Thanks to Jim we will have a nice mission blog to post to each day or so. I look forward to seeing lots of comments and of course pictures from everyone while we are gone.

Speaking of pictures we just bought a new camera so we can take a lot of photos of Indonesia. What I like about this Casio is how easy it is to use and understand. Without even starting to read the manual – 247 pages on line – I was able to figure out how to use most of the features.

 Mom and I get two hours a week with a tutor at the MTC. Mary is doing much better at remembering vocabulary and speaking. I am doing my best and then asking the Lord to fill in the rest.

We got a packet of information about the mission from President Jensen. One thing it mentions is that public transportation may not be the best way for senior missionaries to travel. We may end up buying a car, paying insurance, and then needing to hire a driver because it seems that driving in Indonesia is rather difficult. I do not think we will know more until we get there.

Today we heard from another couple who will be going to the same mission but a month earlier. We shared information about available language aids,etc. that we have found useful. There may be as many as 8 couples in the mission plus more on humanitarian missions. The mission only has about 70 young missionaries. This is because there must be a native – or someone who looks like a native – Indonesian with each young Elder or Sister from outside Indonesia. This greatly limits the number of young missionaries we can send there.

Missionaries can not go tracting but they can do street displays and contacting. Also it seems that missionaries must be very careful when it comes to teaching Muslims. You can not give a Book of Mormon or a tract to any Muslim unless they specifically ask for it.

 But with the Lord’s help the Church will grow and develop in Indonesia.

From Jim: By the way a larger Pierfamily.com site is under development at http://www.pierfamily.com/joomla. Another site I am working on is our troop web site at http://www.troop570.com.