Last Saturday Mom and I along with Jeff Clayton flew to Antananarivo the capital of Madagascar. This is a picture taken from our Carlton Hotel room on the 10th floor. Lake Anosy was built for the specific purpose of providing hydraulic power to the city's factories. In the center is a large statue of an angel. The local Malagasies refer to it as the "black angel". I guess before it was cleaned, city pollution had blackened the gold angel.

At top of hill is "Queen's Palace"  Its real name is Andafiavaratic Palace and in the late 1800's it was the residence of the Prime Minister of Madagascar.

Picture of the doorman at the Carlton Hotel. This is formal Malagasy attire. It seemed polynesian to me.

As in all African cities there are lots of street vendors. Unemployment is very high in Madagascar.

The French invaded and colonized Madagascar in 1897. Much of the architecture had a French feel.

Getting water up the hill to your home is still a problem.

A Malagasy couple waiting for a pizza lunch. Malagasies are a mixture of African, Asian, Malaysian and Indian descent. 

LDS Chapel in downtown Antananarivo, Madagascar. With reference to most buildings built in the downtown area, it looked out of place.

Street vendors.

The city of Antananarivo has over 2.5 million people. It feels crowded.

All around Antananarivo are rice fields. It is the number one food source for most people.

While traveling outside of Antananarivo we came upon this group of school children who were visiting a Lemur refuge. How cute are they?

Welcome to Addis Ababa, Ethiopia.  Last Tuesday, March 4, 2014, I took a nearly 6 hours flight from Johannesburg to Addis Ababa the capital city of Ethiopia. It was founded in 1886 and now has over 3.5 million people.

Many of the women still wear the traditional Ethiopian head scarf. 80% of the country is Christian and most of them belong to the Ethiopian Orthodox Church.

Who needs to worry about seat belts? Lots of traffic in Addis, but this fellow had the best seat in the house.

With labor so cheap, most road projects are done by hand. This is part of a new light rail project which is going through the heart of Addis Ababa.

This is the LDS Chapel in Addis.

Inside of the chapel.

This is Habtu, the 29 year old District President for the Church in Addis.

This young lady is grinding some coffee beans with a rebar. 

The official language of Ethiopia is Amharic. It's a semitic language and the 2nd most spoken after Arabic. LDS missionaries are now learning it in country with the idea that when they return to Provo, Utah they will be able to teach Amharic at the LDS Mission Training Center. I can't tell if the sign is advertising car insurance or a chicken dinner.

We nearly ate lunch here.

This is the LDS Church office building in Addis. Behind the left door is the LDS Charities operation and behind the right door is the Temporal Affairs Office of the Church in Ethiopia.

About a 2 hour drive south of Addis is the town of Debre Zeit (which means Mount of Olives in Amharic). This is the LDS chapel in Debre Zeit. It's on the main road into town and is the prettiest LDS building I've seen since coming to Africa.

The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints.

Countryside - Ethiopia. It was generally greener than I had supposed and there areas of forests.

Lots of 3 wheel taxies to watch out for on the roads.

Not to mention the cows who would just magically appear in the middle of the road. We nearly hit this one.

Or the horse drawn carts which generally went about as fast as the traffic would allow.

A typical road side store, Addis Ababa, Ethiopia.

South Africa is a country of huge contrasts. Here is a street in Cosmos City a township where we attend church. Most of the homes are government built.

There are no malls in Cosmos City, but there are good prices.

Here is 5th Street in Houghton a wealthy suburb of Johannesburg. I jog here in the mornings before heading off to the Area Office. All the mansions are behind very high walls.

This is the Killarney Mall right across the street from our flat. In fact, I took this picture from our bedroom.

When it's raining, which it often does during the summer, everyone is waiting for a bus to take them home to the townships.

When I was a missionary in South Africa (1966-1969) this was the mission home in Houghton, Johannesburg.  A few years later there was a fire which burned a good portion of the home down.

This is the home today. It's located about 1/2 mile from our flat. I ate some pretty nice meals (Christmas and Thanksgiving 1966) in that place.

Lots of street vendors on most corners in Johannesburg. Some are just looking for a hand-out, but others are selling sunglasses, electrical charge cords, or in this case an oil painting.

Big turn out at Church today. It was Branch Conference. The Parking lot was over flowing.

Every other week some of the senior brethren in the Area Office play a round a golf. We usually start around 6:00 a.m. so we can be in the office by 10:30 a.m.  Friday took a little longer because this swan would not allow Elder Bob Rose to play through. I think she thought that "his" ball was "her" egg. There was a momentary stand-off before Elder Rose's 9-iron became a sword.

Nearly every week I'm reviewing LDS humanitarian contracts. It's beyond impressive what the Church is doing in the African Southeast Area. This week across my desk came two different contracts for the drilling of 19 boreholes (water holes) in a small country in central Africa.  Water is a very precious commodity in Africa but getting it into the rural villages has proven difficult for African governments.

The Church will start drilling these 19 boreholes in the next couple of months. What I get to see is only a small portion of the many humanitarian projects started by the Church in Africa.

Also this past week, the Area Public Affairs group hosted the Minister of Interior from the Democratic Republic of the Congo. Sister Naylor on left, Mom shaking hands with the Minister and Sean Donelly the Area Public Affairs Director on the right.

Mom was involved setting up meetings, tours, luncheons and dinners. The Church has proposed to the DRC that it be allowed to micro-film the DRC archives. The Church will get a copy of the birth, marriage and death records and the DRC will likewise get a digitized copy. The Minister of Interior, in gray suit, promised to recommend that the Church be allowed into the archives. Hopefully, the digitization of the records will be completed before the DRC LDS temple is built.

Our friends, Lolly Maritz, CC Lundgren and Reeve Niel were playing a golf tournament within walking distance of our flat this past Thursday and Friday. The Houghton Country Club was the site of the tournament and this photo is looking down the fairway of the 18th hole. On the left is Lolly Mariz. She would hit her next shot just 4 feet past the hole. It was very impressive. 

Mom and Lolly with their zebra shirts and a matching friend.

Lolly, Reeve and CC.

We enjoyed a wonderful lunch after the round of golf. Elder Bob Rose and his wife Connie joined us. Elder Rose is a former attorney who, along with his wife, is serving their 3rd senior mission for the Church. They previously served in China and the Marshall Islands.

Mom with some of her Primary children this past Sunday. 

This is a shot of one of our favorite restaurants in Johannesburg. Tortellini del Oro, is a slice of heaven, or at least make that a slice of Italy. The pasta, ravioli and tortellini are all homemade. We may be in Johannesburg,South Africa, but once a week we take a trip to Italy.