Building Keyhole Gardens

Last month, we brought over 2 garden specialists from Samoa who trained 20 people to build "keyhole" family gardens. They are built on top of the ground using layers of organic components.






Because this island is built on a coral reef, digging up the ground is very hard work.
This garden was built for the new Iroij (traditional king) a few weeks ago using lots of plant cuttings.

 Neilani's garden has been in the ground for two weeks. It uses banana tree trunks as its' outside structure. Her cucumbers seem to love the environment.

 Richard put two rows of bricks on this garden. You don't have to bend over very far when weeding it. Richard has lots of different kinds of gardens. He may be young but he knows a lot about gardening.

 We had lots of help when we went out to Ajeltake to build Nesia's garden. She chose to use banana tree trunks for the outside structure. Then we put a layer of cardboard and soaked it well.  In this picture we are putting down a layer of coconut husks to help retain moisture.

 Next, went in layers of compost, manure and soil with a top coat of peat moss. Then Nesia chose the seeds she wanted, putting the tallest plants around the "live composter" shown in the middle.

Elder Crooks is just bringing the last basket of coconut husks to line the outside of the garden to make it look pretty. The seeds are in. Nesia just has to water and throw plant scraps into the composter with water whenever she has them. This is my favorite garden so far.

Taiwan Youth Ambassadors Show

 We were invited to a show hosted by the Taiwan Embassy featuring 19 Youth Ambassadors from a variety of Taiwanese universities. They put on a fun, energetic performance which we greatly enjoyed.

The students continually changed costumes and provided a variety of dances, gymnastics and other skilled performances while we watched views of Taiwan on a giant screen.

 We learned about the culture of Taiwan while we watched the performances. The students were very artistic. There were 6 Youth Ambassador groups visiting 43 countries over a period of a month or so.

 This baton twirler was particularly colorful.

Students from the Marshall Islands also performed a dance and then at the end of the night, everyone took the stage including VIP guests like the President of the Marshall Islands, Chris Loeck, who is in the light blue shirt in the front row.

Pilot Diabetes Outreach Series Completed

 Together with our health partner organizations, we completed a pilot series of five outreach clinics at Rita Chapel - one clinic a week for five weeks. The purpose was to identify "unknown diabetics," testing for blood sugar, blood pressure and Body Mass Index.

 Depending on the weather, we had the clinics either inside as above or outside which was much nicer. We usually saw between 25 and 30 adults each night.

 Besides the health screening, we also invited participants to take part in 30 minutes of light exercise and encouraged them to do that every day to help control their weight and diabetes.

We played this game to educate how diabetes affects the cells in your body.

 We also provided "hands on" cooking demonstrations where people can cook easy, nutritious recipes which include lots of vegetables and local foods.

Here are our two weight-loss winners from the pilot series. Each lost more than 6 lbs. over 5 weeks. For every 2.2 lbs a person loses, they reduce their chance of getting diabetes by 5%.

Micronesia Fishing Tournament

 We went to another fishing derby last weekend. This one brought fishermen from all over Micronesia.  Lots of people come to watch the boats at the end of the day to see their catches weighed.

This is the winning marlin or "billfish." It weighed 302 lbs. See the fancy fishing rods on the back of the boat? One boat at a time comes to the weigh in. There are different kinds of fish caught.

This was one of the smallest boats in the tournament but they caught the greatest number of tuna. It was a fun day.

Help Arrives from the Archibalds

Church HQs sent Dr. and Sister Archibald from the U.S. to help us identify specific diabetes projects and measurable outcomes. He is a retired surgeon who worked as Director of Surgery for a group of 26 hospitals.

We held 35 meetings over the 2 weeks we were here so the Archibalds could get a good understanding of the current conditions. We met with a lot of the medical community as well as members of the NCD Coalition.

 We also took them to the Wellness Centre and showed him their Wellness gardens. The Centre grows food for their restaurant and teaches diabetics how to grow healthy food.

 Here Dr. Archibald is meeting with Lab doctor and manager to learn about the capacity for increased lab testing of diabetics.

 We also met with the Hon. Phillip Muller, Minister of Health who is very supportive of potential Church diabetes initiatives.

Here he is meeting with Dr. Briand, Chief of Staff at the Majuro Hospital. Dr. Archibald gave presentations on diabetes to the NCD

Diabetes Health Screening Clinics

With several health partnering organizations, we started a pilot project with 5 health screening clinics. We want to find people who don't know they have diabetes and get them into treatment.

We test for blood sugar, blood pressure and body mass index (height, weight and age). We have found that 35% of our participants are unknown diabetics!

As part of each evening, we teach about diabetes prevention. This picture shows one of the interactive games we use that shows people what foods convert to blood sugar and how diabetes affects how cells in their body can use it.

 We also have an instructor who leads 30 minutes of light exercise - a good diabetes preventer - and a demonstration of cooking healthy food.  People love to eat what they cooked at the end of the evening.

Sometimes we do the cooking class outside if the weather cooperates.  Do you see all the children and adults standing in the school yard? We invite all the community to join in the screening so they  can have healthy families.

Smiling Turtle

Check out this turtle. Isn't he smiling pretty for the camera?