Elder/Sister Meyers

Kumar

On Monday we were able to teach the second discussion to Kumar. He is a wonderful man. He is reading and praying but not ready to commit to anything. As we talked about The Plan of Salvation, I could feel Asher's spirit. I shared my feeling with Kumar and testified that I knew that our grandson would be resurrected and we would be able to see him again someday.The Spirit was strong and we were able to schedule a third discussion with him.
Wednesday we left home around 6:45 am and headed for Kandy. Sister Ann, Milli, Codi, and Anjini went on the trip with us. On the way I asked Ann if we would see any monkeys. She said we need to go higher into the mountains to see that. Just as she got the words out of her mouth the driver is saying something and pointing to the side of the road. We look over and there are two small monkeys playing.
The mountains (hills is what we called them) are beautiful. They are covered with trees, shrubs, and all kinds of greenery. When we left to come home it was raining and the mountains reminded me of the Smokey Mountains with a haze hanging above them.
Our first stop was the Pinnewala Elephant Orphanage. It is one of most popular tourist attractions in Sri Lanka. The elephants are controlled by their mahouts(keepers), who make sure they feed at the right times and don't endanger anyone, but otherwise the elephants roam freely around the sanctuary area. There are usually 60 or so elephants in the sanctuary. We saw the elephants go bath in the river, feed, and just roaming in their area. There are men all over the place trying to get you to buy bananas, shirts, cd's, or anything they can get you to buy. You learn just to shake your head, no!
The most exciting part of the orphanage for me was to get to ride the elephant, Calmily. Reece had me promise her before we left on our mission that I would do that and now I have kept that promise. It was a little scary. Anjini and Codi rode with me. Ann and Milli went after we came back. Elder Meyers didn't want to ride. He took lots of pictures. Calmily loved it when we fed her the bananas. Her mahout said that she knows 57 words. He kept saying, "De Ha." (that means elephant move) It took 10 years for her to learn that many words. She is 25 years old. The mahout said that elephants usually live 120 years. Calmily was very friendly to us. She loved to be petted. Her hair was stiff and her skin was leathery.
The other fun part of the orphanage was seeing how they made elephant dung paper. The elephants eat a diet high in fiber so they take the dung boil it, blend it, and then make it into paper. People there make the paper into items to sale.
Other than being a little hot, the day was wonderful! A once in a lifetime experience.
After leaving the orphanage we went to Kandy. There we stopped at a Buddhist Temple. It is called The Temple of the Sacred Tooth Relic(Sri Dalada Maligawa). This temple houses Sri Lanka's most important Buddhist relic- a tooth of the Buddha. The tooth is said to have been snatched from the flames of the Buddha's funeral pyre in 543 BC, and was smuggled into Sri Lanka during the 4th century AD, hidden in the hair of a princess.
We were told that cameras weren't allowed so we have no pictures to share.
We stayed over night in a hotel by the Mahaweli Ganga River. The hotel had a restaurant so we had dinner and breakfast. The most fun part was watching the people the next morning in the river. They were bathing and washing their clothes. Three women were beating their clothes against a huge rock to wash them.
On the way home we stopped at the Peradeniya Botanical Garden. It was beautiful. It started to rain on us but that kept us cool. We enjoyed the area with hundreds of bats in the trees. They were all hanging upside down. The other item we enjoyed was the suspension bridge. Codi and Milli were apprehensive about walking on the bridge but they finally did it. We loved watching the man bathing. You should be able to see him in the picture.
It was hard to come back home and start on our assignments once again.
Saturday we were suppose to have two discussions but both called and canceled. That was a big disappointment but that is how missionary work goes lots of times.
The other missionary couple, the Kellerstrasses, have to go to India for a couple of weeks. Their visas have run out and they don't have a new one yet. We hope they are able to return. Our visas will run out on Thursday and we pray that we won't have the same problem that Kellerstrasses are having. President Anton thinks ours will go through since we have already been granted a residence visa in the past.
Today we started an English class for the Relief Society Sisters that have trouble speaking English. We were impressed that we had 8 sisters attend. They speak much better English than I thought. Many pretend they can't speak to me but now I know they can.
We pray that we will be allowed to continue our mission here in Sri Lanka but we have learned whatever happens is in the Lord's hands.