15 October 2009 – Thursday

Elders Wengert and Maremela held their first ZDM and did a great job. There was no long discussion about Zone Activity and the rest moved right along with many of the elders participating. I think this was the best since one that Elder Bradley led in Swazi.

After the ZDM the Barts treated everyone to lunch at McDonalds. Twelve elders and two couples ate a lot of food and took up over half the seating places. It was a good last goodbye for the Bs with all the elders and you can tell they are going to miss each other.

We went directly from McDonalds to Port Durnford for English. Although we were missing Gogo Nzama, we had a good class. It was good to have Tembe there and hopefully he will soon be able to be baptized. As the class was finishing Sister Thandi told us that sister Mhlongo had died on Tuesday. While her death from cancer was expected, the fact that she had died two days earlier and no one had bothered to tell us, was rather a shock. Especially since it seems the elders knew on Tuesday, had not called us nor told us when they saw us on Wednesday nor earlier this morning. Also President Machaka had not called. I guess they all assumed someone else had told us.

Two of our three English students – Temba and Thandi. These are more of my experiment with changing ISO settings and I think both came out well. They show facial detail that I have been losing in the past. Maybe by the time we head home I will have the system down. One of the words we learned today was ‘plaid’ because of Thandi’s blouse. I loved her orange hat that she wears even when she is inside because she did not time to do her hair before we came.

We immediately went up to their homestead to offer our condolences and to sit with the family for a while. As mentioned I had spoken to sister Mhlongo’s daughter Manini on Sunday about her mother and about how the family could be together forever. She met us as we drove in and took us in to the family and friends gathering that they hold until the funeral. Manini, Gabi and us sang “I am a child of God” for the family – it is a tradition that people sing when visiting.

I met with brother Mhlongo and asked if there was anything we could do. He said they would need some help with the food. We agreed to pick up the daughters tomorrow and take them shopping for the funeral that will be held on Saturday. All the other arrangements had been made and she will be buried in the family plot on the homestead.

We excused ourselves and went to the PD chapel and held youth. We discovered that a memory game using the General Authorities would not work, so we started playing Book of Mormon Bingo which they really like. After a while, to make sure everyone went home a winner, we started eliminating winners and luckily the last two had Bingo at the same time.

While we were at Youth sister Chirwa, the RS President, came in and talked to Mary. We did not realize that sister Mhlongo had been through the temple and could be buried in temple clothes. Of course she did not have any and so we said we would see what we could do to get some on such short notice.

We then had to dash home so I could grab a little something to eat and go down to the Richards Bay Chapel for District Council Meeting. It was a good short meeting with lots getting covered before President Baldwin and Calwyn had to leave for something at school.

As we were leaving I told Elder B about the situation with the need for temple clothes for sister Mhlongo. He helped me find most of what we needed but some parts were missing. I decided if worse came to worse Mary could make the missing pieces tomorrow before giving them to sister Chirwa so she could dress the body.

So it was busy and surprising but it felt good to be able to be of service to the people here in Richards Bay. I think that we are going to find ourselves really busy once the Bs leave on Sunday. I am also sure that if we are diligent in our calling and follow the spirit we will be able to accomplish that which the Lord has sent us here to do.

2 Mite day…