Recently Jon travelled to a Scripture Union
conference in Malaysia, and just 24 hours after returning from overseas, it was
time to mark his 50th birthday.
Jon had said before he left that he wasn’t wanting a big party, coz he
wasn’t a ‘party man’ (he would be more than happy to go to someone else’s party,
but has always said that he doesn’t need his own party). However, we felt that the occasion was
certainly worth at least a small acknowledgement.
Accordingly the boys and I made a quiet plan
to invite over a couple of Jon’s long-time Vanuatu friends for a family kakae at our home on the night
of 13th November. Previously,
we had only let on to him that we had invited Netty and her husband and their two
little girls to come over to share a “laplap sosor” for the evening meal. (An
all-time favourite meal of Jon’s.)
As the night went on, a few more friends just
happened to ‘turn up’. And ... it turned
out to be a lovely evening catching up with friends whom we don’t necessarily
see all that often, even though we all live in the same town.
It was fun too that we could use our new
home to offer hospitality to others and host this group of 25 people with
enough space for people to sit around on the mat enjoying the laplap and others
relaxing and chatting outside the house
or on the verandah.
We weren’t able to find birthday candles
for the birthday chocolate cake, but the colourful chewing gums were still enjoyed
by all the kids who were there!
The oldest member of our Vanuatu family was
Pastor Leinamau’s mother (in her 70s) and the youngest was Yolanda Yosef (Netty’s
second daughter), at 8 months old.
Congratulations Jon (and dad)!
Lots of love from Lyndell, Ben & Joel
