PEANUT PANCAKES & FLYING FISH

Walking down off the suspension bridge to the market

Careful where you step....it is 100 feet down to a muddy river

Dried fish at the Wednesday market

The rain continues.  When we go out at night sometimes it is raining AND dark but Bill is a good driver.  So far so good.  We try to avoid going out in deluges.  There is just too much rain for even the deep drains to handle it and roads get flooded and there are many more accidents.

We have had some interesting visits this week.  On Tuesday we visited Sister Hellen Enombiling and family.  Sister Hellen has 7 children and the youngest is less than a month old.  Her husband is not a member of the church but she is diligent in bringing all her children to church.  They are fortunate to have a vehicle for transportation.  President Jared and his wife, Mary, went with us for the visit as they know where everyone lives and we do not.  We shared some scriptures and visited with all the family.  I got to hold their new baby.  I am sure she does not lack for attention and love with all those older siblings.  I saw the younger children nuzzling her several times and older sisters took turns with diaper duty.

Sister Helen and her family.

As we were getting up to leave, President Jared walked over to the big aquarium that was sitting against the wall to get a better look at a large fish---it appeared to be about 10 to 12 inches long and was making continuous circles among smaller fish.  Suddenly we heard a crash and a yelp and from the corner of my eye I saw something go flying across the room.  The fish had been startled, jumped out of the aquarium and over President Jared's head and landed on the other side of the room, flapping and flopping on the floor.  Sister Hellen grabbed a towel, grabbed the fish, and quickly got it back into the water.  I guess that has happened before and we all had a good laugh---at/with President Jared.  [President Jared is a very gentle and serious 33 year old Chinese man who is serving as our district president.  Our district is all the state of Sabah.]

The jumping fish. Boy did he fly!!

Their only piece of furniture and a very happy boy

Ervina and Venchent, President Ling and Mary
and Ellen and Bill

On Thursday evening we went to visit Brother Johnny and his wife, Ervina, who have been members just a little over a year now.  He is an Elder and was recently released as a counselor in the Sunday School presidency.  Ervina's family are also members bur not Johnny's.  They live about a 20 minute drive from the church up near Turaran.  Johnny is a long distance (well, long distance here isn't that far) truck driver and, alas, because of the rain, he had not been able to get home for our visit.  He normally works long hours---7 AM to 9 PM and 6 days a week.  We had a nice visit with Sister Ervina and their "going on 4" year old son, Venchent, who loved having some playful attention from Elder (Grandpa) Davis.  Bill sure likes to play with the little ones.  They warm up to him fast even though they start out quite shy.

While we were visiting with Sister Ervina, I noticed a beautiful quilted table runner displayed on the door to one of the bedrooms and went to look a little closer because I do appreciate that kind of work.  Sister Ervina opened the door and showed me her 'work room' where their only piece of furniture is a foldable utility table with a really nice sewing machine set up.  She also had strung up on a piece of clothesline across one wall her crafts of clothing and handbags.  She does beautiful work and she told me she would like to make a bag for me.  "Which one do you like, Sister?"  Wow!  She is so sweet.

This week after our missionary district meeting we all went to lunch at Devi's Curry House which is just across the road from where the missionaries live at Marina Court.  They have eaten there in the past and recommended it.  One of our new missionaries is Sister Zafar who was born in Pakistan but her family is trying to immigrate to USA.  So she told us what would be good to eat.  We ordered, not knowing what we were getting; "You will like it" she told us.  So they brought out pieces of banana leaf about 16" by 16" and put that on the table in front of us.  Those were our plates.  Then they brought rice, packed and formed in a little bowl that was put in the center of the rice (the bowl is turned upside down to leave a mound of rice on the 'plate').  Then several waiters brought food and started putting it around the rice---there was pickled cabbage and other veggies, some cooked veggies, and the curried (hot spicy curry!) chicken.  I watched the elders who had eaten there before and they just started mixing the food with the rice---WITH THEIR FINGERS as we had no utensils.  That was a little beyond me so I asked for a fork and got the traditional fork and soup spoon.  It was pretty good food and I especially liked the mango lassi.  I do like the ethnic food here and I am getting pretty good at picking out the chilies which they all use to spice up the food but I don't care all that much for them.

Typical police car here

On Wednesday, Brother Anthony took us to a nearby town of Tamparuli  to their weekly market day.  We parked on one side of the river and walked across a swinging bridge to the market.

Ellen buying another basket. The lady is the one that made them.

 They had EVERYTHING you can imagine in that market from tools and hardware to clothing and accessories, to food such as vegetables and fresh fish and dried fish and fast food and a few handwoven rotan baskets.  Bill bought a pancake as fast food.

Red hot peppers for sale

A small hardware shop on the sidewalk

Making my pancake. It was very good.

 It is about 14 inches across, on the thinnish side  and sprinkled with sugar and chopped peanuts, folded in half and cut in pieces, wrapped in a piece of plastic and then a newspaper.  It tasted pretty good hot or cold.

a little grandma selling her dried fish

SELLING HER MELONS

Just a little of everything at the market
 laid out on the dirt with newspapers underneath.
 Dried fish is very popular.

On the way back to Brother Anthony's home he took us to his canteen.   He is retired from his job with the government but he is only 63 so for an income he and his wife have a canteen at one of the schools.  This is where the children have lunch.  He showed us the kitchen which is set up with 3 large woks, each on a stand above the propane tank that burns to heat.  Here he fries noodles---wide noodles and narrow noodles (like our raman noodles).  They serve the noodles with vegetables, fresh fruit like melon or papaya, and drinks such as Milo (the 'national' chocolate milk drink), chrysanthemum tea, sodas (no Pepsi or Coke for Brother Anthony's kids) and soy drinks.  They also had little packaged snacks such as fish crackers (these are fish FLAVORED, not shaped) and sego snacks.  Brother Anthony seemed very proud of his canteen and even showed us the outdoor sinks where everything is washed.

A LITTLE GRANDMA AT THE MARKET 
SELLING CIGARETTES

Our mission president has decided that the senior couples need to do an inspection on the younger missionaries' apartments between each zone conference.  So I asked them if the day after their 'P' day would be a good time to come to inspect.  "Sure, that is good."  So I got up early on Thursday morning and baked a pan of cinnamon rolls and took a plateful to each apartment.  The apartments looked great!  (I am comparing them to the apartments I saw where Jason and Lynn lived in Mexico and El Salvador.)   I think they liked the cinnamon rolls, too.  I used your recipe, Christine, for Cinnabon Rolls.  That was my first time to use that recipe and it turned out great.  I don't know if the elders in Tawau, who live about 400 km away (as the hornbill flies), will get fresh cinnamon rolls or even an inspection for that matter.  We don't get over there too often but when we do we will connect up with them.  We sure do love these young men and women.  They work hard and they help us when they can so we do likewise.

These are the prospective missionaries for the KK Branch. Most will go out within the next year:7 of them!! That will make for a total of 10 at one time from this branch in East Malaysia. We are currently teaching them CES institute class 130 Mission Prep on Tuesday nights before our visits.

These are the last two of the three that have received their calls.
We work with them to get them to where they are going
as the branch and district leadership have no experience with doing that.

We are so proud of the KK branch. They are such good people and are trying so hard. They have such wonderful testimonies. On fast Sunday there is never a break between. If you are wanting to bear your testimony you have to be very quick to stand up. They are so excited about the gospel. They want to serve and do what is right. Most of them work 6 days a week and 10 to 12 hours a week. They still manage to home and visit teach and serve each other. With a little guidance from us old white people they have increased attendance 20% in the last three months. Today they hit 138 again. They are pretty solid at 118 mark. 

We hope we can remember the stories to tell all of you when we get home that we can't now. The average income here for the hours I told you is about 1000 RM a month which is about 300 US dollars.

We will visit a family tonight that we are teaching the new member lessons to. They live in a walled off part of a garage shop. There were 12 of us in a 8 by 10 foot room. Their living room window is a piece of plywood hinged so that it can open into the shop.

We have zone conference this week and a trip 2 hours south by car to witness the first use of vision surgery equipment LDS Charities has donated to the local vision doctors, around 100,000 USD. Then to Sibu by plane for a youth conference welfare project and then onto Kuching for a handover of a water project and then back Saturday night to be ready for a full Sunday of teaching and leadership coaching. One of my sisters asked how we found the energy to do all of this and keep up the schedule. Only with God's help and your prayers is our answer. We know we are "on the Lord's errand."

Thanks so much to all of you that keep in touch and for a few SKPYE calls. We know you are all busy. SO it is a real treat for us when some of  you take time from your busy lives to include us.