Our Salt Lake Visitors

Brother and Sister Marriott, Sister and Brother Stevens

Sister Abraham, Sister Stevens, Sister Gubler, Sister Antoniou

Elder and Sister Maynes and our ENTIRE mission :-)

We have been very fortunate to have Salt Lake guests visiting in Botswana this past month. Here are pictures of Sister Stevens, 1st Counselor in the General Primary Presidency and Sister Marriott, 2nd Counselor in the General Young Women's Presidency. It was so fun to have these delightful women and their husbands speak to us and especially to have them speak with the leadership of the wards, branches and stake in Botswana. Additionally we had Elder Richard J Maynes of the Seven Presidents of the Seventy come and do a training for the Priesthood in Botswana as well as a personal training for the missionaries. We also had Elder Carl B Cook of the 1st Quorum of Seventy come and do training. What an amazing time for all of us. We were told to open our mouths and share the Gospel message ever chance we get. It has been a very spiritual month for us.

It's so wonderful to be able to serve the Lord on a mission! We love the people here. They are so friendly and kind to us. We can't go into a store without someone asking us about the church. Everyone wants to know where are congregations meet. One lady at a store told me that her Mom went to our church when she lived in Gaborone but she has moved to her village is and is 150k from the nearest LDS church. This delightful woman also told me that the missionaries had gotten her off of coffee. :-)

I can't even imagine having these types of conversations in the US. How blessed we are to be in Botswana!

New favorite treat

I found out a couple of weeks ago that if I don't eat wheat my lungs are much happier. So this is my new favorite junk food treat. Dip a rice snack into peanut butter and then into jam. Yum.  (It's almost like a pb&j on bread)

Flat Stanley and His Fun Activities

Some of our favorite people

Elder Gubler in the bush

Sister Gubler and a Termite Mound

We decided to have a few Flat Stanley activities. First, we took Flat Stanley to church with us to meet all of the young people we work with every week.


Here is a picture of Elder Gubler in the African Bush on the way home from Lobatse. The bush is really green and pretty this time of year. In the winter (that's summer in the United States) there is no rain so the bush is really dry.

Other people have US animals crossing the road

Outside the Gaborone Game Reserve

Next, we went to the Gaborone Game Reserve and saw some fun animals.

Here are the fun animals we saw. We couldn't take pictures with Flat Stanley and the animals because the camera couldn't focus on both at the same time.

Oryx, one of few we've seen 

Kudo, he just wanted to pose for us

Impala

Mr Warthog

Monkeys on the fence

Look closely in the tall grass and you can see young ostriches

I Did It!

I had many people asked how I liked Mopane worms  and they weren't impressed with my answer--In a ziplock bag)

I decided to try one. They are kind of saw dusty and salty...not bad but I'm not sure I'll try them again. But I DID IT!! Yeah me!!!

Flat Stanley and Mopane Worms

Dry Mopane worms, YUMMY

Mopane (pronounced: Mow-pa-nee) worms aren't really worms, but are actually caterpillars. They live in Mopane trees. These caterpillars hatch from eggs laid by moths in the Mopane trees.  The caterpillars provide protein for African people and are considered a delicacy. Caterpillars are picked off of the leaves of the Mopane tree by women and children. Using their fingers, the women then squeeze the guts from the caterpillars and set them out to dry. After the caterpillars are dried, they are sold, often by the side of the road by Francistown. Sometimes you can purchase Mopane worms that have been commercially canned. (Then instead of being nice and dry, they are good and slimy)

These Mopane worms were given to Elder Gubler for his birthday by President and Sister Wilson. All of our missionaries have tried Mopane worms. Some like them dried, some like them cooked and squishy and most like the deep fried in oil and crispy.Some people eat the worms with the heads on and some people take the heads off. Sure glad that Flat Stanley could be here to share this treat with us!

Here are a few recipes for cooking with Mopane worms.
Fried Mopane Worms
Ingredients:
   Mopane Worms
   Vegetable oil, heated in a pan
Drop Mopane worms into the hot oil. Take the worms out then they are crispy.

Mopane Stew
Ingredients:
For 4 people

1.  5 Tablespoons Peanut butter
130 Grams Mopane worms
4 Ripe, medium tomatoes, chopped
3 cups water
1 medium Onion
1 teaspoon Deli hot chili sauce
1 pinch salt and pepper

Directions:
1. In a mixing bowl place Mopane worms and water. Soak for at least 4 hours or over night
2. When the worms are re-hydrated they are ready, drain and reserve 1 cup liquid
3. Heat the oil in the pot, add the onions & cook for 3 minutes until soft.
4. Add the worms, tomatoes,peanut butter and chili sauce together with 1/2 of the reserved liquid. Bring to a boil and cook for 5 minutes. Turn down heat to simmer for a further 10 minutes, stirring from time to time. Add more liquid.
5. Season with salt and pepper. Add more chili sauce if  required.
6. Serve with rice.

Allergy Season

This looks like every street in Gaborone right now

In case any of you are wondering about allergies right now in Gaborone during the rainy season, here it is!
Luckily we have allergy pills.

You're having another birthday!

Elder Gubler was able to celebrate his birthday here in Botswana. It was a pretty exciting  birthday for sure. This week we received our Christmas as well as Elder Gubler's Birthday package. We are extremely pleased that everything got here so fast! In the mission office, we live vicariously. When someone gets a package they get to open it in front of those of us in the office. We ooh and awww and are so happy for them. Its like we just received a package ourselves. Elder Klingler always says "Sweet!"

Our Christmas packages held CDs and pictures of our children and grandchildren. Oh, I just want to pick them up and squeeze them!(Not the CDs and pictures but the real grandchildren!) We also received lots of dried fruit, yeast, summer sausage (yummy) and a video of "42", a baseball movie about Jackie Robinson. We have eaten some of the sausage on home made rolls, eaten the yummy fruit, looked and laughed at the photos and just thought of all our special family. Oh how we love you!

Then came the birthday package. Ta-da! Heidi sent the package to us by DHL. But, I gave her our postal address at Postnet Kgale, our mail box. Oops! We didn't think we would ever see the package BUT DHL found us at our physical address! And, on Friday, the day before the big 70. We receive quite a bit of mail from DHL, for the mission office and we think they remembered our name, or it was a just plain miracle! Other than that, we have no idea how it got here but we are so pleased. We both thoroughly enjoyed the book our family put together for Elder Gubler. Oh those letters and the pictures of us all when we were young and had color in our hair! Very thoughtful remembrances from our children and grandchildren.

Flat Stanley came for a visit. I think he wanted to see what was in our Christmas package.

Best companion ever! Birthday boy with his Birthday book and Flat Stanley to help celebrate with us.

In the Birthday package was Flat Stanley. George sent him to visit with us. We will take him into Gaborone with us tomorrow. Hopefully we can get some fun pictures.