A Few More Pictures From San Diego

I am back on Guam now after a long, but productive, three week trip away. I have a few more pictures from the trip to post, while I am still jet-lagging. After the TRACS Conference, I was able to spend the weekend with Matt, Kristin, Milo and Keiahni before I headed for Texas on Sunday afternoon. Here are a few pictures from the time spent at their place in San Diego. Then I will post a few more pictures from the other stops on my trip. I tried to get my picture with both kids (left) but Milo was not into it on Sunday.

Cute kids in car seats

Milo and I played in the street every day

Milo looked tough in either 49ers or Batman gear

Keiahni looked good behind the wheel of her ride. Grandpa almost dropped a palm branch on her head but everything worked out ok.

We had a lot of fun together

Went to church with the family on Sunday morning and enjoyed hearing Matt on guitar in the worship band – and watching Milo ride various wheeled vehicles

TRACS Conference

This year’s TRACS Annual Conference was at the Manchester Grand Hyatt in San Diego, California. TRACS is the organization that provides accreditation for PIU and the annual conference is a valuable time for us to interact with other TRACS schools and TRACS officials, find out what is happening in the US education communities, attend valuable workshops and get some PIU-TRACS business done face to face in real time (rather than email). PIU VP of administration, Nino Pate, and I attended this year. This was one of the better conferences I have attended and I especially thought the workshops on building and working with governing boards were especially helpful. Of course the accommodations were very nice and included the spectacular view in the pictures here that were taken from the window of our room.

Here are a couple pictures of the hotel taken from the Seaport Village as Nino and I walked to find a place to eat dinner on Halloween evening. Not sure what the UFO in the middle of the picture is.

This is the 2nd time Nino and I have attended the conference together

There were three days of workshops and sessions

And a banquet on the final evening. Sorry no pictures of desserts this year. I didn’t see any desserts at any of the meals!

Hawaii to San Diego

I have never done “red-eye” flights on two consecutive nights until this trip. As I mentioned in my previous post I flew the island hopper to Hawaii which left Pohnpei a little after 2 in the afternoon and arrived in Honolulu at 3 AM. Then in the evening I met Nino in the airport in Honolulu and we flew out at 8.30 arriving in San Diego at 7.30 the next morning. Even though our friends at New Hope Christian College graciously provided me with a nice hotel bed to sleep in, please remind me not to try that again. I did have a good meeting with the administrative team at New Hope and we laid out the steps to make our new partnership work. We are looking forward to welcoming them out to Guam in the coming semester. I also had the opportunity to eat lunch at the Marina Restaurant, which, I was told, was the inspiration for Disney’s Tiki Room. I am sorry the picture is so blurry – jet lag I guess. Nino and I were picked up by my son Matt and grandchildren Milo and Keiahni. We rested up Tuesday for the TRACS Conference which would start the next day.

This was my welcoming committee.

On the “Island Hopper”

Last Monday I boarded the flight from Pohnpei to Hawaii. This flight is called the “island hopper” because it stops in Kosrae, Kwajalein and Majuro before it heads across the wide open sea to Honolulu. I had a window seat so I tried to take pictures of the islands from the air as we took off and landed. I think I got a few good ones. It was raining so hard in Majuro that I didn’t get any pictures there. The airport picture with the plane is from the waiting area of the Chuuk airport. The little island here is just off Pohnpei and shows a little of the reef.

I took these pictures as we landed in Kosrae

I think these are some of the small coral atolls of the Marshall Islands

I took these pictures as we took off from Kwajalein.

A couple more little coral islands as the sun went down

Pohnpei 2

On Sunday, in Pohnpei, I had the opportunity to preach and teach in the Mokil church. In the morning I preached in the main worship service. They have two preachers in the morning service and I was asked to do the “youth sermon.” I asked how long I had to preach and they told me to preach as “long as I wanted to.” That was fun. In the evening I did a presentation of my Old Testament overview to the people from Mokil and Pingelap. It was pretty much a preview of the class I will teach in the Spring in the seminary. It all seemed to be very well received and the church leaders asked me if PIU could come back and do some more leadership training. The picture on the right was taken as we entered the Mokil church on Sunday morning.

These pictures are from the evening presentation. The church president and head pastor were there to welcome us

And, of course, we had plenty of local food to eat during the fellowship time after the service.

Stop in Pohnpei

After a few days in Chuuk I headed to Pohnpei. I met PIU faculty members Peter Knapp and Ken Dixon when I boarded the plane in Chuuk and we landed in Pohnpei together. The plan was to meet with the leaders of several different church groups, meet students and parents, do a Bible seminar and some other ministries. I had a great time meeting the church leaders from several different groups and I am even more excited about the potential for PIU do ministry in Pohnpei. I think we can help the churches in a lot of areas, including Bible translation efforts. We stayed in the Mokilese church. I slept on a cot in the upstairs Sunday school room. Ken Dixon gave the PIU entrance exam on Saturday afternoon.

There was an interesting German graveyard behind the church. During the “German time” (1917) several naval officers were killed in an uprising and buried here.

Got to spend some time at the Pingelap and Kapinga churches

Peter Knapp and Ken Dixon led strategy meetings for the Mokil and Pingelap Bible translations.

We also enjoyed a good time of fellowship with the translation team.

Faithwalk Christian College–School Song (Video)

Before I spoke to the students at Faithwalk Christian College they sang their school song for me. In the video you will also see Mondale Tim, PIU alumni, who is now a teacher at FCC. Enjoy!