This is a picture of our children that came to see us off on June 8, 2009. Barbara wanted to include them on our blog so here is the picture of the family.
This has been a busy week for us. We had to take one of the missionaries to the Opthalmologist because of some problems that he was having due to an operation that he had on one eye in Tanzania back in 1998 when he got a thorn in his eye. They operated and put a lense in his eye and put stitches in but never removed the stitches and the lense that was inserted was much more than he needed so he became very near sighted and that eye couldn't focus and the muscles allowed the eye to wander. The opthalmologist was able to remove the stitches, identify the problem with the lense and clean the film that had grown over the lense and recommended that we take him to an optometrist to get a contact lense for the eye that had the lense of the wrong strength. When all of this is fixed he should have normal vision in that eye and be able to drive a car.
We are getting to know the people better and to help out in different ways. We were asked by the missionary couple work with the Perpetual Education Fund (PEF) to assess some classes put on by a private college here to determine if it would work for a deaf student that was applying for a loan. We visited a local university and the private college to make the assessment on the computer skills, classes, and instructors. It was interesting testing out their classes in Information Technology and making recommendations. We may be able to meet the needs with it costing much less and provide better training but we'll see.
The people here are so loving and kind even though many of them have so very little in the way of material things. It is evident that wealth doesn't buy happiness because they are as happy as any group that we have seen. We have much to learn from them.
The spirit of the Lord is being poured out upon the people throughout Africa and the Church is growing well. We are helping with a branch (more correctly referred to as a "twig" here) because it is so small in a small town, Dundee. We attend church in Newcastle and then drive to Dundee to attend there. The Mission President spoke at Sacrament Meeting and then interviewed all of the local men to get an idea of how to proceed with the organization of a branch. One of the men he spoke with was an investigator and in the interview the President challenged him to baptism and he accepted so the President conducted an interview for baptism. He will be baptized on Sunday...the missionaries were surprised to find out they would have a baptism this coming Sunday for their investigator.
We went out to dinner with the Mission President and the Klinglers, the other senior couple here and then visited with them for a while the next morning when Barb prepared breakfast. We also had 14 missionaries over for dinner on Sunday. We are staying very busy helping members, missionaries, and others. The plans that we make for the day seem to change as new opportunities for service come up each day, and we are fine with that as long as we are able to assist others.
We went to Nambiti Conservancy (Reserve) today with 4 missionaries and the Klinglers and we had a wonderful time. We had to be there by 7:00 am so we got up at 4:30 am so we could drive there. It was quite cool (around 2 degrees Centigrade) so we had to bundle up and ride in a Land Rover (up high so we could see). I have included some of the pictures that we took so you could see the animals that we saw. We were able to get very close to them and the camera worked wonderfully.
We are getting to know the people better and to help out in different ways. We were asked by the missionary couple work with the Perpetual Education Fund (PEF) to assess some classes put on by a private college here to determine if it would work for a deaf student that was applying for a loan. We visited a local university and the private college to make the assessment on the computer skills, classes, and instructors. It was interesting testing out their classes in Information Technology and making recommendations. We may be able to meet the needs with it costing much less and provide better training but we'll see.
The people here are so loving and kind even though many of them have so very little in the way of material things. It is evident that wealth doesn't buy happiness because they are as happy as any group that we have seen. We have much to learn from them.
The spirit of the Lord is being poured out upon the people throughout Africa and the Church is growing well. We are helping with a branch (more correctly referred to as a "twig" here) because it is so small in a small town, Dundee. We attend church in Newcastle and then drive to Dundee to attend there. The Mission President spoke at Sacrament Meeting and then interviewed all of the local men to get an idea of how to proceed with the organization of a branch. One of the men he spoke with was an investigator and in the interview the President challenged him to baptism and he accepted so the President conducted an interview for baptism. He will be baptized on Sunday...the missionaries were surprised to find out they would have a baptism this coming Sunday for their investigator.
We went out to dinner with the Mission President and the Klinglers, the other senior couple here and then visited with them for a while the next morning when Barb prepared breakfast. We also had 14 missionaries over for dinner on Sunday. We are staying very busy helping members, missionaries, and others. The plans that we make for the day seem to change as new opportunities for service come up each day, and we are fine with that as long as we are able to assist others.
We went to Nambiti Conservancy (Reserve) today with 4 missionaries and the Klinglers and we had a wonderful time. We had to be there by 7:00 am so we got up at 4:30 am so we could drive there. It was quite cool (around 2 degrees Centigrade) so we had to bundle up and ride in a Land Rover (up high so we could see). I have included some of the pictures that we took so you could see the animals that we saw. We were able to get very close to them and the camera worked wonderfully.
Hi Bro & Sis Knudsen,
ReplyDeleteThanks so much for the details on your work - sounds like you've got a variety of things to do in a beautiful place with loving and interesting people.
- Bryan