Another Weekend, But..........

Friday night and a wonderful dinner by the pool to-night. It will be a short weekend, because Marlene and I are on duty all day Sunday from 6:00am until 10:00pm. This duty only happens twice during our three month stay, so it is not a terrible inconvenience.

Because caterers are used here, dinner which we share with the participants can be served almost anywhere, so to-night it was by the pool. We do the setup and takedown of tables, chairs, etc, but it is a very nice change. But dinner in the dining room is just like going out to dinner each evening, so it to is nice. The food is very good and the entertainment is the participants telling us about their country, backgrounds, vocations, families and so forth. This is always interesting for a variety of reasons. For example there are two fellows from Russia in the group, both I believe from Moscow. Now one fits my description of a Russian, ie a Boris Yelstin lookalike. But the other guy is an Eddie Murphy lookalike, so learning his family background will be interesting to learn, but I haven't got around to it yet. He is a very talkative fellow, so it won't be a problem.

To-night's dinner companions were three fellows from India and one from Sri Lanka. The story from India is very positive as their economy is just starting to explode. These people are happy to be at the Haggai Institute, but they remain wary of Americans. All three of our dinner companions were delayed at Honululu because of security concerns. There were five in their travelling party and all were thoroughly searched. Since they are told thorough security checks are completed at random, why all five in one party?? In any event they were laughing to-night, but I doubt they were laughing a few days ago. These are well educated people with successful careers who speak very good english, so it is a wonderful opportunity to learn about them and how they view us from the west.

The pictures attached are from our tour Wednesday, a pineapple field (they grow on a plant, but harvest is a time away), a mailbox configuration (this fellow likes his mail sorted) and notice the cactus in the background, and a group of volunteers (the couple on the left is Dick and Eileen Radstake from Moorefield, Ontario and this is their fourth time here).

You can enlarge a picture by clicking on it.