It is Africa after all...

Well, I have a free moment or two and it is high time I caught you up on what has been going on in my little address in Africa! I am sorry that I have not been on-line the last two days, I have been under the spell of a rather nasty and persistent African stomach bug (bound to happen eventually). I don't want my posts to only sing the praises of the heat and the ever prevalent roosters so I intend to share with you briefly what I have experienced since landing now almost one week ago exactly.

Thursday night I got home rather late and basically had a free schedule to rest. Friday I went to a Youth fellowship Bible Study that was incredible. I remain very excited to see a group of young people so passionately opinionated about discussing a story from scripture. The interaction was incredible and I was left wondering why youth groups back in the states that I've been a part of lack this kind of excitement and open discussion about scripture. This is definitely something that warrants further study and I plan on revisiting this topic in a later post for all of us to discuss. Saturday started early and we went to a traditional baby naming ceremony. We greeted everyone sitting in the room (counter clockwise of course!), we sang, prayed, pastor read some scripture then we all went around the room and recited the baby's name and then a small bucket is placed on a small stool in the center of the room and gifts (usually money) are placed in the bucket for the benefit of the child. From there we went to our first of two Saturday funerals, this one was at the church for a lady only thirty-three years of age. We went from the church to the graveyard and they actually had several men carry and then lower the casket into a shallow, tile-lined grave. We sang a few songs and then the pastor read who each wreath was from before tossing each into the grave onto the casket. Then a man began shoveling dirt onto the casket and there was one woman in attendance that became hysterical. I find that the space between life and death is so small here that it is almost non-existant, unlike in America where we have developed a more comfortable almost austere and clinical way of handling death.

The second funeral was no where near the church, it was all the way into the mountains in a very rural place called Adukrum, the pastor's hometown. The air was so much cleaner in the hills, I tried to breathe as much as possible in the hopes of storing some clean air for when we returned to the city (the smog is visible, thick and stings the eyes). This funeral was for a man of eighty-three years I believe, and we had a full blown meal while we were there. When we sat to eat, Mamma Comfort (host mom) stopped me from eating the salad, warning that there was no telling when it was made or by whom and it might not be clean (I had already eaten one piece). The car trip there and back to the church took at least an hour but I could be wrong (it could be more!). The distance was likely not so great but the roads here are beyond belief. Enormous, numerous chassis-ending potholes like vast craters make the roads more or less a system of dirt paths around the said holes. Negotiating them at any speed is a jarring experience, traversing the roadways at the speed pastor drives (he's always in a hurry!) is a truly transcendant experience (it draws you into a much closer walk with God). I should at this point mention that we have several drivers that work for the family, this is not the luxury expense it would be in the U.S., instead, it is a normal practice for most middle class Ghanaians. I think this might be a hold over from the days of colonialism.

One of our drivers, Edgar, has been very kind and has walked with me outside the walls of the home and down the dirt path to the main road. He explained the different fruit trees that are growing all over the place and some other basics of Ghanaian culture. I don't think I've mentioned it before but there is a large brick and plaster wall measuring about eight feet high and topped with row upon row of metal spikes that closes in the property of the pastor's home. There is a small but intimidating metal door for pedestrians and a much larger double doored gate for vehicles. There is a large mango tree in the front yard, the backyard has several plaintain and coconut trees. We have a lot of rather large lizards with bright orange and yellow heads and green bodies. There are, of course, the chickens. There are "wall Gekkos" that occassionally race across the interior walls. The floors are decorative concrete (the kind with little flecks of colored bits in them), the windows are moveable horizontal glass slats which, by necessity almost always stay open. Those are covered by curtains that are almost always tied midway by a little piece of rope so as to allow for more air movement. We have a fierce guard dog named Bruno (I'm in talks with him to see if he'll eat a rooster), he has the most curious and interesting coloration I've ever seen and loves to wiggle his little stub of a tail when greeting any family member.

I have introduced my host brother Stephen to Star Wars, yes, yes, I am corrupting a whole new continent with my nerdiness! I had a great discussion with him the other day about what his passion was, he currently works for a mobile phone company and plugs in bits of code to make sure all the calls go through. I briefly met my other host brother Caleb, he's away at school but comes home to do laundry (isn't it cool how all the way in Africa some things are the same?) My host sister Dorcas has been a great friend to me. She has taught me most of the Twi phrases I now know and has made sure I've eaten each and every day. She will be leaving us soon to go live and work up north somewhere with churches there (it is infinitely more rural the further north you go). Sunday I went to the first service (in english exclusively) and then to Sunday school, then to the second service (in Twi exclusively) and then home. I may be mixing up my days (I've been vociferously ill for two days) but I'm pretty sure Sunday night is when Dorcas took me to a graduation ceremony for a Sports Leadership school. They use sports combined with evangelism to equip attendees to go work with the young people of their areas. Students come from all over. One of the first things they did was all the students went to the front and stood together, introducing themselves and saying a simple greeting in their native language, then they sang a song together. As I listened, there were students from Cameroon, Liberia, Nigeria, Sierra Leone, Ghana, and other countries. Most of these countries do not get along, some outright seek the anihilation of the other. I knew if I let myself shed a tear Dorcas would never let me live it down (joking) but I'll never forget how incredible it was to sit there and listen to all the different greetings and then hear a song sung together in unity.

Monday I was a volunteer at a school run by a church member. It was a unique experience to be called "Uncle Kwame" over and over and over again by thirty or so children. I helped them with their classwork, read several stories, assisted in feeding some of the younger ones and had an altogether good but tiring day. Tuesday and Wednesday I have been sick, but that about catches us up. I'll blog again soon! I hope to have pictures up by Friday.

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I've got to go sweat some more, I think I still have some fluids left in me! God bless!

A Fierce Ghanaian Schedule...

I want to try and catch you up on what I've been up to since arriving. I didn't blog or journal Saturday, and believe me when I tell you that there is a reason for that! Friday I went to a Youth Fellowship and was rewarded greatly with the blessing of seeing a group of young people who are intensely interested about their Bible study and very passionate about their opinions about the text, yet they all loved one another and shared good company. Saturday I went to a traditional baby naming ceremony and then two subsequent traditional funerals in completely different geographic locations. My laptop battery is dying so I'll leave you with this: I will get pictures up by next weekend. I will get a more detailed blog about the things I've seen and done by Wednesday. Pray for me - water is a true commodity here. I find I'm thirsty nearly all the time and often catch myself in the middle of a hydration headache.

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I have to go - I am sweating and going to enjoy a few hours that the rooster isn't awake for...yet.

Have faith that God is speaking to me in powerful and amazing ways which I hope to share with you soon. My heart breaks for the suffering and poverty I have already seen but I feel empowered by my heart's love for these people that are now within my arm's reach. I hope I can count on your continued prayers and support! Peace and blessings! Become the change!