Time is really flying by now. We will pass our one year mark this month and we have so many things we want to do that it sometimes looks overwhelming. We spend a lot of time preparing for Institute, missionary class and YSA activities. But we are really enjoying all those. We have a lot of fun with our YSA group here.
We had another baptism on the 6th.
Our branch is growing little by little. We have several members that come and go. We just keep praying that they will get strong enough to come every week.
Our current group of Missionaries are really strong and we were hoping there would not be any transfers this month. But we got a call from the A.P.s on Sat. May 5th telling us to go and get a ticket for one to leave for Nairobi on Monday. They usually transfer on Wednesday so we wondered what was up. They wouldn’t tell us who was going. They said they would tell the Zone Leader that evening. When they got the call we were told that Elder Pocock would be transferring out and that he would be the new Assistant to the President. We were sorry to loose him but glad for him to have that opportunity. He will be a great assistant.
On Sunday Elder Pocock bore his testimony (in Swahili) and bid farewell to the branch. At the end of his testimony the member started clapping. They really love him. The new Elder transferring in is from South Africa. So now we have no American Elder here and we really miss the American English. Sometimes we need an interpreter for the African Elders that speak English. Their accents are quite hard for us to understand. But bless their hearts they are very patient with us.
So early Monday morning we took Elder Pocock down to the bus.
We have a young sister in our branch getting ready to go on a mission.
She has really had a hard time with the immigration office. They keep telling her to come back with more paperwork and documents. She has been working on the paperwork since early February. We decided to take Brother Kibanda down to the immigration office with her to see if we could get things moving along. What we ended up doing was just creating more paperwork. I think our next step will be to take all the paperwork and send it to Dar Es Salaam for our church member there that handles all the paperwork for missionaries in Dar. He tells us he can get a passport in 10 days.
And just to add a little spice to things here, we had another accident. We were hurrying back to our flat to get our phone that we forgot and as we turned the corner the car in front of us suddenly stopped. But we didn’t. Not much damage to his car but our front plastic bumper really looks bad.
The Help, Inc. people are back in Arusha for a few months. They come each year to help people setup NGOs. They always give our little branch a boost. The men are all return missionaries and some of the women are too. And the other women are all good active members. They show up each Sunday and help teach or whatever is needed. And the members really enjoy them. So many of the members come more regularly just to see them.
Then on the 13th we got a call from the A.P.s that they would be coming to Arusha on Monday. We were not sure how we would handle our FHE with them here. We barely have enough chairs and room for the missionaries here now that we have 2 Sisters. But we were happy to see both Elder Raymond and Pocock. Elder Raymond served here back in mid 2011. And we managed to have a great evening on Monday with all of them. They came to Swahili class on Tuesday and then spent time with the missionaries.
We have been working on getting a group ready to attend the temple so we spend a lot of time getting paperwork ready for passport applications. That has turned out to be quite a job. Most of the members do not have birth certificates and those who do, do not have the same name on their birth certificate as they do on their church membership record. And those who do not have a birth certificate have to get an Affidavit to prove their birth date. And that process is story all it’s own. We’ll reserve that for a fireside when we get home. So with all that process and getting the photos required we have been really busy.
One of the highlights of the month was a new baby in our branch. We went with the R.S. Pres. to visit.
The family only has boys so far so this little girl is very welcome.
This mission experience is one that we will treasure for the rest of our lives. We are taking lots of pictures so we can reminisce when we get home. There are such strong members here that face such overwhelming challenges. Every week we talk about whether we would be as strong if we had to face the same challenges. This is the “Big Rain” season and the road up to the church is quite often just a river of mud. But the members just keep coming out. The chapel floor is quite often covered with mud but we don’t care as long as they keep coming out. Some walk for several miles in the mud to get to church. Many do not have power at their homes so on Sunday there are phones plugged in all over the church. Ask yourself if you would be a strong church member if you had no running water at your home to take a bath or shower, had to do your laundry in a bucket and haul the water in buckets to your house, no power to run your hair drier, no stove to cook on, an outdoor toilet and then had to walk 5 miles to church. These members live that way and they love the gospel so much they do it every week. We complain about our accommodations here and we can look forward to going back the land of luxury. These members don’t have that to look forward to. They look forward to the time when they can return to live with their Heavenly Father. And we have learned so much from them. Our testimonies have been strengthened so much through this experience. If we ever gripe about anything at home will you remind us that we live in luxury and to shut up and get on with it.
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