Greetings from a delightful Laie. It’s a Sunday, one of our busier days of the week (although it’s getting difficult to say which is the busier day anymore). We have Church from 8-11am, then the Visitors’ Center from 11:30am – 4:00pm. Following that we have a fireside tonight from 6pm until about 7:30pm, which means getting setup ahead of the fireside and cleanup afterwards (we got home just after 8pm). Tonight the Ko’olauloa Children’s Choir is performing (see attached picture). This is a choir quite similar to the one Danielle sang in a number of years ago. They perform at the Visitors’ Center at least twice a year, once around Christmas and again around Easter. I’ve uploaded one of their songs they sang tonight to YouTube. Anyone interested can go to https://youtu.be/Q-0cnTydpfs and play the 3-minute rendition of a stirring number form Handel’s Messiah.

Sunday is also busy as the Mormon tourists here in Hawaii come to the Visitors’ Center on Sundays as their activity for the day. Local members also come over and sit and “talk story”, a very descriptive Hawaiian phrase. They kind of treat the Visitors’ Center on Sunday as a type of a community center. We enjoy that as it keeps us quite occupied the entire day.

We’ve had a generally normal week, meaning that we’ve not had any spectacular events or issues. The big excitement happened a couple of days ago when one of the sister missionaries tripped and fell while walking home in the dark. They are to be back in their apartments by 9:30pm, which means quite often they are walking or riding their bikes after dark. Although there’s a pretty full moon at present, clouds obscured the sky and she didn’t see the obstacle and took a very hard fall. Nothing broken, but she’s walking rather tenderly. We have three local doctors who will provide assistance literally at the drop of a hat, so the missionaries get good care here.

In addition to the trip and fall incident, one of the refrigerators froze up and is currently unplugged waiting for it to thaw out and test to verify it is still working. That problem comes from stuffing too much into the freezer so the air can’t circulate. I’ve also fixed two flat tires and a bicycle handlebar that wouldn’t stay put. Just a normal week….

This was transfer week and we’ve received one new missionary. Sister Lee is a Korean-speaking missionary from Virginia. Her family moved there when she was ten and spoke Korean at home. Her English is excellent, as is her Korean. She’s already proving to be quite an asset at the Center. We’ve also had visits from two former missionaries that were serving here when we arrived more than fourteen months ago. We’ve enjoyed catching up on their activities since returning home. Both were outstanding missionaries when they were here.

We’re still waiting on the insurance adjuster and the auto body shop to come to agreement on the repairs needed for our car. The auto body shop says that the parts are available here in Hawaii and that they are “reserved” for our repair. The Church has authorized a rental car from Enterprise for the week or so that the car will be in the shop. All we need is for the two to come to agreement on what all the damage is and the right way to fix it.

Last week I talked a bit about the trams and realized that I didn’t have a good picture of the trams that bring people from the Polynesian Cultural Center over to the Visitors’ Center. So, I took a picture the other day and it is attached. The last two scheduled trips at 6:20pm and 6:40pm are very popular, so most days we need two trams at those times and then need a small bus for the rest of the guests (also picture attached). People far prefer the tram to the bus, but we still have no problem filling two trams and the bus those two time for about 85 people per trip.

Ralph Nettleton, Sister Smith’s younger brother, had his funeral last Monday. Aunt Marsha, Sister Smith’s older sister, missed the funeral because she was in the hospital for a possible TIA (mini-stroke) — she’s doing well.

So, that’s the way it is this week in Laie, Hawaii! Hopefully your week has been a good week.

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