October 26, 2014 - Shelley

October 26, 2014

It’s hard for me to imagine that you are tearing out the flowerbeds and breaking out your winter clothing now.  We’ve decided that Lubumbashi has 3 temperatures: warm, hot, and hotter.  Right now it’s HOTTER!  If I had paid better attention in Geography class, I would have remembered how the seasons are opposite on different sides of the equator!

Our week has been one of culminating activities.  One big one was the ending of Operation Smile.  That has been such a great experience for so many people!

Clark was very lucky to be able to watch several surgeries, along with Dr. Mikesell, our mission doctor.  Clark loved it so much that I’m afraid now he’ll want to go to medical school when we get home!  I might have to put my foot down!  We were so astounded at the number of volunteers from two of our local stakes – nearly 100 people!!!

Sister Claudine Riendeau, a senior sister missionary who is serving here, has been teaching French language skills to ladies in the community who may not have had the opportunity to finish school or to even go to school.  She had a “graduation” programs for them this week.

Including all 3 of her classes, she taught around 60 ladies.  These gals were so thrilled and felt such a sense of accom-

plishment!  Just imagine being able to understand a language without being able to read or write it.  During classtime, many of the ladies would need to borrow Sis. R.’s reading glasses in order to read, so she gave all of them reading glasses as a graduation gift. Boy – that was a total hit!!!

Another project that ended this week was the rebuilding of the market that had burned down in a fire.  We were able to obtain funds for the materials, and the church’s construction class built two structures that will house around 100 vendors.  It was quite an under-

taking!  At the end of a project, we are required to “hand the project over” to the city, in this case.  We had a little ceremony at the construction site with the mayor of the local commune.  The mayor said that they had asked 900 churches to help them rebuilt the market, and we were the only ones to help, so it felt pretty good.  

Here we are with the mayor and two gals from his office.  (I’m the one in pink!)  He was very nice and gracious.  But something I found really hilarious happened at the end.  There was a group of ladies who spontaneously broke into song – just kind of “made-up” songs.  The lyrics to one song said – “We thought you were a bad mayor, but now you’ve helped us and we like you!”  And the other song was for us, and the words were very touching.  They sang – “In our difficulties, Mormon cried with us.”

These are the singers.

It was also a week for getting the kitchen project near completion.  We are providing a kitchen for a school for underprivileged girls so that they can learn to cook and hopefully get a job.  Therese, the director of the school went with us to pick out what she wanted.  It was like taking a child to Toys R Us.

Lest you think this is something super fancy, her cooking lab is pretty humble.

This is the outside of the kitchen – it still has a ways to go before completion.  She is, however, a wonderful woman with vision of a better life for the 350 young girls she teaches.  She wants them to have a vocation so that they don’t feel trapped into getting married at a young age.

And, just when we thought there was nothing “fun” to do – we found something!  Our translator, Flavien, suggested we visit a game preserve that is located about 20 miles away.  I think I have mentioned before that we have seen very few animals here.  A few dogs and a cat – but nothing like you might imagine. Flavien says that we are 50 years too late!  Anyway, we took some of our fellow senior missionaries and went to “Futuka”.

Here we are in front of a hummer that took us on an hour-long drive through the preserve.  We actually saw a giraffe, several water buffalos, deer, zebras, and some ostriches!  It was really fun!

We have a saying in our family that when someone is upset, they have a “bee in their bonnet”.  Well, poor Clark actually did get a bee inside his hat while we were in the hummer!  It just flew in one of the holes on his hat and stung him on the head!  The saying will have new meaning for us now!  I always thought my grandma just made that up!

My handsome companion before the sting!  He’s really okay – just a bee sting!

Futuka had a restaurant with this beautiful brick oven.  I must have watched too much TV when I was a child because when I saw this I just couldn’t help but remember the “I Love Lucy” episode where Lucy and Ethel built an outside fireplace!  Lucy thought she lost her wedding ring in the mortar and they took it all apart!

Well, enough silliness!  We’re hanging in there.  The French Conference DVD’s arrived this week, so this has been Conference Weekend.  Church members gathered at the various churches to watch all of the sessions.  We have them downloaded already and have been able to enjoy them.  Modern technology is pretty amazing!  Our daughter Monica sent us the audio version practically as it was spoken – and we have loved that, too.  Never before have I felt such a closeness to the messages and especially to the church leaders themselves.  We are fortunate indeed!  I must end this by saying “Happy Birthday” to Daphne this week!  We love you all –Mom/Soeur Davis