"Time Out" in Fiji: February 15

Tonight there were Valentines dances all over Suva. The Nausori Stake had a YSA dance, as did the Suva North Stake. We, however, were invited to participate in the Suva Stake Valentines Dance. We along with the Jacksons were the pre dance infotainment. While they were waiting for the young adults to arrive they wanted the Jacksons to speak for 15 minutes on PEF stuff, and we were to speak on "The importance of institute." When the Jacksons started there were perhaps 15 young adults, but by the time we got to our part there were between 20 and 25. We decided to play instead of being to serious. Scott spoke for a moment and then I had them divide into groups of four or five. I told them we had a treat for the group that came up with the most reason why it is important to attend institute in 120 seconds. We then had the group with the most answers read their reasons and ask the other groups to listen carefully. If the other groups had a reason not noted in the first groups list, we would give them a treat also. Of course, every group listened and while the first group that really had a reason not mentioned by the first group was telling us their reason the other groups thought up not mentioned reason which worked great for us. Scott wrote the reasons on a white board. It was full by the time we were finished. We passed out the treats and then Scott bore his testimony. We had fun. They had fun. We delivered the message.

After our part the young adults took their dates (date only event) or paired off with someone of the opposite sex who did not have a date. We then were given table numbers and went into dinner. Brother Taito (Tie toe) taught the youth about table manners, eating with lots of utensils, and toasting. We sat with a young couple who were friends; she was a recent convert and he is putting his papers in now that he has graduated university. Men who were not lucky enough to find a girl before they were all paired off were our waiters. We had a soup course, an entree course, and dessert.

Our Dinner Mates

After they had a fashion show. The five dresses were all made from recycled materials. The dresses were not all modest enough for LDS women, so the models wore shirts under the dresses. They were fabulous. The following pictures does not do justice to the dresses. I was impressed and told the fashion designer--a man--that I thought he had real talent.

Bad Focus
Dress is made of totally recycled materials

The Dresses and the Designer (second from right)

The dress on the left is made of old plastic tablecloths with flannel backing
The black and white dress(second from left) is made of trash bags
The blue dress is made of blue tarp.

We took Asemaca and her date home.
She lives with a relative and earns her space by babysitting.
She will graduate from USP this November in Economics
Don't they look elegant?

We left before the dance lessons as it was 10 p.m. as we wanted to visit the Samabula (North Stake) dance before it got too much later. Even though the Samabula dance had more attendees the feel was not as good as the first dance at Nasinu.