Newton Circus

Hello from Singapore,

We hope this finds everyone doing great. It's hard to believe that we've been on our mission for almost 5 months. The time is already flying by. We love Singapore - we never have to think about putting on a sweater or jacket as it is always hot! We just have to worry about having an umbrella with us and it rains almost every day. It is so beautiful here though. All the roadways are landscaped beautifully and the city is exceptionally clean. There is, however, construction almost everywhere you drive. Dave is becoming a "Singaporean" driver. Just cut in front of everyone and hope for the best! So far, so good! To get to the office we have to go around a giant round-a-bout. They call it Newton Circus - aptly named as it is a circus. There are 8 roads that come into it - all packed with cars, buses, taxis, motorcycles, trucks and bicylists. There are four lanes with everyone trying to get into a different lane all the way around! We always feel it a miracle when we make it through safely!

This morning we went to church in Jahor Bahru. We made it through immigration without any problems and arrived almost an hour early. We left at the same time last week and were a half hour late! You never know what to expect. The branch seems to have the attendance going down - it is a real concern. No one is quite sure why, except the leadership in the Branch is really lacking and there seems to be a disconnect between the Chinese, Malay, and Iban members. The people are all so friendly to us though. We went over to the Gregory's (the missionary couple in JB), with the Howarths and Bro. Allen (the high councilman) for lunch. . The Gregory's are a fun couple to be with and love to have other Americans that they can understand to visit with. Today there were talks in Chinese, Malay and English - all the Iban's had gone back to their "longhouses" for their Iban holiday.

This has been a sad week for us. One of our Office Elders, who has been such a huge help to us since we arrived, has been sick and is being sent home on Tuesday. We have a Doctor (missionary) from Hong Kong who is flying in tomorrow to accompany him home. The missionary has been out about 18 months and will be released honorably from his mission. How we hate to see him go. We will get a new Office Elder tomorrow. In about 5 weeks we will be having 17 missionaries returning home and the next day 18 new missionaries arriving. It's going to be crazy. Our two AP's will also be leaving so it's going to be different in the office. They also closed the Service Center for this area two weeks ago (except for two who will be leaving soon for Hong Kong). Everyone is leaving us!!

We love our mission and being in the service of the Lord in these latter days. We love the people here and in Malaysia. We have yet to hear a swear word from anyone (at least that we understood). People are exceptionally polite and everyone is well groomed and neat. You rarely see anyone with long hair (men), with tattoos, baggy pants, and women smoking. The hardest thing for us is adjusting to the food and the way dishes are washed in the "hawker" stands. We ate at one last week with the President and AP's. The owner's son (about 12 yrs. old) was washing dishes in front of the stand in dirty, cold, soapy water and then dipping them in rinse water inside the stand. We couldn't see if it was clean or not - but definitely cold! The owner then dished our food up on the dishes! You never hear of anyone getting sick though.

Well we need to close. We are going to the airport to pick the President, his wife and the AP's up from their latest trip (they have one trip each week). I don't know how the President keeps up his pace. He is definitely blessed - along with his wife and AP's (Assistant's to the President - young Missionaries). That is why Mission Presidents are now all under the age of 60! We pray for you daily and miss associating with each of you, but we also know that the Lord needs us here at this time in our lives.

We love hearing from you when you have time to answer.

Elder and Sister Garrett, Mom & Dad, Grandma & Grandpa, relatives and friends