Monday, March 27th: Today Elders Robinson (St. George, UT), Bond (Las Vegas, Nev.), Ballamis (Kayesville, UT), and Buthelezi (Johannesburg, SA) left East London and went to Cape Town to have a farewell dinner at the mission home before flying home tomorrow. We FedEx'ed to the mission office an auto accident report, Elder Kuome's medical papers, and Elder Pappoe's passport. Because tomorrow is such a big transfer day, we decided to purchase additional duvet inserts so we could do a complete exchange without doing laundry in between exchanges. We took a couple of hours of diversion and visited the East London Acquarium. We saw for the first time the penguins of South Africa which inhabit the coast around Cape Town. Then we went to MD and tried to find Yo, as well as some less actives. Tobeli helped us find the houses, but none of them were home.
Tuesday, March 18th: Within mission transfer day. We had elders departing from the airport at 8:00am(2) and incoming elders arriving at 11:30am(4). At 11:25am 2 arrived on the bus, and at 1:45pm 4 departed by bus. It was an extremely busy day. We met all the incoming elders and took their photos with their new companions. We make 3 copies--one for us and one for each of the elders. We also delivered clean duvet inserts to all incoming elders and picked up inserts that were used by departing elders, which we will launder.
Wednesday, March 19th: The day started with a 8:30 phone call from the King William's Town elders who were in EL doing a puppet show at a local mall on eating healthy and The Word of Wisdom. The call to us was that the elders needed food storage containers for their boardings. We also received 7 cases of Books of Mormon from Joburg which we had previously ordered. At 10 am the Searle's came and we spent a few hours with them. We drove up the coast and made reservations to visit a wild animal park with them next month. We treated them to lunch at Lavendar Blue. The Searle's were down from Queenstown for a doctor's appointment at 2pm. In the evening we met the Aprils and home taught 2 families. In one house, Sis April ended up sitting on 2 pillows on the floor because of lack of furniture. At the other home, we met with a yw-age girl who is the only person in her family who is a member. We met outside under a tree just as it was getting dark because their house was too small to accommodate 4 additional people.
Thursday, March 20th: Elders Cobia and Lyman, fresh from the Provo MTC, arrived at the EL airport at 10:45am. We met them about noon at the Pic 'n Pay grocery store. One of the MD elders' cars is in the shop getting the window fixed and so we took Elders Burke and Warren with us to MD. We showed them the new church that is being built, visited the Mgitidi family and invited them to the temple preparation class, and went with the elders to their appointment. We also dropped by the Bishop's home to get a clarification on Karen's speaking assignment in Sacrament Meeting on Sunday. Sometimes these good African folks do not communicate very well, even when we can understand their English!
Friday, March 21st: Made a quick trip to the airport to pick up the mail. At 10:30 was District Meeting after which we made a few deliveries to Elders and then came home to work on Institute class, temple prep class, and Karen's Sacrament Meeting talk. The majority of the elders in one of our districts are suffering from what appears to be a mild case of food poisoning--diarrhea and vomiting. We bought all the elders chocolate covered marshmellow Easter eggs as a treat. We were quite surprised to find that here in South Africa Good Friday is a major holiday as well as the Monday that follows Easter, giving them a 4-day weekend. School is on a 3-week vacation after having been in session for only 2 months. The new school year begins the middle of January. We saw a lot of people dressed up and going to church on Good Friday.
Saturday, March 22nd: The EL elders had their District Meeting today. We had to get a slow leak in our tire fixed so did not attend their meeting. After we locked up the building we went out to MD where the MD elders were holding a free car wash in the church parking lot. They told us that it was rather slow in the morning, but in the afternoon they were somewhat overwhelmed. While the patrons' cars were being washed, they were invited to come into the chapel where some of our elders explained some of the doctrines of the church and gave out Books of Mormon if the people wanted one. We stayed just a few minutes.
Earlier in the day we met an older gentleman whose name the Bishop had given us to contact. Before we even got out of the car, he came up to Stan's window and indicated that he was a member of the church. He invited us into his home where he told us about his conversion. He was told about the church by someone he knew and respected--President Jadda who is now a counselor in the Stake Presidency. He was taught by the elders and joined the church. He went into a back room and brought out a letter dated about a year ago from President Egan to "prove" to us that he is, indeed, a baptized member of the church. He is a man of about 70 years of age, in good health, has never married, and lives with his older sister. He said that the reason he doesn't come to church is that he doesn't have money for taxi fare and it is too far to walk--a story we have heard many times before.
We also visited with Bro Lubelwana about coming to the temple prep class. He shared with us the moving story of his conversion to the church. He has been a member for about a year. He said that about 5 years ago he had a great job and things were going very well for him. He said that if he had met the elders at that time, he would not have been interested at all. But then he lost his job, his 2 cars and most of the furniture in his house was repossessed, they were expecting another child, and he and his wife were fighting all the time because of money matters and his depression. She asked him for a divorce and he responded by saying that he would go to his family for 3 weeks and then they would talk about it. When he came back he said that he wanted the family to stay together, but it was her decision. They decided to work it out. It was at that time, when he was working on the roof of a neighbor's house, when he saw 2 young men in white shirts and black name tags walking up the road. They greeted him and asked him if he lived there which started a conversation that resulted in him inviting them to his home. He said that these circumstances made him humble and teachable. He attended church with his wife who was active in another denomination. She asked her preacher for a leave of absence for that first day. He said that after the 3-hour block of church he wanted to stay longer and learn more. The next week his wife asked her minister for a few weeks' absence. As you might guess, they were baptized a short time later and have been very active in the church ever since.
Our Institute class today went well, but our numbers were small. A sister from the ward just returned from her mision to London, England and most of the Institute class was at the party at her house. Today was a perfect day weather wise--very comfortable all day.
Sundy, March 23rd: The temple prep class went very well, 11 attended. The lesson was "The Temple Teaches the Plan of Salvation". There were many comments and a few questions were asked. Karen's talk in Sacrament Meeting went very well also. She was assigned the topic of "Christ's Betrayal by Judas Iscariot".
Hope all is well with you and your family. Love to all.
Elder/Sister Allen; Karen/Stan, MOM and DAD; Grandma/Grandpa
Tuesday, March 25, 2008
Monday, March 17, 2008
Same But Different
Dear Family:
We are beginning to think there is no such thing as "same ole, same ole" in our mission.
Even the weather is sometimes different from morning to afternoon and day to day. While you are enjoying the change from winter to spring, we are enjoying the change from summer to the winter season. We have not heard the locals here use the term "fall" or "autumn", just that it is getting "cold". They are in wool caps and scarfs, sweaters and coats, and we are still in short sleeves! It has cooled down considerably, though, especially at night and early mornings. One day will be alternating between rainy and misty, another will be torrential rain storms with strong winds, and another will be sunny and very pleasant.
Our missionary service also is different each day even while doing the same things--if that makes sense! Our Institute study is the same but the subject is different each week and we try to vary our presentation and activities. We are having much success with building attendance. What started out as a class of 6 has increased to 14. The newest member came for the first time last week even before his baptism this week. Most of our class members were there to support him. While he (and 4 others) were being baptized inside the church, the heavens outside decided to baptize us by complete immersion! It was like a mild hurricane with the wind whipping the rain around. Since it was close to the time for Institute and the Bishop's house is far from the church (like 15 minutes away), and no one had transport except walking, we decided to give the kids a ride to class. Problem was, our car only holds 3 others besides the driver, so Dad went back and forth 3 times to get us all there! Actually, the weather could have been partly responsible for 3 new members! We had talked to them before and they committed to come for sure this week. Getting a ride instead of having to walk maybe encouraged them to really come! We had a good discussion, the spirit was there, and everyone enjoyed it. Most of them are very strong in the gospel while some are less so, but they all are such good young people. We pray they can overcome their challenges of living the commandments in spite of being the only member of their family in the church, cultural traditions that are contrary to church practices, and peer pressure to live contrary to church standards.
Another "same but different" is our new teaching assignment, Temple Preparation, which began on Sunday--s0me diligent study is required but 7 different topics. All the members of the class have only been baptized within the last couple of years so are very inexperienced in the gospel. We will have to go slow, and be very thorough to make sure they understand, which means we will probably spend more than one week per topic. A ward temple trip to the Johannesburg temple is scheduled for June or July, so we are very excited to be able to teach and make ready these wonderful people to receive the blessings of the temple.
Missionary support continues to add spice to our lives. We received a "thanks, but no thanks" email from President Egan regarding our efficiency in finding a boarding for 2 new missionaries from the States who are coming to East London. Unfortunatley, their South Arican visas have not arrived so they are not expected until April 29. We immediately went to Sister VanToner's (the landlady who is building on to her garage to make a granny flat) and explained the situation. She actually was relieved to have the extra time so she can get all the little details done instead of leaving some things until after the missionaries move in. The contractor was there working and he, too, was glad because the hurry-up time frame did not allow for unexpected complications. All in all, it is a blessing for all involved--except for the missionaries who want to be here, but can't!
It is the policy of the mission to pay for the medical needs of the missionaries. Payments for office visits are put on the church's account which the mission office pays, but whenever a missionary needs a prescription filled, we pay for it and then the office reimburses us. It seemed like such a simple task--meet the missionary companionship at the pharmacy, pay, come back home. But it was not to be! A second set of elders were also there with the glass from their car window shattered in pieces on the front seat and on the ground. It seems that there was some sort of a malfunction and when they opened the door to get out, the glass shattered. Since they are the ride for another set of elders, we were greeted by 6 elders, standing around, looking at the glass all over the place, and acting like "What do we do now?" After Dad went in and paid for the prescription, he told one elder to clean up the glass and helped the other one fill out the Auto Damage Report, (several copies of which are in the glove compartments of all missionary cars) and the rest of us just stood around! We brought the damage report back to our place and faxed it to the mission office.
Monday through Wednesday are transfers, so we spent a good part of Thursday inspecting missionary boardings and cars. We left our house by 7:30am and, taking about 20 minutes per boarding, finsihed at 2:00pm. We drove to King William's Town on Friday morning (45 min away) and did our last 2 inspections, then drove back to attend our District Meeting.
A new mission president, another feeding-the-elders activity, "I'm not less active", "detective Tobeli", and an outdoor church are all adventures we will save for next time! We are especially grateful for the Atonement of the Savior at this Easter time and hope this is a significant event in your lives also. We are happy, healthy, and loving the work.
Love, MOM and DAD/Grandma and Grandpa
We are beginning to think there is no such thing as "same ole, same ole" in our mission.
Even the weather is sometimes different from morning to afternoon and day to day. While you are enjoying the change from winter to spring, we are enjoying the change from summer to the winter season. We have not heard the locals here use the term "fall" or "autumn", just that it is getting "cold". They are in wool caps and scarfs, sweaters and coats, and we are still in short sleeves! It has cooled down considerably, though, especially at night and early mornings. One day will be alternating between rainy and misty, another will be torrential rain storms with strong winds, and another will be sunny and very pleasant.
Our missionary service also is different each day even while doing the same things--if that makes sense! Our Institute study is the same but the subject is different each week and we try to vary our presentation and activities. We are having much success with building attendance. What started out as a class of 6 has increased to 14. The newest member came for the first time last week even before his baptism this week. Most of our class members were there to support him. While he (and 4 others) were being baptized inside the church, the heavens outside decided to baptize us by complete immersion! It was like a mild hurricane with the wind whipping the rain around. Since it was close to the time for Institute and the Bishop's house is far from the church (like 15 minutes away), and no one had transport except walking, we decided to give the kids a ride to class. Problem was, our car only holds 3 others besides the driver, so Dad went back and forth 3 times to get us all there! Actually, the weather could have been partly responsible for 3 new members! We had talked to them before and they committed to come for sure this week. Getting a ride instead of having to walk maybe encouraged them to really come! We had a good discussion, the spirit was there, and everyone enjoyed it. Most of them are very strong in the gospel while some are less so, but they all are such good young people. We pray they can overcome their challenges of living the commandments in spite of being the only member of their family in the church, cultural traditions that are contrary to church practices, and peer pressure to live contrary to church standards.
Another "same but different" is our new teaching assignment, Temple Preparation, which began on Sunday--s0me diligent study is required but 7 different topics. All the members of the class have only been baptized within the last couple of years so are very inexperienced in the gospel. We will have to go slow, and be very thorough to make sure they understand, which means we will probably spend more than one week per topic. A ward temple trip to the Johannesburg temple is scheduled for June or July, so we are very excited to be able to teach and make ready these wonderful people to receive the blessings of the temple.
Missionary support continues to add spice to our lives. We received a "thanks, but no thanks" email from President Egan regarding our efficiency in finding a boarding for 2 new missionaries from the States who are coming to East London. Unfortunatley, their South Arican visas have not arrived so they are not expected until April 29. We immediately went to Sister VanToner's (the landlady who is building on to her garage to make a granny flat) and explained the situation. She actually was relieved to have the extra time so she can get all the little details done instead of leaving some things until after the missionaries move in. The contractor was there working and he, too, was glad because the hurry-up time frame did not allow for unexpected complications. All in all, it is a blessing for all involved--except for the missionaries who want to be here, but can't!
It is the policy of the mission to pay for the medical needs of the missionaries. Payments for office visits are put on the church's account which the mission office pays, but whenever a missionary needs a prescription filled, we pay for it and then the office reimburses us. It seemed like such a simple task--meet the missionary companionship at the pharmacy, pay, come back home. But it was not to be! A second set of elders were also there with the glass from their car window shattered in pieces on the front seat and on the ground. It seems that there was some sort of a malfunction and when they opened the door to get out, the glass shattered. Since they are the ride for another set of elders, we were greeted by 6 elders, standing around, looking at the glass all over the place, and acting like "What do we do now?" After Dad went in and paid for the prescription, he told one elder to clean up the glass and helped the other one fill out the Auto Damage Report, (several copies of which are in the glove compartments of all missionary cars) and the rest of us just stood around! We brought the damage report back to our place and faxed it to the mission office.
Monday through Wednesday are transfers, so we spent a good part of Thursday inspecting missionary boardings and cars. We left our house by 7:30am and, taking about 20 minutes per boarding, finsihed at 2:00pm. We drove to King William's Town on Friday morning (45 min away) and did our last 2 inspections, then drove back to attend our District Meeting.
A new mission president, another feeding-the-elders activity, "I'm not less active", "detective Tobeli", and an outdoor church are all adventures we will save for next time! We are especially grateful for the Atonement of the Savior at this Easter time and hope this is a significant event in your lives also. We are happy, healthy, and loving the work.
Love, MOM and DAD/Grandma and Grandpa
Sunday, March 9, 2008
Week 9--March 3-9, 2008
Dear Family:
We have decided to have our letter this week exerpts from our weekly diary.
Monday, March 3rd
Spent most of the day communicating via email to family, and Elder Johnson and President Egan regarding the new boarding we have located. We faxed various forms to the office for Elder Kuome who arrived this week from the Joburg MTC and before that the Ivory Coast. He is a delightful elder. One of the things that is unusual about the South African phone systems is that you have to buy minutes. You go to a store and buy, for example, 200 minutes and they give you a voucher with a numbered code. You dial a special number on the phone the minutes are for and key in the voucher code. When we tried to use our fax (which uses the same line as our land line phone) this morning, but we couldn't because the machine said we were out of minutes. So we had to go to the store and buy some. A lot of things are just not that quick and easy to do! As a diversion, we spent about an hour this evening driving down to one of the beach areas of the Indian Ocean in East London.
Tuesday, March 4th
We were requested by the office to have one of the elders sign 2 documents for his South African visa extension because it expires just a couple of days before the date of his release. The office faxed us the forms, we drove to his boarding about 5 miles (20 minutes) away, had him sign his name twice(!) because the Home Affairs Office won't accept faxed signatures (we already tried that with another elder), then went downtown East London to the FedEx (another 15 minutes away) office to send the forms back to the Mission Office by "fast mail", then back to our boarding (another 15-20 minutes away). As we said, a lot of things are just not that quick and easy to do!
While we were in the area, we also went to St. Dominic's Hospital where our elders go for immunizations they didn't complete before coming and TB test before going home or for their Namibia visa if this isn't done before they come. We wanted to locate their pathology and radiology departments so we can direct the elders where to go.
On hot days--which is most every day right now--we like to open our windows to cool our boarding off. The problem arises, however, in the evening after dark when bugs, especially moths, are attracted to light and invade the place because we don't have screens for the windows. Stan decided to make some screens so we went to the store called Build It and purchased some insect screening material and some wood. Total money spent was approximately 20 U.S. dollars. The screens are not pretty, but they work, so on hot evenings we can keep the windows open and have the fans on and not be invaded by flying critters!
During the evening we went with the East London Elders Dinkle and Power and visited 3 member families here in Gonubie. It was an enjoyable and productive evening. Earlier today we received a telephone call from our Zone Leader that the Area Presidency wanted all church owned vehicles filled with gas before midnight. Here in South Africa the price of petrol is controlled by the government and price increases are announced in the media. All stations sell gas at the same price, so their only competition is on service. At the station which we use, attendants run to your car, politely fill your tank, wash your windshield, check the oil and water as well as the air pressure in the tyres if requested. They do, however, expect a tip of about R3 (40 cents American). There are also official and unofficial attendants in many car parks (parking lots) at the shops (stores). They usher you into parking spaces, give you directions for backing out, take your shopping carts back to the grocery store, and some even say "I've been watching your car and there are no dents"! They also expect a tip of a few R.
Wednesday, March 5th
Today it rained off and on all day--the rainest day thus far on our mission. We received permission from the Mission Office to make an offer to Sister VanTonder to rent her boarding for the new elders. We met her before she left for work this morning and she accepted the offer and is delighted to have missionaries occupy the boarding. We visited with the contractor and he feels that he can have it finished by the 15th. We spent the middle portion of the day preparing for our Institute class. At about 5:00 we headed out to MD to visit with Tobeli's friend. Unfortunately he did not show up. Tobeli, however, had a back-up plan so he took us around to visit 3 member families. Sister Maluka is an old widow in her 70s or 80s. She has been a member of the church for 12 years. She has 8 children, but the one she told us about is a son in Joburg who is living with a woman and they have 2 children. Sis Maluka explained to us that in their culture (Lesoto, the independent country right in the middle of SA) the parents of the bride require a payment, called bola (sp?) from the groom's family before they can get married. They have already paid R11,000 but the family still wants more. Apparently, with each additional child the price goes up. Since they cannot afford to pay more, the couple is living together as though they are married, but they are not.
Thursday, March 6th
Today for lunch we had 6 elders in our home, including a set of Zone Leaders and APs. It all started when we asked Elder Maramela, who is famous for his "pop" to make us an authentic African dinner. He and his companion, Elder LaPorte, share a car with the Zone Leaders, so they came along. Then they found that they had a training meeting with the APs that same day, so they came along too. What began as a simple invitation to 2 elders turned out to be a group of 6. Pop is a white corn meal which is boiled, similar to grits in the U.S., but is served rather dry and pasty. It is covered with a "gravy" made up of baked beans in a tomato sauce to which has been added grated tomatoes and carrots, diced onions and then boiled. It was served with fried chicken. We bought all the ingredients Elder Maramela asked for and he and Elder Senne (ZL) were the cooks. They cooked up 5 lbs.of dry Pop, 1260 grams (3 cans) of the beans, 1/2 doz medium tomatoes, 3 onions, 2 or 3 carrots, 14 chicken breasts (the expensive chicken, the elders said), 3 doz chocolate cookies, ice cream--and they ate it all! We had a very modest serving. It was our first real African food experience. It was a fun time. In the evening we went to MD and visited with Brother Silmuko (saw-loom-ko) Siwisa (see-we-saw) who is about 45 years old, a convert of several months. We've heard that he had been offended by someone in the ward who ignored him, so he quit going. We had a nice visit with him and asked him to come to church on Sunday. He said he would. PS: He did attend church on Sunday, all 3 hours of the block, had a short visit with the Bishop in which they agreed that the Bishop would stop by his house this week and talk things over. He appears to be a very intelligent man who could make a real contribution in the ward. He told us that he is currently a priest in the Aaronic Priesthood. We are going to drop by next week and see him again. We also visited Brother Thwani and his family. He is a high councilman in the stake and lives in the MD 3rd Ward, but is on special assignment to strengthen and build leadership in the 1st Ward as a counselor in the Bishopric. He has previously served as a Bishop himself.
Friday, March 7th
Went to the airport and picked up the mail then went to District Meeting. Stan, using an alphabetical ward list, divided it into several lists by proselyting areas to aid the missionaries in identifying part-member families and less actives. This was passed out at District Meeting. The afternoon and evening was spent working on our Institute class.
Saturday, March 8th
Today's Institute class went very well. We had 10 in attendance, which is the highest number so far. Last week we assigned out portions of the lesson to each student and they came well prepared and contributed significantly to the discussion. We continue to be impressed by their depth of understanding of gospel principles, their faith, and their sincerity.
Sunday, March 9th
Our day started with a 10:00 meeting with the missionary correlation meeting of the East London 1st Ward. The former Stake President is now the ward mission leader and has asked for our help with visiting less actives in his ward. We then went to our own ward in MD in which they announced that we will be teaching the temple preparation class begining next week.
At 5:00 we attended the CES fireside broadcast in which Sister Julie Beck, RS General President, was the guest speaker. Her message included encouraging the young adults to
(1)get involved in serving others;
(2)share the gospel;
(3)participate in temple and family history work;
(4)prepare for the future.
She said that if you focus your life in these 4 areas, you will be associating with other latter-day saints with similar standards and finding a mate will be a natural consequence.
Love you all,
MOM and DAD; GRANDMA and GRANDPA
We have decided to have our letter this week exerpts from our weekly diary.
Monday, March 3rd
Spent most of the day communicating via email to family, and Elder Johnson and President Egan regarding the new boarding we have located. We faxed various forms to the office for Elder Kuome who arrived this week from the Joburg MTC and before that the Ivory Coast. He is a delightful elder. One of the things that is unusual about the South African phone systems is that you have to buy minutes. You go to a store and buy, for example, 200 minutes and they give you a voucher with a numbered code. You dial a special number on the phone the minutes are for and key in the voucher code. When we tried to use our fax (which uses the same line as our land line phone) this morning, but we couldn't because the machine said we were out of minutes. So we had to go to the store and buy some. A lot of things are just not that quick and easy to do! As a diversion, we spent about an hour this evening driving down to one of the beach areas of the Indian Ocean in East London.
Tuesday, March 4th
We were requested by the office to have one of the elders sign 2 documents for his South African visa extension because it expires just a couple of days before the date of his release. The office faxed us the forms, we drove to his boarding about 5 miles (20 minutes) away, had him sign his name twice(!) because the Home Affairs Office won't accept faxed signatures (we already tried that with another elder), then went downtown East London to the FedEx (another 15 minutes away) office to send the forms back to the Mission Office by "fast mail", then back to our boarding (another 15-20 minutes away). As we said, a lot of things are just not that quick and easy to do!
While we were in the area, we also went to St. Dominic's Hospital where our elders go for immunizations they didn't complete before coming and TB test before going home or for their Namibia visa if this isn't done before they come. We wanted to locate their pathology and radiology departments so we can direct the elders where to go.
On hot days--which is most every day right now--we like to open our windows to cool our boarding off. The problem arises, however, in the evening after dark when bugs, especially moths, are attracted to light and invade the place because we don't have screens for the windows. Stan decided to make some screens so we went to the store called Build It and purchased some insect screening material and some wood. Total money spent was approximately 20 U.S. dollars. The screens are not pretty, but they work, so on hot evenings we can keep the windows open and have the fans on and not be invaded by flying critters!
During the evening we went with the East London Elders Dinkle and Power and visited 3 member families here in Gonubie. It was an enjoyable and productive evening. Earlier today we received a telephone call from our Zone Leader that the Area Presidency wanted all church owned vehicles filled with gas before midnight. Here in South Africa the price of petrol is controlled by the government and price increases are announced in the media. All stations sell gas at the same price, so their only competition is on service. At the station which we use, attendants run to your car, politely fill your tank, wash your windshield, check the oil and water as well as the air pressure in the tyres if requested. They do, however, expect a tip of about R3 (40 cents American). There are also official and unofficial attendants in many car parks (parking lots) at the shops (stores). They usher you into parking spaces, give you directions for backing out, take your shopping carts back to the grocery store, and some even say "I've been watching your car and there are no dents"! They also expect a tip of a few R.
Wednesday, March 5th
Today it rained off and on all day--the rainest day thus far on our mission. We received permission from the Mission Office to make an offer to Sister VanTonder to rent her boarding for the new elders. We met her before she left for work this morning and she accepted the offer and is delighted to have missionaries occupy the boarding. We visited with the contractor and he feels that he can have it finished by the 15th. We spent the middle portion of the day preparing for our Institute class. At about 5:00 we headed out to MD to visit with Tobeli's friend. Unfortunately he did not show up. Tobeli, however, had a back-up plan so he took us around to visit 3 member families. Sister Maluka is an old widow in her 70s or 80s. She has been a member of the church for 12 years. She has 8 children, but the one she told us about is a son in Joburg who is living with a woman and they have 2 children. Sis Maluka explained to us that in their culture (Lesoto, the independent country right in the middle of SA) the parents of the bride require a payment, called bola (sp?) from the groom's family before they can get married. They have already paid R11,000 but the family still wants more. Apparently, with each additional child the price goes up. Since they cannot afford to pay more, the couple is living together as though they are married, but they are not.
Thursday, March 6th
Today for lunch we had 6 elders in our home, including a set of Zone Leaders and APs. It all started when we asked Elder Maramela, who is famous for his "pop" to make us an authentic African dinner. He and his companion, Elder LaPorte, share a car with the Zone Leaders, so they came along. Then they found that they had a training meeting with the APs that same day, so they came along too. What began as a simple invitation to 2 elders turned out to be a group of 6. Pop is a white corn meal which is boiled, similar to grits in the U.S., but is served rather dry and pasty. It is covered with a "gravy" made up of baked beans in a tomato sauce to which has been added grated tomatoes and carrots, diced onions and then boiled. It was served with fried chicken. We bought all the ingredients Elder Maramela asked for and he and Elder Senne (ZL) were the cooks. They cooked up 5 lbs.of dry Pop, 1260 grams (3 cans) of the beans, 1/2 doz medium tomatoes, 3 onions, 2 or 3 carrots, 14 chicken breasts (the expensive chicken, the elders said), 3 doz chocolate cookies, ice cream--and they ate it all! We had a very modest serving. It was our first real African food experience. It was a fun time. In the evening we went to MD and visited with Brother Silmuko (saw-loom-ko) Siwisa (see-we-saw) who is about 45 years old, a convert of several months. We've heard that he had been offended by someone in the ward who ignored him, so he quit going. We had a nice visit with him and asked him to come to church on Sunday. He said he would. PS: He did attend church on Sunday, all 3 hours of the block, had a short visit with the Bishop in which they agreed that the Bishop would stop by his house this week and talk things over. He appears to be a very intelligent man who could make a real contribution in the ward. He told us that he is currently a priest in the Aaronic Priesthood. We are going to drop by next week and see him again. We also visited Brother Thwani and his family. He is a high councilman in the stake and lives in the MD 3rd Ward, but is on special assignment to strengthen and build leadership in the 1st Ward as a counselor in the Bishopric. He has previously served as a Bishop himself.
Friday, March 7th
Went to the airport and picked up the mail then went to District Meeting. Stan, using an alphabetical ward list, divided it into several lists by proselyting areas to aid the missionaries in identifying part-member families and less actives. This was passed out at District Meeting. The afternoon and evening was spent working on our Institute class.
Saturday, March 8th
Today's Institute class went very well. We had 10 in attendance, which is the highest number so far. Last week we assigned out portions of the lesson to each student and they came well prepared and contributed significantly to the discussion. We continue to be impressed by their depth of understanding of gospel principles, their faith, and their sincerity.
Sunday, March 9th
Our day started with a 10:00 meeting with the missionary correlation meeting of the East London 1st Ward. The former Stake President is now the ward mission leader and has asked for our help with visiting less actives in his ward. We then went to our own ward in MD in which they announced that we will be teaching the temple preparation class begining next week.
At 5:00 we attended the CES fireside broadcast in which Sister Julie Beck, RS General President, was the guest speaker. Her message included encouraging the young adults to
(1)get involved in serving others;
(2)share the gospel;
(3)participate in temple and family history work;
(4)prepare for the future.
She said that if you focus your life in these 4 areas, you will be associating with other latter-day saints with similar standards and finding a mate will be a natural consequence.
Love you all,
MOM and DAD; GRANDMA and GRANDPA
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