Vanuatu Port Villa Mission

Recently, I found a post on the Missionary Mom's internet sight, that explains a little of what Kate is experiencing.  She served on Tanna with this Elder, and is now currently serving in Santo.  This is written by Ryan Jones, Elder Jesse Colten Jones' Father.  Sister Brown served with Brother Jones in Tanna, and is now in Santo where Elder Jones served as well.

"One year ago today, we dropped off our oldest kid, Elder Jesse Colten Jones at the MTC, where he only spent 1 ½ weeks before being sent to the Vanuatu, Port Villa Mission. Vanuatu is located in the South Pacific, just west of Fiji. In the past 12 months, he has served on three separate islands: Tanna, Espiritu Santo, and currently on Gaua. He has lived near active volcanoes, survived 2 hurricanes, and several earthquakes. He has eaten dog, cat, sea turtle, and flying fox (fruit bat). He has lived in native built huts, cooked his meals over an open fire, and bathed in waterfalls, rivers, and the ocean, and he has loved every minute of it. 

He is currently the branch president of Gaua Island and part of the only missionary companionship on that island. Gaua has no email or post mail service, so we can only hear from him if someone from the mission office goes to the island and picks up and delivers the mail. We won’t hear from him again until late November. He lives in a very primitive village with no modern conveniences. The only fresh water they have access to comes from what they can catch in a large rain barrel. There is a very small food shop on the island that only sells rice and a few vegetables. They buy most of their food from the villagers where they live. When they buy meat, they buy the animal alive and have to do everything else on their own. 

Colten has had great success, having a baptism about every other week on average. He has experienced so much in his first year, I can’t imagine what could be left that he hasn’t already gone through. I can’t wait to find out. My wife and I have survived this past year on his weekly emails and letters, but now that he is on an island with no mail or email access, it will be a tough part of the next year for us. Having a missionary out has been an odd combination of opposites. I can’t imagine him doing anything else that could make us so sad for missing him, and yet so proud of what he is doing, or so excited for him to come home and yet so excited for him to spend the next year in a place we never even knew existed a year ago."

Pictures from Kate's mission:

Tanna

P-Day on Tanna. Volcanic Ash

Santo