Russell and Eileen's Church Missions: BIRTHDAY FUN

This week was a pleasant week with the opportunity to celebrate Russell’s birthday which was September 11^th, a memorable day for most Americans. Here in Indonesia at our office we celebrate birthdays by bringing food in for the office staff. Russell has mentioned for a while that it would be fun to return to the days gone by when he was a younger missionary and could go out and yell “SATE” and an Indonesian man with his little grill would come running and cook sate before his eyes. Unfortunately that would be quite a trick for the approximately 25 people that serve in the office. So Russell made arrangements with the sate man up the street to cook 250 tusuk (little skewers) of chicken and bring them for lunch on Monday. The sate came with peanut sauce, which is typical here. Russell and I both think it is delicious. It is like ground peanuts with some spice to it. We also ordered some fried rice, cap cai (vegetables ) and I bought a chiffon cake for dessert. The office staff all sang Happy Birthday to Russell and Suman (the office caretaker) brought some hot boiled peanuts.

Tuesday we had a skype phone call with our 4 out of our 6 children and ten out of our eleven grandchildren. It was fun to see how much our grandchildren have grown up and hear about their interests and how their schooling is going. One family was showing goats at the fair, one had just come back from boating, another was canning peaches, and one was eager to see a tour of our apartment via the camera on our computer. It made us feel like we were sort of part of their lives again by being able to talk with many of them on one day. Hopefully we will be able to coordinate schedules to be able to talk to the other granddaughter soon.

After our phone calls we went sight seeing in Jakarta. This is the first time we have done this in 5 months. It was fun being out to actually see something rather than to have to be somewhere. First we went to a place called the Monas. The Monas is the National Monument in Indonesia and celebrates their independence. It is 433 ft. high. There was a sign outside indicating the wait some days could be up to 3 hours long. Fortunately, since it was beastly hot, we were able to go straight up to the top. Although the air wasn’t quite clear due to the smog it was interesting to look out and see Jakarta in all directions. We had many people ask to take our pictures, but most wanted Russell’s picture. Many women wanted to stand directly next to him, which we did not allow. After all, he is married and a missionary! Several cab drivers have told us he looks like Bill Clinton. I guess to them all middle-aged Caucasian males with white hair look the same! Russell was definitely overdressed for the occasion. Maybe the women thought he actually was Bill Clinton, even though he had a missionary name-tag on.

After the Monas we went to Istiqlal Mosque. This Mosque is the 3^rd largest in the world according to our guide. It holds 120,000 people. We registered ourselves as Christian, but the guide immediately asked us if we were Mormons. When we said yes, he said he had been to our church’s office a couple of times. He also mentioned that he had taken a leader of our church named Packer through this Mosque. In 2005 Elder Packer, who is an apostle of our church, came to Indonesia and was allowed to offer a prayer in this mosque which was quite a special opportunity. As we toured the building there were people meditating, praying, some sleeping, and there was also a group of school children in the middle of school. It was enjoyable to be taken through on a private tour. This gentleman had also taken President Clinton and President Obama through this mosque when they visited Indonesia.

We also visited the National Museum of Indonesia. I (Eileen) am not much of a museum gal, but there certainly is a lot of history in Indonesia. Russell had to finally prod me on to leave. On our way back we drove by the house Russell lived in 36 years ago but it had changed so much that he could barely recognize it anymore.

Saturday afternoon we had the wonderful opportunity of attending the baptism of a woman named Kharisma. Kharisma has been investigating the church for a couple of years and decided to get baptised Saturday. It was a beautiful service with the young missionaries singing, Sister Beaman and I said prayers, and Elder Beaman performed the baptism and Russell was a witness. We were very happy for her and could see the happiness in her eyes afterwards.

So this year we will both grow one year older while living here in Indonesia. We are so grateful for a merciful, kind Heavenly Father who knows us personally and meets our needs, not always in the way we are hoping, but in a way that we can learn and grow. We have much to be thankful for. Most of all we are grateful for each other and the opportunity we have to be together as servants of God. It is always easy to see what we don’t have, but we want to be grateful for what we do have and spread that knowledge, joy and kindness to others.