In the jungle, the mighty jungle

Our plan for today was to leave town early and drive out to the little village of Makiavale (pronounced Mock ee uh voll ee) and I really don’t know how it is spelled.  It should not be mistaken for the Prince of a similar name—no relation).  We were to attend the services of what was reported to be a 400-500 member congregation of zoramites or pseudo-lds.  Following the service our plan was to hurry back to town in time for our own service at 10 a.m.  Well, although Makiavale is only a half hour away, we discovered that the community we were to visit was considerably further removed from the road and the world as we know it.  The trip was fascinating in every respect—suffice it to say that we never even got close to making it back to the Quelimane service. 

Francisco was our guide.  We have been teaching him for several weeks now.  He lives in Quelimane but we have noted that he has an amazing amount of knowledge about these various other groups which are scattered around the Zambezia province.  Well, as I questioned him today, we came to find out that he is something of the leader/coordinator of all of them.  Stake president in LDS parlance—Bishop for catholics.  Is progressing well in our teaching and is anxious for the gospel to be preached to these groups.  I don’t know if it was our failure to ask or his modesty that heretofore obscured his role in all of this.  Anyway—he showed us where to turn off the road onto a dirt footpath—we assumed it was a short little jaunt that we could walk—but a half hour later we were still winding our way through the literal jungle—weaving our way through huts (reed and stick construction for the most part instead of mud), banana, and palm trees.

  It was really quite beautiful.  The homes were all clean and surrounding areas well cared for.  I neglected to bring my camera—so I must rely on borrowed megapixels from Elders Gee and Brogan who I pressed into service to accompany me (Debbie is still miffed that she had to stay with the Quelimane group this morning).  I did bring my small movie camera which of course possessed a dead battery when I tried to use it.    The drive was beautiful—though slow (it would not have done to run over a goat).  We were told that they have plenty of baboons in the neighborhood—though we saw none this morning.  We could finally drive no further—then after driving a little further left the truck and walked a quarter mile to the gathering place.

They had a nice little chapel that would hold about a hundred or so and in the end, it was only slightly less that gathered for the service.  I asked where the other hundreds were—and Francisco was perplexed and embarrassed since he had represented that far more would be present.  “Next time” he says.  Well, it was a somewhat Pentecostal experience—in a dialect unknown to us.  As I suspected and planned, but had not been told—WE were the service.  After the singing (with something of a Jewish Cantor up front singing in a clear voice—and then being repeated by the congregation—and then various women going off on various riffs and descants of their own. 

They could generally carry a tune and altogether it was fairly pleasant. 

Then they turned to me and I spoke for maybe fifteen minutes—we had a good translator (well, I think he was good but who knows just what he was saying in Chuabo).  The other Elders followed me—Elder Brogan in particular, seemed to garner a few more AMENs and Hallelujahs than I did. 

We closed and I prayed over them and then prepared to leave.  They all gathered outside—the kids quite afraid to approach, but we circulated and greeted and smiled and were warm (literally and figuratively).  They asked us to wait for a moment and finally some emerged from the trees bearing a basket of freshly dehusked coconuts. 

 We walked back to our truck with a procession of singing women and children which really was very cool.  We were presented with our coconut parting gifts and made our way back.