One of my favorite things to do while riding in the car in Ghana is to look for the names of shops we pass by. Some seem normal; others make me laugh out loud or don't make any sense to me at all. Many have Christian words and phrases in the name, from what I hear to ward off bad luck and bad spirits. Here are a just a few examples of the ones I've seen so far:
Almighty Electrical
Taste and See Fast Food
With God All Things Are Possible Cosmetics
In God's Time Power Tools
Another thing I love looking at in our many car rides around the city is all of the people carrying things on their heads. I've seen countless women carrying up to maybe 100 pounds of things on their heads plus a baby strapped to their back, sound asleep. When hiked up Medie Mountain with some of the girls at the home here (on a super narrow, rocky, steep, and overgrown path), we all had to jump aside into the bush as a man carrying a really large bundle of wood on his head passed down the mountain.
I wish I were that skilled, but I've learned that the shape our "Obrunni" (white people) heads and our slippery hair makes it difficult to carry things on our heads. Also most people here use a cloth wrapped up on top of their heads to help balance the load. Maybe the kids can give me lessons at Haven of Hope.
Last cultural note before wrapping this short post up: Everywhere we go, people yell "Obrunni! Obrunni!" if they're speaking Twi and "Yevu!" if they're speaking Ewe. Adam is often adressed as "Mr. White Man". Sometimes I really wish I had brown skin so that I would blend in in a crowd, but instead my super pale skin and light hair stands out like a sore thumb in a crowd. The advantage to having lighter skin, though, is that we're able to do ministry in public schools and to capture the attention of more people simply because we're white. It seems silly, but it's reality here.
More to come about the last week in Accra soon... off to lunch right now.
Saturday, June 25, 2011
Sunday, June 19, 2011
GHANA MISSION TRIP 2011
Hello from Medie, Ghana! It’s been awhile since I’ve written anything on this blog... and has also been awhile since I’ve traveled, so I figured it might be about time to resurrect it and post a little bit about our current globetrotting adventure. I will upload pictures as soon as I can figure out how to do it on the computer I’m using. For now, I hope a few stories will do.
I’m writing from Haven of Hope (HoH), which is a school and children’s home run by Every Child Ministries. It’s pretty quiet here at the moment, which is a rare occurance. The 50 kids who live here are all taking their daily “siesta,” the many goats, puppies, dogs, and birds aren’t making noise (okay I take it back - one puppy just started crying), and really all I can hear is the ceiling fan above me quietly whirling and cooling us off. And yes, you read that correctly - Ghana has come a long way since I was here four years ago, and the children’s home now has electricity and running water almost all of the time, which is shocking. I feel so spoiled!
Adam and I arrived here with our team of four other Americans (all college girls) late Monday night after 32 hours of travel. This has been our home base and training center over the past week, but we’ll be leaving HoH tomorrow for ministry in the capital city of Accra. The schedule so far has been pretty intense for the Adam and me as trip leaders, even more so than expected because the details of our trip weren’t quite in order when we got here like we had hoped. Thankfully we have gotten a schedule worked out, have completed the team training for our American and Ghanaian team, and are finally feeling prepared for teaching Bible lessons and doing street ministry next week. Our team has also been super flexible and understanding, which has helped us out a lot.
Here’s what our schedule for the next two weeks will look like: teaching two mornings per week (five teams of one American and one Ghanaian each), street ministry and family visitation in slums in Accra four times per week, and weekends off to spend at HoH. Adam will be supervising the teaching, and I will be in classrooms with my Ghanaian partner Emmanuel.
Here are some noteworthy highlights of the trip so far:
-Almost all of the kids here remember me from when I was here four years ago. It’s been great to reconnect with them and to see how much they have all grown up. I love it when kids call for “Miss Stacy” to come out and play. There are at least a dozen kids who I would love to take home with me.
-Yesterday the kids used machetes to cut open big coconuts for us. I actually think the coconut milk in the middle is disgusting, but Kelsey (a team member) challenged me to a coconut milk chugging contest, and for some reason I agreed... it’s all on video should you want to see us fail miserably :)
-Today we snuck up on and chased a herd of goats out of the compost pit... pretty funny until they all charged right at me!
-Playing with the seven puppies of HoH’s guard dogs that are here has been fun. They’re all some huge South African breed, and while the adults look very intimidating, the puppies are cute. Last night, though, two puppies were really sick and were howling and crying for hours. Several of us stayed up with them well into the night and thought for sure they would die, but somehow they hung on until this morning when the vet saw them. As it turns out, both were stung by scorpions. After three shots of antivenom each, they should be okay.
That’s about it for now. We’ll be heading to Medie Mountain soon to hike with some of the older girls, so I need to get ready to go. Thanks for reading and I’ll try to update again a few times while we’re here depending on Internet access. Miss you all back home - thanks so much for the prayers and support! If you think of it, I would love to ask you to specifically pray for safety and effective teaching next week as we begin ministry in Accra.
I’m writing from Haven of Hope (HoH), which is a school and children’s home run by Every Child Ministries. It’s pretty quiet here at the moment, which is a rare occurance. The 50 kids who live here are all taking their daily “siesta,” the many goats, puppies, dogs, and birds aren’t making noise (okay I take it back - one puppy just started crying), and really all I can hear is the ceiling fan above me quietly whirling and cooling us off. And yes, you read that correctly - Ghana has come a long way since I was here four years ago, and the children’s home now has electricity and running water almost all of the time, which is shocking. I feel so spoiled!
Adam and I arrived here with our team of four other Americans (all college girls) late Monday night after 32 hours of travel. This has been our home base and training center over the past week, but we’ll be leaving HoH tomorrow for ministry in the capital city of Accra. The schedule so far has been pretty intense for the Adam and me as trip leaders, even more so than expected because the details of our trip weren’t quite in order when we got here like we had hoped. Thankfully we have gotten a schedule worked out, have completed the team training for our American and Ghanaian team, and are finally feeling prepared for teaching Bible lessons and doing street ministry next week. Our team has also been super flexible and understanding, which has helped us out a lot.
Here’s what our schedule for the next two weeks will look like: teaching two mornings per week (five teams of one American and one Ghanaian each), street ministry and family visitation in slums in Accra four times per week, and weekends off to spend at HoH. Adam will be supervising the teaching, and I will be in classrooms with my Ghanaian partner Emmanuel.
Here are some noteworthy highlights of the trip so far:
-Almost all of the kids here remember me from when I was here four years ago. It’s been great to reconnect with them and to see how much they have all grown up. I love it when kids call for “Miss Stacy” to come out and play. There are at least a dozen kids who I would love to take home with me.
-Yesterday the kids used machetes to cut open big coconuts for us. I actually think the coconut milk in the middle is disgusting, but Kelsey (a team member) challenged me to a coconut milk chugging contest, and for some reason I agreed... it’s all on video should you want to see us fail miserably :)
-Today we snuck up on and chased a herd of goats out of the compost pit... pretty funny until they all charged right at me!
-Playing with the seven puppies of HoH’s guard dogs that are here has been fun. They’re all some huge South African breed, and while the adults look very intimidating, the puppies are cute. Last night, though, two puppies were really sick and were howling and crying for hours. Several of us stayed up with them well into the night and thought for sure they would die, but somehow they hung on until this morning when the vet saw them. As it turns out, both were stung by scorpions. After three shots of antivenom each, they should be okay.
That’s about it for now. We’ll be heading to Medie Mountain soon to hike with some of the older girls, so I need to get ready to go. Thanks for reading and I’ll try to update again a few times while we’re here depending on Internet access. Miss you all back home - thanks so much for the prayers and support! If you think of it, I would love to ask you to specifically pray for safety and effective teaching next week as we begin ministry in Accra.
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