Colds in the Heat

When we came to church on Wednesday, we found an ant mound in the Relief Society Room.  Elder Porter was successful in baiting and getting rid of them.  He was also doing some tests at the home of a church member.

President & Sister Mackay in Medan

Last week Sister Porter was tryng to recover from a cold.  She managed to give a talk in sacrament meeting last Sunday about service. She wrote the talk the Sunday before, the day it was assigned.  And she worked on it, smoothing and cutting a lot, on the flights to and from Jakarta.  But in Jakarta we learned that our mission president and his wife would be in attendance in Medan!  Talk about pressure.  They had a very successful visit, meeting with the younger missionaries on Saturday and then enjoying meeting members after church and visiting some potential sites for a new, bigger church building. Sister Porter went home right after church and went to bed.  Elder Porter caught the cold partway through the week.

On Monday, we went shopping at Carrefour, which is an international grocer and often has foreign foods.  But no dill pickles!  It had been out of the other store where we had found them earlier.  Fortunately, later in the week we were near a large Brastagi store and found some pickles.  Yay!  We bought two.  They also had Coke Zero, a rare treat.  They have wonderful fruits and vegetables so it seems trivial to complain about the Western foods we cannot find.

Another thing we haven't been able to find easily is dental floss.  Stores will have a huge aisle of toothpaste and mouth rinse--but no dental floss!  I wish I had brought more Glide from home.  Speaking of dental issues, Colleen has to have a cleaning every 4 months because of dry mouth issues.  I went in for a cleaning at an office with a good reputation, and the dentist said that it was rare to see someone with a full mouth of teeth at my age.  Indeed, he said he never saw a patient my age.  He seemed to do a good job of the cleaning-- for just under $21.  So we now have a place we can go for dental care.


On Saturday, one of the young missionaries was sick.  Our afternoon appointment was cancelled, and his companions had other places to go, so we took him to the clinic at the hospital, and then took him home and fed him American food until the other missionaries were done teaching.  There are three of them until Tuesday, when a newcomer is arriving here for training.

It has been really hot out lately-- fewer clouds in the sky perhaps. Most of the heavy rainstorms have been at night, and from the 10th floor we have a panoramic view of the lightning.