24?

The airport tarmac

Man playing the musical instrument

Another busy week just flew by.
I went to work for a couple of hours on Monday morning then took a couple hour flight to the island of Timor for work. The distance from where I live is like Salt Lake to Lincoln, Nebraska or maybe Chicago to New York, something like that. Anyway, it's not very close and it feels pretty far away, too. The climate and plants are different. The air is dry, things look a little different and there are some unique cultural things like this interesting musical instrument and hat. I had to get a picture. The instrument has strings, (I think it's 24?), around a cylender and then the strings are plucked like a harp and the shell in the back can be expanded to magnify the sound, except the one in this picture is plugged in to an amplifier! When I traveled up into the mountains I saw near so many of the homes these little huts where people hang out. Some had the grass roof all the way to the ground and some just a couple feet above the ground. Some things are the same as where I live and this is still Indonesia, but these are things that are not the same.
On my trip I got to visit the home and graveyard of one of the former kings, (I think there were 24 on the island). The king's descendants still live there and carry on the tradition though they have no real governmental power anymore. I think the influence of the king and all his relatives, which are many, are still felt in the community, however.

Welcome to the home of the king

The road up was winding and narrow and interesting with all of the hills, villages, and views. I liked the airport also with it's one runway. The plane lands and then turns around to drive back to where it can drop everyone off on the tarmac. Then a plane drives down to the end of the runway, turns around and takes off. One thing I didn't get a picture of was all of the goats for sell for the holiday on Wednesday, (which I had off since it's a national holiday). They were on practically every main road in temporary set ups. I heard that many families buy a goat and then kill it and eat it on that day. All I did was go swimming with a couple of my own children and some boys from our branch (congregation)!

Elder Pratt

There are only a couple other news items for the week: the doctor was in town from Jakarta so my wife and I went to get our remaining immunization boosters, my daughter and I seem to be getting eaten alive by mosquitoes, she even gets them feasting on her all night despite her mosquito net, we swam more on Saturday, and we had our district conference for our church on Saturday and Sunday with a visiting general authority, Elder Carl Pratt and his wife, who happen to know a cousin of mine very well.
Are there still only 24 hours in a day?

Typical hut

View from hotel room in Kupang