Rain and Conference

Island offshore from Suva where they exile all the deposed leaders after a coup

Mom and the other sister missionaries at the temple

Hi All-

Well, we were able to see all of the conference sessions yesterday and today. The rains were heavy but it cooled things off so much that many of the locals were wearing sweaters and jackets. This is for 84 Degree weather. One member of a stake presidency was wearing a ski parka. Oh well, it was perfect for us. We saw the last 2 sessions of conference this afternoon as your mother has already told you about our one week timing delay. They were tremendous sessions and those of you that missed the prophet's address for Sunday morning missed a real treat. I have never heard Pres. Monson speak so powerfully. He is a tremendous prophet and it was a pleasure to sustain him in the solemn assembly. The other addresses especially by the apostles were special and definitely worth watching again. It's difficult sometimes being away from the states and seeing things live but it was just as powerful for us with an overflowing stake center of the Fijian saints. We will have a special broadcast next week for our stake conference that is just for the South Pacific. Should be a very special treat for these people. Incidentally, one of the brethren sustained to the 1st quorum fo the 70 was Allan Packer who is Boyd K Packer's son and he and I worked together in Caracas. Wish him well. The conference was great and the spirit so strong that I didn't really want it to end. Will have to wait 6 more months for more of the same.

We are doing fine and hoping that the rains willstop soon. Has been raining heavily for several days and enough is enough. Had to taxi a taxi home from the temple the other night(3 blocks) because it was raining so hard. They are doing a lot of construction in front of the temple and the mud and muck make it difficult getting in. Hopefully it will dry up soon and they can get on with the construction and get it finished on time. We are still trying to get a new phone line so that our emails, blog, skype etc. will be faster and clearer. Working with these folks to get things done is often very trying and they do things on Fiji time-kind of like Mormon standard time. Trying to get on to the new family search program so we can do some family history while we are here. The new program is great as we looked at it on someone else's account. Have our p-day tomorrow and have lots of errands to run including filing my IRS extension. Hope it gets there. Am tired tonight but wanted to catch you up on things. Love, Dad