Tonga!

Friday, January 24th,

We stopped at the industry park on the way into the office to pay the bill for the chemicals to clean the pharmacy. Hopefully that will be all done this weekend. We have heard that story so many times now that we don’t know what to believe. We paid even more for the chemicals this time than we did the first time. This had better be the end of it!!

We didn’t see Ana at all yesterday. She went one way and we went another. We sat down for a few minutes to catch up on what we are all doing and then she was off to another meeting with the National Emergency Management Organization. I’m a little worried about her. She is really tired. She didn’t come into work today until almost 10:30. The stress is starting to show on her and all of us. Ha’api is almost out of food and the water situation up there is not good. They are so dependent on rain water there. It has poured all day here but they said that these storms are missing Ha’api. Sometimes you just feel helpless as to what to do to help!

Our office is starting to look much better. They finished painting yesterday and the new blinds are up. They also moved the bulletin board and the white board over, so now it is starting to feel more like an office. Alan is quite happy with it all. He likes it much better than the old one. The printer is still on the other side of the building and that is a pain. Whenever I print anything I have to walk through the whole building to pick it up. Hopefully they will move that soon.

Ofa stopped by. He is the contractor for our Ha’utu project. He said that they couldn’t put the engine and pump in today because of the rain and the Ministry of Health is behind schedule. Hopefully they will do it tomorrow. We are sick about that! We really wanted to be there to see this project come together, but we will be on another island tomorrow. We don’t want them to delay because of us, this village has been without water for almost 3 weeks. They need to get things up and running ASAP! Ofa said that he would take pictures for us if it happens tomorrow. After waiting all this time, it would happen on the ONE DAY that we won’t be able to be there.

I tried to get caught up on all of the finances and make sure we are ready for our meeting with the Area Presidency on Monday. It rained all afternoon and into the night. We are getting lots of needed moisture. This was a good rain.

Tiamani told us today that her friend that was going to Singapore on a mission, had to be reassigned because it is to dangerous to send missionaries in there. We had not heard that before and we don’t know what is happening over there. He was really disappointed. He wanted to go to Singapore but now he is going to New Zealand.