Last week was Linda's birthday.  The 2 branches came together and celebrated with lots of food and cake.  One Monday, May 27th, I was all excited to give her the present I was planning to get.  The elders kept her busy while I went into 4 different stores to find her a new "oven".  She has this small thing that can only bake 6 cookies, if you're lucky.  It burns most things we try.  After 4 stores, no luck.  Everyone had sold out of the larger one I wanted.  This picture is the sweet Muslim sales lady that helped us find the oven I wanted, one week later.

 Here is Elder Steven, sitting inside the oven box.  It was large enough for him to crawl into the box and fit quite nicely.  We had a bit of a hassle at the store.  The oven was on sale a few days earlier and they forgot to take down the promotion sign.  We had to pay an additional 120 ringgit, after talking with the store manager and calling the company.  We still lost and had to pay the higher price.  I really didn't care, as long as I could get the bigger oven for Linda's birthday.

 Here are the two ovens, side by side.  The new oven is a convection oven, which circulates air around while it cooks.  That will prevent burning.  Linda made a "fruit cocktail" cake with brown sugar on top.  It turned out perfectly.  It was soft and delicious and all gone in a few minutes.  Even though we have to leave this oven behind when we go home, some other senior couple will enjoy a larger oven in this apartment.

 The elders and mother and I have tried very hard meeting up with this sweet young Chinese sister, just baptized a few months ago.  Her name is Zhen Li and she speaks very little English and none of us speak Chinese.  So the new plan for our mission and for our area in Johor Bahru is to always take a member along when teaching and connect the new convert or the less active to an active member who will befriend them and love them.  It has really worked.  This picture is Brother Ng, who just got back from the Hong Kong Temple with his wife and son in April.  He speaks bahasa and Chinese very well.  We didn't understand anything he said to Zhen Li, but the Spirit was so strong and she was so grateful for the lesson we gave her.

We are going around to everyone and telling active members and all our inactive people about "CPR".  This stands for church attendance, prayer, and reading your scriptures.  If they have those 3 basic things in their homes and in their lives, they will have daily spiritual experiences and stay converted in the gospel.  Many of our members stay close to the church as long as the elders or the senior couple visits them.  When the elders get transferred or the senior couple goes home, the new converts become less active and stop coming to church.  This new approach is really working and we are seeing wonderful results by always bringing a member with us to bear testimony and attach themselves to both active and less active members.

This past week, we went to Singapore and had our first Senior Conference and Zone Conference.  It was wonderful.  The only thing we forgot was to take pictures.  We left on Tuesday night, right after we taught our 3 Chinese kids.  We just got a new little five year old boy to teach, by the name of Yan Hao.  It is very smart and very cute.  His mother comes with him each time.  We waited for about 45 minutes for the taxi and then left for Singapore.  We have to go through immigration and customs for both countries, first leaving Malaysia and then entering Singapore.  When we arrived, we got into our hotel room at the V Lavendar Hotel.  Very beautiful and very tiny.
We were essentially in a very small "hamster" cage.  There was a queen size bed with a TV on the wall, a small bathroom and a very tight shower.  That was it.  We didn't have the room, next to the bed, to kneel for prayer, it was that tight to walk around the bed.  But, we didn't have to pay for it and the best part was it had "hot water".  That's a real treat, since no homes in Malaysia have hot water.
We then got on the MRT, the underground Singapore subway system.  What a thrill!  You scan your card and get on this very, very long train and you are whisked away and seconds later, you're at the next stop.  There were so many people on the trains, in the morning, that we had to wait for 7 trains to pass by us before we got up the nerve to become extremely aggressive and push our way onto the train before the doors close behind you.  We were like sardines in a can.  We had 7 stops and then got off and walked to the Stake Center.  The Senior Conference was a spiritual high, with Elder Woo (of the 70) and his wife speaking, then Pres. and Sister Mains and lots of other panel discussions and break out sessions and testimonies.  We then went out to eat with other senior missionary couples and shared a wonderful evening together.  The next day was Zone Conference, and that was not as exciting because much of it is geared to the young elders and sisters.  The sessions were about the correct language of prayer (thee, thou, thine, etc.) and how to use the Restoration pamphlet, etc.  It went from 10 AM to 9 PM, with a huge lunch of pizza and brownies.  There wasn't a piece of anything left after the elders and sisters got to it.  We spent 3 nights and 4 days in Singapore and loved it.  We didn't venture very far, being new to all this and was very happy to run into some senior couples who helped us along the way.  We then had another wait of an hour or so, standing in the hot, humid outside, waiting for the taxi again.  This time, leaving Singapore went just fine, but trying to get back into Malaysia came with some difficulty.  We were detained for a while and finally got back home.  I never can sleep, when it's not your own bed, and I enjoyed a wonderful nights sleep in our bed in Malaysia.  Now we kind of know how to go back and forth and what is expected for both conferences.  We must do this every 3 months, which is the law in Malaysia.  You must leave the country and get a new passport stamp or "chop" in order to return.  I hope September's conference is just as wonderful and will begin praying that the Lord will soften hearts for coming and going through immigration and customs.  It is so great to be here in Malaysia with such wonderful people.