Bula Vinaka everyone,  we flew up to Labasa Friday to do contracts for 2 new flats.   The four  Elders will be glad to have a space of their own.  The landlord of the large flat they are currently in, wants them to vacate it so he can rent it to three nurses.  We couldn't rent a room in Labasa the first night so we drove down to Hot Springs in Savusavu.  I took a quick picture of these school kids playing on their field day.  They loved not having to wear their uniforms.

This bay is always so pretty, and yes,Richard rolls his eyes at yet another bunch of pictures I've taken.

This is the beautiful Frangi Pani in bloom (known in Hawaii as Plumeria)  Notice how green and lush the foliage is.

Ironicall, right next to the tree above is this Frangi Pani tree.  Most of them
 look like this tree with few leaves and some blooms, I don't know why.
few blossoms and few leaves while others next to them are lush and green.

Interesting carving on the entrance walls to our hotel

The fish should look familiar, but I wanted to capture how they decorate poles here.  They take palm frongs and braid the leaves on the back side and incorporate pretty colorful leaves from bushes into the design.

More pictures of the bay.  I think I'm getting sentimental knowing that we're
 close to 10 weeks from the time we are finished with our mission.

This is a picture in our room second one down is the neck breaker and Perpendicular one is the club the women would use if neighboring enemy villagers would try to enter their home, others are war weapons for various uses.  In Labasa I bought a small wood cava bowl and turtle, the store keeper said I'll throw this in for free and asked if I knew what it was.  I said "yes isn't it used by Fijian women to fluff their hair?" and the shop keeper said "no that's a brain picker"
 (utensil type tool used during cannibalism days)

patterns seen in traditional fijian cloth

Yes grandma took some more pictures of the mosiac tiles  and this looks like....Nemo and his family in some coral

Sea turtle

No kidding, this is the true color of the starfish we've seen when snorkeling.

On our flight up toLabasa we saw all of these coral islands just beneath the surface of the water and some of them had mangrove trees (salt water loving trees growing on them) it made me wonder how long it takes for these to develope into an islet (very small island)  This map shows the structures on a map (dotted lines) I haven't seen a map like this before.

Elder Andrews, Rainsdon, Mabunga, Abplanalp, Hogge
We stopped by to drop off several fans to the Savusavu Elders.  Elder Rainsdon is from Odgen Utah and was adopted as a child.  He was born on a neighboring island  to Suva called Kiribati.  A wonderful  tender mercy was granted to him in his current assignment in Savusavu.  He was invited to an investigator's house for dinner who asked him where he was born, his island first name (which is different from the one he now goes by), and the date he was born.  When she heard his answer she began to weep and went to get some pictures, telling him that she was his aunt.  When her sister was unable to keep him as a baby, this aunt had planned to adopt him but something prevented it and his parents adopted him and immigrated to the US and now live in Ogden Utah.  How very aware the Lord is of our needs.  Before leaving on his mission, his mother counseled him to go and find his birth mother and a way has been provided for him to find her, and possibly visit her, before he leaves to go home.  He is one of our newer elders.  

This is one of the many coral islets you see on Vanua Levu that may have started as coral and grew big enough to
 support a palm tree another salt water tolerant tree.

I've made a deal with Richard, to give me a half hour to just roam on the beach and find shells on these trips.  This time he stopped near a village and stayed in the truck while I looked.  I soon discovered there were only old worn out shells and was about to return to the truck when a young boy came up to me and upon hearing  I was looking for shells, became my self appointed shell finder!  I smiled and thanked him each time he handed me more shells.  Then he showed me his margarine container with two shells the size of a golf balls in it.  He picked one up showing me the shazi (hermit crab)he would use to bait a hook to catch a fish.  I naively asked him what kind of fish he was trying to catch and he said "we just eat whatever we catch."which made sense to me.  Then remembering we were looking for shells, he grabbed the crab, pulled it out of it's shell and handed it to me! (worn pointed shell with the green moss above).  I wished him luck on catching a fish and Richard drove up the road a bit to a more promising spot.  

This interesting looking flower pod from a tree (about 5 inches long) was
on the shore at the next spot along the beach we stopped at.

here is the adaptable mangroove tree the upper part with branches and leaves the tangled bottom part are its strong roots that anchor it in the mud and sand so it can withstand the storms of life that come up.

As I finished my shell hunting, I saw three boys coming up the road.  They stopped and talked with Richard at the truck and I asked if I could take their picture.  They said sure and struck a fun pose... then said " dollar, dollar"  As they ate some peanuts from a can like the ones we had just bought (Richard gave it to them).  I told them  "oh my husband has the money" and jumped into the car.  Richard was on the phone talking and the boys were still hanging around.  I looked in my coin purse and decided to give them what I had.  When I opened the window a crack they went into a loud frenzy of "me, me, me'" so I quickly handed them my change telling them to share, because Richard couldn't hear the conversation he was trying to have with President Klingler.   Oi! I mouthed mothe (good bye) and they walked away.

There are large sections of land around Savusavu with a ton of palm trees that are evenely spaced out.
 I think this area had a lot of coconut plantations here in the early history of this island.

On our way back up to Labasa on Saturday, we stopped to say hi to the Seaqaqa Elders and took
 a picture of the home that's been converted into an LDS church for the members there.

large 3' x 3' fan in Grand Hotel we stayed at
We got a room at the Grand Eastern Hotel in Labasa (the only lodging available there).  We parked in the middle of town by Courts and did some shopping for a washing machine, refrigerator etc.  We wanted to find a few more things at Rupts but Richard couldn't remember which direction it was.  We asked someone and started walking to the left as directed.  After walking several blocks, we asked another pedestrian and she said it was to the Right.  As we neared Courts I suggested we take the truck and we drove to the end of town that direction, turned around and drove the
 other direction and finally found it.  It's sugar cane harvesting time and their's an unpleasant odor in the air..
.maybe rotting silage from the cane.

view of pool on our varanda.  Two guys were swimming in their shirt and shorts.
No swim suit required in Fiji, but I question whether there was chlorine in it.

These  historical pictures in the dining room were interesting.
 I particularly like the hair cut like this chief has.  He was a handsome man

What the Grand Eastern Hotel used to look like in the good old days

An Indian woman that was brought here as an indentured servant in colonial times

The Grand Easter Hotel today

While we were waiting at the Nausori Airport for Elder Tennis to pick us up, we saw this sign
So Richard went and bought a coke for us to split and wash down the last of the cookies I had in my purse.

Monday was our  seniors once a month FHE.  I was assigned to make two pumpkin pies with some canned pumpkin I found at Cost U Less.  It called for cinnamon, cloves and ginger.  I discovered I had Cinnamon and whole cloves and since it was 5 am in the morning and I didn't want to wake Richard, I thought of our native American Indians, took two smooth stones and hand ground the cloves between them.  We have plenty of fresh ginger, so I put some of it through a garlic press, mixed everything together and placed the two pies in our toaster oven.  I cooked it an hour alternating the heat from high to medium and hid the black scorched spots with a dob of  wipping cream!
Moral of the story :  If there's a will there's a way

We hope you all have fun on Halloween and enjoy the Thanksgiving season.

Love Elder and Sister Hogge