We had a great day on Thursday, January 31st.  We had our last zone conference with Pres. and Sister Leavitt.  We will finish our mission 4 weeks from today and drive to Johannesburg to fly home!! I cry every time I think of leaving our wonderful friends here... We have loved serving in Swaziland! We were asked to bear our testimonies at the end of zone conference and it was SO emotional and SO hard....

Our Eswatini Zone (new name)

Front: Elder Rea, Elder Jolley, Elder Earl, Us, Elder Hlatshwayo, Elder Reneer and Elder Clawson.  Back: Elder Nielsen,  Elder Behunin, Elder Smith, Elder Leterme, Elder Van Thiel Berghuys, Elder Van Thiel Berghuijs, and Elder Lee

After our picture was taken and before we ate our lunch, I did a little presentation for the Leavitts, with letters spelling out their name and expressing our feelings about them. 

L     You really LOVE us!

                E     You are EXCELLENT leaders!

                      A     You ALWAYS make us feel good! 

                                 V     You are VERY kind and understanding!

                                 I     We can't IMAGINE serving without you!

                            T     You have amazing musical TALENT! 

              T     You TREAT us with respect!

                                                   S     We are SO glad you're our Mission President and Companion   Ü

Lunch ~ pizza, salad, and carmelitas with vanilla ice cream!

Elder Rea, Elder Leterme, Elder Earl, the Leavitts and Elder Smith

Clockwise:  Elder Nielsen, Elder Hlatshwayo, Elder Reneer, Elder Behunin, Elder Van Thiel Berghuijs, Elder Lee, Elder Jolley, Elder Clawson, and Elder Van Thiel Berghuys

After lunch our three Ezulwini elders sang a hymn acapella. 

They sounded GREAT!! 

Bearing my  testimony at the end  of  zone conference

As soon as the zone conference was over, we drove to the Ngwenya Glass Factory and met all six senior couples, who traveled from Johannesburg to be together this weekend in Swaziland!  We took them to see Sibebe Rock and then drove to Ezulwini to the Sibane Hotel where they are staying.  We had dinner there and also had a nice meeting together, sharing some of the things we have been doing in our areas to further the work... They are great couples!  We are so happy they could come to see Swaziland and we can spend a few days together one last time before we go home.

Clockwise: Elder Steven and Sister Julie Oliver, Us, Elder Scott and Sister Jean Truman,  Elder & Sister LaNice Groesbeck, Elder Larry and Sister Todd, Elder Lowell and Sister Debbie Fugal, Sister Leavitt and Elder David and Sister LaRee Rees. 

Pres. Leavitt went to great lengths to get us all in the photo!! Haha! 

We have had a fun, busy, past 6 days and the next four days will be even BUSIER!!! We had district council in Manzini on Friday morning and then district leader council which we had all of our zone come too! 

Elder Lee (right) and Elder Clawson (our DL), serve in Nhlangano but are in our district. 

We usually do our meeting every Friday over the phone but they were in town!! 

Elder Hlatshwayo and the zone leaders, his trainers

It was the first time meeting with our FIVE new elders in our Eswatini Zone!  It was great! 

Friday night, Sister Tirhani Ngomane, our S&I Coordinator from Johannesburg, came to stay with us and we had our first Inservice meeting for seminary and institute teachers on Saturday morning.  We had only ONE teacher and our district council member come!?!?! (We have always had 12-14!!?)

Seth (Sihle) Nkambule on the right teaches institute in Mbabane and Nkosingphile Ndwandwe is our District Council representative for S&I.

Trevor Zulu below on the left was baptized by Elder Reneer (on the right). Next to Trevor is Elder Hlatshwayo, then Elder Jolley and in the pink jacket is Trevor's brother Lindelwa, who will be baptized in February! 

Sunday, on the way back from our meeting with the district presidency and branch presidents in Manzini, we saw this family of Apostolics, walking home from their church.  They all wear very colorful costumes, so do the Jerichos and the Zionists.

MONDAY

We heard from Sister Truman about the Baobab Batik Workshop in Malkerns. So we went to check it out on Monday!  We had seen a small sign on the highway with an arrow but never drove down to see what it was!  It's an AWESOME place!  We added it to our itinerary and are taking our senior missionary couples there on Friday. (They arrive tomorrow during zone conference and we have 3 days of FUN in Swaziland planned for them before they go back to Johannesburg on Sunday!  We love showing people our beautiful Swaziland! 

Looking across one of many pineapple fields in Malkerns, next to Baobab Batik Workshop

The Workshop buildings

On the left, you can see the fabric hanging to dry, then the place where they dye the fabric,

inside is the room where the women draw the designs, press the fabric, and put the wax on before it goes to be dyed.

Applying the hot wax to the fabrics... 35 women work at the workshop

Pressing, measuring and cutting the fabric...

What a CUTE, friendly bunch of ladies!!!  We LOVED meeting them!

These three met us in the front office. 

There is a little "store" off to the left and I bought a scarf! 

We saw some like this hanging on the line....

TUESDAY

Nearly every 6 weeks for MLC our zone leaders come to our flat and use our laptop to join the meeting in Johannesburg. I found this photo of Elder Reneer and Elder Jolley on the mission blog, at the last MLC on January 29th, as they sat in our office. (We always fix lunch for them since they have a short amount of time to eat while the elders in Joburg have  pizza brought in!

We went to Mbabane to Swazi Mall before lunchtime to order the pizzas for zone conference at Pizza Inn and to buy chocolate chips and nuts at Spice World while the ZLs  had were having MLC on the computer at our flat.  I bought this shorter African dress in Mbabane, so I can wear it to church and not look like I am in a lounging outfit.

WEDNESDAY

We LOVE these two! Sindi, is our neighbor, who lives with our landlady (the owner of all the flats in three compounds).  Futhi Dlamini lost her husband 3 years ago and had Sindi move right in with the family.  Simangaye is four and his sister Tipholele is 11. The two older sisters are at school in South Africa. Sindi has had ALL of the missionary lessons and has had MANY missionaries teach her with us for the past several months.  She has been to church four times, but often has to go to Hlutse to her homestead to care for her mom on the weekends and other times has to take care of meals, etc. for her boss's visitors, go to Mbabane with the kids, etc... so she is not able to attend our branch regularly.  We are hoping she can attend in February and be baptized on our last Sunday here, January 24th...

We had a lesson with Sindi today. Simangaye is always with her.  He is the cutest kid! We were making Carmelitas for zone conference and for dessert for the senior couples on Friday night at our flat, so I fixed some with vanilla ice cream for them. Simangaye told Sindi to just leave him here today and he is going to live with us!! 

He said he just needs his pajamas and toothbrush! Haha! 

Yesterday, we had the LAST mission transfer before we go home.  We lost four of our elders  to Johannesburg and got FIVE elders last night, who have been transferred to serve here in Swaziland!  We will miss Elder Dos Santos, Elder Daybell, Elder Rodgers and Elder Mbaki.

Monday, we went to Manzini to pick up two elders, Elder Rodgers and Elder Clawson had come up from Nhlangano, and they went on to get Elder Dos Santos in Mbabane on their way.  Elder Reneer drove one truck and Elder Rodgers drove another to get them all to Johannesburg and be able to bring five elders back.  Elder Lee drove Elder Rodgers' truck back. They arrived last night around 9:00 pm. So we just met the new elders this morning. Ü 

MONDAY

Our departing Manzini elders with their companions

L-R: Elder Earl, Elder Mbaki, Elder Rea and Elder Daybell

 
                 

Monday afternoon, we took Venus and Simphiwe shopping

for school shoes. Tuesday was the first day of school.

WEDNESDAY

We met our elders new to Swaziland this morning and got their pictures taken.

Elder Leterme is from France

Elder Smith is from Highland, UT

Elder Hlatshwayo is from Durban, South Africa. 

Pres. and Sister Leavitt with Elder Reneer on transfer day in Johannesburg, with 

his NEW missionary, Elder Hlatshwayo, who he will train with Elder Jolley in Ezulwini  

Elder Nielsen is from Denmark

Elder Lee is from Panguitch, UT

(We met him, working at the Panguitch Drug Store, when we were at our Marshall Reunion,  the month before we both left on our missions to the same place!! 

Our Swaziland Missionary Board on the wall in our flat

We have served with a total of 51 elders in Swaziland!! 

(22 have returned home, two are finishing their missions in Madagascar,

one is serving in Angola, one in Sierra Leone, one in Mozambique ~ but is at the 

Brazil MTC and 11 have returned to Johannesburg to finish their missions there. 

Elder Msumhi and Elder Samatanda in Johannesburg will finish their missions 

the day we arrive home!  

Oh my goodness! What an adventure we had today! We drove up to Sister Thoko Shongwe's to visit her and take cookies to her family.  She has not been well.  We had a nice visit with her and then I put Sifiso Silindza's family's coordinates that I found, into my phone and we started for his home. He recently left to serve a mission in Accra Ghana. His mom came to church one week, but doesn't speak much English.  His dad also came another week, but he is from Mozambique and speaks mainly Portuguese. I found three Liahonas in Portuguese when the elders moved from their old flat, so we took them to Bro. Silindza and also took a plate of chocolate chip cookies for his family.

Google maps was having us go up a steep dirt road that was not wide enough for our truck and had deep crevices.... So we parked and got out and started to walk up the road.... We heard someone behind us and there was a young girl who knew the Silindza family and said she would guide us there.... (My map said 1 min. farther by car, but we couldn't make it in the truck.)  So we walked... and walked.... We went past her homestead and her three brothers joined us. (We had given her a cookie off the plate for Sifiso's family and she immediately broke it into four pieces when she saw her brothers.) Ü 

Our guides up the mountain and through the "jungle"!! Ü 

L-R: Owenkhosi (9), Sibonakoliso (9), Phiwaynkhosi (15) and Andile Shongwe (16)

We hiked up the dirt road up the mountain, then across a path to the kids'

homestead, then on a dirt path....also uphill! 

I followed Phiwaynkhosi and her brothers were behind Elder Wold.

We walked forever through bushes and trees on a tiny footpath...

...pushing branches out of our way....

...and we FINALLY got to the Silindza's and went through their gate,

across their garden (below), around the hen house and we were there! It was WAY

up high on the mountain!

Sifiso's sister Rose and her baby Sakhikhule (3 months old), his sister Ncobile (9),

her friend in the green and Rose's older sister Nelly's daughter in the jammies, in

front of both houses on the homestead. .

 What a BEAUTIFUL view of Ezulwini from their homestead! 

(The Conference Center....zooming in!)

 

We took a "better" way down, than back through the bushes, and ended up climbing on up the mountain and then hiking across a field over to a road. Then we hiked down the road, ending up just where we started at Sister Thoko's home!!  Then we had to keep walking back around to our truck!!! Whew!  We hiked and then walked for over an hour! 

This is the road we walked down at the end that ended up by Thoko's home...It was better than the one where our truck was parked... We had a fun visit with the kids.  We told them about the church, about Elder Wold's miraculous recovery from his bike accident, and showed them photos of our family.  (We gave them each E5, a pass-along card and a bubblegum sucker for helping us!) Ü 

A Sausage Saloon just opened at The Gables, so Elder Wold had to give it a try yesterday!

He had eaten at one at ALZU on our way to Joburg.

Sunday after church, the zone leaders said they had a bunch of meat they bought  for a braai with a guy, that was cancelled, so they brought it over with a bag of carrots, 3 bottles of soda, and we added sweet potatoes, a fruit salad, chocolate cupcakes and had dinner together.

Elder Jolley came in this suit that a member in Soweto made for him! 

 

Monday afternoon (P-day) they wanted to see the Swazi Candle Factory and House on Fire in Malkerns so we took a little outing...


Even the plants at House on Fire are weird and different!! 

(Monday night at about 9:15 pm our power went off.  It was off all night and all the next day! They finally got it on after dark Tuesday, 22 1/2 hours later.... only to go back off at 11 pm Tuesday night for another 9 1/2 hours until it was finally back on this morning at 8:30 a.m.!! It was SO hot on Tuesday!! We were "melting" and our phones were dead and computers were dead and no internet, no fans, no AC.... It was a LONG day!!)