Visiting Families - October 18, 2017

Today we were able to visit Raja Ratnayake's parents. We met Raja when we found out that we were going to serve a mission in Sri Lanka. Raja grew up in Sri Lanka and joined the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints there. He later served a mission in the Salt Lake city area when Tooele was in that district. He met his wife at BYU Hawaii and eventually moved to Tooele. Raja and their family invited us to their home to tell us about Sri Lanka before we left. What a neat experience to be able to meet his parents. They were so kind to us. Fed us a lunch of bread, cheese, sausages, cucumbers, tomatoes, cookies, but my favorite thing was a drink made out of fresh mango with ice cream in it. Oh so refreshing!

Outside the Ratnayake home they grow mangos, papayas, guava and coconuts.

Here I am picking a cherry. The cherries aren't like what we have in the United States. To me the taste was bitter but Ken really liked it.

           Here we are with Raja's parents. We enjoyed our visit very much!

Our next visit of the day was going to President Nishan's family. President Nishan is the Branch President of the Colombo 1 Branch. We enjoyed being in their home and being around their three children. The children reminded us of our grandchildren.

                                          This is a picture of wood apples.

From the wood apple Sandy (Sandimali) takes out the pulp to make a drink. People in Sri Lanka love the drink. It will take me a while to get use to the flavor.

Here we are around the table. Sandimali fixed so much food. She made rice, chicken, pork, salad, beans, dhal, and of course ice cream for dessert. People are so kind and are always feeding us.

This is their family pictured with Elder Luke and the Sister Missionaries.  I loved when President Nishan told us about how he and his wife were married in Sri Lanka and then flew to Hong Kong to be married in the temple. Their son is the first Sri Lankan to be born under the covenant. What an inspiration to me of their faith and love for Jesus Christ.