And The Adventures Continue…

After our tour around New Zealand finished at the beginning of December, we still weren’t quite done for the year. A few months ago we worked out a deal with the local PolyTechnic Institute that allowed us to have several thousand dollars’ worth of free tuition so those of us in Marine Reach could get some extra training. A lot of us went through the survival-at-sea/firefighting course I talked about in our last letter, and a couple of our engineers benefitted from an engineering course. In return for all this free tuition, we agreed to make the ship available as a training vessel for the students taking basic seamanship at the school. In mid-December we were able to make good on our end of the deal and took 12 students and 2 instructors onto the ship for 3 days. We did a short overnight sail to a nearby island, and the students were able to practice some of the things they’d learned in the classroom. This was a really positive experience, both for the students and for the regular ships’ crew. It also afforded us a unique outreach opportunity as we spent time living with these young people who didn’t seem to have much Christian influence in their lives. While they were practicing their deck hand skills, some of us were getting an entirely different education…

Four of us, myself included, have been working towards getting a cooking certification so we can have “certified cooks” onboard the ship. Much of our learning was self-study, completing a lot of unit standards on paper. However, while we were on this sail with the PolyTech students, a very enthusiastic and passionate chef named James joined us. For three days he taught and observed us as we worked. It was a lot of hours in the galley, but definitely worth it. I learned so much about growing sprouts, cooking beans, working with yeast, knife handling, making soup, and much more. I was initially quite nervous to have a professional chef and food handler watching everything we did, but it was such a great experience! James also marked and critiqued our written assignments, and spent as much time as we needed going over things with us. It’s another one of those things I never thought I’d do, but very shortly I will have completed everything and should receive certification as a Level 3 Cook! You just never know where this stuff is going to come in handy down the road. Jeremy has already commented that he may reap the benefits of me taking this course for the rest of his life J

And so the adventures continue. As Jeremy has already mentioned, we face a lot of challenges in the year to come. I suppose life would not be very adventurous without challenges. Please pray that we will have the strength and wisdom to tackle the adventures and challenges that come our way.

Lori Schierer