a little easter treat

Hi! Here's a quick glimpse at what's been going on in Fiji the past couple weeks!

happy easter :)

As tradition in the Eberle household, we put together easter "baskets" and hid them before we left for church on Sunday. When we got home, we surprised rob, dave and brian and had them search our apartment for their baskets of candy, chocolate, and prizes! We were so excited when we each found our baskets! We loved getting to celebrate that we serve a God who's alive!
shout out to mom for sending an egg-dying kit in my easter package! so we also got to bring a little of america to fiji by coloring easter eggs! brown eggs are a bit more tricky to dye than white eggs. but we managed :)
As I've mentioned, during our thursday night connexion meetings, we've been talking about the attributes of God. Last week, Brian shared that God is a God of mercy. Some of the students said they were really touched by his talk and learned a lot. This week, Mary will be explaining God as intimate. Next week, I get to talk about God's grace! I'm stoked!
Last week was USP's mid-semester break. Ministry looked a bit different because the students didn't have class, so we weren't on campus much. On Monday, we had a training day on discipleship, evangelism, how to lead a small group, and how to go through follow-up with new believers. On Tuesday, we went to Coral Coast Christian Camp, where we'll hold our Student Conference at the end of June. It was exciting to catch a vision of how the long weekend will look at the end of the semester. I'm on the conference committee, so it's been fun to get to help plan the schedule for the week!

what i'd love you to pray for:

+ student conference! It's not until the end of June, but we're really encouraging students to register before May 20th. Our goal is that 150 students will come and get to grow in their faith. pray for all the planning over the next two months and that students will come!
+ cheap plane tickets! No, I'm not coming back to america early (although i would really like to hold my baby niece, who is now THREE months old!), but in July, we get to travel to New Zealand for V20, which is an international student conference with students from New Zealand, Australia, Fiji, Malaysia, Thailand, Singapore, and Japan! We're trying to find cheap plane tickets. Also pray for the twenty-ish fijian students who are going to be raising support to attend.
+ a second year?! nope, not a question mark because it's optional to pray for, but rather because myself, along with my 5 teammates, are trying to figure out our lives. pleeeease pray for our team as each of us has been individually asking the Lord if he wants us to come back to fiji for a second year of STINT. We're each excited to follow jesus in whatever he wants... but pray for clarity and discernment in knowing how to best invest our lives in 2012. We're just hoping the world ends and we won't have to make any big decisions. joking!
+ autumn and no leaves. fiji is trying to do "fall", but it's still pretty hot. pray that global warming stops and somehow we get to see snow 17 degrees below the equator this winter (june-aug since we're in the southern hemisphere).

Thanks for 1. reading- and making it to the end! 2. praying. 3. being excited about what God's doing here! and 4. continuing to send lots of love to: Kori Eberle, GPO Box 19284, Suva, Fiji Islands :)

love you all!

sunday funday

Even though it's just the beginning of your sunday (if you're in America)- here in Fiji, Sunday is coming to a close, and it's been a fun and exhausting day. Today marked the first annual STINT Decathlon:: 10 events. 6 participants. 1 winner.

To break up the sometimes monotonous feel of everyday ministry, we decided to spice things up with a little friendly competition among the six of us.

The line-up:
1. u.s. capitols quiz
2. pasta threading: use a fettucine noodle in your mouth and string rigatoni pasta noodles through the fettucine noodle
3. cup stacking: making pyramidal formations with plastic cups
4. 100 meter sprint
5. triple jump
6. chubby bunny with marshmallows
7. logic puzzle
8. pool run-around: how fast can you run around the ledge of the pool without falling in
9. pool somersaults without taking breaths
10. pool handstands

it was such a fun day! the results were:

gold: dave
silver: brian
bronze: me!

me during the cupstacking competition

the winners of the 100-m dash: 1. rob, 2. dave, 3. mary

jenny doing work on the pasta

the guys thought that matching outfits would give them an extra edge

this is me and my game face. prepare to die. (joking) (sort of)

a short clip of our opening ceremony::

what i've been up to

Firstly, I would like to apologize for the month long break since my last post. Life in Fiji has been exhilarating and keeping me plenty busy!

After the spring break team from Miami left, our STINT team went to the west side of the island with some of the Miami Crusade staff members for an "encouragement trip". We spent a couple days evaluating our ministry, how we've been walking with the Lord over the past few months, and how we've been working together as a team. Along with some assessment of our first months in Fiji, we had some refreshing time before heading back on campus.




LORAINI. loraini is a first year student who I get to hang out with every week. She is outgoing and always full of energy! Lo asked Jesus to come into her life a couple weeks ago, so I've gotten to grow with her, as we talk about what it means that we're forgiven children of God and how to walk in the power of the Holy Spirit. I love thursday afternoons with Lo :)




After I meet with Lo on thursdays, we have our weekly Student Life meeting. Our weekly "Connexion" meeting is where we invite students to hear more about being connected to God and where they can meet other students who want to grow in their relationships with God.

For the semester, we're talking about the attributes of God. We kicked off the semester with a talk on God's love. Rob gave the next talk on God's sovereignty. Some other attributes that we're so excited to study this semester include: God's justice, mercy, and holiness.

Students are taking mid-semester exams this week, so they've been super busy being studious! Next week, they have their mid-semester break from classes, so we'll get to hang out with some students outside of campus and do some planning for the rest of the semester.

Thanks for your prayers! I promise I'll blog again soon :)

it's spring break time!

This week, we have very special visitors from a little utopia I like to call Oxford, Ohio! There's a group of ten Miami students + Miami Crusade staff who came all the way to Fiji to spend their spring break at USP telling students about a relationship with God! We're sooo thankful for their willingness to give us a huge boost in ministry. They've been here for less than 12 hours, but already it's been really refreshing to see some familiar faces and interact with other whities (who aren't kiwis or aussies)! Not only are we excited for their help in ministry, but they also came bearing TONS of reese's cups and some gifts from parents :)

So far, we've successfully convinced the newbies that:
1. In the presence of Koli (the super cool national director of Crusade in Fiji), it's expected for men to tuck in their shirts out of respect.
2. In order to board a bus, it's necessary to show the bus driver your passport.

(neither of which are true)


Also, today we celebrated the end of daylight savings time. So since it's summer here, we actually got to set our clocks BACK- giving us a whole extra hour of sleep last night!!! But if you live in the northern hemisphere, don't forget to spring your clocks forward next weekend. Everything is backward on this side of the world. it's even true what they say- the toilet bowl water really does swirl the other direction (but not really).

Stay tuned for sweet stories from the MU spring break week and other fabricated cultural norms!

+ please be praying that the Lord would use the miami team in incredible ways this week!

p.s. today i've been loving psalms 23 & 73- check them out :)

white tables and rope swings

Since classes have started, our lives have gotten exponentially more crazy - and it's been so fun (as we ask the lord to be our strength:))!! Last week, we got to see about twenty USP students give their lives to Jesus! Our goal for the next month is to follow up with the students who filled out the surveys during orientation, indicating that they want to know more about how to be connected to God. With 700 women to call on the phone, this is quite the task- but we're loving it. Students are always willing to meet (even if they're 2 hours, or days, late to the appointment).

Last weekend, we had a sleepover for some of the student leaders. We loved having the girls over because previously, the american girls were known for being loud and crazy, but the fijian girls totally showed us up. They (and I mean"they"... I went to bed well before) were awake until 5 a.m.!!!

On Saturday, we went to Colo-i-Suva, a national park just outside of Suva. There were hiking trails, waterfalls, natural swimming pools, and a rope swing off some rocks! I had been wanting to check it out since we were on the plane over and I read about it in my travel book, so I was really excited to finally get to go!
Last Thursday, we had our first weekly meeting! It's called Connexion and is held in the Bure, which looks like a Fijian hut. We sang worship songs, played paper-rock-scissors, introduced the americans, mary shared a bit of her life, and dave gave some vision for this year. And there were some delicious cookies provided by maybe the best three stint girls ever!

Our office:: we call it the White Tables. This is where we spend every day, calling students to set up appointments, waiting for students when they don't show up and then calling again to see if they're still coming, meeting with students to share the gospel, and praying with them to ask Jesus into their lives!

We're really encouraged by the way the school year has started off, and despite joking about getting stood up a lot, we know that it's really just a part of their culture, and often the students do actually want to meet with us. I can't wait to share more stories- and be looking for my February prayer letter in the mail soon!

love from fiji :)

we were almost deported

This week has been SO exciting!!!!! We just completed orientation week for first year students. During orientation, USP gave tents to student organizations to promote ourselves. Every day (in the warm, warm, warm heat), we were on campus handing out surveys for students to fill out to find out if they'd be interested in Student Life. When students completed the surveys, we gave them the bags that we'd put together. We initially made 750 bags. But we went through 500 the first day! Throughout the week, we got about 1,600 new student contacts! that's ONE THOUSAND AND SIX HUNDRED! We're amazed. and stoked. and realizing that this is going to be the busiest year of our lives. Next week, we'll hit the ground running and start contacting students who indicated interest.
confession: we weren't really almost deported. I was trying to think of a captivating title for my post to make you read it. but, we DID get our passports back today with our Fiji visas! We've been praying that our visas would go through- and they did-and we are praising jesus that we don't have to leave fiji, because we really like it here and we now have a lot of work to do.
One thing that supersedes cultural boundaries is that people like free stuff. That's why whether I'm in Fiji or Miami U, orientation week is always the best week ever (although presidential elections on campuses is a close second). This is Joyce and I celebrating Free Stuff and Fijian Dances week.

You'll never guess the number one hot spot in Fiji for Valentine's Day. McDonald's gets decked out for V-day: balloons, candles, table clothes, glittery signs, reservations. The employees even take the orders and go get your food. It's hilarious. Brian even fed me a bite of his chocolate sundae (mcdonald's just gets you in the mood). Anyway, best valentine's day EVER.

What we're really doing (when we're not playing pool volleyball).

What we're really doing. After purchasing our volleyball net for the pool at our apartment (it will be a GREAT outreach tool), we've spent our "fun" time playing pool volleyball, learning the ropes of buying fresh fruits and veggies at the market, learning/teaching guitar, winning (if you're me) or losing (if you're one of the other 5 stinters) at card games like euchre, canasta, and 10's and 2's, and baking cookies.

"So after all the fun and games are over, what do you do?" you may be asking yourself. Well, this week, we're putting together 1,000 First-year kits that we'll hand out to all the first year students at USP. The first-year kits include a brown lunch bag with a book, CD, magazine, bookmark, highlighter, and pen. We decorated the bags with information about when our weekly meetings will be held. The goal is that the bags will familiarize the students with Student Life ("student life" is what fijians call Campus Crusade for Christ), and we'll have questionnaires for the students to fill out that will help us find students who are interested in talking to us about spiritual topics. Jenny, Mary and I found the bags (which was quite an adventure), and decorated them, while Brian, Rob and Dave put them together. We're still looking for a good deal on some bulk pens and highlighters, so if you know of any fijian stores that sell them cheap, holla!

A surprise from MHCC. Yesterday when we got home from the grocery store (MHCC), we discovered little bugs infesting our 4 kg (that's a lot!) bag of flour. As evidenced by the picture, this led to a disgruntled mary. But the girls were troopers and sifted through the entire bag and picked out the bugs. Yesterday was also when I realized that grocery shopping is in the running for being my least favorite thing to do in Fiji.


Last weekend, Jeanette (Koli and his wife, Jeanette, are the crusade directors at USP) drove me, jenny, and mary around Suva to see some places that we hadn't yet discovered (and to be honest, probably would have never found on our own). We saw the Australian, American, Chinese, and Indian embassies. We went to a Fijian flea market, the Pure Fiji factory (a fijian-style bath and body works), and she took us to the most beautiful overview of Suva that I've seen yet.

Keep it real, america.