{"id":105,"date":"2014-12-18T01:19:34","date_gmt":"2014-12-18T01:19:34","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/blogs.ethnos360.org\/noe-martinez\/2014\/12\/18\/2014-12-16-its-beginning-to-look-a-lot-like-christmas\/"},"modified":"2014-12-18T01:19:34","modified_gmt":"2014-12-18T01:19:34","slug":"2014-12-16-its-beginning-to-look-a-lot-like-christmas","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/blogs.ethnos360.org\/noe-martinez\/blog-1\/2014\/12\/18\/2014-12-16-its-beginning-to-look-a-lot-like-christmas\/","title":{"rendered":"It’s Beginning to (Look?) a Lot Like Christmas"},"content":{"rendered":"

Merry Christmas!<\/p>\n

<\/p>\n
<\/p>\n
\n

\n \"\"\"\"\n <\/div>\n<\/p><\/div>\n<\/figure><\/div>\n

The sound of coconut branches breaking as a coconut plunges with a huge \u201cBANG!\u201d to the ground reminds us of branches snapping from the sheer weight of snow. This may not sound to you like \u201csounds of winter”\u2026 but it\u2019s about as close as we can get here*!<\/p>\n

*Here = a tiny island off the coast of New Ireland. It takes approximately 10-15 minutes to walk around the island\u2026 Not that we\u2019ve ever done that. It usually takes us 2-3 hours for all the mingling we do!<\/p>\n

<\/p>\n
<\/p>\n
\n

\n \"\"\"\"\n <\/div>\n<\/p><\/div>\n<\/figure><\/div>\n

As I look around, I\u2019m surrounded by beautiful palm trees and varieties of hibiscus flowers. The residents of the island pride themselves in keeping the island \u2018pristine\u2019, with groomed walking paths and homes free of debris or clutter. The beach is of course beautiful, and the water is warm (ok, in the afternoons sometimes it\u2019s too warm!). Similar to our time in Madang, we will occasionally have a \u201cchilly\u201d, cloudy, rainy day which many homeschooling families deem an automatic \u201csnow day\u201d, and we pull out the hot chocolate mix (thank you for the care packages, friends\/family!) and pretend that we\u2019re cold enough to drink it!<\/p>\n

You might recall reading our blog a year ago, in which we wondered specifically where we would be for Christmas THIS year! And here we are now, in our Bush Orientation in the beautiful islands of PNG. So what are we doing in this time of Bush Orientation?<\/p>\n