Update on the gun battle

  We've been learning a little bit more about what the gun fight was about the other night.  A group of seven Indi-Pakistanis were trying to abduct a guy and hold him for ransom.  They followed him to our Gastros and attempted to kidnap him there.  The two guards up the street at the police station who stand at their gate with AK47s noticed what was going on -- and that's when the 'fun' started.
  Our guard, Feete, said that one of the gang was standing in the driveway to our complex shooting up the street - that's why it sounded like like they were right in our parking lot.  Our apartment is the first one as you come  into our complex.  That is also where he died, right in our driveway!  Another one was shot just across the street from us.
  Three of the seven were shot and killed here and the other four ran away.  The police chased them down our street and all the way down into Analamahitsy.  They got away; but I don't think they will be coming back to this neighborhood.  I'm sure they didn't plan on all the police and guns in this neighborhood.

That's our car on the left, just inside our gate.  The Humanitarian couple, the Richards, live on the right.

Gunshots in the Dark!

  We had a little excitement last night!  About 8 pm we were both sitting at our dining room table working on our computers when we heard what we first thought were some fire crackers.  It didn't take long to figure out that they were gunshots and there were LOTS of them! They were very close to us, some of them sounded like they were out in our parking lot. 
  We turned off all the lights and sat here in the dark for a few minutes, then started worrying about all of our missionaries.  I had talked to the Richards, who live next door to us, a couple of hours before and they were up at the Mission Office calling some of their kids in the US.  First we called them to tell them to stay there if they were still at the office, but they were home and hearing the same things we were.  Since President and Sister Adams are down in Tomatave this weekend, we called the APs and had them check on all of the missionaries to make sure that they were in a safe place.  They were all fine.
  On Thursday of last week they had announced the official results of the elections that were held a month ago; since then there has been a military 'take over' in ten of the provinces, mostly down south.  We were worried that some of the political unrest was making it's way to Tana.

  We live right by the prison here, in fact our back 'yard' wall is the wall of the prison.  Just up the street from us, between our house and the Mission Home, there is a police station and military installation where they have soldiers with machine guns standing by the gate at all times.  Also, down the street a couple of blocks is another police station.  We are pretty much surrounded by people with guns. 

  After the initial shooting right by our house, it sounded like it moved down the street a ways before it finally stopped.  I'm sure it didn't go on for more that 15 or 20 minutes, but it sure seemed like it was a long time.  Everything was quiet the rest of the night.  And I do mean quiet, no traffic on the street, no dogs barking - just quiet. 
  This morning when we went out to go to Church, I kind of half expected to see bullet holes in the back of our car.  We couldn't see anything wrong. We talked to Elder Richards early this morning and he  had been out front checking things out.  The guard, we have a guard at the entrance to our complex 24 hours a day, he was telling a bunch of the residents what he had seen going on last night, but Elder Richards doesn't understand Malagasy so didn't know what he was saying.   When we got to Church we cornered one of the members who is with the police.  He told us what had happened and then gave us his phone number so that we could call him at any time day or night.  After Church Dad took a couple of the missionaries down to our house and had them talk to our guard to see what his version was of what had happened last night.
  A group of five or six armed East Indians went into Gastro's, a Pizza place about 100 yards up the street from our house, planning to rob them.  We're not exactly sure when the shooting started, but you can imagine with all of the gun power on this street, it didn't take long until a few shots turned into LOTS of gun shots!  Two of the robbers were shot and killed and the others took off; that is when the shots started going down the street.  Apparently the others got away.
  These guys must not have checked out the situation very thoroughly or were overly optimistic, with all of the police and military right here on this street it probably wasn't the best place they could have chosen to rob.  I know of a 'List' they could go on!  "World's ________ Criminals".
  Everything is calm and quiet tonight.  We are sure glad.

Spring is Beautiful

  Spring is beautiful over here with all of the jacaranda trees in bloom, you can see their gorgeous purple flowers all over the city.  Down towards the 'downtown' area is a lake with a statue out in the middle,  it has these beautiful jacaranda trees all the way around it.  It is quite a sight.

You want to be careful walking under a jacaranda tree.  The flowers are like little cups that fill with water in the night and then as the day warms up the little cups of water turn upside down and the water spills out.  Sister Richards thought that a bird got her really good the other day when she walked under one of the trees!  She was relieved to see it was only water.

   Whenever you go anywhere and get stopped in traffic - which is ALL of the time.  There is always someone that comes up to your car with their hand out begging for anything that you might give them.  Lots of times it's the little kids, but it is people of all ages.  Apparently, no one feels ashamed to beg here.  I just had to take a picture of this lady with two babies.  After we took her picture we gave her something.

  Most of the people here have very little.  More than 70% of the people live on less than 2,000 AR a day, which is less than $1 USD.  I can't imagine what it would be like to try and find enough money each day just to feed your kids.  These two babies don't look like they are starving, but we have seen some who are really skinny and do look like they are starving. 
  The lady and her two kids who live by the garbage dumpster down the street from us look hungry.  They sit there all day and go through what everyone throws away, hoping for something that they can use or eat.  When we take our garbage out I try to put some things that they can eat or use in plastic bags so that it doesn't get dirty.  All of the garbage dumpsters all over the city are gone through numerous times before the garbage is finally hauled away.  We are so blessed!  It makes us feel guilty that we are so blessed, and so are our children and grandchildren.

  I've always told Dad that 'I am not a pioneer'.  Living here must be a little bit what it was like for our pioneer ancestors.  Most of the people have no indoor bathroom, they have to haul whatever water they use, dirt floors, one room houses, no glass windows, hopefully they have shutters that they can close.  We live in a nice little apartment, but many around us live very humble lives.  Every day I am thankful for my toilet that flushes and the water that runs out of the tap for a shower, even on the days when it is just a trickle and you hope it will be enough to get the soap rinsed off.

  Just to the side of our house they are building another level on a two story little building.  They build them out of bricks that they make out of the mud out in the rice paddies.  During the winter here they make bricks out in the rice paddies; I guess that is why each little rice paddie has a 'lip' all the way around it.  They clear out the mud making bricks and then when it rains, it floods each individual little rice paddy and the water stays in the field to water the rice.  When they have a bunch of the bricks all made they stack them all up with a hollow spot in the middle and then light a fire inside to cure the bricks.  As you drive down the country you see lots of little mounds of bricks 'smoking' out in the rice fields.
  As we have watched him build we have noticed that he puts a 'little bit' of dirt and water between the bricks, then taps on them until they look even with the others around it.  This afternoon he was putting a piece of wood all around the top, he's probably getting ready to put the roof on.  It's none too soon for the roof as it usually rains every evening now. 
  He will end up putting some plaster or concrete looking stuff on the outside and then it will look like it is a concrete building and will look very sturdy.  But we know what is really on the inside of those walls!  There is an eight story apartment building just down from the Mission Home, and it is built the same way.  Sure hope there is never an earthquake here - everything will crumble!

Missionary Work

    A few days before our October 30 missionaries were to depart, Elder Cloward and I went teaching with Elder Randall and his Malagasy companion.  We went to see two families that evening.  The first family lived in a little house down this alley.  Elder Randall said that we could drive down there and it would be okay.  As we got driving down there we got lots of strange looks from some of the people walking along; the further down there we got we really started to understand those strange looks.  It got to the point that we had about 6 inches on each side of the car, and that was after we had folded both side mirrors in.  When we got to where their house was, we pulled over as much as we could, which wasn't much, and people just had to walk around the car.
  Their house had the main room that was big enough for a double bed, a little love seat and a cupboard with a television on top.  It had a real wooden door and a little window way up high with a shutter that would close.  There was some kind of other room also cause when the little boy had to go to the bathroom they went in there.  It had concrete walls and a  concrete floor.  The room was really clean, everything had a place; because there was No Room for anything to be out of place!
   The little family that lived there had a five year old little girl and then twin boys 22 months old.  Often the Mom and Dad would be gone, either working or looking for work, and the five year old would tend those two little boys, feed them, change them and take care of them for hours at a time.    The little family had been members for several months and they were teaching the Dad's cousin and his fiance over there. It was awesome to talk with them about the importance of families.
   When we first walked into the house, the little girl started to scream and cry and climbed back to the back of the bed as far away from us as she could get.  From what I understood, it was all of my white hair that had her so scared.  I've heard a few times that I look like a ghost.  By the time we left the little girl was my good friend, holding onto my hand and trying to climb up me.
  In order to get our car out of there half the neighborhood came out and they took down a fence so that we could get turned around.  The whole area knew that we had been there!

   The next family, a mother and three kids (a 14 years old girl, 10 year old boy and about a 6 or 7 year old girl), lived in a little one room wooden house out in the middle of some fields; I think they were rice paddies but don't know for sure because it was dark by the time we got there.  We walked along this little raised path out in these fields to where there were about 15-20 little one room 'houses'.  The lady had met us about half way along the path.  When we got to her house her 14 year old daughter was sitting on a bench seat out of an old taxi busse studying on a little 2x3 foot table by the light of one little candle.  Dad had a flashlight in his pocket and he stuck it to the metal ceiling.  It really lit up that little room.  All of his flashlights have certainly come in handy.
  They had fabric hanging over the door and the one window.  There was barely enough room for a double bed on one side with their belongings stacked on the bottom of the bed, and a twin bed on the other wall.  In between there was the seat out of a van, a little table that they could eat on and then another little 2x3 foot table against the other wall that had a couple of pans  and a jug of water under it.  Almost all of the people here cook on little charcoal burners either just outside their door or just inside the house.  It is always smoky here.
   This sweet lady that lives there is working like crazy just so she and her three kids can survive, and what she is worried about is making sure that she has a temple recommend.  She knows that she won't actually be able to go to the temple, but she wants to have a recommend.  The church here will help families to go to the temple in Johannesburg for the first time when they are going to be sealed as a family.  She won't be able to go because her husband is in prison.  She would like to get a divorce from him but she doesn't have the money to do it.  She was such a sweet lady, and it was wonderful to get to visit with her and to help teach her a little bit. 
   Going into these peoples houses and seeing how sweet and humble they are really makes you realize what is important and how much we need to be doing to help them.  It sure is humbling.

We  have a sign in our office of the definition of a missionary:

I love this little sign.  It certainly keeps things in perspective.




  

Gardens grow all over the world

  It has been a pretty crazy month here.  The days seem to be flying by, and we just hope that we get everything done that we need to.
  The garden out front is growing amazingly well.  We have lots of little green tomatoes on our tomato plants, and the zucchini plants are heading for the gate, they may end up out on the street at some point.  Dad takes really good care of it, he waters every morning before we head to the Mission Office and again in the evening if it doesn't look like it is going to rain.

This picture is from a few weeks ago.

Dad spent part of Saturday staking his tomato plants.