Maize! Maize! and MORE MAIZE!

We were assigned to Home Teach this amazing Banda family.  They have been members for a long time and even held church in their home when a new group was started in Matero North.  Unfortunately, for whatever reasons, the group was disbanded.  They are very gracious to invite us into their home.  They have a large farm outside the city where they grow maize.  Each year they pick the maize and bring it to their home in Lusaka to dry and prepare for the mill.  One time when we visited their front room was half covered with a huge pile of corn.  When it is dry enough, all the kernels are removed.  We helped them do some of it.  We did it by hand.  But when it is really dry, it can be put in a bag and beat until the kernels fall off.  Alan had a great time helping.

 

Everybody helps.  Even the young neighborhood kids.  Fidas and Alma on the left actually are live with the Brother and Sister Banda and are their grandchildren.
  
Sister Banda taught me how to make mshima and relish.  She makes it look so easy and I did learn to make relish pretty well, but my nshima is still not quite the right consistency and is a bit lumpy.  She's been making it for years and I have made it less than a half dozen times, so I guess I should not expect to be at her same proficiency level!  They cook most everything over a charcoal stove such as the one on the right or a braai, which is a b-b-q type cooker.
  
This is what she made for us.  It was delicious.  In turn, I showed her how to make Rice Crispy squares.  It's much easier than nshima and relish.
  
The kids who were helping with the corn enjoyed the treat.  Sister Banda is a beautiful African matriarch and we have so enjoyed visiting in their home!
 
The Matero District had a service project where the six missionaries and us went and helped again with the corn.  We did a lot of maize that day, but there was still a really big pile to do when we pooped out and left after having been fed a wonderful meal by Sister Banda.  In the picture we have Elder Ssenbgooba, Elder Hiltbrand, Elder Komakech, Elder Bobowski, Elder Almeida and Elder Day and a neighbor who stopped by for a visit.

 
It was a beautiful day for the service project--not too hot and plenty of sun!

A great bunch of service-oriented elders!  We enjoy the opportunities we have to go with them to teach, to visit, to serve or to just have a good time together at an activity.

Practice! Practice! Practice!

I started to teach piano lessons again and have had more success here than previously.  I was teaching three of the White family lessons--Jimmy, Steven and Blessings.  Jimmy went back to live with his mom so I have just been teaching Steven and Blessings.  They are coming along and know more now than they did when we started!

  
Blessings is a little older and is moving along a little faster.  I also think she probably practices more than Steven.  He would rather be playing basketball.  The handsome young man on the right is Gabriel Kapema.  His dad is the S&I director for Zambia and Malawi and works in our building.  Gabe was doing pretty well until he basically stopped coming.  I think he may start coming again!  I sure hope so. It would be great if he could play for Sacrament Meeting before we leave, but he has to come to lessons oftener than once every 2 months!

              
My best student is Andrew Kampelya.  He's a return missionary from our mission.  He was originally sent to Sierra Leone, but when Ebola broke out there, he was sent back to us.  Anyway, he's home  now and wanted to learn piano so we gave it a go and he has done very well.  He was given this keyboard and teaching books through the Harmon Grant because he finished both the piano and the conducting courses.  He plays the prelude music at church and even accompanied a song the hun, "Lord, Dismiss Us With Thy Blessings" and he did really well.  I'm so proud of him!  He has started to teach Davis Chifunda, the bishop's son, and will hopefully have time to teach others too!

Missionary Service Project and Matero District Activity

The road outside the Mission Office was very narrow and rutted and had to be driven with care.  In preparation for the new mission president, President Erickson approved a service project to widen the road.  The missionaries really dug in and worked hard.  It was supposed to be a half day project, but proved to be a bigger project than anticipated and ended up going most of the day.  The sisters were a great held.  Way to go Sister Tuai, Sister Owusu Afriyie, Sister Reid and Sister Mukweya.

            
The weeds we cut with "slashers" and Elder Cunningham knows how to swing it and make it work!
                                                       We have not quite figured out why the broom and  shovel in Zambia have such short handles.  It makes the work so hard on the back, but they got the job done!
Elder Zimene makes it look almost easy!                                                      
                 
Quite a crew!

There was no water at the Woodlands Chapel on a day when a baptism was scheduled.  So the missionaries brought water bottles--two truck loads--to the mission office and filled them with a hose so there could be enough water to conduct the baptism.  It wasn't very warm, but the day warm so it was OK to have cooler water!

One Preparation Day our district decided to go out to Lilayi, the baby elephant orphanage.  We had been there before, but the others in our district had not.  The elephants were fun to watch. It was a fun way to spend our anniversary. 

  

We also stopped at Eureka, a small animal park in Lusaka.  We saw some zebra and giraffe. Also some Kudus and Impalas.  It's so interesting that most of the African missionaries had never seen these animals before.  They were pretty excited and kept trying to get close to get pictures, which usually resulted in the animals running away from us.  .
   

 
We concluded the activity with lunch at KFC!  Yes, there really is one here and the chicken was great.  We were not thrilled about the runny potatoes and gravy nor the coleslaw, but the chicken was really good.  We had a great time together! Those who went on the trip were Elders Komakech, Sstegooba, Hiltbarnd, Bobowski, Day and Almeida,

malawi

In May we took a little break and flew to Lilongwe, Malawi, to spend some time with one of the other senior couples, Lynn and Sharee Birrell.  We had a wonderful time.  We are not sure we have every flown in such a small commercial plane.  It held about 18 people and there was no cockpit door so we could see right out the front windshield.  It was pretty cool when we flew home at night to see the lights on the runway and to see how the pilot navigated by the lights to land.

The house on the right is the travel flat we stayed in.  It was very nice and is located on a large property that has animals, walking trails and two swimming pools.  It was a little too cool for me to venture into the pool, but Alan and Lynn went swimming several times.   The place is Eden Estates and is really about as close to the garden for a place to live as we have seen while here


If i had a place like this to walk, I would do it multiple times a day.  It took about 15 minutes to make the loop and it was beautiful.  These are some of the children from the neighboring compound.  Black children really have the most beautiful smiles.  They are amazing kids!
 
The property had goats, chickens, horses, a donkey and multiple dogs.  It was beautiful!




We went to church at the Lilongwe Branch.  They recently got this beautiful new building.  There many converts there so we hope that branch will soon grow to many branches and contribute to a stake in Malawi. 
We visited a Catholic Mission which was very interesting.  The architecture was definitely spanish and it had some pretty cool statues.


This is the museum on the property.  There was also a nice gift shop where we bought a very nice nativity set.  It's much larger than the small ones we had previously purchased.

The grounds were beautiful, and it had a jungle like feeling to it.  There were trails and paths with lots of greenery and flowers.

 
We drove to Lake Malawi and on the way saw some  very interesting granite rock formations.  We also stopped at the pottery factory and had lunch.  I bought a special "Gramma" plate for special occasions when we get home.  It was very nice.
 
This is probably the biggest geranium I have ever seen!  It was more like a bush and it was beautiful.  These women are taking the kernels off maize.  They will then take the kernels to the mill and have it ground into a fine powder to make Nshima.  This is the basic of everyone in Malawi and Zambia.  It is pretty tasteless, but when a relish of some sort is added, it's not too bad.  Zambians don't feel like they have eaten unless they have their Nshima at least twice a day!
 
We stopped along the road again to visit one of these tourist traps where the artisans sell their wares. This one was really cool.  They made bikes, planes, cars, jeeps and other cool things out of wood. WE bought a bike which had wheels that turn by pedals that actually work.  It was neat.  We later had one of the other couples bring us back a jeep because we didn't get one while we were there.  They are very talented in their skill of making this cute things.
                   
We finally arrived at Lake Malawi.  It was gorgeous.  It was also a little cool so we didn't get in the water much or go out in their rickety paddle boats or ancient kayaks.  But we sure did enjoy the beauty of the lake and the leisure relaxation.
 
We did a little wading on the one day that was warmer and has less wind.  The sunsets there were pretty spectacular.
                    
There were some big rocks where the monkeys enjoyed sunning themselves.  The one day the weather was nice was absolutely beautiful.  We can sure understand why this is one of the bragging points of Malawi.
              

Malawi has something we had not seen in Zambia.  Kabazas or bike taxis.  They were everywhere!  And people use them as a major form of transportation.  Alan had to take a short ride for the photo op.  Actually, one of the new sisters who went to Malawi for her first transfer was riding one of these bikes with her companion on a different one.  They got separated with one going one way and the other a different way.  We understand it was a little tense when we thought we had a missing missionary.  She was found safely on a curb reading her scriptures....so it turned out well.

                                                                                                      I think this is our first "selfie,"
              
It was great to eat our meals out on the beach and listen to the sound of waves on the shore!

Again, there were beautiful sunsets!  It really felt like being in Hawaii!