I was thinking about this BLOG and it feels a little bit like a travel log. You might think we are just holidaying here. Well, we do try to take advantage of our P-Days, but we also do actual missionary work. We are expecting the sisters and a young man I'll just call D. at our house in a couple of hours. D. has a baptism date scheduled in two weeks and he has asked me to perform the ordinance. I was very touched that he asked me to do it - the young missionaries usually do the honors. We don't use baptisms as the measure of missionary success, but they are a nice affirmation that we are doing good. He is a great young man, who found the church website and called in for information about the church. His call was taken in Salt Lake. The missionaries there talked with him at length, then referred him to some missionaries in Hawaii to answer his questions (I can't imagine why Hawaii). After several conversations with him, they got in touch with the sisters here in Maribor, where he lives. So he has literally learned from missionaries all over the World. This is not an unusual process these days. COVID has been a curse in many ways, but it has opened up missionary work as a Worldwide service. Our main tools are now Facebook, WhatsApp, and Zoom, and these tools work as well for someone on the other side of the World as they do for somebody on the other side of the block.
Now I've gotten that off my chest, we visited Ptui last P-Day. Ptui is pronounced like the sound you make when spitting into a spittoon. It is the oldest city in Slovenia and was a Roman town two thousand years ago.
This is Liz at the Orpheus Monument. It was erected in the 2nd century AD in honor of the Roman Governor, Marcus Valerius Verus. There are no actual Roman buildings left, but there are stones, pieces of columns, and stele scattered here and there, especially on this hill.
Behind the monument is the Church of St. George. Inside is a statue of St. George in the standard pose with his spear in the dragon, unusual only in that he is standing instead of being astride a horse.
This is the Ptui castle and museum. We didn't try to go up there because our P-Day is Monday and most things like castles and museums are closed on Mondays. The white building sits on top of ancient walls.
This is a curious B&B in town. They have a poetry festival each year, and visiting poets can have a disc made with whatever they feel moved to declare. Most just have the poet's name and a line or two, but some put samples of poetry on them. These are on the outside wall along the alley and they cover the wall for 40 feet or so. Very cool.
OK, now on to 9/11. We had a meeting with a man at 11:00, but he cancelled. So, we decided to take a walk in THE Park. There are several parks in town, but we went to THE Park. There are lawns and trees, and lakes. At the third lake there is the most marvelous, storybook view imaginable.
The weeping willow is so beautiful, and the lake in front, the lawn behind, and the houses on the hill. What a sight! I was standing on a little, wooden bridge when I took this photo and I imagine thousands and thousands of budding photographers have taken this exact same photo. You approach it going up a hill and as you crest the hill, this is the view.
The walk was a bit challenging for my damaged knee, but the paths were good and it turned out fine. I did ice my knee on our return. I had the long lens on my camera, and I think it is defective. Most of the photos I took are out of focus, and it won't focus any better even if I do manual focus. I did manage to take a few good ones, though.
Can you see the carp just under the water. Carp aren't very exciting, but they are fun to see.
Sister Ashurst wanted to take a nice photo of pretty, yellow flowers. I wanted to take a nice photo of Pretty Sister Ashurst. It was a win - win.
Turtles are fun to see in the water. They move so gracefully in the water, and so clumsily on dry ground.
This turtle was resting on the bottom of the pond in the shallow water. I got to within four feet of him and he acted like he didn't have a care in the World.
I took lots of long-distance shots of ducks, but the long lens just won't focus on them well. But these ducks were acclimated to all the strollers and let me get close. I thought it turned out well.
Butterflies are rare these days, which makes me sad to say. Butterflies are one of life's joys and we have nearly destroyed them. This pretty lady landed in the grass and was fanning her wings. When she closed them I couldn't see her at all. Then she'd open them and look at what she shows!
This evening, we met with D, as I said at the beginning of this post, and the sisters taught him a lesson from a conference talk. Then we all went up into town and had dessert. What a beautiful day! What a contrast from that 9/11 day when we all watched in horror as thousands of people had their lives snuffed out.
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