This week was a long one, but we got through it!
The electricity came back on Wednesday after 10 days without electricity. That was a glorious moment! Sadly, the fridge would not turn on, so we kept living off of bread until Saturday haha. But we have light and food now!
We’ve been teaching this rasta guy named Tchaona who was given a Book of Mormon 7 years ago, but lost his copy and was asking for one when we found him so we brought him one and may I just say, wow. This guy has a testimony of the Book of Mormon! He’s been coming to church and hopefully we can keep working with him to prepare him for baptism!
Words can not describe how excited we were last night when we heard the news that there is going to be a temple here in Zimbabwe!! Like we’re talking tears of joy! What a blessing for the people here who can now go to the temple! I can’t wait to be able to watch Conference this weekend. What a great thing to be able to hear the words of the living prophet!
I love you all and hope everyone has a good week!
Sister Burt
Pic: Sister Bergen and Sister Ziqubu making dinner on Sunday. Macaroni and Cheese and beef curry… this is why us missionaries gain weight
2nd Email
So, like I said, this week was long and insane!
The electricity finally came back on Wednesday! We were screaming for joy when we came home and saw the lights. I didn’t even believe it at first haha! We have it now, but throughout the day it will come and go. Last night I was washing my hair and the lights went out so I was walking around the house with shampoo in my hair looking for my torch. Then although we had electricity, the fridge was broken until Saturday. And we also rejoiced when it was fixed and even took kombis to go grocery shopping and the elders picked us up. The water has been another problem since the power came back. Not sure why, but it has been black…. Black. I’ve been bathing in black water. Not sure how that problem can be fixed but hopefully something happens!
And I finally hung up my mosquito net! How many mosquito bites did I have to get to actually put it up? Not sure. I lost count at 30 lol. I even have on on my earlobe! But the mosquito net is quite cozy… I feel like I’m in my own little sleeping pocket!
Remember when I said the water is black? Yes. So here is a story about that: Last night I ran out of garment so I had to wash them so I would have some to wear today, so I threw them in the washing machine (which I don’t actually even use very much) and started the wash. When it was done, I went to get them out and found that they had turned very brown and grey! They were washed with black water! Ah! so I ended up having to fill a bucket with water from the tiny filter in the kitchen and I soaked, scrubbed, rinsed, and repeated 3 or 4 times. They aren’t really white now, but hopefully the more I wash, the cleaner they’ll get.
Now about the area! It was a hard week as we didn’t have many appointments and the appointments we did have, most of them fell through and it was HOT this week! But we met with Gibson and Elizabeth and started teaching her. She said she needs time, but isn’t ready to be a member yet. She just need to learn and she’ll be baptized in no time. But she is pregnant and is moving in with Gibson next month, who is paying lebola in August, so they have to get married, so they are going to start announcing their wedding next week in church hopefully then after 3 weeks of announcing it, they can sign the marriage certificate and everything is good! Keep them in their prayers though. Elizabeth is having a hard time finding a job and she has 2 degrees- one in social science and one in environmental sciences. Gibson is looking for a way to earn some more money as well. So we are praying that everything goes well with that and the wedding and everything.
On Saturday, we went to Sister Mpala’s- an elderly woman in the ward- and taught her daughter and grandson who have been coming to church and are going to be baptized on the 16th. after we talked and ended up being there for 3 hours. Sister Mpala is powerful. She has been a member for 10 years. She is amazing. then when they were walking us to the bus stop after, I was talking with her and she was telling me about how she went to SA to the temple 5 times last year and that she wanted to go 6 times this year. Then we were talking about a temple in Zim and I told her that I knew they were going to build a temple here sometime very soon. Not sure where that came from… and little did I know that the next day they would announce a temple to be built here!! Words cannot describe how excited I am for that.
Other than that, I’m doing great and having fun! Hopefully our house will get fixed sometime… and we are hopefully going to try to use some different finding techniques to be able to have more appointments and people to teach this week! I love you all and appreciate the prayers and encouragement.
Sister Burt
3rd Email
Haha I just remembered this and it’s funny. Every day I get called many things and from many people… I’ve gotten used to it: “Hey! Baby! I love you!” But I got a new one today: “Sweetie! Sweetie potato!” lol that on is up there with “Kendall Jenner!” My companion says “This is the day companion! I’m giving you to them!” They all call her “rasta” and tell her to give me to them. It’s an ongoing joke haha. Not sure what it will be like when I go back to the states and nobody is paying attention to me! It will be nice!
We went to a new meeting place for church on yesterday for the people in Extension who had to travel far to get to the chapel. We meet in an academy with all glass doors and windows. It was a little noisy at first with all the children running around, but for the 3rd hour, my comp and I went to primary and I stood in front for the whole hour teaching them primary songs! Even the 2 naughtiest ones were singing and dancing with us haha! It was fun. Relief Society didn’t get a single interruption 😉
Picture is of sadsa and sausage that District Leader made last Monday. Soon I’ll be a professional sadsa cooker
maganinzim 