Special Tongan Fan

Today, Sunday, I took a special fan with me to Church. A couple weeks ago, I complimented one of the Tongan sisters in the ward, Sis. Olive, on her fan. It is circular & about 14” total across & is round with the crest of the Kingdom of Tonga hand drawn & colored in the center on Tapa cloth with a “fringe” around the inner circle of dark brown & lighter cream colored folded fronds. It is really, really pretty & I told Sis. Olive how much I liked it. Well, with our Tongan brothers & sisters you must be careful about what you say. The next thing I knew, I was holding the fan & had been given it as a present! So I took it today to use at Church- partly to show Sis. Olive that I really did appreciate the gift. In RS I was sitting across from 4 of the Tongan sisters, including Sis. Olive. One of the sisters said- “What a pretty fan you have.” The others joined in saying how pretty it was, with Sis. Olive saying it at the end. I laughed with Sis. Olive & explained that she had given it to me a couple weeks earlier! It was a fun little private joke we enjoyed.