Last Part of February

Wow, what an interesting couple of weeks. 

We just had to snap this photo of a man on the back of a “Piki Piki” (a public transport motorcycle) carrying a sheet of plate glass about 6 feet high.

It’s amazing the things they carry on these motorcycles. We think we have mentioned this before but we will again just in case. If you want to see enlarged photos just double click on them.

We spent the first few days getting ready for our “Open House”. 

And in the middle of that we had a new Elder coming in. His bus broke down at the border and we spent most of the day trying to figure out how we were going to get him here to Arusha. By the time the bus station notified us that they had no solution, it was late and if we went to pick him up we would be driving in the dark. We really don’t like to do that. But as it turned out he was able to contract a taxi to bring him. It is about an hour and half drive. We still ended up going downtown to get him at 8:00 PM. He was a pretty nervous Elder by then. The streets downtown at night are an experience you would have to experience to appreciate. Most of the people here walk and there are no street lights. Black people walking at night do not show up in your headlights so we take it really slow.

The members were really nervous about the “Open House”. They had never done anything like this before. They had a hard time coming up with a name that meant what we wanted understood by “Open House”. They finally decided it should be call “The Day of Invited Guests” (siku ya wageni waalikwa). We had Brother Kibanda translate all the instructions into Swahili so the leaders could rehearse what they would say. We had several meetings about the “Open House” and we felt they were really quite ready. 

They could not accept the idea that we would just have people come in and go around from room to room and see what we do as a church. The Branch Presidency insisted we have a sit down meeting at the first for the dignitaries. We finally agreed to that. We spent several days hand delivering letters of invitation to all the dignitaries in town. I think there were about 45 letters delivered. An interesting thing about that letter was some of the words. When we typed in the swahili words that Bro. Kibanda had written, we typed a couple of them wrong. It was hard to tell where one word ended and the next began. Then Elder R. thought we better put the words into Goggle Translate just to check them. One sentence was “Kanisa hili lina furaha kukualika kwenye onyesho la taratibu na mipango ya Kanisa”, which says, “This church is happy to invite you to see procedures and programs of the Church.” But we typed the word “kukualika” as “kuku alika”, which changed the meaning to poultry show. So we almost invited people to a poultry show rather than an open house.

But after handing out about 300 invitations to people all over town we felt we were ready for the day. We posted several signs to show where to turn to the church.

Sister R. made about 200 rosettes for the refreshments. No one here had ever seen a rosette.

Here are the Elders and some members that came to help.

We thought only the leaders would come to explain their organizations. But almost the whole active Branch showed up. Kids and all. Only one dignitary came and he came late so the meeting before didn’t happen. We thought we would just put the chairs away and let people walk around. But the Branch Presidency said we had to have a meeting. So after about an hour we finally gave in. 

We played a couple of videos the church has produced here in Africa to tell about the church. Then they insisted we have “kujitambulisha” (self introductions). We thought Bro. K. would just introduce everyone. But he wanted all the missionaries and leaders to introduce themselves. This is the custom here. So we ended up with about an hour of introductions. The dignitary talked for a long time. And a lot of his speech was preaching.

The day turned out quite well. We had about 15 or 20 non members come. One was our good friend that we have been trying to get to come to our church for 8 months. She asked a lot of questions so we hope she will allow us to teach her family in the near future.

We have had a new member here asking us to go with him out to a village north of town to see a problem there. It seems there is too much fluoride in the water and it is causing bone deformities. Mostly affecting the legs & hips, but sometimes the head. It also seems to be stunting their growth. It was an interesting day to say the least.

This young girl on the right is 15 years old. The young man on the left is the son of the member who took us out there and he is only 11.

We met a man there that is 99 years old. He served in World War II.

Another highlight of the month was a visit from the couple that came to see us in Idaho Falls before we left. They are serving in Dar Es Salaam. We really enjoy having them come see us.  

We visited the Snake Park with them. We had a really good guide and we learned a lot about snakes and other reptiles.

Sister Noll even got Sister R. to sort of hold a snake.

Then they rode the camel.

And on the way back we stopped at the Cultural Center to look at some Tanzanite. This stone is worth about $1400.

We had several great visits with them, ate out and even played some dominos. 

Elder Noll is a counselor in the Mission Presidency and was able to interview our potential missionary (Sister Tausi). She is so cute. She turned 21 on the 24th of January and has really been pushing to get out on a mission. (The one on the left).

Our Sunday meetings with Elder & Sister Noll were especially good. The attendance was up and the spirit was great.

We closed out the month with a visit from the Assistants to the Mission Pres. We had a great Family Home Evening with them and our 4 missionaries. Rather crowded in our little apartment but great just the same.

It has really been fun helping our young lady preparing for a mission with the paper work and all. We have the missionary class on Wed. at 3:00. And at the lesson this week we had a young man that was baptized the end of August show up. He has not been out for about 4 months. And no one in the branch knew where he lived. It is pretty much impossible to find people here if they don’t want to be found. There are no addresses so if they don’t answer their phone you just can’t contact them. We were so happy to see him return. I think the sprit has just been working on him and he had lost the feeling he had when he was baptized and wanted that back. We had a great lesson with him and Tausi, the sister preparing for a mission.

It is really hard when you don’t speak the language to be sure they understand what we teach. But the spirit filled in on this one and after asking them to feed back what they understood in their best english we felt they both had a spiritual experience.

First Part of February

Started off the month with a quick trip to Nairobi. We needed to get some things for the open house we are planning later in the month and also wanted to attend the farewell dinner and evening for Elder and Sister Nevin. The countryside on the way there is really turning brown and looking dead again. 

It is so interesting how it changes through the wet and dry seasons. 

This really is the same spot now vs. back in Nov.

The “Big Rains” as they call them here will start in March and April so we are close to the end of the dry season.

We had a great time at the farewell for the Nevins. 

They have been the office couple for the mission for almost 2 years. They were so much help to us when we first came to the mission. They are the couple that brought us down to Arusha when we first came.

The trip home was great. At the border we met the man that considers himself a friend of Pres. Taylor (Bill Taylor from Osgood). We got his name and email. We want to put him in touch with Pres. Taylor if we can. Pres. & Sister Taylor were the Mission President and wife before Pres. Broadbent. We arrived back in Arusha about 5:00.

Wow, Our 47th Wedding Anniversary --  in Arusha, Tanzania, Africa.

What a dream come true. We love being missionaries and love being together.

We had heard that Elders were sometimes real crazy. And we have had some crazy ones here in Arusha. But skydiving while on a mission. 

Really I think that is going too far. 

They weren’t really skydiving onto our roof. But it sure looks like it here. Even standing on the wall 6 stories up is pretty scary.

We have the missionaries over every Monday night for a meal and FHE and have really enjoyed them. They all bring something to the area here. They really have to be strong to serve here in Arusha. They do not receive any language training at the MTC so it is up to them to pick it up on their own. They really do a good job. We have one Elder here that has only been out 6 months and he can carry on a conversation like he was a native. They walk everywhere they go (or catch a Dola Dola, the little minivan buses that run all over town) so meeting their deadlines and appointments takes a lot of planning.

We visited some members that were having some problems this week. We don’t like to go by ourselves as we do not speak well enough to understand what the problem really is. We took the 1st Counselor in the B.P. with us. He’s the one that is a Masaai. We really saw how strong he is in the gospel. We have seen him get an assignment to teach only 5 minutes before class when a teacher does not show up and he really does a great job. They still have a hard time with the idea that there needs to be a regular teacher called and set apart. So quite often the teaching assignment is given at the beginning of the day. But to see him work with a member one on one to resolve a problem was absolutely great. He really has a strong testimony and can work with the spirit so well.

We had one of our Elders go home on the 8th (the one on the right).

So now they are functioning as a 3 some.

On the 10th we flew to Mwanza for our support visit there.

As usual we had a great time. On Sat. Elder R. spent time with the Branch Pres. & Clerk on some financial stuff and Siser R. did some activities with the YSA there in Mwanza. They really have an active group.

The Branch Pres. has 3 children getting ready to serve missions. Because they were unable to be baptized until the church opened a branch there last March, they couldn’t go until they had been members for 1 year. So now all 3 have their paperwork going and will soon be out.

We stayed at the same hotel where we went the first time and it was great. 

We had a room on the 3rd floor so we really had a beautiful view.

Then on Sunday we attended church there and the meeting was just as great as the last time we attended. They really are a strong branch.

Couldn’t resist taking a photo of this little member.

Then on Monday we flew home.

Spent the rest of the week getting ready for our Missionary Open House. We’ll tell you about that in the next blog.

It’s hard to believe but we are at the mid point in our mission. The 16th will mark 9 months out. We can hardly believe it. At first it seemed like we didn’t have a lot to do and now we are in panic mode thinking we won’t be able to get everything done that we want to do. We are really trying to get a temple trip planned so that we can go with the members before we leave the mission. The process for that here in Africa is very lengthy. Usually takes 7 to 8 months. A lot of the problem is record keeping here. Very few have certificates or any other documentation. So they have to apply at the local government offices and that process takes a long time (not to mention the cost). So we hope we can get a few ready at least. This will probably be a once in a lifetime for them.