July 13, 2011
Today we started our first road trip into the other mission in Ghana, called the Cape Coast Mission. Naturally Cape Coast was our main destination. We spent about 3 hours getting there, but it took us over an hour to just get out of Accra. They have major road construction going on it was such a mess! But the ride was very delightful and entertaining just watching life in Africa out the window. We drove through countless little villages and they were all fun to try and figure out what they were selling either on their heads or in their little street stand. It seems like each little village had a theme, they sold pretty much the same thing in each little stand, without much variety, (like watermelons, or flour or snails) then the next village would be ‘specializing’ in something else. Some we never did figure out what it was! The snails down here are huge! They are about the size of racket ball- don’t know how brave I am on that front yet J Talking about things I’m not quite ready for—we saw 3 or 4 young men selling very large rats on the side of the road. They call them grass-cutters down here and the locals love the meat. They think it is very tasty and tender. One guy had his kind of flayed open between 2 sticks, it kind of looked like a tennis racket. Yum! They will even cook it for you right there on the side of the road! Is that considered fast food?
We got to Cape Coast with no real problems and made it to our hotel with relative ease as well and we were feeling pretty proud of ourselves as there is no such thing as good directions here! But the hotel didn’t have a reservation for us and we were very confused until we called the guy that made the reservations for us and it turned out we were in the wrong hotel. We were at Elimina Resort, not Elimina Bay. He told to go back out to the main road and just follow the signs (which is how we ended here in the first place) the receptionist gave us completely different directions. So we followed Daniels advice and headed back to the main road (which could have been any of about 3 by the way) street names are hard to find in Ghana. We did manage to find a road sign for the right hotel and off we went. The signs eventually had us turn off the main road which looked like it was heading way off the beaten path, the road took us way back into some little tiny villages and then headed off into the bush. It became this little tiny dirt road with amazing potholes intermingled with large water holes. We are thinking this can’t possibly be right! But ahead of us was a taxi with a white man in it and it just kept going, so we kept going. We did finally find our hotel but I’m not sure we would have if there hadn’t been a taxi in front of us! And it was a beautiful hotel, it’s right on the ocean. Our room has a little balcony which looks right over the water and the huge crashing waves. Very impressive. The restaurant sits outside next to the ocean, so we had like a great pizza that night in the dark sitting on the beach listening to waves. Very awesome.
Part of our job is to find good hospitals to take our missionaries to when they get sick. So we went out to find a couple of hospitals that afternoon Which is not easy when there are no phone books with addresses and phone numbers. So we headed off with general directions from the bar tender to the closest one. Turned out it wasn’t even a hospital, but they were able to give us directions to a couple that were. The first one was pretty small and while not in great shape, better then some we have seen. The second one we found looked more promising, I happened to be on the phone when we pulled up and Todd jumps out of the car saying “I gotta go talk to this guy”. I finished my phone call, then got out expecting to find Todd talking to this guy we had stopped by. I was rather surprised to find him no where in sight! I wandered around a bit and took a couple of photos to add to our report, then visited with a local for a while. Eventually Todd showed up back totally animated and excited. He introduced me to Dr. Kennedy (the guy he had met by the car). Turns out he knew when we pulled up that he had to talk to this guy. So he jumped right out to catch him before he left. Turns out he was exactly the man we needed to meet. (the Lord is amazing sometimes, isn’t he?) Todd got a great tour of the facilities and we now have a personal contact to call if we ever have any problems. This just reinforced to us that this is God’s work, and he’ll make sure it’s done right.
The story would be great if it ended there, but it doesn’t! While Todd was on his tour he was stopped by a man who noticed his name tag, he was in the bishopric in one of the wards there and his wife was very ill and he wanted Todd to help him give her a blessing. So we headed back into the hospital to find them, while we were wandering around trying to find to this gentleman, a local stops us and points behind us. There is a white women running down the hallway towards us. She comes panting up to us almost in tears. She is down here volunteering at an orphanage and they have a very sick little boy who is in the hospital. She saw us walk by with our name tag and knew that we were an answer to her prayer! She is a member of the church as well and wanted to know if we would give this little boy a blessing. So we followed her and found little baby Francis sleeping in his crib. Totally adorable! Todd gave him a blessing and the woman seemed much more in control when we left. We then found the gentleman we originally set out to find and met his lovely wife and gave her a blessing as well. It was a very sweet experience and we knew without a doubt we were where the Lord wanted us to be.
July 14, 2011
We got to be tourist today! We went to Kukum National Forest this morning and did the canopy walk. It was totally amazing. It’s a rope bridge that they have built about 120 feet up in the top of the rainforest. The bridge runs from tree to tree with a wooden walking platform that’s about a foot wide with ropes running up the sides for support. The height didn’t bother me at all, which was good. Some people were deathly afraid of the height. But even without that fear, the bridge wobbles and sways quite a bit. There are two iron cables that run under the wood planking and then tended to tip you either one way or the other. It took both hands on the ropes just to keep your balance. But the views were spectacular! You could see for miles above the tree tops then what seemed like miles below you. The trees where huge. The jungle sounds were impressive. It was a lot to take in all at once. Almost sensory overload. We got a bunch of pictures that just don’t do it justice. Very cool experience!
We stopped down the road a bit on the way home at an animal sanctuary. It’s run by a Dutchman who takes endangered animals and keeps them until they can be set back in the wild. So we got to see some local wildlife. They were mostly in cages so it was more like a zoo, but we did get to see a few monkeys on leashes, tied up out in the yard. Not really the way I wanted to see the local wildlife, but it was ok.
That afternoon we went to the slave castle. This was a totally sobering experience. Our tour guide took us to the male holding rooms first. It’s a series of 5 interconnecting chambers that are underground. Each one is about 30 feet by 75 feet with stone walls and a stone floor with a gutter that runs through all five rooms. The only light and ventilation comes from 2 small openings on one side of each room. Each room was made to hold between 100-200 men. The gutter is for the human waste. But it’s not very deep and our guide said it would ‘plug up’ very quickly leaving 4-6 inches of excrement on the floor. The slaves spent an average of 2-3 MONTHS in these holding cells before they were loading onto slave ships with even worse conditions if that could be possible. The death rates were staggering! On average, if 500 slaves were captured, about half of them survived the trip to the castle, out of that 250, only about 125 made if out of the holding cells alive, then another 50% were lost in the ocean voyage leaving only about 75 of the original 500 to be actual slaves. Totally depressing. The punishment rooms were nothing more then suffocation chambers.
By the time we were done I was totally depressed. It was something to see once I guess, but I don’t have any desire to ever go again. We went with some friends on the tour, and at the end we all took each others pictures in front of the ‘Door of No Return’. The guy taking the picture said ‘smile’ and one of the women said very adaptly, it just doesn’t feel right to smile in here. Which is exactly how I felt.
July 15, 2011
This morning we went and checked out one last hospital and planned on meeting the mission president and his wife, President & Sister Shulz, for a small meeting. We were supposed to meet them at a nearby chapel and we got there about a half hour early. The beach was right across the road, which some cool fishing canoes on the shore so we thought we’d walk down and get some pictures while we were waiting. On the walk down, we started to hear singing and before long we saw about 15 young men pulling on this long rope that ran out into the ocean and they were all singing some kind of a cool descant song. So we just got in line and starting pulling with them! They seemed a little surprised at first but pretty soon they were all smiles and laughing at our feeble attempts to help. We must of pulled for most of our half hour and my hands were sore! The rope running into the ocean didn’t look any different then when we had started, they said it takes most of the day to pull the fish in. What a lot of work! But it was a lot of fun, I’m glad we got to be locals for a little bit. I’m also glad we didn’t have to do it all day and got to go sit in a nicely air-conditioned car instead!!
July 16, 2011
We drove to Kumasi yesterday afternoon on the worst roads we have seen yet in Africa! We spent the morning meeting the senior couple in this area, Elder and Sister Zoll. They are a great couple who have a lot of energy. This is a great thing out here, they have about 50 missionaries in their area.
I made my first local angry today; it was a little scary actually. We were at another hospital checking things out, my job to take a couple of pictures of the outside of the buildings so they can be used in our reports. We thought seeing a picture of the buildings might help as directions are not always that helpful. So I was doing my thing and taking a few pictures while Todd was talking to a guard at the front door telling him what we were looking for. He saw me taking the pictures and started doing a lot of hollering and yelling, telling me that I can’t just take pictures without asking first! He wasn’t angry that I was taking pictures of the hospital; he thought I was taking pictures of him. We had heard that a lot of the locals don’t like you to just take pictures of them, they are a proud people and I think sometimes they feel like people take pictures like they would at the zoo. I totally understand this concept and have been very careful not to treat people like that. So Todd apologized profusely and I looked through my pictures and sure enough, there was one where he was in the bottom corner. I apologized again and deleted the picture immediately. This seemed to satisfy him and he took us on a tour of the hospital. Well, he took Todd on a tour of the hospital, I was still obviously in the dog house! Towards the end of the tour, he turns to me all smiles and asks if I will take a picture of him and Todd (his new best friend apparently!) So I smile back and take of picture of both of them! What a strange man.
In the afternoon we met with all 50 of the missionaries and did a heath lecture. It was our first one of these, I think we will be doing this a lot. It was a success I think. We hit doxy and nets really hard. Todd made some really great points. We started off with having a little fun with the song ‘Called to Serve’ and compared to them to the 2000 stripling warriors, then Todd talked to them about obedience with exactness. He then talked a bit about why they don’t take their doxy or use their nets, listed a whole bunch of excuses. Then read a scripture in Alma about no excuses. So no excuses and obedience with exactness was the challenge of the day. He did it in such a great way that the missionaries were very fired up when he was done. We’ll see if we get long term results.
July 17, 2011
Today we left Kumasi and headed up to Sunyani. We didn’t even know there was a town by that name when we left on Wednesday, let alone missionaries up there! We got a call on Thursday I think from an Elder Bennett saying he heard we were coming to Kumasi to talk to the missionaries and could we come up to Sunyani too? So we extended our trip another day and off to Sunyani we went! We are slowly figuring what we were are doing, but mostly we are just flying by the seat of our pants. Well, actually it’s becoming very plain to us that the Lord is in the driver’s seat and we are just along for the ride!
Sunyani was an amazing experience. 9 months ago the church was not in this area. The mission president at that time, President Sabey, felt impressed to open up the area. So he purchased 4 buildings, had them renovated with chapels in the front and small apartments in the back and then sent in the missionaries. He sent in Elder & Sister Bennett along with 10 missionaries. They were told to go and find people to bring to church. So they did! 9 months later, they have about 50 people coming to church every week in each of the 4 buildings. They are baptizing people every week. 3 of the 4 have the numbers to become branches, but they are having problems coming up with a map of the area so they can create boundaries. Who needs maps in the bush in Africa?
The missionaries here are incredible. They have brought the people to church like they are supposed to, but once there, they have had to do everything from conduct the meeting, to administering the sacrament, to doing all the talks, to teaching all the lessons. They have to do it all, because there hasn’t been any members. Now they are in the process of teaching the members how to do these things, but they still don’t have anyone higher than the aaronic priesthood. It’s just a slow process. Anyway, they give a whole new definition to the term ‘seasoned’ missionaries. We felt a little like children talking to the adults saying “now, take you doxy and sleep under your nets!” But their heath is important to continue this great work. They seemed very receptive to the instruction. I hope so. It’s important. The thought of losing any of these missionaries to malaria makes me just sick. We know first hand that it can happen.
July 18, 2011
We headed home today! We left about 6 this morning hoping to miss some of the traffic, but only managed to hit the major traffic in Kumasi right at 8. Plus it rained all morning long and most of the night. We finally made through Kumasi traffic and out the other side.
Driving is very slow. There are rumble strips and speed bumps all along the way that the locals put on the roads to keep the speed of the traffic in check as there are no policeman who do this. There are little villages all along the way, like literally every 5 minutes! Someone told us there are 63 villages between Kumasi and Accra, (that’s a lot of speed bumps). It’s about 280 kilometers and it took us almost 9 hours to make it home if that gives you any idea! The rain also caused some flooding on the roads that we had to drive through. One was actually very deep, we probably shouldn’t have driven through it, but there wasn’t another way to get home. The current was very strong and we were afraid it was going to pull us off the road, but we made it through. Then we continued through about 30 kilometers of some really terrible roads. It makes our road to Seeley Lake this spring look like a cake walk! We will never complain about the roads in the States again!
Nine hours later we were home! It was so wonderful to walk into our clean, nice, air-conditioned apartment! We are very happy to be home.
No comments:
Post a Comment