Africa In Pictures

These are a variety of pictures from some of the places we have been as we have visited some of our Branch members, or have gone with Brother and Sister Moss to their areas.  We have been in country one month today and finally have internet up and running on both computers.  What a trial of patience this has been!!  

This is the little town of KaNyamazane where Elder and Sister Moss help with their Branch.  This town is more primitive than Nelspruit where we serve, but there is a lot of building going on and the Church seems to be coming along and growing.

An interesting landmark in KaNyanmazane.

In one of thevery modern Malls in Nelspruit, an artist had his creations on display.  He created these things out of old driftwood that he found.  They were amazing!  He is very talented!

This friend looked very real, even his eyes.  Thought maybe he'd like to be photographed with me.  :)

These flowers are on the porch of the entry to Elder and Sister Moss's house.

Another one in pink.  They were simply gorgeous!!

These Birds of Paradise grow in front of our flat along the driveway.

Part of the largest man-made forest in the world.  It is on the way to Sabie, an area in our Branch.  Notice how evenly planted the rows of trees are.  There are millions of acres of these pine trees.  They are very well manicured, with no deadfall.

This is where it is clear cut, ready for replanting.

At a rest area on the way to Sabie.

A little "Lean to" where they sell their home grown fruits, nuts and vegetables.

This is the bridge overlooking the falls of the Sabie River.

This is a beautiful blooming azaela bush.

More of the Falls on the Sabie River.

Flowering thorn bushes.  Glad I don't have to trim them and haul the branches away!!!

Sabie River with bridge in the background..  Watch out for the crocs!!

Lays Potato Chips, even in South Africa!!  :)

Shacks in a poor section  on the road to Sabie.  People actually live here.  :(  So sad.

Three quarter moon in South Africa.  Looks a little different than at home.

A witch doctor's home in KaNyamazane.  They fly a white flag outside their home.

This is the school that they rent to hold meetings for the KaNyamazane Branch.  They were holding a Priesthood social one Saturday afternoon.   They love to play soccer, even without grass.

The inside of one of the rented rooms.  This is a third grade room.  It has double tables, two to a table.  It had 46 places for children.  So sad.  I wanted to cry to think of trying to learn under these circumstances.  And even worse to think of holding church here.  The principal won't let them put any pictures up in the rooms or even a sign outside indicating that this a Church of Jesus Christ of Latterday Saints.  We have so much to be thankful for!

The few teaching supplies that they have.  As far as the Church goes, there is hope.  The Church has purchased land for a building when the tithing percent goes up.  But these are very poor people.

The wives of some of the Priesthood holders prepared the food for the social.  This is a typical African meal:  chicken legs, livers etc., beans, pap (pop) which is ground white corn cooked in boiling water.  It looks like mashed potatoes, but is much thicker and dryer, hot dog bun. They eat it with their hands.

An African sling.  They use a large towel or blanket, put the baby in it and wrap it around them and fold over to hold it tight.  They carry them like this until they are three or four years old.

I made a batch of  chocolate chip cookies to take up.  They disappeared like magic!

Rocks make a real good chair.  :)

This beautiful young has a mission call to Ghauna.  She is the first missionary in the KaNayamazane Branch.  Elder and Sister Nichols, whom we replaced, helped to buy her clothes for her mission.  She is the only one in her family who is a member.

Our Nelspruit Branch the last Sunday that Elder and Sister Nichols Nichols were here.  She is the one is the center with the pink flower on a beige dress and her husband is the fellow with gray hair a few people to the left of her.

These are avacado trees.  Notice the rows of electrical wire above the fence.  Some of the avacados weigh up to a pound or more.

We were invited to a Brei (Brii - Barbeque) at the home of  one of our members as a going away dinner for the Nichols'  They had pens with different kinds of birds.  This is one of them.

A flowering bush in their yard.  The blooms are white when they first open, then turn a vibrant purple.  The fragrance is unbelievable!  

These are macadamia nut trees.  Lynn is in the height of his glory.  We buy them at little roadside places for 20 rand - which is about $2.25 for a small bag.

Some more shacks coming home from Sabie.

This makes us be really grateful for our wonderful living conditions.

An old fashioned steam engine along the countryside on display.

With it being springtime, the trees are alive with beautiful flowering blooms.

Many of these trees adorn the countryside where ever  you drive.

 These flowering trees are called Jackaranda trees.  They are rich in color right now.  After they finish blooming, they will have long hanging needle like leaves on the branches.

An African sunset.

A hazy day overlooking the town of Barberton.  It has a very high elevation and the drive there is very steep and winding.

This area of Barberton has white limestone.

In Barberton, they have large colorfully painted rocks to welcome you there.

They love bright color!

Thatched rooftops on these huts outside of Baberton.  Notice the high coiled barbed wire above the fence.  That is very common here.

This lady is carrying a load of sticks on her head.  It is a very common way to carry loads of anything, baskets of laundry, heavy buckets, packages,whatever.  And it's always the ladies carrying them.

  

Our New Apartment

     After staying with Elder and Sister Moss for 8 days, we finally began the process of moving.  Elder and Sister Oborn came up from Johannsesburg on Sunday night to bring our new furniture and things for our apartment.  They are the couple responsible for the apartments for the missionaries.  They pulled a trailer with our couch and chair and bedding, along with his tools to fix whatever needed fixing.  They stayed with Elder and Sister Nichols on Sunday night.  Monday morning, the Nichols' loaded their car and headed to Johannesburg on route to Kenya to visit some former members where they served a few years ago.  (I'm always amazed at how many couples have served 2 or 3 missions previously).  Sister Oborn brought a lot of bedding down to the Moss's apartment to run through her washer as the electricity was about to run out in our apartment and it was a holiday today and the office where you buy more electricity was closed until Tuesday or Wednesday and we she didn't want to use all our electricity running the washer and dryer.  She informed me that I might want to go in and clean a little before we moved our things in.  Having been to the apartment a couple of times earlier, I already knew I would need to do that.  (Some people just don't seem to be as particular as I am)

     I started on the kitchen first since that seemed to be the biggest or worst area.  It was worse than I thought!  I took everything out of each cupboard and scrubbed out the cupboards and then washed everything that was in them and rearranged things to my liking.  I wiped of bottles and containers before putting them back in the cupboard or fridge. We worked until about 7:30 that night, and had the kitchen and fridge done.  It was dark and seemed too dingy to tell if I was getting it clean or not, so we decided to call it a day.

    Sisters Moss and Oborn made a trip to the stores earlier to get bedding, throw rugs, and toss pillows to give the apartment some personality.  I was amazed how well Sister Oborn did with choosing out colors that were something that I could live with.  The couch was a light beige suede with a matching ottoman, and a medium blue chair.  We chose to keep the winged back blue chair that was already here.  It was a little worn, but looked great with the other blue chair, though a different style.  It seemed to give balance to the living room.  Elder Oborn hung a new mirror in the main bathroom, and put a new light cover over the light in the second bathroom.  They were supposed to leave to go back to Joburg by about 3:30, but didn't even leave to go have a bite of dinner at the Moss's until 6:30.  We encouraged them to stay overnight, but she had a doctor appointment the next morning, and they were bringing the Nichols' luggage since they couldn't fit it in their car.  So they had no choice but to leave and drive during the night.  It was a four and half hour drive.  We felt badly for them to drive so late, because we knew they were tired, but we really did appreciate all their help in getting  things done in our apartment.

     We also appreciated Sister Moss's help in preparing lunch and dinner for all of us while we worked that day.  We had asked her if we could stay another day so we could finish getting things cleaned before we started unpacking them.  They told  us of course we  could.  It seemed nice to go to a clean apartment and be able to shower and sleep after being in the dissaray of our apartment.  The Moss's have also been expremely helpful while we have been there by taking us to different areas or shopping places for groceries etc, to help acquaint us with the area.  We would have ben totally lost without a clue as to where to go or what was available.   They have been terrific mentors and great friends.  We have had a lot of fun times while at their flat.  Sometimes we hae laughed until we had tears running down our faces.

     The next day, we got ready and headed to the apartment for some more of the same. I finished hanging some drapes in the bedroom, cleaned the bathrooms, wiped out shelves in the bedroom and bathroom so we dared put our things away.  About 8:00 that night, we went back to the Moss's to pack up our things and transfer them to our new apartment.  After unpacking our clothes and some of our bathroom things, we got the bed made up and hit the showers, ready for a good night's sleep in our new flat.  You'd think that after all the hours that we'd put in, I'd be asleep before my head hit the pillow; however, that wasn't the case.  I lay there for several hours.  It was nearly 4:30 before I could finally go to sleep.  The next morning, a litle after 6:00, the sun was shining brightly in our window, despite the drapes being closed, so that was the end of my sleep.

     This day wasn't so productive!  I had been cleaning out the hall closet and washing towels and sheets that were in them, and my washer stopped in the middle of the cycle, and the door was locked so I couldn't do anything to get it unlocked.  A little later, the water went off.  We didn't know why, so without any water to clean or wash, we decided to go do errands and get some groceries.   When we came back later that day, we had water, so we were able to get the floors mopped, (actually Lynn did all the mopping, and with all tile floors, that was no simple task!) and get the rugs down and now the apartment was beginning to look like a real place to live.  It was worth all the effort! 

     Voila!! The finished product!

Hanging the drapes in the extra bedroom.

The finished room, just waiting for guests.  Any takers???

Nice to have a maid to help with the difficult chores!! :)

So much fun shaking those comforters into the duvae covers!

Our finished room.  I like the bright green.

Our patio looking from the outside in.  Notice the barred doors.  This is typical everywhere.

The view from the patio looking out.  That's the row of flats on the row just below us.  We're on the bottom level.  (They think we're too decrepid to do stairs.)

Our front entry.  Notice the African Wall hanging.  The African that I bought it from told me it was a window shade to keep the flies out.  Our African guest tonight told he had never heard of such a thing. Oh well, it does make a nice wall hanging.  (Tha carved wood hanger was already there.  There's a mirror on the other side of the room to match.

The right side of our kitchen.  As you can see, we're fairly modern.  At least we don't have to scrub our clothes outside in three buckets.

Our kitchen, with a small utility room at the end.  Do you like the hand made mahogony bowl that I bought from a young man from Zimbabwe on our way to Nelspruit?

  

 The bath off the main bedroom.

The extra bath.  You'll have your own bath when you come to visit.  :)

This beautiful antherium just started to bloom.  It is on our porch just before you come in the front door.

Our living room.  It is very peaceful and relaxing.  The opens to our patio.

My new automatic dishwasher!

 

First Week

Well, we have been here one week today.  It has seemed like a long week.  Much has happened, but I feel like we're not into the work yet.  We spent from Tuesday night when we arrived in country, with President and Sister Omer, the Mission President.  They are very lovely people.  They made us feel very welcome and comfortable.  Sister Omer is a very gracious lady.  They both have a lot of responsibility.  I don't know how they do it.  She is basically the Missionary Mom, responsible for all the missionaries.  We were at the Mission Home everyday, being oriented to the mission and informing us about the cars, phones, apartments, etc.  One afternoon they took Lynn out to practice driving on the left side of the road.  He didn't take the car home that night though.  We were scheduled to go to Nilspruit on Friday, but they were having difficulty getting the sim card for the phone to operate.  Because it was still not working, they didn't want us to go until Saturday so we  could have a phone to take with us.   So Lynn stayed around the office to do some more practice driving, and I went with Sister Omer and the other Office Missionaries to a warehouse where there are a lot of authentic, handmade African Souvineers.  A gentleman who Sister Omer knows travels throughout Africa and buys hand made articles from the village people and keeps them in a warehouse and opens his store occassionally for people to come in and purchase things. There were a lot of interesting things,but many things that I didn't know what I would do with them after I got home, or how I would even get them home.  I did buy a couple of things that I thought I could decorate our apartment with.

By the afternoon, they had our phone working, so the plan was to leave early Saturday morning.  Lynn and I did a few errands before heading to the Mission Home to pack.  I had bought 2 curling irons the day before, 2 different sizes.  When I got home and opened them, they were both the same size, in a wrong box, so we had to take them back to exchange it.  We spent a lot of time driving around trying to find our way to where we wanted to go.  We had a GPS, but had a difficult time finding the addresses of the places where we wanted to go.  So we just ended up driving around until we found the kind of store we wanted.    It took us about 3 hours to do a couple of things and get back to the Mission Home.  Sister Omer had the Assistants over for tacos.  President had a meeting so missed dinner for the second night in a row.

We got packed with the few things that we had unpacked to last for a few days.  At 9:00 the next morning, we ready to head out.  We worried that we would be able to get 5 large cases, 2 carry on bags, a computer bag and a bag of manuals and journals loaded in the small Nissan, but with the help of the  President and the Assistants, we were able to get everyone loaded in.  It was raining and chilly,but with GPS loaded and Elder Bishop from the Mission Office to lead us out of Johannesburg, we started out.  It took about an hour to get out of the area onto the freeway where we would be able to hit the freeway from there.  It was a pretty drive.  The farther out we went, the prettier it became.  It was very green and a little hilly.  Through some of the areas, we saw some little villages that I wondered if they were houses or just a junk yard.  A litle farther down the road, I noticed some wash hanging out on the line and figured people were really living in them.

We stopped for gas and lunch at a small of the road area.  It is very hard to understand the people as they  speak very fast and with a dialect.  A couple of hours later, we stopped to stretch our legs and potty.  A man from Zimbabwe was selling bowls he had made from Mahogony.  I couldn't pass it up and thought it would make a lovely fruit bowl.  A while later, we stopped at some roadside stands with people selling their bags of oranges,  avacados, pecans and macadamia nuts.  We bought something from each one of them.  We had seen orange trees loaded with oranges a litle earlier.

We finally arrived in Nilspruit about 2:45, but it took us an hour to find the area even with 3-4 phone calls to the couple that we were to be staying with.  Our apartment won't actually be ready until about the 25th or 26th.  Another couple is leaving and then the mission is bringing in some new furniture and other thngs to fix up the apartment.  It is dificult living with complete strangers, but they are very kind and in the gospel, we all feel like family.  We're just geting tired of living out of suitcases and trying to adjust to other peoples' lifestyles.  We haven't had internet since we left the Mission home, but went to the Mall yesterday and got s "stick", but we can only run one computer at a time.  We may look into getting a land line when we get into our apartment.

We went to church Sunday in our Branch.  The people seemed very nice.  we haven't met with the Branch President yet or the Ward Mission leader to know just where they would like to use us.  The Elder's Quorem President invited us to dinner at their home on Thursday, so we will get a chance to get to know him and his family.  He seems like a very nice young man. Our Branch meets upstairs in a rented building downtown.  It is quite nice for not being an actual chapel.  The couple we're living with work with another Branch about an hour away.  They just have two rooms in a school that they use.  The classes are usually held outside because they have no rooms to meet in.  The rooms look just like school just let out.  The Branch President has to hold interviews outside, while sitting on a stump.  The church has purchased a piece of land for a chapel, but they people aren't paying their tithing, so that is holding them up on getting a chapel. 

Well I had better close this epistle.  Our love to you all.