Easter meeting, rural home and more visitors

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Our four day Easter meeting ended with a Sunrise service on Easter morning.  We had a good crowd that attended the meeting and the church was packed everyday.  We had a wonderful time of singing, dancing, preaching, lessons and celebrating the Resurrection.


After church we packed up and Rachel, Samantha and I left to my rural home in Batanai to spend the night with the Mereki family.  The girls got to experience life in the bush from picking soybeans in the field to eating sadza, maize, drinking mahewu, and a big rain storm.  We had a great time and got to sleep and relax over the holiday which extended until Monday here.  Michael, Major's son drove us there and back and boy is the road terrible.  Took us 70 minutes for 25 kms (19 miles)!


Tuesday we were back to work and then joined by 3 high school students from Chinhoyi: Evelyn, Hogan and Zane.  Zane is the oldest son of Nick and Lindale Adams, fellow missionaries in Chinhoyi. All of these kids are interested in maybe pursuing medicine and so they stayed with us until Saturday.  They enjoyed following on rounds, learning to do dressings and helping file medical records.  All of them had great time and it seemed to help them decide this is what they want to pursue.  We wish them well in their future studies and they all promised to come back in the future for more "fun."


With them came Janeece England.  Janeece is  from Indiana and helps to cover for missionaries when they are on furlough.  She is helping in Chinhoyi until May.  I have known her for many years as she and her late husband, Steve, used to cover several times for Ben and Karen Pennington in Masvingo.  We put Janeece to work finding lost ART records.

On Wednesday we had a surprise visit by two of Shannon Kwatchnera's children and their children.  Walter and his wife and 2 children live in London area and Ruth and her 3 children came who live in Johannesburg, South Africa.  Mai Kwatch has worked at the hospital since the late 1970's and we have known these children since they grew up here.  It was nice to see them with their children and hear about their lives.


On Thursday Janeece left with Rachel and Samantha for 3 nights and 4 days at Rhino Camp in Kariba on safari.  They will be back Sunday night.  I am sure they will have lots of stories to tell when they get back.  Rachel and Janeece will leave on Tuesday and then just a couple of weeks left with Samantha.


The kids left this afternoon when Lindale came with their other 2 children, Trent and Serine came to pick them up and have lunch with us.  I now have 24 hours all by myself--yeah!  Watching some TV and napping as I came down with a terrible cold Wednesday.  Hope it will be over soon.





Church meeting--Saturday night meeting



 Sunrise Service Easter Sunday




Sunrise Service-- Singing 






Easter baskets for Rachel and Samantha

Samantha washing for sadza in the village

Major bringing in the soybeans






Samantha and Rachel with Major in the kitchen at Baton





























Mai Kwatch with daughter-in-law, son Walter and daughter Ruth and some of her grandchildren

 Evelyn helping with vital signs for pregnant women


Students and Samantha helping to set an arm 





Janeece England helping find ART records

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