2019 Update

Well it's been a few months so I guess its time for another update. Sure glad I got rid of that expensive WordPress account, since I clearly do not have to motivation to post regularly. A lot has happened since the typhoon. But the big news I will put at the beginning for those of you who like to only read the first few sentences.

Most of you know that I signed a two year contract to work in Saipan. And you may know that this June the 2 years are up. I had plans to come back to the states most likely Tennessee, find a job, buy some land, or a house, and start my life. Back in December, Shortly after I had decided I would NOT be staying in Saipan for a third year I got a call. It was from the president the GMM. They had been after me to come work for them but I told them I had to finish my contract with Saipan first. Many months had gone by and I hadn’t heard from them so I figured the position had been filled. Well turns out they had not filled the position and they wanted me to come work for them the following year. I didn’t know what to do, I had decided to go back to the states. I had plans, then out of the blue, another offer falls in my lap. I prayed a lot about it and talked with the people in Guam a lot, the long and short of it is, I accepted the job and my mission time will be extended by at least a year. I miss the states a lot and will be coming back for a short vacation before starting my new job in Guam. So if anyone wants to hang out while I am stateside let me know. Above anything else this has taught me, don’t make plans. Because God may have something else in mind, and I do feel this is what God wants me to do. So on to the next thing, I guess.

So lets see, last time I posted was about a month after the typhoon. And many things have happened since then. The trouble with waiting so long to write is I don’t remember everything that happened, but I will do my best and go over the highlights.

 I am still living at the school, but I moved from the copy room to a shipping container. Its so nice to not have to roll up my bed anymore. I have access to the school’s kitchen for when I need to cook, and I can take a hot shower by boiling water on the stove. It’s nice but honestly, I feel like I have died an gone to heaven every time I use a real shower. I am eternally thankful for my tea kettle and pitcher showers though. The one drawback to the container is it was too far away from the school to get access to the internet, I thought about just dealing with it, but then I realized I was going to be here the rest of my time in Saipan, and figured I may want internet eventually. It was a slight problem but when you are head of the IT team and the only member of said team solutions come quickly. I ran a line out to my container and now I have full internet access which is a real blessing. Below are some pictures.

Over Christmas break I went to Guam and got to meet up with some former Rio students, Sam and Miles. It was great to see them again, and to hang out with them. We went on a few hikes, and just in general had a great time exploring and hanging out. Of course, I got my daily Taco Bell, well almost daily. It really should have been daily. But there is so much food in Guam sometimes Taco Bell took a back seat. After getting back I spent the last week getting everything ready for school to start up again.

  

The last several weeks have been pretty normal. Just fixing things as needed for work. In my free time I have been playing with my new camera, trying to explore everything I can before I leave.

One of the things that I have to work on before I leave is a full report of everything, I know about the Tech side of things for our school. Passwords, network addresses, documentation on how to change settings etc. Thankfully I had started this shortly after my first year on the island. However, there is still so much to document. I had no idea how much information was just sitting in my head to be lost forever if something happened to me. Lesson to everyone out there, DOCUMENT EVERYTHING!!! And I do mean everything.

Better documentation would have really helped me out this last week. In preparation for my leaving Saipan I was setting everything up on our server to be as easy to use as possible for the next person, getting rid of anything unnecessary, deleting things no longer needed. In the process our internet controller got messed up so I had to reset it, not a huge deal, I’ve set it up several times, but this time was different I couldn’t get it back up no matter what I tried, after much prayer, many fails, and lots of sitting staring at a screen I gave up and “went to bed” I used the quotes because I didn’t get much sleep. I was thinking about the situation all night, finally getting up around 4:30 to work on it some more. I finally gave up and waiting until the internet company got up and called them. 5 minutes on the phone with them, I had them change a setting and within 4 minutes it was all up and running again. Sadly, I didn’t have the faith I should have that God would take care of it, but it was a lesson learned. So, I am thankful for that.

To wrap this up I will just say I am really looking forward to coming back to the states and seeing everyone, as of now only 15 weeks, 4 days, 15 hours, 35 minutes and 11 seconds, remaining. Hope everyone has a nice weekend and I will hopefully post another update soon.

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