Kalene North West Province Zambia

I found this beautiful spot on a recent visit to Zambia. I had heard about the hydro electric scheme which had been installed in that area and so took the opportunity to visit while also visiting the CMML Hospital there. The natural beauty of the place is quite unspoiled despite this huge undertaking of providing power for the hopital and mission station and surrounding area.
A lovely peaceful place for a picnic and a swim and we certainly enjoyed the visit.

visit of my two Harvey nephews....Ian and Graeme

We have had a really great week with Ian and Graeme but sad really that Graeme only has 2 weeks in DR Congo and therefore is now off to spend the rest of this week with Ian his brother in Lubumbashi. Still I am really pleased that he was able to come and we have had a lot of laughs ! He arrived in time to celebrate Sandys birthday on the 25th May and this week in Lubumbashi will celebrate Ians birthday on the 3rd June so we had a pre birthday celebration for their last meal here which was also fun. Any excuse for another celebration and a special meal...it can't be bad !

Trip to Zambia

We have just got back from a very interesting trip to Zambia's North West Province. We did discover that the roads which used to be the envy of the folk on our side of the border are in fact beginning to resemble the ones here !!!

For those who know the district we entered at M'sha crossed the renovated Mukelweji bridge and spent the weekend at Sakeji School because Sandy's friend Hanneke arrived in from South

Africa( New Zealand) on the Saturday. She has come to help us at Katoka for 6mths all being well.It didn't take her long to get aquainted with some of the locals !

While we were in the area we visited the Kalene Turbo scheme which was opened about 2-3 yrs ago. The area has retained its natural beauty and the rapids are quite an amazing sight. Also a perfect spot for a swim.

On Monday we went on to Solwezi a town on the way to the copper belt. The attraction for us was its well stocked super market called Shoprite.....we had fun !!

photo from my last blog,

I am still having trouble with the internet connection, it takes forever to upload and then suddenly cuts out for no apparent reason, however having said that, I still find it amazing that we now have internet out in the african bush, so I shouldn't be complaining really. The offer on the Zain phones too this weekend has been great. If you buy 500 or more units on 2 given days then you receive a bonus of 100%. I put 50$ on my phone and got another 50$ for free, that can't be bad ! Well as you see the photo has finally appeared and this is our little solar oven. So far the temp seems to be sitting at 130C on a bright sunny day so we will continue to experiment and have fun, tomorow we are going to cook rice in it so that will be good.

cooking with solar oven

When I was down in Lubumbashi recently I was invited to join a seminar on solar ovens the why's and the wherefore's and the pros and cons.....well it proved to be a very interesting experience and included meeting an elderly lady working with the Methodist Church in Lubumbashi who was very experienced in this form of cooking and highly recommended it to us all.
I decided to invest in the smaller of the two versions available one was $60 US and the larger version $120 US. Now that our rainy season is almost over I can see we shall be using it on a daily basis but to date we have cooked banana buns, bran muffins, a chocolate birthday cake which was delicious, chicken pieces also scrumptious and this week we have started drying peanuts and sliced banana pieces. We did do bread rolls one day but after the dough having risen beautifully the clouds suddenly came over so we had to finish them in the wood buning stove instead!
The nutrition centre ladies have also started using it for their large soya cake which they make each week and are very enthusiastic now that they have seen and tasted some of the things which we have cooked.
It is such a simple design and one of its big attractions to our local people is that you need neither wood nor charcoal and yet can produce a very nice meal.

army ants

It was about 1 am that I heard Sandy speaking to the night guard in a semi frantic voice !!! Then she knocked at my door..have you got any army ants in there she asked ? No I said but leapt out of bed to see what was going on. Sandy had had an invasion in her room and what was worse was that they had found their way under the mosquito net around her bed and she woke up to find them all through her hair and biting with determined unity ! We went to look in our visitors room and that was also invaded so Sandy decided to go over to the other mission house....I went for a torch and discovered in that few minutes they had also reached my room and the bed was a moving mass.....we decamped together to the other house much to the amusement of the night guards....what was amazing was that by 7am when I returned to investigate there was no sign of them at all they had done their spring cleaning for us of all the cockroaches and any other moving insects and then they had moved out no doubt looking for more lucrative areas to invade ! Something to be glad about as in the Pollyanna game for those who know that from their childhood.....I am glad Sandy woke me in time to avoid having them through my hair.

exam time.

I have been busy marking exam papers for the Ladies Bible School group. They are a very keen and very competetive group of about 30 ladies and we meet once a week on each Monday afternoon

for our study group. Out of 28 who were present on the exam day 21 got more than 50% and the top 3 got 75% and then 2= at 72% so I was very pleased with those results. I just pray that the things which we study will be of practical value to them in their day to day lives. At the end of each term we have a fun and fellowship night at our house and this usual ends with a time of singing and praise as you see in this picture.