Sept 15, 2006 Tommorow is the last day of my six week placement here in South Australia and now I'm off to Tasmania for about a month. It will be a big change for me heading in to the International Conference with three hundred people and their families and I will likely be missing the quiet atmosphere back in Tanunda.

My placement here has been a great time of fun and learning and growing and the highlight has to be last weekend when four of us went camping in the outback. We loaded up our "swags" (which apparently is a sleeping bag with a waterproof cover) and most importantly the Dirt Bikes !!! Although I've been in Australia for eight months I hadn't experienced the outdoors like this before as we had lamb chops and pulled up "Mallee roots" to burn in the fire. Most Australian wood is impossible to chop and these roots are like concrete. As you can see in the photo we found a few groups of kangaroos and I've figured out that they can run about the same speed as a dirt bike going flat out, but I haven't quite mastered their maneuverability, well I can go straight, it's a start :) We saw some Emu's as well, and the whole experience felt a bit like I was in the middle of some National Geographic documentary.

This past week we went out to a local primary school to put on some activities for the students as a part of their math week. I was running the Tug 'o War today and at the end of the day my boss asked me "So how did you tie in math with Tug 'o War", all I could think to say was "Uh... I didn't?" Managing twenty elementary kids hanging on to a rope seemed to be enough of a challenge without adding in some times tables :)

Also this week we went out for my farewell lunch and they gave me a big card full of nice notes. It is hard to say goodbye to the friends that I've made and with a fairly small team here I know that they will continue to manage a heavy work load. Wherever I end up it will be great to be able to contact them for ideas and resources and to find out how the work is moving along. By mid October I'll know where I'll be off to next and if you could please pray for direction for that I would appreciate it.

Well I hope you enjoy the photos, I miss you all.

Bye for now, Dave.