New Pics

Here are some more pictures from the Beans!

Watch out for the gorilla!

The local Relief Society

Elder Bean has finally found someone to play (American) football with.

United Nations and Visit to the Tomb of the Kings

We are going with the United Nations group on Monday to the refugee camps. we are going to represent the church in distributing some of the goods that the Church sent to Africa. The people from the UN contacted us and want us to be part of the hand over. Evidently there will be a lot of publicitiy and international news people there. So look for us in the news. We also got an e-mail from a man at BYU Idaho who wants to come over here with a photographer and do a documentary on globalization of Africa and the humanitrian work here. He wants to follow us around for a day or two as we visit villages and assess projects. So we might be in a BYU documentary. We will let you know how that goes.

We had a fun morning. We were taken around this morning by a member of the church called Ssimbwa, who does a lot of things for all of us. He buys our blankets, mosquito nets, etc. that we take to the villages. He gets a better price because he is African. He picked Ron and I up and took us to the tomb of the KIngs and also to the martyr's site. It is so interesting. Love Nana and Ron

xoxoxoxoxo

The Latest

Several things to tell you.

Elder and Sister Williams just barely left to go home to Kaysville, Utah. They were here with the Church educational system. Their two daughters came over a week or so to see the country and accompany their parent’s home. We have been with them several times, once at a luncheon at the mission home and once for family home evening and met them once when they were with their parents in their truck going off to see the source of the Nile. The one daughter Noel is married and her husband’s sister works with you in the young women’s program in Lynnwood. I can’t think of her name, but anyway you will probably know who I am talking about. We really enjoyed meeting them and I think they had a great time here. However, while they were at the source of the Nile, their parents home was robbed. This is not a good way to finish your mission. The whole family left yesterday and we will miss them. The Williams were a lot of fun and Elder Williams is just crazy, and has a wonderful sense of humor. When he and Ron would get together it was just a competition on who could tell the most outlandish story and you couldn’t believe a word either one of them said. Anyway just thought that was interesting because she mentioned the connection with you.

Noel and her sister brought 3 full bags of little kid’s shoes and gave them to us to distribute. We gave them to a woman in one of the branches [so she could sell] the shoes to get a little money. It is so sad here. A lot of people in the branches only have one meal a day. President Call told us he went to one of the branches for a meeting and it was very dark in the room. He said to the branch president turn the light on and the branch president said, we only have one light bulb and that is for Sacrament meeting. Stealing is a big problem here and you cannot leave anything in your car, even if it is locked. We carry everything we don’t want stolen with us when we leave the car parked. The Moore’s have had their truck broken into 3 different times. That was the first month they were here. We have a guard at the gate to our homes, but we are always very careful about locking our doors, locking up our computer. People are so poor that I guess they don’t think anything of helping themselves to whatever they can.

We sent some pictures of our latest trip to one of the villages and a picture of the Relief Society sisters in our branch with our update to the blog, so hope they worked, we are still trying to master the new Vista system. [MATT: HAVEN’T BEEN ABLE TO OPEN THEM YET, BUT WILL POST THEM WHEN THE VISTA ISSUES HAVE BEEN WORKED OUT]

Thank you again for heading up the hygiene kit project. When we were out in the village last week and all the little kids were following me around, I was wishing I had those kits to give out then. However, we still have a lot of time left here and will be going to the villages all the time. Wish I could kiss all the kids. I think of them constantly and miss you and Matt very much. I got an update from him about driving the NASCAR. Tell him the two missionaries that live in our compound are so impressed and so is Ron. WOW, heard you were also headed for SunRiver. What a fun summer you have planned. Has Torri arrived yet? We have not heard anything, but we have been out of contact too.

I sent the boys some hand painted African bookmarks. I thought they were cute and they were easy to send and fit in an envelope. We sent them in the pouch that goes out every Tuesday to America. So it only costs the usual postage. I think we sent the address of the pouch to you. Ron and I both have the bookmarks and think they are kind of cute.

We have been very busy. The new mission president comes in two weeks and we have our boss coming from South Africa the day after the Calls leave. He will spend a week here and we will be taking him around to all our projects and to a hand over. Also the Call’s are going to stay with us for 3 days when the new president gets here. They don’t want to stay at the Mission home with them there. I really like Sister Call. We have become good friends. We went to the Mission home last Wednesday for a going away luncheon for the Williams and Sister Call is very fussy and a good cook, so everything was very nice. It is really a beautiful home. It is furnished very nicely and has some very pretty & unique pieces of African art. I don’t like a lot of the art work here, but I would like to get a nice wall hanging before we leave. They do hand painted African people or batik on bark cloth and there are some very pretty ones. I would also like a few of their baskets. I am keeping my eye out for gifts for everyone, so far a few have been bought and stowed away.

We really appreciate having you there – I often think of you and Matt and the kids as “Beans”. And I mean that in a wonderful way. Nana could not be a better companion – she is like a “pied piper” to all the children in the villages and the sisters in the branch all adore her. This is truly a blessed time in our life.

Anyhow, thanx for all you do, Ron

First Picture from Uganda

Here it is. I'm told there is more to come. They already look like seasoned veterans, don't they?

Hospitals and Haircuts

The following is a compilation of a couple of letters. I wanted to make sure we got all the details. No in-country pictures yet. Elder and Sister Bean -- Send pictures!
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You must come to Africa. It is so interesting and so different. Each day is an adventure. Especially traveling the roads. We are in a fairly nice compound and love our neighbors, who are Elder & Sister Moore from Bountiful, Utah. Today, two new young elders moved into the apartment above the garage. They are from Phoenix, Arizona and North Ogden, Utah. So we are a compound of muzungu's (white people) from the United States. We definitely are in the minority here. Very few white people. When we drive around we never see anyone else of our kind, only at the larger malls and restaurants will you see maybe two or three.

This morning we went to check on a project at the Maluka hospital. We have a women we met named Angela, She is in a wheelchair and wants the church to contribute 120 blankets, sheet sets and pillows to the spinal injury ward at the hospital. We met her at the hospital today and toured the spinal injiury ward. It was so awful, you can not believe it. Of course this is the part of the hospital where they put the people who cannot pay. I just sort of looked straight ahead as we walked through this dirty, smelly place with all kinds of people with all kinds of things wrong with them in a bed. Anyway, we are going to help them with blankets, sheets, etc. How could you not?

On Wednesdays people come to our office to present their humanitarian projects and hope that we will partner with them and help them. The office is always crowded and we stay way past the time we are supposed to, just listening to needs and very sad stories. A lot of them are looking for ways to get clean water, and we & the church want to do a bunch of wells and help protect & maintain wells already in existence. So many needs, we wish we could help all of them. A lot of them are woman groups, wanting to go in together and raise poultry, pigs, pineapple, cattle and want the church to set them up. There are alot of single African women raising big families and no man in sight. It definitely is a man's world here, especially in the villages, where they still do things like caning (you know with a big cane or stick) The little kids are so cute and very shy. I love to smile at them and then they will smile back. I also love to see a woman walking along the road with a big basket of bananas on her head and a baby in a sling on her back. Driving to our office or to church, this is a very common sight. We go out to the villages to look at projects and to take mosquito nets, blankets, etc. and words cannot describe what you see.

You must come visit. There are wonderful sights to see. The source of the Nile is in a city called Jinja, which we have and will visit often to get to some of the villages. If you want to read a good book that talks about searching for the source of the Niles and all the explorers that explored this area in the 1800's read: The White Nile. Very Very interesting. It is quite acceptable for us to have visitors. The couples that are here now all have had their families come and visit and stay with them. President Call and Sister Call, who are the acting mission president until the end of the month when the new mission president,arrives, went with their daughter and son-in-law to Ethopia to adopt two little sisters, ages 2 & 4 from an orphange and took them back to Wyoming. There is so much to tell you, but this is turning into a book. So hope you are having a wonderful time. Let us hear about your adventures too. We are going with President and Sister Call tomorrow to get haircuts. I hope she is as good as Csaba. I am also (for the time being) letting my hair go gray, don't know if I can last though.

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Yesterday we spent the day with President and sister Call. We all had our hair cut, that was pretty interesting. We all have a little different look today, but it just cost us 20,000 shillings a piece, which is around $10.00, not quite a Csaba cut, but not bad. We then drove out to an African Market and walked around and Ron bought some sandals and an African ball to throw around. It was made out of dried material like reeds, grass, not sure.