Senior Couples Retreat at Lesedi

The three senior couples serving in Gaborone (Taylors, Gublers, Rands) were asked to arrange a couples' retreat for the South Africa Johannesburg Mission for 21-23 March. We were hoping to go to Kasane and visit Chobe National Park but the cost of transportation was too expensive for a couples retreat. Instead, we arranged for a retreat at Lesedi Cultural Village near Hartbeespoort in South Africa. We and the Taylors visited the Lesedi Village in December to see if this would be an appropriate venue for the retreat.

All couples were supposed to arrive at the village around two o'clock and get settled into their rooms which are representative of different African tribes. At three o'clock we met in a conference room. President Omer gave us a brief message; and a half dozen couples introduced themselves, explained their assignments, and shared successful things they had done in their areas so we could benefit from their experiences.

At four o'clock we watched a video of the history of South Africa, followed by a tour of the villages representing four tribes with presentations on aspects of village life for each tribe. The tribes are Sotho, Peri, Zulu, and Xhosa.

After the visit to the villages we watched a dance demonstration. The couples then had a lesson on how to play African drums which we all thoroughly enjoyed. They asked us to sing them a song at the end and we sang "Jesus Wants Me for a Sunbeam" with drum accompaniment. We then had an African buffet dinner. There were many African dishes and game meats to choose from such as crocodile and ostrich.

After dinner we returned to the conference center where we had a few more couples introduce themselves. It was our assignment to teach them games they could play with members back in their areas and then we played some of the games.

The second day started with a buffet breakfast and then all the couples were on their own to do activities they wanted in the area. There were many things to choose from such as a cable way ride up a mountain, shopping at Chameleon Village (an African craft market), elephant experience, monkey sanctuary, zip line, and lion rhino park, etc. We chose to ride the cable way and go shopping at Chameleon Village where we also ate lunch. We also tried to ride the zip line but a conference group had booked it.

In the evening we all met at a Swiss-African restaurant for dinner. We ate outdoors and the weather was perfect. We went back to Lesedi Village and met in the conference room for more introductions, game instruction, and games. We were having so much fun playing games we got to bed late.

After breakfast on the final day, the last of the couples introduced themselves and President Omer spoke again. The drumming teachers could tell that we had so much fun with the drumming lesson that they organized an extra session of drumming for us.We sang "Book of Mormon Stories" accompanied by drums this time. With the upcoming organization of the Botswana Mission in July, this will likely be the last time the couples serving in Botswana will see the Johannesburg Mission couples so everyone said their goodbyes.