Walstons in Egypt 2024-2026

  We have been holding family home evenings with branch members. This was our third one. Here are Samia and her children and Mariam and her family in our apartment. Samia is a new member and Mariam has been a member for three years, but her husband, Maged, is not a member yet. They had a lot of fun and good treats. We traveled with the Phillips and Bernards to 3 different monasteries. They were built in the 4th to 6th centuries. This one was the site of a cave where an old hermit lived and then the monastery was built around this. This is one of the monks giving us a tour of the monastery. David is next to him. The monasteries survived even though they were beset by Berber attacks and then Islamic persecution. There are still about 10 to 20 million Christians in Egypt. This is the base of an old tree that is supposed to be more than 1,000 years old. Kathleen and I at one of the monasteries.

  Kathleen is now teaching about 15-18 people piano. More keep asking. We bought 6 new keyboards. Here are a group of some of the students who are taking lessons from her. She is teaching Sundays from 4 to 8 or 8:30 pm and an hour or so on Wednesday evenings, while I teach an English class. Here is the inside of the store where we bought the soccer equipment and shirts. This is the only display room and they have a tiny office in the back. I rode with a member a "tut-tut", which is an adventure as they wind through the traffic and potholed streets. We began visiting members homes. The person next to Kathleen is the Nile River Branch President, President Marcous. He is one of a handful of Egyptian members, who belong to the branch. The person next to him is Amir, who is a new member and wanted to go with us. Most of the members in the Nile River Branch (Arabic speaking) live in very poor conditions. The lady in the center of the street is Samia, who was baptized a couple of mo...

  Kathleen has started teaching piano lessons, which encompass leading the music. Here an 11-year old is leading the music in sacrament meeting for the first time. She did an excellent job. It is interesting that in the Arabic hymnbook we have, there is just the words and no notes, so it is hard to tell which is the song's timing. Of course, no one in the audience cares. Here is one of the semi-feral dogs on top of a car. I was walking to the church at 6:30 am to meet people to go golf. Here is the golf course we went to. It was beautiful and very cheap. I rented clubs, bought balls, paid for a practice set of balls and 9 holes and paid about $18 total. A tree and pond at the golf course. Nathan Fox and Roy Phillips with whom I golfed. We are teaching English each Saturday at Resala, a Muslim NGO. Here are some of our students from our last Saturday class. The numbers dropped in half when Ramadan started this month. After our English class Kathleen and I went to an Indian restauran...

  Today was the third time it has rained since we have been in Egypt. People were coming outside and looking out windows to see the rain. We waited under trees and the rain made the dirt on the leaves into mud and covered our head and shirts. Here was the outside of the hotel we stayed in Luxor, looking at the Nile River. Kathleen holding the light at one of the ancient palaces.  One of the temples in Luxor. Kathleen and I in the temple of Karnak in Luxor. Here was the staff and us in Aswan at the clinic we funded this past year. They are also asking for us to fund it this year. The NGO, CRS, has had their international funding severely cut this year and if the church does not fund the clinic, it will close. This is the only place in 100s of miles where the refugees, mostly from Sudan, can get healthcare services. This is the clinic and men waiting. It is in a poor area and a poor looking building. This is the waiting area for the women. This is the entrance of the clinic. Thi...

  We began teaching a group of 25 Muslim young people at an NGO, Resala. Kathleen and I trade off teaching. We had over 400 people wanted to join the class and, even though they only cleared 25 to join the class, there was 50 who showed up for the first class. The students have reasonable English skills and we are trying to push them. One of the things we do each week is to read a section from the book, Charlie's Monument".  Kathleen also began piano lessons this week. This class is the beginning to lead music material. She will have one more group lesson and then will need to schedule individual times. This is the main room in what we call our Gathering Center. It is 1.2 miles from the building where we meet for church and very close to where many of our South Sudanese members live. We visited a project we funded. This is an NGO called Terre do Homme and they provide services to the poor and refugees. The two men that took us around the project were refugees from Syria. This ...