Happenings of the week 18-24 January

This has been a week of much travel, reasonable distances to Pinetown, Kwadabeka, KwaMashu, Mpumalanga, and further to Richard's Bay which is about two hours from Durban. In our travels we have signed loan documents with several students, Sandy is still trying to develop more patience as our students "hunt and peck" entering their applications on the computer, and have given orientations to other prospective students. There have been shouts of joy upon receiving our phone calls telling of the approval of their PEF loans in Salt Lake. There have also been tears shed when we have had to say, "There can be no loan this semester because you haven't met the deadlines." Of course we love to hear the happiness, since we know they are going to have the blessing of an education, but our hearts ache for the ones who have to put off starting school for six months due to the lack of money. The loan process is lengthy and time consuming, so we always encourage our kids to not put off filling all the requirements in order to be ready for the new school year, but for some they think school starting dates are so far off!

On Monday we received an e-mail from Elder and Sister Von Stetten, missionaries in the Area PEF Office in Jo'burg. We have shared the MTC experience, training for PEF in Johannesburg and talk with them almost daily about PEF questions, concerns and joys over the past 14 months. Their email was sharing the news that they have been called to preside over a mission somewhere in the world and will be leaving shortly to return to the United States in order to make ready for their July departure. There will be a large empty spot in the office until another couple can be called to fill their shoes. So, another plug for couples to put in their mission papers and our Durban Mission is still down a couple or two!


Thandiwe with her son. Thandiwe has studied nursing for one year on her own and is needing some help this year, so is applying for a PEF loan. A number of our students are married or single parents. Each time we add a prospective student to our growing list (150+), we take a picture to help us remember their faces when we see them again.

These three young ladies saw us taking a picture of one of our PEF students and felt they needed their picture taken also. They are primary children in the Mpumalanga Branch.