Machakahiri's, Crafts, and Cornrows

Serious crafting, making scrapbooks, with the Machakahiri daughters. Ellie, Lottie, and Eve are above. I love their school uniforms. These girls are smart and know how to cook, sew, crochet, etc. in their young teens. Eve's given several sacrament meeting talks in church and delivers like an adult. 2023.06.23

    Friday, June 23rd, Mary Machakahiri, a sister in our Highland ward and the stake president's wife, asked me to come to teach "crafts" to their 7 daughters. Yes, they have seven beautiful daughters from ages 14-4, Eve (14), Ellie (13), Lolly (11), Laura (10), Amy (7), Adrianna (6), and Sophia (4). All the girls are remarkably mature for their age, not only physically but spiritually. They speak in church and do musical numbers. I've been impressed with their testimonies at such a young age. They all want to be future missionaries, both their parents served full-time missions. Pres. Sawman Machakahiri, our stake president, works for a Utah/Arizona company, Young Living Products. He does very well and has a beautiful home with a swimming pool and tennis court. There is plenty of room for their large family and three dogs!

    I decided to teach the girls how to scrapbook photo albums. Mary and I went shopping last Tuesday, and she bought all the supplies, paper, and binders they'd need. At first, it was mass chaos! The younger ones were fighting over the scissors and glitter etc. Once we got the order and they started "crafting" as they like to call it, everyone was quiet and busy being creative. Mary wants their daughters to learn life skills and be prepared to serve missions. She also told me her mother lived so far away and the girls didn't have a grandma to influence them. She wanted me to be an adoptive grandma; I was honored. Their mother is very wise and patient; she wants the girls to learn and interact with different cultures and Americans as much as possible. 

    Their mother, Mary, left me to prepare for a large dinner party she was hosting for the HXP (Humanitarian Experience Program). Evidently, the Machakahiri's host a party every 2 weeks for these groups of about 20-25 teenage volunteers. They invited us to stay for dinner and the festivities. They brought in a live African band for a dance. The HXP group is mainly LDS based out of Salt Lake, who come to build a school in Zimbabwe and donate their time. They also get the remarkable experience of serving the people of Africa, seeing the culture, and going on safari. I wish I had been involved in something like this while in my teens. The director told me it costs about $3,800 per person which includes meals, lodging, and airfare.

President Machakahiri with his brie, chicken and pork, for the HXP party.

Elsie from HXP gets corn rolls and braids. It was remarkable to watch how fast these women braided their hair. She let me videotape it while I learned a new skill. It's basically a reverse french braid with very tiny strands.

The Machakahiri family at the Easter program, two daughters are missing in the photo above.

Idah and Putsy Zulu, doing the ironing!  I love my housekeeper, Idah. How I'll miss having to do my own ironing again someday! She comes every Wednesday for $10.00 a day and cleans for me. I pay her $15.00/day about 5 hours to mop my floors, clean the bathrooms, dust, and do the ironing. Most my neighbors only pay $8.00/day for a maid to work 10 hours. The going rate on the temple site is about $50.00/week. The workers work very hard, manual labor from 0700-1600 M-F with 2 half-hour breaks.  Idah takes a combi for $1.00 each way to come from almost 1 hour away to our apartment. I pay her an extra $5.00 because I feel bad she comes from such a distance. She is so grateful to have work! There is a 90% unemployment rate in Zimbabwe. I remember when my nurses refused to come to work extra when we were short-staffed unless we paid them double or triple time with a bonus. They made over $100.00/hour and sometimes received a $1,500.00 bonus for working the weekend at McKay Dee or Primary Children's Hospital. It was very hard to get nurses to work during Covid.

BTW, Idah, Agnes Solani's sister, is now taking missionary lessons. We have seen a remarkable change in her including not being so shy.  She is getting baptized next week! We are so happy for her.