What we're up to. (Nyla posting) Thank you for e mails, phone calls and 'keeping us in the loop.' We appreciate everyone's love and support. You are in our prayers and we keep a 'perfect brightness of hope.' We, like so many of you, were shocked and saddened at Judy R's death. A great, noble lady. We served together in the R.S. Presidency and those were great times and now fond memories. I call her one of my best friends as I'm sure hundreds of others do. When we were pondering whether or not to serve a mission, she and Ross visited us with great enthusiasm for serving. I was so unsure about leaving my elderly mother and she said, "I know what you should do. Just put it in the hands of the Lord." I took that advice and soon we knew what we were supposed to be doing. We're sorry to miss her funeral, but loved her dearly and our love and prayers are with Ross and the family. How enriched our lives are for having known her. Thank you Becky for your phone call and filling me in on sweet details of her funeral. I cried, but it was nice to feel a little connected over the many miles. Today when I was talking to my Mother she said, "Now where are you?" I tried to explain and she said, "I just can't understand that." Yup - sometimes it's too far away for me to understand either. Thankfully there's technology that bridges the miles.
Yikes - what a mess. Our little 'office room is stacked, as you can see by these two pix. We're receiving all the new materials for the new branch, plus all the curriculum materials for the new year for both branches. It's getting deep. The whiteboard is filled with Malay words that our little Chinese neighbor children leave every time they're here. We're supposed to learn them!
More organized chaos. When the new building is finished (which should be in two weeks) we'll be moving much of this.. we hope.
Sister Eva on the left is an 'inactive.' She's Philippino and her husband is from India. We visit them often and recently she said she wanted her two sons to be taught. So we involved the missionaries and had their baptism last Saturday with a little social here at our apartment after. Another daughter on the right. Good people.
Just popped out the camera as we were going up the stairs in one of the block house apartments this week. At home we might say 'backwoods' here we say, 'back jungle.'
I had never seen a cockroach in my life before coming here. Snapped this pic outside our apt door one morning. (OUTSIDE is good, right?... right.) Put the key ring there so you could get an idea of the size. I really don't care for them... understatement.
Visiting a store where we're purchasing a lot of furniture for the new Masai branch. I mostly just roamed around while Garald did the real work. I used to think shopping was fun - a different story for now. We do want to spend church money wisely and sometimes that's hard to do when communication is compromised by language. Bro. Tan on the left, a branch member, was helping. Bro Agus is coming this week from Jakarta and we're supposed to have the list completed. We're working on it.
Another job - who would think that getting the elders into a new apartment would be such an undertaking. Again here's Garald doing the paperwork with two of the elders, the apt owner and the agent. Lots of new learning experiences about how they do this kind of thing here. Many e mails back and forth between Garald, Kuala Lumpur, and Singapore trying to get it right. Mission accomplished. Then we helped the elders shop for new furnishings for their apartment - stuff like dishes, pans, bedding, pillows, etc. And helped them move. They're glad to be in their own place and the 4 elders remaining here in the Taman Molek house are very glad to not be a house of 8 any longer. They'll still come very Tues for dist. mtg and lunch. We talked about not doing that any more as there are now so many of them. They love American food and offered to pay 5rm per person if I'd still continue. Well, we can't take their support money and we so love the time they're with us - we must continue. It's worth it. If zone leaders drop in, as they often do, that's 10 elders and the two of us. Spaghetti and soup - cheap and fills them up. Last week - around the table during dinner, one of the elders from Wisconsin, told us about his conversion to the church. He's the only member in his family. He's one of the new Mandarin speaking elders. Only been a member for 3 years. Choice experience. Pretty soon, we'll be singing Christmas songs at our meeting. Well, actually we do quite often anyway. One of the elders always chooses one - we tell him it will soon be actually legal.
Okay... here's the food section. Of course, you knew this was coming. We went to a Korean barbecue on Monday night with Wee Lee & Felicia and the Pleysieur's - our yacht residents from Australia. Fun. We count going out to dinner with members as part of our job... of course. Tough but somebody's gotta do it, right?
They cook at your table. Lots of fun side dishes. New stuff to try - liked all of it except the hot and spicy.
He eats everything - I kind of pick and choose.
Oh, another food pic. This was at Sister Eva's house on the Deepavali holiday. Most of this was very hot - as that's how they like it. Curry - for dipping. Actually I'm learning to like it - a little bit.
Deepavali holiday at Sister Eva's. It's customary to have new Indian clothing for the celebration. They were all color co ordinated in blue. Beautiful people - inside and out. Elder G. in the back donned some recently purchased traditional India clothing. He was lovin' it.
Now they look like really nice people, don't they? Well, they were until.... the Book of Mormon came out. The young man on the right is a super wonderful guy from S'pore who is the elders quorum pres. When he learned that the two Mandarin speaking elders in his area were being transferred to JB, he invited them and us for dinner and teaching. They were so cordial and nice. Loved showing us the unique wood work in their home. Look at the beautiful detail on this stairway.
This is one of the tables in their home - carved from a tree root. After a lovely dinner, we sat down to visit and when the elders tried to talk to them about the gospel, they were quite indignant. Obviously, we don't speak Mandarin, so we didn't know exactly what was being said, but the body language and mannerisms made it pretty obvious. We tried to just read a scripture with them and they wouldn't touch the B of M. Later one of the elders said he'd never been so insulted by what they said. Oh well. Their son was very disappointed, embarrassed and apologized. We felt bad for him. Maybe someday....
Okay Carrie Lyn - these pix are just for you - John, Alan and baby Chynnewoth (sp?) Took them Thurs when we were there for piano. What a beautiful baby. She'll be blessed tomorrow on fast Sunday. (the date at the top of this post says Fri - but it's really Sat. here)
When she was born he texted us with this msg. "Another childhood come to the world. It's a girl." She joins 3 sisters who are just as beautiful. First one in their family to be 'born in the covenant.' Delightful. The joys go on. We're so grateful to be here - never realized our lives would be so eternally intertwined with lives here. Life and eternity forever changed for us - with great sweetness. Thankful... thankful.
Yikes - what a mess. Our little 'office room is stacked, as you can see by these two pix. We're receiving all the new materials for the new branch, plus all the curriculum materials for the new year for both branches. It's getting deep. The whiteboard is filled with Malay words that our little Chinese neighbor children leave every time they're here. We're supposed to learn them!
More organized chaos. When the new building is finished (which should be in two weeks) we'll be moving much of this.. we hope.
Sister Eva on the left is an 'inactive.' She's Philippino and her husband is from India. We visit them often and recently she said she wanted her two sons to be taught. So we involved the missionaries and had their baptism last Saturday with a little social here at our apartment after. Another daughter on the right. Good people.
Just popped out the camera as we were going up the stairs in one of the block house apartments this week. At home we might say 'backwoods' here we say, 'back jungle.'
I had never seen a cockroach in my life before coming here. Snapped this pic outside our apt door one morning. (OUTSIDE is good, right?... right.) Put the key ring there so you could get an idea of the size. I really don't care for them... understatement.
Visiting a store where we're purchasing a lot of furniture for the new Masai branch. I mostly just roamed around while Garald did the real work. I used to think shopping was fun - a different story for now. We do want to spend church money wisely and sometimes that's hard to do when communication is compromised by language. Bro. Tan on the left, a branch member, was helping. Bro Agus is coming this week from Jakarta and we're supposed to have the list completed. We're working on it.
Another job - who would think that getting the elders into a new apartment would be such an undertaking. Again here's Garald doing the paperwork with two of the elders, the apt owner and the agent. Lots of new learning experiences about how they do this kind of thing here. Many e mails back and forth between Garald, Kuala Lumpur, and Singapore trying to get it right. Mission accomplished. Then we helped the elders shop for new furnishings for their apartment - stuff like dishes, pans, bedding, pillows, etc. And helped them move. They're glad to be in their own place and the 4 elders remaining here in the Taman Molek house are very glad to not be a house of 8 any longer. They'll still come very Tues for dist. mtg and lunch. We talked about not doing that any more as there are now so many of them. They love American food and offered to pay 5rm per person if I'd still continue. Well, we can't take their support money and we so love the time they're with us - we must continue. It's worth it. If zone leaders drop in, as they often do, that's 10 elders and the two of us. Spaghetti and soup - cheap and fills them up. Last week - around the table during dinner, one of the elders from Wisconsin, told us about his conversion to the church. He's the only member in his family. He's one of the new Mandarin speaking elders. Only been a member for 3 years. Choice experience. Pretty soon, we'll be singing Christmas songs at our meeting. Well, actually we do quite often anyway. One of the elders always chooses one - we tell him it will soon be actually legal.
Okay... here's the food section. Of course, you knew this was coming. We went to a Korean barbecue on Monday night with Wee Lee & Felicia and the Pleysieur's - our yacht residents from Australia. Fun. We count going out to dinner with members as part of our job... of course. Tough but somebody's gotta do it, right?
They cook at your table. Lots of fun side dishes. New stuff to try - liked all of it except the hot and spicy.
He eats everything - I kind of pick and choose.
Oh, another food pic. This was at Sister Eva's house on the Deepavali holiday. Most of this was very hot - as that's how they like it. Curry - for dipping. Actually I'm learning to like it - a little bit.
Deepavali holiday at Sister Eva's. It's customary to have new Indian clothing for the celebration. They were all color co ordinated in blue. Beautiful people - inside and out. Elder G. in the back donned some recently purchased traditional India clothing. He was lovin' it.
Now they look like really nice people, don't they? Well, they were until.... the Book of Mormon came out. The young man on the right is a super wonderful guy from S'pore who is the elders quorum pres. When he learned that the two Mandarin speaking elders in his area were being transferred to JB, he invited them and us for dinner and teaching. They were so cordial and nice. Loved showing us the unique wood work in their home. Look at the beautiful detail on this stairway.
This is one of the tables in their home - carved from a tree root. After a lovely dinner, we sat down to visit and when the elders tried to talk to them about the gospel, they were quite indignant. Obviously, we don't speak Mandarin, so we didn't know exactly what was being said, but the body language and mannerisms made it pretty obvious. We tried to just read a scripture with them and they wouldn't touch the B of M. Later one of the elders said he'd never been so insulted by what they said. Oh well. Their son was very disappointed, embarrassed and apologized. We felt bad for him. Maybe someday....
Okay Carrie Lyn - these pix are just for you - John, Alan and baby Chynnewoth (sp?) Took them Thurs when we were there for piano. What a beautiful baby. She'll be blessed tomorrow on fast Sunday. (the date at the top of this post says Fri - but it's really Sat. here)
When she was born he texted us with this msg. "Another childhood come to the world. It's a girl." She joins 3 sisters who are just as beautiful. First one in their family to be 'born in the covenant.' Delightful. The joys go on. We're so grateful to be here - never realized our lives would be so eternally intertwined with lives here. Life and eternity forever changed for us - with great sweetness. Thankful... thankful.
1 comment:
Loved the post! Hated the roach! I hope Danna Lee and Adam made it there safe! Can't wait to see the pictures. Love you!
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