June 12, 2009

Graduation from West Johnston High School! ABC... Amanda, Brooke, and Caitlin.

Proud parents. Caitlin checked Shiloh's graduation pictures to make sure Dad wasn't wearing the same plaid shirt he wore for Shiloh's graduation. Same football field, same parents, different plaid shirt. However, it is Shiloh's graduation cap. It fit Caitlin's head better than her own. In between my typical parent thoughts about a child graduating, moving on, moving out, etc., I kept thinking that in just four more years, I will have spent $400.00+ on teal graduation gowns. We'll have to make room in the closet for those next to Jacob's bright red gown.

This is proof for Caitlin that Jacob was there. He left for a date after she received her diploma but before she marched off the field.

Sorry, pictures are out of order. This is Caitlin getting ready to walk "in".

Pomp and circumstance...

But she felt it was more of a waste of her time....

Caitlin found out who her roommate will be at UNC. Michelle Fry. She lives on Ocracoke Island, attended a K-12 school with less than 100 students. Was the 2009 valedictorian from a class of 9. She does not like junk food. Caitlin was one of 453 graduating seniors and will eat junk food.

And, she started working at Michaels three weeks ago. Yeah!!

The Singapore/Malaysia Update

So. Again, playing catch up. But I think I'm getting consistent, posting every six weeks.... I believe I left off promising an update on the Singaporean Kid. And now he's been transferred. I had sent him a package to the mission office while he was in Singapore and he was promptly transferred back to Malaysia a few days later....

June 2, 2009

Dear Mom,

As I opened your email I had the feeling that you were going to say that you sent the package. I was excited to hear it but I would have been more excited if I were still in Singapore. I figured it would happen this way as soon as I got the transfer news haha. This past Monday I flew in to PJ. Petaling Jaya. I'm back to West Malaysia. PJ is really close to Kuala Lumpur, I now live in the house that I stayed in for zone conferences back when I was serving in JB. PJ is about mid west malaysia, JB being at the bottom and Butterworth at top. I am really excited to be back and PJ is a really cool area.I remember telling you last week how I didnt want to be transferred. I am pretty sure now that all I have to do to get transferred is to sincerely and completely not want to. This past Saturday, Kelvin, our baptismal candidate passed his interview and will be getting baptized this Saturday. I'm still really excited for him, but naturally sad at not being there to witness it. My new companion is Elder Murphy from Kansas. I lived in the same house with him back in Kuching. He is a really cool guy. I'm now in my fourth area and I am still holding strong as District Leader. PJ is a really big city, as is KL. There are a lot of internationals here as well. Our teaching pool includes Nigerians, Filipinos, Burmese, Chinese, Indian, Nepali, and so on. More to come.

Elder Brennan Kartchner(Shiloh's cousin) is serving in the Czech Republic. He is serving in the mission office, was sorting mail, and came across a letter for Sister Perez. The return address was an Elder Shiloh Judd, in the Singapore mission. He expressed his curiosity. I expressed my curiosity. Shiloh replied...

June 9, 2009

Wow. Talk about living in a small world. I wasn't even aware that there were two Shiloh Judds in Singapore. I'm gonna have to find him and see what's up. Crazy stuff. I mean really, Do I know that many people from California, and what's more, Californians residing in the Czech Republic? It's always been a dream of mine to meet someone else named Shiloh. Who would've thought that it would take going to the other side of the world to find him.

So...Sister Stacey Perez of California was in the same MTC group as Elder Briggs of Goldsboro, NC. Their District was with my district in the same zone. Though our two districts had different classrooms due to language differences, we usually had the same meal schedule along with Pday and gym. The zone leaders at the MTC were some of these Czech bound elders. We had a lot of interaction and luckily it was friendly. some of my district (me) became really good friends (as good as friends could get spending lunch together for three weeks) with some of their district. As I was leaving the MTC before them, I had agreed to stay in touch with a few of them. I kept that promise and wrote a few of them back when I was in Johor Bahru. I got an email or two from my previous zone leaders and another elder or two. By the time I had arrived in Kuching, a letter made its way to Johor Bahru, addressed to me, from the Czech Republic. I finally gained possession of it when I got transferred to Singapore. It was from my friend Sister Perez. The letter that Brennan must have intercepted was my reply to her letter.

Thanks for the heads up the Elder Kartchner was working in the office...

That's too funny. I'm only slightly embarrassed. I'm more amazed at how it unfolded than I am embarrassed. I hope that is enough information.

June 16, 2009

We had a baptism this past Saturday. His name is Jacky, or Liang Zhu Jie. He is the first Chinese person I have baptized, Malaysian Chinese or mainlander. He was a mainlander from Guang Xi China. He is a funny guy.

June 30, 2009

There is a large percentage of non-Malaysian Muslims here in the PK/KL area. It is the capital city of Malaysia so it is a hot spot. For example, I am emailing you from a Pakistani internet shop. I can't remember how many Pakistani, Iranian, and Iraqi people I have met while here. As my hair gets longer, I am more and more often guessed to be or mistaken for other middle eastern people. Yesterday there was a group of ladies debating where I was from. After they discussed it for a while, they came to the conclusion that I was Palestinian. They were so convinced they didn't believe me when I said American. In the past week I have also been asked if I was from Lebanon. I'm sure I would be asked if I was Jewish (just like through out high school), except that no Jew could ever make it over here.

Tonight we have an appointment with two mainland Chinese people at a members house. I'm really excited for it. One of them is only a week and a half from baptism. The guy that was baptized a few weeks back, Jacky, moved back to China. He has called us twice from China. He is applying for BYU-H right now. That made me really happy since there are no groups or branches near his place in China.

In a previous post Shiloh had talked about cutting grass with machetes. I'm sure these were the mission approved ones.

Machetes come in handy for cutting sugar cane.

This is Sister Lihot's house. She lives out in Kota Samarahan, an area subject to flooding. This past King tide was especially bad because it was combined with a weeks worth of rain. We had an appointment with her so we borrowed the inflatable mattress from the kids up the river. We went one at a time and made it as dry as you could for an inflatable mattress.



Heavy new age meditation

This is the part of the beach between Singapore and Johor Bahru. It's the far end of my area in a place called Pasir Ris. In was in the middle of receiving revelation when my companion took this picture.

This is at Sentosa Beach, where a sign proclaims "the southernmost point of continental Asia". Is Singapore not an island?

I know Caitlin took pleasure in mistranslated signs a while back and told me to keep an eye out. I don't know if this counts. I just didn't understand it I guess. Who takes water from toilets? There were both sinks and water fountains within sight.

These poop signs are everywhere. I think I have seen one every single day that I have been in Sinapore.

So. We'll try to update this blog with more pictures than words, and no, the pictures are not in chronological order.

I think I left off in mid March....

Jaimee started phase II with her orthodontics and had braces put back on. A week later, during one of her soccer games, she took an elbow to the mouth. Chipped a top and bottom tooth. Didn't stop the play though. She later took the girl down with a slide tackle. She thinks. The girl had a twin on the team and she got one of them. But, we got the teeth fixed and she is as lovely as ever.

I had mentioned on a previous blog that Shiloh sent us Sarungs. I think Jacob's vest adds a nice touch.

Shiloh bought this parosol for Jaimee at the state fair, pre-mission. She thought the chinese characters on it went well with her asian sarung.

Jacob finished his classes in mid May. He is no longer working at Target (bye-bye 3:00a.m.) and is working for a pest control company. He's also taking a summer class. He also moved out in May, found a roommate and he's living near NC State campus. We usually see him briefly on Sundays and try to have food to send home with him.

Caitlin took four AP classes, English Lit, Statistics, U.S. History, and 3-D Studio Art. Since school started last August, the art class has consumed most of her time and our kitchen table. She had her exams in the beginning of May, and now she's just coasting until she can walk across the football field and receive her diploma. She has decided to be a Tarheel. Her first choice was Wake Forest, but UNC is covering most of her tuition and expenses, so Carolina it is.

Becca. Well. March found her enjoying track. And then April hit. She started the month with shingles. She missed a few days of school and then the girls were out for spring break. When school started back again, she made arrangements with all her teachers to make up her missed school work and tests. The week she was to make up her tests, she came down with a nasty gastroenteritis that kept her mostly horizontal for a week. We had to run her down to the urgent care to get her rehydrated. She also turned 16 that week. We propped her up and made her open some presents. As of this writing, she just completed all her make up work, projects, and tests. Just in time for finals this week.

We (okay, me) couldn't resist using this motorcycle prop. I love the training wheels.

Jaimee's photo's haven't been updated professionally because she's working every Saturday. Hopefully once the strawberry season is over I can get her in.

Happy Easter!!

At this point with the blog entry, I had a bunch of pictures from Shiloh. As I was trying to copy and paste snippets from his emails, it wasn't working. So, I saved this entry as a draft and just stepped away.....far away. Instead of getting overly frustrated, I'll do a two-part update. This is the American Kids update. My goal is to get the Singaporean Kid update before the week is out. I can do it.

So. I guess I completely skipped over the month of February. To summarize, I turned 45, the girl's got valentine p.j. bottoms (the day after, 50% off at Target), and I had a slight career change. I'm still doing medical transcriptioning, but I'm actually working in a doctor's office. So, no more working from home in the p.j.s. It's a good thing I didn't get new valentine p.j. bottoms like the girls. That would have been a waste of $2.50. Oh, and Jacob is dating Julianne. She is from Arizona, she graduated from NAU, and is currently working on a math related masters at UNC Chapel Hill. We like her and try not to be intimidated by her math skills. And, Dad continues to keep on keepin' on. We found some dark chocolate malt balls for him, so I'm sure February was as good as it could be for him.

And. Here's the beginning of March. Jaimee's started a new soccer season. She's a little frustrated already with the caliber of her team and they haven't even had a game yet. She was just hired Saturday to work at a nursery and strawberry farm. It is owned by her best friend's family. She'll start working every Saturday starting in April, which is the busiest time for the strawberry season. She doesn't have health benefits, but she gets free strawberries and can get plants at wholesale prices. She's excited and so are the rest of us strawberry eaters.

Becca just got her learner's permit. Yep, she was honest and reported her actual height at 4'11". She's also running track again this year.

Caitlin would be enjoying her last semester in high school except for an AP 3-D art class that she thought she would enjoy. It's very time consuming and she would rather spend more time on her other AP classes. She still hasn't made a decision yet as to UNC or Wake Forest.

We seldom see Jacob, but we know he lives here. His dirty laundry piles up and the whole milk goes down. He's still working at target, going to school full time, and dating on weekends.

Shiloh sent us a package. He included sarungs for all of us. He said the one that he picked out for Dad was very rare. We all had a good chuckle when we pulled his out of the box. A very nice grey plaid. He also included a CD with pictures and I've included a few of those.

January 27, 2009
Something that I am grateful for here is how people cook things. Meals are almost always fried and you almost never have to worry about things being undercooked. They are usually over cooked. Having said that the monkey meat was cooked all the way. This past week I got to add two more things to that list with the monkey. Biawak and I forget the other but I think it was memorang. Those are monitor lizzard and beaver, respectively. The beaver was kind of plain and odd but the monitor lizzard was fun. Biawak meat is really expensive if you dont catch it yourself. Its considered a special occasion meat. 46 ringgit per kilo.

We just celebrated the Chinese New Year. Tahun Baru Cina. It was crazy. I was still living on the sixth floor so I could see all across the city that night. Fireworks were EVERYWHERE. Even right next to our building. Ashes would have fallen in the windows had we opened them. right after midnight there was soo much smoke we couldnt see past the end of our road. I found out later that the Chinese believe that the more smoke, light, and noise you make, the further the evil spirits are driven from your house and family, and the longer it takes them to come back.





February 10, 2009
This past week has been really great. Things are so much better now for so many reasons. We baptized a guy that was a member referal. Those are always the best. His name is Frankie anak Bache. I dont know if I've explained it yet or not so I will now. Everyone that is iban, bidayuh, melanau, kayan, or any kind of dayak race from indonesia or malaysia is named Something Anak Something. Anak means child and they are given their own name and their fathers. For example, had I been born here I would be Shiloh anak Shayne as would be all of my brothers and sisters anak Shayne. Then all of my children would be something anak Shiloh. Makes family history work a little different.Ive had four or five baptismal interviews so far and theyve all been really cool. Its an amazing experience.

February 24, 2009
This morning we got up early to go to one of Sarawak's state nature reserves. We went to the Orang-hutan rehab state park. It was soo amazing. You walk through a path in the jungle for about 200 meters and they come swinging in through the trees. They have some platforms with fruit on them but they will also just come in through the trees right above you. There were three mothers with new borns. The adolescent ones tried peeing on a few people and they threw some sticks at us.

Last Thursday we were doing a service project with one of the Senior elders. Elder Young is 65 but still in great shape. We were cutting tall grass, some as tall as me with, parang, or machettes. Elder young fell in a puddle and sliced open his hand. He severed the tendon in his middle finger and damaged another. My companion ran to get Elder Young's car ready to take us to the hospital whileI wrapped and elevated Elder Young's hand. He started to go into shock so Ielevated his legs and gave him water. We got him into the car and sped off to the hospital. Right before we went in he asked my companion to anoint him and then I gave him a blessing. He was in surgery for two hours and he spent the night there. Not even two days later he was up and driving again. Heis a good sport about it all. We do avoid that kind of service project though.Thats my news. My companion gets here in two days and I am excited to be training.

March 3, 2009

I forgot to mention last week but right now I am in singapore on a visa run. Immigration got a little cranky with me but I got in plenty fine. I just picked the wrong officer. My new companion is great. I found out his real last name is Rajah-Kanagasabai. He's not actually a local but most people think he is. They are stunned when I, the white guy, have to translate for him. He was born and raised in Perth, Australia and his ethnicity is Sri Lankan. He talks like an aussie, so I dont understand most of his slang. He is having a tough time realizing that the language they speak here is not the language he learned in the MTC. He is good though.

Great Excitement for Caitlin (which is a little tricky, since she doesn't 'do' great excitement well....) She heard from UNC Chapel Hill on Wednesday that she was accepted, and then got the big yes from Wake Forest University today. Tough decision. Carolina Tarheel or a Demon Deacon?

And Shiloh's latest....

January 20, 2009

Thats insane about the snow. Six inches is a lot for anything. I wonder how the pond looks with all of that.

I can't believe that Caitlin got accepted to both of those schools. Actually, I can believe it, she is a genious.

I dont count Becca liking that chocolate as much. She doesn't eat it right anyway. She takes pride in the fact that she chews dark chocolate. That is a bold transgression. It's actually one of the baptismal interview questions now.

A lot of stuff has happened of late. Two nights ago I got to eat monkey. As we sat on the floor and the children and mother brought out the dishes of food the dad, Bro Harrison (the same family that has the pet monkey), told us that we would be eating monkey. We thought he was just joking but he wouldn't take it back. He kept telling us to just try it, so we did. It was a really tough meat but it tasted really different and really good. It was a really sweet meat. I asked him what kind of monkey it was and he said, "Monyet itu yang tidak ada ekor, ekor pedek saja." "That monkey that doesnt have a tail, just a very short tail." Im not sure which kind that is, other than the delicious kind.

For other news I got transfered into the same area that I am in now. I am switching companions and houses and I am going to be the new District Leader. Don't worry about the package address, I am still in the same appartment complex. The packages only go to the post office and we pick them up from there so it will still be the same. My new companion will be (the transfer takes affect this Monday), Elder Campbell from Sandy, Utah. He is a really cool guy.Thats about it for news here, let me know how Jacobs birthday goes.

If it is snowing in America, it must be raining in East Malaysia....

We awoke to our first real snowfall in years. It continued until late afternoon. Beautiful. I lost track of the amount of cocoa and mugs we went through today.


Last week we had some really cold weather. Our highs didn't get above freezing and our lows at night were around 11 degrees. We stayed toasty warm in the house, with much use of the aforementioned cocoa mugs.

However, unbeknownst to us, the electricity went out in the barn. My first thought was, "No big deal, we won't lose the food in the freezer, it's too cold for anything to thaw". And then, I remembered the boy's snakes, who prefer a warm and humid climate. Shayne brought the snakecicles in. We used our bathroom for the "Reptile Resurrection Room", since it seems to be the warmest in the house. We used heating pads and tons of towels warmed in the dryer.

Jacob and Shayne also "cuddled" the snakes to their warm bellies.

And whaddyaknow?

It worked! Snakes Alive!

The girls were not worried or impressed with the outcome. Jaimee and Rebecca were involved in a snake warm up a few years ago, when Jacob was on his mission. It wasn't to this extreme, however. Caitlin feels that if the snakes freeze twice, that's it. Two strikes and they're out.

We also had a birthday to celebrate. Not too shabby for a 45-year-old.

He bought all of his presents, except one. A source of amusement for me was that he hid the bag, and then couldn't find it. And just who was he hiding it from?!?

I told him he needed to practice his "surprised" look. The kids didn't know which presents he had bought, and so the game of the evening was guessing which was the surprise gift.

And, last but not least, an update from Kuching...

January 7, 2009

I did get my package and I think that it is, if not the best Christmas package ever, at least in the top three. Its up there with the gameboys, paintball guns, cellphones, and rock gear. I haven't made the grits yet, I'm buying cheese today so that I can. All of it was extremely important and very much appreciated. Especially the Dark chocolate. Have ya'll tried the kind with Chili or did you just send it to me because its wierd? Either way, I liked it a lot.

Last night at a dinner appointment I ate snake. It was cut into inch long pieces and fried. We ate it with soy sauce. I think.

January 13, 2009

When I went the the malls in Florida I would usually check the chocolate store and as you know I tried quite a few different things but I had never tried the chili. It always scared me but once you sent it I just decided to eat it like you would any other dark chocolate and it turned out fine. I converted one of the elders in my house to liking dark chocolate. As it is for most people, he was just eating it wrong the whole time. He has already asked his parents to send him more.

The weather here now is really great. It's not hot at all really. It rained for about four days straight again and there was some pretty bad flooding in some parts but the actual temperature feels great.

My old trainer, Elder Etable, is training a new elder now. His name is Elder Leavitt, he is from Arizona and he is the one Uncle Brian interviewed and stuff. I got meet him this past Monday. We had what is called a Zone tour, where Elder Hallstrom of the Asia area presidency came and trained us. All of the elders in all of east malaysia came down here to Kuching for it. I got to see the two of them along with a lot of others including Elder Romney.

I just got over a really bad cold. I had to stay in for three days because of it. One of the nights my fever was all the way up to 102.6. At that point I asked for a blessing and later the doctor gave me an antibiotic. I am however, better now, out and working again. Nothing is worse than staying home on your mission.

Okay. So this was our second favorite Christmas photo.
Grandma Judd sent her Christmas Eve pajamas. This year it was matching nightshirts with black leggings. Nice job on the cute factor and fit.

December 16, 2008

Our branch Christmas party is this saturday. It should be a lot of fun. We have a good strong branch. Upwards of 200 come to church each week.

I got to play with a monkey this week. It is a baby proboscis monkey. One of the members in our branch was at work one day and one of his co-workers saw the mother full grown monkey and shot it so that they could bbq it. When the member saw that the baby was still alive, he bought it off the guy for 20 ringgit, about 6 or 7 US. Now his family is just raising it.

We had a nice chat with Shiloh on Christmas Morning. It was around 9:15 a.m. our time. By the time we were through, it was close to midnight for him. He said it was the latest he had been up his whole mission.

He mentioned a village that previous missionaries hadn't been to yet. He was told they had seen white men before, but only on T.V. He also said the Malaysians like to say "If it's raining here, it's snowing in America".

December 30, 2008

On Christmas day we ate five meals. On the day after Christmas we ate eight meals. each with at least two servings.