My first stop on the African tour was Cote d’Ivoire. I traveled by planes, buses and canoes until I reached my ministry home.
Greeted by my loving host family, I quickly became acquainted with pulling water from the well, bucket showers, eating whole fish and half my weight in rice. I learned the “African” way of doing laundry and adjusted to this life quickly. I couldn’t leave without getting a dress made, and so I became the “African woman” in my hosts eyes. Our adventure days consisted of getting off the island, and finding the ocean, really in search of a change of scenery since we couldn’t leave the compound.
Month 5: Ghana, debrief and team changes!
We partnered with a local church this month and evangelized throughout the villages.
My favorite family from this month was Maggie, Elizabeth and Jr. Maggie is mentally unstable to take care of her children, so her husband dropped them off with her mom and is no where to be found. The grandmother does not have the means to take care of both her daughter and the children and is doing everything she can to keep them out of the orphanage.
I met a seamstress and her daughter, well called her Mama Ghana. She and her daughter made several outfits for the girls on my squad.
I tried making foo foo, a local favorite, but honestly it is NOT worth the work! Whew!!
I usually had one or more children in my arms most of the month.
Adventure days were few to be had in Africa, although the last day of the month we journeyed to a monkey sanctuary, a waterfall and a monastery.
Month five overflowed into month six as Burkina Faso was not safe enough for us to be, so we ended up staying in Ghana for two months! We spent the last two weeks in ATL (ask the Lord), so we left Sunyani and headed north. Ask the Lord means, no host, no ministry, no food, just the name of a city the Lord gave us. Here we prayed for patients in the hospital, met a Muslim man and baptized him into Christianity! (See attached video)
Oh, and I was cured from lactose! So I immediately chowed down on some ice cream!
Pictures are worth 1000 words so enjoy a glimpse of when I was in Africa.
