New Years in Emergency

We kept hearing how crazy it is in Pohnpei on New Year's Eve, but Elder Hedgpeth and I thought we would have a quiet evening, maybe hear some pans banging and even a few fireworks.
Instead we received a call about 7:30 pm that one of the Sister missionaries was on the way to the emergency room. When we arrived she was non-responsive and we realized that the fall down her stairs was much more serious than we originally thought.
The sisters and elders were definitely lead by the spirit as they gave her a blessing, started her breathing again and carried her out to their car and rushed her to the hospital.
We were very worried as she lay there for the longest time without being able to communicate or move her legs.
The missionaries stayed by her side, talking to her and even singing softly until she began to respond.
After over four hours she walked out of the Emergency room, looking just fine. Everyone knew there were some miracles that night.

Beautiful Pohnpei

This has turned out to be our favorite spot on the island so far.  There are rarely few views of the ocean because of the dense vegetation.  It is close to Kolonia and only a few minute drive from our apartment.  Tho photos don't do the view justice but gives you some idea of what it looks like here.

Mand Branch

We like to visit a different church building each Sunday to get to know as many of the members as possible. This is Mand (pronounced Mont) and is in the most beautiful setting. They have their own baptismal font outside and just behind it is this small waterfall. As you can see a young man was cleaning up for the day.
My favorite part of being in this small, open building was when we were having Relief Society in the center of the building, I could hear the Primary children singing from the front and the young Women singing behind me in a different room.
In many church meetings there is no piano, so the person leading the music sings the first line of the song. It is amazing how well that works, but maybe because they all seem to have beautiful voices.

Palikir Baptism

We attended this Baptism after our Christmas Party at Wone. The older sister has an interesting story. A very poor family was walking quite far back and forth to church each Sunday. To do so they passed this woman's home. She began inviting them in to share dinner with her each Sunday even though she didn't know them at all. They began to share the gospel with her and she was taught by the missionaries. Now she is a member of the church and a great example to all of us.

Christmas party at Wone

This Christmas party was at the church structure for Wone Branch. We arrived 3 hours late due to some missionary responsibilities and we only missed a few minutes of the program. They were giving out gifts, but before the person could claim their gift they had to do a crazy dance. We brought candy for the kids so they performed a song just for us that they wrote. They are so cute. I took a picture of the little girl with fancy jewelry and her hair made so pretty. She stuck by my side all evening.
Then we were served a heaping plate of food. I'm holding up a fish, tail and all. The plates are hand woven with Banana leaves. They invited us to a Family Home Evening in a couple of weeks where they will teach me to make them.
This was a very competitive volley ball game. When I asked who had won, both sides claimed victory. They could easily compete very well in the States. When you leave you feel well loved.

Missionaries "Phone Home"

Christmas Day in Pohnpei and then Christmas Day in the States, we had all the missionaries in our
apartment making phone calls home to family. I made an old fashioned American breakfast for them, sausage gravy and homemade biscuits, sausage patties, eggs, cheese (in case they wanted biscuit sandwiches and our stand-by drink- Crystal Lite.
I thought my family could put away this breakfast, but they have nothing on these guys.
There were a few tears (mine included when we Skyped) and grateful missionaries to make that important connection with home.
Now back to work!

Christmas Eve Gifts

Every Christmas Eve a counselor in the Bishopric in Panasang Ward invites all the missionaries to his home and gives out hand crafted gifts to each one. These gifts are normally sold in a gift shop and are expensive, so it is a very generous offering.
He is part of a group of people who once lived on a small island that was devastated by a storm. All the people on that island had to be evacuated. Pohnpei had a street of shacks that they gave to these people.
This structure of the party is just a gravel floor with a tin corrugated roof. They decorated it with palm fronds and a fabric banner made into small triangles. Plastic flowers were added to a small banana tree for a Christmas tree.
The missionaries presented their nativity program with Christmas songs. We even had sheep crawling on the gravel floor. Last Sunday we spoke in church. Mel told about our nativity every Christmas Eve and how the most coveted role is the sheep. The sister missionaries were there and loved to be those sheep and kept looking at Mel with a sparkle in their eyes.
The display is of some of the hand crafts that were given last night. We brought the extra home for the missionaries yet to come. Ours were the boat and the hand woven purse. The intricate boat was made by the elderly man in a wheel chair just to the left of the little girl. We were truly treated well.