Christmas Devotional and A Walk Through Christmas Lights

Today was a little different than we thought it would be. We seemed to start slow, but we were out the door early. Not sure how that happened. The Cambodia Service Center weekly devotional is typically at 8:30 on Tuesday morning, so we planned to attend District Meeting after. Those plans changed with the announcement that the devotional time was moved to 10:00 so we could connect live to the Asia Area Christmas Devotional on a Web-X connection with Hong Kong.

This was a wonderful devotional. Elder Garrett Gong, the Area President, has received a new assignment and will be moving back to Salt Lake City to serve as one of the Seven Presidents of the Seventy. This was a farewell to Elder and Sister Gong. Elder Randy Funk, who was serving as a counselor in the Area Presidency, will take his place as Area President. It was fun to see people we know from the area office perform in a bell choir. We have truly been blessed with friends all over Asia.

After working hard and accomplishing much at the office today, we went to the Mission Home to meet up with Elder and Sister VanBrocklin to go out to dinner. Of course that meant we invited Elder and Sister Leavitt to join us and have a Senior Night out. We all decided to introduce the VanBrocklins to Fox Bistro, and that we should just walk to the restaurant. Crossing a busy street during rush-hour can be interesting, but we used the "power of the Swarm" to our advantage. Besides, all you have to do is cross one inch at a time.

Dinner was good, food was great, and the company was wonderful. We decided this is where we need to suggest for the next big Senior Missionary dinner outing. Elder VanBrocklin rarely smiles when it comes to food or restaurants here in Cambodia, and he even smiled and said he would definitely come back. He even checked and found that they have a private room for a party that would fit our missionary group.

After dinner the sun had set and the "Christmas" lights were lit for a pleasant walk back. As we walked past several lit Christmas trees, and the hanging lights hung from the tropical trees, we decided this is the way to walk through the Christmas lights. The temperature was about 88* F, and the only snowflakes we saw were the decorations for the holiday.