A Busy Day in Shelbyville

How many of you have heard of Colonel Sanders (no helping from our Kentucky friends)? How many of you have eaten at Kentucky Fried Chicken? KFC is the creation of Colonel Sanders. We had the unique pleasure of stuffing ourselves at dinner (lunch for the Hawaii folks), through the generosity of Dr. Don and Betty Jean Chatham, at Claudia Sanders’ Restaurant in Shelbyville. The restaurant was built by Colonel Sanders for his wife, Claudia. The home they lived in still sits on the property, in front of the restaurant. Yes Virginia, there is a Colonel Sanders – and what is more interesting for us is that Dr. Don Chatham was his personal physician (even before the Colonel became famous).


[Standing in front of the Colonel & Claudia Sanders' portrait - look at the top of the stairs. If you click on the photo - it will enlarge ... we are all enlarged from the huge lunch.]


[Delicious ... only our first plate!, Randy talking with Dr. Erwin & guests.]

We had “a finger lickin’ good” lunch with Dr. Ed Erwin, pastor of the First Baptist Church of Shelbyville and others from the church (including Martha Pryor – Don & Betty Jean’s daughter – she was also our guide for the day – so we didn’t get as lost as some days). The mayor and former mayor of Shelbyville were also dining there, so our group ended up doing an impromptu concert for everyone. You've heard the phrase, singing for your supper? Well, we danced for our dinner ;-) This was the one time that we needed to dance the Hukilau, in the hopes of working off some of that HUGE lunch.


[Dancing the Hukilau, do we look satisfied or what? - thanks Colonel!]

Then we were off to a private concert at the home of Dr. Don and Betty Jean Chatham. (see the story from the Sentinal News - in the" stories about this tour" - in the right column). Don was Dan Kong’s friend at Georgetown College in Kentucky. But the Hawaii connections continue to grow through the years and the Chathams were longtime members of MAC (the Mainland Advisory Council for Hawaii Baptist Academy). In fact, Don was president of the MAC! How they fit in support for Hawaii in their busy lives (Betty Jean is also an internationally known concert pianist) is quite remarkable! Betty Jean was one of the first people to respond when Danette sent word that Gay & Randy were going to be on tour in Kentucky. Due to his illness, Dr. Chatham was unable to attend any of our performances. However, this was one of our most meaningful presentations as it was an honor to dance for this great man of God.


[Dr. Don Chatham with our group. Betty Jean, Don, Danette & Martha Pryor.]

Then we were off for a concert at the First Baptist Church of Shelbyville. We arrived early at the church so that we could spend some time visiting with Rick Astle –who had been a fellow student of the Hongos and Danette at Southern. In fact Rick and his wife drove 11 hours from South Carolina, where Rick is Director of Resort Ministries at Myrtle Beach. In addition to the catching up about mutual friends, no one could sit still when Rick, Randy and Gay entertained Master’s Touch with their rendition of the Baptist Boogie Woogie!

[Danette, Rick Astle & wife, Gay & Randy; Rick entertaining the group]

On the way back to Louisville, we stopped at a medical facility where Dr. Don Chatham used to provide free medical care to indigents of the county. In honor of his service, the clinic was renamed the Don Chatham Medical Building.

[Martha & Danette in front of Dr. Donald Chatham Medical Building plaque.]

We are all so blessed to have such wonderful friends and such inspiring role models in our lives. Thank you Lord for allowing us to spend some time today ministering to such great men and women of God!

St. Matthews Baptist Church - Thanks

[Willis & Roberta Tasssie with Chie and Liane. Roberta was a longtime choir director at Olivet and also taught at HBA - Chie now teaches Japanese at HBA. Roberta's husband was instrumental in helping get the Pu'u Kahea Conference Center started.]

I wrote about some of our experiences being on pins & needles while waiting for Randy to arrive for our presentation at St. Matthews Baptist Church. (Some of you are probably wondering why a Baptist church is called St. Matthews - hey, I'm a mother and can read minds, didn't your mother know how to read your mind? The name takes after the name of the town.) Thanks to Rick for being at the airport ready to whisk Randy to St. Matthews and to Betty Jackson & Mary Ann (Betty's daughter) for picking up Randy's luggage. We also want to thank David Garrard, an internationally known professional Christian magician (read mre about David at his website - http://www.davidgarrardmagic.com) for inviting us to St. Matthews. David is currently Minister to Children at St. Matthews. He was in seminary with Randy and Danette. This was really a wonderful evening reuniting with old friends for Danette and the Hongos and meeting new friends for the rest of Master's Touch! (You can read much more about St. Matthews in our post: Reunion with Friends)

Buffalo Lick Baptist Church

Buffalo Lick Baptist Church has significant ties to Gay & Randy. They often attended & performed here while Randy was in seminary. Randy was particularly disappointed that he missed this visit due to his brother-in-law's funeral. One person who didn't miss it was a woman who traveled for 6 hours from Ohio to attend this service/concert. We were amazed to learn that her father had been a former minister at Kalaupapa. She joined us, along with the Taliaferro's, for a delicious lunch at Olive Garden (you know, that place which has the great commercials on TV and not a single restaurant in Hawaii!).

Louisville Hula Club & Brookview Baptist Church

People usually write blogs in sequential order ... but you know, mothers have to be major multi-taskers... and as such do things when the moment presents itself. So we've had to make decisions like ... find a store to buy batteries to download pictures from the digital camera or go eat at Krispy Kreme? Find a store to buy batteries to download pictures from the digital camera or go to the Louisville Slugger (baseball bat) factory? Find a store to ... oh, you get the message. Well, amazing as it is, we did get to a store and remembered to buy batteries. So here are a few photos of our first few days.

Our First day started with sharing at the Louisville Hula Club Luncheon at Masterson's Restaurant. This concert was organized by a dear friend of the Hongos, Betty Jackson. Betty was like a mother to them while Randy was at seminary. She and her daughter Mary Ann were a sight for sore eyes. The Louisville Hula Club has been in existence for almost 40 years. One of the members who danced was 94 years old (she is definitely an inspiration to all of us, as we will be glad if we even remember our children's names at 94!). They danced very authentic hula - in fact they danced a song they had learned from a workshop in Indiana led by Leinaala Kalama Heine, (who dances for the Cazimeros). There were a lot of hana hous from the audience for these lovely ladies. And the food was awesome - some of us even had our first taste of tilapia (now how did you know we'd write about the food?). And to top it off, we met Elaine, a member of the hula club who has been a long time pen pal with one of the Hawaii prisoners at Otter Creek!


[The Louisville Hula Club performs.]

Later that afternoon, we participated in the Brookview Baptist Church Luau. A big mahalo to Inky Hoots for setting this up. We enjoyed fellowshipping with these warm hearted Kentuckians who put together quite a spread for the luau. Who would have thought that such decorations were possible in Louisville. In fact, Miss Opal even made hula skirts for the younger children to wear. We were very touched that Gene Wilkerson gave us 25 t-shirts for us to wear or share with others. Brookview was one of the churches that Danette had served as pianist during her seminary days. Since Randy had yet to join us, Gay did a fantastic job singing by her lonesome. What a great way to start our tour!



[Danette, Riverson & Inky Hoots; performing at the Brookview Baptist Church luau; Master's Touch with Pastor Troy Rust and his family.]

Home Away From Home

As we get older, it seems it’s not as much fun to “rough it” and sleep in sleeping bags on floors (thanks Dean & Hayden for willing to do so with our youth on their mission trip to Oklahoma!). So how blessed we are that Jim and Shirley Taliaferro have opened up their home, given up their privacy and even the use of their SUV to help support our tour. They’ve even provided delicious meals for ALL of us, plotted our travels, and are pampering us with late night snacks! Here's Danette with Jim and Shirley in their lovely home. Danette and Shirley are modeling two of the pa'u skirts before they were taken to Otter Creek. Thanks Jim and Shirley, you are definitely a blessing to us!!! [This photo is courtesy of Shirley's camera.]

Kentucky Baptist Convention

[photos courtesy of Dannah Prather of the Western Recorder]


Our God is sufficient for all our needs. In His sufficiency, He blesses us with earthly friends to guide, lead, direct, and encourage us. And what a great history of friends that Hawaii has had with the Kentucky Baptists! This was the theme of our performance at the Kentucky Baptist Convention Chapel Service ... a time of thanking and honoring these folks for the years of partnering with us.

In addition to the staff of the Center (which also houses the Western Recorder - the organization that prints our convention newsletter - see info below), the service was filled with old friends. It was especially nostalgic for Randy and Danette as some of their professors and fellow students from their Southern Baptist Seminary days were in the audience. Did you know that among the alumni of Southern Baptist Seminary who have served and continue to serve in Hawaii include: Dan Kong, Jim Baggett, Mori Hiratani, Arjay Gruspe, Sterling Lee? (apologies to all the others who are serving that I don't recall at this time) Danette was especially thrilled to revisit with Mozelle Sherman, one of her former professor, and Ted Hodge, who was her supervisor in her first Chaplaincy. Mozelle has been one of our biggest supporters on this tour from the very beginning. She made a lot of contacts with churches here and help set up some of our concerts. She also provided us with an ukulele before Randy arrived, so we could use it for the luau at Brookview Baptist Church. In addition, she connected Randy, Gay, and Danette via telephone with their former professor and well-known composer, Phil Landgrave, who had planned to be at the concert at the Baptist Building. However, he was in the hospital and unable to attend. Friends with direct Olivet connections included Betty & Dan McAninch (they were also at the St. Matthews program) - Betty served as our organist; and Roberta Tassie and her husband - Roberta was our choir director as well as a teacher at the Hawaii Baptist Academy and her husband helped with the founding of Puu Kahea.

This tour has been filled with blessings from the very moment that Master's Touch said yes to Randy & Gay's request to accompany them. And many times, we walked in faith that God would provide. In order to transport all the donations to Otter Creek, we needed another vehicle (and you already read about the "holey moley" experience) so we just rented it and figured we'd deal with the credit card bill once we returned home. At this time, we want to thank the Fryrear family. This family was Danette's adopted family when she was in seminary- always there to support her! They continue to have a generous heart, as at the end of this concert, they presented Danette with a token of appreciation for Master's Touch ... and yep, our God is sufficient - our "holey moley" van expenses are now covered!

And ... all the photos thus far are from Dannah Prather works so hard to put our Hawaii Pacific Baptist Newsletter together. Not only has she provided the photos that are up on the blog right now, but she has been a driving force in getting other Kentucky Baptists to welcome and support us on tour. And we were able to meet several KY Baptist Convention staff, including the WMU Director, Joy Bolton, who had played in the seminary band with Danette. The WMU put together a wonderful assortment of refreshments for us as part of the reception which was held in our honor by the staff of the Baptist Building.

Hawaii has been blessed by our partnership with the Kentucky Baptists. It is our prayer that this friendship continues 'til the end of time and that they will be blessed until we meet again!

Otter Creek - Day Two

[from left to right: OCCC halau dancing with their new pa'u skirts; Master's Touch & Randy outside OCCC - Corrections Corp of America, the company that operates the prison gave everyone a Kentucky Wildcats t-shirt and CCA cap, as well as providing a very ono lunch; passing out more gifts to the Hawaii inmates on Tuesday. Pictures are courtesy of Dannah Prather of the Western Recorder.]

Who would have thought that the fresh orchids donated by Greeters Hawaii would have such a huge impact. On Monday afternoon, when they were distributed, everyone was so appreciative - as fresh flowers (and from Hawaii) are a rarity. We had a nice surprise, for when we arrived at Otter Creek many of the inmates and guards were wearing them!

This morning's program was a sharing time with the women from Hawaii. Our Danette is quite amazing! She opened up with the introductions and everyone listened so attentively, as her good humor, her openness, and her pidgin was just what everyone needed this morning. Then Liane read a letter from Haunani Apoliona, Chair of the Office of Hawaiian Affairs; followed by Audrey reading a message from Mufi Hanneman, Mayor of the City of Honolulu. The women were touched that important people from home had taken time to send them a message of hope and their prayers. When Danette shared about sister Verdine's work with the Maui Economic Opportunities Inc. - the women from Maui cheered! Randy had wanted someone to share their testimony and we all thought it was going to be Ethel. However, while all this was taking place, she was sitting in the audience next to a volunteer from Kentucky ... who turned out to be non-other than Eileen Mullins. Now you're probably asking, who's Eileen? Wait until you hear this story. Eileen has a son who ended up in the Kentucky Federal prison. It is located waaaay out of town, so visiting him was very difficult, especially as there wasn't any place to stay nearby. So she founded Haven of Rest in 2004, a hospitality house for those who have loved ones in prison. She received the Women's Missionary Union's Dellanna West O'Brien Award for Women's Leadership Development in 2006! To read that story, please visit http://www.wmu.com/news/readnews.asp?id=116

Back to this story - Eileen leads a Bible study at Otter Creek. One day, she observed a group of women from Hawaii out in the yard. She was heartbroken by how sad and forlorn they looked. So she prayed that someone would come to visit them. Her testimony was about how amazing God is - for never in her wildest imagination could she have dreamed that a husband and wife team who have won 6 Na Hoku Hanohano awards and a group of hula dancing - gift bearing women would show up at the prison to minister to this group of women that she had been praying for. She addressed the inmates and said, "God is the one who loves you" for no one other than someone who loves you this much could have planned such an experience. We do have a great and mighty God!

For those of you who know Ethel, she is one talkative lady, especially when sharing about what God has done for her. The background of Ethel's sharing goes back to KHNL sharing our story of our planned visit to Otter Creek. After the story, Ethel received a call from a mother looking for her step-daughter. She begged Ethel to check if her step-daughter was at Otter Creek. Ethel wondered how she would ever accomplish this - do you just blurt out if there was a woman with a specific name from Hawaii there and please call home? Our God is all sufficient. On the first day of passing out the goodies in the dorm and cell, Ethel ended up meeting this specific step-daughter to a chance conversation (Ethel wasn't even looking!). So that first night, upon leaving the prison, Ethel called her parents who were overjoyed to know where their daughter was! So when Ethel had to share with the inmates, she requested that this step-daughter come up to the stage. And there she passed on the story leading up to that moment, and then passed on the message from her parents - that they loved her! In fact, Ethel shared that the dad was so choked up that he couldn't talk to Ethel on the phone, but passed on the message via the stepmom ... that he loved her - hard! As Ethel was sharing, the chaplain was sitting next to Danette, who said - this girl needed to know she was still loved. Wow, isn't it amazing to know that our God loves us hard!

The chicken skin continues ... when Master's Touch was ready to teach Hulihia - there was a women who jumped up and said she knew it! She had learned it from Ilima when she was at the Kailua facility. So, she danced it with Master's Touch and everyone was whooping and cheering! What was so neat about this story is that this prisoner recently came to Otter Creek, and so wasn't yet comfortable with this new group of women, and the halau women didn't even know that she wanted to or even could dance! We're thinking that this woman now has a group she can bond and feel comfortable with. And of course, when we presented the pa'u skirts to the halau, there were more tears and hugs all around. Remember that this halau is a prison halau, so they practice in plain pa'u skirts made from sheets ... so to have these colorful Hawaiian print skirts - and many from a master kumu hula, Michael Casupang - how thrilling!

As we left the prison, each of us were glad we had made the trip. While we were only there for a few hours over two days, it was long enough to get a sense of that loss of identity, as you leave all your personal belongings - including driver's license, credit cards and keys at the front desk; and the sense of hopelessness as you hear doors clanging shut behind you. We pray that the gifts that were so generously donated by our friends in Hawaii, the handwritten words of encouragement on colorful Hawaiian postcards by the members of Olivet, the memories of these two days of sharing in dance and song, and the hugs, tears and prayers will help sustain these women as they as so far from home. We have been touched and have an even greater and personal awareness of our God who gave us this opportunity.

When we left, we followed Eileen Mullins to the Federal prison so we could visit the Haven of Rest and to spend some time with the folks there. While there, we had an impromptu concert in the chapel for the volunteer missionaries.

Then on the drive back, Shirley thought we should experience some of the beauties of Kentucky so we stopped by the "natural bridge" - a natural stone formation. Then we rode a sky lift up into the mountains ... everyone was a bit nervous and had to pair up for comfort on the ride up. Chie was our lone brave soul - riding by herself (whew - since we had an uneven number). Everyone held on tightly to their rubber slippers since when we looked down, we could see a lot of rubber slippers which had lost their owners.

We're happy to report that we are once again back safely at Shirley & Jim's ... of course, not before stopping for a bite to eat, where Audrey and Ethel had their first taste of chicken & dumplings!

Otter Creek - Day One

[These photographs show the outside of the Otter Creek Correctional Center. As you can see, it is in the middle of nowhere. These photos are courtesy of Dannah Prather, partnership editions editor of the Western Recorder.]

When we arrived and looked at the mountain of donations to be transported to Wheelright, we realized that our current van wasn't going to be big enough; even with the help of Shirley's SUV. So Ethel & Danette went online to order a midsize car and looked for the cheapest rates. With tax and other costs included, it was going to be $378. We ordered it about half an hour before we left to go pick it up from the airport. When we got there, they didn't have any of that size left, and said all that was left was a MINI-VAN, which we could have at THE SAME PRICE!!! Holey-moley! Ethel was beaming all Sunday!

Thanks to everyone who prayed for our travel. On Monday morning, when Jim Taliaferro checked the weather channel at 1:00 am (yep, we are a bunch of night owls), the report was for scattered thunderstorms. Praise God, there were no storms today. We anticipated that it would take us 4 hours to drive to Otter Creek, another hour to get through the prison entrance requirements, and be able to start the concert at 2:00 pm. It actually took us 5.5 hours to get there - so we didn't arrive until 2. Shirley came to the rescue once again as she stayed with the vehicles & boxes to get inspected while the rest of the group went through security to prepare for the concert. Gay was the first one ready, so when she stepped into the performance room, a woman approached her and asked if this was the same Olivet Baptist Church in Hawaii where Dan Kong was pastor. Once Gay shared the sad news that Pastor Kong had died, but his daughter was here - the tears started flowing. Her mother Doris was a member at Olivet and Danette even taught her sister Myra in Sunday School! There were lots of hugging and crying over the recollection of days at Olivet.

Most of those who attended today's concert were Hawaii prisoners, but about 20 of the other inmates also came. The concert started with the prison halau performing for about 20 minutes - they were awesome; performing auwana, kahiko and Tahitian numbers. Then Randy & Gay sang while Master's Touch performed. When Gay sang the Kamehameha Waltz, the Hawaii women were moved and more tears flowed. We were supposed to end by 3:30, but with such a late start, we actually went later. The staff here were so accommodating and really bent over backwards to help make this experience a positive one for everyone. Instead of passing out the cookies and some of the goodies in the main hall as originally planned, we were allowed to follow the inmates as they returned to their dorm rooms or cells for a bed check. Master's Touch was allowed to distribute the gifts in their residences. So half the group went to the dorms (led by Danette) while the other group went to the cells (led by Randy and Ethel).

We decided to make this side trip during our tour because 1) these women have so few visitors from home and 2) to let them know that people in Hawaii are praying for them. We are so glad we went - how many times did we hear ... "wow, first time we talk and someone know what we mean," and as we passed out the cookies ... "hey, plenty mahalos," and "plenty mahalos for comin." And from the non-Hawaii women, they not only thanked us, but also requested our prayers. As we were leaving the dorm, all the women stood, raised their hand in the air and snapped ... their way of clapping - it brought tears to everyone. We definitely thank our Lord for giving us this opportunity to minister and we thank the staff at Otter Creek for making this possible. And Grace - we heard a lot of, "please tell the cookie ladies thanks" - they were definitely a hit!

We will be returning to Otter Creek from 8 - 10:30 am (2-4:30 am Hawaii Time) to share with the women from Hawaii. This is when we will teach Hulihia [Transformation], written by Ilima Stern for the women and present them the pa'u skirts.


Needless to say, we were 2 hours late getting to the Wheelright Baptist Center. But they were waiting and so we were able to do a short program for them. Here we are with Pastor and Mrs. Charles Wilson. Thanks to all for your patience with us!



Blessings continued as we got lost on the way to the hotel. So we stopped on the side of the road in front of a house to ask for directions. When Danette stepped out of the van, a little boy yelled to his parents that there were a bunch of Chinese people here. The father came out - shirtless and surmised that we were lost. But he asked if we were from Hawaii since he had heard that there was a group of folks from Hawaii doing something at Otter Creek. He tried to give us directions, but we just couldn't seem to figure it out. He looked at us and then said that if we wouldn't mind waiting a minute, he'd put on his shirt and lead us there since he had to go into town to attend an AA meeting anyway. When he went to get his shirt, his son informed us that his father had just gotten out of rehab. We pray that this encounter with us will help him realize that despite his personal situation, he can still help others. We had half a package of cookies left - we won't mention who ate the other half ;-), so we left it with them as a small token of our appreciation.

Continue to pray that Tuesday will go well - a special prayer for Ethel as she will be sharing as part of the program, and that the group will return safely back to the Taliaferro's home in Louisville.

Reunions with Friends!

While everyone is exhausted - we have survived the first weekend ... and continue to be blessed.

On Sunday morning (7/15), we sang at Buffalo Lick Baptist Church, where Gay and Randy attended during their seminary days. A woman drove all the way over from Akron, Ohio ( a six-hour drive) in order to see Randy and Gay. Her dad was former pastor for the United Church of Christ church at Kalaupapa settlement, and had become friends with the Hongos when they came to sing for his congregation about 10 years ago. After the service we all went to Olive Garden, which we have seen many commercials for in Hawaii, but which only a couple folks had ever visited. Food was great!

Since Randy hadn't arrived yet, by the start of our evening concert at St. Matthews Baptist Church in Louiville on Sunday evening, we were a bit nervous. However, so many friends came to support us that we were blessed by their presence. Among the MANY friends were Don and Ruth Hustad (he is former long-time organist for the Billy Graham Crusades, and a good friend of Clyde Yagi; also was a professor of Randy and Danette's at seminary); Roberta Tassie - former choir director at Olivet during the 1940's and 1950's (Ayako Nakanishi and Alice Ogawa would remember her --in fact, Ayako had mentioned her to Danette just a week or so ago!); Rev. & Mrs. Mike Dixon -- former pastor at Lanai Baptist Church, George and Mary Chun -- he grew up in Wahiawa, and when Danette was about 4 years old, the Kongs escorted him and George Watanabe to their respective colleges on the mainland; Dan and Betty McAninch, with their daughter Sue Causey and her husband -- Olivet members during 1968-69 will remember them well, as Betty was our organist while Dan played oboe for the Honolulu Symphony for a year, and their kids sang in our youth choir; and our apologies to anyone we left out. Randy arrive mid-way through the concert so the concert ended on a very high note (even higher than the high notes that Gay seems to reach so effortlessly)! Randy, Gay, and Danette renewed friendships with several other friends from their seminary days. It was a fun evening for everyone!

Please continue praying for everyone, especially as we travel to Wheelwright. The forecast for the next two days is scattered thunderstorms on the way to and from Wheelwright. We are blessed that Shirley Taliaferro will be leading the way in her SUV (we had too many things to transport for our two vans) as she has volunteered at the Baptist Center there and has traveled the route. Ethel will be the middle driver in a mini-van (that story to come next), and Danette will be bringing up the rear in the full sized van. Please pray that God will be watching over the drivers as they make their way to Wheelwright on Monday (7/16) morning.

Bedraggled but Arrived

[in transit - starting off our Kentucky Adventure]
















We Made It!!! and arrived safely in Louisville, on three different flights and they was loooong flights. But how wonderful to be met at the airport by Danette and transported to Shirley and Jim Taliaferro's home. After being on the road for approximately 14 hours in transit, it is especially comforting to end up in a home that has been so lovingly prepared for us... and what royal treatment by the Taliaferros!

Please be in prayer for this group as Randy will not be leaving until Saturday evening, as he is participating in his brother-in-law's funeral. He will be arriving in Louisville just minutes before our Sunday evening concert - we're hoping he will be able to at least participate in the grand finale. This is putting extra responsibilities on Danette (which she handles with such panache) as she will now have to do some piano playing and singing - in addition to being the chauffeur, organizer of our group and dancer. We are truly blessed by Danette!

Moving/Shipping Day!

The preparation for our tour continues to be full of wonderful blessings. In addition to a packing coordinator and a team of willing packing volunteers, we thank our wonderful movers: Rick and Riverson Poole, Roy Mizushima, and Makito Watanabe (if some of these names seem familiar - it's because they are family of our tour members). Last Monday (July 2) they came with their truck and muscles to help Ethel, Danette and Chie get the 28 boxes, weighing a total of 757 pounds to UPS. Of course we needed Roberta Harada, our packing coordinator to solve the intricacies of UPS. And none of this could have happened without the patience and resourcefulness of Joyce Sueda, the UPS Customer Service Supervisor. Prior to arriving at UPS, Roberta completed online forms and found that it would cost over $1070 to ship our boxes! She asked Joyce via email what she had done wrong since the original estimate from UPS had been $760. By the time the moving crew arrived at UPS, Joyce had correctly printed out the labels for the boxes and had them waiting - and the good news - it was only $629.11 (which included additional insurance and the fuel surcharge). Joyce definitely epitomizes the best in customer service - Mahalo Joyce!

Praying Over Pa'u Skirts

Approximately 40 women dance in a halau at Otter Creek. Upon hearing this, Kumu Hula Michael Casupang donated 25 pa'u skirts. Agnes Casupang and Faith McFatridge also donated skirts and the women of Master's Touch sewed the remainder to make sure each of the 40 women would have a pa'u skirt. Prior to being packed with all the other donations, our packing volunteers took a moment to pray for each skirt. The hope is that the women of Otter Creek would be blessed in some way, knowing that their skirts have been prayed for, and that there are strangers half-way across the globe who are praying for them.

On Saturday, June 30, our great group of volunteers gathered at Olivet Baptist Church to pack all the donations for the women and staff at Otter Creek. A job that would have taken Master's Touch all day was reduced to mere hours due to the help of all our volunteers. Thanks to Alison Ebesu, Gayle Fukunaga, Roberta Harada, Hirono Haraguchi, Cheryl Henderson, Eileen Lovelace, Hannah Miyachi, David Pang, Naomi Pang, Rick Poole, Ashlyn Okimoto, Jim and Cathy Shepherd, Janet Shitabata, George and Claire Teramoto, Nan Tsuruda!

Packing Coordinator

OK, Master's Touch is going on a Christian Music Ministry Concert Tour with Randy and Gay Hongo ... sounds exciting ... so tell me where a packing coordinator comes in? Well, there are 11 people going on this tour ... and the airlines allows us 2 pieces of luggage each. And if you read our donations column on the right ... including the 112 gallon jars of homemade macademia nut chocolate chip cookies ... even those of us who forgot high school math a loooong time ago can figure out that we can't possibly carry these. Now God would not provide us these great donations for the women prisoners at Otter Creek without a solution ... and you know how God has been answering prayers for our tour each step of the way ... He provided us with a Packing Coordinator, our own Roberta Harada! Roberta started checking around and it looked like it would cost us more than $3000 to send these donations. Roberta didn't give up and found us a great deal with UPS to ship our boxes (it's a brand new UPS service that JUST got started in JUNE), at a rate that even we could afford. Thanks Roberta!