$56.00 per person for lunch!

Hello,

Greetings from the other side of the world! This has been another busy week (are there any other kind on a mission). Monday we went to lunch with President and Sister Clark, the Stake President, and Norman ( the Service Center Director). They are moving the Service Center for Singapore, Malaysia and Indonesia to KL and Hong Kong. Norman will be leaving soon for Hong Kong. They have occupied the 5th floor of our building. We will be moving up there this week and the Stake President (who is also the Institute Director) and his secretary will be moving into the 4th floor along with an office for a Bishop and Clerk, plus classrooms for the Ward that meets on the 2nd and 3rd floor of our building. We went to a buffet that was wonderful. Singapore does have good food! You just have to be willing to pay for it ($56.00 per person for lunch!).

President Sister Clark spent from Tuesday morning to Friday night in Hong Kong for a Mission President's Seminar. On Tuesday at noon we picked up a new Senior Couple, the Hodder's, from the airport. They are from Canada. We took them to the office and then back home for dinner and then they collapsed into bed. Two days without sleep will do that to you! The next morning they had to decide what luggage to leave here (they can only take 44 lbs of luggage each into Malaysia at a time). We then took them to the airport for their trip to East Malaysia. They will have real cultural shock for a while! It again amazes me that complete strangers can become such good friends immediately. We really enjoyed their SHORT visit.

Several weeks ago the person who cleans the buildings, does maintenance and washes our cars, was backing our van up to wash it and backed into a pillar. It really dented the back of the van. It was already starting to rust. Friday he took it in to have it repaired at about 11 a.m. and had it back to us by about 6:30 p.m.. It smelled of paint but it looked brand new! If you have ever taken a car in to have bodywork done in the US you can plan on being without your car for at least a week! We were amazed.

Brother & Sister Ho, who we take an Institute class from, invited us to go with them to a play on Saturday night. We had no idea what to expect but thought it would be fun. It was put on by a group of Indian actors and actresses with a social message about how people don't want to get involved in other peoples lives. It was different, but we enjoyed it. Another couple went with us, Sesh & Teresa (Indian). He has worked for Phillips Lighting for about 30 years and she is a school counselor. What a delightful couple. After the play they had a huge buffet of food set up (Indian Food, which we like) but the Ho's insisted that we have a traditional Chinese dinner. It was certainly different. They thought it was wonderful but we have certainly had better food. Dave in particular wasn't too fond of the slimey fungus that he had in one of the dishes. It was fun going with them though and it was great spending the evening with them.

Friday night we went to the airport to pick up the President and Sister Clark, thank goodness, as the ward here in front of our house had a movie and dinner night (chicken rice - what else!). The movie was "The Three Idiots", a Bollywood Indian movie. We were so thankful to be picking them up!

We had two recruiters from BYU Hawaii come into the office Saturday. They were giving a fireside that night for the youth and our missionaries trying to convince them to attend school in Hawaii (which a lot do from here). In talking with one of them we found out he is the brother of Elaine Purdum who lives in our Ward in Fort Collins! Also, the brother of Brother Lesser in Ft. Collins is also in the Stake here in Singapore. It really is a small world. One of the concerns of many of the members in Singapore is that their kids want to go to BYU in the states or they serve a mission there and they want to live there permanently - usually getting married to an American. It really affects the future leadership of the Church here in Singapore.

We are constantly amazed at what kind of troubles our Elders encounter - from stolen bicycles, lost or stolen support cards, lost phones, etc. Yesterday 4 of our East Malaysian missionaries bused with their branches several hours to a District Conference. They were scheduled to fly back to their areas tomorrow night after a Zone Conference, however Dave received a call from President Clark while we were in JB today saying that 3 of the 4 forgot to bring their passports with them! Now they will have to bus back instead of flying back and I'm sure we will be out the money for their plane tickets. We just have to remember that these are 19-21 year olds! But we love them!

We were asked today to speak in JB next week. I'll speak on "Enduring to the End" and Dave on "Tithing", we just have to remember to keep the talks pretty basic.

We love serving the Lord here and in JB and only wish we could do more. The gospel makes such a difference in the lives of the people here. They are wonderful!

We love all of you and remember you in our prayers.

Elder and Sister Garrett (mom & dad, grandma & grandpa, relatives and friends)

October 1, 2011

Just a quick note to remind each of you of General Conference starting in less than two hours in your area.  We don't get it until next week.  It is such a privilege to be able to hear what a prophet and apostles have to say to us in these trying times.  You don't realize how much you miss hearing from them until you can't listen to them live (I guess we could stay up all night and watch it on BYU TV). 

We were cleaning, shopping and cooking all day today and are exhausted tonight.  We have all the Senior Couples coming in this week for Sr. Conference.  It is always so much fun - but so much work getting ready for them all.  We are leaving early in the morning for JB to church.  We are taking 2 women and 3 kids with us.  Also, the President and his family (a daughter, her husband, and two kids are visiting) will be following us over there.

 

Again, we encourage you to watch conference - it will bless all your lives.

 

We love all of you!

 

Mom & Dad

The Singapore Zoo

Hello from Singapore,

We can't believe another week has gone by! The time is going so fast. We decided we would take part of our p-day this week (preparation day). For the young Elders and Sisters this is on Wednesday each week. We went to the Singapore zoo, which is one of the best in the world. It is a beautiful zoo in a jungle setting. They don't have cages - just moats around each enclosure. It was hot, but all the shade makes it tolerable! The most entertaining thing of all were the orangutans. They were mostly sleeping when we first walked up. One woke up and started posing for everyone. We'll attach a photo of him. He was quite the ham! Another one had a piece of metal stripping and was digging a hole with it. I guess he wasn't making enough headway as he got a big mouth full of water and spit it in the hole to make digging easier. They are smart animals and the highlight of the day for us. We really enjoyed the morning. That afternoon, we returned to the office to catch up on our responsibilities (they don't take a p-day).

On Thursday the Office Elders plus one of the Chinese speaking Elders wanted to take us to lunch in Little India (of course we paid!). Little India is an interesting place. It is blocks of small stores and restaurants - mostly family run. It is full of shoppers and a lot of fun to visit. We ate at a vegetarian restaurant. Most of the people there were eating with their hands, however we all ate with forks and spoons.! We have discovered that we really like Indian food as long as it isn't too spicy.

On Thursday we picked the Mission President and his wife up at the airport at noon. That afternoon he had to take a class that is required to keep his Dental license current (he is a dentist). We dropped him off and returned to the office only to find our computers were dead along with our phones. They are putting a new MRT (subway) line in across the street from the Mission Office and they cut the lines. We were without internet or phones for two days while they spliced everything back together! How we depend on computers!

Saturday we went to a baptism in the Chinese ward. The entire baptism was conducted in Chinese - even the hymns. The ones that didn't speak Chinese (many of the Elder and Sisters, President and Sister Clark, and us) sang in English. It was beautiful hearing the two languages combined in one hymn! Today, we went to JB. I taught Relief Society. It is so different teaching here. While most of the Sister's speak English a couple only speak Chinese and one only Tamil. They are all pretty shy about participating in the lesson. The lesson was on the post-mortal world. For some it was the first lesson they had on this. It is very humbling to teach these sweet sisters. They are all so appreciative. We are learing to love them more and more each week! In Priesthood, the father of the Indian family that was recently baptized was ordained a Priest in the Aaronic Priesthood today. What a great addition this family is becoming to the branch! Andy, the father, is eagerly learning the gospel teachings. As soon as there is enough active Priesthood holders in the two JB branches, it will be put under the Mission instead of the Singapore Stake. We are all looking forward to that day. Two of the missionaries in JB had their bicycles stolen this week. There have been several stolen in Malaysia recently. At least these missionaries weren't beaten up and robbed when theirs were stolen like the one in East Malaysia last week!

We have a new Senior Couple coming in this week. They are the Hodder's and are from Canada. The Mission President and his wife will be in Hong Kong for the annual Mission President's Seminar, so we will pick the Hodder's up and keep them overnight and then send them off to East Malaysia the next day! We are looking forward to meeting them.

We are thinking a lot about America this week with 9/11 in all the news - even the headlines of the papers here are talking about it. Evidently terrorism is even a threat here! They found information that the Orchard MRT stop was a target last year (the stop we go to several times a week for lunch), but the ones involved were arrested. I guess that is why we sometimes see armed solders walking around. The Orchard MRT is a mass of people all the time! We do feel very safe here though! We can't let threats stop our daily activity. We are praying, though, that the threats received in the US are only threats and that nothing happens.

As we work so closely with our young Elders and Sisters here, it makes us even more appreciative of our two grandsons now serving missions - Garrett (Kovach) in Indiana and Scott (Garrett) in the MTC preparing to go to Conception, Chili. We see on a daily basis the dedication these young men and women have to teaching others the gospel and how much they love serving their Heavenly Father. We see their testimonies and their love of the people they serve here in Singapore and Malaysia grow on a daily basis. We see the ones here in Singapore daily, the ones in JB weekly, and the rest of them at least once every 3 months (but we talk to them often on the phone). What great young people they are and what great examples they are to us!!!! I'm sure none of them would consider these two years as a sacrifice but only as a blessing in their lives.

How grateful we are for family and friends. We love and pray for all of you.

Elder and Sister Garrett (mom & dad, grandma & grandpa, relatives and friends)

(Note: Picture to come as my computer doesn't download the pic that was attached. When David gets home from his trip I will pull and post it off from his computer! Thanks for your patience. deb)

The 3 D's of success

Hello All,

This has been a great week. We had our missionary, Elder Schone, come back that was injured so severely about 10 months ago. The area Presidency said the chances of his returning to this mission were about a million to one! But he really wanted to return to this mission and the doctor's decided it was ok to come to Singapore - especially since the medical care here is so good. Although he probably won't be able to serve in Malaysia. He is a remarkable young man. He is working in the office with us as an Office Elder. He had only been out a couple of months when his accident happened and he feels he still has things to accomplish here. The entire zone went to the airport to meet him and then we had a dinner in his honor. It was a good day!

On Wednesday we had our Zone Conference for the missionaries serving in Singapore. President Clark spoke on the importance of overcoming temptations. Some of teachings were:

We either change the outside world of we change the inside world so nothing is tempting.
We have free agency to make a choice to resist temption - the choice is ours.
When temptation presents itself you must immediately and completely modify the situation.
If you can't change the situation, get out.

He talked for about an hour on this subject. He is a great teacher and everyone learned from him - it was especially applicable to todays world where so many things seem to be acceptable.

President Perkins (our Area Seventy from Hong Kong) and Elder Osguthorpe (the General Sunday School President from SLC) were both here. They met with just the missionaries from 2-4. What a great meeting. Elder Osguthorpe is a professor at BYU and then 2 days a week he meets with all the auxiliary leaders in SLC. He is on a tour of Asia for 10 days. He arrived in Singapore around noon and then left at 9 p.m. for India. He is in charge of teaching in all organizations of the Church. One of the things he said was - (a quote from Pres. Bednar):

"Teaching is not talking and telling, teaching is observing and listening so that we can discern and then know what to say."

He said that President Monson always tries to be an answer to some else's prayers. We need to try to do the same. Elder Osguthorpe used to sing with the Mormon Tabernacle Choir. He and his wife wrote a Primary song about Ammon (Book of Mormon hero) called the 3 D's of success -

"Desire, decision, determinination, yes! These are the 3 D's, the 3 D's of success. So when you are discouraged and you don't know what to do, remember Ammon's 3 D's and the Lord will help you too." (we didn't get the 2nd verse down). It was really fun. He had everyone singing it.

He also said we are engaged in an amazing work in every corner of the world! He talked a lot about teaching in the home and the qualities we learned from our parents. He had a lot more to say, but we didn't get much of it down.

That evening from 6-8 they held a Stake Fireside for all members of the Stake. We feel very privileged to get to spend time with them with just the missionaries and to learn from them. What remarkable, wise and loving men they are.

The elders have been teaching a young woman for about a year. She said she knew the church was true, but didn't want to go against her parents in the Philippines and join the church. She decided on Thursday that she wanted to get baptized on Friday! She was returning to the Philippines on Saturday and she felt like she couldn't leave without joining the church as she knew it was true. The Elders were scrambling, but got things arranged and the Filippino ward came out in force to support her. Plus they all brought food to share afterwards (they love food for any activity). She is truly a great young woman.

Today, Sunday, was spent in JB as usual. We go to both branches. The JB branch had 10 Indian investigators there today. The people are great about sharing the gospel with others. We made it there and back without any problems - which makes it a great day!

We hope you all have a great Labor Day. For us it will be a day in the office as usual - doing the Lord's work and making another run to the airport. We love and miss all of you.

Elder & Sister Garrett (mom & dad, grandma & grandpa, relatives and friends)



Reeka, the Filippino girl baptized Friday night by Elder Nowland (office Elder). Elder Schone is the Elder on the far right.