HAPPY MOTHER'S DAY to some of the most wonderful MOTHERS on the planet!!!!!
I got to thinking, today, (I know, I know, your happy I finally got to thinking!) that the list of Mothers that get this letter is a pretty remarkable list! I am so grateful for your example and friendship and love. The force for good that comes from all of you fills so many lives. Isn't it awesome to be a mom!?! I know I am so thankful for my incredible little Mom, whose stature was mighty in a little teeny body.
We have had so much goodness in our lives this week. It has just been a "feel good" week. Nothing remarkable... just goodness. We took Monday and did a bunch of preparation work, then turned around and did almost everything different than normal. Tuesday we picked up Luki, Lala, and Kiki for piano. They had forgotten, but they hurried and came with us anyway. I worked them hard this week. Luki always does this throw his arms and head back frustration thing when the music looks hard. He use to refuse to play, but then one day it was him or me, so he doesn't do that any more. But I always know when he thinks the music looks toooooooooooo hard. Lala just does this little squeak thing, but Luki demonstrates. Regardless, I had both write in some names of notes, and work on the beginning of the piece. Next week we'll tidy it up. Kiki(who the Bishop wants to take over the piano for Sacrament meetings come August, when the current pianist goes on a mission), plays and works hard until I stop to listen to her, then she won't play. "Kiki!", I said, "people will for sure hear you play come August, so let's get use to it." Her English is so-so, SO I have to explain it all in a Indoenglish sort of language. Now she has an opening, sacrament, and closing song chosen to play for me in 2 weeks.... or whenever I can get her to do it. Veve also comes on Tuesday, along with Willie and Dinda. My Tuesdays have really diminished, (we are down to the truly serious). But my Wednesdays have increased!.
Tuesday evening Untea and Harman were married. Untea (ooontaya) is a widow, and Harman is a non-member. Untea wanted Harman to join the Church before they were married. The Elders have been working with him for about 3 weeks, however.... Harman has a smoking problem. He has been coming to church with Untea, (Elder and I have been visiting Untea since we came here), but Untea has not been reliable in that respect, so we were glad to see her being a good example. Well, Elder Watson happen to get to an appointment at Untea's a little early last week, (with his companion right behind), and saw Harman, with a cigarette, run into the house. When they all greeted each other soon after, the cigarette was gone, so Elder Watson asked how long it had been since Harman had a cigarette. Harman told him about a week.... So Elder Watson asked me on Sunday what he should do. I told him that he needed to discuss it with the Bishop, since he would be performing the marriage scheduled for May 23. So he did, and the Bishop pulled Untea and Harman aside and told them that he thought they shouldn't wait for Harman to quit smoking, and join the Church(since it didn't sound as though he was too sincere), and so they were married Tuesday night. There families were there, and a number of members, including the missionaries. They asked if I would play piano, and the whole "shootin' match" was over in about 25 minutes. We'll see if Harman is serious about the Church....
Wednesday after piano lessons, (I now have 5 new Wednesday students), we had our only Seminary English class of the week. Tuesday was the wedding, and Thursday was "Ascension"(as in Christ's) Day in this Muslim country of Indonesia, and is a National holiday. So there was no English class
on Thursday. On Wednesday we took the hymn "The Spirit of God", printed it off in English, and went through it line by line, word by word, so that they could understand what it was saying. You would find it very interesting the words they know, and the words they don't know. On the don't know list: ire, chariot, descends, inherit, glories, burst, veil (in Muslim Indonesia), expanding, shout!, etc. It was a great discussion, with them reading each line, and taking in the joyful words of this hymn. Then, before we had the closing prayer, we had them stand and sing all 4 verses, with Yos conducting and me playing. WOW & WADU!!!!! You would have been amazed at the volume in that classroom. We were all tingling after, and just stood there a moment to soak it all in.
Thursday was a wash because the Wards had all gone off on buses to far away places, however... we decided to break tradition and go swimming in the middle of the day, with the sun and everything. Elder had decided to do some "laying out" to soak up the sun, and I was still doing some laps, when a young couple got into the pool. Turns out they were from Texas, and were in Indonesia with the Peace Corp! They had been in eastern Java, and would be finished in June and were trying to decided whether to stay and work (as in a profession), or to go back to Texas. They really wanted to stay, and were looking for a job in Solo. We talked and talked for a long, long time. We talked a lot about the Church, (they are "Christian" was all they told us), about the members and general population here in Solo. We are going to try to help them get a job working for a company from the U.S. that is owned by some members there, and run by a member here. Anyway... we were glad for the swim and the opportunity to get to know this great young couple.
Friday we found 3 "lost sheep" who definitely want to stay lost. One has been lost since the 1980s..... We try to explain the whole "write the letter" business, but they mostly just smile and nod and say, "yea, yea". So I talked to the Bishop today about having them write a letter for removal, and he smiled and nodded and said "yea, yea". Hmmmph... I think I'll send them to the great lost list in the sky (or at least in cyber space). Also on Friday, we spent about 15 minutes in DDM with Elder Taulu (taowlu) trying to get the 4 "Slamet Widodo's" (weedohdoh) and the 1 just "Widodo" straight, from the Banjasari Ward. I had given him a copy of my less active list and asked him to do some searching for me. Now, we each had a Slamet Widodo that was dead on the list, it just wasn't the SAME Slamet Widodo. Some mistakes are not so bad, but to mistakenly "kill" someone off is a bit nerve-wracking. The addresses here are so weird, and we had the dead guy at two different addresses. I think we FINALLY got it straight, but it did sound a little like "whose on first" for a while there, and all the Elders got involved when we were trying to decide who to "kill". I will go over it with the Bishop before I bump the guy off.
Finally, there is a young man, Agus Haryono, who is nineteen and has cerebral palsy in the Solo 2nd ward. He has the tortured body of a 10 year old, but his mind is alert and friendly. Elder has been trying to get him his own "made just for him" wheelchair for a while. Today we found out that the process has begun!!! He has been slouched in a regular chair that is difficult to maneuver, but now he will have a slightly reclined custom chair that can get around in uneven Indonesia. Yay, Elder!!! Also, today we found out that we WILL be teaching a Seminary English class at the Kapatihan building each Friday at 6. That means that we now teach English on Tues., Wed., Thurs., at the Supomo building and Friday nights at Kapatihan. We have been writing lesson plans, so we can just go back and refer to the plans, and we can share between the two buildings. I do want to confess that we do nothing about irregular verbs, or past perfect tense, etc. I don't think I even care about irregular verbs, or past perfect tense. However we have some great fun with vocabulary, and we DO do some technical stuff like..... nouns, and verbs, and adjectives, and adverbs. (Matthew and Adam are right now rolling their eyes, and sighing).... Oh well, maybe Heavenly Father will send a new couple who were English majors to take our place! Until then... we will just have fun and soak up the love!
Lovingly (adverb) fun! (noun or verb depending on what's goin' on.)
Master Elder and Madame Sister
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