AFRICA NEWSLETTER #6

Our most exciting news is about the wheelchairs.  Fifty completed chairs were given to recipients at a ceremony held at the Bonapriso Branch on March 21 2009.  What a sight it was to see the Tricycle chairs lined up along side our little Branch.  Recipients were chosen by two handicap organizations.  They arrived by taxi and Moto.  Our Elders had to carry many of them into the church.  A few literally crawled in. 

The Branch Missionary Committee planned a nice program and we served sandwiches and a fruit drink. Once again our Elders served these needy people, serving them food and drink.  One man had brought his brother to receive a chair and was so overcome with gratitude that he almost cried expressing his thanks.  A woman hugged and hugged us.  We who are so use to the handicapped having corrective surgery in the U.S. had a hard time seeing these twisted and broken bodies.  After eating, the missionaries and young adults from the Branch carried them to the chairs.  Up and down the long driveway they practiced driving them.  Two little girls cheered for their mother, clapping when she mastered the pedaling technique. It was a thrilling day.  We will be giving away more soon, an opportunity to bless 50 more lives.

We had another fun day in Limbe with the Elders seeing the monkey refuge and the ocean.  On our way home we bought a loaf of Nigerian bread.  Many Nigerians live in and around Limbe.  It is very good.  When you slice into the bread, it looks and feels like Angel Food cake.  It makes good toast.  The people selling it stand alongside the road, just waiting for you to slow down so they can run out and peddle their wares.   It is an unsliced loaf about the size of a loaf of sandwich bread.  On the bottom their initials are stamped in the bread.  We suppose they all claim to be the best bakers.  Along the way are rubber trees all with the tapping spout and cup hanging on the side of the tree.  Del Monte has a large banana plantation here too.  We were lucky the police stopped us only once.  They look at our papers and if they want you can get hung up for a long time.  

While traveling around the city we see some interesting cottage industries. Several places we see men with little grinders with a thin blade all mounted on a little bench.  He sits there all day slicing old rubber tires into different lengths and widths.  Each size is coiled up in a pile on the sidewalk.  Customers select the size they want and buy right off the street.  They are used for tie downs, bungee cords and even belts for cars, motos, and equipment.  Others cut metal cans of all sizes into stoves to grill on.  They have a grate on the top and a hole on one side to feed the wood or charcoal into. Some get fancy and paint them with aluminum paint.

Several places we have seen men with a pile of rocks beside them hitting the rocks with hammers breaking them into gravel.  At the Wouri River, canoe-like wooden boats are tied up to poles.  The owners shimmy down the pole onto the river bottom bringing up bucket loads of sand to sell.  

Almost every corner has a woman cooking on a stove or grill of some sort, preparing her specialty to sell.  We are beginning to wonder if anyone cooks at home.  It looks like everyone is eating on a bench or under a tree all along every street.  Every morning carts of water jugs are hauled to the bottling company to fill them at the outside spigot.   We have been told that it is free to do this.  The carts haul them back to the cartea, (neighborhood) to the owner of the jug.  Africans are survivors!


Samuel was Baptized on Sunday.  After being confirmed he bore a powerful Testimony of the church.  We were amazed  at how a new member could speak.  A quote to remember--”It is better to repent and prevent than to repent and repent”;  this from his teacher Elder Neilson.  

We love the work!  
Elder and Sister Willis