Groundbreaking for Mission Home and Freetown Stake Center

On 12 January 2013 two groundbreaking ceremonies were held in the Sierra Leone Freetown Mission and the Freetown Sierra Leone Stake.  Before the actual ceremony a news conference was held, sponsored and organized by Sister Mariatu Browne who is the country director for Public Affairs for the church.  She invited Elder and Sister Burns to come and tell about many of the humanitarian projects they are involved in, which include wells in many places, supplies and furnishings for a polio orphanage, and some springboxes to capture and dispense spring water.  They are also helping with a wheelchair fitting and distribution as well as a neonatal training program.  The media was so attentive and asked some very good questions.  President Patrick Swarray, Jr. fielded questions as well as President Richard Roggia. 

President Roggia wields a shovel in the groundbreaking for the new mission home.  It will be located right next door to the mission office in a nice large compound which also includes a church building which houses four wards.  It should be completed by September, a few months after the new mission president arrives in July.  The mission home will also have two apartments for senior couples located below it.

This is the large lot on which will be built the new Freetown Sierra Leone Stake Center.  It will also house the Congo Cross ward, with the hope that more wards will follow in the future.

President Roggia and President Swarray shared the honor of digging some of the first shovels of dirt for the new stake center for the Church's 3000th stake, the Freetown Sierra Leone Stake. They have been partners in the progress of the church here for the past 2 1/2 years.  President Swarray was called as District President in August of 2011.

 

 

After the groundbreaking for the new chapel, many of the media representatives were invited to tour the new Hill Station Chapel which is under construction.  The rock you see in the foreground is a tiny representation of the rock which completely covered and filled the lot where this new chapel is built.  Some of the boulders were taller than a man.  The workers build fires on top of them so they can be broken into pieces and hauled away.  The groundbreaking for this building was held over a year ago.  It has been a painstaking process to clear the ground enough to build the building.

 

This is a good view of the construction and you can see our two trusty mission vans in the background.  The gray one is old and will soon be retired.  The white one was purchased for Elder Holland's visit in February 2012 and has hauled many missionaries on transfers.

New Year's Day Hike

We met this little boy at the first of our hike.  He is carrying his breakfast.  The sticks in the background are used in construction to provide support for cement floors while the cement hardens.  They also build scaffolding with them

We found some beautiful gardens growing in the valley close to a small creek.  The creek will run until March so the people are growing all they can until then.

If you look closely, you will see the bananas growing on this tree.  Many of the banana trees look as "messy" as this one.  The old leaves are allowed to drop around the base to compost and provide nourishment to the tree.

There are many unusual fruits that grow in Africa.

This woman waters all of her gardens with these two watering cans.

 

This is St. Andrews Church in an area of Freetown called Gloucester. 

 

The front entrance to St. Andrews church (and a good companion)

Taking a moment to relax and enjoy the scenery.

A home dating back to the colonial period.  This house had wood siding.  The newer African construction is all done with cement blocks.

Children pause for a "snap."  They always want to see what it looks like after you take it.

We found the children playing near this slide, the only piece of playground equipment at St. Andrews School across from the church.

This is newer African construction.  They are quite skilled at building with concrete.  They love their brightly colored homes.

A beautiful cabbage patch growing alongside equally beautiful lettuce.  We are grateful for gardens such as these that provide the produce we enjoy her in Sierra Leone.

A big thank you to our good friends, the Lauritzens, who took us on our New Year's Day hike. 

Young Single Adult Activity

We were invited by the Young Single Adults from the Lumley Branch to attend the activity they sponsored for the YSA's of the whole stake.  Marian Campbell, who was on the organizing committee, asked us to judge their "quiz competition."  She had written some questions about the Church and its doctrine.  Each branch who attended had an opportunity to answer the questions.  We kept track of whose turn it was and kept score. 

We  awarded the certificate for highest points to a young man from Goderich Ward and the certificate for the “Best Quizzer”  to a young 11-year-old girl, Virginia, from Congo Cross Ward, who answered 3 questions—all of them fairly difficult.  She quoted 1 Nephi 3:17 for one of the answers! The YSA’s had an opportunity to bear their testimonies and then they had a dance, complete with loud music out in the courtyard of the Church.  We left just after the dancing started, but we could tell they were all ready to dance and celebrate.

The Young Single Adults enjoy watching the organizing committee introduce themselves with a little dance exhibition.

The committee and their dance exhibition.  Notice the young men all have matching blue shirts and the young women all have matching pink shirts.

Our young friend, Marian Campbell, who helped organize the activity.  Not long after this activity she received her mission call to the Nigeria Enugu Mission.  She will be the first sister in the Freetown Sierra Leone Stake to serve at age 20.

Christmas in Sierra Leone

We decided to do something for Christmas in Sierra Leone that we could not do at home.  We decided to have a barbecue.  Elder Lauritzen offered to be our chef.  The Roggias had brought a barbecue grill with them and had only used it one other time, the Christmas after they arrived, so we asked to borrow it.  Elder Lauritzen filled it with the local charcoal that the locals cook on and it performed beautifully.

Hamburgers are not traditional Christmas dinner fare, but lots of things are different here in Sierra Leone, including that water tank you see in the background. 

Here is our happy group, including Sister Cathy Burns, Elder Ron Burns, Sister Marlene Lauritzen and Elder Mike Laurizen.  We had hamburgers, potato salad, deviled eggs, pasta salad and lemon bars, coconut cookies and ice cream for dessert.

Christmas Eve with Basma and Nadia

We were invited by our landlord, Mohammed Basma, and his wife, Nadia to have dinner with them on Christmas Eve.  It was a lovely occasion.  Nadia cooked most of the day to prepare our food.  We had three different kinds of meat, including some whole fish, all of it prepared so well.  There were some Lebanese vegetables, some hummus and Lebanese flatbread as well.  We enjoyed some lovely pastries and ice cream for dessert.  Best of all, Basma, who is Lebanese, but who was born here in Sierra Leone, told us a lot about the history of Sierra Leone and some of the progress that is being made.  We discovered that he is a good resource for people to help us, such as a good mechanic to fix our cars.  He lives next door to us and has helped the Church find properties to rent for apartments and chapels for many years.  He is Muslim, but is a good "friend to the Church."




 

A Visit with the Haws

We had a visit from a couple serving in Ghana on 18-20 December 2013.  They are Elder Greg and Sister Debi Haws.  They are assigned as auditors and they travel around to each of the ten countries in the Africa West Area and train the local auditors to conduct the audits of the church units.  They will see a lot of West Africa before their mission is over.  We love meeting new couples and the Haws were no exception.  We enjoyed a lovely dinner with them at Country Lodge and had a nice visit in the two days they were here in Sierra Leone. We took these"snaps" on Lumley beach on our way to the hovercraft which took them to the airport.




 

 

"Primary Day"

Sunday, 16 December, 2013 was what the members were calling “Primary Sunday.”  It is a tradition in the Freetown District (now Freetown Stake) to have all of the Children’s Sacrament Meeting Presentations on the same Sunday.  We have been serving for several weeks in the Belliar Park Branch (now Belliar Park Ward) and so I decided to try to attend all four sacrament meeting presentations.  We started at 8:30 with the Freetown Ward.  They had a simple program but it was beautiful.  Two young girls gave talks (probably at least 5 minutes each).  One of their Primary teachers spoke and then they had a group of about seven children sing two Christmas Primary songs.  At 10:30 we attended the Dwarzak Ward presentation and it was picture perfect.  I was so proud of Sister Pieh-Sharkeh.  She had asked me how to organize the program and I had shown her how to do it, but she had written it all herself and handed out all the parts.  Each child had about three speaking parts and the Primary as a whole sang six of the eight songs for the year.  Many of those songs they had learned just in the last six weeks because Sister Pieh-Sharkeh had not known before what the Children’s Sacrament Meeting presentation entails.  She has been a member less than a year.  She spoke at the end of the presentation in a well-prepared talk, praising the children and encouraging parents to teach their children the gospel.  Bishop Oneil closed the meeting with a wonderful address thanking the Primary leaders, but especially Sister Pieh-Sharkah. At 12:30 I attended the Belliar Park Ward Children’s sacrament meeting presentation.  There were about four children with parts to say, then two children with well-written talks prepared and then the children sang five songs.  It was well-done and I was so proud of Sister Charlie.  She gave a wonderful talk at the end highlighting many of the gospel principles she has taught the children this year in sharing time (she has taught the Valiant Class and taught Sharing Time and Singing Time all on her own this past year; she has a counselor who teaches the CTR class.) Bishop Sesay spoke at the end praising her and her counselor and saying that he has seen changes in his own daughter this past year and knows that the Primary leaders have played a big part in those changes.

Dwarzak Ward Primary before their Children's Sacrament Meeting Presentation.

Dwarzak Ward Primary

Dwarzak Ward Primary Leaders

This girl and the one below both helped direct the music for Dwarzak Ward during the Children's Sacrament Meeting Presentation

 

Belliar Park Primary

Belliar Park Primary Leaders

Mt. Aureol Ward Primary

Mt. Aureol Ward Primary leaders