Monday was Martin Luther King holiday. The students didn't have class, but the PCC was open. So, we were working. At the Food Warehouse, we were still missing our "boss", Lili. She has been out since December 18th. We were also missing Kapu'u, who is second in command. Luckily Kalo was back and she was keeping things going. As far as I could tell, everyone just knew what to do and was busy doing their duties. We made it through the day without messing everything up.
We always start the week off with ukulele lessons on Monday nights. Here's a picture of our new ukulele. We bought it at the Ukulele Experience store at the PCC. They give the missionaries a discount and free engraving on the ukulele. We had the Hawaiian Islands engraved on it, along with the name of our mission and dates of service. If we end up not ever mastering playing the ukulele, we at least have a nice souvenir of our mission.
Here is Elder Rappleye practicing the ukulele. We have made it through the whole round of beginning lessons. This week's lesson we were back to learning the same songs we have already been taught. So, we will be working on trying to get quicker at changing chords and not looking at the frets when we change chords.
Picture of the city of Laie
Tuesday night we had our monthly Senior Missionary Devotional. One of the Laie Stake Presidents spoke to us and told us about some of the history of Laie. We have heard some of what he told us, but we learned quite a bit about Laie's history. One of the things we learned was that Laie was known as a city of refuge, Before1819, Laie was a puʻuhonua, or a sanctuary for fugitives. As long as the fugitives were within the city boundaries, they were safe from their pursuers. The stake president compared this history of Laie being a city of refuge, to it also being a place of spiritual refuge. With the temple, BYU - Hawaii, and the PCC all within Laie, it makes Laie a unique place to find spiritual refuge from the world. The mission of the PCC is "to spread the spirit of aloha throughout the world." Aloha meaning love, acceptance, and welcome. In gospel terms spread the light and love of Christ throughout the world. Aloha is a way of living and treating others with love and respect. If we, who live and serve in Laie, strive to instill aloha, then Laie will still be a city of refuge.
At the beginning of January, we had cooler and rainy days, but this week we had almost perfect weather - sunny and not too warm. It was delightful to be outdoors, so we took advantage of the nice weather and spent some time at two different beaches on Wednesday and Saturday, our days off. With beaches everywhere you go, it doesn't take a lot of time to get to a beach. On Wednesday, we headed down to Kahana bay. We pass by this beach on our way to town to do our grocery shopping. It looks very inviting every time we pass by. I've been wanting to go spend some time there for quite a while. It's a little further away from where we live, but still only 20 minutes or so. The only problem was the closer we got the more overcast it was getting. When we were about 5 minutes away, we decided it would not be a good day to go to Kahana Bay and turned around and headed back north. By the time we reached Laie, it was nice and sunny. So, we stopped at Hukilua Beach and soaked up some sun, walked along the beach, and played in the water.
Since we didn't get to go to Kahana Bay on Wednesday, we decided to try again on Saturday. This time we decided to do a hike that was across the highway from the bay before heading to the beach. It was a short 1.2 mile hike called Kapa'ele'ele' trail. So many of the trails get very muddy and slippery after it rains. Since we had no rain this week, we thought it would be a good time to try hiking it.
The hike was not a favorite of mine. It was very overgrown and lots of gnats and mosquitos. I was worried the whole way about centipedes. They tell us they can sting and it really packs a punch. Not realizing that the trail would be overgrown, I was wearing shorts and sandals. Thankfully Elder Rappleye lead the way, hopefully shoeing all predators out of the path. We walked past this wall of vines draping off a power line.
The trail got narrow and steep. I could totally see how slippery it would be if muddy and one could slide right off the path down the hillside. Luckily it was dry, but there were quite a few big tree limbs across the trail that you had to climb over or under or around. At the top we got a great view of the bay.
On the way down, the trail was even steeper. They had a rope along the trail that you could use to help assist you to not fall. You would definitely need it if it was slippery. We thought it was interesting that we did this hike the same week we were studying about Lehi's dream of the Tree of Life in the Book of Mormon. Although it wasn't a rod of iron like in Lehi's vision, the rope certainly reminded us of hanging on to the iron rod (Word of God) to get us safely home.
Elder Rappleye is giving a demonstration of holding on to the rod (aka rope) in the picture above. The picture to the right shows the rope along the trail.
Elder Rappleye at the end of the trail, coming out of the forest, It put us out at the edge of the highway, so we had to walk along the highway to get back to the beach area. You can probably understand why this hike is not a favorite of mine.
Pictured above is both ends of the bay. We loved that the water was calmer in this bay. I wish we had a kayak or raft to paddle around in. You can see that it's a wide-open beach with no one around, even though it's a Saturday! Actually, there were people on the beach, but it obviously did not feel crowded at all.
The weather cooperated again this week so we could play pickleball. There are quite a few senior missionaries that like to come and play. We only have two courts. We play short games of first team to 7 points, so we can quickly rotate in and out teams.
This week we did initiatories at the temple on Thursday night. Women only get to do 3 names at one appointment, but men can do 5 names because it's not as busy on the men's side. You are not allowed to book back-to-back appointments. You just have to fill your time slot and then if you want to do more names you can do more, but you have to go into the back of the rotation, so the wait time depends on how busy it is. It is a busy temple, so I have not been able to do a second round yet. The wait time is too long. I don't want to keep Elder Rappleye waiting a long time in the lobby.
Today was the third week of Conducting class, halfway through the course. Here's a picture of the students practicing their conducting. They are conducting the song "I Am A Child of God". They learned how to conduct 4/4 time and how to conduct songs with fermatas (you can hold me as long as you want) in them. They are quick learners.
Pictured from left to right is Kawdalya from India, Rizza from the Philippines, Deepika from India, Taputailo from Samoa, Ylistia from the Philippines, Krystel from the Philippines, and Nicha from the Philippines.
Sunday is definitely my favorite day of the week. It is the day we get to have the most time and interaction with the students. I am so impressed with how friendly they are and how much they know about the gospel. The talks in Sacrament meeting by the students have been very good and you can tell they have strong testimonies of the gospel. They will strengthen the stakes of Zion wherever they end up after they are done with their schooling.
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