Saturday & Sunday, October
24-25, 2015
E/S Lata drove us and two other
women to the airport at noon; we had a nice flight on a roomier coach seat than
normal on a NZ flight, and they even had more bathrooms. It seems the space is getting smaller and the
bathrooms fewer, so it was really a more comfortable flight in coach. Jim got bumped up because he complained about
his seat mate, a very large Samoan (nice guy, but took up part of Jim’s
seat). He sat in Traveler Plus next to a
writer, who noticing our badges, had many questions all about the church. It was a 2+ hour question and answer
session. I think he was trying to find
out what made us different from other Christian religions and I suspect he was
trying to figure out if we revered Joseph Smith more than Jesus—well, we
worship Jesus, not Joseph, but treat him (Joseph) with the same belief as we do
with any prophets that we read about in the Old Testament.
Our last look at the
Apia, Samoan Temple. Maybe someday we’ll
have time to go to one of them in this area.
This was burned down a few years ago and after being rebuilt got
dedicated. We passed it every day on the
way to the offices.
It took us forever to get out of
the airport this time because so many planes landed at once and the place was
jammed. Elder & Sister Winters
braved the wait to pick us up and take us to dinner. They have been so welcoming even before we
ever planned our trip. We checked into
our hotel and they took us to eat the best hamburgers ever—so yummy. He said they are the best burgers in all of
NZ, and I have to say that they were as good as they told us that they were.
We were in our hotel just after 9
PM and hurriedly began our wash in the blessed washing machine and dryer. I have to say that we had so little time to
do wash so this is a real treat, and we have tons of it. I stayed up till 12:30 AM getting it all
washed, dried and ironed. Then we will
begin our week in Tonga with a whole new set of clothes. This time we are on the 11th floor
(7th last time) in a look-alike room--same as last time.
Sunday: The Winters’
picked us up at 8:45 and after church took us to their apartment and fed us a
yummy lunch after which we went back to the hotel for a snooze. We feel like celebrities the way that they
are taking care of us. We are glad that
they are back here after their UT trip. They
picked us up again to feed us dinner, including a couple we just met who will
be doing accounting work on Kiribati.
They are going to the airport at about the same time we are. Their name is Jenks and they are from Blackfoot,
Idaho. Everyone who comes in and out of
here (members) stay at the Spencer Hotel, so we will always run into people
serving here.
At church today we ran into
Sister Vincent Haleck, who is the Aunt of Makisi Haleck that Jim helped to
coach in the pole vault at T.O. High School.
Her husband is a member of the 70 and they are here on assignment. We had our picture taken together after
church so that she could put it on her Facebook page and surprise her nephew. He took 2nd in the State (CA) his
senior year. He went on to pole vault
for the Air Force Academy and his PR was just barely under 18 feet.
Susan Winters in her
kitchen, preparing lunch for us. It was
a nice, modern place with a pretty view of a park across the way. There must be 20 Church couples that live in
this same apartment complex. There are
so many people serving here.
We had to get up at 5 AM, eat breakfast
in the hotel at 6:30, and leave for the airport at 7. Monday is a holiday so there will not be as
much traffic getting to the airport.
I told them to give me
their most ‘nervous’ smiles, E/S Jenks from Blackfoot Idaho, going to live on
Kiribati for 18 months. He is a
professional agricultural guy, but will be doing accounting and many other
things while living there. E/S Waldron,
who had to go home because she got something called chicken ‘something or other’
(can’t remember the official name and never heard of it before) from a mosquito
bite, had to go home to get it fixed, but will be returning in a few months to
complete their mission, so eventually they won’t be all alone.
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