Day 9 in New Zealand

Jordan wasn’t feeling too well today. We woke up and started getting ready which started with Jordan tossing last night’s meal and finished with her tossing anything else in her stomach. From Hamilton we shot up to Auckland to go to the Otara Flea Markets with a brief stop for more tossing and a scoop of Pokeno ice-cream. We didn’t see much of interest in Otara but did run into President Kennerly who served in the Mission Presidency with President Mendenhall (and 3-4 other mission presidents). After leaving the markets we tried to grab lunch at a burger and fry joint we used to go to on my mission but unfortunately we must have been the only ones that went to it because it was gone. We settled for McDonald’s (for like the 8^th time). I think there is a high likelihood we’ll never eat at McDonald’s ever again. We then checked into our motel which was just on the other side of the Kamo road round-about from the flat I stayed at for the 8.5 months I served in Whangarei. Jordan slept for a little bit while I tried ringing Debi Birch a woman Elder Tanner and I taught and baptized. I spoke with her mom and step-dad and told them we’d call by later that evening. I woke Jordan up and we head to the Whangarei Falls and tried to go in to town for some shopping only to find every store was closed (it was 6 pm). We swung by Debi’s place and had a chance to sit-down with her and do some catching up. She’s getting ready to head over to Brisbane, Australia with her job. It was unfortunate to hear that she had slipped into inactivity and she gave us several excuses but ultimately it was just too hard and she didn’t care that much (not her exact words but pretty much what it boiled down to). A little disheartening but hopefully she’ll find her way back in the very near future.