Here is a sweet picture of my beautiful bride on our 40th Wedding Anniversary.  We had big plans on April 19th to go bowling with our elders and all the YSA in our District, but no one showed up.  Then we planned to go out to eat for our anniversary, but we got stuck in a traffic jam.  We did end up teaching our first Seminary class in Malay with 8 kids.  So we celebrated our anniversary by getting online and making up our Gospel Doctrine and Seminary lessons in Malay.
She is as cute as ever and we now begin our next 40 years together.  I don't know how she puts up with me.

 The next day, April 20th, is our Easter.  Here in Malaysia, no one celebrates or even knows about Easter.  Even at church, they welcomed everyone to Easter services and then all the talks had nothing to do with Easter.  We couldn't find a ham in a Muslim country like this, so we had some ham lunchmeat and cut it up over a baked potato.  We colored two Easter eggs (brown, of course, since we are in Malaysia) and our yummy can of Spam, which is getting tastier all the time.  A sweet sister gave us some rolls and there is our Easter dinner for 2014.

We see these signs almost weekly at our local Tesco (like Walmart) store, but don't even pay much attention to them anymore.  We love their "phonetic" way of spelling.  In the top wording, the hard sound of "c" is with a "k", since their "c" makes the "ch" sound.  (Bimbit means "mobile)  The bottom wording is with their other unusual sound "sy" which is their "sh" sound.  All the other consonants are just like our sounds and it's fun to read words like "farmasi" (pharmacy), "aksesori" (accessory), "akademik"
(academic), "butik" (boutique), "mesej" (message) and our all time popular one, "kredit cad" for (credit card).

 On Sunday, April 6, 2014, we went to the Masai Branch as we always do.  It was our Fast & Testimony Meeting and next week, we will have the privilege of watching General Conference, when it is sent to us on flash drives.  As I sat on the stand, President John, our branch president, came up to me and said that I was asked to bless this beautiful baby boy.  I was honored.  His name is Aivenoel (Ivan Noel) Baba anak Robert.
I then sat back down and the president came up to me again and said that the next set of parents also asked me to bless their little boy.  Number 2.

 This beautiful little guy is Vesly Smith Anyan anak Mike Aleyster.  He is the little boy belonging to Sister Venessa, who I was privileged to baptize a number of months ago.  Her husband, Mike Aleyster, was baptized just weeks ago and they are the most wonderful couple in our branch.  Mike will soon receive the Melchizedek Priesthood.
After this little baby blessing, another parent asked me to bless their little boy.  I don't have a picture of him, but his name is Atkinson Nelly anak Galam and he belongs to Sis. Melati.  Three baby blessings in a row.  What a record!

On Saturday evening, the day before our Fast & Testimony meeting, we were invited over to Bro. Uki's home, along with Bro. Gema and his family and Bro. Rantai and his family.  The lesson was on faith, given by our two sweet missionaries in the Plentong area, Elder Scheutz and Elder Thatcher.  After the lesson, we played a fun game that I had to remember, so I took some pictures.
You begin by packing flour in a plastic container and turn it upside down on some newspaper.


Then you place a piece of candy on the top of the flour tower.  Everyone then takes turns using a plastic knife and cutting away at the tower.  You can cut a large area away or just a very small little slice.  The fun part of the game is whoever makes the flour tower fall down, has to get the piece of candy out with only their teeth.  Here is Elder Thatcher, who lost.  He had the fun task of finding the piece of candy with his nose and teeth. (after I went up and buried it deeper in the flour pile)



Here is a great picture of Bro. David, making a very large cut down the side of the flour tower.  After his turn, Elder Scheutz went and made another large cut down the tower and the next player was Elder Thatcher, who barely touched the tower when the whole thing fell down and he had to pick out the candy with his teeth.  The room has about 30 people all sitting around in a circle and the temperature is well over 90 degrees.  It really makes the flour stick to ones face when you are the loser.


This is the spring time here in Malaysia and every street is lined with these very large pink and white flowering trees for miles and miles.
The temperature is a constant 85 to 90 degrees throughout the year, but we go through similar seasons as we do back home in Utah.  January, February and March are a wetter monsoonal season with lots of moisture (even though this year was quite dry).  April, May and June are the spring time and very beautiful.  July, August and September are quite warm, with temperatures going above the 90 degree mark.  And then comes our very cold winter months, when the

temperatures go down into the mid 80's.  The flowers come and go and the rain comes and goes, but the temperatures seem to stay the same.  Depending on the month of the year, the humidity also goes up and down.  Linda curls her hair and sprays it so nicely each morning and it lasts for a few minutes when she goes outside.
We look forward to seeing General Conference this next week and enjoying the time to hear from our church leaders.  Linda and I only have one more General Conference here in this great country of Malaysia.
We just came back from our Senior Conference in Singapore, along with our two days of Zone Conference with the elders and sisters of our Zone.  We also successfully got through immigration again, which is a real ordeal.  We went through another causeway crossing into Malaysia called the Tuas Crossing.  It took Linda and I almost 4 hours of traveling.  We get on the MRT underground railway trains and go to the far west side of the Singapore island.  We then stood in line for over an hour and a half, standing in the rain, to wait our turn to get on a causeway bus.  We packed into the bus like sardines, with our large luggage that we had to carry on the bus.  Then you get off the bus and go through the Singapore Immigration and get back on the bus with your luggage in front of you.  Then you get off the bus and go through the Malaysian Immigration, which is scary.  If they don't feel like giving you a "chop" (stamp in your passport), then you are sent to an office and are given a "talking to" by the immigration officials.  Last time we went into Malaysia, we had the wonderful experience.  Going through Tuas though is usually better than going through the busy Woodlands causeway crossing.  We made it through immigration, got back on another bus with our luggage in tow and went to Galan Patah.  There we exit the bus and find a taxi to take us home.  No taxi was available, so we had to hire a special blue taxi that has a meter.  Usually, it costs about 50 ringgit, but a metered taxi is much more.  It cost us 76.80 ringgit to get home, but we made it.  Now, we are able to serve here in Malaysia until June 25th, when we have to do this all over again.  We are so glad the Lord can soften hearts and help us through the immigration experience, busses, taxis, rain and all.  We just remember that "all this shall give thee experience, and be for thy good".