The past weeks in Apetina were filled with Wayana. Our Wayana is slowly improving, but we feel that the more we learn, the more we discover that we know so little yet. We can keep a conversation going for a few sentences, but then we’re out of words. We would like to say so much more….excellent motivation to keep our noses in the books and our ears close to native speakers. We notice that a lot of our dutch words and sayings are not known in Wayana, so we need to describe a lot instead of ‘simply’ translating. When we learn their figure of speech, we learn a lot about their culture and their way of speeking. A very different culture and way of life indeed!
When we want to know how to translate ‘problem’, than we can figure out something like ‘ it is difficult’. The word ’truth’ is best described as ‘someting that is true, the opposite of false or a lie’. Maybe there is much more diversity in words, but we don’t know them jet. We hope to discover the richess of this language in the coming years.

Marjolein started to translate a Bible for toddlers. She recieves assistance from a 17 year ‘old’ girl, who has visited the mulo 1 year in the city Paramaribo. She had to return to the village because her parents couldn’t pay the monthly fee for boarding school.
Marco is assisting the elders of the Church by typing their statutes into the computer. These statutes are translated from Trio into Wayana by two elders who know both languages. When these statutes are available to the leadership, there need to be teaching in the Church about these topics. There is still a long way to go before the churches can be registered by the government authorities.

Pasakili is helping Situnka translate from Trio into Wayana.

Together we’re working on the materials provided by Operation Christmas Child. Materials to train childrensworkers and materials for ‘The greatest journey’ for kids in the age of 8 untill 14. Ilse van Dijk, who lived and worked in Apetina for 25 years helps us with the translation of ‘The greatest journey’ in Paramaribo. Internet is a wonderful medium to work with in this case.

Last week we showed 4 evenings in a row a DVD with a Bible school training about the ‘minor prophets’ in Church. We were pleased to see that many people showed up, including quite some youth. Two weeks from now Roy Lytle will visit Apetina presenting one next Bible school subject himself and interpreting Marco with another. We see how our vision on Bible school training this way is taking place strengthening the Wayana Church in the interior.

We are greatful for all means of modern technique like internet, computers, beamers en mobile phones. With these we maintain contact with family and friends. Last week our oldest grandchild recieved her first diploma after her swimming lessons. We recieved pictures of our grandson Jayden after his operation on his nostrils and we could be present in a meeting with our home front committee by telephone.