April 1, 2014

Last week was a busy one for us.   Five of our favorite missionaries are leaving and we had good-by luncheons and dinners.  That's right eating again.  Monday at Family Home Evening they talked and we sang good-bye songs to them.   We always sing the Aloha song with hugs and lei's.

Elder and Sister Walker

Elder and Sister Walker will be moving home
to St George


Sister Sherlene Cooper from Logan
Sister Helena Radzik from Switzerland
Sister Cathleen Tremea
Sister Janet Johnson from Ogden

Sister Radzik is returning to Switzerland

 Elder and Sister Robinson

They are returning to Provo and to St George. They have two homes.

Elder and Sister Cooper, Elder and Sister Robinson, Elder and Sister Cardnol, Elder and Sister Tremea and Elder and Sister Nielson

Papa's golfing buddy Phil…..along with Nielson and Cooper
They have a lot of fun together.

Kahuku Golf Course

We worked Monday and Tuesday and Wednesday was a State Holiday.  Both of us had it off but our Young Adult Singles Ward had planned a temple day.  We had endowments in the morning, baptisms at noon, and a big luncheon at 2:00 pm.   We had decided since we were going to be busy all day we drove to Millani Costco on Tuesday night.  We accidentally met the RS sisters who were buying the food for the Temple Day.  They bought $450 worth of groceries and didn't have room to take it home in their little car.  We stacked 14 chickens, 7 cakes and 200 rolls in our car to help.  I think we were part of a minor miracle.  They could have never fit all the food in their car.

Wednesday Ward Temple Day turned out to be a memorable day.  We went to the 9:00 am session. Then we went to help with luncheon.  We had almost 100 kids in the temple that day doing endowments and baptisms.  We had plenty of food.  Leftovers the kids took home for dinner.  That seems to be the Polynesian way,  have plenty of food so everyone eats and carries home.  We were home almost one hour and had to be back to the PCC to work that night.  Because it was a holiday, the PCC was busy with a lot of people for dinner and the show.  We were very tired at the end of the day..

Friday the Queen of Tonga came to the Polynesian Cultural Center.  She came in a large white limo and we rolled out the red carpet for her.  It turned out to be a cultural experience for me.  Papa wasn't able to see it.  Sherlene and I decided since our boss was out of town, that surely she wouldn't want us to miss greeting the Queen of Tonga.  We found out later that day one needed to have special invitation to go, oh well.  We will have to ask forgiveness now, permission next time.

The Tonga Queen was new because her husband just became King after his brother passed away.  It's passed down through blood line.  I took pictures and hope you can picture what greeting the Queen was like.

Dancing, drums, singing and loud music greeted her at the front entrance of the PCC.

This man on the right is the Tongan representative here at the PCC in the PCC Village.  He is dressed in native costume.  He is also a counselor in the Stake Presidency.  Nice man.  He is missing a front tooth. Maybe Dr. Mangelson could help him.















President Grace is in the red shirt and the Queen is walking beside him in her native costume.  She was led to a decorated golf cart to the Lagoon where she stepped on a canoe that took her to the village of Tonga.

In the picture the lady with the fan sleeves had on a beautiful dress.

The sleeves were beaded fan sleeve.  The women wore different waist skirts each hanging in long note like strips, but all made differently.

The decorated Golf cart

Riding down the Lagoon

This is a pig dressed and ready for cooking.  The pig was presented to the Queen as a gift.  Check him out, he has the longest nose I have ever seen.

This little boy was so cute all dressed up in his Tongan clothes.  He's wearing shirt, skirt and lava lava or sulu.




This is his sister wearing her native dress too.






















The Queen was sitting at the door to the Tongan Hut.  The carpet was rolled out for her to walk up to the Hut, and at the bottom of the steps two people were sitting guard.  No one could enter the hut, all gifts were brought up and laid on the steps.  The pig was pulled up toward her as a gift too.

The PIG

The singing and dancing began.  Money was thrown out to the dancer in yellow and black, the older ladies in blue would dance and roll on the ground into the money.  After the dance the money was gathered up and given to the Queen.   We asked what she did with it….no one knew.  We hope she would distribute it to the people.

Below is President Grace bringing the Queen back to the Golf Cart to escort her to lunch.

Two Tongan Girls in their native dress.

Three sisters who came to see the Queen in their Tongan dress.

                                          Notice the difference in their waisted skirts.

What you see on the right is the YSA 5th Ward Elders Quorum Presidency.  They are from left to right Landon Southwick 1st counselor from Kaysville, Me, Kevin Miller, Secretary from California, Freddi Ika, President from Oakland, but he is Tongan and Jesse Grimshaw, 2nd councilor from California.  I should mention that Jessee is getting married in 2 weeks to Aubry who is a beautiful girl from Texas.  They are all returned missionaries and love the Gospel. These are great guys, they are all leaving except for Freddi, to go home in April so our Quorum will be in need of more leadership. During the summer our ward will shrink by over 60 percent, so we will be combining our ward with another ward.  This is my first selfie picture and was fun to be with my boys.  All of them could be my grandsons and I would be happy about it.

After work we took a hike up to the Point.  The point is a beautiful place where you can enjoy the ocean and whales.  On our way back we saw some guys getting ready to jump from the cliff.  The distance from the top to the ocean is about 30-40 feet.  They jumped feet first and way out to avoid hitting the rocks.  Crazy.  Nobody got hurt .  I will be waiting to see if any of our kids will try to do the jump.  Hopefully not.

After the jump they swam to shore and climbed up a steep crevice to get back up to the top to do it again. The waves pound you as you come in and you have to walk on sharp lava rocks with your bare feet.  It was fun to watch them.

On a more depressing note,  in January a young women drove her car over the cliff  near the spot these guys were jumping and committed suicide.  She was a young mother, a member of the Church but apparently could not cope with life any more.  I can't image life being that stressful and depressing with out any hope to commit suicide.


Saturday morning was our Stake Relief Society Birthday Social.  I helped with the lunch.  It started at 8:30 am and the first 100 girls received a cute T-shirt.  We had a good turnout and the girls enjoyed a speaker, hands on projects of hygiene kits, missionary letters, baby blankets, and genealogy on line.
We served them taco salad and birthday cake.  It was a fum morning.   We had a large group picture taken but I haven't seen it yet.  I will put in Blog when I get it.

                               Sister Essley, Sister Pollock and Sister Greer who also helped.

Sunday was a mixed day.  It was our fast and testimony meeting at Sacrament Meeting.  Many of the students will be graduating and returning home.  Our two Relief Societies will blend into one and it will be a small group for the summer.  We made lots of new friends from Hawaii to China and all the islands in-between.

The gospel is true, we love and miss each of you.  My dear grandchildren, remember to stay in the boat…the safe boat, don't let anyone pull you over into drowning with the wicked!!!

Be good….
Love,  Nona and Papa