26 August 2009 – Wednesday

In the morning I went with Elder Bartholomew up to Enseleni to deliver a food order. After we delivered it, he took me on a quick drive around the township to show me where most of the members live. They almost live in clusters with a number of members along one street. He said that they have maps showing the location of all the members in both of their branches. That will really help after they leave. We have started to do that for Esikhawini but it is impossible for Port Durnford. He was hoping that his wife would be released from the hospital today. She has had two good nights in a row.

In the afternoon we drove to Esikhawini where we returned some painting tools and a new pitcher to the pre-school/crèche that we help paint on Saturday. They have about 150 children enrolled in the school and there seems to be about 5 staff to watch over them.

When we left there I felt that we should visit a family that has been struggling lately and had some health issues. Our timing was perfect and the brother opened up to tell us many of their problems. We listened and tried to build him up spiritually. I suggested that he needed to make an appointment for he and his wife to talk to president Malinga. He said he would do that and I hope he does.

Next we went to PEC meeting with President Machaka. As always there was no one there but him and the missionaries, but we had a pretty good meeting. The missionaries have a number of people ready for baptism in September and will coordinate it with a couple baptisms from Esikhawini. Now if we can just have decent weather and enough water to fill the font, everything will be great. Later Mary found out that they have set the wedding for December 12 – I think she was the first to find out the date.

 

After that we went to the Esikhawini chapel to see if the toilet had been fixed and to wait until it was time to meet with President Malinga. It was supposed to be time for seminary but the only person there was Lisa Mathe who was filling in for sister Khumalo. While we waited I tried to take pictures of some birds that are often at the chapel. I have tried a number of times but with poor results – this time was alittle better but not much. None of the students showed up. We ended up taking Lisa home before going to the Malingas.

We had a short meeting – it still went 30 minutes – with president Malinga. Mainly we talked about how his wife was – she was home and had gone to the salon – and some of the needs of the branch. He told us they are going to hold Presidency meeting on Friday. I gave him an outline on how they might plan socials without him needing to anything but follow up on assignments.

His wife came home so I took him out to the yard and told him that a couple was going to make an appointment with him to talk to him about their problems – financial and marital.  I could tell he was uneasy about this so I took some time to build up his confidence in himself, his calling, and God being available to help. He may be worried but he will do well. Given some time and training he will become a fine branch president. I reminded him that part of his calling was to train men to take his place when his period of service was up.

It was growing dark as we left the township, but there were no fields being burned so the sky was quite clear. There were few cars on the road – at least the way we were going – so it was a nice drive. We stopped at Spars to get a few things – including something for dinner.

We had a quiet evening at home. We did find that sister B had been released from the hospital. Hopefully she will continue to get better so she can finish their mission on a positive note. They are a very special couple who love the people they serve.

This is a fun picture because the woman has a 2 liter container of milk on her head. I have no idea how she kept it balanced perfectly  or why she chose to carry it on her head as it is not either heavy nor cumbersome. Maybe it is just for practice.

Car wash from inside. Mukie Nzama’s daughter. Laundry on the fence and cow in the background – typical homestead shot

Mary, Gogo Nzama, Thandi Nzama at hospital. I was playing with filters. The nurse in the back soon came over and said taking pictures were not allowed. An interesting tree on the hospital grounds…no one knew its name. This is the Zondi’s house with the roof finished. It still needs to be plastered inside and out.

The Khiphikhono Baking Club out in the middle of no where on the Port Durnford road. We have never seen any activity at the club and someday we need to check it out.

25 August 2009 – Tuesday

Woke up at 4:00 and never got back to sleep. I gave up at a little after 5:00 and got my day started. Last night I decided that if it was not raining that I would get the car washed early today. It was not raining – but there were clouds – so I got ready and was the first one in line. It still took most of an hour but at least I did not have to wait in a line. As they were soaping the car I took some pictures through the windows. They did not come out great but they are rather interesting.

As I waited – you wait in the car until you get to the finishing station, I re-read two conference talks that have become very important to me. The first is by Elder Kevin Pearson and is “Faith in the Lord Jesus Christ.” He mentions that faith is a gift of God that comes through obedience – a consistent pattern of obedient behavior and attitudes. He ends his talk by talking about what he calls “Six Destructive D’s.” The one that struck me is the third one – “Distraction.” It is the one area I really need to work on both while on our mission and at home. I tend to be distracted from doing what I should do for what I want to do. Not that I want to do what most people would consider ‘bad’ things, but many times I find that I am doing comfortable or things that I am interested in rather than giving service or fulfilling my calling the best I can. I put in way too many 1 mite days and not enough 2 mite days. By doing this I limit the blessings – including the blessing of faith – that God can give me. I am limiting my own spiritual growth by not being ‘exactly obedient.”

It is rather like a vegetable garden where the soil is good, the weather is good, but the gardener does not do the work needed to keep out the weeds, water regularly or spray for pest. If he does not do the work, he can not expect to get the bountiful harvest he could have had. I am afraid that at times there are too many weeds in my garden.

The other talk that I studied this morning was by Elder Allan F. Packer: “Finding Strength in Challenging Times.” He told a good story about hearing his coach in the middle of a game and related it to being able to hear the spirit in a busy world – we must become familiar with the promptings of the Holy Ghost so we will understand what we should be doing. He quoted Elder Oaks”Testimony is to know and to feel, conversion is to do and to become.”

He said; “This is a great time to be alive! The Lord needs each of us. This is our day; it is our time!” I think it is a good way to look beyond the trials of the times and understand that all of us are here on earth at this time because it is when we need to be and when we are needed. While it may seem that we are suffering trials that we do not have control over, if we are righteous and trust Christ we should have peace and comfort that will get us through the hard times.

We went out to Port Durnford to help one of the Zondi brothers update his CV so we could make copies for him to give out. When we got there I could not remember which one needed our help but they finally found the right one. It turned out that he did not need to change his CV, he only needed copies. So we told him we would make copies and return them on Thursday.

While we were there, we looked in his house that we watched being roofed a few weeks ago. It is large and roomy – all one room really – but he will not move in until he has plastered the walls. He has electricity but there is no plumbing of any kind.

As we were about to leave, I noticed a large pile of what I thought was dirt. I of course wondered where it came from and how much it cost to get it delivered. It turned out that it was dirt mixed with cow manure and they got it from a local dairy. It should have cost R50 but he got his for R25 by bargaining. I asked him to see if he could get a load that was 10 times as big delivered to Esikhawini for R250. If we can get it for that price, we will be able to use it as a basis for our gardens and it should really increase the production. He said he would see what he could do.

Since we were still early for picking up Thandi Nzama to go up to the hospital to see her mother, we took a quick trip out to see where the road went. It turned out that it went through down town Port Durnford – which contains about 6 buildings and a school – and then continued up to R102. This was the road we ended up on the day we got completely lost!

When we got to the Nzamas we found that Thandi was already at the hospital but her aunt – that is sister Nzama’s youngest sister – wanted to come with us. We said sure and Mary convinced me that it would be shorter and quicker to go the new way than to wind our way back through Esikhawini. It turned out to be a nice trip with new scenery and it might be quicker.

Sister Nzama has not been eating much so she is still not very strong. Thandi was at the hospital to take some lessons on how to take care of her mother when she is released. I got in trouble for taking pictures in the hospital – it is not allowed. I apologized and told them I would not do it again. After a short visit, we all left for home and hope that sister Nzama will be home by Thursday.

After dropping off the Nzama women, we went to see Bungumuse as arranged on last Thursday. It turned out that he thought he should get some money for painting the backdrop to our roadshow. I do not know where he got the idea – it was never mentioned before – but they obviously need money so I should not have been surprised. Now we have to figure out how to not pay him for the painting but to get them some money.

We did learn one interesting thing while at his homestead. When we were out driving on the main road, we came across a very nicely dressed woman carrying a beautiful umbrella walking down the road. I commented to Mary about how nice she looked to be walking. Later we saw her again, still walking along. I mentioned that if they could not afford transportation it was just natural for them to walk.

It turned out that it was Bungumuse’s mother who had walked to and from Port Durnford to drop off a CV to someone who might be able to help her get a job. We all had a pretty good laugh about this but I wish that we had recognized her and we would have given her a ride.

We talked to Thandi and her aunt about what it was like growing up in Port Durnford. It turns out that their family has lived here for generations. They talked about walking to Esikhawini every day to go to school – without having any shoes. They said that life was much simpler then – electricity did not get out to Port Durnford until the 1990’s – but life was good and they really did not feel that they were poor.

23 August 2009 – Sunday

 

Missions are about people. I thought Elder Mokopotsa  looked sharp today. Thobani Chirwa also looked good. Later he would go with his younger nephew to the free clinic. The smiling face on the end is of our friend Thembe who has a baptism date set for the end of September and who often attends our English classes in Port Durnford.

Sunday night was our last supper and the elders had a great time eating, talking and sending in reports. But the day was long and they worked hard so elder Mokopotsa and elder Torgerson decided to get some rests.

 

We picked up the Esikhawini missionaries, picked up presidents Nyawo and Nkosi, attended PEC at Esikhawini, attended church in Port Durnford, took two of the Chirwa boys to the free clinic in Esikhawini, Mary taught piano at Esikhawini, came home to take a nap and prepare for the missionaries coming over for dinner, dinner with the missionaries except for elder Mbhiti who was heading for Durban, cleaned up the after dinner, and went to bed. It was a good Sabbath day. It would have been better if sister B was out of the hospital.

24 August 2009 – Monday

Monday’s gray, wet morning sky. We went to the Richards Bay boarding and found it clean and the elders settling in for a relaxing P-day. Elder Peterson shows off his Gordon B. Hinckley guitar and Elder Hoosier join him for a duet. Elder Torgerson is just going with the flow. Elder Muthoka decided to go into another room – was he being critical of the quality of playing?

Elder Muthoka on the exercise bike that is missing a pedal – that makes it interesting to ride for 30 minutes. The last pictures of the four together. At this time they had guessed that elder Hoosier and elder Torgerson would be leaving but I don’t think they realized they would both me made zone leaders. We will miss them here in Richards Bay.

 

Another rainy P-day but that was OK because we had things we needed to do around the house that we have kept putting off. But before we could start on them, we went and expected all three of the elder’s boardings. We do that the last Monday before transfers so those who will leave will have cleaned up any mess they helped to make. All of the boardings were fine except a couple of them needed to defrost their fridges. The Esikhawini one looked like they were trying to get enough ice to make a snow man – I am sorry I did not get a picture of it.

After we had finished with the inspections we went to the Barts boarding to deliver some mail. Sister B is still in the hospital and elder B is doing a good job of being a bachelor until she can come home. We then went to the mall so we could have some lunch, pay some bills, and do a little grocery shopping.

As I said at first, the day was then devoted to periods of house cleaning, going through piles of accumulated pages of church related material – we truly are pack rats when it comes to some things- and general house cleaning. When not doing that we were taking care of e-mail – I sent out a letter about our week. We enjoy getting them from other missionaries so I am going to try to send them on a regular basis.