The Office

Both Sherry and I work at the Area Offices.  Her office is located on the second floor across from the Humanitarian Department.  Her days are full helping process missionary applications from the Southeast Area of Africa and to prepare them to be presented to the Area Presidency.  Once they are approved, she assists in the preparation of the applications to be submitted to Church Headquarters for Mission calls.  She has learned a lot about various software programs like Word, Excel and some specialized software programs that are used to facilitate the processing of the files that she deals with, including a new program written for her Department to use. In her position, she reports to and receives her assignments from Sister Martha Ludwig (who serves as an Assistant Executive Secretary).  In addition, Sherry sends many emails to Stake and Mission Presidents and works closely with the Area Medical Advisor and his wife (Elder and Sister Johnson).  Truly, it is a great team to work with.

Sherry at her desk with her two monitors, working on missionary applications. (For those of you who know Sherry you will see she has lots of bright sticky notes.)


About once a week,  Sherry helps tend the children at the temple annex ("Gatehouse") for those who have come from other parts of South Africa or from other countries in the Africa Southeast Area (like the Democratic Republic of Congo, Mozambique, Angola, Zimbabwe, Botswana, etc.) who are waiting to be sealed to their parents in the Temple for all eternity. Most of the time, the children do not speak English which always makes it a little challenging, but it is amazing how well they manage.  And knowing Sherry, you know how much she loves serving there!  Often they have French, Portuguese, Malagasy and a host of tribal languages all being spoken on different weeks and sometimes, several languages on the same day.

                       Here are five children waiting to be sealed to their parents for all eternity.

Sometimes Sherry has to draft her "Assistant" to help out.  Even if he can't speak Zulu, he can speak "Lego."

          Sometimes the children like to be carried like their mother's carry them  bundled on their backs.

Sometimes you entertain the children, and sometimes they entertain you.  Some of these children are amazing. It is obvious to see this child knows his Primary songs!        

 


The Office of General Counsel where I work is on the first floor across from the IT Department.  It is a small very compact office with 4 attorneys and two Legal Coordinators.  It may be small and cozy but it is a happy, supportive, and friendly environment.  When an older gentleman was here from Salt Lake meeting with us about Church History records, we got joking around with him and laughing and he commented it was definitely different than the last legal office he visited.  We really do try to help each other as we get promptings on the different issues.  It can be very stressful dealing with many of the issues that come up and one really needs to rely upon the Lord for guidance. We also enjoy being together outside of the office and have taken opportunities to visit wildlife reserves on our preparation days, exploring the area or getting together for meals  My boss, Bryan Jackson and his wife Tina are outstanding.  They see their job as trying to make sure the senior missionaries have positive and spiritual experiences.  And they do a great job of it.  We also enjoy reaching out to other missionary couples who serve in different departments to join when we go as an office to the Temple on Friday evenings or out to dinner.  Truly, we have loved serving in the Area Offices and getting to enjoy so many missionary couples.  We may not serve in the same departments, but we are each doing our part to further the Gospel here in Africa. It is amazing the love and support you feel from these great missionaries.  They each have been examples to us.

      This is part of the Area Office Complex.  We park underneath.  The main doors are to the right.

The Area Offices are responsible for 32 African countries and Islands off the coast of Africa.  We have a Church presence in about 26 of them at the present time.

                  The entrance to our small office.  I work in the small office behind the gray door.

Here is my boss Bryan Jackson and his wife Tina.  This picture was taken on Heritage Day.  Our legal coordinators gave our wives Zulu hats that are worn by married women.  Tina is also wearing a beaded necklace that is common here.

This is Zanele Dlamini who is a legal Coordinator in the office.  She is the font of all the Corporate knowledge with over 10 years experience.  She is going to law school at nights. and is the mother of an 8 year old.  She keeps all of us out of trouble, but she sure can load me up with work.

This is Dorcus Murumo who is our second Legal Coordinator.  She has about 8 years of experience and she too is going to law school.  She also has a daughter and leads an incredibly full life.  Her husband is a Bishop and up until recently, she has been serving as their Stake Young Women President.

This is Elder Winn from Saint George who shares the small office with me.   He handles most of the HR matters because of his background.  He was my sponsor in the Air Force when I finished law school 39 years ago, and was transferred to South Dakota.  We worked for a man named Bryan.  Now 39 years later, I was his sponsor when he was assigned here to South Africa where we again work for a man named Bryan.  There is a certain symmetry in life.

 

This is Mike Deamer the other Associate Area Legal Counsel.  He and Evelyn are from Centerville where he was mayor, a highly successful attorney in private practice, and an assistant Utah Attorney General.  Mike handles most of the land acquisition issues and many other difficult issues such as those directly involving missionaries.   It is a toss-up as to who is funnier, Mike or Rod.

And finally, here I am working at my desk.  We all have two computer monitors and I wonder how we ever managed with just one.  I don't think Sherry will want to go back to a single monitor either. Africa is so big and has so many countries! The map behind me helps me see where the all the various cities are in the different countries we work with and how to spell them.  It is truly amazing to see the Gospel of Jesus Christ roll forth among so many nations.