Hi to our family and friends,

This has been a REALLY busy week so far. Sunday we went to Kadoma. Two of our missionaries that have been serving here finished their missions and returned home to Kadoma this past Wednesday. The 2nd counsellor in the branch presidency was released and one of the newly returned missionaries was put in that position. It was fun for Elder Bullock to be able to call him. The elder certainly wasn't expecting that. He will do a good job. The other elder was put in as Young Men's President. We were really pleased to see that the Branch president is putting them to work right away. These young returned missionaries are such assets here and are the ones who will be the great leaders.

I gave my talk in church and the two elders both talked. That didn't leave time for Elder Bullock to give his talk so he just said a few words and will save his talk for another day. We heard back from the elders here in Harare that Lawrence, our investigator, was at church and they have an appointment with him for tonight to teach. He had no transport money so he walked to church.

Trying on white shirts and ties at Kadoma

Happy recipients of shirts and ties -- it was great to be able to help them out.

He's happy to get a white shirt and tie -- he looks pretty smart!

Monday we had a meeting with the committee at the Kadymadare Mill. We invited the MP to join us as we needed his help to solve a problem there. I think I told you about it before -- how one man, the chairman/also a village head, insisted on only charging $.50 instead of one dollar. At the beginning of the meeting Elder Bullock read 'their' original proposal to us requesting the mill and how they were planning to make the project work for them. He explained that they were not living up to what they had proposed and agreed upon.

The MP then took over and talked for quite a while, some in English and a lot in Shona. He explained to them how a business has to run in order to be successful and make some profit. He also explained very well how the committee should work and the role of the chairman. It was agreed that they would start charging the dollar. We then ask how soon they planned to do that. The Chairman wanted to wait until March 1st and one other agreed with him. I suggested starting in 1 week (this coming Monday) so that they could start making some profit sooner. A member of the committee agreed and we told him he needed to make the proposal and it was seconded. We then suggested that there were two proposals and as a committee they should vote on it. The outcome was 7 to 2 in favor of starting to charge sooner. It was really a good meeting and I think the members felt somewhat empowered when they realized they didn't have to feel intimidated by the chairman/village chief. They realized they all had an equal say
and vote on things. We were pleased how things came out and are grateful to Mr. Zhanda, the MP, for helping us. He is really a good man. One thing I keep meaning to tell you is that whenever we have these kind of meetings they always begin and end with prayer. Quite different than America.

Monday afternoon we went with Bigboy (a wheelchair contact that we have talked to a few times) and met with a lady who is over all of Zimbabwe and represents disabled people and groups. They are the ones who we can partner with and they can bring the chairs into the country duty-free. It was a good meeting and we are hoping to get the wheelchair project underway.

When we got back to the office, Pauline was waiting for us. She is the mom we helped several months ago with the tiny baby, Edson, who almost died. We took formula out for the baby and food for the family so that the mom could eat and be able to nurse the baby. Edson is now about 8 months old but looks like he is only 2 months. He apparently has some symptoms of Downs Syndrome (I could see it in his face) and he also has some heart problems. However, he is one lucky baby as he was leaving the next morning with a Doctor who is taking him to Italy for 3 months where he will get some heart surgery etc. free of charge. Pauline was needing help for her 8 yr. old who she said was very sick, had a rash, and was losing strength. She had him at the hospital the day before and they gave him some tablets and said to bring him back to get his temperature taken. However, the combie (transport) would not take him. We drove her home and put her and the boy in the back of the truck (just in case he had something we don't want to get) and took them to the hospital. The husband, Ed, came too. We had to wait for quite a while as the doctors decided to go for lunch just as we arrived. While we were waiting we gave some balloons to the children in the waiting room and that seemed to cheer them up! Anyway, the boy has measles and a problem in his chest and a high temperature. They gave him a couple of injections and sent him home with instructions to go to a different hospital in the morning that would admit measle patients and also he would get a chest x-ray. We haven't heard any more yet. That all took about 5 hrs. and we got home about 8:30 after returning them to their home.

Pediatrics waiting room at Harare Hospital - we gave out balloons to the kids while we were waiting with Paulene and Ed

At hospital -- we made a few kids happier

Tuesday we spent most of the day helping Reeve, CC and Lolly and a good group of youth, finish sorting the goods in the containers that arrived last Friday. It has been a big job but it is now organized. I went with Reeve to take a truckload of medical supplies to a Dr. who has helped us the other day with the boy that had terrible rashes all over his head. The dr. wasn't there but we left the things - She will be delighted to have them.

Sorting containers that Reeve, CC and Lolly brought to Zimbabwe

We were tired at the end of the day. Reeve, CC and Lolly left this morning for Australia for some golf tournaments etc. They will be back in a month. We will miss them. They are fun to have around. We will continue our squash playing though and we now have President and Sister Dube joining us in the mornings and learning squash. Fun!

President Bullock has gone right now to a meeting with President Dube to meet with some government minister to explain what the church and LDS Charities does.

Today we are hoping to work on our training session that we are to do in Masvingo on Saturday. We have an hour allotted to us to train on lesson preparation as they feel that too many just read the lessons from the books when they teach (& they do that a lot here). We are
feeling a little nervous about this as we don't feel like we have a lot of expertise in the area, however, we do have "Teaching No Greater Call" and I have printed off some talks from church leaders. We will make a plan and pray a lot!! I better get busy working on it.

One more picture:

AIDS sign

We are grateful to you all for your love and support. We have a great family that we are proud of and also wonderful friends! Thank you!!

Love, The Bullocks

Sunday, January 3, 2010

Sunday, January 3, 2010

Happy New Year to all! We hope it is a good year for Zimbabwe and things can get better here for the people. There is concern about the lack of enough rain. They say that a lot of rain should have come in December and it didn’t. The rivers should be flowing by now and they aren’t. Some wells are low.

The zone leaders in Mutare put together a good meeting at the Holiday Inn for the ministers and pastors of other churches. There were over 30 in attendance plus about 10 of us. We explained about LDS Charities and what we do and have done in Mutare and of course, that brought a lot of enquiries afterwards. Pres. Chadambuka, the District President, the elders, and Pres. Dube, the mission president all gave short speeches about the church and that we are family oriented and want to serve and work together with them to help people. They said that if they have service projects that they would like help with that we are ready and willing with a lot or a few people that can help. Afterwards a wonderful lunch was served and they all enjoyed that. There were some really good and positive comments from them. Most didn’t understand much about us and were glad to know more. We were pleased with the outcome and Pres. Dube is thinking that perhaps we should do the same type of meeting in Zambia.

Sign above a toilet at Kwe Kwe church

We stayed overnight at the Holiday Inn as it was too late to drive home – we don’t drive on rural roads after dark. It was New Year’s Eve so there was a fair bit of noise outside most of the night. It seems like the people here like to celebrate New Years!!!

We had a young man about 13 or 14 yrs. old come to the gate on Wed. and ask if there was any work he could do so that he could earn money for his school fees. I was impressed with him for trying to earn his own money so let him work in the garden area for 2 days. He earned $6 a day plus I gave him a school kit. (I think he needs $65 for his fees for this next term starting Jan. 12^th.

On Tues. we took ZESA, the electrical people, out to the school to connect the power to the building where the mill will go. It was suppose to take a couple of hours but it took our whole day by the time we waited for them to get organized, do the job, and return them to their office. If we don’t take them out we could wait indefinitely for them to do the job as they have very little diesel for their vehicles. On Wed. we led the way out to the school with the Precision Grinder people to install the mill and dehuller. That also took the whole day. We were to be at their business at 9:30 but didn’t leave until 11:30 when they were finally loaded and ready to go. It got hooked up but couldn’t be tested as the power was out due to a lightning strike. (Note: Zimbabwe has more people killed by lightning strikes than any other country in the world).

Unlaoding grinding mill at Kadayamadare School on December 30th

Getting mill and dehuller set up

Can't flip the switch and test it because the power is not working today!

On Friday afternoon we stopped in to see our investigators, Carol, Ellison, and Dzikamai. They are doing well, especially, Dzikamai. He hadn’t been to church until last Sunday because he had no proper clothes to wear so we gave him a white shirt and tie and I found some pants from our humanitarian clothing. He has attended church in the past when he was in Boston. He said he had forgotten how good it felt and he wants to keep coming and learning. We are going to Highlands ward today so we can be there with them. Hopefully Carol will come – she plays the keyboard at her other church and feels needed there. We could really use her to play the piano too! Later: Only Dzikamai came but he had a good day and we spent a couple of hours after church with him as he had some questions. We also spent time with Seka, as well.

Reeve, Lolly, and Cecilia are back from their golf tour now so they have us back playing ‘squash’ again. My body was a little stiff but is getting used to it again. It is good exercise. Jim isn’t playing as he doesn’t want to put his back out. I have a good trainer – the #1 guy in Zimbabwe on the squash court. Reeve, Lolly and CC help he and his brother a lot and occasionally send them to tournaments and for training in other countries. Needless to say, they are really good. They are gentle with me and let me get a point once in a while. Mayfields are learning to play too and the girls are teaching them. Deppe’s also have played too but Sis. Deppe hurt her hand (doing something else) and can’t play right now. We meet at the court at 5:30 a.m.

The girls (Reeve, Lollie and CC) brought us a nice gift bag of goodies for Christmas. They are too good to us. It included a tie for Jim, scarf for me, Hilary Weeks Christmas CD, chocolate, an Ipod (16 GB) filled with church music, videos and talks. Nice!!

Yesterday we took a Preparation day and went grocery shopping and then we went with Mayfields to the ‘Lion and Cheetah’ Park that is only about 30 minutes away. We took lunch with us, had a little picnic, and saw the animals there – lots of lions, but not the kind we would want to walk with. It was a nice afternoon.

Kids sitting in a Banana tree - more joined in when we pulled out the camera.

At the Lion and Cheetah Park - these guys were big!

We were in the car - not walking with them!!

Nice bush

Big turtle at park - he is 300 years old!

Sister Mayfield and me

Cubs (3 and 4 months old) getting their dinner

Tomorrow we are back to work again – hopefully getting another grinding mill motor installed. We have 4 grinding mill projects that were approved – a new kind of project for here and our people in South Africa are watching to see the success of them. We think they will be good but will also monitor to see how they work out and report back after a few months.

There are some ladies that want to talk about a ‘sewing’ project that they are hoping we might help them develop. We will look into that shortly too. Some ladies in Mutare at the meeting we just had also approached me about a sewing project. I suggested we could talk more in a couple of months as I want to see about this one here first and see if it is something we should look at or not.

We are off to church (Highlands ward) right now and I will send this letter off after.

Love, The Bullock's

Hello family and friends,

Merci was baptized today and it all went great. She bore a great testimony at the end. The water was rather cool but she was brave! Tomorrow Elder Bullock will confirm her at the Highlands Ward here by the mission office. It was a good day. She is a fantastic lady!

Merci's baptism

Our other family has some issues and so their baptism needs to be postponed. Sis. Kureva was rather disappointed but it is for the best right now. The missionaries talked to them this morning and we will go out and talk in the next day or two.

Tomorrow afternoon we have to a meeting at the Celebration Centre to make some final plans for the meeting there with Elder Holland. After that there is choir practice - and I need all the practice I can get for that on the keyboard. That will about take care of our day.

Our golf/squash friends are back in town for 10 days or so and so we (myself and E/S Deppe) met them this morning and played squash. I told Sis. Deppe she needed to learn how so that we can play together. This morning they had me playing against a guy that they train with - he is #1 in Zimbabwe at playing squash. He was nice to me and let me get a few points but I did get a good workout. Reeve and Lolly have these guys play with them so that they get a really good workout - and then they helped teach the Deppes. I thought I did pretty good, considering I haven't played for a few months. It was fun and really good exercise -- I will likely have some stiff muscles tomorrow.

Hope everyone is doing okay.
Love, E/S Bullock

Friday

Good morning, It is a holiday here today - labor day - so everything is shut down. We got up early and met our 3 golf friends at 6:30 so that they could teach us how to play 'squash'. It was really quite fun and a very good workout. I think I may have some stiff muscles tomorrow. They play every morning at 5:30 and the club is very close to our residence so maybe we will take up squash. We were suppose to go for another golf lesson after but decided we had done enough for one day so we will go for golf on Monday morning! They also brought me another Ziploc bag of the cereal they make up out of a lot of healthy things. It is good.

They leave next Saturday for their European golf tour and are gone until Christmas. We will miss them. They are really fun and wonderful at sharing the gospel with all they come in contact with. They keep a supply of scriptures in their vehicle (Bible and Book of Mormon) in a cloth scripture case and give them out. They gave out 2 this a.m. at squash and gave the two men a quick overview and invited them to church. These ladies have a fair bit of money and they spend it doing a LOT of good things. They have an organization called: Eyes4Zimbabwe and they have helped people get cataract surgeries, etc. They really are a great trio. One is Pres. Nield's daughter, and the other two are converts (because of her). Great ladies!

We went home and bathed (yes we actually had water for a bath). We then went to the Chinese Consulate and met a man named Lee. He was referred to us by another couple that we met at the MTC who are serving as teachers in Beijing and met his wife who teaches at the University there. He works here for 2 years at the consulate. He gave us some tickets for a Chinese show here in Harare this afternoon. It sounds like it should be quite good. There will be Chinese dance, acrobatics, magic and martial arts. He was a very nice man and we shared with him about our mission here. He would like to go to church with us one Sunday! We also suggested we could get together and go out for supper one night and he seemed to like that idea. Perhaps we will be able to teach him of some eternal principles and our MTC friends in Beijing can teach his wife. (they are not allowed to proselyte there). Perhaps they already are teaching her some things because he told us that his mother is Buddhist but that he and his wife are not. They have a 3 year old daughter.

We are also going to start teaching discussions to Phillipa and her two boys (12 yrs. and 17 yrs) so that they can get baptized. They have been coming to church for a long time and want to get baptized. I am not sure why it has taken so long but sometimes there are special requirements here. By the way, I have meant to tell you that in our branch in Marendera there were 13 convert baptisms and 3 child of record ones last Sunday. Unfortunately we could not be there. We really wish we had been. It would have been something to see. There are no missionaries stationed out there so the ward mission leader etc. teach the investigators and then the missionaries go out from here and do the baptism interviews. That branch is growing and are asking us if we can get them more chairs -- however, there is no room for more chairs. I think they are going to knock out a wall and make the room bigger for them. They meet in a house -- maybe one day they will get a church built. (It is on a large lot - they have their garden plots there). Apparently the church is no longer building chapels for just one ward - there must be two. So I guess these people will have to do with what they have for now.

We are now going to give Huseni a ride home so that he can take his maize harvest from his garden plot here. After that we will go to the Chinese production. This evening we are invited out for supper with the stake/district presidents in the mission and Elder Bricknell (the Area Authority
Seventy), the mission president and also the Taylors. Pres. Bester said he wanted some female influence!! Apparently we are going to a really nice place. Tomorrow morning at 7:30 they are having a meeting and we are invited to report on what we have been doing. They are having an open meeting to discuss whatever they feel they need to discuss. We were in on a meeting with some of these brethren when we first arrived here and were really impressed with their leadership.

I must run. Love you, Mom/Nancy/Sis. Bullock