Friday, 4 Nov 2016

The week is a blur.  The time goes so fast and the days seem to be so long, it is hard to remember what we did - if anything.

Oh yeah - we spent most of Thursday and Friday working with the YSA and some others on English and their written homework or other written materials.

Mike worked with a Spanish girl who has a Masters degree in Chemical Engineering and is trying to get her PE (Professional Engineering) certification here in Australia, plus get at least a 7 (out of 9) mark on her IELTS exam.  She is smart, but this is still an uphill climb.  Changing from Spanish to English is not an easy chore - changing from any language to English is not an easy chore.
In most cases we start our lessons with prayer, but not always - it depends upon the faith of the person we are working with.

Margaret is working with a Muslim lady from Iran and they are getting along quite well. Today, Friday, the lady brought in a lentil soup for the missionaries or whomever wanted some soup. In Islam, she said, that they believe in vicarious works - her son is sick and should have some nice, hot soup but he does not live in Sydney so she made soup for others as a way of doing a good service for others in place of doing the service for her son.  The blessings will be the same as if she did the service directly for her son.  

Friday we got a call from one of the young men in my Priest quorum when I was the Young Men's president here in 1995.  Simon Degaris was in town and wanted to catch up and feed us, so Margaret and I met him for a quick sandwich and some gas bagging.  We will catch up with him some more the next time he is in town. It was so good to spend some time with him and catch up. Then we came back to the ward building and vacuumed/cleaned level 1 while the YSA held a game night on Level 2.  We left around 8:45 pm (before game night was over) and headed for home and bed - I was tired and was looking for a good night's sleep.