When we stopped at the restaurant, there was this chopped down scooter sitting next to the door. Sam decided to climb on for a picture. On the right hand side you can see an arm reaching for a green branch that is stuck in the fender. This is what they do when a vehicle has broken down. It lets folks know that it is not going to move anytime soon so they might as well go around. It is like us putting out reflective triangles or flares.

14 November 2007

The pictures and comments below covers the time the ceremony was completed, everyone had been seen and hands had been shaken.  After we left the ceremony we stopped at the restaurant we found a few months ago that had the best chicken sate we have eaten. Elder and sister Kane agreed about the quality of the sate and elder Kane loved the nasi goring.
As we drove back into Jakarta we found that we missed a really big storm that blew down trees and signs all over the city. The rain also flooded streets. Sam took an alternate route to miss a mess he heard about on the radio. We hit one bad spot where the street was so flooded that there was only two lanes where we could get through. Since 5 or 6 lanes fed into this bottle neck we were lucky it only took us 15 minutes to get through. As we drove in to the complex we looked back to an area we had driven through not long before and saw that now it was a solid mess. The Lord blessed us in many ways on the way home.

It was a good day for us. We got to see the Kanes and share some experiences. None of us can believe almost a year has passed since we met at the MTC. We talked some about teaching English – we have learned a lot there also. The ceremony was quite interesting, but it was meeting and interacting with the families that made it so special. What to us looked like semi-finished eye-sores, to them were mansions. Hopefully they will not suffer such loss again.

We have truly been blessed to be able to serve this mission. To learn to work together to accomplish tasks and programs. To have good health, to make good friends, to see things we would never have seen any other way. I do not know if we will ever come back to Indonesia, but anything is possible. We will see what the Lord has in store for us. What I do know is that Indonesia will be a part of us the rest of our lives and for eternity. I am sure some of the friends we have met here we will see on the other side of the veil. The gospel changes lives, it unites families, and it provides opportunities to serve.