December-2014 udpate

Early December pictures 

As the time for “graduation” draws near, the missionaries get more and more excited.  It is especially true for our 6 weekers.  We get to know them better than those who are here for less than 2 weeks, but we love them all.  

Of course, our sister missionaries hold a special place in our hearts.

Eventually, it is time to say our goodbyes and pray for great success in their future.

We love them all.  As you can see, they come in all shapes and sizes and that’s the long and the short of it. Hands down, they are wonderful.

They come in various sizes and shapes.

Aproaching Christmas

Well, we are still waiting for our white Christmas to hit, but since it is around 85 degrees every day, we don’t think that is going to happen soon.  Nevertheless, we had a nice Christmas with our missionaries and our missionary couple friends.  We will include more information and some pictures later in this update.

No, this isn’t Walmart, but the little food store we shop at regularly.  Santa could sing too.  It was fun.

We did say our goodbyes to some of our dear missionaries, who are ready to go into the mission field to serve the Lord.  Some of them have learned a new language, and others have learned the basic lessons and procedures they are to follow.  Most of all, they have felt the sweet Spirit of the Gospel in their lives and we loved being part of that.

We take them to the temple occasionally, and it is always a nice experience for us all.  This is one of our language districts.  They have learned French and are off to their fields of labor.  I had to laugh as one of the African elders was giving a talk in Church and he said,
“The field is black and ready to harvest”.  They have a neat sense of humor as well as a sweet attitude toward life. 

 They come in all shapes and colors, as you can see.  We love them all.

Christmas week was very busy for us.  Many of our missionaries are in the field now.  We do have our 6 week language missionaries with us, and other non-language missionaries are coming in regularly.  Christmas was busy, even though we didn’t have as many missionaries as we usually have.  Many of them wait until after Christmas to come into the field.  Nevertheless, we had a very busy week getting ready for our Christmas celebrations.

We invited the missionaries who are serving in the Accra Mission, to come for a Preparation Day, at the MTC.  They came in sports clothes and had a fun day with programs and sports for the day.  We remembered that Devin Despain is serving his mission here, so we went out to the sports field, to see if we could find him.  Sure enough, there he was.  What fun to see someone from home.  He said he will be home before us, so he can be at our homecoming.  What a nice young man he is.

Elder Despain and the Malmroses.

I was asked to organize the Christmas Eve program with the missionaries only. We already had big plans for some of the senior missionary couples to come to the MTC on Christmas Day, so this would be our “family” celebration with our own missionaries.

I talked with the different districts and asked them if they would participate in the program.  They were enthused to be part of their own program.  So I assigned each district a Christmas Carol and asked them to practice it.  I also gave them some background on that particular hymn. I even had one of the elders ask me if he and his friends could do “Oh Holy Night”.  I said, “sure”.   A few days later, I went around and had them all sing for me to make sure they were ready.  They did a good job, and I thought it would turn out OK. 

The night of the performance, I gave the introductory remarks and then let each district take their turn.

There was a sweet, reverent spirit in the room for the whole program and I was very pleased with their love and enthusiasm for the Christmas hymns.  Gerald and I, along with Sister & President Robison, sang a quartet of Silent Night, and the congregation joined in as the closing song.  I was very happy with how it all turned out on that special night. They did so well, so we asked them to sing again during the Christmas Day celebration with the couples.

On Christmas Day, all the couples arrived to join us at lunch.  It helped us to not be so homesick, to be away on Christmas. They are such nice people and we really enjoyed being with them. 

Here are a few pictures of our Christmas celebration:

We decided to wear traditional dress for the festivities.

Some of our Senior Couples Christmas Greeting

It was pot luck style, but the MTC furnished the chicken, gravy and rice and they brought the rest.

Especially good is the homemade bread that our head chef Margaret makes. It was yummy.

This is our cafeteria.  The elder on the right has one of the neat beaded ties they wear here.  Oh, and yes, that is the back of my head on the left behind the elders.  I got a haircut just in time it seems.

After eating our lunch, they asked Elder Malmrose to share memories of his father, whose birthday was 100 years ago to the day.  He presented the song that his dad had played every year that Gerald could remember.  He danced and lip synced to “My Birthday Comes On Christmas”.  Everyone really had fun with his presentation.  I don’t think I have ever heard our missionaries laugh so hard and clap so loud.  This may become an annual tradition. We put it on the blogspot for the whole world to enjoy.

Each young missionary was given a little Christmas gift and were they pleased!  They really appreciate being remembered.

Here are some pictures of some of the great folks we work with every day.  What beautiful smiles they have, don’t you think.

We are working very hard, but we are enjoying it.  Just so you don’t think that we work all the time, we do occasionally get a break and do a little sight seeing.  There really are some interesting places to go to visit here, and we hope to get a chance to see more of them, as time goes on.  Since we don’t drive here, for many reasons, the Robisons are wonderful at taking us places. Here are a few pictures of one of our little excursions.

 Sometimes we move at a very slow pace, but we try not to monkey around too much.

Even the restroom signs are unique here.

They really dress up nicely for special events here.  The ladies are usually in beautiful dresses and the men in shirts and ties or traditional dress.  These are pictures of a wedding held at the ward building on the property.  Because of the laws here, members must be married civilly and then they have a traditional wedding with the family only and then they may be sealed in the temple, if they desire it.

View from out of our kitchen window.

We hope that you all had a great Christmas and a happy New Year.

November 2014 - Update

We are still super busy as we welcomed in a large number of missionaries.  The intake days were exhausting, but we got it done and they are settling into the MTC routine.  We have missionaries from all over the world, but mostly Africa.  We have representatives from Benin, Botswana, Congo, DR Congo, Ghana, Ivory Coast, Kenya, Madagascar, Nigeria, Philippines, Samoa, South Africa, Togo, Tonga, Uganda, United Kingdom, USA, Zambia,

What a wonderful time to be here in Africa as the Gospel spreads across the continent.  There are wonderful true stories of the early pioneers in Africa and as time goes on we will share some of those histories.  The Lord is truly hastening the work here.  We did not realize what a big continent this is, until we saw this picture.

  Africa map

  

    It seems that we just get through the training and other things to get our missionaries prepared, and off they go and we start over again.  Gerald is very busy with all the technical needs, family history, temple preparation, etc. etc.  I continue to help out with their medical needs.  They really enjoy coming to visit us on immunization days.  That’s our friend Doctor Hill, doing what he does best.

We were asked to get a little group together to sing at the devotional on a Sunday evening.  We had attended the French sacrament meeting that morning, and I noticed how enthusiastic they sang “Secret Prayer”.  So, when I was asked to find a number for the devotional, I asked the pianist to get his district to sing while he played the piano.  Gerald and I did the first verse in English, and then they joined in for the rest of the verses in French.  When we were done, the congregation broke out in enthusiastic applause (a cultural thing).  They sure make it fun to serve here.

Sister Robison and I, along with two other senior missionary sisters, took a morning off and went to a very well-known open air market in Accra.  It was quite an experience.  There are so many people all walking around and squeezing around each other.  Some of these folks have heavy stacks of goods balanced on their heads.  I tried really hard to stay out of their way as we hurried up and down the streets looking in the booths.  We all came out OK, but I did get hit with someone’s elbow to my head.  It wasn’t bad, but could have been.  We were mostly looking for the beautiful dyed material they have here, so that we could make or have made (in my case) clothes. 

Also, we found a couple of ladies who sell blouses really cheap, so we stopped there and got some. While I was standing by the street and the other ladies were shopping, a young fellow around 12 years old, came up to me and looked me in the face and said, “Salt Lake City, Utah” and then smiled.  I looked surprised at him and said, “Are you a member of the Church?  He said yes, both he and his twin brother, who also came up to say Hi.  I asked him if he was planning on a mission, and they both said yes.  Who would have thought that we would meet some members among such a crowd.  What fun!

So, since November is Gerald’s birthday month and it is also Sister Robison’s, we decided to go to one of the hotels that has a really nice buffet.  We don’t eat out often, but this was a special occasion.  A number of our senior couples came too.  Sister Hill is next to me.  She helps us out when her husband, our mission doctor, comes to the MTC.  My plate is full of one taste of each of the neat desserts that I wanted to try.  It’s amazing how fast one bite can fill up one plate J

A happy birthday week for our dear Sister Robison.  She deserves it!

The Elder at the far right of this picture, reminds us of Noah with some of his expressions.  Both Gerald and I noticed it separately.  Maybe he’s a long lost relative or maybe we are just homesick.

Thanksgiving Celebration:

Since November is our Thanksgiving holiday month, we did celebrate it here with the other senior couples.  We had a nice potluck dinner with turkey, no less, and all the trimmings at one of the mission homes.

To help our USA missionaries not to feel homesick, our wonderful cafeteria manager Margaret, set a beautiful table with tablecloths, bubbling soda and some of their favorite dishes.  For the Americans, she served them mashed potatoes and chicken and served the Africans some of their favorite dishes.  It was neat to see how excited they were.

An African Thanksgiving feast.

Manager Margaret and her grateful friend

Thanksgiving is nice!

This is the tall and the small of it.  And the in-between.

Our Friend Patrick

This is Patrick Appianti, who is the chief technology specialist, office manager and supervisor of teachers for  the MTC, with his new statue of Joseph Smith.  He has been immensely helpful to us.

This is Patrick's son with his favorite grandma.

On one of our errand days, Patrick took a side trip so that we could see the beautiful coast line and warm ocean.

GHANA Temple Trip

On my birthday (November 18), we decided to go with the missionaries to the Ghana Temple. 

  Ishmael Assan is washing the van in preparation for the temple trip.

The elder who is on the far side of the van seat is Elder Broadhead.  In talking with him, we discovered that he is the great-grandson of Dakin K. Broadhead who was a counselor to our Pasadena Stake President, Howard W. Hunter when I became active in the Church.  Not only do I remember President Hunter who helped me come back to the church, but I also remember President Broadhead and the other counselor Richard S. Summerhays.

We love this view of the Angel Moroni at the Accra Temple.

And she is an angel also.

This is a nice place to spend my birthday morning. 

My Lorna and her Ghanaian hat.

Closing photos of some departing missionaries:

The American missionaries still love Pizza and hamburgers. Notice the background gentleman; almost everyone has a cell phone and/or a tablet.

This is the end of November.

October, 2014 Malmrose MTC

We have settled in to our routine here in the MTC.  We are kept very busy with our responsibilities.  We have seen several groups of missionaries come, get trained, and then leave for the mission field.  Our 6 week missionaries are learning a language, either French or English, so we get to know them better because they are here longer.  We are coming up on the time when they will be done with their training and ready and anxious to get out and get to work.

Along with our multiple duties to keep our missionaries happy and healthy, we get to attend many of their devotionals.  It isn’t unusual to be asked to come up and share our testimonies with them.  Sometimes, we sing to them.  At one of the devotionals, we sang a duet in French and when we were done, they broke out in loud applause that filled the room.  Now that’s a first for us at a Sunday meeting.  They are very enthusiastic in many ways and sing with gusto always. 

We were at the temple with our missionaries the other day, and we were waiting outside in the garden area for the others to come out.  Some of our missionaries came out to wait too, so they came over and said Hi to us.  One Elder shook my hand and then held it and looked into my eyes and said, “All of the missionaries really, really love you Sister Malmrose.”  I thought that was sweet.  I think they like to have someone they can talk with when they don’t feel well or are a bit homesick.  And that’s part of my calling.  Sometimes I get a little impatient, but when things like that happen, it makes it all worthwhile.

We have not minded the weather so far.  It is warm and humid, but not too bad.  They tell us that it will be warming up and should be quite hot by Christmas.  It is a bit weird to have the sun come up every day at 6 AM and set at 6 PM regularly.

So far, we have had good food and probably too much of it.  The sweet lady who runs the cafeteria here, often sends us up leftovers during the day.  We either eat it as it comes, or I make it into something else.  The people here are very kind and generous.  We don’t eat out often and are careful where, but occasionally we do go out and have pizza or something like that.  Fortunately, they have very good ice cream at the restaurants, so that makes Gerald very happy.

Here are a couple of pictures of several of our groups on devotional days when an area authority comes and meets the missionaries and gives them encouragement for the challenges ahead.  They always do a great job.

This is a picture of what they call the “man dress” that many of the natives wear around here.  It is comfortable to wear around the house, but they don’t wear them out in public.  Pres. Robison and Gerald are really getting into the African theme.  Ghana does have a Muslim population, so we do see women dressed with the head scarves, etc., but not too often.  One of our Relief Society counselors is a convert from the Islamic faith.

Another wonderful trip to the temple in Accra.

The end of the day at the temple.
The black elder on my right is rather interesting.  I was surprised when I started talking with him and he didn’t have an accent.  I said, “Where are you from Elder?” and he answered “Provo, Utah.  Ever heard of it?”  We do a lot of mix and match of cultures here.

Time flies by quickly for those who are here less than two weeks.  Before very long, they are ready to say goodbye to us and be out in the mission field putting their training into practice.

We usually have about 20% sisters in our groups.  They are quite the ladies, and we come to love them.

This Sister Olivarius is from Martinique going to Madagascar. She has a sweet personality as you can see by her smile.  She is a good friend of Yva Jean-de-Dieu who we knew well on our earlier mission in the French West Indies. 

Our Elders aren’t too bad either, even though most of them are a little tall.  Sometimes I feel like I am in a forest of tall trees.  Nevertheless, they are super nice young men, and we enjoy them greatly, even they are white “ebrunies”.

On the property of the MTC, is a ward building, so we get to see members from the wards coming and going from time to time.  It is neat to see them all dressed up in their Sunday best and coming as families should, to attend their meetings. 

We also have missionaries from the Ghana mission, who serve in those wards and on “P” day they will come and borrow the basketballs or soccer balls and play some sports.  The other day I looked out the window while I was doing dishes and saw them sitting around on the little wall around the soccer field, playing a guitar and singing, just for fun.  Well, I couldn’t resist;  so I went and got Gerald, and we went over and sang with them.  They handed me the guitar and were surprised that I could play it.  So, we gave them a duet and had a lot of fun being with them.  They are from the U.S., Pacific Islands, and Africa.  It’s fun to see how they get along so well.

Soon, we are sending another group off into the real world.  We hope we have done our job to help them be prepared in every way.  They have many challenges ahead, but we have faith in them.

The night before they leave the MTC, we always have a farewell get-together and just enjoy each other.  They often sing their favorite songs.  This missionary was great at playing the hymns, but he also could play honky-tonk and other fun piano tunes for us to sing along with.  What fun!

The stake that our MTC is in had a youth conference recently, and we were so glad to see such nice young folks attend in great numbers.  Boy, do they love to sing and dance too.  Must be part of the culture. I'm sure some of these are our future missionaries.

This is Dr. Kissi, who is an early pioneer in Africa for the Church.  He does the medical exams for those who serve in Ghana, so we get to see him regularly.  We were able to get a copy of the book that he wrote that gives the history of how the Church has developed and grown over the years.  We'll bring home a copy.  It is really interesting to see how much these people of faith went through in the early stages.  It must be gratifying for them to see the tremendous growth taking place now.

All in all, we work tirelessly, day in and day out, and never take a break.

Well,  almost never.