Christmas and So Much More: December 23 - 29, 2024

 

     Monday I was back to my regular schedule for serving at the PCC.  All week it was going to be very busy.  The holiday season finally has kicked in.

      Monday night we went to the last musical presentation of the Christmas season at the Visitor's Center.  The schedule said it was Hau'ula 2nd Ward, but it was only a family that was performing.  Maybe the family was in the Hau'ula 2nd Ward.  The young man pictured in the top photo is a singer/songwriter and performed one of the songs he wrote.  The father, in the bottom left picture was the narrator.  The bottom right picture is the mother and daughter singing while the son played the piano and sang.  They were a very musical family.

     Tuesday was Christmas Eve.  Lili, my boss, had me do most of Tuesday's purchase orders on Monday just to make sure we got them in on time, in case the vendors were closed or closing early on Christmas Eve.  That made Tuesday a really short, quick day.  I was done by 10AM.  I went over to the church building in Laie by the temple to practice my piano solo one more time before the performance that night.  By the time I came back, Elder Rappleye was wrapping things up at the motor pool because Anthony, his boss, told them to close at noon.

       Tuesday night was the mission wide Christmas devotional.  All the missionaries, young and old, attended and anyone could volunteer to perform a musical number.  I had brought with me a piano Christmas solos book (not sure why).  Last Christmas we were so new and getting adjusted that we did not participate in the musical devotional.  This year when they asked for volunteers, the spirit reminded me that I had brought the Christmas solos piano book. I wasn't sure I wanted to volunteer.  I could think of lots of excuses not to - I didn't have ready access to a piano to practice on; I had hardly played the piano in over a year; and I have not performed in public in decades.  But the spirit kept prompting me, so I looked over the songs in the book and picked out what looked like the shortest and easiest piece to play.  I emailed the sister missionary in charge of the program and told her I would be willing to play a piano solo and told her what the piece was, "The First Noel".  She responded by asking if I could play a different piece because someone else was already doing "The First Noel".  I wavered.  I looked through the pieces again and thought I could possibly do the medley of "Joy to the World/Hark the Herald Angels" although it was one page longer than "The First Noel".  I emailed her back and told her I could change it to "Joy to the World/Hark the Herald Angels" medley.  She responded by telling me that Joy to the World was going to be the closing song and was there something else I could play.  I was ready to tell her no, and to just forget about it, I would not be a part of the program.  But before I responded back, she responded again and told me it would be fine if I played the medley, and that there were a lot of vocal numbers, and they needed musical numbers on the program so she would put me on the program.  I guess I was stuck.

  I have been practicing for weeks almost every day.  Fortunately, I have been able to go to the church building on the far end of campus and practice on the piano in the chapel most days after work. I felt fairly confident about how well I had learned to play the piece, but I was not very confident about how my nerves would do playing in front of 200 people. 

      At the devotional, I was sitting on the stand because we were in the choir for the closing song.  I took this picture (right) of President and Sister Bassett speaking.  It shows how full the chapel was with all the missionaries in attendance.

     I was scheduled to play my piece in about the middle of the program right after the men's choir sang "The Little Drummer Boy".  After they sang, I got up and started laying out my music on the piano (see picture above) and as I was doing that, the junior sister missionary who was listed on the program after my song came up to the podium and started singing and playing her ukulele.  I was mentally all ready to play, but then I had to wait until Sister Walker got done playing her song.  That's when I started getting nervous.  When she finished, as I started playing the air conditioning came on and my music was right in the path of the AC vent, and it started to blow my music off the piano.  I had to stop playing, rearrange my music and start again.  The same thing happened!  Now I was pretty flustered.  Sister Lee and one of the junior missionaries came to my rescue and stood on both sides of the piano to hold my music in place.  I started playing for the third time and was able to get through the piece with only a few minor mistakes despite it not going well to begin with.  I had asked God to send me angels to help me as I played, specifically asking for my mother to calm my nerves and my mother-in-law to help me play well because she was very good at playing the piano. I'm sure God answered my prayers, and they were there beside me to help me get through it.  Although it stressed me out for weeks, I'm grateful I followed the spirit.  It was certainly a learning and growing experience for me. Now I could enjoy the Christmas holiday - no more stress.

 We were really hoping being away from family on Christmas day would not be as hard as last year. We were able to Facetime several of our children in the morning and open presents that they sent while talking to them.

      We had a mission wide Christmas luncheon at noon.  I volunteered to bring cheesy potato casserole.  There were rows of tables filling up the cultural hall to fit enough places for everyone.  There were 3 serving tables, one on either side of the gym and one in the overflow back area.  Even with 3 serving tables, the lines were long, but everyone didn't mind, it gave us a chance to visit with each other.  We had traditional ham, potatoes, corn, rolls, Jello salad, garden salads, and many different kinds of desserts.  There were so many desserts that they had to put them in the Relief Society room.

   After eating, there was a program (pictured above bottom right).  The first skit was "The 12 Days of Christmas I see in Laie!" (top left and bottom right picture).  It included geckos, chickens, turtles, matching muumuus, ukulele players, fans, cockroaches, and a mission leader in a palm tree.  Then a junior sister missionary did a hula dance (top right and bottom left picture).

     Then the king, Elvis Presley, made an appearance and sang "Blue Christmas".  Elder Parker was "the king" and did a pretty decent job of impersonating Elvis.  He even dyed his hair black to help complete the look.  Elder Harris, Sister Larsen, Sister Lee, and Elder Wayt were his backup singers.

     We have 12 sister missionaries from the Philippines serving in our mission.  They all sang a Filipino Christmas song.

     All the BYU - Hawaii senior missionaries did "Twas the Night Before Christmas" skit and adapted it to what their assignments at BYU-Hawaii are.  It was nice to see which missionaries are serving where because we don't interact with the BYU-Hawaii missionaries much unless they are in our district.

     Sister Purcell, a counselor in the mission presidency's wife, did the "Song of Christmas Hula"

     Then she taught the moves to everyone, and we all did it with her.

      I captured a few pictures of Elder Rappleye trying to learn the hula.

   Then we had a ukulele sing along.  Everyone who has been learning how to play the ukulele was encouraged to bring their ukuleles to play.  I didn't see too many people playing the ukulele this year.  It seems like last Christmas there were a lot of missionaries playing the ukulele, especially the younger sister missionaries.  

   After the program was over and after helping clean up, we headed over to see the Cowley family.  There was so much food leftover from the luncheon that they were trying to get people to take some home with them.  We grabbed some of the bags to take over to the Cowleys.  Jen was going to have a baby in a couple of weeks, so we thought they could freeze it and use after the baby was born.  We visited on their front porch, and they opened the gift we had left them on Sunday.  It was a Velcro dart game.  They immediately went out on the lawn and started playing the game.

   Thankfully Christmas wasn't as hard as last year.  We were able to talk or Facetime with all of our children.  We ended up not having enough time to go to the beach like I was hoping, so we can't say we spent Christmas on the beach.

        But we did go play some pickleball with the Fishers and Goodfellows, and Elder Rainsdon to burn off some of the calories we ate at the Christmas luncheon.

   We finally unwrapped the rest of our gifts after pickleball and ended the night watching Mr. Kruger's Christmas.

     

     One of the gifts we opened were messages and drawings from children and grandchildren.  I was so happy to now have some pictures to put on our ugly looking refrigerator.  Doesn't the refrigerator look so happy now?

     We got so many notes that they wouldn't all fit on the refrigerator, so we taped them up in our stairwell.  Now we can see them and feel the love every time we go out our front door and when we come home.

    The day after Christmas we were back serving at the PCC.  They had pushed town run to Thursday since Christmas was on Wednesday.  Thankfully, there wasn't very many stops, so it wasn't as stressful as the last couple of weeks.  Here's a few interesting sites we saw on our town run this week - top picture is Oahu Community Correctional Center.  It's the largest jail facility in Hawaii and it's right in Honolulu.  It houses about 950 male inmates.  The bottom picture shows that there is a street named "Salt Lake Blvd." in Honolulu.  We have driven by there lots of times.  We finally stopped at a red light where I could get a picture of the street sign.

   We were so excited to see our neighbors that live across the street from us in South Jordan at the Hukilua Marketplace.  They were vacationing on the island for Christmas break.  I arranged for some discount PCC tickets for them.  It was good to see familiar faces from home and visit with them for a little bit.

     

         The pictures to the right show the decorations at the Aloha Center (Student Activities Center).  It's pretty quiet there during semester break.

 On Saturday we drove over to Turtle Bay Resort.  We had heard that the Christmas decorations at the resort were pretty good.  So, we walked around the resort looking for all the Christmas decorations we could find.  We also found an infinity pool with a gorgeous view toward the ocean with lots of palm trees.  The ocean swells were quite large that morning.  We were hoping to enjoy some beach time at the resort, but it was too overcast.  We decided to get back in the car and drive along the north shore in hopes of finding some sunshine.  We got to Sunset Beach and the sun was shining, so we got all settled into our beach chairs to watch the wild waves (too dangerous to swim) and do some reading.  After about 30 minutes it started to rain, so we packed everything up and headed home.  So much for getting some beach time.

     

     Later Saturday afternoon we were able to watch on our laptop the BYU football team play in the Alamo Bowl and beat the University of Colorado, 36 - 14.  So even though we didn't get to have some good beach time, it was a good day after all with the BYU win!

      We had a fun district activity on Sunday evening.  The Tates offered to cook everyone a turkey dinner with mashed potatoes, stuffing, and gravy.  Everyone else brought different sides.  The dinner was delicious.  Then we did a white elephant gift exchange.  It was mostly a true white elephant gift exchange with odd items found around our houses that each person didn't want any more.   There was even some stealing going on during the gift exchange.  I ended up with a pretty nice hoodie that says Ketchikan Alaska (never been there) with canned snow.  Elder Rappleye ended up with a box of macadamia chocolates. 

      We celebrated three birthdays - Elder Brent Timothy's whose birthday was December 24th; Sister LaRae Tate whose birthday is January 16th, and Sister Sherry Gammon whose birthday is January 7th (bottom picture - left to right),

      Top picture is a group district picture with the birthday honorees seated on the couch.

A week full of Christmas celebrations: December 16 - 22, 2024

 

     This was the first full week that school was out for Christmas break.  For FHE, the ward had another movie night in the Little Theater with dinner provided.  Can you tell what movie we watched from the photos? (The Polar Express).  The attendance was low because of kids going home or working at the PCC.

    I just feel that I need to document an aspect of the work Elder Rappleye does even though I don't have any pictures to go along with it. Elder Rappleye and Elder Bates who work out in the motor pool are the most popular senior missionaries in the mission.  I don't have any way to prove it, but all the senior missionaries that have vehicles are frequently asking for help with their cars.  The senior missionaries don't get mission cars, so every senior missionary who wants to have a car to use while serving here is responsible for buying and maintaining their own cars.  Whenever someone's vehicle is having mechanical troubles, they approach Elder Rappleye or Elder Bates and say, "Could you help me with . . . " or "I'm having a problem with my car, it's doing (fill in the blank), what do you think is wrong?"  Everyone knows who to ask if they have car issues and many days Elder Rappleye is helping a missionary with their vehicle or giving advice on what they need to do. With no auto repair shops in Laie or the surrounding area, the closest place to go to get a car fixed is Kaneohe, 40 minutes away.  For minor repairs or diagnostics, Elder Rappleye doesn't mind helping them, but it does keep him busy serving both the PCC and the senior missionaries.

    I went into work on Monday and worked the full day, then Lili, my boss told me, "Merry Christmas. You can have the rest of the week off."  I was like, WHAT???  The PCC was going to be so slow that week and all the student workers are allowed to work 40 hours a week when school is not in session.  They were going to have a hard time keeping the student workers busy all week, so they let me have some time off and had Jaz, who I've trained to do my job, do the purchase orders, to give him something to do all week.  Sister Sauve was already taking time off because she had family in town.  Since we haven't had Wednesday's off, I have not had enough time to get things done.  It was nice to have time off to clean, get Christmas gifts ready, practice the piano for a piano solo I was playing at the Christmas Eve devotional, and Tuesday morning I spent a little time at the beach.  I still had to work on Wednesday doing town run, and a short day on Thursday greeting the tour buses, so I wasn't completely off the hook on all my duties.

   This week at the Hukilua Marketplace is Santa week.  Every night some of the missionaries get a chance to help at Santa's workshop that has been set up near the Pacific Theater. The kids can stop by and tell Santa what they want for Christmas and get their picture taken with Mr. and Mrs. Claus.  We volunteered to be Mr. and Mrs. Claus on Tuesday night.  We had two elves to assist us - Sister Julene Jolley (a perfect name for an elf - sitting next to Santa in the picture) and Sister Carlene Bailey (the elf standing far right).  We had fun posing for a lot of pictures with kids, young and old, that believe in Santa Claus.  My main job as Mrs. Claus was to hand out candy canes to the young kids after they got their picture taken with Santa.  No sitting on Santa's lap was allowed, except for one lady who shocked us both and sat on Santa's lap and quickly took a picture.

     Thankfully this Wednesday's town run was not quite so crazy - only 11 stops (still quite a few).  It didn't help that when we went to one of the locations near the airport, they told us one of the items we needed to pick up was not at that location, but at their downtown location.  We had already done all the downtown pickups before we had gone out to the airport.  Alas, we had to head back to downtown Honolulu, and unluckily we got stuck in a traffic jam.  So, getting stuck in the traffic jam and going back downtown probably added an hour onto our travel time.  Luckily, we did go past the Aloha Tower nice and slow so I could get a picture of it.  I'm hoping to go see it up close and out of the car before we go home.

      The added stop downtown was right by these murals pictured left.  Since we had to illegally park, I opted to stay in the car while Elder Rappleye went in to get the part.  We have actually been here before, but I didn't get a picture of the murals last time.  There are so many buildings in Honolulu with painted murals on them.  It's so fun to see them, and it helps you remember where you are.

      We stopped by the Hukilua Marketplace after playing pickleball Wednesday night to see who was acting as Mr. and Mrs. Claus.  We were delighted to see our district leaders, Elder and Sister Lee in costume that night.  We were able to get our picture taken with them when there was no line.

     We were finally able to get over to another musical presentation at the Visitor's Center on Thursday night. It was the Laie 9th Ward Relief Society choir.

      Friday at work, we had a BBQ out at the motor pool for all who work out there and their spouses.  Everyone pitched in to bring something.  It was fun to have Anthony (the boss over motor pool) bring his 3 teenage kids to participate and we were able to get to know them a little bit more.

     This whole week at the Hukilua Marketplace is like a party every night.  So, we just go hang out at the marketplace after dark for a little while to enjoy the lights, music, and atmosphere.  The top right picture in the collage to the left shows the band that was playing in the gazebo in the marketplace Thursday night.  The bottom left picture shows the "train" that gives people rides around the marketplace and parking lot of the PCC.  We were hoping to take a ride on it, but the line was too long.  We wanted to make it over to the visitor's center on time for that night's musical presentation.

     When we got to the visitor's center we were surprised to see the Cowley family there.  We knew it wasn't their ward performing that night because it was the married student 4th ward.  We found out that Ava and Cohen's piano teacher is in that Ward, and she had recruited them to come perform.  There were also some nice singing groups that performed - a men's group and a women's group (pictured), and some individual performances.

 

We finally were able to go back up the mountain behind our house and hike all the way to the pillbox.  Above are pictures of the trail.  The top left is us at the trailhead up by the water tank where the paved portion of the trail ends. It had rained the day before so I was a little reluctant to hike it because I thought it would be too muddy, but surprisingly it wasn't bad except for the spot pictured bottom left.  There were places along the trail that was covered in dead pine needles like pictured in the bottom right picture.

When we got to the top of the ridge, we found this sign.  The left picture, taken on the way up, I'm pointing the way to the pillbox.  The other way goes to Koloa Gulch.  The right picture, taken on the way down, shows Elder Rappleye giving a thumbs up because we made it to the pillbox.

Shortly after the sign as we were walking along the ridge, we came to this section of the trail.  Thankfully the trail was wide enough and there really wasn't any risk of sliding down the mountain.

The views from the top.  The top picture is looking south over Hau'ula and beyond.  The bottom picture is looking north over Laie.  If you look closely you can find the BYU-Hawaii campus, Laie point, and Hukilua Bay.

We made it to the pillbox!  It's hidden behind trees that have grown up so you can't see it from our house or the highway.

The top picture is showing the other side view of the mountain shown in the bottom picture (yellow arrow pointing).  The red yellow is showing where the pillbox is located.  The bottom picture was taken from our deck.

This last picture shows the view of our house (red arrow) from the top of the mountain.  It's a zoomed in photo. Mission accomplished for Elder Rappleye, now having completed the hike to the pillbox.

  Saturday was our last chance to ride the PCC train, so we again went to the Polynesian Cultural Center so we could ride the train.  Knowing this is our last Christmas here, it was now or never.  As we waited in line for our turn, we asked the little boy behind us if he was excited to ride the train.  He told us that he already rode it, and this was going to be his 5th time!  I guess that means he liked it.

      After riding the train, we walked around the marketplace for a while.  The top right picture shows where they were making "snow".  The bottom two pictures show the band that was playing in the gazebo that night.

    We didn't stay long because we needed to hurry over to the Visitor's Center to enjoy another musical presentation.  Saturday night's performers were from the La'ie 7th Ward.  This was my favorite night of all the one's we went to.  They had so many youth participating, and they were all a little reluctant, but also very good.  The young men's group (bottom left picture) was especially reluctant, but the young man with the long hair had a good voice and carried the group.  Despite his demeanor, I think he actually enjoyed singing the song.

    

    The choir conductor was THE best!  He is the head of the theater department at BYU-H, Dr. Michael Morris. As he led the choir, he would sway and bob to the music.  You could tell he loved music, and it was in his heart and soul.  He sang a solo, "O, Holy Night" (above bottom right picture) - so very good.  The pictures to the right I took trying to capture his body movements, but it doesn't really show it.  I really should have videoed it.

     Sunday, we only had Sacrament Meeting, so after church we delivered gifts to our fellow district missionaries and to my Aunt Faith and Cousin Julie (bottom right picture).  We missed connecting with Cowleys and just left their package on their porch.  Elder and Sister Timothy is in the top left-hand picture.  Elder and Sister Lee are in the top right-hand picture. Sister Tate is in the bottom left-hand picture.  Elder Tate was taking a nap.  I'm sad I didn't get a picture of the Gammons when we dropped off their gift.  

Top Left to Right: Devin's family, Sara's family, Noelle's family, Derek's family, Neal's family, Aimee's family, Angela's family, and Elder and Sister Rappleye

 

     We decided to take a picture by our little Christmas tree to document it since all of our children were sending us pictures of them by their Christmas trees.  Merry Christmas Sunday!

Finals, Graduation and Christmas in the Air: December 9 - 15, 2024

     Once again, it's final's week and that means it was time to do our cookie delivery to our YSA student's Hales (dorms) to urge, encourage, and spread love to them and let them know we believe in them and that they can do hard things.  This time I had purchased on Amazon some cute Christmas self-sealing cellophane cookie bags.  It was so much easier to package the cookies for delivery and kept them nice and fresh.  I wish I had been using them from the beginning.  

      This is the fourth semester finals we have handed out cookies to everyone in the YSA 10th ward.  Elder Rappleye goes into the boy's Hales to pass them out to all the boys and I always recruit the young sister missionaries in our Ward to come help me pass out the cookies to the girl's Hales.  About two-thirds of the Ward are girls and one third are boys, so Elder Rappleye doesn't have as many doors to knock on.  He always finishes before I do, even with the sister missionaries helping me.

      This time I remembered to take a few pictures while we were delivering.  In the picture above are three of our Ward sisters we actually met in the hall.  They live in Hale 2. In Hale 2 there are just single rooms with 2 girls per room.  They don't have a kitchen, and they share a community restroom.  They were excited to get homemade chocolate chip cookies.  The picture to the left is Dana (to the right of me).  We caught her at home and gave her cookies for all of her roommates.  She lives in Hale 4. Hale 4 has 6 girls to an apartment.  They have their own kitchen and share a bathroom between all 6 roommates.

      We had the best success so far on this cookie delivery run.  I caught about two-thirds of the girls at home, and Elder Rappleye caught about half of the boys at home.  I think since we have done this a few times now, they are learning to expect the cookies and don't want to miss out.  We only have one more final's week to experience here before we go home.

      Tuesday evening, we were able to go to the temple with Elder Brian and Sister Julie Coleman and do sealings.  The Colemans taught religion classes at BYU-H and are part of the missionary pickleball group that plays on Wednesday nights.  We were able to do sealings with them and then went over the Hukilua Marketplace for a bite to eat.  We'll miss the Colemans.  Not so sure we'll miss Elder Coleman's wicked pickleball serve though.  Sister Coleman and I made a pretty good team on the pickleball court and had a pretty long winning streak going for a while.

   

   Wednesday's town run was crazy busy with 15 stops to make!  That's a record.  It was a long day, but we did get to see a few Christmas decorations in the downtown area and a beautiful fountain.  Hopefully we won't have another town run with that many stops again, but since we are only doing one run a week now instead of two, every week could be a long day.

     Although it was a long day doing the town run, we went to the musical presentation at the Visitor's Center that night.  Moana and Junior Feinga were performing.  We didn't realize Moana was part of the family band, "The Jets" in the late 1980's until she mentioned it when introducing themselves.  It was a good concert.  We even got a photo with Moana, just as if we are groupies - 😁😉

     Friday was commencement at BYU - Hawaii for Fall graduation.  There were 207 graduates from 21 states and 31 countries, 21 - 54 years old.  66% of the graduates were female, and 34% were male.  87.7% of the graduates had at least one job either at BYU-H or the PCC during their time at BYU - Hawaii.  The commencement speaker was Elder Marcus B. Nash.  He and I grew up in Seattle.  He was in the Ward that shared our building in the North Seattle Stake.  We went to early morning seminary together, although he was a year ahead of me in school.  It's been at least 50 years since then, but it would have been nice to have talked to him while he was here. I was working at the PCC during commencement exercises, so I knew our paths were not going to cross.  I was able to listen to the live stream in my office while I worked.  I'll share one quote from his talk, "To the degree you focus on Christ, He who is the 'light and the life of the world' will unerringly guide and take you safely home, no matter the currents and storms you encounter." – Elder Marcus B. Nash

Lili, our manager at the Food Warehouse, made a beautiful lei for Kyli Panti, one of the warehouse workers, who graduated. She sent me over to the Cannon Activities Center when the commencement ceremonies were over to find Kyli and give him the lei. I told her OKAY, but in my mind, I was thinking "How in the world I'm I going to find Kyli in the throng of people who are going to be out on the plaza celebrating?" Elder Rappleye drove me over there in a cart. We parked by the side of the CAC building and walked toward the crowds out on the plaza. We walked down one side of the plaza and then the other looking for Kyli. The longer we searched, the more discouraged I got. I stopped and said a prayer in my mind, then decided we would retrace our steps and go back around the plaza. We got all away around, still not finding Kyli. Then I saw Jared, another food warehouse worker, and asked him if he knew where Kyli was. Jared saved the day and pointed to a grassy spot right next to the CAC. We finally were able to give Kyli his lei and tell him congratulations. I love the picture his girlfriend took. It shows how the graduates are showered with love from friends and family with so many leis - flower, candy, ribbon, etc. He even was decked out with an inflatable flamingo around his waist and an inflatable crown on his head. Many others were similarly decked out. I have never seen anything like it before.

We received this delicious, wonderful loaf of bread from Tita's Grill, a food truck in the Hukilua Marketplace owned by the Ah You family. It was their Christmas gift to all the senior missionaries that serve in the Hawaii Laie Mission. We enjoyed the bread with our dinner from many nights.

The Mission Settlement missionaries put on the musical presentation at the Visitor's Center on Friday night. We attended because we wanted to support our district leader and his wife (Elder and Sister Lee), and the other missionaries. Most of the songs were the same ones we heard at the Mission Settlement Devotional a week ago. We still enjoyed it very much.

    After getting a taste of downtown Honolulu's Christmas decorations on Wednesday's town run, we decided to venture back down to Honolulu on Saturday morning and see if we could discover more Christmas decorations to enjoy.  We headed to Ward's Village and Ala Moana Mall.

     The decorations to the left we found around the Ward's Village area.  I'm sure they would have looked much more impressive after dark.

      There was an elf scavenger hunt at Ward Village.  We found a few perched at various businesses around the area (pictured right). I think there were 51 total you could find. We didn't even come close to finding all of them.

   Then we headed to Ala Moana Mall.  It's a big mall in downtown Honolulu near Waikiki.  It was not the best weekend to go to the mall being it's so close to Christmas, but we had not been to the mall yet and malls are usually decked out for Christmas. Besides a few Christmas decorations, we found a Giving Machine that The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-Day Saints sponsors at the mall.

      We also found a big Christmas tree in an open area of the mall (pictured on the left side of the collage to the right).  The other picture on the right side is the Christmas tree we found at Ward's village.  Although we did find a few Christmas decorations to enjoy, we were a little disappointed that there wasn't more. (Since going down there I discovered that there were more Christmas decorations at City Hall near where we saw the huge Santa and Mrs. Claus when we were doing town run.)

     Since we were on the hunt for Christmas decorations, we went down to the Hukilua Marketplace that night and snapped a few pictures of some of the decorations there.  The top picture on the left is the nativity scene that is displayed in the gazebo.  The fun wintery train scene is at the entrance to Pounder's restaurant.  The bottom right picture is technically not a Christmas decoration, but it shows the PCC's main waterfall all lit up after dark. 

     We usually are not in the PCC after dark, but Saturday night we were invited to a private screening of a PCC documentary that has been produced and they are hoping to be able to get it shown on Netflix or Hulu, or something like that.  The documentary follows several BYU-H students that work at the PCC and how working at the PCC is beneficial in allowing them to go to school and improve their education without going into debt to do so.  They are then able to go back to their countries and help their families and communities.  Many of the students don't get to go home to see their families until they have graduated, that's at least 4 years being away from their families.  It was a very interesting documentary.  We have been here at the Polynesian Cultural Center for over a year and there were still things mentioned in the documentary that we didn't know about.  It reaffirmed to us how inspired this relationship between the PCC and BYU-H is and how God's hand is in all the details.

 

   It was Jo Ya's last Sunday in our YSA Ward.  The next day she would fly home to Taiwan.  We gave her a lei to say goodbye and wish her success in her future endeavors.  We love to see the students accomplish their goals of graduation, but it's hard to have to say goodbye.  Jo Ya is definitely part of the rising generation, youth of the noble birthright, that will keep building the kingdom of God wherever life takes her.

       Because of conflicts in the student's finals schedules, our work Christmas party was held on Sunday.  It was held in the Gateway Buffet building.  Lili and Regina set up and decorated these beautiful tables.

    Here's some of the student workers - Satoru (left edge of picture), Jared, Rachel, Rowan, Leiana, Aurel, Ralph (behind Aurel) and Jaz.  Regina is standing.

    

      I only got this picture of the food, but there was a lot more.  A separate dessert table, and more salads and sides.  It was a Christmas feast.

      After eating, the group played a few games.  These pictures show the game of picking up M&Ms with chopsticks from the plate in the middle to the plate in front of each individual.  Whoever could get the most M&Ms onto their plate during the allotted time won.  

 

   These pictures show the game where you place a cookie on your eye and have to try to wiggle it down your face and into your mouth without touching the cookie with your hands.  It was pretty hilarious watching everyone try to do it.  No one was able to accomplish the task, but Elder Rappleye was the only one to get his cookie touching his tongue, so he was declared the winner.

 

 

   The next game was to try to unroll a roll of crepe paper using just one hand.  When they said go, crepe paper was flying everywhere!

   It was finally time for the gift exchange.  We all grabbed a gift from off the table and stood in a big circle.  Then Regina went around the circle, the first person rolled two dice and depending on what number they rolled we would have to pass the present to the left or right, exchange with (blank), everyone changes with someone else, etc.  When everyone had a turn to roll the dice, and we had mixed up the gifts multiple times, then we all opened up the present we ended up holding.

 

   I opened up my gift and it was a mini waffle maker.  Elder Rappleye opened up his gift and it was a beach towel.  The top picture shows Jared, Kyli, Satoru, Jaz, Ralph, Aurel, and Rachel with their gifts.

       Here's a picture of the whole supply chain group of workers.  It includes the motor pool, the food warehouse, uniforms, and the main warehouse.  I don't know if you can see in the pictures, but the murals on the walls of the Gateway are amazing.  Most of the student workers don't get to go home for Christmas because they can't afford to, and they need to stay during the school break and work. This work party was to help give some Christmas cheer to the students who are a long way from home and family.