01 May 2010 – Saturday

May starts with a beautiful morning. Just a few thin clouds but who knows what the day will bring. Woke up to the phone ringing and it was Cindy wishing me a belated Happy Birthday. There was an e-mail from Tom doing the same. Bob actually managed to catch us home during our lunch time yesterday and added his birthday wish.

I forgot to mention that last night we got a call from Percy Zibani saying that he had got the job he wanted and would report to work on Monday. He thanked us for our help and I told him we had not done much but prayed for him. He mentioned that we had updated and improved his CV – I had actually forgotten about that. Hopefully he will do well in his job and will be able to support his family as he would like to. He is a good man and will be a great strength to the branch.

When we found out that we did not have a meeting in Esikhawini this morning we called and made arrangements for Mary to teach Mbali Ndlovu her first piano lesson. While she did that I visited Mama Zulu and saw her very impressive garden that she recently put in. Vegetable just explode out of the soil here. Then I was joined by Khulekani and we went to visit Thandeka who was at a friend’s house. It was good to see her out of her bed but she is so skinny that is almost painful to look at her. TB will probably end up killing her before her 23 birthday. She told me she had been sick for four years and she is tired of it.

A quick stop at Woolworths got us the few things we still needed for dinner tomorrow night. After having delicious peanut butter and jelly sandwiches we went to Esikhawini where Mary first had a meeting with sister Khumalo about the RS Conference next Saturday. Earlier in the day she had made handouts to be given our on Sunday in all the branches.

While she then taught four more piano lessons, I put fittings on the hose we bought a couple of weeks ago and then cut it in two so they do not need to drag hoses all over the garden. Just after I had finished that sister Mathe arrived to work in her garden patches and I had a nice talk with her about her garden and her children.

She is taking care of 7 of her grandchildren because two of her daughters died and the fathers do not want anything to do with helping raise them nor helping with any financial support. The gogos here are amazing and the only thing that keeps much of society together.

After lessons we went to the Richards Bay chapel where Elder Griesmer was giving Elders Kitili and Lemmon a shortened Career Workshop. After he was through we went with them to the mall to have dinner.

He was excited to share with us the news that the Area Presidency had approved his idea to have a regular Employment Office in Durban. He gave me some of the credit because I talked him into writing a letter to the Area Employment Office explaining why he thought this was necessary and why it would be of a great help for the members.  Unfortunately the Griesmers will probably not get to use the new office with computers, etc. but their replacements will. I told the Griesmers that this might have been the main reason they were sent to this mission. To assess the needs and write an excellent proposal for making employment services work in the Durban area.

I think we touched a few lives for good today.