Hot Hot Hot...with extra humidity for good measure. We remain in the "rainy season," and we have just added temperatures in the upper 90s to the mix! There is an amazingly uncomfortable difference between the HOT here and the DRY hot of Utah. We are still in the midst of the summer transition period where military families are moving on, or traveling (usually to the US) for the summer, and new families and service members are arriving. We also experienced the transition from one set of Mission Leaders to new ones. President and Sister Node signed off from the Mission LINE chat (something like WhatsApp) on Monday and we got to meet President and Sister Tueller on Thursday at a special meeting at the Temple Annex. The missionaries loved and will miss the Nodes, as will we; however, I am sure we will feel the same way about the Tuellers in time.
We always enjoy when we can meet with the young missionaries and we had several opportunities this week. We saw some of them on Monday at our YSA activity, our whole Zone on Thursday, had lunch with our District on Friday, and helped some of them have a YSA activity in one of the Japanese wards. Their enthusiasm for serving and love of the Gospel is inspiring.
Our District Lunch this week, by request, featured pulled-pork sandwiches with all the usual summertime sides, including baked beans and a red-white-blue "Twinky-cake." :) It was also a farewell of sorts for our District Leader.
Transfers will come this next Friday and the mission will welcome nine new missionaries and eight are going home, including our District Leader. We never know who else will get moved around, so stay tuned... We did some "strategic resupply" of needed essentials, including peanut butter, for a couple who are nervous about getting transferred out of our district.
Our Tuesday Temple work day was devoid of missionaries this week because all attended the Zone, by Zone meetings with the new Mission Leaders. We still feel both welcome and needed by the other temple workers and we really enjoy our weekly Tuesday temple experience.
It was our turn on Thursday to meet President and Sister Tueller. They are both originally from Idaho but have been in Hawaii for the last 18 years. Both served missions in Osaka Japan several years ago. Their Japanese is a bit rusty like mine, but I am sure Heavenly Father will bless their memory to get up to speed. They introduced themselves and told us about their family. We enjoyed a nice Bento lunch and took pictures and such. After it was over, we met up with another Senior Missionary couple, Elder and Sister Yamada, who work in the Area Office for dinner. We took them over to the nearby DoD-run hotel (The New Sanno), which was new to them, and we stepped back into "America" for a while and enjoyed a nice meal together.
Our Sunday trip to Camp Fuji was a bust because all the training Marines departed and the incoming unit canceled at the last minute. We did have a nice visit with the Chaplain and did a little tidying up of the USO lounge before heading back to Zama.
Besides military families transitioning, we are in both Red Cross offices that we help also going through leadership changes. Hence, we have spent more time than usual manning the offices...
We do our best to go with the flow and look forward to cooler weather in the Fall and all the moving about completed. Until then, we follow the "Army" motto of "Semper Gumby" (Always Flexible). In addition to remaining flexible, we always have a prayer in our hearts to guide our efforts and sustain us through the challenges that come our way.
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