroka we had a whole pile (well a little pile of mail which had arrived while we were gone.) We would like to thank Dottie Johnson of Texarkana for the huge box of visual aids for our Bible classes. They were all laminated and we sure appreciate that. Also want to thank Eddie Shores from Cave Springs Ark for the box of filters for our water system and the food items, especially the block of Peanut Butter Chips (oh, they are suppose to be single chips?). We found out that there is no brown sugar available in the country and also no Crisco available. Can someone send us some?

Love you.

the Huffs