January 2 - January 22, 2017

It is mango season and we are buying some every week at a low price.  This one is ripening on a tree at the elders apartment in Dodowa.

 

Both of the missionaries at Dodowa have had malaria and part of the problem is that mosquitoes are getting in through the bedroom window that has inadequate screens.  Fred is putting screening across the entire window to keep them out using the new ladder that we bought.

There are are a number of missionaries from Tonga, Samoa and Fiji who like to cook a pig in an earthen

pit.  They collected sufficient money from the missionaries who wanted to be involved in a pork feed and cooked two small pigs.    The pork was tasty but quite tough!

We decided to add to the event by having a member bake a cake - which tasted like one of the ingredients was 1/2 cup of diesel fuel.

Elder and Sister Clark have been serving as audit missionaries but are going home early because he has been called to serve as a mission president for 3 years in Liberia!  No one was volunteering to take their place.

  

We often stop at the church building in Ashaiman to eat lunch because it has a convenient location and is a quiet setting in a busy town.

    

The sisters missionaries in Madina had bunk beds without ladders and were having difficulty  getting to the top bunk.  We went to a furniture store along the roadside and bought two ladders that fit perfectly.

Looks like the sisters were celebrating by making some good food.

 

 

This minivan seems to be overloaded with a suspension problem. 

We took a picture of the white van because it had a Canadian flag decal in the back window.  We later pulled up alongside and told him that we liked the decal and that we are from Canada.

 

 We attended church at the Cantonments ward and found that there were a lot of investigators in the missionary class.

 The chapel for this ward is located on the Accra Temple site.

 Ten new missionaries arrived from various parts of Africa and were assigned to their training companions on January 17.

  

Meg bought two new purses and also is getting four dresses made of some colourful material.

 

We treated Elder James to some chicken and rice while his companion was in the hospital getting a plate put in his broken wrist.  We had to go to a medical supply outlet and buy the plate along with the screws.  I hope we bought the ones that do not rust!

  

Elder Pace and I are waiting for church to start.

We have to wash all of our fresh food in bleach water to kill any germs. 

 

    On  my 64th birthday we went to a very nice restaurant and had a delicious bowl of butternut squash soup as part of the meal.

  

The Findlays live in Kelowna and are visiting Accra as part of their assignment in providing wheelchairs.  They joined the Paces and had lunch with us after church.

December 26-January 1, 2017

We attended the missionary district meeting in Nungua and had some 'fan ice" during the break,

which is like frozen vanilla ice cream - actually quite good for the low cost of 30 cents.

One of the missionaries from Liberia was looking down at the chain of his bicycle which was giving him problems when he hit a hole in the road and fell off the bike  breaking his wrist.  We spent 9 hours in the hospital to get a cast put on the wrist and making arrangements for surgery the following week.  

  

We knew we were in for a long wait when we saw the crowded waiting room.

This goat liked the view from this parked car.  There are always goats on the side of the streets.  We were asked if we had goats back home on the streets and when we said "no" we got a response of "why not"?

 New Year's Eve was spent at the Noble House restaurant with about 40 other senior missionaries.  

We shared East Indian and Chinese dishes which were very good - the best Chinese dishes we have ever had!  Happy New Year everyone!

November 7 to December 25

We scheduled a flight to Scotland for November 8 to be with Meg's mother, since we heard that she was not doing well.  After spending Monday delivering some bikes we packed up and took off Tuesday evening at 11:30 pm.  We arrived at the nursing home at 4:00 pm the following day and Meg stayed with her mother till her passing at 6:30 in the morning.  Meg's sister and brother-in-law arrived a couple of days later and preparations were made for the funeral.

We did some travelling around seeing some of the nearby sites such as Caelaverock castle where 60 Scots were besieged by 3000 English soldiers in the 1300's.

Meg's hometown, Dumfries, provides many opportunities for good photos.  I just wish I had a better camera.  The river Nith runs through the town and often floods the street where I am standing. 

The building with the turquoise domes is the town hall.

  

Sweetheart Abbey is a ruin just outside of Dumfries with an interesting history.  The builder of this ancient structure also founded one of the colleges that is part of Oxford university (Balliol College).

We visited the coastal town of Portpatrick that has a lighthouse and a good cafeteria.

Portpatrick is in Wigtownshire.

In the nearby hills in Dumfriesshire there is a Tibetan Buddhist temple.

  Also close by is the town of Lockerbie where the 1988 air tragedy occurred when the Pan Am 747 fell on the town, after been blown up by terrorists.

We went to the Craven Arm's for dinner and were about to order when four of our children (Fergus, Nicole, Ramsey and Vanessa) plus our son-in-law Marty ran into the restaurant shouting "SURPRISE!"  They had gotten together and planned a joint trip to be with their mother at this time.  So very nice of them.  Our other son, Gareth, flew in a couple of days later to complete the reunion.  

They arranged through Air B&B to rent this cottage in the countryside with enough room for all of us to stay together.   

 It was located right next to a wee burn.

 

We saw some more castles, had dinners together and attended Meg's mother's funeral as a family.

c

Vanessa brought me my favourite snack food from Canada - Hawkin's Cheezies that will be made to last throughout the next year. 

 The meal below was ordered by their cousin and was haggis and steak - good way to ruin a good steak.

Some nice countryside views including the Wickerman, which has been the site for folk festivals. 

 We spent the last day together touring downtown Edinburgh.  We had a treasured time together with our family.

 

 

Back in Accra in time to see the mission take ownership of a new transport van.

We helped some missionaries move from the worst apartment in the mission to the best new apartment. 

On December 7, Ghana held an election that resulted in the ruling party being replaced by the opposition party and so far things have been peaceful even with some lively rallies on the streets.

Once again, some missionaries left for home as well as some new ones arrived with fears and a few tears of what would be in store for them for the next two years - a lot of new experiences.

What a coincidence!  Meg met two other senior missionaries here in Ghana that also served in the same mission she did and at the same time over 40 years ago!

We also greeted Elder and Sister Haglund who will serve as member support missionaries in the town of Koforidua which is about 60 miles north of Accra.  They previously served in Armenia so they know how to operate in a foreign country on their own.

|Oh mercy, we see some strange sites but one that stands out is seeing a goat tied to the top of a van going 100 km/hr down the highway!

 

We attended the Ashaiman zone meeting and bought coconuts for all the missionaries afterwards. 

We bought 33 coconuts for a cost of $22.  The vendor cuts off the top of the coconut to enable you to drink the milk which is very refreshing.  

He will then split it open so you can eat the coconut meat with is about 1/8-1/4" thick.

A couple times a week we take Fred Aboagye with us to help with apartment repairs.  He visited the mission home Christmas open house with his family.

A choir from, Tema, a nearby town came to the open house with Santa hats to sing to the mission president and his wife.

The senior missionaries gathered the Monday before Christmas to have dinner and a gift exchange that provided a lot of good laughs.

We also had two multi-zone meetings last week with a meal of Ghanaian food for the  missionaries and some entertainment 

including some of the missionaries from the south seas islands doing the haka.

Christmas eve was made special by joining the other senior missionaries at the temple apartment poolside for a great meal 

which included salmon from Norway and BBQ chicken.

At another mission open house Gilbert Oppong and his family visited.  Gilbert is the facility manager whom we work with to get the apartments repaired.

Meg found some new friends during the week.

We went to a pharmacy located in the Movenpick hotel to get some medicine and saw this nicely decorated tree.

Gilbert's cute daughters.