Week 70 in Tarawa

For my birthday this past week, Sister Sumner baked me a cherry pie! (She can bake a cherry pie, quick as you can wink an eye; she's a young thing and cannot leave  her mother.)  The 2 cans of pie cherries were purchased in Australia during our trip there last month since they're not available on Tarawa.  In this picture she's rolling out the crust.

Now that the filling is in, she's rolling out the top crust.  Notice how cleverly she uses a baking sheet to keep the crust from sticking to the rolling pin.  In the picture above, I had her remove the baking sheet to show the dough she was working on.

With the heart cut out on top (true love), the pie is ready for the oven.

Here I am, cutting the pie into 9 slices for our senior couple family home evening treat.

Lighting the candles.

Getting ready to blow out the candles after everyone sang Happy Birthday accompanied by me on the piano, just like at home!

These are 5 of my pie eating assistants.  From left to right: Sister Waldron, Elder Waldron, Elder Jenks, Sister Jenks, and Sister Alldredge.

The other 2 pie eating assistants are Elder and Sister Olson.  Note the piano I've borrowed from the choir room during the school break.  The pie maker and birthday boy are in the background.

We taught EDU 430 Classroom Management in the TALL lab each day this past week from 8 a.m. to 1 p.m.  We had 6 students, but 2 of them were taking the class for professional development rather than BYUH Teaching Certificate credit.  What you can't hear in this picture is the jack hammer breaking up the concrete porch in front of houses 8 and 9 just outside the room.

Aneta, our school nurse, Miiran, our music/choir teacher, and Tereke, our carpentry teacher, are hard at work during class.

So are Tipo (left) and Kevin (right).  Tipo is one of our Vice Principals and Kevin is our new computer science teacher.

Each day Sister Sumner provided a nice snack to break up the 5 hour long class.

On Wednesday, however, the class members turned the tables and brought me a birthday cake.

So once again everyone sang Happy Birthday and I had to blow out some more candles.  I know it's a tough job, but it's only once a year.

I requested spaghetti for my birthday dinner, and once again, Sister Sumner came through.  Yumm!

On Saturday we went with Sister Alldredge to visit some sister apartments.  Sister Tiatia, seated on the bed, has been fighting a cold.  Although the picture is small and hard to see, you get an idea of the living conditions the young elders and sisters endure.  You can see the mosquito netting above the bed.

The tap water in their apartment was not working, so they collect rain water off the roof and use it for drinking as well as washing.  It's amazing they're not sick more often than they are.

This is the view behind one of the sister apartments.  It's so idyllic and yet so poverty stricken.

Saturday afternoon we had a baptism on campus.  All four youngsters are from different families. Some were taught by the sisters and some by the elders.

I thought about cropping this picture to better show the baptism, but instead wanted you to get a feel for the vastness of the surrounding ocean.

The baptism was supposed to start at 5 p.m., but we had to wait for one of the baptism candidates to show up.  We actually started the baptismal service around 6:30.  That gave me about an hour and a half to play prelude music.  During that time, I worked up a musical number with Elder Ah-to, who has a beautiful singing voice.  He sang "I'm trying to be like Jesus".  As the evening wore on while we waited, we had a beautiful sunset, which accounts for the pink colored windows behind me.

Sister Sumner took this picture looking west out of the chapel windows, but it doesn't begin to show the wonderful colors.

The elders and sisters finally finished the New Year's puzzle this week.  We were able to help some, but they did most of the work.  Try as I might, I could not get the blogger program to load this picture correctly.  The original really is right side up.  I even tried making the original upside down, and it still wouldn't load it correctly.  Oh well.  It's getting late, so you'll just have to stand on your heads to see it right.





Janet and I were both asked to speak in sacrament meeting today, Sunday January 17th, in addition to her teaching the Relief Society Lesson and me teaching the Sunday School lesson.  She spoke about the Area Plan regarding honoring the Sabbath Day at home as well as at church.  I spoke about the Area Plan goal of seeking the blessings of the temple.  It was a spiritual feast for us both to prayerfully consider what we could say to touch their hearts and lift their spirits.  We felt the spirit as we delivered our messages and taught our lessons.  Doing what the Lord asks us to do is never a burden if we do it with the spirit of the Holy Ghost.  We've had a Sabbath Day that was truly a delight, as Elder Nelson said in a recent conference talk.

Week 69 in Tarawa

This past week has been taken up nearly entirely by preparation: preparation for the EDU 430 Classroom Management class we start teaching tomorrow, January 11th, preparation for the Sunday School lesson I taught today, and preparation for our return home.  The latter preparation for our return home was the purchase of a van so I'll have a vehicle to drive.  We managed to go the entire week without taking a single picture, so Sister Sumner started recording our Sabbath day on her iPad.  This 1st picture is of the coconut grove we walk past to and from the TALL (Technology Assisted Language Learning) Lab where we will be teaching.

 

Flowers and flowering trees are in bloom year round in Kiribati.  We wonder if we have started taking the beauty around us for granted.

The only flowers left on this tree are the ones that are high enough to be out of reach of the girls who pick them to put in their hair.

We don't know what kind of tree this is beside our Moroni High School Maneaba, but we call it the climbing tree because of all the children we often see climbing in it.

Another tree behind the maneaba about to be covered in white blossoms.

This is the same coconut grove seen above from a different perspective. It is one of our favorite places to stroll alongside the ocean.

This is a baby Pandanus tree.  If you look carefully, you can see a Pandanus fruit growing near the bottom right hand corner.  Local people break the large pod apart and chew on the individual segments but don't actually eat them.

These are the pink and white flowers growing on the bushes right in front of our apartment.  In the evenings around sunset they put out a most fragrant aroma.

When the tide is out, the sound of the breakers is much softer.

But we can still hear them rolling in and crashing on the barrier coral reef farther out.  Unfortunately, this picture doesn't show the distant breakers very well.

After our Sacrament Meeting, Sister Sumner took this picture of the missionaries.  Given the difficulties of their living and working conditions, they look amazingly good, don't you think?

Iotua Tune taught our Priesthood Lesson.

Sister Cross taught the Relief Society lesson.

Elder Sumner taught the Sunday School lesson.  You'd think Sister Sumner could have at least taken a picture of me smiling!

Our last picture for today is of me slicing the banana bread and the French bread (in the foreground) that Sister Sumner baked yesterday.  I hope she keeps on baking bread even after we return home, although that will certainly not help my diet any!








We hope this blog hasn't been too boring.  Many of our blogs only highlight the occasional outside and unusual activities we are involved in.  Truth be told, most of our daily activities are very routine, although I would NOT call them boring.  Being called as full time missionaries colors all of our daily activities whether they are routine or not.  The name plaques we wear serve as a constant reminder to everyone we meet that we represent Jesus Christ and His restored church.  While it is a solemn and sacred responsibility, it is one that fills our lives with joy and happiness none the less.

 

Week 68 in Tarawa

December 27th, the Sunday after Christmas, was filled with wonderful activity.  I was asked to accompany a musical number by Taanari in the Bikenibeu 1st Ward.  After I arrived, however, I was asked to play the music for the Sacrament Meeting which happened to include the Primary Program!  While I couldn't understand what they were saying in Kiribati, I could feel the Spirit.  I had wonderful flashbacks of playing for many Primary programs, including those I did as a child back in our Austin, Minnesota Branch.

Sometimes teachers have to hold and help their Primary class members, just as they do in the states.  It's hard to see in the picture, but the Tarawa Lagoon is just a few feet from the windows of the Bikenibeu Chapel.

After returning to our own Moroni Ward, we had a joint Relief Society/Priesthood lesson taught by the Bishop introducing the Pacific Area vision and goals for 2016.  Following the lesson we had a wonderful meal provided by the Relief Society.  Sister Sumner can be seen just behind the middle girl in the front.

Even the Primary children joined our feast.  Since the Moroni Ward is a student ward, we have very few children.  During December and January, when school is out between school years, most of our students go home, resulting in very small classes.  Sister Sumner still insists on calling the months between school years "summer vacation"!

I spent several days rehearsing "O Holy Night" with Taanari (left) and her brother Tawesa (right) for the New Years Eve program.  While school was out, I borrowed one of the choir room pianos for our apartment so I could play Christmas music at  home.

Here we are performing "O Holy Night" on New Years Eve.  Both Taanari and Tawesa have beautiful voices that blend well.  Our new principal, Banririe, who is also a member of the stake presidency, can be seen seated on the podium.

After the program in the chapel, we went out to the basketball court to see the beautiful decorations they had been putting up all afternoon in the hot sun.

While waiting for the wards to perform their numbers on the basketball court, we found ourselves swamped by children eager to shake the hands of "Imatangs" (white strangers).  Sister Sumner got out her tin of mints and started passing them out, but she had to tell them, in Kiribati, "Only One".  I was impressed that she had learned to say that.

Some of the missionaries from nearby areas were invited to come.  Just as the local people do, they ate sitting on the ground in a circle.  The locals usually have thin hand woven mats to sit on, however.

After the midnight count down, the kissing, handshaking, and Happy New Year greetings, everyone danced in the Cultural Hall.  We were chased indoors by a brief rainfall which cooled the ocean breezes nicely.

New Year's Day the senior missionary couples set off on an adventure to broken bridge on the island of Abatoa, just as we did about a year ago.  We and the Waldron's wanted to show our new couples, the Jenk's and the Olson's some of the more primitive and beautiful places in North Tarawa.  This picture shows the sisters riding a small canoe across the gap between Buota and Abatoa islands.  When the tide is low, we walk across, as we did returning, but when the tide is high, it's much more pleasant to take the boat, especially for those like Sister Sumner who are short and don't swim well.

We walked past the primary school, Mamatannana, on our way to broken bridge.  What a fun name to say!  The motto on the sign says "Struggle hard for a better life."  It took us a minute to figure out the image on the sign, though.  At first we thought it might be a Hermit Crab, but then someone realized it is a sprouting coconut!  How appropriate for this island which has a large coconut plantation on it.

Here's a picture showing most of the school.  Can you even imagine attending an elementary school like this?  In front of the classrooms are rows of suspended 2 liter bottles filled with water with a stick attached to each bottle.  The children step on the stick to tip the bottle to pour water on their hands when they wash.  Our kids have no idea how nice their schools are compared to other countries in the world.

We had to stop and take a picture of this "high tech" bouilla.  Notice the power pole and power line running to the solar panel on the bouilla's roof.

At last, we made it to broken bridge, where we rested and ate snacks and drank ice water in a wonderfully cooling ocean breeze.  I carried 4 bottles of water in my backpack, 2 of which were frozen to keep the others cold.  They were wrapped inside 2 towels to keep them from melting too fast during the hike.

Here we are in our P-day clothes, walking along a quiet beach in one of the most beautiful places on Earth.  I was going to crop the picture so you could see our faces better, but I really wanted you to see the background more than us.  Besides, you already know what we look like.  We will truly miss this corner of God's creation when we return from our mission on February 29th.  We want to make the most of our last days here as we prepare to teach our final classes at Moroni High School.  We have felt the Spirit of the Lord working to bless the people of this tiny island nation, and have grown to truly love them as we serve them.

As you consider your personal New Year's Goals, we would like to share the goals of the Pacific Area:
1.  Honor the Sabbath Day at home and at church.
2.  Increase spiritual and temporal self-reliance.
3.  Hasten the work of salvation.
4.  Seek the blessings of the temple.
As we have written down our goals for the coming year, we realize how important our families are to us and to our Heavenly Father.  We pray this year will bring blessings and joy to each of you.