Labor Day

Family,

It's pretty annoying when national holidays fall on our preparation day. All the banks are closed, and the post office is closed. Besides, who does The Republic of Palau think they are? Stealing our national holidays. I always thought the idea of Labor Day was ironic: "Let's celebrate all the work we're doing by taking a day off of work and not working!"

Anyway, I already told Hannah this, but I just talked to the mission office and my flight lands at LAX at 10:00 am on the 28th of October (I'm leaving Guam at 10:25 am that same day. That's what I call time travel - I'll live the day once on the plane and again at home). So that will leave plenty of time for the luncheon.

This week was pretty busy for us (as is every week though). We had to get Elder Roko's immigration stuff taken care of, but in order to do that, he had to get a blood typing test. So we went to the hospital and did that, then went back to the immigration place. Now we're just waiting to go back to pick up the permit. We were supposed to get back to our area that evening after District Meeting at like 4:00, but it ended up being like 7 after we got everything done. Plus, we had to come into town early because Elder Wright had to go to the airport late Friday night/early Saturday morning. His flight was cancelled though because there was a fire in a warehouse or on the runway or something, so he didn't end up leaving until Saturday night.

I've been waiting patiently for the basic unit to be started in Ngaraard, but I think I'm just going to have to take care of all the logistics myself and just call the branch president and ask for permission to go ahead. So my task this week is to find a definite place to start holding the meetings. Brother Hibbard (the military doctor) said he's met most of the Governors of Palau's 16 states, so he'd be happy to help. We'll see what we can do with that this week.

Love,

Elder Barlow