July
1, 2001. Bridgewood, CT. My one-month stint in Shinar‘s place
brought me to places I never dreamed to set foot on, many of them I only read
in books and magazines.
On my first Sabbath in the Midwest, we
attended a camp meeting held at the campus of Graceland University in the town
of Lamoni situated on the state boundary between Missouri and Iowa. A camp
meeting is similar to our association rally in the Philippines except that ours
is done by district while theirs is conference-wide. The principal speaker was
the President of the North American Division. In the afternoon, we took a side
trip to visit Jamesport---an Amish country. That was my first time to see the
Amish with all their primitive way of life---no electricity, no motorized
vehicles, no TV, no nothing. Previously, my Amish knowledge consisted only of
occasional articles I read from newspapers and magazines and the movie, The
Witness, starring Harrison Ford.
On Sunday of the following week we made a 3-hour drive to Saint Louis,
a city known for its magnificent Gateway Arch. This is also the home of the
first aviator to cross the Atlantic, Charles Lindberg---his plane, Spirit of
St. Louis, was named after the patron saint of this city. St. Louis lie along
the Mississippi River on the boundary of Illinois. From the summit of the Arch you can see the entire St. Louis on the west and a large portion of Illinois
on the east. Beneath the ground level of the arch is the Museum of Westward
Expansion. From there we went to St. Louis Science Center and the Purina Farms. On our way home, we made a stopover at the tomb of that famous American pioneer Daniel Boone in Marthasville.
Last June 13 we went
to the legendary Lake of the Ozarks. It was the most scenic place in Missouri.
We made a stop-over at one 5-star resort hotel, loitered in their spacious
terrace then went to the marina and took turns feeding those gigantic carps and
catfish with the remnants of hand-baked breads we bought at an Amish bakery the
week before. Before reaching the Ozarks, we made a brief stopover at the Harry
S. Truman Dam
The Truman Lake is one of the tributaries
to the Lake of the Ozarks before it empties its waters to the snake-winding
Missouri River. I learned that President Truman, one of the greatest
personalities that Missouri has ever produced was born in Independence a city
not far from Kansas.
On our way back from our Great Lakes Escapades we made a 2-day stopover at the Saldias in Berrien Springs. In the
afternoon of June 23 we made a side trip to the Amish Acres, another amish
colony in Northern Indiana. We were rather quite a big group consisting of Amy
and her 2 kids: Amythst and Don, Shinar, Manang Vi, Shinar’s sister Pilar and
Danish nephew Svend together with Pilar’s childhood friends from Chicago,
Nenett and Twoots and her son Dwaine.
Leaving Berrien Springs on our way home to
Sweet Springs last Sunday (June 24) we made a brief stopover at Springfield,
the state capital of Illinois and the birthplace of President Abraham Lincoln.
Shinar’s 11-year old Danish nephew, Svend, contended that that was the place of
the Simpson Family (one popular carton series) but considering that there are
so many Springfields in the US, we reserved our judgment on the validity of his
contention. We posed for some photos with the statue of the 6th US president.
Reaching Missouri using the northern route
we made a stopover at Hannibal, that sleepy little town by the Mississippi
which was put on the map of world literature by its most famous resident by the
name of Mark Twain. Samuel Clemens in real life, Twain created the two famous
fictional characters Tom Sawyer and Huckleberry Finn in his book The Adventures
of Tom Sawyer. All the fictional characters in that book were based on real
people living in Hannibal during his time. We joined the guided tour inside the
historical Mark Twain Cave which was a maze of passageways and cracks. What an
experience that was!
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