Ahh….the Christmas Season! Our choir of carolers grew by four new missionary couples this month—Woods (ITEP), Sings (CES), Hawleys (CES), and the Heimulis (teacher). The Sperrys (Mission Office Couple) will come in three weeks. It looks like it’s the changing of the guard, except all the previous missionaries have long gone home…excluding us! And we celebrated Christmas big time!
Our little branch had a branch party where the Primary children reenacted the “First Christmas.”
We used the old script John has used at our own family’s eve celebration. One Christmas our grandson, Luke, was designated to be a cow in the manager. “I don’t want to be a cow,” he said. None of the children here wanted to be the cow either (cows get eaten). To encourage his child to be the mooing animal, one father bought his boy a set of flashing red devil horns (like you find at Halloween).
It added an interesting affect to the nativity scene. Our Baby Jesus was interesting too. He was a blue teddy bear.
The children, dressed in their Biblical attire,
had their story parts memorized. Young and old joined in the retelling of Luke 2 and the singing of traditional hymns. We weren’t exactly a professional acting troop, but we did receive a taste of the real meaning of Christmas.
This event was followed by a visit from Santa;
and Santa would have look very familiar to you all. Elder Thompson just happened to buy a 30 pa’anga Santa suit in town that morning. When asked to play the role, he was ready to go…and he was funny! At the appropriate time, he grabbed a red sock stuffed with presents.
The sock was as tall as he was. He entered the party with a big Ho Ho Ho. The kids were mesmerized by this jolly old elf
as he passed out a gift to every Primary child.
He even had a few older Tongans sisters sit on his lap.
As Santa was skipping out the door, making his departure and singing dashing through the snow, his red trousers slipped down around his knees. It brought a roar of laughter and became the big topic of discussion in Primary the next day. In his class of 3-7 year olds, they all speculated who Santa was and giggled about the pants falling down.
And then (after Santa left)…would you believe? We had a feast!
Later in the week, we, being the “old timers,” gave the new missionaries a tour of the island. The mission nurse had us stop at a home or two sick Tongans to sing carols and deliver hand-made Christmas bears to the children. We made over 40 teddy bears and delivered them to children.
On Christmas Eve we had a spaghetti dinner with the seniors, Office Elders, and APs. Elder Thompson and I thought we’d give the new arrivals to the island a little flavor of Tonga by insisting that they use different cooking utensils for inserting their food into their mouths instead of forks and knives. Tonga is kind of a quirky and unpredictable place…so was our dinner; quirky that is. The group also wrapped ribbon around 50-60 Church videos and DVDs for the Elders to pass out on Christmas Day as an approach to opening a dialogue for prospective investigators. The seniors then watched the DVD of “Mr. Kruger’s Christmas.” And Santa showed up again and distributed his VHS’s to all. That guy gets around! (With all the ufi that he and the reindeer ate, it’s a wonder that his sleigh was able to get off the ground.)
On Christmas Day we had breakfast with the Office Elders and the APs. (It seems like we’re feeding those boys a lot!) Who made the scene again? Santa, himself! He was a busy man this season! He even made a trip to President McMurray’s home. This time it was Sister McMurray, Michele, and Danny who got to sit on Santa’s lap and had to answer his clever questions. He had gifts for all including four rolls of toilet paper—two ply, and really difficult to acquire in Tonga. “Ho, ho, ho! Merry Christmas!”
We ended the day with a picnic at the beach with the other senior missionaries and the McMurray family. (The infamous Office Elders and APs were there too. They are always where the food is, and we wouldn’t have had it any other way. We like these guys—Elders Iketau, Karratti, Lyon, Haltli, and Uluilakepa.) There were choices of beach activities--frisbee, miniature golf (using long poles we had found on a previous beach and tennis balls), shell-gathering, swimming in the ocean for the kids, visiting, and helping the chefs prepare our meal over an open fire.
The McMurray family also joined us for the afternoon activities. The President has his own way of having fun! Once, when we turned around, he was giving the “first discussion” to some people lounging on the beach. President McMurray is such a great example to all the missionaries on how to get the Lord’s work done!
When he got through with his discussion, he challenged each of the missionaries to walk the beach, introduce ourselves, and engage in a gospel message.
Well, Merry Christmas and a giant Ho Ho Ho to all.
‘Ofa ‘atu,
Elder and Sister Thompson
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