Before departure.

Over 11 million square miles: That’s roughly how much land constitutes Africa, a continent with more than 50 sovereign states, trod by 1.1 billion people who speak thousands of languages. A continent so varied, and with such a deep and complex history, it’s the source of some of the earliest advances in mathematics, urban planning, engineering and surgery.

With that statement our African adventure in Ghana begins.  Ghana is located just north of the equator in West Africa. It has a population of 27 million people (Utah has a population of around 3 million people) and an area of around 92,000 square miles (Utah is around 85,000 square miles).  There are 62,000 members of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, four missions, 207 congregations, one temple and one Missionary Training Center (MTC).  The MTC will be our home for the next year, beginning with our arrival in Accra on January 20th.

As we corresponded with President Robison, we discovered that many of the African missionaries arrive at the MTC with very little in the way of material possessions.  We were able to collect clothing for these missionaries from our ward and our daughter Heather's North Carolina ward.  We delivered these boxes to President and Sister Brubaker's home in Midway for shipment to Ghana. President Brubaker is the new President of the Ghana MTC, replacing President Robison in January. You may recognize that name as President Brubaker was our Mission President in the Belgium Netherlands Mission.  They invited us to go with them and we're excited to serve again.