2-8 October 2010

This week we were invited over to Joseph's apartment for African food. He is a recent convert in our ward, from Gambia. He lives in a one room apartment with his roommate, Baks (pronounced Bugs). It was a party! Even though it was literally a studio apartment near the middle of town, there were about 15 people there at different times, including the Assistants, the sisters, and us - 6 missionaries total.

Before the dinner, we had a little time to visit a diamond museum here in Antwerpen, which is supposed to be the diamond capital of the world. We talked to a man who was demonstrating how they polish diamonds and he was very negative about the whole diamond business, what a racket it is, how you always get ripped off whenever you buy diamonds, how he hates his job, etc. Not much of a salesperson for buying diamonds in Antwerpen! He said never buy diamonds unless you have a trusted friend who works in the business. So any thoughts we had of picking up a diamond or two while here, went out the window.

Here's Joseph, holding a friend's baby, welcoming us to his home.

Joseph and Baks made two dishes this night. The first (pictured above) was rice with a peanut sauce and chicken wings - and very hot peppers.

The second dish has a delicious kind of sauce with chicken wings in it and fried kasava root, then poured over rice and put in a big bowl. You all grab a spoon and dig in! It was really fun and very delicious. Kasava root is about 6-8 inches long and about two inches in diameter. It grows like a potato and tastes a little like potato with a hint of coconut.

You can see the two sister missionaries and Elder Relitz here, along with another friend of Joseph's. They put a couple of red hot peppers in it (Scotch bonnets) and they cautioned us to be careful of those. Elder Relitz wanted to try just a little of the juice from one with his rice - but it was so hot and spicy that his face turned red and he could hardly talk, had to motion for his companion to get him some milk fast!

Loel got a big kick out of the cute baby (Owa) that was being passed around as everyone wanted to hold her. We had one round of food, and then Baks came home and started making another round. The other missionaries all had to leave for appointments, but Joseph begged us to stay for the 2nd round, so we did. It was similar food and again, very delicious. We were there for 3 hours! I told Loel that we probably looked a little out of place - the only old white people there! Most Africans speak English, but when they're all together, they speak their own language and the Belgium girls that were there often spoke Dutch, so we heard a myriad of tongues during the evening. It was a really fun, cultural experience.

We really enjoyed general conference last Saturday and Sunday. It felt kind of strange to be watching it over the internet at 10 pm at night! We kind of take conference for granted in Utah, as we can watch it on TV on numerous channels, or listen to it on the radio, or watch it on the internet. Here, if you have internet, you can watch it live at 6 PM and 10 PM. If not, you wait until it's re-broadcast at the Stake Center. We have many in our stake that drive for close to two hours, one way, to watch conference.

We went to Antwerpen for Loel to watch the priesthood session that was re-broadcast on Sunday morning and I went out with the Sister Missionaries to visit an inactive member. She made us Belgium waffles, hot off the grill, with powdered sugar and whipped cream. We had a very nice visit and Sister Fritz felt like it really helped that I was there, as she opened up more than she had in the past. Maybe it helped that we were close to the same age. I hope I can go back.

We had kind of a wild day this week driving to Leiden, in the Netherlands, for a leadership conference. I had boxes and boxes of supplies, plus was supposed to take notes, plus had to help with lunch. Eveline (the Brubakers' helper) cooked two crockpots of sweet and sour chicken, so the day before, Loel and I did the food shopping, brought the food to the mission home for her to cook , and then picked it up at 7:15 am the next morning. We then drove about 2.5 hrs to Leiden, through two bad traffic jams which made us late. Loel dropped me off at the church there, and headed up to Amsterdam, in the van, to pick up Elder Pankratz, then to Almere to the storage unit to get a bed, then way up to Heerenveen, one of the farthest towns north we have missionaries in, delivered the bed, then back to Amsterdam to take E. Pankratz home, then back to Leiden to pick me up. Then we had to drive home. We figured out he had driven 9 1/2 hrs that day! Needless to say, we were tired; especially him.