Arrival Taipei Taiwan

 

We arrived in Taipei Saturday night at 8:30 and were met by President and Sister Day.  Traveling with us was Elder Jacob Chow from Hong Kong.  He missed coming with his group because of a Visa problem.  He was a good companion to have, especially when we wanted to find where to wait for the Days to pick us up and the security guard spoke only Chinese.

 

We wanted to look our best when we arrived and mostly made it.  We had to get up at 2 am, Friday, in order to get ready for a 3am pickup from the MTC to SLC airport.  Our flight was about 17 hours, but we lost a whole day crossing the international date line.  We suffered from jet lag for a good week.  We spent the first two nights at the Day's mission home.  We expected to be transferred to the temple patron housing, but our apartment was ready, so we moved in.

Saturday, Fred and Sherrie Tanner picked us up for lunch.  We really enjoyed our visit.  They lived in the apartment over us for half of our mission in Guyana.  We laughed about our experiences with Timmy d'Teef.  They are finishing up a 3 years service mission in downtown Salt Lake City.  Again, I didn't have my camera, so I don't have a picture:(

Mission Training Center - April - May 2013

Sunday, April 21, our friends Barry and Peggy Oliver picked us up and drove us to the airport.  We enjoyed our visit with them in the car. I got so excited, I forgot to take my camera out of my purse and take a picture!!!  When we arrived in Salt Lake, our friends Dave and Georgia Owens picked us up and drove us to Provo.

Georgia looks great and feels much better.  She is completely off of the steroids and although she says she tires easily, she is fun to be with.  That night the BYU Men's Chorus sang for us at the Sunday Devotional.  What a treat that was.

Monday we began our week of missionary training.  We found our friends from the Nauvoo Temple, Alma and Fred Bignall.  They are going to the German Alpine Mission.  We got to know them better this week and were really impressed with them. 

We also found our friends from North Gate First Ward, Joe and Jean Riggs.

This is not a good picture of Wayne, but he said, "Use it anyway".  We went out to dinner with the Riggs on Wednesday night and then again the following Wednesday night.  They have a car here, which they are leaving with a son.  Wheels make a big difference.  Joe and Jean are going to Madrid Spain. 

We have enjoyed the speakers who have come for devotionals on Tuesday and Sunday.  The missionary choir sings on Tuesdays.  There are 850 voices and they are wonderful.  They get 2 practices for each performance.  For Relief Society, Sunday, our guest speaker was Sister Bonnie Oscarson, the new President of the Young Women.  She said it was her first official assignment. 

There are 3,000 missionaries on campus right now.  They are expecting to have 6,000 by August.  We can see small changes daily in how they do things, to get the job done.  Yesterday, I watched from my window as a good sized truck was loaded with luggage.  There were two enormous busses warming up.  That was the group going out.  Today a new bunch came in.  It was fhe first time I saw missionaries with "HOST" stickers on their jackets.  Each host had a new missionary in tow to give them a tour of the place.  Here's the dining hall, here's the laundry, here's the bookstore, etc.  The dining hall is now open half an hour earlier than last week, so that not everyone hits it at the same time.  There is still plenty of food, but not as many choices.  It is amazing how they feed everyone. 

On the way

This is my suitcase with my prescription drugs and my maryjane shoes.  Takes up a lot of space but the good news is - it's light weight.  Following is the poem Jan brought us.

To Be of Use

 

By Marge Piercy

 

The people I love best

jump into work head first

without dallying in the shallows

and swim off with sure strokes almost out of sight.

They seem to become natives of that element,

the black sleek heads of seals

bouncing like half submerged balls.

 

I love people who harness themselves, as an ox to a heavy cart,

who pull like water buffalo, with massive patience,

who strain in the mud and the muck to move things forward,

who do what has to be done again and again.

 

I want to be with people who submerge

in the task, who go into the fields to harvest

and work in a row and pass the bags along,

who stand in the line and haul in their places,

who are not parlor generals and field deserters

but move, in a common rhythm

when the food must come in or the fire be put out.  

Taiwan Taipei

We were floored when we received the assignment to serve in the office of the Taiwan Taipei Mission.  We will be in Taipei for 18 months.  We spent a year studying Spanish while we were in Nauvoo.  Go figure!!!!

Camp Nauvoo

Service Project - Camp Nauvoo - October 6, 2012

The timing of this Service Project was unique.  We had one day, when all of the missionaries were available - that was Saturday morning before Conference.  Camp Nauvoo is owned and run by the Community of Christ (RLDS).  One woman tries to maintain it and it needed a lot of work.  We came at 7 am and divided into crews - actually, we formed crews with Crew Chiefs the week before so that we wouldn't waste any time.  One group cleared a path to a beautiful old oak tree.  The Community of Christ church want to make a chapel out of the setting.  Another crew went into the cedar groves and picked up fallen branches and put them into piles.  One of our ranchers, Brother Rees, drove the tractor with the trailer to gather the piles and haul them to the burn pile.  Another crew got week whackers which we borrowed from the FM group to whack around the cabins, tree bases etc.  Another group pruned trees so that the grass could be mowed with a riding mower and not get the driver in the face.  Another group hung curtains in the cabin windows (the sewing crew prepared them ahead of time).  Another group tightened the bolts on all the wood benches and made repairs where needed.  Finally, the Holbrooks brought doughnuts and milk.  We were finished in an hour and a half and very pleased with the results.  Wayne and I were in charge of this project and we had never done anything like this before.