Today is Thanksgiving Day, 2013.  We had our 6 elders over and enjoyed a nice dinner and visit.  We were able to find a small 9 lb. turkey, which cost quite a bit of money, and then added some chicken pieces to it.  We made our Moroni marinated turkey and the elders just loved it.  I was in charge of the turkey and Linda did the two homemade pumpkin pies, which turned out to be the highlight of the dinner.  We had candied carrots, rolls, a relish tray, and one can of cranberry sauce, which we found in Singapore.  The mashed potatoes turned out great and we had a lovely dinner together.
After we all ate and stuffed ourselves, we sat down to watch a cartoon video of Joseph and the Amazing Coat of Colors, which would not show on our computer, so we watched "The Best Two Years" instead.  It was a fun Thanksgiving, but we sure missed our kids and grandkids.

 We were asked by Jared, our grandson, to send some pictures of the 3 Chinese students that we teach every Tuesday and Friday.  This is Yan Hao.  He is a little spitfire.  He is 5 years old and much smarter than me.  He loves to read and will chose a book over any game we get out.  I went through all my phonics lessons with him and he knew just about everything.  It is funny to listen to the Chinese people, young and old, say the "th" sound.  They just can't do it.  For the work "three" they say "tree".  Even the adults in our branch say the same sound incorrectly.  The other sound that Yan Hao can't say is the "v" sound.  He says a "w" sound instead.
He is really a very cute little boy and his mother attends with him almost every time. 

 This is Fang Ning and she works with Linda to read and gain better comprehension.  We don't seem to get along very well and it's better for mother to work with her.  If I worked with her, I would be swatting her little bottom end.  She is the drama queen and very bossy.  She is very intelligent and lets everyone know it.  I really can't be around her.  We set up a deal with her that if she treats us kindly and acts appropriately at our apartment, then she can play a game with us and her brother.  If she is not behaving, then she can watch us but cannot participate.  It just kills her and, even though I shouldn't enjoy it as much as I do, it's fun to see her frustrated.  After a few times missing the games, she caught on and is doing well now.

 This is Fang Yee.  He is 13 years old and really into "Wolverine" and action packed movies.  He is a delightful kid and I really enjoy working with him.  He is very respectful and fun to be around.  Fang Yee really struggles with understanding his English and comprehending what he reads.  We spend a lot of time in books and doing difficult English lessons from his school books.  Here, in Malaysia, a student takes a very long test every 6 months.  It includes numerous subjects and a student must pass with a score of 40 or above.  Below 40 and you failed the class.  Last time we studied together in June, he got a 47.  He just made it and his father was not happy.  We haven't got the results yet from the exam he just competed, but we were both more aware of what to study and he felt really good about it.

 When we are finished with all our homework, we usually play a game of "scrabble".  We found this old, old set at a stationary store and asked if we could buy it.  They sold it to me for 3 RM ($1.00).  We have played this game more times than anything.  Fang Yee loves it and the game teaches him many good skills in spelling and comprehension.  Beside that, he is very competitive and loves to win.  His sister, on the other hand, loves to cheat while she picks up plastic letter pieces and puts them back in the pile because she didn't like that one.  All she needs is one good swat, but I restrain myself and Linda keeps me in control.  We also bought a "Jenga" game and put all the phonics rules on each piece.  They love that game also.

 Here is a random picture of one of our very familiar friends, the local "cockroaches".  These guys run everywhere and they are literally huge.  This one is the size of my entire finger and his antenna are longer than that.  They are super fast and get into everything.  We had one in our laundry room, but it couldn't take the extreme heat and died.  This one was in the corner of the bathroom in the Masai Branch church.  No way was I going to sit down while he was in the corner. 

Here is a larger picture of the cockroach.  It is a bit fuzzy; the picture, not the cockroach.  The other picture to the right is a real classic.
Our sweet kids sent us a Christmas package for home.  We were so excited to open it and see what was inside.

We found all sorts of wonderful wrapped presents, packages of soup mixes and some hair color bottles for me (yeah!), calendar gifts for our Malay and Chinese leaders, etc.  As I opened the box, I began taking things out and some of the packages and boxes were sticky.  A few of the calendars, some sheets, all the candy canes and lots of other things in the box had some gooey sticky stuff all over them.  We kept searching and found a lovely gift, for Linda, of a box of Cherry Cordial (chocolate covered cherries in that delicious red syrup sauce all around them.  She just loves those every Christmas and instead of the delicious red syrup sauce around each cherry covered in chocolate, the red syrup sauce broke out of each candy and was through the entire package.  It was on almost everything and became this sticky mess.  We were just ready to eat the left over cherries, when we opened one more present that said, "Open me now".  It was a package of Hickory Farms cheese except this one was already nibbled on by a mouse somewhere between America and our apartment.
We figure the little critter was in one of the post office stations here in Malaysia and got into the package and went right for the cheese.  After that, we didn't dare eat the opened box of cherry chocolates for fear the little guy also ate some of that.  Bummer!  After cleaning and washing almost everything up, we salvaged all the gifts and calendars and wonderful things the kids sent us and put them under our 2 foot tree.  We are now going out to get a set of lights to put on this massive thing and hope the lights don't knock it over.  We are so grateful to our sweet family for their thoughtfulness and love for us.  One package, for me, was torn open, so I know I'm getting a blue shirt, but everything else we wiped off and set aside until December 25th.  Can't wait.

 Our blog entry for this week has taken place over the past 4 months or so with Brother Gema and his wife, Sister Eta and their family.  We have prayed for them every morning and every night in our prayers in "bahasa", asking that Heavenly Father will bless them and help them through this trial in their lives.  This is a picture of the Urology Clinic (urologi klinik) in the Sultanah Aminah Hospital right next to the river between Malaysia and Singapore.  We have been there numerous times with Brother Gema, as he was diagnosed with cancer.  Here, we sat for 5 hours, in the very humid open room, waiting for our number to be called.  Finally, Brother Gema went in to see the doctor, got some pills and was sent home.  He was very discouraged.

 A few weeks later, we went to another hospital and had a CT scan.  The scan showed a large mass that had wrapped itself around Brother Gema's right kidney.  This picture is back to the Sultanah Aminah hospital, where the doctors decided to do a "bone scan" and see if the cancer had spread into the bones and bloodstream.  Brother Gema just sat in this long hallway, all by himself, very nervous and worried about his life and his family.  We arrived and sat next to him and tried to bring him some comfort.  Brother Gema and Sister Eta have 3 daughters, 2 sons and a grandchild with them.  Two of the older daughters live at their own homes, but that is still quite a large family to take care of.  Brother Gema had to end his employment also, since he was in so much discomfort and pain.

 Here is the sign above the door of the bone scan area of the hospital.  This hospital takes up blocks and blocks of space with over 23 buildings in it.  This is one of the government run hospitals, which doesn't cost as much for the people, but you must wait your turn and continually come back when they tell you.  The sign reads, "Department of Nuclear Medicine, Sultanah Aminah Hospital, Johor Bahru".  We really didn't like the 5 visits we had to make to this hospital, because you would spend quite a long time trying to find a parking space, then wait until a very scary elevator came down and finally get up to the 5th floor to see Brother Gema.

 As we sat with our dear friend and tried to calm him down, we were reading this sign, which is all over the place as the hospital's slogan.  It reads, "warm (or friendly), quality and safe".
We did notice that all the nurses were very warm and helpful and they did give good quality in a safe environment.  The only problem was you had to do things in "their" time frame.  Brother Gema was sent home 3 different times and was asked to return to the hospital, usually one month apart, from Aug. 25 to Sept 25 and then on Oct 24th.  After he finally went in for an MRI, things began to go a bit more quickly for him.  The MRI didn't show that the cancer spread, which was great news.  Now we just had to wait for the surgery.

 Here is our dear friend and brother in the gospel, Brother Gema.  His full name is Gema anak Enggeng.  I know it well, since I have been asked to give him numerous priesthood blessings.  We would go over to his home and have our traditional large cup of Milo (hot chocolate drink) and some crackers and then give Brother Gema a blessing, before he entered the hospital the next morning.  Then we would drive him to the hospital, stay with him and then drive him back home, only to have another appointment weeks later.  Here, Brother Gema allowed us to take his picture in front of the Department of Nuclear Medicine where he had his bone scan.

 We told Brother Gema that he looked so good in his little green pajama outfit that they give all the men in his ward at the hospital.  We love talking with Brother Gema because he speaks English pretty well and we understand each other.  While we were sitting on his bed with him, he got a letter from one of the missionaries that served here a year ago, Elder Rasmussen.  Sister Eta was sitting off to the side and she threw the letter at me and asked me to read it, which was all written in "bahasa".  I really surprised her by reading all three paragraphs out loud to her and Brother Gema, not knowing only 3 or 4 words.  She was shocked.  I think I can read it better than speaking the language, but we are coming along.

 This is Sister Eta, Brother Gema's wife.  She is the funniest lady.  She speaks Iban, which is a form of Malay from the island of Borneo in East Malaysia.  Many of our members speak Iban (E-bon) and understand Malay very well also.
Just like my wife, Sister Eta hates to have someone take her picture.  I leaned over to her and asked, "Buat kamu perlu wang teksi?", which is Do you need taxi money?  She just started laughing and walked out of the ward.  I looked at Brother Gema and asked if I said things incorrectly and he said I did not.  I found out later that these wonderful, humble people are embarrassed when you offer them help and she felt that we have helped them so much and didn't know how to react, so she walked away laughing.  We would do anything for them, they are such amazing people that are committed to the Lord and his kingdom so well.

On Thurday, Nov. 7th, from 8:30 AM until 3:30 PM (7 hours), the doctors operated on Brother Gema, making quite a large incision up, over and down the other side of his stomach area.  They removed a 17 1/2 pound tumor successfully.  This tumor was 12 inches long, 8 inches wide and 3 inches thick.  It was wrapped around the kidney, but they did not have to remove Brother Gema's right kidney.  He was so blessed and this picture is one day after the surgery.  Linda tried to tell him that he will need a pillow to laugh or cough or sneeze for the next little while, but we don't think he understood.  We are so grateful that Heavenly Father blessed this sweet man.  Now, we pray that he will "sembuh cepat" (heal quickly).  Through fast offering and others, the Lord has blessed Brother Gema and his dear family to make it this far.  His employer told him to get better and then come back to see him, so he thinks he still has a job after he recovers.  I really feel this man has a great work to do, here in the Johor Bahru District, before we go home in a year or so.  Father has blessed him well to this point, and now, we just need to get him home and let him recover.

 The first 2 pictures are the beginning of one of our rain storms, here in Malaysia.  The second 2 pictures were taken just 10 minutes later.  In the month of November, we begin our Monsoonal Rainy Season.  It just pours everyday for a number of hours, and then the humidity is so staggering, you can barely breathe.  This is part of the river overflowing, right along side of the Masai Branch.  I was taking pictures out the window of the second story of our branch building. 

 Here is the same picture, just without the zoom on it.  As we were driving up to Masai, on the freeway, we encountered two really hard lightning strikes that we actually felt inside the car.  It must have been the sound waves from the lightning strike that was close to us.  For the past 5 days in a row, our windshield wipers could not go fast enough to see out the front window, it rains that hard and strong.  In just a few minutes, all the streets are flooded and you are constantly hitting big puddles of water that splash up next to your car as your trying to drive.

 Here is the "after" picture, just about 10 minutes later from the first 2 pictures.  If you look right in the middle of the fast flowing river, you can see the overflow that was quite evident in the top picture, but now, the river has swelled so large that it just about covers it.  Totally amazing to see the river swell so quickly in just a few minutes and be so muddy.  I pulled our car up to the parking space to let my wife out and we were sitting in a puddle about 8 to 10 inches deep.  I had to back out of the parking space and drop her off at another open area without puddles.

 This last picture is looking down the river.  You can see how much it has swelled and began to flow over the side of its banks.  The amazing thing is this is just a common occurrence, all through the month of November here and no one seems too concerned about it.  People just continue to drive quite fast through the puddles and no one worries that the water comes up to the side of your car when you open your car door.  Bizarre!  It is a real project, trying to drive and see out the front window though.

 This morning, Nov. 3, 2013, we had two more children baptisms.  This is our wonderful President John and his sweet family of girls.  Pres. John is the Masai Branch President and quite an amazing man, with his delightful wife, Sister Alan.  Joanna Jessy anak John Korea is his little girl being baptized.  Genealogy is quite difficult here in Malaysia, because the child takes on the name of the father as their new last name.  Pres. John's name is John Korea anak Bahak (Bahak being his father's first name).  So Joanna Jessy takes on the last name of John Korea as part of her name now.  Very confusing.

Our other child baptism, this morning at 8:30 am, was the other sibling to Presly.  He baptized his sister a few weeks ago, (Winnie) and finally, Wesley turned 8 in October, so he could be baptized also.  The missionaries had both kids ready for baptism a few weeks ago, and then found out that Wesley was not 8 years old yet.  So they had to wait and we put both baptisms into one program.  Wesley Mudah anak Ngerantar is his full name.  Cute kid, but a bit wild.  His mom and dad are not members, but they like what the church has done for their kids, so they gave their permission.  Presly is an amazing young man who is currently the branch clerk and the Young Men's President and is preparing for a mission in a few more months.

We had a fun activity at our Johor Bahru Branch
this week.  It was advertised as a Relief Society

activity, but the Senior Couple and the Elders are always invited.  The funny thing though, was it ended up with anyone coming, including the husbands to most of the wives.  It was making "Chinese Dumplings".  Here is a picture of my first attempt to make this little dough filled dumpling.  Elder Wang, our newest elder to our district, made the little dough circles and then we put the stuffing inside.  There was three different types of stuffing used.  One was chives and pork, the other was vegetables and the third choice was

pork and prawns.  Here is my lovely wife, with her cute little apron on, supervising the project.  I dropped her off at 7 PM and decided to just go back to our apartment, only one block away.  I gave her my cell phone and told her that I would come back and get her when she called.  As I dropped her off, I ran into the elders and Brother Brian Che, our new Elder's Quorum President.
They begged me to stay, since they were going to be stuck in the foyer, waiting for the sisters to finish the activity.  I told them I couldn't stay and
left.  I stayed home for about an hour and returned.

 Here is our new E.Q. President, Brother Brian Che.  His real name is Miau Fung Che, but all our Chinese brothers and sisters give themselves an American name also.  He was the 1st Counselor, but the president needed to be released and Brother Brian was all that was left.
There is 19 Melchizedek Priesthood brethren here in the JB Branch and all of them are in a leadership position or less active.  It doesn't leave much choices for callings.  Right now, we are in the process of getting a new activated brother to gain the Mel. Pr., so he can become the 1st Counselor to President Che.

Here is Brother Brian's wife, Sister Melanie, which is our branch Relief Society President.  Her real name is Man Yee Pang.  She is a really great cook.  We have been over to her home twice now and she makes wonderful Chinese meals.  Her "spring rolls" are amazing and last time, she made some "cinnamon rolls", from scratch.  They were sooo good.  She said she found the recipe on line and thought she would try it for us, since we were Americans.  They were really great.

 This picture Linda told me take, since this was her job in preparing the Chinese Dumplings.  She had to pull off the heads and legs of all the prawns, then wash them off in the colander.  Who would think you would need to save them.
But, they ended up being the soup base inwhich the Chinese Dumplings were cooked in.  Gross!  I didn't drink any of the soup juice, fearful that I would be sucking up one of the eyeballs or something. 

This is the finish product.  A pot full of the cooked Chinese Dumplings in the prawn head soup and a plate of fried dumplings, which I preferred.  The bowl, behind the fried dumplings, is a mixture of black vinegar and ginger, which you pour over top of the dumplings.  It was quite delicious.  I really enjoyed the chive dumplings, but wasn't so sure of the prawn and pork dumplings.  Their idea of prawns, out here in Malaysia, are suppose to be similar to shrimp, but they don't come anything close to it.

As we visited a local mall called "Giant", we came across this beautiful colored rice painting, done on the mall tile floor.  It is celebrating "Deepavali", which is coming up Nov. 3rd.  This is one of the Hindu holidays.  I thought that the greatest place to teach school would be here in Malaysia.  It seems that they have a holiday almost every other week around here.  Many of them are around the various religions such as the different Muslim holidays, the Hindu holidays, the birthdays for the Sultans and the Presidents of Malaysia, their 4th of July and lots of others.


Each of the sections, of this beautiful peacock, are made of colored rice.  We watched the little children dropping the rice on the tile floor and arranging it.  We went into the store to buy some gifts and when we came out, half the picture was completed.  It thought how beautiful and creative to build this and just a few pushes of the broom and it's all cleaned up. 





Today, we had our 6th baptism.  It was Sister Vennesa's husband, Brother Mike.  His name is Mike Aleyster anak Kinchau.  He is standing along side of his wife, in the white tee shirt.  We couldn't find a white shirt that fit him and couldn't find a jump suit that fit him either.  So we improvised.  Elder Kavapalu had the privilege of baptizing Mike.  He will be a great addition to the Masai Branch.  Along side of Mike is Vennesa's brother, President Joe, who is the 2nd Counselor in the Branch Presidency.  Elder Adam's is on the end with the little monster child, Eddie. 
Eddie is the terror of the Masai Branch.  He runs wild through most of the sacrament meeting and both mom or dad do anything to stop him.  You just want to trip him as he runs by or grab him and give him a good swat on the bottom end.  I guess every ward and branch has an "Eddie" to put up with.  Brother Mike took quite a few weeks to overcome his problem with smoking, but finally did it.  Now, we need to keep him strong in the branch and get him a calling or responsibility.  He has great family support and will bless the branch with priesthood power.

 The amazing blessings, from the Lord, of technology.  On Saturday evening, we had the wonderful privilege to witness our grandson's baptism through Skype.  Unbelievable!  It was Parker Vincent Schollenberger turning 8 years old and his dad, Ben, baptizing and confirming him.  Saturday was October 12th, here in Malaysia, but really, we began at midnight, which would be October 13th.  The baptism, back in Utah, was at 10 AM Utah time, and 14 hours later our time.  We had just finished our first 2 sessions of General Conference over at our JB Branch, and then stayed awake till the

 baptism.  We receive our General Conference one week later, on Oct. 12 and 13.  We watched the Saturday sessions from 3 to 5 PM and 6 to 8 PM, with an hour inbetween for a quick supper.
We ate some KFC Chicken with the Elders.  We were blessed to have 6 people at these session, one of them an investigator.  Then, we went home and stayed busy, trying to keep awake until our midnight.  The baptism began about 7 minutes late and went to about 12:55 AM in Malaysia.  After Parker was baptized, I finally got the idea to get out our camera and take some pictures of our computer while we were Skyping our family.  The young man conducting the meeting announced that we
were joining them from Singapore.  That was fun to hear that.  The first two pictures are Karey Hanks giving a talk on the Holy Ghost.  This picture is just after Parker got confirmed by his dad and shaking everyone's hands.  The last picture is when Parker got up to bear his testimony.  Everything went so very well, with Jacob holding the IPad and getting everything just great.  Preston gave the opening prayer and Porter gave a wonderful talk.  This baptism was held up in Salt Lake somewhere, because Parker's cousin, Orion Xiao was also baptized at the same time.  Rachel lead the music and Whitt

played the piano for the service.  It was really amazing to sit here in Malaysia and see the entire baptismal service live.  Even serving our full time mission half way around the world, we still were blessed to see Parker get baptized and not miss any of our grandkid's special day.  We closed our Skype out and got ready for bed, finally getting to sleep around 1:30 in the morning.  It was so worth it.  We then got up on our Sunday and had the two Sunday sessions of General Conference, from 10 AM to 12 noon and 1 PM to 3 PM.  Linda made a nice pot of chili (which was a bit hot to the taste because of a different chili powder we used) for the luncheon.  Everyone lays out their food and shares together.  General Conference was great, as usual and we got lots of good talks to use for the next quarter's Relief Society and Priesthood meetings.  We are so grateful to the Lord for such technology in our day.  Skyping Parker's baptism was wonderful.

 Here are 4 pictures that were sent to us from Payson, Utah, just 5 blocks from our home back in America.  The church is putting on the Moroni statue onto the top of the Payson Temple.  Our daughter, Rebekah, sent them to us, showing her 4 kids on the bottom two pictures (Jacob, then Karey, then Kaley and Jared on the right).  I wanted to add these to our blog, so we would remember the date and the time, while on our mission in Malaysia.  We have been on the Payson Temple internet site, following the pictures since we arrived.
To think that this beautiful temple will be so close when we get home, and the best part, is it is right next to a Wal-Mart, about 5 blocks north.  Now, that will be the two places we will spend the most time at.
Our week has been very busy here in Malaysia.  We had a young man from the Philippines show up to church on Sunday and made the assumption that he could just stay with us before having a job interview.  We didn't know that the

 interview was on Wednesday and Thursday of this week and that we were allowing him to sleep in our apartment, feed him and drive him to all these appointments.  His "auntie" just assumed it would be alright.  He also needed RM 2,000 for the first interview, to begin paperwork on a "work visa" so he can stay in Malaysia.  By Thursday, we found out that this entire interview was a "scam" and some people were just trying to get RM 2,000 from him.  He was getting the money from fast offerings, but he didn't receive it yet and it was a good thing.  There is a lot of crime and dishonesty here, which is probably the same anywhere.  This young man, Alyzon, then had to get on a bus and return to his aunt's home about 2 hours north of us.  Sad situation.
Secondly, we took our dear friend, Brother Gema to the hospital for a CT scan.  They found a very large mass attached to his right kidney.  He will need surgery and they will find out if it is cancerous or not.  Brother Gema is a great

 leader, here in Johor Bahru.  Many Iban families follow him each week to church and everything revolves around Brother Gema and Sister Eta, his wife.  They are a super family.  The amazing thing here, in Malaysia, is their health care system.  If you want to go to a private "klinik" or to your own doctor or specialist, you have to pay quite a large amount.  But if you use the government doctors and hospitals, it cost very, very little.  A doctor's appointment to a specialist is RM 200.  Going to the hospital and seeing one of the government doctors is about RM 3.  Having a baby C-section cost Sister Madeline about RM 50, because she went to the government hospital.  The only problem is if you have an emergency or immediate need, you will have to wait you turn and follow an appointment schedule according to the governments plan.
Brother Gema needed an ultrasound first, scheduled in Aug.
Then his CT scan was scheduled Sept. 24 and the follow-up was Oct. 24.  He could have been dead by that time.

While all of this is going on with Alyzon at our house and taking Brother Gema to the hospital, we had another missionary transfer since Elder McCown went home to Idaho.  Elder Tan is getting a new "greenie" from China who doesn't speak English, only Chinese.  That should be fun.  Also, we are still working on the Manila Temple Trip in Dec.
It was all going well, then we had to cancel it because of passport concerns, then we worked that out and were on again, and now we had more problems with the records and schedules and temple patron housing.  What a mess.  I think we are back on, but I'm not sure.  With all this, we have to get the flash drives working for General Conference in 3 different languages, arrange for another special conference next week (Asia Area Stake Conf. Broadcast) and I'm writing, almost daily, to Elder Gong, the President of the Asia Area Presidency of the 70 for our District Conference, Nov. 9th and 10th.  It is crazy busy around here.  My new word, added to our list of 450 words now, is "gila gila".  It means "crazy".

No pictures today, just a great experience that we had with a sweet family here in Johor Bahru.  For the past 7 months, we have made many visits to Brother Rantai and Sister Sani.  They have 3 daughters, ages 16, 14 and 6.  They joined the church, here in JB, about 9 months ago.  After an interview with the branch president, I was privileged to interview Brother Rantai to receive the Melchizedek Priesthood and be ordained an Elder.  I read all the questions to Brother Rantai in "bahasa" and he actually understood me and answered everything very well.  The one difficulty that Brother Rantai has is he cannot read or write.
This humble family, the wife and two older daughters, read the scriptures to their dad.  They never miss church and even though he can't read the words of the hymns or read in a Sunday School class, Brother Rantai and his family come out every week.  So today, Brother Gema is going to confer the priesthood on Brother Rantai and ordain him to be an Elder.  It was very touching.  Brother Gema is just a member for one year and I needed to help him with the correct wording and procedures.
Right after Brother Rantai was ordained, he switched seats with his 14 year old daughter and he anointed her head to bless his little girl.  Brother Gema sealed the anointing and I just sat back and took all this in, trying to hold back the tears.  Brother Gema showed Brother Rantai how to drop one drop of oil on her head and then took Brother Rantai's hands and placed them on his daughter's head and then whispered in his ear what to say.  Then Brother Gema sealed the anointing and gave her a blessing in "bahasa".  Such faith and dedication and courage to see this humble man bless his daughter and his family with the priesthood of God.  I then handed a little booklet of all the ordinances in "bahasa" to his 16 year old daughter and also a sacrament card in "bahasa".  Brother Rantai and his wife and going to work together so he can memorize the prayers so he can bless the sacrament soon.  Wow!  It is an amazing honor and privilege for Linda and me to be here in Malaysia and witness, first hand, the great faith and commitment of these saints.  The Lord has blessed me to use my priesthood enough times to help these humble saints to do things according to His will and follow the church handbook and church procedures.  Today, I set apart a new Elder's Quorum President, taught the Branch President how to give a name and blessing to his own son, and assisted Brother Gema and Brother Rantai to use their priesthood and bless others.  A very fine Sabbath Day.