At the Ballgame

We went to the Oakland A's baseball game. It was SO cold. Isn't it
supposed to be warm in the middle of July?

Fiddler On The Roof

This is a few of the senior couples at a performance of Fiddler On The
Roof. We had a great picnic together before and then enjoyed the
production. Even though it's the middle of July, we always are
prepared with coats, blankets and mittens. When the fog rolls in, it
gets very cold. The production was very good.

Look A Likes

Joseph had a member in Wales, Grandma Taylor, who knew that his
parents were on a mission, and knitted these dolls for us. I think
they look just like us.

The Gift of Tongues

When our stake president set us apart as missionaries he blessed me
with the gift of tongues and I wondered how that would come to pass.
We were going to California, and didn't everyone in America speak
English? I soon found that the Oakland San Francisco area is a very
diverse area with many cultures. The mission officially teaches 11
languages, with missionaries from about 25 different countries. In
the supply room were 100 different languages of the book of Mormon.
Mostly we taught in English, Spanish, Chinese, Tongan, Laotian,
Tagalog, Fijian,. Amharic (Ethiopia) and Igbo (Nigeria) were also
asked for. But the gift of tongues came into play in other ways
which I didn't expect. One of my duties was inputting baptism records
and sometimes a 19-20 year olds handwriting is not the best. I
learned to say nihow (Chinese hello) and ola (Spanish hello), and I
learned to like otai, a Tongan drink. I learned from a black woman
where "way out in the way way" was. We also learned the language of
poverty and welfare as we worked with a family who lived in the
flatlands of Oakland. I worked on a project for a visiting GA where
each missionary was to write a short paragraph and email to me. I
quickly found that while our foreign missionaries knew how to speak
and read English, they didn't know how to write English, and I would
have to interpret what they wanted to say. One set of sisters had
never written an email before. Many American elders and sisters
didn't understand how to write a complete sentence either. Many
elders and sisters wrote in text language with no capitals or
punctuation. We eventually put together a document that could be read
and understood. I also participated in singing the National Anthem at
the Oakland A's game and the Golden State Warriors game. Teaching
many cultures to sing the United States national anthem is truly an
exercise in the gift of tongues.

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Popular car

This is an old Cadillac that someone has fixed up. I took this
picture as we were stopped at the light. If the man had known that 2
white people were taking his picture, he might not have liked that.

Another miracle.

The night before President Wade was set to drive home, his 16 year old son
ran into the back of his girlfriend's mother's car. His car was an
older one that they had just bought. The next morning we took
pictures and sent them off to the guy who fixes all the mission cars.
He called around, got parts, and came to fix the car. He called the
parts warehouse who just happened to have 2 headlights for a twenty
year old Nissan Maxima that someone had ordered and never picked up.
He came and by noon the car was fixed and ready to be driven home.

It's a miracle that no one was hurt, it's a miracle that the car guy
was free to work on the car, it's a miracle that a parts warehouse
would just happen to have 2 twenty year old lights, and it's a miracle
that they could drive out that afternoon for Utah.

The Miracle of the Bikes

Elder Lyman is in charge of the mission bikes, and missionaries who
come from other countries can get a mission owned bike instead of
buying one on their own. The mission owned bikes are kind of broken
down and needed replacing. Last week we got a call from a member in
Pleasant Hill, south and east of Oakland, who had a friend in Sonoma
whose brother had died two years ago. The brother was a "hoarder" and
had died and the brother was trying to get rid of all his stuff. He
had 29 bikes he wanted to give away. We jumped and said we'll take
them, sight unseen. So last Monday Elders Lyman and Mcintire took two
trailers and traveled 1 1/2 hours north to get the bikes. They
returned and we unloaded them into the garage. Most didn't have the
front wheel on and there were a lot of parts not matched up. There
was every kind and color.

As we did this a young man who just "happened" to be working at the
temple grounds for the summer and was staying nearby, came over to
have a look. He is a return missionary who served in this mission
some time ago. He has a summer job with the temple engineer, and he
knows bikes. He and Elder Lyman worked out a deal that he would get
one of the bikes in return for putting them together and testing them
out. He researched their values on the Internet and they are between
10 and 20 years old, but very high end racing bikes. He said the most
expensive one there would be about 3000.00 and the least one would
cost 1000.00. All in all we figured we had about 20,000.00 worth of
bikes given to us. He has worked on them all last week, took pictures
and then we are going to the local bike shops and trade them for bikes
more conducive to ones the missionaries can ride.

It is a miracle that the member called us. It is a miracle that the
brother was willing to just give them to us. It is a miracle that a
young man was nearby who knew bikes. And it is a miracle that Elder
Lyman can now work his magic and trade them. The picture is some of the bikes and a few of the admiring missionaries.