Elder Reeves presenting elder Musisi with the first ever Empangeni District ‘Goof Ball.’

12 May 2010 – Wednesday

The days seem to be flying by. We are trying not to think about our mission here in South Africa ending in a couple of months but there is so much to do before we leave it seems to always be at the back of our mind.

Today we went to Elder Reese’s fist DDM as a district leader and his enthusiasm was just bubbling. His goal is to make a difference which is a good one. He started a ‘goof ball’ tradition – in Swazi there was a Zone Bone – that is given each week to the elder or sister who made the funniest mistake during the week. The first elder to get the ball was elder Musisi. When asked why they had knocked on the gate he responded with a new door approach ‘we have come to eat your food.’ Of course he was making a joke but the lady said OK and prepared them some food. Too bad he did not say ‘we have come to baptize you.’

They set the district goal as improving the number of 2 mite days they have as a district each week. They should already be keeping track of 2 mite days for their letter to the president. But it seems some have not been too good about writing and this will focus their attention on the idea of giving their all each day.

After the DDM we found that president Vilane came home from the hospital this morning so instead of visiting him there, we bought some fruit juices for him and after lunch at KFC went to see him. He seemed to be a little stronger and was able to talk some. If we understood him correctly his wife said they took 600 ml of liquid from his stomach. He also has stopped being constipated which should also help. We will keep in close contact with him to see how he is doing.

We went from Enseleni to Esikhawini so Mary could give an English lesson. While she was doing that I went to see President Machaka about how things were going with him getting to Zimbabwe and getting his passport renewed. He said he needed someone to watch his shop while he was gone and I suggested he contact Musa and Solo and see if they could fill in.

After the lesson we had to go shopping for some of the things we will need for feeding the missionaries on Sunday. I hit gold by finding 7 boxes of Mary’s favorite brownie mix at Pick N Pay while she shopped at Spars. When I got back to Spars she was outside the store looking in the parking lot for me and I must have walked right by her when I went into the store to look for her. It took us a while to find each other but we finally made connections – luckily she was wearing a very distinctive Indonesian patterned skirt.

Unfortunately they delivered the wrong motor for our garage door opener so it will be another weekend without it…hopefully it will come before we go home!  

In the evening we called the Coxes and set a date for our trip to the midlands. We have been meaning to do this for almost a year but just could never fit it in to our schedule. Hopefully this time it will actually happen.