Wednesday, October 30th
Today was a huge day for us. I went to the office at Liahona to work on our finances. Our report is due tomorrow and there is no more time to delay. It took me 1 ½ hours! I hate that report!!!!!! Next month will be murder, with all of our projects going at the same time.
Alan stayed home for a little while this morning to watch Tonga play in the World Cup Rugby match. It is a HUGE thing here. They lost by 2 points in the last seconds. SOOOO SAD!!!
We headed into town to check on the painting project. We knew that no one was going to come until after the rugby game, but even then half of the volunteers didn’t show up. The Bishop said that they were mad about the calls in the game. They will calm down and be there tomorrow --- we hope! We had to get some more tape and some rope. It has been raining a little today and the roof is slippery. We needed rope to tie around the men on the roof so they don’t fall off. We got everyone set and then ran to Lavangatonga to do the hygiene training.
We were so afraid that we were going to be late, but we made it just on time. Sister Uai, our champion, was there, but no one else. The training was supposed to start at 3:00 but no one came until 3:30, once again Tongan Time. It drives us crazy but it is just the way it is here and it doesn’t bother anyone but the Palangis. We asked her to have 6 sisters there for us to train, but 10 sisters and 2 brothers came. One was the Bishop, but he liked what he heard and he wants to be involved. The training went well. The Spirit was strong and Sister Uai did a good job ----- I think. She did it all in Tongan. Ana went with us and she translated for me. I was trying to simplify everything, but she said whatever she wanted to say, sometimes lots more that what I said. She talked a lot about the puppet show. By the time we were finished we had everyone set up with their own materials and they were ready to go. Hopefully they will all follow through and Sister Uai will keep track of them. We are anxious to see how this goes.
We found out today that it is going to be harder to change the habits of the older people than we thought. Some of the ladies we taught said that they only wash their dishes every 3 or 4 days and most of them don’t have a sink, just a bucket. But they all want to keep their children healthy. We showed them simple ways to do that, now if they will just try to do better.
We got home at 5:30. Once again --- exhausted!!
