Forty years ago this day we celebrated our first anniversary on Bonaire. What a difference! The population was about half what it is now, and there were no condos, only one hotel, and fewer houses. It also was much dryer at that time. Although Bonaire is outside the hurricane belt and only has a 2% annual risk of being seriously impacted (the last one was in 1999 and passed 150 miles to the north), recent hurricanes, although passing far to the north, have caused more rain here and less wind. Also, diving, wind surfing and sailing were not as popular then. Fishermen could still live by the sea and live from their catch of the day, by eating it or selling it. Now those fishermen can no longer afford the taxes

of a “seaside home”, poor as it was, and have had to move inland. They are nearly extinct on this island. I must say we miss the old, slower, quieter lifestyle. Yes, we can buy most things in the grocery store. There is always meat. We don’t have to wait for a boat from Venezuela for some bananas, or flank steak or wait for someone to butcher a pig or goat for fresh meat. We can even buy apples for about a dollar an apple.

Yesterday, I worked in the office and fielded a few calls and sent a few people on their way when they were looking for Dutch Radio. I also went through some old photos and tried to identify faces from the past, to label them for the archives. That is interesting and brings back lots of memories. A lot of time has passed and a lot of people have been touched by the broadcasts of TWR (Trans World Radio).

Last week we heard about our Cuba broadcast. The pastor who is doing the programs keeps a map on his wall and adds pins to the areas he hears from. There was one valley he had heard nothing from and was thinking that for some reason the signal did not get in there. Then one day a person from this valley showed up at his office. He was not the only one listening. There were many in that valley listening. The pastor gave the man some literature and Bibles and he went on his way. The man began writing the pastor and when someone was able to visit the valley, discovered that this man had kept all the communication with the radio pastor, filed on shelves along with other literature sent by the pastor. There were several groups of believers who used this as their library and would come to the man’s house and study the letters and any other material he had. They also listened to TWR together. Many groups of believers were formed in this valley where, at first, no one was thought to listen. Radio still goes where no man has been to spread the Gospel. PRAY for TWR as it continues to rightly divide the Word and teach those who have no other teacher and reach those who may not have other opportunities to hear.

Yesterday, after work, I was not feeling up to our usual swim as I have been fighting a nasty cold. We did go down to the ‘beach’ (no sand) and took pictures of a beautiful sunset. Then we went by a Chinese restaurant and ordered takeout. It was very good and we thoroughly enjoyed it. When we walked into the house, Larry had picked some very pretty flowers from the yard and had a beautiful bouquet setting on the table. It

was a special evening, but I was feeling so sick, I went to bed right after dinner. I didn’t wake up until around 5:30 this morning. I think I feel a little better because of the sleep.

NOTE — To see a bigger (and in some cases, expanded) version of any of the images in this blog, just double click on the one you want to see.

Happy

Anniversary!

We love you lots 🙂

Allan, Nathan, Sam, Philip, Joshua

Joyce, Beth, Angelique, Angie

Mark, David, Andrea, Audrey, Adrian, Rachel and Megan

Praise the Lord — not even one cutback in power on the transmitter last night or this morning! The water around the antennas is drying up and it appears the bugs are going away, too.

Just before 9am this morning I called (via the internet) the Technology Center in Elkhart and the men there were waiting for the truck to arrive with the container to pack the 50,000-watt AM transmitter for Swaziland. A short time later, news came that everything was now rescheduled for 9am on Wednesday.

For the rest of the morning at the office/studio, I repaired a VCR player that was giving problems, then searched for the equipment that I needed to proceed with repairs to the spare PA Module at the transmitter site. There are lots of tools and parts here, but, especially for a new person like me, it takes a while to locate what I need.

I stopped by our house* to eat dinner with Virginia. Often she will drive me to the site so she can have a car for the afternoon, but today she had a sore throat and decided she did not want to go anywhere. Pray that she will be able to fight off what ails her!

At the site, I managed to change the crowbar transistor on the filter board between the Modulator and RF Amplifiers. That board now seems to measure OK.

While I was doing this, Benny Saragoza, back for his first day from vacation, turned down the O.D. of a 5mm deep socket to 7mm. This was the tool I needed to take the transistors off the heat sink of the RF Amplifier. Actually I was amazed that a regular cutting tool could do this to a Craftsman socket. I thought the socket material would be harder than that and had been planning to use a Dremel motor with grinding wheel in place of the cutting tool on the lathe.

I then began the process of checking the transistors on the RF Amplifier. Since there are four in parallel, I took them off one at a time. Wouldn’t you know it, the first three that were removed were OK and the fourth was the bad one! Will also need to check a few more devices on the RF Amplifier board to make sure the one transistor is the only thing that is bad.

By this time, it was almost 5:30pm when the transmitter comes on, so I waited a few more minutes and completed some log readings. I then headed home for our 6pm swim, then a light supper.

Talked to Allan, Joyce and Mark on Skype this evening. Modern technology is amazing, especially when it comes to communicating.

*For reference, our house is about 1/2 mile south of the town of Kralendijk. The office/studio is about 1-1/2 mile north and the tranmitter site is about 6 miles south. Use this link:

http://maps.google.com/maps?f=q&source=s_q&hl=en&geocode=&q=Kralendijk,+Netherlands+Antilles&sll=41.621363,-85.915441&sspn=0.006657,0.01678&ie=UTF8&hq=&hnear=Kralendijk,+Bonaire,+Netherlands+Antilles&z=14

Or go to ‘www.maps.google.com’ and enter ‘Kralendijk, Netherlands Antilles’

If you zoom in one click using ‘map’ view, you should see just south of the city center a label on the coast for Divi Flamingo Beach Resort. Our house is across the street and we use that beach for our evening swims.

If you follow the main coast road north of Kralendijk you will come to a circle (the only one on the Google map, but there are now two more). TWR’s office/studio is on the SE corner. If you zoom

in enough, there is a label for Trans World Radio Studios. On satellite view you can see the building even through the cloud.

The transmitter site is a little harder to find, but if you use satellite view and go south of town and the airport on the coast road, you will see the outline of salt pans. If you zoom in on north side of the north-most salt pan along the road, you will see one large building and two smaller ones. If you look closely just north and west of the main building, it is possible to see the four towers, with shadows (the photo must have been taken around 8am), and the antenna tuning huts.

NOTE — To see a bigger (and in some cases, expanded) version of any of the images in this blog, just double click on the one you want to see.

Sunday we were up and off to the little International Bible Church, which meets in a local school. The building is quite ordinary for this climate. All ceramic tile floors and a tin roof. The windows are louvered glass panes, a number are missing and there are no screens. In the foyer of the school, the roof is elevated and open around the sides. The bathrooms are in this area as well as some offices. On Sunday morning, we have tea, coffee, juice and cookies in this big area.

They have a very nice keyboard and an accomplished pianist to play it. She played her own arrangement for the offering. It was very nice. Last week we had guitars, but this week they were missing. We sang the old fashioned way, from the hymnal. The chairs are chairs that the people have purchased or just brought from home. All the chairs there were filled. I think I heard them say that they have around 40 attenders. Not sure how many members. It varies some because of the tourists.

During the service we had the pleasure of the usual little mourning dove walking through, looking for crumbs. This Sunday, we had a little extra entertainment as a large iguana decided to jump from a nearby tree onto the roof. Now keep in mind that it is only a tin roof. What a noise, as that iguana landed and then slithered down the slope of the roof. Not sure if he stayed on the roof or slid completely off, but he did cause a stir. Even the locals were snickering! It was very noisy! There was also the loud trill of a tree frog off and on during the service. Sounded similar to the cicadas in Indiana.

For lunch we ate at a little restaurant by the sea that we used to frequent in the ‘old days’. Quite disappointing. Of course it had changed hands and the food offerings were quite different. No local food at all. Very unremarkable in flavor or offerings, except possibly for conch fritters. We were eating there for our anniversary dinner. I hope Larry takes pity on me and we go to a better place for our anniversary :-).

The afternoon was just a lazy Sunday afternoon. Naps, and a little reading and puttering. Later we went to the transmitter site to watch the transmitter go on the air, so Larry could take readings. Then home for our usual swim.

We slept in late this morning — must have needed it. The heat seems to have a draining effect on those of us not used to it. The typical high is about 87F and low is 80F, but the last few days that has been more like 95F and 89F respectively. Forecast for next week is supposed to be more normal.

In an email yesterday we learned that the 50,000-watt AM transmitter for Swaziland is supposed to be packed into its container on Monday 18 Oct 2010 at 9am. Pray that it can be loaded and secured in the allotted 2 hours before charges begin for extra hours. Also pray that it will be able to make the ship departing for Africa on 23 Oct.

The transmitter ‘called’ me at 9am this morning, which seemed strange since it was not supposed to be on the air at that time. Joe Barker then called to say that he had changed the settings so the transmitter called in the morning about cutbacks in power rather than interrupting sleep. Of course, if the transmitter was off the air, it would still call. Virginia and I went to the site to check the events log to see exactly what had happened. Found that there had been several cutbacks, but in each case the transmitter returned to full power within minutes. The listeners would have hardly noticed. If would be good if the system could be programmed to call if the transmitter did not return to full power within a certain amount of time. I will need to investigate whether that is an option with this monitoring system.

While at the site I continued to disassemble the PA Module to get to the faulty parts. I think everything is accessible now, but I need to grind down the outside diameter of a 5mm socket to less than 7mm. Fortunately there is a small lathe at the site, if it can be made operable.

From the site we came home for an early lunch, then filled up the car with gas at about $4.60 per gallon to do some sight seeing. Today we went to Lac Cai (Lac Bay) on the east (windward) side of Bonaire. Lac Cai is a shallow bay that is very calm in spite of being being on side of the island with larger breaking waves. I estimate the bay is about 10 feet deep in the deepest parts and one can see all the way to the bottom every where. There also seems to be more sand there than any place we have seen so far. This bay is famous for all the conch, and their shells. They are protected now but 40 years ago I would go diving for conch and brought home a couple of really pretty shells. The huge piles of conch shells that were let after the conch were harvested to eat are still there after 40 years, but are all bleached white and crumbling.

On the way back home we passed a wind turbine, one of more than a dozen large ones on Bonaire. We are rather amazed how quiet it was while standing under it, but it may have been louder with faster winds.

Back in town, we decided to do some shopping at Cultimara, where it is possible to select fruits and vegetables (not prepackaged) and sort out the bad ones. We then shopped at Warehouse Bonaire Supermarket. Stores are now open on Saturday afternoons. Will need to check tomorrow to see if some are open on Sundays.

Again we were able to have our regular half hour plus swim at sunset. This evening was amazing! Exactly as the sun set, there was a boat in the distance that completely fit into the circle of the orange setting sun. Unfortunately we did not have our camera with us. Even if we did have, we probably could not have gotten out of the water fast enough to get it.

NOTE — To see a bigger (and in some cases, expanded) version of any of the photos in this blog, just double click on the one you want to see.