Life can be hard

Sister Tucker and I went visiting teaching the other day with Elsie, our visiting teaching companion.  We first went to see Daisy, who was also going to go visiting with us.  When we got to her place, we found that she was not feeling well.  Sister Tucker, being a nurse, diagnosed her the best she could.  She thought we had better take her to see a  doctor.   I'm wondering if she has walking pneumonia.  As I've said before, you can't always drive close enough to get to where people live, so sometimes you have to do a little hiking to get there.  We had to hold on to her and walk her up a hill that was a bit rugged, she was having a hard time breathing.  When we got to the hospital, Elsie took right over.  She went in the room with her to get checked out, then down to get an xray, and talked with the doctor.  We let her do whatever she could without our help.  She really is quite self reliant.   They decided to admit her for two or three days.  I'm glad they did, she didn't seem well at all.  Daisy is about fifty years old (best guess).  She never married, but helps take care of all of these children, plus her father.  Families take care of each other, so you don't always know who belongs to who.  I'm attaching a picture of Elsie and Daisys father (amazing picture).  The other picture is of the children that she also helps to care for. 

On Saturday night, the seniors went to Sister Tuckers apartment for a Halloween Party.  It was really fun.  She had it all decorated with Halloween stuff.  They don't celebrate Halloween here, but Uncle Bills, a variety store, gets in all kinds of holiday stuff for the Americans and Australians.  Here is what she had for us:

- She had a menu for us to choose from.  You got to choose 6 items.  The items consisted of things that you would not be able to figure out like; lizzard lips, ghost guts...I can't remember what all they were, but it was funny.  She put the items on your plate that you ordered and served it to you.  Some of my items were ghost guts (spagetti sauce), lizzard lips  (a serrated knife) to eat with, witches blood (drink).  In the end, we eventually all ate spagetti, garlic bread, and salad. 

- We played halloween bingo.

-  We had a mummy wrapping contest.  Each couple got one roll of white toilet paper.  One of you had to be the mummy, and the other one got to be the wrapper upper!  It was funny because the paper kept tearing, so it  became quite comical.  Elder Lindeman was the winning mummy.

On Sunday,  Bishop Mahit asked me if I would help out in the Young Women's organization.   Nellie, the YWs president went to Australia to pick fruit for six months.  She is trying to earn money for school.  Recruiters from Austrailia come through the islands in the summer looking for people to pick their fruit.  They pay them $10,000 Austrailian dollars for 6 months of hard work.   So people will leave their families to make money that is desperately needed.   I haven't been in YW for many years, but I told him that I would do my best.  He talked to Sister Tucker too, and asked her to help out in the Primary.  They want her to do the sharing time. The Primary is very disorganized, she'll do alot more than sharing time, I'm sure. Greg teaches in the High Priest Quorum.   We're happy to help, but the ultimate goal is to help them develop the skills to do it on their own.  We love our ward and are happy to serve.

Yesterday, we picked the Anderson's up from the airport.  They are the senior couple that was serving on the island of Santo.  They will be returning home to Genola, Utah, next week.  They had family home evening with us last night. They will truly be missed.   The next day, Greg and I took them back to the airport for a short trip to Tanna before they go home.  If you come to Vanuatu, you have to go to Tanna and see the active volcano.  We've been to the base of the volcano, but not to the top to look inside yet!  We'll do that on our next audit cycle in January.  They will return to Port Vila on Friday.  That night we will have a going away party for them at the mission home with Pres. and Sister Granger.  They also told us of some really crummy news. You know the Ipson's, the new couple that replaced them?  They got robbed!  Someone slit the screen of a window and was able to reach in an unlock the door.  They took a couple of computers and a projector.  This happened while they were at home, in probably the early morning hours.   They've only been there three days.  Sometimes bad things happen don't they?  You just have to move forward and look forward to brighter days.  I'll check in again soon! 

Love you all.  Elda and Sis Robison XOXO

Pouring Rain

Wow! It's been pouring rain today.  We were able to get pickleball in this morning, but an hour after that it started to come down by the buckets full.  The temperature is starting to inch its way up too.  It was quite humid yesterday, so sauna weather is on its way.  We can hardly wait!! ha ha.

Wednesday night, the senior missionaries, along with the members of the Mele (Maylay) Branch, were invited to a "smol kakae" (which means small meal) at the new Mele branch chapel that was just built.  They are thanking the construction workers and contractors for their good work.  The Davidson's attend Mele and are so excited for the members.

As we left our apartment and on our way to Mele, Mary and Anita, two of the women that clean our apartments were just finishing for the day.  We asked them if we could give them a ride home.  Mary is in our ward and lives out by where we were going.  They both got in the truck and away we went.  We dropped Anita off down the road.  As we continued on our way, I remembered that we needed bread.   Greg pulled into Crave bakery where we like to buy our bread.  We like to buy it there because you can get whole grain bread, and it's really good.  After I bought the bread, I asked Mary if I could lay it by her on the back seat.  She said, oh yes thank you.  Mary doesn't speak much English, so it's hard to understand her sometimes, and she inturn doesn't always understand us.  When we got to the place where we would drop her off, she had us pull over.  Very seldom do you take them right to their home.  They live up a path that you can only get to by walking.  She then thanked us, took the bread and was on her way.  She thought we bought the bread for her!  That's okay I'm sure she needed it more than we did.  So funny.  We love Mary!  

The celebration at Mele was suppose to start at 5:00.  When we got there they were no where near ready to start.  We couldn't stay because we had our returned missionary self reliance class to teach.  The chapel is really nice and alot better than the bush chapel they were meeting in.  

This is the second My Plan for Returned Missionary's/self reliance class that we've held.  This go around, we started with six returned missionaries; five young men and one young women.  We now have between three or four attending on a regular basis which for them isn't a bad attendance. (I'll attach a picture of them)  We've been talking to them about planning for the future.  They are really at a loss for planning a career, let alone have a wife and pikinini's, it's hard to do that here.  There just aren't that many jobs available.  The only manufacturing they have here is Vanuatu water.  They have a spring here and can bottle water.  They also make ice cream, and have a factory called Switi, however, the cream comes from New Zealand.  Let me tell you, it's some of the best ice cream I've ever had.  Kinda weird to have something like that here.  There are some government jobs, there's the gas and electric company, bus drivers, clerks at the Bon Marche (grocery store) and the many Chinese five and dime stores, hotel maides, teachers and a few other things.  The pay is maybe $1-2 American dollars an hour.  If you work at the Bon Marche, once you get three years in with them, you get fired because they are suppose to start giving you retirement benefits and they don't want to do that.  Some of these young adults are starting to want more than that.  

This is the returned missionary class picture.  Brian is the one on the far right.  He wants to be a pilot.

Some of the young men in our class have an idea of what they want to do, as far as a career goes, in their quest for becoming self reliant.  Brian wants to be a pilot, so he's listening intently on what Greg has to say to him.  Moroni wants to be a doctor, and Greg wants to get a business degree.  They don't realize all that's involved.  They don't have all the options and opportunity that we have in American.  The church has programs to help such as Pathway /BYU Idaho, BYU Hawaii, they can get some money to help with the college fees.   The Perpetual Education Fund was available at one time, but it was taken away because no one was paying it back.  There are some government grants, but it seems that your have to "know someone" to get any of that money.  The is a private scholarship program that was set up by some rich Austrailian.  FiJi has a program where they can go there to get a plumbing or electrician license.   It's difficult though, because it's so expensive.  With the internet being world wide, the young people in these countries are starting to see what's out there, and some of them want more.  It will be interesting to see what happens in the years to come.  You just don't realize how blessed you are until you come to country that struggles mightily.  We love our brothers and sisters here in Vanuatu, and we'll do what we can for them.  Love to all of you at home.  XO   Elda and Sista Robison

Missionaries

President and Sister Granger were in Tanna for a zone conference this past week, so they were unable to meet new missionaries coming to the mission.  They asked Greg and I if we would represesnt them, and greet them at the airport, along with the travel elders.  Sister Granger asked me to take pictures and video of their arrival.  When they saw all of us waiting to meet them, they started to waive and hurry toward us.  They are so excited to be here.  You can tell their going to be successful.   Two sisters are from Tonga, and two from Samoa.  One of the elders is from New Zealand, not sure where the other two elders are from.  All I know, is that they are happy to be here, and we're glad they're here too!  The day after new missionaries come, they are taken to the bank to get their finance stuff taken care of.  The banks here are a source of GREAT FRUSTRATION.  Vanuatu deals only in cash.  They don't have direct deposit,  so everyone has to go to the bank if they want it deposited.  When they go to the bank, they wait forever to see a teller.  You have to take a number, then sit and wait until your number appears on the board.  It's like going to the DMV years ago.  That's why if you aren't one of the first in line when they open, you could be there a good two hours.   They use an ATM card to get cash out.

One of the fun things we get to do is make breakfast for the new arriving missionaries.  We make it for them the morning they go to the bank.  We prepare it in our apartment and take it to the mission office.  They take it with them and eat it while they wait in line. The breakfast consists of; an egg sandwich, piece of fruit, cookie, drink and a scripture. We want it to be a hardy breakfast in case they're there all day!  I'm really on one about the banks aren't I ?  The scripture we chose for the meal was D&C 68: 5,6.   The one we chose for last month was D&C 84:88.  I just type it up and put it in their sack.  They're both great scriptures.  D&C 84:88 is my favorite scripture.

Every morning you can smell the fires that people start as they get ready to make breakfast.  On our way to play pickleball, we see people walking along the road with their three loaves of french bread for $1.50 from one of the local bakery's.  They are taking it home for breakfast.  I've mentioned before that the Chinese have a large presence here in Vanuatu.  They have introduced white bread, white rice and maggie noodles (ramen noodles) into the diet of the people here.  As a result, there is a  diabetes problem here among the people.  The people are selling alot of their produce, instead of eating it, and buying rice.  Rice is filling, and they eat LOTS of it.  It's not that these things are bad to eat, but when they become a staple in your diet, they aren't good for you.     

Yesterday, the senior couples went to the airport to met a new couple coming into the mission.  They aren't assigned to Port Vila, they will be serving in Santo.  They are replacing the Anderson's who will be leaving in a couple of weeks.  They are an amazing couple just like the Anderson's.  They will be in Port Vila until Wednesday,  getting some training from Brian King, the head guy in charge of Seminaries and Institute.  We had a welcome dinner for them at the mission home last night.  They are the Ipson's from Sandy, Utah.  They live on about 160th South and 13th East.  We've met several of the young missionaries that are also from Utah.  It will be fun to attend missionary reunions and see them from time to time.  We love you all and think of you often.  

We'll write again soon.  Love, Elda and Sista Robison XO

Visiting Teaching

Sista Tucker and I arranged with our visiting teaching companions, Elsie and Daisy, two older sisters in our ward, to go visiting teaching, Thursday morning.  Sista Tucker ended up not being able to go because of a meeting she had to attend that morning.  We decided to make arrangements to go the next week instead.  Almost everyone has a cell phone here, the problem is  soooo often a cell phone company will run a special that gives them a better deal, the people drop the provider they have, their number changes, and well, you know the rest of the story.  We tried to reach Elsie, and the RS President, know such luck.  So, Thursday morning, Greg, bless his heart, took us visiting teaching.  He keeps telling me I need to drive, but I don't want to drive the treacherous terrain around here!   I'm not kidding about the rugged roads in some of these areas where people live.  Some of the chuck holes  in the these roads are a foot deep.  You need a four wheel drive to manuver those craters that's for sure!  We picked Elsie up at our designated place, Daisy wasn't able to come.  Elsie is a real character.  She is a bold, hearty, woman who takes no sas, but she also loves Papa God, and the Book of Mormon.  One Sunday morning, before sacrament meeting started, she passed a guy bent over talking to someone.  She then slapped him on the behind and said, "gud moning."  I could hardly contain myself.  I had to try hard to keep from laughing my head off.   I'll attach a picture of Elsie.  Anyway, back to visiting teaching.  We did some hill climbing to get to our visits.  Greg just parked the truck and waited while we did our visiting.  It was so amazing to trek down these narrow paths, see where people live, and the conditions they live in.  Life seems so hard, yet they are so happy.  As you pass by each camp, you see the children playing and having a good time, and then a mama will call out, "gud moning." They are such kind people.   I love to take pictures of the people, and they love to have their picture taken.  I always ask them if they want to see the picture I took.  They always do!

Saturday morning we helped with a project called the "chicken initiative."  Elder and Sister Sackley are the Humanitarian couple.  Among other things, they are helping people learn how to build portable chicken coops and raise chickens. The church is actually helping a non profit organization with the project.   The coop is designed so that it can be easily moved.  The idea is to not have to use chicken feed, but use what grows on the ground.  The floor of the coop is the ground, so when the chickens have eaten what is available where they're at, the coops can be moved to another area of the yard.  The chickens are helping out by creating the fertilizer for the spots they will be moved back and forth to.     Those of us that could help, met at the Black Sands ward, and loaded up our vehicles with those that were interested in building a coop.  There was about twenty five people that showed up.  We then traveled to a chicken farm way up in the hills.  When we got there, they gathered the people together and instructed them on the care of the chickens and how the coop should be built.  The church purchased some of the wood to be used and had it delivered to the site.  While the people were getting instruction, we cut the wood up.  The people were given the wood pieces for the base, plus the chicken wire.  They are responsible to gather the rest of the wood to finish it up.   In two weeks, someone will check to see if the coop is finished, and if it is, they will be given five chicks.    Right now, the people just let their chickens run loose.  The chickens lay their eggs where ever, and either the rats get them, or they don't find alot of them.  This could be a real blessing to them.

On Sunday, while we were waiting for Relief Society to start, this little pikinini walked by me. He stopped and just stared at me (I'll attach a picture of the look).  Then, as I often do, I aimed my phone to take a picture.  All of the sudden, he started to SCREAM, and I mean scream.  One of the mama's scooped him up and tried to console him.  That happens alot with tiny toddlers.  They don't see too many white faces, and we scare them to death!  I wanted to pick him up and give him a love, but I don't think that would have been such a good idea. 

We see that Fall is on its way there at home.  I've had some beautiful picture sent to me, and it looks so beautiful.  Summer is on its way here, and it's starting to get warmer every day.  I'll close for now, we love and miss you all.  

Love Elda and Sista Robison XOXO

Zone Conference

We attended Zone Conference this morning with the young missionaries. They are so fun to be with. They are so enthusiastic about missionary work. President and Sister Granger work hard to help them stay focused on the work. They memorize all kinds of things, and boy can they recite them. We attended the morning session of training, and then went to Golden Port for lunch with them. The Golden Port is a fairly nice hotel, with a pretty good, and reasonably priced Chinese restaurant. Greg and I took three darling sisters with us to the restaurant. Two were from Tonga and the other from Malaysia. They are new to the mission and seem to be adjusting pretty well. If I remember to attach a picture, it's with me, the three sisters and Sister Granger. Don't focus to hard on my hair! I got scalped again the other day. I guess I'll just plan on having bad hair days until I get home! ha! They really don't know how to cut hair very well here. Anyway, lunch was really fun. We sat at a table with several Elders that were a hoot! They can put the food away too, especially the Tongan Elders. At our table we had Elders from Idaho, Mexico City, Tonga, Philipines, and Vanuatu. It is so
amazing to be with these fabulous missionaries from all over the world.

Friday night, the seniors were invited to attend the last two hours of the zone conference. If you ask me to describe the room that night, I would say that it was spiritually energized! Those missionaries are so well prepared to teach the gospel. They know the scriptures and have strong testimonies. President and Sister Granger love them and want them to be successful, and they are.

This weekend was conference weekend for us. We met at the church and watched conference with the members. Saturday, we met from 10:00-12:00 for the morning session, with a hour break, then from 2:00-4:00. We had the same schedule on Sunday. Many of the members brought a lunch and had a picnic outside and waited for the next session. They walk everywhere they go, so they don't just run home for a quick bite. Today is Sunday, and I was sitting outside visiting and taking pictures of the pikinini's as we waited for the afternoon session to start. One of the mothers had a pikinini that wasn't feeling well, so Greg and I took her home. You should have seen the bumpy road we took to get her home! Luckily we have a four wheel drive truck or we wouldn't be able to get around. We loved being able to watch conference with the members. They are trying hard, and are good members. I think I mentioned, that conference was translated into Bislama. They had a room for those that wanted it in English. We had quite a few that sat in on the English version. Many of the members can speak fairly good English, way better than my Bislama. Many want to learn English too, so its good
for them to listen. Wasn't conference outstanding?! It was fun to hear Elder's Stevenson, the apostle, and Elder Ardern, of the Seventy, because they were just here to visit Vanuatu. The members were excited to see them speak again.

 A few weeks ago, the District Presidents from Malekula, Santo and Tanna were here in Port Vila for some training. President Granger had things to train them on, and Greg talked to them about some audit issues. President Granger always has big bowls of candy on the tables for those he is training. After training, the Presidents gave a look as if to say, "do we get the candy"? President Granger told them they could have the candy. Greg said, they all stuffed their pockets full. He said it was so funny. I'm sure they don't see a lot of candy, let alone have the money to buy it. The next time we go to the islands to do the audits, I'm going to bring them each a bag of candy.

We got an email the other day for the Area Auditor, Glen Reid, inviting us to attend Assistant Area Audit Training, at the service center, in Fiji, 26-30 November. We are really excited. We had a lay over there before coming to Vanuatu, so it will be fun see the island. We'll send pictures! I'll close for now, but we want you all to know that we miss you and love you all very much!

Love, Elda and Sista Robison

Conference

We've been watching conference on the internet this past week.  The members here will be watching a recording  this coming Saturday and Sunday at the stake center, which will be translated into Bislama.  There will be a room set up with a TV so that we can watch it in English.  Greg and I watched the General Women's Conference the other day and loved it.  We haven't listened to all of the talks yet, but I understand Elder Stevenson talked about his trip to Vanuatu.  Can't wait to hear it!  Our lesson in Relief Society was on President Uchtdorf's talk from the General Women's Conference, about the three sisters whose names were; Mad, Sad and Glad. If you listened to the talk, you know how inspiring and encouraging his words were.  In class, we were all given a sheet of paper with either a mad face, sad face or a glad face.  The teacher then read different scenarios in life, and had us hold up whatever face we thought applied.   One of the scenarios she read was, "your boss just came into work and told you that you didn't need to come any more."  A couple of the sisters held the glad face up!!  It was hilarious!  What's funny too is that Sister Tucker and I understand only a fraction of what is being said! The lessons are given in Bislama, mingled with a little bit of English, so we struggle a mightily.  

Today, Sister Tucker and I held our English class after church.  There's usually about six sisters that attend.  We are reading the Mormon with them.  We have them read a verse, then we discuss what it means and talk about any words that might be hard for them to understand.  They have a hard time comprehending what they've read.  I just imagine myself trying to learn how to read Bislama, but not understanding what I've read, so I know how they must feel.  After class, they always give us a hug and tell us they love us, and thank us for helping them.  I tear up ever time.  I just love and adore those sweet sisters.  When we're finished, we head out into the bush to take them home.  

I was looking at some of my receipts from the grocery store the other day, and thought I would share with you some of the bargins we got!  Ha!  A few things we've picked up at the grocery store lately:  Greg loves bleu cheese, so, for 1/4 of an American pound it was ($18.35), 8 oz. sour cream ($4.50), 4 lb pork roast (20.00), 1 lb hamburger ($9.50), Kelloggs frosted flakes ($8.50), 15 oz can or corn ($2.60),  large box of corn flakes (12.50).  I just have to keep in mind that it costs alot to have things shipped here, but really, $12.50 for corn flakes! BROTHER.

We started a new class on becoming self reliant both spiritually and temporarily.  The class is for returned missionaries, helping to keep them focused after returning from their missions.  We work with the missionary couple who heads up education and self reliance.  The class is off to a rough start, with just two attending.  You never know how many you're going to have.  It's like that with most things here.  The members are good, they're just easily distracted.  

Remember the spider in our yard that I wrote about?  I sent a picture, a few posts back.  Greg named her Charlotte, for Charlottes Web.  We've been watching her for the past three weeks.  Her web was getting quite flimsey from the wind and the rain that we've been having.  Sadly, the other day the web finally fell apart.  We watched as she slowly tried to get to the branch of a tree where her web was still attached.  The next day she was gone.  We were quite fond of Charlotte, and will miss her.  This afternoon, Greg looked out in the tree and low and behold, another spider has  repaired Charlotte's web and has moved in!  Isn't that amazing?!  

Thursday and Friday this week, we will be attending zone conference with the young elders and sisters in the mission.  We just received several new missionaries in Port Vila.  This past week, I've been helping Sister Tucker with laundry, as she gets the housing ready for them.  As I've mentioned, we have a little time before we do our audits, so we'll be helping with additional duties.  I'll close for now, but I'll write again after the zone conference and tell you all about it.  Take good care.  

We love you all.  Elda and Sista Robison XO 

Volcano

Hello All, 

We've received calls and emails from many of you concerned about the Volcano eruption here in Vanuatu.  Vanuatu is a country consisting of 80 islands here in the South Pacific.  We live on the island of Efate in the town of Port Vila.  The island of Ambae is the island with the Volcano that's been flexing its muscles.  The church pulled the missionaries off the island last week.  About 5,000 people have been moved to the other side of the island away from the smoke and ash.  If things get worse, they are planning to evacuate the whole island, about 11,000 people.  They did actually evacuate 1,000 people to other islands.  If you look Vanuatu us on the internet, you can see the position of the islands.  Thank you for your love and concern.  I'm working on a post that will soon be ready.  

We love you all!  Love Elda and Sista Robison XO