The Philippines

We departed Salt Lake City at about 8:45 P.M. on Thursday, August 28th and flew to San Fransisco where we had a 4 - 5 hour layover. We then had a 12 hour flight to Taiwan and arrived at 5:00 AM on Saturday the 30th. Somewhere in there we flew threw 14 hours of Friday--it just disappeared. We had a layover in Taipei and then boarded another flight to Manila. We got off the plane and there was a greeter with our names on a placard. He took us through customs, escorted to the front of all the lines and we didn't have to say a word, that was sweet treatment. We exited the terminal and there were 2 sister missionaries (there husbands were waiting in their vehicle parked nearby. I had not seen such a welcome sight in a long, long time. It was so good to see their name tags, their smiling faces and someone to take us by the hand and get us settled. We rode from the airport and I sat there staring out the window. I am not sure what was opened widest, my eyes or my mouth. The heat and humidity, the sites and sounds. There were so many people, so much traffic, I thought MacLeod Trail in Calgary at 5:00 PM on a Friday was congested. I now know the meaning of "culture shock." I'm not sure if I could define it properly but I know what it means; I have experienced it.

Elder and Sister Armstrong and Elder and Sister Whitney picked us up at the airport and took us to our apartment. It is a nice apartment on the 10th floor of a 42 floor building. After dropping off our luggage Elder and Sister Armstrong took us shopping to pick up a few items, sheets towels and few groceries. We got back to our apartment at about 6:00 PM and went to bed, we had been up for about 36 hours, we tried to sleep on planes and in airports with little luck. Bed felt very good. The picture upper left is of a trike. A trike is a small motor bike perhaps 90 - 125 CC with a little side car attached. Sometimes the side car is covered and sometimes it's just kind of like a basket. This trike has a basket and is loaded with 6 people. This is not unusual to see.

The tree (upper right) is located on the temple grounds, there is very interesting, lush and beautiful vegetation here.