Kimira Kingdom Hall Dedication

A couple of weeks ago I received a surprise envelope containing our invitation to the dedication of Kimira’s kingdom hall.

Regular readers will remember several posts to our blog about the travails of our dear brothers and sisters over there – they’ve been battling to finish their kingdom hall project for 5 years.

Following the involvement of one of Tanzania’s KH build teams, the hall was completed, making use of society funds.

The hall can hold about 60 to 70 people on plain wooden benches. It’s not fancy, but the high standards of construction certainly bring glory to Jehovah, and show doubting neighbours that Jehovah’s Witnesses is indeed a credible world religion. (When congregations here meet in the homes of our brothers they are often mocked. People assume that they don’t have God’s blessing if they don’t have a proper church building.)

The brothers in Kimira congregation were so happy when we went to see them on December 19. A short history of the kingdom work in the Kimira area was followed by a dedication talk by Rick Stringer our circuit overseer.

After that, the local brothers and sisters had gone to considerable effort and expense to feed their visitors, providing fizzy drinks and hot food to everyone present. There was quite a party atmosphere.

Congratulations, Kimira congregation!

Lucas Fabian

Lucas has been studying since Scott Freedlun contacted him during one of Lucas’ brief visits to Arusha between travels around the country. Scott met him at the kingdom hall the first time and they had a conversation about spiritual things. Lucas accepted a What does the Bible really teach? book and then disappeared for two months.

When he returned in January this year, all he wanted was the truth, and he began attending meetings regularly right away. That was back in January. It was obvious to everyone despite the fact that his formal study had barely started that Lucas was unusual.

By the time he reached chapter five of his formal study in March, he was already a kingdom publisher. Scott passed the study over to me and Now we’ve reached chapter 16. I’m hoping, as is Lucas, that he’ll be baptised in a forthcoming assembly.

In the meantime Lucas was looking for work and was struggling. You see, he’d given up his travelling job that he’d had before working for his brother so that he could get to all the meetings. The work had been fairly lucrative. But now he’s been able to get a job on the missionary home site as a construction labourer – they are paying salaries to brothers in order to secure their services day in, day out.

Spending all day with dedicated witnesses from Tanzania and from abroad has brought Lucas on a great deal. Now he’s looking for something to do after he gets baptised. Perhaps he’ll preach full time, serve at the branch office, or join the construction team full time. He’s been a great source of encouragement to the brothers and sisters because of his earnest desire to help others.

Joshua ‘Nusugari’ Shinga

Joshua Shinga and I

You might remember, some time back, that I mentioned this fine African gentlemen, who was studying with me during 2007. In fact, he studied from March 2007 until October 2008 with me, and also began attending many meetings. He was well known to the brothers, and regularly gave heartfelt comments at the watchtower study. Our coordinator came to me and asked me why Joshua was not yet a publisher.

However, there was a reason why. Many people here who consider themselves married are only married by common-law, in many cases co=habiting for decades and bearing several children together. This is the case with Joshua. His wife, unlike the Shauris (who are both reaching out for more privileges since their baptism last spring) is uncooperative and undermines Joshua’s efforts to train his large family spiritually. Last October Joshua seemed to have given up on the truth, and we didn’t see much of him for about a year. We went to speak with him now and then at his little bike repair shop, but he didn’t share much with us during those occasions.

Joffrey

During that period, his 18-year-old son Joffrey began studying. He didn’t have the obstacles that his father has, and he was quite zealous. He’s been a publisher since June, and he’s working towards baptism. I’ve recently done a story about Joffrey, and I’ll provide a fuller update soon. Joffrey’s younger brother Samwele is also studying with a brother in the congregation.

Since last month, though, Joshua has made a clear decision to take his stand. He is back at the meetings, and has made it his goal to become a publisher of the good news. He still doesn’t have his marriage certificate but he’s working towards it. (- Hebrews 13:4.)

How thrilled I was to see Joshua at a recent Sunday meeting with all five of his children!

The Shinga Family

His wife still is not interested in joining her family at Christian meetings, but we keep going to meet her and to reassure her of our love for her and the warm welcome she’ll receive.

Star Cup Lamech

The ministry has been going very nicely indeed lately for both Avril and I, as you’ll perhaps have noticed from recent blog entries.

The first call work is a delight. Once a publisher masters the language and spends a sufficiently long time greeting before coming to the task of preaching, he can enjoy excellent results. One challenge is distinguishing real interest from material greed, especially if you’re obviously from abroad.

Recently I had a excellent experience. Pete Jennings and I were doing some return visit work not far from our place when one householder explained that he would be available after half an hour or so, and that then we could have a conversation at leisure. We didn’t have any back up plan, so we headed for a fancy open-air coffee bar called Star-Cup to wet our whistles.

I struck up a conversation with the manager about absolute truth. Many people here feel that all religions lead to God, whether they teach what the bible says or not. But most are surprised at just how much of church teachings have no basis in scripture – on the contrary, they teach the opposite. I showed him a classic example from 1 John 5:19: that Satan rules. Almost all Christians and Muslims here are certain that God rules the world he created, but the bible asserts that ‘the whole world is lying in the power of the wicked one.’ (If, dear reader, you don’t know why, ask one of Jehovah’s Witnesses to give you a scriptural explanation.)

The manager, called Lamech, was quite surprised to read that. Then he began asking other questions, and since that short first conversation we’ve met four times, gradually building towards a formal bible study.

Each time Lamech sees for himself a new and unfamiliar bible truth there’s a twinkle of excitement in his eye and a big appreciative smile. I hope that my efforts will come to something, with God’s blessing. (2 Corinthians 4:7)

Moussa Kileopa

I am often reluctant to accept new students because of my busy roster. Our local pioneer sister Anna Natai saw fit, as a result, to resort to underhanded means to convince me to take care of one man she’d met, back in April this year.

She agreed to take some of my lady calls from me in the same neighbourhood, and begged me until I couldn’t refuse. I learned a big lesson though!

Avril contacted Moussa the first time at his shoe repair shop by the roadside, where she gave him a tract or a magazine some time ago. The publication was enough to raise Moussa’s curiosity. He had been raised a nominal Muslim but soon became dissatisfied, exploring Christendom for a while with the local Assemblies of God. But he quickly recognised the ring of truth. Anna contacted Moussa next, and answered a few of his questions. Then she began studying with Moussa’s wife.

It was at this time that she asked me to begin conducting Moussa’s bible study. I did agree, and when I met Moussa, I was immediately impressed by his level of interest. He had already learned a good deal about the truth from Anna and from the publications he’d been able to read. Despite not having a good education, he had been able to study quite a bit on his own.

We started the study at chapter one of the What does the Bible really teach? book and rapidly made progress, assisted by Moussa’s zealous preparation for our little lessons.

In July he began asking how he could qualify to preach with the congregation, and the elders suggested he be given a little more time. This month Moussa qualified as a kingdom publisher, and I had the great joy of taking him out on his first house call.

Jehovah’s Witnesses are known as such because they give a witness – it is essential for each one to make a ‘public declaration for salvation.’ (Matthew 24:14; Romans 10:10-14; Isaiah 43:10-12)

Prison Preaching

Here’s me preaching in a low security prison to a local man who lives on site. He’s not actually a prisoner, but lives with a family member who works as a guard. His name’s Robert.

The prison is intended as a demonstration of how prisoners can be used to do productive work. The small population of the prison consists of offenders who are already near the end of a longer sentence, so there’s little reason to attempt an escape.

They keep ducks and hens and plant crops and, to some extent, pay for their keep by means of the work.

Camping in Loch Lomond

Whilst in Scotland in June Mike and Cathy and the two of us went together to camp for a couple of nights on the banks of the world famous Loch Lomond.

We set up our tents and built a fire, and prepared hot food on our stove.

On the middle day we decided to go canoeing on the lake itself. We navigated to a few of the islands that make the Loch so interesting. There were four of us, but only two canoes, each built for only one person. So we had to return twice towing the empty boat to pick up the two others. But we had fun, at least until the famous Scottish weather began to close in on us.

Kusini Congregation 2009

Here is a recently taken picture of our congregation just shortly before the departure of our beloved local missionaries Scott and July Freedlun. Behind you can see the extendable kingdom hall in all its glory.

We hope to bring you coverage of the dedication of the kingdom hall before long.

Since we’ve been in Arusha Kusini we’ve seen spectacular growth. In November 2006 shortly before we joined their ranks there were just 38 publishers, but recently the figure rose as high as 75, with many new publishers from the field swelling our numbers.

Goodbye Charles and Sonya

Charles and Sonya have been with us for nearly two years during two stints with us here in Arusha. We were very sad to say goodbye to them in July – indeed, the whole congregation was sorry to see them go.

Both Sonya and Charles worked hard with the Swahili language during their time here, and both of them conducted many bible studies with interested people. Charles was very busy too in the congregation – after Scott and July Freedlun left for California in March, Charles began serving as the coordinator of Kusini’s body of elders.

But more than these things we became very close to them as friends, especially when they moved into Kusini congregation and into a house not far from ours. They showed warm hospitality and gave me a lot of training as an elder. We had some marvellous conversations about spiritual things.

We’ll miss your pizza and your bolognese, and your smiles.

We hope dearly that you’ll be invited to Gilead school before long and that perhaps, just perhaps, you’ll be assigned here to Arusha!

Missionary Home Progress

Perhaps you were aware that our extendable kingdom hall was on a plot rather larger than the hall itself.

The Governing Body decided some time ago that the space was to be used to construct a home for Arusha’s missionaries. Since the spring Tony and Ann Porter, our friends from South Africa, as well as two couples from Wales, Glen and Jo Cole and Dan and Kim Bath, have been with us helping with the construction work.

The work has been moving on apace. When we left in May for Blighty the foundations were nearly complete. When we returned the walls were nearly complete.

Now the roof is complete, the walls have been drylined and painted and they’ve started first-fix electrical installation and tiling. The house is straightforward in its design but built to a very high standard. Each missionary couple will have a room about six metres square which includes an en suite bathroom and a walk-in wardrobe. There’s a laundry, a large open plan public area used as a dining room and living room, with the kitchen facilities at one end. There’s a large generator for power outages and water storage facilities for when the water gets cut off.

Tony, project overseer, shows the Muxlows what they’ll be missing out on since they were reassigned to Moshi

The unfinished kitchen

 

Tiffany Karshnick keeps a low profile

‘Choncho’

There’s also been some changes to the missionary team. Our circuit overseer Rick Stringer and his wife Malin have completed two years with our circuit now and they are staying for the moment. Mika and Hanna Santikko are still here, our Finnish friends who graduated from a recent Gilead class. Last month they were joined by Todd and Michelle Hodgins, whose acquaintances we renewed at the English Special Assembly Day.

Angela Wendy Dowds 1943-2009

Angela Wendy Dowds, my dear mother, died yesterday evening (November 5) in her home. Feel free to email the family with any messages of condolence.

Pioneer School 2009

The Karshnick Family: all four invited to pioneer school; youngest, Kevin, only 14, already pioneering over 2 years.

Public transport witnessing – special training!

Lickle birdy wants spiritual food, but turned away due to dress code

Avril and I were thrilled to be invited to pioneer school in English in Dar es Salaam in the month of September. I only qualified on Avril’s coat-tails – I wouldn’t have qualified to attend a second time officially for another year, but there’s a special dispensation for married couples.

Eighteen pioneers were present, including ones from eleven different nations, all working hard in the ministry here in Tanzania. Most of them are based in Dar, with the exception of two Danish girls Helle and Charlotte, who are based in Moshi, 70 miles or so from Arusha.

The school was a very special opportunity to refresh ourselves, and attend a pioneer school that catered for the very special territory here in Tanzania, whilst also being able to follow in English. Such classes have been held only once before in Tanzania, so it was a really special privilege.

The two instructors are both circuit overseers here, both Gilead-trained missionaries serving in Dar with their wives. So it was quite inspiring to benefit from their experience of ministry here.

We managed to have fun too though! It wasn’t all serious. We had a ‘pioneer school beach day’ in the middle weekend, and stayed in the branch for a couple of nights also. At the end of the school Avril and I went to a quiet beach resort and set up our tent, camping for a couple of nights before returning home. There’s no beach in Arusha, 500 miles from the coast, so we have to seize the day!

Tarengire Safari 2009

With Graham White visiting us for a couple of weeks, our social lives have undergone a bit of a renaissance. Naturally he was keen to go on safari, and we were able to negotiate a special price since we send so much business in the companies’ direction, so we too went along.

Tarengire is said to be especially good after long periods of drought, because the animals group together wherever water is still available.

I posted a few of our photographs for you. We were particularly fortunate to witness a female lion making a kill. It’s rare enough, but you’ll see from our photos that the lioness was pregnant, and opted to smother the poor wildebeest rather than going for the jugular. It took some time, and was obviously rather draining for the lion. (Come to think of it, it was very draining indeed for the wildebeest.)

Elephants have been actually eating the bark of this tree.

a Dik-dik

1 Peter 5:8 – can you spot her?

There she goes!

Ouch!

Carrying her young.

Hackfall

Whilst in the UK John and Monica Moonie (the in-laws) and Avril and I had a smashing day out to Hackfall. We had a lovely walk in the countryside and spend some time together.

READY

May’s last minute photos

Yeah, we’re off to England in just a few days now – we’ll be in Blighty by first thing on Friday morning. And we’re looking forward to it now too.

In the meantime, please enjoy the following pictures. I apologise for the poor quality – my phone has a poor camera in it, but I always have it with me, you see.

Progress on the missionary home site

Yeah, our friendly build team have broken ground a few weeks ago. Concrete has been poured for the footing, which is pretty deep and very solid looking, reinforced with pre-fab box sections of re-bar. Now the foundation is being build up using breeze blocks. I suppose by the time we get back to Tanzania it’s possible that the walls will be erected as high as the ring beam over the windows.

Rick Stringer, our CO and local missionary brother

Yeah, Rick and Malin Stringer’s visit finished yesterday. Rick is an experienced missionary with 26 years of missionary service behind him. Rick went to Gilead as a single brother, one of the last bachelors to be invited. Just a few short years ago, whilst in his assignment here in Tanzania, he met Malin, a Swedish need-greater, and they got married.

The visit was a great success, with plenty of support for the field ministry. 102 people attended the public talk, and we heard that our congregation has reached 72 publishers, including 7 completely new publishers since the last visit in November. Our publishers average over 14 hours in the field service, and on average conduct 1.5 studies each – not including the pioneers. (The regular pioneers’ average is nearly 8 studies.)

Avril taking her life in her hands

This was a snap from our field ministry. You may imagine that we were in the ‘rurals’ here, but no, this really is quite an urban location, ten minutes’ walk from the Kingdom Hall. Avril and I were preaching together during the circuit visit last week.

Jofrey Joshua

Jofrey is nearest the centre of the picture, holding the small child.

On previous occasions I have written about my student Joshua, and mentioned his 18-year-old son Jofrey. Joshua, as some readers may remember, was attending nearly all the meetings and becoming quite keen to publish himself, but finally gave in to opposition from his wife and has now returned to finding new ways to feed his 6 children. Life is hard, but I still feel sad that he couldn’t find a way to put the kingdom first.

Just as this was happening, Avril noticed that his eldest son Jofrey was becoming interested, and it took her a while to convince me that he was worth studying with. Finally, on her advice, we began the study together. One difficulty in particular is that, like many young people here, he studies at school six days a week, and the only day free is Sunday – prime time for bible studies with many in our territory.

His progress became manifest, and though he doesn’t often make it to Thursday meetings, I was thrilled when Jofrey was accepted as a congregation publisher. So he is now one of Jehovah’s Witnesses, with the privilege of bearing His name and talking to people himself about the good news of the kingdom, as all Christians are meant to do.

I double-booked myself with Joffrey and my other publisher student on Sunday, and so Lucas assisted with Joffrey’s study, then Joffrey assisted with Lucas’. We did the studies at the kingdom hall, as is my custom on Sundays. We had a good laugh, then the three of us went to look for two other students out in the field.

Avril and I are happy about this for a personal reason too. After a couple of years struggling with the language and the culture, we feel we are both beginning to make an impact in our territory (with a lot of help from the local brothers and sisters.) Jofrey is the first study that we’ve started ourselves that has taken the step of preaching. A rewarding morale booster for both of us.

Culcha, init!

It’s funny the things you miss when you’re far from home. Often, you don’t even notice them until you get them once more.

Avril and I have long had a fondness for music, and especially live music, of practically any kind. Though I lost any taste I once had for rowdy rock concerts, a little bit of real live musical entertainment is a treat.

There isn’t really anything like that around these parts, that we know of. Few people take the time to learn to play an instrument – certainly, it would be the preserve only of the rich and the determined.

Our team of builders includes two British brothers, along with their wives, and both of the brothers are rather talented musicians. Glenn Cole plays the guitar and sings, while Dan Bath plays drums. Though there isn’t a proper drum kit available, Dan makes do with a few little drums.

Valerie and Glen Corey dance to one number

Claire joins in with her flute

On Tuesday night Charles and Sonya invited us round to their house, where the build team is staying, and we all appreciated their renditions of our favourite numbers from Blighty. Claire Salvage, a sister involved in the kingdom hall build projects and who travels throughout Africa with her husband Mark, joined in with her flute.

We haven’t had a treat like that for some time, and we enjoyed it more than we expected. The concert went on until fairly late in the evening, but we were sad when we went our separate ways that evening. We hope we’ll be able to do it again before too long.

Things we miss from Blighty

Yeah, our trip home is now only two weeks away, and we’re looking forward to it quite a lot. Avril was home in June last year, but I haven’t been home since Dad died in August 2007 – nearly two years.

There aren’t too many things that you can’t buy here, but some staple items you would buy in the UK we can’t afford here. Butter is about £2.50/lb here, though milk is not expensive. Yes, we’re working on preparing our own! Cheese is another thing. Cheddar is available, as well as a slightly out of the ordinary locally prepared Gouda. Neither are particularly nice or cheap. We certainly can’t afford the brie, camembert, stilton, or roquefort that we so enjoy.

Another complaint is that crisps (potato chips) just aren’t the same here. Pringles are available and not too expensive, but for some reason any other kind tends to be a bit soggy when you get them. We’ve perfected the art of home-made salt ‘n’ vinegar crisps, but we’re looking forward to crinkle cut, Discos, Doritos and other flavours too.

Avril says she misses fruity yoghurts. She makes yoghurt every week from fresh local milk – bought still warm from the farmer. But it’s just not the same somehow. (She likes that ‘factory’ taste, I suppose.)

The chocolate here, some of which actually bears the Cadbury’s logo, is grainy and lacks chocolaty-ness, defeating the purpose somewhat. One of the major items brought to us from Britain by guests has been chocolate, as well as good ground coffee. It surprises many to hear that. You see, Starbucks buys all the best coffee from here and we can’t afford it. Mars bars, Bournville, Lindt dark chocolate and so on are amongst ‘most missed items’ too.

The beer here is good, though it has nearly doubled in price in the nearly three years we’ve been here. Local varieties are called Kilimanjaro, Safari and Castle, and there’s a Guinness franchise as well. Tastes nothing, nothing like Guinness back home but I still love it. It tastes of marmite. We’ll still be queuing in Tesco’s with San Miguel, Guinness and maybe even Scotch.

Number one, though, on the missed list, is undoubtedly Red Wine. We only buy red wine once every six weeks or so, and save it for special occasions. We sometimes make a bottle last three nights. It’s usually from South Africa and is not too bad, though it beats me why no one takes advantage of the ideal climate here to grow wine grapes.

So if any of you, our readers, sees us in Tesco over the month of June, you’ll no doubt predict the bizarre combination of items that’ll be in our baskets!

English Lessons

As we mentioned, our newly-secured visas stipulate that we actually do some volunteer work, and I’ve found myself teaching an elementary level English class.

The class has up to fifteen students in it, and they’re all adults. The average attendance is about ten, and consists mainly of workers who are associated in some way to the work of the charity. There’s a pastor in the class from a local church. The lady who runs the charity for whom the class is held gave him a dressing down one day. She’s one of Avril’s bible students, though she herself is a Muslim. Overhearing the pastor trying to give doctrinal advice to someone there at her office, she interrupted, saying, ‘If you’re really going to give advice about the bible, you need to sit down at the feet of one of Jehovah’s Witnesses first and learn!’ Though of Islamic persuasion, she was keenly aware of the inaccuracy of his ‘Christian’ teaching. In many vocations, including the clergy, people are not as qualified even as they might be in the UK. I have no doubt that there are clergymen here that have never received any structured vocational tuition at all.

In each of the two weekly one-hour lessons I teach I try to keep the students involved. So we play games, do involving exercises, and work in pairs. This helps to make sure that shrinking violets in the class receive less practice than others. A game some may remember from their childhood, ‘Simon Says’ is ideal for teaching verbs, and is endlessly expandable. We play bingo to help with numbers. The students prepare their own flashcards to help them remember nouns. The hour always seems very short. I am also instructed to give the students plenty of homework, and I am happy to oblige with this. Two hours’ language tuition is not really enough without zealous private study and practise.

Special Day Assembly Highlights

Our extendable kingdom hall was host once more to a special assembly day, which was very successful. For Avril and I it was an enjoyable programme which we enjoyed to the full, since we had no share on the programme ourselves.

Once more we were pleased to invite our dear friends from Mbulu, Modesty and Jamaica Kobelo. They are the couple that we went to visit in the town where they are assigned, out in the middle of nowhere and at 2,000m above sea level. We have made it a habit to invite them to stay during each assembly, and we enjoy their company very much. Each time, they bring their humble gifts, usually vegetables that grow in the fertile soils from around Mbulu. This time, among their gifts, was a fruit called topetope, whose name in English we don’t know. It tastes like a slimy pear, but has a tough lumpy green outer skin and seeds that look a bit like cockroaches. It’s quite nice really.

On the programme, we enjoyed hearing the experiences of the local brothers and sisters, many of whom are very zealous in the ministry. For example, there was one regular pioneer sister who was interviewed. Though she is a local girl, she was asked a few months ago to serve where the need is greater in a village called Mto wa Mbu, or in English, Mosquito River. That unappealing name does not prevent tourists by their thousands from visiting this village, since it stands at the gates to two world-famous national parks. In contrast to the UK, where practically all the area of the country is assigned to some congregation or other, no doubt a large majority of the area of this large country is not assigned and not regularly preached. Mto wa Mbu has perhaps never been thoroughly preached before. She went there with a companion and started preaching, just the two of them. The nearest meetings are fifty miles away, but the sisters got a good response from the field and now have 30 studies to conduct between them.

She even managed to start a study with a pastor in the area, and as the study progressed, they reached chapter 11, paragraph 5 in the What Does the Bible Really Teach book. On reading the cited verse in Job 34:10, the pastor exclaimed, ‘Oh, when people find out about this, we clergy are done for!” Something no doubt said in the hearts of many of his colleagues around the world. It certainly is a privilege to expose bible truth and Christendom’s lies, and all the better when individuals respond humbly.

There was a young lad who made special efforts to start studies at school during his free periods. He was able to begin a study with a classmate, who had many questions to ask. The classmate made rapid progress, and was baptised last year. The youth’s family perceived fundamental positive changes in the lad’s behaviour and personality, and they also started studying and now attend meetings regularly themselves (- Ephesians 4:23, 24.)

Among the attendance on Sunday was my student Geoffrey. I have spoken of his father on a few occasions in the past and I am disappointed to say that he’s no longer studying himself. He had many pressures, including his common-law wife who opposed him but who is the mother of his four youngest children. It’s not easy feeding all those mouths with an ordinary job or home business. He succumbed eventually to these pressures, while his eldest son began studying earnestly. It took me a while to see his potential, and now we study on Sundays each week. He struggles to answer the questions well when he doesn’t prepare for his study, so sometimes he refuses to study, asking for a little more time to prepare.

He tells me often about the hardship and opposition he faces because of taking his stand as a witness. Not only does he face opposition from his step-mother, but also at school, where his colleagues mock him for not being a part of a ‘proper’ religion. They make fun of him because Jehovah’s Witnesses, to them, seem like a small, pathetic church compared to the Catholics, Muslims and Pentecostals here. Witnesses expect that kind of persecution, I tell him, and that it’s a further proof that he’s in the right religion (- John 15:20; Matthew 5:10-12; 2 Timothy 3:1, 12.) The elders will meet with him this week to see if he’s ready to preach with the congregation.

Another student, recently passed into my care, is Moses, and he too was there, with his two small children. Though his accurate knowledge of the bible is not advanced, he has great zeal for the scriptures, and though he had not even begun studying the first chapter, he asked me what I thought the unforgiveable sin described at Mark 3:29 actually is. He works as a shoe repair man in a tiny hut by a busy thoroughfare, and in between resoling and stitching people’s shoes, he’s there, reading God’s word. We sit there, studying together, interrupted by his customers as they come to ask for his help.

Lake Duluti

Our dear friends Tony and Ann Porter from South Africa recommended that we take a trip to a place called Lake Duluti, for a day out, while our Swedish friend Anna Sanberg was here visiting with us. We had heard of the place, but we didn’t know where it was or anything else about it.

We found out that it was quite an easy place to reach and struck out for our destination one warm Saturday afternoon in January, the warmest month here.

When we arrived, we found that there was a nominal entrance fee, which seemed to be promising. As we entered, we saw a bar playing noisy music, right there on the bank of the beautiful tree-lined lake. How relieved we were when we found out that we could rent a rowing boat for our party for a few dollars. We bought some cokes and clambered aboard the boat. Since there were no seats in the boat, the staff had taken some plastic garden chairs (the kind you see literally everywhere around here) and hacked the legs off them. Then they are placed on the flat ‘deck’ of the boat – perfect!

 

Once you are out of earshot of the bar, the lake is tranquil and beautiful. We quietly rowed all around the lake, taking in the sunshine and the extraordinary variety of bird life. There are diving birds and storks and herons and other birds, either enjoying the sunshine, drying their wings, or actively engaged in hunting down a tasty tilapia or bass.

We were quite sorry to have to head home after so little time, but we loved it so much there that we went back a few weeks later. a perfectly relaxing way to spend a sunny afternoon.

A couple of interesting photos

Today Avril and I spent a long morning together in the ministry conducting her series of ‘Tuesday’ bible studies in a distant area of our territory called Engo Sheraton.

On our way to the territory, we saw a touching site, which we would like to share with you our loyal readership.There was a tiny kitten, dozing gently at the breast of a young dog. The kitten woke up and stayed with her larger friend, a very ordinary ferral dog of the kind often seen round here. They were obviously very close friends!

Later in the day, a student of Avril’s convinced her to accept a kind gift: a live hen. The student tied the hen’s legs together and dropped her into a plastic bag, with a hole for her head. Here she is!

Now our hen, whose name is Mnomno, an adjective in Swahili meaning ‘very fine indeed’ and used particularly in reference to chickens, is running around our little compound, clucking and eating bread and pooing. She’s quite loveable, really.

Real Joy!

A number of months ago I wrote a blog about Shanilla (A picture of her is on that blog). An eleven year old girl with whom I was studying. Initially I studied with her Mum and when she stopped Shan carried on. She had made wonderful progress, attending the meetings and bringing her friends along with her until she was bundled off to live in the middle of nowhere with her Gran.

I saw her a short time later, her mother had brought her home for a weekend. She said that she had found the KH in the area she went to but that it took her two hours to walk there and thus couldn't go each week. I encouraged her to try and find out if there was any bros and sisters living near her. I didn't know if she had succeeded or not til today. I was not able to help her as she couldn't describe where exactly she lived.

Today the other half of our circuit assembled for the special assembly day, we had ours last week. As it is held nearby I attended as I hoped some studies would attend. Happily they did. But even happilier (if that's a word), Shan was there. It seems that she found a group 1/2 hrs walk from her home and a sister in the group is studying with her and she is able to attend sunday and thursday's meeting each week. There are 14 publishers in the group. It seems that Shan, determined to find any witnesses in her area, went out one sunday morning and stood on a main path and asked anybody passing, who looked like they had a meeting bag, if they were witnesses and unsurprisingly Jehovah blessed her efforts. She met Sara, the sister who is now conducting her study. The sister told me that Shanilla has been severely opposed by her grandma who has beat her and threatened her not to attend the meetings. The reason is that many churches have an arrangement to give out money and her Gran wants her to attend one of those. One neighbour of Shan's was so curious as to why she was so determined to go to the meetings with the witnesses that she decided to go to the meeting herself but the Gran has frightened her off so she has not as yet attended. Sara said she thinks this lady is too curious not to attend and they will see her soon at the meeting. Shanilla insisted that I meet each of the 14 publishers in her group, two are pioneers, one an elderly bro and the other his son who is married and has a little boy, there is an elderly ministerial servant who leads the group. No elders. I asked Shan if she felt loved by the people she lived with and she said no but she said that the brothers and sisters in this little group do love her and I could see that as I talked to them today. Shan had slept overnight at one of there home's in order to travel early with them to the convention today. I really felt a loss when Shan left to move away and prayed to Jehovah that she have contact with witnesses there. I should have had no doubts that Jehovah would look after Shan! It is really faith strengthening.

Visiting Home

For the third time in two and a half years, the fourth for Avril, we’ll be headed to Blighty for four weeks beginning on June 4.

We’re flying to Newcastle Airport via Schipol, avoiding London altogether. We’ll be at Newcastle District Convention. Starting on June 22, we’ll be spending a week or so in Dunoon with the congregation there. Otherwise we’ll mostly be in Northallerton and perhaps briefly in Stockton-on-Tees.

Apart from spending time with family (I haven’t been home myself since Dad died in August 2007) we have a further motive for returning.

We’ve been quite focused on applying for Gilead Missionary School since we got married, and our desire to attend has become stronger as the years have passed. We see Gilead as a chance to perpetuate our circumstances here in Africa, serving Jehovah our God in the fullest way possible. It would also be a privilege to gain such a wonderful training over there at Paterson, USA.

However it is not presently possible to apply for Gilead from countries that accept Gilead missionaries. Why take people away from useful assignments only to send them back again? So it’s necessary for us to go home for a little while and fill out our applications as UK residents.

Our Gilead application will be more significant on this fourth occasion because generally the brothers invited are elders (almost without exception) and this will be the first time that we’ll apply whilst satisfying that criterion.

Barbeque Chicken?

I received an unusual gift on the ministry on Tuesday, a live chicken! The Bible study who gave her to me lives about 2 miles away so I had a lovely walk home with her under my arm, the most difficult bit was keeping my balance crossing the plank over the river, not usually easy but infinitely more challenging with a chicken. To be perfectly honest she didn’t really make much fuss unlike all the people I passed on the way who evidently didn’t think it was a usual thing to see a white lady wandering round with a live chicken.
I think the idea is that I was supposed to slaughter and eat her but I couldn't bring myself to do it. I had to take her with me to two Bible studies I had planned on the way back. The first is with a lady who sells coal from a shed. She usually throws a piece of fabric over a bag of coal as a seat for me. I don’t usually come out clean. She actually keeps chickens and said that she could tell that mine is an unusually nice chicken who would lay eggs this week. Her husband came in partway through and said that he believed his wife was right about the chicken. He could tell “by the look on the chickens face”.
She is currently living in the garden, the chicken I mean. I don’t know if it is odd but I quite like her wandering around, clucking away. I am trying to decide whether to buy her a boyfriend. I have tried to do some research as my knowledge of chickens is based on the film “chicken run” and I suspect that this knowledge will not suffice.
The cat is terrified of her and has spent hours watching her suspiciously from a distance. The chicken seems to have a penchant for sitting on the barbeque. Is that prophetic?
The picture is me sitting on the goat (the Tanzanian tool for preparing coconut), in my garden, trying to do the coconut without permitting the chicken to steal all of it. She was quite determined.