Friday, April 19th - Murdocks again?

Today, we are picking up the Murdocks from the airport. They are flying in for the Area Public Affairs meeting on Saturday. This means another adventure in driving for Elder Kyle. We woke up and it is raining...looks like it will be that way all day. Then we figure out that their flight comes in about 5:15 pm (RUSH HOUR TRAFFIC)...so two strikes against driving. We wrap up our emails and phone calls for the day and make sure everyone knows about the meeting tomorrow. We head off for the airport at 5 pm giving ourselves 45 minutes, which should be plenty. Of course we have to use the GPS, because we have no idea where the airport is. I look on the airport settings and see Durban International Airport...yeah...that must be it, so I program it to follow those directions. We drive for about 30 minutes in the rain and traffic and the GPS points us to turn left and says we are at destination. We drive in and OOPS...doesn't look like an operating airport...fences everywhere and no sign of planes. Now we are nervous, so we see a taxi with two women in it coming out of one of the gates and we tell her we are supposed to be at the airport. She says, "Oh no, you are no where near the airport and she tells us to go back out on the freeway, going the other way and keep going until we arrive at King Shaka International Airport. The one the GPS took us to was closed down about ten years ago! By now the traffic is even worse, we are on the left side of the road and it is pouring down rain. I say, "What else could happen?" AND, we hit construction! After we pass that, we continue down the freeway and the cell phone rings. Elder Murdock is telling us they have just landed...I say, "Sorry, but we're not there and have 45 more kilometers before we get there. I agree to call when we are about there. The miracle is that we arrived about 15 minutes late...not so bad considering we went 30 minutes in the wrong direction. GPS's are so much fun.

The Murdocks took us to dinner at a seafood restaurant called Ocean Basket. This platter is only $11.00! We talked about their experiences in Johannesburg and how they have to go to Zimbabwe on Monday and then off to Kenya, Ghana and Congo all to help set those countries up with their own Mormon Newsroom. All Sister Murdock wanted to do to live in Durban again. They are overloaded with office work. We just smiled and said, sorry guys, but inwardly thinking, "Glad it's you and not us." Ha. We then went back to our flat and they slept in our spare room. Wow, what a day!