End of the New Year Celebration

24 February 2013

Today is the official last day of the Chinese New Year Celebration.  I know….you thought it was over….well so did we, but as I write fireworks are going off again all over the city.  There have been fireworks every night somewhere but tonight it is bigger and more sustained and it has started early.  So no one has said anything about how long the fireworks will last tonight and we didn’t ask, it has just become part of our nighttime; pops and crackles and that “old typewriter” sound. I will miss the lovely displays.  I wonder what will replace them.  

Much time this week was spent helping fix bikes, buy new bikes and get new missionaries established in their new assignments.  We had our first Zone Meeting with new Zone Leaders and about half new missionaries.  We are enjoying our new Sister Rhodes upstairs.  She has been a great addition.  Our Zone Leaders are great leaders.  I was asked to give a 3 minute talk on our purpose as missionaries during the Zone Meeting.  It was a great meeting taking most of the day on Tuesday. 

Monday we met the Physical Facilities person from KL who came for the final inspection on the new Church building in Kuching.  The architect and contractors came on Tuesday to go through the building for the final inspection at the end of the 1 year warranty period.  Enjoyed getting to know him.

I have been sick since last Tuesday night.  I have come to appreciate being able to count on buying a decongestant or cough medicine or Puffs with Vicks.  First you have to find the right shop and then you have to be sure you know what you are buying and where it came from.  Some American brands are available but at a substantial cost.  We will have to see how I do and then we may need to do some “finding”.  I just need to be well for Tuesday when our official FamilySearch employee trainer comes from Taiwan to train us.  We are so looking forward to that!

The other senior couple who is serving in Kuching, Elder and Sister Nielson, have been here for almost two years.  They are leaving in April and another couple is coming in before they leave so they can be trained.  They are called as Seminary and Institute missionaries and will do some of the traveling that we will be doing but for a smaller area of East Malaysia.  It is frightening to think that they may feel the same way we did when we arrived and they will be asking us the questions we have been asking almost daily of the Nielsons.  We don’t begin to have the answers!!  Well, we will just do all we can and the Lord will magnify us and we will build memories together.   It will be great.

One of the things that Sister Nielson has done while here is establish a Kuching District Music Program.  It is held at the new chapel (referred to as the KDC – Kuching District Centre) every Tuesday night.  The Sister missionaries and one Elder companionship help teach students on little keyboards and most of the students are youth who have become the accompanists for their individual branches.  Sister Nielson has “invited” me to take over the music program when she leaves so I started this last week teaching for the first time.  She assigned me two students but only one came, a lovely young woman, Melissa (pronounced Maleesa) who has a wonderful touch on the keyboard and I think plays by ear.  She is very quick to learn and is diligent in practicing one hour each day.  There are between 15 and 30 students total in the program.  Most Tuesday we have 15 who come;  transportation is always an issue.  [HUGE fireworks display just went off for 5 minutes outside my window in the street. So fun!!!]  Sister Nielson has planned a concert for April 6^th so I took some pictures of the students last Tuesday to put on posters and flyers to advertise the event around the District.  Aren’t they cute?

 

Language study is ramping up for us.  We aren’t yet engaging in conversation which we should be, but we are understanding more and more as we increase our vocabulary.  Our nightly ritual of praying, crawling into bed and drilling each other on our weekly words was challenging for Elder Moulder at first.  He would turn his back to me to try to go to sleep as I would say an English word or phrase and ask him for the Malay word or phrase.  Each response became weaker and weaker one night as he tried to feign falling asleep (with the characteristic sense of humor) as I kept the words coming.  Then the word was “to have a wife”…..without missing a beat the weak and sleepy response came….”nirvana”.  I burst out laughing so loud I was sure the Sisters above us would hear (it was about 11pm).  He was not thinking that having me as a wife was nirvana at that moment but his response was successful enough to stop the study for the night.  For the life of me I can’t remember the word for “to have a wife” because I always remember “nirvana” which definitely is not the Malay word!  

So far most days have been cloudy or partly cloudy and the heavy rains have come at night.  There have been a few days where we have been happy to stay inside even though our poor young Elders and Sisters ride their bikes around in the downpours.  We did have an experience last week driving in uncharted territory to take a young woman home who had come to a missionary preparation class at the Nielson’s.  Her name is Stephanie and she wants to be a missionary.  There are about 10 young single adults here who are planning to go on missions in the next year or so.  It is great.  Anyway…..we were happy to help out and take her home knowing that she was a member of the Matang Branch which is a little bit of a drive and across the river.  It was about 10pm by the time we started out and raining very hard.  It had been raining for several hours so there was water building up along the outside lanes of the roads.  She is a little tiny thing and she has a very soft voice so I asked her to sit in the front seat to direct me.  We drove to the place where the Matang Branch meets and she directed me to a road that went past and told me to go straight.  We drove for about 10 minutes and I began to wonder how far this was going to take us.  Another 5 minutes went by and she directed me to turn left which I did and then she said nothing for about 5 more minutes.  I then asked and she told me just keep going straight.  I was obedient but wondered if we were going to end up in a jungle somewhere in the dark with the rain and getting stuck.  Soon I was directed to turn right and continue straight again.  This time though, we didn’t go too far and there were shops around so I was more confident we could find our way but then she said turn right.  

At this point, as I turned right onto a small but paved road Elder Moulder spoke up from the back seat.  “Uhhhh, this isn’t a road”.  He had been following our trip on the GPS so he could get us home, but according to the phone GPS we had turned into a field.  Now this has happened to us before in the States and we have never worried too much about it, but every moment we went further into the “field” I was more apprehensive.  We continued to the end of this road to see that it turned right.  There were little connected houses along one side and a real field or jungle (we couldn’t see) on the other.  The road again made a turn which I was directed to follow.  At that point we came to a dead end with little residences in front and on both sides with cars in front of them and the rain continuing to pour upon us.  I thought we had arrived.  But then cute Sister Stephanie directed me to turn a bit left and drive up along a walkway…..at least I thought it was a walkway.  I looked at her and asked, “here??”.  She nodded yes.  I drove on the walkway.  At the end of the walkway we had to turn right again and she pointed to her house and I got as close to it as I could.  I was basically in a little driveway circle place.  Elder Moulder had an umbrella in the back and gallantly got out and walked Stephanie to her door.  

When he got back into the car we realized it was 11pm.  We looked at each other and the question was, “Can we get back out of here?”  Fortunately, I was able to back up without hitting another vehicle, falling into a puddle or ditch, made it back down the sidewalk and  find our way out of the "field" to streets where the GPS led us back to our covered parking place at our apartment.  We were grateful to have helped and grateful to have been helped! 

On Friday we made our first Family History presentation to the District Branch Presidency Council.  There were about 17 people there from Branch Presidencies.  We had 25 minutes on the agenda of a one hour meeting and we did it in 22 minutes but the meeting lasted almost 2 ½ hours.  It was a good training meeting for the Branches and the District leadership did a great job.  I loved that as they spoke about everything from missing baptismal clothing (that’s a problem everywhere in the world isn’t it?), the Branch Mission Fund, using electronic devices to access the scriptures rather than the books to toilet paper and towels for the bathrooms they referred often to the Handbook of Instructions.  Elder Moulder and I were very impressed.  The District Counselor actually ended the meeting by holding up the Handbook of Instructions and testifying that if they would all study and follow the Handbook they would be blessed.  These are such valiant people.  

We had our first hospital experience also this week.  A young man (age 27) from another city called Muka has been through chemo therapy for colon cancer and was sent by his doctor to Kuching for a specialist from Kuala Lampur to come and see if he needed surgery.  The Nielson’s know the family but they were leaving for their work trip and asked us to please watch over this young many and his parents while they are here.  We went on Tuesday to meet them and they are a sweet family.  The young man, Sylvester (who speaks good English because he watches TV he said), wants to go to Salt Lake to the temple and to see snow.  His mother, Rosita, did not speak English but his father, Brother Bangat, did so we communicated with them.  Because I was sick I didn’t feel well enough to return to the hospital after the first visit, but Elder Moulder was able to go and help the family with some food, a new crutch for Brother Bangat, who had a bad foot [more HUGE firework noises very close by], and help him give his son a blessing before the surgery.  They left Kuching and went back to Sibu (the larger city close to Muka) the second day after surgery to recover there.  We hope to hear from them and possibly see them the first of March when we go to Sibu for the dedication of the new Church building there.  We understand there will be a busload of members from Muka who will come for the Open House March 9^th and stay for the dedication on the 10^th and then return (3-4 hour bus ride) to Muka Sunday evening.  I am sure they are very excited for this building although we have learned that there have been so many problems with poor construction that it will be a miracle if it is ready to open.  We pray it will be.  President Chua (pronounced chwa), the District President has been working so hard to get it done.  He wants us to come and train everyone in Family History for the Family History Center in the building.  We hope we will be ready as most do not speak English.  We will need to use the Elders to translate since we still aren’t good enough to train on detailed stuff in Malay. 

Saturday night we had another baptism. One of those baptized was a man who we met two days after being here.  He is so sweet and shy and I am so happy that he was able to overcome some of the challenges he had to be baptized.  We had a conflict on Saturday evening with a birthday party for a prominent member of the church here in Kuching so I had to rush out to join Ed at the party but it was a special experience to see him so happy that he was finally able to receive this blessing.  He has a strong testimony of the Sabbath Day and I’m sure he will know how to strengthen the Branch as he learns and grows. 

The birthday party was something else.  It was for Sister Molly Ero, wife of Lebanon Ero who are long time members here.  They are the ones who picked us up at the airport the first day we arrived.  They are very wealthy people and have a great family and do a lot for their Branch, which is the English speaking Branch.  They held it in a large room in the Hilton Hotel.  It is an annual dinner event for her birthday and they apparently do it for the anniversary and Valentines Day too.  She is lovely and I ws so impressed with the birthday card their daughter made for her.  It was a large (about 14x14) 4 page card all handmade.  The cover had a photo of Sis. Molly.  The first page had 12 pop-ups that when opened revealed a message from the daughter and a picture that came up.  The messages were all about what a wonderful mother she was for bringing their family into the gospel and taking them to the temple to be sealed so they could be an eternal family.  I was very impressed. 

Molly and Lebanon were wonderful hosts of a typical Chinese style (still celebrating Chinese New Year) meal with multiple courses shared by tables of 10.  They invited family and church members and people who work for him and missionaries.  It was delightful with way too much food.

Thought I would share a picture or two from this event. 

These new friends were not happy I surprised them with a photo but it is the best one I have of the table ^_^

Left to Right:  Maureen, her neice Forena, Molly and Helen

Molly and Lebanon

The Family...Their son is in the blue on the far left, daughter Laura (who made the card and took photos all night in the red next to her mom), in front of Molly is the youngest whose name is Liahona, Lebanon is holding their grandson and their oldest daughter is next to him.  I don't know the other people.

 

 

We attended another Branch Conference today in the Kota Sentosa Branch.  It was our first visit there although we have met many of the members from that Branch.  Both Ed and I (per usual for the first time we visit a Branch, were invited to give a testimony.  I had changed mine to reflect some of the new words I had learned so I could be broader in expressing my feelings and testimony.  One of the bad things about broadening my testimony and learning to say it and not read it is that people then think I can speak it much better than I can!  I was asked by the Relief Society President who taught the lesson today, to read from the scriptures…..from the Indonesian scriptures.  I am able to do that, but I don’t always understand the words so I use my Samsung reader to keep up.  I was very happy I was able to do that because the 2^nd time she asked me to read, she also asked me to explain the meaning of the scripture!  I had to do it in English….so sad.  One of these days I will be able to respond in Malay….limited Malay, but I will be able to at least respond.   After the closing prayer the RS President stood up and said, "Okay, let's take a picture!"  So everyone got out their cameras and we took a picture! 

The President is Sister Angelina, 2nd from left in the front.  The cute lady in the front who is 3rd from the right works at the This Spring mall where we often go.  She saw Elder Moulder there last week and came up to him and asked if he remembered her.  He couldn't remember her name but did remember her face.  Apparently she had a difficult time communicating with him because she said today that talking with him was like a chicken talking to a duck!!!  Everyone had a good laugh about that, including cute Elder Moulder.

During Sunday School we went to the Family History class taught by our two youngest Consultants, Belinda and Marina.  They are so cute.  They have the room decorated and they had the hymns playing as we entered for class.  They were prepared to teach lesson 4 to the two students who came.  We are so impressed with these two cute sisters.  They are great examples.  They had everything ready as you can see by the pictures below.  

The girls did a great job decorating, complete with tinsel and stars, temple pictures and a warning in red marker on the white board to leave the room as it is! 

Maureen on the left is the District Director, Belinda is in the middle and Marina on the right.  I think Belinda is 18 and Marina is 19.  They are my hero's!  (Notice the tablecloth and flowers on the table.  I told them they were definitely ready for Relief Society!)

They had all the forms they needed to teach lesson 4 from from Member Guide and had bookmarks to hand out.  I think they had kept some left over from the Open House last year of the Kuching Buildilng.

Here they are helping their two students, Bro. Christopher (hasn't been a member a year yet) and his granddaughter, Forena complete family group sheets.

 

My favorite moment of this week happened during the District training on Friday night.  At one point one of the older men stood up and moved to an empty chair next to the other older man in the room.  They are from different Branches, but obviously knew each other well.  I was watching them and at one point as they were talking quietly to each other (both speaking their tribal language, Iban I suppose) one of them patted the other’s knee and then the first one put his hand over the other’s and patted it and they just patted each other’s hands for a few minutes with big smiles on their faces after sharing a funny story or experience.  It only lasted a few minutes, but it was a tender exchange between two older members who have been through a lot of changes in their lives.  They have lived hard if I compare my life to theirs but they are faithful servants in their respective branches and were happy to be together. It was very sweet.  Both of these men always have smiles on their faces and love to shake our hands.  I will enjoy getting to know them and serving with them for the little while I am here.