Who are the students you are helping?

The Polynesian Cultural Center has a very special Sprit to it too.  In fact, the whole Laie area has a very special Spirit to it.  It is due partly to the Temple being here and everything pointing to it; the BYU Hawaii and the Polynesian Cultural Center.  When you walk the area, you feel it.

This is the view walking outside my office on a daily basis and what I see.  Beautiful.  This is a beautiful place.

The students are beautiful too.  Most of the students working at the PCC are iWorks.  As you look at the Canoe Pageant shown below, keep in mind that most of the students are ours.  They work three years to obtain their degree, and then return home to their country and invest at least three years to the building of their homeland with their newly acquired talents.  As a result of going back; their education is paid.  Not to say it is easy.  They don't return home in the three years there and they continually go to school until finished.  Probably the biggest shock is coming to Hawaii after growing up on an island for most of them.  You have to admire them. They are a determined, focused, studious group, that also like to have fun and show off their talents at the Polynesian Cultural Center.
  

Spam A Lot!!! You hungry, Mon?

Welcome to a typical Hawaiian Market.  Now, when you go into a market in Hawaii, you will see a LOT of different food.  After all, this is an international place!  You will find all kinds of different foods!  However, there is one very unique item found in Hawaii; SPAM!  It is known as the "Hawaiian Steak." It was introduced when the soldiers were here during World War II and it has just stayed.  In fact, there is more, per capita, consumed here than any other place in the United States!  Question of the Day:  What do the letters SPAM stand for?  Put your answer below.  Let's see what we get!!!

Aloha Stadium-The Marketplace!

Every Wednesday, Saturday, and Sunday, the Aloha Stadium is open for the weekly Swap Meet and Marketplace.  I have been to many swap meets, but this one is totally unique from the others!

Imagine just about everything you can find as a souvenir or Hawaii related being found around the outside in the parking lot!  It's all there!  From Ukuleles, to Aloha clothing, to pineapple and exotic fruits and nut, to all things you could ever want Hawaiian...

Need something to wear?

How about some stylish wear?

Sticker for your car?

Beads galore!

Ukuleles in all sizes...

Fruit from Hawaii?  Also reminds me of the wet market items when we visited China.

Don't miss this opportunity to go and see what they have.  A fun morning cruising with the locals!

Scenes from the new Neighborhood...

BYU Hawaii is a beautiful place.  This is what I see when I go to the corner of my neighborhood and look up the street.  As you can see, this is a International University.  The flags in the roundabout help to set the tone and give us a reminder.  In our iWorks Program, which we administrate, we have kids from all over the World.  You name it, we have it.  Go to a map and find all of those very tiny islands, and we probably have a few kids from each island.  We also have Chinese, Korean, Mongolian and Japanese students.  It is amazing.  Last night we went to eat at a restaurant at the PCC and one of our students was our waiter.  He has a very interesting history.  He is from Thailand and when he became old enough, he went on a mission to Australia.  It was there where he learned English.  Now he is on our program and going to BYU for three years to get his degree and return to his homeland.  Part of the deal is to go for three straight years, not go home until finished, and then return home and stay there for at least five years, and then his whole college experience is FREE.  FREE!  All of it including housing and food.  It really gives the students a break to get it done and give back to his homeland.  Beautiful...

We Have Arrived!!!

We have arrived!  That's right, we are in Hawaii.  We left Provo, for SLC airport around 8:30 am and took off around 11:30 am.  Six hours later, we arrived at Honolulu Airport and felt the breezes of Hawaii.  It is nice and warm.  We were greeted by Elder Woods.  He is the Coordinator of the Senior Missionary Program here at the Polynesian Cultural Center.  After a lei greeting, schlepping our suitcases to the car, we set out to Walmart for supplies!   The closest Walmart is 1 hour away from Laie, so it is not just a jaunt over to Duarte.  You have to plan.

We had dinner at the local Wendy's and then set out for Laie, arriving at around 6 pm.  Being that it was Saturday, everyone was out going to the beach and other activities all across the Island.

We came to Laie with one other sister; Sister Dykman.  She is going to work in the Island Office.  What is that?  I don't know and neither does she!  We dropped her off, and headed away to stow our items.

Our home will be on Palekana Street.  It is very centrally located.  We will live downstairs, and three other Sisters will live above us.  They workat different venues at the PCC too.  Some of them work in costumes, some in offices.


We then picked up our "Island Car."An "Island Car" is a car that is passed on from one Missionary Couple to another.  We purchased this Kia minivan and will be our "hot rod" for the next 18 months.  Got to bed around 10:30, (around 1:30, Utah time and prepared for Sunday.  It's great to be here.

"Food, Glorious Food!"

We have made many friends here at the MTC.  One of them is Chris Justice.  He is the head of Dining at the MTC.  Shauna Miller knows him very well.  She put in the good word that we were here and he came up and introduced himself.  Kind of feels nice to have someone "on the inside."



Speaking of food and Chris Justice...

The Cafeteria that Brother Justice maintains, is not too bad at all.  They put out a lot of great food that will help sustain the Mission population with making you feel like you are really getting Prison food.  It's not that at all.  Good healthy food.

But, you know what?  You can also find some decadence too.  Think really good donuts.  And Wednesday...well, Wednesday is BYU Creamery Ice Cream day.  Unbelievable!  Three types of ice cream, and huge vats of chocolate, caramel and marshmallow to put on top, And little candies, etc. to put on top of that.  A sure hit!

Day One! Blast Off!!!

We have made it here!  Arrived!

There are about 1500 young missionaries here and about 103 Senior Missionaries that arrived here yesterday with us!  Unbelievable!  They are going all over the world.  You name it and they are going there.  The pictures above show us entering the MTC thanks to Margie, Mary's sister, bringing us, and the other photo is us in the cafeteria.  Great shot.  Check out the young, male missionary photobombing us!  They told us to get in and mix it up with the young missionaries.  We did!  Easy for us.  We had a great time with them too!
Many inspirational talks too.  Probably the most important talk, echoes what Bishop Daines told me when I was leaving to say good-bye;  "Bill, just go and do it without a worry about home."  All will be well and your families will be blessed by supporting you as you go.  We know we have that support too.
We met the people we are replacing today.  They live in Pleasant Grove.  We went to their house, learned how to make cinnamon bread (a door opener in Hawaii when we get there) and talked about all the responsibilities of the job.
I am even more excited to go and do it!!!

"Cleared For Take Off..."

This is it.  Zero days left.  We are poised, ready to go.  In a few minutes, we are going to our Church Leader, the Stake President, and he will lay his hands on our heads and "set us apart" as a Missionaries for 18 months.  No backing out now.  The biggest challenge is to be able to close the suitcase without being overweight!

Thank you to all who have wished us well, told us you are going to write, told us you are going to come see us, helped us, took us to dinner, and held our hands through this preparation.  We are excited and look forward to this experience.  We hope you check in often, if to learn about a senior mission, just see what we are doing, or if you are just curious about what this whole this is about...

We know, however, the Lord will bless, be with us and help us on this excursion.  I can't wait to see what we need to do.

We will be staying at Margie's house, that's Mary Jane's sister, tonight and go to the MTC at 10am.  That is when we cross the threshold into a new adventure.

Thank you everyone.  See you sometime, somewhere!

3 More Days!!! Missionary Training Center, Provo, Utah

Only three more days to go and we will commence this Big Adventure!  By the way;  in case you did not know.  We go on the 6th of June to the Missionary Training Center in Provo, Utah.  We will be there from Monday to Friday.  All the new missionaries, whether Senior or the other younger missionaries, go to one of the many Training Centers before going out to the "Field."

Ours will be a very different training as well as we have such a specialized mission.  We will meet with the couple we are replacing, the Beagley's for one of the first days.  They already came home and live in Pleasant Grove.  They are coming to get us and go over everything that we will be doing in Hawaii.

Other time will be spent going over "Preach My Gospel,"  making sure we understand how that works and I bet we will be meeting a few people that are going to the same mission as us.

This is getting exciting!

Saturday, the 11th, we arrive in Honolulu in the afternoon!