July 3 to September 5, 2016

On July 3,2016 we left our home in Kelowna, British Columbia to serve an 18 month mission in Accra, Ghana.  Meg is going to serve as a mission nurse and I will help with coordinating apartment repairs for the missionaries.  The picture below is the view from our backyard in Kelowna which we will really miss.   After being in Ghana for over a month we can also state that another thing that is truly missed is COSTCO!

After visiting family for a week we entered the mission training centre in Provo Utah for a week of missionary training.

This is the group of Senior Missionaries we trained with.  They all had different assignments around the world.  We became instant friends!  The young people were our teachers and they were really good!

The day after arriving in Accra we attended a huge missionary multi zone conference with about 80 missionaries.  It was great meeting so many wonderful young men and women so willing to serve away from their homes for 2 years.

As a remembrance of their time served the departing missionaries are given a scarf with their name, years served and mission name woven in the fabric.

The picture above is the person that weaves these scarfs in a place called Ho.

The departing missionaries are also taken to a nice place to eat such as "The Lord of the Wings".  One of our favourite places to eat in Accra.

This is the back up nurse Adwoa Ennin and her daughter.  We met her in the Accra mall and bought her a pizza.  She did not eat it but saved it to take home to her family.

 

We used a 2013 Nissan Navara to navigate the off road conditions encountered throughout the city.

Or to make your way through heavy traffic like we encountered at the Medina market on a Saturday.

Bubba, our security guard, lives in the hut and opens and closes the gate for us.  You would not want to mess with him.

Less than 40% of Ghanaians have full time employment and there is no government safety net.  The rest have to hustle to get by.  People are trying to sell things at traffic lights and by the roadside such as these bed frames. 

There is a new big mosque being constructed (with money from Turkey) close to where we live.

Dramane, Miriam and Junior travelled from Bamako, Mali to Accra to be taught by the missionaries and to be baptised members of the church.  Dramane had previously lived in Utah for 10 months and became acquainted with the church,

We went out to eat at "Burgers and Relish" where this missionary demonstrated his ability to devour a monster hamburger.

Junior had never seen the ocean or been on a horse so we took an afternoon off and went to the beach. I was beset with hawkers trying to sell everything imaginable including a head massage.  I will never go back there.

Dramane's friend also travelled to Accra to become a member.  I like this picture showing Dramane and Francois at the baptismal font.

The driving conditions can be hard on vehicles as we found out when we went through the very crowded Ashaiman market and got squished between a truck and a deep gutter.

We went to a district conference in Ho where we tried some banku which is a doughball dipped in a broth.  Meg says she liked it but I will not eat it again.

We enjoyed the district conference that was well attended.  Over 100 people were crowded into this 55 passenger bus.