Pictures of our Home in Dar Es Salaam

We have been out of electricity for the past several days.  This has not happened since we've been here, so it is great to finally have some power! Usually we have power at least 8 or 9 hours for every 24  hours, but this was something  new as when the electricity came on it would fluctuate between bright and almost nothing. Our neighbor warned us to turn everything off as the power surges could damage everything electrical.  Everything thawed out in the freezer and much went off in the frig...but we didn't have a huge stock of food yet, so thankfully it wasn't a great loss. We are excited for our generator to have a home in the new outside building, but are still waiting for the door and window grates to be installed.  We are not fussed about any of these things because we have learned pretty quickly to roll with it as that is what it is like here. The great things about our new home here in Dar FAR out weigh the inconveniences...some you will see below. We have been asked to send pictures of where we are living, so here they are.

Our home - Street view

Elder and Sister Worthen outside our front porch and entrance

Looking from the screened porch and front door into the Living Room. That is a Swahili Book of Mormon. Swahili lessons every Wednesday evening! Habari,  Za Jioni (How are you this evening?) 

Looking into the Dining Room from the Living Room

Looking into the Kitchen from the Dining Room

More Kitchen to the right of  picture to the left.

Master Bedroom- notice mosquito net on top of frame. A welcomed protection.

 

          Back yard with 3000 Liter Storage Tank and smaller gravity flow pressure tank.  Because of these, we have thankfully, never been without water.

Papaya tree in our back yard.  Yum, we have already had 3 of these.  Jarvis, the compound keeper climbed up and gave them to us.  We'll try to get a picture of him up there next time.

Bananas almost ready! Behind our generator house.

Fausta, our next door neighbor, an incredible woman who takes care of 2 of her nephews, twins Dennis and Davis. Another little boy, Armani, lives there too with his mother, Veronica who is the house helper.
 

FINALLY...The Blog is Official!

Dear Family and Friends,
Our darling daughter-in-law, Lindsey, helped get this blog going before we left for our mission.  She designed the heading, downloaded pictures, copied our emails, and coached and cheered us along. Thanks for never giving up on us, Lindsey! We are so techno-illiterate.  After many hours of  learning through doing, we are so happy to finally be up and running. 
We have started at the beginning...so if you want to begin at the beginning you should scroll down to the bottom of the blog where it all starts.  We will try to keep up with the blog most weeks. We would enjoy reading your comments if you would care to leave them...don't feel obligated, and also please understand we won't be able to respond much because of our limited time and internet access here.
Thanks for all your love, patience and support,
Bruce and Pam (AKA Elder and Sister Worthen)

Tanzania Update

We have been learning our job and meeting people that we need to meet to make happen what we are supposed to make happen. We flew back home from Kenya Tuesday and have had an entire day at the new house today with "fundis" (foon-dees) or workers that are repairing plumbing and electrical things so we can have a pleasant time here in Dar. We have a list of things that don't work and they need to be fixed within 30 days of move in - after then we are responsible for ALL repairs. The good news is we are happy and healthy. We have a really beautiful home but just outside our gates are many, many hundreds of thousands of people with one room homes, no car, very little money, very little food and very little work. But you would never know it.  They are a happy people. A beautiful and loving people that we adore! What a great blessing to be here with so many people who are so excited about the Gospel of Jesus Christ in these Latter days. The Gospel is true and has changed so many lives for the better.

Tomorrow is Sunday and we will be attending one of our two branches, the Ubungo branch (pronounced ooh-boon-go ) for the first time. We will be attending 3 convert baptisms after the 3 hour block! We have asked the Nolls and the two Elders assigned to that branch to come over for dinner.  They will be our first dinner guests in our new home. We will also be meeting with the District President, Pres. Balilemwa, about the PEF coming to Tanzania.  He was a PEF recipient himself, and is very excited for it to start.  We will have a busy Sunday, it will feel good!! Also, there is already someone ready and anxious to take keyboard lessons.More on that later.

We have some people here next week from the Church's translation dept. that we will be meeting with. Then Elder Nelson will be coming with a group of Seventies to the Africa South East Area in late October. He will stay in Nairobi, but Bishop Edgley will be coming here to Dar Es Salaam. Everyone is very excited and looking forward to their visit.

Elder and Sister Worthen, Elders Chimbetete, Rosemann, Coles, Anievas, Elder and Sister Noll

The Nakuru National Park and Lodge

We just had the most amazing weekend at the Lake Nakuru National Park and Lodge in Kenya.  The rooms were lovely, we had an incredible panoramic view of the hills and lake.  We kept thinking how much the grandchildren would have loved seeing all the Zebras, Giraffes, Cape Buffalo, Rhinos, Baboons and LIONS!! The only problem would have been them wanting to jump out of the truck to pet them.  Most probably would have ran away...all but the Lions, that is. Some in our group actually saw the pride take down a Cape Buffalo and enjoy dinner. We drove off a few minutes before and just missed it. What an amazing experience to see these truly magnificent creatures in the wild just a few feet away.  A once in a lifetime experience!

While we were all gathered to enter Nakuru Park,  this monkey jumped on the top of the our truck. 
We took this picture for our grandson, Avery, who LOVES monkeys.

Zebra crossing-right in front of our truck

Giraffe from a distance- beautiful and shy

Lion cubs playing on the road - there were six cubs altogether.

King of the beasts taking a nap

Waking up

You could stare at these beautiful beasts for hours. We were about six feet away.

Make way for the Lions

Up on the rocks again

Elder and Sister Worthen at Nakuru Lodge with a Maasai Warrior

Mommy with baby hanging on for dear life

Mommy and baby Baboon

Pelicans

Cape Buffalo right on the side of the road. He wouldn't move...just kept starring

Many, many Pink Flamingos. Unfortunately the road did not go very close to the Lake at this point.

We came around the corner and this White Rhino was heading down our path

So glad he decided to turn and go another way. Extraordinary beautiful creature! Breathtaking!

We were all in our own vehicles. We rode with the Byrds who knew the difference between the white and black rhinos, and could share all sorts of interesting information about the African wild life. We meandered  along the many roads in the park looking for and chancing upon the animals. When someone saw something really exciting, we would call each other on the phone and let them know the location.What a way to Safari! The best of the best of fun!
On Sunday we had a Sacrament Service with all the couples and President and Sister Broadbent.
It was full of the Spirit while each couple told which hymn was their favorite and why. Many sweet stories and testimonies were shared.  Then everyone sang each couples choice.  It was a powerful meeting. Music invites the Spirit!  We also had a fireside that evening where President shared with us the new training that has come out to enhance Preach My Gospel. He also showed us a new video clip that the Church has produced just for Africa. Amazing weekend! Oh, and did we mention the food?  Excellent!!

More about home in DAR

We love our new home! We are fortunate to have a large reserve water tank so we have a constant supply.  We have to purify it before we can drink it or brush our teeth with it and we also need to keep our mouths closed in the shower. We have adjusted well to this and are so thankful that we have water readily available. The church has supplied all the missionaries, young and old, with a water filtration system.  It was installed for us the day we moved in.   We need to rinse all of our fruits and vegetables in a bleach and water solution before we eat or cook them.  There are no dishwashers here (but us!) and so we also must put bleach in our wash and rinse water. We never know when our electricity will be on or off. Every day and night we are without electricity for many hours at a time.We have fans in most of the rooms, and it is so nice to have them running when the electricity is on.  We have 3 air conditioners...one in our bedroom, the guest room and the living room.  The living room air conditioner is on the "need to fix" list.  We are fortunate to be getting a generator, especially for the very hot days to come this summer (which are December and January). Workers are building a cement block house to keep it in.There are many fundis fixing many things today. All is good!!
We leave for the couples weekend this Friday to the Nakuru National Park and Lodge and are looking forward to meeting with all the Kenya Nairobi Mission couples and Pres and Sister Broadbent. We are told there will be picture opportunities galore with all sorts of African animals. Til then!

Our wonderful water filtration system

Elder and Sister Worthen with building fundis (workers)