Getting Reacquainted

On Monday, May 31, 2012 the church attorney, Jeff, and his wife, Marge, traveled from Johannesburg to Kinshasa to do some legal work here and in Brazzaville. It was wonderful having them stay in the mission home with us. These two graduated from Highland High with me and we hadn't seen each other in all those years. Now they have come to Africa.  What an amazing coincidence.  We enjoyed their company very much. It was fun to be with them and get reacquainted.

  

The ride from the airport is always a bit shocking to visitors and this was no exception for Marge and Jeff.  It's a crazy hour's drive that never disappoints in its ability to throw people into the Kinshasa culture.

 

    

   

  

 

 But then after driving down several miles of the wide boulevard on which we live and spending the evening in our very comfortable apartment, Marge, understandably, began to think that Kinshasa was a lot like S. Africa, where they live, and that the trip from the airport was not typical Kinshasa.

 

We also took them to our favorite Home Evening hangout which is a very nice place too.  It's called  Nice Cream. It's a winning combination and our favorite "p-day, good ice cream with good friends.

   

 The next day they crossed the Congo to Brazzaville where they spent a day and a half.

   

  

 

Back in Kinshasa we did a little ladies outing and took Marge to a few places to see the REAL Kinshasa while Jeff did his work. Sisters Stagg, Smith and Bingham joined us. Our first stop was the fabric marché. It had rained some the night before and the narrow path through the marché was a muddy mess, but it just added to the ambiance of the place. Congolese fabrics are beautiful, colorful and very important to the women here.  You can buy six yards of gorgeous material for $10-$12. If somebody  gives you a special gift in the Congo, it's usually fabric or clothes made from fabric bought at a  marché.

  

  

After the fabric market it was off to the craft and antiquities marché.  We call it "Thieve's Market" because if you don't "discuss" the price with the sellers and you pay the full asking price, you're getting robbed.
This is about my favorite place in all of Kinshasa. I love the things you see there, especially the antiquities. I love the people who are selling their wares and I even love to "discuss" the price. I can never get away without buying some little thing. I'm sure that I always pay too much since I'm obviously a foreigner, but it's still fun!

Brent HATES this place, so I'm glad when somebody will go with me.

Kuba cloth is one thing that is very typically Congolese. It's a hand-wooven, rafia cloth and, although not washable, it is very interesting and you just have to have a piece of Kuba cloth when you come to the DR Congo.

Wooden masks, statues, figures, canes, chief's scepters, dolls and animals of all kinds can be found at Thieve's Market.  There are some that are very old and come from the villages around Kinshasa and there are also new creations. All are most interesting, but if you look too long the vendor is bound to harass you and follow you around the market offering you lower and lower prices for his treasures.

.  I almost succumbed to this beauty. I still may go back for her. Since she still has her rafia hair she's special.

Wood carvings are made of ebony and wenge and are generally simple and somewhat modern in their character.

There are also always drums and other musical instruments. Marge got a great "finger piano" attached to a tortoise shell.  Sister Bingham picked up a few tiny wooden elephants to take home to grand kids and Sister Stagg always has a hard time resisting the fun African jewelry. 

Before we leave Congo I'm going to by one of the Amalicite solitar games in the bottom left corner of this  this picture. I'm hooked on it and the Malicite balls are mined in DRC. The bowls and plates are edged in silver or copper, which are also mined in the DRC. This poor country is very rich in natural resources.  

At one point Marge just stopped in her tracks and stood quietly. I asked if she was OK and she said that she was just  trying to take this all in and it really was a bit  overwhelming when you really see Kinshasa. It is certainly a unique place. She bought a few fun things to take home to remember our girls outing in the big city. So did all the rest of us. Never go to Thieve's market if you don't want to blow your budget!

Memorial Day in the Good Ol' USA

We were invited to a party at the home of the American Ambassador to celebrate Memorial Day. They have parties occasionally for all the Americans and their families who live in Kinshasa.  Since we register all our American missionaries with the embassy, we're invited.  It's a wonderful occasion when we go to these events.  We walked through the gates of the residence in Kinshasa into what felt like being back in the USA.  There were several hundred ex-patriots there enjoying this little bit of America.

   

 The tables were covered with blue table clothes. Nice folding chairs surrounded the tables which were under white awnings.  There were red, white and blue decorations everywhere.

There were hot dogs, chicken, french fries, cold drinks, ice cream and cake, popcorn and pizza cones 

(this last item  is a Congolese addition.)  All the foods were free and in abundance.

There was a bouncy play-yard for kids and the swimming pool and tennis courts were available.  

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There was even a place to get information about voting long distance in the upcoming November election.

But the most important and most impressive thing for all of us was when the Marine color guard posted the colors and we sang the Star Spangled Banner. It can't help but touch our hearts and bring tears to our eyes when we saw the American flag proudly displayed and realize what a wonderful country it represents. We're thankful to be American. It's easy to see the blessings of our citizenship when we're far away in a land which lacks many of the freedoms that we enjoy.  I think that none of us will ever again take this citizenship and its freedoms for granted.   God bless America!

 

Baptisms with our Assistants

We always love it when we get a chance to go to the baptisms done by our missionaries.  We  don't get to do it as often as we'd like, but we attended this baptism which was done by our Assistants, Elders Twite and Mulambo.  It was a great occasion.

 Among those baptized was a young couple who were baptized together. This is not a common thing.Usually the men are baptized first and then sometime later, they might invite their wives and families to join them in the church. We were very excited to have a husband and wife baptized together and see them begin their life in the church together.  After the baptism it was a sweet moment to see the whole group who had been at the baptism walking off toward town together.  It's a great experience to share these special times with our elders.

  

The Office Gets a Face Lift

For over a week painters worked daily to do a little face lift on our office. It was a pretty big mess to work around.

 

 The Africans couldn't figure out why we would want to change the beautiful turquoise blue color of the office. The Americans felt like they were in a constant "blue funk."  It was dark and depressing to us. 

 

    

For the Americans it was a great idea to make the office lighter. We thought it would be a nice change to put a calm and pleasant beige on the walls. We like things a little on the boring side and our friends from Africa can't figure out why we'd go for such a dull color. But the Americans outvoted the Africans and we're very happy with the change.

He's Gone to the Dark Side

Those of you who know Brent as a mild-mannered, kindly, gentle man will be somewhat surprised to hear that when he gets in the drivers seat of a car, he's a different guy. The Congo has not helped this problem.  He's learned to drive like the Congolese. He says that it's because of our Humanitarian Elder. Brent says that he learned all he knows from Elder B. But no matter how it happened, it has happened. President Jameson, as a driver, has gone to the Dark Side. 

The following pictures will show positive proof that he has "turned" and there's no turning back.  Can you see what he did today on the way to the Masina Stake Conference?  It was pretty terrifying.

We were just driving along toward  the Masina stake center. The road is worse than usual because they might be starting to pave it, but it's very torn up right now. Suddenly a terrible traffic jam started and we couldn't move at all on the right side of the street. So, one transport driver decided to cross between the cement barriers and just drive on the wrong side of the road. 

 Then others began to follow suit and we were right there with them. We were driving on the wrong side of the divided road.

We whizzed past all the cars that were sitting in traffic on the right side of the road. The only trouble was that cars were coming the opposite direction on their side of the road. In the end Brent decided to take his half out of the middle and we had cars on both sides of us going both directions. But we did get past the traffic jam in record time and headed on to our stake conference. 

  

After this crazy ride I'm not sure that I will ever feel totally safe on the roads again with this man at the wheel. He has gone to the Dark Side. Another bizarre day on the roads of the Congo!