June 14, 2015 - 41 Years Of Togetherness

This week, we celebrate our 41st wedding anniversary.  What a great time it has been!!!  We kind of celebrated all week - we finished writing our training program and have a training session with the Pesega Stake STSs scheduled for next Thursday - our very first.

We are excited and a little apprehensive because we don't know where this will take us.  It's a new adventure.

Friday we attended our first Zone Conference.  President and Sister  Tolman provided great training to a great group of missionaries.

On Friday night, we went to a fiafia show (typical Samoan show) over at the Sheraton hotel out by the airport.  This was a somewhat traditional buffet, they had the whole pig that was roasted and they just reach inside and grab some meat.  They had pulsami (mmmmm) and salads.  I didn't try the oysters and squid, and the desserts left much to be desired - not sweet enough, but how do you make cooked papaya and truffles too sweet.

This is a picture of the dancers, behind them were about 5 drummers. One of the "very healthy" female dancers did a solo dance and boy could she shake those very ample hips! It was quite impressive and amazing.  After their show, we moved outside for the fire dance.  This was a great fire dance; of course it's the first one we've seen.

On Saturday, we went across the island to snorkel at "clam" beach with Elder and Sister Gillette,

The Gillettes are newly arrived vocational instructors for the school from Idaho.  They own like 1500 acres in Idaho so they refer to the farms here as 'gardens'.

The name of the beach is Lefaga Bay at Savaia.This is a beautiful inlet beach, bay and in the picture where the dark water begins is a marine preserve defined with buoys and rope around a coral reef populated with giant clams.  These clams are about 2 to 2.5 feet across, they have a membrane between the two shells and at one end a large open tube.  There were some smaller ones that were about 8 - 12 inches.  The colors were phenomenal - blues, pinks, browns, yellows and greens.  These pictures are from the website as we don't have a go-pro yet -- wink, wink--hint, hint!! Children, children.

The water is flat, no surf, and is only a couple of feet deep  up to about 6 feet deep in the preserve.
Shanna's swim belt arrived so she was brave enough to snorkel out and see the clams.  If the clams sense anything inside, they will slam shut, so you want to watch your fins.

Adrian, Todd and the boys were in California last week and sent us some pictures, which we love and as many as we can download are our screen savers at the office.  A very favorite is this one of Melanee - a new little one is obvious.  Wow, keep sending us pictures.

Today, Sunday, it is raining (timu = rain; afa = storm) like crazy and the deacons came out to our car with an umbrella to escort us into the gym where we have church.  Our church is at the Pesega School Gym and the side walls are open, so you can watch the rain, wind and sun (la = sun) and palm trees when it is good weather.  It's somewhat of a distraction during sacrament meeting, but it is a beautiful scene to look upon.

From manaia motu Samoa!