24-30 October 2016

As we start this week, we have a picture of a road
near the MTC that has thousands of cars driving over
it each day.  These pot holes have been here for
months.

Elder Gohi is the third missionary that was sealed
to his parents last week.  Paula and I were the proxies
for his parents.

Our second debut of our musical number to the next group of departing missionaries.

Again, our missionaries erupted in applause at the end!
We're thinking of taking our act on the road.

We had a couple of free days this week, so we spent
one day driving about 2 hours to a children's
rescue center. Ghana Make A Difference was started
by a couple from Boise who recognized the need for
this kind of facility and took action to make it happen.

They work through the government social services
to identify at risk children; abused, abandoned,
homeless or victims of human trafficking. There
are a lot of children unknowingly sold into slave labor
by families unable to care for them. They are promised
a good life for the child and then the child disappears
into slave labor. 

Stacy Hoffman or her husband are here every
other month. The man with her is the manager,
Richard, and he's a gem.

The facility is on 5 acres donated by the government.
They have an option on 5 acres more.

The library.  The children attend a government
school about 150 yards away.

This is Kofi. He was found on the streets
and brought to the shelter. The only
English he knows is, "Give me money
for food." He's had a lot of freedom and
so he is a constant runaway risk. He's
becoming better as he understands he
will be fed. His right leg is shorter that the left from an injury suffered from being dragged under a car.  He's a candidate for
surgery from an orthopedic group that will be here next month.

The boys bedroom.

Each child has a cubby hole for their personal
things. Note the scriptures. They take them to a
local LDS Branch. When they are reunited with
their family, that's the thing they miss most - the
Church.

The kitchen stove - outside the kitchen.  It's too hot to cook inside the kitchen.

Preparing lunch. This is a corn meal
kind of like polenta.

On the grounds is a building built by a group out of Provo, for
handicapped children.

Two girls in the home.

They are trying to improve their self sufficiency.

These are okra plants.

Very, very, very hot peppers.

A young man came to Ghana and planted fruit
trees for his Eagle project.  They have papaya
guava, mango, coconut and more I can't name.

They have over 1000 chickens that they raise for eggs.
This is another step to self sufficiency. They hired
Liberian refugees as labor for the chickens and as nannies
with the children.

The foreman for the chickens, on the right, is
Liberian.  President Hill, the previous Accra
West Mission President is at BYU and arranged
for a class in poultry care to be taught in Accra.
The foreman was able to attend and as we asked
questions, it's obvious he knows exactly what's
going on, down to the exact number of chickens.
We asked, "how do you know how many chickens
you have?"  He said, "We count them."

Part of today's egg harvest.

 

As we drove back to Accra, I'm continually amazed
at the variety of things carried on hawkers heads.

More.

We stopped at Florence's baskets and this little
goat, about the size of a large cat walked by.

We stopped at Labadi Beach club for lunch and
some pool time. Actually a little nap time.

For two nights the only missionaries in the MTC
were our 6 English speaking missionaries, learning
French. Three of them are Americans, so the
Brubakers took them to KFC.  They loved it. The
two elders closest to the camera had to have their rice.
The other person is Brother Taki, the teacher.  This
was his second time to KFC. Paula asked Sister Quaye
if she liked KFC.  She told Paula yes.  Paula asked her
if she had been to KFC before. She said, "No. We never go out
to eat."

Paula imitating the missionaries getting
shots.

Taking this picture today about killed me.  The sun was so hot and so bright that we could barely keep our eyes open.  The hot weather is definitely back.