Week Two — Eswatini — 10 to 16 July 2022

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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.

Boerewors — farmer’s sausage
TWR guest rooms with 7 rooms (2 twin bed), large kitchen, 4 toilets,
3 showers, large meeting room and screened porch
Looking across the foot bridge from the guest rooms toward the transmitter building.
The maintenance team has just finished replacing and treating the wood.
View of transmitter site from guest rooms. If you look closely (or enlarge the photo), you can see lots of large round bales of hay that has been baled still on the antenna field.
This round building next to the guest rooms is the pump house. The same concrete forms were used to make the water tank that sits on top of a high concrete tower located 400 feet up the slope from this location. The braai pit/grill is under the tree to the left. Note the cactus growing next to the sycamore tree, so close their branches intertwine.

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.