Nowhere to go

Well, it finally happened. The lockdown for all missionaries here in Ghana started right after our twenty-minute sacrament meeting on Sunday. We hope to not be here much longer, but who knows. After the election results are announced, the area office will monitor for disturbances and then let us know. I found I could get my morning walk by going around and around the house, but that got boring in a hurry. (At least we can go outside. The sister missionaries have no wall, so they have to stay indoors.)
Elder Max always finds plenty to do in the yard. Here he is trying to decide if his cucumbers are going to live or die. My vote is they will likely die just as everything else does that we try to grow here.
We took these photos to prove we did as the mission president advised which was go home and read the Book of Mormon.
I think this picture was posed. I should have gotten the one of the nap. :-) We rested yesterday and have gotten a lot done today. We cleaned out and sprayed our cupboards for bugs. I took the scissors to my hair. (Never lock me up in a house with a pair of scissors. Now my hair is too short to pull back. But I do have bangs. I said I would get bangs for Christmas and they came early. I'll probably be sorry I cut them, but then, it's just hair.)
This is our cute little toad friend. He is the closest thing Elder Max has to a pet here. He chases him out of the garage so the car can get locked up every night. I've almost stepped on him a few times when I've walked outside at night. He sits under our security lights and waits for the bugs to fall to the ground. We think he is cute. Hope he is not poisonous.
Lots of coconuts from our trees. They are starting to turn brown, which is the way I like them. We should have enough to last for the rest of our mission.
We've gone back to a bit of a rainy spell. We're enjoying the cooler weather but have had some pretty wild storms. Three of our big plantain trees blew over the other day. One was just loaded with fruit.
We'll leave it to see if they will mature, but it is doubtful. As I've said before, if we had to be farmers and live on what we raised here we would starve. Thank goodness for ShopRite.
The people here always amaze me at the ideas they come up with to get by. I've seen a number of these plastic chairs on the back of bikes. It makes riding double a lot more comfortable.
We drove up to Nkawkaw the other day for a baptismal interview. We got there a little early so we drove the very narrow, twisty road up the mountain. The view of the valley was great.
This is a photo of the same mountain from the bottom. It was taken in front of the Rojo Hotel where we met the Mattinsons for lunch
They are the brave couple who keep finding snakes at their house. And to think they noted on their mission papers that they would really like to serve on the coast of Oregon. I'm sure they are glad they are here having all these adventures and are not being bored watching the waves in Oregon. They are a great couple and good friends. (And the baptismal candidate didn't ever show up so we were glad we at least had lunch after the long drive.)

Much to be thankful for this year

I happened to snap these two photos of the big bats in Accra. It was early in the morning and they were making their way back to the trees to roost. (I guess bats roost. Anyway, they were coming back to their trees.)
The sky was just full of them. As soon as they would reach the tree they would just collapse their wings and hang. I wish we had a video camera to film them.
As I said last week some of the trees in our area have dropped their leaves for the dry season. The trees have come out in flowers which are quite stunning on the hillsides. It reminds me of fall at home.
We took a different road to Asamankese last week and passed by this true African village. I loved this little house with the painted white shutters. It reminds me of the picture on the cover of one of the Lady Detective series books.
Just another shot of the same little village. There are not a lot of grass roofs anymore in Ghana. Most people have upgraded to tin.
Happy birthday to you....... How old are you now? How old are you now? ....... I'll be up there next zone conference and I need to think of a clever way to say how old I am. Kind suggestions are welcome.
Sister Mauigoa who will be going home to Samoa next week.
Elder Musiiamamii will be going home to Uganda. And I just finally got so I could spell his name. He told me his tie is made in the colors of his country's flag.
Elder Hansen from Sandy. We don't like him better, he just had a camera also and wanted a photo together. He has served with us two separate times.
On Monday we invited all the elders and sisters from our zone to our home for Thanksgiving dinner. It was traditional Ghanaian food since that is the best way to go here.
They enjoyed the food and also just getting together to hang out and visit.
The sisters shared the living room with us. We need another table to actually seat everyone, but we get by.
Then on Thursday we cooked some American food for the two of us. It looks pretty normal except for my piece of plantain. Notice I had to quickly eat the jello because it melted as soon as it hit my plate.
Before you imagine this is a huge turkey in my big oven just realize it is a very small chicken in my very small oven. Notice I have a piece of a shipping crate on the bottom since the oven had nothing to keep the flame from burning everything. Then we added another piece of metal on top of that. It works fairly well now. (I'll be glad to have an electric oven at home.)
We had pumpkin pie with whipped cream. Our cream comes from France and I have to say they make thicker, better cream than we get in America. It almost doesn't need to be whipped.
No Thanksgiving dinner is complete with the yams. Well these are cocoa yams my companion dug up in our back yard. They are eaten here, but I think they must know something about cooking them that we don't know. I had a choice of things to eat that day and I chose not to try these. Elder Max said they taste like a dry potato. Too bad they don't look like one.
The Adweso Branch had their first baptism at the Koforidua Chapel. Left to right: Young women leader, Branch President Boateng, Sister Boateng, Elder Musimmamaii, the Relief Society President and her son.
On Saturday we were invited to a memorial service for the first branch president in Koforidua. He died fifteen years ago. Max spoke at the graveside and then the family and friends put these wreaths on the grave. After they finished they started to pull them all apart.
We couldn't figure out what they were doing. I supposed this was part of a ritual or tradition.
When we asked we found out they do that because if they leave them someone will just come, take the wreaths away and sell them on the street.
So they ripped them apart and then carefully put them back on the tomb. This was a peaceful resting place for the first branch president who was also a patriarch in the Tema stake.
We went back to the house for refreshments. We had a nice visit with some of the original members in Koforidua. Here are Joseph Quarshie and Brother Adu.
These are the women dressed in their funeral clothing. Sister Boateng who is the widow is second from the left. Her daughter is standing behind the little girl. The others are close friends in the branch. It was a very nice day.

We are Thankful

Even though this is a dry time of year in Ghana, we see many interesting things. The flowers are blooming in full force. A number of trees have lost their leaves and have come out in colorful flowers. (This is a huge bougainvillea vine at a neighbor's house.) It is interesting to me in America we get the flowers before the leaves. Here they get the flowers after the leaves fall off.
I've heard people call these eggplant. I knew they didn't look like the eggplant in America. But you have to admit they look much more like an egg than ours.
They are actually called garden eggs and grow on bushes much like tomatoes. I haven't eaten one so I don't know if the taste is the same.
We were talking to someone the other day about cocoa. He told us one tree produces about 200 cocoa pods. We couldn't imagine that until we stopped at this more productive orchard and took a closer look.
The pods grow on all the large stems all the way to the top of the tree. After harvesting, the pods are opened. The sticky "seeds" inside are wrapped in bamboo matting and fermented. Then the very smelly seeds are opened back up and dried. I don't know what happens after that because they are sold and shipped somewhere else. This is cocoa harvesting season right now.
It is also dry, dusty driving season.
The new road being built by our house is getting some median curbing. The blocks were all poured by hand, brought by trucks and laid out in rows. Then a cement strip was poured to hold them in place. We don't know if the middle will be filled with dirt or cement or blocks. Hopefully they hurry before the taxi drivers start to plow through the middle of it.
The dust makes driving difficult. Sometimes we can't see if anyone is coming toward us. And they drive on both sides of the road here, so anything goes.
The beautiful bush also gets very dusty and dirty next to the roads.
A good rainstorm is needed to make it all green again.
We traveled on this dirt road to Asonafo the other day. It has been repaired since the last time we were here when we almost slipped off into the ditch.
We did see a large dump truck who did that very thing. We wondered how that could happen when the road was dry. Then someone told us the truck's engine had a problem so the owner was towing it to Nkawkaw with a very long rope. I guess he learned it is best not to tow with a long rope. He was working hard to get his truck back on the road.
Each time we pass this mountain we continue to be amazed at how these people are slowing removing all the granite. There are still hundreds of people working here to make gravel out of solid granite.
We are happy they have found a way to make some money. The new road will require a lot of gravel, so there is a ready market.
The BATS are back in the trees by the 37th Street hospital in Accra.
They left during the rainy season but are hanging in the trees by the hundreds.
They are huge. I keep thinking they are about the size of a seagull when they fly, but maybe not quite that big. I wouldn't want one to forget to hold onto the branch and fall on my head as I walked by.
Elder Max presented to the Ghana Minerals Commission this week in Accra. I expected it to be about five people in someone's office. I wasn't quite prepared for the size of the group. His message was very well received. One of the commission ladies, the one you see just three people to the right of Elder Max, told me his was the best presentation she had ever heard. They have a lot of work to do to get serious about salt production. He certainly gave them a lot of ideas of where they need to start.
The dear little lady in the purple is my friend from Suhum. She is the one I taught to hold a pencil in Literacy lessons. I wanted her photo before I go home. She lives in a tiny village on our way to Suhum. I just surprised her the other day and said I wanted to take her photo in front of her house. It is such a unique little square house. She wanted to go get all dressed up but I told her she looked beautiful just as she was.
She insisted she had to go put on her flip flops and her bracelets. Then she posed for the photo. The other lady insisted she was her sister and HAD to be in the photo also. I'm hoping Brad can get on Photo Shop when I get home and wipe her out. :-)