OUR NEXT UPDATE WILL BE FROM NAIROBI, KENYA

Pictures from our Philippines senior missionary reunion. It was well attended. Two of the couples who attended have been called to serve as mission leaders. One of the Filipino couples will be serving in the Philippines and the other Filipino couple will serve as mission leaders in the Anchorage, Alaska Mission. That will be a bit of a cultural shock for them.  

 

Our MTC missionary picture. we are each pointing to a different area in Africa because we will be serving 15 missions in 8 different countries. The Central Africa Area stretches from one coast of Africa to the other coast. About half of the countries are French speaking. Since we don't speak French, it will be interesting. We are learning how to use technology to translate documents and other things. 

 

 

Our MTC Missionary District. Two of the couples are headed to the Philippines to serve as medical advisors. It was fun to share some of our missionary experiences with them.

Despain Family Reunion in Fielding, Utah.

 

Our MTC and training experience is coming to an end. We had one week in the MTC in Provo, Utah. We just completed our second week of specialized medical and mental health training in Salt Lake City. We were scheduled to fly out on Friday, June 20th but because of a "hiccup" with the visa process, we will now leave on Tuesday, June 24. While at the MTC we were able to spend time with friends who served with us in the Philippines and we ran across a mission leader who we worked closely with who is serving as a branch president at the MTC. On Saturday, June 14, we had former Philippines senior missionary friends transport us to a Philippines senior missionary reunion outside of Salt Lake City. We had a chance to visit with several Couples who we served with in the Philippines. It was a great opportunity to relive our previous missionary memories. On Father's day we attended the live broadcast of the Spoken Word from the conference center. We met up again with some former Philippines senior missionaries. One of the invited us to come with them on a back stage tour of the conference center. The following Saturday we were able to attend a family reunion for Anita's side of the family. We consider this a tender mercy since did not expect to be able to attend, but because of our visa delay we were able to go. Since we are here without a car, Anita's brother picked us up and drove us to the reunion. We are looking forward to this week as we enter our assigned area. We are expecting some difficult challenges with our assignment. There are not a lot of resources or services in this part of Africa. It is an area that has lived with decades of civil unrest, violence, and poverty. Many missionaries have a history of living with trauma, death, and destruction. In spite of that, this is the fastest growing area in the church. We are already hearing stories of the strong faith and dedication of the African people. 

Here are pictures of our setting apart as full time missionaries. We had two of our sons and family members who were able to attend. Our grandson Kaden will also start his mission the same day we started our mission. We have one other grandson also serving a mission in Argentina. He will finish his mission the end of July. We are grateful to be serving with them. 

 

Here is our MTC picture. We are serving in Central Africa Area which goes from one coast of Africa to the other so we decided to each point to a different side of our area. We finished our week at the MTC in Provo and are now in Salt Lake where we will have four days of specialized training for medical, mental health and dental missionaries. 

 

Some family support when we were set apart. Others joined in on a Zoom meeting to participate in the setting apart. 

Or Grandson will be starting his missionary service the same day we start our missionary service.

 

We built shelves and encased our heavy furniture in wooden cases for protection. We went as high as we could so we could get our car and our pick-up in one storage unit.

Thanks for the help from our Grandson who helped us build wooden cases and put things in storage.

 He will be serving his mission at the same time we are serving. 

Final Storage. Everything is in storage and we are now at the MTC in Provo, Utah for a week. Next week we will go to Salt Lake City for specialized training prior to going to Nairobi, Kenya.