Week 47: "He told us that the thing he liked most about church was that he was able to look around during sacrament meeting and see that all the families actually looked happy together!

I think this week has been the craziest week I've had on mission!

droppin sister bergen off at the bus :(

i will never get tired of the sunsets here

exchanges with my mother!

It all started on Wednesday. Sister Bergen and I had gone to Kwekwe for exchanges and it was going to be with Sister Richards and Sister Ziqubu! Sister Bergen trained Z and so we were going to have quality mother-daughter bonding time. As we were preparing for the day, we got a call from President during our studies. Sister Bergen was being ETed (emergency transfer) back to Harare because a sister there was going home. I was so sad because I was so excited to "translate" (haha) her back to the states. He told her to go home and pack and she would be in Harare by the end of the night. So, her and Sister Richards drove back to Gweru and they left Sister Z and I to still go to the area...WELL, as we were about to leave the house, we realized that the sisters had locked us into the house! That previous Saturday, Sister Ziqubu and Richards had locked all the keys in the house and so they decided to take out all the keys and put them in the car, which funny enough, was terrible timing. We waited about 5 hours for them to come back..haha it was something else. We only went to the area for an hour because we then had to take Sister Bergen to go catch her bus...so, now I'm in a threesome with the other sisters for at least the next two weeks. The rest of the week was hectic because we were canceling appointments to compromise our schedules together.

Charity's newborn baby! she thought she was going to have a son, which is why the baby is dressed head to toe in blue haha

Reality is so cute, and has such an awesome name!

Investigators:

Nyasha-I met Nyasha at the internet cafe on Monday and as I was emailing my family, he kept on looking over at my screen. He finally introduced himself and started commenting on what I was writing and on all the pictures that were on my email. I decided it would be best to just answer his questions all together and then focus back on my screen since I only had a limited amount of time. We had a conversation about missionary work and I explained our purpose as missionaries. I invited him to church, but I didn't think much about it. He showed up that Sunday, and the next! He took his Gospel Principles book home because he wanted to read the rest, and I told him to read about the Restoration since we didn't have any pamphlets at the time. The lesson with him was amazing. We reviewed the lesson with him, but he essentially taught us the lesson because he understood it so well! He brought questions he had written down so that we could answer them. The amazing thing is is that previously, he hadn't attended church for four years! He told us that the thing he liked most about church was that he was able to look around during sacrament meeting and see that all the families actually looked happy together! He expressed his desire to have that for himself as well. Nyasha truly is a tender mercy from Heavenly Father

Alfred- Now that our areas are combined, I've been able to meet some of the sisters' investigators. Alfred will be baptized this Saturday. He has been wanting to change his life. He received a priesthood blessing this past week to help him quit smoking, and although the withdrawal symptoms are pretty bad, he hasn't smoked since! He's such a sincere person and he enjoys church so much!

all the girls!

belindah's fan club

tatenda and belindah, the cutest sisters

We had a baptism this week on the Mkoba side for Belindah! Her sister was already a member and so it was an exciting and touching day for them. Although I was never able to teach her, I was still so excited for her. She was all smiles that night!

 Simba making sure I don't hit any squirrels, oh wait, there are none.

haha when Sister Thomas missed the ball..golfing is harder than it looks!

Haram, Dad, don't laugh at my form. If you are, go golf left-handed and then we'll talk

Sisters Smith and Thomas!

Sam teaching us how to golf

Today, haha, I convinced the sisters to go golfing. Some of my investigators work at the Gweru Golf Club, and so they let us golf for free! It was very funny watching them golf, and we had a good time. They didn't have any left-handed clubs, so Joshua, Simba and Sam just told me to golf right handed. It felt so awkward, but it was still fun! We played two holes before we left and I got two bogeys haha

Glad to hear all is well back home! Yes, I'm healthy. Yes, I'm safe. Love you all!