20210803

Shalom, dear all!

Thank you for faithfully praying for us. I have a good news. The seniors’ day care center has been re-opened as the level 3 alert dismissed last week. My mom is “back to school” now, and my dad is able to have a break during the day.

各位代禱勇士，收信平安。

感謝大家忠心為我們代禱。好消息是，隨著上週三級警戒解除，日照中心重新開放。我媽媽恢復上課，我爸爸白天就能有喘息的空間了。

Coughing so badly that I can hardly talk, I have spent a lot of time practicing sewing skills and making patterns. It took me three days to learn well how to make sleeve slit of a shirt. You can tell that I am not very talented. This makes me miss PNG very much. PNG women are the most skillful women as I know. Almost every PNG women I know is able to make traditional carry bags. We call them “bilum”. Bilum is one of the most important cultural heritages in PNG.

咳嗽到幾乎不能講話，我就花大把時間練習縫紉技巧與服裝打版。光是練習好襯衫的袖杈就花掉我三天的時間。您應該看得出來我不是很有天分。這使我非常想念新幾內亞。新幾內亞的女士們是我所認知中最手巧的了。幾乎所有的新幾內亞小姐太太都會編織稱為「比綸」的傳統揹袋。

Women would take off the bark form trees and dry it in the sun for several days. When the bark is dried enough, the fiber can be torn and made into thread. The thread can be dyed brown with the skin of fruit, black by being buried in dark mud for two weeks. Then, women would twist the thread into strings and plait the string into bilums without any tools. It would take 2 weeks to plait a bilum, not to mention about the work of making the tree bark into strings.

她們先把樹皮從樹上扒下來，在太陽底下曬幾天。等樹皮夠乾了，就可以把其中的纖維拆成細線。除了乳白的原色以外，可以把細線用一種果皮染成褐色，又可以埋在深色泥巴裡面兩週染成黑色。女士們再用手把細線輾成絞線，又編織成揹帶，不用任何工具。前置作業不說，光是把絞線編織成一個揹帶就要花掉兩個星期的時間。

I heard some out coming businessmen complain that the PNG banned them from importing machine made bilum strings. They thought machine made strings would be able to make the price of bilum much lower. ….Well, I hope PNG cultural heritages can be treated properly. And I would like to honor my PNG lady friends who make the bark into bilum strings.

我曾經聽到一些外來商人埋怨說新幾內亞政府不准許他們進口機器製造的織袋絞線。他們想說機器製的絞線可以使手工揹袋的價格降低下來。….我倒希望新幾內亞的文化資產可以被適當對待。那些肯花時間把樹皮做成絞線的新幾內亞女性們，應該獲得尊崇。

From one man he made all the nations,
that they should inhabit the whole earth;
and he marked out their appointed times in history
and the boundaries of their lands.
God did this so that they would seek him
and perhaps reach out for him and find him,
though he is not far from any one of us.

他從一本造出萬族的人，住在全地上，

並且預先定準他們的年限和所住的疆界，

要叫他們尋求　神，

或者可以揣摩而得，

其實他離我們各人不遠。

Please remember us in your prayers.

敬請在禱告中記念我們：

1. Though PNG have received vaccine donation from other countries, only very few people have been vaccinated. The PNG government have to shut down the boarder again because the Delta variant has been detected in the country. May God help PNG people get rid of the myth of vaccine conspiracy theory.

儘管有其他國家捐贈新冠疫苗給新幾內亞，接種的人數非常稀少。近來國內發現有Delta病毒的確診者，使得新幾內亞政府又得宣布封鎖邊境。求神幫助新幾內亞百姓破除疫苗陰謀論的迷思。

2. May God evoke the awareness among out coming communities of the need of respecting PNG cultural heritages of PNG.

求神使外來的群體更加尊重新幾內亞的文化資產。

3. May God show His mercy and cure the pain on kellen’s knack and her back that is bothering her a lot.

求神施憐憫醫治Kellen肩頸及腰部的疼痛。

4. I am still suffering from periodontal disease and hope it can be cured before I take off for PNG. May God’s healings dwell upon me.

我的牙周病還沒好，但願在我到新幾內亞之前能夠痊癒。願神賜下醫治。

5. May God heal my cough.

求神醫治我的咳嗽。

6. May God guide us in all the work of website relocation.

求神在網頁遷移的所有工作上指引我們。

All for Him

願神得榮耀

主內末肢

In Christ

20210803