Family Discovery Day: Growing the Branches of Your Family History and Ancestry Tree

(This Content Is for Non-Muslim Use only)

On September 27, 2025, a Family Discovery Day was offered by The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints in Malaysia. This event was held at the Kuala Lumpur District Center in Petaling Jaya. 

As early as June of this year, a committee was formed to help plan this event. “Members of the committee included the Church’s district family history consultants and church members who worked to realize this event, and promote it to family, friends, and members of the church,” said Elder Dan Haltinner one of the committee members. 

He also mentioned that the turnout filled the hall with guests, volunteers, church leaders, and church members. “The volunteers socialized with visitors and introduced them to a family history platform called FamilySearch.org,” he added.

FamilySearch.org is a worldwide website and platform that specializes in documenting family history: from building a family tree, providing ancestral research tools, creating photo albums, and recording family journals, to name a few. It is a non-profit platform that is accessible in many languages, and available to anyone who wishes to begin creating their family tree and discovering their ancestral roots. 

There were booths set up for participants to be introduced to family history at the event. These booths covered welcome and registration, setting up a family history online account, learning how to create a family tree, and making family photo albums on the FamilySearch.org website. Other event activities included doing Chinese-based ancestral research, videos on church members experienced with family history, presentations by family history experts and unique games. Refreshments were served throughout the event, concluding with dinner to wrap up the evening.

Daiki Tanji, from the Kuala Lumpur Branch created an interesting family history game. When asked on how he came up with his creative ideas, Daiki responded, “When I received this assignment, I wanted a game that would have the participant remember memories and information about their family or ancestors.” 

He went on to say that a game similar to roulette would support his idea. “As the game player waited for the wheel to spin and land on a question, it would be a moment of anticipation for him or her,” said Daiki. He added, “The participants responded very well to this game. Those who played said it helped them to keep family in their thoughts often.”

Age and Experience No Barrier to Doing Family History

Niccolo Comaschi, 15, from Italy was a visitor who participated at the event. He expressed, “I thank my Latter-day Saint friend Santiago for introducing me to FamilySearch.org. He invited me to attend this Family Discovery Day.” He noted that their friendship at school has expanded beyond the classroom space because of FamilySearch.org. It made him happy and excited to discover his roots and ancestors, especially building his family tree. 

He elaborated, “I have thus far found information about deceased family and relatives going as far back to the 1800s in Italy and Europe, including photographs and grave markers.” Although it is not easy to find family history earlier than the 1800s, he said that he will work harder to discover more.

“Niccolo has a remarkable interest and ability with family history research and discovery. He is resourceful in his efforts to find information and other types of data that are relevant and helpful in his family history journey,” observed Elder Scott and Sister Lois Sucher, family history volunteers stationed in Sibu, Sarawak in East Malaysia. 

Sister Sucher shared, “I am deeply impressed with his youthful passion and eagerness to do family history and genealogy work. For a 15-year-old, Niccolo is an exceptional young man who is going to have an amazing lifelong experience discovering these roots.” 

A young participant (who wished to be anonymous), a newcomer to family history, felt his experience at the event was “very insightful” and was “really glad” he had attended, thanks to his friend Daiki Tanji’s invitation. He found setting up his account with FamilySearch.org simple and found the application quite unique and easy to understand and learn. 

Eugene said, “It is indeed a user-friendly application to use on any type of device. I also had the opportunity to begin my very first family tree. Now, I can embark on searching for ancestry records and information from living family members and relatives.” 

The Blessings of Sharing about Family History

Family Discovery Day was also visited by Yong Meow Ng and his wife Christina who felt very pleased with the success of the event. Both were recently called as the Asia Area Family History and Temple Work Advisors for Singapore and Malaysia. They expressed, “We are very grateful to share this lovely day with the organizers of this event, guests, visitors, volunteers and members of the Church.”

The Ngs felt that it was especially significant to meet the key persons involved in fostering and boosting family history and temple work in Malaysia as the event would not have been possible without the volunteers’ dedication. 

Ng added, “These family history consultants of the Church play an important role supporting, encouraging, guiding, teaching, and training both church members and public participants on the savvies of being actively engaged in discovering their family history and ancestral roots. There were many others that we got to know, too. A very sweet experience for us indeed.”

Both participants and volunteers found meaning in the Family Discovery Day events. After introducing themselves and getting to know them, volunteers guided participants to set up a FamilySearch.org account first, then teach them the ropes of adding names, organizing their family tree, and navigating the site. 

Charles Petrinovich and Robert Brock from the Kuala Lumpur Branch shared, “The feeling of servicing visitors was well worth our time. We could see enthusiasm light up in these visitors as each of them learned to use either the FamilySearch.org website or its online application to build their family tree.”

“FamilySearch.org is a user-friendly tool that helps the user to maximize his or her experience while creating their family tree and navigating the site,” commented Julian Lee from the Cheras Branch of the Church. With functions such as accommodating users’ language preferences on a mobile phone or tablet to experience hands-on application of FamilySearch.org at their convenience, he concluded, “These attributes make this technology-driven platform an effective vehicle to perform family history and genealogy work.”

Carol Ng, the coordinator of the Family Discovery Day event expressed, “I could see that everyone enjoyed themselves through learning, socializing, and serving one another.” 

She felt grateful to observe how volunteers and committee members from the different branches of the Church in Klang Valley stood out as wonderful examples of Christlike love with each giving their best to help participants catch the vision of the importance of family history.

“One thing I am especially grateful for: that 102 participants came…I feel happy knowing all who attended this event had a significant takeaway. They developed greater awareness and understanding of family history work,” she mentioned. 

She shared that a few visitors came forward to express how glad they were to attend, learn the process of doing family history, and feel the joy that comes from performing family history work for the living and those who had passed

The Kuala Lumpur (West Malaysia) District Presidency of the Church extended their appreciation and gratitude to the District Family History Consultants, branch leaders, members of the Church, volunteers, missionaries, and many others who contributed to this event, stating that their dedicated and exemplary service made Family Discovery Day more than just successful, but also meaningful and significant in the lives of those who participated.