WalkerTalkie: "Not the Real Papua New Guinea!!" 01-16-09 Updated

Highlights of an eventful Trip!

Paying Twice of what we planned to pay for check-in luggage
Running to catch our flight while the intercom reminds us "Final boarding for San Francisco"

Going from the Domestic to International terminal Chris, Jael and Titus were unable to return to Angie and Baruch for security reasons. Almost 2 hours later, the family is reunited!
After a while we realized we'd dropped the receipts we'd received in Chicago for our check-in-luggage, we had to spend 3 1/2 hours between airlines to reproduce the receipts before we could be issued our boarding passes for the flight to Hong Kong.
Finally before left San Francisco, we were informed our flight to Hong Kong was going to be delayed 2-3 hours because the plane was not available due to a baby being born, causing the previous flight to be diverted. Turning our 13 hour layover in San Francisco in to nearly 16 hours.
During the flight we requested bulk-head seating, this came at the cost of keeping our family together. Angie sat near the front of the plane with Titus, while Chris, Jael & Baruch were nearly in the back.
Arriving 3 hours behind schedule in Hong Kong, we missed our flight to Papua New Guinea.
The airline then paid for accommodations at a 4-Star Hotel attached to the airport, we were tired and thankful for the opportunity to sleep.
We enjoyed a wonderful English/Chinese breakfast buffet
Chris, Jael and Baruch went swimming in the pool
Taking advantage of our unexpected layover, our family took a train from the airport to the downtown island of Hong-Kong, very impressive.
After eating lunch at Burger King, the airline flew us to Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia in order to connect us to Papua New Guinea.
Some confusion with our baggage delayed the issuing of our boarding passes for several hours.
After arriving in Port Moresby Papua New Guinea, we found one of our foot locker trunks hadn't made it, after filing a report, we were brought quickly through customs and enroute to Goroka.
Arriving in Goroka, one of our carry-on bags had been moved and was no-where on the plane to be found, with a laptop inside, we reported the bag stolen.
Arriving at New Tribes Mission headquarters in PNG we were pleased to be greeted by so many co-workers, some of whom had displayed a huge "Welcome Home" sign on our porch.
Chris was given a tour of the new computer service department, many have stated how thankful they are to have his help over the coming months.
After unpacking and setting up our temporary home, we received a call from the airline, saying our missing back-pack had been found and that we could expect it on the next flight from Port Moresby.

Each one of these bullet points could probably be stretched out into their own stories, however we don't want to abuse the privilege of your time.

"Not the Real Papua New Guinea!"

Welcome Home Throughout our long 3-4 day journey from the USA to PNG, starting in Chicago, Baruch would continually ask, "Is this Papua New Guinea?" and we would patiently respond, "No this is..." This was repeated at each and every destination. Finally when we arrived in Port Moresby, learning that we were finally landing in PNG, he was so giggly and excited to finally be arriving at this elusive place we'd been talking about for so long....one might have thought that he'd just received a puppy!! Mistaking so many places for that mystical place called Papua New Guinea, you would have thought he had no memories of PNG from his early life here. However, upon looking around Goroka, he then exclaimed, "Where's the real Papua New Guinea!!" He was of coarse referring to the place of his memories, memories of our Mibu friends, co-workers, free-roaming chickens and village dogs and our house on the cliff of a mountain. We reminded him of our commitment to stay in Lapilo and he was relieved to hear that it wouldn't be very long before we were indeed going to go to "the real Papua New Guinea." The feeling was mutual.