Mary with a white tiger cub – about 4 months old. The park is in the deep mountain jungle and this is one of the waterfalls. If we had opened the door, I think the zebra would have come right in.

20 August 2007 – Monday

I woke just before the alarm went off and after a brief struggle with a desire to go back to bed, I got up and did my hour of exercise. I do not think I am losing much weight but I know that I am getting in better shape. Sit-ups are killing me – even though I am doing them only every other day. I guess it is going to take a few weeks to get so I can do enough sets to make a difference.

While cooling down from exercising I read more from Elder Packer’s biography. It is interesting but it does not seem to me to get into the man as the one about Spencer W. Kimball written by his son. It reads more like a gospel tract than a biography of a human being. The best part about it is when he talks about the inter-action between him and other general authorities. I guess what I find is a nice surface but not much depth. I think he is a much deeper and human man than what I find in these pages.

We thought we had a quiet day with only a trip to Taman Safari with the Taylors on the plate. Since they are going to Jogja and may never have another chance to see it, he president approved us taking them. The first thing that went wrong was that they thought we were coming at 9:00 and Mary thought we said 8:30. So we got there too early.

Then as we were waiting for them, we got the news that we were also going to take Sister Marchant and their son Dallin. Our car is not really made for carrying 7 people comfortably but off we went – rather late but going. The day went fine – it was overcast most of the day so it was not too hot. We saw lots of things and our guests were impressed and seemed to enjoy it.

I suggested we stop and eat at before we headed home – we had not eaten all day except for some treats and a couple of bananas that we did not feed to the monkeys and other animals. I called the Kanes and asked if they could join us but they said it would be better if we dropped by afterwards. Just as we were finishing eating, sister Marchant got a call from the president asking when we would get home. It turned out that they had forgotten that they were invited to a FHE with Hendra’s family and they were suppose to leave at 6:00. So I had to call the Kanes and tell them we could not come by but had to hurry back to Jakarta. We made it by 7:00 which was pretty good considering.

Earlier in the day Mary had been asked to play at the funeral for sister Subandriyo for the choir and they were going to practice at 7:30. Sam and Mary dropped me off at the apartment so I could wash dishes and do some laundry while Sam sang and Mary played. She did not get home until almost 9:30 and said that she volunteered to play all the songs for the funeral.

So while it was not a very productive day, we did get closer to the Taylors, learned more about how they worked with the members in the Philippines, and I got to finish Elder Packer’s book while we drove to Bogor and back. One point that he has always stood behind is that we should not try to fit the gospel into the man’s knowledge but fit man’s knowledge into the gospel. That a teacher should not try to explain the gospel in terms of man’s growing knowledge and philosophy but to fit the new knowledge into the things we know are true. He also made the point that a testimony often can not be articulated in words but only through feeling. As the 50th section of the D&C points out, we are taught and teach by the spirit and when both sides meet each is edified.

 

The Peterson’s farewell party – the Taylors and Petersons on the left and Mary and the Marchants – including their son  – on the right. At the back are the missionaries from Bandung. The one at the far end is elder Mongolan who will be released on Monday the 21st. He is an excellent missionary and also is a lot of fun. I hope he gets an education and does well.

19 August 2007 – Sunday

It was a regular Sunday, except we picked up the Taylors and took them to Tangerang with us. I asked the elders to translate for the Taylors and as I sat there I decided I would ask them to translate more often for us. I do not seem to be hearing enough yet to understand what is being said and I think I am missing somethings that are important to my life. The Lord does not have us sit in 5 hours of meetings just to be there – He certainly has something for us to learn.

Elder Peate – one of the new elders – taught the Gospel Principles class. He has only been in Indonesia for 10 or 11 days yet he taught like a veteran. He did not just read from the manual or have other read, but gave a lesson in decent Indonesian. I thought his lesson was better than a number I have heard from English missionaries who have been out a year. The president was correct – this is a powerful group of missionaries.

There was one event that put a real damper on the Sabbath day. When we got into the car, I asked Sam how he was and he said he was very sad because a friend of his had died. It turned out that DeeDee Subandriyo – elder Subandriyo’s eldest daughter – had suddenly died of meningitis in Arizona while visiting the Jensens. The Jensens were taking her to her flight to Provo where she was going to go to school at the Y, when she collapsed and within 24 hours or so she was dead.

Elder Subandriyo flew there from Malaysia and her brother was released a month early from his mission to join him in Arizona and bring the body home. It seems that as she was dying she told the Jensens that she wanted to go home. On the way home from church, after dropping off the Taylors, we stopped by the Subandriyo’s home and told sister Stephanie how sorry we were.  When someone dies, people come by the house to show their respect. Yellow flags with the name of the deceased are placed at entrances to the village or town as a guide to the home. The family is showing a strong face, but it was easy to tell that they were greatly mourning their loss. We stayed about 30 minutes and came home.

As I sat in their house, I thought about why a great young woman like this would die of a disease that today – according to what I read on the web – is seldom fatal. She was beautiful, smart – she had just finished 2 years at BYUH and was transferring to BYU Provo – and was preparing to go on a mission when she turned 21. She was in the US, she had gone to the temple with the Jensens, her parents are stalwarts in the church, her father is an Area 70, and looked up to by everyone in the country and in Hong Kong.

I do not suppose I will ever know and it is not really important. I tend not to think that the Lord had a hand in it, but it would not bother me if He did. Unless the spirit tells me differently I will just find it a part of living a mortal life in a world where sickness, death, and all the normal things that happen here. We knew that when we came to earth we would have experiences and death was one of them. I do know she goes home to her Father in Heaven worthy to be called His daughter. I know she will live again and she will be there to greet her parents and loved ones when they cross over. I know her parents will find comfort in the knowledge that she is safe, but they will still miss her greatly.

18 August 2007 – Saturday

The alarm woke me before 5 and I got in my hour of exercise. I only did 30 sit-ups because my stomach muscles were still complaining about those I did on Thursday. I continue to try and study vocabulary while I walk/job the track. Getting my body use to exercising is going to take some time. About an hour after I have finished, I feel like I am ready to go back to bed.

We read from the Kitab Mormon and it is interesting how the writing in Jacob is so much more difficult than that in the last part of 2nd Nephi. The concepts and the vocabulary is almost as hard to translate as Isaiah. I have a great respect for Jacob’s teaching and the task the Lord gave him to accomplish as he saw his people start to slide into inequity. How easy it is to forget where our blessings come from when we have an abundance. In today’s reading Jacob tries to convince the people that they should be more generous with their riches and the danger of pride.

We went into the chapel and I opened the office while Mary went to SoGo. I almost forgot to mention we finally got our car back from the garage and it looks as good as new. All the scratches and damage was repaired.

While Mary was gone, one man who we had worked with came in and said that he had been offered a job driving and he would start in September but he was not really happy with this and would continue to try to find another one. We started talking about how sometimes when we are poor and need help we become humble enough that we turn to the Lord. I shared Alma 32 with him and told him that while our worldly condition may seem poor at times, our spiritual condition never needed to be. That if we kept the Lord’s commandments he would help us to feel good with ourselves and to lift us up to try and improve our worldly condition.

I also called Franky – another of our clients – and asked if got his job on the cruise ship. He said that his interviewer would call him the first of October and in the mean time he was helping his mother with her small business. Unfortunately he is determined to seek employment away from Indonesia. If he would be happy with living and working here, I would send his resume to the Marriott chain.

I listened to a talk by President Hinckley in Bahasa and read along. I can pretty much keep up with it and also could translate a lot of it as I read. I am hoping that sometime in the future I will come to hear and understand Bahasa. I told Mary today that if we did not get called to another mission where we needed to learn a language, we should continue to read the Kitab Mormon and try to master the language.

After lunch we continued our reading in the Kitab Mormon. Jacob includes an interesting verse I do not remember reading before. He firsts admonishes the husbands to stop taking more than one wife and not to have concubines. But then the Lord puts in a verse that opens the door for future revelation that might make possible if “I want to raise up a seed unto Me.”

This morning Mary suggested that we have the Petersons and the Taylors over for dinner tonight. I said I did not think that was a good idea. But later I came up with the idea that we invite them to go to Amigos. Mary called and the Peterson’s accepted. Later we called the President and found that they were picking up their son in the afternoon and would have to call us back. Later he called and said they would love to join us. I just got off the phone with the Petersons and found that they had some elders and luggage in their car so they were loaded. It should be a real interesting dinner. After the dinner, the Petersons and the Marchants are going to go pick up the Dayhles who are coming in around 10.

After office hours we came home and took naps. Before I went to sleep I read from the biography of Boyd K. Packer that the president loaned me. I am still reading about his early life and that of his wife. I found it interesting to read how he finally came to have a testimony of the Book of Mormon and the Church.

Before heading off to dinner, Mary and I read again from the Kitab Mormon – we are trying to keep our average of two hours a day. It really helps us center on the gospel and also to learn Indonesian.

Our farewell dinner for the Petersons was well attended. The Petersons had been up in Bandung for Sister Peterson’s last piano lesson giving day. The Taylors had gone with them and for the trip home the president asked if they would bring back two missionaries and their luggage. So their car was quite crowded. The president and sister Marchant brought their son who is on his way home from his mission in Paraguay via Argentina, France, Hong Kong, Jakarta, etc. So he will fly almost around the world.

We gave the Peterson’s a small stone frog for a going away present. It turned out that sister Peterson is a frog collector so that worked well. We all had a nice meal and there was lots of talk. I reminded the president about making arrangements for the Taylors to fly into Solo and staying with the Roberts until they could get settled into Jogja. He called the Roberts from the restaurant and got it all settled.

The night ended with us taking the Taylors back to the mission home and coming home ourselves. I read from ‘Watchman on the Tower.” It is clearly written and reflects the solid organization that is part of Elder Packer’s life. His family really needed that since it consisted of 10 children and a father that was often away on assignments. His wife Donna certainly deserves a lot of credit for providing a safe haven for him.

 

This  is the bougainvillea at the mission home – they have grafted two plants together to get purple and white. I am extremely jealous of this plant. The Wok picture came from Elder Kane but I thought it was worth sharing. The load on the motorcycle appears to be a full stereo system. I hope he made it home safely.

16 August 2007 – Thursday

Up and did my walk/job until 6 and then went into the gym and did sit-ups. I was surprised to see that my weight was less than I expected. But I still need to lose some weight. I guess I should really avoid BreadTalk. After that it was a normal morning with me studying Indonesian before we read from the Kitab Mormon – we are now sailing through the latter part of 2nd Nephi.

We went into the office so we could do some things and then left for the mission office. When we got there we found that they were having an office party and so we got to join in having lunch. President and sister Marchant and the Taylors were all busy eating the traditional foods.

Mary sat in while Sister Peterson taught the office staff their English class. While she was doing that, I talked to the office elders, the A.P.s and president Marchant. I am still working on the president about improving the English lessons of the native missionaries. Hopefully before we leave there will be a real program in place so the missionaries learn as much as they can before they are released.  After lunch the Taylors went to Immigration to apply for their KITAS. It was the perfect day to go, because everyone was busy getting ready for the big holiday tomorrow so there were few who were interested in visiting Immigration.

We took the Taylors to Tangerang for our District Meeting and English Class. As we traveled we got to learn a lot more about their mission. They had great success re-activating members – hopefully they will do the same in Jogja. I am not sure they learned much or how much they enjoyed the evening with us. Mary taught Catherine a piano lesson, we had a rather joyous District Meeting with a larger than usual group of missionaries. That was because that group of 9 that recently arrived are still waiting for their KITAS and then transfers so the usual group of 4 has been increased to 8 missionaries and then there was the two couples. The new missionaries are super and seem to be able to communicate fairly well with their companions.

The joy of being on their mission just shows on their faces. It is like there is an inner light that just must shine forth. They have the same attitude as Elders Roper and Thiemann did when we first met them. One of the pairs got 93 referrals – someone gave them a map of a kompong with all the names and addresses of those living there. It is great because they can now go around a single area and check out if the people are really living there. However Elder Wiryanto – the DL – wisely told them to not neglect their investigators to check out the referrals. Elder Tuxworth seems to have picked up some bug that made him violently ill yesterday. But he has such a great spirit and fun nature that it is hard for anything to get him down. It is hard to believe that he is a number of years older than most of the other missionaries and has been in the military. I have really enjoyed getting to know him. The other great missionary in the district is Elder Hadi Suyatmo – he is a powerful missionary and is only going to get better. He is also full of joy. He gave a good lesson and used some role playing to make it work better.

Our English class got off to a slow start and never really got large. We had Elder Suyatmo and the other new native missionary stay in the young class. I am not sure how effective the lesson was tonight – we went through propositions, counting and opposites. We also played Simon Says which the Taylors and the new native aced – I gave up trying to get them out.

The trip home was a little long because we had to drop off the Taylors. But it was not as long as the Marchants and their guests. They left at 5 to take a quick trip into the middle of Jakarta and ran into the mess around the train station. They had forgotten that everyone would be leaving or arriving for the long holiday weekend. They ended up taking 5 hours instead of an hour.  As usual on Thursday night we pretty much did nothing after we got home except grab something to stuff in our mouths and then went right to bed.

 

Mary with the young son of the woman we helped teach today. This is where the family of 4 or 5 adults and a child live. We got to sit on the bottom bunk bed – the only seating in the house other than the floor. They also turned a fan directly on us so we did not melt. The kindness of the people to us is never ending. As we were driving back from the appointment, I happened to look up and saw this UC Berkeley  logo on the back of the car infront of us. They did not have a ‘Go Bears’ decal anywhere.

15 August 2007 –

Up and out the door just after 5 – put in a good 45 minutes of walking and jogging. It is getting easier. I only did a little work on vocabulary instead I tried to organize my testimony in Indonesian. It is becoming easier to organize Indonesian sentences. Yesterday when I asked him how his cold was doing he said ‘Hampir hilang.’ I caught the hampir = almost, but it was only when he spelled hilang that I knew that it meant lost and he told me it also meant gone – so his cold was almost gone. I really need to work on hearing the words because I think we now know enough that if we can hear them, we can get an idea of what is being said.

The morning mail included two from McKay – I can almost see her great smile and hear her voice as I read her short but wonderful letters. It seems that it took about 13 hours for them to get home – that is pretty good time from Tom’s to Salt Lake. They did not make a lot of long stops.

I had watermelon and orange juice for breakfast – it certainly filled me up. I then caught up this journal on the blog with pictures. We then read from the Kitab Mormon for an hour – it is a good way to get the spirit into our day.

I called Herb Bergman about the furnace at the rentals. Herb was not home but Edith was and so I asked her to please ask Herb to do the work. I would guess that it will now get done. I talked to her for about 5 minutes and we talked about how she is doing. She has had problems ever since she fell a number of years ago and shattered her hip. She is a lovely lady and I have always enjoyed talking to her. She shares my love of gardening.

I got a call from Elder Subandriyo asking if we could help out with a couple of projects involving the visit of the folks who donated all the books and wheelchairs. For one I am surprised that the Peterson’s are not taking care of but for the other, they will be on a plane heading home. The Kanes would usually fill in but they are going to some Rotary convention. So we will have a rather busy schedule for this week and next week. But that is good – we need to keep out of trouble. Elder Kane soon called and will e-mail the details – hopefully all we will have to do is appear with the Deyhles and smile at the right time.

We went to the office and Mary made the graduation certificates and sent them to all the couples. Earlier I had received a call from Elder Rigby asking if we could move the time up for our visit with them to a single sister. So we just had enough time to get the one project completed before we left for Jakarta Raya.

We had a wonderful experience helping to teach the gospel. The young woman who they are teaching is the one we visited with a number of elders over the last couple of months. She is married and with two children but the husband wants a divorce and obviously is not going to give her much money. So she has had to leave their nice house and move back in with her mother. Now she lives with four or five other adults and her small child in a very humble home that is perhaps 10 x 12 feet.

I gave the opening prayer and Mary gave the closing prayer in Indonesian. It was short but I think I got most of the words right. I also bore my testimony of the Book of Mormon. After the lesson I asked if she was looking for work and she said she was. It turns out she has a degree in accounting from a good school. Before she was married she worked for a bank and had a promising career. But now she is in her mid-30’s and it will be hard for her to find work in her field. But she looks very young and perhaps we will be able to help her. I certainly hope so.

After that meeting we came home for a short time before leaving again for the mission home and dinner with president and sister Marchant and the new mission couple – the Taylors – who came in today. We were joined by two of the elders who had problem getting their Kitas and had to stay over a night. Then when he saw how much food was left, the president asked the office and A.P.s to come down and eat. So we had a nice time getting to know the Taylors and talking about missionary work in Indonesia. The Taylors were released from a mission in the Philippines in late December and immediately put in for another mission. Since they have lived in a 3rd world country and know what they need to do to help build up the activity in a branch. They are going to be a great help to the members in Jogja. Elder Taylor expressed a desire to drive their own car and I wished him the best. I do not know what we would do without Sam to drive and translate for us. After dinner we talked for a while and then headed home and bed.

It is an added blessing when we can get out and be involved in preaching the gospel. I know that our call as ERS missionaries is important but I think a native couple would do even better at it. In fact I am going to suggest to President Marchant that he consider trying to find a couple to become the ERS country directors after we leave. I would think Sister Mary and her husband would be perfect. Then the couple here in Jakarta could have a large home near or between the branches and have people over.

Our young guest who I entertained while Mary help his mother. The Petersons and the Tobings – the twin older sons are in Australia getting Master Degrees. The oldest son at home wants to go to school in America – we suggested BYU.

14 August 2007 – Tuesday

Exercise – two others came out about the time I was going in. This is the first people I have seen since I started walking again. Unfortunately neither were my friend Bob who I need to find. For some reason I was quite tired and ended up falling back to sleep later in the morning. We only read for about 45 minutes – we could not seem to get started. I guess it was just a tired morning.

We went into the office and spent much of the first two hours reading from the Kitab Mormon and watching Hendra move a wireless broadcast unit into our office. When he was done we had a great connection but it is still way to slow. Especially if we are trying to get to the US. It is even worse for the Family History Center – they are dependent on the records in SL and they are taking forever to download.

Sam got me lunch off the street. It was good but Mary’s tuna sandwich also smelled good. After lunch a sister came in and asked us to help design a price list/order form for her small business. Mary did all the work and I played with her young son. She could get a job sewing but she can not take her 4 year old son. She has no family in Jakarta and so there is no one to take care of the child. I had a great time working on some e-mail and playing with him. All children are the same – they like to play peek-a-bo.

After we had helped the sister, we came back to the apartment to wait for the air-conditioning repair folks. It took them about an hour to find the problem – a damaged fan motor – and fix it. Cost $40 – which I actually thought was high compared to their usual service. But still way below what it would have cost in the U.S. It is nice to have the quiet back and it also gave me a chance to clean the deck and re-arrange my garden.

Sam took us to the mission office and the Petersons. We had a nice talk with them about getting ready to leave the mission. They are going to be so busy the last few days that they will have little time to be trunky. They are a truly delightful and lovely couple.

We got stuck in traffic – no surprise there – but still made it to the Tobing house right at 7:00. They are a family of seven – mom, dad, four sons and a daughter. The mother and father converted in Fresno, California while he was going to school but became in-active so none of their children are members. They live in a wonderful California inspired home, speak almost perfect English – in fact the children do not speak much Indonesian – and go to an British International school.

The father seems to have a desire to know more about the Church and is reading the Book of Mormon. After Elder Peterson gave a nice lesson on the 12 tribes of Israel and how the ‘other sheep’ were those who came to America, brother Tobing asked Elder Peterson to give him a blessing. I got to take part and there was a strong spirit there. Elder Peterson had said that he thought brother Tobing would be a great leader in the Church and I am sure that he would be. Hopefully he will feel the spirit and desire to become active and his children will become members. Since the Petersons will be gone, I made an appointment to bring the new couple and home teach them in September. I wish we could be their regular home teachers but I am sure the new couple will do a wonderful job. Perhaps that is one of the reasons the Lord is sending them here at this time.

By the time we dropped off the Petersons and got home, it was almost 10 and we both headed straight to bed.

 

Elders Rigby and Erickson – Our latest lobby floral arrangement.

13 August 2007 – Monday

I woke at 3:00 and could not go back to sleep but I managed to doze until 5:00. I decided that I really needed to get up and exercise if I ever hope to lose some weight. Once I get going it is not hard to continue – I am still not really stretching myself at running. I worked on my vocabulary. I am not sure it is doing any good but I am making the effort which is what counts. I may not ‘obey exactly’ but I am giving it a good shot.

Other activities for the morning included reading from the A&P for personal study and the Kitab Mormon with Mary for companion study. Since we are out of Isaiah we were able to read almost 4 pages. Between us we know almost all the words – Mary still knows more than I but I do contribute a needed word now and then. Our problem is still getting the right person doing the right thing at the right time. Most of the time it is right there in front of us but we skip over the word that would make it clear for us. As I wrote that I remembered that the part we read today included a comment by Nephi that he was writing ‘clearly’ so the reader would not ‘make a mistake.’ I guess he should have also warned us to read carefully – ‘menyelidiki.’

We went into the office and it was not long until a non-member young woman showed up with her member brother, looking for work. As I talked to her I found out that an agent for obtaining work abroad had her passport and would not give it back until she paid $100. I told her that she should never give up her passport and that I knew someone in the American Embassy that might be able to help her. We also tried to register her on Jobsdb but two attempts failed. We will try again later. If I can get her back her passport she can once again go to Taiwan and work for about $500 a month.

Her brother came in about a month ago and we registered him with Jobsdb. I told him to send in 10 resumes a day but I find that he says it is too hard. He has been trying to work as a job printer but is having little success. My guess is that he does not put much effort into it – it is probably too hard.

I had an interesting discussion with Sister Yoshie who volunteers in the Family History Library and also owns a successful business. We talked about hiring members and their attitude. They think that because they are members and their employer is a member that they should be able to take off when they feel like it, come in late, and not work too hard. I told her that seemed to be one of the problems with Indonesian workers in general. They tend to be less productive than other Asian countries.

After office hours we went to SoGo to get some things for tonight’s dinner and some goodies from BreadTalk. Then we had to hurry home because we thought our cleaning lady was coming. She never came so we ended up doing a semi-good cleaning so the place looks OK.

I saw that the Christensens were in their office so I sent them a Skype chat and we had a nice conversation. We are going to try it again tomorrow and have another couple join us. I think we need to get all of us together once in a while and share good ideas and solutions to common problems. I have been suggesting that we have some place to share idea since we got here and I guess that at least something like it may start happening. I am going to suggest we have a regular time each week to meet and whoever wants to join in can do so. If we keep it to about an hour it should not be a burden for anyone.

Mary spent much of the afternoon getting dinner ready while I cleaned up the apartment. We thought that the cleaning lady would come but she didn’t. I think we have confused her by changing the days so often. I think she expects to come on Thursday. I like tile floors but I am not a fan of white tile floors – they show everything. I think a pattern like the one in our kitchen at home would be great here.

The Guttormsen arrived about 45 minutes late, but the food held up OK. We had a delightful dinner, talked a lot about our English students – especially Vita. They told about a Vietnamese young woman who they sponsored to go to BYU Hawaii – it cost about $1000 a year. They are hoping she falls in love and marries. We introduced them to Category Five. By the time they left and we cleaned up all the dishes, it was time for bed. I did take the time to study from the A&P.

12 August 2007 – Sunday

A quiet morning and we got going so late that we did not make time to read the Kitab Mormon before we had to leave for church. We called Oregon and talked to Kelli to let her know we were thinking about her on the day she was baptized. Unfortunately we woke her up and I am not sure how much you understood. But I hope she realized that we were happy for her today.

Today it was Jakarta Raya so Sam takes us and we will catch a taxi home. We arrive early and we stand in line with the elders to meet and greet the members as they come in. Two of the new elders – Andreson and Ercikson – are now here with Rigby and Louhannapessy. They are both excited about being out doing missionary work and when I talked to them about their first night in the field they both said they slept well without air-conditioning. They seem to have some progressive investigators and there may even be a baptism coming up.

Sacrament meeting was on being humble – President Kencana was kind enough to translate for us. Johan Salim spoke but the highlight was president Anthony speaking about the teachings of President Faust. He brought a strong spirit to the subject and recounted that Elder Subandriyo suggested that we study his teachings and talks.

There were three progressive investigators in the Gospel Principles class. One was the young woman we visited with the elders a few months ago. She has moved in with her mother – who was not there. Hopefully she will continue to investigate the church and be baptized. I thought I had a major problem with my stomach but it cleared up and I have had no trouble since.

I forgot to mention that Sam has managed to catch a cold and if things run true to the past I will get it sooner or later. Which reminds me that I should start taking lots of vitamin C.

PH was rather unstructured. They started talking about a number of quorum members who were not coming out to church. They assigned one of them to us to visit – I told them we would be happy to look in on as many as five if we could help. After most of the class was done, we started on the lesson about reverence. I am afraid it is one of those subjects we always talk about but can never really master. The saints are just too excited about seeing each other and sharing the love. I think about the 100th Psalm where it says: “Make a joyful noise unto the Lord.” I think the ‘noise’ before and after the meeting is ‘joyful.’ What we need to work on is being reverent during the meeting so we can feel the spirit of the speakers and the sacrament.

For the first time we had to wait about 5 minutes for a cab but the driver knew right where to go so it did not take long to get home. Soon after we got home we got a call from our guests and they said that there was a major demonstration going on in and around their complex and perhaps it would be better to postpone our dinner together. We settled for tomorrow night.

We make it through the Isaiah sections of 2nd Nephi with a sigh of relief. Actually the last chapter was not all that bad to translate – at least not until the last two verses. The word that is used for ‘ponder’ is ‘menyelidki’ which literally means ‘study carefully.’ I think that is the only way to read Isaiah – carefully reading and studying with a desire to understand why Jacob and the Lord thought it was important to include these chapters in the Book of Mormon when they were already available in the Bible. I told Mary all of this could have been expressed by saying ‘Because of your wickedness, I the Lord will chasten and almost destroy the House of Israel and the House of Jacob, but a remnant will be saved and will be restored to the lands of their inheritance. See the stick of Jacob for the details.” Before turning off the light, I continue to try to absorb A&P 50 in Indonesian.

 

This is a coffee table made from used teak RR ties. It is gorgeous, weighs a ton, and cost about $100. We saw lots of Batik in Jogja and bought more than we should. The secret with buying – which I did not learn soon enough – is to set a price and walk away. They either will say OK, OK and you get it for what you wanted to pay, or you go to the next booth – and there are a multitude – and start over again. Often as we visited people would ask us about where we were from and why we were here. We would have a chance to tell them about our being on a mission and I gave away a number of pass-along cards.

11 August 2007 – Saturday

I increased my exercise this morning – a couple of extra laps and I ran a little further on some of them. I do not get really tired but the sweat just pours off of me. The important thing is that I feel good afterwards. I have decided that I need to lose about 3 pounds a month for the rest of our mission. I should be able to do that by continuing to exercise and just cutting back some on the sweets.

I forgot to write that President Marchant called us late last night to tell us that President Faust had died. I met him once when he came as a member of the 12 to Torrance North Stake. He was very kind but also very straight spoken. He had a firmness in his voice and manner that gave weight to his words while showing love. I believe he was the authority and taught us that there is nothing that says a man must be in the church a year before he is given the M.P. I wonder who the Lord will call to replace him and if it will happen before the October conference.

We read from the Kitab Mormon. We get most of the words but how Isaiah uses them, many times escapes us – actually I think the poor translator had an impossible task. I can not imagine what an Indonesian who does not ever gets to read the English makes of Isaiah.

We get to the chapel in plenty of time to visit for awhile before the PH and RS meetings start. The highlight of the PH meeting for me was when Elder Subandriyo asked two recently converts and the youngest Deacon to offer their testimonies. The two adults had wonderful stories about how they came into the kingdom. One man came to Jakarta to meet with his estranged son. The meeting did not go well but he met the son’s landlord who was a member of the Church and invited him to hear the missionaries. Both men talked about how they felt the spirit telling them that the Book of Mormon was true. I did not see how the young Deacon could top this but he did. He stood in front of 200 or so older PH holders and shared a clear and meaningful testimony without any help or nervousness. I am sure I could have not done that at 12. But obviously Primary had prepared him to speak before a group.

Talks by the District Presidency and President Marchant filled out the meeting. I am sure all were fine but the translators had a difficult time keeping up with what was being said so much got lost. I felt a strong spirit when President Mak bore his testimony at the end of his talk. All in all it was a good meeting.

After the meeting Mary got a box lunch but I passed. We spent a couple of hours working in the office and talking to the Petersons and Kanes. Elder Kane explained how he was using the 25 Business Rules to teach one of his English classes. The Bennetts also use it for their advance class. I must tell Steve Gibson about how it is doing two things at once here.

We both took naps before starting to clean the house for our guests tomorrow. There is not a lot to do but I did have to attack the porch which has accumulated lots of debris from my gardening efforts. The nice thing about tile everything is that it is easy to clean. Too bad we can not have this in Utah – but after a few winters it would be a mess.

Since we went over to the Mission Residence last night, tonight is our date night. That means Pizza Hut and a movie. We ended the day by reading from the Kitab Mormon – we did much better this evening and I look forward to tomorrow’s reading. I continue to read in the A&P – it is easier but there are still too many words that I have to look up or guess at. What makes it easier than the Kitab Mormon – and especially Isaiah – is the sentence structure is less complex. This means once I have the words I can pretty much figure out how they all fit together for a complete sentence.

Prambanan was a complex of over 240 Hindu temples with a center complex of 6 larger temples. It was built in the 8th and 9th centuries A.D.  The 2006 earthquake made the restored temples unsafe for tourists to enter so all we could do is walk around the outside. Unlike Borobudur, each temple is a individual structure and is easier to get absorb than the huge single temple. The carving techniques seem to be identical – the craftmanship is outstanding. It must have been built by a very prosperous nation.