Kona June 18 - 24

Kona June 18 – 24

Aloha from another week in Paradise!  I’m referring to the Temple as well as this beautiful Island.  Lapule, (Prayer day), has been what we refer to as a Kona Day, meaning the weather has been clear and warm.  As we drove down the mountain to church, we could see the deep indigo blues and turquoise of the ocean along the Kona coast with the white surf of the waves crashing on the black lava beaches creating a stark contrasting border between ka aina a ke kai (the land and the sea)! This spectacular view was deeply appreciated without the veil of VOG that has become a daily insult to the beauty of God’s creation.  While the VOG, or the sulfur dioxide from the two active vents on Kilauea flanks mixed with water vapor, is part of the natural process of creating new land, we come to appreciate our Kona days as reminders of the Island’s clear beauty of the early 80’s when we first come to love this land.

This has been another learning experience in the temple for us. We had the pleasure of meeting and serving with the saints from three of the Maui Wards in long days in the temple.  Their dedication and love for temple service is humbling, yet spiritually uplifting.  While we don’t share ordinance statistics outside the temple,  I will say that record numbers of ordinances were performed!  Along with the Presidency, we labored with love for up to sixteen hours a day alongside our brothers and sisters in the Gospel! Starting this Tuesday morning at 6:00 AM we will have the opportunity to welcome one of the Maui Tongan wards to the temple for another week of spiritual fellowship and service.

Last Sunday was Father’s Day and we were invited to join Bishop Nakamoto’s family at their farm for pot luck.  Our contribution was a decadent carmel, apple, macadamia nut cake with a sugar butter glaze. Where’s that scale!

We can now add a couple of more dishes to our list of traditional Hawaiian foods we have tried.  Lau Lau is Salt Butterfish, pork, chicken and rice (or combinations of them all and anything else that’s fresh) wrapped in layers of taro leaves and ti leaves and then steamed for several hours. The filling was good but the inner layer of leaves reminded me of cooked spinach.  Probably an acquired taste.  Carolyn tries everything!  This last week she’s tried breadfruit, baked bananas, and lychee.

Today, Carolyn was asked to teach Relief Society and she spent a good deal of time this past week getting prepared. I understand she did her usual great job of teaching!  I’m sure it was not just the Mints she passed out to the sisters at the end of the lesson to illustrate the principle she was teaching.

We met a couple from Shelly Idaho in the temple this week.  I asked them if they knew my cousin who has lived in Shelly for many years and, of course, he had been their Bishop.  Today in church, we met some visitors from Mesa Arizona and we asked if they knew the Reed family and, of course, they were in their ward and Brother Baker was the stake patriarch.  Well, it is a small world!

Some “So’s” and “OK’s:”

So, gas at Costco has dropped from $4.89/gal when we arrived to $3.24 last week!  Still $.50 - $.70 cheaper than in Kona town. Mahalo nui loa Costco!

So, we are serenaded to sleep every night by a chorus of Koki frogs which make a sound like “Bob-White” or “Bo Peep”,  just like a bird.  Check it out on YouTube, look for Koki Frog sound! We thought we were in the jungle the first night we arrived with all the sounds of the forest and the softly falling rain.

OK, we really don’t just eat and go to ‘Pot Luck” all the time, in fact, we often only eat two meals a day due to our schedule.  That’s probably a really good thing because Hawaiian’s have a saying “E komo mai e ai”, Welcome, let’s eat!  It is said the Tongans have a saying…in English…”eat until you die!”

OK, Carolyn has been adopted into Malama Pono (take care, be right) by some of the more senior Relief Society sisters…this is a great honor to be a part of these very special sisters!  See an earlier post about “Malama Pono.”

We are enjoying serving all of Heavenly Father’s children that come to the temple.  Their love, dedication and spirituality is contagious and if we feast, it is in the joy and light of Jesus Christ in whose House we are privileged to serve every day.

E ka Aloha pumehana!