Archive for December, 2008
New Traditions
Saturday, December 27th, 2008Well, since it has been such a long time since I have posted anything, and since New Year’s is coming up, I figured I’d get a head start and make a resolution now:
I am going to update my blog at least once a week, on Sunday, with an overview of my life for the past week. This will be a sort of journal for me. For all those wishing to know what I have been up to for the past few months of silence, I would suggest checking Sharon’s blog, since she updated it every time we did anything big.
This past week has been a bit busy for me. We got back from our trip to KK about a week and a half ago, and we’ve been Celebrating Christmas by going Christmas Caroling with the ward members. The way they do it here is kind of funny. They schedule it. They have a schedule that they will go to so and so’s house and that person knows beforehand so they prepare lots of snacks and treats. So we go there and we go inside the house and sing some christmas songs then eat and talk, then on to the next house. We do about 4 houses a night because each house takes at least 30-45 mins. We only did member’s houses, and since our group is so small (the chinese group) we did almos all the members. It was fun and took two days, but it was very different from American caroling, where the receiver is usually unaware beforehand, and treats are not expected, and we don’t usually go inside it seems. Anyways, that was an interesting experience.
Sharon and I went shopping for our primary kids (we have 5 regulars now) and it was fun. We bought them each two toys (some were really poor so we knew they would be getting nothing else this christmas) then we taught them a primary lesson about giving gifts, and how Jesus was God’s gift to the world, and how they can give to jesus by giving their love and service to those around them. Then we gave them their gifts. It was a good lesson. Sharon also gave a really good talk about Jesus’ love for us that Sunday.
Then on Tuesday we had a Ward Christmas Party, and it was a lot of fun to get together with the Iban members and have a good celebration, with lots of Songs and Food.
Christmas was also really enjoyable, I was able to sleep in and Sharon and I gave her mom our gift to her (two boxes of bird’s nests, a real delicacy here). Then we did something I’ve never done before on Christmas: We went Shopping. Apparently it is a tradition of sorts here, because the malls never close and so many people go shopping on holidays. I thought it was really funny because in the USA you couldn’t really go shopping even if you wanted to, because all of the stores are closed except maybe Wal-Mart or something.
Anyways, Sharon’s mom bought me a nice belt, which I needed, so that was good. Sharon gave me a lot of gifts this year: some shirts for Chinese New Year, a laptop bag and some laptop accessories, and a really really nice massage (the best gift was just being here with her^^).
Then yesterday Sharon’s old friend Doreen (she’s my friend too, from BYU-Hawaii) was back in town visiting her family for the holidays, so we spent a whole day with her (consisting mostly of them shopping and me following them around). I met Nguti ak Maja at the Mall surprisingly, I recognized her and she recognized me at the same time. I baptized her in Bintulu, and she is working in Miri now, so I had a nice talk with her for a minute before we exchanged phone numbers. I am planning on going back to bintulu tomorrow to visit some old friends. That night we went to eat at Soho’s with Doreen, so that was fun.
Merry Christmas!
Sunday, December 7th, 2008Sharon and I made this (well mostly Sharon but I helped) so I thought I’d post it here. Also, I apologize for not updating my blog recently. A lot has happened but if you want to hear about it you’re going to have to go to Sharon’s blog (which is highly recommended because there are MANY things there that you don’t want to miss about us).