17 October 2007 – Wednesday

I slept in until after 6 so I did not go down and exercise. Mary said she slept much better than the night before. I caught up with my journal posting on the blog and added some pictures. We read a couple of pages from the Kitab Mormon – we hit a chapter from Isaiah in 3 Nephi and that caused us a pause. We both broke out laughing when we hit the first verse in 3 Nephi 23 and the words “karena besarlah kata-kata Yesaya.” That may not so when you are trying to translate the words.

I wrote a few e-mails to different missionary couples including the Petersons who are back in Utah. They tell us they have held a number of firesides and have used some of the motorcycle load pictures I had shared. I also wrote to Mike saying that I was sorry that Cal lost just when they had a chance to be ranked first nationally. I wrote to Kristy about some pictures on her blog. It is good to hear from the family.

The traffic is still really light so the trip to chapel is very quick. This will all change come Monday when everything opens again. We have not missed the traffic jams that adds so much time to any journey.

Mary taught the first half of the morning class and I took the other half. Today I changed the relay race some and I am not sure it was so good. Tomorrow I will try to refine it some. I think they are trying to speak English more – Wawan said that he was dreaming in English and that is really good. I had them read some of Elder Hallstrom’s talk and I was surprised how many of the words that I thought might throw them, they already knew. Only occupy, procrastination, prior and consequences stopped most of them.

Explaining about the meaning of Consequences gave me a chance to expound on their choices about how much Indonesian they speak when they are not in class. I may pound on that a little too much but I know that the less then use Indonesian the easier it will be for them to hear and see when they make a mistake in English.

While waiting for some copies to be printed – or printer is really slow – I read president Hinckley’s talk about anger and had to confess to myself that it is something that I still need to work on each day. I have always felt strongly that General Conference and the thoughts and instruction we receive there is very important. However since we have been on our mission and I have needed the spirit as much as I ever have, this inspired information has become even more important to me.

As I wrote that I thought how much I have missed by not feeling this way no matter what my calling. I have always needed the spirit in my life as much as I do now. I just have not thought about it that way. I imagine I have often felt that I can get by on past knowledge, stored up light, etc. What this means of course is that I have not been able to do my best, to fulfil my calling as well as I could, and have in some way failed to keep the commandments. Hopefully as my children and grandchildren read this, they will learn from my mistake and ponder the conference talks and then follow the instruction that is in them. 15 living prophets spoke to me – how wonderful that is to think about. Not only that I can go back and see, hear and read their talks as often as I want – as often as I should. Only in this last dispensation has so much been available to the saints of the kingdom. There is so much that I foolish take sips of living water instead of drinking my fill again and again.

 

This is a mobile gas station. I do not see many on bikes, but there are lots of them with carts. He is either taking this load to his own station or is taking it around to sell to others for resale.  See the ‘Things go better with Coke” picture to see a typical small gas station.

16 October 2007 – Tuesday

I woke at about 5 and read from the Kitab Mormon before heading down to exercise. It was a very pleasant morning to be on the track. It was drizzling for about the first 3 or 4 minutes and then a nice breeze came up. The combination kept the temperatures down. This is only the second time this has happened since I started using the track. After a normal morning we read a couple of pages from the Kitab Mormon. Christ institutes the sacrament and talks about its importance. We only look up a couple of words today.

At the chapel Mary teaches the first half of the class while I work on getting ahead on the vocabulary. Then we switch places and she comes into the office to catch up on some paper work. The students are working very hard and I think by this time next week they will have a lot of confidence. They are still not working together well so there is not a lot of synergy but I am trying to get that going. As I was writing this I realized I have not felt the spirit very often when I am teaching. I think I need to work more on that. Brigham Young said that nothing should be taught without the spirit.

We spend our lunch hour working on more English stuff. It is amazing how much time we put in on preparation, grading, etc. I can not imagine what it is like being a professional teacher and having to do this day after day for years. I have even more respect for teacher than I had before. Especially those who must teach all day, every day in public schools.

The Walkers taught the afternoon class so we were able to leave and go to Sogo. We did not need a lot so we were not there very long. I need to put in a point about the traffic this week. It seems that the week after Ramadahn is vacation week in Indonesia. All the offices shut down – even the LDS office staff has it off. What this means is that the traffic in Jakarta is amazingly light. Normally if we leave from the office and go to Sogo it will take us about 2 hours. Today it took one!

After we got back to the apartment we read from the Kitab Mormon for an hour. We are now reading about 4 pages an hour because we do not need to look up many words. I am not sure how much of the spirit of the writing we are getting. I guess it is like any time we read from the scriptures. That is if we are open to the spirit we receive the spirit of the writing and if not they tend to be just words. Not too long ago we were reading where Christ tells the Nephites to search the scriptures that were laid out before their eyes. Not to read them but to search them. In the New Testament he reminded the Jews that ‘they are they that testify of Me.’

Which reminds me that as I read through my notes about the latest conference talks, again and again the speakers point out that whatever subject they are talking about is based on the atonement of Christ. Also both Elder Packer and Elder Cook pointed out that the only real qualification that was necessary to be a general authority is an unwavering personal testimony. I thought it was interesting that Elder Packer learned it from the first presidency and Elder Cook learned it from Elder Packer.

We finish our companionship study by reading another hour in the Kitab Mormon.

Mary teaching our class. All of the class – back row – Rudi, Wawan, Ronald – front – Puji, Daisy, Femmy. The motorcycle load is a milkman delivering fresh milk. The orange box is just because we do not see a lot orange delivery boxes.

15 October 2007 – Monday

I was up and exercising by 5:40 this morning. It felt good to walk, jog, do sit-ups, etc. This is the first time since last Thursday. Normal morning except I did some laundry. We continued reading about Christ’s visit to the Nephites – the part about “other sheep.” We enjoyed reading about the Creers week in Ireland. They seem to be living in their van about as much or more than we do. They also talked about the terrible traffic in Dublin. We then had a brief Skype call with Tom’s family. William is really starting to speak. Kelli is growing up quickly. It is good just to hear their voice. We miss them but we know we are doing what we should be doing.

A normal day of classes. I enjoy teaching the youth. One of the young ladies came to me and said that she just could not keep up with the others. I told her not to judge herself against the other. Just do the best she can do and that is all the Lord expects. I talked to Mary about maybe giving her easier work or working on a one to one basis with her for part of the class.

The class really likes my sentence relay game. They usually come in very close together and so it is a lot of fun. It gives them a chance to work alone and also together. At the end of the afternoon class, we come home and they head off to have FHE with president and sister Marchant.

We have macaroni and cheese with Spam for dinner. It has always been one of our favorites and is easy to fix. We read for a couple of hours from the Kitab Mormon. It is a wonderful thing to do together. We not only can share the scriptures but also we are learning the language together.

Before going to bed, I start going through my notes from conference and picking out the one or two things from each talk that I think are most important for me. The things I need to learn and work on more. The purpose of the conference is to hear living prophets give us guidance and to share their wisdom as lead by the Holy Ghost. As I read the notes I was reminded of a number of attributes I need to work on. As I thought about them, I realized that even though I am approaching 70, that I can change habits and values so that each day will be more joyous and valuable for me. You are never too old – or too young – to grow closer to Christ. When you put everything into an Eternal prospective, I am still very, very young. Of course I am not sure that age has any real meaning when discussing Eternity.

14 October 2007 – Sunday

This was a great Sunday. We studied the Kitab Mormon in the morning and then went to the chapel to watch conference. Once again the main part of the audience for the English version were missionaries and our class, but there were a couple of the English branch families there.

Each talk had something for me. I must admit that I could not get into one of the talks and even wrote down that it was boring, but then I remembered another speaker warning us about just this thing and so I quickly repented and soon I heard the one point in his talk that I needed to hear. It reminded me of my battle with pride – the learning of men – and the need to be humble so that I can take advantage of the tender mercies the Lord extends to me.

I will not write about conference at this time because there was too much to absorb. I am going to write up my notes and ponder them. Also we will watch and listen to the talks over the next few weeks. I think we will use some of the talks in our class.

After the conference we came home and read from the Kitab Mormon – we are about 100 pages from the end – and then took naps. It is great to have time to take a nap – something we do not get to do enough when teaching the English class. After that we watched the Priesthood Meeting together. Elder Hallstrom – the one of the Bicardi Rum Cake fame – is the area president and will be at our Zone Conference in a couple of weeks. Again lots of notes to be re-read and typed up. We finished up the day reading once more from the Kitab Mormon – we find reading what is basically the Sermon on the Mount – difficult. We should be able to translate it with ease but it does not work that way for us. Before turning off the light I again read from Elder Holland’s talk about this being the greatest Dispensation from the Liahona.

13 October 2007 – Saturday

It seems that I do not have much desire to write in this journal during an IEC. I am not sure if it is because the class takes so much energy or because there is not much new going on during that time. What ever it is, I do not make time to sit down and write.

This morning I got up and decided I really needed to exercise. But as I started to prepare to go to the gym I realized that due to the holiday, the gym would not be open. For some reason I did not even think of just going down and walk/jog for a half hour. I guess I did not really want to exercise. However I did not go back to bed. I got out the Liahona and started reading an article by Elder Holland. I was rather surprised about how much of it I could read without looking up words. So maybe all the reading and work is starting to pay off. I am still determined that before we leave, I will learn Indonesian to a point where I can read just about anything. Anyway that is what I keep asking the Lord to help me with.

We went to the church and Mary taught the class for an hour before it was time for conference to start. We all went into the English version – they also have Korean and of course Indonesian. The only people there was our class and missionaries – including president and sister Marchant.

After the morning session, we came home and spent the day watching the DVDs of conference and reading from the Kitab Mormon. I took lots of notes from the conference and will put them in some kind of order and put them in this journal.

10 October 2007 – Wednesday

The class went well today but we did have to make a quick adjustment. Just as we were finishing the afternoon class and the young people were about to leave for Joel’s place, he called and said he could not make it – he was in a meeting that was never going to end. Later he called again to apologize and we talked some about the class. He feels they are a sharper class than the first one. I guess we are too close to them to really see this.

I am worried about one of the young ladies – actually two of them but for different reasons. One does not seem to be able to keep up with the work. She is really struggling with the vocabulary. I worry about the other one because I am afraid she is struggling with being away from her family in strange living conditions. Hopefully the other young women will grow closer to her. The young men seem to be all doing well. They are all returned missionaries and have pretty good English. Everyone needs to be better about not using Indonesian when they are not in class. I am just going to keep working on this, I really feel it is one of the most important parts of the class experience. If they can master the reflex of dropping back into the comfort of their own language, they will be able to move ahead much quicker.

Mary and I read from the Kitab Mormon both in the morning and evening. This continues to be one of my favorite things to do each day. I still have too much trouble with words I should know, but I can read about 95%.

09 October 2007 – Tuesday

I slept very well last night but woke at 5:00. Gym, breakfast, and reading the Kitab Mormon. Not for an hour because we have to leave by 8:15 to get to the chapel in time to start classes. We stop along the way and pick up the printing, then we run into a traffic jam, but we still make it in time.

The first full day goes well. We push them hard today. I start by getting a commitment from them that they would only speak English – especially at their home. I tell them I am going to do it just as they asked for commitments as missionaries and that I would be very disappointed if they did not keep the commitment.

We give them a test for the first part of the day. After lunch I took over because Mary was supposed to have an English class at the office. Just before she is to leave, she got a call saying there would be no class. So she works on other lesson plans while I teach the students grammar, TH sound, and the vocabulary. The students are very far apart in abilities. One of the young ladies probably should not be in the class but we will try to help her with individual teaching.

We are finished right at 4:30 and Sam takes off with them to Joel’s home and Mary and I catch a taxi home.

During the morning class, elder Subandriyo came to class and welcomed them. He taught them the importance of gaining as many skills as they can. Also he spoke to them about the need for English if they want to get a good job. After he left I told them how this class came into being. How it was through the inspiration of elder Subandriyo and other experience I had after starting my mission. The interesting part is that elder Subandriyo does not remember at all his part in the process but he was the catalyst that got me thinking and praying.

So we are off and running with our second class. Hopefully we have learned a lot from the first class and this one will be better. We are trying hard to cover all the things they will need to pass the Michigan test. We are giving them more vocabulary and working more on grammar. While it is important that they can understand and speak English, it is not as important for the Michigan test as reading, vocabulary and grammar. With the Lord’s help – which we certainly need and receive in abundance – we will help these young people enjoy a better life both for their families and in the church.

08 October 2007 – Monday

I got up and went to the gym – it is really an enjoyable experience and if I ever figure out how to keep my mind occupied I would spend more time exercising. Regular morning with Kitab Mormon and such.

When we got into the car, Sam said some of the young ladies had already arrived and were now on their way to Bogor to visit some friends. We dropped Mary off at the office and then went to do a number of chores. First to the mission home to take some packages that sister Mongan asked us to bring to friends in Jakarta, pick up a few things, and ask elder and sister Walker to teach some of our classes. Next we went to Sogo to get some orange juice – my breakfast – but found that they did not have any. Also we tried to buy a new ink cartridge for our broken printer but again without success. After that failure, we went to Carrefore where we got the print cartridge and all the other things we needed for the students.

It was then back to the mission office to drop off the cartridge so Hendra could find out for sure the printer was broken – it was and he will get it fixed. We had lunch from BYU and I had a great talk with Soewigno about his businesses. He is very successful at what he does and has built two houses with the profit. He uses one to live in and for his store. The other one is a warehouse and a restaurant. I learned all about making meat balls and the rest of the business. I also talked to elder Subandriyo about the IEC and invited him to come and speak to the students tomorrow. We decided to raise the daily food budget to R20000. The Walkers agreed to teach two afternoons a week.

When we finally got back to the office, I called Joel and he said president Smith was getting people to help with the class and the evenings. I called the president and he gave me the names of five families who were willing to help. This means we should have each evening covered and most of the afternoons.

We then came back to the apartment to rest up before starting the class at 6 p.m. We read from the Kitab Mormon before taking our naps.

Everyone was waiting for us when we got back to the chapel, so we got started early. The students seem to all have fair to good English. Daisy even used the word siblings when introducing herself. That is a word that is not well known in Indonesia. We gave out the supplies, went through what was expected, gave them a pep talk about studying, speaking only English, etc. I tried to get across the importance of doing their best in this class and then continuing to study after it finishes.

We had Sam go get KFC and after eating that we called it a day and sent them home to rest. We came home and read from the Kitab Mormon before going to bed. It is a humbling experience to have the responsibility to teach these young members. I feel developing this program was one of the important reasons we were sent here to Indonesia and Jakarta. Hopefully the Lord’s trust in us will not be shown to have been misplaced. We certainly need all of His help to succeed.

 

I love this picture of the cart before the horse…the colors of the load, the bright turquoise wheels – it just seems to work. This shed is just across the fence from the Solo chapel. I thought the design, the rust and the feeling made taking the picture worthwhile. Mary training sister Endang. The last picture is an early morning view from our room. It shows how clear the air is in Solo – so different from Jakarta.

07 October 2007 – Sunday

We had a pleasant morning, except for a problem with the hot water. It seems they had worked on the hot water pipes or had a break in the hot water pipes during the night and so when we went to shower the water had lots of dirt in it. Mary did not notice it until after she had showered and saw the black water in the bottom of the tub. I decided it had probably been cleaned out when she took her shower so I went ahead with mine. When I looked at the towel I used to dry off, I found it covered in black dirt. I did not want to think about what I had used to wash with. I am glad I kept my mouth shut. I am kicking myself for not taking a picture of the residue in the tub – it was gross.

We packed up most of our things and then had a nice breakfast with Lukito. After that we pretty much finished out packing before heading off to the conference session. When we got to the location, we found all the missionaries – including couples – in lines greeting people. I joined the line and shook hands with lots of members.

The conference session was good. There was lots of singing, elder and sister Barnard spoke, the translators need improvement, but did quite well. Vita was the best translator but ran into a problem when sister Marchant used a different talk that Vita thought she would. There was three choirs that sang, including a primary choir that sang before the meeting started.

When the meeting was over we said goodbye to all the couples and took pedicabs back to the hotel. We finished packing and then had lunch with Lukito. The hotel van took us to the airport. Lukito was scheduled to be on Lion Air with president and sister Marchant. We were on Garuda which left an hour earlier. However the Lion Air flight was delayed 2 hours and they were all able to get on the flight with us. I had a good talk with the president while waiting for our flight, he has a wonderful vision of the church and missionary work in Indonesia.

I had a good experience on the plane. I sat next to a young woman and started a conversation. I found she spoke excellent English and so I talked to her about where she learned it. To make a long story short, I ended up giving her an English Book of Mormon, a pass-along card, showed her Moroni 10:3-5, and got her card so the missionaries can take her a Kitab Mormon. She has a great job with a multi-national insurance company. If nothing else she now knows about the church and maybe it will lead somewhere. The Lord does provide if we are willing to try.

We took the Marchants to the mission home and then made it to our apartment. Sam kept the car so he could pick up our students when they come in. He seems to have just about everything ready at their apartments so we should be set for tomorrow.