October

October letter 2022

Elder Muhammad baptizing
Aluvereti in the Verata Branch

This is been a month of unique baptisms. The first Sunday of October we got word that our little branch in Verata was going to have a baptism at 9 AM. So we started out an hour earlier to travel up there. We had the service in the home of the first counselor in the branch presidency, because it has a very convenient creek. We had opening hymn, prayer, and Baptismal talk in the main room of the house and then trouped down the hill to the deep spot in the creek and the baptism took place. After the participants were dry, we finished the service, got up and stretched for a minute, and then started Sacrament meeting. 

Elder Andrew baptizing
Kelerayani in the Verata 
Branch

The following week there was another baptism scheduled, and it was also conference weekend for Fiji. There’s no Internet service back in the village where we attend, so we had the morning session downloaded on our laptop. After the 9 AM baptism service, we plugged the computer into the main room TV and sat and listened do the Fijian translation of the Sunday morning session. I found that as everybody was glued to the TV, I was able to discreetly bring up the talks on my phone and read them. It’s almost the same as listening to it in English, because you still have the tabernacle choir.

Our transport truck

 

On October 22 (Saturday) we were traveling to the west side of the island to do some Self-

The Beach in Sigatoka

Reliance training, and we planed to stop in a little town called Sigatoka on the way, because when we told the local branch president we were traveling through, he said he would be happy to meet with us after the baptism they had planned in their branch that day. We were supposed to arrive at 3 PM, but we were delayed by road construction so we called ahead and said “don’t wait for us, we’ll be late”. When we arrived at the church building we heard the members singing hymns and the branch president greeted us at the door. We quickly took seats in the back of the room and joined in the hymns, but the branch president continued to look anxiously out the door and down the road. We thought at first that the people to be baptized weren’t there but we spotted them a few rows in front of us, so we knew that wasn’t the problem. Pretty soon a transport truck pulled up and everyone in the room, about 20 people, went out to the truck, and climbed in over the tailgate (fortunately there wasn’t enough room for Steve and I and the branch president to fit in the transport so we went in our truck). We drove down the road about 4 or 5 km to a beach access, and held the baptismal service on the beach. I’ve seen lots of pictures, but this was the first time I’ve attended a baptism in the ocean.

We have several projects going, but at the beginning of every week we look at our calendar and think “It’s not gonna be very busy this week”. But at the end of the week,  “Wow! We were so busy this week!”

Parking was pretty tight
at Korovou Chapel.
Good thing Steve stays skinny!

One of our projects is helping the members of Korovou District

Several children from the 
Verata Branch

obtain seasonal supplies  and seeds for their vegetable gardens. This assignment sent us on a hunt throughout Fiji for supplies and methods of vegetable gardening in this climate. Our eyes have been educated. Since everything is green and lush and beautiful, we have been missing the little vegetable gardens tucked into many nooks and crannies around town, and also the larger farming operations that do a lot of intercropping. You see bananas, coconut, cassava, dalo, ginger, and sweet potatoes all in the same plot of ground, intermingled. As we travel further into the hills, the cultivated fields are sometimes very steep hillsides. What the members in the villages need is assistance with seeds and supplies (fertilizer, compost, weed killer, etc.) from season to season which, of course, here in Fiji  is year-round. Self-reliance comes into it because they’ve been taking their usual crops to market, and then have to bring them back home because everybody else takes the same kind of produce to market. We’re helping them nurture a greater variety of produce, such as tomatoes, cucumbers, cabbages, and eggplant for their own consumption, as well as increasing opportunities at the market. Those vegetables take more care, and are more sensitive to growing conditions than the regular crops. The villagers also need to learn resource management a bit better so they end up with either enough money or enough seeds to take care of the next season's planting. 

Members enjoying shade and 
lunch after district meeting

Ding! Ding! Ding! Enter the self-reliance missionaries. We have 89 families living in districts on the north eastern side of the island between the main highway and the coast. As soon as we leave the main highway, we travel on gravel roads to the villages. Each branch has four or five villages associated with it. Steve and I (mostly Steve) are working with the district presidency and the branch president of each unit to put together a program that not only supplies resources, but also has an education component so these members don’t have to keep approaching charitable organizations for donations to keep their gardens going. We are starting off with fast offering funds, but Steve has been writing a proposal to go to the area welfare self-reliance (WSR) office in New Zealand for additional funding. He’s done an amazing job researching the available resources and getting it all down on paper to submit what is, essentially, a grant 

proposal to the area office.

The beautiful chapel in Korovou
with a garden growing on the property next 
to it

 We’ve been told that there is funding available for member projects, but this is relatively new and nobody  knows exactly how to apply for, and administrator those funds, including the area managers. With the encouragement of the Mission President, the district leaders, and the local WSR manager, we decided to jump in, be bold, and ask for money. It’s a lot more complicated than it sounds. Fortunately, Steve had grant proposal writing experience during his years with the Sacramento Police Dept.

We had our first senior missionary couple Farewell a week ago. All the senior couples (and two senior sisters) met

Senior Missionaries,
President & Sister Marcus
Fiji, Suva Mission
14 October 2022

for a potluck dinner at the Mission President’s home. The Denney’s have been here for 18 months taking care of the mission finances and the vehicle fleet. Steve and I went to Riverton, UT in April 2021 three times so he could train Sister Denney as the finance secretary. They served remotely for several weeks until they could actually come to Fiji. We sure love them and will miss them. We also had another couple go home unexpectedly, for health complications. The Jorgesen's were handling all the housing responsibilities. Their departure leaves a big gap in the mission office, because new missionaries from outside Fiji are coming in every transfer. All those flats sitting empty for two years have to be cleaned, then supplied, so missionaries can actually live in them. So far, my biggest responsibility to those projects has been to hem some curtains.

The Indian holiday Diwali is a great experience in Suva. On Tuesday 25 October, our landlord, Avinish, who lives on the property next to us, greeted us at 7:30 am with a plate of goodies; small, bite-sized cookies that were both sweet and savory. His wife, Shammie, told us not to cook because they would bring us dinner. They also made the same visit and request to the Roper’s (the senior couple who live in the flat next door). Sure enough, about 6:00 pm, they came and delivered a delicious potato lentil curry, some carrot, cucumber and yogurt dressing, a small pumpkin curry that was pretty spicy for our kaivalangi tongues, and a foil wrapped pouch of puri (think of a cross between naan and Indian fry bread). We took our treasures next door to the Roper’s (who had the same meal delivered) and enjoyed a great Diwali feast. By the time we finished eating, the fireworks had started, and continued until midnight. Learn more about Diwali in Wikipedia, on Google.

My new favorite picture of Steve
at Kiuva Beach. One of the two people
walking in the surf is me. The other is
Rhonda Roper. The Roper's introduced 
us to this beautiful place

Leftover from MTC 
health clinic

This is Uraia Tabua. He creates
YouTube content with 
authentic Fijian village life.
I acted like his biggest fan
when I saw him at the Pure Fiji 
sale one Saturday morning. He comes
into Suva every 2 weeks
to visit his special friend.

General Conference coloring sheets

Enjoying Sunday morning session
9 October 2022

The baby is gazing out the door
during Sunday morning
conference session

Students working in the garden
at the Fiji LDS College
in Tamavua