Teaching In The Tropics: "Thank you for your service"

Well, we are still here. It is official, we are to be evacuated . . . eventually. As we were getting ready, the Church suddenly decided to bring all foreign missionaries home, prioritizing areas that were more dangerous to be in since the outbreak (wisely so). That probably bumped us back a week or two as the Coronovirus outbreaks escalate in other areas of the world. We still have no official cases here in Samoa. That has not stopped them from being very vigilant in closing the borders and banning public transportation and dine-in eating. In fact, they have closed off ferry traffic between the islands of Upolu (where we are) and Savai'i. The Mission President quickly evacuated all of the missionaries in Savai'i including our new ITEP couple at Vaiola and had them come to this island.

What was a little shocking was when I logged in to the full-time missionary portal to check on any notices, a screen came up that said, “Thank you for your service.” It looks like someone punched the release button for me somewhere. I bet they don’t know we are still in Samoa.

So, without any classes to teach (because we cannot meet in groups any bigger than 5) we are at a standstill. We are making arrangements to see if we can offer an online class for Human Growth and Development.

This past week, the emergency restrictions got more stringent. So before they took effect, we visited Vavau beach one more time. Yesterday, we took a senior missionary couple (the Williams from across the street) and had the Roundy's (the ITEP couple from Savai'i) follow us so we wouldn't break the "no more than 5 in a group" rule and drove all the way around the island for one last time. It took 8 hours. The pictures below chronicle yesterday's trip.