Daily Archives: March 30, 2008

Pictures – Zone conference and trip

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Barat Zone Conference – 27 March 2008. The whole gang. Notice that President Marchant is on the phone. So is the life of a mission President. Sisters Sadimin and Marchant teaching the missionaries the proper way to clean and cook veggies. The Senior missionaries in the Barat Zone minus the Walkers who were with their driver at the hospital at Out Back Steak House.

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Pictures – Sumatra

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This was our first view of the ferry that would carry us to Sumatra. Notice the interesting rust pattern on the side. I can not say that it gave us great confidence. However it turned out to be a smooth day and a fine ferry so our concerns were unfounded. The series of three shots is of one of the young men who jump off the side of the ferry to chase money that the passengers throw in. The dive is about 25 – 30 feet but the water they then swim in looks like a cesspool. They have to be very desperate, foolish or both to touch that water.

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Sam managed to get us on to the bridge of the ferry so we could see the crew at work.

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Once on Sumatra we took a tour off the main highway on a road that led through small towns and rice paddies. Along the road most houses had lots of plants and flowers growing. The road was very old and so crossing bridges such as this was common. Mary and I got out and walked across. We did get to the beach for a few minutes. The old fishing boat was there for atmosphere. Other than us the beach was empty.

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Motorcycle loads on Sumatra are not much different from those on Java. These are loads of banana cakes. One of Sumatra’s claim to fame is their banana cakes and so large loads of them can be seem going through the streets – even in small villages. Mary liked the taste of the cakes but they did not do much for me.

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As you can see we had lunch at an exotic restaurant where Mary met an old friend from the US. He seemed happy to see us.

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On our way back to the ferry to head home we came across these two truck loads of elephants. Three in one truck and four in the other. When they went around a corner it looked like they were about to fall over. Mary decided we had to have some souvenir from Sumatra so we stopped at one of the roadside stands to buy some.sumatra-trip-march-26-2008-new-friends-who-laughed-at-us-2.JPGsumatra-trip-march-26-2008-us-and-olga.JPG

On the ferry trip back to Jakarta we went to the front of the ship where we became celebrities. The first group of four had great fun making jokes about us but they were friendly folks. Olga was determined to have her picture taken with us and later I gave her a pass-along card and told her to look us up in Jakarta.

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As we approached Java, the sun begin to set. Every few minutes the sky changed colors. Going from white and gray to this final brilliant sunset. It was nice way to finish our trip – well at least our ferry ride. We still had 2 hours of driving to get home to our apartment.



29 March 2008

29 March 2008 – Saturday

Back to a more normal schedule today. My morning included going to the gym, reading from the Kitab Mormon, and catching up this journal. We gave Sam the morning off so we took a taxi to the chapel.

As usual we had a quiet time at the office. We once again had problems with the internet but it finally settled down to be OK bit not until it had taken up a good portion of my time trying to get it to work. I then tried to figure out why the mike did not work on Skype. While testing it we did have an opportunity to talk to Tom for a while. I think I got that fixed also but I am not sure. Once those were settled I answered e-mail and worked on some English material. Mary worked on more games for learning English.

Sam came at noon and did an errand for us. Then he mentioned that he and Anne had an appointment to get their pictures taken. It turned out that it was just when we would be going back to the apartment so we told him to go ahead and we took a taxi back to the apartment. He assured us that they would be back in two or three hours.

At the apartment we read the Kitab Mormon and I took a short nap before catching another taxi back to the chapel to give the Michigan English Test to 8 young people. Only 7 of them showed up – 1 young man and 6 young women. There was District Priesthood at the same time but I had to miss that.

After the test I took a taxi back to the apartment. I checked with Sam to make sure he would be available to Mary to choir practice and found out they were still getting pictures taken. So when the time came I went with her to the chapel. As the taxi was taking me back to the apartment, Mary called to tell me that choir practice was cancelled so I told the driver to go back and pick her up. The driver thought it was great fun to make another circle. When we finally made it back to the apartment the total ride cost R 40,000 with a generous tip – about $4.40 US.

I spent almost all the evening editing the pictures from the last three days. I took about 250 and so a lot got tossed away and the remainder had to be titled and enhanced if needed. I got finished in time to read from the Kitab Mormon for the third time before heading for bed.

I can not say it was a greatly spiritual day, but I have learned that there are days when you keep very busy but no outstanding spiritual experiences. It is just that you have been serving others and God all day in small ways by doing things that need to be done, talking to others, and reading the scriptures. As the scriptures say ‘by small means, great things are brought to pass.’ Or something like that.