Mission Report No 29

Did Margot get a new car for her birthday?

 

Tuesday 18th October 2022

Margot's birthday today. We celebrated with the Cashmores at the Pagoda Chinese Restaurant in Atherton. While there, one of the staff, a Pilipino lady, noticed Margot's nametag and told us that she is not a member of the Church, but she has a niece who is currently serving as a missionary in the Philippines. We had a brief chat with her, but she was very busy. And then we left without even getting a phone number from her! We're not the most efficient missionaries out there, are we? Leila came with us back to Cairns, to stay the night with her niece, before she catches a flight to Ethiopia, via Sydney, and Dubai, tomorrow morning. She is going for two months, so we will keep in touch with David while she is going. He's 83 years old and his health is not fantastic - it's been a downhill slide since he had a heart attack some years back. He's not about die or anything (I hope), but we might just be able to give him a bit of help around the house perhaps, and some good conversation.

Wednesday 19th October

We spent a fair bit of time today helping get Leila to the airport. Two 24-kilogram suitcases made it a bit tricky. She takes a lot of presents to family over there. We had to do some repacking at the airport, and we ended up bringing one extra suitcase home with us, which we will take back up to David soon. He niece, Hana, was also there helping with the packing and transport. You know how you go to the aiport sometimes and you see people struggling to get everything into suitcases and re-spreading the load etc - well that was us!  We all had lunch together afterwards to celebrate an amazing achievement!

Thursday 20th October

We picked up our brand-new Mission car this morning - a little Kia Cerato sedan, so that was a bit exciting. We've been using our own car for everything since we had a third missionary companionship come into our area and we let them have our Mission car (a Toyota Corolla). It was hard work, trying to buy a new car, on behalf of the Church. There are supply problems with a lot of products, in this post-Covid world, and we were unable to get another Corolla, but we were able to get a Cerato.

So, we went to pick up the car at Trinity Kia. Margot didn't need to come in, so she dropped me there and then went shopping on the way home. The saleslady, Chantelle, sat me down in her office to sign the necessary paperwork. Somehow, we got on to the name of the Church, we was all pretty obvious as it was on all the paperwork. I think I mentioned that it's a bit of a mouthful, and it didn't always fit on the forms that well, and that the old nickname, "The Mormon Church" would have been an easier fit. So the forms had to have the full legal name there of course, but when they were shuffling paperwork around the dealership, and talking about the car over the phone, they came up with a unique solution. "We just call it "Jesus' Church", she said. I can imagine the conversations around the dealership - Have you got the thing for the car for "Jesus' Church"? Could you bring the car for "Jesus' Church" over here for cleaning? I just said, "I'll take that!" 

"What church to you go to?"

"I go to Jesus' Church" 

"Oh, which one is that?"

"It's The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints!

Friday 21st October 2022

This morning we had a whole mission Zoom call with President Vongsawad with some important announcements about some upcoming meetings, including a mission tour from Elder Wakolo, a counselor in the Area Presidency.

This afternoon we went to visit Ayako again. We got to meet her husband today, which was nice.

Saturday 22nd October 2022

With no wind forecast for several days, I need to get out on the water today. I went out to Yorkey's Knob for a paddle. Paul, Miriam and Kim were there doing "doc starts" on their foils. For those of you who don't know what that is, have a look at this video. No, I am not doing it! Looks way to energetic for my old body! The video shows Miriam getting a fairly long run.

Sunday 23 October 2022

We attended Church down at Innisfail today, being assigned to speak in their Sacrament Meeting. It was our first long drive in the new Cerato and it all went very well.

Tonight we had mission preparation class run by Shannon, an American Young Single Adult girl who does a great job of running the class.

 

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