Letters from overseas : Return to Guadalcanal

Notes: The author, from the diocese of Toronto, "is a librarian working at Bishop Patteson Theological College on Guadalcanal in the Solomon Islands. Last summer [2000] she left Guadalcanal when ethnic tension flared into violence and spent several months on the neighbouring island of Malaita. She recently returned to Bishop Patteson [College]." While on her way back, she "began to think that few people can really absorb the amount of damage that has been done to the Solomon Islands and its people since June 1999 or understand that things will probably never go back to the way they were. I have not been here long enough to appreciate what `back to normal' might mean but I don't think that can happen. The disruption to every aspect of life -- the economy, the schools, the churches, the way people act towards each other -- has changed more than the landscape."

Subjects: Bishop Patteson Theological Centre (Kohimarama, Solomon Islands); Volunteers in Mission - Anglican Church of Canada; Solomon Islands - Politics and government; Church of the Province of Melanesia