Sunday 10 July – We attended Evangelical Bible Church in Manzini, the only church we have attended while in Swaziland since 1974. Their service starts with about 45 minutes of singing (mixture of old hymns and newer songs with lots of audience particpation) and testimonies. It is so good to hear the harmony when hymns are being sung. The sermon by Pastor Deon Phillips on Matthew 6:25-31 was about no need to worry. Some of the founding members are still around, and many of the children and grandchildren of those that have died still attend.

The Pieffers had invited us to join them at Mlilwane Game Sanctuary for a braai (cooking meat over a fire), but after church we found a note on our windshield letting us know that theIr son Lucas sick. They were inviting us instead to a braai outside at their home. We had a good time of visiting with them for the afternoon.

Monday 11 July – Forgot to take notes on my activity at the site, but do remember checking to verify the transmitters were still tuning for optimum efficiency.

Tuesday 12 July – Virginia joined Steve and Lorraine Stavropoulos to come to the transmitter site today. They organized a braai for lunch at the guest rooms across the river from the transmitter building. The braai consisted of steak and boerewors.

Wednesday 13 July – Decided to stay in town today to exchange some of our cash – we get about 17 lilangeni (Eswatini’s currency) for each dollar exchanged. We also needed to do some grocery shopping as the food that was stocked in the fridge and cupboards for our arrival was starting to run out. We found food prices at the supermarket to be fairly comparable to U.S. prices. Fresh fruits and vegetables that may be a little cheaper. Previously we’ve always used cash to buy groceries here, but our missionary colleagues advised using cards instead of carrying so much cash. We brought two credit cards, one Master Card and one Visa, and had called both before leaving the U.S. to let them know of our travel plans. We were told that for purchases of more than 500L (about $30) we would need to use our PIN. Since we have never had to use our PINs in the U.S., we do not remember them, so we made sure our first purchase was less than $30. The Master Card was declined, but the Visa was accepted. We then made a second purchase for a little more than $30, knowing that we had enough cash on hand. The check-out person was very surprised (and we were relieved) that the purchase went through without requiring a PIN.

On Sunday, Ruth Crowie, one of the founding members of Evangelical Bible Church, invited us to her home for a meal. Her son, Calvin, confided with us that his mom (85 years old in August) repeats herself and is forgetful, so we called her this morning and asked if we could bring something for lunch. She suggested fish and chips (french fries), so we stopped at The Fish and Chips Co in Riverstone Mall

[http://www.riverstonemall.co.sz/] and picked up their ‘kaasi’ special – 4 small hake fillets, 4 russians (sausages), 4 dinner rolls and ‘kaasi’ fries – for less than $12. Not sure what ‘kaasi’ means, but I think it must means ‘gigantic’. The small hake fillets were as long as a dinner plate is round. Wonder how big the large ones are? We ate until we were full and still brought well over half home! We got two more meals out of it.

Thursday 14 July – stayed home from work to gather items, photos and listener excerpts for our August 2002 McGuiReport that is due tomorrow.

Friday 15 July – finished up our McGuiReport and sent it to proof readers and family members for approval. The Stavropouloses invited us over after supper to play games. Played a new game (to us) called Ticket to Ride Europe.

Saturday16 July – worked on our McGuiReport making the changes suggested by family members and proofreaders, then cleaning up text around photos. Will probably wait until Monday to submit it for printing in case some more change requests come in. Also wrote the first two entries for this blog. My laptop (Windows Vista) is so outdated that our daughter-in-law had to actually do the final posting for us. [Thanks, Joyce]! Could probably do editing and posting from my Kindle Fire, but it would be more cumbersome.

Wednesday 6 July – My first meeting of the day was not until ll a.m so we were able to catch up on sleep deprivation and jet lag. The two-hour meeting was held at the TWR Eswatini office at Singing Pines – only a couple hundred feet from where we are staying. Stephen Murray met with Steve Stavropoulos (Station Director), Tobi Pfeiffer (Chief Engineer) and me about some long term goals and operation strategies.

Since our last visit in 2016, more of the administrative duties are being managed at the TWR Africa Support Center in South Africa. As a result of the reduction in Eswatini staff, TWR decided to remodel one of the smaller buildings at Singing Pines and rent out space in the larger 3-story building in downtown Manzini that TWR built in 1992. Part of the space in this larger building is used by Voice of the Church [https://vocfm.org] which broadcasts over a network of seven FM stations that TWR started 27 years ago. A couple years later the network was handed over to local Christian leaders to manage. It is now self-sustaining. Other Christian missions and ministries are also using the downtown building.

We had supper with Tobi and Britta Pfeiffer and their three sons, David, Lucas and Samuel.

Thursday 7 July – I left at 6:50am with the day shift and headed to the transmitter site, taking the parts that we had carried in our luggage. A short time of devotion and prayer is held each weekday at 7:30am before starting to work. I spent most of the day familiarizing myself with the changes since we were here 6 years ago.

Tobi asked for Larry’s advice about repairing a damaged guy anchor. An unattended tractor had rolled into it. Fortunately the guy anchor and guy wire (supporting a tower and antenna) held with the most damage to the hood of the tractor. The anchor consists of a large 4′ X 3′ X 2′ high block of concrete about six feet under ground level with a rod coming up through the ground. That rod is encased in about 8” diameter of concrete to keep it from rusting. That encasement concrete had broken and the rod was bent. Larry suggested removing all that concrete down to the anchor block to assess the damage and determine how to proceed.

The day shift ends at 4:30pm and we are back at our homes about 5:10pm. This trip is much faster than ever, since a four lane highway has been built from Manzini to the ‘new’ airport. Over half our week day drive is on this freeway with a speed limit of 120km/h (75mph). Most drivers, including us, keep it under 60mph. This improvement has all happened since we were here 6 years ago. Now there is a freeway all the way from the South Africa border post (Ngwane) to the airport, except for a short stretch being worked on through the town of Manzini.

Friday 8 July – I worked with one of the transmitter technicians to show him how to install one of three fiberglass insulators that we made in Elkhart in May.

Saturday 9 July – Steve and Lorraine Stavropoulos took us to Hlane Game Reserve for the day. We had a great time and saw hippo, impala, nyala, warthogs, about 10 rhino, a few giraffe and one elephant well hidden in the bush.

Stephen Murray and his wife Teresa picked us and all our baggage up about 11am for the five hour trip to eSwatini. We visited the bakery next to the TWR Africa Service Center to purchase savory pastries to eat during the trip. We stopped at Alzu rest stop, which is about midway, for some drinks. The view from the restroom windows looks out over a small game farm with rhinos, Cape buffalo, eland and other small game.

Next stop was at the border were we had to check out through the South Africa border post, then in through the Eswatini border post. That process was quick until we got to the eSwatini border gate where we were informed we needed to pay a car tax, because the car had South Africa license plates. Neither Stephen or Larry had thought of that, so back to the border post to take care of that. Back again at the border gate, we were again informed that we would have to pay tax on the case containing a transmitter part, so back to the border post again to get in line for customs.

Fortunately, there were only two truck drivers in front of us at customs, so about half an hour later (it was now past sundown) we proceeded through the border gate for the 45 minute trip to our final stop at the TWR houses on Singing Pines Farm just past Manzini. The house we are staying in is named “Kiegala Pinnata.” We know it as the Kimber house, because the Kimber family lived in it during our previous three trips. We have also stayed in it on at least one of our trips.

NOTE—in case you missed it, Eswatini was spelled two ways in this blog entry. Doing some research, we could find no ‘official’ right way for it to be spelled. When the King announced the name change in 2018, it appears he used “eSwatini”, yet in most places we see Eswatini being used. The country’s currency still has “Central Bank of Swaziland” on it.